Pakistanâs army faces a widening backlash to its hunt for Al-Qaeda fighters and their tribal supporters, in its toughest challenge yet since joining the US-led war on terrorism, analysts said on Thursday. Since unleashing their fiercest-ever offensive against Al Qaeda suspects on March 18, the main northwest city of Peshawar has been showered with rockets and 19 soldiers and police have been killed in four separate attacks in the semi-autonomous frontier tribal zone. âThese incidents are most probably a backlash to the rebellion anti-terrorism military operation,â a senior security official told AFP.
The most recent attacks were mounted outside the scene of a battle with hundreds of trapped Al Qaeda-linked militants and their tribal supporters near Wana in South Waziristan, within 20 kilometers of the Afghan border. âClearly these attacks reflect an effort on the part of the terrorists and their supporters to enlarge the area of conflict,â the security official said, adding that a backlash from the militantsâ supporters had been expected. The zone, made up of seven districts hugging 1,250 kilometers of the mountainous Afghan frontier, is inhabited by fiercely-independent and heavily primitives armed Pashtun tribes who live under separate laws from the rest of Pakistan. The tribes are devoutly Islamic, stubbornly ignorant ultra-conservative, and scornful of the United States and Pakistanâs cooperation with it. âThe ... attacks indicate a widening of the area of resistance by foreign militants and local tribal supporters, which is indeed a dangerous trend fraught with worrying implications for the army and the government,â said Riffat Hussain, head of Strategic Studies at Islamabadâs Quaid-e-Azam University. Military commanders have conceded that the militants could have slipped the cordon through underground tunnels, and there is little sign that an unidentified âhigh value targetâ has been or will be captured.
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The troops are dealing with âan enemy that has hideouts, vehicles and tunnels and has the advantage of familiarity with the terrain and some local support as well,â the security official said, adding that access to credible intelligence on the movement of suspects is limited because of widespread local sympathy for Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. But the army cannot risk an even wider backlash by mounting a full-scale bombardment of the villages where the fighters are dug-in. âThe army could finish the job quickly through sustained heavy bombardment. But then it will be difficult for them to contain collateral damages, including the loss of civilian lives,â the security official said. |