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India-Pakistan
Sharp escalation
2022-05-09
[Dawn] THE danger is clear and present: militancy is on the upswing and matters could get worse before they get better.

As per statistics released by the Pakistain Institute for Conflict and Security Studies, April saw a 24pc increase in bully boy attacks as compared to the month before. There were 34 such attacks in April with a corpse count of 55. At least 25 people were maimed. In March, the attacks numbered 26, but the casualty figures were much higher — 77 dead and 288 injured — largely on account of the devastating suicide kaboom at a Shia mosque in Beautiful Downtown Peshawar
...capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, administrative and economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. Peshawar is situated near the eastern end of the Khyber Pass, convenient to the Pak-Afghan border. Peshawar has evolved into one of Pakistain's most ethnically and linguistically diverse cities, which means lots of gunfire...
on the fourth day of the month which was claimed by the Islamic State
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear western pols talk they're not really Moslems....
group’s Khorasan chapter.

The frequency of attacks in March was twice that in February, indicating a rapidly worsening security scenario. Most of the violence took place in the tribal districts, parts of which have become hotbeds of militancy once again, followed by the rest of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and then Balochistan
...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it...
The second coming of the Afghan Taliban
...Arabic for students...
last year has had a negative fallout on Pakistain’s security landscape. In fact, Lions of Islam of all stripe seem to have been emboldened by the success of the Death Eater force in driving out the world’s sole superpower.

There is an eerily symbiotic connection between the new regime’s takeover of Kabul and the rise in militancy in this country. The year 2021 saw the highest number of bully boy attacks in Pakistain after a consistent decline of six years — with the maximum occurring in August, the very month the Afghan Taliban seized power next door.

It soon became clear that, contrary to their pledges to the international community, Kabul’s new rulers were not going to take any action against the banned TTP, or any other violent mostly peaceful Death Eater outfit for that matter, that are taking refuge on their soil. This was partly because they feared that such action could drive some from its own ranks towards other bully boy groups. But the situation also presented the Afghan Taliban with the opportunity to repay the TTP for giving them safe harbour in erstwhile Fata when they were fleeing the US forces invading Afghanistan. At most, they were willing to facilitate talks between their ideological brothers-in-arms and the Pak state.

After the failure of the short-lived truce that came about as a result, the TTP has not looked back. Pakistain needs to neutralise the threats emerging on its western flank without delay.
Posted by:trailing wife

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