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Cross Border Militant Assails in Upper Dir:
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Visits
397
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Visits
397
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Visits
397
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June 29, 2012
The recent cross border militant assails in Upper Dir district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) was third such attack in last ten days and overall 10th attack since September last year, when first such attack was reported from Afghanistan into Pakistan. Cross-border militancy has remained a constant source of friction between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Both blame each other for providing sanctuaries to terrorist outfits on each other’s soil.
Until this month the administration of the Afghan President Hamid Karzai was in denial about TTP’s bases in Afghanistan. While the previous assertion of the Pakistani Taliban’s presence on Afghan soil could be disputed as a mere speculation or rumours for propaganda purpose to deflect pressure from its own refusal to go after the sanctuaries of the Haqqni Network, however, the confession by the outlawed Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), a conglomerate of anti-Pakistan militant outfits based in the Pakistani tribal areas, has closed all doors and windows of speculations and propaganda warfare. The TTP itself has admitted for using the Afghan soil as a springboard for launching attacks on the Pakistani security forces
The Malakand chapter of TTP has claimed responsibility for the ambush. The group’s spokesperson Sirajuddin said, “Our fighters mounted the attack as the Pakistani security forces reached the SunaiKandau area in Barawal sub-district of Upper Dir.” According to Sirajuddin, “MaulanaFazlullah is leading TTP attacks from Afghanistan’s border provinces and is in touch with fighters in Malakand division.” He maintained, “We regularly move across the porous border and claimed that Fazlullah was commanding over a thousand diehard fighters.”
The recent raid will further strain the already stressed relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan as well as between the US and Pakistan. While the US and Afghanistan are mounting pressure on Pakistan to go after the safe havens of the Haqqani Network in its tribal territory, Pakistan is likely to up the ante after this cross-border militant assail, pressing the NATO/ISAF forces to destroy the sanctuaries of the Pakistani militant groups on Afghan soil.
Cross-border militancy is a constant reminder to core stakeholders of the Afghan conflict and its extension into the tribal areas of Pakistan that underlying factors of the overall conflict are the same and a lasting peace and stability will only come if better coordinated and joint approaches are implied. Without improving border coordination mechanisms and sprucing up joint counter-terror mechanism, under the US-Pak-Afghan tripartite commission, peace in the A-Pak region will remain an elusive dream.
These attacks reinforce the fact that it is inescapable and counterproductive to disassociate the problems of Pakistan and Afghanistan and their potential from each other. The blame game between Afghanistan and Pakistan emboldens the militants who take full advantage of the ungoverned spaces in both countries. Instead of passing the buck it is high time that both countries should explore co-operative mechanisms with a view to pave way for a political settlement of the dispute.
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