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By Dante “Klink” Ang 2nd, Executive
Editor
The average Pakistani on the street does not see
the Talibans as terrorists, much less a security threat, which seems
to perplex and frustrate the United States and other partners in the
global war on terror. The cozy Pakistani sentiment toward the
Taliban is even hinted at in official policy. The fairly new
government of Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani signed a peace
deal on May 21 with Taliban militants in Pakistan’s northwestern
valley, calling for, among other things, the withdrawal of Pakistani
troops from the tourist region of Swat and the imposition of sharia
or Islamic law there, according to a report by the Agence France-Presse.
In return the militants will close camps, hand
over foreign fighters and halt suicide attacks on government posts
and security forces. The United States is naturally unhappy, as it
wants Pakistan to do more and be tougher against all terrorist
forces, not just the Talibans but also al-Qaeda, whose leader, Osama
bin Laden, has been rumored to be hiding in Pakistan.
Most Pakistan officials, of course, argue their
country has done more than its share. More than 1,000 Pakistani
soldiers have died since the infamous attack on the World Trade
Center in New York City on 9/11, according to military sources.
Nearly 2,700 soldiers have been seriously wounded. And Pakistan has
the distinction of having the second-most number of suicide bomb
attacks next to Iraq, according to a report by Dawn, a media group
in Pakistan that owns television channels and a major,
English-language daily newspaper. Unlike in Iraq, though, there is
no war in Pakistan.
Indeed, Pakistanis are less tolerant of
terrorist groups today, especially since the assassination of former
Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto in December 2007. She was popular, and
her death seems to have triggered a public backlash against
fundamentalists.
With the indiscriminate killings and destruction
brought about by terrorism, why then do Pakistanis retain seemingly
friendly ties with the Talibans?
Neighbors and family
First of all, many of the Talibans—which means
“students of the Islamic knowledge movement”—joined Pakistani
and Arabs as mujahideens (holy warriors) who fought the Soviets and
ruled Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001. More than 40 percent of the
people in Afghanistan are ethnically Pashtun, much like those across
the border in Pakistan’s Northwest Frontier Province, one of that
country’s four provinces. The Pashtuns, which are nearly all Sunni
Muslims, are the world’s largest autonomous tribal society.
The al-Qaeda, in contrast, is a network of
terrorists made of people from different nationalities, mainly of
Arabs. Osama hails from Saudi Arabia. In essence, Pakistanis see al-Qaeda
members as foreigners.
The Afghan Pashtuns, which including the Taliban,
have been trading and interacting with the Pakistanis along their
2,560-kilometer border for many generations. And for some 35 years
now, Pakistan has been hosting Afghan refugees, who fled or sought
sanctuary in that US-backed Islamic republic during the Soviet
occupation of Afghanistan from 1979 to 1989. At the height of the
war against the Soviet Union, about four million Afghan refugees
fled to Pakistan.
Many of Afghans never left. Some have
intermarried with Pakistanis. Today, some 2.6 million refugees
remain in Pakistan, which continues to host the third generation of
those mixed families.
Most of the refugees live in some 30 camps on
the Pakistan side of the porous border with Afghanistan. The
Pakistan military concedes it is difficult to control their
movements, and the camps are difficult to close, mainly because the
Afghan government is unwilling to take the refugees back. They
refuse to go back to Afghanistan, anyway.
Foreign policy
Pakistanis’ tolerance of Talibans also makes
sense from the standpoint of foreign policy and military strategy.
To put it in perspective, a brief look at history is necessary.
Pakistan and India were once a united country under British rulers,
who actually preferred to keep the colony intact when they leave.
But the 32.5 million Muslims there at the time yearned for a country
of their own and didn’t want to be minorities in a newly
independent state that was predominantly Hindu.
Before the British granted independence to both
nations on August 14, 1947, there was a mass migration of Muslims to
what became Pakistan and of Hindus to India. The “partition” was
marred by violence, as traveling Muslims were held up and
slaughtered by Hindu and Sikh mobs. Hindus and Sikhs fleeing to
India suffered the same fate from Muslims.
With relations already strained between the two
newly created nations, it did not take much for war to erupt over
Kashmir, which was predominantly Muslim but its ruler, a Hindu,
preferred to be part of India. Pakistan and India fought wars over
the disputed territory in 1947, 1965, and recently during the term
of incumbent Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf. In other words,
Pakistan, from its inception, has to deal with the possibility of
war with India. Tensions between the two fester even today.
Pakistan, although smaller, is locked in an arms
race with India, matching its nuclear capability. Major General
Athar Abbas of Pakistan explains that military strategists gauge the
external threats based on the capability of their potential, not
their intentions, which can change over time. India poses a nuclear
threat to Pakistan that pales in comparison with the dangers posed
by suicide bombers and other terrorists.
Also, it makes no sense for Pakistan to engage
in a two-front war, with both India and the Taliban homeland.
Historically, Pakistan has been friendly with the government of the
day—whoever that may be—in Afghanistan. And from 1996 to 2001,
the Talibans ruled a vast majority of their country. Many of their
leaders were even schooled in Pakistan. Even with their fall from
power, they remain a force to reckon with in that country—just ask
the Americans and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization forces
fighting there.
Not all terrorists
As people say, one man’s terrorist is another
man’s freedom fighter. Even the American perception of the
Talibans has changed over time. Just a few decades ago, Talibans
were fighting for freedom from the communists Soviets and received
support from the United States. When the Soviet Union collapsed and
its forces withdrew from that central Asian country, the Talibans
did not seem as strategically important to the Americans. So, they
also faded away from that region.
What was left behind were battle-tested men and
plenty of guns. With no more jihad or holy war to fight, many of the
mujahideen went to work for warlords and terrorists. Some Pakistanis
believe that the US government only has itself to blame for the rise
of terrorist elements in Afghanistan.
Moreover, if the Americans can go from calling
the Talibans freedom fighters to terrorists in a relatively short
period of time, what might their neighbors, like Pakistan, call
them? Unlike the American, though, Pakistan cannot pack up and leave
the region. Like it or not, Pakistanis have to live next door to the
Talibans—and in some cases, welcome them as family.
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Editor’s note: The Islamabad Policy
Research Institute, a think tank funded by the Pakistan government,
recently invited Filipino journalists to their country. The Manila
Times was part of that media delegation.
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