Geopolitics

Is letting Pakistan collapse an option?
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By B Raman
Issue Net Edition | Date : 27 Dec , 2010

“The News”, a daily of Pakistan, has carried on December 24, 2010, an analysis by Amir Mir, the well-known Pakistani journalist, of acts of suicide terrorism in Pakistan during 2010.It covers data up to December 23.

According to this analysis, till December 23, there were 52 acts of suicide terrorism resulting in 1224 fatalities as against 80 acts in 2009 with 1217 fatalities. Though the number of suicide attacks came down from 80 in 2009 to 52, the lethality of the attacks increased with the largest number of fatalities in a year since the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), the anti-Shia Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LEJ) and their associates such as the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) and the Islamic Jihad Union (IJU), another Uzbek group, stepped up their acts of suicide terrorism after the Army raid in the Lal Masjid of Islamabade in July, 2007.

“¦till December 23, there were 52 acts of suicide terrorism resulting in 1224 fatalities as against 80 acts in 2009 with 1217 fatalities.

According to Amir Mir, the number of fatalities due to suicide terrorism rose from 837 in 2007 to 965 in 2008. It went up to 1217 in 2009 and 1224 till December 23,2010. During 2010, the largest number of attacks were in the Khyber Pakhtunkwa province (KP) with 25 attacks resulting in 416 fatalities. There were 12 suicide attacks in the Federally-Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) with 381 fatalities followed by Punjab with seven acts of suicide terrorism resulting in 312 fatalities. There were four incidents in Balochistan with 81 deaths, two in Sindh with 28 deaths and another two in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir (POK) with six deaths.

The Pashtun belt in KP and the FATA continued to be the worst affected. Thirty-seven of the 52 attacks were in the Pashtun belt with 797 deaths. There were 15 attacks in the non-Pashtun areas with 427 deaths. Muslims killing Muslims and Pashtuns killing Pashtuns has become the defining characteristic of the the Pashtun Taliban. As against this, the Punjabi Taliban has concentrated its attacks in Pakistani territory on non-Deobandi and non-Wahabi Muslims consisting of the Shias, the Barelvis and the Ahmadiyas. The expression Punjabi Taliban is applied in Pakistan to the LEJ, the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LET), the Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HUJI), the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HUM) and the Jaish-e-Mohammad (JEM). Of these, the LET, which is the closest to the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), did not indulge in any act of terrorism in Pakistani territory. Its main focus was on India and Afghanistan.

Also read: If Pakistan splinters…

Of the 1224 fatalities till December 23,2010, 1055 were civilians as against 863 out of 1217 in 2009 and 169 belonged to the security forces. Of those from the security forces killed,62 belonged to the police, 48 to the armed forces, 26 to the Frontier Constabulary, 24 to other para-military units and nine to the ISI. Of the civilians killed, 151 were Shias and 103 were Ahmediyas. Three American nationals were among those killed in 2010. On an average, suicide bombers killed 102 persons per month in 2010, compared with 2009’s average of 101 killings a month.

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The views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions or policies of the Indian Defence Review.

About the Author

B Raman

Former, Director, Institute for Topical Studies, Chennai & Additional Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat. He is the author of The Kaoboys of R&AW, A Terrorist State as a Frontline Ally,  INTELLIGENCE, PAST, PRESENT & FUTUREMumbai 26/11: A Day of Infamy and Terrorism: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow.

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