The attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore deepened a sense of crisis surrounding Pakistan’s civilian government as it confronts political turmoil less than a year after it took office, analysts said.
“They (militants) are trying to create a vacuum of power in which eventually they can take over,” said Ahmed Rashid, a respected analyst and author of “Descent into Chaos”, chronicling the nuclear-armed Pakistan’s mounting insecurity.
Around a dozen assailants attacked the Sri Lankan players bus and a police escort with AK-47 assault rifles, rockets and hand grenades as they were driving to a stadium in the eastern city of Lahore for the third day of a match. Six Sri Lankan players and two officials were wounded while eight Pakistanis, including six policemen, were killed.
Officials said the attack bore similarities to the assault by Pakistani-based militants on the Indian city of Mumbai that killed at least 170 people in November.
Pakistan has detained some members of the Lashkar-e-Taiba, a militant group that has had friendly ties with Pakistani security agencies in the past, over the Mumbai attack. India and the United States have been watching to see how strongly the government acts against the extremists and attack in Lahore could reinforce those compulsions.
“This embarrasses the Pakistani government enormously,” said M.J. Gohel, executive director, of the UK-based Asia-Pacific Foundation think-tank. It also further chills Pakistan’s investment risk outlook at a time when the government is trying to raise more money abroad, having staved off virtual bankruptcy with an emergency loan from the International Monetary Fund last November.
The stock market slumped due to a political crisis that blew up last week, because of President Asif Ali Zardari’s decision to dismiss the Punjab provincial government led by the party of his main rival, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Sharif has urged street agitation against the government after the Supreme Court last week barred him and his brother for standing for elected office.
“Obviously the country is in a very, very serious danger and instead of concentrating on the war against the extremists, the government is fighting other political parties...This is a time they should reconcile with Nawaz Sharif,” Rashid said. While Westerners have long feared becoming targets, analysts could divine no other reason for the attack on the Sri Lankans other than to give a message that nobody was safe. “Obviously the idea was that the message be sent to the rest of the world that Pakistan is not a safe place to go to. I think that way they have succeeded,” security analyst Ikram Sehgal said. Some Pakistanis are getting that message as well.
“I never wanted to leave my country, but these attacks have proved no one is safe. If I had the option, I would leave,” said Amina Ansari, a 26-year-old working in a multinational bank in the southern city of Karachi.
Most analysts won’t look far beyond Pakistan’s militant groups for likely suspects, though Pakistani hawks and nationalists are predisposed to blame India. During the past two years, militants, angered by their government’s alliance with the United States, have launched a wave of suicide attacks and bomb blasts. The brazenness of the attack in Lahore, Pakistan’s cultural capital and political nerve center, was similar to the Mumbai attacks, though the gunbattle lasted only 30 minutes instead of three days and unlike Mumbai the attackers all got away.
As was the case in the aftermath of the attacks on Mumbai, eyes will be on Pakistan to see if Islamabad mounts a serious crackdown on militant groups or whether relations with India will be further destabilized.
