While watching the shocking footage of the murderer of the British soldier in Woolwich recently, my eight-year-old daughter was surprised that Pakistan was not linked with the breaking news on TV.
For her, and it is sadly true to an extent, there is often a Pakistani connection in terrorist activities. Either it is accused of training terrorists on its soil or there are allegations of someone having had their warfare skills sharpened there and sometimes there is also news of illegal financial transactions being carried out to facilitate terrorism.
But my daughter did not have to wait long. On Friday evening RAF Typhoon jets scrambled to escort a Pakistan International Airlines flight bound from Manchester to London because of a family quarrel which had arrived to the point where one excited passenger threatened to blow up the plane in mid-air.
The PIA crew took the threat at face value and the pilot immediately alerted the UK authorities of imminent danger to the 300 passengers on board.
My question is if the RAF can respond at the touch of a plane’s emergency button, how come we have been unable to fight the menace at our door for the past several decades?
In fact, we continue to talk of peace deals with the Taleban despite having lost 50,000 Pakistani civilians and military personnel. The governments in the center and in the three provinces have pledged to strike a peace deal with the Taleban from June onward. But what have they got in return so far? The Taleban are playing hard to get, thus ensuring that they have the upper hand at the negotiating table. The right-wing governments need to understand that appeasing the Taleban will only help them in expanding their area of influence.
History is witness to a string of peace deals with the Taleban which have ended in futility. The 2008 peace deal forced the handover of Swat to the Taleban and all know what happened there. The fact is that Pakistan has only two options: Either accept what the Taleban are demanding, or fight them and their hate-philosophy until it is eradicated. The choice is ours. — Masood Khan, Jubail
Pakistan and terrorism
