Taliban and Anti-Taliban [1 ed.] 1443829609, 9781443829601

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Taliban and Anti-Taliban

Taliban and Anti-Taliban

By

Farhat Taj

Taliban and Anti-Taliban, by Farhat Taj This book first published 2011 Cambridge Scholars Publishing 12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Copyright © 2011 by Farhat Taj All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-2960-9, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-2960-1

Dedicated to the People of FATA

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgments ...................................................................................... ix Preface ........................................................................................................ xi A Note on Methodology ........................................................................... xiii List of Abbreviations ................................................................................. xv Chapter One................................................................................................. 1 Deconstructing Some Myths about FATA Chapter Two .............................................................................................. 33 Lashkars and Anti-Taliban Lashkars in Pakhtun Culture Chapter Three ............................................................................................ 57 Deconstructing Some FATA “Expertise” Chapter Four .............................................................................................. 81 Waziristan: A “Tournament of Shadows” Chapter Five ............................................................................................ 121 Orakzai: Taliban Incursions and Tribal Resistance Chapter Six .............................................................................................. 151 The Tragedy at Darra Adam Khel Chapter Seven.......................................................................................... 167 Adeyzai Lashkar: The Emissaries of Peace Chapter Eight........................................................................................... 187 Terrorism in Pakistan and the Muslim Diaspora: A Case of the Norwegian Pakistanis

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Appendix ................................................................................................. 197 Full Text of Peshawar Declaration Glossary................................................................................................... 213 References ............................................................................................... 215

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I am thankful indeed to a host of people in Pakistan, Norway, the UK, and Sweden for their generous cooperation. It was their encouragement and support that steeled my resolve to finish this book against all odds. But I can acknowledge only a few since many of them, for security reasons, would prefer to remain anonymous. The residents of FATA, living in the combat zone, deserve my special gratitude. To mention their names is to risk their lives, however, I wish to categorically say that this book would not have been possible without their help. Some of the tribal elders and leaders of anti-Taliban lashkars interviewed for this book, have been targeted and killed even before the book went to press. Similarly, relatives of several informants, who granted interviews and took part in group discussions held for this book, have either been killed or injured in bomb blasts or in military operations by the Pakistani army. Most of these informants and their families have been subjected to barbaric atrocities committed by the Taliban as well as the Pakistani army. I am profoundly grateful for their invaluable information, thoughts and insights. May their departed souls rest in eternal peace! I am also thankful to my friends at the Amn Tehrik for holding a seminar on “Misconceptions about Pakhtun in the Western Scholarly Circles.” The sole purpose of this seminar was to facilitate this book. With participation from writers, poets, journalists, tribal leaders, political activists, and social workers from FATA and the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, this seminar provided useful insights in deconstructing several stereotypes about FATA’s tribal population. I am also indebted to my friend, Farooq Sulehria. His insightful comments on the initial draft helped determine the orientation of this book. Even more importantly, his encouragement throughout has kept me going. Similarly, Sangeen Khan not merely helped in editing a chapter, but his informed feedback was instrumental in deepening my research. A special note of thanks to him. Adrian Moylan, a British friend now living in Norway, edited two chapters as well as providing useful comments on the text he edited. His kind co-operation made my job easy in many ways. Vidya Krishnan and Amit Julka also deserve special mention for their help in editing some parts of this book.

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Acknowledgments

I am highly indebted to the members of the Totalitarian Network, University of Oslo, for the opportunity to present a chapter of the book at a public seminar in Oslo. This offered a chance for useful discussions with some senior researchers working on political Islam. I extend my gratitude to Professor Nina Walentyna Maria Witoszek, University of Oslo, Professor Øystein Sørensen, University of Oslo, and Karin Ask of Chris Michelsen Institute, CMI, Norway, for their cooperation and encouragement. Finally, let me confess that without the generous support lent by Fritt Ord Norway and the Norwegian Writers and Translators’ Association, Oslo, writing this book would have been nigh impossible. Bergen, Norway March 2011

PREFACE

There was a seminar titled “Pakistan: Challenges and Solutions”, at Stortinget, the Norwegian Parliament, in May 2009. One of the distinguished speakers, Ola Bøe-Hansen, Lieutenant Commander, Defence Staff College, Norway, informed the participants that the tribes in the Federally Administered Tribal Area, or FATA, in Pakistan have given refuge to AlQaida militants who frequently attack the NATO forces, including Norwegian soldiers, in Afghanistan. How did the Lieutenant Commander know that the tribes were sheltering Al-Qaida militants? Most probably, he never had an opportunity to interact with the tribal society. Most likely, his opinion had been shaped by the research and journalistic literature on FATA produced in the context of war on terror. A big chunk of such literature either reproduces colonial stereotypes of the region or affirms notions popularised by Pakistan’s all-powerful military establishment about the tribal people and their culture. All such literature, presenting FATA as the safe haven for Al-Qaida and the actual site of struggle in the war on terror, is dangerously misguiding. Not only is it misleading academics and activists, but it is also confusing people in power. The Norwegian general is but one such example. In the first place, FATA is not accessible for independent journalistic and scholarly inquiry owing to poor security. Only a handful of scholars and journalists have acknowledged this inadequacy of their works. They have duly and conscientiously cautioned their readers to draw any conclusions from their work in the light of this limitation. However, most of the researchers as well as journalists have developed a tendency to uncritically accept Pakistani media reports on FATA. Often such reports are planted by the Pakistani intelligence agencies in the country’s media through pro-establishment and pro-Taliban journalists. This practice is an anathema to research and journalistic ethics. Unfortunately, only a few seem to take note of the violation when reproducing the axiomatic constructs about FATA. The intent of this book is to caution against such literature and its uncritical acceptance. In a bid to offer a better understanding of the ground realities in FATA, in the context of the war on terror, this book voices the

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concerns, fears, and hopes of FATA tribes. It is the voice of these tribal people that is largely absent in the literature on FATA authored since 9/11. Concretely, this book has two objectives: first, to document the story of FATA as narrated by a wide range of FATA residents; and second, to document feedback by the tribal people on the literature written on them in the context of the war on terror. This book, let me forewarn, is highly critical of Pakistan’s military establishment, certain political parties, and some authors, both Pakistani and foreign. I hope the book will be understood and acknowledged as an effort in good faith to find modes and mechanism to beat terrorism in FATA, not merely in the rest of Pakistani people, but in the interest of the wider South Asian region and the world at large. I also hope that this endeavour will make researchers and journalists recognize FATA as a combat zone that deserves special ethical and methodological considerations so as to ensure security of the informants as well as obtain honest information from them for quality of knowledge about the area.

A NOTE ON METHODOLOGY

This research is of primary nature and draws on over 2000 face-to-face interviews, discussions and seminars with people across FATA and the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province. These interviews with people from various walks of life, were conducted over a period of more than two years. The informants include men and women, lettered and unlettered, rich and poor, Muslim and non-Muslim (in particular Sikh residents of FATA). The interviewees and discussants include tribal leaders and family members of the tribal leaders who were targeted and killed since 2003. They also include leaders and volunteers of anti-Taliban lashkars, people in the transport business and agriculture sector, retired and in-service FC soldiers, Khasadars and officials recently retired from the political administrations in FATA, daily wagers and jobless people, Internally Displaced People (IDPs) from FATA -displaced as a result of military operations in the area- and people hosting the IDPs in their houses on humanitarian grounds or tribal and kinship basis. I have also interviewed teachers and students, doctors and paramedics, journalists and poets, NGO workers and political activists, eye witnesses to the drone attacks on Waziristan and Orakzai, people injured and people who lost close relatives in bomb blasts or military operations, people who suffered gross human rights violations at the hands of the Taliban, such as amputations, floggings, and incarcerations in the Taliban-run jails, and people whose close family members were beheaded by the Taliban. I shared the literature critiqued in this book with many of the informants and encouraged them to comment on it. Most of them generously commented. Most of the interviews and discussions have been conducted in people’s houses and village hujras in FATA and guests houses, homes, and hujras in various towns of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province. Many of the interviews were tape-recorded, but in several cases it was not possible. This research has also benefited from discussions I have had with people of FATA since 2008 for my newspaper articles. I travelled across FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa for the interviews and discussions. Owing to my newspaper articles on FATA, many people knew me even if I had never met them. This greatly facilitated the research because the people who had read or heard about my articles took me to

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A Note on Methodology

their communities and villages to interview other informants. Having a shared ethnic, cultural, and linguistic background also facilitated my interactions with the wide range of the people of FATA and KhyberPakhtunkhwa. Interview (and discussion) data may suffer from limitations such as selection perspective and bias perspective (Fair and Chalk, 2006:xvi). In order to address such limitations, the interviews and discussion were conducted with a wide range of people over a long period of time, i.e. over two years. Some of the key informants, like lashkar leaders, were interviewed more than once, or were invited to participate in discussions more than once. I have made a sincere effort to put across voices of FATA people to the wider world and document their feedback on some of the literature written about them in the context of the war on terror. I leave it to the readers to decide whether I have succeeded in doing so or not.

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

AIRRA ANP APA CIA FATA FC FCR FRs ICC ICG IDP IDMC IED IMQ ISI JI JUI(F) MNA PMAP PML (N) PML(Q) PA PIPOS PPA PPP TTP

Aryana Institute for Regional Research and Advocacy Awami National Party Assistant Political Agent Central Intelligence Agency Federally Administered Tribal Area Frontier Corps Frontier Crimes Regulation Frontier Regions Islamic Cultural Centre International Crisis Group Internally Displaced People Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre Improvised Explosive Device Idara Minhajul Quran Inter-Services Intelligence Jumaat Islami, Jamiat Ulama Islam (Fazal-U-Rahman) Member of National Assembly Pakhtunkhwa Mili Awami Party Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) Pakistan Muslim League (Quaid-e-Azam) Political Agent Pakistan Institute of Prosthetic and Orthotic Science Political Parties Act Pakistan People’s Party Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan

CHAPTER ONE DECONSTRUCTING SOME MYTHS ABOUT FATA

This chapter aims to comment on some of the literature produced on the Federally Administered Tribal Area, FATA, of Pakistan in the context of the war on terror. The chapter argues that the literature misinforms and distorts the ground reality of FATA. I will question the distorted notions attributed to some aspects of the Pakhtun culture and society in FATA.

1) Code of Pakhtunwali Pakhtunwali is a flexible unwritten code of behaviour that a Pakhtun is supposed to abide by. Its flexibility is due to the institution of jirga where issues are contextually resolved through logical discussions without adherence to any hard and fast rules. Rajmohan Gandhi rightly informs that Pakhtunwali “cannot of course be seen as static” and “is subject to negotiation and innovation” (2004:32). Pakhtunwali is a worldview that encompasses political, economic, social, religious, and secular aspects of life. It also provides a space for expression of art and peaceful coexistence with aliens; Muslims as well as non-Muslims, like the Punjabi settlers in Kurram and Sikhs in Orakzai and Khyber. Pakhtunwali demands equality among all Pakhtun. It is, however, a gender discriminatory code, as beautifully elaborated by (Ali, 1997). All prominent aspects of Pakhtunwali are grounded in centuries old Pakhtun history that is also deeply rooted in its pre-Islamic past. Despite the introduction of Islam in Pakhtun territories, the Pakhtun have never given up Pakhtunwali1. It is thus no surprise when one hears a Pakhtun saying “I am a Pakhtun for 5000 years, a Muslim for 14 centuries and a Pakistani for 64 years. Where do you think my identity lies?” In the literature the entire notion of Pakhtunwali has been reduced to some of its constitute parts, such as melmastia (hospitality), nanawati (forgiveness) and badal (revenge), which have been freely employed by the scholars and journalists to project a particular wild view of the Pakhtun

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culture and society, including the notion that FATA people have given refugee to Al-Qaida terrorists under the code of Pakhtunwali. In C. Christine Fair and Chalk’s opinion, melmastia means “unconditional hospitality” and thus “may help explain why FATA has given a geographic space that has been open and receptive to the influx of foreign Islamists” (2006:12). Rakisits (2008:6) claims that “part of Pakhtun tribal honour is to offer hospitality (melmastia), regardless of whether the guest is welcomed or not, a criminal, a friend or an enemy”. Accordingly, it is easy for the foreign militants to settle down in FATA (ibid). “Patronage of local tribal groups” in FATA facilitated the Uzbek terrorists to “gain a foothold in the region” (Moore, 2010). Ahmed Rashid distorts the concept of nanawati when he writes that it is “the notion that hospitality can never be denied to a fugitive” (2009:265). The fact that “the Pakistani tribesmen decided to fight against the government rather than surrender the Arabs and other foreign nationals who had taken refuge with them was basically due to (the notion of hospitality under) the code of Pakhtunwali” (Dogar, 2009:9). All such notions of nanawati and melmastia are distorted and far from the actual practice of nanawati and melmastia among the Pakhtun. In Pakhtunwali the notion of nanawati is that the offending party tenders an unconditional apology to the offended party and surrenders himself to the mercy of the other party. As a mark of his true regret, the offending party is supposed to go to the house of the other party with a piece of grass in his mouth, thereby underlining that what he did was truly beastly; that he regrets it and begs for forgiveness. The offended party is then generally expected to forgive no matter what the crime may have been, although the expectation may not be universally applicable to all contexts and circumstances. Thus nanawati actually means appeal for forgiveness2. Under Pakhtunwali hospitality, forgiveness and refuge are neither unconditional nor offered to everyone who asks for it. They are especially conditional when the seeker has been involved in blood feuds. The seeker is obligated to surrender his weapons to the host and promise to never attack his enemy as long as he is enjoying the hospitality. Once the seeker agrees to the conditions, he is granted refuge under the notion of hospitality and the code of Pakhtunwali binds the host to protect the guest against his enemies. In addition to this obligation other conditions may also be imposed upon the guest depending upon the context. Any breach of the obligation or the conditions on the part of the guest may lead to instant withdrawal of the refuge under the hospitality. Hospitality or refugee in FATA to someone wanted by the Pakistani state is out of the question. Some first-hand interactions with the tribesmen

Deconstructing Some Myths About FATA

3

would have provided the scholars and journalists with a wealth of empirical evidence to establish that no tribes in FATA can dare to host anyone wanted by the state. Under the Frontier Crimes Regulations, FCR, the set of laws applicable in FATA, the Pakistani state is empowered to bulldoze entire villages and towns if any tribes refuse to hand over a wanted person(s) to the state. In the past the government has used the FCR laws to punish tribesmen for giving refuge to people wanted by the state and the tribes would give in pretty soon. Let me share an example. Amanullah, a former Pakistani parliamentarian and minister, was wanted by the government of Pakistan and also probably to the US government on drug-related charges back in the 1980s. He ran away to Waziristan. The political Agent threatened the village hosting him with the FCR law and the villagers immediately expelled him. He ran away to another village and that too was threatened by the Political Agent which resulted in that village also taking back the refuge granted to him. Amanullah kept running from one village in Waziristan to another where he was closely followed by the state authorities threatening the hosting village (or tribe) with FCR. Finally, disappointed with the people of Waziristan, Amanullah surrendered himself to the authorities by saying this: “a Pakistani jail is better than any place in Waziristan”. Waziristan today is the same as it was in Amanullah’s time. No tribes could dare to challenge the writ of the state in Waziristan or elsewhere in FATA. Where do Usama Bin Laden, Ayman al Zawahiri or other foreign terrorists fit in to this notion and practice of hospitality? Well-armed and battle hardened Al-Qaida terrorists never surrendered their weapons to the tribes in FATA. Instead they have overpowered the tribes and brutally killed those tribesmen who defied them. They entered Waziristan with full state consent and all the tribesmen, who opposed their entry, were killed with state collusion by the militants. Those that were left ran away or were overpowered by the militants covertly backed by the Pakistani state. If the Pakistani state wants today, no militants can ever stay in Waziristan or elsewhere in FATA. It is a myth that FATA tribes gave refuge to Al-Qaida terrorists under the code of Pakhtunwali. In the tribal context, public backing of any issues, including refuge to anyone, has to be discussed and agreed upon in a tribal jirga (council). All over FATA there has never been any jirga at entire or tribe(s)/sub-tribe(s)/clan(s)/town(s)/village(s) level that has granted refugee to Al-Qaida or endorsed any activities of the militantsTaliban or Al-Qaida. I would challenge the scholars and journalists to produce evidence of any such jirgas. The fact is that Taliban and Al-Qaida

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banned the institution of jirga wherever they took control in FATA or at least rendered it ineffective through targeted killing and intimidation of the tribal leaders, and all this was thoroughly facilitated by the ISI (see chapter three).

2) Soldiers of the Frontier Corps Frontier Corps (FC), a federal paramilitary force, is under the control of the Interior Ministry of Pakistan. The FC is mainly responsible for antismuggling and border control duties. It is split into two independent forces: FC Baluchistan and FC Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, individually commanded by senior military officers from the Pakistani Army with the rank of Major General. In theory, the force is also meant to be deployed for assisting the regular law enforcement agencies on need-basis. However, in the Pakistani scheme of things it fundamentally remains part and parcel of the Pakistani military-intelligence complex. Rank and file and non-officer cadres of the Frontier Corps -both the FC Baluchistan and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa- are drawn from Pakhtun tribes of FATA and the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, while the officer cadres are exclusively drawn from the regular Pakistani army. Frontier Corps has been the subject of intense controversy for some time now in relation to its role in the on-going security situation in the country. FC Baluchistan is consistently blamed for human rights violations including its running of the “dump and kill policy” of the Baluch nationalist leaders and activists3. So heightened is the controversy that even the incumbent Chief Minister Baluchistan feels no qualms in blaming it for running a parallel government in the province4. All this emanates from the ground reality of Baluchistan province – that the province remains the exclusive policy domain of the Pakistani military. Being the instrument of extreme highhandedness and brutality of the military-intelligence complex in Baluchistan, the FC is highly loathed in Baluchistan and has been seen as an outside force committing atrocities against the Baluch population5. In northern Pakistan it is however a subject of different controversy. The dubious role of the Pakistani military-intelligence complex in the war on terror and the tribal area being a safe-haven and launching pad for terrorist operations in Afghanistan against the NATO and US troops is the subject of intense international controversy, and so is the FC KhyberPakhtunkhwa. The leaders of Afghanistan and international military coalition have frequently alleged cross-border movement of the Afghan Taliban across the Durand Line separating Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Deconstructing Some Myths About FATA

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Allegations include facilitation of Taliban intrusion into Afghanistan from FATA, including the direct “covering fire” (Nawaz, 2009:17) to the Taliban by the FC personnel manning the border. The Pakistani military government under General Pervez Musharaf initially rejected all such allegations, but in the face of challenging evidences to the contrary the military establishment resorted to the lame excuse of a “sympathy element” of the FC personnel with the Taliban due to tribal ethnic factors for sustaining its plausible deniability. Sadly many foreign researchers and journalists simply peddled that view without making any verification. Their literature freely accuses the ethnic Pakhtun soldiers FC of “helping the Taliban” (Fair and Jones, 2009: 164) because of the soldiers’ shared ethnic ties with the Taliban (John, 2009:174-181 & Hussain, 2008:149). We are informed that the terrorists have been crossing the Pakistan-Afghan border “with direct assistance” from the FC (Kilcullen, 2009:57). None of the writers provide any substantial evidence to validate their claims. However, Fair and Jones (2009: 164) refer to some news reports and a classified US document in support of their claims. I do not doubt any assistance provided by the FC soldiers to the Taliban. There may indeed have been this kind of assistance provided to the terrorists by the FC soldiers. What I question is the tendency of the writers to drag the Pakhtun ethnicity of the FC soldiers in to the issue. None of the allegations or the supporting evidence so far provided by the scholars establishes the claim they make, i.e. that the FC soldiers assisted the Taliban out of ethnic or religious considerations. The Frontier Corps is organized under a strict military discipline, and its immediate command remains in the hands of commissioned military officers appointed on deputation from Pakistani military. Various units of the FC are named after the administrative units in the province, like Dir Scouts (District Dir), Swat Scouts (District Swat), Chitral Scouts (District Chitral); and Mohmand Scouts (Mohmand Agency) and Khyber rifles (Khyber Agency) and are commanded with the title of FC Commandant by military officers with the rank of Colonel. Commandant is further assisted by regular military officers with the rank of Lt. Colonel, Major, and Captain directly managing and commanding the rank and file. Whereas in regular combat operations the direct command of the military officers goes as far as the “Company” level. The issue of any ethnic tribal loyalty of the rank and file is also belied by the role of the FC all along its history, right from its establishment in the British era. It has conducted successful military operations in various

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areas of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province and FATA at various points in time and has earned commendation from various quarters. Its role was highly commended by the UN advisor to the Dir District Development Project, DDDP, against the poppy cultivation in the Dir District (Gillett, 2001). The FC also conducted successful operations in Bajuar agency (FATA) during the Benazir Bhutto government. How could the FC enforce the rule of law on behalf of the Pakistani state on fellow Pakhtun tribesmen in Dir (Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa) and Bajaur (FATA) but “fail” or “offer reluctance” to do so in the context of the war on terror? The writers who accuse the FC soldiers fail to provide any insights into the role of the FC in the war on terror from the perspective of this force having a long history of being used as an effective tool of promoting the Pakistani state objectives. Even if the tribal ethnic sympathy element is to be believed, the fact remains that Pakhtun society is divided into various tribes, sub-tribes, clans, and sub-clans. The loyalty and sympathy of any individual would logically go as far as his tribe or to even to the sub-tribe or sub-clan level. However the FC Units rarely operate in their own area. This moots any such claim of tribal sympathy, even if the strict command and control hierarchy of the force is not taken into consideration for a while. It is next to impossible that any personnel of the FC would dare join hands with the Taliban due to any such consideration of ethnic loyalty and sympathy. Exceptional incidents cannot be ruled out, but that is as true for the rank and file as it is for the officers in command. What is clear is that any such collaboration with the Taliban is simply impossible on a large scale unless sanctioned by the top echelons of the force, or at least by the immediate military officer commanding the force in the area. The bottom-line is that the strong clan-based identity and sympathy link between the Taliban and the FC rank and file simply doesn’t exist for two mains reasons: the ethnic make-up of the FC ranks, and their respective area of operations. To elaborate further, the Dir Scout, for example, doesn’t necessarily draw its rank and file from the tribes and clans domiciled in Dir district. The force is only headquartered in Dir, while it draws its ranks and file from diverse tribes inhibiting the Pakhtun areas of Pakistan. Neither is the same Unit deployed in territorial limits of Dir districts; it is generally deployed in various parts of the KhyberPakhtun province and the tribal area. Also, the Frontier Corps remained a subject of controversy during the Afghan war against the Russians for its facilitation of the Afghan insurgents, which included their training and logistical support; however that was clearly a part of the then state policy. Precisely for this reason the

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then Inspector General FC, Gen. Naseerullah Khan Babur, could publically take pride in its role in Afghan jihad. Babar publicly acknowledged “that Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and Ahmad Shah Masoud were among the Afghans who were first recruited as Frontier Corps personnel (on paper) and then trained by the Pakistani military's Special Services Group” (Abbas, 2007). “After the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1978, these assets proved very valuable” (ibid) because the two citizens of Afghanistan- Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and Ahmad Shah Masoud- became key Mujahideen commanders fighting the Soviet invaders in this country. I have been discussing the Western and Pakistani writers’ claims about the FC soldiers with people in FATA, including retired and in-service FC soldiers, who I interviewed; 15 of them. Each one of the FC soldiers rejects any notion of sympathy with the Taliban due to shared ethnic or religious ties. Here I quote from an interview with one of the FC soldiers I interviewed: “It is simply impossible for FC soldiers to ignore the orders from their commanders, who are from the regular Pakistan army. This understanding in the West (that FC soldiers assist Taliban), if really so, is very drastic and far beyond reality. There may have been cases of indiscipline. There have been some cases where the FC men are compelled by the circumstances to do something their official duty would not allow; for example when some powerful Taliban groups pressurize an FC man on duty with serious threats, he is sometimes compelled to let them cross the border or run away from duty. But to say that an entire unit or units after units of the FC soldiers were assisting Taliban or have sympathies with Taliban is simply baseless. I have relatives and friends in FC, some of them have died fighting the Taliban and others got injured. How did they die or get injured if they were with the Taliban? Come with me and I will show you the graves of the countless FC soldiers all over FATA. They all died fighting the Taliban, not cooperating with them. My understanding is that many more FC soldiers have died fighting Al-Qaida and the Taliban than the soldiers of the regular Pakistan army. Those in the West who write such things about FC soldiers should at least double-check their information. They are misleading the world by spreading around such information. It is simply irresponsible on the part of the Western writers”.

Any assistance per se by the FC soldiers to the Taliban is no proof of their ethnicity-based comradeship with the Taliban. On the contrary, they could have been under order by their commanders, who come from the regular Pakistan army, to allow cross-border movement of the militants, or to fire at the US, NATO, or Afghan forces. Most people with whom I have discussed this issue support the view that FC soldiers were under orders by their commanders.

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Chapter One

It is also pertinent to mention that 735 FC soldiers have died in the fight against the Taliban and Al-Qaida in the war on terror, and 2050 have been injured6. The writers seem to be ignoring these deaths and injuries among the FC soldiers. Do these deaths and injuries mean nothing in terms of the FC soldiers’ commitment to the Pakistani state, if “facilitation” of cross border movements by some FC soldiers is always attributed to their ethnic and religious bonds with the Taliban?

3) Tribal Women’s Marriages with Al-Qaida Men This is yet another myth circulated in the national and international scholarly and journalistic literature about FATA. Fair and Chalk report that “after Soviet Union’s withdrawal from Afghanistan, many of these battle-hardened militants- denied return by their countries of originstayed on in FATA where they were welcomed as jihadi heroes and allowed to marry local women” (2006:12). David Kilkullen (2009:34) uncritically believed his Punjabi informant - a Pakistani army officer stationed in the Khyber agency- who informed him that Al-Qaida “leaders have married into the local tribes; they have children and businesses here (in FATA)”. The author then based his entire theory, the “accidental guerrilla” on this myth and other unsubstantiated assumptions (2009:235). Rakisits informs us that “following their defeat in October 2001, the Taliban and Al-Qaida escaped across the border into the tribal area of Pakistan. Hundreds of these foreign fighters settled and married into local tribes. They have since then established safe havens in FATA, especially in South and North Waziristan and Bajaur agency, and have been attacking coalition forces in southern and eastern Afghanistan with success, particularly since 2005” (2008:6). Several other writers have reproduced the same myth- marriages of the tribal woman with the foreign Islamist militants (for example, Behuria, 2007:703; Hussain, 2008:143; Dogar, 2009:15). It is untrue that several foreign militants, Mujahideen, or Al-Qaida terrorists, married into the local tribes in FATA. This is not to deny that the foreigners never tried to do so. It is not the first time that alien Islamists have tried to marry the Pakhtun women. The male-dominated Pakhtun society has violently responded to such aliens in the past, and it did so this time as well. Many Pakhtun vividly describe how back in 19th century foreign Islamist militants, led by Syed Ahmad, tried to marry local women. The attempt led them into lethal clashes with the Pakhtun (Jalal, 2008:102103). Hunter even informs us that Ahmad issued an edict that every girl

Deconstructing Some Myths About FATA

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not married within 12 days should become property of his lieutenants (1999:17). Today many Pakhtun tribal leaders do not question the veracity of Hunter’s information. They elaborate how Ahmad’s men announced in mosques that their Mujahideen had left their homes and were in need of wives. Then the local families were forced to marry their girls to the militants. This violently backfired. The Yousafzai tribal leaders had a grand jirga that concluded that there was no way but to massacre all the foreign Mujahideen. The jirga chose the signal of lighting of a bonfire on the top of a mountain, called Karamar, for the beginning of the massacre. The bonfire was lit. The Mujahideen were killed and the remaining fled towards Balakot, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, where the waiting Sikh army killed all of them- a successful hammer and anvil strategy. The present day Pakhtun also harshly reacted to attempts by the foreign Al-Qaida militants, to marry local women. In my interviews with Koki Khel tribal leaders, I have been told that back in the 1980’s several Arabs, probably including Usama Bin Laden, were hosted as guests by a local tribal leader, Gulabad Khan, in a village near Maherban Kalay in Tirah, Khyber agency. Gulabad was given a great deal of money by the Arabs for the hospitality. The Arabs wanted to marry the local women. The Afridi disagreed and built up pressure on Gulabad Khan to evict his guests. He disagreed and several Afridi tribesmen clashed with Gulabad Khan and his Arab guests, killing him and some of his guests. The remaining Arabs fled to Afghanistan. The key reason why the Afridis violently chased out the Arabs is the clash of cultures between the Pakhtun and the Arabs in terms of marriage and divorce. Divorce is highly frowned upon in the Pakhtun society. Dr Shaheen Sardar Ali, a Pakhtun scholar of Islam, elaborates this aspect of the Pakhtun society in these words: “Insofar as the dissolution of marriage by divorce is concerned, it is a near impossibility due to the principle in Pakhtun society of women being the honour of the man. Consequently, were the man to divorce his wife, he would be relinquishing his “honour” and thus running the risk of another man appropriating it for himself! “Zantalaq”, or a man who has divorced his wife, is one of the strongest most pejorative forms of abuse in Pakhto (Pashto)”. (1997:202).

On the other hand, “the Arab men routinely divorce and marry all through their life time. They have no shame about it. The Arabs are dishonourable men in relation to their women. No honourable Pakhtun father would like to give his daughter in marriage to the Arabs”, said a Koki Khel tribal leader as he explained the background of the Afridi tribesmen clashes with the Arab militants. The Arab jihadis enraged the

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Afridi tribesmen when the former produced hadith in support of their marriage practices and consequently attacked the Arab militants. Many Koki Khel Afridi tribesmen now proudly say that “we clashed with AlQaida militants when even the West was in a “love” with them”. Similarly, a Jaji tribesman in Kurram agency agreed to give his sister in marriage to an Arab militant. The tribe held a grand jirga whereby all Jajis were stopped from marrying their women to foreigners. The tribesman was warned to give up the marriage plan or face exile. He gave in and the Arab militant never married the Jaji woman. It is also not uncommon to even see the tribesmen feeling embarrassment over the marriages of their fellow tribeswomen with local Taliban commanders from FATA. Thus, for example, the Orakzai tribesmen do not like that one of their tribal girls from the Masuzai tribe has been given in marriage to Hakeemullah Mahsud, a militant from Waziristan. Similarly, an important reason why the Sunni section of the Story Khel tribe in Orakzai developed differences and ultimately clashed with the Taliban was that local (FATA) but non-Orakzai, Taliban wanted to marry women from the Story Khel tribe. Most Story Khel tribesmen do not admit it publicly due to their strict tribal norms of honour embodied by the tribal women. But many admit in private and even indicate the families who were approached by the Taliban with marriage proposals. This includes the families who were at the forefront of the Story Khel clashes with the Taliban. Moreover, the Peshawar Declaration also categorically rejects the notion that the foreign militants have become part and parcel of the larger tribal society in FATA due to their prolonged stay in the area since the Afghan “jihad” and marriages with the local women during that time7. “The fact is that in the tribal areas a foreigner is never called a native even if they have taken asylum and lived there for centuries”, as affirmed by the declaration. This should not be surprising given the fact that FATA is a traditional tribal society that can be regarded as a homogenous society in many respects. Even societies across Europe have faced problems integrating people from non-Western ethnicities. This, however, does not mean that the tribal society is xenophobic as reported by (Liebl, 2007). The tribes have been providing socio-cultural space to aliens, both Muslims and non-Muslims, to integrate themselves in the surrounding Pakhtun culture through a peaceful co-existence, such as the Sikh in Khyber and Orakzai, and the Punjabi settlers in Upper Kurram. In terms of culture and language the Sikhs and the Punjabis are fully integrated in the local tribal societies. Sikhs in Khyber even have tribal surnames, like Jeet Singh Afridi, Mehtab Singh Afridi etc. I have also met

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some tribal Sikhs who told me they are members of the Qamber Khel Afridi tribe, a well-known Pakhtun tribe of the Khyber agency. Similarly, some of the Punjabi settlers have married local tribal women in Kurram. The Punjabis came to Kurram as tailors etc. The Sikhs settled in the tribal area as cloth and spice merchants. Both came to live in the tribal area as peace loving people and the local tribes accommodated them in the area. Today both Sikhs and the Punjabis are part and parcel of the local tribal society. Unlike the Sikhs and the Punjabis, the Al-Qaida militants had come to FATA for violent jihad. As long as they are in the business of the jihad, there is no question they can be allowed to settled in FATA, because the jihad direct their commitments to the global Muslim Ummah rather than the tribe or clan based Pakhtunwali. To be integrated in FATA, commitments to the tribe or clan based Pakhtunwali must overrule other commitments. This first and foremost implies a commitment to peace in the area. This is something that the jihadis are unlikely to do. They have not come to FATA to get married and live peacefully for the rest of their lives as husbands and fathers. They have come there for jihad. They have disrupted life in FATA for the sake of their jihad. The wider society in FATA resents this; how could one hope to integrate in the surrounding majority society by annoying it? There have, however, been some marriages between the foreign militants and the local Taliban families in FATA. Such marriages, however, have no impact or influence over the wider tribal society in any of the tribes in FATA. Some of them are said to be forced marriages. I have challenged David Kilkullen in the third chapter of this book to provide empirical evidence of the marriages between foreign militants in the local tribes. I pose the same challenge to the writers mentioned above and all other people who make claims about such marriages.

4) The Tribes’ Autonomy and Weak State Control The literature highlights the FATA tribesmen as “fiercely autonomous” and “under a weak state control”. FATA tribes are notoriously adverse to interference from foreigners, be they British colonialist, the Soviet invader, or even non-Pakhtun Pakistanis, including the Punjabi-dominated Pakistan army (Kronstadtn & Katzman, 2008:10). The tribes have “traditionally (been) beyond the full writ of the Pakistani state” (ibid). FATA tribes are fiercely “autonomous” and “independent” (Hussain, 208:143). FATA is a critical “no-man’s land” (Rikisits, 2008). The people

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of FATA have historically been “too unruly to be governed” (Dogar, 2009:10). FATA is “ungoverned space” and “a no-go area for the government (of Pakistan) forces” (Kilkullen: 2009:232-233). All such statements are sweeping judgements and far from the truth. Fair and Chalk are right when they comment that ‘these axiomatic constructs of FATA as a “no-go zone” or an “ungoverned space” are not strictly speaking correct (2006:10). Constitutionally, FATA is part of the Pakistani state, and subjected to its authority. The President of Pakistan is authorised to direct the governor of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa about the state administration in the tribal area. The state administrative structure and authority in FATA is led by a Political Agent along with his support staff, including Khasadar forces, the tribal police force. Moreover, the President of Pakistan is authorised to declare at any time that “the whole or any part of a Tribal Area shall cease to be Tribal Area” under the current special legal set up, FCR, and to legally integrate it with the rest of Pakistan8. In a sense, these axiomatic constructs of FATA also sound ridiculous. I would like to raise a few simple questions for the writers of such constructs of FATA. One, how could the CIA and ISI operate their entire grand “jihad” against the Soviets from their bases in FATA if the area has been an “ungoverned space” or “under a weak state control” or a “no-go area for the government of Pakistan”? Two, were the Soviets so witless that they could not even destroy the bases of jihad in an “ungoverned space” or a space “under a weak state control”? Three, perhaps instead they believe that the entire “jihad” against the Soviets was solely launched and operated by the FATA tribesmen, and the CIA and ISI have had no role in it since the area has been a “no-go area” for the government of Pakistan and presumably for the US government as well? The notion that the FATA tribes are fiercely autonomous is also misplaced. The tribesmen are subjected to the legal and administrative structure contained in the Frontier Crimes Regulation (FCR) 1901. Most human rights bodies have termed the FCR “oppressive” and “against human rights”. Each tribal agency’s administration is presided over by a Political Agent who enjoys extensive executive, judicial, and fiscal powers. The FCR allows for collective punishment and preventive detention and does not provide the right of legal appeal in Pakistani courts. Political parties of Pakistan are banned from working in FATA. How could a people living under the FCR be “fiercely autonomous” and “independent”? Anita Demkiv (2009:7) puts forward a frivolous reason for the continued existence of the FCR in FATA since the British time: “the FATA residents have not replaced it (FCR)”. How could FATA residents replace the

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FCR? The President of Pakistan is authorized to do so. Demkiv must tell us, when was the last time the Pakistani authorities asked FATA residents to vote on whether they want FCR? May I ask Demkiv and all those who claim that FATA is “autonomous” and “independent” why the Political Parties Act of Pakistan has not been extended to the area? President Zardari announced the promulgation of the act in FATA in 2009. Who is resisting a formal notification in this regard? Is it the people of FATA or political parties of Pakistan? Isn’t it the military establishment based in Rawalpindi that is averse to any idea of Pakhtun nationalist political parties operating in the area due to its eternal fear of Pakhtun nationalism? Isn’t it the military establishment that is ensuring the legal isolation of FATA so that the area can be freely used a strategic space in pursuit of strategic depth in Afghanistan? Jails in Khyber-Pakhtunwali have never been empty of FATA residents incarcerated by the political administration for indefinite periods on the most flimsy of charges. For how long would a “fiercely autonomous” people put up with such a situation? The people of FATA have been bearing this situation from the creation of the state of Pakistan to this day. Some interviews with jail authorities, staff in the political administrations in FATA, and friends and relatives of the incarcerated tribesmen would have been quite informative for the writers, who uncritically keep reproducing the axiomatic constructs of FATA.

5) Drone Attacks on FATA The US Central Intelligence Agency, CIA, has made a series of attacks on Taliban and Al-Qaida targets in FATA since 2004 using predator drones, also known as unmanned aerial vehicles. These strikes are part of the USled war on terror. Pakistani authorities routinely denounce the US drone attacks on FATA and demand that the US halt them9. They argue that the attacks are a violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty and that the robotic assassination campaign has proven to be counter-productive in the war against terror. They point out that due to large scale civilian casualties the attacks are uniting the militants and the tribal people10. There are, however, many reports that the drone strikes on FATA are carried out from air bases within Pakistan11. US Officials say the strikes are carried out under an informal agreement with Islamabad that allows Pakistani leaders to criticize them in public, but Pakistan denies any such agreement12.

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There has been a great deal of research and journalistic literature13 produced about the US drone attacks in FATA. Most of the literature misinforms in terms of civilian casualties caused by the attacks and public opinion in the tribal area about the strikes. I have been addressing such reports via my research papers14 as well as newspaper columns15. Unfortunately, the misinformation continues. One such example is a report “The Year of the Drone” produced by two writers, Peter Bergen and Katherine Tiedemann, linked with the New American Foundation. The report claims that 32% of those who have died in drone attacks since 2004 were innocent civilians in FATA and that the public opinion in Pakistan, including FATA, is against the drone attacks. I have challenged that report through my paper, “The Year of the Drone Misinformation”, published in the journal Small Wars and Insurgencies16. Later the New America Foundation, together with Terror Free Tomorrow, conducted a public opinion survey in FATA that showed that the “American drone attacks (are) deeply unpopular” in FATA and 76% of respondents opposed the attacks17. The survey was conducted at a time when most people of FATA were IDPs outside FATA. Serious ethical and methodological flaws mar this survey. It provides blighted information about the tribal public opinion that seriously misguides. I have challenged the survey through my newspaper column “An Unethical Survey on FATA18” and my research paper, “A Critical Perspective on a Recent Survey of Opinion in Pakistan’s Tribal Zone”. The paper will be published in the research journal Small Wars and Insurgences in spring 2011. Almost two years ago the Aryana Institute for Regional Research and Advocacy, AIRRA19, conducted the first-ever public opinion survey in parts of FATA on the US drone attacks in the area20. The survey contradicted the widespread mediatized opinion that the FATA residents begrudge the drone attacks as drones target civilians. The survey generated heated discussions in media and research circles. Many dismissed the survey findings in disbelief, others with disgust. Ironically, most of rejectionists do not have any direct access to FATA due to poor security or other reasons. Two years down the road, at least two independent investigations, one by Matthew Fricker, Avery Plaw and Brian Glyn Williams21 and the other by Shahid Saeed and Awais Masood22, have concluded what the AIRRA survey claimed: the drone attacks are accurate in hitting the militants in FATA and the number of the civilian casualties has been greatly inflated by media reports. This is a welcome development in research and I hope that more researchers will show their ability to see beyond the media fabrications about the civilian deaths in the drone attacks inside FATA.

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This leaves us with the issue of the public support of the drone strikes in FATA. All media and research reports about the drone strikes being unpopular in FATA are far from the truth. There are three main reasons why all reports are inaccurate. Firstly, the Pakistani media routinely spreads distorted and even baseless information about FATA that seems to be planted by proestablishment forces in the country23. Due to the poor security situation, international media and researchers do not have independent access to FATA. They rely on the Pakistani media for information. International media and researchers have shown a tendency to uncritically accept the Pakistani media reports. A case in point is the daily news report dated April 10, 2006: “60 drone hits kill 14 Al-Qaida men, 687 civilians”. The report was widely and uncritically quoted in media and research around the world. The report is highly questionable. Quoting some unnamed Pakistani authorities the report claims that 687 civilians had been killed in 60 drone attacks. There is no information as to how the authorities collected these figures. There is no control of the authorities in the area; the area is under the control of the militants. The authorities have, to this date, failed to provide evidence in terms of names or places of residence of those 687 people. The authorities have also failed to produce relatives of those 687 “innocent civilian victims”. The main problem is that after every drone attack the militants cordon off the area and no one, including the local villagers, is allowed to come anywhere near the targeted place. The militants themselves collect the bodies, bury the dead and then issue the statement that all of them were innocent civilians24. This has been part of their propaganda to provide excuses to the pro-establishment and pro-Taliban media persons and political forces in Pakistan to generate public sympathies for the terrorists. This is an important reason why all estimates about the civilian casualties in the drone attacks are unreliable. Such estimates are thus fabricated as also demonstrated by the research conducted by Fricker, Avery Plaw and Brian Williams and Shahid Saeed and Awais Masood. Secondly, a key reason why there is so much denial of any notion of FATA public support for the drone attacks is that everyone seems to look at this issue from their own pre-determined perspective. Any evidence of the tribesmen and women’s support for the US drone attacks is an anomaly for the pro-Taliban and pro-military establishment media and political forces of Pakistan. Thus they tend to reject or ignore any such evidence. For the left-wingers in Pakistan, a FATA public support for the drone strikes is a misfit in their ideology of “American imperialism25”. Several

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influential opinion makers, such as famous scholars and journalists, have shown little ability to see beyond the ivory tower of their grand theories. A case in point is the opinion of a scholar, David Kilkullen26, and a journalist, Zahid Hussain (2010). The authors’ opinion is rooted in their poor knowledge of the whole crisis in the tribal area. For Kilkullen everyone in FATA is “accidental guerrilla”, an ally of the Al-Qaida militants who have married into the local tribes and have become part and parcel of the tribal society (2009). How could the “accidental guerrilla” approve of the drone attacks killing his ally, the AlQaida militants? Seen through the prime of Kilkullen’s “accidental guerrilla”, the drone attacks would be unpopular in FATA regardless of whether they killed or did not kill the innocent civilians. But as I have demonstrated in the third chapter of this book, Kilkullen’s entire theory of “accidental guerrilla” is not even applicable to the crisis in FATA. This is a false theory as far as the situation in FATA is concerned. By extension his opinion- that drone attacks are unpopular in FATA- is baseless. Zahid Hussain’s (2010) understanding of FATA is equally distorted. For him, the Taliban terrorism is the war of the Pakistani Pakhtun, who have allied themselves with Al-Qaida (ibid), and therefore, the drone attacks are ineffective in a counter-terrorism strategy (ibid). The drone attacks have killed leading Taliban commanders and Al-Qaida leaders; how could the Pakhtun, the ally of Al-Qaida, approve of the drone attacks, if the Taliban terrorism is a Pakhtun war? Seen through Hussain’s understanding, the drone attacks would be unpopular in FATA regardless of any civilian casualties, but as I have demonstrated in the third chapter of this book, Hussain’s understanding of the crisis in FATA is plagued with distorted information and is even bias against the Pakhtun. Thus his viewthat drone attacks are unpopular in FATA or ineffective in counterterrorism- is irrelevant for the tribal area. Thirdly, another possible factor that might have misguided some people- with no direct access to the drone hit areas in FATA due to security or other reasons- is the fact that the ANP, the Pakhtun nationalist party, has succumbed to the military establishment’s pressure on the issue of the drone attacks. Tens of ANP legislators, workers, and their relatives have been targeted and killed27. This is the establishment’s pressure tactic to punish the ANP for its Pakhtun nationalism and to force the party to take a public position against the drone attacks. The pressure tactics worked and the ANP gave in. In 2010 the party took a public stance against the drone attacks. The ANP-dominated Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly condemned the US drone attacks in September 2010 through a unanimous resolution28. Top party leaders have

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been issuing anti-drone attack statements since then. This position on the drone attacks is totally against what the party had been saying in the past and what the party leaders continue to say in private even to this date. The ANP is a signatory of the Peshawar Declaration, signed in February 2010, which categorically supports the drone strikes in FATA and holds the Pakistani military establishment responsible for terrorism in Afghanistan and Pakistan, especially in FATA29. Moreover, due to its ethnic, tribal, and political affiliations with people in FATA, the ANP knows very well that the drone strikes are precisely killing the terrorists, and the people in the drone-hit areas welcome them. Privately, the ANP leaders support the drone attacks. They hold the Pakistani generals responsible for terrorism and violence in FATA and Afghanistan. They want the terror centres in FATA to be destroyed and they do not mind if the US or NATO forces accomplish this since the Pakistani generals do not seem to be interested in giving up their jihadi adventures from the soil of FATA. A top ANP leader told me this: “We know the drone attacks are precise in killing the militants; the tribal people welcome them. But we as a party cannot take a public position in support of the drone attacks. We have to follow the state policy of opposing the attacks in public. We can publicly support the drone attacks in only one case: when we terminate all our ties with the state, take up weapons against it and retreat to the mountains of Tirah valley (FATA) to launch a war of independence from Pakistan”.

Thus the party, he implied, was not ready for such an eventuality at this point of time. The ANP seems to understand that their public position is tantamount to treachery against the Pakhtun in the drone hit areas. How could a Pakhtun nationalist party take a public position that goes against the sentiments of the Pakhtun public in the terrorism-devastated area? The ANP also has a track record of succumbing to the establishment’s pressure tactics. The ANP fell on its knees during the signing of the Swat peace deal with the terrorists in 2009. ANP circles have anonymously claimed that suicide bombers were sent by the ISI to the top leaders to force them to sign the peace deal. If they had refused, they would have been killed on the spot and so they had to sign the deal even if they were not prepared for it. Moreover, under pressure from the military establishment, the ANP government has stopped supporting the anti-Taliban lashkars all over Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the lashkars that the provincial government initially supported with enthusiasm30. People in the drone hit area and also many Pakhtun nationalists are disappointed with the ANP position on the drone

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attacks. They want the party to take a public pro-drone attacks stance. In this context I would caution the researchers and journalists against drawing any definitive conclusions from the ANP public stance on the drone attacks. I would encourage them to hold some ‘off the record’ conversations with key ANP leaders on this issue. It is very pertinent to mention the position of another Pakhtun nationalist political party, Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awamy Party, PMAP, on the issue of the US drone attacks on FATA. Unlike ANP, this party has not issued any public statement against the drone attacks so far to the best of my knowledge. The party has also never issued a public pro-drone attacks statement either. This seems to be the party position: “The US drone strikes are in response to the FATA based terrorists’ attacks on US forces in Afghanistan. The US has a right to strike at the terrorists as long as they continue to attack the US forces in Afghanistan. What the US is doing (drone attacks) is a reaction, not an action (the terrorists’ attacks from FATA on the US forces). First, the action must stop before we demand the reaction to stop”31.

The party leaders have been taking this position in their public meetings and even media interactions. PMAP’s public position on the drone attacks thus seems to be indirectly pro-drone-strikes. The party’s position, regardless of its pro- or anti- drone attacks tilt, is important. As a Pakhtun nationalist party, PMAP is a stakeholder in FATA, especially in Waziristan where it seems to have a large following. It should be noted that political leaders and workers linked to PMAP were among the first eliminated by the ISI when it unleashed targeted killings in the area in 2003 to silence those who had the potential to question, or had already questioned, the arrival of Al-Qaeda militants in FATA following their escape from the post-9/11 bombing of the militant positions in Afghanistan (see third chapter). A case in point is the Waziri tribesman, Farooq Yargul Khel, who was President of PMAP in Waziristan and had publicly opposed the arrival of Al-Qaida terrorists in Waziristan. Farooq Yargul Khel was targeted and killed in 2003 in South Waziristan. Like ANP, PMAP also seems to be under pressure from the military establishment of Pakistan. An important leader of the party, Dr Syed Alam Mahsud who is from Waziristan, has made the accusation that the party’s top leadership has surrendered to the establishment’s pressure and is not doing enough to provide the much needed leadership to the Pakhtun32.

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5.1) Drone Attacks: Pieces of Evidence I have been arguing in one of my papers33 and an article34 that there is enough evidence that should at least caution researchers and journalists against uncritical acceptance of notions like the idea that drone attacks are unpopular in FATA or that they lead to large scale civilian killings. Examples of such evidence are given in the following sections. 5.1.1) Peshawar Declaration The Peshawar Declaration35 is a joint statement of political parties, civil society organizations, businessmen, doctors, lawyers, teachers, students, labourers, and intellectuals of FTA and NWFP, following a grand tribal jirga on December 12-13, 2009, in Peshawar, Pakistan. The declaration notes that “if the people of the war-affected areas are satisfied with any counter-militancy strategy; it is drone attacks that they support the most”36. Some people in Waziristan compare drones with the Quran’s Ababeel — the holy sparrows sent by God to avenge Abraha, the intended conqueror of the Khana Kaaba, the holiest Muslim site in Mecca, Saudi Arabia37. I have also heard many people of Waziristan calling the drone strikes an “airborne justice delivery system”, because the strikes are precisely killing the terrorists who have imposed a reign of terror on the people in collusion with the Pakistan state.

Grand Tribal Jirga in Peshawar in December 2009 that approved the Peshawar Declaration.

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Drafting the Peshawar Declaration: From right to left: Jamila Gilani, Parliamentarian (ANP), Dr Said Alam Mahsud, Leader PMAP. Khadim Hussain, Coordinator AIRRA, Mohammad Rome, Member AIRRA, Sikandar Khan Sherpao, Provincial President of PPP (S), Dr. Fazal Rahim Marwat, Research Scholar, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.

Presenting the Peshawar Declaration to Media: From 2nd person in from the right to left: Dr. Said Alam Mahsud, leader PMAP, Mukhtar Yousufzai, Provincial President PMAP, Idress Kamal, Chairman Pakhtunkhwa Civil Society Network, Hasham Babar, Central Joint Secretary, ANP, Mukhtar Bacha, Provincial President National Party and Khadim Hussain, Coordinator AIRRA.

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5.1.2) Armageddon in Pakistan This is a book written under the pseudonym, “Khan”, for reasons of security. The writer is a Pakhtun from Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Khan’s book depicts happy sentiments of the people of Bajaur Agency regarding the drone attacks in these words: “Another excitement is the sighting of the drone. People and children do not rush indoors, they look at them and discuss and argue about the distance at which they must be flying. The general impression is that they are close. They feel the happiness of something close, friendly and powerful and against evil”. (2009:178).

Researchers and journalists can access Mr. Khan for interview, although he is usually very careful about who he should meet owing to his security concerns. 5.1.3) Amn Tehrik (Peace Movement) This is an umbrella group of various individuals and civil society groups from all over FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. The Amn Tehrik publicly opposes the Taliban and Al-Qaida; denounces the military establishment’s strategic depth; demands the military to conduct targeted operations against the militants in FATA; and supports the drone attacks. The Amn Tehrik expresses such views almost every month in its public sociopolitical activism. Mainstream Pakistani media largely ignore them and this is the reason their views do not reach out to the wider world.

5.2) Drone Attack: Humanitarian Perspective from the Tribal Point of View A humanitarian perspective from the point of view of the tribal people would make it easier to understand why they might welcome drone attacks. Unlike the wider society in Pakistan, Taliban and Al-Qaida terrorists control large parts of tribal society in FATA. Tribesmen and women of FATA have suffered much more at the hands of the terrorists than people of any other region of Pakistan. Even human rights organizations, both Pakistani and international, have failed to document the full range of human rights violations in FATA at the hands of both the militants and the Pakistani army. As per my knowledge, no human rights organizations have documented a list of hundreds of people target-killed all over FATA since 2003. The Pakistani media narratives do not take into

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consideration the countless human sufferings in FATA at the hands of the militants and the army. Nobody seems to be giving significance to the fact that the state of Pakistan, in pursuit of foreign policy objectives, has abandoned its tribal citizens to the brutal religious militants. People of Waziristan have confirmed that women and children of the Taliban and Al-Qaida have been dying in some of the drone attacks. They do not rule out the possibility that more children and women of the terrorists may be killed in future attacks. However, in my opinion, they have a very pragmatic view of the whole situation. “This is a war, not a game and in wars innocent people do die”, they argue. Available options for the people of FATA are harsh. Either they condemn the drone attack for the sake of women and children of the militants and let them continue to slaughter the tribal people, including women and children, or ignore the deaths among the militants’ families and welcome the attacks because they precisely kill the killers whose hands are stained with the blood of countless FATA tribesmen, women and children. People of the drone hit areas go for the latter. It is in this context that, contrary to the wider public opinion in Pakistan, the people of FATA welcome drone attacks and want the Americans to continue hitting the FATA based militants with the drones until their complete elimination. Due to my close association with this area, I understand that a vast proportion of people support the drone strikes, especially in the drone hit areas. The same is true about activists in Amn Tehrik and those who passed the Peshawar Declaration. Leading activists of the Amn Tehrik are well known public figures at least in the Pakhtun areas. Researchers and journalists can also access them for ground information about the drone attacks. I would encourage the researchers and journalists around the world to also get to know the FATA people’s support for the drone strikes through their investigative skills and direct access to people from the drone hit areas. Due to poor security, access to FATA may be dangerous, but FATA tribesmen and women live as IDPs, all over Pakistan. The researchers and journalists may contact them in safer places in Pakistan. They, however, need to keep in mind that even outside the Tribal Area, the FATA people feel threatened and reluctant to openly express themselves. Targetedkillings of tribesmen showing the courage to challenge the dominant narratives on the war on terror in FATA are a fact. This is an ethical challenge and the researchers and journalists need to develop special methodologies to ensure security of the respondents as well as gathering honest information from them.

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5.3) “Innocent Victims” of Drone Attacks and Pakistani Media I would also like to caution researchers and journalists against the recent Pakistani media reports that present some tribesmen as innocent victims of the drone attacks; reports such as those that showed Karim Khan, a tribesman from North Waziristan, announce his intention to sue the CIA for killing his close relatives in a drone attack on the agency38. I keep hearing from the tribesmen that such people may not always be innocent civilians. They have close links with the intelligence agencies of Pakistan as well as the Taliban. They have been brought to the media by the intelligence agencies to counter the argument that the Pakistani authorities have been claiming civilian deaths in the drone strikes, but have failed to produce the relatives of the innocent civilians. Let us consider the case of Karim Khan. He announced he would sue the CIA for the drone attack on his home (or hujra) on 31 December 2009, which he says killed his brother and son39. But is he as innocent as presented in Pakistani media? Let me say at the onset that I am still making enquiries to definitively determine whether he is an innocent civilian casualty of the drone attack. However, I share my thoughts and preliminary information with the readers to give them a sense of seriousness in this issue. Karim Khan was educated in Islamic Studies at the University of Peshawar in the 1990s. One of his (former) fellow university students describes him as a “religious person with close links to (the pro-military establishment and pro-Taliban) JUI(F) during his time in the university40”. Some people in Waziristan describe him as a person “very close to the political administration in North Waziristan as well as the ISI operatives (in the agency)41”. Some people from North Waziristan inform that a leading Taliban commander was in his house (or hujra) when the drone attacked it. The “real target of the drone attack was not Karim’s family, but the Taliban commander”, says a tribal leader from North Waziristan. At least two people from North Waziristan claim that Haji Omar, a wellknown Pakistani Taliban commander, died in the drone attack on Karim Khan’s house (or hujra) on 31 December 200942. This date (31 December 2009) concurs with the date of death of Haji Omar in a drone attack reported in Wikipedia43. Moreover, Karim Khan is a journalist in North Waziristan. It has been almost impossible for journalists having no links with the intelligence agencies of Pakistan to survive in Waziristan since 2002. A case in point is Hayatullah Khan, a journalist from Waziristan. He was kidnapped in 2005 and later his dead body was found44. He made photographs of pieces of the Hellfire missile fired by a CIA drone that had killed Abu Hamza Rabia, an

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Egyptian Al-Qaeda terrorist based in North Waziristan. He shared the photos with the world through international media. His evidence- the photographs- contradicted the Pakistan authorities who had claimed that Rabia had blown himself up while making a bomb. Hayatullah Khan’s family holds the intelligence agencies of Pakistan responsible for his murder45. About a year later his wife was also killed and here too his family hinted at the intelligence agencies of Pakistan for murder of the widow46. This widow had publicly asked the Pakistani authorities for justice in the case of her husband’s murder. Similarly, another Waziri journalist, Dilawar Khan, linked with BBC Urdu, was kidnapped, tortured, and released after 24 hours47. Dilawar Khan would not publicly say who kidnapped him, but people in Waziristan widely understand that he was abducted and tortured by the intelligence agencies of Pakistan, who were unhappy with his reporting. They also claim that Dilawar Khan stopped being objective in his media reports following his abduction and release. The Pakistani media has been giving a great deal of coverage to Karim Khan as an innocent victim of the drone attack. Strangely, the media refrained from probing some difficult questions, such as these. Who was the “guest” in his house (or hujra) who was killed in the drone attack on 31 December 2009 that also killed his son and brother? How does he keep working as a journalist in Waziristan when other fellow Waziristani journalists have been killed or forced to toe the ISI’s line? Does he have any connections with the intelligence agencies of Pakistan? Who is paying his lawyer and for his stay in Islamabad? Many people in Waziristan believe that the ISI is paying for both. Back in 2004 many Waziristani students in the Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad, were forced by the ISI operatives to refrain from holding a demonstration in the federal capital against the agency’s strategic games in their native Waziristan48. To this date no students or other people from Waziristan have been able to hold public demonstrations due to the ISI’s pressures. It is hard to reconcile the wide media coverage given to Karim Khan in Islamabad and the ISI’s pressure on his fellow tribesmen, the university students, to stop them from holding a demonstration in the same city. The point that I wish to make here is that journalists and researchers looking for innocent civilians in the drone strikes on FATA need to make investigations about the background of the people presented as “innocent civilians” in the Pakistani media. This is not to say that no innocent civilians ever died in the strikes. I have been saying in my newspaper columns that women and children of the Taliban and Al-Qaida militants

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have been dying in the attacks. I also said that some civilians died in the drone attack on the funeral ceremony of Khwaz Wali, a Taliban commander in Waziristan. The main point that I wish to make here is that the Pakistani media should not be uncritically believed when it presents people as “innocent victims” of the drone attacks. Moreover, the timing of Khan’s appearance in the media is really interesting. In November 2010 a US court issued a summons to the ISI chief, Ahmad Shuja Pasha, in response to a lawsuit submitted by relatives of two Americans killed in the coordinated terrorist attacks on Mumbai in 2008 that killed many people49. There have been many reports blaming the ISI for having trained the terrorists who attacked Mumbai. By the end of November 2010 Karim Khan appeared in Pakistani media to announce that he will sue all US officials who control the drone operations in Pakistan because one of the drone attacks had killed his close family members50. Some days later he also submitted an application in an Islamabad police station for registration of a First Investigation Report (FIR) against the Pakistan based Station Chief, Jonathan Banks, the American intelligence officer who used to oversee the US drone strikes against the militant positions in FATA. The US immediately removed Banks from Pakistan “amid threats to his life51”. It is pertinent to mention that the top US spy’s name was a classified secret. How did it turn up in the lawsuit by the tribesman, Karim Khan? Quoting some unnamed US officials, The New York Times reported that the ISI may have had a hand in exposing Banks’ name, possibly in retaliation for a legal suit in the US that implicated the ISI chief in the 2008 Mumbai attacks52. Many people in Pakistan also look at Karim Khan’s seemingly statefacilitated appearance in the media as a manifestation of the strategic games between the CIA and ISI, the two spy agencies that are, in the words of The New York Times, “two uneasy but co-dependent allies53”. Several tribesmen in Waziristan see Khan’s role in the whole issue as a manifestation of his long-standing relationship with the military authorities of Pakistan. Coming back to the issue of the reliability of media reports on the drone attacks, it should be noted that the international media is also not always reliable on the issue of the drone strikes or other matters related to the war on terror in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Farooq Sulehria, a Pakistani journalist, has beautifully described how some Western journalists have been concocting stories on the war on terror in Pakistan54. Insecurity and targeted-killing in FATA has been scaring away independent journalists from the area55. I have also been questioning some US media reports in my

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newspaper columns56.

5.4) Intelligence Sharing Between CIA and ISI for Drone Strikes The tribesmen acknowledge that there seems to be a degree of intelligence sharing between the CIA and ISI for drone attacks on militants’ positions in FATA. As a case in point, they refer to the killing of Tahir Yaldeshov, the Uzbek militant commander, in a drone attack. The tribesmen believe that the ISI shares intelligence about only those militants who it wants to eliminate because they are no longer needed or have “gone out of control”. But the CIA also seems to have its own intelligence on the ground and also often kills militants in the drone attacks who are in the military establishment’s good book. This is a bone of contention between the ISI and CIA and this is the reason why the pro-establishment Pakistani media is against the drone attacks. In regard to Tahir Yaldeshov, some tribesmen informed me that, in the context of the Waziri tribesmen’s revolt against the Uzbek militants, he refused to carry out targeted killings sanctioned by the ISI, in the Mahsud area. It had dawned on Yaldeshov that the Waziri tribesmen turned against his men due to their involvement in the targeted killings in the Wazir area in South Waziristan, thus he was reluctant to carry out any more targeted killings. This led to serious differences between him and the ISI, which then shared intelligence about him with the CIA, which in turn ordered a drone attack that killed him. The tribesmen also informed that they were happy over the elimination of Yaldeshov, regardless who facilitated the elimination. There have also been news reports that Pakistani military authorities have been asking the US to transfer the drone technology to Pakistan. The Waziristan tribesmen who I interviewed are terrified of this idea becoming a reality. They wish to warn the Americans that every single one of the remaining anti-Taliban tribesmen would be killed in the drone attacks, and the militants’ writ over the area would be strengthened even further, if the drone technology was transferred to Pakistan. The US must eliminate the militants with the drone attacks and targeted ground operations in FATA rather than trusting the ISI with the drone technology. They said that their close relatives have been killed in the name of the US forces in Afghanistan- they were killed on charges of spying for the US. They now expect the US forces to help them to get rid of the militants. They said they would welcome US troops in the tribal area, if they entered to eliminate the terror centres in targeted operations. They have no hope from

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the Pakistani army to eliminate the jihadi infrastructure in FATA.

6) Concluding Remarks To end I would also like to make a few comments as to why so many myths about FATA have been produced and reproduced in the literature authored in the context of the war on terror. In my view, the following are the reasons for this. I) There is a great deal of British colonial literature on the Pakhtun that orientalize them. The Pakhtun have never systematically challenged the literature due to their backwardness in education. The researchers and journalists writing in the context of the war on terror have been uncritically drawing upon the colonial literature. This has contributed towards strengthening the colonial stereotypes about the Pakhtun, for example, that the Pakhtun are fiercely autonomous people etc. II) FATA is inaccessible for independent scholarly or journalistic research due to the poor security situation. The authors have been reporting what they are told by the Pakistani authorities and people linked with the Taliban and Al-Qaida. Most of the writers had no opportunity to cross check their data against first-hand information from the area. They have not been acknowledging this as a limitation of their research. They have not been warning the readers that any conclusions drawn from their research must be seen in the light of this limitation. This, in my view, is a violation of research ethics on the parts of the authors. III) The researchers and journalists have shown a consistent tendency to uncritically accept reports about FATA in the Pakistani media. Seemingly, many of such reports have been planted by the intelligence agencies57. Consequently, the research authored in the context of the war on terror produces very distorted knowledge about FATA. But what is done is done. From now onwards I would expect the researchers to understand that in FATA they are dealing with a society that lives in constant fear of the Taliban and intelligence agencies of Pakistan. Therefore, research in FATA needs special ethical and methodological considerations. I would expect the researchers to rise above the recent aphoristic constructs and colonial myths about FATA, and study it as a normal human society trapped in a security and humanitarian crisis.

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Notes 1

Babri Gul Wazir, The Faqir of Ipi. P:7 ibid 3 See for example, “Parallel Government”, Daily Times, dated 24 January 2010, http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010%5C01%5C24%5Cstory_24 -1-2010_pg3_4 4 “FC running parallel govt, says Raisani”, Daily Dawn, dated 21 January 2010. On: http://archives.dawn.com/archives/44459 5 See for example, “Angry Baloch People”, Crisis Balochistan, http://www.crisisbalochistan.com/secondary_menu/analysishistory/angry-balochpeople.html & “Islamabad Barbarism”, Mohammad Akhtar Mengal, Daily Times, dated 18 March 2011, http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011%5C03%5C18%5Cstory_18 -3-2011_pg3_2 6 These statistics regarding the FC soldiers have been provided to me by Major Fazal, spokesman FC media cell, via email dated February 8, 2011 7 See text of Peshawar Declaration in the Appendix and also is on this link: http://www.pukhtunkhwa.com/id70.html 8 247(6) Constitution of Pakistan 9 For example, “Drone attacks undermining Swat operation”, prime minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani, The News, 24, May 2009, available on: http://www.thenews.com.pk/top_story_detail.asp?Id=22318; “Zardari asks US to give Pakistan drone technology”, President Asif Ali Zardar, The News, 12, Feburary 2010, on: http://www.thenews.com.pk/top_story_detail.asp?Id=27216; “Drone Attacks Undermining War on Terror”, Associated Press of Pakistan, available on: http://www.app.com.pk/en_/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=57706 10 ibid 11 “CIA runs secret bases in Pakistan”, on: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=86029§ionid=351020401; “Google Earth reveals secret history of US base in Pakistan”, The Times, February 19, 2009, available on: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article5762371.ece 12 “Pakistan says U.S. drone attacks could hurt ties”, Reuters, available on: http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE60C38S20100113 13 For example, Kilcullen, 2009; Dogar, 2009:29; Ahmad, 2009:76 & Sheikh, 2009:7). “Do Targeted Killings Work” by Daniel Byman of the Brookings, available on: http://www.brookings.edu/opinions/2009/0714_targeted_killings_byman.aspx?p=1 14 “Drone Attacks: Pakistan’s Policy and the Tribesmen’s Perspective” Publication: Terrorism Monitor, Jamestown Foundation, Volume: 8 Issue: 10; “CIA Drone Strikes in Pakistan’s FATA Region and the “Loss” of Actionable Intelligence: A Pashtun Perspective”. Publication: Terrorism Monitor, Jamestown Foundation, Volume: 8, Issue 15, April 17, 2010 2

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29

“Drone attacks -- a survey”, The News dated March 05, 2009, http://criticalppp.com/archives/26239; “Drone attacks: challenging some fabrications”, The Daily Times, January 02, 2010, http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010\01\02\story_2-1-2010 _pg3_5; “Drone attacks and US reputation”, The Daily Times, February 06, 2010 http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010\02\06\story_6-22010_pg3_4, ; “Drone strikes: some problematic assumptions”, The Daily Times, dated 26 Feburary 2011, http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011 \02\26\story_26-2-2011_ pg3_4 16 Vol. 21, Issue 3, September 2010 17 “Public Opinion in Pakistan’s Tribal Regions”, New America Foundation/ Terror Free Tomorrow Public Opinion Survey, September 2010, available on: http://www.newamerica.net/sites/newamerica.net/files/policydocs/FATApoll.pdf 18 Daily Times dated 9 October 2010. Available on: http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010%5C10%5C09%5Cstory_910-2010_pg3_4 19 AIRRA is the first Pakhtun think tank that has taken upon itself the responsibility to challenge the fabricated notions about the Pakhtun culture, both in the context of the war on terror, and before it. Journalists and researchers around the world took note of the think tank’s work. But the work of the think tank has always been greatly hampered by financial constraints. It has always been understaffed and lacked even basic resources. More than once the authorities cut off the electricity supply to AIRRA due to non-payment of the utility bills. A small core group of researchers and activists used to run this think tank on a voluntary basis. These members are not rich people and, like ordinary Pakistanis, struggle with the ever rising inflation in Pakistan. The Pakhtun nationalist party, ANP, has not supported AIRRA. A top ANP leader said that no Pakhtun think tank could independently work in Pakistan due to the military establishment’s pressure. AIRRA too has been facing some pressure from the intelligence agencies of Pakistan. The current position is that, mainly due to lack of sustainable financial support, AIRRA is dormant. Some Pakhtun nationalists intend to reactivate it by the end of 2011 through their meager resources. Currently, there is no hope of support from the ANP or any affluent Pakhtun. 20 “Drone Attacks- a Survey”, The News, 5, March 2009. http://criticalppp.com/archives/26239 21 “New Light on the Accuracy of the CIA’s Predator Drone Campaign in Pakistan”, Publication: Terrorism Monitor Volume: 8 Issue: 41. http://www.jamestown.org/single/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=3716 5&tx_ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=7&cHash=cdd658051e 22 “Demystifying the Drone”, Daily Times, 27 October 2010. http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010\10\27\story_27-102010_pg3_5 23 For example, see my column “Urdu Media: Dirty and Dangerous” in the Daily Times dated February 19, 2011 about one of such planted stories:

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http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011%5C02%5C19%5Cstory_19 -2-2011_pg3_2 24 Interviews with eyewitnesses to the drone attacks from Waziristan and Orakzai. 25 For a view of the Pakistani Left position on the drone attacks see “Drone Attacks: Left Should Not Be Seen As Collaborationist” on http://www.viewpointonline.net/drone-debate-left-should-not-be-seen-ascollaborationist.html ; “Drone and the Left Wing Politics” on http://www.viewpointonline.net/drones-and-left-politics.html 26 “Death From Above, Outrage Down Below”, David Kilkullen and Andrew McDonald Exum, New York Times dated May 16, 2009, available on: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/17/opinion/17exum.html?_r=1&scp=5&sq=davi d%20Kilcullen&st=cse 27 Moreover, there have been life attempts on the top ANP leader, Asfandyar Wali, and his sister. The only son of the ANP provincial minister, Mian Aftikhar, has been target-killed. Ajmal Khan, a close relative of Asfandyar Wali, has been kidnapped and still in the custody of the militants. Most probably he would killed if ANP openly expressed support of the drone attacks. 28 See detail on this link: http://www.onepakistan.com/news/top-stories/65228drone-nato-attacks-blow-to-sovereignty-kp-assembly.html 29 See the text of Peshawar Declaration February 2010 on this link: http://www.pukhtunkhwa.com/id70.html 30 For example, the anti-Taliban lashkar in Adeyzai. See chapter 7 31 Interview with a senior PMAP leader, Senator Abdul Rahim Mando Khel, Senior Deputy Chairman PMAP 32 Interview with Dr Said Alam Mahsud 33 For example, “The Year of the Drone Misinformation” published in Small War and Insurgencies, Vol. 21, Issue 3, September 2010 34 “Drone Attacks: a Critical Perspective”, online weekly viewpoint November 2010, on: http://www.viewpointonline.net/drone-attacks-a-critical-perspective.html 35 See text of Peshawar Declaration on this link: http://khyberwatch.com/nandara/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id= 809&Itemid=84 36 See text of Peshawar Declaration on this link: http://www.pukhtunkhwa.com/id70.html 37 ibid 38 “Drone Strike Death: Waziristan Tribesman to Sue CIA”, daily Express Tribune, November 30, 2010, on: http://tribune.com.pk/story/83484/drone-strike-victimdemands-compensation-for-family-deaths/ 39 ibid 40 Discussion with a former student of the University of Peshawar, who was a contemporary student of Karim Khan in the university. He knew Karim Khan through his student friends from Waziristan. 41 Discussions with two political activists and a tribal leader from North Waziristan 42 “Drone Attacks in Pakistan”, Wikipedia,

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drone_attacks_in_Pakistan#cite_refLongWarJournal_122-1 43 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drone_attacks_in_Pakistan#cite_ref-LongWarJournal _122-0 44 “Killing scares media away from Waziristan”, The Christian Science Monitor, http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0622/p07s02-wosc.html 45 ibid 46 “Slain tribal area journalist’s widow murdered”, Reporters Without Borders, 17 November, 2007 47 “Abducted BBC journalist released”, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6169768.stm 48 Interviews with three the tribesmen from Waziristan who are former students of Quaid-e-Azam University. These tribesmen were in the group of the students who attempted to hold a public demonstration against the ISI, but were forced to give up the plan. 49 “Mumbai Attacks: End of Day 2”, New York Times, dated 27 November 2008, http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/27/mumbai-attacks-updates/ 50 “Drone Strikes Death: Waziristan Tribesman to Sue CIA”, daily Express Tribune, dated 30 November 2010. http://tribune.com.pk/story/83484/drone-strikevictim-demands-compensation-for-family-deaths/ 51 “CIA withdraws station chief from Pakistan after threats”, Daily Express Tribune, dated 18 December 2010, http://tribune.com.pk/story/91458/ciawithdraws-spy-from-pakistan-after-threats-official/ 52 “Pakistani Role Is Suspected in Revealing U.S. Spy’s Name”, Yew York Times, dated 17 December 2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/18/world/asia/18pstan.html 53 Pakistani Role Is Suspected in Revealing U.S. Spy’s Name”, Yew York Times, dated 17 December 2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/18/world/asia/18pstan.html 54 “Reporting ''war on terror'', http://www.newageislam.com/NewAgeIslamWarOnTerror_1.aspx?ArticleID=2508 55 “Killing scares media away from Waziristan”, The Christian Science Monitor, http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0622/p07s02-wosc.html 56 For example, see “Drone Strikes: Some Problematic Assumption”, Daily Times dated 26 Feburary, 2011. http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011%5C02%5C26%5Cstory_26 -2-2011_pg3_4 57 For a view of how the dominant pro-establishment and pro-Taliban journalists and columnists fabricate stories in Pakistan media read ‘‘Reporting ''war on terror', by Farooq Sulehria, 26 Feb 2010, NewAgeIslam.Com. Available at: http://www.newageislam.com/NewAgeIslamWarOnTerror_1.aspx?ArticleID=2508

CHAPTER TWO LASHKARS AND ANTI-TALIBAN LASHKARS IN PAKHTUN CULTURE

This chapter elaborates the role and status of lashkar in the Pakhtun tribal context. It also describes the background of anti-Taliban lashkars in FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa that were established in the context of the war on terror.

1) Introduction FATA is a part of Pakistan as per the Constitution of the country1. However, the state of Pakistan has hardly taken up its basic responsibilities towards the development of the tribesmen and women of the area. “FATA can be regarded as the biggest NGO in the world- a society of over three million people that fends for itself in almost every sphere of life in the absence of the state support and protection”, says Dr Said Alam Mahsud, a Pakhtun nationalist political leader from South Waziristan. Dr Mahsud’s view is not an exaggeration. FATA is probably the only area in the world where the state sublets even its primary responsibility, e.g. security, to its citizens and that too without any material compensation. Moreover, the fundamental human rights of Pakistani citizens, which are guaranteed by the Constitution of Pakistan, do not apply in FATA. Political parties of Pakistan are legally banned from functioning in the area, whereas proTaliban and Al-Qaida religious political parties, like JUI(F) and JI, are allowed to work under the banner of religion from mosques and madrasas. Furthermore, writ of the Supreme and High Courts of Pakistan does not extend over the region. The tribal people have been left to fend for themselves in issues ranging from local security to resolution of interand intra-tribal disputes. Any society in the world confronting the absence of state protection would most probably look at its traditions, customs, and history to establish norms and principles for social organization and peace. FATA tribal society too does so to maintain socio-political peace and order. Jirga

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is the institution in the tribal traditions that ensures peace and participation of the larger tribal society in public affairs. Lashkar is merely a temporary instrument of jirga. Therefore, I would first elaborate the notion of jirga in the Pakhtun tribal context before coming to the concept of lashkar.

2) Jirga in the Tribal Context Jirga is a word of “Turkish language, which means to bring together, to circle, or to sit around in a circle to be of equal status” (Waziri, 2009). Jirga is a council of tribal elders (or leaders) who are appointed by a consensus in a tribal community. The institution of jirga is not limited to only “elders” and, depending upon the issue under consideration, young men can also be part of it. A jirga may have two or more members depending upon the issue at hand. Jirga is an important decision making body under Pakhtunwali and “exercises both judicial and executive roles to settle all disputes pertaining to the distribution of land, properties, blood feuds, blood money and other important inter-tribal and intra-tribal affairs on the basis of tribal conventions, traditions and principles of justice” (Taizi, 2007:5). Jirga settles both individual and collective disputes. There are no pre-existing jirgas in the tribal context. One is made when there is a need for it; for example, in individual cases both parties in the dispute may request with mutual consensus any number of the available tribal leaders in the local community to make a jirga to settle their disputes. Similarly, a grand tribal jirga is made to deal with an issue concerning the entire tribe, community or village. A Jirga has no hard and fast rules for dispute resolution. Disputes are contextually resolved through rigorous and logical discussions with both involved parties. It is always the aim of the jirga to arrive at a settlement that is mutually acceptable to both involved parties. In summery “Jirga is a fairly “democratic” institution in the tribal system which solves problems through open, clear and critical discussions and provokes (promotes) tough dialogue to solve every matter on logical bases through majority (opinion) or by unanimous votes” (Waziri, 2009). In a jirga system, disputes within or outside a tribe, are solved peacefully. Thus the tribal norm is to peacefully resolve all kinds of dispute through jirga. In rare cases, the jirga may have to use force to implement its decision. Thus, a jirga can form a tribal lashkar to enforce jirga decisions if needed (Fair and Chalk, 2006:11).

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3) Tribal Lashkar The term lashkar means “troops” (Waziri, 2009). Western writers have referred to lashkar as “raiding party” (Garrett, 2008:14) and “militia” (Fair and Chalk, 2006:11). The concept of lashkar in FATA is that of formation of an armed group as a temporary instrument for the execution of a decision of a tribal jirga (council). This emerges largely in cases of decisions against individual people of the tribe. Lashkar raised during a conflict with another tribe or clan is again a temporary measure. This is mostly in cases of dispute over water, a piece of land or mountain and is used for taking its possession from the other group. This is, in most cases an operation of a few hours or days, or in very extreme cases a few weeks or a month. The lashkar remains in control of the tribal jirga, which disperses it upon the completion of the objective for which the lashkar has been raised, and thus the armed men of the lashkar go back to their ordinary lives. Most people in FATA have small weapons like pistols, Kalashnikovs etc. for personal security because the Pakistani state does not provide security to the tribesmen. Thus, most armed men use personal weapons for the purpose of lashkar. The tribesmen donate a certain amount of money per household to buy heavy weapons, like machine guns etc., in cases where such heavy weapons are needed. Such tribal lashkars are raised by obliging every family or clan to give a specified number of men for the fight. In practice, almost every house has one or more male members actively participating in the conflict, and the displacement of families is largely out of the question. There has been a traditional unwritten but absolutely inviolable code of conduct of sparing children and women during the conflict, rendering the issue of human displacement irrelevant. Hence, in FATA, there is an old tradition of tribal councils (jirgas) to maintain social order in their particular areas. While a jirga commonly resolves disputes peacefully, it can form an ad hoc armed militia (lashkar) comprised of local tribesmen to settle disputes by force.

4) Anti-Taliban Lashkar and the War on Terror Several anti-Taliban lashkars were made in FATA and KhyberPakhtunkhwa in response to growing Taliban atrocities and a lack of state protection against the Taliban brutalities. Never in the Pakhtun history have there been so many lashkars in a given time as have emerged in the

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context of the war on terror. Most members of the lashkars had never been fond of violence. They would prefer a peaceful and quiet life. The state's inability or unwillingness to protect them forced them to take up weapons in self-defence. A great deal of misinformation about these lashkars has been circulated by the media and think tanks. One key misconception is that lashkars are in support of the Pakistani government2. Similarly, Bill Roggio thoroughly misinforms when he claims that “the tribes’ unwillingness to cooperate with the government and the military (of Pakistan)” complicates the tribal resistance to the Taliban3. Also, Jason Motlagh misguides his readers of the daily Washington Times when he reports that the formation of anti-Taliban lashkars could “lead to more attacks on the US (troops in Afghanistan) and Pakistani forces or a civil war in the borderlands4”. Referring to some unnamed people “familiar with the region (FATA)”, Motlagh claims that the formation of the anti-Taliban lashkars “disregards tribal mores and could stoke blood feuds and create private armies beyond the state's control5”. Similarly, two reports, “Pakistan countering militancy in FATA”, October 2009, and “Reforming Pakistan’s criminal justice system”, December 2010, authored by the International Crisis Group (ICG), provide misleading information about anti-Taliban lashkars. The ICG’s reports claim that the anti-Taliban lashkars “are often nothing more than renegade squads comprising former Taliban foot soldiers6”. In the following sections I will respond to the misinformation.

4.1) Anti-Taliban Lashkars in FATA- Background Under American pressure, Pakistan- led by the military dictator, Gen Musharraf- joined the US-led war on terror following the 9/11 attacks on the US. Clandestinely, it facilitated the arrival into FATA of the escaping Al-Qaida and Taliban militants from the US bombing in Afghanistan, and their settlement in the tribal area. They were implanted in Waziristan. Targeted killing of those who opposed the presence of the alien militants in Waziristan began in 2003. Their families hold the ISI accountable for the murders. Unknown young men in Waziristan, like Nek Muhammad and Abdullah Mahsud, were first made Taliban leaders and then were imposed on the tribesmen as “leaders” through “peace deals” after dubious military operations that left the Taliban untouched, but killed antiTaliban tribesmen, as well as innocent tribal women and children. Through Gen. Safdar Hussain, the Pakistani army made a “peace deal” in 2004 with Al-Qaida militants led by Nek Muhammad, which led to the

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discrediting and elimination of the tribal authority led by tribal leaders like Mirza Alam Yargul Khel and Malik Faridullah Khan. It is indeed interesting to note that even a writer like Zahid Hussain, who spreads misleading information about FATA7, also quotes in his recent book, Scorpion Tail, another Pakistani general, Hamid Khan, who is of the opinion that the treaty made by Gen. Safdar Hussian with Nek Muhammad was responsible for all the jihadi terrorism that Pakistan is now experiencing (2010:86). He also says that the treaty by Gen. Safdar Hussain left all the tribal elders at the mercy of militants as they were indirectly declared by the military establishment as politically legitimate militants to override the authority of the tribal leaders (ibid). It is thus no wonder that the targeted killing of the South Waziristan tribal leaders, who could have made tribal lashkar against the militants, started in 2003; for example, the targeted killing of anti-Taliban tribal leader Farooq Yargul Khel. The targeted killings of the anti-Taliban tribal leaders accelerated following the Pakistani army’s “peace deal” with the Al-Qaida trained Taliban commander Nek Muhammad. Several tribal leaders were killed, which forced several other tribal leaders to flee for their lives. Those who remained in Waziristan were forced to live a quiet life. The Taliban and Al-Qaida established a strong foothold in Waziristan and overpowered the local tribes. From Waziristan the Taliban began to expand their influence in other FATA areas and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. The state looked as an unconcerned bystander as the Taliban, in league with Al-Qaida, comfortably continued to commit the kinds of atrocities never previously experienced by the people of FATA, such as beheadings. Pakistani media that often follow the establishment’s policy of Taliban control over FATA, often do not report the human sufferings in the area at the hands of the militants as well as the Pakistani army. Instead the media continue to this date to propagate the establishment line, i.e. that the Taliban have widespread public support in FATA. Lies, such as that the tribes of FATA have given refuge to foreign militants due to shared Islamic bonds and that they (foreign militants) have married women in the local tribes, are being circulated. Thus in this context of sheer helplessness many local tribal jirgas responded to the growing Taliban atrocities in their communities with Anti-Taliban lashkars. Tribesmen across FATA had learnt their lesson from Waziristan. They knew what happens when an area (Waziristan in this case) is taken over by the Taliban. One or more fake military operations follow, in which local civilians are killed and the Taliban are given safe passage during, or even before, the onset of the operations. Subsequently, there is a large scale human displacement from the area and the innocent tribal civilians have to

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live, in the words of an Ali Khel tribal leader, “like stray dogs in the IDPs camps”. “We made the anti-Taliban lashkar because we did not want our people to become IDPs”, says Bahram Khan, leader of the anti-Taliban lashkar in district Dir. In summary, the anti-Taliban lashkars are the local tribal communities’ desperate response, born out of sheer helplessness caused by the Taliban atrocities and lack of state help to protect the communities from the Taliban.

A view of government girls’ college in Orakzai, FATA, bombed by the Taliban

4.2) Are Anti-Taliban Lashkar Pro-Government of Pakistan? A new PPP-led, democratically elected government came to power in Pakistan following the general elections in 2008. In Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, a Pakhtun nationalist party ANP, won the election and took power in the province in a coalition with the PPP. Both ANP and PPP have a clear antiTaliban stance. Both parties have greatly suffered in acts of terrorism committed by the Taliban. The PPP lost its leader Benazir Bhutto along with several party workers and hundreds of ANP legislators and workers have been target-killed by the Taliban.

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It is in this context that the Government of Pakistan and especially the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government encouraged the lashkar formation through local authorities8. The key idea was to defeat the Taliban through a popular jirga-backed resistance supported by the democratically elected government. The local tribal jirgas that organized the lashkars were referred to as “peace committees” in the official discourse. The KhyberPakhtunkhwa government even issued letters of appreciation to some of the peace committees (jirgas) wherein the government commended the committees’ work for “ensuring maintenance of peace and tranquillity in the concerned areas in collaboration with law-enforcement agencies9”. Reportedly, the authorities believed that mobilization of the people was the way to isolate the militants and deny them sanctuary10. The authorities, therefore, promised money, weapons, ammunitions, and other kinds of state support to the lashkar leaders. The promises, however, were almost never fulfilled. Why? The PPP and ANP leaders do not admit it publicly, yet privately they say that the powerful ISI does not like the idea of lashkar formation. Any popular idea that contradicts the widely held Pakistani perception- e.g. that the Taliban are backed by a wider tribal public support, constructed through the pro-establishment Pakistani media and intellectuals and religious groups- is not acceptable to the ISI. Consequently, the lashkars never had state support in material terms. Obstruction of state support to the lashkars is not the only issue where the powerful military establishment of Pakistan thwarted the civilian leadership to change the situation in FATA. The Extension of Pakistan’s Political Parties Act, PPA, to FATA is part of the manifestos of both PPP and ANP. The late Benazir Bhutto, the PPP leader, had a petition in the Supreme Court of Pakistan to allow political parties in the tribal area (Bhutto, 2008:11). President Zardari announced the extension of the PPA to FATA on 14 August 2009. The announcement was never followed by a formal notification, again under the establishment’s pressure. The establishment is not ready to allow civilian control over FATA. I met leaders and volunteers of several lashkars across FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. All lashkar members complained of an acute shortage of weapons, ammunitions, and financial resources in their antiTaliban resistance. In most cases, lashkars are helping themselves, i.e. the local people are putting whatever meagre financial resources they might have towards financing their resistance. There is no one to offer material or even moral support to their resistance, including, of course, the government of Pakistan. Generally, the media in Pakistan ignore the lashkar or belittle or even defame their struggle.

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Haji Malik, the assassinated leader of the anti-Taliban lashkar in Adeyzai in rural Peshawar, told me (when I met him before his targeted killing) that he had spent his lifelong savings, Rs 200,000, on the antiTaliban lashkar. He informed me that he made that money in his property dealing business and in the Middle East where he worked as a driver for many years. He said that he now keeps requesting his friends, relatives, and fellow villagers to continue supporting the lashkar with whatever they can. The opinion of ICG that anti-Taliban lashkars “are often nothing more than renegade squads comprising former Taliban foot soldiers” is factually wrong in the case of most anti-Taliban lashkars. Similarly, the ICG report specifically claims that the founder of the Adeyzai lashkar, Haji Malik, supported the Taliban until his arrest in 2008 and that “his lashkar eventually refused to cooperate with the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police in anti-Taliban operations, citing insufficient weapons11”. This is far from the truth. The fact is that the Adeyzai lashkar has a good record of cooperation with the police and the military. However, in December 2010 the lashkar threatened to end cooperation with the government due to lack of state support. The ICG never referred to the context in which the lashkar was threatening to end cooperation with the government. The lashkar, however, continues to cooperate with the authorities to this date despite the threat. I challenged the ICG’s claim through my column in the Daily Times12. The ICG never responded to the challenge. I also shared the ICG reports with the Adeyzai lashkar leaders. They were disappointed and said that the misleading ICG information was caused by a lack of direct interaction between the organization and the lashkar volunteers on the ground. Therefore, they invited the ICG to Adeyzai for direct discussions. I extended the invitation to the ICG on behalf of the lashkar leaders through my column in the Daily Times13. The ICG never responded to the invitation. Going to Adeyzai may be a life threatening exercise. This probably explains the ICG’s silence over the invitation. However, the inability of the ICG writers to reach out to Adeyzai due to security concerns does not provide them with a justification to spread distorted information about the anti-Taliban lashkar. One would expect the ICG to ensure that their Pakistan-related writers respect the necessary professional considerations, including direct interactions with the lashkar leaders, as well as the local communities that provide volunteers to the lashkars. Haji Malik first gave his lifelong savings and then his life in the antiTaliban resistance. This is the situation of almost all anti-Taliban peace

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committees and lashkars all over Pakhtunkhwa province and FATA. Several lashkar leaders informed me that many members of their lashkars have lost their lives in armed clashes with the Taliban and there is just no one, including the government of Pakistan, to take care of their families. For the government of Pakistan, they complained, these widows and orphans just do not exist. Nobody else from outside their villages comes forward to help either. I also met several family members of the martyred lashkar people. Many, if not the majority of them, need immediate and sustainable financial help for expenditures related to subsistence, utility bills, children’s education, and healthcare of ailing relatives, especially children and the elderly. How can the lashkar be termed “progovernment” when the government provides them with no material support? To call them “pro-government” simply because the government made empty promises of help with the lashkars in the beginning is misleading. Contrary to Roggio’s claim regarding the “unwillingness (of the tribes) to cooperate with the government and the military”, the tribes have been requesting the government of Pakistan to support the lashkars. The Ali Khel lashkar that destroyed several centres of the Taliban in Orakzai was given no material support from the government of Pakistan. After the assassination of the entire tribal leadership of the Ali Khel tribe in a suicide attack by the Taliban, the tribesmen thronged the office of the PA Orakzai with requests with tearful eyes for state security over the main roads leading to the Ali Khel area to ensure no more Taliban suicide bombers entered the Ali Khel territory. The PA instead snubbed the Ali Khels for being “too harsh” on the Taliban. He categorically told the grieving Ali Khels that they must never expect any state help, if they continue to oppose the Taliban. Similarly, the Adeyzai lashkar, initially supported by the provincial government of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa with some Klashenkov rifles and cartridges, has been abandoned by the government seemingly under pressure from the ISI. The lashkars genuinely need government support, because they are up in arms against the well-armed and well-financed Taliban and Al-Qaida. The latter have an almost unlimited supply of money to procure weapons and vehicles, pay its ranks and files and so on. Recent Wikileaks cables indicate that the oil rich Saudi Arabia is the “cash machine” for terrorists groups like Al-Qaida, Lashkar-e-Taiba and Afghan Taliban14 in Pakistan, including FATA. Three other rich Arab kingdoms, Qatar, Kuwait, and the United Arab Emirates also contribute generous funds to the terrorists in Pakistan15. The Taliban extort money from UAE based Pakhtun16. They also raise money by kidnapping Pakhtun businessmen in Dubai or their relatives17. Moreover, the Taliban generate money by kidnapping local

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Pakhtun in FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. They also make money by looting the houses of their opponents and as well as ordinary tribesmen after having “conquered” their villages. In Orakzai they plundered the houses of Shia Ali Khels and Sikh businessmen. Sunni tribesmen also complain that the Taliban looted their houses after the former fled due to the military operation. The Taliban also loot banks, as well as benefit from drug money. Moreover, they also have financial links with the timber mafia. On the other hand, the anti-Taliban lashkars are not supported by any foreign powers. They do not generate funds through criminal activities. Most of the lashkar-men are drivers, farmers, or linked with small business. They and their tribes put together whatever they can to support the lashkar. “We (families of the lashkarmen) contribute money to buy bread and vegetables for daily food consumption. This is how we make for the lashkar ration”, says a leader of the Salarzai lashkar. The proof of the lashkars’ financial constraints is that they have far inferior weapons and vehicles than the Taliban. They do not even have the money to compensate the families of the fellow lashkar-men who died in clashes with the Taliban. Moreover, the Taliban hit the entire community backing the lashkar. The Feroz Khel tribesmen in Orakzai stopped the Taliban from entering their area by force. The Taliban retaliated by bombing the entire marketplace, a source of earnings for many hundreds of the local tribesmen. They also bombed the shops of Adeyzai villagers to punish them for backing the village lashkar. There are many other cases of the Taliban attacks on the economic sources and resources of the communities that provide manpower to the lashkars. It is therefore no surprise that the lashkars have suffered great casualties due to their financial inferiority to the Taliban and it is in this context that they seek help from the government, especially in terms of weapons, financial compensation for the families of the martyred lashkar-men, and necessary support from the security forces in case of clashes with the Taliban. Far from being supported by the government, the lashkar leaders complain that their anti-Taliban struggle is being obstructed by the intelligence agencies of Pakistan. Leaders of the anti-Taliban lashkar of the Salarzai tribe in Bajaur informed me that they hold the ISI responsible for the targeted killing of all their lashkar leaders. “The Taliban are just a façade. The real force is the ISI punishing us for our anti-Taliban struggle”, said one of the leaders. Leaders of the lashkar as well as scores of Bajaur IDPs, who I interviewed in Kacha Ghari IDP’s camp in Peshawar, allege that the military purposely targeted only those villages in Bajaur that were known for their anti-Taliban stance and avoided firing in

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the villages that were under Taliban control. One Salarzai leader said he went to the office of the Pakistan army Colonel Sajjad, who was bombing the anti-Taliban villages of Bajaur from his base in Timergara. He saw a big Bajaur map affixed on the wall in the office of Col. Sajjad. The map had several encircled villages. Col. Sajjad informed him that the map had been handed over to him by his commanders with the order to bomb all the encircled villages. “None of the encircled villages- Butmali, Danqul, Attkay, Matasha, Baro, Raghjan and Nazkai- had Taliban in them and I had an exchange of heated words with Col Sajjad over the map” said the Salarzai lashkar leader. In summer 2009 the anti-Taliban lashkar in Feroz Khel, Orakzai, captured several militants after they killed some innocent Feroz Khel tribesmen. Three of the militants were foreigners. They could not speak Pashto or Urdu languages. According to the Feroz Khel lashkar members they looked like Uzbek or Chechen. Rather than taking the law into their own hands by killing the militants, the lashkar presented them to the political administration Orakzai for necessary legal action against them for killing the three tribesmen. To the utter surprise of the Feroz Khel tribesmen, the political authorities refused to take custody of them and ordered the Feroz Khel tribal leaders to deal with the militants on their own. There are plenty of other such examples, but the point that I wish to make is that lashkars, all over FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, have serious complaints in terms of the state collusion with the Taliban. In a sense, however, the anti-Taliban lashkars may be termed as progovernment. They have no agenda against the state or any specific government of Pakistan. Unlike Al-Qaida and the Taliban, they do not have an international or national political agenda. All they want is to restore the writ of the government of Pakistan in their villages and towns as it existed before the arrival of the Taliban and go back to their normal lives as drivers, farmers, and labour-migrants etc. Motlagh’s report that the lashkars may “lead to more attacks on the US” forces in Afghanistan and on the Pakistani army reflects his lack of ground information. All lashkar leaders who I interviewed support the US drone attacks on Al-Qaida and the Taliban. All of them demand targeted military operations from the Pakistani army to eliminate the militants at the earliest opportunity so that they are relieved of the lashkar responsibility that they have taken upon themselves in defence of their relatives’ and fellow tribesmen’s lives due to the lack of state protection. Motlagh’s claim about civil war in FATA is also totally misplaced. All anti-Taliban lashkars are backed by their respective tribes through grand

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and popular tribal jirgas. How can there be a civil war when an overwhelming majority of the tribesmen are behind the anti-Taliban lashkars and support their cause through whatever they can afford? The tribesmen who I interviewed inform me that even the Pakhtun terrorists are a minority in the ranks and files of the Taliban outfits that control several parts of FATA. In this regard it would be pertinent to appreciate an author, Mujahid Hussain, for writing his extraordinary book, Punjabi Taliban that categorically informs that the Punjab province of Pakistan provides most of the manpower to the jihadi groups in FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. What are these Punjabis and foreign (Arab, Uzbek, African) militants doing in FATA? The Pakhtun never invited them to their land. Why should the Pakhtun not make lashkars against them and their local partners- the Pakhtun Taliban, who make up a fringe element of Pakhtun society?

4.3) Taliban, Anti-Taliban Lashkar and Pakhtunwali As stated above, the making of tribal lashkars is a part of the tribal culture within the contours of Pakhtunwali. Contrary to the widespread media discourse- that there is popular insurgency in FATA and the Taliban outfits are a tribal backlash to Pakistan’s joining of the US war on terrorthere is in reality no popular insurgency or backlash in FATA in terms of the Taliban’s activities. If there is any Pakhtun popular backlash in FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, it is anti-Taliban, especially in the form of lashkars. As per Pakhtunwali, the lashkars are backed by popular tribal support through grand jirgas. The Taliban never had such jirga support. In the entire of FATA or Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa there has never been a single grand tribal jirga that supported the Taliban. Contrary to this, all antiTaliban lashkars are backed by grand tribal jirgas of the respective tribes and communities or villages. The Taliban, on the other hand, bomb jirgas and ban it altogether in places they take over. There is thus no doubt that the Taliban are afraid of the popular backing of these lashkars and their leaders are on the top of their hit list. Imran Khan, a Pakhtun observer of the Taliban and anti-Taliban lashkars has very rightly pointed out that “in terms of identity and cause, these (anti-Taliban lashkars are far more representative of the Pakhtun (and Pkahtunwali) than their ethnically diversified opposition18”- the Taliban. The Pakhtun Taliban have international and national links, in terms of ideological and material resources, to Al-Qaida and the Punjabi Taliban. The anti-Taliban lashkar have no such ideological links in Pakistan or in the wider world. In fact media in Pakistan and abroad ignore the anti-Taliban lashkars, or distort

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their image, Islamists in Pakistan scorn them and international think tanks like the ICG assassinate their character. The Taliban are the embodiment of a global Muslim Ummah. The anti-Taliban lashkars are a reflection of the clan or tribe based Pakhtunwali. The two notions (Muslim Ummah and Pakhtunwali) are not one and the same. Above all, the two may not always nicely fit into each other. In this case (Taliban vs anti-Taliban lashkar), the two are mutually exclusive and cannot coexist with one another in peace and harmony.

4.4) Anti-Taliban Lashkar - An Exercise in Self-Defence I, respectfully, disagree with many people in Pakistan, mostly nonPakhtun, including some prominent civil society activists, who object to the idea of making armed lashkars against the Taliban. Their basic argument is that because the lashkars in Afghanistan resulted in warlords, the lashkars in FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa will therefore also produce warlords. This is largely a misplaced reasoning that contradicts today’s ground reality in the Pakhtun areas, as well as world history in similar situations, where people took weapons in self-defence. The formation of anti-Taliban lashkars is an exercise in self-defence. What should the citizens do when their state is unable or unwilling to protect their lives, and their political leaders are too compromised to take a clear stance? Should they keep requesting that the state protect them and that the leaders give up compromises? In the meanwhile, should they leave themselves exposed to serious dangers or take whatever life-protecting measures may be possible? Much of the upper-middle class- detractors of the anti-Taliban lashkars- always go for the second option, hiring private security guards to protect their families. What should the poor villagers in FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa do? They neither have the means to hire private security guards nor the possibility of moving to the safety of foreign lands. They will naturally look into their tradition to deal with the situation, which in this case is the building of lashkars. The tribal lashkars never became a security problem for the local Pakhtun or the wider society in Pakistan in the past. The lashkar leaders whom I interviewed repeatedly told me this is not the life they wish for and that they were forced by the circumstances to raise anti-Taliban lashkars. They said they would be the happiest men the day the state provided security to their villages and thus lashkars would cease to exist. In this context, I understand that the people who keep their lives well protected through private security guards have no moral standing to question the formation of lashkars.

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Moreover, world history also shows that working class people took up weapons in self-defence without producing warlords. If the working class militias in self-defence had led to warlordism, Europe and the US today would be under the rule of warlords. As late as the 1930s, the workers at General Motors for instance defended themselves with grenades and guns when they occupied some plants in Flint. Italians, French, Norwegians, Dutch and all others occupied by Nazi Germany, built militias to resist fascism. German workers themselves organized militias to fight Nazi brutalities. Likewise, in Italy and Spain, the two countries that had passed into the hands of fascism, workers built militias in self-defence. Above all, lashkars are no novelty in FATA. For centuries, we have a tradition of lashkars, not warlords in the tribal areas. It is a misplaced notion to compare the foreign-assisted war militia in Afghanistan with the anti-Taliban lashkars in Pakistan. Warlords in Afghanistan were not a product of tribal lashkars or Pakhtunwali, but of CIA-ISI manipulation to defeat the Soviets back in the 1980s. These warlords were encouraged to fund their jihad with drug peddling. Pakistani lashkars are not supported by any foreign powers. The proof is that they have far inferior weapons than the Taliban and suffer from a lack of finances. The mainstream media in Pakistan ignores them and they are clearly an anomaly in the state’s scheme of strategic depth in Afghanistan. On top of that, powerful individuals with access to public forums continue to tarnish their image with twisted arguments. Even if there is a remote possibility that some of the lashkar leaders could end up as warlords, given the fact that so many regional and global powers are eyeing the area, should we allow the Taliban to keep slaughtering the tribal people lest this remote possibility should come true? But the issue is that giving up the idea of lashkars may not be an option from the perspective of the villagers, who daily face the threats of kidnapping for ransom and killing by the Taliban.

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A view of a boys’ high school in Orakzai, FATA, burnt down by the Taliban

4.5) From Anti-Taliban Lashkars towards a Way Forward From the above reasoning it should not be concluded that I am pushing anti-Taliban lashkar as the “best methodology” to defeat the Taliban and Al-Qaida. I would also agree that concentrating weapons in private hands for a prolonged period of time might lead to some unintended consequences, despite sincere intentions and efforts behind the exercise, because today so many external powers are eyeing the region. I would, however, underline two things: one, the detractors must acknowledge that lashkar is an exercise in self-defence out of sheer helplessness in the absence of state protection; and two, they must come up with alternative solutions to lashkars without un-necessarily indulging in character assassination of the lashkar leaders and rubbishing the idea of lashkars on the basis of unverified media reports. The lashkar leaders aim at peace and writ of the government in their villages and communities. The same is the aim of the detractors. The lashkar volunteers would welcome any arrangements that would give them and their families the opportunity to go back to their normal lives in peace.

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In 2009, the International Crisis Group put forward the idea of merging FATA with Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa so as to extend the jurisdiction of the provincial police department over the tribal area19. The report also suggests the merger of the tribal police force (the Khasadars and levies) into the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa police force after necessary police training. This is a positive idea and can be further elaborated and refined for durable security in the region, as well as job opportunities in the police department for the tribal youth, including many young lashkar volunteers, who are unemployed. The government of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa also implemented a new idea to deal with the terrorism in Swat with the help of the local people. Hundreds of young men, who could be part of a local lashkars, were recruited in the newly established institution- the community police- under the control of the provincial police authorities. Familiarity of the community policemen with the local communities and their commitment to peace in their area can significantly contribute to the capabilities of the provincial police authorities to deal with the terrorism in Swat. A similar idea may be implemented in FATA to accommodate the tribal youth, including the young lashkar volunteers, after proper training, in the state law enforcement agencies. The agencies must be under civilian control, but for that to happen, the intelligence agencies of Pakistan must stop using FATA as a strategic space for strategic objectives in Afghanistan. Unfortunately, there are no signs of this happening in the foreseeable future.

4.6) Anti-Taliban Lashkars in FATA The following list of anti-Taliban lashkars in FATA and KhyberPakhtunkhwa, formed in the context of the war on terror, is in no way exhaustive. Owing to time and security constraints, reaching out to leaders of all the anti-Taliban lashkars all over FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa was not possible. I hope the lashkars not discussed here will feature in my next book. The following list, however, gives an idea of the anti-Taliban lashkars formed in FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. 4.6.1) Bajaur Agency The Salarzai tribe in Bajaur is arguably the first tribe in FATA that raised an anti-Taliban lashkar. The grand Salarzai tribal jirga decided to resist the presence of the Taliban on their soil. In line with the jirga decision, the Taliban have been driven out of the Salarzai area. The Salarzai lashkar,

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mostly made up of labourers and peasants, has for years successfully kept the Salarzai area free of the Taliban to this date. However, the entire Salarzai tribe has been harshly punished for its tough anti-Taliban stance. Tens of Salarzai lashkar leaders, as well as ordinary tribesmen, have been target-killed. The tribe holds the ISI responsible for the targeted killings. For a view of the Salarzai struggle against Taliban, see the book Armageddon in Pakistan. The following tribal leaders of the Salarzai tribe were target-killed in the resistance against the Taliban: Abdul Rehman Khan, Gul Mohammad, Juma Khan, Kashar Khan, Malik Abdul Qayum, Malik Bakhtar, Malik Fazal Karim, Malik Wazir Khan, Mohammad Akbar, Mohammad Amin, Mohammad Aziz, Mohammad Iqbal, Mohammad Nabi, Mohammad Shah, Said Jan, Sardar Khan, Syed Ghafur, Syed Mohammad, Taj Mohammad, Wahab, Wajeeudin, Yousuf Khan, Zakir Khan and Zia-u-Din. 4.6.2) Darra Adam Khel, FR Kohat The Taliban’s pre-emptive strike- a suicide attack on the grand tribal jirga in Darra Adam Khel- eliminated the chance for the formation of any antiTaliban lashkar in this part of FATA. The attack killed many of the tribal leaders of the area who could potentially raise an anti-Taliban lashkar. For details see the chapter on Darra Adam Khel in this book. 4.6.3) Khyber Agency Militants attached to armed Islamic groups such as Mangal Bagh’s Lashkar-i-Islam, LI, the late Haji Namdar Khan’s Amr Bil-Maruf-WaNahi-Anil-Munkar, (Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice) and Qazi Mahboobul Haq’s Ansar-ul-Islam, AI, dominate Khyber Agency, particularly, Bara sub-division. Khyber Agency’s Koki Khel tribe has been prominent in resisting the Taliban. In 2008, the Mullagori tribe in Khyber also formed a lashkar, consisting of about 2000 men. At first, the lashkar proved successful. Later the lashkar was abandoned under pressure from Khyber-based militant groups. Similarly, some other tribes and clans made peace committees and anti-militant lashkars that failed due to the targeted killing of the leading members of the peace committees. Tribesmen in Khyber, like elsewhere in FATA, hold the ISI responsible for the militants’ violence in this agency. Meanwhile, targeted killing, including the beheading of anti-Taliban people in the area, has been going on for years.

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4.6.4) Kurram Agency The Shia Turi and Bangash tribes in Upper Kurram are the ideological rival of the Taliban and Al-Qaida. The Tribes clashed with the Taliban across villages and towns in Kurram. Owing to stiff resistance offered by these tribes, the Taliban and Al-Qaida have never been able to control Shia-dominated Upper Kurram. They have, however, besieged Upper Kurram for three years, cutting it off from the rest of Pakistan. Currently, access to Upper Kurram is through a long route via Kabul and Peshawar or by air from Pakistan. The Taliban’s blockade of Kurram has led to great human suffering in the area due to a shortage of medicines and food supplies. The Turi and Bangash tribes’ resistance to the Taliban is successful in the sense that the Taliban had never been able to take control of the Shia majority area. However, there is a downside to the Shia resistance to the Taliban and Al-Qaida. Kurram is a mixed Shia-Sunni agency in FATA. Some Sunni in Kurram were linked with the Taliban as well as with Sepah-e-Sahaba Pakistan, SSP; a Punjab-based anti-Shia militant group. Also, there are pre-existing tribal disputes over land and water between the Shia and Sunni tribes, especially, between the Shia Turi and Sunni Mangal tribe. The Shia resistance to the Taliban took the shape of Shia-Sunni clashes in Kurram leading to the massacre and mass scale displacement of innocent people on both sides. The government of Pakistan continues to look on as an unconcerned bystander while Shia and Sunni armed groups have been massacring and displacing innocent people since 200720. The most important issue is that the ISI is part and parcel of the violence in Kurram, i.e. the violence in Kurram is in pursuit of the strategic depth in Afghanistan. Dr Mohammad Taqi and myself have been writing in mainstream Pakistani newspapers about ISI’s involvement in the sectarian violence in Kurram21. More details about the crisis of sectarian terrorism in Kurram and the Pakistani state role in the violence will be elaborated in my forthcoming research papers. 4.6.5) Musozai (Kurram) Lashkar Musozai is a Sunni tribe in Kurram. This tribe also has a lashkar that clashed several times with the Taliban and suffered huge losses. Generally, the lashkar may be termed as a successful struggle but at a great human and material cost.

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4.6.6) Mohmand Agency Leaders of peace committees in Mohmand have been repeatedly attacked. There have also been several anti-Taliban lashkars in Mohamand, discouraged due to target killings of the tribal leaders. There are also several cases of heroic resistance to the Taliban. In just the past two years, more than 200 anti-Taliban tribesmen, most of the tribal leaders, have been target-killed. The following are some of the prominent anti-Taliban tribal leaders from Mohmand who have been target-killed: Malik Sikandar Ali Sher, Malik Wazir Utman Khel, Malik Zenat Masood, Malik Mukhtar Dewazai, Malik Walayat Shah Haleemzai, Malik Adam Khan Qandahari, Malik Zahir Shah Safi, Malik Mohammad Ajaml Khawezai, Malik Mohammad Afzal Khawezai and Malik Afzal Koda Khel. 4.6.7) Orakzai Agency Like Kurram, Orakzai is also a mixed Shia-Sunni tribal agency. The agency offered stiff resistance to the Taliban and thwarted their efforts to drive a wedge between the Shias and Sunnis of the area. Three important tribes in the agency, Ali Khel, Feroz Khel, and Story Khel, had antiTaliban lashkars. The Story Khel lashkar has been successful and the other two failed. For details see chapter on Orakzai agency.

4.7) Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Anti-Taliban Lashkars The following is an introduction to some of the anti-Taliban lashkars formed in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. 4.7.1) Bunir Bunir is a beautiful district in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa bordering Swat. The Swat Taliban threatened Bunir after they took control of Swat valley in 2008. In response, people in Bunir prepared an anti-Taliban lashkar to defend their native district in the face of Taliban incursions from Swat. Community leaders in Bunir gave calls, using the loud speakers of mosques in various villages, to prepare for the defence of Bunir against the Taliban. Within two hours, a lashkar of about 4000 armed men was ready to confront the Taliban. The lashkar had clashes with the Swat Taliban. In the initial clash 5 Taliban were killed and two lashkar volunteers martyred. After that, the Taliban retreated to Swat. It looked clear that the

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Taliban could not have outfought the Bunir lashkar. The lashkar, however, was out-maneuvered through the treachery of Commissioner Malakand Division, the highest administrative authority in Bunir, and ISI operatives. For a description and details of the treachery read “The Treachery at Bunir” in Armageddon in Pakistan. 4.7.2) Dir Residents of village Dog Darra in district Dir built an anti-Taliban lashkar. This lashkar clashed with the Taliban several times. The lashkar was supported by the provincial government of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. The lashkar successfully removed the Taliban from their area. Similarly, Sultan Khel and Painda Khel, two leading tribes in Dir district made a grand tribal jirga in response to the growing Taliban power in the neighbouring Swat. The jirga prepared a lashkar of about 400 people to defend district Dir from the Taliban incursions. 4.7.3) Lakki Marwat This was the first district in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa where an anti-Taliban lashkar was formed by the local Marwat tribe without any encouragement by the authorities. The lashkar has been repeatedly clashing with the Taliban. The lashkar is successful and the Taliban have so far not been able to control most of this district in the south of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. 4.7.4) Peshawar Three anti-Taliban lashkars have been formed in three Peshawar villagesAdeyzai, Badaber and Bazid Khel. All three villages are close to FATA areas of Darra Adam Khel and Khyber agency. The Taliban from these FATA areas have been attacking Peshawar, the provincial capital of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. All three lashkars were formed with the encouragement of the Pakhtun nationalist government in KhyberPakhtunkhwa. The three lashkars are like the first line of defence of Peshawar against the Taliban incursion in the provincial capital, especially the Adeyzai lashkar. These lashkars continue to resist the Taliban. 4.7.5) Shah Hasan Khel Lashkar Shah Hasan Khel is a poor village of district Laki Marwat. The village is located on the border with Waziristan. The village population is about

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7000. Due to its proximity with Waziristan, the village was very vulnerable to Taliban incursions. In response, the village jirga formed an anti-Taliban lashkar to block Taliban entry in the village. The lashkar managed to prevent the Taliban from spreading their influence in the village, although it was no match to the Taliban in terms of material resources. On 1 January 2010, the village council of elders who control the lashkar was in a jirga meeting. Nearby a crowd, including several lashkar volunteers, was enjoying a volley ball match between two village teams. A Taliban vehicle laden with 250kg of explosives entered the village on a dirt track not often used by vehicles. Probably it aimed to kill the village elders through a suicide attack, but could not manage to reach the elders. The vehicle, driven by a teenage boy named Bedul, rammed into the crowd watching the match. A catastrophic scene of death and destruction followed. Over 100 people including leading players of the village as well as lashkar volunteers died on the spot. Several succumbed to their injuries later on. No one in the village escaped the tragedy. Almost everyone in the village had a close relative killed or injured in the attack. Even this grand tragedy has not sapped the anti-Taliban spirit of the villagers. The lashkar is still on alert to guard against the Taliban. Thus this lashkar may be termed successful so far. 4.7.6) Swat In Swat, Pir Samiullah raised an anti-Taliban lashkar on the encouragement of the Pakistani army stationed in the area. However, the Pakistani army never showed up to help Pir Samiullah when his lashkar was engaged in armed clashes with Taliban. The army allowed the Taliban to besiege and kill Samiullah and his men. Samiullah was killed in the clashes. His associates buried him. The Taliban exhumed his body and hung it at a public place for several hours to terrorize the local people. His lashkar was slaughtered and dispersed by the Taliban. The lashkar failed due to the lack of promised support from the Pakistani army.

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Notes 1

Article 246-247, Chapter 3, Constitution of Pakistan http://www.pakistani.org/pakistan/constitution/part12.ch3.html 2 For example, see, Jason Motlagh’s report “Pakistan's anti-Taliban support risky”, Washington Times dated 10 November 2008 http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/nov/10/pakistans-support-of-militiasagainst-taliban-coul/; and Rahimullah Youfuszai’s “Tribes Fight Back”, The Newsline, Karachi, dated 15 October 2008 3 “Pakistan engages the tribes in effort to fight the Taliban”, The Long War Journal, available on: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2008/09/pakistan_engages_the.php 4 “Pakistan's anti-Taliban support risky”, Washington Times dated 10 November 2008 http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/nov/10/pakistans-support-ofmilitias-against-taliban-coul/ 5 ibid 6 “Reforming Pakistan’s Criminal Justice System” Crisis Group Asia Report No 196, December 6, 2010. P: 25 7 For example, Hussain, Zahid.2008. Frontline Pakistan, the Path to Catastrophe and Killing of Benazir Bhutto. Penguin Books and I.B.Tauris: London. 8 Sardar Babak, education minister, of the Pakhtun nationalist government of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa participated in a radio BBC Pashto language discussions. I was also one of the participants in the discussions Sardar Babak defended the formation of the anti-Taliban lashkars. 9 See for example, on the following link my article in daily The News dated 25 July 2009 wherein I discuss a “letter of Appreciation” dated 17 Nov. 2008, by the chief secretary of the NWFP and addressed to two of the lashkar's leaders in rural Peshawar: http://www.khyberwatch.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-7374.html 10 See for example, the report “The Tribes Fight Back” in the Newsline dated 15 October 2008 on: http://www.newslinemagazine.com/2008/10/the-tribes-fightback/ 11 “Reforming Pakistan’s Criminal Justice System” Crisis Group Asia Report No 196, December 6, 2010. P: 25 12 “An Invitation to the ICG” Daily Times dated December 25, 2010. Available on: http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010%5C12%5C25%5Cstory_25 -12-2010_pg3_4 13 “An Invitation to the ICG” Daily Times dated December 25, 2010. Available on: http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010%5C12%5C25%5Cstory_25 -12-2010_pg3_4 14 “WikiLeaks cables portray Saudi Arabia as a cash machine for terrorists”, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/05/wikileaks-cables-saudi-terroristfunding 15 ibid 16 ibid 17 ibid

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18 “Abandoned Patriots”, http://iopyne.wordpress.com/2010/11/11/abandoned-patriots/ 19 “Pakistan: Countering Militancy in FATA”, Asia Report N°178 – 21 October 2009. P: 18. http://www.crisisgroup.org/~/media/Files/asia/south-asia/pakistan/ 178_pakistan___countering_militancy_in_fata.ashx 20 For a view of the crisis in Kurram see the following articles: “The Kurram Conundrum” Daily Times dated 5 February 2011. http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011%5C02%5C05%5Cstory_52-2011_pg3_4 Also see “Between Military and Militants” Daily Times dated 13 November 2010. http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010%5C11%5C13%5Cstory_13 -11-2010_pg3_4 21 For example, see “More Misery in Kurram”, Dr Mohammad Taqi, Daily Times, dated 31 March 2001, http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011%5C03%5C31%5Cstory_31 -3-2011_pg3_3 ; “Kurram- the Forsaken FATA”, Dr Mohammad Taqi, Daily Times, dated 4 November 2011, http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010%5C11%5C04%5Cstory_411-2010_pg3_2 ; “The Kurram Conundrum”, Farhat Taj, Daily Times, dated 5 February 2011, http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\02\05\story_5-22011_pg3_4 ; “Kurram: Peace Accords and State Writ”, Farhat Taj, Daily Times dated 12 February 2011, http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\02\12\story_12-22011_pg3_4 ; “Between the Military and Militants”, Farhat Taj, Daily Times dated 13 November 2010, http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010%5C11%5C13%5Cstory_13 -11-2010_pg3_4

CHAPTER THREE DECONSTRUCTING SOME FATA “EXPERTISE”

1) Introduction This chapter seeks to deconstruct the problems in FATA. In the process the chapter will also question the writings of three FATA “experts”: David Kilcullen, Imtiaz Gul, and Zahid Hussain. These writers’ works have reinforced the stereotypes surrounding the tribesmen and have misled their readership about the ground reality in the area, especially in terms of the war on terror.

2) FATA Crisis as Fruition of Mullah-Military Alliance: a Background FATA, the border area between Afghanistan and Pakistan is being described as the epicentre of global terrorism. In an official correspondence to President Bill Clinton, CIA official Bruce Riedel characterized Pakistan as the “most dangerous place” in the world in 1998 (2011). This aspect is not an anomaly, but rather is the fruition of a more than two decade old policy pursued by the state of Pakistan, with the indirect help of the West in the 1980s and the Muslim Arab world even earlier than that. Pakistan wished for an alliance of Mujahideen to rule Afghanistan. The infighting between Mujahideen, exacerbated by Pakistan manipulating the post-Soviet era political arrangement in Kabul to seek favours for its favourites, led to a bloody civil war in Afghanistan. The civil war was brought to an end by the Taliban. There are a number of perspectives on the emergence of the Taliban. A majority of scholars researching the phenomenon see the Taliban as “strategic tools of Pakistan's foreign policy” (for example, see Roy, 2004; and Hussain, 2005) that are intellectually and politically independent, but physically under the control of the Pakistani state. The strategic design of the Pakistani state in Afghanistan under the Taliban involved thousands of Pakistani madrasa students, jihadi group operatives, as well as hundreds

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of intelligence and security officials. Seymour Hersh gave a vivid account of how Pakistan evacuated hundreds of its security and intelligence operatives from Afghanistan immediately after the post 9/11 US bombing of the Taliban positions in Afghanistan1. Pakistan has been actively pursuing a foreign policy rooted in religious idiom vis-a-vis Afghanistan, to blunt the latter in its pursuit of a foreign policy rooted in secular Pakhtun ethno-nationalism since the 1970s. Pakistan, being born insecure vis-a-vis its arch rival India, and having disproportionate power capabilities on its eastern front, was traumatized at the prospect of Pakhtun nationalist claims backed by the Soviet Union and India emerging across its western borders in Afghanistan. Afghan religious figures were disenchanted with the secular pursuits of the Afghan monarchy trained in Soviet and Western administrative and intellectual traditions. The cultivation of religious forces as a counterweight to the incumbent Afghan ruling elite was an ideal opportunity in the strategic calculus of the ironically secular Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto led Pakistan of the 1970s. The overthrow of the Zahir Shah monarchy by Sardar Daud, an avowed supporter of the independent Pakhtunnistan movement's claims, rang alarm bells in Pakistan. Later on, Sardar Daud's support for Pakhtun Nationalists in the NWFP- now Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa- was equally matched by Bhutto's support for the Islamists of Afghanistan. This was the time during which Pakistan cultivated more than one thousand disgruntled religious figures, including Gulbaddin Hekmatyar, Rabbani and Ahmad shah Masood, who would become big players in the later jihad against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Though the jihad against the Soviets was financed and equipped by the West, it was Pakistan who would exert monopoly over the disbursement of these assets. In other words, the West could not establish direct contact with the resistance movement leaders based in Pakistan. The West would extend financial and military support and intellectual and political legitimacy, but their physical control was in the hands of Pakistan's security apparatus. President Zia-ul-Haq of Pakistan once warned Gulbadin Hekmatyar for his independent initiatives while carrying forward the Afghan resistance movement against the Soviets in these words: “Gulbaddin must be clearly warned that it was Pakistan who made him an Afghan leader and it is Pakistan who can equally destroy him if he continues to misbehave” (Muhammad Yousaf as cited by Hussain, 2005:248). It must be mentioned here that the security establishment of Pakistan views foreign and national security policy as their institutional prerogative and strategic imperative (Hussain, 2005; and Haqqani, 2005).

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The issue of the security establishment of Pakistan seeking alignment with the religious class in Afghanistan has a striking resemblance with them seeking alignment with the religious strata within Pakistan also. It is not that the security establishment has aligned with religious groups inside Pakistan just to further their institutionally designated national interests in Afghanistan; the mullah-military alliance has an internal dimension too. In his book, Pakistan Between Mosque and Military, Hussain Haqqani insightfully traces this mullah-military alliance to the quest of Pakistan's security establishment to not only neutralise perceived centrifugal ethnic secular political parties, but also mainstream secularist parties like the PPP (2005). The religious groups then extended legitimacy to the military in the latter’s direct and indirect rule over the country. Thus both are interdependent. Some religious scholars having militant armed groups boast that “the army needs us more then we need them2”. The post-colonial state of Pakistan cultivated Islam as the supreme source of legitimacy. Successive governments in Pakistan used Islamic ideology to counter the demand for provincial autonomy. General Yahya Khan would use Islamic groups and parties to offset the challenge posed by the populist left wave of the Bhutto led PPP in West Pakistan and the demands for provincial autonomy of Sheikh Mujib in East Pakistan. Cooperation between the army led establishment and religious parties, which started under the dictator Yahya Khan, to come to full fruition under another dictator General Zia. A Popular government was overthrown in the face of the agitation of Islamist groups in 1953 in Punjab over the Ahmadis issue. The military dictator Gen. Ayub Khan would add the term "Islamic" to the country's name under pressure from the Islamists. The popular secularist Prime Minister Bhutto would abdicate to Islamist pressures and declare Ahmadis to be non-Muslims in 1974 and also ban alcohol. In 1995 Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was stopped from auditing the finances of, and from outlawing, guerrilla training imparted in madrasas. President Asif Ali Zardari stopped Sherry Rehman, a PPP parliamentarian and close associate of the late Benazir Bhutto, from tabling in the parliament a bill proposing amendments to the country's notorious blasphemy law following the assassination of Salman Taseer. The assassination of Taseer, the outspoken PPP governor of the Punjab, was condoned by religious groups due to the governor's public support of a poor Christian woman implicated in a dubious blasphemy case. Through the use of street power, Islamist groups and political parties have forced various secularist governments of Pakistan to withdraw an initiative perceived by the former to be anti-Islamic.

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The Islamists of the 1980s jihad era turned from the ballot-oriented strategy of their first generation towards bullets, sectarianism, and militancy. Students of religious madrasas since the 1980s have been instructed in a world view which carries a sharp hostility towards minority Muslim sects, especially Shia, and enmity to non-Muslims and the westernized elite ruling Pakistan. The majority of the madrasas' students belong to families living on the edge of society in terms of poverty and economic breakdown. They have been socialised in an exclusively male society which views interactions with the female gender as a corruption of morality, and many, if not the majority of them, are raped in their madrasas. In the wake of Osama bin Laden's arrival in Afghanistan in 1998, the two jihadi networks, the Taliban and the Kashmiri Mujahideen, made a symbiotic loose alliance with bin Laden's Al-Qaeda. The regional dimension of religious activity emanating from Pakistan and gradually extending to Afghanistan linked up with global jihad. They viewed themselves as being at war with Christians and Jews because of their perceived domination of the Muslim world. “Having started out as a pressure group outside parliament, Pakistan's religious parties have now become a well-armed and well financed force that wields considerable influence and presence within various branches of government”. (Hussain, 2004:88).

The religious parties, due to their special relationship with the security establishment, have given themselves the role of protecting Pakistan's ideology and nuclear capability and championing the cause of Kashmir vis-a-vis India as well as jihad in Afghanistan. The political commitment of the establishment to an ideological state gradually evolved into a strategic commitment of exporting jihadist ideology for regional influence. The war in Afghanistan, which was initiated, financed, and supported by Pakistan and indirectly but more effectively by Washington, took Islamist politics into its militant mode of operation. A number of Islamist groups and political parties, specifically JI and JUI(F)- with its base in the Pakhtun-inhabited bordering areas of Pakistan in the vicinity of the war theatre- accumulated huge financial resources and lethal weapons, and gained diplomatic access to the outside world. “The Islamic movement in Pakistan changed its character from a pressure group establishing sharia in the first quarter of a century after independence to an electoral and then a militant force in the second quarter”.3

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President Zia produced a pan-Islamic agenda and vast Islamic networks at home and abroad based on sectarian parties and madrasas. The involvement of Islamic militants in Afghanistan led to the privatisation of foreign policy and the militarisation of Islamic activists. The strategic community of Pakistan has over the years provided the conceptual framework for the intellectual activity of the citizens. The conceptual framework is Indo-centric coupled with an “on again, off again” suspicion of the West and even the world of Islam. The defeat of the Soviet Union in Afghanistan emboldened the policy planners to try the same against India in Kashmir, throwing Pakistan's strategic weight behind this idea (Hussain, 2005). Pakistan's policy pursuit of a client regime found expression in the Taliban. Pakistan was one of only three countries to recognise the Taliban, the others being UAE and Saudi Arabia. By then Pakistan was increasingly perceived as a state sponsoring terrorism, primarily because of its support of the Taliban and the jihadi activity in the Indian Kashmir. Thus the state policy is a critical determinant in the origin, direction, and growth of religious militant organizations in Pakistan.

3) FATA “Experts”: a Confrontation with FATA Reality Now I turn to question some misleading literature from three FATA “experts”, David Kilkullen, Imtiaz Gul, and Zahid Hussain. Their literature is marred by serious methodological flaws, especially the lack of direct interactions with the countless people of FATA who are eyewitnesses to the state collusion with the Taliban and Al-Qaida on their tribal land and who suffered in the process. Moreover, their literature is questionable in terms of research and journalistic ethics.

3.1) Accidental Guerrilla- An Orientalist Narrative of FATA David Kilkullen, in his book Accidental Guerrilla, defines his methodology to describe Islamist militants as under the rubric of conflict ethnography. It is “an attempt to study a conflict in its own terms and to internalize and interpret the physical human informational and ideational setting in which it takes place” (2009:304). It is an attempt, which tries to “understand in detail the terrain, the key actors in the conflict, the people, their social and cultural institutions, the way they act and think” (ibid). It is an attempt to understand “a war holistically, in its own terms and through the eyes of its actual participants, in their words and in their language” (ibid). The purpose of the book is “to see beyond surface differences between societies and environments, beyond military orientalism” (ibid). Kilkullen

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confesses data corruption can frustrate rigorous statistical analysis leading to an overemphasis on professional judgments and blighted knowledge. He is cautious of this paradox and yet he has set his understanding of the aspects concerning FATA over it. He derives the title of his book from one of the informational and ideational settings of the problem, and through the eyes of the actual participants. One of the actual participants, a Pakistani army commissioned officer hailing from Punjab, informs him about the nature of his opponent combatants- a mix of local and Afghan Pakhtuns, Punjabi Taliban, and mostly Arab or Uzbek etc. foreigners. There is no evidence of the actual participant's familiarity with the combatant guerrillas. Yet he knows that almost all the foreigners- Arabs, Uzbeks and others- have married local tribal women and have had children with them. Ironically Kilkullen accepted the Punjabi army officer's claims without any proof. The Punjabi Taliban, of which a section is aligned with the “bad” Taliban and another one with the “good” Taliban, in the actual participant's observation is as foreign as he is himself in FATA. The actual participant is searching for a needle in a haystack and comes across it by chance. David Kilcullen, out of credence, christens the activity of the Islamist militant according to what his actual participant's eyes saw by chance. So the title of the book is Accidental Guerrilla. The opportunistic move of Al-Qaida into a remote traditional society creates the conditions for Western intervention, giving rise to popular sentiment which is then exploited by the former in its war against the latter. Thus the local militant becomes part of an alien war by accident. Is not David Kilcullen rejecting the assumptions of the scholarly debates about the origin and growth pattern of Islamist activity in this part of the world? An academic recourse to the policies of the West in this region over the last three decades, and the subsequent scholarly work associated with it would have been a useful tool in not only understanding the “accidental guerrilla” but the world view of the “actual participant” which shapes Kilcullen's own. The convergence of Pakistan's regional foreign policy goals through jihad with the Western goal of defeating its Cold War rival, the Soviet Union, in Afghanistan through Islamic jihadist means, led to the establishment of an extensive infrastructure involving the educational and military training of today's Islamists guerrillas. The ascendency of the Taliban in Afghanistan was a first step in the long struggle of the broader Islamist networks in the region, achieved with substantial and critical support from the Pakistani security establishment.

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David Kilcullen identifies four steps of the Al-Qaeda military strategy: provocation, intimidation, protraction, and exhaustion. Al-Qaida, as inciter-in-chief sees its function as a propaganda hub and incitement mechanism. Kilkullen gives an example of an act of intimidation by one of the groups of the Al-Qaida led syndicate, the Haqani Taliban, at the Indian embassy as a step by the latter to intimidate the population against working with the government (2009:31). It is documented in the Western press4, as well as acknowledged by Western officials that the attack was conducted with the help of Pakistan's security services. Was it a deviant case of collaboration between the Haqani Taliban network and the security services of Pakistan or an example of a long term relationship only identified as such now? Is it the corruption of data which has led to the blighted knowledge the author fears? Is not the Al-Qaidaassociated “accidental guerrilla” of Kilkullen an ally of the state of Pakistan as well as nurtured by this state? Who matters most to the “accidental guerrilla”: the state of Pakistan or Al-Qaida? Is not he tied to both at once? How could something as important as the Arab Al-Qaida members' relations with the “accidental guerrillas” be unknown to someone who has been allied, in a life and death struggle for over twenty-five years, with the “accidental guerrillas”? Does Kilkullen know that sons, brothers and other close relatives of Jalaludin Hanaqi, leader of the Haqani group “accidental guerrillas” live in beautiful houses in Rawalpindi, the headquarters of the Pakistani military establishment5? How could the houses and their occupants be unknown to the top most6 intelligence agency in the world today, the ISI, also based in Rawalpindi and the nearby Islamabad? Certainly, the Haqani family members have not taken political asylum on humanitarian grounds in the main urban centres of Pakistan. Kilkullen further informs us that Al-Qaida establishes active sanctuaries in host communities whose immune system is either compromised or where they can super-infect existing wounds, like broader societal breakdowns and state weaknesses concerning the governance in the communities. Some dispossessed sections of the local elite become eager to regain their lost authority and resort to resistance. Al-Qaida tries to either co-opt or eliminate the adversary. It would have been very useful for the readers to actually have a case study in which the dispossessed local elites' resistance to Al-Qaida was manifested. But it seems that the author could not find even one out of thousands of actual participants' accounts to establish this fact. Does it mean that there was no such resistance to Al-Qaida in FATA?

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Al-Qaida arrived in the South Waziristan agency in the wake of massive bombing in Afghanistan by the US. Hundreds of tribal leaders were killed in this agency in the following months and years. Having interaction with one of those families would have been quite informative. These families live in constant fear of the ISI. However, when taken into confidence they open up their hearts. They hold none but the ISI responsible for the murders of their near and dear in the ISI’s pursuit to create a leadership vacuum for the Al-Qaida led Taliban in the tribal society. They even name specific officers of the Pakistani army, ranking as colonels, majors and brigadiers, as having murdered tribal leaders. These families would have vividly elaborated to Kilkullen how the ISI physically controls both Al-Qaida and Taliban militants. For the information of the readers, let me share some of the information from my interviews with family members of the assassinated tribal leaders. Many of the families report a similar methodology whereby the tribal leaders were trapped by the army officers stationed in Waziristan for assassination by Taliban or Al-Qaida militants. In the aftermath of the Al-Qaida militants' arrival in South Waziristan, the military authorities would call tribal leaders for a meeting where they would be encouraged to openly express their minds about the militants' presence in their area. Without doubting the authorities' intentions, the tribal leaders would express their aversion to the militants. Each meeting place would to be secretly fitted with taping instruments. Within hours, often even within minutes, the tape recorded conversations were delivered to the Taliban and Al-Qaida commanders. In the latter case the militants would be waiting in the side room when the military authorities were meeting with the tribal leaders. Within days after the meeting, sometimes even hours, the Taliban would confront the tribal leaders with their tape recorded conversations with the authorities and warn them to prepare for death. The tribal leaders were bewildered. They were angry with the military authorities. Soon afterwards the Taliban or Al-Qaida would eliminate the tribal leaders. David Kilcullen's understanding of the next two phases involves careful or reckless intervention by an outside force. In the case of careful intervention the chances of success for the outsider are high, while a reckless intervention could lead to a tribal uprising to reject the outsider (the West in this case). In the latter case, Al-Qaida is viewed by the local tribes as a relative versus an intruder (more precisely, the US). The local perception of “foreigner” is elastic (2009:235) and in FATA, persons of non-Pakhtun origin, like Al-Qaida militants, are not seen as foreigners, because they have “burrowed deeply into tribal society, through activities such as intermarriages with local tribes, co-opting of local leaders,

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purchase and operation of businesses and other services, charity activities, sponsorship of partnership with madrasas, and settling of local disputes” (ibid). The writer's entire process of analysis is misleading and his argument simplifies the internal heterogeneity into homogeneity. Everyone is a potential insurgent in FATA in this framework, and their becoming active militants is dependent on the notion of external intervention. It is a universal fact that external intervention is met with resistance, but let us look at this analogy. FATA, like the rest of Pakistan, is composed of different social strata. As Kilkullen himself outlines, there are three sources of authority in the tribal triad. The social structure of the tribal areas comprises the lineage based authority (Maliks or tribal leaders), the governmental authority, and the religious authority. The tribal system under FCR, as introduced by the British, involves the interplay of these three forces. One should view the evolving social-political drama through the eyes of these three main actors. Each of the three has a different source of power. The governmental authority is represented by the Political Agent, PA, half ambassador and half governor. The authority of the PA is backed by state law and has its auxiliary administrative machinery throughout FATA carrying out its respective functions. The tribal leaders and religious clergy are a diverse group with no organized bodies. It is the under exigency of time that the two would rally around their respective concerns. Historically, and legally under FCR, the tribal leader is supposed to visit the PA office for issues concerning the government and the tribe. The PA does not speak for the tribe, but he speaks to the tribe. The tribal leader receives monthly and annual allowances, the quantities of which are determined by his being in harmony with the PA's policies and effectively communicating them to the tribe. With the war in Afghanistan, the dominance of the tribal social structure by the combination of PA and tribal leaders mutated towards an equation involving the interaction of the clergy, the army, and the political agent. The PA would invite religious clerics into tribal jirgas in the 1980s. Almost all the literature on the Pakhtun carries the notion that “jirga is not the business of religious clerics”. The collusion and alliance maturing between the security establishment and the religious right in mainstream Pakistan was advanced in FATA, thanks to the jihad against communism. The religious strata in the tribal areas were now evolving into having regional and global connections with the help of the Punjabi Mujahideen and international, especially the Arab, Mujahideen. They were eulogized as moral equivalents of the American founding fathers.

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The events of 9/11 and the subsequent invasion of Afghanistan by the US-led international forces brought the retreating Taliban and international militants- the majority of them Arabs and Uzbeks- into FATA, where they mixed with the anti-Western forces headed by the religious authorities in collusion with the security establishment of Pakistan. Pakistan's favoured strategic design for the state in Afghanistan, the Taliban, was thrown into the wilderness by the “United States’ angry invasion” (Musharraf, 2006:275) of this country. Afghanistan would no more be led by the Taliban; referred to as “our boys” protecting “Pakistani interests” in Kabul by the former interior minister of Pakistan, Naseerullah Babar (Hussain, 2005:208). Pakistan was compelled and constrained in the post 9/11 circumstances to fight the force it had nurtured and befriended. The then ISI chief, Lieutenant General Mahmoud Ahmed, was in the US on an official visit when the 9/11 terrorist attacks happened in the US. He was called to a meeting with the US Deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage, who sought Pakistan’s help in the US invasion of Afghanistan. Gen Mahmoud reminded the US of Pakistan’s long history with the Taliban. Richard Armitage categorically told him: “History begins today.” Thus Washington forced Islamabad to fall in line with the US. In response, Pakistan opted for a pragmatic policy and accommodated immediate US concerns vis-a-vis Al-Qaida-led terrorist networks while maintaining a low profile, yet deep, sympathy for the Taliban. General Mahmoud, who headed the ISI, is a case in point. General Mahmoud and other pro-militant generals were removed by Gen. Musharraf to address US concerns over the military's links with the Islamists in the post 9/11 interaction between Pakistan and America. The Musharraf government also captured 689 militants and handed over 369 to the US (Musharraf, 2006:237). This however does not mean that the Pakistan army led by Gen. Musharraf was purged of pro-militant generals. General Safdar Hussain is an example; he signed a “peace deal” with Al-Qaida-trained Taliban commander Nek Muhammad in 2004 in South Waziristan. This General would not even camouflage his anti-US sentiments. He told a Pakistani journalist, Zahid Hussain, that the US forces were going to be bogged down in Afghanistan and “this is what we want” (2010:71). Gen. Safdar Hussain even had the audacity to publicly question the post 9/11 US presence in Afghanistan, despite the fact that his supreme commander, Gen Musharraf, had enlisted Pakistan in the US led war on terror7. The US had not accommodated Pakistan's strategic concerns about the post-Taliban Afghanistan led by Hamid Karzai and supported by the Western countries, as well as the Indian influence in this country.

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Strategically, Afghanistan is too important to Pakistan to be left for the international community in such circumstances. Thus Pakistan needed to frustrate the US-led international effort in Afghanistan. Pakistan began to frustrate the effort by engineering a “controlled chaos” through its natural allies, the Islamist militants, in FATA, the border area with Afghanistan. A fake reality has to be constructed to show to the world that the tribes in FATA are up in arms against the Pakistani state for joining the war on terror and that the tribes are enraged by the US removal of the Taliban from power in Kabul and that the tribes are determined to take revenge against the Pakistani state and the US through acts of terrorism, both in Pakistan and Afghanistan. For this purpose one of the best aspects of the Pakhtun tribal societyegalitarianism- was tampered with to submit the tribal society to the Taliban. “Leadership in Pashtun (Pakhtun) society is unlike the Baloch tribal structure where the Sardar (chief) sits at the apex and where even inter-tribe relationships are hierarchically determined. The Pashtun (Pakhtun) leadership is a matter of who can negotiate effectively with the outside world for the solidarity group (tribe, sub-tribe or clan)”, writes Ejaz Haider, a well-known Pakistani political and security analyst8. “The role of mullahs is restricted to mosques” (Musharraf, 2006:263) in this egalitarian tribal society led by tribal jirga leaders. The egalitarian jirgabacked tribal leaders had to be removed through targeted killing in order to be replaced by the Taliban, who would be presented to the world as popular leaders of the Pakhtun. It would then be argued to the world to be prepared for a negotiated settlement with the Taliban. Meanwhile, the tribes would be too subjugated with constant fear and insecurity to question the sudden and drastic change in their tribal social structure: the replacement of the bottom-up tribal leadership by the top-down (imposed) Taliban, physically controlled by the ISI. The Taliban and Al-Qaida started setting up an infrastructure for fighting in the supposedly “weakly governed” or ungoverned spaces” of FATA. The Pakistani state entered into a treaty with Taliban commander Nek Muhammad in April 2004 in South Waziristan. It projected the treaty as one signed with the tribal leaders of the Ahmadzai Wazir tribe. This is factually wrong. By the time of the treaty, targeted killing of the Wazir tribal leaders was well underway. The remaining tribal leaders were in the grip of fear of the ISI. On the occasion of the signing of the treaty, the Taliban leader, Nek Muhammad, with whom the treaty was signed, arrogantly told the tribal leaders sitting in the ceremony that “their authority has become a thing from the past. Now the Taliban will rule”. Consequently treaties were made with Abdullah Mahsud and Baitullah

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Mahsud in February 2005. The treaties endorsed the state's recognition of the militant commanders as politically legitimate stakeholders in representing the viewpoint of the respective tribes. Former political agent in Waziristan, Akbar Ahmed, himself notes: “The conceptualization of the office of Political Agent presupposes a tilt as part of a deliberate policy towards either the tribal elder or religious cleric. The tilt is conditioned by the context of the policy ends desired”. (1983:143)

Needless to say the tribes' opinion, expressed through popular jirgas, was never taken into consideration in giving political legitimacy to the militant commanders. The tribal social structure composed of the interaction between tribal leaders, and the PA saw the participation of the religious cleric in the last quarter of the century. It saw accommodation of Al-Qaida-allied Taliban commanders replacing one of the pillars; that of the tribal leader. The period between the signing of the treaty in 2004 with Nek Mohammad and the infighting between some of the jihadist comrades in March 2007 in South Waziristan saw a sharp increase in the brutal killing of hundreds of tribal leaders. Those who survived either linked up with the Al-Qaidaallied Taliban as a means of escaping the targeted killing, or limited their mobility in the form of a self-imposed social siege. In my view, the picture would become clearer with the addition of some subaltern and academic or journalistic knowledge about the area produced over the last three decades. Akbar Ahmed, whom the author mentions as a guide and one of the actual participants- though not so in the post 9/11 FATA- introduces him to his understanding of the Islamic district paradigm and the tribal triad I mentioned earlier. Ahmed's view conveys an impression that occasionally a religious cleric in the face of an external aggression assumes a greater role and overrules the traditional tribal leaders and central government authority. His role dissipates over time as the external aggression recedes. In his book Religion and Politics in Muslim Societies; a case Study of South Waziristan, the main subject of the study is the emergence of a religious cleric assuming the role which Ahmed envisions. Ironically the religious cleric as per Ahmed's supposition does not reach these criteria contingent upon external aggression. The actor is a shrewd and agile but ruthlessly efficient religious figure who develops a role unto his own, unprecedented in many ways in FATA. His emergence is due to creating a network of loyalists holding important social status alongside cultivating relations with the then military authorities.

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In Pakhtun tribes each family member is collectively responsible for the actions of every other, and each tribal member is collectively responsible for the actions of every other. The British Colonial introduced FCR manifests this aspect in FATA. The said religious cleric that rose to prominence for a few years was subjected to this role by the tribal leaders with the consent of the government and was imprisoned for five years in 1976. Interestingly the religious cleric of the Islamic district paradigm did not opt for implementing Islamic sharia or leading a revolt against the tribal leaders or the government of Pakistan. The cleric, Maulana Noor Muhammad, stayed in jail for some years but was released before the expiration of his full sentence in prison, thanks to the exigency of the jihad against communism where his role was critical in the strategic designs of the Pakistani state. The imperatives of the jihad against Communism and Gen Zia's Islamization required him to transform his position from an outlaw in the tribal society to the most respected person in the eyes of the government. The government extended huge financial and political incentives to him as needed for expanding his patronage networks through madrasas and mosques. Historical studies of civil wars and insurgencies show that “popular support tends to accrue to locally powerful actors rather than to those actors the population sees more congenial: the more organized, locally present, and better armed a group is, the more likely it is to be able to enforce a consistent system of rules and sanctions, giving the population the order and predictability it craves in the deeply threatening, uncertain environment of insurgency.”(Kilkullen: 2009:67-68)

Moreover, Kilkullen informs us that: “It is extremely important, in analyzing an insurgency, to be able to put oneself in the shoes of local community (tribal) leaders. In insurgencies and other forms of civil war, community leaders and tribal leaders find themselves in a situation of terrifying uncertainty, with multiple armed actors - insurgents, militias, warlords, the police and the military, terrorist cells - competing for their loyalty and threatening them with violence unless they comply. .... The equivalent of “shaping manoeuvre” in counter insurgency is engagement with local community (tribal) leaders, seeking their support to one's (government's) activity and establishing measures to hold them to their commitment.” (2009:67-69)

Kilkullen is right. The government's engagement with the tribal leaders is indeed an important tool to analyze an insurgency and counter it. But, strangely, Kilkullen has thoroughly negated this important idea in his research on FATA. Circumstantial and personal information about the

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tribal leaders and their views about the Taliban and the military's activity are missing in Kilkullen's work. His information about militant commanders is at best faulty. It portrays the Taliban commanders’ bravado and their heroic deeds and local support, but is silent on the same when it comes to the tribal leaders of localised but immense social status and influence. Kilkullen's theory of “accidental guerrilla” is rooted in assumptions that have no, or at best insignificant, empirical existence on the soil of FATA. Therefore, I would request him to produce some empirical evidence of the following in support of his theory: one, foreign Al-Qaida marriages with women in local tribes in FATA; two, settling of local tribal disputes by Al-Qaida militants; three, purchase and operation of businesses and other services; and four, any popular tribal jirga that has endorsed Al-Qaida's presence and their activities in FATA. There are some 3 million people in FATA. I would expect Kilkullen to produce a list of at least 100 marriages between local tribal women and the foreign AlQaida men. If he ever produced that list, then, I would also expect him to establish that none of the 100 marriages was forced and none of the local tribal families have close links with the military establishment of Pakistan. Kilkullen should also produce a list of at least 100 local disputes settled by Al-Qaida militants. He should also establish that all local tribal parties to the disputes were ordinary tribesmen and had no links with the ISI. He should also substantiate that the local parties involved Al-Qaida in the dispute resolution with free will and consent and that there was no fear or pressure of the militants or the ISI. The writer should provide a list of “purchase and operation of businesses and other services” between the local tribesmen and Al-Qaida. The writer should establish that the tribal partners of Al-Qaida had no links with the military establishment of Pakistan. There are many tribes, sub-tribes, clans, and sub-clans in FATA. I would request the author to present a list of at least ten tribes or subtribes or clans or sub-clans who have endorsed Al-Qaida presence and activities through a popular jirga. The point that I wish to make here is that Al-Qaida has strong links with the local tribal Taliban, but has no influence over the larger tribal society in FATA in terms of marriages, dispute settlements, business deals etc. Kilkullen's “accidental guerrilla” exists nowhere in FATA. His analysis of the problem of militancy in FATA is not applicable to this region. I would now encourage the writers in other “traditional societies” he reports on, from Indonesia, Thailand and Afghanistan, to question his analysis if they believe it is misrepresenting their societies as well. Imtiaz Gul quotes anonymous sources who think that the bulk of the Western aid to Pakistan goes to the militants' relatives in the name of

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development projects in FATA (2009: 248-251). He provides a list of close aides of the leading Taliban commanders, like Baitullah Mahsud, who directly received hefty sums of money from the state as contracts for development projects (ibid). Leading Taliban commanders from the Ahmadzai Wazir tribes, like Mullah Nazir and commander Sharif receive monthly stipends from the administration (ibid). Similarly, Zahid Hussain (2010: 78-79) also informs us that: “Millions of dollars of US aid for the development of the tribal areas made its way to Baitullah's supporters which enabled him to further enhance his power and the size of his fighting force. The money was paid to tribesmen close to Baitullah as part of the peace deal, as part of the government plan to wean him away from support for Al-Qaida”.

My own interviews in FATA reveal that sick relatives of all Taliban commanders (good or bad) continue to be treated in the best hospitals in the big urban centres of Pakistan at the state's expense. This includes PIMS Islamabad, Jinnah hospital Karachi, and leading military hospitals in Pakistan. Leading religious figures, like Maulana Fazl-U-Rahman, as well as intelligence operatives, routinely visit sick relatives of the Taliban commanders. Health staff in PIPOS Peshawar confirm that Abdullah Mahsud, the Taliban commander, got his artificial leg in that hospital under the protection of intelligence operatives. Families of the Taliban commanders are transported in military helicopters. My own investigation shows that from one end of FATA to the other, development projects funded by foreign donors are contracted to people closely linked with the Taliban by the state authorities in the FATA secretariat and Political Administration in the FATA area concerned. The development projects hardly ever materialise on the ground in FATA. The funds go straight to the coffers of the Taliban. Tribal leaders of the Salarzai tribe, a fiercely anti-Taliban tribe in Bajaur, complain that their tribe is routinely discriminated against in the allocation of development funds by the authorities due to its staunch opposition to the Taliban. One Taliban commander in Waziristan publicly told a group of Mahsud tribesmen that he has been told by the military authorities in Waziristan to wait a couple of weeks because his share of the money will be paid out of the grants given to Pakistan under the Kerry-Luger Bill which they expected to be passed by the US legislatures in some days. Is this the government's “compensation” to, or “appeasement” of, the Taliban, wonders Gul (2009:248-251). It is neither compensation nor appeasement. It is part of the security establishment's design to beef up the socio-political power of the Taliban in the tribal society. Instead of

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countering the militancy by weaning away population from the militants by empowering those who resist them, the government looked for ways to strengthen the Taliban. The governmental incentives (like the development contracts), which were part of the official patronage extended to tribal leaders in helping the government to establish its writ, now go to Taliban commanders. Moreover, quoting a unanimous source, Gul informs us that the foreign donors know that some of their grants make their way to the Taliban and they accept it (2009:249). If so, I would request tax-payers in the Western donor countries to put pressure on their government to publicly explain why their hard earned money is made to go to the Taliban, who pose a threat to security on the Western streets. Neither David Kilcullen, being cautious of the bias of "military orientalism", nor the Pakistani authors reporting from the field, carry observations of the target-killed tribal leaders in their books. Rather none of these three even considers it relevant to discuss the link between the targeted killing of the tribal leaders and the gradual slip of the area into Taliban control. However, both Imtiaz Gul and Zahid Hussain refer to the assassination of Faridullah Khan, a leading tribal leader from Waziristan. Seemingly, Imtiaz Gul diverts some of the responsibility of the assassination to the deceased (2009:12-15). According to Gul's narrative, Khan was “instrumental in facilitating the army's entry into Shakai”, South Waziristan; in the presence of visiting journalists he addressed his fellow tribesmen in Urdu, instead of Pashto; “he was distinctly attired differently from the rest of the tribesmen” (who were presumably pro-militant), and “most of his words thus fell on deaf ears”. He implies that the militants, “who do not forgive those who betray them or hurt their interest”, killed him. The same is the view of Zahid Hussain (2008:152), i.e. the militants killed Faridullah Khan for his support of the Pakistani army. But is this the view of Faridullah Khan's family and friends as well? Some Ahmadzai Wazirs told me that Faridullah was in Bannu when the military authorities directed him to immediately journey to South Waziristan and meet the visiting journalists. He was reluctant to do so, but the authorities insisted and he had to give in. He reached Waziristan, met the journalists and was killed the next day. “The military authorities called my father to Waziristan to murder him”, one Wazir tribesman quoted his son saying. Faridullah Khan, the tribesman said, was a man well connected with people in the outside world. He had the potential to disclose the ISI's collusion with Al-Qaida and Taliban in his native Waziristan. The

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intelligence authorities had to kill him to eliminate this potentiality and to intimidate his influential family. I would also like to draw Gul and Hussain's attention to some important questions raised by the brother, Ayaz Wazir, of another targetkilled tribal leader of the Ahmadzai Wazir tribe, Shah Alam Wazir, in his article in The News dated 30 October 2009. The questions are: “Who was responsible for the collapse of the three institutions around which the tribal system revolved? Was it done by the tribesmen themselves? Was it done by a foreign power or non-state actors within the country? Who elevated Nek Mohammad overnight to new heights of popularity by entering into a deal with him? Who was threatening the Yargul Khel (Wazir) tribe in Waziristan of dire consequences? It certainly was not the tribesmen to be blamed for the collapse of the system.”

The killers of Faridullah Khan, Shah Alam Wazir and other target-killed tribal leaders can be identified in the honest answers to these questions. I would urge Gul and Hussain to have an interview with Ayaz Wazir over these questions and write afresh about who killed Faridullah Khan. In response to Ayaz Wazir's Op-Ed I wrote “Waziristan: Name the Names” in the same daily, dated 7 November 2009, whereby I urged the people of Waziristan, including Ayaz Wazir, that the time to simply pose such questions has past and they must now show the courage to publicly give honest answers to these questions. Ayaz Wazir never responded to my request, but many young Wazir men, both educated and illiterate, including family members of the target-killed tribal leaders, did. They confidentially shared with me honest answers to these questions on the condition that I never disclose their identity. They all believe the tribal leaders, including Faridullah Khan, were eliminated at the behest of the ISI. They also opine that Ayaz Wazir would never show the courage to publicly point the finger at the real killers of his own brother; he is too afraid for his own life to do so. Zahid Hussain, without giving a circumstantial example, carries the view of a Gen. Hamid Khan (a colleague of Gen. Safdar who signed a treaty with Taliban commander Nek Muhammad) as testifying to the linking of tribal leaders' killing with treaties between the Pakistani army and the Taliban (2010:86). Senator Afrasiab Khattak of ANP lamented the day the treaty was made and predicted hell losing its gates in South Waziristan. “It is shocking that the state of Pakistan is establishing peace in the tribal areas by signing treaties with Al Qaida led militant commanders” said Afrasiab Khattak, a Pakhtun nationalist political leader of the ANP party9.

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The President of PMAP Mahmud Achakzai would visit thrice between 2003 and 2007 to attend the funerals of his friends and party affiliates amongst killed tribal leaders. General Hamid Khan thinks that those treaties left tribal leaders at the mercy of militants. Governmental indifference, and in many ways collusion between army and Taliban, in these brutal tribal leaders’ killings destroyed the whole tribal structure and their ways of managing conflicts. The whole exercise was highly damaging, altering the whole tribal structure. It was like renewing the social contract between the state and tribes in South Waziristan (and later in rest of FATA) without having taken the tribes in confidence.

3.2) Scorpion's Tail and Al-Qaida Connection: A Falsification of FATA Three highly misleading conclusions come out from Hussain's book (2010:211-212). One, the militancy in FATA is a Pakhtun war and the Pakistani Pakhtun have become “strongly allied with both al Qaida and the Taliban”; two, dialogue with the Taliban “must become an urgent priority” of the US and its allies, including Pakistan; and three, drone attacks are not effective in the counter-terrorism strategy in FATA. I have commented on the issue of the drone attacks in the first chapter. Here I will comment on the two former conclusions. Through a selective use of only one type of information out of a whole range of data on the terrorism in FATA, the author paints the terrorism in FATA as a Pakhtun war. According to his narrative, the only General out of all serving Generals of the Pakistani army stopping the military from launching operations in FATA is a Pakhtun, Gen. Ali Jan Orakzai (2010:67-68). His retirement from service made it “less controversial” for President Musharraf to launch operations in FATA, and the very next day he deployed 6000 troops in South Waziristan (ibid). The only officers of the Pakistani army who refused to fight in FATA, and were court martialed, were Pakhtun (2010:71). Many FC soldiers refused to “fire on their fellow tribesmen”, the Taliban, on ethnic grounds (2010:70). The author fails to link up the ethnicity of non-Pakhtun Pakistanis to their pro-Taliban views. From the author's own narrative Gen. Orakzai seems to be no more pro-Taliban than his Punjabi colleague, Gen. Safdar Hussain, who personally told the author that “the American forces were going to be bogged down in Afghanistan and that's what we want”. Gen. Hussain made treaties with Taliban commanders Nek Muhammad and Baitullah. The General, on the occasion of signing the treaty with Nek Muhammad, endorsed the mission of the latter as moral and religious, and

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thus an imperative. He even publicly questioned the US presence in post9/11 Afghanistan. “None of the 9/11 attackers was from Afghanistan. So what then is the US doing in Afghanistan”, he said of the post-9/11 invasion of Afghanistan10. The author never connects the ethnicity of President Musharraf with pro-Taliban views when he made Gen. Orakzai the Governor of KhyberPakhtunkhwa province after his retirement from the army, despite being fully aware of the pro-Taliban views of Orakzai. Why was Ali Jan Orakzai even appointed as governor if his views were so opposed to the will of the military-led government of General Musharraf? Did the Musharraf government search all over FATA and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and find no person with anti-Taliban views to be appointed as governor? Let me share with readers that during my fieldwork with Kurram and Orzakai IDPs I frequently met both Sunni and Shia tribesmen who hold Gen. Orakzai as one of the authorities responsible for their displacement. They wished him the most terrible divinely inflicted punishment in this life and in the life hereafter. Gen Orakzai has been a representative of the military establishment rather than Pakhtun. How is it possible that he stopped all the serving Generals of the Pakistani army from launching operations against the Taliban - and that due to his ethnicity - if all the other Generals, most of who were Punjabi, diverged from his views? With General Ali Jan Orakzai’s appointment as corps commander, Peshawar and later as governor, despite being a pro-Taliban individual, he can only be logically seen and reasonably described as an individual best suited for executing the state policy in FATA, not one undermining it. The author never mentions the ethnicity of those non-Pakhtun soldiers of the Pakistani defence forces who violated their professional code due to their pro-Taliban views. What about the ethnicity of those who attacked President Musharraf or those who attacked the military headquarters in Rawalpindi? What about the ethnicity of thousands of Punjabi Taliban committing atrocities on Pakhtuns in FATA? There may have been FC soldiers who refused to fight in FATA, however, I would invite the author for a detailed tour of FATA. All across villages and towns in FATA there are graves of the FC soldiers who died fighting against Al-Qaida and the Taliban on behalf of the state. Why did the author fail to highlight the Pakhtun ethnicity of those FC soldiers? Talibanization is a mind-set that has infected people among Pakhtun and non-Pakhtun Pakistanis alike, thanks to the state nurturing of the mind-set. Why are only the Pakhtun identified with the Taliban on ethnic grounds? The power of religious extremists within the state and society in Pakistan will not vanish even if all Pakhtuns, both pro- and anti-Taliban,

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are killed through some weapon of mass destruction. Deliberate identification of the Pakhtun with the Taliban may be part of the political agenda of some who share ethnicity with Zahid Hussain, but this is not going help the war on terror in any sense.

Hazarkhwani, Peshawar: Shrine of revered Pakhtun Sufi poet, Rehman Baba (1650 – 1717). The militants bombed the shrine in March 2009. The shrine is now being rebuilt and devotees have started returning.

The idea of dialogue with the Taliban has no popular Pakhtun backing. Past dialogue and peace deals with the Taliban have been a recipe for disaster for the Pakhtuns. Take for example the peace deals that were signed with the Taliban in Waziristan. Despite their existence, killings are happening there, women are barred from applying for national identity cards, schools are bombed, and music is banned, and the entire tribal leadership has been killed or made to flee from the area. Furthermore, safe passage is often provided to the Punjab-based sectarian terrorists to Kurram and Orakzai agencies, and we are all well aware of what has been happening there: sectarian violence. In many areas across FATA, and in adjacent parts of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, people have made anti-Taliban lashkars. Most victims of the Taliban terrorism are innocent Pakhtun men,

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women and children. The Taliban have bombed the basic symbols of the Pakhtun; the jirga and hujra. They have even attacked women; a violation of the dominant Pakhtun norms that forbid such attacks. They have even bombed the shrine of Rehman Baba, the popular mystic Pakhtun poet whose poetry book is only next to the Quran among the Pakhtuns. Following chapters in this book will give an idea of how the Pukhtun view the Taliban. In such a situation there is only one “valid” ground for dialogue with the Taliban: to hold the dialogue with complete disregard for the popular Pakhtun wish, but in pursuit of the State's strategic designs that do not respect any popular considerations anyway. There could be a dialogue with the Taliban along these lines, but then let's call it what it is, pursuit of state policy, and do not cover it up with an imaginary Pakhtun popular support that simply does not exist on the ground. Zahid Hussain looks at the Taliban as a relentless popular Pakhtun force with the urgent need of political recognition by the world, who otherwise would inflame the whole region. He sees the Taliban as one carrying the inherent biological metamorphosis ability of a scorpion tail which regenerates when cut off. He looks at the strategic regional political context as an irrelevant variable. Commenting on the March 2007 fighting, Wana Imtiaz Gul terms it a rift between an Uzbek faction of foreign jihadis and the good Taliban, led by Mullah Nazir. In reality the issue was much more complex. It was a problem between Nek Muhammad's family-based militants and Uzbeks and the tribal elders of a sub tribe called Dari Khel (some members of this tribe were also hosting Uzbeks) over the former's rude commanding behaviour. The tribal elders of Dari Khel opted to fight those who challenge their authority in their respective areas. The tension between the two expanded into troubles for Uzbeks who underestimated the power of the tribe. Meanwhile the news of an Arab Al-Qaida member and his local bodyguard being killed by Uzbeks and seen by locals spread like fire in the jungle. Intermittent skirmishes between the Dari Khel tribe and Uzbeks escalated in to an explicit split and fighting across the tribe, its clans, and even families between those taking the side of the Uzbeks and those against. Meanwhile, the issue of the Punjabi Taliban increasing in numbers in South Waziristan was the hallmark of the year 2006. The issue of the Wazir revolt against the Uzbek militants will be further discussed in the following chapter.

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4) Conclusion The picture presented in this chapter is the real picture and represents "informational and ideational settings" of the "actual participants", rather than the ones painted by the three authors. I leave it to the readers to decide exactly which facts carry data corruption and marred knowledge. However, before closing this chapter I would like to make one more comment. General Kiani, the current Chief of Army Staff of Pakistan, was part of those pro-Taliban Generals who imposed the deadly “managed chaos” on FATA. He was Director General of ISI under President Musharraf when the ISI’s orchestrated “managed chaos” was well underway in FATA. Today, General Kiani is leading the military. This indicates that the Pakistani army continues to be dominated by pro-jihad generals. This implies that FATA will continue to be abused as a strategic space by the Generals.

Notes 1

“The Gateway, Questions Surround a Secret Pakistani Airlift”, January 2002, New Yorker, available on: http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2002/01/28/020128fa_FACT 2 For example, Maulana Sami-ul-Haq a political cleric close to the Taliban and the military establishment. He is the chancellor of Darul Uloom Haqqani, a grand madrasa in Nowshera, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. He spoke these words to a tribal leader from Bajaur who I interviewed. 3 Muhammad Waseem’s article “Origins and Growth Patterns of Islamic Organizations in Pakistan”. Available on: http://www.apcss.org/Publications/Edited%20Volumes/ReligiousRadicalism/Pages fromReligiousRadicalismandSecurityinSouthAsiach2.pdf 4 For example see this report of the New York Times “Pakistan Aided Attack in Kabul” on: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/01/world/asia/01pstan.html?scp=1&sq=ISI%20a nd%20Attack%20on%20India%20embassy&st=cse , Also see this report of the New York Times, “Pakistan Aids Insurgency in Afghanistan”: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/world/asia/26isi.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=The %20New%20York%20times%20%20General%20Kayani%20directing%20lower %20military%20officials%20to%20protect%20Haqqani%20from%20a%20possibl e%20attack%20by%20the%20US%20in%20reaction&st=cse 5 This information was shared with me by the Shia and Sunni tribal leaders from Kurram agency in FATA during my field research in December 2010 and January 2011 on the Kurram IDPs in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. At the time of the field research these tribal leaders had been participating in an ISI-backed dialogue with the Haqani Taliban, led by Zangi Khan and Bangi Khan, close relatives of

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Jalaludin Haqani, leader of the Haqani Taliban, for a negotiated settlement between Shia and Sunni tribes in Kurram. 6 See the world ranking of the ISI on this link: http://www.smashinglists.com/10best-intelligence-agencies-in-the-world/ ; also see this piece written by a former Director General ISI, Asad Durrani, on the ISI’s ranking as world’s top intelligence agency in the Daily Express Tribune dated 27 August, 2010, http://tribune.com.pk/story/43154/the-invisible-soldiers-of-islam/ 7 Watch the documentary film “Return of the Taliban” for Gen. Safdar Hussain’s public statement in Waziristan whereby he questioned the US post 9/11 presence in Afghanistan. 8 “Some More on the Pakistani Taliban”, daily Express Tribune, dated 13 March 2011. http://tribune.com.pk/story/132054/some-more-on-the-pakistani-taliban/ 9 Watch the documentary film “Return of the Taliban” for Afrasiab Khattak's comments on the peace deal between the army and the militants. 10 Watch the documentary film “Return of the Taliban” for comments of Gen. Safdar Hussain.

CHAPTER FOUR WAZIRISTAN: A “TOURNAMENT OF SHADOWS”

Introduction The Great Game, the Struggle for Empire is a book by Peter Hopkirk in which he lays out a historical narrative of the orientation of the great game played between the Russian Empire and Great Britain in and around Afghanistan. The expression “great game” according to his narrative was first used by Captain Arthur Connolly- an East India company employeein a letter to a friend, and was popularized by Rudyard Kipling later in his novel Kim. At the same time the Russian agent who had come to Afghanistan for the same purpose as Connolly, used a term which better explains the nature of events in and around Afghanistan. The term is “tournament of shadows”. In the context of the war on terror a “tournament of shadows” is well underway all over FATA. The aim of this chapter is to introduce the reader to the “tournament of shadows” in Waziristan, the first FATA agency where it was initiated. The chapter consists of five parts. Part one elaborates the “tournament of shadows”; part two depicts what happens to the ordinary people of Waziristan in the “tournament of shadows”; and part three questions a piece of research whereby the writer has not only failed to grasp the “tournament of shadows”, but has also orientalised Waziristan and its people. In the literature authored by the ‘other’, Waziristan has been depicted as a “religious society”. Thus Part four comments on the “religiosity” in Waziristan. Part five presents a social composition of the Ahmadzai Wazir tribe and profiles some prominent Taliban and anti-Taliban leaders from South Waziristan.

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Part 1: Sketching and Painting the “Tournament of Shadows” in Waziristan “We would reveal a new verse in case the US would physically infiltrate across the Durand Line in to our territory. They asked him who would do it. He cited Noor Muhammad and one of his Friday sermons in the month of September and later on arranging a procession in Wana bazaar in the last week of Ramazan, whereby he delivered a religious verdict in favour of an all-out obligatory jihad in case the US attacks Wana”. — A Recently Retired Intelligence Officer of Pakistan

This statement was made in a conversation with a Peshawar-based lawyer and his wife in a guesthouse in Peshawar in the backdrop of Angor Ada, South Waziristan, operation by the US forces in September 2008. He was confident that the intelligence agencies of Pakistan would hire the services of a few mullahs and tribal leaders. Of course there are many who are not reluctant to betray their conscience. He was confident because by 2008 almost all those tribal leaders who would not compromise on the blood of their respective tribes had been killed and the remaining were under social siege, like Nisar Lala, one of the most respected nationalist tribal leader from Waziristan. “We would cut the roots and destroy the infrastructure of international jihad, albeit hesitantly, but its domestic and regional character would remain intact. Once we would do that, Washington’s concern would dissipate and maybe, we anticipate, that its role attached to Afghanistan would dissipate. Then we would gather the scattered forces around religion into a unified agency to counter domestic secular forces and its regional and international tentacles. This would last till Afghanistan is amenable to carving a geopolitical identity subservient to Pakistan’s concerns, less we would act as spoiler whenever and wherever we choose. Issues in and around Afghanistan are the function of our security institution and are a national security interest and they would remain the same. FATA would remain a Black hole where reality would be created in a way that reflects our interests, accordingly until we balance the strength accumulated by India. You must understand that we have a military state. Look, compare us with Afghanistan and not America or a somewhat European state. We have an institution which is military and bureaucratic machinery which can hold the imagined community of Pakistan together. Afghanistan had a strong sense of an imagined community but they lack the tactics and the institutional apparatus to carry it on. It is a question of how much shock one can absorb. And if we were successful in this adventure, which of course would take time, we would be the region’s masters with lethal skills. In the pursuit of this whole exercise we have to

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master the technique and muster up the will and skill of how to be an incognito actor. Acting otherwise is unaffordable. You must understand that the US acquiesced to Pak demand of reconstituting the Taliban in its folds, which is of course a disliked reality; it is a question of how we trickle onwards”. —A Pakistani Intelligence Officer in Peshawar, in early 2009. “You cannot locate the allegiance of the Political Agent. The Pakistan Army had its own ways and dealings; it is more important in Wana than the political Agent these days. Quam (Wazir tribe) is in disarray. The tribal elders and the associated traditional social and political structures, initially suspended, stand debilitated. Seek the help of Amir (Mullah Nazir). The operative paradigm is; we are fighting the mighty US and its allies, so Pakistan is nothing in terms of fighting for them. Doubting the cause (forcing Western withdrawal) is sin and debate a heresy. Remember there are many other unintelligible players”. —Maulana Noor Muhammad

This Sufi Muhammad of South Waziristan was killed on August 23, 2010 in his mosque in a suicide attack. “I listen to BBC Pashto service daily and sometimes I am amused by the hearsay that Americans are sophisticated people”.

Regarding Pakistan and America, he said, “Dwasara sara Ghala di, Khou ay Posa dasey lagi, Chey Amrika ta de har shi pata na lagi”. Both are thieves to each other and not sharing and revealing to each other their real motives, but apparently it seems that America knows very little about the issue in hand. —Anti Taliban Tribal Leader Khadeen

Khadeen made this statement in South Waziristan in September 2008, and subsequently was killed by the Taliban. (Jalaludin) Haqqani is nothing but ISI. —Conversation with an intelligence Officer in August 2010 in Peshawar

A hundred years of modernization in our part of South Asia has bypassed FATA, where political vision has been based on denial of history. Deciphering the violent drama in Waziristan is hard, if not inexplicable; it is complex and fluid. Historical experience of Waziristan, structure of the society and operative principles of the society are important variables. Structurally, Waziristan is a tribal society. The real question is what are the sources of power in this society? What is the orientation of the tribal

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social ladder? The dynamics of its political process could best be discerned through the eyes of the main actors pulling the strings. What is the nature and orientation of the interaction amongst the main actors? Answers to these questions would bring out a coherent and accurate picture of the structure and organization of the society in Waziristan. There are three sources of power. Pakistan’s Political Agent is half ambassador and half governor to the area. He maintains a complex multilayered interaction with a variety of sections of the tribal society. He fixes the borders of socio-political activity. Patronage extended by the office of the political agent -now by the Pakistan army- lubricates the social system. The resultant patronage in the internal social makeup is discerned as social contract. The transformation of an individual, and by extension the society, is as much a function of a personal relationship with the PA (now Pakistan army) as with traditional rivals. It creates concomitant obligations and system requirements defined in terms of the potentially dangerous, but profiteering enterprise through access to resources and sources of power. The conceptualization of the office of political Agent presupposes participation in the political life of Waziristan as part of a deliberate policy tilt, either in favour of a tribal leader or a religious figure. The Political Agent’s leaning towards either side reflects fruitions of effects desired by the state. The notion owes a lot to international, geopolitical, and national exigencies. The tribal chiefs have been of two types. Those whose forefathers, like Malik Mirza Alam Yargul Khel, displayed exceptional heroism, in a not so distant history, at an opportune time for the general perceived wellbeing of the tribe, usually leading to victory in a tribal feud. There are others who owe their social status to being useful tools in carrying forward the interests or agenda of either the British, like Malik Ajmal Kaka Khel, Malik Faridullah Shoudai Khel, or that of the state of Pakistan, like Malik Khan Zada Yargul Khel. Balanced opposition between lineage segments of approximately equal size, in which each group member sides with the more distant relative, defines and enacts the social order. Winning over key traditional tribal leaders would be tantamount to having an entire village or lineage group on your side. There have been theological figures, notably Maulana Noor Muhammad and Maulana Shakirullah, popping up at times displaying religiously motivated activity, usually ending in violence. History indicates that it has been a glory couched in the language of resistance to infidel invaders at some point in time. In either case, the notion of wielding enough authority to maintain a favourable social order over a durable period of time has proved fungible. The occasional appearance of a religious figure has overshadowed the long peace exhibited by the interaction of the tribal

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leaders and the Political Agent. The Political Agent is a representative of the federal government of Pakistan and is appointed by the governor of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, also a representative of the federal government. The tilt of the Political Agent is like the decision of a pilot of a cruise. The decision of the jirga is nothing but the expression of the will of the Political Agent in cases where perceived national interest is at stake. He is king on the chessboard. It may be noted that administration of tribes in FATA is based on an indirect method. The tribal leaders act as middlemen for their tribes. Government policies are implemented through advocacy in face-to-face meetings with the tribes. This advocacy becomes more “appealing” when the message is sugar coated with patronage distributed by the Political Agent. The real issue is what is the nature of engagement amongst the Political Agent, tribal leaders, Taliban commanders, mullahs and Pakistani army in the context of the war on terror? Keep aside the non-locals jihadis. The Political Agent was side-lined, though not discarded, and the army was brought in to fill the void after 9/11. A sizeable portion of the patronage was taken away from the Political Agents, when junior military functionaries either gave contracts for development works themselves or used army work teams for construction. The bulk of the Annual Development Projects by either the army or political Agents have been awarded to prominent Taliban relatives or to their sympathisers. Ikram-udin Mehsud, father-in-law of TTP leader Baitullah Mahsud, Jahanzeb Wazir and Jamil Wazir are a few examples. Besides that, the Taliban have enforced commissions; money paid by the tribesmen to the Taliban who have been awarded developmental project contracts by the army or Political Agents under the direction of the army. This implies that the Taliban were the real beneficiaries of the development contracts and the contracts produced very little benefit for the tribal public. That also meant both the Political Agent and tribal chiefs were no longer functional. The whole structure of local power was brought to naught and discredited. The lines between pro-militants and anti-militants were blurred. The gradual withdrawal of the governmental machinery and complicit ambivalence of the army towards the Taliban thrust the whole power equation in to free fall. The loss of administrative capacity provided the space for the Taliban to be a parallel authority with its own taxation and administrative structure today. The Taliban collect a monthly tax on all the business transactions in Waziristan as well as in other parts of FATA that have fallen under their control. Nobody would dare to resist the Taliban taxes. This also weakened the required collective resolve of the tribal leaders to deal with the menace head on. Did not the political administration disown the whole

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arrangement involving tribal leaders/maliks? Did not it discredit the influence of the tribal leaders as a legitimate go-between? Instead of organising a political manoeuvre to separate militants and people, the governmental or state behaviour, led and exacted by the army, favoured the pro-Taliban networks all over FATA. The prominence of the Taliban in its current position is not due to out-fighting but out-manoeuvring the tribal leaders through the Taliban’s links with the army-dominated state machinery of Pakistan. Was not it this policy that brought “politically legitimate” militants to the fore? Why would militants challenge the legality of the tribal leaders convening the jirga in the backdrop of a treaty between Al-Qaida-led militants and the Pakistani army in 2004? Was not Pakistan the first state conducting peace deals with Al-Qaida-trained and led militants after 9/11? Prominent Pakhtun journalist, Rahimullah Yousufzai, termed the April 2004 treaty between the army, led by General Safdar Hussain and Nek Muhammad, as the most significant factor in the history of Waziristan since it became part of Pakistan in 1947. In Yousufzai's calculation the deal between Nek Muhammad and General Safdar Hussain altered the local power structure in Waziristan, thereby discrediting the tribal leaders1. The most significant part of the treaty was the declaration of an obligatory Jihad against the US in Afghanistan during the signing ceremony by General Safdar Hussain that legitimated the stance of Taliban commander Nek Muhammad, not only vis-a-vis Afghanistan, but also in Waziristan. On that occasion the general also publicly questioned the US presence in post 9/11 Afghanistan2. Researchers (like, Gunaratna and Bukhari, 2008:6) have reported that the 24 April 2004 Shakai, South Waziristan, agreement was signed between the government of Pakistan and the Ahmadzai Wazir tribe. Former Chief of Army Staff and President of Pakistan, Gen. Musharraf, is obscuring the truth when he says that the Pakistani army operations in South Waziristan “forced the Waziri tribe to sign the famous Shakai Agreement with the government” (2006:269). He is obscuring the truth because, unlike the researchers, Musharraf as the army chief could not have been unaware of what was happening to the Waziri tribe in interactions with the military in South Waziristan. The Shakai agreement was never signed with the tribe. It was signed between the government of Pakistan and the military establishment-backed Taliban linked with Al-Qaida. The tribal leaders were informed before and during the signing ceremony that they did not matter in the new scheme of things; that they must keep their mouths shut. The tribal leaders who disagreed were target-killed one after the other following the agreement. I would encourage the researchers to interview the families of the tribal

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leaders who were target-killed following the Shakai agreement. In my own interviews all of the families immediately hold the ISI and Pakistani army responsible for the targeted killings of their near and dear ones, the tribal leaders. The families however, live in constant fear of the ISI. The researchers must, therefore, apply proper research ethics to ensure the security of the tribal informants as well as gaining honest information from them. The first military operation by the army was conducted in a village in South Waziristan along the Durand line in June 2002. The army brazenly entered a village in the vicinity of Azam Warsak in the agency. There were no consultations with the tribal leaders either by those high up in the military or by the Political Agent about said operation. The tribal leaders led by Mirza Alam Yargul Khel conveyed their frustration to the Political Agent over the operation. The political administration assured the tribal leaders of a prior consultation with them in case there was a need of an operation in the future. However another operation was conducted by the army without informing the tribal leaders in a small village near Azam Warsak, South Waziristan in 2003. The tribal leaders again conveyed their frustration to the Political Agent. The tribal leaders asked to convene a jirga to deliberate on the issue of terrorists’ presence and thereby raise a tribal lashkar against them. The Political Agent turned indifferent and cold to the idea. The indifference of the Political Agent increasingly looked like it was discrediting the tribal cultural fluency of managing conflicts, including tribal lashkars. As per the time-tested practise, the tribal leaders could have been used as auxiliaries in marginalising tribal militants and capturing their foreign guests from Al-Qaida. A kind of political suspense was in the offing. The notion of military officials being in consultations with certain Taliban commanders like Nek Muhammad and Mullah Nazir became the talk of the town since January 2004. Some important tribal leaders, led by Malik Alagai, were invited by high up in the military at army headquarters in Wana, South Waziristan, to discuss how to deal with the Taliban. The military had also invited Taliban commanders including Nek Muhammad. The tribal leaders were completely unaware of this treacherous trick by the army. One room was reserved for the Taliban commanders and the other for the tribal leaders, and the conversation in one room was audible in the adjacent room, where the Taliban commanders were sitting. The tribal leaders were asked by the military authorities to speak their mind and unveil their plan for dealing with the Taliban and their foreign guests. The tribal leaders expressed their resolve to cleanse their area of the religious militants and make a tribal lashkar for the purpose. The tribal leaders were bewildered when the

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Taliban confronted them with the conversation they had with the military authorities. They were angry with the military authorities. The tribal leaders were then target-killed one after the other. The political Agent’s office has become dominated by the relatives of the Taliban commanders since then. The story of Mirza Alam Yargul Khel, a towering tribal leader, is heart wrenching. Syed Iftikhar Hussain, former governor Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa was meeting tribal leaders in Wana where he demanded the tribal leaders evict the Taliban and foreign militants from the area. The tribal leaders, already bewildered by the military’s treacherous links with the Taliban, looked at each other’s faces. Mirza Alam stood up and told the governor point blank that they (the tribal leaders) are prepared to make lashkar to eliminate the militants but the military authorities in Waziristan are the biggest hurdle in their way. Javed Karmaz Khel, a Taliban commander, was having a meeting with the military intelligence authorities in Wana even as they spoke with the governor, and he challenged the governor to confirm this right now through his support staff. A silence fell on the governor. He recovered himself and simply said that he would investigate this issue. The governor then changed the topic of his conversation with the tribal leaders. Following the meeting Mirza Alam immediately went to the man who prepares dead bodies for burial. “You must never touch my clothes3”, he ordered the man. This implies that he informed the man that he will be killed very soon and the man must give him a martyr’s burial. Mirza Alam was target-killed soon afterwards along with his two brothers, one son, and two nephews, in July 2005. It is also pertinent to mention that some time back the military authorities in Wana had asked Mirza Alam Yargul Khel to “give” them one of his close relatives, a son or nephew, to be made a Waziri Taliban commander. Mirza Alam had politely refused. The military authorities had been displeased with him since then. It is not that the whole Ahmadzai Wazir tribe is Islamist militant. The tribe was deprived of the state patronage and this is the definitive reason why it was over-powered by the Taliban, who still enjoy state patronage to this date. The tribesmen live in utter fear of the Taliban, Al-Qaida and the ISI to this date. The authors who report that the entire Ahmadzai Wazir tribe allied itself with the foreign and local Islamist militants exhibit a flagrant disregard for adherence to ethical and professional standards that would be expected of researchers and journalists writing on such sensitive issues (Hussain, 2010; Gul, 2009; Liebl, 2007). Kilkullen displays the same disrespect for professional and ethical considerations when he claims that FATA tribesmen (including Ahmadzai Wazirs) have become

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“accidental guerrillas” to fight against the West and the government of Pakistan (2009). Instead of marginalising the Islamist militants, the army institutionalised them through peace deals and legitimatised their objectives. The army initiated peace deals with the Al-Qaida-linked Waziristan Taliban, conferring the latter political legitimacy by replacing the traditional triangle of Political Agent, tribal leaders, and tribal society. Those tribal leaders, who could not discern the enormity of the situation and opted to fight back and pre-empt the ensuing cycle of violence, were target-killed. In the wake of the 2004 Shakai agreement, Nek Muhammad would stand up abrasively against the tribal leaders' deliberations of the evolving market of violence in a jirga in Waziristan. Nek Muhammad had it right, as it was he who negotiated the terms of engagement over the issue of foreign militants and jihad in Afghanistan. The treaty explicitly endorsed the objectives pursued by Nek Muhammad. The whole episode brought to the fore new actors, factors, and structures of power. The social contract between the state and society was rewritten. Taliban commanders emerged as the incumbent ruling configuration in Waziristan. Having deep roots inside the establishment, the Taliban would boost their depth of support. The Taliban capacity in overrunning the local cultural fluency owes to these correlated facts. Those tribal leaders who have a soft spot for the Taliban have hugely profited from the gradual monetization of the war. Anybody who had the capacity for a robust personalized network of spies and fighters, with ingenious and shrewd tactics of adapting to the winning end, would lead the unfolding events. So the pulse of the time became: have a Talib as a safety valve, otherwise you will be either vanquished or silenced. You have no place in the new scheme of things. The Talib’s role is now exaggerated and expanded. There is no counter-balancing force of either the civil administration, or the tribal leaders backed by the former. Lines were drawn where violence emerged as a marketable tool. The Taliban became war entrepreneurs. Membership in a Taliban combat unit became a more profitable tool than anything in the defacto opportunity curves. People adapted to the changed economic situation. It proved to be a significant defence mechanism too. The notion of X number of suicide training camps and members in Wana became the talk of the town by 2005. Those who had Arabs and Uzbeks in their homes strolled in villages with an exalted sense of honour and power. The war against the communist invasion of Kabul was receiving general approval, though it was led by the religious strata. The heads of the political madrasas have remained dubiously connected to the military since the 1980s. The symbiosis provided the former with an opportunity to

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manipulate and dominate their social order. The sustenance of the Taliban was apparently having a peripheral effect on the societal order in Waziristan in the pre-9/11 era, though it is evident now that the Taliban in Afghanistan were thriving on having deep contacts with some individual families. International and regional jihadis had deep contacts with these families and played upon this fact. In normal times it is rare for someone to take a dictatorial stance in the egalitarian tribal society; a culture of deterrence prevents the emergence of such an order. It is like a bottom-up democratic governance while the Taliban has enforced a top-down rigid religiously-couched governance. Local commanders of sufficient armed men keep the balance of power, which is patronage-based, extending incentives and social status carry immense influence, and lead the show these days. The pre-9/11 political and social base operating around the office of the Political Agent was dominated by tribal leaders. The post 9/11 anti-American hype couched and propagated in the name of religion by the religious class has resulted in the killings of over 200 tribal leaders, mostly friends of Mirza Alam Yargul Khel, or people favouring his notion of creating a lashkar to evict foreign militants from South Waziristan. The societal pattern was off-balanced and has tilted in the favour of relying on the sermons of the religious figures dominated by Noor Muhammad, links with non-local jihadis, and the Pakistan army. The revived office of the Political Agent is maintaining trust with the surviving tribal leaders, albeit heavily leaning towards the Taliban, and is sympathetic to militants’ objectives. The real question is who is maintaining manageable control over local indigenous irregular forces? Extending political legitimacy to the Taliban is a reflection of the imperatives of the institution of the army and their ultimate hold over and pursuit of the objectives of foreign policy. Over the years since 9/11 the people of Waziristan have socialised into a paradigm whereby the internal political and social dynamics are a function for the security establishment of Pakistan extending influence into Afghanistan. The use of the militant sanctuaries for cross border fighting and international terrorism developed to such a large scale that FATA is dubbed the most dangerous place on earth, a black hole. Would it become a global quicksand for the international community? It is amazing that the state of Pakistan displays little anxiety over the situation. Are not terrorist groups from across the globe maintaining and running their bases there? The global war on terror is sizing itself up in confronting the infrastructure of Pakistan’s strategic depth. Pakistani generals say the recruits of strategic depth have nothing to do with terrorism in the West, so why should the West be concerned? The state would mould the internal

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heterogeneity of positions into homogeneity, a strategic necessity. The state explicitly owned and brought the pro-Taliban families into its orbit of patronage. The extension of political legitimacy through successive peace deals between the army and Taliban encouraged violent religiously-couched resistance as an intrinsic part of the evolving process of socio-religious-political power in Waziristan. Shrewd and tactical control over tribal political process and conflict equations is ensured through loose, shadowy family alliances across inter-tribal and intra-tribal lines. Shifting alliances, changing circumstances, and shifting temperaments of new actors determine the dominance of one over the other. The families of Khan Zada, Sarwar Khan, Bangul and Sharif within the Yargul Khel sub-tribe and individual families from other sub-tribes, clan and sub-clans made an implicit alliance in order to shelter non-local jihadis. The whole of the religious strata was sympathetic to the cause. It was also joined by families from other sub-tribes of Ahmadzai Wazirs. Jamil Tojia Khel, Maulana Iqbal Ashraf Khel, Haji Yaqoub Mughal Khel, to name a few, and Maulana Noor Muhammad also joined it. The tribal leaders who had an anti-Taliban stance were Malik Mirza Alam Yargul Khel, Malik Shah Alam Khojal Khel, Malik Faridullah Shoudia Khel, Malik Alagai Itmun Khel, Jimak Yargul Khel, Malik Shirin Jan Ghani Khel, Nisar Lala Tojiay Khel, and Malik Noor Rehman Ashraf Khel. With the exception of Nisar Lala (because he is in his social prison), all of these tribal elders have been target-killed. The Family of Khan Zada and Maulana Noor Muhammad sailed safely through the whole drama owing to their skilled diplomacy, deep contacts within the establishment, a historical social status, and influence within the Taliban ranks. The tribal leaders, having no unifying strategy, have been overwhelmed by the adjudicative authority of the Taliban. Another round of political legitimacy was extended to the Taliban in the wake of evicting Uzbeks from the Wazir area in April 2007. Uzbeks were declared responsible for the preceded tribal leaders’ killings since 2003 by the Taliban, thus absolving the Mullah Nazir-led Taliban commanders from any misdeeds. The notion heavily favoured and strengthened the Mullah Nazir led-Taliban set up. The new round of political legitimacy has additional dimensions. First, the most important factor of the fight against Uzbeks was the public legitimisation of a bond between Mullah Nazir-led commanders and Punjabi Taliban. Mullah Nazir’s praise for the Punjabi Taliban in the fight was a kind of approval of their presence and activities in Waziristan. The alliance between the Punjabi Taliban and the Mullah Nazir-led Taliban publicly validated and consolidated the link between the two. The Arabs also stayed out of the

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fighting. Both the Punjabi Taliban and Arab militants were publicly heard by many tribesmen in Wana saying that they will concentrate on fighting the US and NATO forces in Afghanistan. It was implicitly encouraged by the Pakistani army and the political administration of South Waziristan. It is worth mentioning that a photograph of Mullah Nazir adorns the wall of the Political Agent’s office in South Waziristan. Second, the issue of providing further sanctuary, which was associated with the killings of the tribal leaders and some Arab fighters, to the Uzbeks, split the ranks of the pro-Uzbek and anti-Uzbek tribal leaders and Taliban families within the Shiekh Bazid tribal group, which are Yargul Khels and Ghani Khels. Saidalay, Shirin Jan and Khadeen were the most prominent figures that stood against the Uzbeks. Some tribal leaders underestimated the role of the Taliban and opted to create an alliance against the Taliban’s lordship. The family of Khadeen gradually gravitated towards creating an entirely anti-Taliban momentum. He was killed in August 2009. It is widely believed that his brothers and sons blamed the relatives of Sharif, a pro-Uzbek Taliban commander, for the said killing. It is a talk of the town in Wana that relatives of Khadeen killed the proTaliban tribal leaders (Sarwar Khan, Gul Zari, Bakhmal and Sadiq) belonging to the Sharif clan. The families of Malik Khan Zada and Maulana Noor Muhammad had a different standing over the issue of evicting Uzbeks. The family of Malik Khan Zada stood neutral, while Maulana Noor Muhammad declared Uzbeks hypocrites and infidels. The issue of Maulana Noor Muhammad being the target of Uzbeks had been percolating since then. Arabs were glorified for their non-interference in local affairs and concentration over jihad against America in Afghanistan. Third, a non-Yargul Khel, so far the ruling elite or tribal leaders in terms of leading events in the last hundred years, though Zali Khel was appointed as head of the Taliban. The mutation of leadership of the local Taliban commanders from the family of Sharif, a Yargul Khel to Nazir and Muhammad Alam, both Kaka Khels, was a significant factor. Sharif's family was having it both ways in relation to contacts with Noor Muhammad and Khan Zada, but the majority of his clan was close to Noor Muhammad. Mullah Nazir and Muhammad Alam had no social or tribal status of their own though they have been as close to non-local Punjabis, Arabs, etc., as Nek Muhammad was. It is worth mentioning that the understanding between the Mullah Nazir-Led Taliban commanders and the army is meditated by people close to Mullah Nazir instead of Noor Muhammad as of January 2009. Maulana Noor Muhammad's leadership and control diffused. The Taliban found new intermediaries between themselves and the army. There was a split

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between Maulana Noor Muhammad and Maulana Fazl-U-Rahman, leader of JUI(F), a religious-political party of Pakistan, over the nomination for contesting the elections from amongst the religious clerics in the general election in Pakistan in October 2002. The nominee Fazl-U-Rahman won both the October 2002 and February 2008 elections against Maulana Noor Muhammad. Maulana Noor Muhammad was a favourite student of FazlU-Rahman’s father. The family of Sharif had also weakened over the course of post 9/11 ups and downs. The family of Malik Khan Zada had distanced itself from Maulana Noor Muhammad. The two would publicly hurl accusations and allusions against each other. The promised undying loyalty of Malik Khan Zada's family to Maulana Noor Muhammad in the 1970s stood nowhere. Rumour had it that Arabs suspected Maulana Noor Muhammad's hand in the killings of Arabs by Pakistan’s army on December 29, 2009. He had lost almost all important influence in the Taliban, as well as with religious clerics close to Fazl-U-Rahman and surviving tribal leaders. Noor Muhammad opted to stay at home for about seven months sensing threats prior to his killing. As he came out of his social prison he was assassinated in a suicide attack. Reliable hearsay had it that Mullah Nazir twice decided to confront Maulana Noor Muhammad for being too close to the army. A restrained tension prevailed amongst the important commanders of Mullah Nazir over the issue of dealing with Noor Muhammad and the evolving showdown between the army and Baitullah Mahsud. A prominent Taliban Commander Haleemullah allied with Mullah Nazir, had a close religiously-oriented allegiance to Noor Muhammad, while at the same time he had a bad opinion of Baitullah. So was the case of Shamsullah, another Taliban commander. The standing of these two commanders acted as a restraining factor over Nazir’s calculation of either confronting Noor Muhammad head on or being too close to Baitullah. It is interesting to note that the splinter group of Mahsud militants, the Abdullah group, was sheltered by the cousin of Haleemullah, Jamil Tojiay Khel. The Taliban arrangement consequently feels slightly in disarray. The Mullah Nazir-led Taliban commanders are divided over the issue of the Mahsud Taliban and have opportunistic loyalties towards non-local militants. The overtly unified ideological dimension blurs the underlying fragmented nature, which heavily draws its strength from local grievances. The Mullah Nazirled coalition of Taliban commanders has diverse sources of patronage. Factionalization is simply a result of patronage considerations. There are some within Mullah Nazir's circles who would display sheer helplessness in confronting non-local militants while the top leadership like Mullah Nazir and Muhammad Alam consider them indispensable assets. These are

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the real dilemmas of all the stakeholders in the game plan. What would happen in case the Taliban commanders are deprived of their external sources of patronage? What would happen in case the leading figures of the Taliban are eliminated? One aspect would stand clear; that the setup of the Taliban would stand beyond repair. Are not drone attacks, which precisely hit the militants without damage to the civilian tribesmen, also contesting the Pakistani state strategic design in Waziristan? Why would Pakistan sign peace treaties with the Taliban? The imperative of the strategic depth in Afghanistan, a prerogative of the militaryled establishment, requires ties to this or that militant group in order to counter Indian influence in Afghanistan, and neutralize an alternate secular political order in Pakistan that might accentuate ethnic Pakhtun nationalism. The army has symbiotic links with the Taliban in a variety of ways. The presence of Arabs in Taliban ranks apportions the former with moral and ideological legitimacy in terms of jihad. The equation is further strengthened by the presence of the Punjabi Taliban. There is a convergence of interest amongst all these actors when it comes to Afghanistan. There were enough families by 2006 that had privileged access to state authority. For many, staying on the margins of the differentiated political patronages was nothing short of political and economic suicide. In hindsight, attraction to state patronages and privileges was irresistible. State magnetism would create a tier of new Taliban commanders. An extremely complex system of allegiance follows on from this. Loyalty is not what one's ideology is, but reflects the context of a situation. Jamil Tojiay Khel had deep contacts with the army, and two of his brothers are hardened Taliban. One of his sons was killed while he was accompanying Saiful Asad, an important Uzbek commander in Lakki Marwat. At the same time he had allotted a portion of his property for sheltering Uzbeks and the Qari Zainadin group. Jamil Tojiay Khel survived an IED attack while on the way home in his own vehicle. He convened a jirga of his tribe, the Tojiay Khel. The purpose was to convey his displeasure over the issue, and blamed the Mullah Nazir-led Taliban for the attempt on his life. In order to stimulate sympathy within his tribe, he linked the attack to renewed and evolving targeted killings against the tribal leaders. The tribal leaders demanded a two day moratorium in delivering judgment through the jirga. After an intense deliberation, a group of twenty five Tojiay Khel sub-tribe leaders gave him the following reply: “Mr. Jamil, one of your sons was a bodyguard of Saiful Asad who was deputy to Qari Tahir Yaldeshov of the Islamic Movement of Uzbikstan. Two of your brothers are hard core Taliban. You take pride in your links

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with the Pakistani army. The Taliban commander Qari Zainadin Mehsud was living in your home. Besides this, your father had been a close buddy of almost all the political agents posted in South Waziristan. We cannot locate you. We cannot help you”.

The game plan requires both climbing on board, and bandwagoning or ganging up; else the ensuing repression would neutralize one as a silent spectator. It requires hard will, a sophisticated mind of an intelligence operative, treacherous links, and beguiles pursuit. Being part of the game means exposure to the dangerous, confusing pulls and pressures of the evolving war climate. Mullah Nazir was asked by the military to get ready for an operation against Baitullah Mahsud in September 2008, as the military was preparing for an operation against Baitulah Mahsud, which the military did in October 2009. Mullah Nazir refused to toe the army line. It was also difficult for him, since he is not a good orator, to convince the Wazirs as a tribe to concentrate on fighting Baitullah Mahsud. The army offered Haleemullah Tojiay Khel a deal for his standing on the issue of fighting Baitullah. Haleemullah complied, but with hesitation. The army increasingly looked at Mullah Nazir as one who does not follow rules of the game set for him. The army decided to get rid of him. Mullah Nazir was the target of a drone on October 29, 2008, which he survived. In the wake of the drone attack Mullah Nazir initiated a search for the spies involved in the attack. As a result, Shabir Karmaz Khel was taken and confessed to having dropped a chip for the drone attack. As per the video released by Mullah Nazir, Shabir revealed that Major Tariq of ISI provided him with money and the chip to kill Mullah Nazir through a drone attack. The individual must draw some form of opportunity-cost curves that would advise him to follow one course of action rather than another. It results in a pervading system of conflict, which is manageable through negotiations, truces, and paying tributes. The entry into each opportunitycost curve would define your profit column and subsequently maximize relationships and optimize chances. It gives birth to a culture of an operating code which sets rules of conduct that define the range of actions and ideas of individuals and groups within a social system. This implies that every person who is a player in the game keeps his own contacts and players within the “tournament of shadows” to maximise his security. This enables one to get to know with confidence which group is doing what and why. An example is the relationship between Maulana Noor Muhammad and Mullah Nazir on one hand, and between Maulana Noor Muhammad and Shamsullah and Haleemullah on the other hand. Haleemullah and Shamsullah, a favourite student of Maulana Noor Muhammad, were

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gradually cultivated by the Maulana to have a safety valve in his growing, but retained, tension with Mullah Nazir. Shamsullah had the opportunity to join Nazir’s Shura after his uncle Meeta Khan was killed by the brother of Sharif. In an effort to appreciate his uncle’s contribution, Nazir and Noor Islam appointed him as a commander and Shura member. How could Shamsullah be in Nazir’s Shura when Noor Muhammad nurtured him as a safety valve against Nazir? The answer is that there is no good and bad in the “tournament of shadows”. The good guy of today could be the bad guy of tomorrow. Changing temperament, shifting alliance, and changing circumstances are the order of the day in the “tournament of shadows”. The real question is what societal order or social political design needs to be there in the post-militancy period in Waziristan? Is not the state backtracking from extending the Political Parties Act to FATA? Asif Ali Zardari, the President of Pakistan, announced the promulgation of the Political Parties Act in FATA on 14 August 2009. The announcement was never followed by a formal notification by the concerned authorities. Although constitutionally empowered to enact laws in FATA, in reality the President of Pakistan is powerless to deviate from the ISI’s script for FATA. The military establishment looks to be averse to any idea of mainstream or Pakhtun nationalist political parties operating in FATA. Could the Arab and other foreign terrorists be forced to withdraw from FATA? And could they afford it? They are hardcore wilful ideologues, who had a Takfiri dichotomous world view of Islam and the West; the two eternally at war with each other, until the former had definitively defeated the latter. Using FATA as a staging post has been an indispensable military strategy of Al-Qaeda. What to do with the Punjabi Taliban? Ahmadzia Wazir tribesmen and women from South Waziristan inform that the overwhelming majority of the militants in their area are from the Punjabi Taliban. Local Taliban commander, Haleemullah, would point to an inability to do anything against the dominant Punjabi Taliban. Could Mullah Nazir afford the Punjabi Taliban’s forced eviction on the pattern of Uzbeks? Would not doing all this shatter the militants’ aim vis-a-vis Afghanistan? Affirmative answers to these questions would mean a shift in the strategic calculus of Pakistan vis-a-vis Afghanistan. We do not see any sign of that happening up until now. In the absence of an all-encompassing, objectified, legal, formal authority of the government, the informal, traditional, tribal customary law would assume the role of maintaining social order. Community consensus around these practices would prevent the breeding of anarchy. The authoritative hold of the Taliban has replaced the informal influence of the tribal

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leaders, albeit not permanently, and it is in a flux. The traditional tribal, social, economic and political structures of managing and resolving disputes have been ruthlessly suppressed since April 2004 by the Taliban and exacted a copycat of pre-9/11 Taliban Afghanistan in Waziristan. Social and power relations mutated with the conflict and leadership based on armed strength and relations with the army. Regional and international jihadists’ affiliations crowded out traditional authority and practices. In other words, the informal tribal leaders’ jirgas were replaced by the Shuras of Taliban commanders. The former was fluent in Pakhtunwali, a traditional tribal system with no global, regional or national political ambitions, while the latter is couched in religious and anti-American axioms with global designs in pursuit of global militant Islam. The rules and the means of resolving conflicts and enforcing decisions of the Taliban are evolving. The tribal popular legitimacy, if any, is under social siege in this whole matrix. The militant organizations are highly organized, battle-hardened, heavily armed, and well funded. And importantly, while tribal influence is limited to its own area and its own people, the militant organizations have cross-tribal, cross-border, regional, and international linkages. And while the tribes are bound by their tribal traditions and customary laws (riwaj), the militant organizations are not. They have out-gunned, out-funded, outmanoeuvred, and out-organized the tribal leaders and their tribes. AlQaida decided then to build a regional ideologically-motivated franchise in South Asia to thwart the strategic designs of Western powers in the area. The proportion of violence emanating from Waziristan has a positive relation with the resolution, and a negative relation with the no resolution in the means and ends employed by those who have a stake in Afghanistan and are trying to kick around Waziristan in a way whereby it would be favourable to their respective interests.

Part 2: “Tournament of Shadows” and the Tribes of Waziristan Are the tribes of Waziristan, the Wazir, Mahsud, Dawar, Urmar and various sub-tribes, clans and sub-clans, part of the “tournament of shadows” being played on their soil? Literature authored in the context of the war on terror suggests so. The tribes of Waziristan are the “tribes of terror” (Kurtz, 2007). Tribesmen of Waziristan (and rest of FATA) are accidental guerrillas (Kilcullen, 2009). In alliance with various Al-Qaida elements, the tribes and clans in Waziristan are thoroughly engaged in vengeance killing according to Pakhtunwali (Liebl, 2007). The ability of various

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Taliban groups (who are rooted in the tribes) is questionable due to tribal rivalries4. The reality is that no entire tribe, sub-tribe, clan or sub-clan is participating in the “tournament of shadows” as willfully active participants. All the local Waziristani players of the tournament are individuals across the tribes, sub-tribes, clans, sub-clans and families, both extended as well as nuclear. Their tribes, sub-tribes, clans, sub-clans, and families, i.e. majority of the people of Waziristan, have no control over the powerful individuals among them, who are linked with the military establishment of Pakistan as well as Al-Qaida. Initially the tribesmen and women looked at them as worried bystanders while anti-Taliban tribal leaders were killed one after the other, at times along with family members or friends. Soon the circle of violence engulfed the people. A reign of terror was imposed on them. Although no reliable statistics are available, there is enough anecdotal evidence to suggest that many, if not most, of the people of Waziristan are living as Internally Displaced People, IDP’s, in other parts of Pakistan. For example, the entire Mahsud tribe is IDP. Those who are in Waziristan, many of them due to economic compulsions, are overpowered and under a social siege. They have no one in the whole world to complain to against the terrorism of the Taliban and Al-Qaida towards their people, including children, on their own soil. Scholars and journalists around the world have misrepresented their character and factual situation in their writings. This has misled the world, which sees them as complicit with AlQaida’s terrorism in Pakistan and abroad. On the ground, the tribesmen and women have suffered some of the worst human rights violations, including beheading, and live in constant fear of such crimes. Their economy and culture have been greatly damaged. They feel alone and abandoned in the face of jihadi brutalities. Take, for example, that training centre for suicide bombers in the middle of Wana bazaar (market place). People of Wana can only shed tears in the privacy of their homes over the fate of the young children who are being trained there, but cannot even whisper against them in public. Even the Waziri Taliban feel dangerously trapped. They are a minority on their own soil among the multi-ethnic international militants. Some of the Waziri Taliban go, in the dark of night, to the families of the targetkilled tribal leaders. They cry like children while admitting to the families that their misguided engagement with the jihad caused so much suffering to their fellow tribesmen. They say there is only one way they can repent and that is to begin an all out war against the Al-Qaida militants and Pakistani army. They can’t do it alone. They are waiting for the Wazir tribe to take such an initiative at the tribal level. The Waziri Taliban

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pledge that, if and when this is done, they, the Waziri Taliban, will be at the forefront of the Wazir tribe’s armed resistance to Al-Qaida and the Pakistan army. In the last week of September 2010 a mid level Waziri Taliban commander asked his Punjabi and Arab guests to leave his house. The Punjabi Taliban told their host that they have invested enough money in building a training camp and ammunition stores in his house so they would not leave. The Arabs and Punjabis looked at him as troublesome and killed him on the spot. Nobody would dare to ask the Punjabis and Arabs; why this killing? Mullah Nazir would give a tacit approval of the killing by refusing to take action against the Arabs and Punjabis. The Punjabi Taliban run the deadly jihadi show in the entire of Waziristan; south and north. In South Waziristan the centre of the Punjabi Taliban is in an area called Doag, which is about 1 kilometre from Wana bazaar. In case of any difference of opinion between the Punjabi Taliban and others (Arab, Chechens, Pakhtun etc.), the opinion of the former always prevails. All the Al-Qaida and Taliban jihadi literature in multiple languages, Arabic, Urdu, Pashto, English, is authored, printed and packed in Lahore. The packed literature is then transported to Wana through Waziri truck drivers. The drivers are strictly instructed to hand in the packets to a designated person among the Punjabi Taliban. Who are the Punjabi Taliban really? My Waziri interviewees inform that they are either ISI operatives or militants closely linked with the ISI. One interviewee said he once saw a Punjabi militant, who he had seen many times in Wana, in full military uniform in Islamabad. Spontaneously and out of sheer surprise the Waziri addressed him: “Are you the Talib from Wana?” The man, who was in a military vehicle, looked at the tribesman and immediately drove his car away. The tribesman was with a parliamentarian from Waziristan, who snubbed him for being too “reckless”. He told the tribesman that he must now pray for life. The tribesman has lived in fear since then. This is the reality of life in Waziristan. But the international and Pakistani literature, authored far away from the horrors of Waziristan, criminally implicate the tribes of Waziristan as perpetrators in the violence and terrorism. In the following part I will comment on one such piece of literature authored by Vern Liebl.

Part 3: Waziristan: The Catastrophe and the Camouflage “If the NATO (and US) forces are in Afghanistan, they (international Islamist militants) have to be in the region (including FATA)”. —Col. Imam5

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The above words of the Col. Imam connote the position of the ISI on the alien terrorists in FATA. In pursuit of that position, the people of FATA had to be forced, through immense torture, to keep the foreign terrorists as their “guests”. People outside FATA and in the wider world have to be made to understand that the terrorists have been given protection by the tribes under the code of Pakhtunwali; that the tribes are fiercely autonomous and the state has no control over them. A bloody drama of catastrophe and camouflage had to be staged in FATA. The drama began in Waziristan. Pakistani authorities informed the world community that the border with Afghanistan has been closed to stop the entry of the militants fleeing the post-9/11 bombing of Al-Qaida positions in Afghanistan. People in Angor Ada, South Waziristan’s border with Afghanistan, saw a totally different scene. The Angor Ada border was opened by the authorities, including ISI officials, for a welcoming entry of the fleeing militants into South Waziristan. Dozens of vehicles filled with the fleeing militants entered Angor Ada. The ISI officials also got into the militants’ vehicles after all of them had entered Angor Ada and drove away. Many of them came to Wana. Local tribesmen informed that the militants were covered with dust and dirt. The first thing they did in South Waziristan was to all take showers. “No international or national media never reported this important event that we saw with our own eyes”, complain the people of Angor Ada and Wana. People in South Waziristan were observing the military authorities’ collusion with the militants, while the world at large remained in the dark, or perhaps many in the world chose to ignore the drama unfolding on the soil of South Waziristan. Thinking minds in Waziristan were alarmed and began to educate people in jirgas and hujras. But as per the intelligence design, anyone objecting to the unfolding drama had to be brutally killed, along with families if necessary, to make horrific examples out of them for potential objectors. Farooq Yargul Khel and journalist Mir Nawab are two examples. Besides that, ordinary people were publicly slaughtered. They were subjected to immense violence to generate acute insecurity in the area so that no independent journalists and researchers could access the area for an independent investigation. It was systematically propagated through the right wing-dominated Pakistani media and pro-military establishment writers that the tribes of Waziristan had offered protection to the terrorists, that they have given their daughters in marriage to the terrorists and the state had become the target of tribal anger for switching sides under US pressure in the war on terror. Scholars and journalists around the world produced literature that thoroughly reflected the ISI’s script for the area. In this regard I will now

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consider the assumptions and conclusions in a research paper, “Pashtuns, Tribalism, Leadership, Islam and Taliban: A Short View”, partly written in the context of fighting between the people of South Waziristan and AlQaida-linked Uzbeks in the area. I will then challenge those assumptions and conclusions with first hand information provided by the people of Waziristan who were eye witnesses to the fighting. Some of them experienced immense stress due to the fighting. Some lost close relatives, and some still have nightmares several years down the road. The writer informs us that the Uzbek militants have been “living on the hospitality of the Ahmedzai Waziris” under the notions of melmastia and nanawati (Liebl, 2007). The Uzbeks in alliance with Yargul Khel sub-tribe clashed with the Dari Khel sub-tribe (ibid). The clashes were ignited by the killing of Asadullah, an Al-Qaida-linked Arab, by the Uzbeks (ibid). Asadullah was linked with the Dari Khels (ibid). The fighting was a result of the intra-tribal power move of the Dari Khels against the Yargul Khel (ibid). The fighting led to a series of vengeance killings in line with the Pakhtunwali (ibid). The government of Pakistan was happy to see the “fractious Pashtun display their violent tendencies” (ibid). Al-Qaida and Afghanistan-based Taliban leadership were trying to quell the violence and restore the semblance of Islamic and tribal unity (ibid). The author concludes that the only vehicle viable for consensus among the Pakhtun is Islam and any successful government among the Pakhtun must have Islamic legitimacy (ibid). I read that paper out to dozens of people of South Waziristan, both educated and illiterate, who termed it ‘baseless’, ‘nonsense’, ‘rubbish’, ‘out of ignorance’ and ‘having nothing to do with what happened on our soil’. The following is the eyewitnesses’ account of what happened in Waziristan. No doubt there was this reported killing of the Arab man by Uzbeks, and it did contribute to a bad name for the Uzbeks. But this was not the real issue. The real issue was how the Uzbeks were seen by the two Tojiay Khels. One of them, Dost Muhammad, was killed on the spot by Uzbeks while the other one fled. The fled Tojiay Khel narrated his ordeal at the hands of the Uzbeks, which spread like a forest fire. The most important factor that led to the eviction of Uzbeks was that Saidalay and Shirin Jan Dari Khels,a branch of the Ghani Khel tribe, questioned the entry of vehicles with tinted glass driven by the Uzbeks and the associated local Taliban commanders in their area of Azam Warsak. While Saidaley, Shirin Jan and Haji Jamal -all cousins- were contemplating how to prevent the entry of tinted-glass vehicles, they were attacked by the Uzbeks in which one son of Saidaley and two nephews of Shirin Jan were killed. Saidaley

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and Shirn Jan felt that they would be either killed while sitting idle or should confront the Uzbeks head on. They opted to confront them head on. It snowballed across the sub-tribes and clans and was also joined by Khadeen, the man who had previously provided shelter to Uzbeks. Maulana Noor Muhammad, Mughal Khel, sub-tribe Bizan Khel opportunistically favored the drive against the Uzbeks by Dari Khels. It is worth mentioning here too that Maulana Noor Muhammad previously supported Uzbeks financially and in his Friday sermons. Meanwhile, Uzbek affiliated commanders led by Noor Islam Yargul Khel, a brother of Sharif Yargul Khel, publicly hanged Juma Khan, also known as Jimak Yargul Khel. Looking at the powerful flow of events, Mullah Nazir Kaka Khel decided to go along with the flow against the Uzbeks. Thus the drama against Uzbek eviction was set in. It also split the family of Commander Sharif, a Yargul Khel, from within. Noor Islam and Maulvi Omer -both brothers of Sharif- and a son of Sharif fled along with the Uzbeks. Besides this, Javed Karmaz Khel, Abbas Ada Khel and Ghulam Jan Ada khel, all local militant commanders, accompanied Uzbeks in their migration from the Ahmadzai Wazir area of Wana to the Mahsud area of South Waziristan, under the control of Baitullah Mahsud, and to the North Waziristan areas, controlled by Hafiz Gul Bahadar, Maulana Khaliq Noor Dawar and Maulana Abdul Khaliq Dawar. What does all this mean; the shifting of Uzbeks from Ahmadzai Wazir area to Mahsud area and North Waziristan? It means that instead of eliminating the Uzbeks in collaboration with the Wazir tribe, the state of Pakistan put the “services” of the Uzbeks at the disposal of the Taliban based in the Mahsud area and North Waziristan! The same was repeated in the Operation Rah-e-Nijat started on October 2009 against the Hakeemullah Mahsud-led group in South Waziristan. Instead of crushing the Hakeemullah Mahsud group, the military operation has simply displaced it from the Mahsud area in South Waziristan to North Waziristan. In short, the Hakeemullah-led Taliban are simply put in the loop of the Haqqani group in North Waziristan so that their jihadist thrust and energy can be properly directed at Afghanistan. Thus there is no question of an entire tribe, sub-tribe, or clan in Waziristan giving protection to the Uzbek militants under the Pakhtun traditions of melmastia and nanawati. Initially, there were individuals within various tribes, sub-tribes, clans, and families who gave protection to the Uzbeks and other foreign militants, and there were good reasons that persuaded them to do so. First, these people considered the foreign militants as the soldiers of Allah; the UN-backed coalition attack against the Taliban regime was labeled as anti-Islamic and anti-Muslim by the

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Pakistani media and by clerics with links in the military establishment. It was propagated in the local community that these militants were struggling for the liberation of Muslims. The local commanders and clerics like Nek Muhammad, Mullah Nazir, Maulvi Mir Ajam Khan, and Mualvi Abdul Aziz were thoroughly engaged in this propaganda. According to widespread public perception in Waziristan, all these gentlemen were on ISI payroll. Secondly, many local people have observed them visiting various army cantonments. Moreover, the state machinery was busy in protecting the militants. At that time in 2002, the army was regularly carrying out search operations in different areas of Wana, South Waziristan. It was a common perception among the general masses that one Colonel Khattak of the Frontier Corps was informing the Taliban one day prior to the search operation to vacate the area. So the operations were faked. The local people were pretty assured that the government of Pakistan was patronizing the militants. Even at that time, there were thinking minds and visionary people who foresaw danger in those activities and agitated against them in public. Some of those agitated include local activists of the Pakhtunkhwa Mili Awami Party, PMAP, a Pakhtun nationalist party; some tribal leaders; and other sensible individuals who were against the militants. All of them were from various sub-tribes or clans of South Waziristan. They were publicly criticizing the presence of Uzbeks and other foreigners in local mosques, village shops, and in public discussions everywhere in the area. It was exactly at that point in time that targeted killings started in the area in summer 2003 and killed anti-militant people across all sub-tribes and clans. The first victim of target-killing was Farooq Yargul Khel, a local leader of PMAP. His father, Mirza Alam Yargul Khel, brother Tariq Yargul Khel, two uncles Feroz and Saadullah Jan and two cousins Ishaq and Ibrahim (also PMAP activist) were also assassinated. Ex-senator Malik Faridullah also became the victim of militant terrorism. Haji Shah Alam Khujal Khel, a friend of Mahmood Khan Achakzai, leader PMAP, was assassinated. Malik Mashad Khan Dotani was beheaded. It was a new style of killing unknown to the locals for centuries. This type of killing shocked the local people to their bones. Families of the assassinated people believe that the government assassinated them through the militants. The families believed they were eliminated simply because they were educating the people about the evil designs of the militants and the ISI feared that they could expose its double role in the war on terror to the outside world. Furthermore, Al-Qaida’s money factor contributed to a greater extent. The militants hired residential and other properties on lucrative payments.

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Local owners of those properties were happy for the huge money that came their way overnight. In addition to the above, most people of Waziristan, being illiterate, never had the sophistication to understand the complexities of the current global power politics. Initially many developed an opinion that the militants were serving Islam under the one-sided propaganda of the religious forces, the only political force allowed in FATA to operate under the law in Pakistan. The opinion immediately changed after the targeted killing began in summer 2003. From then onwards people have been in the grip of fear and trauma and there is no question of any kind of wider public or tribal support for the local or foreign militants in Waziristan. Fighting with the Uzbeks was never ignited by the killing of Asadullah. There was public talk of his killing before the fighting began. Moreover, Uzbeks had also turned their guns towards Mullah Nazir and his accomplices to maintain a permanent control over the area. When Mullah Nazir felt threatened, he organized a Waziri lashkar with the logistic support of the Pakistani army, including the military’s artillery, against the Uzbeks. Why the security forces of Pakistan provided support in terms of heavy weapons to Mullah Nazir is a big question for people of Waziristan. Only the ISI can answer it. When Mullah Nazir realized that he was now on the hit list of the Uzbeks, he started convincing the Wazir tribe that he has documented proof (CDs) that Uzbeks were involved in the killing of local people. He requested the people to support him to oust Uzbeks from Wana. Finally he managed to make a mixed lashkar of local people as well as Punjabi Taliban against the Uzbeks. (Many Wazirs claim that the Punjabi Taliban were actually soldiers of Pakistani army in the attire of Taliban). People supported Mullah Nazir out of compulsion rather than choice or tribal affiliations. People were threatened by two evils, the Uzbeks and Taliban led by the ISI-supported Mullah Nazir. People thought it was an opportunity to get rid of at least one of the evils: the Uzbeks. In the beginning the Yargul Khel, a sub-tribe of Ahmedzai Wazir, was in the media because three of the five wanted militants’ commanders were from this sub-tribe; Maulvi Abdul Aziz Yargul Khel, Nek Muhammad Yargul Khel, Noor Islam Yargul Khel, Maulvi Abbas Kaka Khel and Javed Karmaz Khel. None of these commanders was a tribal leader. It was not the matter of the entire Yargul Khel sub-tribe supporting the militants. Mainly the Taliban leaders mentioned above were supported by certain people among the underprivileged segments of the society in lieu of financial benefits from Al-Qaida. During clashes with the Uzbeks, only Noor Islam Yargul Khel supported

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them. At the same time, his brother Sharif was leading the lashkar against them. Sharif had never been with the Taliban in the pre 9/11 era. He, however, used to lead the Waziri lashkar in occasional tribal clashes. But now he is working under Mullah Nazir. Another brother of Noor Islam Yargul Khel, commander Omar, remained neutral. He was only interested in fighting the US and NATO forces in Afghanistan. He was killed in a drone attack in Miran Shah in 2010. Commander Khan Muhammad Yargul Khel was fighting the Uzbeks alongside Mullah Nazir. Another important point is that the first victim of target killing in South Waziristan was the anti-Taliban and anti-Al-Qaida Farooq Yargul Khel, a local leader of Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party. This was followed by the targeted killing of more than twelve other Yargul Khel leaders, including Juma Khan, his three relatives and Gul Zada, in addition to the Yargul Khel names mentioned above. Moreover, Taliban commanders from other Waziri clans were fighting along side the Uzbeks. The prominent among them were Commander Javed Karmaz Khel, Commander Abbas Malak Khel, and Ghulam Jan Adda Khel. In short, it was not the situation in which an entire tribe, sub-tribe, clan, or sub-clan supported or opposed Uzbeks. It was people within these tribes, sub-tribes, clans, and families who supported or opposed them. Most people in each tribe, sub-tribe, and clan watched all the drama as unconcerned bystanders, or become innocent victims in the violence. This is, more or less, how the catastrophe was unleashed on the entire of Waziristan. Countless people suffered across the tribes all over the area. The majority of them hold the intelligence agencies of Pakistan responsible. It is pertinent to mention the case of Khalid Khawaja, a former ISI spy, who was killed by Taliban in Waziristan. A few months before his killing, Khalid Khawaja had asked Hakeemullah Mahsud to kick out a dozen of the bad Punjabi Taliban who were involved in unapproved attacks inside Pakistan instead of Afghanistan. Khalid Khawaja also gifted a few sophisticated vehicles to Hakeemullah. What happened to the gifted vehicles? One of the vehicles was in use by the Punjabi Taliban who Khalid Khawaja considered “bad Taliban”, and were targeted by the US drone. Resultantly, some of the Punjabi Taliban who were not liked by Khalid Khawaja were killed in that attack. The remaining Punjabi Taliban not liked by Khalid Khawja, invited him to join the making of a documentary film. It was a clever trick on the part of the Punjabi Taliban. When Khalid Khawaja arrived there, he was caught and killed. The event of Khalid Khawaja’s killing also created distrust among Mahsud Taliban

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led by Hakeemullah and some Punjabi Taliban. Some of those Mahsud Taliban and Punjabi were reportedly killed recently by the Hakeemulah Shura.

Part 4: Waziristan and Islam “Waziristan nim Quran na mani” “Waziristan does not accept half of the Quran” —A famous saying of Waziristan

Traditionally and historically the tribal society has never been a religious fundamentalist society. The people prefer to decide their local dispute through tribal jirga, in which disputes are contextually and pragmatically resolved through discussions rather than according to the dictates of sharia. No doubt, the local people are Muslim but they do not really know much about Islam. They generally mix selective Islamic notions with the norms and values of Pakhtunwali, in which the latter often overrules the former. It is a common saying among Pakhtun that Pashto is Islam. Historically, the tribal people have never experienced sharia as a way of their government or way of life. The Western researchers who spent a great deal of time in the tribal areas during their research on the Pakhtun confirm the “lack” of Islam in the tribal culture. For example, Fredrik Barth, a famous Norwegian Social Anthropologist, reports: “they (people of Waziristan) themselves used to say that they do not know much about Islam. They just were Muslim and they do not have to do anything special to be that”.6

It is true that Waziristan offered resistance to the British colonialism under the leadership of the Faqir of Ipi. But his resistance was indigenous without any foreign links7. This is unlike the Taliban who have national (Pakistani) and international jihadi support links. Moreover, despite the resistance, several people of the area also cooperated with the British. During the peak of Faqir of Ipi’s movement, there were British nationals who happily lived in Waziristan, like Frank Leeson, a former Khasadar Officer in North Waziristan in 1940’s. “I have happy memories of Waziristan”, he said in an interview for my documentary film “Waziristana Culture under Attack”. In the same documentary film Mrs. Willie Brown, the Scottish widow of Major Willie Brown, also shared her husband’s happy memories of Waziristan, where he served as a military officer in the 1940’s.

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It is interesting to note that unlike people in the rest of Pakistan, including Pakhtun, people in Waziristan do not circumcise their boys according to the Islamic tradition. The wider society in Pakistan is unaware of it, and Pakistani media have been reporting about arrests of “uncircumcised” men, who they believed were foreign non-Muslims sent by Israel and India for terrorism in Pakistan. Actually these men were Muslims from Waziristan and part of various militant groups. Referring to this situation Dr Mohammad Taqi, a Pakhtun intellectual, writes this interesting paragraph in his weekly column in a Pakistani newspaper: “one of the Pakistani officers who flew the body of Taliban commander Nek Muhammad Wazir, after he was killed in a US drone attack in 2004, gave me the undeniable proof that Wazir was an Indian agent. “Doctor sahib, woh Hindu tha (listen Doc, he was a Hindu),” confided the major. “And you know this how?” I asked. The response, which has since become an urban legend of sorts, was simple: “He was not circumcised!” My immediate question to major sahib was whether they had ever checked the circumcision status of these fine men when dispatching them to fight the infidel Soviets. Had they done so, they would have figured that, back in the day, the prevalence of such uncircumcised RAW agents among the mujahideen was pretty darned high”.8

The fact that men in Waziristan are not circumcised also substantiates that it is a traditional tribal society that is not fully integrated with all Islamic traditions followed by other Muslims in the region. Almost no one in South Waziristan gives the right of inheritance to women as prescribed by Islam. Maulana Noor Muhammad was once publicly ridiculed by a tribal leader, while the former was delivering Friday sermon about women rights in Islam, for not giving the right of inheritance to his own daughters. The musical instruments played for performing Attan (the traditional Pakhtun Dance) are mandatory, but music and dance are prohibited in Islam as propagated by the dominant religious forces in Pakistan. The elders in Waziristan instruct and trains their young sons and daughters in attan, the traditional dance of Pakhtun. A young woman of Waziristan, Maria Torpakai, has been Pakistan’s No.1 female squash player from 2003 onwards. She has represented Pakistan in international squash tournaments, where she won various matches. Maria complains that the government of Pakistan does not provide her with the necessary financial support to facilitate her training as well as participation in international squash competitions9. It is her family that finances her training and participation in international matches10. Her family and several other tribesmen from FATA complain that Maria is neglected at the official level simply because she is a tribeswoman from

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FATA. This is not a baseless complaint. Squash star Maria does not fit into the state scheme of things for Waziristan. In their scheme, Waziristan is not supposed to produce international stars in sports or make any other contribution to civilisation. Only militants like Baitullah Mahsud, Hakeemullah Mahsud, Nek Muhammad and Mullah Nazir can be symbols of Waziristan. Any contradictory symbols from the area, like Maria, have to be suppressed, or at least treated with state neglect and disdain. Like people in any society, the tribal people want peace and development without interruption and not Sharia. The notion that the tribal people will accept only a government having Islamic legitimacy is far from the truth. Pakistanis linked with the military establishment, like Col. Imam, former general Hamid Gul, Brig. Yusuf and Zaid Hamid circulate this notion in pursuit of their jihadi agenda. The tribal people want development, including institutions of higher education, and many are sending their kids (both boys and girls) to good schools in Pakistan. They do not seem to favour religious institutions controlling the society. Pakhtunwali is not a religious code, and neither is jirga, the most important Pakhtun institution banned or suppressed by the Taliban in the tribal areas under their control. Religion, although part of Pakhtunwali, is not the whole of it, and in case of any clash the latter is more likely to overrule the former. “We make war in religion and turn to Pakhtunwali to make peace among us (warring Shia-Sunni tribes)”, said a tribal leader of Kurram in an interview with me. The people of FATA polled their votes during general elections in Pakistan despite the fact that many among the Taliban consider democracy an un-Islamic practice. In South Waziristan, for example, Maulana Abdul Malik, who is linked with JUI(F), a religious party, won the February 2008 election but the second and third position holders in the polls were Ali Yargul Khel, a son of Malik Mirza Alam Yargul Khel, and Ghalibb Tojiay Khel respectively, who are not linked with any religious groups. This election result came despite constant threats by the ISI-backed Taliban who were pressuring the voters to vote in favour of the JUI(F) candidate. Pakhtun nationalist Parties, ANP and PMAP, as well as the mainstream PPP, have a support base in FATA. Given the domination of the military backed religious forces over Waziristan, it is remarkable that candidates with secular and nationalistic orientation would contest elections and even get many votes.

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Maria Torpakai, young tribal woman from Waziristan, Pakistan's No.1 female squash player, with her father.

Many tribal people already participate in political activities on the platforms of various political parties of Pakistan in areas outside FATA, and the following are a few of the prominent political activists from FATA: Latif Afridi (Khyber), Vice President ANP and President Pakistan Bar Council, Malik Waris Khan (Khyber), PPP President FATA, Azam Khan Afridi, party affiliation PPP, former Mayor Peshawar, Dr Said Alam Mahsud (South Waziristan) Senior Vice President PMAP, Zaman Wazir, President PPP Youth Wing FATA, Ali Wazir (South Waziristan) leader ANP in South Waziristan, Ashrafullah Dawar (North Waziristan) leader ANP in North Waziristan, Zar Noor Afridi (Khyber) Deputy Secretary General FATA, Jumaat Islami, Abdul Rahim Afridi (Khyber) President ANP Khyber, Zar Ali Khan (FR Peshawar) Former Spokesperson ANP and Chairman Pakhtun Democratic Council, Hamid Hussain Turi, leader PPP Youth Wing in Kurram, Sheikhzada, leader ANP Bajaur, Noor Islam Afridi, party affiliation ANP, former leader Pakhtun Students Federation, Gomal University in Pakistan and Karim Khan (North Waziristan) leader JUI(F) in North Waziristan.

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Part 5: Social Composition of Ahmadzai Wazir Tribe Ahmadzai Wazir has several sub-tribes and clans, and prominent among them are detailed below. Prominent Taliban and anti-Taliban figures from the sub-tribes and clans are also mentioned below. 1. Zali Khel. Zali Khel is approximately 60% of of Ahmadzai Wazir tribe in South Waziristan. It has three sub-tribes. a. Utman Khel: Shamsullah is the most prominent militant commander from the Utman Khels. Malik Noor Ali is the most influential tribal leader alive in this tribe. The most prominent antiTaliban tribal leader of this tribe was Malik Ala khan, nicknamed Alagai, who was killed by the Taliban in 2005 while on his way to arranging an Anti-Taliban jirga. • Kaka Khel: Mullah Nazir and Mullah Alam are the prominent Taliban figures of this tribe. Malik Ajmal, a very close friend of Muhammad Alam, is the most prominent tribal leader alive. • Sheikh Bazid Khel: The ruling elite of Ahmadzai Wazir belonged to this tribe pre 9/11. The tribe has other sub divisions; • Yargul Khel: The ruling elite in the pre and post 9/11 era belongs to this branch of the Ahmedzai Wazir tribe. Prominent Anti-Taliban and Pro-Taliban figures belong to this tribe. There are six major families whose standing determines the direction of the whole Wazir tribe. They are; Malik Mirza Alam, a class fellow of Afrasiab Khattak, a top ANP leader, who was dominating the Political Agent office holding jirgas. He was killed along with a several family members. His rival includes the pro-Taliban tribal elder families of Maidari, his son Malik Khan Zada. Bangul, another pro-Taliban figure. who looks neutral these days. Malik Gul Zari, Bakhmal, Sarwar Khan were the other prominent figures of this clan supporting the Taliban. They are first cousins of the Sharif family: Nek Muhammad, killed in drone attack, Maulvi Omar (also known as Haji Omar), killed in drone attack, Commander Khan Muhammad, and Noor Islam, handicapped in drone attack while sitting with Qari Tahir Yaldeshov, the chief Uzbek terrorist in which the latter was killed. Malik Gul Zari, Bakhmal, and Sarwar Khan were killed

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in the wake of anti-Taliban Malik Khadeen’s killing, probably by his brothers and sons suspecting them in the involvement of killing Khadeen. With the exception of Malik Mirza Alam, all of these people were very close to Noor Muhammad. • Ghani Khel: Saidaley, Jamal, Nawazi, and Khadeen were prominent figures from this tribe. Khadeen initially joined the ranks of the Taliban and hosted Arabs and Uzbeks, but after March 2007 joined the chorus of his other cousins and became anti-Taliban. He was killed in August 2009. • Deenor: It is a sub-tribe of Darri khel. They joined the fight against Uzbeks led by their cousins Shirin Jan, Saidaley, Khadeen and Jamal. • Ashraf Khel: Maulana Iqbal, killed in Afghanistan by the US army, and Chauta, two of his brothers were killed in a drone attack while hosting Nek Muhamamd, are the prominent families associated with the Taliban. Both of these men’s families have pre 9/11 ties with Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Maulana Iqbal was killed in Afghanistan along with thirteen other fellow Taliban. The mother of Jamil Tojia Khel is the sister of Maulana Iqbal. Chauta is still alive but had his two brothers killed in a drone attack while hosting Nek Muhammad. 2. Toji Khel: Dali, (Muhammad Ali) the father of Jamil is the most important figure. Commander Kaleemullah is the head of the Taliban from this tribe. Other important figures are Sodalay (killed in drone attack), Amir Hamza and Gulum Khun. Lal Mohammad is another important pro-Taliban figure from this tribe. Nisar Lala, a veteran nationalist and famous worker of Khudai Khidmatgar11, is the most anti-Taliban figure from this tribe and runs his own private school. These days he is confined to his social prison at home in South Waziristan. 3. Khojal Khel: Perhaps this is the most educated and anti-Taliban tribe amongst Ahmadzai Wazir. The family of Mir Askar, an antiTaliban extended family, is the most important one but is a silent spectator these days due to multiple pressures. Shah Alam Wazir, a close friend of Mirza Alam's family was killed in 2004. Shah Alam was the brother of Ambassador Ayaz Wazir. Recently a man called

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Jamshed has been appointed as commander by Mullah Nazir from this tribe. 4. Gangi Khel: Malang (survived a drone attack) and Haji Yaqoub (survived a drone attack) are the prominent Taliban figures. The most important family of Mada Akbar remains neutral in the whole drama. 5. Mughal Khel: The Sufi Mohammad of Wana, Maulana Noor Muhamamd, belongs to this tribe. Malik Pasti and his son Nasrullah, a 20 grade Officers in Customs bureaucracy, are the most prominent figures from this tribe. 6. Khouniay Khel: Khanan was a prominent commander from this tribe. He was killed by the uncle of Nek Muhammad and recently has been replaced by Tehsil-u-Rehman 7. Shoudia Khel: This is the name of a Waziri tribe living in Shakai. Mailk Faridullah a former federal minister and anti-Taliban figure was killed in 2004. Dr. Babri Gul Shoudia Khel, author and a PhD in mathematics is another prominent person, who lives in London these days. At the time, Dr. Babri Gul voluntarily arrived from London, and was appointed as Principal of Musa Nikka Public School. He was declared an infidel by Maulana Noor Muhammad in 1982 because Maulana Noor Muhammad feared his stature and growing popularity.

Profiles of Some Prominent Anti-Taliban Tribal Leaders in South Waziristan 1) Malik Mirza Alam Khan Yargul Khel Mirza Alam Khan, target-killed at age of 65 years, was the most important leader of the Ahmadzai Wazir tribe. Tall and bearded, Mirza Alam Wazir had completed high school education. He used to have regular meetings with teachers of the boys’ and girls’ schools in Wana to enquire about the absentees and drop-out students. He would then contact parents of the students to urge them to make sure their children regularly attended school. He used to say that the Pakhtun have a great deal of wealth, are ahead in men’s education, but far behind in women’s education, and this is the main cause of their backwardness in all walks of life. “Wide spread education of women is a must for overall development in the society”, he

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used to say. There is not even a single sign of a development project, such as bridges, roads, schools, colleges, health units, irrigation schemes, etc. in Wana that has not been initiated or facilitated by Mirza Alam Khan. He favoured the idea of making a tribal lashkar against the Taliban and their foreign Al-Qaida guests and has communicated these views to the military and political authorities. Mirza Alam Khan was target-killed along with his two brothers, one son, and two nephews in July 2005. His family and friends hold the ISI responsible for his and the relatives’ targeted killings, due to Mirza Alam’s anti-Taliban views and his potential to unite the Wazir tribe against the Taliban and Al-Qaida.

2) Farooq Yargul Khel Farooq, target-killed at age of 45, a tall and handsome man, had completed his bachelor degree. He was married and had seven teenage children. He was the owner of a patrol station in the main Wana bazaar. He used to lead the Wazir lashkar in tribal clashes and was also president of the Waziristan chapter of the Pakhtun nationalist party, PMAP. Farooq was known for his kindness towards mentally retarded people, who he often used to feed. As long as he was alive, the Taliban or Al-Qaida militants could not dare to enter the Wana bazaar, the city centre, where he used to sit in his patrol station. He was one of those tribal leaders who opposed the arrival of the militants in Waziristan, following the US bombing of their positions in Afghanistan, right from the day they entered the agency. He used to publicly express his determination to kick out the Taliban and Al-Qaida from Waziristan. This is the reason he was target-killed in July 2003 by a masked man who drove, in a car with tinted glass, into his patrol station and fired at him, killing him on the spot. At the time of his targeted killing he was feeding a mentally retarded man in his patrol station. The Taliban entered Wana bazaar soon after Farooq’s assassination and have controlled the bazaar and the rest of Wana since then.

3) Jimak Yargul Khel Jimak, 50, was a soldier in the Afghan national army, at the time when Dr Najib was President of Afghanistan. Following the assassination of Dr Najib he came back to his native Wana in South Waziristan. He was truly a brave anti-Taliban man and used to publicly say that Uzbeks are the most savage people on the face of the earth. The Uzbeks captured him and took him to Azam Warsak, where Noor Islam, the closest Yargul Khel associate of the Uzbeks, hanged him to death in 2007.

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4) Faridullah Khan Shoudia Khel Former minister in the federal government of Pakistan, Faridullah, was a leading tribal leader in the Ahmadzai Wazir tribe. He was influential even in the Mahsud area as well. He was staunchly anti-Taliban and Al-Qaida. In 2004, he was directed by the military authorities in Wana to come to the area to meet the visiting journalists in the town. Alarmed by the targeted killings of the anti-Taliban tribal leaders in mysterious circumstances that implicated the military authorities, Faridullah was very reluctant to go to Wana. But military authorities insisted and he was compelled to reach Wana and issue statements in favours of the Pakistani army. Fariduallah did as directed and was killed by “unknown” militants the next day. His family holds the Pakistani army responsible for his targeted killing.

Profiles of Some Prominent Taliban Commanders in South Waziristan 1) Taliban Commander Sharif A Yargul Khel Wazir, Sharif, 60, is said to have the zeal of a young man in his twenties. He has the reputation of a brave man, who is never afraid of death. He lost his nephew, Taliban commander Nek Mohammad, and brother Maulvi Omar in US drone attacks. His other brother, Noor Islam was injured in a US drone attack that killed Tahir Yaldeshov on August 2009. Noor Islam was sitting with the Uzbek terrorist at the time of the attack. He insists he is not afraid of drone attacks despite so many deaths in his family caused by the drone strikes. A tall and arguably handsome man, Shairf is from the village of Kalooshah. He is illiterate, good in Waziri attan (traditional dance) and fond of goat meat. He is known for homosexual tendencies, but not for any drug abuse. Before his career in jihad, he was a thief. People of Kalooshah vividly remembered how he stole 11 cows from the Shirani tribes. Sources close to Taliban inform that at times he laughs at himself when recalling his past thefts. He does not, however, repent, and narrates the stories as if he did a great job. He is married with four sons and four daughters. One of his sons fled with Uzbeks and lives with them in Miran Shah. This son was in favour of the Uzbeks staying in Wana and so fled with them when they were chased out of the city. Some of his relatives participated in the Afghan jihad in the 1980s. His nephew, Nek Muhammad and brother Omar, joined the Taliban in the late 1990s. Sharif joined jihad after 9/11. Sources close to the Taliban reported

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him as having said that he is doing jihad for money and fame rather than any religious cause. It is also whispered in the Taliban circles that Sharif met the Egyptian terrorist, Ayman Al-Zwahiri, in summer 2009 when the latter met with Baitullah Mahsud. Currently, Sharif is part of Mullah Nazir’s Shura.

2) Taliban Commander Maulvi Omar Tall and well-built, Maulvi Omar (also known as Haji Omar) Yargul Khel belonged to the family of militants. His close relatives are Noor Islam and Sharif, both Taliban commanders from South Waziristan. Noor Islam is uncle of another Taliban commander, Nek Muhammad, who died in a drone attack. Maulvi Omar was born in Kaloosha village, 10km from Wana, in South Waziristan. He participated in the Afghan jihad. Disappointed with the war between various Mujahideen groups following the Soviet withdrawal, he went to live in Dubai. He came back from Dubai during the Taliban control of Afghanistan and lived in Kandahar. He remained a close aide of Afghan Taliban leader, Mullah Omar. He came back to Wana in 2001. He was known for beheading people and he proudly admitted this in an interview with the BBC12. “We do not waste our bullets on them (people spying for the US). We slaughter them”, he told the BBC journalist. Besides his native Pashto, he could also speak Urdu and Arabic. He had two wives, one from South Waziristan and the other from Kandahar. Maulvi Omar died in a US drone attack on a house in Miran Shah on December 31, 2009.

3) Taliban Commander Haleemullah Bearded Haleemullah, 40, is said to be a good looking and tall man. His father was a farmer and one of his brothers worked in a shop of a flour merchant. Haleemullah was sent to madrasa, but he left the madrasa without completing the education there. Fellow villagers remember him as an unruly child who has had an uneasy relationship with his father. Haleemullah is known for his love of football and Indian movies. He has never been known for drinking Tara or any other kinds of alcohol. Haleemullah never had a permanent job. Occasionally, he used to work in an apple orchard in the season of apples. Out of sheer economic misery he went to the D.I.Khan district where a fellow tribesman appointed him as imam in his mosque. Haleemullah remained a very poor man until 2004 when he joined Taliban and overnight became very rich. Haleemullah

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became a member of Amir Hamza group. Amer Hamza escaped a drone attack in Angor Ada in which Sodalay Tojiay Khel was killed. Then he joined the group of Ghulam Jan Ada Khel. When Ghulam Jan Ada Khel fled with Uzbeks in 2007, Haleemullah was made commander of his group by Mullah Nazir and Muhammad Alam. Both Mullah Nazir and Haleemullah have been close to Usama Al Kini, known as Mazarai (lion) among the local Taliban, who was killed in a drone attack. Usama-Al-Kini was a very close friend of General (rtd.) Hamid Gul of the Pakistani army, and one of the core members of the Al-Qaeda leadership. Haleemullah perhaps is the second most important figure in Mullah Nazir’s Shura. He survived injuries in an attack by the American army while he was on an ambush mission in Afghanistan.

4) Taliban Commander Jamshed Khojal Khel Age 29, married, with two sons. He was a good cricket player in the late 1990s and was a frequent user of charas (marijuana). He left school in 8th grade. He killed one of his friends in 2005 and due to the heavy stress involved with the fear of being killed for revenge. He joined the Taliban in 2007 and was made commander by Mullah Nazir in 2009. He had a troublesome relationship with his father. He has been involved in bachabazi. He killed one of his friends, probably because of the friend's involvement with his (Jamshed’s) boyfriend.

5) Taliban Commander Javed Karmaz Khel Javed, 38, is married and has four children; two sons and two daughters. He got 12 years of school and college education. He was a brilliant football player in the early 1990s. In a clash over a piece of land in 1996, he received a bullet in his left leg and was unable to participate in football matches for two years. He has five brothers and was fond of Indian music and movies. He has been known for bachabazi and intruding into Afghan refugee camps for theft. He was a non-religious person until 2000 and continues to be known for his frequent use of bhang (cannabis) and charas even to this date. Out of sheer economic misery he joined jihad in Afghanistan along with Abdullah Mahsud in 2001. Hours before his departure for jihad in Afghanistan, parents of his friends who became addicted to bhang and charas because of his company, requested him to advise his friends against the drug abuse. His reply was this: “there is a hadith (saying of Prophet Mohammad) that in the end of the times Allah will safeguard Islam from

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infidels through people who would apparently look non-religious, but Allah knows that these are real Muslims”. In other words, he meant that although he may be a non-religious person, but due to his participation in jihad, he is the best in the eyes of Allah. Javed fled with Uzbeks from Wana and lives in Miran Shah as a guest of Taliban commanders, Gul Bahadur and Maulana Khaliq Noor.

6) Khanan Khouniay Khel Khanan was a Taliban commander. When Noor Islam’s men fled with Uzbeks from Wana, he asked Khanan to provide them shelter in the mountains of Shakai, near the North Waziristan border. Mullah Nazir pressed Khanan to the contrary and he complied. In retaliation, Noor Islam killed him in D.I.Khan district, when he was on his way to Wana. Tehsilu-Rehman has replaced him following his killing.

7) Malang Gangi Khel Illiterate Malang (literally meaning “beggar”) is a Taliban commander from Gangi Khel clan. He is over 50, and publicly known in Wana as a harsh person and sometimes would even quarrel with Mullah Nazir over money and power related issues. He complains that he was not sufficiently compensated as compared to other Taliban commanders. He survived a drone attack.

8) Khadeen Khadeen was a fearless and secular tribesman. He would publicly say that till his late forties he had not memorized the five times prayers verses, the verses that a Muslim is obligated to know from the age of 7. A few days prior to his death, he arranged a public musical gathering in the main Wana bazaar and was himself performing attan along with others to the tune of loud music. He was very good at performing the atten dance. Khadeen was member of a large extended family that owns a 500 acre piece of land in Wana. His father was a smuggler and so was he. They used to smuggle timber, weapons and anything else they could between Afghanistan and Pakistan. None of the Khadeen’s family members were Taliban, but they, including Khadeen, did shelter Arabs and Uzbeks till 2007. How come he gave refuge to Arabs and Uzbeks when he had never been a religious person his whole life? Khadeen was a smuggler and

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would look at the issue from the angle of monetary benefits. The Arabs and Uzbeks had no permanent stay in South Waziristan and were mobile. Khadeen was a strong man of the area. Arabs and Uzbeks gave him money to buy a place of refuge under his protection. One of the famous Arab AlQaida members who lived under his protection was Saiful Asad, although Asad has also lived with Jamil Tojiay Khel. Asad gave his daughter in marriage to Tahir Yaldeshov, who lived with Noor Islam, but also had connections with Khadeen till 2006. Khadeen and his family turned against Al-Qaida as well as the Taliban in 2007 when they realized that their moneymaking enterprise has contributed to the large scale death and destruction on their native land. Khadeen took a very public stance against the Taliban and Al-Qaida in line with his fearless nature. This led to his targeted killing by the Taliban. Moreover, Khadeen’s family has blood feuds with Sharif’s family whereby his brother killed five cousins of Sharif within a month of his killing.

9) Mullah Muhammad Alam Kaka Khel It is widely believed that he is the highest ranking Taliban Official from South Waziristan who had access to Afghanistan’s Mulla Omar’s Shura in Quetta, Baluchistan, Pakistan.

10) Maulana Abdul Aziz Yargul Khel Widely believed as on a mission of the Taliban in Karachi. He has not been seen in Wana for the last four or five years. He is of Muhammad Alam’s calibre.

11) Noor Islam Yargul Khel Uncle of Nek Muhammad and brother of Sharif. He survived a drone attack. He was considered the closest person to the Uzbeks and is said to have married the daughter of an Uzbek terrorist. He lives in Miran Shah these days.

12) Khan Muhammad Yargul Khel Sits on Mullah Nazir’ Shura.

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13) Mullah Nazir Kaka Khel The post-2007 Taliban leader in Wana.

15) Ameer Hamza Tojiay Khel Recently escaped drone attacks.

16) Soudalay Tojiay Khel Killed in drone attack in Angorada.

17) Gulum Khun Tojiay Khel Deputy to Haleemullah.

18) Maulana Iqbal Ashraf Khel Killed by US army in Afghanistan.

19) Chouta Ashraf Khel Two of his brothers were killed in a drone attack.

20) Maulana Abbas Ghulam Khel Fled with the Uzbeks and is in Miran Shah these days.

21) Ghulam Jan Once fled with Uzbeks and is now back in Wana.

22) Meeta Khan Karmaz Khel Killed by Uzbeks.

23) Shamsullah Replaced Meeta Khan and is considered the third most important figure in Mullah Nazir’s Shura.

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Notes 1

Watch the documentary film “Return of the Taliban” for Yousufzai’s comments. Watch the documentary film “Return of the Taliban” for Gen. Safdar Hussain’s comments 3 In the usual Muslim burial a dead body is washed and wrapped in a white cloth for burial. This is not the same with those who are martyred. Under the Muslim tradition a person who is martyred is buried in the same cloths that s/he wearing at the time s/he gave her/his life. 4 “Pakistan's New Generation of Terrorists”, by Jayshree Bajoria in Council on Foreign Relations. Available on: http://www.cfr.org/publication/15422/pakistans_new_generation_of_terrorists.html 5 Col. Imam’s Interview in Geo TV’s programme Jawab Deh. Col. Imam was a former ISI operative and had long standing relationship with militants, including Al-Qaida militants, including Usama Bin Laden. He was killed by unknown militants in North Waziristan in January 2011. http://tribune.com.pk/story/110841/clandestine-operation-colonel-imam-had-tieswith-osama-mullah-omar/ 6 From interview with Fredrik Barth. I interviewed Fredrik Barth for my documentary film, Waziristan- a Culture Under Attack, in 2009. Commenting on this issue he said: “they (people of Waziristan) themselves used to say that they do not know much about Islam. They just were Muslim and they do not have to do anything special to be that’. 7 This has been documented by Babri Gul Wazir in his book The Faqir of Ipi. The author used only British sources to establish that the Faqir’s resistance to the British was fully indigenous and without any foreign assistance. 8 “9/11 redux: made in Muridke”, Daily Times, dated 17 March 2011. http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011\03\17\story_17-32011_pg3_2 9 See my column “ Maria and Salam of Pakistan” about Maria Torpakai in the Daily Times dated 6 November 2010, http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010%5C11%5C06%5Cstory_611-2010_pg3_5 10 ibid 11 Non-Violence Movement of the Frontier Gandhi, Khan Ghafar Khan. For a detail about the movement see (Gandhi, 2004) 12 “Meeting Pakistan’s Taliban Chief”, BBC in April 2006. Available on: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4927914.stm 2

CHAPTER FIVE ORAKZAI: TALIBAN INCURSIONS AND TRIBAL RESISTANCE

This chapter presents an introduction of the tribal society in Orakzai. The chapter also highlights some of the heroic anti-Taliban resistance put forward by many of the tribes in the agency.

1) Orakzai: Society and Geography Orakzai is the only political agency in FATA which has no border with Afghanistan; it is surrounded by Kurram in the West, Khyber to the North, district Kohat on its South-East border, Hangu to the South and Peshawar on the East. The total area of the agency is 1,538 square kilometres and its total population is about 272 986. The Office of the Political Agent Orakzai is in Babar Mila in neighbouring Hangu, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, physically outside the geographical the limits of Orakzai agency.

1.1) Tribes in Orakzai Orakzai has a mixed Shia-Sunni tribal population, along with a small Sikh minority. All three have co-existed in the area for generations. There are 18 tribes in Orakzai. Four of the tribes, Bar Mohammad Khel, Mani Khel, Bharamzai and Sepoy, are Shia. Two of the tribes, Ali Khel and Story Khel, are a mix of Shia-Sunni. The remaining twelve tribes are Sunni: Feroz Khel, Mishti, Shekhan, Mala Khel, Aha Khel, Rabia Khel, Bezot Khel, Mamuzai, Utman Khel, Darha Darh Mamuzai, Isa Khel and Khadizai. Two Orakzai tribes, Ali Sherzai and Masuzai, inhabit the neighbouring Kurram agency.

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1.2) Terrain and Agriculture Orakzai is a mountainous territory, with its mountains covered by dense pine forests. The forests are privately owned by different tribes, and a key source of their income. The soil of Orakzai is fertile, and wheat, maize, potato, and wild hemp or cannabis (locally known as bhang) are grown in the area. Many fields are small because they are arranged in terraces that climb the mountains. There are lush green orchards of apple, apricot, peach, walnut and wild olive.

1.3) Socio-Cultural Life Women are not restricted to the home, although Orakzai is a gendersegregated society. Every single morning women go to the fields to contribute towards the agricultural activity. Many houses have no clean drinking water and women have to fetch water every day from water sources, often several kilometres away from their homes. Many men of the area are labour migrants in the Middle East and Karachi. They regularly send remittances home to support their families. Nevertheless, for them home still means their origins in Orakzai where their children, wives, parents and siblings are cultivating their land or engaged in small business, such as grocery shops etc. Coal mining is another source of income in the area. Most houses have their own chickens, and cows and goats for milk and yoghurt. Orakzai tribesmen are part of the FC and Pakistani army. Many people of Orakzai are also linked with the Pakhtun-dominated transport business of Pakistan. A communal family system is usually found in Orakzai, where parents live with their married children and children’s children in the same house. 1.3.1) Urs of Mir Anwar Shah Mir Anwar Shah was a saint, and his shrine is located in a lush green picturesque site in a place called Kalaya, revered by the Shias in Orakzai. An Urs used to be observed every year at the shrine and was attended by a large number of the Shia followers, as well as Sunni tribesmen. The shrine is built on a Sunni land. The Shias claim that the land belonged to them several decades ago. So this is also a land dispute between some of the local Shia and Sunni communities. There were some clashes between some Shia and Sunni groups over the question of ownership of the shrine in 2006. The government intervened and put the shrine in the custody of the FC. Neither Sunnis nor Shias are now allowed to go to the shrine.

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There has never been any Shia-Sunni clash over the shrine since the FC’s deployment on the holy site. My interviews with Sunni Orakzai tribesmen show that they have no objection to the Shias coming to the shrine to pay their homage. Also, they want a peacefully negotiated settlement for the land dispute concerning the shrine. 1.3.2) Madrasa Ehal-e-Bait Anwar –ul-Madaris This madrasa-cum-school complex is located close to the main market of Kalaya, in Lower Orakzai. The complex combines a school and madrasa system. It was inaugurated in a mixed Sunni-Shia gathering in 1985. Shia philanthropists from Orakzai and Kohat finance the educational system through donations. It aims to provide free, good quality modern education to the children of Kalaya, where there does not exist many private schools, and the government schools are sub-standard. The system has a high school for boys and a primary school for girls. Most of the students in the schools have been Sunnis. Due to the growing Taliban pressure, Sunni parents were compelled and even forced to remove their children from the schools. Currently, most of its students are Shia, whilst a few are Sunni from those families that have lived amongst Shia dominated areas for generations. The ethos of this particular system is that it aims to spread a network of male and female schools and colleges for all children of Orakzai, regardless of sectarian affiliations, in the near future. 1.3.3) Orakzai Melas Mela mean festival. It also means market, as well as a place of gathering for people for recreation. Several weekly melas are held in Orakzai. Famous amongst them are: Kalaya mela, Dabori Mela, Mishti Mela, Jalaka Mela, and Ghaljo Mela. They are regularly held on Friday, except for Ghaljo Mela which is held on Monday. Each mela is a market place close to a mosque. People attend melas for social interaction, Friday prayer, and for the sale and purchase of a wide variety of items ranging from food and cattle, to small weapons, such as pistols etc. The most important feature of these mela is that tribal leaders meet to discuss matters of public interest and also to settle disputes amongst individuals, families, clans, tribes and sects. Common tribesmen can easily gain access to tribal leaders in a mela, where they are available for the resolution of disputes. In reality, the primary purpose of the mela is to provide a forum where people can exchange ideas and resolve their disputes through the tribal leaders. A striking feature of the mela is that no one is allowed to kill

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anyone during a mela, including his enemies. Violation of this code instantly leads to culturally sanctioned punishments, including heavy fines. Thus even people who may be locked in deadly family feuds can freely come to a mela, spend time there and depart home in peace without any fear of being attacked. Melas are also held in other areas of FATA. Generally, all people of FATA love their melas because they view them as a symbol of their culture and inter-tribal harmony.

1.4) Some Picturesque Sites in Orakzai 1.4.1) Kalaya Kalaya is a Shia area of Orakzai inhabited by the Shia tribes, Bar Mohammad Khel, Sepoy and Mani Khel. With lush green mountains on both its flanks, the river Mastura, one of the two rivers of Orakzai, flows across Kalaya along a narrow road linking the area to Upper Orakzai and district settlements of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. From a scenic point of view, Kalaya is beautiful. Densely thick forests on mountainsides, waterfalls, springs, and apple and walnut orchards are in abundance. A peculiar but not unpleasant smell of bhang pervades the air of Kalaya, which is grown extensively in this area. In Kalaya, like elsewhere in FATA and KhyberPakhtunkhwa, bhang consumption is part of the culture, where it is smoked or consumed as a beverage. There are many shrines in Kalaya revered by Shias. Zilfiqal Ali Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto remain the most popular political personalities in Kalaya and their photos are displayed and can be seen in people’s houses and shops etc. Kalaya has never experienced direct Taliban control, although it has experienced terrorist attacks by the Taliban. Those Kalaya inhabitants who have been assassinated in Taliban attacks are buried in graveyards on both sides of the main road in Kalaya. These graves are conspicuous. The local people always keep them covered with flowers and sheets of cloth called chader, out of reverence. Some of the graves are also decorated with photos of those who have been assassinated and buried there. 1.4.2) Ghaljo Ghaljo, a small town of about 3000 people, is the headquarters of the Upper Orakzai agency and houses most offices of the political administration in the area. The town’s bazaar is the biggest market place in

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Orakzai. The bazaar is located in the area of the Aha Khel tribe, but most of the tribes have easy access to it. A weekly mela used to be held in Ghaljo, before the arrival of the Taliban in the area. Most of the traders were local, together with some Afghan refugees as well. People from all over Orakzai used to go shopping in the mela. Ghaljo has a hospital, two colleges (one each for boys and girls), two schools, again segregated one for boys and the other for girls, three private schools, a madrasa and a grid station, all of which have been bombed by the Taliban as well as the Pakistani army.

2) Some Misconceptions or Misinformation about Orakzai 2.1) Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, TTP, and Orakzai How old is the TTP presence in Orakzai? In his book, A to Z of Jehadi Organizations in Pakistan, Muhammad Amir Rana writes that the TTP was created in 1998 and became especially influential in Orakzai, where it executed Khial Ghaffar, a murder suspect, and also banned TV, VCRs, and music in the agency (2009:190). He further claims that the TTP, led by Mohammad Rahim, “convinced (all) eighteen tribes (of Orakzai) to accept the organization” (ibid). Mohammad Rahim supported the Afghan Taliban and wanted to bring a similar rule to Pakistan (ibid). Similarly, retired Brigadier Asad Munir, a former ISI operative, keeps saying in his newspaper columns that the Taliban emerged in Orakzai in 1999 and took control of parts of the Orakzai.1 In reality, all 18 tribes of Orakzia have hardly ever agreed on many issues in the last 200 years. The acceptance by all 18 tribes of the TTP would therefore represent a significant milestone in the recent history of Orakzia, and most, if not all, tribesmen would be aware of such an historic event. But I have yet to meet people from Orakzai who know of Mohammad Rahim and his TTP. Also, I have not found any Orakzai tribesmen who know of Khial Ghaffar. Moreover, among the 18 Orakzai tribes, four are Shia and two are partially Shia. How could the Shias accept an extremist Sunni organization such as the TTP? It is evident Rana’s claims about Orakzai and the conclusions he seeks to draw are factually wrong. The same is true about Asad Munir. But perhaps Mr. Munir is obscuring the truth like many other Pakistani writers linked with the Pakistani military establishment, who circulate distorted information about FATA.

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However, some Orakzai tribesmen inform that there was a Taliban style movement in some villages in Orakzai in 1998-99, which was led by Aslam Farooqi Akhuzada, who is one of the leading commanders in the TTP and is closely linked to the intelligence agencies of Pakistan as well as the Orakzai political administration. The other Orakzai tribesmen say that the movement was cultural, rather than religious, and was a reaction to the impact of the use of modern technological tools, like cameras, in the honour-bound, male dominated culture of Orakzai. There have been reports that men were photographing Orakzai women, unrelated to them by any family ties. In Orakzai women do not veil themselves in public spaces. Thus the movement denounced the use of cameras and photography in Orakzai to preserve family honour. A Shia religious scholar from Orakzai informs that, in 2000, the Taliban formed Tehrik-e-Taliban Orakzai, TTO, in Lower Orakzai and the inaugural ceremony was held in Municipal Committee Hall Kohat city. Aslam Farooqi Akhunzada was leader of the TTO. The movement had no significant presence in Upper Orakzai and even in Lower Orakzai it generated no wide public support. All the tribesmen, who have knowledge or understanding of the movement, agree that the movement had no designs beyond the boundaries of Orakzai. Even in Orakzai it had no popular backing and the activists of the movement gave up their mission for good after having been active for some months. It would be pertinent to mention another Pakistani writer, Syed Manzar Abbas Zaidi, who makes these comments about Orakzai: “they (Orakzai tribes) are amongst the most conservative of all the tribals, being amongst this first to ban NGOs from operating in the area, declaring them anti-Islam. The possession of television was declared a punishable crime under the influence of the local Taliban. Most of the state-run educational institutions have been shut down by the local Taliban”. (2010:122)

I would expect Mr. Zaidi to provide some empirical evidence in support of his claims about Orakzai. The information that he provides seems to be wrong. I would expect him to name a few tribes, sub-tribes, clans, subclans in Orakzai who have banned NGOs through popular jirgas. True, there have been attacks on the NGOs in Orakzai, and armed groups tried to ban them in parts of Orakzai. But the attacks and the ban per se do not mean the tribes were behind such acts. Many tribesmen say they were individual people linked with the militant groups backed by the ISI, and were creating fear and terror on the behest of this spy agency.

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From right to left- (Number 4) Aslam Akhunzada Farooqi, a leading Taliban commander from Orakzai and (Number 6) Political Agent Orakzai in an official Tree Plantation Campaign in August 2008 in Orakzai.

Mr. Zaidi’s work was published in 2010. In this year I went to some parts of Orakzai and found TV sets in people’s homes, although many of the TVs were tuned to Afghan channels. Later this year I had many interviews with Orakzai IDPs who told me that their household belongings, including electronic appliances, TV sets, etc. were looted by the Taliban. One of the things some IDP women and children missed in their displacement was TV entertainment that they used to watch in Orakzai.

2.2) “The Chief Mullah of Orakzai” In his book, South of the Khyber Pass, John Garrett reports that Mullah Mahmud Akhunzada was “the Chief mullah of Orakzai” (2008:41). He also offers the opinion that even before Mahmud Akhunzada, his own father was also “the chief mullah of the Orakzai tribe” (ibid). The fact is that Orakzai population is a mix of Shia and Sunni, and the two sects never agreed upon a single clergyman as their “chief mullah”. Moreover,

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neither Mahmud Akhunzada nor any other Orakzai man had ever had the distinction to be recognized as “Chief Mullah” of the entire Sunni population of Orakzai. Garrett seems to over simplify the complex sectarian and tribal realities in Orakzia. There is no such thing as “Chief Mullah” in any of the Pakhtun tribes. There have been occasions, and this applies even today, when some individual may acquire considerable respect and devotion due to his religious beliefs and activities; however, he is never referred to as “Chief Mullah”, or by any other title that even approximates this. Similarly, in the Pakhtun tribal system, no single leader can claim to represent his tribe as “Chief Tribal Leader” like among the Baloch or in most tribal formations elsewhere. Even if one ignores the term “Chief Mullah” and treats the use of this term as conveying an understanding of a well respected religious leader of a particular tribe, this can occur, but it simply will not apply to the whole of Orakzai, due primarily to the sectarian divide. Secondly, even the status of a “well respected” religious or tribal leader does not confer any authority on such leaders, and the other tribesmen still remain free to disagree with them.

3) Taliban’s Entry in Orakzai Before 2007, the Taliban had a nominal presence in Orakzai. The formation of the TTP was announced in December 2007 under the leadership of Baituallah Mahsud, who aimed to control Orakzai and deputed Hakeemullah Mahsud, his close confidant, as commander of Orakzai. Under Hakeemullah, the TTP entered Orakzai and gradually took over most of its territory and placed it under Taliban occupation. The Taliban chose the Ali Khel tribe as its means of entering Orakzai, since by controlling them it was thought it would make it easier to control the rest of Orakzai.

3.1) Ali Khel and the Taliban Ali Khel is the biggest tribe in the Orakzai agency, numbering over 40,000. It is a mixed Shia-Sunni tribe, with Shias representing 5% of the tribe. The tribe is located in the area where Orakzai borders with the Khyber agency. The TTP militants, led by Hakeemullah Mahsud, entered the Ali Khel area in early 2008. They included non-local Pakhtun and Punjabi militants. Local clergymen, like Hafiz Mullah and Salam Mullah, welcomed them. More importantly, a powerful local Ali Khel tribal leader, Malik Abdul Akbar, and his brother Malik Fazal Wahab supported them. The two

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brothers would introduce the Taliban to their fellow Ali Khel tribesmen as “people of God” who wished to enforce Sharia. The brothers held feasts in honour of the Taliban, both local and outsiders. Ali Khel supporters of the two brothers joined the Taliban. There were Ali Khels linked with madrasas who also joined the Taliban. The Ali Khels who participated in the Afghan jihad joined the Taliban as well. Also, local criminals, murderers, drug pushers, and thieves entered the ranks and files of the Taliban. The Taliban, led by Hakeemullah Mahsud, went to Dapar, a mixed Shia-Sunni village, and asked the people to cooperate with them in attacks on the government security forces. The villagers, both Shia and Sunni, refused to cooperate. Hakeemullah Mahsud threatened the villagers with severe consequences. The Taliban then attacked a security check point in the Ali Khel area, killing the security guards who were also local Ali Khels. Moreover, the Taliban captured local people (both Sunni and Shia) on the least pretext, such as “you have been talking against the Taliban”, dragged them to their centres, then flogged or fined them. There were some kidnappings for ransom. The Ali Khels were under considerable pressure and the fear of the Taliban reprisals became pervasive. By this time, the Taliban had managed to establish centres in various parts of the Ali Khel territory. They had occupied schools; they were given buildings by pro-Taliban Ali Khels; and there were madrasas set up in all the locations where they had established centres. The centres were in Gandi Tal, Bari Khel, Gall, Ghunda Mela, all localities in main Ali Khel towns, Dabori and Khadayzai. The Taliban were especially harsh in their attitude to the Shia Ali Khels. They held a public procession in Dabori (a famous Ali Khel town in Orakzai). There was huge a display of weapons and firepower. They threatened the Shias and insisted that the Sunni Ali Khels must boycott social contact with the Shia Ali Khel. Those Sunni Ali Khels found violating such a boycott were threatened and some were killed. The Taliban attacked the Shia Syed families in a village called Tali, and plundered their houses. The Syed families fled the area and became IDPs. The Syed families are considered to be “holy” families among Shias, and their plight annoyed both Shia and Sunni Ali Khels alike. The Taliban further required the Shia to change their religious teachings. They demanded that Shia children must be enrolled in Taliban-controlled madrasas. Shia elders jointly decided to leave the area and several Shia families fled from Dabori and Gall areas. Taliban followers looted their property, sold their crops and butchered their livestock.

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Some Sunnis benefitted from the Shia exodus, but Sunni and Shia sects had, by and large, lived peacefully together in the same area for a long time. Some had intermarried. So rather than winning a wider Sunni support, by their methods the Taliban alienated them. In this context, Sunni and Shia tribesmen decided to act together in order to protect their communities against further abuse. By mid 2008 Shia Ali Khel tribal elders were actively requesting their fellow Sunni tribesmen to help them against Taliban. The Sunni Ali Khels, who were already alarmed by the growing high handedness of the Taliban, agreed to protect the Shia Ali Khels and take some action against the Taliban. In line with the long standing tribal tradition, a grand Ali Khel tribal jirga was convened, in which over 5000 tribesmen participated, and was held in a spacious ground to deliberate on what action to take with the Taliban. There was a dirt road near the ground where the jirga was being held. Several Taliban vehicles drove past the jirga at high speed, whilst it was still continuing its deliberations. The Taliban in the vehicles were also brandishing and displaying their weapons and shouting at the jirga members. But above all, the speedily passing vehicles produced a huge cloud of dust which settled on the members of the jirga. This is highly disrespectful conduct, especially in the tribal context. It is necessary to understand that a jirga is a very respectable occasion; all people are supposed to behave themselves in a fitting manner and do nothing that may be considered or interpreted as disrespectful to a jirga. Throwing a cloud of dust on the jirga members, especially a huge jirga to the magnitude of 5000 people, was certainly very disrespectful. This annoyed the Ali Khels intensely; they immediately decided then and there that they would capture and beat up the Taliban, should they return in that same fashion. The Taliban did come back very soon, throwing another cloud of dust on the jirga and displaying their weapons. The Ali Khels men captured them, destroyed their vehicles, captured their weapons and severely beat up each one of the Taliban, some 20 in number and most of them local Ali Khels, who were surrounded by 5000 angry anti-Taliban Ali Khels. The relationship between the Ali Khel tribe and the Taliban dangerously deteriorated. The Ali Khels requested their pro-Taliban Ali Khel tribal leader, Abdul Akbar to lead his tribe against the Taliban, which he refused. In response, the grand Ali Khel jirga removed him from his position of jirga leadership in the Ali Khel tribe Another grand tribal jirga of 5000 Ali Khels decided to form a

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Lashkar, whose objective was to destroy all Taliban centres in and near the most important Ali Khel towns of Dabori and Khadayzai, and to kill or chase out the Taliban from the Ali Khel territory. By consensus, the grand jirga selected Sabeel Khan and Momin Khan as key leaders of their antiTaliban lashkar. Around 2,000 Shia-Sunni men, who ranged from farmers, labourers, local traders and other tribesmen, both rich and poor, formed part of the lashkar. Following the formation of the lashkar, the jirga leaders sent a message to displaced Shia-members of the tribe inviting them to return to their homes. They explained that the cause of their initial displacement, the Taliban’s human rights abuses, would be removed through force. Within a few days, the lashkar destroyed all Taliban centres in the Dabori and Khadayzai areas. Most of the Taliban fled, whilst others were killed. A grand Ali Khel jirga was then convened to decide what to do with the Ali Khel tribesmen who had supported the Taliban. The jirga met at the spacious ground in an area called Munda Ghuz, Khadeyzai, after the Friday prayer on 10 October 2008. Thousands of Ali Khel men participated in the jirga. There was hope on every face. The Ali Khels, rich and poor, illiterate and educated, Sunni and Shia, all were confidently determined to eliminate the Taliban from their native land. The jirga decided that each Taliban supporter had to pay 200,000 rupees as a fine (about US$ 2,300). Additionally, they were given the choice of handing over a Kalashnikov or vacating their house to be burnt down by lashkar men. Some time shortly before the conclusion of the jirga deliberations, a Taliban vehicle, loaded with 150kg of explosives and driven by a teenage boy, rammed into the jirga. There was a huge and deafening explosion. A biblical scene of horror then followed. Pieces of human bodies, burning flesh, and blood were everywhere. Ball bearings and sharp pieces of hot iron, which had been packed into the explosives, erupted like projectiles all over the area and wounded people who were within range. The suicide attack killed almost the entire Ali Khel tribal leadership, over 100 tribal leaders, along with many other tribesmen. 150 died on the spot and over 50 died later of fatal injuries. Many suffered horrific burns. A small Orakzai tribe, Mishti, supported the Ali Khel jirga and lost at least one of its tribal leaders, Ghani Shah, in the suicide attack. The nearest hospital, 10km away in the town of Ghaljo, was ill prepared to deal with hundreds of injured. There was acute shortage of blood, medicine, and trained medical staff and the hospital was too small to accommodate so many patients. The wounded had to be taken to hospitals in Hangu and Kohat in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. There was also a

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shortage of ambulances and many of the injured were transported in private vehicles. Many died on the way to hospital. The Ali Khel lashkar is an excellent example of the Pakhtun tribal backlash to excesses of the Taliban. The lashkar had popular backing through the grand tribal jirga. It was convened to address the issue of the Taliban atrocities, caused mainly by the complete absence of any state protection from those atrocities. This tribe-based lashkar was a powerful rejection of the Taliban’s vision of the creation of a world-wide Muslim community led by Muslim extremists. The lashkar was also a repudiation of attempts to exploit the sectarian differences that the Taliban wanted to create in this tribe. But nevertheless the lashkar failed to defeat the Taliban. Almost all Ali Khels hold the state of Pakistan responsible for this failure. They argue that state treachery and betrayal are the key causes behind such failure, and that the proper authorities failed them. Following the assassination of the Ali Khel tribal leadership, tribesmen approached the Political Agent, the highest state authority in Orakzai, and other local authorities for support, but the local authorities flatly refused to support the Ali Khel. The Political Agent Orakzai categorically told them that the Ali Khel had been “too harsh” on the Taliban; they must now face the music and never expect the state to help. The tribesmen begged the PA to provide security on the main roads leading to the Ali Khel area so as to ensure that no Taliban enter it. The PA refused to take any responsibility of this kind on behalf of the government of Pakistan. Here it is pertinent to mention that, under the FCR laws, security on roads in FATA is the responsibility of the government of Pakistan. All that the devastated Ali Khels asked the government of Pakistan was to fulfil its responsibility under the law. The state authorities refused. Reality in FATA is therefore often directly contrary to the stance which is publicly maintained in the official Pakistani government statements, and press releases. This was clearly evident in the aftermath of the assassination of the Ali Khel tribal leadership. The President and Prime Minister of Pakistan had expressed the view to the people of Pakistan that their government’s resolve was to “clamp down the terrorists with an iron hand” in the wake of the Ali Khel tragedy2. But in Orakzai, the very authority representing the government of Pakistan, the powerful PA Orakzai, had firmly communicated to the Ali Khels that they must never expect the government’s moral or material support in their anti-Taliban struggle. They also communicated and made it clear that any defiance of the PA’s decision could lead to punishment of the entire Ali Khel tribe under the collective responsibility clauses of the FCR. The message to the Ali Khels was clear: the state was in league with the Taliban and the Ali

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Khels stood alone. The Ali Khels had a perception about state collusion with the Taliban even before the destruction of their tribal jirga. Aslam Farooqi Akhunzada, a TTP leader in Orakzai, had been attending public meetings in Orakzai, together with the PA and APA. Now the PA had not only refused to extend any state help to the grieving Ali Khels, but had also criticised them for being “too harsh” on the Taliban. The Ali Khels were therefore convinced that the state would stand aside and do nothing, preferring them to be slaughtered to the last man, rather than supporting them against the Taliban, if they continue to oppose the Taliban. Traumatized by the carnage at the grand jirga and shocked by the unwillingness of the state to help, the Ali Khel tribe was confronted with an impossible security situation. Out of a sense of sheer helplessness, several Ali Khel joined the Taliban as a means of survival and others fled to other areas of Pakistan. Those who were still determined to stand up to the Taliban, like Malik Momin Khan, who survived the suicide attack, were target-killed by the Taliban. The remaining opponents were overpowered by the Taliban within their own villages. Lack of state support broke the spirit of the Ali Khel tribal resistance against the Taliban. The Taliban therefore had created a power vacuum and an opening in the Ali Khel area, which they easily exploited and swiftly occupied. Moreover, they also extended and consolidated their control in other parts of the Orakzai agency. The Taliban openly imposed themselves by force. They killed tribal leaders all over the area, and systematically targeted all those who opposed their rule. For example, the Taliban killed in a single day 14 tribal leaders of the Feroz Khel tribe in Orakzai. Their “crime”: they were tribal leaders and had the potential to make a Feroz Khel tribal lashkar against the Taliban. The Taliban banned the jirgas as a forum for settling disputes and banned public meetings and the formation of organizations in general. Local people were banned from carrying weapons. The Taliban organized public gatherings where young suicide bombers with covered faces were paraded with the aim of intimidating the local people. Punishment of any opposition, particularly public beheadings, terrorized the people into submission. Their Sharia courts, with its systems of fines, became fundraising tools. Taliban-endorsed kidnappings for ransom became common. Alleged propaganda against the Taliban became a Sharia court-sanctioned crime in Orakzai. A special tax, jazia, was imposed on Sikhs and Shia families. Those who failed to pay were kidnapped and sometimes killed. The militants ransacked their houses. Sikh families who had been living

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peacefully in Orakzai for generations were displaced by the Taliban and their properties looted by them and bombed.

3.2) Was the Ali Khel Lashkar Pro-Government of Pakistan? There are government offices in the nearby Ghaljo headquarters of Upper Orakzai and state authorities used to be based there. They all fled the town in 2008, when the Taliban entered. There was no state authority operating in the Ali Khel area at the time of the lashkar activities. The Political Agent has his office outside the territorial limits of Orakzai, in Hangu city. The Political Agent had called an Ali Khel jirga in his office and told the tribal leaders that there were Taliban in their area and they must remove them. The tribal leaders said they already had plans of a lashkar action against the Taliban. So the government verbally (without any material state help) supported the Ali Khel lashkar against the Taliban. However, to term this lashkar a pro-government lashkar would be a mistake. It was not made in response to any state initiative. The state apparatus just ran away and left the Ali Khels to deal with the Taliban. Secondly, the Ali Khel tribal leader closest to the government, Abdul Akbar, was already supporting the Taliban so he distanced himself and stayed away from all anti-Taliban activities, including the grand Ali Khel tribal jirgas, even after the Political Agent encouraged the lashkar against the Taliban. He expressed no wish to join his tribe in its anti-Taliban struggle. No material or moral help was provided to the lashkar by the state. The lashkar was not promoting, covertly or overtly, any agenda of the government of Pakistan. Its sole purpose was to protect its fellow Ali Khels from the Taliban atrocities in the absence of state protection. After the destruction of the Ali Khel grand tribal jirga by the Taliban, the Political Agent flatly refused to give any state help whatsoever to the grieving Ali Khels who thronged his office seeking state help or action against the Taliban. The Ali Khels said that they had already destroyed Taliban centres within their area and had chased them away from the Ali Khel area. The Taliban knew the Ali Khels were furious with them following the assassination of their leadership. The Ali Khels could guard their own area. But the dangers to the Ali Khels lay in the fact that there were Taliban strongholds in several places between Hangu (KhyberPakhtunkhwa) and Ghaljo (Orakzai) from which the Taliban could easily enter the Ali Khel area. So the request for state help was to ensure that no Taliban fighters could enter from these locations into the Ali Khel area. The Political Agent flatly refused to provide any state help in this regard.

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One of the key Ali Khel lashkar leaders, Momin Khan, survived the suicide attack on the grand jirga, but his brother died in the attack. Following the deadly suicide attack on the jirga, Momin Khan went to the Political Agent and requested him to provide him and the (new) lashkar leaders with some state security, because the Taliban were after them. My interviewees inform me that the Political Agent snubbed him, and categorically told him that he and his tribe had crossed all the limits in their attempts at dealing with the Taliban, so that the government could neither provide him nor his tribe with any security. Momin Khan was soon target-killed by the Taliban in a suicide attack, along with his three close relatives. The assassination of the Ali Khel tribal leadership, and especially the refusal of the state to provide any post-assassination help to the grieving tribesmen, broke the Ali Khel tribal unity against the Taliban. Consequently, the Taliban went from strength to strength. They extended and consolidated their hold on most parts of Orakzai. The Taliban launched a campaign to kill all those Ali Khels who were linked with the jirga, both rich and poor. Several were killed, while others fled the area. All Shia fled the area. Due to the lack of state protection, several Ali Khels even joined the Taliban out of compulsion and fear. The state of Pakistan watched over all this deadly drama as if they were an unconcerned bystander. One the other hand, the lashkar cannot be termed as anti-Pakistani state either. It had no political agenda against the state or the government of Pakistan. It sought state help after the assassination of the Ali Khel leaders, and even passionately requested the state’s help and support. If the state had stepped forward to protect the Ali Khel tribe, the lashkar would have been disbanded. The lashkar was the people’s response out of helplessness. The response, the lashkar, was of the people, for the people, and by the people; the Ali Khels. It had no pro- or anti-government of Pakistan agenda. However, if the lashkar had been successful, it would have restored the writ of the government of Pakistan in the Ali Khel area. The lashkar had no agenda beyond the removal of the Taliban from Ali Khel soil, so that everyone, including the local government servants, could return to their daily routines and live their lives in peace.

3.3) Ali Khel and the Strategic Depth The following is a quotation from an interview I did with a tribal leader from Darra Adam Khel, FATA, who was a friend of some of the Ali Khel

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tribal leaders who died in the suicide attack on the Ali Khel tribal jirga. The Darra Adam Khel tribal leader told me this with tears in his eyes. “I have been sending desperate messages to my friends to desist from making anti-Taliban lashkar. They (the ISI) could not even tolerate our jirga. We humbly requested the Pakistani army and the Taliban not to fight in Darra Adam Khel as it was killing innocent people. We requested them to take their fight to any other part of Pakistan outside Darra Adam Khel. We said nothing against the army or the Taliban. There was no plan for anti-Taliban lashkar in the tribal jirga in Darra Adam Khel. And yet our jirga was bombed. Our tribal leaders were killed. I myself was injured in the suicide attack on our jirga. The Ali Khels had anti-Taliban lashkar. The lashkar had killed the Taliban and destroyed their centres. How could they (ISI) tolerate the Ali Khels up in arms against the Taliban! I kept warning them that your jirga will be bombed. The Ali Khels are stupidly stubborn people. They ignored my pleas. They said they would teach a lesson of life to the Taliban. Look what has happened! The Ali Khels have been taught a lesson of their life! You can control some of your wayward boys in the ranks and files of the Taliban. But you cannot control the state power behind those Taliban”.

The destruction of the Ali Khel tribal leadership was not a sudden and isolated event that the intelligence agencies or the government of Pakistan could not have anticipated. Growing tensions between the Taliban and the Ali Khels had prevailed over the preceding months. The Ali Khel jirga leading to formation of an anti-Taliban lashkar, the lashkar’s destruction of the Taliban centres, and its armed clashes with the Taliban, had been occurring over weeks. Neither the government nor the intelligence agencies of Pakistan could have been unaware of the emerging situation in the Ali Khel region. The Ali Khel tribe had offered the Pakistani army a golden opportunity to cripple the power of the Taliban. The army should have grabbed the opportunity, if it was really serious in crushing the Taliban. Instead the army and the government of Pakistan stood as silent spectators and let the Taliban crush the Ali Khel tribal leadership. The crucial question is “why?”. The popular Ali Khel resistance to the Taliban was a serious anomaly and contradiction for the ISI’s scheme of strategic depth. Thanks to the pro-establishment Pakistani media and the researchers’ disregard for professional ethics in accurate reporting about FATA, the world has been misled to believe that the Taliban have widespread popular support in the tribal area. The example of the Ali Khel tribe demonstrates just the opposite. Ali Khel is not an unimportant tribe. It is the biggest tribe in Orakzai. It is a mix of Shia-Sunni. The entire tribe took up arms against the Taliban. The tribesmen even proved that they could set aside any sectarian

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differences in their fight against the Taliban. This popular tribal resistance to the Taliban had to be eliminated to keep the “jihad” going on in FATA in pursuit of the strategic depth in Afghanistan, and this is exactly what happened.

4) Resistance on the Story Khel Front Despite the expanding Taliban occupation following the assassination of the Ali Khel leadership, there were still pockets of resistance in many parts in Orakzai that defied the Taliban occupation. One of them was the Story Khel front. Story Khel is small mixed Sunni-Shia tribe in Lower Orakzai (around 2% of the total Orakzai population). The Taliban established control in the Sunni-majority Story Khel area after the assassination of the Ali Khel tribal leadership in October 2008. The adjacent Shia Story Khel set up bunkers at main entry points to their territory and armed tribesmen guarded these bunkers. Checkpoints ensured that no Taliban fighters could enter their territory without alerting and activating their Lashkar. Early in 2010 the villagers of Chamanjana, a Sunni village situated at the border between the Sunni and Shia areas of the Story Khel tribe, found themselves in confrontation with the Taliban, although previously many people in this village were linked with Taliban. One of the sons of Haji Marwat, a local tribesman, was qazi (judge) in a Taliban court in the nearby Anjano area. He is known to have sentenced many people to public lashing. But they fell out with each other over the Taliban killing of a man, Sabir-u-Rehman, who worked in the security forces of Pakistan. They beheaded him and put the chopped off head on his chest with a note saying “American spy”. Furthermore, the Taliban also kidnapped some people of Chamanjana. They also tried to kidnap some Shia Story Khel men from Chamanjana who were on routine visits to the village due to family or business ties with the local people. A local tribal leader, Malik Noor Ahmad was also killed by the Taliban. They also killed a cousin of Kareem Khan, one of the men who ultimately led the village’s armed resistance against the Taliban. Such activities increasingly annoyed people in Chamanjana. Interestingly, it is the women, not men, of Chamanjana who initiated the violent resistance to the Taliban. Female relatives of the men killed by the Taliban, reacted to avenge the death of their relatives and captured five Taliban, who were patrolling in Chamanjana. They beat them severely with farming tools, so much so that the militants were left bleeding all over their bodies. Despite an intervention by community elders, it became

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clear that the Taliban would avenge this incident and attack Chamanjana. A number of men armed themselves to defend the village. The neighbouring Shia village of And Khel’s jirga leadership supplied the Chamanjana men with bullets and Kalashnikovs to strengthen their resistance. Sporadic fighting took place over a two-week period. During the first week, the women and children fled to And Khel for protection. By the end of the second week, the men followed suit. The “victorious” but angry Taliban burnt down all 80 houses of Chamanjana along with the households’ belongings. Most villagers had fled empty handed. The Taliban also destroyed the electricity system and bombed the school in Chamanjana. The government of Pakistan never interfered when all this was happening in Chamanjana. It was a case of Taliban-imposed control all over, and no attempt was made by the state to intervene. ‘No one could challenge the Taliban’s orders’, said a Chamanjana villager. The jirga leadership in Shia And Khel and Sunni Chamanjana villages had previously discussed the possibility of the people of one village having to flee collectively to the other village in case of an attack. It was the Muslim holy month of Moharam when Shias hold ceremonies to commemorate the martyrdom of the grandson of the prophet Mohammad. In And Khel the Shia Story Khel were busy with Moharam ceremonies when the homeless Sunni Story Khel arrived. The whole community was thus granted asylum in neighbouring And Khel on the basis of their common shared tribal identity. For some religious Shia Story Khels, such support was also in line with the spirit of sacrifice embodied in Shia Islam. Collective asylum was not an obvious choice though; some of the And Khel people had tribal hostilities with some Chamanjana; families and people from nearby Shia villages argued that the Taliban would enter their territory disguised as Chamanjana IDPs. However, it was decided in the And Khel jirga that, based on their tribal affiliation with the Chamanjana IDPs and the suffering of the women and children, the tribal rivalry would be abandoned during the displacement. Even some Chamanjana families that normally would never have dared to enter And Khel were allowed in. Villagers from Chamanjana were accommodated in houses the first night and were thereafter offered schools, mosques, guest houses (hujras) and some private houses, vacated by their occupants, to make space for the IDPs. One the tribal leaders hosted up to 35 IDPs in his hujra (guest house). The IDPs were meanwhile treated as guests and given food throughout their 4-month stay. They were granted loans to pay for extraordinary expenses, such as health services.

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And Khel Shia leaders also realised that the burden of hosting an entire village on a long-term basis would be unsustainable. The IDPs would soon strain their meagre resources, but they said they had to support the IDPs as long as possible due to their shared tribal identity. Moreover, it was important for the security of And Khel that Chamanjana was cleared of the Taliban. Negotiations with the government were immediately initiated. The army operation had already started in Orakzai in March 2010. The And Khel jirga requested the army to enter Chamanjana. They argued that if the army failed to occupy Chamanjana, the Taliban would establish a centre in that village and launch attacks on neighbouring Shia villages. Meanwhile, the jirga called all And Khel men to provide guns and bullets to the IDPs from Chamanjana so that they could form a Lashkar upon their return and defend themselves. By July 2010 the army was in control in Chamanjana as part of the ongoing military operation which had been taking place in Orakzai since March 2010 and almost all the villagers had returned home, where they lived in tents on the sites of their burnt out houses.

5) Ali Khel and Story Khel Lashkars: a Comparative Perspective Just as the Ali Khel, the Story Khel tribe also transcended their sectarian differences and responded to the Taliban atrocities as a united tribe. But the Ali Khel and Story Khel resistances to the Taliban led to different consequences. The former might be considered a failure, whereas the latter can be termed as a success. There are two key reasons that contributed to the different results. Firstly, unlike the Ali Khel lashkar that had no state support whatsoever, the Story Khel lashkar finally had the Pakistani army on their side. The army entered Chamanjana following the retreat of the Story Khel lashkar and cleared the village of the Taliban. The army’s repossession of the village is the most important reason for the return of the Chamanjana villagers to their burnt out houses, whereas the Ali Khels continue to live as IDPs in various parts of Pakistan. Secondly, the village And Khel that gave refuge to the Chamanjana IDPs and its retreating lashkar is the first village on the border dividing the Shia area from the Sunni territory in Orakzai. A Taliban assault on And Khel could have been perceived as an attack on the wider Shia community in Orakzai and consequently Shia lashkars from other areas could have become involved to support the And Khel’s fight against the

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Taliban. Strategically, this would be an undesirable situation for the Taliban. It could have become even more undesirable if Sunni tribesmen from the mixed Shia-Sunni tribes, like Ali Khel and Story Khel, had joined the Shia anti-Taliban lashkars on the basis of their tribal affiliations with the Shias. This is the key reason why the Taliban refrained from chasing the retreating Story Khel lashkar into And Khel. The Ali Khel lashkar had no such option as a fallback possibility. Like the Ali Khel lashkar, the Story Khel lashkar also never had any pro- or anti-Pakistan agenda. Just like the Ali Khels, the Story Khels too wanted peace on their soil. They wanted the Pakistani army to eliminate the Taliban. They formed the lashkar out of compulsion caused by the Taliban brutality and in the absence of any state security. The Story Khel lashkar abandoned their activities when the Pakistani army took control of Chamanjana. “I hope that the Pakistani army permanently restores the writ of the government of Pakistan in FATA, so that there is no need for tribal lashkars to fight for security in the tribal area”, said a Chamanjan lashkar man.

6) Is the Story Khel Front Permanently Secured from the Taliban? There is no solid evidence to believe so. Past experience shows that the Taliban have been retaking areas previously cleared by the Pakistani army, like several parts of South Waziristan, Bajaur, Khyber, FR Kohat and FP Peshawar. The army has not been able to kill even a single leading Taliban commander responsible for terrorising people in Orakzai, i.e. men such as Hakeemullah, Toofan Mullah, Aslam Farooqi, Tariq Afridi, Gul Zaman Mullah, Salam Mullah, Zia-ur-Rehman, Nabi Mullah, Hafiz Saeed and Saif-ur-Rehman.They simply relocate to other areas of FATA and then return after the army has withdrawn from those areas. I have yet to meet any Story Khel tribesmen who rule out the possibility of Taliban reoccupation of Chamanjana. In Chamanjana too, much like elsewhere in FATA, there is a perception of state collusion with the Taliban. People of Chamanjana complain that there was an army helicopter hovering in the air when the Taliban were setting their entire village on fire, but the helicopter never fired at the Taliban. The man who led the Chamanjana resistance to the Taliban informs that he and all his eight brothers are on the hit list of the Taliban and they would be target-killed by the Taliban as and when the opportunity arrived. Several people of Chamanjana state that at the beginning of the clashes, the Taliban sent them a message to abandon their lashkar leader and his friends, which they rejected. In

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response the Taliban burnt down their houses, but could not massacre the villagers because they had fled to And Khel. Nonetheless, they are apprehensive that the vengeful Taliban will kill them in case they reoccupy Chamanjana. The people of Chamanjana and And Khel are most concerned about this possibility. It is in this context that the And Khel tribal leaders have vowed to give refuge to their fellow tribesmen and women from Chamanjana in case they are displaced once again due to any Taliban onslaught following the army’s withdrawal from the village. They also pledge themselves to support any armed resistance from this village to the invading Taliban. Also, the And Khel villagers were strengthening their own security to withstand future Taliban attacks and prevent any fresh human displacements.

7) Resistance on the Kalaya Front Kalaya is a lush green and beautiful area of Orakzai, and home to three Shia tribes: Bar Mohammad Khel, Mani Khel and Sepoy. The Taliban never occupied Kalaya, but its people have suffered due to the Taliban’s acts of terrorism inside and outside the area.

7.1) Potential Massacre Prevented in Kalaya Not far from Kalaya’s main market is a dirt road that leads to the area’s busy cattle market. After the assassination of the Ali Khel tribal jirga, the Taliban threatened to massacre a large number of people in busy public places in Kalaya. The Kalaya cattle market was a soft target for this purpose. In response, the local volunteers guarded the market. On 5 December 2008, at a time when the market was filled with people, the guards confronted a suicide bomber, who detonated his explosives, killing himself and the volunteers on the spot. Some of the volunteers, like Amin Alam Khan, are buried in a graveyard close to the dirt road. By sacrificing their lives, the volunteers prevented an Ali Khel grand jirga type massacre in Kalaya. As a mark of their gratitude and respect, the people of Kalaya always keep their graves covered with flowers.

7.2) Feroz Khel Sikh Given Refuge in Kalaya Feroz Khela (an area inhabited by the Feroz Khel tribe) shares a border with Kalaya. A tiny Sikh community consisting of 34 families has been peaceably living with the Feroz Khela tribe for generations. All this changed with the Taliban occupation of the Feroz Khela. The Taliban

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ordered the Sikh community to pay Rs 600 Million as jazia, or prepare for a fight. The peaceful community could not fight and also could not afford to pay the jazia. Consequently, the Taliban kidnapped and killed some of the Sikhs. The community leaders decided to flee Feroz Khela for their lives. Most of the Sikhs were cloth and spice merchants. The Sikh families fled empty handed to Peshawar, Hasan Abdal, and other areas of Pakistan, and the Taliban looted and burnt down their properties. Ten of the Sikh families came to neighbouring Kalaya and pleaded with the Shia tribal leaders to give them refuge under the code of Pakhtunwali. The refuge was granted and some people in Kalaya vacated their houses for the Sikhs to move in. Owners of the houses charge no rent from the Sikh IDPs. Most of the Sikh men have also been given small jobs by the local merchants in Kalaya market where they earn some money for their families to sustain themselves. The IDP Sikh families freely observe their religion in Kalaya. They wish to stay in Kalaya as long as peace has not been restored in Feroz Khela, and the Kalaya tribal jirga has allowed them to live in the area for as long as they wish. The Sikhs want to go back to Feroz Khela; whilst their houses and shops have been destroyed, but the land on which they were built still belongs to them. The Taliban issued threatening letters to the Kalaya tribal leaders as a result of their giving refuge to the Sikh families. In response, local volunteers were posted at key locations to prevent suspected vehicles and people from entering the area. The Kalaya community never had any government assistance for the help it extended to the Sikh families.

8) Mass Scale Human Displacement from Orakzai Due to the Taliban atrocities, there has been some displacement from Orakzai. But human displacement on a mass scale occurred as a result of the Pakistan army operation in the agency in March 2010. Almost 84% of the Orakzai population became IDPs3. These poorest of the poor among the IDPs have been living in the most pathetic conditions in cities and towns of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Many of them have not been registered as IDPs, and so they cannot even obtain the little help that the Red Cross or other international aid agencies provide. Some of them were literally living on roads. Some were living in the Afghan refugee camps. The IDPs say that both the Taliban and the Pakistan Army have bombed their empty houses and as well as schools, hospitals, and the electricity system in Orakzai. The IDPs especially accuse the Pakistani army of deliberately killing innocent civilians and destroying their homes. At the same time they also accuse the army of

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deliberately avoiding hitting the Taliban and their centres, private jails, and madrasas. Two suicide bombings at a registration centre for the Orakzai IDPs in Kohat killed at least 38 people and wounded 65. The first attack was carried out by a suicide bomber disguised as a woman in a burqa. Minutes later the other attacker, a teenage boy, exploded himself. Both blasts were very powerful and scattered people’s limbs, pieces of flesh, and blood all over the area. The authorities stopped registration for an indefinite period, leaving the unregistered IDPs in the lurch.

9) US drone Attack in Orakzai There was a US drone attack on 1 April 2009 in Khadeyzai, the town where the Ali Khel tribal leadership was assassinated in the suicide attack in October 2008. The attack killed Abdullah Hamas al Filistini, a senior alQaeda trainer4. He seldom interacted with local people in Khadeyzai. The people were also never enthusiastic to meet him due to fear of the militants. People in Khadeyzai never knew the real name of this Al-Qaida terrorist. A few locals of Khadeyzai who were linked with Taliban and their non-local visitors used to call him Kaka, which means “uncle” in the Pashto language, and so he was known by this name, Kaka, in Khadeyzai. I interviewed two people who are eyewitnesses to the drone attacks that killed Kaka. The following are extracts of the interviews with these two tribesmen. Aslam Khan, 27 years old driver, is from the Mishti tribe. He had ten years school education and according to him: “Not many people know his (Filistini’s) real name; I do not know either. Rarely, he interacted with local people, rarely he was in public. He was a guest in the house where the US missile struck him. Many people died, including female residents of that house. There was so much terror because of these terrorists in Khadeyzai. No one could say anything about the US strike, neither for nor against the killing in the drone strike. Any spoken word could have rendered the speaker a US spy in the eyes of the militants. They (the militants) brutally kill alleged spies. The terrorists cordoned off the bombed site. No one was allowed to come near it. In their heart of their hearts people were happy about his death. Our people are not used to living under fear. These terrorists have overpowered us. I do not know who he was; where he came from, and why he came to Khadeyzai. The only thing I know is that he was locally known as Kaka and he was an ugly looking man. I am happy he died. I am sad for the innocent deaths in the host family, but I hold the male members of this

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Zareen Khan Orakzai is a 50-year-old farmer from the Ali Khel tribe. He has never been to school. Some of his relatives have been linked with the Taliban not for ideological reasons, but for money and power. He shares this information: “I reached the site of the drone attack along with my relative, a local Taliban commander from the Ali Khel tribe. The militants had cordoned off the site and no non-Taliban allowed to approach close to the debris. I was allowed to because of my relative, the Taliban commander. I helped the Taliban in removing dead bodies from the debris. That badrang shietan (ugly devil), Kaka, had been killed. Yes, three women and one child also died. I was very sad for the women and the child. I was happy over the killing of Kaka. I had a very difficult night that night. I wanted to celebrate Kaka’s death. I wanted to mourn the innocent deaths. I could not do both. It was a strange feeling. I do not know what the real name of Kaka was. I think he was from the Yemen. He came to Afghanistan during the Afghan Jihad against the Soviets. He had a wife and children in Yemen. But he also married a woman in Mamonzai in Orakzai and had small kids with her. This is the only marriage of a local Orakzai woman with a foreign jihadi. I do not know of any other marriages of local Orakzai women with foreigners. I am pleased he died. It is the terrorists like Kaka who caused so much suffering to our tribe”.

10) Some Examples of Taliban Savagery in Orakzai The Taliban introduced a new style of justice - vigilante justice - in FATA. The tribesmen and women had never seen this kind of justice before on their soil. The Taliban meted out inhumane punishments in the name of Islamic justice to instil an aura of fear in an area where the state had surrendered its writ to the militants. The punishments were the Taliban’s tools of control over the innocent people of FATA. The following are examples of some of the hundreds of inhumane punishments carried out by the Taliban.

10.1) Beheading of Amin Janan A Shia tribesman, Amin Janan, 30, was a schoolteacher in Dabori. He was captured, tortured and beheaded by the Taliban. The reason: simply because he was a Shia. His hands and other body parts were cut off and he

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was assaulted with dagger and the butts of Kalashnikov rifles when he was alive, and finally his head was cut off. Scattered pieces of his chopped off body were lying on the roadside for four days, and no one could touch them because the Taliban had left a threatening note. On the fourth day, someone informed his relatives, a brother and cousin who were searching for him, about a dead body lying on a road in a nearby village. The relatives were shocked to see his tortured and battered body parts. The relatives took his body to a health centre in Dabori, where the health staff stitched it. The Taliban would not allow his dead body to be transported for burial in Kohat, where most of his family, especially women and children were living as IDPs. The relatives however carried his remains on less frequented mountainous tracks to Kohat, where he is buried. Amin Janan left behind elderly parents, a wife and a four year old son In July 2010 I went to meet his relatives in Sherkot, a village in Kohat, where the extended family lives in a rented house and under economic constraints. The four-bedroom house looked too small for over 20 people, but they could not afford a better house. Surrounded by women and children of the family, I and Amin Janan’s brother sat on a charpoy for an interview in a room decorated with photos of Amin Janan. There was only one charpoy in the room. Amin Janan’s mother and elder brother and I sat on the charpoy. All the others sat on the floor. The brother sitting next to his mother was narrating to me the graphic details of his murder. His mother, wife and other women of the family were sitting and hearing and occasionally contributing to the conversation. On hearing the details, the women broke out in loud wailing. His mother cried and screamed that Syed Janan, the brother, had never shared such details with her and she was told that he was only beheaded. It was an emotionally tense situation and I was embarrassed as well as feeling that it was now because of me that the mother’s pain is renewed. After some time Syed Janan took me to another room in his house for the interview to be completed in peace and privacy. I spent the rest of the day feeling under stress for what I had heard and for contributing to the additional pain this conversation has caused the family.

10.2) Orakzai Men whose Hands were Cut Off The Taliban cut off the hands of Razim Shah, Aimal Khan and Khaisteen, three tribesmen in Ghaljo, a town in Upper Orakzai, for an alleged theft. The three men, like many other men in Ghaljo, were left behind to look after the cattle and household belongings whereas every one else in their families had fled the area due to the Taliban atrocities and the military

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operation. The men were arrested by the Taliban, who jailed them for 40 days; beat them every single night in order to force them to admit the theft or join them as fighters; and on 40th day they were brought to Ghaljo main market where their hands were chopped off. I interviewed two of the three men, Razim Shah and Aimal Khan, in Kohat where they and their extended families live as IDPs. There were rumours in Ghaljo that the Taliban had been involved in looting the houses which had been left by the people who fled the area due to the military operation. Some of the people had seen with their own eyes the Taliban breaking into people’s houses and removing their belongings. There were also thefts in the neighbourhood where the three men lived. The Taliban were gaining a bad reputation.They needed some scapegoats to shift the blame for the thefts. So they charged the three men with looting the houses. One of their co-villagers, who had allied himself with the Taliban, had an old family hostility with the families of Aimal Khan and Razim Shah. He implicated them and their friend, Khaisteen, in the theft. They were blindfolded and arrested and jailed by the Taliban for 40 days. Every single night they were beaten up. The Taliban wanted them to join them as fighters or admit the theft. They refused. On 40th day of their incarceration, hooded Taliban brought the blindfolded men to the Ghaljo main market and injected something in their hands. This was probably some anaesthesia that did not work and so the chopping off of their hands was extremely painful. “It was as if I had a strong electric shock”, recalled Aimal Khan. “I can’t describe the pain in words. There is no comparable pain in the world”, said Razim Shah. Out of sheer fear the men could not even scream and had to bear the pain in silence. “We knew our screams would never provoke their sympathies, instead they might increase our punishment, and even kill us for making noises”, said Aimal Khan. The Taliban left the men in pools of blood and took the cut off hands with them, to hang in a public place to terrorise people. Soon a few children approached who took off the blindfolds from the eyes of the men. The children were followed by a woman, who gave them water. They walked towards the nearby road. Soon a bus came and they sat in it. All passengers in the bus were shocked to see the blood stained clothes of the men and their chopped off bleeding forearms. They told them that the Taliban did that to them. Some of the passengers had tears in their eyes and some hanged their heads in shame for their helplessness in face of the Taliban atrocities.

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The men came to Kohat, where their families lived as IDPs. They had no support from the government and each one had to spend Rs 85,000 for treatment.

10.3) Ordeal of Hayatullah Orakzai Hayatullah Orakzai is an IDP from Orakzai agency. His family’s ordeal began when his brother applied for a job in the Frontier Corps (FC). The Taliban had already announced that any tribesmen joining the FC would be killed. The Taliban kidnapped Hayatullah’s brother and a friend of his brother, while both boys were in the process of recruitment, killed them and dumped their dead bodies in a nearby village. Nobody dared touch the dead bodies out of fear because the Taliban had left a threatening note. Putting their lives in danger, some of Hayatullah’s relatives brought the dead bodies to their village. The boys had been shot many times in the head; their heads had been blown open. Out of sheer fear of the Taliban, none of the mullahs were ready to offer funeral prayers for the boys. Finally, Hayatullah’s cousin, who is not a mullah, offered the prayers. The boys were killed because they were recruiting in the FC. The ordeal of Hayatullah’s family multiplied when the Pakistani Army, stationed in the famous Zargari Fort in Orakzai called the elders of Hayatullah’s village for a meeting. The elders were told that as there was no health centre, whenever there might be an emergency during the night or a curfew, they must call on the phone numbers provided to them and inform the officers about the details of the villagers and vehicles so that they could be allowed to pass on the roads smoothly, and so that the army would not shoot innocent people by mistaking them as terrorists. The army officers and the elders discussed the general security situation in the area before the meeting ended. Hayatullah’s father was among the elders. Soon after the meeting, the Taliban ordered the elders who had attended the meeting to come to their centre for an investigation. Some of the elders ran away from the village. Others thought they would talk it out with the Taliban. The next day the Taliban came to arrest the elders who had attended the meeting. Those who resisted were killed on the spot. Hayatullah’s father, Akhtar Jan, was arrested. The next morning, his father’s beheaded corpse, along with the dead bodies of the other arrested people, were found in a ditch. Relatives and friends advised Hayatullah to leave the village because his turn could be next. Hayatullah ran away from the village along with his mother and three young siblings. I met Hayatullah in August 2010 in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa where he and his family lived in pathetic conditions as IDPs without any state

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compensation for the tragedy the family had suffered. Moved by the family’s tragedy I wrote a column5 about it in the daily Times dated 2 October 2010. The FC authorities in Peshawar took note of the column, and they asked me to put them in contact with Hayatullah to enable him to apply for some compensation from the FC. Given the security institutions’ collusion with the Taliban, I remained in two minds whether or not to put Hayatullah in contact with the FC authorities. After consultations with people who I trust, including the editor of the Daily Times, the newspaper where I write, I put Hayatullah in contact with the FC media spokesperson, Major Fazal. Hayatullah’s family has now received Rs 0.6 million as compensation from the FC. Major Fazal also emailed to me a photo of Hayatullah receiving the cheque from PA Orakzai.

11) A List of Orakzai people Target-killed by the Taliban The following are names of some of the Orakzai tribesmen who were assassinated in the suicide attack on the Ali tribal jirga in October 2008. Abdullah, Abdul Akbar, Abdul Latif, Abdul Rehman (1), Abdul Rehman (2), Abdul, Shafiq, Afzal Khan, Afzal Shah, Akran Khan, Amin Akbar, Amin Askar, Asrafeel, Ashraf Khan, Arab Khan, Awid Khan, Dawlat Khan, Din Asghar, Dostali Khan, Farooq Khan, Fahim Muhammad Khan, Fazal Rahim, Fazal Amin , Ghafoor Khan, Ghairat Khan, Gulab Shah, Guldar Khan, Gulma Khan, Gul Haider, Gulaf Khan, Habib ullah Had ullah, Hayat Muhammad, Ibrahim, Ibrahim Shah, Ikhsan, Ikhasnullah, , Jalil Khan, Janat Mir, Kaimin Khan, Kaistaq, Khial Janan, Khial Dad, Khial Khan, Khial Zarin, Khushrang, Khaista Khan, Khial Bad Shah, Lal Asghar, M.Taib, Majoor Khan, Mastali Khan, Mastali Shah, Mastan, Mast Ali Khan, Mehboob Gul, Mehbob Khan, Min Afzal, Mir Askar, Mir Badshah, Momin Khan, Muhammad Janan, Muhammad Faroq, Muhmmad Jan, Mullah Muhammad Alam, Nazir, Nazir Khan, Nazir Shah, Nawar Khan, Niaz Bar, Noor Afzal, Noor Bad Shah,, Noorap Khan, Qadir Shah Sobidar, Rahim Jan, Rahib Noor, Rajmeen , Rasol Shah, Rehman Gul, Rehman Shah, Saihib Khan, Said , Said Akbar, Said Almar, Sadir Shah, Sabir Shah, Saif Khan, Sajef Khan, Saleem Khan, Shah meen, Shawkat Khan, Sheer, Asghar, Sheer Khaidar, Sheer Badshah, Sorat Gul, Speen Gul, Sturi Khan, Sultan, Sultan Asghar, Syed Rehman, Tahsin Bat Khan, Talib Jan, Taza Gul, Wakil Khan, Yadmir Khan, Yaqoob Khan, Yasin, Zarghon Gul, Zareen and Zareen Khan.

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House of a tribal Sikh in FATA destroyed by the Taliban

Notes 1

See for example the following Op-Eds of Asad Munir in the daily Express Tribune, “The Real Agenda of the TTP”, dated 10 March 2011, http://tribune.com.pk/story/130107/the-real-agenda-of-the-pakistani-taliban/; and “How FATA was Won by the Taliban”, dated 21 March 2011, http://tribune.com.pk/story/22601/how-fata-was-won-by-the-taliban/ , accessed on 22 March 2011 2 “40 Killed in Attack on Orakzai Jirga”, Daily Times, dated 11, October 2010, available on: http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2008\10\11\story_ 11-10-2008_pg1_1 3 IDP figures and Registration. On the IDMC link: http://www.internaldisplacement.org/idmc/website/countries.nsf/(httpEnvelopes)/944667B8E6F38FD FC125778C00711DD9?OpenDocument#36.2.1 4 “Al Qaeda and Taliban leaders killed in US airstrikes since 2004”, Long War Journal http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2009/08/al_qaeda_and_taliban.php 5 “Ordeal of Hayatuallah Orakzai”. See this link: http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2010\10\02\story_2-102010_pg3_4

CHAPTER SIX THE TRAGEDY AT DARRA ADAM KHEL

1) A Peaceful Town of My Childhood Until a couple or so years ago, Darra Adam Khel, also known as Darra (and referred to as Darra in this chapter), was the peaceful town of my cheerful childhood memories. Darra bazaar, main business centre of the area, is located between two parallel mountains. My grandmother together with other women of our family used to go shopping in Darra Bazaar to buy household items, cloths, shoes, toys etc. Male relatives almost never accompanied the womenfolk. It used to be the ladies’ trips and I used to accompany them. We used to eat Darra Kabab, the area’s delicacy, at a roadside restaurant during the trips. The Darra bazaar consists of two long and parallel rows of shops on both sides of the British-built Peshawar-Kohat Road that passes through Darra. The bazaar is located between two mountains that are filled with coal. The jubilation of watching the sudden rise of dark clouds on the mountains in the midst of a harsh summer was wonderful. The springs of Darra were delightful, its wild flowers adorable and its birds lovely. There used to be open musical concerts in hujras (village community centres). People would walk for miles to attend such parties without any idea of its being against religion or the fear of being attacked. Eids were adorable, as children, men and women could be spotted here and there, in their new attires, walking to nearby villages to wish Eid greetings to their relatives and friends. Life in Darra used to be easy, simple and plain. It was a sleepy tribal town with beautiful mornings, afternoons and evenings, full of hope and enjoyment. This was the Darra of the late 70s and early 80s.

2) People of Darra Darra is inhibited by Afridis who are Pukhtun. The Afridis are divided into eight major tribes of Adam Khel, Aka Khel, Kamar Khel, Kamber Khel, Kuki Khel, Malikdin Khel, Sipah and Zakha Khel. As the Adam Khel tribe

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lives in Darra, hence the area is called Darra Adam Khel. The Adam Khel tribe is further divided into four sub-clans; Galai, Jowaki, Hasan Khel and Ashu Khel. Only the Galai clan lives in Darra and the rest of them live adjacent but outside the territorial limitations of Darra. The Galai is further sub-divided into four small sections (Khels); Tursaper, Zarghun Khel, Sheraki and Bosti Khel. A fifth branch, Akhorwal, originally part of Hasan Khel, is now part of Darra. Akhorwal lies on the very opening of Darra from the Peshawar side. From Peshawar, Darra is 40km away, on the main Peshawar-Kohat Road, covering an area roughly 14km in length.

2.1) Darra Tribesmen and the British Colonials There have been a few eventful encounters between the British and the Darra Afridis. This includes the murder of Colonel and Mrs. Foulkes in their house in Kohat Cantonment in November 1920 and the Afridi raid of Kohat cantonment resulting in the stealing of 48 rifles. Also some Darra Afridis led by Ajab Khan attacked the house of Major Ellis in Kohat Cantonment in 1923. His wife was murdered and his 17-year old daughter, Molly Ellis, abducted. Molly was rescued some days later with the cooperation of the Darra Afridis and Orakzai tribesmen. Except for these events, the Darra Afridis remained comparatively more trade-oriented and cooperative towards the British. In 1899, the main Kohat-Pass Road was built through the valley, following an agreement between local people and the British Indian government. The road linked southern districts of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and the Peshawar Cantonment. Darra tribesmen also joined the imperial job as soldiers and local Khasadars (tribal police force). Some joined transport business. Darra tribesmen remained cooperative during the Third Anglo-Afghan War in 1919 towards the British Indian government in lieu of which their annual allowance was doubled from Rs. 300 to Rs. 6,000. Later, many Darra Afridis joined the Laam (World War II, in local Pashto language, is known as Laam). Some of them died in Egypt and some returned alive. Gul Khun, Khan Said and Amal Din were among a few fortunate men to return to Darra from war fronts in Africa and Burma1.

2.2) Ajab Khan Afridi: “Our Hero” and “Their Villain”? It was the era of the British Raj in India. A group of Darra Afridi tribesmen, led by Ajab Khan Afridi, broke into the house of Major Ellis in April 1923. The house was in the garrison town of Kohat on border with Darra. Major Ellis was away on duty. The group led by the Ajab Khan

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Afridi killed Mrs. Ellis upon resistance and kidnapped the British major’s young daughter, Molly Ellis. The British rescued her some days later with the help of the Orakzai and Afridi tribesmen. How does history remember Ajab Khan Afridi? It seems that it depends on who is narrating the history. The Western writers describe him a “notorious criminal2”, “murderer” and “terrorist” (Garrett, 2008:33) and “charismatic extremist fugitive leader” (Kilkullen, 2009:36). On the other hand, he clearly comes across as a hero in a popular Pashto language film “Ajab Khan Afridi”. Molly Ellis even fell in love with Ajab Khan in this movie. Interestingly, Ajab Khan’s son, Nek Mohammad Ghazizoi, wrote the foreword of Garrett’s book (2008). In the foreword he calls his father a “Pathan hero” who “resisted every temptation to submit to the authority of alien rulers” (2008:xv). There is a need to reinvestigate the role of Ajab Khan Afridi beyond the narrow narratives of hero and criminal, terrorist or extremist. His actthe killing of one woman and kidnapping of another- is a violation of Pakhtunwali. His fellow tribesmen never universally approved the act. This is the most important reason why so many Afridi and Orakzai tribesmen fully facilitated the British to rescue Molly, a fact also acknowledged by Garrett (2008) and Michael Lambert3. Without the tribesmen’s cooperation it would have been extremely difficult, if not impossible, for the British authorities to rescue Molly. It must also be remembered that Ajab Khan’s attack on Major Ellis’ house in April 1923 was a response to a British raid in March 1923 on Khan’s village and house where women were subjected to body searches by the British policemen, an act that violates the norms of Pakhtunwali. Moreover, like self-respecting people anywhere in the world, the Darra Afridi also had a right to resist the alien British colonization encroaching on their native land. Garrett informs, “after the British began using airplanes to bomb Pakhtun villages killing women and children as well as men, the British officers’ wives also became targets for the assassin’s knife or bullet” (2008:33). Ajab Khan’s true place in history should be determined by these and other related circumstances.

3) Arms Industry in Darra Adam Khel In the early 20th century, Darra Afridis learnt the art of making guns, probably from a Punjabi outlaw, Waris, who took refuge in the area4. Later, the weapon industry flourished and local people have been engaged in the art till this day.

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Currently, various hunting and sporting arms such as 12-bore shotguns, rifles, pistols, revolvers and vintage weapons are manufactured at Darra. The industry became a main source of income of the Afridi tribesmen and according to an estimate, some 80 per cent people, out of the total 10,000 population of Darra, are dependent directly or indirectly on gun manufacturing.5 The Darra arms industry has largely been limited to small weaponmaking. People from Punjab have been among major clients. It had never been a major market for strategic and heavy weapons until the 1980’s when major supply orders were provided with state collusion to locals arms makers for manufacturing single barrel and double barrel guns. According to some Darra arms traders, these weapons were supplied to Sikhs of India who were fighting for the Khalistan Movement against the Indian state. Later, Afghan Jihad made it a key market for weapon supply to the Mujahideen. The tribesmen say it was the government itself that transferred heavy weapons technology to Darra in 1980s. Afghan Jihad had its own political economy. Afghan leaders and some locals, co-opted by state agencies, made huge amounts of money in the Jjhad business. Haji Afridi, a well-known weapon tradesman of Darra and former parliamentarian from the area, became rich as a result of the Afghan Jihad. Before, his family was an ordinary tribal family from Darra. One of his elder brothers married a daughter of an Afghan Jihadi leader who was supplying weapons to the Mujahideen from Darra. His shop was one of the places where a variety of rare kinds of weapons like anti-personnel mines, sub-machineguns, small cannons and even rocket launchers, could be found. Locally manufactured small hunting weapons considerably lost their value when better quality new weapons reached Darra, especially the Kalashnikov. Darra has been projected as a source of weapons supply in the national and international media. The fact is that mainly small firearms were made locally. It was a source of income for thousands of Darra people. Residents of Darra often complain that the government never seriously attempted to develop their weapon making skills into a formal part of Pakistan’s legal economy. Instead, the area and its weapon market were exploited in pursuit of the state’s foreign policy objectives. Presently, a comparatively small number of people are involved in weapon manufacturing and some tribesmen inform that the art is losing its value because local people are turning more and more towards other trades and jobs.

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4) Education in Darra The government of Pakistan established the first high school in Darra in 1955, followed by a first technical training centre in the early 1970s for producing local welders, technicians, and electricians.6 The decade of the 70s brought prosperity to Darra and education was promoted along with economic prosperity during the regime of the late Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto (December 1971- July 1977). In 1974, first boys’ college was established and the number of high schools tripled. The Bhutto government provided opportunities to Darra Afridis, like peoples elsewhere in Pakistan, to become labour migrants abroad. This brought economic prosperity to many Darra families, who got their children enrolled in schools. Girl’s education started quite late. Although girls’ education started slowly, it gradually increased. By the late 80s the number of girls’ high schools tripled. Currently, there are eight high schools (four male and four female). The first girls’ college was opened in 2004. Darra girls’ college was only the second college in FATA after Parachinar (Kurram Agency) that was operational and had impressive girls’ enrollment. Even by 2009, Darra had one of the highest enrollment ratios in schools in FATA7.

5) Impact of Afghan Jihad on Darra The Pakistan state-sponsored Afghan Jihad slowed down the gradual opening up of Darra towards modernity. The state encouraged the pumping of Arab money into establishing extremist Madrasas all over FATA, including Darra, to poison Pakhtun culture with alien Jihadi ideas. In the initial days of the Afghan Jihad, one Jihadi mullah known as Adda-mullah, came to Darra and based himself at Akhor Madrasa.8 He was a Shinwari Pakhtun of Jalal Abad (Afghanistan) and his real name was Fazle Hadi Shinwari. Most of the students of Akhore Madrasa were outsiders, other than Afridis. Fazle Hadi preached a ban on cable television and dance parties, and advocated purdah for tribal women working in fields. It was because of his preaching that many people of the Akhor clan began to regularly offer Friday prayers. Fazle Hadi became the chief justice of Afghanistan (from 2001 until 2006) during the Presdient Karzai government, after the fall of the Taliban Government in 2001. The Supreme Court, led by Fazle Hadi Shinwari, proved very conservative; several of its rulings disappointed the reformminded Afghans and the outside world. The Chief Justice surprised people by reinstating the dreaded Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice

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Ministry under the Taliban by renaming it as the Ministry for Haj and Religious Affairs in 2003. During the 2004 presidential election campaign, Fazle Hadi sought a ban on a candidate who questioned polygamy as contradictory to the sprit of Islam. Further, the Supreme Court called for an end to cable television service in the country.9 The court also upheld the death penalty for two journalists convicted of blasphemy for saying that the Islam practiced in the country was reactionary.10 The same court banned women from singing on television.11 It was also ruled that a girl, given as a bride when 9 years old and now 13, could not get a divorce from her abusive husband, notwithstanding a law that makes it illegal for girls under 16 to marry.12 In 2006, President Karzai re-nominated Shinwari to the position of Chief Justice but the parliament rejected this nomination. Fazle Hadi left Darra for Afghanistan but left his fundamentalist religious ideas behind. Although nothing was publicly imposed on Darra women by force, voices were still raised against women’s free movement in the fields while taking care of their crops and livestock, claiming it to be against the Islamic law. Young school-going girls were asked to observe Purdah. More dangerous Jihadi initiatives hit Darra in the late 90s when open invitation by the Punjab-based Jihadi organizations through wall chalking, inviting people for Jihad, became visible in Darra. Phone numbers of the Jihadi organizations were given at the bottom of the graffiti. At least once the people of Darra saw Maulana Masood Azhar, leader of militant organization, Jaish-e-Mohammad (Army of Muhammad), publicly roaming around in Darra. Masood Azhar was freed by the Indian government in exchange for passengers on the hijacked Indian airplane that had eventually landed in Taliban-led Afghanistan. Upon release he fled to Pakistan where he established a militant organization, Jaish-eMuhammed, in 2000. Jaish-e-Muhammad was banned by the Pakistani government in 2002, but it continues to function under other names in collusion with the ISI. The group leader, Masood Azhar used to receive money along with other jihadi leaders from the ISI in return for their agreements with this intelligence agency (Haqqani, 2005:306). The people of Darra complain that the political administration in Darra did absolutely nothing to stop the Jihadi activities of Jaish-e-Mohammad and other militant groups operating on their soil. By the start of 2007, parents were actively encouraged by Tableeghi Jamaat to send their children to madrasa instead of modern schools. In fact the trend towards madrasa education and memorization of Quran started slowly with the preaching of Tableeghi Jamaat. But even then a very small number of the Darra children population went to madrasa. More than 98 per cent of Akhor madrasa students were outsiders. But

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from 2000 onwards, more and more Darra children, both male and female, were sent to madrasas. Their dress code was different from the normal Pakhtun dress and the burqa was mandatory for girls and women to wear. The government and its political administration in Darra maintained mum over these activities and let it proceed unchallenged. It was the time when the Taliban had already started bombing girls’ schools and colleges in Darra. Instead of providing security to the educational institution, political authorities in Darra issued strict directives to the principals of all girls’ education institutions to make sure that all students observe strict purdah and wear burqa13. Moreover, the government was failing to address the deteriorating law and order situation of crimes and kidnapping for ransom in the area. Gangsters were becoming ringleaders and putting pressure on traditional tribal leaders to move into the background. One of the ringleaders was Amir Syed, commonly known as Charg, who was not only fast becoming affluent but also influential. He insulted some tribal leaders and even fired upon some of them. The government never challenged his growing criminal activities. The people of Darra complained that the state had deliberately retreated from Darra and left it to the criminals like Charg and the emerging Taliban. Then a day came when girls’ college teachers and students were asked by the local Taliban to observe strict purdah. Most of the girls’ schools and college were finally closed in 2007 and the situation is the same to this date. All eight high schools (four male and four female) have been torched; some destroyed and the rest partially damaged by the Taliban. Among 14 torched schools, 8 are girls’ schools. Security forces of Pakistan took positions in Darra boys’ college a couple of years ago and there have been no educational activities in the college since then.

6) Enter the Taliban Initially, the Taliban started their activities from acts such as blowing up music shops at night, or threatening gangsters, like Charg, which was welcomed by the Darra people, who were especially unhappy with the authorities’ collusion with Charg’s gang and the resultant lack of state will to check Charg’s growing highhandedness. The Taliban killed Charg, attacked his village and besieged it. Charg’s gang, now led by his relatives, and the Taliban were face to face. Scores of Taliban from Swat and Orakzai rushed to strengthen the Darra Taliban against Charg’s gang14. The government gave a free hand to the Taliban to destroy Charg’s gang. No attempt whatsoever was made to impose writ of the state on

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either side. The government closed all roads leading to Darra for five days as the Taliban encircled Charg’s village. The Taliban plundered all houses of Charg’s close relatives who were either killed or ran away during this operation. Charg’s gang was annihilated. The government reopened the road to Darra following the victory of the Taliban over Charg’s gang. The people of Darra fail to understand why the government allowed the unhindered arrival of the Taliban fighters from Swat and Orakzai to support the Darra Taliban in their clashes with Charg’s gang; and why the main road was closed by the government for five days during the clashes of a small gangster, Charg, with the Taliban15. Why did the state become a silent spectator and refrain from interfering until the annihilation of Charg’s gang? This is against the state norm in FATA. The norm is that under the FCR laws the Assistant Political Agent summons a tribal Jirga in response to even an ordinary act of violence. Clashes between the Taliban and Charg’s gang were too big an issue to be ignored by the government. Now Darra has entered a dangerous phase. Local criminal gangs have been replaced by more brutal Jihadi gangsters, the Taliban, who were in league with the ISI and international Jihadi gangsters like Al-Qaida militants. Local criminal gangs of Darra, including Charg’s underworld, were never known for interfering with the local culture. They restricted themselves to criminal activities. The Taliban and Al-Qaida did exactly that. They have imposed a radical Wahabi version of Islam. The Taliban imposed a reign of terror on the Darra people. Beheading and kidnapping for ransom became the order of the day and the state looked on as an unconcerned bystander. The Taliban threatened the local Khasadar force to leave their jobs. An intelligence official, Nazar Mohammad, also a Pakhtun, was killed in broad daylight near the busy Darra bazaar. Schools, health centres and bridges were destroyed. Music was banned. Pakhtun women were forced to wear burqa and men to grow beards. Barbers were threatened to stop shaving off men’s beards or face consequences16. Several barbershops were bombed and destroyed. Moreover, the Taliban brutally killed those who questioned their Jihad, including Maulana Tahir, a local Darra cleric. They continued to generate money through kidnapping for ransom and did not even spare the people who were linked with pro-Taliban religious political parties. They kidnapped for ransom the son of a local Jumaat Islami activist, Haji Mohammad Khan. Later, they released the boy for a ransom and killed Mr. Khan. Some alleged offenders of the Taliban were sent to Tableegh for 40 days to rectify their “wrongdoings”.

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At that point, few in Darra doubted that the key people of the Darra Taliban running the deadly show, Tariq Afridi and Arif Afridi, were anything other than ISI. The two were setting the ground for the ISI to play the double role as ally and enemy of the US and NATO forces in the war on terror. Pakistanis on the eastern side of the mighty Indus and the world at large had to be shown that the Taliban, backed by the Darra tribal society, had indeed taken on the state of Pakistan in response to the country’s entry into the US-led war on terror.

6.1) Staged encounters between the army and the Taliban The famous Indus Highway passing through Darra is part of the NATO and US supply line to Afghanistan and people of Darra claim that one of the key reasons why a “managed chaos” has been created in the area is to destabilize the supplies to the Western forces in Afghanistan17. For this purpose, fake encounters were staged between the Pakistani army and the Taliban following a pseudo-seizure of four army trucks full of arms and ammunition in January 200818. The trucks were supposedly bound for South Waziristan. The “seizure” led to a military operation in Darra that made many of its residents flee the area. “The operation is aimed at recovering the seized trucks, regaining control of the tunnel and reopening a major highway blocked by miscreants”, military spokesman Major General Athar Abbas was reported as saying by Pakistani media19. Not many in Darra believe the military spokesman. They claim that the ISI agents removed the ammunitions from the trucks soon after their “seizure” by the Taliban, filled them up with old pipes and scrapes and handed them back to the Taliban20. The Taliban also captured 15 FC soldiers and paraded them in Darra bazaar. The Taliban brutally killed anyone who cooperated with the security forces. Two Darra boys were killed because they provided an electricity connection to the soldiers21. The Taliban threatened to bomb any grocery shops selling groceries to the FC soldiers22. They bombed a tube-well from which the FC soldiers used to bring water23. They declared that FC soldiers were Munafic24. It was the holy month of Ramazan and the FC soldiers were fasting. FC unit commander Ajmal had hired vehicles to bring food and water for his soldiers from the nearby town of Kohat because no one in Darra could dare to do such business with the FC25. The FC commander called a Jirga of the tribal leaders and pleaded that he and his men were Muslim and do not deserve such a boycott26. Conscious of the ISI’s collusion with the Taliban, the tribal leaders expressed their inability via-a-vis the Taliban27.

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6.2) Darra Taliban and Sectarian Terrorism Darra Taliban commander, Tariq Afridi, belongs to the Punjab-based sectarian terrorist group Lashkar-e-Janghvi. The Taliban led by him were especially brutal with Shia or anyone perceived to be linked with Shias. Two Shia truck drivers, who were carrying coal from Darra coalmines, were dragged out and killed, and their bodies were found lying near Darra bazaar, and no one could dare remove them for burial. Shia passengers were dragged from public transport passing through Darra on the Peshawar-Kohat road and beheaded on the spot. To confirm the Shia identity, the Taliban used to undress the torso of passengers and all those with marks of Zanjirzani on their back used to be rounded up by the Taliban. Moreover, the Taliban also killed two Darra residents, Badshah Hussain and Mohammad Zaman, for their alleged links with Shias.

7) Profile of Darra Taliban Commanders The following are leading Taliban commanders from Darra: Arif Khan Afridi and Tariq Afridi.

7.1) Arif Khan Afridi Arif, 45, belongs to a well-off family from the Zarghun Khel tribe of Darra. His father, the late Zar Khan Afridi, was the first man who introduced a stone crushing machine to Darra in the 1970’s. His business included that machine, and cement and cooking oil supply to Darra. He gave good education to all his children. One of Arif’’s bothers’, Azeem Khan, is a judge, the other is a retired colonel of the Pakistani army, and one is a heart specialist. Arif studied at the famous Islamia College Peshawar. He never attended any madrasa. Arif, the youngest of the brothers, was not as successful in his career as his brothers, but has never been a poor man. He shared the rents that came from family properties, such as shops, with his brothers. A keen footballer, Arif was a member of his village football team, called the Fantastic Team. In his village, Meri Khel, he was known as a social worker. He took pleasure in helping fellow villagers with small errands. Arif, a short man, never had a beard until four years ago when he joined Jaish-e-Mohammad, a militant organization in Pakistan. He is married and has three children. His wife and all his brothers live outside Darra. They fear revenge from the people of Darra, especially from

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Charg’s family. However, his first cousins live in Darra and his wife visits their home in Darra. Quite contrary to Tariq Afridi, a Taliban commander from Darra, Arif is not known for brutality. People in Meri Khel say that recently he returned some teenage boys from his village, who had come to Orakzai to enroll themselves with the Taliban. The boys told their families that Arif gave them some money and asked them to go back before their names were registered. A Darra resident informs that following the attacks on Darra girls’ schools, he called Arif, who said he was neither against girls’ education nor involved in attacks on the schools. Arif’s relatives claim that he has been trapped by the Taliban and the ISI. The idea of Arif’s return to normal life was discussed between him and his relatives. He said he couldn’t come back. The Taliban or the ISI would kill him and so he had to carry on with the Taliban.

7.2) Arif Afridi Tariq Afridi, 30, is a bearded man with a light skin colour. People in Darra describe him as a smart, intelligent and a brave man. Those who have had the opportunity to ride in vehicles driven by him, report that he is a good driver. This implies that he can comfortably drive on dirt roads in the mountains. He is known for his strong anti-Shia views.

8) Assassination of Darra Tribal Leadership The growing insecurity in Darra compelled its people to beg both the army and the Taliban to leave them in peace. On Sunday, March 2, 2008, around 1000 people from five Afridi clans- Zarghunkhel, Akhurwal, Sheraki, Bostikhel and Toor Chapper- participated in a jirga led by their tribal leaders and decided to formally request the army and the Taliban to vacate their valley. Following the decision, most of the jirga participants dispersed and key tribal leaders began a discussion on how to implement the jirga’s decisions. At that time, a suicide bomber entered the jirga and blew himself up close to the tribal leaders. There was a huge explosion, fire, and suffocating smell. In the blink of an eye, the peaceful jirga site turned into a site of carnage. There were human limbs and flesh all over the place. The blast killed 46 Afridi tribesmen, most of them tribal leaders while over 100 were injured.28 The Darra Adam Khel hospital, built in the 1960’s, had no capacity to serve so many injured. The injured had to be ferried to hospitals in

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Peshawar and Kohat. There were no ambulances and thus the injured were transported in private cars. Many of the injured died due to lack of medical help. The suicide attack assassinated many tribal leaders of Darra. The prominent tribal leaders who were killed included, Maulana Sabir Afridi, convener of the jirga, Haji Zar Khan, Haji Nazer, Haji Jamal Hussain, Malik Muhammad Nawaz and Haji Khan Muhammad Din, Malik Gharat Khan, Malik Khan Badin, Malik Waris Khan and Malik Arbab. In line with the tradition of grand Pakhtun jirgas, the Darra jirga was held in the open air, close to Abbas Chowk near Mani Khel Khasadar Picket on the main Kohat-Peshawar Road. No security measures had been taken for the jirga either by the state authorities in Darra or the army. Darra people also complained that no official had visited the area after the blast and no official arrangement was made to take the wounded to hospitals. Pakistani media spread distorted information about the intent of the jirga. The media reported that the jirga had been convened to discuss the formation of an anti-Taliban lashkar to drive militants out of the area29. The tribal leaders, who survived the suicide attack, reject such reports and insist that the jirga requested both the army and the Taliban to leave their native valley in peace and take their “fight” elsewhere30. People in Darra, like all over FATA, are convinced that the clashes between the army and the Taliban were planned at the level of the army generals and the Taliban commanders. Darra civilians, poor soldiers of the security forces, and foot soldiers of the Taliban all had to pay the price of that high level “understanding” in pursuit of the strategic depth in Afghanistan. Soldiers of the Pakistani army below the rank of brigadier, the FC soldiers, and foot soldiers of the Taliban are all part of the “collateral damage” that Pakistan’s powerful Generals have accepted in its double dealing with its allies in the war on terror. When you are out to deceive the whole world, you must be ready to take some “collateral damage”. The lives of the soldiers of Pakistan’s army, the Pakhtun FC soldiers, and the Taliban foot soldiers do not matter at all in pursuit of the larger state “interests”. There are a lot of jobless young Pakistanis. More soldiers in the army and FC can be recruited with utmost convenience. Madrasas are full of indoctrinated youths, who can easily replace the killed Taliban foot soldiers. “The Punjabi and Pakhtun soldiers of Pakistan’s army (below the rank of brigadier), the Pakhtun FC soldiers and Taliban foot soldiers are all sons of bitches (in the eyes of generals)! Their lives can be sacrificed any time at the altar of the national interest”, a Bajaur tribal leader told in an angry tone. The US-led allies in the war on

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terror have not addressed Pakistan’s concerns in Afghanistan vis-à-vis India. Thus Pakistan will do everything it can to frustrate the efforts of the international community against the Islamist militants. Some people in Darra arugue that the generals never kill the Taliban commanders and vise versa. I diverted the people’s attention to the killing by the Taliban of Lt-Gen Mushtaq Ahmed Baig, a celebrated eye specialist in the Pakistani army. Like innocent civilians in FATA, the General too paid the price of the war Generals’ deadly games with the Taliban, people in Darra argue. Lt-Gen Mushtaq Ahmed Baig was not the war General of Pakistan’s army. He had never been a direct part of the strategic games for Afghanistan. His duty was to take care of his patients, not the strategic games for Afghanistan. To kill a General like him as part of the deception in the war on terror is not a big price. “The fellow Generals killed Lt-Gen. Baig through the Taliban, just like they have killed people all over FATA through the Taliban”, said a tribal leader who survived the Darra Jirga blast. I do not have the means to confirm the claims of the Darra people about the Lt-Gen.’s assassination. But I do understand what they believe, i.e. the generals and the Taliban commanders are playing strategic games with the blood of innocent civilians and those in the security forces who are not part of the dealings with the Taliban at the generals’ level. This understanding is widespread across FATA. This perception concurs with the well-documented knowledge that Pakistani generals have deep seated and mutually beneficial links with Islamist militants in this country (Hussain, 2005 and Haqqani, 2005). People in Darra, like all over FATA, have a great deal of first hand information to substantiate their perception with empirical evidence. People in Darra, just as people in other areas of FATA diverted my attention to the attacks on the NATO trucks. They claimed that actually in most cases the Taliban plundered the trucks with consent of the ISI. The plundered goods end up in the markets in Khyber Agency. “Go to the markets in Khyber Agency and ask for goods from the NATO containers and you will see what they show you”, a Darra tribal leader told me. To test his claim I did go to one of the markets. What I found was surprising; NATO and US military uniforms, shoes, wrist watches, knives, pens, electronic devices such as laptops, radios, camera etc, foods like chocolates, nuts etc, bathroom items, shampoos, soaps, and much more besides. Many of the goods were clearly marked with stamps, signs and symbols of NATO and the US government. People in Darra are trapped between militants and the military. The militants are the “anti-government” Taliban led by Tariq Afridi and “pro-

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government” Taliban led by Momin Khan. The two Taliban groups together with the Pakistani army form the emerging socio-political order in Darra. The old socio-political order, led by tribal leaders, stands fragmented, if not totally discarded. Many tribal leaders have been targetkilled, while the remaining live in constant fear of the ISI and its proxies, both “pro” and “anti” government Taliban In February 2011, a 20-member delegation of Darra elders went to Tirah, the stronghold of Tariq Afridi in Orakzai, to seek his commitment to not attack a gas pipeline in case the gas supply was permitted by the government to Darra. On returning, the delegation was summoned by army officers in Darra and put under arrest for 5 days. Following their release, at the request of local people, the same delegation was summoned by the Darra-based Taliban groups, the Momin group, for questioning. “We would not have visited Tirah if our people had state protection and if they were not vulnerable to Taliban brutalities”, said one tribal leader. “The militants and the military come, attack us, and leave with impunity. There is no one to protect us from both”, said another tribal leader. Darra tribesmen are at the mercy of these new powerful actors. The new actors are breaking the culture of Darra as well as extorting a share in the local economic sources. In the newly discovered coals mines in Darra, it is obligatory for the owners to pay Rs. 1000,000 to the Pakistani army as a security fee. Recently, the owner of one mine, at the village Qasim Khel, was targeted with rockets fired by the Taliban for not paying the demanded amount of money to the Tariq group.

9) Polish Engineer The Darra Adam Khel Taliban kidnapped a Polish engineer, Peter Stanczak, in September 2008 and released a videotape showing his beheading in February 2009. The beheading shocked everyone in FATA and KhyberPakhtunkhwa who heard about it. This is because he was a guest and working on a development project that was ultimately going to benefit Pakistan. The Aryana Institute for Regional Research and Advocacy conducted survey about the beheading in February 2009 in which an overwhelming majority of the people condemned it and interpreted as a direct attack on the Pakhtun culture that takes pride in its norms of hospitality. To convey the Pakhtun anguish over the beheading to the people of Poland, I wrote an article captioned “We stand in grief with you”. Professor Nina Witoszek at the University of Oslo translated it into English and helped in publishing it in a Polish newspaper31.

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It is pertinent to mention that the Swat Taliban also kidnapped a Chinese Engineer. Somehow, he managed to run away from captivity and was safely taken to the authorities by a local Pakhtun, Liaqat Ali Khan. The Chinese Engineer has been reunited with his family in China, while Liaqat Ali Khan has been killed by the Taliban for helping the Chinese. Many Pakhtun believe he has gone down in Pakhtun history as a hero for giving his own life for the life of the Chinese Engineer. On the other hand, the Darra Taliban, who killed the Polish Engineer, are perceived to have disgraced Pakhtunwali.

Notes 1

This information has been provided by a tribal elder who belongs to the Zurghun Khel branch of Darra Afridi. He lives in Darra and survived the deadly suicide bomb attack on the grand tribal jirga in Darra in 2008. He heard this information from his elders. Darra tribesmen who fought on the side of British India during World War II, such as Khan Said, Amal Din and Gul Khan, belonged to village Mullan, Zur Kalay and Sunni Khel villages respectively. 2 “The Kidnapping of Molly Ellis” written by Michael E. Lambert, P:1. Available on: http://michaelelambert.com/main/pdf/The_Kidnapping_of_Mollie_Ellis_by_Afridi _Tribesmem-Michael_E_Lambert%20_C_.pdf 3 ibid 4 Interview with a tribal leader of Darra. He said he learnt about the origin of the Darra weapon factories from his elders. 5 SMEDA (Small and Medium Enterprises Development Authority) NWFP 2006, A proposal for revamping of light engineering cluster of Darra Adam Khel 2006, by Ishfaq Afridi. 6 Ibid. 7 Fata: Annual School Census Report of Government Educational Institutions, 2008-2009. Education management Information System (EMIS), Directorate of Education FATA, pp.2 8 The information about Fazle Hadi Shinwari, known as Adda-mullah (Mullah stands for a religious preacher and Adda is a place near Jalalabad in Afghanistan) in Darra, was disclosed by an important leader of Darra (who wished not to be named). The said leader fortunately survived the suicide bombing attack made on tribal leaders of Darra in March 2008 in which many people lost their lives. 9 "17 Afghans, Turk home from Guantanamo Bay". China Daily. April 20, 2005Available on line at http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/200504/20/content_435839.htm.Retrieved from wikpedia on March 6, 2010 10 Carlotta Gall (April 20 2005). "17 Afghans Freed From Guantánamo Prison”, New York Times. 11 "Division between Islamists, Moderates hamper effort on new constitution". Eurasianet. Available on line at:

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http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/pp020103a.shtml. Retrieved 2008-08-04. 12 Sudarsan Raghavan (2004-11-14). "Afghan girl, given as bride at 9, fights for divorce". Arizona Daily Star. http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/attack/48031.php. Retrieved from wikipedia from the article on Fazl Hadi 2008-10-28, under Supreme Court of Afghanistan. Retrieved on February 28, 2010 13 Interview with tribal leaders and teachers in Darra. This has also bee reported upon by BBC Urdu service: http://www.bbc.co.uk/urdu/pakistan/story/2007/01/070122_dara_adam_khail_ur.sh tml 14 Interview with tribal leaders of Darra Adam Khel 15 Interviews and Discussion with people in Darra Adam Khel. 16 Discussions with Darra residents. Also see a BBC Urdu report about this issue on: http://www.bbc.co.uk/urdu/pakistan/story/2007/05/070502_dara_blast_rs.shtml 17 Interviews with tribal leaders and discussion with residents of Darra Adam Khel 18 Interviews with tribal leaders and discussion with residents of Darra Adam Khel 19 “Troops close in on Darra after fierce clashes”, reported in Daily Dawn, dated 27 January 2008. Available on: http://www.dawn.com/2008/01/27/top1.htm 20 Interview with a tribal leader of Darra 21 Interviews with Darra tribal leaders and discussions with Darra residents 22 ibid 23 ibid 24 ibid 25 ibid 26 ibid 27 ibid 28 Some eyewitnesses and injured elders in the same suicide attack report the number of dead 46 and more than 100 injured. 29 For example see “Tribal peace jirga attacked: 42 killed, 58 injured in Darra Adamkhel” in daily Dawn dated March 3, 2008 on: http://www.dawn.com/2008/03/03/top1.htm & ‘Suicide bomber attacks Darra elders, kills 40’ in the Daily Times dated 3 March 2008 on: http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2008\03\03\story_3-32008_pg1_1 30 Interviews with the tribal leaders, who survived the suicide blast. 31 Polish version of my article “We stand in grief with you”, is on this link of the Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza,: http://wyborcza.pl/1,76842,6294224,Pakistanczycy_tez_sa_wstrzasnieci_zabojstw em_polskiego.html

CHAPTER SEVEN ADEYZAI LASHKAR: THE EMISSARIES OF PEACE

We, the Adeyzai, are called the emissaries of peace. Our valor is recognized, our lives sacrificed for honor. Cursed be those who bring war And the smoke of gunpowder to our land. As long as the valiant Like Dilawar are alive, The blood of Ali Ahmad and Malik Will not have been shed in vain. We the daring honored sons of our nation, We the Adeyzai are called The emissaries of peace. History is our witness: We abhor subjugation. Aggression will not be accepted Towards a single person among us. We neither provoke nor invite provocation. And we will not tolerate those Who wish to terrorize Our cherished village Our lives are sacrificed for honor. Our valor is recognizedWe the Adeyzai are called The emissaries of peace. To the bomb blasts We have lost Both our youth and elders By the smoke of gunpowder Our children are consumed.

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Chapter Seven In the dark of night Our markets and shops Are torched, reduced to ashes. In the shrapnel of bombs Our possessions are lost. We are left empty, but for the madness of revenge. O Valiant sons of my village, I offer a salute: To your perseverance, To your resolve, To your dedication for peace! Because of you our honor and stature have been raised. In the Khalil -Momand tribe Hadi pays rich tribute To all his people of Adeyzai History will remember us fearless as tigers. We, the Adeyzai, are called the emissaries of peace. Our valor is recognized, our lives sacrificed for honor. We, the Adeyzai, Emissaries of peace. —A villager’s compliment and homage to the anti-Taliban lashkar in his village, Adeyzai1

1) A Targeted Killing in Adeyzai It was a fine Sunday morning on 8th November 2009. Four men, along with their bodyguards, were travelling in a vehicle. They were on alert and at the same time in a cheerful mood, sharing jokes with each other. Their destination was the local cattle market. The moment they stepped out of the vehicle, a waiting suicide bomber ran towards one of the men. His bodyguard tried to overpower the bomber, a young man in early 20s, but he detonated the explosives strapped around his waist. The resulting explosion killed three of the four men, their bodyguards, and 15 civilians on the spot, including a three year old girl, Noreen, and 12 cattle heads, all on the spot, and injured the fourth man. The bomber used around 10kg of explosives in the attack and most of the casualties were caused by the large quantity of ball bearings that the bomber had stuffed in the suicide vest. This was the targeted killing of one of the men who have been lovingly referred to as “emissaries of peace” by a fellow villager, Fazal Hadi. The man was Haji Abdul Malik, the brave leader of the anti-Taliban lashkar in

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Adeyzai. The fourth man who injured was his son, Noor Malik.

2) Adeyzai: Geography and People Adeyzai is a village in the south of Peshawar. A small road from the Indus Highway leads to Adeyzai, the last village in rural Peshawar. The village is located on the border with FATA. Total population of the village is about 7000. Adeyzai is like most other villages in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Adeyzai villagers have three sources of earning: transport, agriculture and foreign remittances. Many people of Adeyzai are linked with the Pakhtun-dominated transport business of Pakistan, stretching from Peshawar to Karachi. They work as managers, automobile mechanics, conductors, drivers and owners of vehicles. People of Adeyzai have more than 10 oil tankers under All Pakistan Oil Tankers Association, APOTA2. Several Adeyzai villagers cultivate land to produce wheat, maize and various vegetables. The produce is mostly for domestic consumption and some of it is sold in the markets in Peshawar. The land is irrigated through tube wells. Many of the villagers are labour migrants in Saudi Arabia and Dubai. They send regular remittances to their families back in Adeyzai. There is no big market (bazaar) in the village. There are only small shops selling groceries and other items of kitchen and everyday use. There is one basic health unit in the village that is without any doctor, and patients have to be taken to hospitals in Peshawar city. There are 6 schools in Adeyzai, three for girls and three for boys. Adeyzai is a gendersegregated society and women work in the domestic sphere. However, girls’ education is not uncommon. The village girls go to Peshawar for college and university education. There are also women who work in the education and health sectors. Kiker trees and various kinds of wild bushes can be seen all over the landscape of the village.

3) Adeyzai and Taliban Adeyzai shares a border with Darra Adam Khel in FR Kohat (FATA) and Kala Khel in FR Peshawar (FATA). Khyber Agency is also close to the village. The Taliban based in all three FATA areas have been attacking villagers in Adeyzai, but the Darra Adam Khel Taliban have been at the forefront in intimidating people in Adeyzai and the surrounding areas since 2007. They banned music and bombed music outlets. Policemen in the nearby Mattani Police station were attacked. At least one policeman was beheaded and his body was hung up in a public place to terrorize the people. The Taliban threatened the grocery shopkeepers to stop selling

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groceries to the policemen and they complied out of fear. They bombed all three schools for girls in one night. Most outrageously, they ordered that all those families who have unmarried women must fly a white flag atop their houses and those with widows must fly a black flag atop their houses. The Taliban wanted all unmarried or widows to be married at the earliest possible time. There was a complete collapse of the writ of the state in Adeyzai.

4) Adeyzai Lashkar- Background of Formation On 8th August 2008 Haji Abdul Malik, former union councilor Adeyzai, was arrested by the police in connection with an attack on a police flag march in the village. For the next two months Abdul Malik remained in police custody where the intelligence agents investigated him for suspected links with the Taliban. At that time the Taliban’s activity was on the rise in the many settled districts of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. The provincial ANP government began to encourage local people to take up weapons against the Taliban and flush them out of their areas. The government hoped that anti-Taliban lashkar volunteers would eliminate the Taliban, or at least isolate them from the wider communities. The police released Abdul Malik in this context. The provincial government encouraged the tribal elders of Adeyzai to make an anti-Taliban lashkar. For a greater public good the elders agreed to make the lashkar to protect the villagers from the Taliban atrocities, as well as to help the provincial government establish its writ in and around Adeyzai. The police arranged a press conference for Abdul Malik following his release in the Badaber police station and demanded him to announce that he is terminating all his links with the Taliban. Malik refused and argued that he never had any links with the Taliban. Malik told me in an interview: “the police kept pleading with my father to tell the newsmen he would never have any more links with the Taliban. My father responded that he had never had any links with the Taliban. Instead it was the government of Pakistan that had been lenient with the Taliban despite their atrocities on the people. My father kept asking the police why was he had been arrested and why he was being released now”, says Malik’s son, Noor Malik. “I never understood what all this was about. The police arrested me, kept me in cells for two months. Then they garlanded and released me amid a public ceremony. Why did the police do that drama?”

The police stopped him from open interaction with the newsmen during the press conference. Newspapers the next day reported that Malik vowed

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on the Quran to eliminate his links with the Taliban. Later he had an argument with some of the newsmen. Malik, however, agreed to take a public stance against the Taliban and continued to do so till he was targetkilled a year later. He became leader of an anti-Taliban lashkar formed by the Adeyzai jirga with the encouragement of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government.

5) Adeyzai Lashkar- Organization There are 20 neighborhoods in Adeyzai. Each neighborhood is represented by two elders in the 40-member village jirga. The jirga decided to make the lashkar with the encouragement of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government. The lashkar is under the control of the jirga and would disband when the jirga decided so. The Adeyzai lashkar consists of 300 armed men. If needed, more armed villagers could join them to back up the village resistance to the Taliban. All lashkar members are Adeyzai men, both rich and poor. They are farmers, drivers, property dealers, transport owners, and labour migrants who have come back to join the lashkar. “There is no issue of class differences or tenant-landlord relationships in the lashkar”, said late Abdul Malik. “There is no rigid rich-poor divide in Adeyzai. It is a tribal society where decisions are made in jirga through consultations with all concerned people”, said a farmer who is a volunteer in the lashkar. Some lashkar men have their own weapons, like Kalashnikovs, and some weapons were bought through money contributed by the villagers. “Who is paying for your lashkar?” I asked Haji Malik, “We (pointing to the Lashkar men surrounding him) all are paying. Everyone contributes whatever little is possible. This is our war and every one of us finances it with whatever little he can”, was the response of Malik. The police also gave some Kalashnikovs and cartridges to the lashkar men. Some policemen and FC soldiers have been posted in and around the hujra of Abdul Malik. His hujra is the centre of the lashkar. It was this hujra where I went to interview Abdul Malik before his assassination. Inside the hujra, and in houses of the lashkar leaders, cabinets and closets are stocked with light and heavy arms. Armed lashkar men guard Malik’s hujra as well as the houses of other lashkar leaders. Roads leading to the hujra and houses of the lashkar leaders are barricaded and armed men with machine guns stand on the roofs. Abdul Malik commanded the lashkar together with Dilawar Khan, a fellow villager. Following Malik’s targeted killing, Dilawar Khan took the leadership of the lashkar. Other

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important lashkar leaders are: Malik’s son, Noor Malik, Haji Gul Abbas, Irshad Khan, Haji Shah Zaman, Haji Zahurullah and Haji Misal Khan. I went to Adeyzai to meet the lashkar men in August 2009, August 2010, September 2010, December 2010, and January 2011. A visit to this small hamlet can be a heart-breaking journey, especially the sight of so many young Adeyzai men of tender age guarding their village with weapons around the clock. These young men should have been in high schools or colleges. Many have left their studies to join the armed resistance against the Taliban. Elderly men who should be playing with their grandchildren are also holding guns to protect their village.

6) Adeyzai Lashkar: Real and Symbolic Role “Without the Adeyzai lashkar, the Taliban would have been controlling Peshawar today”, said Abdul Malik. This is probably not an exaggeration. This lashkar is indeed a hurdle in the way of the Darra Taliban’s attempt to take over Peshawar, the provincial capital. The lashkar leaders share intelligence about the Taliban with the security forces. The security forces take the lashkar men to fight with them in the operations against the Taliban in the FATA areas close to Adeyzai. Moreover, security in Adeyzai greatly improved following the lashkar formation. The police can freely perform duties in and around the area. The government became confident enough to rebuild the bombed out girls schools in Adeyzai. The village parents had stopped sending girls to school due to Taliban threats. The lashkar gave them the confidence to send the girls to schools that were temporarily opened in rented buildings while the bombed school buildings were being rebuilt. Symbolically, the Adeyzai lashkar is an encouragement to other Pakhtuns to stand up to the Taliban. Moreover, it is a sign of the Pakhtun will against the Taliban. “Even if NATO, US forces and the government of Pakistan forgive the Taliban, I would never. I would fight them until their complete elimination”. These were the words of the late Abdul Malik expressing the lashkar’s commitment against the Taliban. “Will Adeyzai fall?” I asked the new lashkar chief, Dilawar Khan, following the targeted killing of Malik. “No, never. Haji Malik has embraced martyrdom, but the rest of Adeyzai is alive. We will defend Adeyzai till the last man among us. Adeyzai will never fall”, said Dilawar Khan in a spirited voice. This determination of the lashkar men symbolizes a psychological challenge to the Taliban. Unlike the Taliban who ban and bomb jirgas, the lashkar is backed by the people’s jirga of Adeyzai. Unlike the Taliban who are despised, the lashkar has become a symbol of public pride, as has been

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expressed in the Pashto poetry recited above. It is thus no wonder that the Taliban have all the lashkar leaders and jirga members on their hit list.

Leaders of Adeyzai Lashkar: From 2nd in the right to left: Noor Malik, Dilawar Khan and Haji Gul Abbas.

7) Adeyzai Lashkar- Sacrifices The lashkar and people of Adeyzai have greatly paid for their anti-Taliban stance. The Taliban have assaulted Adeyzai through suicide bombers, Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs), rockets and missiles. They bombed the village shops to economically damage the villagers and they bombed schools to deprive the village childern of education. Over 300 Taliban attacked Abdul Malik’s house and hujra within days of his taking leadership of the lashkar. He was ultimately assassinated in a suicide attack a year later. There have been over 30 attacks on Adeyzai in which 40 people died and scores injured. People who died include lashkar leaders and as well as civilians, including women and children, who died when the Taliban fired rockets on their houses.

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8) Adeyzai Lashkar Complains against the Government The lashkar leaders have many complaints against the government as well as the security forces of Pakistan. The complaints range from the lack of state resolution to crush the Taliban, to the lack of compensations for the victims of terrorism in Adeyzai. • Upon the request of the military authorities the Adeyzai lashkar volunteers participated in the military operations in the surrounding FATA areas, Bora and Pastavana. However, the government usually announces the launch of operations before they actually start them. This enables the militants to run away and, as a consequence, the operations never lead to the desired result, i.e. elimination of the Taliban. Moreover, the lashkar leaders also complain that the security forces have not been responding to the actionable intelligence that they have been sharing with them. • The lashkar volunteers have never been given any weapons or ammunition for participation in the military operations in FR Peshawar and they have been using their own weapons and ammunition, for which they have never been compensated. They have never been given food during the operation and have been kept hungry and thirsty. • With the exception of a few Kalashnikovs and some cartridges given to the lashkar leaders by the police in 2008 and deployment of some FC soldiers and policemen around the hujra of Haji Malik, no state help, moral or material, was ever provided to this lashkar. The villagers have to feed the security staff posted around the hujra of late Abdul Malik. • The police have registered criminal cases against the lashkar leaders. • The government has never compensated families of the lashkar martyrs. Also, no compensations have been paid for material losses suffered by the Adeyzai villagers in Taliban attacks on their properties, like shops and houses. Terrorism in Adeyzai is due to the Taliban presence in the surrounding FATA areas, especially Darra Adam Khel, Kala Khel and Bora. These areas have to be cleared of the Taliban for a durable peace in Adeyzai. There is enough anecdotal evidence to substantiate that the authorities lack the will to do so. The late lashkar leader, Abdul Malik, repeatedly requested the authorities to eliminate the Pastavana (FR Peshawar) based heavily armed

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Taliban. They were about 25 and terrorizing the Pastavana tribesmen and committing acts of terrorism in Adeyzai. The authorities never responded, which made Abdul Malik request that they allow his lashkar volunteers to take on the Taliban. The authorities rejected this suggestion as well. Malik’s family now alleges that the suicide bomber, who killed Malik, was sent from Pastavana. Taliban commanders such as Shahidullah, Ghufran, Jangrez and Said Kalam belong to the Adeyzai. They are still not killed or arrested by the authorities despite the actionable intelligence that the lashkar leaders have been providing to the authorities. Similarly, the government did nothing when the Darra Taliban killed brother of Dilawar Khan who was based in Karachi, to punish Dilawar for leading the lashkar following the assassination of Malik. The police registered criminal charges against the lashkar leaders when they captured a nephew of Arif Afridi, a Darra Taliban commander, in response to the assassination of Dilawar Khan’s brother. The nephew had to be freed under the authorities’ pressure, but the police have refused to withdraw the criminal cases against the lashkar leaders. Why would the police register criminal cases against the Adeyzai lashkar leaders? The police in Adeyzai were paralyzed by the Taliban. The lashkar restored the writ of the state in the area and facilitated the police to perform their routine duties. Why would the police reciprocate with criminal cases? It must be that the intelligence agencies of Pakistan are putting pressure on the lashkar through the police. It seems that the intelligence agencies, which run the Afghan policy of Pakistan, are punishing the people of Adeyzai for their anti-Taliban stance. Anti-Taliban Pakhtun, it seems, do not exist in the strategic worldview of the military establishment and must be eliminated or at least kept under a stategenerated pressure to break their will against the Taliban. It is sad that the ANP government could not continue to support the lashkar that it helped to establish and promised official help to in terms of weapons, logistics and money. The ANP government almost never delivered on its promises, most probably under pressure from the intelligence agencies of Pakistan. The lashkar members say that the nationalist ANP government has abandoned them to the brutalities of the Taliban. “The government has abandoned us in the middle of an ocean”, says Dilawar Khan. This does not concur with the ANP’s tough stance against the Taliban. What justifications do the government of Pakistan have for denying compensation for the losses suffered by the lashkar volunteers and their families?, The government is showing indifference to the people of

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Adeyzai and their courageous stance against the Taliban. This indifference does not concur with the anti-Taliban political stance that the PPP and ANP proclaim. Both, it seems, have given in to the military establishment, which does not seem keen to eliminate the Taliban. Thousands of people have been killed, and property worth millions of dollars destroyed, in the fake or at best clumsy operations conducted by the Pakistani army in FATA3 and not even a single Taliban commander has been killed. People in Adeyzai complain that the Taliban led by Tariq Khan Afiridi and Arif Afridi have been conducting most of the attacks on their village. Both men are despised in Adeyzai. At one point Abdul Malik interrupted me during the interview with him and said: “Please do not call him Tariq Khan?” I asked him, “What should I call him instead? This is his name”. “Just Tariq. No Khan. He has never been Khan and will never be4”. Malik’s disdain of Tariq Afridi is shared by many people in Adeyzai. The lashkar members point out that close family members of many Taliban leaders are freely roaming around towns and villages all over Pakistan. They wonder why the authorities do not arrest the relatives to break the fighting spirit of the Taliban. Has the state of Pakistan begun to show respect for human rights? They argue that this is not the case as is clear from the Pakistani state oppressions against the Baluch nationalists5. In Baluchistan the intelligence agencies have been arresting close relatives of the Baloch nationalists to pressurize them. Why are the Baluch nationalists and the Taliban treated differently if both are “enemies” of the state? They wonder, why can the security forces of Pakistan not launch unannounced and targeted operations against the Taliban? Why is it so important to announce the operations before they are launched? The Pakistani army launched sudden and unannounced assaults on Indian positions in Kargil. Even the Indians were taken aback. In the initial phase of war, the Indians suffered great casualties. Why can’t similar unannounced and prompt assaults be carried out against the Taliban in FATA by the security forces of Pakistan? It is thus no wonder that nearly all lashkar members of Adeyzai doubt the intention of the authorities to combat the Taliban. In line with the Strategic Depth policy, which invites elimination and suppression of anti-Taliban Pakhtun, the Adeyzai lashkar has been left to fend for itself. People of the village have been contributing to support the lashkar expenses, which includes feeding the volunteers, buying fuel for vehicles used for patrolling the area, purchasing weapons and ammunition. This is certainly too much for a small village of farmers, drivers, and small businessmen.

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9) Is Adeyzai Lashkar Pro-Government? The government of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa encouraged the Adeyzai lashkar formation. The government’s police authorities facilitated the making of lashkar when they released Abdul Malik and provided Kalashnikovs and cartridges to the lashkar men. Lashkar leaders had a meeting with the chief minister of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa in which he assured the lashkar leaders of government support in terms of weapons, vehicles and money for the lashkar’s ration. Thus in a sense the Adeyzai lashkar can be termed pro-government. This, however, is not the whole picture of the lashkar. By 2008 when the lashkar was made, the people of Adeyzai knew very well what had become of the areas where the Taliban gained control. People suffered under the Taliban order, which does not tolerate many aspects of the Pakhtun way of life. Then the following military clashes with the Taliban led to large-scale human displacements and sufferings. They had seen what happened in Swat and Waziristan after Taliban control and subsequent military operations in the area that displaced the entire population. They had a strong desire to prevent Adeyzai from becoming another Swat or Waziristan. But the state writ was deteriorating in and around Adeyzai. The village jirga frequently met to discuss the growing insecurity and a consensus emerged that the villagers may have to take up weapon to halt Taliban control of Adeyzai. The jirga had no plans and never even discussed the idea to turn Adeyzai guns towards the Americans in Afghanistan or any other groups in Pakistan in pursuit of any religious or political agenda. The only aim and objective was to protect Adeyzai from the Taliban. The provincial government encouraged the formation of lashkar. The village Jirga welcomed it. The lashkar continued to defend Adeyzai even after the government abandoned the lashkar. The lashkar suffered enormously for defying the Taliban. Meanwhile, the Taliban have also been sending reconciliatory messages to the Adeyzia jirga. They even offered to compensate each and every person in the village who had suffered human or material loses in the Taliban attacks. The jirga refused. “We want writ of the state in Adeyzai, not writ of the Taliban”, said one of the jirga leaders. The very fact that the lashkar was established with the government’s encouragement underlines that it aims to establish writ of the state in the village. The lashkar facilitated the writ of the state. Police could freely perform duties in Adeyzai and the girls’ schools were reopened. Thus the Adeyzai lashkar may be termed as pro-government, but in pursuit of peace in Adeyzai rather than in pursuit of a larger pro- or anti-government agenda for a wider religious or political goal.

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I also discussed with the lashkar leaders the possibility of the lashkar men becoming warlords. They rejected the possibility. This was the response of Abdul Malik: “I am ready to give up the lashkar, if the state would restore peace in and around Adeyzai. If the authorities still have any doubts about me, I assure I will leave Adeyzai and the whole country and go to Dubai to live and work there. But they (state authorities) must establish the writ of the state so that I and everyone in the village can go back to routine life in peace”.

All lashkar men insist that it was not by choice that they took up weapons. They emphasised they would most happily go back to a quite life with their families, if the state would restore peace in and around the village. The Adeyzai lashkar men have been called “emissaries of peace” by a fellow villager. They are in my view too; drivers, farmers and workers endangering their lives for a peaceful life for their fellow villagers.

10) Adeyzai Lashkar- Stance on Girls’ Education The Adeyzai lashkar took a clear pro girls’ education stance in the face of the Taliban bombing of the village girls’ schools. The Taliban had threatened the parents against sending their daughters to schools. They bombed all three girls’ schools in Adeyzai on the night of 28 August 2008. There were some people in the village who appreciated the bombing, but most villagers disapproved of it. “I wept the day the Taliban bombed the girls’ schools”, said Abdul Malik. The village jirga decided with consensus to request that the government rebuild the schools. Within days, the educational authorities initiated the official procedure to rebuild the schools upon the request of the jirga. The lashkar members cooperated with the educational authorities to reopen the girls’ schools in rented buildings during the reconstruction of the bombed schools. Dilawar Khan, the lashkar leader, gave Kalashnikovs to the guards of the girls’ schools. Prior to this the guards had no weapons. The teachers confirm that the lashkar leaders sent them messages to carry on the educational activity without any fear and would immediately inform them in case of any dangers. The principal of one of the schools informed that the lashkar’s support encouraged the parents to send their daughters back to the school, who had previously stopped the pupils from coming to school due to the threats from the Taliban. It would be pertinent to appreciate the effort of the Pakhtun nationalist ANP government in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa for girls’ education. The

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Adeyzai girls’ schools were bombed in autumn 2008. Before autumn 2010 all schools were reconstructed and educational activity restarted in the new buildings. This also goes to the credit of the provincial ANP government. This is quite a quick reconstruction given the routinely slow pace of the government’s reconstructions in Pakistan.

11) Adeyzai Lashkar: Trapped Between State and Taliban? As mentioned before Abdul Malik was arrested in August 2008 in connection with an attack on the police in Adeyzai and cases were registered against him and his relatives. It was also the time when there was resentment against the Taliban in Adeyzai and the villagers were ready to defend their area against the Taliban. At that time the police released Haji Malik on the condition that he would lead the anti-Taliban lashkar in the village. On the one hand Haji Malik agreed to lead the lashkar and on the other hand he kept asking the police to take the cases back or proceed according to the law. The police did neither. Even after Malik’s assassination, the police neither took back the cases against his close relatives nor proceeded as per the law against them. Moreover, the police also registered terrorism related cases against Dilawar Khan, the new lashkar leader, and his close relatives when the latter captured a nephew of Arif Afridi, a Taliban commander from Darra Adam Khel, in response to the Darra Taliban’s targeted killing of Dilawar Khan’s elder brother, who lived and worked in Karachi. On the contrary, the police pressurized Dilawar Khan to release the Taliban commander’s nephew, which he did. Despite all this, the police have not revoked the cases against Dilawar Khan and his relatives. Meanwhile, the authorities, including the police, have done nothing to bring the killers of Dilawar Khan’s brother to justice. It is pertinent to mention that Dilawar Khan has never been known for any past connections with the Taliban. I asked the lashkar leaders as to why they do not proceed to the court of law to clear themselves of the police cases against them. They expressed the fear that they would be killed by the Taliban the day they stepped into the court area. They said they have already been sent thinly veiled messages by the Taliban stating as much. The lashkar leaders feel trapped by the resourceful Taliban and the deceitful state. The state has abandoned them to continue fighting the Taliban. The state would immediately arrest them under terrorism charges, already registered with the police, if they made a deal with the Taliban- a deal repeatedly offered by the Taliban- whereby the former would refrain

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from crimes inside Adeyzai and the lashkar would allow the militants to peacefully pass through their area for any attacks inside Peshawar. They would be put in jails where the lashkar leaders are afraid the Taliban will kill them. The jails, they told me, are filled with the Taliban where they have a comfortable life and torture to death any anti-Taliban men put together with them in the same jail. “Every path in our life leads to violent death. The Taliban will kill us if we keep fighting them. The police will arrest us if we stop fighting the Taliban, who will then kill us in police custody, just like they have killed many other anti-Taliban people in state custody. We are trapped”, says a lashkar leader. The hardships of the Adeyzai lashkar indicate the state ambiguity in dealing with the Taliban. It also hints at Pakistani strategic planners’ thinly veiled aversion to the anti-Taliban Pakhtun. It is no wonder that the lashkar men feel trapped between the state and the Taliban.

12) Profile of Some Adeyzai Lashkar Leaders 1) Dilawar Khan Dilawar Khan, son of a former FC soldier, was born is 1972 and had ten years of school education. He has three sisters and 11 brothers, five older than him and five younger. Two of his brothers have been in the Pakistani army, three of them work in the Middle East, and two have been killed in a deadly family feud with the family of Ali Ahmad, a slain leader of the Adeyzai lashkar, over a land dispute. Dilawar Khan could not continue education due to the feud. The feud ended in 1993 in a settlement facilitated by the then commissioner of the Peshawar division and Iftikhar Jhagra, a well-known politician of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Then Dilawar Khan joined PLM(N) as a political activist. Later he left PML(N) to become president district Peshawar of the PML(Q). Dilawar Khan has been an active member of the jirga that made the anti-Taliban lashkar, and later he became leader of the lashkar. He became chief of the lashkar after the assassination of Abdul Malik in November 2009. Dilawar Khan is a cricket fan and his favourite players are Wasim Akram and Shahid Afridi, both players for the Pakistani cricket team. He is father of seven teenage children.

2) Noor Malik Noor Malik, son of Abdul Malik, slain leader of the Adeyzai lashkar, was born in 1985. He had ten years education from a private school in

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Adeyzai. He was injured in the suicide attack that killed his father. He was adamant on carrying forward his father’s anti-Taliban cause. “My father gave life for peace in our land and I will never give up his cause”, he declared. Noor Malik carried forward his father’s mission for over a year and then committed suicide in January 2011 due to some domestic dispute. His family insists he died when a bullet accidentally came out from his own pistol that he was holding in his hand. Many other people in Adeyzai say he committed suicide. I was shocked to hear about his death. I have had long discussions with him face to face and on the telephone. We discussed various issues about the lashkar, his personal life, and the accusations against his father concerning his alleged links with the Taliban. I also shared the initial draft of this chapter with him and he gave good comments about the draft. Noor Malik was just like ordinary Pakistani young men. He loved cricket and used to play a lot of it before he joined the lashkar. Shahid Afridi was his favorite player. He told me he missed the normal life of a young man of his age but also insisted that his personal leisure is of secondary nature in comparison to the cause his father gave his life for; defeating the Taliban. He said he would go to the Middle East to work as a driver to support his family just like his father, who was also a driver in Saudi Arabia, after the Taliban have been defeated. He also said he wished to tour the world. A wish that he added may never materialise due to the responsibility of the anti-Taliban struggle that befell him after his father. Tragically, his apprehension proved correct. Like other Adeyzai lashkar leaders he was under constant mental pressure due to the terrorism-related police cases against them. He was especially concerned about the possibility of being killed in jail by the Taliban. He told me that he might not withstand the Taliban torture in jail for long because his body has not fully recovered from injuries he sustained in the suicide attack and that he could be killed with a couple of kicks in his stomach. His fellow lashkar men agree that the police case was a constant source of mental torture for him and most probably pushed him to commit suicide. In my view the state’s collusion with the Taliban and its aversion towards anti-Taliban Pakhtun may have contributed to Noor Malik’s death, regardless of the immediate cause of demise. The Taliban attacked Adeyzai with five rockets, which luckily neither killed nor injured anyone, following the burial of Noor Malik. “This was the Taliban’s way of celebrating Noor Malik death,” said his brother who has now taken Noor Malik’s place in the lashkar.

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13) A List of Target-killed people in Adeyzai The following is a list of some of the people of Adeyzai who were target-killed by the Taliban. Haji Abdul Malik, 58, was founder and leader of the anti-Taliban lashkar in Adeyzai. Malik, also known as Maliki, had high school level education and began his practical life as a soldier in the Pakistani army. He left the army over disappointment with “discrimination” against him in his promotion case. He went to Karachi and worked as a taxi driver in the city for several years. Then he went to the Middle East where he also worked as a driver. In 1993 he came back to Adeyzai where he took interest in the village politics. He was also elected as a Nazim (local councillor) from Adeyzai. He stood like a rock against the Taliban despite over 18 attempts on his life. Over 300 Taliban attacked his house and hujra within a few days of the Adeyzai lashkar formation under his leadership. The attack was repulsed but some of his friends and relatives died as a result. Malik was a religious person. However, he had serious reservations against mullahs and religious political leaders of Pakistan. I had the good luck of having interviewed him before he was killed by the Taliban in the suicide attack. In the interview he told me he wished all mullahs in Pakistan be killed by the state, including Maulana Fazl-U-Rahman, leader of the JUI(F), who should be the first one in the line of execution for his deep-rooted links with the Taliban. He said that there was maatam (loud wailing and mourning) in the house of the Maulana Fazl-U-Rahman the day Baitullah Mahsud, the former TTP leader, died in a drone attack. He left behind a widow, three sons and three daughters. One of his sons, Noor Malik, became a leader of the anti-Taliban lashkar following his assassination. Like most Pakistanis, Haji Malik was also a cricket fan. Javed Miandad and Shahid Afridi were his favourite players. Abdul Malik was buried close to his hujra so that the lashkar men can look at his grave at all times. The Taliban have been digging up graves of their dead opponents and hanging up the dead corpses in public places. Therefore Malik has been buried close to the hujra to prevent a possible Taliban insult to his remains. A 2010 report of the International Crisis Group, ICG, “Reforming Pakistan’s Criminal Justice System” claims that the founder of the Adeyzai lashkar, Haji Malik, supported the Taliban until his arrest in 20086’. The ICG’s report is misleading.

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The report also mentions the past “support” of Haji Malik to the Taliban but it never refers to its specific context. Haji Abdul Malik was never a Taliban fighter. Long before the formation of the lashkar, he was an elected councilor in Adeyzai. In line with tribal, as well as democratic, norms, he used to keep the door of his hujra open for everyone. This implied that the Taliban used to come to his hujra to present their point of view. At that time, the Taliban were not involved in any crimes in Adeyzai. It was also a time when the most powerful men in Pakistan, the army generals, were publicly making peace deals with the Taliban. Why should an ordinary Pakistani like Haji Malik, a driver, be targeted for giving a sympathetic ear to the Taliban when the generals were inking agreements with them and presenting these agreements to the world as a solution to the terrorism in Pakistan? If the government had any solid proof of his support of the Taliban, it should have been taken to court. Instead, the police released him. “The police never informed me why I had been arrested and what caused them to release me”, said Haji Malik in his interview with me. More importantly, Haji Malik’s most firm public stance was against the Taliban and he gave his life for that stance when the Taliban killed him in a suicide attack in November 2009. Abdul Manan, 55, was the elder brother of Adeyzai Lashkar chief Dilawar Khan. He was gunned down by the Taliban in Karachi on January 24, 2009 to punish Dilawar Khan for leading the anti-Taliban lashkar. Dilawar Khan received a phone call from the Darra Adamkhel Taliban within 15 minutes of his brother’s murder informing him of the killing. Abdul Manan was a university graduate and worked at Haroon Oil Mills in Karachi as a field officer. He had been living in the city for 30 years for work. He left behind six sons and two daughters. Ali Ahmad was leader of the Adeyzai anti-Taliban lashkar. He died in the suicide attack on 8 November 2009 that also killed Haji Abdul Malik, the main leader of the Adeyzai lashkar. Arab Gul was a village elder who supported the anti-Taliban lashkar. He was target-killed in a mosque where he was worshiping. Arsala Khan was a volunteer of the anti-Taliban lashkar and bodyguard of Israr Khan. The Taliban killed both Israr Khan and Arsala Khan in a blast caused by an IED.

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Dilawar Khan was the bodyguard of Haji Abdul Malik. He was with Malik when the suicide bomber attacked him. Dilawar Khan became suspicious enough to see the teenage bomber moments before he exploded the bomb. He tried to get hold of the bomber but the boy exploded the bombed strapped to his body, killing Dilawar Khan along with Abdul Malik. Fazal Haq was an elder of the Adeyzai village council that formed the anti-Taliban lashkar. He was killed in a Taliban attack on a mosque in Adeyzai. Islam Gul was a member of the anti-Taliban lashkar in Adeyzai. He was killed in attack on Israr Khan, the slain leader of the lashkar. Israf Khan was a village elder and member of the village council that formed the anti-Taliban lashkar. He was target- killed by the Taliban in a local mosque where he was worshiping. Israr Khan was nephew of Haji Abdul Malik and a leader of the antiTaliban lashkar. He was target-killed by the Darra Adam Khel Taliban in an explosion caused by an improvised explosive device in August 2010. Khayal Gul, 70 years old, Khayal Gul was a village elder who supported the anti-Taliban lashkar. He was beheaded by the Taliban in his house. Murad Khan was a village elder and leader of the Adeyzai anti-Taliban lashkar. He died in the suicide attack on 8 November 2009 that also killed Abdul Malik, the main leader of the Adeyzai lashkar. Nek Muhammad was a village elder and member of the Adeyzai council that made the anti-Taliban lashkar. He was target-killed by the Taliban in a mosque where he was worshiping. Rozi Khan was an Adeyzai villager. He used to work in a weapon shop in Darra Adam Khel. He was close to the anti-Taliban lashkar in Adeyzai and often used to meet the lashkar leaders. The Darra Adam Khel Taliban target-killed him for his links with the anti-Taliban lashkar. Sher Mast was a village elder and member of the Adeyzai jirga that made the anti-Taliban lashkar. He was killed in the Taliban attack on the hujra of Abdul Malik, the lashkar leader.

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Shamim Khan was a village elder and member of the Adeyzai council that formed the anti-Taliban lashkar. He was target-killed by the Taliban in Adeyzai.

Notes 1

This is an English translation of the poetry originally composed in Pashto language by Mr. Fazal Hadi, a villager from Adeyzai. The is Pashto poetry is available on this youtube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Z4KJnXAEJg 2 “Long Arm of the Outlaw”, The Express Tribune, 8 June 2010. http://tribune.com.pk/story/19589/long-arm-of-the-outlaws/ 3 See government of Pakistan’s own report “Cost of Conflict in FATA”, on: http://fata.gov.pk/files/costconflict.pdf 4 According to (Garrett, 2008:x) Khan is a word of Mongolian origin and originally means king. “By 1920’s its meanings were extended to include local chieftains or men of rank. In the egalitarian Pakhtun society every man is considered to be a king and is part of many men’s surnames”. 5 For a view of the state oppression in Baluchistan, see this article, “ Islamabad’s Barbarism” written by a Baluch nationalist leader and published in the Daily Times dated 18 March 2011, http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2011%5C03%5C18%5Cstory_18 -3-2011_pg3_2 6 “ Reforming Pakistan’s Criminal Justice System”, Crisis Group Asia Report No 196, December 6, 2010. P: 25

CHAPTER EIGHT TERRORISM IN PAKISTAN AND THE MUSLIM DIASPORA: A CASE OF THE NORWEGIAN PAKISTANIS

1) Introduction A great deal has been written about how growing religious extremism and militancy in Pakistan are financed by petro-dollars from the Middle East, and especially Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia is described in a recent WikiLeaks memo as a “cash machine” for Al-Qaeda’s worldwide terrorism networks, including Pakistan-based terrorist groups1. In Pakistan, it is widely believed that Saudi donors finance the religious organizations that indoctrinate and train young Pakistanis with a deep seated hatred for both Shias and non-Muslims as well as a disdain for democracy, human rights, and pluralism. At issue is the question of whether the rise of religious extremism and Islamist militancy in Pakistan has links with diasporic communities now living abroad, but originating from this country. This chapter will explore the question with reference to the NorwegianPakistanis. Islam is the second largest religion in Norway, a Scandinavian welfare state with a state Lutheran church, of approximately 4.5 million inhabitants, out of which about 2.5% of its population is now said to be Muslim. Muslims in Norway come from diverse ethnic and national backgrounds. However, the Norwegian-Pakistanis make up the single largest Muslim group in Norway.

2) Who are Norwegian-Pakistanis? The term Norwegian-Pakistanis refers to the Norwegian citizens of Pakistani origin, who began to arrive in Norway in 1967, predominantly as migrant labour. Most of them took unskilled jobs in the industry and the service sectors (Tjelmeland, 2003:151 &162). Over time, their position

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gradually improved in terms of employment, education and accommodation, so they did not become a permanent underclass in Norway (ibid). Norway banned the arrival of new labour migrants from the developing world in 1974, but new immigrants from Pakistan, like many other countries, continue to come to Norway through the family unification law. Today, the Norwegian-Pakistanis are the second largest immigrant group in Norway with 29,000 persons, and the majority of them marry a spouse from Pakistan2. Most of the labour migrants from Pakistan came from hierarchical communities in rural areas of the Punjab province, where there is little participation of citizens in state affairs. Moreover, the military has been ruling Pakistan for most of the time and, as a consequence, many people have little opportunity to interact with others within the formal state apparatus. Moreover, the labour migrants had limited educational and Norwegian language skills. This limited their public lives to earning money through hard work, and as a shared place for socialization they opened up mosques in rented buildings. They now required imams to lead them in prayers and take care of the mosques. This led to the practice of ‘importing’ imams from Pakistan. It is important to understand that the sense in which Christianity understands the concept of religious leaders is alien to Islam3, or at least to the Sunni version of Islam adhered to by most Norwegian-Pakistanis. Sunni Islam has no organized or hierarchical system of clergy. There is no one of comparable status to that of a priest or minister in this dominant version of Islam; an imam certainly does not possess this same stature. In all likelihood, with limited knowledge or comprehension of this fact, the Norwegian government supported the mosques and imams in much the same way as they supported the State Church and Christian clergy, presuming a similar organized or legal framework must apply as with the state-church alliance in Norway4. Thus the Norwegian government helped the mosques and imams to acquire a religious authority and socio-political influence that they never had possessed in Pakistan. Upon arrival in Norway, the imams were elevated to the position of religious leaders by the local Muslim community, and the state provided them with all the appurtenances for the position. Today, imams and those people linked with mosques widely appear to be, and are treated as, spokesmen of the Norwegian-Pakistani community in the media and feature highly in interactions with politicians.

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3) Mosques in Norway Mosques in Norway have their own funding generated through donations from their members, in addition to the financial support from the state. However, financial aid to mosques in Norway from abroad has also been a matter of concern in this country. On one occasion the Norwegian government rejected a Saudi offer of finance for the building of mosques in Norway5. But there has been relatively little attention paid to the possibility of the mosques’ donations from Norway contributing to the strength of the militant and extremist Islamist forces in Pakistan, a country that remains the centre of the ongoing war on terror. There are over twenty five Norwegian-Pakistani mosques. All diverse strands of Pakistani Islam - Barelvi, Sufi orders, Deobandis, Jamaat Islami, Tableeghi Jamaat, Minhajul Quran, Shi’ism or the Ahmadiyya are now well established on Norwegian soil and function as membership associations (mosques) in Norway (Leirvik, 2004). Almost all mosques collect donations and a significant proportion is sent back to Pakistan-based religious organizations of their choice. Saudi Arabia, the key financier of extremist Islam in Pakistan, is mainly contributing to Deobandi and Wahabi organizations. The Barelvi organizations rely greatly on donations from the diasporic Pakistani communities linked with Barelvi mosques abroad. Most NorwegianPakistanis are followers of the Barelvi version of Islam, and the main Barelvi mosques in Norway are: Jumaat Ahle-Sunnat, World Islamic Mission (WIM), and Idara Minhajul Quran (IMQ), the three largest Norwegian-Pakistani congregations in terms of membership. The Deobandi mosque in Norway is the Islamic Cultural Center, ICC. Other prominent Norwegian-Pakistani mosques are: Ghusia Muslim Society, Bazm-eNaqshband, Madani Mosque and the Shia mosque called Anjuman-eHussani. They all send donations to religious groups in Pakistan. The Barelvi version of Islam, to which most Norwegian-Pakistanis belong, is influenced by pre-Islamic traditions and cultural practices of South Asia. Some writers (e.g. Jones, 2002:10) conclude that Barelvis have a “tolerant interpretation of Islam” and they have been the “Islamic radicals’ most effective obstacle”. This is a problematic generalization, at least when viewed in the Pakistani context. Pakistan’s military and its jihadi proxies, Islamist militant groups, have used religious bigotry as a tool of both foreign and domestic policy for decades (Haqqani, 2005). Consequently, religious extremism permeates all strata and socioeconomic groups in Pakistan, including the Barelvis. The Barelvi scholars and their followers celebrated the murder in January 2011 of Salman

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Taseer, the powerful governor of the Punjabi province, and hailed his murderer, his own bodyguard and a religious fanatic, as a hero6. The governor had questioned the validity of Pakistan’s blasphemy laws and supported a poor Christian woman implicated in a dubious blasphemy case by the Muslims. The extent to which such religious extremism has permeated amongst the Barelvi Norwegian-Pakistanis naturally is a matter of speculation. However, the Barelvi mosques in Norway maintain close contacts with Barelvi religious groups in Pakistan, and their influence can be assumed, although some of the mosques, such as Jumaat Ahle-Sunnat and World Islamic Mission, are comparably “free” from the organizational control of the Pakistan-based religious organizations. These mosques’ contacts are ideological and financial in terms of donations to the Pakistani-based groups. Jumaat Ahle-Sunnat has cordial relations with a Pakistani Barelvi scholar, Allama Riaz Hussain Shah. The World Islamic Mission is close to Jammiat Ulama-e-Pakistan, JUP, of Maulana Ahamd Noorani, son of late Maulana Shah Ahmad Noorani, who founded the global network of the World Islamic Mission mosques. Some of the Norwegian-Pakistani mosques however are hardly more than overseas branches of religiopolitical parties operating in Pakistan. ICC and IMQ are overseas branches of Jumaat Islami and Minhajul Quran, religio-political parties in Pakistan.

3.1) Jumaat Islami and ICC Islamist scholar, Maulana Abdul Al Maududi established Jumaat Islami in 1941. The party opposed the idea of the creation of the separate state of Pakistan through division of the British India in 1947. The party accepted Pakistan after it came into being as an independent state. The party has always promoted an Islamist agenda in Pakistan and has aligned itself with the military establishment of Pakistan, which was also using Islam to promote its foreign and domestic policy objectives. On the domestic front, the military establishment wanted to undermine the secular and nationalist political forces in Pakistan, whereas on foreign policy it aimed to counter the perceived enemies of Pakistan, especially India and Afghanistan (Haqqani, 2005 and Hussain, 2005). Jumaat Islami constructed the model of an Islamist state and provided the military establishment with militants, who were armed by the state, to massacre fellow Pakistanis and commit terrorism in foreign countries, predominantly India and Afghanistan. The Pakistani army raised a volunteer force of 100,000 men to massacre supporters of the popular Bangali movement in the eastern part of the country which was seeking

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independence from Pakistan in 1971. Jumaat Islami linked students filled ranks of the volunteer force and organized them into two groups, Al-Shams and Al-Badr (Haqqani, 2005:79). Bangladeshi scholars argue that the two groups acted as death squads of the Pakistani state in the former eastern wing of Pakistan, now Bangladesh (ibid). By 1960 Jumaat Islami had established contacts with Islamists all over the world. The writings of Maulana Maududi were translated into various languages and disseminated widely across the world. The party also received lavish financial aid from Saudi Arabia and the Saudi-sponsored Rabita Al-Alam al-Islami (Muslim World League) for a global outreach (Haqqani, 2005:171). Numerous Jumaat Islami publications in various languages documented perceived atrocities against the Muslim world and promoted a thesis that all of the true followers of Islam have an obligation to free their co-religionists from non-Muslim occupation and control. Jumaat Islami supported Gen Zia, Pakistan’s military dictator, in his decision to hang the popular Prime Minister of Pakistan, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, father of late Benazir Bhutto. Gen Zia had overthrown the democratically elected government of Bhutto in 1977 in a military-led coup. Jumaat Islami supporters took to the streets to celebrate the hanging of Bhutto (Haqqani, 2005:139). Jumaat Islami also supported Gen Zia in his efforts to “Islamize” Pakistan’s legal system and his foreign policy that aimed to promote militant Islam abroad, especially in the Indian Kashmir and in Soviet occupied Afghanistan. Hizbul Mujahedin is the militant wing of the party that is involved in violent jihadi acts of terrorism in the Indian Kashmir. The party publically proclaims that it has a “martyrs’ fund” to support families of the jihadis killed in jihad. Jumaat Islami has had a significant role in what Afghanistan is today: a country devastated by war and human suffering. Jumaat Islami supports the Taliban and presses for dialogue with the Taliban, even though it knows that the tribal people of Pakistan, who have suffered the Taliban atrocities much more than any other people in Pakistan, are against the Taliban. The Peshawar Declaration clearly identifies Jumaat Islami as an ‘enemy of Pakhtun” in Afghanistan and Pakistan due to its pro-jihad role and ideology. Jumaat Islami has many overseas branches all over the world and the Islamic Cultural Center, ICC, Norway is one of them. People linked with ICC insist that their centre is free from Jumaat Islami’s control, and has only ideological links with the party. This view is disingenuous and over simplified. First and foremost, it is the predominantly pan-Islamic ideology of Jumaat Islami that is a central issue in this time of global jihad supported by the party both ideologically and logistically in the most vital

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battle ground in the war on terror; Pakistan. It is difficult to miss the presence of Jumaat Islami in ICC. Its library is full of Jumaat Islami literature. The Imam in ICC was trained in a Jumaat Islami madrasa in Pakistan. Jumaat Islami in Pakistan closely interacts with its overseas branches, which in turn are encouraged to collect funds for the party to support its work in Pakistan, ostensibly for the “welfare work” of the party. The ICC also collects donations from its members for Jumaat Islami’s welfare work in Pakistan. It is difficult to determine the amount (of the funding received from abroad) that has been used in “welfare work”, and whether some has been used for jihad; the party does not publicly provide such details of its receipts or allocation of funding. Jamaat Islami’s thinly veiled and live links with Al Qaeda and other jihadi groups are well-documented; and it is in that context that genuine concern lies regarding the misuse of the money sent to the party from overseas Pakistanis. Even the party’s apparent “welfare work” is not free from connotations of religious extremism and violent jihad. Aid workers in the IDPs camps in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa noted that workers of religious groups, including Jumaat Islami, supply food packages whilst at the same time lecturing the IDPs on why it is important that Pakistan must pull out from the US led war on terror, and that the Taliban are the ‘most well balanced people7’. Leaders of the party, including its former chief, Qazi Hussain Ahmad, frequently visit the overseas branches of the party, including the ICC in Norway. While both Belgium and Holland have banned his entry into their countries because of Qazi’s “jihadi links”, he was allowed to enter Norway in 2004. He visited ICC and refused to discuss women’s rights with the head of Amnesty International in Norway8. Qazi viewed the discussion as an “attack on Islam9”.

3.2) Minhajul Quran and IMQ The party came into existence in Pakistan in the 1980s as an Islamic movement with the objective to Islamize people in Pakistan, through the use of peaceful persuasion rather than use of violence and to further the spread of Islamic educational teachings in Pakistan. The party initially entered electoral politics but was rejected by the voting electorate. Currently the party has distanced itself from party politics and is concentrating on evangelism and welfare work. The party has a wide network of Islamic educational institutes, madrasas, in Pakistan. It has established Minhaj Welfare Foundation in Pakistan that runs orphanages and projects for health, education and rehabilitation for the victims of

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natural disasters, such as earthquakes and floods. Unlike Jumaat Islami, it appears that this party has never been accused of having violent jihadi connections, whether in Pakistan or abroad. The party leader, Tahirual Qadri, even issued a detailed Fatwa that totally rejected terrorism10. This party also advocates an Islamic revolution in Pakistan and throughout the world through peaceful means. Minhajul Quran has 90 overseas branches around the world11. It has a Directorate of Foreign Affairs, established in 1981 in Lahore, to regulate the activities of its overseas branches from a centralized setup based in Pakistan12. One of the objectives of the directorate is to provide “guidance (to the overseas branches) to establish new mosques, libraries and schools in foreign countries13”. In Europe, the mosques affiliated with Minhajul Quran are established in Germany, UK, Spain, France, Denmark and Norway. All these mosques regularly interact and coordinate amongst themselves. In Norway, the Minhaj-linked mosque is Idara Minhajul Quran, IMQ. The IMQ is in Oslo. It offers Islamic teaching classes to men and women. Similarly with ICC, it nurtures and promotes a culture of gender segregation. To promote hijab culture, the IMQ sells hijabs (head covers). These hijabs are sent to IMQ under the Hijab House Project of Minhajul Quran in Pakistan. Besides ICC and IMQ, other Norwegian-Pakistani mosques also have institutional mechanisms in place to collect donations locally and arrangements for the funds raised to be sent to their affiliated religious parties in Pakistan.

4) Fall of the Left in Pakistan It is pertinent to mention that up until the early 1980s, secular and progressive political forces were dominant in Pakistan, and this mode of thinking was reflected in their overseas branches. However the success of the Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979, combined with the capitalist West’s funding and political support of the international Islamist militants in their resistance to the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, greatly bolstered the religious forces in Pakistan, and expanded their outreach to the diapora. This combination battered the secular and progressive forces in Pakistan and simultaneously increased the power of the religious forces and their global influence. Gen. Zia’s dictatorship conspired to implicate members of the vibrant left-wing Pakistani groups abroad; for example, some of the Netherlands based Pakistani left-wingers were implicated in a conspiracy to hijack a Pakistan International Airline plane. In Sweden, the energetic

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Pakistan Society was run by Pakistan’s Socialist party and Communist party. The Pakistani left is in disarray today and is dominated by the religious forces, both inside Pakistan and abroad. Pakistan’s secular and left-leaning parties, such as the federalist PPP and Pakhtun nationalist ANP, have branches abroad, including in Norway, but they are spiritless and almost dormant when compared with the mosque-based diasporic groups. During the Swat IDPs crisis in Pakistan, the two parties that were elevated to power by popular vote in 2008 failed to mobilized their overseas branches to collect donations to support their district level organizations’ work for the IDPs. The religious groups, by comparison, received huge donations from the Pakistani mosques abroad that facilitated their welfare work with the IDPs. The PPP and ANP have therefore failed to retake ground from religious groups on multiple fronts, including in the failure of mobilization of their overseas branches to alleviate the sufferings of poor Pakistanis.

5) Long Distance Ummah and the Identity Crisis Norwegian-Pakistanis are part of the long distance Ummah14, the global Muslim communities in diaspora. Seemingly, this ummah does not seek to impose sharia law and practices on those living in the host countries, with the exception of a small minority section of the ummah15. It enjoys the welfare benefits, employment and educational opportunities, and state shelter when attacked by neo-fascists in the West16. The ummah-in-exile has no intention of returning to the Promised Land, as was the case with a section of the Jewish diapora17. This ummah is also hit by an identity crisis; for example, they are neither “Pakistanis” in Pakistan, nor “Norwegians” in Norway. They are, in the words of Oliver Roy, “culturally uprooted people”. The ummah identifies with Islam to compensate for their culturally rootless status. It therefore refuses to share in the perceived (im)moral values of the host societies, justifying this isolationism in the name of Islam. It turns apologist when confronted with the brutalities of the Taliban in its disregard for human freedoms, womens’ rights and cultural heritage, and Al-Qaida’s brutalities against non-Muslims and fellow Muslims. Similar traits were shown by appeasers in the West who tolerated the rise of Hitler, or those who tolerated the racism in apartheid South Africa. The ummah donate money to religious groups that provide fertile ground for the growth and encouragement of religious extremism in Muslim societies. Thus, probably unintentionally, they strengthen the religious groups that directly or indirectly promote religious extremism and militancy in countries of origin and also threaten human security in

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their host countries.

6) Norwegian-Pakistanis and the Terrorism in Pakistan My own interactions with the mosque members in Norway show that most of them are unaware of the pro-violent jihad activities of the religious groups linked with the mosques in Norway, or have not given it due thought. They go to Pakistan for vacation or family gatherings and are not greatly interested in the politics and history of the country. Indeed the long periods of military control in Pakistan had actively discouraged involvement or interest in political debate that would question the military establishment. They do not have any clear knowledge or appreciation of the contribution of the religious parties towards the ongoing terrorism in Pakistan, nor their connections with mosques in Norway. They are not even conscious that their donations might be strengthening the religious groups that have contributed to violence in Pakistan. Many even seem to be influenced by the propaganda of these religious groups that attribute the terrorism in Pakistan to other causes, such as the perceived causes behind the US attacks on Muslim countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq etc, and the apparent one-sided US support of the Israeli state. It is the right of the diasporic communities to donate their hard earned money to whomsoever they like. Firstly, I would like to caution them against blindly donating to religious congregations and to request them to ensure their donations do not end up contributing to religious extremism in Pakistan. Secondly, Pakistan is a multi-religious country and so is its diaspora in Norway. The diaspora should also consider and look into supporting groups in Pakistan and Norway that unite, rather than divide, people on religious bases. One of Pakistan’s most prominent lawyers, Itizaz Ahsan, was invited by the Norwegian Pakistani-community to Oslo in 2008 in connection with the celebrations marking the national day of Pakistan, 14th August. On that occasion an announcement requesting donations for the ICC was made. In response, Mr Ahsan advised the Norwegian Pakistanis to establish a “Pakistan Culture Center”. The point that the lawyer seemed to make was that the diasporic Pakistanis should present and embrace a view of Pakistan way beyond the narrow Islamism of the religious groups. This is what Pakistan needs from its diaspora. The diasporic communities can, through a diligent use of donations, contribute towards reining in the rising religious extremism in Pakistan. But to do so they first have to address, then rise above, the limited world view formed by the Long-Distance Ummah in their search for a solution to their identity crisis.

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Notes 1

“WikiLeaks cables portray Saudi Arabia as a cash machine for terrorists”, see on this link: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/05/wikileaks-cables-sauditerrorist-funding 2 “Who do immigrants in Norway marry?”, Statistics Norway. http://www.ssb.no/vis/english/magazine/art-2006-10-13-02-en.html 3 “Religious Pluralism, Human Rights, and Muslim Citizenship in Europe: Some Preliminary Reflections on an Evolving Methodology for Consensus”, paper presented by Dr Shaheen Sardar Ali in the Women Law Institute University of Oslo in 2007. Dr Ali is Professor of Law, University of Warwick, UK, and Professor II, University of Oslo, Norway 4 ibid 5 “Nekter å godkjenne moskémillioner”, http://www.vg.no/nyheter/innenriks/artikkel.php?artid=10041746 6 “Taseer’s murder: Religious Right Heralds the Assassin as Hero”, Express Tribune dated January 6, 2011. http://tribune.com.pk/story/99797/taseers-murderreligious-right-heralds-the-assassin-as-hero/ ; “Hardline Stance: Religious Bloc Condones Murder”, Express Tribune dated January 5, 2011. http://tribune.com.pk/story/99313/hardline-stance-religious-bloc-condonesmurder/; “Valentine Gifts for Mumtaz Qadri”, Express Tribune February 14, 2011. http://tribune.com.pk/story/118594/valentine-gifts-for-mumtaz-qadri/ 7 These observations have been made by activists linked with AIRRA who were engaged in relief work during the Swat IDPs crisis 8 “Pakistani Politician Makes the Rounds”, http://www.aftenposten.no/english/local/article855480.ece 9 ibid 10 “Influential Pakistani cleric issues fatwa against terrorism”, http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/panelists/john_esposito/2010/03/infl uential_pakistani_cleric_issues_fatwa_against_terrorism.html 11 This information is on the Mihajul Quran’s website: http://www.minhajoverseas.com/en.php?tid=12893 12 ibid 13 ibid 14 See the following article for an understanding of Long-Distance Ummah. http://www.viewpointonline.net/the-long-distance-ummah.html 15 ibid 16 ibid 17 ibid

APPENDIX FULL TEXT OF PESHAWAR DECLARATION

Author’s Note on Peshawar Declaration The Peshawar Declaration is a policy document that aims to lead Pakistan out of violence and terrorism. The declaration was formally issued, in February 2011, in line with the recommendations of a grand tribal jirga held in Peshawar in December 2009. It was duly signed by political parties, civil society organizations, NGOs and tribal leaders. The KhyberPakhtunkhwa chapters of the following political parties are signatories to the declaration: Awami National Party (ANP), Pukhtunkhwa Mili Awami Party (PMAP), Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians (PPPP), Pakistan Peoples Party Sherpao, (PPP-S), National Party (NP) and Awami Party Pakistan (APP). Meanwhile, all political parties, minus two small political parties, National Party and Awami Party, have distanced themselves from the declaration under immense pressure from the intelligence agencies of Pakistan. The civil society activists and tribal leaders from FATA, who actively worked for the declaration, continue to be harassed by the intelligence agencies. Some of them have been arrested by them. I reproduce the full text of Peshawar Declaration on the following pages. The aim is to let the readers see what the political parties cannot publicly own for the fear of all-powerful intelligence agencies.

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PESHAWAR DECLARATION On December 12 and 13, a two day workshop/conference was held in Peshawar with the sole agenda “Terrorism - the ways out”. The workshop was attended by the political parties and civil society organizations that actively opposed terrorism. The participants were keen to contribute and participate in discussions regarding the political, ideological, strategic, economic, and cultural and education/ awareness related aspects of the agenda. The participants were divided into Five Groups and they freely expressed their opinions about the topics they had selected by choice. On the first day every group came up with a rough draft. On the second day final recommendations were drawn from the rough drafts. In a commendable show of unity, members with different political affiliations and shades of opinion succeeded in agreeing upon a single document of consensus. The workshop was attended by the provincial leadership of Awami National Party (ANP), Pukhtunkhwa Mili Awami Party PMAP, Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians (PPPP), Pakistan Peoples Party Sherpao PPP(S), National Party (NP) and Awami party Pakistan (APP). Civil society organizations under the banner of Amn Tehrik, (Peace Movement) businessmen, doctors, lawyers, teachers, students, laborers and intellectuals also participated in the workshop. Representatives from all the agencies of FATA, Swat, Malakand and Buner also participated. A significant number of female participants were also present. Each group presented its report before the Conference. Every report was critically analyzed, objections raised and recommendations for improvement discussed. It was decided that all the reports should be amalgamated into a joint declaration namely Peshawar Declaration. A five member committee was constituted to prepare the documentation. After deliberation it was decided that all the organizations that attended the conference will jointly struggle to translate Peshawar Declaration into actions. For this purpose, ten members Coordination Committee (Rabita Committee) was constituted comprising of members from ANP, PMAP, PPPP, PPP Sherpao, Awami Party, National Party and Amn Tehrik (Peace Movement). After the discussion the participants made political, ideological and strategic aspects as a single/one report.

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Defining Terrorism Terrorism is to create fear in someone to achieve certain ends. A person can be terrorized by a mere threat or he/she can be beaten, abducted, jailed and/or killed. An individual, a particular group, a sect, a nation or a country can indulge in terrorism to achieve certain objectives. People can also engage in terrorism for money, property or women.

The Current Wave of Terrorism Man has been indulging in the ruthless treatment of other human beings throughout history. The modes of terrorism were different in different times. In the conference all the participants agreed upon the idea that the current surge of terrorism is the most dangerous; the worst type. This kind of terrorism is a complex mixture of religious extremism and fanatical, sectarian, anti-civilizational, anti-humanity and coercive ways of life, which are most ruthless ones. The aim of this kind of terrorism is to impose a self-proclaimed global agenda by killing humanity. What madness is this that the terrorist teacher issues the ticket to paradise to his soldier and marries him to a Hor (beautiful women in paradise) and the soldier confirms the ticket to paradise by ruthlessly killing innocent humanity including women and children! The obvious madness and inhuman thinking behind the rationale of killing fellow human beings including women and children for one’s material and animalistic yearnings (Pure Wines and Beautiful Women) is beyond any comprehension and does not deserve any sympathy or empathy. To defeat this kind of terrorism of our region, it is mandatory to understand its causes and modus operandi, without which cure or elimination will not be possible.

Causes of the Terrorism in our Region The current wave of terrorism emanates from two sources: Al-Qaeda, and the Strategic Depth policy of Pakistan. Al-Qaeda is a caricature of Arab Expansionism in the disguise of global Islam. Due to the prevalence of Wahabism in the historical hub of Islam, Arabs have dominated the other Muslims. Due to this, Al-Qaeda is a specialist of this kind of terrorism including all of its ingredients, organizational structure, techniques and strategies. The second ingredient contributing to this kind of terrorism is the Strategic Depth policy of the Pakistani army. The purpose of this policy is to use

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Jihadi Culture in order to counter India and protect nuclear weapons: to subjugate Afghanistan and making it a fifth province, or like the Azad Kashmir model. The policy was advanced further in 1995 and it was decided to make Central Asian Muslim states as their “client” states. The Strategic Depth policy of the Pakistani army has a complete background. The ideology of nationhood on the basis of religion served its foundation. Cantonments were labeled with the slogans of Jihad Fi Sabele-La (Jihad in the name of Allah). Large crossings and roundabouts in cities were furnished with tanks, fighter planes and replicas of the Chaghai hills to make a war-like environment. Instead of a welfare state Pakistan was made a security state. The Objective Resolution (1949) gave birth to Mullah-Military Alliance. The same resolution was included, in letter and spirit, in the constitution by General Zia ul Haq. As a result of religious background, war-like environment, security state, and Mullah-MilitaryAlliance, the first terrorist organizations in the names of Al-Shams and AlBadar were launched in Bengal. The defeat in Bengal should have been an eye-opener for the establishment and should have signaled the end of the military-Jihadist nexus, but unfortunately the same policy was practiced in Kashmir, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. Terrorist organizations like Hizbul Mujahideen, Harkatul Mujahideen, Lashkar-e-Tayeeba, and Jash-eMuhamamd were installed in Kashmir. In Paksitan Sibah-e-Sahaba and Lashkar-e-Jhangwi, and in FATA Lashkar-e-Islam, Ansar-ul-Islam, Amarbil-Maroof, Tahreek-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-e-Muhammadi, and Tahreeke-Taliban have been operational. All these organizations were termed as strategic assets. In Afghanistan terrorism was started in 1972. First of all, Gulbadin Hikmatyar was brought to Peshawar and Colonel Imam was sent to Afghanistan. During that period and till 1978 Gulbadin Hikmat Yar, Professor Mujadidi, Burhan ud Din Rabbani, Pir Gilani and Abdul Rasool Siaf were trained to be the leaders of terrorists’ organizations. When these people conquered Afghanistan they tried to stop their patrons from interfering in Afghanistan. Thus strategic assets did not help their patrons. Even then, the army did not learn any lesson here and another asset with the name of the Taliban was formed which turned out to be more aggressive and destructive for Afghanistan. During this time the marriage between the Taliban and Al-Qaeda took place and they became the rulers of Afghanistan. Due to the policy of strategic assets the country had already plunged deep into the abyss of terrorism even before 9/11. The riots between Shia and Sunni Sects were a common phenomenon. The suicide bombing in the

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country was started in 1993. The suicide attack that killed Ahmed Shah Masood was carried out just one day before 9/11. India and Afghanistan had already been suffering from such attacks. But in due time Pakistani religious extremism spread its tentacles in the country and sectarianism grew. Besides Shia, the Barelvi were also targeted. It is a historical fact that the US, China, Arab countries and Europe helped Pakistan in its aggression against Afghanistan. To quote just one example, 24 billion petro-dollars were spent to establish seminaries (religious schools). Military aggression was named as Jihad. The whole environment was favorable to nurture the already strong triangular Mullah-MilitaryMilitant nexus. During the rule of the afore-mentioned religious and military components of terrorism, terrorists from Chechnya, Uzbekistan, Sin kiang and other parts of the world came to Afghanistan. Thus Afghanistan became the hub of international terrorism. After 9/11, all these peoples were shifted to FATA. No doubt these terrorists are now present in FATA and elsewhere in the country. There is no denying the fact that these terrorists have occupied FATA and some parts of Punjab, such as central Punjab and Muridke, are their strong holds.

A contradictory Perception in the minds towards terrorism by the people of those areas who are under direct control of terrorists and those who are less effected or are not effected FATA and Malakand are the most affected areas due to terrorism. Similarly not a single village or city of Pukhtunkhwa province is spared by terrorists. Although the whole country and even the whole world is suffering from terrorism, and the fact that central Punjab or Mureedki is also the hub of terrorists, it still remains a bitter fact that the people of FATA and Pukhtunkhwa are virtually hostage to the terrorists. The perception of terrorism and its causes, or their opinions about military operations, the involvement of foreign hands in terrorism and drone attacks, are poles apart from the rest of the country.

Why this contradiction? One of the reasons is a natural one. There is a Pushtu proverb that

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“burns are felt where there is fire”. The second reason is the policy of the government. For example the media policy during General Pervez Musharaf allowed massive coverage to those people who were supporting terrorism. This also includes some of the retired generals, a few journalists and analysts. As a result, those living in other parts of the country or those who were not directly affected by terrorism were uninterruptedly indoctrinated with ideas for about eight years, which further helped terrorism. Those living in the war zone are eyewitnesses to all that is happening there and they have their own perception of this war of terrorism. A few examples are given below: • It was propagated through the media, though in an implied manner, that terrorism is the continuation of Jihad against Soviet Russia. The fact is that almost all of those who were fighting against the Russians are eagerly and actively painting on the political canvas of Afghanistan in order to bring stability to the democratic process in Afghanistan. They are the foremost opponents of terrorism. They include professor Mujadidi, Burhan ud Din Rabbani, Pir Gilani and Abdul Rasool Siab, Rasheed Dostam and the party of the late Ahmed Shah Masood. • Only two of the anti-Soviet campaigns are now involved in terrorism: Gulbadin Hikmatyar and Jalal ud Din Haqqani. Gulbadin’s party is almost non-existent. Only one of his commanders, Kashmir Khan, and a few friends are supporting him. Haqqani had already joined the Taliban. • Uzbeks, Chechens, Sudanese and terrorists from Sank yang came to Afghanistan during the period of the Taliban. At that time the Soviets had withdrawn and Dr. Najeeb’s government was toppled. These terrorist did not exist during the war against the Soviets. • None of the Pakistani terrorists’ organizations, like Hizbul Mujahideen, Harkatul Mujahideen, Lashkar-e-Tayeeba, Jash-eMuhamamd Sibah-e-Sahaba, Lashkar-e-Jangwi, Lashkar-e-Islam, Ansar-ul-Islam, Amar-bil-Maroof, Tahreek-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-eMuhammadi and Tahreek-e-Taliban, had participated in the anti-Soviet campaign. • Even the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan have no direct linkage with the anti-Soviet campaign. Despite this, it was propagated through the media that the on-going war is a continuation of the socalled Jihad in Afghanistan. It is propagated that these terrorists were part of the anti-Soviet campaign and they have been living in the tribal areas for thirty years where they had married the local women and thus

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became part and parcel of the tribal society. The fact is that in the tribal areas a foreigner is never called a native even if they have taken asylum and lived there for centuries. The Mahsud tribe of South Waziristan had the peculiarity that did not allow a single non-local to stay in their area during this whole period. • Another false propaganda through the media is the number of foreign militants. In the media the number of foreign militants is portrayed as a hundred to two hundred. The reality is that there are 11000 Uzbeks, 6000 Arabs and 9000 Punjabis. From Waziristan to Swat the number of Pushtun terrorist is merely 4000 but despite this fact the whole Pushtun nation is falsely propagated as extremists and terrorists. • On other issues such as military operations, peace deals and the fighting between the army and Taliban, the people of war-affected areas have quite a different outlook than those living in the mainland. For example the people of the war-affected areas think that the army and Taliban are not enemies, but friends. They have been persistently asking the question why the military failed to target the core leadership of the militants in all the 17 military operations in FATA. It is true that during the military operations the top, as well as the second and third, cadre leadership were neither killed nor wounded or captured. Moreover, the news of the killing of many terrorist leaders is telecasted several times over the media but they are still alive. Commanders like Ibn-e-Amin, Shah Duran and Ikram ud Din are prime examples of such false propaganda. In Swat, the news that Fazl Ullah is under a siege was three times telecasted by the ISPR, but in the same month it was propagated through the media that he had escaped to Afghanistan. Fazl Ullah’s close associates Muslim Khan, Haroon and Mahmood were arrested by the militants, but six months have passed and nobody knows what happened to them. In the past, Sufi Muhammad was arrested and then released in a so-called peace deal, which was imposed upon the political leadership at gunpoint. The valiant police of the province once arrested 28 terrorists with suicide jackets but these terrorists were taken by the intelligence agencies who took them away with the plea of further investigation. These people were kept somewhere for a few months. They were released on the day when General Pervez Musharaf imposed Emergency Plus. Only a few words came to us about their release. It is due to these reasons that the people of the war-affected areas are neither satisfied with the military operations nor do they entertain false hopes. • The people of the war-affected areas demand that these terrorists

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should be hanged in open space like they used to hang innocent civilians or as they did to Shabana. These people call for a real and targeted military operation and strongly condemn the dramas in the name of military operations. These people do not support any peace deals with the militants, but, unlike them, the rest of Pakistan talk of putting an end to the military operations and resuming the so-called peace deals. • The issue of Drone attacks is the most important one. If the people of the war-affected areas are satisfied with any counter militancy strategy, it is the Drone attacks which they support the most. According to the people of Waziristan, Drones have never killed any civilian. Even some people in Waziristan compare Drones with Ababels (the holy swallows sent by God to avenge Abraha, the intended conqueror the Khana Kaaba). A component of the Pakistani media, some retired generals, a few journalists/analysts, and proTaliban political parties never tire in their baseless propaganda against the Drone attacks. • The same is true of the discourse of foreign hands in militancy. In FATA there is either military or the afore-mentioned militant organizations. The majority of the local people have migrated to other parts of the country. Those who could not flee are helpless and nothing is in their control. The questions arise, which one of the militant organizations is not created by the Pakistani army, and which one is serving a foreign agenda? Pakistan should raise the issue in a UN forum or name the organization which is serving a foreign agenda by using the diplomatic channel. The possibility remains that there is a second or third tier terrorist with a few suicide bombers and he exchanges them for a handsome price. But this is not possible on an organizational level, and if the chaos persisted for a longer period there is also the possibility that some other countries would jump into the fray, or the UN would bring peace forces to these areas. All the participants agreed that the failure of military operations and the ongoing terrorism which is spreading its tentacles very fast are not because of the inability of the Pakistani army, but rather it is a deliberate attempt on the part of our establishment to secure its military assets at any cost.

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Terrorism and the Identification of Friends and Foe The conference agreed upon the idea that every individual, writer, intellectual, organization or country who is against the terrorists is our friend. Every individual, organization, party or country that provides sanctuary to the terrorists, extends financial or moral support to them or supports them in any way, like diverting peoples’ attention to non-issues by concealing the truth about them, is a friend of the terrorists and hence an enemy of the participants of the conference—an enemy of Pushtuns, Pakistan and humanity in general. The conference applied the above mentioned criterion to gauge political parties. The participants unanimously reached the conclusions that Jumate-Islami, both factions of Jameet-Ulema-e-Islam, Jumat Al-Hadis Sajid Mir Group, Tahreek-e-Insaf, a component of the Pakistani media and establishment are pro-terrorists. All the Baloch Nationalist Parties appose terrorism and support the Drones so they are our friends. The Pakistani Muslim Leg (N, Q) are primarily Punjab based parties, and very closed to the establishment. Their stand against terrorism is vague so they are on our watch list. MQM in itself is a terrorist organization. Though MQM apposes terrorists, but that is because they see their own terrorism vanishing if the new phenomena enters their constituency.

A) Political Recommendations for the Elimination of Terrorism 1. The conference agreed upon the decision that the strategic depth policy is not only the cause of terrorism, but also it is an end in itself regarding terrorism. The policy caused thousands of times greater harm to Pakistan than any NRO or writing off of debts could do. Due to this policy hundreds of thousands of people have been killed or injured. The policy has pushed Pakistan into such abysmal depths that its foundations are eroding. The conference agreed upon the idea that the people of Pakistan would still be resolute in opposing terrorist ideology even if the US, NATO, or ISAF are defeated in Afghanistan and the terrorists capture the throne of Kabul. If the terrorists succeeded in Afghanistan their next target would be Pakistan. Therefore, this policy is destructive for Pakistan and should be abolished above board.

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Those who framed this policy should be tried in courts.

3. Interference in Afghanistan should be stopped at once, and it should be treated as a sovereign neighbour state. 4. Sanctuaries of terrorism in FATA, Pukhtunkhwa province and other parts of the country like those in Bara, Darra Adam Khel, Mechanai, Mirnashah, Mir Ali, Kurram Agency and central Punjab should be destroyed. A brief and targeted military operation should be launched against the terrorists. A half-hearted military operation is only spreading and helping the terrorists. Therefore, the blunders of the past should not be repeated. 5. NATO and ISAF are sent to Afghanistan under UN mandate. NATO and ISAF should stay in Afghanistan until terrorism is uprooted, foreign interference in Afghanistan must be stopped and the institutions of army and police should be established on solid footings. However they should offer a clear timeframe for the withdrawal of troops. The US has supported some of the terrorists and it still holds a double standard. Americans are blamed for supporting the Jandullah Group. Similarly they are least interested in dealing with the terrorist from Sang kiang. Therefore, no peace loving person would tolerate them after terrorism is uprooted. 6. The conference appeals to Saudi Arab and other Arab countries to stop financing the terrorists. 7. The Pakistani army should not indulge itself in registration of the IDPs or Reconstruction and Rehabilitation of affected areas. This job should be done by the civilian authority and the army should concentrate on elimination of the terrorists. 8. Some political forces and a component of the media and establishment are supporting terrorists. These people are enemies of Pushtuns and Pakistan. Such anti-human forces should be defeated and uprooted. 9. The conference urged to promote AFPAK people-to-people contacts, and demanded that both countries not pose obstacles to them. 10. Besides uprooting terrorism in FATA the people of FATA should be compensated for the damage done due to terrorism. A comprehensive

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developmental package should be planned and the people of FATA should be allowed to choose any administrative system for themselves. 11. The so-called nonfunctional terrorist organizations are still operative in the country. Merely naming them dysfunctional will not help. These organizations should be practically eliminated. 12. The conference demands that the Pakistani army and intelligence agencies should not interfere in politics. They should do the jobs for which they have been recruited. Army and intelligence agencies should be made subservient to the parliament, and their control should be in civilian hands. 13. The conference believes that every democratic government should complete its term. Any conspiracy to derail democracy will be defeated. The conference condemns the media trial of the politicians and the socalled corruption charges against them. The conference strongly demands that the establishment stops dividing the political parties. 14. The IDPs resulting from army operations should be treated as per UN resolution. 15. The conference agreed that Pushtuns in FATA and Northern Pukhtoonkhwa are made hostage by the terrorists. The terrorists and security personnel are apparently engaged in fighting, but their targets are innocent civilians. Four million Pushtuns are living as IDPs. Our schools are closed and our youth unemployed. Whenever there is a chance for festivity or an occasion of mourning, terrorism is feared. Our jirgas are the target of terrorism. Jirgas and Lashkars are banned in tribal areas. In settled areas, gatherings and processions are not possible. Local Pushtun names like Aimal Khan, Darya Khan and Khushal Khan are changed into Abu Zar and Abu Jandal. The Pushtun nation is not only hostage to these terrorists, but there is also an organized campaign to “Arabize” them. The whole world is playing its due role against terrorism, but the most affected people of this menace are unable to play their effective historical role. The participants in the conference agreed that if Pushtuns were given an opportunity to fight terrorism they would definitely deal with the terrorists in their historical and courageous way. It is suggested that a grand Pushtun Jirga of the Pushtun of Pakistan should be called upon under the auspices of the United Nations. If possible, Afghanistan should also be given representation. The Jirga should deal with the sole agenda “how to eliminate terrorism.” The Jirga should not be arranged under the

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traditional pattern; rather it should be given a broader touch by inviting all the Khels and tribes so that they can discuss the matter for two or three days. The participation of women in this Jirga must be mandatory. It should be conveyed to all non-Pushtuns that these Jirgas are actually timetested indigenous workshops. We believe that this Jirga would supersede all effective counter terrorism efforts. If succeeded, the same experiments should be repeated with the Pushtuns of Afghanistan. 16. The conference unanimously concluded that the ground realities suggest terrorism is on the rise and Pushtuns are drifting along on the tides of national, social, educational, and psychological hopelessness. If terrorism is not uprooted in the upcoming months, or if it further increased, Pushtuns would distrust all state institution vis-à-vis eliminating terrorism. In that case Pushtuns will be forced to invite UN peace-keeping forces. To avoid the worst case scenario, the problem of terrorism should be taken seriously. Participants of the conference were unanimous in their thinking that all responsibility would fall on the shoulders of the Pakistani establishment if UN peace-keeping forces landed in the area, or the world finally opted to redraw the marking of various countries in the region.

B) Economic Recommendations to Eliminate Terrorism FATA and Pukhtunkwha province have been the most deprived areas for the past 62 years. The irony is that despite having vast natural resources and being the richest nation, Pushtuns are the poorest, the most uneducated, the most unemployed, and perhaps the most displaced people of the world. The ongoing surge of terrorism is only adding insult to injury. To defeat terrorism, all the deprivations of the Pushtuns should be dealt with and their economic problems should be solved. b. All the aid and international assistance in the name of counter terrorism should be spent on FATA, Pukhtunkwha province and other terror-affected areas. The aid should not be diverted to other provinces or institution as is the routine in Pakistan. c. Reconstruction Opportunity Zones (Roz) should be established in FATA and the people of FATA should be given ownership of them, and they should also be equipped with the relevant technical knowledge. d. Pukhtunkwha province should be declared a war-affected area and support should be extended till terrorism is uprooted in the form of exemption from taxes and utility bills.

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e. In FATA the damages done due to terrorism should be compensated and a comprehensive developmental package approved to compensate the deprivations of the past. f. An economic database should be established in FATA and Pukhtunkwha province for planning and keeping a record of the economic needs. g. Small and medium enterprises and large scale industries should be planned with the aim of imparting technical knowledge to the local population. h. FATA and Pukhtunkwha province should be granted ownership of the resources of water, electricity, tobacco, gas and petrol, and full fiscal autonomy should be granted accordingly. i. Pushtuns living in four divided administrative units should be merged together and made a single united province. Full national autonomy should be granted to this Pukhtun province named Afghania, Pukhtunkhwa, or Pukhtunistan. All the liabilities of this province in regard to their resources that are due to the federal government should be paid immediately. j. Canals from Indus should be networked in Swabi, Shakardara, Laki Marwat and Dera Ismael Khan in order to irrigate and cultivatable 80% of the land which will contribute to the overall agricultural output of the country. k. In order to increase the hydroelectricity output, the proposed plans in Pukhtun lands should be materialized.

C) Education and Awareness Related Recommendation to Eliminate Terrorism The need for education and awareness to combat terrorism should be emphasized. Terrorism is a global phenomenon but it has become the core issue of Pakistan. The rulers of Pakistan openly admit that the country is in a state of war, but unfortunately an open willingness to declare war on terrorism is still a far cry. Minor and poorly coordinated military operations have aggravated the crisis even further. A close examination reveals that the menace of terrorism is spreading deeper and deeper into the society by eroding the basic social fabric.

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Recommendations: Media: 6. The government of Pakistan should institute and initialize a concentrated media campaign against terrorism and activities such as dramas, educational pictures, documentaries etc. against terrorism should be promoted. 7. The media should play its due role in the fight against terrorism. Pro-terrorism broadcasts should be banned. The media should also realize that discussion of non-issues further plays into the hands of the terrorists. The political parties, civil personalities, and Lashkars constituted against terrorism should be given proper media coverage. Positive portrayal of terrorists should be discouraged. 8. The suicide bomber is the most lethal weapon in the hands of the terrorists. The experience of the last many years has proved that the age of a suicide bomber is from 12 – 20 years. This age group should be educated that this act is against humanity and Islam. A massive campaign in this regard should be launched in all the schools, seminaries, every house and village, and of course the media should be utilized for this purpose and the message repeatedly re-telecasted. If we are able to educate this age group, it would mean that the terrorists would lose their major weapon. Education and Religious Seminaries • Budget allocation for education should be increased. • Education should be acknowledged as a basic human right. • Education till matriculation should be provided free of cost and elementary education up to grade 8 should be made compulsory. Female education should be emphasized. • Admission to higher education should be based on merit, while special arrangement should be made to secure the rights of the backward areas and lower classes. • Participatory teaching methodology should be introduced in education. • Corporal punishment should be banned in educational institutions. • The syllabus of education should be renewed. The curriculum should be designed on broader humanistic goals and the aims of good citizenship.

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• Modern scientific knowledge should be imparted on the basis of research and creativity. • Laboratories and libraries should be declared necessary for all institutions and all areas. • The need to inculcate the qualities of tolerance, peace and democracy should be emphasized and the contributions of people having these qualities should be highlighted to inspire the youth. • All the material regarding hate, prejudice and Jihad should be removed from the curriculum. • Sectarianism and religious hatred in any form should be termed as terrorism and the persons involved in such activities should be severely punished. • All the seminaries that have direct or indirect links with terrorists should be closed and ‘Fatwas’ (Religious Decree) should be obtained from the remaining against the current terrorists. • Orthodox seminaries should be streamlined and made answerable to the government. • Old history of the region and the consequent major historical events should be incorporated into the curriculum. • The curriculum should cater for broader national, regional and international understanding. • Healthy co-curricular activities should be made compulsory. • Gender equality should be ensured in Education and it should be taught to the students. Discriminatory customs, traditions, laws and curriculum against women should be undone. • A Parent Teachers Association/ council should also be made compulsory for every school. • A Students Unions should be reinstated, and literary and cultural activities should be termed mandatory in colleges.

D) Cultural Recommendation for the Elimination of Terrorism The Pushtun nation has a 6000 year old strong cultural heritage. Pushtun society and culture is the main target of the current wave of terrorism. Jirgas, Lashkars and Collective Responsibility are the three hallmarks of social and cultural fabric in the tribal areas. Terrorism has targeted these three pillars of the tribal structure in a very organized way. As a result the society has become vulnerable. If we empower Pushtuns socially and culturally it would mean we have won 50% of the war against terror.

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1. There is a dire need to instill a new life in Jirga, Hujra and Lashkar and reorganize them on modern modalities. 2. Arts Councils should be established in every district. 3. Community Centers should be set up in every district. 4. Pushtu Literary and Cultural Centers should be organized keeping the Press Clubs modality in view. 5. In this regard the literary organizations which are already contributing should be supported and Peace Committees should be organized in all parts of FATA and Pukhtunkwha province. 6. All illegal FM channels should be closed at once and the perpetrators should be severely dealt with. 7. FM channels should be started by the government to promote peace, development and Pushtun culture. 8. The artists who suffered due to terrorism should be compensated on emergency footings. The female artists must also be compensated. 9. Fine Arts departments should be opened in colleges and universities and other educational institutions should be encouraged in this regard. 10. The Pakistani media should take measures to discourage the negative trends of presenting Pushtuns as backward, ignorant extremists and terrorists. 11. A national TV channel for Pushtuns should be started. 12. All those cultural activities should be banned which are against basic human rights, especially against the rights of women. 13. In FATA and Pukhtunkwha, museums related to historical, literary and political personalities, should be established, for example Khushal Khan Khattak, Aimal Khan Momand, Darya Khan Afridi, Umara Khan, Pir Rokhan, Faqir Ipi, Baacha Khan, Abbdul Samad Khan Achakzai and Sanubar Hussain Kaka Ji. 14. Pushtu should be declared as official language and it should be made the language of education courts and offices. 15. The sign boards should be written in the mother tongue.

GLOSSARY

Attan Bachabazi Badal Bhang Burqa

Chader

Charas Charpoy Eid Hadith

Hajj Hijab Hujra Jazia Jirga Kabab Khasadar Laam Lashkar Madrasa Maatam Mazarai

A general name of various types of traditional dances popular in FATA A kind of child prostitution or engagements of adult men with adolescent boys in sexual activities Revenge Wild hemp or cannabis An enveloping outer garment with veiled holes for the eyes. During their rule the Taliban forced women to wear burqa. A cloth used for multiple purposes in Pakistan, such as, a veil or shawl worn by women, a warm shawl worn by men to protect them from cold, as a sheet that can be spread over shrines as mark of respect etc. Hand made hashish that is prepared from the extract of the cannabis plant A low bedstead wound with string Muslim festival Written traditions of prophet Mohammad. This includes his sayings, actions and his silent approval of issues that were submitted for his consideration Pilgrimage to Mecca, Saudi Arabia Head cover Village community center Islamic tax Tribal Council A famous flat and round meal prepared from meat, eggs, tomatoes, onions and various species Tribal police force The World War II in local Pushto language in Darra is known as Laam Armed Group formed on temporary base to carry decision of a tribal jirga Seminary Loud wailing and mourning Lion

214

Mela Melmastia Milad Moharam

Glossary

Festival or/and weekly or monthly market place Hospitality Celebration of Prophet Mohammad’s birth Shia Muslim’s holy month when they hold religious ceremonies to mark the martyrdom of Imam Hussain, the grandson of Prophet Mohammad Mujahideen Holy warriors Munafic Hypocrite Mullah Cleric Nanawati Forgiveness Pakhtunwali An unwritten and flexible code of behaviour that a Pakhtun is supposed to adhere to Purdah Veil Ramazan Muslim holy month of fasting Qazi Judge Raj The British Empire in India Riwaj Custom Shura Council Tableeghi Jumaat Preaching/Evangelical party Tableegh Preaching/Evangelism Talib Singular of Taliban Tara A local alcoholic drink in Pakistan Ummah Global Muslim Community Urs Birth or death Anniversary celebration of a saint Zanjirzai Part of the traditional Shia Muslim ceremonies annually held to mourn the death of Imam Hussain, grandson of Prophet Mohammad. The mourners whip themselves using a bundle of chains with sharp and curved blades attached.

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