Pakistan's frontier turns into war zone
War has come to Pakistan, not just as terrorist bombings, but as full-scale battles, leaving Pakistanis angry and dismayed as the dead, wounded and displaced turn up right on their doorstep.
An estimated 250,000 people have now fled the gunship helicopters, jets, artillery and mortar fire of the Pakistani Army, and the assaults, intimidation and rough justice of the Taliban who have dug into Pakistan's tribal areas.
About 20,000 people are so desperate that they have flooded over the border from the Bajaur tribal area to seek safety in war-torn Afghanistan. Many others are crowding around this northwest Pakistani city, where staff members from the UN refugee agency are present at nearly a dozen camps.
The sudden engagement of the Pakistani Army comes after months in which the United States has heaped criticism, behind the scenes and in public, on Pakistan for not doing enough to take on the militants, and has increasingly taken action into its own hands with drone strikes and even a raid by Special Operations forces in Pakistan's tribal areas.
The military was already locked in an uphill fight against the militants in Swat, a more settled area of North-West Frontier Province that was once a middle-class ski resort. Today it is a maelstrom of killing.
Pakistani Army commanders have said that in order to put down the Taliban, the government must win the hearts and minds of the Bajaur tribesmen. But in interviews in the camps, and in villages around Peshawar where the displaced are bunking with relatives, many of the people of Bajaur say they are fed up with both sides of the conflict.
In Swat, the Pakistani Army has been fighting the Taliban for more than two months, and still the Taliban hold the upper hand, according to accounts from people who have fled the area. Reports of Taliban terrorism are widespread.
The one hope in the gloom of war, said civilians and law enforcement officials, has been the formation of small private armies by tribal leaders, known in the region as lashkars. They have traditionally served as a way of dealing with squabbles in Pakistan's tribal society, but are now being formed in some cases to stand up to the Taliban.
In Salarzai, in the northern corner of Bajaur, a local private army has attracted several thousand anti-Taliban fighters, said Jalal-Uddin Khan, a tribal leader.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/10/03/asia/pakistan.php?page=2
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Just remembered some awesome pictures from Pakistan which were posted a while back...If I was a praying man, peace to this beautiful land and regions close by would defenitely have been foremost in my prayers!!
Well, the meaning of WAR is PROFIT PROFIT PROFIT in terms of weapons sale, capturing physical resources, etc.
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Disclaimer:
The following is my political analysis, the discussion is going on therefore I am going to share my thinking:
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Now in frontier area of Pakistan, same thing is happening. There is war of interests going on. Russia want to take revenge of its Afghan defeat, Iran doesn't like any sunni power or warriors in that region, India also want to take a revenge from Pakistan what they faced in Kashmir for so many years (India's big Army was deployed in Kashmir for many years), US and NATO want to control warriors but they are being fed by Russia, India and Iran in different ways.
If u study history, this area belongs to typical warriors but these warriors are always used by any super power. First they were used by US against Russia and that time US called them "Holy Warrior" but now these became Terrorists, isn't funny?
Now these warriors are being used by others against US, history is repeating its self.
The local residents of this area are also worried that from where these Taleban stuff came? They do not look like us but they are called Taleban or Pushtun. These are all paid warriors.
Now the question is this that from where Suiciders are coming, those are puppets only whose minds are already washed. They are being used by word ISLAM but its not ISLAM.
In short, this is all dirty politics, suspicious game plan.
What is the simple and effective to control this?
Local residents should get united against those warriors. Because they will be not more than few thousands.
India has its own thorium-fuel based nuclear prog. US wants a piece.
"Everything in this book may be wrong." Illusions: The Adventures of The Reluctant Messiah by Richard Bach
the long term intentions of gaining some sort of control over its nuclear assets..
sigh, so sad:( wish there was something I could do to make it just stop.
so many innocent people will be affected.
GO find some other contry plz leave us alone PEACE
now plz tell some thing about india? how much bomb blast today:/?
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the main problem in the region is pakistan, not the people of pakistan, but the minority of muslim hardliners that even consider musharaf and the new government as too soft and too light in their application of islam in the pakistani social life
the usa or for this matter no other country have the right to intervene in pakistan, but the pakistani society have to stand to its own extremists and find a solution,
to put it simply do you want pakistan to be a second saudi arabia or to be a turkish kind of society ?? pakistani people's choice , no one else
musDon't wait for the last judgment it takes place every day.
"Albert Camus "
Darn... I still have my guide book for Pakistan...I am never going to get to to on holiday there :(
it looks like such a stunningly beautiful country...
Its so sad tht for a mere bunch of bad ppl, so many innocent ppl hav to die. its such a shame tht ppl have to bear atrocities of such kind from a handful of bad ppl.