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Pakistan should not have any role in the future affairs of Afghanistan |
Pakistan's new game
US and allies must prevent ISI sabotage of Loya
Jirga, and help UF
Editorial
The United States-led air strikes against terrorist bases controlled by the nefarious terrorist kingpin, Osama bin Laden, and the barbaric Taliban militia -- as well as the militia's countless Arab, Pakistani, and other foreign terrorist patrons and allies -- have hastened the eventual collapse of the Pakistani-created, Pakistani-supported, and Pakistani-imposed Taliban regime.
For the past two decades, Pakistan, especially its military intelligence, have attempted to install a puppet regime in Kabul in order to turn Afghanistan into a satellite state. On the course of this ungodly mission, Pakistan has committed, either directly or through proxy (i.e., by way of Gulbudin Hekmatyar and now the Taliban), numerous atrocities and crimes against humanity in Afghanistan -- e.g., ethnic cleansing, mass killings, scorched earth policy, cultural genocide, and forced displacement of hundreds of thousands from their native lands.
Now that the impending doom of its terrorist flunkies and other agents is near at hand, Pakistan is playing a new game by meddling in the US-led international war on terrorism, lest Islamabad's goal of colonizing Afghanistan is thwarted.
Early this month, an attempted coup d'état orchestrated by Pakistan's shadow government, the InterService Intelligence, to replace Mulla Omar with Mulla Hassan Akhond failed. Consequently, Pakistan was forced to voice its uncertified and highly questionable support for the former Afghan king Mohammad Zahir Shah's Loya Jirga initiative. However, Pakistan's "president," military dictator Gen. Pervez Musharraf, has made it clear that Islamabad wants a pivotal role in the Loya Jirga process and establishment of the next Afghan government, while all along working to sabotage a credible, fair, just, and acceptable Loya Jirga. And Pakistan isn't running short of Afghan traitors, or watanforosh (literally, "homeland hawkers," Dari-Persian) -- "Pir" Sayed Ahmad Gailani being prime on that list -- to use toward undermining the Loya Jirga process and the creation of the next Afghan government.
On one track, just as it had done so in the early 1990s, Islamabad now hopes to create a coalition government from among the former leaders of mujahideen groups, many of whom served no viable purpose during the Afghan war of resistance against the Soviet Union, except to provide Pakistan with leverage and a means to achieving its takeover of Afghanistan. On another track, Pakistan is utilizing these former mujahideen "leaders" and "commanders" -- like "Pir" Gailani, Abdul Haq, and the Butcher of Kabul, Gulbudin Hekmatyar, who have spent the past many years engaged in self-interested economic ventures -- to infiltrate the Loya Jirga process and provide the basis for the next armed force to enter the fray in Afghanistan with Pakistani mastership.
The people of Afghanistan have always and will again condemn Pakistani plots to annex their country. And they are certain that if Islamabad finally succeeds, then neither will Afghanistan find peace or retain its sovereignty, nor will the plague of terrorism unleashed on the world, especially the US, will come to an end.
Furthermore, the people of Afghanistan support the US-led strikes against terrorist bases and the Taliban, as they view it as a catalyst to finally rid their country of Pakistanis, Arabs, and other foreigners, who, led by Pakistani generals and the ISI, have sought to hijack their land. However, a prerequisite for the success of the US-led effort is that the US and its international allies must officially recognize and appropriately counter Pakistan's detrimental role in the war against terrorism. (Of course, unofficially, US policymakers, especially Pakistan-sympathizers in the State Department -- who either never retire or are somehow mass produced by some faulty diplomat-making machine -- have always known all there is to know about Pakistan's central role in the war in Afghanistan and the spread of terrorism throughout the world.)
Preventing the sabotage of the Loya Jirga process and helping the United Front, Afghanistan's national resistance force, which has so far received useless assistance from the US, are key to helping the people of Afghanistan achieve their will and ending the scourge of terrorism against the civilized world. ><
APDA condemns Musharraf's wonton words
A statement from the Association for Peace and Democracy for Afghanistan, the only Afghan political organization in the West.
Pakistan's military ruler, General Pervez Musharraf, spoke recently about the future of Afghanistan. His remarks went against international norms and firmly evidenced Pakistan's direct interference in Afghanistan's internal affairs.
Pakistan must learn from the utter failure of its recent, monumental political mistakes: nurturing and supporting Pakistan's religious extremists; creating the Taliban and making possible the militia's occupation of most of Afghanistan; placing Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden in Taliban-occupied Afghanistan, thereby adding further financial and military support to the militia, and consequently leading to the creation of the terrorist base and training camps of Al-Qaida; and unceasingly interfering in Afghanistan in a most cowardly and impudent way. These mistakes have led to the recent tragedies in the US, the near complete destruction of Afghanistan, as well as huge problems and unrest in Pakistan itself. By learning from these failures, Pakistan must realize that its continued interference in Afghanistan will not only be rejected outright by the people of Afghanistan, but it will also be opposed by neighboring and regional countries, and it will lead to perpetually increasing conflict elsewhere in the world.
Consequently, at this critical juncture, our expectations are that Pakistan will be mindful of its own disquietude and extremely precarious condition, and therefore seriously desist from any further interference in Afghanistan. Pakistan must instead leave the people of Afghanistan to decide for themselves on their future leadership, administration, type of government, and their country's fate.
Pakistan should not have any role in the future affairs of Afghanistan
By Mariam Momand
The following commentary, a response to recent contributions to the Los Angeles Times ("In this Crisis, Avoid Giving Away The Store to Pakistan," by Shireen T. Hunter, an October 3rd commentary, and "Pakistan's Role in Afghanistan," by Asad Hayauddin, an October 8 letter to the editor), was forwarded by Ms. Momand for publication in the LA Times and Omaid Weekly.
I agree with Hunter's view that "Pakistan has been closely linked to the Taliban in the past and shares responsibility for Afghanistan's current state of crisis. No one asked how a group of religious students who had not fought in the Soviet-Afghan war could handle sophisticated weapons and defeat veterans of a long struggle without solid military support from somewhere."
Hayauddin, a spokesman for the government of Pakistan, presented contradictory statements. He conceded that "Pakistan and the US were aligned with the Taliban," and yet he stated that "Pakistan was not opposed to any Afghan Mojahdeen leaders, including Masoud."
While the US may have had a program to cool down the mujahideen, Pakistan had an evil and sinister plan to keep Afghanistan divided ethnically, in order to create a government subservient to Pakistan, and to eventually swallow the Afghan nation.
Afghanistan lost over a million brave souls in the war to oust Soviets from its soil. The heroism of the Afghan people initiated the demise of the Soviet Union and its communist system of government.
At the end of that war, Pakistan divided the mujahideen groups and attempted to divide the nation along ethnic lines. In the past 80 years of Afghan history, ethnic strife was almost non-existent. Politicians, lawyers, administrators, and educators from all ethnic groups were involved in the building of a once great nation.
In creating these ethnic divisions, Pakistan eventually became master over most of Afghanistan. Islamabad supported Gulbudin Hekmatyar to prevent the rightful Afghan government of Prof. Burhanuddin Rabbani to run the nation in an organized manner. Hekmatyar constantly rocketed Kabul. He was also the arch-nemesis of Ahmad Shah Masood. [eds: Ahmad Shah Masood (rahmatullah alaih -- God's blessings upon him) was Afghanistan's national resistance leader until his martyrdom in early September, and his spirit continues to be an inspiration for the continued resistance of the people of Afghanistan against the Taliban, Osama bin Laden, and Pakistan.] Commander Masood was the leader who won the war against the Soviets, and who did not see fit to bow to the will of Pakistan.
Hekmatyar was brutal, but unsuccessful in his mission, eventually becoming useless to Pakistan. Then Pakistan envisioned madrassas, the extremist religious schools. Hundreds of these madrassas were established along the border of Pakistan. The students took rudimentary courses in Islam, but their basic and primary studies were the art of warfare. The barbaric mess that we now know as the Taliban was created in these madrassas. With the support of the Pakistani military, the Taliban and Osama bin Laden became the nightmare of the people of Afghanistan...and now of Western countries.
Hunter, who has written an important strategic document to set future policy for Afghanistan, is unquestionably correct in stating that "Islamabad should not be given carte blance in deciding Afghanistan's future." Pakistan has done enough devastation in Afghanistan and should not be allowed to take part in the future of Afghan affairs. But, I agree with Hayauddin's ironic conclusion, "no wonder Afghanistan became a breeding ground for extremism and terrorism. ><
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