‘India calls off sec-level talks with Pakistan’

NEW DELHI – India on Monday called off foreign secretary-level bilateral talks with Pakistan which was slated to be held on August 25, Times of India newspaper reported on Monday.

The paper reported that the Indian government decided this after a meeting between Pakistan’s High Commissioner to India Abdul Basit and senior Hurriyat Conference leader Shabbir Ahmad Shah in New Delhi. Earlier on Monday, the high commissioner met Kashmiri leader ahead of the proposed secretary-level talks between Pakistan and India.

Read more » Daily Times
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/national/18-Aug-2014/india-calls-off-secretary-level-talks-with-pakistan

Is Pakistan Going to Become a Taliban State?

Distinguished anchor of Rawal TV, Tahir Aslam Gora, discusses the current negotiations of Government of Pakistan & Taliban, with Arshad Mahmood an astute political commentator in Bilatakalluf (Straight Talk). The language of the talk show is Hindi (urdu).

Courtesy: Rawal Tv » Bilatakalluf with Tahir Gora, Episode 131 »» YouTube

“If the talks succeed, we may see a metamorphosis of the state”

by Alefia T. Hussain

Ayesha Siddiqa, defence analyst, talks about the implications of the on-going talks with TTP 

The News on Sunday (TNS): How does the government’s approach to counter terrorism through talks look like to you — a compromise, a time buying tactic or you expect something substantive to come out of it?

Ayesha Siddiqa (AS): The only substantive thing that may come out of the talks (and, mind you, I am not using substantive positively or negatively) is change in the overall nature of the state. If the talks succeed, we may actually see a metamorphosis of the state from a hybrid-theocracy, which it is at the moment, to a complete theocracy. The Taliban and their allies, including both good and bad militants, want implementation of sharia in Pakistan. Even if there is an agreement on limited implementation in parts of the country, it will eventually trickle down to the rest.

Everything will depend on how far the military and civilian leadership wants to go in accommodating the Taliban demands. Although a more important question would be how comfortable is the leadership in changing the nature of the state. The Taliban may not want to compromise on anything less than implementing sharia — also release of prisoners, which means adding to the militant force that aims at capturing the state.

So, if we have made up our mind to surrender, there is no way anyone will challenge the Taliban. If not, then yes, some form of conflict is inevitable.

Like many people, I’ve also heard an operation is inevitable. But, I’m not sure. Because, how can an operation take place with your backs against the wall. When some generals in GHQ, Rawalpindi, thought the 1986 Indian military exercise Brasstacks was a plan for war, General Hamid Gul and some others disagreed. They argued that India could not launch a war with its back totally exposed and vulnerable. This was with reference to the insurgency in East Punjab back then.

Similarly, how can we think of an operation when we have all kinds of militants sitting in our heartland, in Punjab and Sindh. I’m not just referring to Jamaat ud Dawa (JuD) and Jaish-e-Muhammad (JeM) but also TTP and Lashkar e Khorasan, allegedly part of al-Qaeda and has men that were once part of JeM. These organisations are thriving in Punjab and Sindh. They even have links with the politicians and military establishment.

So, if we can’t take care of our own backyard, how will we launch an offensive.

I’m not even sure if the military has a plan to abandon the good militants/Taliban. The good Taliban are connected to the bad Taliban by blood, friendship and alignments. You can’t separate the wheat from the chaff. If we want to use some of them after the US withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2014, we can’t really be serious about launching a serious operation. Or can we?

Read more » The News
http://tns.thenews.com.pk/talks-succeed-may-actually-see-metamorphosis-state/#.Uvgz17Th3g8

After owning the deadly bomb blast in Quetta, Taliban (TTP) welcomes Nawaz Sharif’s call for peace talks

TTP welcomes Nawaz’s call for peace talks

By Zahir Shah Sherazi

PESHAWAR: Nawaz Sharif’s call for peace talks made to the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan was welcomed by the proscribed militant organisation on Thursday.

Talking to Dawn.com from an undisclosed area, TTP spokespersons Ehsanullah Ehsan said that the offer for peace talks made by Prime Minister-elect Nawaz Sharif was a positive sign and that the militant organisation was devising a strategy over the course of action to be taken in response to the peace talk offers.

Moreover Ehsan also claimed that the banned oganisation was responsible for the bomb attack in Quetta today and said that the attack was carried out in retaliation to the killing in Balochistan of their activists from Malakand region.

Courtesy: DAWN
http://beta.dawn.com/news/1013236/ttp-welcomes-nawazs-call-for-peace-talks

via – Twitter

US withdraws negotiators from Pakistan, no supply deal

WASHINGTON: The United States has withdrawn negotiators from Pakistan after talks failed to produce an agreement on reopening Nato supply routes into Afghanistan, the Pentagon said Monday. ….

Read more » DAWN.COM

What happens when PM Gilani chairs meeting with COAS, DG-ISI to finalise US ties?

As Grossman arrives, high-level huddle finalises strategy

By Kamran Yousaf

ISLAMABAD: The country’s top civil and military leadership finalised on Wednesday their strategy for re-engagement with the United States in light of new recommendations approved by parliament, as President Barack Obama’s point-man for the region landed in the capital for crucial talks.

Ahead of interactions between Pakistani and American officials, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani chaired a high-powered meeting, which was attended by key ministers as well as Army Chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and ISI chief Lt-Gen Zaheerul Islam.

“The meeting took stock of the recent developments in the region. They discussed matters related to Afghan peace and reconciliation and new terms of re-engagement with US/Nato/Isaf in accordance with the recommendations of parliament,” said a statement issued by the Prime Minister House.

This was the second gathering of civil and military leadership in less than 10-days and was aimed at evolving a consensus on how to move forward after the US voiced reservations over some of the demands made by parliament.

All issues will figure in the talks when US Special Representative for Pakistan and Afghanistan Marc Grossman, who is leading a delegation of senior officials, meets the country’s top leadership.

Grossman is the first senior American official to travel to Islamabad after parliament passed a new foreign policy framework that seeks to redefine the country’s relationship with Washington.

Grossman will hold formal talks with Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar and Foreign Secretary Jalil Abbas Jilani. He will also meet Prime Minister Gilani and Army Chief Gen Kayani.

Ahead of Grossman’s visit, US Ambassador Cameron Munter dashed to Karachi on Wednesday and held an important meeting with President Zardari.

Brahamdagh : No talks with government, We welcome if US, NATO or India intervene, says BRP chief

Baloch Republican Party chief Brahamdagh Bugti living in exile claimed Wednesday Baloch movement did not enjoy any foreign support, saying but they would welcome it, be it from the US, NATO or the India.

‘We know foreign powers have their own interests; we think of our own greater interests”, he said in a telephonic press conference at Quetta Press Club.

Mr. Bugti said Baloch women, leaders, activists, students, writers, poets, and intellectuals were being picked up and eventually being disappeared and eventually turning up dead. Under such circumstances, we would welcome the support of foreign countries for independence, he said.

Bugti backed the US resolution on Balochistan and justified it was not against the sovereignty of Pakistan as every country possessed right to intervene in another country’s affairs if that state was involved in human rights violations ….

Read more » The Point

More details » BBC urdu

Pakistan Taliban ‘in peace talks’

Pakistan Taliban’s deputy Mohammad admits peace talks

The Pakistan Taliban is in peace talks with the country’s government, the group’s deputy commander has said.

Maulvi Faqir Mohammad said the focus was on the Bajaur tribal area bordering Afghanistan, and that if successful, talks could be extended to other areas.

He said 145 Taliban prisoners had been freed as a goodwill gesture and the authorities wanted a ceasefire.

It is the first time a top Taliban commander has confirmed negotiations. There has been no government comment.

“Our talks are going in the right direction,” Reuters news agency quotes Mr Mohammad as saying.

The BBC’s Orla Guerin in Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, says that in the past such negotiations have backfired allowing the militants time to re-group.

There are also doubts about whether or not any possible peace treaty would be observed by all of the factions in the Pakistan Taliban, which is an increasingly fractured alliance, she says.

In October, Pakistan’s Interior Minister Rehman Malik said talks would only be held if the group disarmed. ….

Read more » BBC

No mention of the Munabao-Khokrapar trade option in India-Pak trade talks!?

Normal trade ties with India from February

By Jawed Naqvi

NEW DELHI: India and Pakistan agreed on Tuesday to resume normal trade ties in February, paving the way to end decades of political mistrust and military rivalry.

“We have turned the corner,” Pakistan’s Commerce Secretary Zafar Mehmood told reporters at a joint news conference with his Indian counterpart Rahul Khullar. “We are talking of a complete normalisation roadmap.”

Mr Mehmood said in a separate TV interview that Pakistan’s decision to accord India a most favoured nation (MFN) status would be conveyed officially to the world trade body before February. Misgivings about the move among ‘stakeholders’ in Pakistan who fear open trade with India would be allayed by then, he said. …

Read more » DAWN.COM

Seeking ‘dubious’ peace with the Taliban

By Khaled Ahmed

Talking peace with the Taliban is a tough undertaking. The Americans who want to talk to the Afghan Taliban should take a close look at how Pakistan fared when it talked to its own Taliban. One can also make a guess at what will happen in the wake of the September 2011 APC in Islamabad as Pakistan gets ready to talk to the Taliban once again.

In 2003, Musharraf nearly got killed when three attacks on him — by al Qaeda through Abu Faraj alLibi, Jaish-e-Muhammad and Pakistan Air Force personnel — on him were foiled. He wanted a counter-attack in South Waziristan but was thwarted by his corps commander in Peshawar, General Ali Muhammad Jan Aurakzai, who preferred retirement to an operation.

The succeeding corps commander Peshawar, General Safdar Hussain, was from the ISI — its second-most important member, DG Analysis. He made peace with the Taliban commander Nek Muhammad at Shakai in 2004, binding him to not attacking in Afghanistan and getting rid of the ‘foreigners’ in return for amnesty. Nek Muhammad did not abide by the peace accord.

General Safdar Hussain told Zahid Hussain (Scorpion’s Tail page 71) he wanted the Americans trapped in Afghanistan. He was seen on TV dubbing Nek Muhammad a soldier of Islam. After Nek Muhammad was killed by a drone in June 2004, General Safdar Hussain signed another peace accord with Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud at Sararogha after giving him half a million dollars to pay back the bribe he and his commanders had got from al Qaeda before shifting loyalty for money. He, too, did not abide by the terms of the accord.

The ‘peace accord’ allowed Baitullah to kill the tribal elders and fill the vacuum thus created in Fata with his warriors. ….

Read more » The Express Tribune

Peace is not in line with Pak generals – Karzai

– Ruling out negotiations: ‘Taliban talks futile’

With no headway being made, Afghan President Hamid Karzai and his top aides have hinted that they may abandon efforts at peace talks with the Taliban after concluding that negotiating with the militant leadership was futile.

Instead, Karzai has said, negotiations should actually be held with Pakistan – an apparent dig at Islamabad, which is regularly accused of harbouring the Taliban’s senior leadership.

The comments come on the heels of fresh allegations that the assassination of Afghanistan’s top peace negotiator Burhanuddin Rabbani in Kabul was planned in Pakistan. Rabbani was killed in a bombing by a purported Taliban emissary who had come to visit the former Afghanistan president last month.

The frustration with stalled talks and the escalating violence come months before a key conference is to be held in Bonn, Germany – where it is expected that the Afghan end game will be charted. There had been reports that the Taliban leadership would be involved, in some manner, about the future of the war-torn nation.

“The peace process which we began is dead,” Rangin Dadfar Spanta, Karzai’s national security adviser, said in an interview on Saturday. “It’s a joke,” The Wall Street Journal reported.

Karzai and his aides have decided to shift their efforts on putting pressure on Pakistan, which has allegedly provided aid and sanctuary to Afghan insurgents.

“Their messengers are coming and killing … So with whom should we make peace?” Karzai said in the recorded address to the country’s senior religious leaders.

“I cannot find Mullah Muhammad Omar,” Karzai said, referring to the Taliban supreme leader. “Where is he? I cannot find the Taliban council. Where is it? “I don’t have any other answer except to say that the other side for this negotiation is Pakistan.”

Afghan officials have also unilaterally cancelled plans to host a trilateral meeting on Oct 8 with Pakistan and the United States. Instead, a special Afghan delegation will present Pakistani leaders with evidence about the killing of Rabbani, WSJ reported.

Courtesy: → The Express Tribune, October 2nd, 2011.

Pakistan’s military and legislators plan peace talks with Taliban

– In the midst of bad and worsening relations with Washington, Pakistan considers new round of peace talks with Pakistan-based Taliban, arguing that ‘military solutions’ are making things worse.

By Owais Tohid

Excerpt;

……. But analysts believe that striking negotiations with Islamic militants will pose serious challenges. “We struck peace accords with militant commanders during the past and those blew up on our face,” says Peshawar-based defense analyst, retired Brig. Mohammad Saad. “Once you enter into negotiations, they [the militants] grow bigger than their size and start believing themselves as equal. The more the state talks to them, they will become a bigger problem in Pakistan.”

“Their agenda is different,” Brigadier Saad adds. “Their ideology is in clash with the norms and values of any modern civilized society.” …..

To read complete article → csmonitor

MQM Will Soon Rejoin the PPP led Coalition Government

PPP, MQM talks in final stages: Govt sources

ISLAMABAD: Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) will soon rejoin the PPP led coalition government, Geo News reported.

The channel quoted government sources claiming that telephonic talks between President Asif Ali Zardari and MQM chief Altaf Hussain Thursday night were the turning point between the two parties.

In the first stage Ishratul Ebad Khan will reassume his office of Sindh Governor, the sources said and added that talks between PPP and MQM were in final stages.

MQM had parted its ways with the PPP government, both at provincial and federal level in protest against the postponement of polls on two Karachi constituencies of the Azad Jammu and Kashmir legislative assembly. …

Read more → THE NEWS

Peace and Cricket : India, Pakistan to review rivalry

The language of the discussion is in urdu/ Hindi.

Courtesy: Aaj News TV ( Aaj Ki Baat – 26th March 2011 – Shahid Ameen & Sohail Warraich)

via – Siasat.pk – You Tube

Government opens peace talks with local Taliban

By Qaiser Butt

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has started peace talks with the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), and other militant groups across the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata), in anticipation of early withdrawal of Nato troops from Afghanistan, informed sources told The Express Tribune. …

Read more : The Express Tribune

ISI thwarting Taliban talks: report

WASHINGTON: Pakistan’s intelligence agency is pressuring Afghan Taliban members to shun US-backed peace talks aimed at ending the war in Afghanistan, a Wall Street Journal report alleged.

Citing Taliban commanders and US officials, the newspaper said Pakistan Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency has encouraged Afghan insurgents to step up attacks, including those on civilians, and resist surrender or peace talks.

“The ISI wants to arrest commanders who are not obeying (ISI) orders,” the Journal quoted a Taliban commander in Kunar province. The commander said he had no plans to stop fighting foreign troops, but war opposed to the broad-based attacks being urged by some ISI officials.

“The ISI wants us to kill everyone — policemen, soldiers, engineers, teachers, civilians — just to intimidate people,” the newspaper quoted the commander, adding that the agency had tried to arrest him when he refused. ….

Read more >> WALL STREET JOURNAL