United States has issued a warning to its citizens travelling to Pakistan of possible terror threats. The top American general, John Allen, commander of the US and Nato forces in Afghanistan, said in an article published on Tuesday, that the Taliban leader Mullah Omar was hiding in Pakistan along with his commanders. The article focused on the recent increase in attacks on the US troops from the Afghan security forces, which the Taliban claim responsibility for. “Omar lives in Pakistan, as do many of his commanders. From that safe vantage point, they’ve sent hundreds of young, impressionable, largely spiritual and helpless youths to their deaths and detention in Afghanistan. For this, they must forfeit their honor and any claim to Islamic virtue.” The point is whether Mullah Omar and others are really in Pakistan? If they are, then where are they hiding? Do the Americans know and If they know, why don’t they pin-point their locations?
US claim to have killed Mullah Dadullah in a drone attack, how do they get the conformation of who was killed and if he was Mullah Dadullah or someone else? If they know of the location of these terrorists then the question is why are the Americans keeping it a secret? Is Pakistan not willing to dismantle the hideouts of terrorists, who are posing a threat to its security? This shows that there is a lack of intelligence sharing and mutual trust between US and Pakistan. Are the deaths of over 40,000 Pakistani people and soldiers not enough to prove their sincerity?
By blaming Pakistan, the Americans are trying to divert the real of issue of threat from within Afghanistan, and that too not from the Taliban, but from their own trained Afghan security forces, whose personnel, though individually, are frequently targeting their American colleagues. An Afghan is an Afghan, neither a Taliban nor ANA personnel. Pakistan has nothing to do with it nor does it house Mullah Omar or any other terrorist. If these people are in Pakistan and Americans really know it, they need to share it with Pakistan so that they would be caught or expelled to save the country from this continuous war on terror, which the Americans started and is now ours, in the words of Pakistan army chief, General Kayani.
If by all means Mullah Omar is listening and he as he is reportedly against the deaths of civilians and attacks on Pakistan’s security forces, he should give himself up or leave the country for the sake of Islam.
F Z KHAN,
Islamabad, August 29.