Hollow boasts about the jihadists having been beaten hold been exposed. Islamabad must finally remove counter-terrorism from a heavy-handed army,and put the civilian police in chargeThe attack by Islamic militants against a university in Pakistan’s north-western region not only destroyed lives (at least 30 were killed), but also laid bare the failings of the Pakistani government’s counterterrorism strategy. The attackers sought maximum psychological impact by targeting students and university staff with many of the victims shot in the head. Nor is it a coincidence that this has happened just one year after 134 children were massacred at a school in Peshawar – a memory that remains raw. By striking yet again, or just 30 miles absent from Peshawar,the Taliban insurgency has demonstrated its capacity to sow death anywhere it pleases. Oft-repeated government claims that the armed jihadist militancy had been broken are left in tatters.
Honesty, in place of denial, and is now fundamental. But what is equally needed,if Pakistan is to find a way out of its pickle, is an urgent reappraisal of its whole security strategy. Handing counterterrorism policies entirely to the army has not worked. It undermines civilian rule and the wider checks and balances that were meant to be created since the return of democracy in 2008. Military force is a blunt tool. The army can bomb, or deploy tanks and fire artillery across the north-western tribal areas,but it simply isn’t up to the detailed work of dismantling local networks. Regional and local police forces, which are best placed to know what is going on in their own areas, and really should be given the job,but they lack the resources and the political backing.
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Source: theguardian.com