Pakistan Security Brief

Supreme Court orders New Prime Minister Pervez Ashraf to open old corruption case against President Zardari; Indian Home Minister alleges Pakistani state involvement in 2008 Mumbai terror attacks; U.S. calls for stronger “counterterrorism relationship” with Pakistan; U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan Munter says U.S. regrets Salala border strike; U.S. drone kills five militants in North Waziristan; Pakistan Army target of “vicious attack” by al Qaeda; Pakistan security forces conduct multiple offensive operations in FATA; Pakistan Frontier Corps arrests two militants in Quetta. 

New Prime Minister and Domestic Politics

• On Wednesday, the Pakistani Supreme Court ordered new Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf to reopen old corruption cases against President Asif Ali Zardari. The order, demanding that Ashraf ask Swiss authorities to investigate Zardari’s alleged use of Swiss bank accounts in the 1990s to launder $12 million in bribes, had been issued to former Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, whose refusal to comply led to a contempt conviction and his subsequent ouster as prime minister. Ashraf has two weeks to comply with the court order.[1]

India-Pakistan Relations

• On Wednesday, Indian Home Minister P. Chidambaram stated that Indian authorities’ interrogation of Sayed Zabiuddin, the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) member alleged to have handled the ten gunmen responsible for the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks, confirmed the involvement of Pakistani state actors in the attacks. Though not specifying a particular agency, Chidambaram said “clearly there was state support or state actors’ support” for the attacks. Rehman Malik, internal affairs advisor to the Pakistani prime minister, denied the allegations, suggesting instead that three Indian citizens had been involved in the attacks and that India’s information on Zabuiddin was incomplete.[2]   

U.S.-Pakistan Relations

• On Tuesday, U.S. State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland expressed the U.S.’s desire to strengthen its “counterterrorism relationship” with Pakistan. She stressed the need for Afghanistan, Pakistan, and NATO’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) to work together “in a trilateral way” to deal with terrorism “on both sides of the border.” Her comments came in response to Pakistan’s “strong protest” to NATO and Afghan forces for Sunday’s cross-border ambush of Pakistani security forces by Taliban-linked militants based in Afghanistan. In his Wednesday meeting with General John Allen, the U.S.’s top commander in Afghanistan, Pakistan Army Chief of Staff Ashfaq Kayani expressed serious reservations regarding militants’ use of Afghanistan as a safe haven for launching attacks in Pakistan.[3]

• U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan Cameron Munter said on Tuesday that the U.S. regretted the November border strike on the Salala check post that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers. Speaking to a private news channel, Munter said the NATO supply route issue was not properly handled and that a reopening of the supply route was in Pakistan’s interest. Meanwhile, a senior U.S. official expressed skepticism that the supply route would be opened anytime soon, given Pakistan’s political upheaval and the Pakistan Peoples Party’s (PPP) reluctance to make a decision. In response, a PPP member said the government was prepared to move past the Salala border incident but that Pakistan’s security establishment was not ready to compromise on certain issues.[4]

Drone Strikes

• Late Tuesday, a U.S. drone killed at least five militants and injured three others in North Waziristan tribal district, according to security officials. The drone fired two missiles at a militant compound in the Shawal area, some 50 kilometers southwest of Miram Shah. Speaking to reporters, a security official based in Miram Shah said the slain militants were linked to Pakistani Taliban commander Hafiz Gul Bahadur, who has connections to the Afghan Taliban.[5]

• The National Research Development Foundation (NRDF), a Pakistani nongovernmental organization that helps the government mobilize support for anti-polio campaigns in North and South Waziristan, is calling on the U.S. to halt drone strikes in the region in an effort to help the children in the region receive vaccinations. Pakistani Taliban commander Bahadur banned polio vaccinations in North Waziristan on June 15 in retaliation for U.S. drone strikes, prompting top Taliban leader Maulvi Nazir to do the same in South Waziristan on June 25. Speaking to Dawn, Tehseenullah Khan, coordinator of NRDF, noted that the ban “will adversely affect 318,000 children in the two agencies,” and could produce adverse affects in Frontier Region Bannu, Tank, and Dera Ismail Khan as well.[6]

International Relations

• President Zardari will meet with British Prime Minister David Cameron and Foreign Minister William Hague during a visit to London from June 27-30. A Foreign Office official said the meeting will focus on Afghanistan and the reopening of the NATO supply route. According to the Express Tribune, Britain has lately served as mediator between the U.S. and Pakistan during the two countries’ diplomatic standoff.[7] 

• Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) on Tuesday celebrated the election of Muslim Brotherhood candidate Muhammad Morsi as president-elect of Egypt, calling the victory a source of inspiration for Islamic movements around the world. Meanwhile, Jamaat-ud-Dawa leader Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, after calling U.S. policy in Afghanistan a failure, said “Islam must rule the world,” while Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan called the creation of Pakistan pointless if it failed to become an “Islamic welfare state.”[8]

Militancy

• The News quoted sources in Islamabad who said that “al-Qaeda has launched a vicious attack on [the] Pakistan Army which is a major threat to its designs.” The sources highlighted a July 2012 message by al Qaeda and a January 2012 video by the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) that were critical of the Pakistan Army and encouraged launching a jihad against Pakistan. The sources called these developments, and attacks on Pakistani forces by al Qaeda-allied groups, a “progressive attack on the Pakistan Army and its credibility.”[9]

• Police found the bodies of four people, including the leader of a 1,500-strong anti-Taliban militia, in a vehicle in the Bazid Khel area of Peshawar on Wednesday. Though no group has claimed responsibility, police said the Taliban and warlord Mangal Bagh, leader of the Lashkar-e-Islam militia in Khyber tribal district, had targeted the militia's chief Fahimud Din several times in the past.[10]

• Security forces claim to have carried out several offensive operations in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) on Tuesday. Security forces killed eight militants, including three commanders, and destroyed two militant hideouts amid heavy shelling in the Botakhel area of Orakzai agency on Tuesday. Simultaneously, warplanes targeted suspected militants near Khyber agency, though no casualties have been reported. Security forces also employed heavy artillery and mortar firing in Miram Shah, North Waziristan on Monday after suspected militants fired two rockets at a paramilitary base in Miram Shah.[11]   

• On Tuesday, Sindh police arrested six suspects in connection with the TTP attack on a Pakistani television station on Monday that resulted in the injury of two employees. Police seized weapons and detained the suspects – five of Pashtun descent and one Baloch— during a raid in Patel Para, Karachi.[12]

• One civilian was killed and another injured in Karachi on Wednesday when a hand grenade exploded in the Agra Taj Colony of Lyari. Another hand grenade attack occurred in the Dalmia area of Karachi on the same day, injuring three people. Police in Karachi also killed three alleged criminals during a clash at Jail Road on Tuesday night.[13]

• The Frontier Corps (FC) arrested two militants with suspected links to a banned organization in Quetta, Balochistan on Tuesday. FC personnel intercepted a vehicle at Imdad Chowk near the railway station on Zarghoon Road. The officers arrested the driver of the vehicle after seizing explosive materials. Subsequently, police arrested another suspect and seized weapons at a building near Sariab Road in the Mill area of Quetta. FC Sector Commander Brigadier Abdul Rashid and Police Deputy Inspector General Hamid Shakil said the arrested were promised $15,850 by the Baloch Republican Army Commander to carry out attacks on government officials and organizations in Quetta.[14]