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“We will meet Taliban threat”

ISLAMABD: Paramilitaries began erecting road blocks and checkpoints on Friday in the North West Frontier Province capital Peshawar as the Pakistan government reiterated that it was serious about countering the threat of Taliban militancy on its western frontier.

Preoccupied with the judicial crisis and accused of letting the security situation drift to a point where militants were poised to take over the Frontier’s premier city, the government is taking steps to show that it is seized of the situation and is acting upon it.

“Security forces are more visible now. It has given people some confidence and optimism that the government is doing something,” Ismail Khan, resident editor of the Dawn newspaper told The Hindu from Peshawar.

The increasing lawlessness in the city, topped by the abduction of a group of 16 Christians by a militant gang known as Lashkar-e-Islam, had raised fears of an imminent takeover by militants.

Days later, the killing of 28 tribesmen on a peace committee in South Waziristan, acted to shake the PPP-led government out of its earlier complacency that negotiations with the militants alone would enable it to re-establish state control in the frontier areas.

A spokesman for the Tehree-i-Taliban, an umbrella group of militant organisations headed by Taliban commander Beithullah Mehsud, said the tribesmen were killed because they were “pro-government”.

The tribesmen were monitoring the implementation of conditions in a yet to be finalised peace deal between the government and the Mehsuds. The incident seemed plainly intended by the militants as a message to the government that peace would be on Mehsud terms.

After this, the government appears prepared to use force where required while negotiating peace deals. Backed by a government ready to own the consequences of military action, the Army is also said to be more willing than previously to undertake operations in the area.

An emergency meeting earlier this week chaired by Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani appointed the Pakistan Army as “the principal for application of military effort” to deal with the deteriorating situation, to be used on a “selective” basis, alongside peace talks and economic development of the frontier areas.

President Pervez Musharraf, who is directly responsible for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, or FATA, but who had of late distanced himself from the developments in the frontier region, also sent out the signal that he endorsed the government’s new carrot-and-stick policy.

On Friday, he and Army chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani met to discuss the situation in FATA and NWFP.

The official Associated Press of Pakistan reported that the retired General Musharraf said while the multi-pronged approach was needed to wean away people from extremism, “terrorism must be combated with full force and all available resources.”

As the deployment of the Frontier Constabulary began in Peshawar, a Beithullah Mehsud spokesman sent out a warning through local journalists that the Taliban would not hesitate to hit back if harm came to any of their comrades.

Meanwhile, the violence in the NWFP and tribal areas continues unabated. Six more people were killed in clashes between two groups in the Tirah valley of the Khyber Agency. In Damdola village of Bajaur tribal agency, Taliban militants publicly executed two men charged of “spying” for the United States.

Despite the continuing violence in Swat — over the last few days eight girls’ schools were torched, a motel burnt down checkposts attacked — the provincial government said its peace deal with Taliban militants in the valley was on track. According to reports the provincial coalition government led by the Awami National Party has agreed to most of the demands of the Taliban, including the release of 45 more militants.

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