Almost all members of the Uighur militant group the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) have been eliminated from Pakistan, the country’s president said on Wednesday during a visit to Beijing.China blames violent unrest in its far western region of Xinjiang on Islamist separatist groups like ETIM, which it says wants to set up an independent state called East Turkestan and have bases in countries like Pakistan and Afghanistan.Many foreign experts, however, have questioned whether ETIM exists as the coherent group China claims it is.Meeting Chinese President Xi Jinping in the Great Hall of the People, Pakistan President Mamnoon Hussain said a recent anti-terror operation codenamed Zarb-e-Azb “has been successful in eradicating the terrorism from our country”.China and Pakistan were “iron brothers” and always helped each other “with great zeal”, he added. Hussain is in China to attend a military parade marking the 70th anniversary of the end of World War Two in Asia. While the claims are quite possibly true, they do not necessarily reflect a longer-term reality. Since 9/11, the Pakistani state has periodically attempted to evict foreign militants from its soil. Be it through the much-lamented peace deals with so-called pro-state militants, counterterrorism operations in urban areas or direct military operations, the space for Arabs, Uzbeks, Chechens, Uighurs and militants of sundry other nationalities has progressively shrunk. Since Zarb-i-Azb in particular, the physical space available to foreign, non-Afghan elements has been virtually eliminated. But it is also the case that many are believed to have escaped to Afghanistan — and the correlation between an increased outside militant presence in Afghanistan and violence in, say, the northern parts of the country has not gone unnoticed. What that means then is that while it is possible to dislodge militants from one area or region, it is far more difficult to eliminate them or put an end to their activities altogether. So long as the Pak-Afghan border remains porous, a return to Pakistan of foreign militants cannot be discounted. Particularly in the case of Uighur militants, the lure to return to Pakistan, just as the state tries to ramp up economic linkages with the Xinjiang region, will be strong. Success today should not translate into complacency tomorrow. There is another aspect to what President Hussain said in Beijing: while he may have conveyed good news, will there ever be a reckoning inside Pakistan of how the problem of foreign militants was allowed to grow to such an extent to begin with? Who were the architects of a security policy that allowed Fata to become an international hub of militancy? Who were the individuals responsible for letting foreign militants wage war against Pakistan and its neighbouring countries?
pk.shafaqna.com
