National Assembly Standing Committee on Defence chairman Shaikh Rohail Asghar said that Pak-Army will stay in North Waziristan till 2019. During the session of standing committee, Defence Secretary Lft General (R) Aalam Khatak and other Pak-Army authoritative briefed about Zarb-e-Azb. The defence authority informed the standing committee of National Assembly that Operation Zarb-e-Azb entered the decisive phase. It told that more than 3,500 terrorists have been killed while dozens of their hideouts including ammunition factories have been annihilated.
The committee also informed that major part of North Waziristan has been evacuated from the terrorists during the operation while the decisive phase of the operation continues in Shawal Valley. More than 200 terrorists have been killed in Shawal Valley so far. The military and civilian high command then seem truly determined to keep militancy at bay and prevent the tribal areas from turning into a breeding ground for banned outfits once again. This nationwide resolve was expressed in clear terms after the December 2014 massacre at the Army Public School in Peshawar. The army will also obviously be eager that its sacrifices do not go wasted. It has lost 300 valiant army officials in fighting in North Waziristan while more than 3,500 terrorists have been killed. There have been important strategic gains. The military now controls the Shawal mountains after a prolonged campaign of aerial bombardment and clearly wishes to ensure this hard-won supremacy is not lost. Rohail Asghar has also said that steps are being taken for the return of the 1.8 million persons temporarily displaced from the tribal areas. Around 40,000 of these have already gone home and of the Rs80 billion required to rehabilitate them, Rs13 billion have already been allocated. The continuation of Zarb-e-Azab is additionally important to prevent the incursion of supporters of Taliban and Islamic State through the Afghan border. The issue of the porous border has been creating problems for Pakistan since the first Afghan War. Even now, we are unsure about how many militants were actually captured and killed, and how many escaped to Afghanistan, to return with a vengeance. While the world is becoming more careful of its borders and walls, we have allowed ourselves to be continually infiltrated though the Durand line. We need a real border- monitored, physical and closed. Though our hearts bleed for refugees coming from Afghanistan, lets not forget that the UN is wrapping up its programs in Pakistan in light of the greater need of Syria, and we already have a massive IDP problem that seldom makes the headlines due to other distractions happening in Karachi and Punjab. The continuation should signal to the United States that Pakistan is taking meaningful action against the Haqqani Network and “doing more”. The refugee crises in the Middle East and the destruction of Iraq have sapped the resources of international humanitarian operations. We can speculate that the government of Pakistan is trying to extend the operation so that the United States will extend the Coalition Support Fund due to expire in 2016- because honestly, we need all the help we can get. The extending of the military operation is a good decision, but lets be clear, there is too much at stake and too much has already been lost to this war. We have seen the operation through a very optimistic lens, one provided by the military itself. We do not know the situation of the towns and cities in Waziristan. Are people safe? Do they feel safe? Do they have water and electricity?
pk.shafaqna.com
