Posted: 17-08-2009 by: Thomas Ruttig
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Jalaluddin Haqqani Challenges Mullah Omar’s Leadership of the Taliban Publication: Terrorism Focus Volume: 5 Issue: 25 July 1, 2008 03:18 PM Age: 3 yrs By: Waliullah Rahmani Since the reemergence of the insurgency in 2002, Afghanistan has witnessed a largely united insurgent front under the banner of the Taliban. To date there have been few records of disputes and differences within the Taliban. The unity of different groups of insurgents under the Taliban banner and the obedience of the rank and file of the group to the orders of Mullah Omar as their only Amir has been a key to the success and revival of the Islamist resistance. But seven years after the fall of the Taliban, disputes about the direction of the movement have begun to emerge within Mullah Omar’s mujahideen. Small clashes inside the insurgency have been followed by deep divides within the Taliban. A recent letter from Jalaluddin Haqqani has asked for a change in the leadership of the Taliban. Haqqani is a respected veteran commander of the anti-Soviet insurgency of the 1980s and is now a powerful authority within the current insurgency, well known for his dedication to jihad and the suicide attacks carried out under his orders in many parts of Afghanistan. Unlike many elements of the Taliban leadership, Haqqani was little influenced by the religious and political thought of the Muslim Brotherhood in the 1980s and early 1990s. The open letter to Taliban fighters and other Afghan insurgents is written in the Pashto language under the logo and title of the “Islamic Emirates of Afghanistan.” Haqqani’s message describes Mullah Omar as an illiterate person and claims that his erroneous decisions might cause the collapse of the Taliban (Payman Daily [Kabul], June 14). As stated in Haqqani’s letter, it is time for the neo-Taliban to change the head of the Taliban leadership council. Haqqani claims to have consulted many Taliban commanders who were in agreement that this is the right time to bring about changes in the leadership (a full facsimile of the letter is published at www.kabulpress.org/my/spip.php?article1816). Haqqani suggests that the passage of time has led to the understanding that errors by the Taliban leadership have caused the loss of many prominent commanders, including Mullah Akhtar Muhammad Osmani, Mullah Dadullah, Mullah Abdul Manan and Mullah Saifullah Mansoor. The veteran jihadi commander believes that the Taliban’s shura (consultative council) in Quetta has made a deal with intelligence agencies to kill those insurgent commanders who are opposed to working with Mullah Omar’s representatives. Singled out for criticism is Mullah Omar’s cooperation and coordination with his relatives, such as Mullah Azizullah Eshaq Zai, Mullah Abdul Shakoor and Mullah Jan Muhammad Baloch, whom Haqqani accuses of issuing orders that have caused losses to Taliban forces. Haqqani claims that those loyal leading commanders of the Taliban who learn of the shura’s deals with intelligence agencies and no longer want to work with them have either been killed by Taliban figures or murdered by foreign forces allied with the Taliban leadership. In other parts of his letter, Jalaluddin Haqqani informs the Taliban that the leadership of the organization is not hereditary and that one family should not lead the Taliban forever. Instead, he suggests that the Taliban leadership should be given to a person who is literate and knowledgeable about political issues. He should also have the ability to bring positive changes for the political development, unity and international relations of the Taliban. The Taliban needs to have productive diplomacy around the world and Haqqani points out that not all countries and governments are foes of the Taliban. Criticizing past decisions of Mullah Omar, Haqqani stresses that the leadership system of the Taliban with its poor decisions and egotism has led to the infamy of the organization and threatened it with collapse. Although the authenticity of this letter has not been confirmed, many local observers believe that the rift within the Taliban is both real and serious. To date, neither Mullah Omar nor Haqqani have made any public statements regarding the letter’s publication. The media sources which published the letter, Payman Daily and Kabul Press, are both critical of the Karzai government. Kabul Press has a history of receiving and publishing documents of this type and its editor was jailed for a time last year by the National Security Directorate for his criticism of their activities. Jalaluddin Haqqani has a strong influence in eastern Afghanistan and the North Waziristan tribal agency of Pakistan, which puts him in a far stronger position than any other leader of the Taliban except Mullah Omar. His “Haqqani Network” has proved highly effective in striking government and Coalition targets, leading him to be regarded in some quarters as already a greater threat than Mullah Omar. A confrontation between Mullah Omar and Jalaluddin Haqqani over the leadership of the neo-Taliban, however, may provide the opportunity for a Coalition/Kabul government success against the insurgents, who continue to control at least 40 percent of Afghanistan. A Who’s Who of the Insurgency in Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province: Part One – North and South Waziristan Publication: Terrorism Monitor Volume: 6 Issue: 18 September 22, 2008 10:09 AM Age: 3 yrs By: Rahimullah Yusufzai Militants operating in Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) include both Taliban and non-Taliban forces. However, the Taliban militants are much larger in number and have a lot more influence in the region. The Pakistani Taliban have close links with the Afghan Taliban and operate on both sides of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, also known as the Durand Line after the British diplomat who demarcated the boundary in 1893, Sir Mortimer Durand. The non-Taliban militants, on the other hand, are often pro-government and enjoy cordial ties with the Pakistan authorities and security forces. The Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) of North and South Waziristan Most of the Pakistani Taliban militants are grouped in an umbrella organization, the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). The movement was launched on December 13, 2007, in a secret meeting of senior Taliban commanders hailing from the South Waziristan, North Waziristan, Orakzai, Kurram, Khyber, Mohmand, Bajaur and Darra Adamkhel tribal regions and the districts of Swat, Buner, Upper Dir, Lower Dir, Bannu, Lakki Marwat, Tank, Peshawar, Dera Ismail Khan, Mardan and Kohat (The News International [Islamabad], December 15, 2007). According to TTP deputy leader Maulana Faqir Mohammad and other senior commanders, the militants formed the organization to pool the resources and manpower of Pakistan’s Taliban to fight in self-defense if the security forces of Pakistan attacked their areas and also to extend help to the Afghan Taliban taking part in the “jihad,” or holy war, against U.S. and International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) troops in neighboring Afghanistan (Newsline.com.pk [Karachi], July 2008; The News International, July 29, 2007). Due to the military operations undertaken by Pakistan’s armed forces against them, the Pakistani Taliban now have a fight at home and are therefore unable to send many fighters to Afghanistan to fight alongside the Afghan Taliban. The TTP is headed by Baitullah Mahsud, based in South Waziristan and currently the most powerful Pakistani Taliban commander. In his late 30s, Mahsud is referred to as the “Amir Sahib” by his followers. Like many other Pakistanis, he began fighting as a young man during the Afghan jihad against the Soviet occupation force in Afghanistan and later joined the Afghan Taliban. Presently, he is stated to be ill, suffering from kidney and heart diseases due to complications arising from diabetes. He reportedly named three of his commanders to run the TTP on his behalf, including Waliur Rahman who has been negotiating with the tribal jirgas, or councils, created by the Pakistan government (The News International, August 24). The TTP is not a disciplined organization as two fairly recent events showed. First was the refusal of some components of the TTP to accept Hafiz Gul Bahadur, the Pakistani Taliban commander from North Waziristan, as deputy leader of the Baitullah Mahsud-led organization. Later in the winter of 2007-2008, Hafiz Gul Bahadur did not cooperate with Baitullah Mahsud when the latter was under attack from Pakistan Army. In fact, Bahadur warned Baitullah Mahsud against firing rockets at Pakistani forces camps in Razmak, which is located in North Waziristan. His plea was that he and his followers had signed a peace accord with Pakistan government in North Waziristan and therefore no action should be taken against the Pakistani security forces there as it would amount to violation of the agreement (see Terrorism Monitor, February 7). In simple terms, he refused to become involved in the fighting that was then taking place between Baitullah Mahsud’s Taliban and Pakistan Army in neighboring South Waziristan (Newsline.com.pk, July 2008) Opposition to Baitullah Mahsud Hafiz Gul Bahadur is now head of an emerging group of Pakistani Taliban commanders opposed to Baitullah Mahsud. The yet-to-be-named group also includes Maulvi Nazeer, the Taliban commander for Wana area in South Waziristan, and Haji Namdar Khan, the head of the Amr Bil Maruf Wa Nahi Anil Munkar (Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice) group of militants operating in the Bara area of Khyber Agency. Namdar Khan was recently killed in Bara by a young man who was allegedly sent by Baitullah Mahsud’s group to eliminate him (The Nation [Islamabad], August 14). This was the second attempt on his life. The earlier attack was a suicide bombing targeting him some months ago, but he survived. Several of his men along with seminary students were killed in the earlier attack which took place inside an Islamic school in Bara. In the second instance of TTP indiscipline, the TTP failed to take action against the Pakistani Taliban commander Omar Khalid (whose real name is Abdul Wali), in Mohmand Agency even though Baitullah Mahsud had sent a commission to investigate charges against him. In fact, TTP spokesman Maulvi Omar had publicly stated that Omar Khalid would be punished for attacking a rival group of Islamic fighters that had a training camp in Mohmand Agency. Omar Khalid’s men killed the group’s commander Shah Khalid and his deputy Obaidullah, along with several other fighters and captured more than 70 (Dawn [Karachi], July 20). The detained men, all belonging to the so-called Shah group affiliated with the Salafi Ahle-Hadith sect, were subsequently freed through the intervention of a jirga of religious scholars, including Maulana Sher Ali Shah, an Islamic teacher at the Darul Uloom Haqqani seminary in Akora Khattak near Peshawar. In the end, Baitullah Mahsud and the TTP just kept quiet and took no action against Omar Khalid as this would have created disharmony in the organization and possibly even caused a parting of ways between it and its chapter in Mohmand Agency. South Waziristan While discussing the leading figures of the ongoing insurgency in the NWFP, it would be worthwhile to start in South Waziristan, where the Pakistan Army began its military operations in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) in early 2004 and suffered heavy casualties in fierce clashes in Kalosha near the regional headquarters at Wana. The Wana region is inhabited by the Ahmadzai Wazir tribe, which has historically been a foe of the neighboring Mahsud tribe to which Baitullah Mahsud belongs. Both Ahmadzai Wazirs and Mahsuds are Pashtun, the ethnic group to which the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban belong, but they have long been traditional rivals in South Waziristan and competed with each other for political and economic power. Baitullah Mahsud was an obscure Taliban commander in 2004 when Nek Mohammad from the Ahmadzai Wazir tribe in Wana was occupying the media limelight. The 27-year old Pakistani Taliban commander had fought the Pakistan Army to a standstill and forced it to conclude a peace accord with him largely on his terms. The signing ceremony was held in one of his strongholds, Shakai, near Wana, where the Pakistan Army’s Corps Commander for Peshawar, Lieutenant-General Safdar Hussain, publicly embraced and garlanded Nek Mohammad and hailed him as a partner in peace. Subsequently in February 2005 when the government signed a similar peace agreement with Baitullah Mahsud in Sararogha in South Waziristan, the same army general described Baitullah as a soldier of peace (The News International, February 10, 2005). Commander Nek Mohammad was killed in April 2004 in a US missile strike on his hideout in a village near Wana. His death not only led to the collapse of the peace accord he had signed with the government but also resulted in a rift among his Taliban followers in Wana on the issue of his succession. Haji Mohammad Omar declared himself the new head of the Taliban in Wana but certain other commanders declined to accept his decision. Eventually, a five-member Shura, or council, emerged to jointly led the Wana Taliban. The Shura included Haji Omar, his brother Haji Sharif Khan, Javed Karmazkhel, Maulana Abdul Aziz and Maulana Mohammad Abbas. The Pakistan government subsequently made a peace deal with this Shura, sometimes called the “Wana 5,” and allowed it to form a so-called peace committee that was given an administrative role to man roadside checkpoints and provide security to the people. Conflict with the Uzbeks In 2007, serious differences emerged among the Pakistani Taliban in Wana over the presence of foreign militants belonging to Uzbekistan in the area. A majority of Taliban and Ahmadzai Wazir tribesmen decided to evict the Uzbek militants, led by Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) head Tahir Yuldashev, from Wana and Shakai. Backed by the Pakistan government and military with arms and money, they fought the Uzbeks and their tribal supporters and finally succeeded in expelling them from Wana. A young Taliban commander, Maulvi Nazeer, led this campaign along with his two deputies Malik Abdul Hannan and Maulvi Mohammad Iqbal. Hannan was allegedly killed in July 2008 by pro-Uzbek tribesmen commanded by Noor Islam, who is the brother of Haji Omar and Haji Sharif (of the Wana 5), while Maulvi Iqbal died fighting alongside the Afghan Taliban in Afghanistan’s Paktika province in June 2008. Apart from Noor Islam, other pro-Uzbek commanders of the Pakistani Taliban from Wana include Haji Omar, Javed Karmazkhel, Maulana Abdul Aziz and Maulana Mohammad Abbas. They had to take refuge with Baitullah Mahsud in the area populated by the Mahsud tribe in South Waziristan after being evicted along with the Uzbek militants. In recent months, the pro-Uzbek tribal fighters of this group have indulged in targeted killings of men belonging to Maulvi Nazeer’s group (Newsline.com.pk, July 2008) As mentioned earlier, Baitullah Mahsud is the most powerful and dangerous Pakistani Taliban commander. He was accused of involvement in the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto in December 2007 and blamed for sending fighters to Afghanistan to fight US-led coalition forces. He denied his involvement in Benazir Bhutto’s murder but conceded on more than one occasion that he was indeed sending his men to wage “jihad” against U.S., NATO and Afghan government forces in Afghanistan (Newsline.com.pk, July 2008). Other Taliban commanders working under him include Waliur Rahman, who could succeed him in case of his death, and Qari Hussain, known for his strong anti-Shia views and also for training suicide bombers and sending them on their fatal mission. There were reports that Qari Hussain was killed in an airstrike earlier this year, but he appears to have survived (Daily Times [Lahore], January 27). In North Waziristan, the most important Pakistani Taliban commander is Hafiz Gul Bahadur, who is also Amir (commander) of the Taliban shura there. He is now opposed to Baitullah Mahsud and has been trying to build a rival alliance of pro-government Pakistani Taliban without any appreciable success (see Terrorism Monitor, July 25). Two clerics who wield considerable influence on the Taliban in North Waziristan are Maulana Sadiq Noor and Maulana Abdul Khaliq.(Newsline.com.pk, July 2008) Other clerics affiliated to Pakistani parliamentarian Maulana Fazlur Rahman’s Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-F (Assembly of Islamic Clergy – JUI-F) also appear to have some influence on the Taliban operating in North Waziristan. (Editor’s Note: The next part of this Terrorism Monitor article will cover the important Taliban and non-Taliban commanders in other tribal regions and districts of Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province) Taming the ISI: Implications for Pakistan’s Stability and the War on Terrorism Publication: Terrorism Monitor Volume: 6 Issue: 20 October 24, 2008 03:40 PM Age: 3 yrs By: Tariq Mahmud Ashraf Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) is Pakistan’s premier intelligence agency. As such, it has found itself at the center of a dispute between Pakistan and the United States over the prosecution of the War on Terrorism, a dispute fuelled by the two nations’ varying strategic aims. Established just a year after the country’s independence in 1947, the ISI has grown immensely in size, activity and influence over the years. The concept of the ISI being a truly “joint” or “inter-services” organization is a falsehood, since this organization has been always dominated by the Pakistan Army, with barely a smattering of involvement from the other two military services. Moreover, its Director General is always a serving Lieutenant General of the Pakistan Army, answerable only to the Chief of the Army Staff and not to the civilian government, the Ministry of Defense or the Joint Staff Headquarters. [1] By this reckoning, the ISI is essentially an extension of the Directorate General Military Intelligence (DGMI) at the General Headquarters (GHQ), rather than a tri-service national-level institution. The excessive involvement of the Pakistan Army in the affairs of state has led the ISI to focus on internal/domestic intelligence gathering. While this internal emphasis of the ISI has its roots in the Ayub Khan era (1958-69), its external activities got a significant boost during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan (1979-1989), when the ISI was put in charge of managing the Afghan mujahideen and their fight against the Soviet invaders, with the active backing of the United States and the financial support of Saudi Arabia. The links of the ISI with the Islamic militants who routed the Soviet Union from Afghanistan have remained intact ever since and became a major bone of contention between the United States and Pakistan after the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan. Many U.S. military and government officials have voiced their concern over ISI’s links with the Taliban, and some have even blamed the ISI for sabotaging U.S. efforts in Afghanistan. The American press has charged that the ISI has used the privileged information it has about American attacks against the Afghan Taliban to forewarn the latter. In fact, the American government believes that a recent suicide-bombing at the Indian embassy in Kabul was carried out by the ISI. In India, the case is even worse: the ISI is blamed for anything violent that happens inside India that the Indian government cannot otherwise explain (Daily Times, September 17). This backdrop precipitated three significant events: firstly, visits by high-level U.S. intelligence officials on July 12 to meet the new Pakistani leadership and apprise it of the evidence linking the ISI to the Taliban; secondly, the abortive July 26 attempt by the elected government of Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gillani to place the ISI under the Ministry of Interior; and thirdly, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher’s statement during an interview on September 17 that the Pakistan Government needed to seriously rein in the ISI and curtail its sphere of activities (The News [Islamabad], September 18). U.S. Evidence of ISI’s Links with the Taliban Stephen R. Kappes, the Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) accompanied Admiral Michael Mullen, the Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff on a secret visit to Islamabad on July12. This visit was aimed at confronting Pakistan’s most senior officials with new information about ties between the ISI and militants operating in Pakistan’s tribal areas. The trip was a follow-up to a previous secret visit to Pakistan in January, during which U.S. Intelligence officials sought to press former President Pervez Musharraf to allow the CIA greater latitude to operate in the tribal territories. According to one senior U.S. official, Mr. Kappes delivered a very pointed message, declaring that “Look, we know there’s a connection, not just with Haqqani but also with other bad guys and ISI, and we think you could do more and we want you to do more about it” (New York Times, July 30). During Prime Minister Gillani’s visit to the United States he was reportedly provided with incontrovertible evidence of the ISI’s continuing links with religious-extremist elements. The Prime Minister, on his return to Pakistan, blithely denied there was a significant problem. Reportedly, PM Gillani had an exclusive meeting with the CIA Director where he was briefed by the latter regarding ISI’s continuing links with the Taliban and was provided with a U.S. “charge-sheet” against the ISI (Dawn [Karachi], September 17). Gillani’s Decision to Shift Control of ISI In a move aimed at appeasing the United States while simultaneously projecting its own control and influence, Prime Minister Gillani’s government issued instructions on July 26 for control of the ISI to be shifted to the Ministry of Interior, currently headed by Zardari’s trusted aide Rehman Malik. The timing of the decision was significant, coming on the eve of PM Gillani’s visit to the United States and just two weeks after the secret visit of Mr Kappes to Pakistan (The News, August 5). As expected, the decision to place the ISI under the Ministry of Interior had to be withdrawn almost immediately under pressure from the powerful Pakistan Army. In retrospect, this decision served no other purpose than to re-establish the limits of power of the democratic government in Islamabad vis-a-vis the Pakistani military. While there is no doubt that some Pakistanis detest the ISI’s political shenanigans, it is also true that most realize the good that the agency has done for the country in the domain of warding off threats to Pakistan’s national security. Given the current climate where the United States is increasingly perceived as following a policy aimed at downsizing Pakistan geographically and militarily in favor of strengthening India and securing the Central Asian theatre, it is not surprising that the ISI has started being viewed as “Pakistan’s first line of defense” (The News, August 5). Richard Boucher’s Statement on ISI Reform Expressing his dissatisfaction at the lack of control exercised by the Pakistan government over the ISI, Deputy Secretary of State Boucher stressed the imperative of reforming the ISI at a private luncheon in Washington, saying “It has to be done” (Dawn, September 17). It might be possible that Gillani made some commitment regarding reining in the ISI during his meetings with Bush administration officials that he was unable to implement on his return, precipitating the outburst from Richard Boucher. Diplomatic sources have indicated that the United States is trying to work out an arrangement with Pakistan for curtailing ISI’s power. Under this new arrangement, the ISI wing which deals with internal security is to be transferred to the Interior Ministry and the agency is to be asked to reduce its role in the war on terror. Directory: gifiles -> attach attach -> British Forces – Akrioti, Greece Griffin Fighter Squadron (84 Squadron raf) MoD announced possible Typhoon and Tornado arrivals to the base France attach -> Russia 110204 Basic Political Developments attach -> Unclassified//for official use only attach -> Adaptability Sustainment attach -> Pop-up 1 ("C" Chechnya) Header Text: Emir of the Caucasus Emirate Doku Umarov Image attach -> Russia and Islam are not Separate attach -> Chapter 13: The Northern Caucasus attach -> Russia 100209 Basic Political Developments attach -> The evolution attach -> The devolution Download 0.66 Mb. Share with your friends:
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