Nine Pakistani census takers killed near Afghan border

(May 6) Pakistani security officials claim that at least nine people have been killed and 33 wounded when they came under fire from Afghan forces. Those attacked were conducting a census near the Afghan border. Casualty accounts vary.

The attack Friday was near the Chaman border crossing into Pakistan's Balochistan province. The attack prompted security forces to ask people on the border to evacuate. The incident resulted in the Chaman border crossing being closed. Pakistani military spokesperson, Asif Ghafoor, said that firing was still going on. Chaman is one of only two main border crossings from Afghanistan to Pakistan. Ghafoor added: "Since April 30, Afghan Border Police had been creating hurdles in conduct of census in divided villages of Killi Luqman and Killi Jahangir in Chaman area, on Pakistani side of the border."

Ghurzang Afridi, an Afghan spokesperson claimed that the Pakistani census team had been working on the Afghan side of the border. Pakistan is in the second phase of its first door-to-door census in 19 years. There are more than 100,000 enumerators plus double that number of troops taking part in the census.. There has been political debate as to how the census may change electoral constituencies. The 2,500 kilometer-long border between Afghanistan and Pakistan is largely unpoliced and passes through much mountainous terrain.

Pakistan has recently tried to put fences and border posts along the border in an attempt to curtail the movement of Taliban fighters into Pakistan. However Afghans have resisted the move and dispute the location of the border. Earlier, in February Pakistan closed off all border crossings with Pakistan after more than 100 were killed in a wave of attacks. AL Jazeera reported:"Pakistan's decision to close two border crossings with Afghanistan following a wave of deadly attacks has forced cross-border trade to grind to a halt.Pakistan closed the Torkham and Chaman borders after Thursday's suicide attack at a sufi shrine in the southern Sindh province which killed at least 88 people.The attack at the Lal Shahbaz Qalandar shrine in Sehwan was the worst attack on Pakistan soil since 2014 and the latest in a wave of violence last week that claimed more than 100 lives.The closing caused chaos at the border as many trucks loaded with perishable goods were stopped.There were frequent clashed between the Pakistani Taliban and Pakistani military forces in several districts. In March 20, Nawaz Sharif; Pakistani PM ordered the crossing to be reopened. Since the census began in March, some teams have been attacked by Pakistani Taliban fighters.

Residents in the area where the attack took place said that Pakistani and Afghan forces used both light and heavy weapons in an exchange of fire. Akhgar Mohammad a doctor at the state-run hospital in CHaman said “So far, we have received nine bodies. These civilians were killed as a result of the Afghan shelling.” He reported at least 42 wounded on the Pakistani side alone including women and children. Some of the wounded he said were in critical condition.

Pakistani PM Nawaz Sharif in a statement called the Afghan firing "unfortunate" and he urged Afghanistan to end cross-border attacks that threatened the peace between the two countries. Nafeez Zakaria Pakistani foreign minister claimed that the census workers were on the Pakistani side when attacked, General Abdul Raziq, police chief in Kandahar province said that the census was being used to conceal crossing of militants from Pakistan to Afghanistan. He claimed that 4 Afghan policemen and 2 civilians were killed and 37 wounded by fire from Pakistan forces. Raziq claimed: “Pakistani forces were trying to infiltrate Afghan territory but Afghan forces stopped them; that’s when the fight started,”

Pakistan angry at U.S. bill that would support independence for Balochistan

Pakistan has had problems with separatists in Balochistan and Iran has suffered from attacks by terrorists that originate in the Balochistan area in western Pakistan bordering Iran. A spokesperson for the Pakistani Foreign Ministry said that the proposed bill was self-serving and based upon both arrogance and ignorance while showing disrespect for international norms.

The bill is sponsored by Republican Dana Rohrabacker and two fellow Republican representatives and was presented on Friday. The three stated that the people of Balochistan had the right of self-determination.

Pakistani officials as well as condemning the motion also accused the U.S. of interfering in Pakistan's internal affairs. The Pakistanis should realize this is not an official Washington position unless the motion were to pass which I expect is unlikely. But who knows!

Rohrabacher also tried to cut off aid to Pakistan and has long been a critic of the Pakistani government. The motion will be successful only in providing one more irritant in the already rocky relationship betwee Pakistan and the U.S. For more see this article.

US wants to launch drone attacks on Pakistan city of Quetta

Time and time again critics have pointed out that drone attacks simply turn citizens against the US and also are a powerful recruiting tool for militants since much of Pakistan is tribal and there is a duty of revenge when a member of your group is killed. But this criticism seems to have no effect on policy makers. Expansion of drone use is great for the companies that make drones, is costless in terms of US casualties and any number of often unverified claims about how many militants and leaders are killed can be made. Yet studies show that actually many civilians are killed for ever militant. The US apparently could care less. This is from antiwar.com.


US Wants to Expand Drone Strikes Into Major Pakistani City
Officials: 'Real Discussion' of Attacking Quetta
by Jason Ditz,

Top US officials say there is a “real discussion” going on right now about launching drone attacks against the Balochistan capital city of Quetta. The comments are the latest in a series of threats against the city, one of Pakistan’s largest.

Though the Pakistani government has looked the other way and even provided behind the scenes support for the various US drone attacks against Pakistan’s tribal areas, officials say a strike on Quetta would be a deal-breaker.

“We are not a banana republic,” one official declared, adding that a US attack on Quetta “might be the end of the road.” Pakistan’s military has likewise repeatedly warned against attacks on the city.

The US threats are ostensibly designed to counter the Quetta Shura, a group of Afghan exiles supposedly running much of the insurgency from the city. Pakistan has repeatedly denied that the Shura even exists, though on Friday Defense Minister Ahmad Mukhtar insisted that security forces had degraded them to the point they no longer pose a real threat.

Pakistan PM fears Afghan escalation will destabilize Balochistan

The U.S. does not really care about the difficulties the surge may cause for Pakistan. They will insist that Pakistan battle the many militants who will simply cross the border into Pakistan. However, Pakistan already is facing a separatist threat in Balochistan. If the separatists team up with militants from Afghanistan there could be real trouble for Pakistan. Pakistan already worries about having sufficient troops for offenses against the Taliban in the tribal regions and also to guard the border with India. No doubt the cozy relationships the US is developing with India will not go down well in Pakistan and will create an even stronger anti-American sentiment in the country.


News From Antiwar.com -
Pakistan PM: US Escalation in Afghanistan Will Destabilize Balochistan

Posted By Jason Ditz

Speaking just days before President Obama unveils a massive new escalation in neighboring Afghanistan, Pakistani Prime Minister Yousef Raza Gilani warned that he is increasingly concerned that the escalation could imperil Pakistan’s Balochistn Province.

“This is the concern that we already discussed with the US administration,” Gilani noted. The US is expected to commit additional troops to Helmand Province, along the border with Pakistani Balochistan.

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U.S. warned Pakistan on Helmand Spillover into Balochistan

The U.S. seems not to care what happens in Pakistan as long as it creates more violence that may force Pakistan to further internal conflict. The spillover creates even more tension in an already tense area that contains many who wish to separate from Pakistan. The U.S. simply ignores Pakistani complaints and follows whatever policies the U.S. thinks are in its own interest.

- News From Antiwar.com - http://news.antiwar.com/2009/07/29/us-warned-pakistan-on-helmand-spillover/print/ -

US Warned Pakistan on Helmand Spillover

Posted By Jason Ditz On July 29, 2009 @ 6:59 pm
US envoy Richard Holbrooke says that since the US launched its massive offensive in the Helmand River Valley, US officials including top commander in Afghnaistan General Stanley McChrystal have “fairly regularly” consulted with Pakistani officials about what is going on.

The hope is that the coordination will prevent the clash, near the Pakistani border, from spilling into the Balochistan Province, in which Pakistan is already contending with a growing separatist movement.

Since the 2001 US invasion of Afghanistan, considerable numbers of Taliban have relocated into the regions on the Pakistani side of the border, destabilizing and plunging the area into open revolt against the US-allied Pakistani government.

Pakistani officials have criticized the Helmand offensive, fearing that it will do to Balochistan what the war has already done to the Federally Administered Tribal Areas and the North-West Frontier Province. The US has dismissed the concerns, saying the attack was “necessary” and that they were comfortable Pakistan would be able to handle the consequences.

White House Split on Drone Strikes Against Balochistan

This is from antiwar.com.

As this article points out not only is there a problem in Buner but there is an even worse situation in Balochistan one ignored in the media. Some in the Obama administration including no doubt Obama himself want to extend drone attacks to kill some militant leaders who are in Balochistan. However, the area is already rife with separatist strife and US drone attacks would make things much worse. For some reason this seems to be the general policy that Obama has taken throughout Pakistan and Afghanistan. He even accelerated military involvement while having a policy review of the Afghan war! Some review that! However, the US probably will not carry out drone attacks against refugee camps. However, they might look the other way if the Pakistani forces attacked them.




White House Split on Drone Strikes Against Balochistan
Posted By Jason Ditz
While today’s drone attack on South Waziristan Agency underscored the Obama Administration’s eagerness to continue hitting militants inside Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), the long-reported calls to attack Balochistan are being met with far more controversy.
Proponents say that much of the Taliban’s top leadership has taken up residence in and around the Baloch capital of Quetta. However the concern is that, while Pakistan has secretly backed the FATA strikes, they have managed to drive the ill-controlled mountainous hinterland into a constant state of opposition to the central government. The much larger Balochistan province, already struggling with a growing separatist movement, could hardly bare the repeatedly US bombardment the Waziristan agencies have, nor is Pakistan likely to stand aside while one of its major cities is attacked. The provincial governor is already warning that the situation could rapidly wind up out of control.
What’s more the Taliban are believed to be staying in the Afghan refugee camps around Quetta, and while it’s hardly without precedent, American planes attacking a camp teeming with innocent civilian refugees of an American war would be, to quote one former State Department official, “a real human rights controversy.”
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