The Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has not only claimed the attack, but also made it clear that the spillover from the military operations in Swat and other tribal areas will not end in Lahore.
‘Residents should leave the cities of Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Lahore and Multan,’ the purported aide of Baitullah Mehsud warned.
Is the Pakistani state ready to deal with the emerging threat? What measures should the authorities take to ensure the security of citizens in cities and the rest of the country?
The militant ..loves me .. he loves me not .. he loves me .. he loves me not .. he ..
If we have militants/non-state actors do our dirty work when they “love” us, can we make sure that “love” is permanent ?
No we cannot because “love” is NEVER permanent.
Wish our FO had not gotten us into this mess. But now that we’re in it, I hope they realize the foolishness and stamp it out ALL militants – the good and the bad.
However if history is any indicator, we will still end up doing NOTHING about LeT, JuD, HeM since they are “good” while we protect them with our “good nukes.”
Why do we still insist it is Americas war. It is now OUR WAR and to survive we have to win it and win it soon. These acts of bomb blasts and the warnings by the Taleban asking residents to move out of our cities is a clear sign of desperation. No religion, no ideology or chism can support the acts of the militants. For the survival of Pakistan the operation has to go on till the mission is achieved.
We are at war and we will InshaAllah defeat them. We are with our Armed forces, Police and other security agencies to crush these terrorists.
Allah will help us as these so called ‘Mujahidins’ are killing innocent people which Islam does not allow. They are friends of nobody.
@Dr. Malek Towghi
How much america had paid for a war initiated by them and for them? surely not a small part of what we pakistanis have paid.
We are not so fool nation that “to get your cheques” we have compromised our security and even our future.
No, its not pakistan which is part of problem but its America. they started a war in afghanistan in 80’s in the name of jihad and it was american printing press who printed jihadi lectures for pakistani madrassas. its alright till 89 because USSR was a common enemy for both pakistan and US. but at the end of war, what they did is called “presslor amendment”. they trained 80,000 jihadi commandos and at the end imposed sanctions on us and left us alone for them. We had no option but to try to settle them. and for this we are accused of “links” with them. tell me how can we try to settle them without “links”. although Ronald Ragon once called them “forefathers”.
Again they repeated the thing, after capturing Afghanistan in 2002 they had to be concerned about them but again they left it and focus their attention on Iraq for WMD which were never discovered.
meanwhile india made it strong in Afghanistan and started to propagate anti pakistan sentiments over there.
I wish that the Pakistan Government should have gone after the Taliban leadership in order to eliminate them rather then going after few hundred militants and insurgents in this very expensive military operation that would ruin Pakistan’s already hand to mouth economy. Over 2.5 million people of Swat have been made to flee their homes, agricultural land, and livelihood and made to live under the open skies in 40C temperature, horrendous conditions without sanitation, medical, water, electricity and without adequate food supplies.
President Asif Ali Zardari is obeying American administration orders and applying President Obama’s policies in Pakistan and this military operation was an American order that has to be obeyed to receive American 1.85 billion dollars. It should be remembered that USA is the richest world economy and the most technologically developed country in the world and has so far failed to defeat Al-Qaeda and Taliban in Afghanistan despite wasting over five trillion dollars on lost the war. It is a misconceived perception that Pakistan can defeat war of terrorism on its soil by bullets and bombs. President is misleading the nation and PPP has no idea what is doing or should to fight terrorism and sort out its domestic, economic, defense and diplomatic problems.
If it were happening in the USA, UK and other European countries, their interior ministers would have resigned long time ago for negligence, incompetence and inability to handle their jobs. Rehamn Malik, the interior minister is always telling Pakistanis Your country is in danger” as if he is not a Pakistani but a foreigner. This is the price that Pakistan will have to pay to ally itself with the West and for getting expensive American aid with long list of string attached.
It is about time that he is sacked from his post and Pakistanis are saved from more atrocities. This government is incapable of handling Pakistans internal and external problems and dragging the country into a big hole. In the West these terrorists are caught even before they blow themselves and innocent human beings; and are even caught when they are planning a terrorist act. Rehman Malik has so far failed to come up with any thing positive and even those arrested red handed in the terrorist activities are never heard off afterwards.
The recently displaced US, Gen McKiernan, has said many times that we will never win the “hearts and minds” of the Afghan people but we can win their support, though we will not do that through military operations alone. The struggle is not about killing insurgents. We have killed more insurgents than we can count over the past seven years and have moved no closer to victory by doing so. This struggle is about the Afghan population. Afghans must believe that their government will provide them greater security and opportunity for prosperity than the insurgency will. We are not naive; we know that military operations must continue and that some people must be killed — but under McKiernan a more holistic approach to winning the peace has been our focus. These are the “conventional” tactics he has been employing. To those who say we have moved too slowly, to those looking for the quick fix or fast score that will enable our forces to come home, I urge caution.
The Americans, British, Indians and Israelis are all involved in a devils conspiracy to fragmentize Pakistan, and the terrorists who so ever they are and from where ever they come from are beyond any shadow of a doubt are trained, armed, funded and logistically supported by the Pakistans enemies around its borders and from far away. The Americans are playing a very duplicitous game here: they want to control Pakistans Baluchistan for its strategic importance and also for its abundant natural resources. If President Asif Ali Zardari stays in power for more one year, American long held dream of controlling Central Asia would appear to be coming true. This inept Pakistani PPP government has no idea of what they are doing or should do to combat terrorism. This military operation will surely bankrupt already hand-to mouth Pakistan’s economy that has become so dependent on US hand outs.
To eradicate the menace of terrorism in Pakistan it needs support from the general public.
The government is doing what it can do to protect the lives and properties of its citizens, but it equally also be the responsibility of the citizens to look around the people who have dubious characters and inform the nearest police station.
I do not see any reason as why the government after having full support from the people of Pakistan could not defeat and eradicate the menace of terrorism from Pakistan.
Every Pakistani should become a solider in protecting the motherland from these evil forces. Pakistan Zindabad.
Taliban are animals from inside. They disregard human life. For them, anyone not listening to them is Kafir.They act like as if they are God and have the right to do anything in the name of Islam.Only if they had to read the quran in urdu transalation they would have understood islam and Quran
I am afraid the Military-Mulla Complex of Pakistan has duped my country, the US, again. We did not know that while supposedly ‘pursuing’ 200 or 2000 Taliban militants, the military will dislocate more than 2,000,000 innocent Pashtuns for which we, Americans, will continue to be blamed. Meanwhile, we are being — and will be –asked — to pay additional sums to help these internal refugees.
These are the results of military ‘operations’,so far, in a single district, Swat. The whole Taliban-infected NWFP, FATA, and the Pashtun regions of Balochistan are yet to be dealt with. Only God and the ISI know the final extent and number of dislocated Pashtuns.
The disaster will be so great that we will be asked again to forget about Bin Ladin, Zawahiri and Mulla Umar. Our Pakistani ‘friends’ have already ‘convinced’ us to slow down, if not completely stop, the Drone operations … which had just begun to corner Alqaeda- Taliban operatives.
By the way, we do not know what new game the Pakistani military is playing with the Taliban leaders in the ‘battle fronts'; the international media are not allowed any access.
Meanwhile according to a well-thought scheme — and to warn the Sharif Brothers to ‘behave’, fanatics are being let loose to terrorize Punjab. The planned chaos will widen… and we will be asked to continue paying …. For what? Definitely not for capturing or destroying Bin Ladin & Co.
The rational way for us, the Americans, is to get out of the mess called Pakistan along with the remaining undelivered checks, take a deep breath and relax for awhile, while protecting Afghanistan with full force, and thinking of ways to deal with the Al-Qaedah other than depending on Islamabad and its military.
There are definitely other ways …. more effective and less expensive.
Malek Towghi, Michigan, USA.
All the taliban can do now and will unfortunately continue to do in future is target innocent Pakistanis in their homes, offices,bazaars and places of worship by such cowardly acts of terrorism.But if they think they can take over Pakistan like Swat,they are gravely mistaken.
Government alone is not what we call Pakistan. We are a nation of free people. we have survived even worse times. Practically I think media can play a great role to “prepare” us for the real scenario of being involved in a war. People who are major stake holders in this war should be prepared.. for example:
What should I do, immediately, in a situation like Bomb Blast or cross fire?
how can I help authorities as a civilian?
I want to know which acts of mine can possibly increase chaos, that I should avoid?
What sort of emergency Aid Skills I must learn in order to be able to helpful in such a situation?
and thats not it.. We owe you(media) a lot more than this to tell us. Instead of just telling us the increasing number of casualties whenever something happens.
Rest we have to do ourselves. No one can help us.. Allah helps those who help themselves and He is not on Terrorists’ side for sure.
These followers of shaitan will see their end very soon.I guess they are the most hated living being on this earth.
We are the people of Pakistan,We know how to defend our country.We should have complete faith in our security services, they are there to protect the public, frankly yes we will take hits from the Taliban but this is the high time for Pakistan to remove this taliban threat forever and when the dust settles we Pakistani’s will be victorious.
You reap what you sow. We sowed militants instead of scholars, we reap violence instead of progression. What unethical investments our governments prioritized.
Baitullah Mehsud was an asset before the Lal Masjid fiasco and considered ‘good’ Taliban by the Pakistani army.
He is just one militant out of thousands who have a story of Pakistan State support and investment since the 80s.
Can the Pakistan government seriously provide for the people now after decades of unethical incompetency?
Do you expect the people of Pakistan to change after gifting their next generation a horrible system which lacks values?
Can they eradicate corruption, poverty, militancy, extremist ideology and improve in education, health-care, security (including law & order) and infrastructure?
How about ONLY eradicating extremist ideology (Wahabification and religious intolerance) and militancy (guns, political & religious groups,etc?) and providing such security that when you hear about a Dacoit, you are shocked instead of acting like its the Norm?
Yeah…me too…
Inshalah Taliban will be defeated …….talibans are not humans they re animals ..i wish pakistan army shoot them on sight and the commanders should be caught and given tortures by cutting their arms and legs ……they have spoiled the name of islam , killing muslims ..Allah will never help taliban ……….God bless pakistan and its army ….
Thank you for initiating the discussion.
I think ‘terrorism in the name of religion’ is deep rooted across Pakistan. While State may have the capacity to deal with these terrorists, but unfortunately, due to multiple reasons, general public still has sympathies for them. And until public sentiment changes, State will not be able to complete the job.
What should the authorities do? Educate the public, media (print and electronic) has a huge responsibility here.
Finally, is it too much to ask from PML-N to join Federal Government for unity sake and categorically condemn these barbaric acts?
Illiterate, anti social, evil and unwnted Taleban now know that they dont have an escape. Pakistanis hate them, their ideas and ideals. They have earned the hatred and wrath of the nation.
No one will leve ny city, rather Taleban will have to leave this world now, we all support our full military offensive!
My sympathies for the bomb blasts in Lahore and Northwest. These are sad, however they should be expected as the side effects of the rightful army actions against Taliban.
Pakistan is on the right path tackling terrorism.
So be it.
Forgiving or punishing
the terrorists is left to God.
But, fixing their appointment
with God is our responsibility
So lets fix these appointments,
Anybody who threatens our PAKISTAN
Who are those talibans they are the authorities themself, This is a play of rat and mouse to show the west and gain money for them.
65 years of deprivation of NWFP, Baluchistan and South Punjab has to show colours now. Pakistan was build for few elite and rest of the nation is a sheep herd to follow.
The movement has started and this will change the face of pakistan for betterment of the people of Pakistan who suffered in the name of Islam for 65 years.
The Taliban openly said that they attacked on 15 Building in Lahore. Today they attacked Peshawar. They openly said that they are enemies of Pakistan. So the writers who are writing in favor of Taliban should also write clearly that they are also enemies of Pakistan or they are taking money from Taliban to write in their favor.
It is the duty of all Pakistani to defend Pakistan. We will not leave our cities. We will fight against Taliban. Peoples of Peshawar, Karachi, Islamabad, Rawalpindi and Multan know very well how to defend our cities. All of us very well know who the friends of Taliban are. They will not be able to escape. Every Pakistani should keep enough balance in his mobile phone and should tell about the doubtful activities of the peoples like Taliban in their neighbors to 15 and other law enforcing agencies at once as the peoples of Peshawer and Lahore done. We are all with our democratic govt. and Pakistan Army to fight against Taliban.We are all United Inshallah agaist the enemies of Pakistan.
The terrorist act of the Taliban trageting Lahore, is like that of a drowning man clutching at straws. The nation is united behind the army in the effort to eliminate them once and for all. The writing is on the wall and the taliban know it.
as an outsider, one thing seems to be clear. The areas of Pakistan that share a lot of cultural heritage with India (like punjab and Sindh) comprise of people who are cosmopolitan in nature. I cannot imagine these women wearing a burqa and being subservient. Their country cousins (NWFP, tribal areas and others) do not have this tradition and may well be comfortable with Sharia/fundamentalist islam. Pakistan could try experimenting with different states building their own system of personal law. Thus, backward provinces could go with an overtly sharia based system and cosmopolitan states can have a more secular system in place.
I would request to operation commander kill them all. I support my army action all the way root them out from our Pakistan forever.
The sad thing is that most of the Pakistanis know who the religious fanatics and Talibans are in their neighborhood, and choose to do nothing about it, as so far the Police and the Government has been in cahout with them.
Now that the fire is spreading, they have to stand up and defend their cities or simply add to the numbers of dead.
Pakistan has been playing a double game with the US by secretly supporting the Talibans to extort money from the West…its time for payback !!!
I have no sympathies with Swatis and the rest of Pakistanis…they asked for it !!!