Mustafa Qadri

Pakistan must reverse its policy of sitting idle as Islamists blur the line between legitimate civil society and militancy

Mustafa Qadri,
guardian.co.uk, Friday 2 July 2010 16.04 BST

After last night’s bombings in Lahore, an ancient sanctuary, which for centuries was a place for prayer and meditation, has been rudely introduced to Pakistan’s very modern conflict. Nothing short of a shift in national culture will rescue the soul of Pakistan’s Islamic traditions.

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Negotiating with the Taliban is too little, too late – western allies need to fix the socioeconomic mess started long before 9/11

Mustafa Qadri
guardian.co.uk, Monday 8 February 2010 08.00 GMT

Memory spans are short in modern politics, but even by those standards the relative ease with which the discourse on Afghanistan has shifted from fighting the Taliban to negotiating with them is remarkable.

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Getting out of Afghanistan won’t be cheap. Mustafa Qadri takes a look at the West’s new hope for a solution to its Afghanistan problem

After much anticipation, Western leaders have finally put some meat on their previously bare-bones proposals for stabilising Afghanistan over the next few years. The short story is that President Obama is sticking to the plan he outlined in his speech at West Point last year, whereby he intends to hand responsibility for the country’s governance and security back to the Afghan authorities over a five-year period starting from 2011.

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Barack Obama’s surge in Afghanistan worries Pakistan – when the US leaves, it will still have to deal with the Taliban

Mustafa Qadri
guardian.co.uk, Friday 11 December 2009 16:00 GMT

There is more to President Obama’s policy shift in central Asia than more boots in Afghanistan. For Pakistan it represents an escalation of US drone strikes in the tribal areas and continued pressure on its army to immediately engage the Taliban and al-Qaida despite the practical complexities of the task.

The fundamental problem for Pakistan is that Obama’s acceleration of the war against the Taliban has been calculated largely on the basis of domestic US political demands and not those of the region, let alone Pakistan. Already under intense pressure at home from the financial crisis and the unpopularity of the US presence in Afghanistan, Obama must deliver some semblance of victory before he bids for a second term as commander-in-chief in 2012.

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A troop surge AND a withdrawal by July 2011? Despite the fuss, Obama’s Afghanistan speech marks very little in the way of new policy, writes Mustafa Qadri

“Unlike Vietnam, we are not facing a broad-based popular insurgency.” Those were President Obama’s confident words as he announced a major US troop surge into Afghanistan earlier this week.

The US may have entered Afghanistan to clean out what was believed to be the key haven for the international terrorist network known as al Qaeda. But in the intervening eight years, America’s main opponents in the deserts and towns of Afghanistan have been the young men of rural Kandahar, Uruzgan, Helmand and so many other areas fighting not for global jihad but for independence from foreign interference. There are key differences between the war in Afghanistan and that in Vietnam — but a lack of a broad-based popular insurgency is not one of them.

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All Eyes On Iran

The fallout from its controversial presidential election has left Iran in a similar position to that faced by Iraq in the lead-up to the US-led invasion, writes Mustafa Qadri

At no point in recent memory has the Islamic Republic of Iran dominated headlines as it has these past four weeks. Virtually all Western governments and mainstream commentators have rushed to condemn the Iranian Government’s violent crackdown on opposition protesters.

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US President Obama recently spoke to Dawn News in Washington. It’s something of a coup for Pakistani journalism given that such opportunities are few and far between. Still it’s a fairly sycophantic thing and hence quite disappointing. For instance, there are no hard questions on the around 800 Pakistanis killed by US drone strikes in [...]

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A 10,000-strong dedicated army unit reportedly guards the nuclear weapons sites, which are dispersed throughout secure parts of Pakistan. And although political instability has plagued the country for decades, the military has been its steely backbone.

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The following report for The Guardian, published today, looks at the recent meetings between the Presidents of the United States, Afghanistan and Pakistan in Washington D.C. and the risks to civilians caught up in the war with the Taliban:

‘Collateral damage’ in AfPak hurts the US too

The bombardment of civilians in Afghanistan undermines the security credentials of western forces in the region

o Mustafa Qadri
o guardian.co.uk, Friday 8 May 2009 16.30 BST

The timing may have been a disaster for Washington, but for villagers in Afghanistan’s south it was far worse. A day after a US bombing killed up to 120 civilians in Afghanistan’s southern Farah province, President Obama asked the visiting presidents of Afghanistan and Pakistan, Hamid Karzai and Asif Ali Zardari, to step up their attacks on Taliban and al-Qaida militants.

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It appears the Pentagon is opposed to too much oversight of civilian aid to Pakistan, including a provision in a proposed bill that would prevent aid in the event of a military coup: After promising last month that U.S. aid to Pakistan would no longer be a “blank check,” the Obama administration is attempting to [...]

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My analysis of the Obama Administration’s new AfPak policy for the Common Grounds News Service was published today:

Obama’s new “AfPak” strategy – the view from Pakistan
by Mustafa Qadri

30 April 2009

Karachi, Pakistan – People with a hammer only see nails. This well-worn maxim aptly describes the United States’ relationship with Afghanistan and Pakistan over the past several decades. As early as 1954, the United States identified the country as a bulwark against regional encroachment by the Soviet Union when Pakistan received its first substantial tranche of American military and economic aid.

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My assessment of the Obama Administration’s newly announced AfPak policy was published in The Guardian today:

Obama’s charm offensive

Is Barack Obama’s change of strategy – switching focus from Iraq to Afghanistan – a real break with the past?

It was easy to be cynical listening to Barack Obama speak about the “new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan” last Friday. Apart from a vast improvement in elocution, at first glance it was difficult to distinguish his rhetoric from that of his predecessor, George Bush.

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Mr Sharif, a possible future prime minister, was sharply critical of US policy in Pakistan saying former US president George W. Bush had helped promote terrorism by backing military ruler General Pervez Musharraf. He said Mr Bush was against Pakistan’s return to democracy and deaf to advice. Interesting to see how his views are now [...]

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THE Obama administration’s $500 billion or more proposal to deal with America’s ailing banks has been described by some in the financial markets as a win-win-win proposal. Actually, it is a win-win-lose proposal: the banks win, investors win — and taxpayers lose.

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Here is my analysis of the Obama Administration’s new ‘AfPak’ policy for newmatilda.com:

Not All Terrorists Are The Same

Obama’s new strategy in Afghanistan and Pakistan is much more nuanced than Bush’s “war on terror”, writes Mustafa Qadri. As a starting point, it recognises that al Qaeda and the Taliban are distinct groups

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There’s nothing new in Barack Obama’s foreign policy – but the way it is knitted together offers hope… See also TIME magazine’s appraisal: Did George Bush leave one of his old speeches in the Resolute Desk? As President Obama unveiled his Afghanistan-Pakistan policy Friday, it was hard to miss the echoes of his predecessor’s “surge” [...]

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Here is my report on Australia’s military presence in Afghanistan and Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s visit to the United States this week, published in NewMatilda.com today:

Don’t Mention The War

They managed to avoid the sticky subject of a troop increase. However, despite growing opposition back home, Rudd has backed the Obama Administration’s questionable strategy in Afghanistan.

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The founder of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolition (ICAHD) has given up on any solution coming from within Israel.

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President Obama and his national security advisers are considering expanding the American covert war in Pakistan far beyond the unruly tribal areas to strike at a different center of Taliban power in Baluchistan, where top Taliban leaders are orchestrating attacks into southern Afghanistan.

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…if Barack Obama can’t stand up to the likes of Marty Peretz, Jonathan Chait, Steve Rosen, and other snarky critics, and if the White House can’t defend a critical intelligence pick when that person is savaged by Republican sharks smelling blood in the water, then how can we expect Obama to stand up to Bibi [...]

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A Gallup poll last month showed that 62 percent of Americans support either an investigation or prosecution of Bush administration officials for torture. Sources familiar with the administration’s thinking say Obama’s team has thoroughly thought through the concept of a torture investigation. President Obama, however, has remained cool to the notion in his public statements.

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The failures of this government and its inability to defend the country’s interests or its population from drones or terrorist attacks are paving the way for the return of the army to power as a way of avoiding a serious split within its own ranks. All that is awaited is a green light from the [...]

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My first piece in a series on Iran was posted on NewMatilda.com today:

What did Iran ever to do to us?

In the first of a series of articles leading up to the Iranian presidential elections in June, Mustafa Qadri looks at how Iran became the pariah of the West…

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With two missile strikes over the past week, the Obama administration has expanded the covert war run by the Central Intelligence Agency inside Pakistan, attacking a militant network seeking to topple the Pakistani government.

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Soviet veterans marking 20 years since their defeat in Afghanistan warned the United States it would never truly control the country, citing bitter memories of a fiercely proud people and unforgiving landscape.

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And I gave an example of the fact that USAID had built forty-one courthouses at a cost of over $200 million, and the day the US ambassador went to the minister of justice to sort of hand over these courthouses, the minister of justice knew nothing about it and said, “Well, that’s very nice, that’s [...]

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My latest article, on US policy towards Afghanistan and Pakistan under President Obama, was published in NewMatilda.com today:

From War on Terror to Plain Old War

Early signs suggest an escalation of the Bush administration’s policies on Afghanistan and Pakistan under the new President, writes Mustafa Qadri

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…was to Al Arabiya. You can read a transcript of it here. As has been his want in a still very young political career the rhetoric is top notch. But material changes from previous US Mid-East policies are yet to be seen.

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“I want to caution my Indian friends: Be wary of your wishes, as they might come true,” Saeed said. “Because the diplomatic cornering of Pakistan, by way of sanctions, by way of coercive diplomacy . . . is going to [create] a tremendous reaction in Pakistan. Any government cooperation with the United States will be [...]

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Remotely piloted Predator drones operated by the Central Intelligence Agency have carried out 28 missile attacks in Fata since last summer, killing at least 132 people. The NYT, quoting Pakistani officials, reported that as many as 100 of them were civilians.

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“The President’s actions send a strong message about his leadership and his desire to support causes that will promote peace and dignity, equality for women and girls and economic development in the poorest regions of the world,” said Thoraya Ahmed Obaid, UNFPA Executive Director.

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Two remote U.S. missile strikes that killed at least 20 people at suspected terrorist hideouts in northwestern Pakistan yesterday offered the first tangible sign of President Obama’s commitment to sustained military pressure on the terrorist groups there, even though Pakistanis broadly oppose such unilateral U.S. actions.

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U.S. President Barack Obama has taken the Middle East by surprise with the speed of his diplomacy but his first statement on the conflict between Arabs and Israelis was strikingly similar to old U.S. policies.

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The official, who was not named by local media, said two Iranian AIDS specialists, whose arrests last year sparked concern in the West, are part of a group of four “ringleaders” who were recently convicted of involvement in an alleged U.S.-funded plot to overthrow the Islamic government. Dozens of others have been arrested and interrogated, [...]

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“These techniques worked,” Hayden said of the agency’s interrogation program during a farewell session with reporters who cover the CIA. “One needs to be very careful” about eliminating CIA authorities, he said, because “if you create barriers to doing things . . . there’s no wink, no nod, no secret handshake. We won’t do it.”

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Will Obama be more hardnosed with the Israelis? I doubt it. Why would he? You’re not supposed to say out loud that there’s a big rich Israeli lobby, but everybody knows there is. And more to the point, what’s their counterweight? Who cares about the Palestinians, even in the Arab world, never mind DC? So [...]

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Barack Obama yesterday appeared to line up behind the Bush administration in support of Israel’s attack on Gaza.

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Fifty percent of Israelis and 59% of the Palestinians said they believed that American policy toward the conflict would not change after Obama took office. (Thanks Antony)

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One leading economist, one of the few economists who has been right all along in predicting what’s happening, Dean Baker, pointed out that selecting them is like selecting Osama Bin Laden to run the war on terror.

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Romer, 49, also fits an emerging pattern of decidedly centrist economic appointments – despite promises of an enormous fiscal stimulus that could match October’s jaw-dropping $700 billion bank rescue – that has disappointed many liberals but is winning rave reviews on Wall Street and in academia. Many Republicans are thrilled.

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Although the pact has experienced pockets of resistance, many Iraqis say the victory of US President-elect Barack Obama was a factor because of his promise to withdraw troops within 16 months of taking office.

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“What was so unique about the Obama campaign [was] that interactivity was real. When people commented on something, they saw things happen. That’s what the people are expecting the president to do now.”

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“For us, the change of America’s president — we don’t have any good faith in him,” said Muslim Khan, a grizzled Taliban spokesman…

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“That means bringing in the neighbouring countries: Iran, India, and the five Central Asian states, and then resolving some of these regional problems — like the disputes between India and Pakistan, between Iran and the Americans, between Afghanistan and Pakistan.”

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The following piece, on the Bush Administration’s policy of unilateral strikes on suspected militant hideouts, appears in today’s NewMatilda.com: Not So Covert Operations By Mustafa Qadri In its last days in office, the Bush Administration is hurriedly escalating the so-called war on terrorism, writes Mustafa Qadri The election last week of Barack Obama as President [...]

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If he goes to the White House, he’ll be going to serve the president – but Israel will have a friend in the White House…

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Lost in the attention given to Obama’s Internet surge is that only a quarter of the $600 million he has raised has come from donors who made contributions of $200 or less, according to a review of his FEC reports. You have to wonder what kind of change is possible when so many of the [...]

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Courtesy of the excellent Tofu Notes: So you can talk about the smell of urine and the kids rummaging through rubbish which has been dumped by the roadside. You can see rusted tin roofs, narrow muddy alleys, streams containing human waste, and kids with grubby clothes and bare feet. But if you do see those [...]

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The English-language press is obssessed with the Obama-McCain presidential race. So much so that they’ve almost entirely failed to report on their policies. It was interesting to note in the first debate between the two candidates that McCain was actually less hawkish than Obama on US policy towards Pakistan: “If the United States has Al [...]

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“A tale of two impeachments” Guardian – Comment is Free 8 August 2008
(A comparison of the impeachment proceedings against Pakistan’s President Musharraf and US President George Bush)

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“One wall Obama won’t be breaching” NewMatilda.com 29 July 2008
(On Barack Obama’s speech in Berlin, Germany and his omission of Israel’s separation wall in the West Bank)

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