Mustafa Qadri

In the Pakistani army’s offensive against the Taliban in South Waziristan, the line between victims and villains remains unclear

Mustafa Qadri
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 20 October 2009 16.30 BST

The Pakistan army’s invasion of the Taliban stronghold of South Waziristan this week brings few surprises. For years observers in Washington and Brussels have been pressing for an assault on this scale. The army says its aims in Operation Rah-e-Nijat (“Road out of Misery”) are to finally eliminate the main sanctuary for the Taliban and al-Qaida in Pakistan and, according to army chief Ashfaq Pervez Kayani, the foreign and local “elements” that given them succour.

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Pakistan’s divided Taliban

Despite internal divisions and a bloody army crackdown, the Pakistani Taliban are a long way from being defeated

o Mustafa Qadri
o guardian.co.uk, Friday 26 June 2009 16.00 BST
o Article history

Baitullah Mehsud, the Taliban warlord from Pakistan’s South Waziristan tribal agency, often described as Emir Baitullah, is widely seen as the movement’s leader in the country. For at least the past two years, Pakistani authorities have sought to attribute most of the terrorism that occurs in this troubled nation to him. According to the North West Frontier Province governor Owais Ahmed Ghani, Baitullah is “the root cause of all the evil”.

Perhaps that is why he was targeted in what was probably the latest and deadliest US drone attack in Pakistan. While the strike failed to kill Mehsud, it did leave the charred remains of anywhere between 40 and 100 people scattered amid the wreckage of a South Waziristan mosque. This has become a dirty war, and neither insurgents nor counterinsurgents have hesitated to attack places of worship.

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