Terrorists inflict record year of bloodshed in Pakistan
Pakistan suffered its worst year of terrorist violence in 2009, with more than 3,000 people killed as an al-Qaeda-inspired insurgency targeted civilians and destabilized the country.
A tally compiled by the Pak Institute for Peace Studies, a research organization based in Islamabad, found that 3,021 people were killed and 7,334 injured in terrorist attacks in 2009. There were 87 suicide bombings amid 2,586 terrorist strikes, a 45-per-cent rise in attacks over the previous year. Saeed Shah reports from Islamabad
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It's a deadlier spot than Afghanistan
Those killed and injured in militancy-related violence, including the extremists, numbered 25,447 in Pakistan, eclipsing the 8,812 such casualties in Afghanistan, according to the report. While the terrorist assault on Pakistan did feel, at times, as if the country was drowning in blood, it was still dwarfed by the nightmare that Iraq passed through, where, at the height of the violence there, four years ago, some 3,000 Iraqi civilians were dying each month.
Civilians make the easiest targets
"The most important trend to emerge was attacks on soft targets," said Abdul Basit, a researcher at PIPS. "The distinction between combatants and non-combatants is gradually disappearing." Pakistani extremists had been careful to limit their targets to the police and military. But toward the end of 2009, purely civilian sites were also hit. Islamabad's International Islamic University and markets in the cities of Lahore and Peshawar saw bombings that horrified the nation.
Expansion of the insurrection
While Pakistan has been plagued by militant violence for decades, the current extremist campaign started in summer 2007, after the military stormed the Red Mosque in Islamabad, a radical stronghold, killing around 100 people holed up inside, an event that al-Qaeda seized upon to call for an Islamist rebellion in the country. That insurrection led to the formation of a Pakistani Taliban movement, which fought not in Afghanistan but at home and which linked up with older militant groups across the country.
Public anger allows forceful response
Pakistani forces struck back in the first concerted military response to Islamic fundamentalists since the country sided with the U.S. after the 9/11 attacks, killing 7,945 extremists according to the report. In 2009, after Pakistani Taliban brutally took over the Swat valley in the northwest, public opinion for the first time turned resolutely against the extremists' claim that they were fighting for Islam. That allowed Pakistani forces to launch operations in Swat, and also later in South Waziristan, on the Afghan border.
U.S. drones: Violation of sovereignty?
U.S. forces also intervened against Pakistani-based extremists, with at least 51 missile strikes from unmanned American drone aircraft over Pakistan's tribal area. The strikes are highly controversial inside Pakistan, where the government complains that they breach the country's sovereignty. The PIPS study says the drones killed 667 people and injured 310.
The next fights grow clearer
Washington is pressing Pakistan to send its forces into North Waziristan, a refuge for al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters and the Haqqani network, which are menacing Afghanistan. Islamabad pleads that it cannot open too many fronts simultaneously, with ongoing commitments in Swat, South Waziristan, other parts of the tribal area, as well as needing to guard its eastern border against traditional enemy India. Others allege that there is still a lack of willingness to take on some of the Islamists. In the past, the Pakistani army was close to certain extremist groups, including outfits like the Haqqani network. There is evidence that the Pakistani Taliban have moved from their South Waziristan base to North Waziristan, which may force the hand of the Pakistani military to go into North Waziristan.
A tally compiled by the Pak Institute for Peace Studies, a research organization based in Islamabad, found that 3,021 people were killed and 7,334 injured in terrorist attacks in 2009. There were 87 suicide bombings amid 2,586 terrorist strikes, a 45-per-cent rise in attacks over the previous year. Saeed Shah reports from Islamabad
***
It's a deadlier spot than Afghanistan
Those killed and injured in militancy-related violence, including the extremists, numbered 25,447 in Pakistan, eclipsing the 8,812 such casualties in Afghanistan, according to the report. While the terrorist assault on Pakistan did feel, at times, as if the country was drowning in blood, it was still dwarfed by the nightmare that Iraq passed through, where, at the height of the violence there, four years ago, some 3,000 Iraqi civilians were dying each month.
Civilians make the easiest targets
"The most important trend to emerge was attacks on soft targets," said Abdul Basit, a researcher at PIPS. "The distinction between combatants and non-combatants is gradually disappearing." Pakistani extremists had been careful to limit their targets to the police and military. But toward the end of 2009, purely civilian sites were also hit. Islamabad's International Islamic University and markets in the cities of Lahore and Peshawar saw bombings that horrified the nation.
Expansion of the insurrection
While Pakistan has been plagued by militant violence for decades, the current extremist campaign started in summer 2007, after the military stormed the Red Mosque in Islamabad, a radical stronghold, killing around 100 people holed up inside, an event that al-Qaeda seized upon to call for an Islamist rebellion in the country. That insurrection led to the formation of a Pakistani Taliban movement, which fought not in Afghanistan but at home and which linked up with older militant groups across the country.
Public anger allows forceful response
Pakistani forces struck back in the first concerted military response to Islamic fundamentalists since the country sided with the U.S. after the 9/11 attacks, killing 7,945 extremists according to the report. In 2009, after Pakistani Taliban brutally took over the Swat valley in the northwest, public opinion for the first time turned resolutely against the extremists' claim that they were fighting for Islam. That allowed Pakistani forces to launch operations in Swat, and also later in South Waziristan, on the Afghan border.
U.S. drones: Violation of sovereignty?
U.S. forces also intervened against Pakistani-based extremists, with at least 51 missile strikes from unmanned American drone aircraft over Pakistan's tribal area. The strikes are highly controversial inside Pakistan, where the government complains that they breach the country's sovereignty. The PIPS study says the drones killed 667 people and injured 310.
The next fights grow clearer
Washington is pressing Pakistan to send its forces into North Waziristan, a refuge for al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters and the Haqqani network, which are menacing Afghanistan. Islamabad pleads that it cannot open too many fronts simultaneously, with ongoing commitments in Swat, South Waziristan, other parts of the tribal area, as well as needing to guard its eastern border against traditional enemy India. Others allege that there is still a lack of willingness to take on some of the Islamists. In the past, the Pakistani army was close to certain extremist groups, including outfits like the Haqqani network. There is evidence that the Pakistani Taliban have moved from their South Waziristan base to North Waziristan, which may force the hand of the Pakistani military to go into North Waziristan.
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