OPEN MOUTH; INSERT LARGE ARMY BOOT

[michelle]

Army's Chief Liaison to Pakistan Is Pulled From Assignment
By Ann Scott Tyson and Julie Tate
The Washington Post

Saturday 10 May 2008

The Army officer named in March as the military's chief liaison to Pakistan has been pulled from that assignment partly because of controversy in that country over his past command of the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a U.S. military official confirmed yesterday.

Maj. Gen. Jay W. Hood is in line for "a position of greater responsibility" at the headquarters of U.S. Central Command, which oversees the Middle East and Central Asia, the officials said yesterday, confirming an account that first appeared in yesterday's editions of the New York Times.

Hood's initial selection, meant to boost cooperation on counterterrorism issues, drew quick criticism from Pakistani politicians and news organizations.

"It is a slap on the face of Pakistan and its 160 million people," Fazlur Rahman, a Pakistani religious party leader, said on a television show in March. Rahman called Hood "a notorious person, who besides insulting and inflicting mental torture on Muslims, six times, confirmedly desecrated ... the Holy Koran."

Last week, the News, a newspaper in Pakistan, called the appointment "unfortunate" and asked, "What is the message coming out of the Pentagon for Pakistanis by this insensitive act?"

A U.S. military spokesman said Hood's shift stemmed from unexpected job openings at Central Command in Tampa. "The detailing of military people is a very dynamic situation," said Navy Capt. James Graybeal, a Central Command spokesman. "There were unforeseen vacancies that developed here at Centcom headquarters of greater responsibility that he is being considered for." Graybeal could not specify those positions.

But another military official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the subject's sensitivity, said Pakistani opposition "certainly has to be part of the calculus," adding: "You'd have to be crazy not to read the Pakistan media" and understand the Pakistani sentiment against the appointment.

Still, the official emphasized that the Pakistani government did not have a say in the appointment. "This is a U.S. decision," the official said, "so it should not be characterized as 'the Pakistan government vetoed this' - they don't have that authority."

Hood, a field artillery officer and 33-year Army veteran with a master's degree in national security from the Naval War College, until last month commanded First Army Division East at Fort Meade.

The controversy around Hood stems from his time as the commander of Joint Task Force Guantanamo, under U.S. Southern Command, from March 2004 to March 2006.

Hood's tenure involved the inception of the restraint chair for Guantanamo detainees on hunger strikes. Detainees were strapped to chairs and force-fed nutrients through thick nasal tubes.

Hood was also the commander when a scandal erupted over mishandling of the Koran in the summer of 2005. After Newsweek reported that a Koran had been flushed down a toilet, at least 16 people were killed in protest riots around the world.

Newsweek later retracted the story, but a Pentagon probe examined 13 specific allegations of Koran desecration at the prison dating to early 2002 and found three in which the mishandling was "very likely" deliberate.

Two others were "very likely" accidental, and eight were unfounded, Hood said.

During Hood's tenure, 167 detainees were transferred out of the facility. In February 2006, the United Nations concluded that the treatment of detainees at Guantanamo Bay violated their rights to physical and mental health and, in some cases, constituted torture. It particularly criticized the force-feeding.

Source: www.truthout.org/docs_2006/051008Z.shtml

[michelle]

US to triple aid to Pakistan

OMG! Is this for real?! Past monies for development [economic aid] from the US were squandered and now more is to follow. Along with 1.5 billion annually for five years, there's stipulations, of course, for military aid. I know many from Pakistan are pleased to receive cash from the US, but considering past monies given, little or none of it will reach humanitarian assistance. For more on that, see:
The U.S. gives Musharraf's government about $200 million annually and his military $100 million monthly in the form of direct cash transfers.
tinyurl.com/6np6xm

And I'm sorry, but as a US citizen in a land where my countrymen and women are without homes, jobs, access to health care, and crumbling infrastructures, I don't like it one bit....Michelle

US to triple aid to Pakistan
Big News Network.com Wednesday 16th July, 2008

US non-military aid to Pakistan could be tripled to $7.5 billion over five years if the US Congress clears a bill.

Joseph Robinette Biden, chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, introduced the bill on Tuesday, proposing US$1.5 billion annually for five years for developmental activities like building schools, roads and health clinics.

The bill, if passed, will also advocate an additional $7.5 billion over the subsequent five years.

Biden said the bill was meant to demonstrate that the US was not a fair-weather ally but an all-weather friend of Pakistan.

At the same time, the bill will put conditions on future military aid to ensure Pakistani military forces don’t interfere with the political or judicial process of Pakistan.

The bill will also state Pakistan must make concerted efforts to prevent terrorists from operating inside the country, and to prevent the Taliban from using its territory.

The military aid conditions incorporate long-standing US demands for increased Pakistani cooperation against Al Qaeda and the Taliban.

Source:
feeds.bignewsnetwork.com/index.php?sid=382836

[michelle]

US accused of backing terrorism in Pakistan
Indo-Asian News Service
Islamabad, August 05, 2008
First Published: 14:12 IST(5/8/2008)
Last Updated: 15:47 IST(5/8/2008)

Pakistan has accused the US of backing militancy within the country, saying this goes against the grain of the Washington-led global war against terror.

Quoting "impeccable official sources", The News reported on Tuesday that "strong evidence and circumstantial evidence of American acquiescence to terrorism inside Pakistan" was outlined by President Pervez Musharraf, army chief General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani and Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) chief Lt. Gen. Nadeem Taj in separate meetings with two senior US officials in Islamabad on July 12.

The visit of the Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Michael Mullen and CIA Deputy Director Stephen R. Kappes, "carrying what were seen as India-influenced intelligence inputs had hardened the resolve of Pakistan's security establishment to keep supreme Pakistan's national security interest even if it meant straining ties with the US and NATO", the newspaper said.

It quoted a senior official with direct knowledge of the meetings as saying that Pakistan's military leadership and the president asked the American visitors "not to distinguish between a terrorist for the United States and Afghanistan and a terrorist for Pakistan".

"For reasons best known to Langley, the CIA headquarters, as well as the Pentagon, Pakistani officials say the Americans were not interested in disrupting the Kabul-based fountainhead of terrorism in Balochistan nor do they want to allocate the marvellous Predator (unmanned armed aerial combat vehicle) resource to neutralise the kingpin of suicide bombings against the Pakistani military establishment now hiding near the Pakistan-Afghan border," The News said.

During the meetings, the US officials were also asked why the CIA-run Predators and the US military did not swing into action when they were provided the exact location of tribal leader Baitullah Mehsud, "Pakistan's enemy number one and the mastermind of almost every suicide operation against the Pakistan Army and the ISI since June 2006", the newspaper added.

One such precise piece of information was made available to the CIA May 24 when Mehsud drove to a remote South Waziristan mountain post in his Toyota Land Cruiser to address the media and returned to his safe abode.

"The United States military has the capacity to direct a missile to a precise location at very short notice as it has done close to 20 times in the last few years to hit Al Qaeda targets inside Pakistan," The News noted.

Pakistani officials, according to the newspaper, "have long been intrigued by the presence of highly encrypted communications gear with Mehsud. This communication gear enables him to collect real-time information on Pakistani troop movements from an unidentified foreign source without being intercepted by Pakistani intelligence".

Mullen and the CIA official were in Pakistan on an unannounced visit July 12 to present what the US media claimed was evidence of the ISI's ties with Taliban commander Maulana Sirajuddin Haqqani and the alleged involvement of Pakistani agents in the bombing of the Indian embassy in Kabul.

"Pakistani military leaders rubbished the American information and evidence on the Kabul bombing but provided some rationale for keeping a window open with Haqqani, just as the British government had decided to open talks with some Taliban leaders in southern Afghanistan last year," The News said.

Source: www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/StoryPage.aspx?sectionName=&id=95c61181-205b-4c33-8c29-01d3161e8786&
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US weighs stepped-up military forays into Pakistan
By PAMELA HESS and MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writers
Fri Aug 8, 1:17 PM ET

WASHINGTON - Top Bush administration officials are pressing the president to direct U.S. troops in Afghanistan to be more aggressive in pursuing militants into Pakistan on foot as part of a proposed radical shift in regional counterterrorism strategy, The Associated Press has learned.

Senior intelligence and military aides want President Bush to give American soldiers greater flexibility to operate against al-Qaida and Taliban fighters who cross the border from Pakistan's lawless tribal border area to conduct attacks inside Afghanistan, officials say.

The plan could include sending U.S. special forces teams, temporarily assigned to the CIA, into the tribal areas to hit high-value targets, according to an intelligence official with direct knowledge of the plan.

Such a move would be controversial, in part because of Pakistani opposition to U.S. incursions into its territory, and the proposal is not universally supported in Washington. It comes amid growing political instability in Pakistan and concerns that elements of Pakistan's security forces are collaborating with extremists.

Senior members of Bush's national security team met last week at the White House to discuss the recommendations and are now weighing how to proceed, the officials said.

The top agenda item at the meeting of the so-called deputies committee — usually the No. 2 officials at the departments of Defense, and State, plus the intelligence agencies and the National Security Council — was to "review and potentially revise cross-border strategy," a person familiar with the session told the AP.

"What the deputies committee has raised is, given the possibility that political fragmentation in Pakistan is going to continue, do we need to change our strategy?" the official said. He and other current and former officials spoke on condition of anonymity because sensitive foreign policy matters are in play.

The deputies committee is two levels down from the president, so its recommendations would not immediately affect policy.

White House spokesman Tony Fratto declined to comment.

Pakistan's army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas and Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammed Sadiq also refused to comment.

The current strategy — relying on Pakistan to keep a lid on the tribal areas along the border with Afghanistan — was meant to support Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, a strong ally of the U.S. who took control of Pakistan in 1999 in a bloodless coup. Musharraf was sidelined this spring when a coalition government trounced Musharraf's allies in parliamentary elections. He remains president but with vastly diminished influence.

Pakistan's governing coalition announced Thursday it will seek to impeach Musharraf, cranking up pressure on the U.S.-backed former general to resign.

In Washington, the State Department and some Pentagon officials are leery of the new proposal, warning of repercussions from the Pakistani government, which they fear could be further destabilized, while some officials in the CIA are pushing the plan.

Officials closer to the front lines in Afghanistan also are pushing for a newly aggressive stance. The rules currently limiting U.S. incursions into Pakistan when in hot pursuit of enemy fighters or targets would not be stretched under the plan. But U.S. forces would be encouraged to use that authority liberally.

The Associated Press reported last year that U.S. rules of engagement allowed ground forces to go a little over 6 miles into Pakistan when in hot pursuit, and when forces were targeted or fired on by the enemy. U.S. rules allow aircraft to go 10 miles into Pakistan air space.

Afghanistan's ambassador to the U.S. supports the plan.

"The argument that we may destabilize Pakistan has taken us to where we are right now," Ambassador Said T. Jawad told the AP. "Pursuing the policy of public praise and private pressure on Pakistan doesn't work."

But defense officials say they are cautioning against stepping up military operations in Pakistan without specific approval from Islamabad. They say violating Pakistani sovereignty would anger the Pakistani people and could affect U.S. use of the country as a base from which to resupply U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

Jawad said U.S. and Afghan forces know the location of training camps, places Taliban extremists live and where there have been large gatherings of al-Qaida members, but the current rules of engagement have hampered attacking those targets.

"We need to enhance the capacity of hitting these targets," he said.

The recommendations also call for developing direct relationships with Pashtun tribes on the Pakistani side of the border. That engagement has largely been left to Pakistan's security service, which U.S. officials increasingly fear is riddled with extremists and militant sympathizers.

Pakistan and the United States have somewhat contrary short-term interests in the Federally Administered Tribal Area, a Maryland-sized swath of ungoverned territory bordering Afghanistan.

It is home to about 2 million Pakistanis, representing between 20 and 30 fiercely independent tribes, several with well-armed, militant branches. The region also is increasingly home to al-Qaida terrorists and a growing network of foreign fighters, according to Defense Department officials.

Bowing to U.S. pressure, Musharraf three years ago directed a military crackdown on the tribal area to root out al-Qaida fighters. The tribes resisted the intrusion into their affairs. Prior to 2007 there were around a dozen tribal attacks a year in Pakistan. Last year there were nearly 100, according to U.S. defense officials.

Many tribes have decades-long associations with al-Qaida leaders, dating back to the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan that they fought against. Al-Qaida leaders have intermarried with the tribes and are a source of arms and weapons.

Now, the defense officials said, Pakistani officials are primarily concerned with negotiating an end to the attacks outside the tribal areas. But the U.S. concern is primarily al-Qaida in the tribal areas, and the negotiations are unlikely to affect al-Qaida's increasingly free rein throughout the region.

Source: news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080808/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_pakistan_pursuing_militants_2

[michelle]

Musharraf resigns as Pakistan’s political crisis deepens

Good People of Pakistan, Do You Understand The Game Your Country's In The Middle Of?

The good citizens of Pakistan believe that public sentiment has brought about the impeachment of Musharraf....Yes and no on that. Any impeachment proceedings would have been merely a dog and pony show for the masses, due to international wheeling and dealing for leniency for Musharraf by US, British and Saudi officials as well as the Pakistani army. Impeachment couldn't have happened until the US [CIA/FBI] and the Pak military figured out how to cover their entanglements. Saudi Arabia's intelligence chief dashed to Pakistan for talks with the government over its plans to impeach President Pervez Musharraf. Saudi Arabia, long time allay of the US and Musharraf, threatened to withdraw oil subsidies worth $5 billion a year unless Musharraf was allowed to leave gracefully. So, this wasn't really about what the public wanted.

It's interesting to note that after 9/11, Pakistanis woke up to the reality that Saudi Arabia had been exploiting Pakistan's poverty and lack of a viable public school system by pouring funds into madrassas that taught a particularly rigid, and sometimes, violent form of Islam. Although much had been made of western involvement in Pakistan's internal affairs, until recently, many Pakistani political analysts failed to underscore the effects of Saudi interference. Ideological infiltration of Pakistan society by the Saudis and their involvement in the madrassa system of Pakistan during the 1980s, helped give birth to the Taliban and other pro bin-Laden groups.

Immediately after Sept. 11, 2001, the link between Pakistan's religious education system and international terrorist organizations came under intense scrutiny. Musharraf clearly felt the pressure to be seen as doing something, and in January 2002 he gave a televised speech promising a series of measures to combat extremism by, among other things, bringing all madrasas into the mainstream. Musharraf pledged increased oversight of the religious schools through formal registration, control of their funding and standardization of their curricula. The world welcomed those promises, but few then checked back to see if they were ever fulfilled. Musharraf's promises came to nothing. His military government never implemented any program to register the madrasas, follow their financing or control their curricula. Although there are a few "model madrasas" for Western media consumption, the extremist ones account for perhaps as many as 15 percent of the religious schools in Pakistan and are free to churn out their radicalized graduates.

That Musharraf has not acted against religious extremists and their madrasas is hardly surprising. He needed the religious parties to bolster his military dictatorship against the democratic forces seeking to reverse his 1999 coup.

What a tangled web! The US needs the war on terror, the Saudis fund the extremist schools and Musharraf turns a blind eye to the training of radicals which gave the need to his dictatorship! And that is an example of the game of global terrorism in a nutshell, folks....a game you can only watch if you're lucky enough not to be blown up/shot up/swept up/ into it as an innocent bystander.

Pakistan has been very important to the game. Lucky you.

And as far as your economy goes, well, you've just been too dependent on imports to the US and Britain. So, the Saudis aren't the only ones who could pull the money rug out from under you...not to mention the billions the US gives in military and public aid. I'd say it's time you start pushing your leaders to come up with creative methods to booster economic independance. And how about real education for the masses so you have a strong workforce, free of exploitation, from anyone, inside and out? This is how the US grew to greatness from the public's viewpoint of self empowerment! [Of course, now the government realizes that an educated populace is its greatest enemy!]

As for any future conviction, good luck if you can it. And let's hope and pray for a future leadership who has ties to no one and agendas only for the betterment of its people.

Michelle

Musharraf resigns as Pakistan’s political crisis deepens
By Peter Symonds
19 August 2008

Effectively abandoned by his domestic allies and international backers, Pakistan’s military strongman Pervez Musharraf formally resigned yesterday as the country’s president rather than face impeachment proceedings that were due to commence this week.

Musharraf’s resignation followed more than a week of behind-the-scenes manoeuvres involving US, British and Saudi officials as well as the Pakistani army to pressure the government to grant the former dictator immunity from prosecution. While Musharraf denied that he had been given any favours in return for his resignation, there is little doubt that a deal has been reached to allow him a “dignified exit”.

The writing has been on the wall since Musharraf’s Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) suffered a humiliating defeat in national elections in February at the hands of opposition parties—the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N). Musharraf is widely hated for his nine years of dictatorial rule and support for Washington’s “bogus war on terrorism” that has triggered what amounts to a civil war in Pakistan’s tribal border areas with Afghanistan.

For months, the Bush administration and its allies pressed the PPP-led coalition government to collaborate with Musharraf, which the PPP endeavoured to do. The PML-N and its leader Nawaz Sharif, who was ousted as prime minister by Musharraf in a military coup in 1999, sought to exploit popular opposition by demanding impeachment and the reinstatement of 57 supreme court judges sacked by Musharraf last year. Sharif pulled the PML-N ministers out of the cabinet in May and threatened to leave the coalition completely if agreement could not be reached on these issues.

Confronting a steady loss in support for the government, PPP leader Asif Ali Zardari finally announced plans on August 7 to impeach Musharraf. Opinion polls showed overwhelming popular support—some 75 percent of respondents—for ousting the president, which was reflected yesterday in spontaneous celebrations in the streets of Pakistani cities. While Zardari declared impeachment would commence, no formal charge sheet was presented to parliament, however, allowing time for a deal to be worked out behind the scenes.

Considerable international pressure was bought to bear to end the impasse without initiating impeachment proceedings. While reluctantly recognising that the president had to go, the last thing that Washington wanted was any public airing of Musharraf’s crimes and anti-democratic methods. Any such probe threatened to expose the extent of US involvement with the Pakistani security forces in the suppression of Islamist groups inside Pakistan and war being waged against armed militia in the Afghan-Pakistani border areas supportive of anti-occupation insurgents inside Afghanistan. The CIA and FBI may well be implicated in the hundreds of “disappearances” for which Musharraf and the army are allegedly responsible.

Having relied on Musharraf since the US occupation of Afghanistan in 2001, the Bush administration was also concerned that the fragile Pakistani government would fail to continue to back military operations against Islamist militias in the Federally Administrated Tribal Areas (FATA). After winning the February election in part by branding Musharraf as a US stooge, the coalition government initially proposed to end the fighting by reaching peace deals with the various armed groups—a move that was sharply opposed in Washington.

Senior Bush administration and Pentagon officials have mounted an intense campaign to pressure the Pakistani government into taking military action in the border areas. There is every sign that Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani was issued with an ultimatum during his trip to Washington in July—either take action against anti-US guerrillas, or the US military would. In response, Gilani declared that the US “war on terrorism” was “our war”.

Just one day before impeachment proceedings were announced, the Pakistani military launched a major offensive into Bajaur agency. Intense fighting is now taking place in areas from the Swat district, through the Peshawar districts, to the Bajaur and Kyber agencies. After 12 straight days of air and ground bombardment, it is estimated that up to 300,000 people have fled the border areas. The timing points to a tacit understanding with Washington to initiate extensive military action in return for US backing to remove Musharraf.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was fulsome in her praise of the former Pakistani dictator yesterday. Musharraf, she declared, had been “a friend of the United States and one of the world’s most committed partners in the war against terrorism and extremism”. It was precisely Musharraf’s decision to withdraw Pakistani support from the Taliban regime in Afghanistan and his backing for the ongoing US occupation that was one of the major factors in the collapse of his initial post-coup support.

British and Saudi officials have also been engaged in closed-door talks to secure a deal that would allow Musharraf to resign in return for immunity from prosecution and other assurances. Saudi Arabia’s powerful intelligence chief Prince Muqrin bin Abdul Aziz arrived in Islamabad over the weekend and was reported to have threatened to withdraw oil subsidies worth $5 billion a year unless Musharraf was allowed to leave gracefully.

Likewise the Pakistani military, while publicly insisting that it would stay above politics, nevertheless quietly made clear its opposition to impeachment proceedings—a point underscored yesterday by the decision to give Musharraf a final guard of honour. If Musharraf were to be tried for breaches of the constitution and other crimes, then the army top brass on which he rested during his nine years in power also risked being implicated. As Najam Sethi, editor of Pakistan’s Daily Times, commented to the Guardian: “Nobody wants the Pandora’s box opened up. The issue of impeachment is really a non-starter.”


An unstable government

While Musharraf has now stepped down, the political crisis in Islamabad is certain to intensify. The two major coalition parties—the PPP and PML-N—are longstanding and bitter rivals. As a number of commentators have noted, opposition to Musharraf was the main glue holding their alliance together. Even on the immediate issue of Musharraf’s future, there is no agreement.

PPP officials have hinted that a deal was reached to give legal immunity to the former president as long as he agreed to go into exile. At this stage, spokesmen for Musharraf have indicated that he wants to remain in Pakistan and has plans to take up residence in a villa being constructed outside Islamabad. In his hour-long televised speech yesterday, Musharraf delivered a strident defence of his period in office, insisting that he had done nothing wrong and blaming the government for the deterioration of the country’s economy. The PPP certainly does not want Musharraf within striking distance as opposition grows to its rule.

The PML-N continues to insist, publicly at least, that Musharraf should be charged and prosecuted for his crimes. Last week Sharif told a meeting in Lahore: “How can safe passage be given to someone who has done this to Pakistan?” There are also differences between the two parties over the reinstatement of supreme court judges, in part because PPP leader Zardari fears that the judges may allow the revival of corruption convictions against him.

Another immediate bone of contention will be Musharraf’s replacement as president. He has been formally succeeded by the chairman of the Senate, Mohammed Mian Soomro, a close ally who was prime minister until the election in February. A new president will be elected via country’s electoral college—the national assembly and four provincial assemblies meeting together. Zardari is known to have ambitions to fill the post, but such a move will be forcefully opposed by Sharif. The constitution drawn up by Musharraf gives the president considerable power, such as to sack the government and to make key appointments, including the army commander.

More fundamentally, the government now faces the same dilemmas that confronted Musharraf. It is under intense pressure from Washington to intensify military operations in the border areas with Afghanistan where the army has largely lost control. Gilani faces the prospect of being branded a US puppet and rapidly losing support. Any retreat risks the prospect of unilateral US military action, which would also trigger a popular backlash against the government.

At the same time, the Pakistani economy is being hit by rising oil and food prices as well as weakening demand in the US and Europe for its exports. The annual inflation rate is running at a 30-year high of nearly 25 percent; the Pakistani rupee has fallen 22 percent against the declining US dollar this year; and in the past five weeks, the country’s foreign exchange reserves have dwindled by nearly $US1.1 billion to $10.15 billion, mainly as a result of the cost of imported oil. The trade deficit has ballooned by 53 percent to $20.7 billion for the 2007-08 fiscal year that ended in June. The share market has slumped by 30 percent since April.

Share values and the rupee rose yesterday on news of Musharraf’s resignation, but further political turmoil will rapidly reverse those gains. Rising prices will only fuel social unrest and opposition to the government. While Musharraf’s resignation is being presented in the Pakistani and international media as a step toward democracy in Pakistan, both the PPP and PML-N have a record of autocratic rule. Whatever its final makeup, the regime holding the reins of power in Islamabad will not hesitate to use anti-democratic methods to suppress any political opposition to its policies.

Source:
www.wsws.org/articles/2008/aug2008/mush-a19.shtml