Twin suicide attacks seconds apart targeted the Pakistani military Friday, killing up to 45 people in the second attack to hit security forces in the country's cultural capital this week. The bombers walked up to army vehicles in the crowded R A Bazaar area of Lahore, blowing themselves up as people sat down to eat before the main Muslim weekly prayers were to begin, a senior official said. Lahore, a city of eight million near Pakistan's border with India, has been increasingly subject to Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked attacks in a nationwide bombing campaign that has killed more than 3,000 people in three years. The bombers targeted the cantonment, home to army officials and military installations, as well as hospitals and schools run by the military. There were civilian homes, shops and restaurants in the vicinity of the attack. Footage of the blasts broadcast by private Geo TV showed people running and shouting in panic. One man, who apparently shot the video on a mobile phone, is heard murmuring: "Oh my God, Oh my God, Be kind to us God." Jumpy images of the second explosion showed a thick ball of smoke with a huge bang and people shouting. Mohammad Nadeem, a man in his 20s whose traditional white shalwar khamis was stained with blood down the front, told AFP he was saying prayers in the mosque when he heard the first blast and rushed out only to hear another explosion. "The second blast took place very near a military vehicle. I sensed real danger and started running," he said. "There were scenes of destruction in nearby restaurants and shops. There were broken chairs and tables and other items lying everywhere on the ground." The army sealed off the tree-lined street. Security officials said at least five soldiers were among those killed when the twin blasts shattered windows and sent debris flying from nearby buildings. "Forty-three people were killed and 134 wounded in the attacks," Lahore civil defence department chief Mazhar Ahmad told AFP. But a senior security official put the death toll at 45 and said six army personnel were among the dead. There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Pakistan's Taliban claimed a suicide attack Monday that destroyed offices in Lahore used to interrogate militant suspects, killing 15 people, and pledged further attacks. Violence in Pakistan is concentrated largely in the lawless northwest border area with Afghanistan, but analysts have warned that extremism is taking a hold in Punjab, Pakistan's most populous and politically important province. Eight attacks have killed more than 170 people in Lahore over the past year, a historical city, playground for the elite and home to many top brass in Pakistan's powerful military and intelligence establishment. "We have the heads of both the bombers. There was an interval of 15 seconds between the two attacks. They were on foot. Their target was army vehicles," added police official Chaudhry Mohammad Shafiq. Nuclear-armed Pakistan is on the frontline of the US war on Al-Qaeda, under pressure to act against Islamist militants in the border area with Afghanistan -- which Washington calls the most dangerous place on Earth. The first two months of this year saw a decline in violence by militants in Pakistan after a significant increase in bloodshed in late 2009. Officials linked the reduction to the suspected death -- still not confirmed -- of Pakistani Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud and military offensives that have disrupted militant networks. Pakistan's military claims to have made big gains against Taliban and Al-Qaeda strongholds over the past year, following major offensives in the northwestern district of Swat and the tribal region of South Waziristan. Washington says militants in Pakistan's semi-autonomous tribal belt are fuelling the war in Afghanistan, where more than 120,000 NATO and US troops are spearheading a last-ditch strategy to defeat a nine-year Taliban insurgency. Despite a series of reported arrests in Pakistan in recent weeks, scepticism remains on whether its powerful spy agency has made a decisive break with Islamist hardliners after well-established historical ties. Pakistan has confirmed only the arrest of Mullah Adbul Ghani Baradar, described by US officials as the Afghan Taliban number two, but also reported to have been in contact with Afghan government officials.
Photo Credit: AFP/Graphic
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Obama administration, that expanded the U.S. drone attacks in Pakistan. Citing current and former counterterrorism officials, the paper reported that the CIA had received "secret permission to attack a wider range of targets" allowing the Agency to rely on "pattern of life" analysis.
"The information then is used to target suspected militants, even when their full identities are not known," according to the report. "Previously, the CIA was restricted in most cases to killing only individuals whose names were on an approved list. The new rules have transformed the program from a narrow effort aimed at killing top Al Qaeda and Taliban leaders into a large-scale campaign of airstrikes in which few militants are off-limits, as long as they are deemed to pose a threat to the U.S., the officials said."
There is no doubt that the Obama administration has dramatically expanded the use of drones in Pakistan and that the drone attacks are unpopular. It is far from a radical position to assert that the bombings are creating fresh enemies, inspiring militants and empowering the Taliban. On Monday, I reportedon the comments of Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer and Georgetown ProfessorChristine Fair on the issue. Shaffer said he was against the drone attacks because they create a reality where the "Taliban are more motivated than ever to come at us... the Predator program is having the same effect [it had] in Afghanistan two years ago in killing innocents" that it is now having in Pakistan. Shaffer is no anti-war activist -- on the same show he advocated deploying U.S. "boots on the ground" in Pakistan. Fair, a respected former UN advisor in Afghanistan, made the ridiculous claim that "the drones are not killing innocent civilians," adding that the "residents of FATA [the Federally Administered Tribal Areas] generally welcome the drone strikes because they know actually who's being killed."
It is indisputable that, across Pakistan, the drone strikes are passionately opposed. According to a poll conducted by Gallup last year, only 9% of Pakistanis support the strikes.
Presumably, Professor Fair was basing her assertion regarding support for drone bombings in FATA on polls such as the oneconducted by the Aryana Institute for Regional Research and Advocacy last year in FATA. It found that more than half of respondents (52%) believed the drone strikes were accurate and 60% believed the strikes were damaging "militant organizations." That is a far cry from "welcoming" U.S. drone strikes.
Pakistani journalist Mosharraf Zaidi raises an interesting point about this, writing, "Anyone that suggests that drone attacks are popular is presenting an amputated and distorted fact." Zaidi writes:
The only enthusiasm that exists for drone attacks is within the context of having to choose between different poisons. If given a choice between drone attacks, and Pakistani artillery and aerial bombardment campaigns, many tribal people will choose the drone attacks because no matter how many civilians they kill, it is less than the blunt force of the Pakistani military. So in a room with only two very ugly options, the drone attacks are the less ugly. That is not the same thing as being popular.
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