It was an embarrassing moment for
Islamabad when the jihadi was found travelling under a false passport
The death of Afghan Taliban chief Mullah Muhammad Akhtar
Mansour in a US drone strike carried out 81km inside Pakistan in North
Waziristan, on May 21, without prior intimation to Pakistanm could become a
game changer in the AfPak region.
Even before
Mansour's death was confirmed, Pakistan summoned the US ambassador and lodged a
protest against the drone attack violating its sovereignty and territorial
integrity.
But Pakistan
cannot miss the cold reality of the event when president Obama hailed the death
of Mansour as "an important milestone" indicating the changing
contours of US policy towards Pakistan.
It was an embarrassing
moment for Pakistan as Mansour was found to have travelled under a false
Pakistan passport. And the passport indicated he had been travelling with
impunity to gulf countries many times. These only substantiated that the old
links of Pakistan's ISI with Mansour established when Taliban-ruled Pakistan
had been in tact all along.
The charred body of the
pseudonymous Pakistani that Mansour was, was handed over to an unverified
relative according to the colourful follow up of a Pakistani columnist. But
Pakistan's problems now are much more than embarrassment.
The US president, who is
on a visit to Hanoi, in a statement on the Mullah's death stressed American
forces would continue to go after threats on Pakistan soil. However, if we go
by his full statement, the US still considers Pakistan an indispensible ally in
its war against al Qaeda.
Obama's words: "We
will work on shared objectives with Pakistan, where terrorists that threaten
all our nations must be denied safe haven" provides Pakistan a face saving
but bitter option. Pakistan has been grudgingly accepting a "friendly
relationship" with the US all along for reasons of real politick. But the
US president's statement laying down the conditions that go with probably makes
only makes it mor bitter to Pakistan rulers and establishment including the
army.
For over a decade and a
half, Pakistan had been denying the presence important Taliban leaders in
Pakistan and the American establishment had gone along with the fiction due to
strategic compulsions of its war in Afghanistan.
Pakistan had swept under
the carpet, the US raid on Osama bin Laden's safe house inside Pakistan in
Abbottabad to kill the archpriest of al Qaeda without informing Pakistan
perhaps as an exception. But Mullah Mansour's killing has shown the exception
may become the routine if we go by Obama's statement.
It added, "We have
removed the leader of an organization that has continued to plot against and
unleash attacks on American and coalition forces, to wage war against the
Afghan people, and align itself with extremist groups like al Qaeda."
The US president's
statement has triggered alarm bells in Pakistan. Its relations with the US have
been facing turbulence over its double faced policy of providing sanctuaries to
jihadi terrorists operating against Afghanistan.
The turbulence increased
further after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's summit meeting with president
Obama in September 2014. On the occasion the two countries agreed to make joint
and concerted efforts to dismantle safe havens for terror and criminal networks
like Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammad, al Qaeda and the Haqqani network.
Pakistan's issues with
the US were further aggravated when president Obama in an interview on the eve
of his visit to India in January 2015 told India Today that he
had "made it clear that even as the United States works with Pakistan to
meet the threat of terrorism, safe havens within Pakistan are not acceptable
and those behind the Mumbai terrorist attack must face justice."
Since then Indo-US
cooperation on counter terrorism, particularly on information sharing has made
much progress. And it is taking place as a part of the strategic convergence
between the two countries much to the discomfort of Pakistan and its strategic
ally China.
The killing of Mansour
only widens the existing cracks in US-Pak relations. It comes on top of US
senators branding Pakistan as "frenemy" to bar the government from
financing Pakistan's $700 million deal to buy eight F-16 fighters from the US.
This was in sharp contrast to the US attitude five years back when it had
gifted Pakistan 14 used F-16 fighters shed by US troops getting out of
Afghanistan.
To add to Pakistan's
agony, two weeks back the US House of Representatives, while passing the
defense budget, tied $450 million aid to Pakistan to a crackdown on the Haqqani
network! Now the Senate has demanded "demonstrable action" against
the Haqqani network from Pakistan before releasing the fund.
In the power vacuum
created by the death of Mansour retaliatory Taliban attacks and suicide
bombings in Afghanistan are likely to be stepped up. Even as the Taliban Shura
was meeting to select a new leader, ten persons of judicial staff travelling in
a bus were killed in a suicide bomb attack in Kabul.
According to Taliban
spokesman it was carried out in response to the government's decision to
execute six Taliban prisoners on death row.
Usually, favourite
targets of jihadi attacks are Indian, American and NATO diplomatic and military
establishments and Afghan military and internal security entities. They will have
to be more vulnerable now than ever before. It would be prudent for American
establishments in Pakistan also to be ready to ward off such Taliban inspired
attacks from the "friendlies".
Mansour had unique
skills. He managed to hide the death of Mullah Omar in 2013 from the rank and
file and manage the organization till July 2015. When Omar's death was exposed,
he came out successful in the power struggle to lead Taliban's resurgence. This
was manifested when Taliban captured Kudruz, Afghan provincial capital in
September 2015.
Although the government
forces recaptured the city after about a month of fighting, it sent a strong
message that Taliban was back in business after a decade and a half. The strong
resistance put up by the Taliban showed a new spirit of confidence among the
cadres. Since then the Taliban has stepped up its attacks in many parts the
country after the NATO forces were withdrawn, heightening the fears of
president Ghani government. Only last month, Taliban carried out a suicide
attack on the headquarters of an elite military unit in Central Kabul killing
over thirty people.
Mullah Mansour's death
has sent shockwaves among the members of the Taliban leadership council (Shura)
holed up in Pakistan. They are now scrambling to protect themselves from
possible American attacks while trying to find a successor to the slain Taliban
leader. The job of finding a replacement for Mansour was not easy.
According to Kabul media,
the two known contenders for the leadership mantle - Mullah Yakoub son of
Mullah Omar and Sirajuddin Haqqani, leader of the Haqqani group and deputy to
the slain leader -were not willing to accept the leadership for their own
reasons. Reuters have reported that the Taliban's Shura has chosen Haibatullah
Akhunzada, an aide of Mansour as the Emir to lead the organisation.
Sirajudding Haqqani and
Mullah Yakoub will serve as deputies. Akhunzada, former chief justice of the
Taliban regime in Afghanistan, will be having a tough job in hand to forge a
unified organisation.
In the context of finding
a successor to Mansour, comments by the Pakistan daily Nation are
interesting.
It said: "...the
best bet for Taliban (and Pakistan too in case it wants to carry on with past
policy of keeping assets) would be to get Mullah Yakoub as Emir, while keeping
Sirajuddin Haqqani and Habibatullah Akhundzada as deputies."
Now that Akhunzada has
been chosen as the leader, will Pakistan "keep the assets" in the
face of loud American objections and strong action?
This would probably be
one more foil in the power game in Islamabad where prime minister Nawaz Sharif
is facing increased pressure from a belligerent Pakistan army.
And the Great Game will
be on in Afghanistan with national and international stakeholders ostensibly
trying to resurrect the peace process killed in the wake of Kudruz attack.
Courtesy: India Today
opinion portal DailyO http://www.dailyo.in/politics/taliban-mullah-mansour-killed-in-us-drone-strike-afghanistan-pakistan/story/1/10827.html