Consecutive suicide attacks suggest that Pakistan, no less than Washington, has become victim to policies it once sowed, writes Graham Usher in Islamabad On 27 January a lone suicide bomber walked into a group of police officers and government officials outside a mosque in Peshawar. He killed 15 people, including two of the city's most senior police chiefs. The attack came a day after another suicide bomber detonated outside the Marriot Hotel in the capital, Islamabad, a favourite haunt for foreign journalists and delegations. The bomber killed himself and a guard, and injured five, one seriously. It is a sign of the state of Pakistan that there could be several causes for these attacks and, potentially, a dozen perpetrators. For example: on the day of the attack the Marriot was to host a reception by the Indian High Commission celebrating Republic Day. The bomber may have been dispatched by one of Pakistan's myriad Jihadi outfits opposed to the peace process with India and, particularly, President Pervez Musharraf's apparent abandonment of the insurgency in Indian-controlled Kashmir. In Peshawar one of the slain police chiefs was engaged in a sweep against the city's several hundred drug-dealers, raising speculation that the bombing may have been a hit job. And across Pakistan there is a high alert in anticipation for the annual Ashura commemoration -- an occasion that in recent years has seen vicious attacks on the country's Shia minority. All or any may have been the motive for Peshawar and Islamabad. But the stronger suspicion held by police officers, intelligence agents and opposition politicians is that the cause of the blasts was neither criminal nor sectarian. They were rather the blowback for the Pakistani army's operations in its tribal areas on the Afghanistan border. For ten years these areas were the base for the anti-Soviet Jihad, funded by Saudi Arabia and the CIA and directed by Pakistan's premier intelligence agency, the ISI. Following the Soviet withdrawal, the same areas became a buttress and resource for the Taliban, with arms being supplied by the ISI and the "mujahadeen" delivered by madrassas sponsored by the state or one or other of Pakistan's Islamist parties. Since 9/11, the tribal areas have become the site for army counter-insurgency operations that tried to tame a movement of radical Islam that the ISI, more than any other state actor, had raised. And it has failed, says a former army officer who served in the tribal areas, Brigadier Shaukat Qadir. The reason is self-evident. "No one in the Pakistani government has explained to the tribesmen why it was 'jihad' to fight against the Russian occupier in Afghanistan but 'terrorism' to fight against the American occupier". Not only did it fail, the Pakistan army has been defeated. In April 2004 and again in September 2006, it was forced to sign peace deals with pro- Taliban tribesmen that, according to local sources, have turned large chunks of tribal territory over to Taliban rule; restocked and replenished the insurgency in southern Afghanistan; and provided a new sanctuary for hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Al-Qaeda linked foreign fighters. The bulk of these are Uzbeks and other Central Asians but some are Arabs who have made the long trek from Iraq via Iran. Clearly, this was a détente Pakistan's alliance with Washington was never going to bear. In October three air-to-surface missiles pounded a madrassa in Bajaur near the Afghanistan border, leaving over 80 dead, most of them seminary students. On 16 January helicopters strafed five compounds in the tribal areas, leaving 20 dead. The Pakistani army claimed both attacks, saying madrassa and compounds were training camps for Taliban and Al-Qaeda guerrillas. Locals said the majority of those slain were tribesmen and that, on both occasions, the rockets were fired by US-army drones flying in from Afghanistan. But whoever pulled the triggers the perception not only of the Taliban but also tribal leaders was that the army, in claiming the attacks, had reneged on the promise set down in the peace deals. "And you can't go back on a promise. It's a big thing in the tribal tradition," says Malik Qadir Khan, an elder who helped negotiate the 2006 peace deal. Following the Bajaur attack, a Taliban suicide bomber killed 42 new recruits at an army base near the tribal areas. After the 16 January hit, a Taliban commander in Pakistan, Baitullah Mehsud, promised that the coming revenge would "cause pain to Pakistan". Two days later, an explosive-filled truck rammed into a military convoy just outside the tribal areas, killing four soldiers and a woman. And the belief is growing that the attacks on the hotel in Islamabad and on the police officers in Peshawar may be the latest doses of Taliban inflicted "pain", a fear compounded by unconfirmed reports that one of the bombers may have an Uzbek from the tribal areas. Between blasts, the Indian High Commission celebrated its national day at the Marriot. The Pakistani guest of honour was Education Minister Javed Ashaf. He is a retired army lieutenant-general and former ISI chief. Sources say he was given the education brief to reform a curriculum that, 17 years after the Afghan jihad, remains disfigured by an utterly retrograde form of Islam. "Musharraf knows one of his biggest battles is in the schools," says a Western diplomat, explaining the appointment. With a nod to India, Ashaf told his audience that the attack on the Marriot shows "Pakistan is also a victim of terrorism." Few would gainsay him, especially after Peshawar. Even fewer would forget the adage that he who sows the wind reaps the harvest.
