Hope juggles with fear as Pakistan's new prime minister offers an olive branch to the Taliban, writes Graham Usher Youssef Razi Gillani's maiden speech to parliament as Pakistan's prime minister on 29 March had the warmth of spring after a long winter. To his people he promised respite from the country's energy, economic and judicial crises. To civil society he pledged freedom to trade and student unions long banned under military rule. And to the West he offered continuity and change in Pakistan's foreign policy. "The war against terrorism is our war because countless of our children and soldiers have fallen victim to it," said Gillani. But "we are ready to talk to all those willing to give up arms and negotiate with us on a resolution of their problems." To this end he said his government would scrap draconian, British-era colonial laws in Pakistan's tribal areas with Afghanistan. Instead political reforms would be introduced to integrate them with the rest of Pakistan. The tribal areas are the Taliban's heartland. Each promise came with desk-thumping applause. Two days before, two of Washington's heaviest hitters -- US Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte and Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher -- had arrived in Islamabad. The president's men wanted to check whether Pakistan's new civilian government would be true to the pro-American policies forged by its old military ruler and current president, Pervez Musharraf. The Americans had not come simply to listen. Since January, US Predator aircraft have flown at least three sorties into Pakistan in the hunt for Al-Qaeda fugitives: 45 people were killed in the missile strikes. Some were Arabs and Afghans and some men, women and children. According to American media the blitz was carried out with Musharraf's blessing and in the awareness that the new government may not be as tolerant of US incursions into Pakistan territory. The attacks certainly crossed the tolerance threshold of the Taliban. In a ferocious reprisal 17 suicide attacks have rocked Pakistan in the last 10 weeks, killing 274 civilians, police and soldiers. Most Pakistanis saw a direct line between the Predator strikes in the tribal areas and the carnage in their cities. "It highlights everything that is wrong in the current Pakistan-US relationship," says Pakistan's new education minister, Ahsan Iqbal. "We read about the agreement with the Predators in the US media. In other words, our policy is made between Washington and an ex- general in Islamabad!" That policy has been cast in stone since 9/11. In exchange for billions of dollars in aid to the Pakistan army, America has demanded absolute Pakistani fealty for its policies in Afghanistan. Under Musharraf -- who, until last year, was also army chief -- it got it. Seventy-five per cent of all NATO supplies were channelled through Pakistan; 100,000 Pakistani troops invaded the tribal regions in the hunt for Al-Qaeda; US aircraft had free use of Pakistani airbases; and, steered by Washington, Pakistan intelligence agencies would go after such prized scalps as Khaled Sheikh Mohamed, the alleged brain behind the 9/11 attacks. "We have not had a better partner in the war against terrorism than Pakistan" under Musharraf, CIA Director Michael Hayden told NBC's "Meet the Press" on 30 March. But the cost to Pakistan has been huge. More than 1,000 soldiers have lost their lives in fighting in the tribal areas. Some 50,000 tribesmen and women have had to flee their homes. And, in 2007 alone, 3,600 Pakistanis were killed and maimed in an Iraq-like bombing offensive that arched from Karachi to the Khyber Past. "We cannot work for peace in Afghanistan if this means the end of peace in Pakistan. The present [US-Pakistan] policy is not working," says Iqbal. What will replace it? Asif Ahmed Ali was foreign minister in Benazir Bhutto's second government in the 1990s. He has just been re- elected parliament member for her Pakistan People's Party (PPP). He believes the new government will have to renegotiate the terms of its engagement in the US "war on terror". It will also have to talk to the Taliban. "We will say: we will give you fundamental political rights, withdraw the army from the tribal areas and pump in billions of dollars to bring them on a par with the rest of country. But you must respect the Pakistan-Afghan boundary as an international border, hand over the foreign militants and not let Pakistan territory be used for the war in Afghanistan". At a mass rally in the Bajaur tribal region on 30 March the Pakistan Taliban welcomed Gillani's speech, particularly the pledge to abolish the "British" colonial laws. The Taliban "did not want to fight their own government," Taliban commander Maulvi Faqir Mohamed told the 5,000-strong crowd. "But the country will suffer as long as Pakistan remains an ally of the US in the ongoing 'war on terror' in the region," he warned. It is going to be a finest line for the new government to walk. Most analysts believe the Taliban does not want to open another front with Pakistan's army, if only because it drains resources from the insurgency in Afghanistan. But neither are they likely to surrender the tribal regions as a haven. Any political strategy towards the Taliban will need time, resources and patience, says former Pakistan foreign secretary Tanvir Ahmed Khan. It is also going to have to carry with it Washington and the Pakistan army. For now at least it seems the army is on board, he says. "My feeling is that the army won't be averse to the new policy, given the strength of the lobby in favour of opening a dialogue with the militants. I expect the army to say to the government, 'OK, try something different. We will let you. But the dialogue cannot last forever. We won't let you create a monster that can't be tackled later. We'll be watching.'" Pakistan's new political line to the Taliban could hardly be more important. It doesn't just promise peace in Pakistan's cities and tribal areas. It may decide whether the current political spring will evolve into summer or lapse once more into a long, cold winter.
