India-Pakistan: Terrorist Shortage Causes Bizarre Police Plot

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February6, 2007: In Kashmir, police investigators uncovered a strange incident of murder and resume building by ambitious, and amoral, police. Two police commanders have been arrested for killing innocent Kashmiri Moslems, and claiming that the dead men were Islamic militants. The policemen enhance their promotion prospects as a result of successful encounters with Islamic militants. But new security measures on the border (Israeli night vision equipment, new sensors, UAVs) have made it much more difficult for the Islamic terrorists to get from their training camps in Pakistan, into Kashmir. The shortage of terrorists to kill led some police to go after innocent civilians. This is a publicity disaster for India, which had been gaining more support from most Kashmiris for a peace deal. The accused police will have to be prosecuted honestly and vigorously in order to calm down Kashmiri public opinion. So far, four police, including two commanders, have been arrested for three murders. There may have been many more.

February 5, 2007: In southwest Pakistan, Baluchi tribal separatists continued their attacks, this time blowing up the main rail line again. In northwest Pakistan, two tribal elders were killed by a roadside bomb. Pro-Taliban tribesmen in this area are going after tribesmen, and tribal leaders, that oppose the Taliban.

February 4, 2007: Indian Maoists in central India, are leaving areas they have long dominated, because of police pressure. Rather than stand and fight, the Maoists have up and moved south, into Tamil Nadu. There are sparsely populated areas in the south, where several hundred armed Maoists can hide, for a while anyway. The police and army are already aware of the movement, and have security forces trying to locate the new Maoist camps.

February 3, 2007: In northwest Pakistan, a suicide car bomber hit an army convoy, killing himself and two soldiers. No group took credit for the attack.

February 2, 2007: Confronted with much evidence (videos taken from UAVs and security troops inside Afghanistan), Pakistan admitted that its border guards often let truckloads of armed Taliban drive right through checkpoints, towards Afghanistan. The Pakistani solution is to begin building monitored fences along those areas, near the roads, that Taliban use to sneak across the border when the border guards at crossing points are disciplined and strong enough to stop them. The fence will slow down border crossers, and create situations where there will be more small battles. If the Pakistanis pass on information about Taliban tearing through the fence, NATO and Afghan security forces could chase after the border crossers.

February 1, 2007: In Pakistan, police have arrested six Sunni terrorists, for attacks on Shia, and found the terrorists linked to al Qaeda groups. This is not unusual, as one of the goals of al Qaeda is the destruction of the Shia sect (and any Shia believers who don't convert to the Sunni brand of Islam.) There has been low level violence over this issue since the late 1970s, which the Pakistani government began encouraging Islamic radicals. This has led to over 4,000 deaths from religious violence. Pakistan has 30 million Shia, fifty percent more than live in Iraq, and these Shia have developed their own militant groups, to fight back against the Sunni terrorists. As in Iraq, the Sunni radicals have common cause with foreign al Qaeda operatives. As a result, over 300 have died in Sunni-Shia violence in the past year. The Taliban are a Sunni radical organization that persecuted and murdered Afghan Shia during the late 1990s, when they controlled Afghanistan. Most Pakistanis consider the Sunni-Shia terrorism more dangerous than the Taliban related violence on the Afghan border. That's because the Pakistani Shia live in the major population centers and cities, and that's where this religious violence takes place.

 

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