Fighting terrorism.

While there are no two opinions about the fact that our valiant security forces and law enforcing agencies have broken the back of the terrorists and cleared Pakistani territory of their outfits, they still retain their ability to stage attacks on symbols of state power and civilians. Of late, Balochistan seems to be their preferred target. The province has been in the grip of sectarian and separatist terrorism for a long time. The cold-blooded murder of 11 miners belonging to the Hazara community carried out by Lashkar-e-Jhangvi in collaboration with Daesh was preceded by the attack on an FC post in Harnai on the night of December 26, 2020, in which 7 FC soldiers were martyred and an assault on a convoy of security forces in Omara in October in which several soldiers and security guards were martyred; this suggests that the fight against terrorists is not yet over.

These incidents, however, in no way reflect on the dedication and commitment of the nation and its security forces to eliminate this scourge. DG ISPR, in a presser revealed that during the last twenty years, 1200 operations were conducted to root out terror outfits killing 18000 of them besides eliminating and capturing 1100 Al Qaeda operatives. Pakistan also shared intelligence with 70 countries. The effort, according to him, cost the country 83000 lives including civilians and security personnel and financial loss to the tune of $126 billion. He also asserted that over 3,71,000 intelligence-based operations were conducted under operation Radd-ul-Fasad and resultantly, terrorists' support bases, their facilitators, abettors and financiers have been eliminated and no organised terrorist infrastructure exists in Pakistan. He claimed that terrorist incidents had declined by 45 percent and over 50 percent terrorist threats were averted during the last year. Similarly, Karachi has witnessed a decline of 95 percent in incidents of terrorism, 98 percent in target killing, 99 percent in extortion and 98 percent in kidnapping for ransom.

The dilemma is that terrorism in Pakistan has both internal and external dimensions. As for as Balochistan is concerned, it is India which is supporting the insurgency and acts of terrorism in the province. Indian involvement was corroborated by Kulbushan Sudhir Jhadav, a serving commander in the Indian Navy who was arrested on March 3, 2016 in Balochistan while crossing over from Iran in a counter-intelligence operation. He was found in possession of a...