Political-military leadership united to eliminate banned outfits: Sethi

LAHORE: About the killing of leader of proscribed outfit Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, Malik Ishaq, in a police encounter the other day, senior analyst Najam Sethi said in Geo News programme Apas Ki Baat on Friday that a small investigation by any investigative journalist could bring the facts to light.
He said such police encounters had taken place in the past also. However, he added, the nature of this encounter is different. In the National Action Plan (NAP), a clear advice has been given about strict action against sectarianism, and it has been stated that such things would happen.
Sethi said the Army chief is very clear mentally that the defence forces would have to eliminate all ills completely. Some people think that no action would be taken against the sectarian elements. But ultimately, the state institutions and security agencies would have to review the role of such elements at last. Sethi said that that moment had arrived. The Lashkar-e-Jhangvi had four leaders: firstly, Riaz Basra, who had been killed in the past; secondly, Malik Ishaq, who has been killed in an encounter recently; thirdly, Akram Lahori, who’s in death cell in a Karachi jail currently; and fourthly, Ghulam Rasool, who’s the only leader who’s still alive.
Sethi said it is a serious decision which has been made by the Punjab government and the military establishment under a full cooperation policy. Sethi said the political and military leadership has taken a consensus decision to eliminate banned organisations, and civilian government is playing an effective role in this regard.
About Mullah Omar’s death, Najam Sethi said it was claimed that he arrived in Pakistan after the US forces attacked Kabul in 2001. In a way, that means, he had been in the custody of Pakistani agencies. For some years, he kept issuing statements from time to time. But it could not be established where he had been living. In 2011, the CIA chief told Asif Ali Zardari that the US believed that Mullah Omar was hiding somewhere between Quetta and Karachi. It was a hint that Pakistan was harbouring him. Zardari told the US Pakistan was not aware of whereabouts of Mullah Omar. Then happened the incident of Raymond Davis, which ensued a tussle between the CIA and ISI.
At that time the CIA was looking for Mullah Omar and Osama bin Laden everywhere. Due to sensitive position of the US on Raymond Davis issue, Washington stopped pressuring Islamabad.
In 2013, the US vice president came to Pakistan and again asked Asif Zardari that according to their information, Mullah Omar was under treatment in a Karachi hospital. There were some cables and Wikileaks also in this regard, but they could not prove that Mullah Omar was hiding in Pakistan.
About the impact of the disclosure that Mullah Omar died in Pakistan, Najam Sethi said that it would become clear soon why that disclosure was made at this point in time, who was beneficiary of this disclosure and who was harmed. He said the first round of Taliban peace talks has been held, and the second round is going to take place soon.
Sethi said Pakistan would suffer a setback due to delay in talks and the other party is Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, who would be affected by this disclosure adversely. Sethi said the news might have been leaked by the Afghan intelligence.
There are not many Pashtuns in Afghan intelligence, and the secret agency is being led by Abdullah Abdullah, who is anti-Pakistan. Abdullah Abdullah and Hamid Karzai are not happy with Taliban peace talks. India is also very unhappy at the development.
This leak would cause more division in the Taliban ranks and it would become very difficult to keep them united.