KABUL (SW): In wake of the brazen militant attack on an army-run school in Peshawar Pakistan, analysts in Afghanistan stressed for the need to jointly fight the menace of terrorism.
Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, a banned militant outfit brutally killed over 140 people, mostly children in the Army Public School and College on the morning of December 16. They dubbed it as revenge against Pakistan Army’s actions against militants and their families.
Pakistan’s civilian and military leadership has sternly condemned the attack and has launched a furious reactionary campaign by intensifying ongoing army campaigns in the tribal areas, killing suspected terrorists in the urban centers and vowing to go ahead with the execution of convicted militants in various prisons across the country.
Waheed Muzda, a Kabul based analyst sees a clear change in Pakistan’s policy towards the militants. He told SWRN that the Pakistan was long reluctant to execute the convicted militants but now it vows to hang some 100 of them.
“It is yet to be seen if this new anti-militant approach is an indicator of genuine policy change or is it an occasional move to malign the public opinion”, he noted.
Muzda stressed that it was the time for both the countries to realize the threat of militancy and jointly fight it.
Jawed Kohistani, a defense analyst believe there is much more for Pakistan to do to prove that it is serious about not to use the militants as a foreign policy tools. “To begin with, Pakistan should produce the Afghan Taliban for peace dialogue or hand them over to Kabul government”, he said.
Afghan parliamentarians too have long been skeptical about Islamabad’s motives in regard to Afghanistan.
A female MP, Sadiquizada Neeli told SWRN that she was always disappointed by the role Pakistan was playing to promote militancy in the region. Neeli, however, expressed hope that the better sense would prevail now and both countries would come together in defiance to militancy.
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