Author: Pioneer News Service
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: May 28, 2011
URL: http://www.dailypioneer.com/341749/'Pak-risks-turning-into-jihadi-state'.html
Senior BJP leader LK Advani has requested
New Delhi to take the recent developments in Pakistan seriously, saying the
"danger has become real that Al-Qaeda and Taliban may get control of
Pakistan and convert it into a jihadi state".
In his latest blog post on Friday, the former
Deputy Prime Minister quoted from a book by Bruce Riedel, a former CIA officer,
that the US' option for dealing with such a state would be limited and costly.
"…When I gathered from various news
channels - Indian, American and BBC - reports about the gravity of the Mehran
attack, I contacted Pranab Mukherjee, AK Antony and Shiv Shanker Menon (I
was told he had accompanied the PM) and urged them to view the Karachi happenings
seriously. The situation in Pakistan is extremely worrisome, I said to them,"
Advani wrote on his blog.
The veteran leader said the attack on Karachi's
naval base had provoked wide-ranging discussion both in the print media as
well as on television channels on how well protected critical Pakistani installations
were, particularly its nuclear facilities.
Advani further quoted from the book by Riedel,
a senior advisor to four US Presidents, that former Pakistan Prime Minister
Benazir Bhutto had admitted to the then First Lady of United States Hillary
Clinton (now Secretary of State) in early 1998 about the rise of extremism
in her country and the ISI's patronage to it.
By December 2007, Bhutto was convinced that
Al-Qaeda could even be "marching on Islamabad in two to four years",
claims the book - Deadly Embrace: Pakistan, America and the Future of Global
Jihad.
He also quoted Riedel as saying that a jihadist
victory in Pakistan - meaning the takeover of the nation by a militant faction
of the Army or a militant Sunni Islamic movement led by the Taliban - would
have devastating consequences, not only for Pakistan but also for south Asia,
the broader Middle East, Europe, China and the US; in a word, for the entire
world.
"American options for dealing with such
a state would be limited and costly. Although this nightmare scenario is,
thankfully, neither imminent nor inevitable, it is a real possibility that
needs to be assessed," Riedel wrote in his book.
Advani added, "Till some time ago, the
worst apprehension security analysts had about Pakistan (in 1998 Riedel wrote
a memo for President Bill Clinton titled Pakistan: The most dangerous country
in the world) was that any of the terrorist outfits active in that country,
or the Taliban, or the Al-Qaeda, may lay hands on the nuclear assets built
by Pakistan and become far more dangerous that any other terrorist setup."
