Pakistan Update: The Missile Attacks Haven't Gone Away....

With all the attention given to Mumbai and its aftermath --- The Washington Post had an editorial today castigating the Zardari Government for "denying the truth" --- the local situation in Pakistan has receded from attention here in Britain.

It shouldn't:

Suspected US missile strikes killed at least eight people Monday in volatile north-west Pakistan.

As The Times of London writes about the links "between [the Pakistani intelligence service] ISI and the likes of LeT [the militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba]: it's a monster we created and now we can't get it back in the bottle", it may want to consider what other monsters are being created with events such as yesterday's.

UPDATE: Thousands Rally Against US and NATO in Pakistan

Following up on a post earlier today, a reader in India sends us this from AFP:

Thousands rally against US, NATO in NW Pakistan

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Dec 18, 2008 (AFP) - Thousands of protesters rallied in the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar on Thursday, demanding that Islamabad end its logistical support for US and NATO troops in Afghanistan.
The crowd of about 5,000 demonstrators chanted "Allahu akbar" (God is greater), "Crush America" and "No to NATO supplies" as they marched through Peshawar, an AFP correspondent witnessed.

The rally came amid a recent spike in attacks by Taliban militants on NATO and US supply depots on Peshawar's outskirts, close to Pakistan's lawless tribal areas -- a hotbed of Taliban and Al-Qaeda activity.
International forces in Afghanistan are hugely dependent on Islamabad for their supplies and equipment, with about 80 percent transported through Pakistan and then across the border.
The chief of the radical Jamaat-i-Islami party, Qazi Hussain Ahmad, told protesters: "It is a shame for an Islamic country to supply logistics to the US, which is working against the interests of Muslims all over the world."
He demanded the government abandon its role as an ally in the US-led "war on terror", warning that if logistical support is not suspended, "we will force the government with public support to halt all supplies."
On Wednesday, missiles fired by suspected Taliban militants targeting a NATO supply convoy killed a woman and wounded her two children in the Khyber tribal district, on the main supply route into Afghanistan.

And this, from December 16:

BRUSSELS, Dec 16, 2008 (AFP) - NATO played down Tuesday a recent spate of attacks on depots and convoys on a key Pakistan route, saying that supplies were still getting through to its force in strife-torn Afghanistan.
"The Pakistani route is still open, is still safe," Admiral Giampaolo Di Paola, the head of NATO's military committee, told reporters. "At the moment, the supplies are passing.
His remarks came after haulage companies in Pakistan said they had stopped delivering to foreign troops in Afghanistan after a major deterioration in security along the supply route to the Khyber Pass.
The bulk of the supplies and equipment required by NATO and US-led forces battling the Taliban insurgency on the border is shipped to Pakistan's largest port, Karachi in the south.
From there, the containers of food, fuel, vehicles and munitions are taken by truck to depots outside Peshawar before being transported through Pakistan's restive tribal areas to Afghanistan via the Khyber pass.
But the fabled road passes through the heart of Pakistan's tribal zone, a largely lawless region turned hideout for militants since the US-led ousting of Afghanistan's Taliban regime at the end of 2001.
Di Paola said that NATO was looking to diversify its supplies, with progress being made on an agreement with Russia to allow non-lethal equipment to be shipped through to its troops.
"We are looking to open multiple routes of communication," he said, noting that talks with Turkmenistan were also advancing. "The more lines, the better."
Pakistan's army chief vowed last month to help keep NATO's supply line open.

Pakistan: You May Want to Notice This

The story only gets one paragraph in The New York Times, and I haven't seen it elsewhere in US and British newspapers:

Thousands of antigovernment protesters demanded Thursday that Pakistan shut the route along which supplies are ferried to American and NATO forces in Afghanistan. The demonstration, staged by more than 10,000 people in the city of Peshawar, also focused on a recent series of American missile strikes against targets suspected of belonging to Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Pakistan’s tribal areas. Leaders of the demonstration drew links between the missile attacks and the supply line, saying the equipment was being used for attacks on Pakistani soil and vowing to shut down the convoys.

So now it's not just "Taliban", attacking NATO warehouses and destroying hundreds of trucks, who are threatening the US-led supply operation for the forthcoming "surge" in Afghanistan. (Take note, Washington Post, which is still catching up with that story.)

And why might thousands of demonstrators in Pakistan take to the streets against the US/NATO campaign in Afghanistan? Before you say "extremism", "Taliban sympathiser", etc., consider:

A deadly United States military raid on a house near Afghanistan’s border with Pakistan became a new source of tension on Thursday, with the Americans calling it a successful counterterrorism strike and the Afghans saying it left three innocent civilians dead and two wounded.

Corruption and Intrigue in Afghanistan

Sarah Chayes, who runs a cooperative in Afghanistan, has a compelling but disturbing account (printed in full below) in The Washington Post. In contrast to most headlines that focus on "the Taliban", Chayes' anger is directed at the Government:

Most of my conversations with locals about what's going wrong have centered on corruption and abuse of power.

Chayes rejects negotiations with the Taliban: "Ask any Afghan what's really needed, what would render the Taliban irrelevant, and they'll tell you: improving the behavior of the officials whom the United States and its allies ushered into power after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks." She makes the disturbing assertion, "What I've witnessed in Kandahar since late 2002 has amounted to an invasion by proxy, with the Pakistani military once again using the Taliban to gain a foothold in Afghanistan."

Indeed, that allegation is doubly disturbing because, on the same day, The Times of London writes of Pakistani Major-General Faisal Alavi, "murdered last month after threatening to expose Pakistani army generals who had made deals with Taliban militants".

Indian Jets Enter Pakistani Airspace

I should be in bed, but it looks like Indian fighter jets may have entered Pakistani airspace sometime in the past few hours. Dawn reports:

A Pakistan air-force spokesman confirmed that fighter jets from the Indian air-force violated the Kashmir and Lahore sectors of Pakistan’s airspace on Saturday.

Information Minister Sherry Rehman said that Pakistan responded to the situation by hailing the jets and having the air-force escort the fighter planes back to Indian airspace.

Speaking with Dawn News, Rehman said that the Indian leadership had been contacted, and that the incident was described as ‘inadvertent’, and that the Pakistan air-force and army had been placed on alert, but ‘did not wish to escalate the situation’ any further.

Reports on Twitter also suggest there may have been a "loud explosion" in the Arabian sea. (Unlike the BBC I'm not having second thoughts about blogging information found on Twitter- you all know how to separate fact from hearsay and opinion, right?).

Further information from our readers is always welcome.

UPDATE: The Indian Air Force is denying the incident.

(Thanks to UJ for the initial tip.)