MATRIXMAG REPORT
During his four-day landmark visit to Pakistan in between Feb 16-20, the United Nations General Secretary, António Guterres went out of way to laud Pakistan’s achievements in counter-terrorism, appreciating the security situation as “absolutely remarkable”, noting that Islamabad, which looked like a “fortress” a few years back had now become a family station for the world body’s staff.
“We are witnessing the state becoming present, both from the point of view of security [… and] basic service, development in an absolutely remarkable transformation,” he said.
“I can see how Pakistan not only opened its borders, in a world where so many borders are closed, but Pakistani people open their houses and their hearts in [an] enormous demonstration of generosity,” he said while referring to the influx of Afghan refugees in Pakistan.
“At the same time, I have seen the commitment of Pakistan to peace, namely to support peace in Afghanistan,” he added.
All this happened to the context of the Operation Zarb-e-Azb launched in June 2014 under the then Pakistan Army Chief General Raheel Sharif. After the Army Public School attack in December that year, the scope of the operation was expanded to the whole of country. Within three years of the launch of Rud-ul-Fasad under the new Army Chief General Javed Bajwa in 2017, Pakistan army and other institutions managed to disinfect most of the country from terrorism.
Official statistics suggests that since 2017, 1,49,000 intelligence-based operations have been conducted. Without losing spirit to the 3,800 threat warnings, 400 terrorist plans had been averted. All this would not have been possible had the rank and file of the Pakistan military not shown the valour of a true soldier.
According to the data since 2001, Pakistani armed forces conducted more than 350 major and more than 850 minor operations in Karachi too and the city jumped from 6th in crimes index to 91 position in world capitals.
Rud-ul-Fasad differed from the preceding operations in both its scope and dimension; it has been a joint civil and military initiative aimed at combing through every nook and corner of the country to take out terrorists and consolidate gains achieved from the National Action Plan.
Even open source data indicates that violence has declined considerably since 2017.
“Pakistan witnessed a nearly 31% reduction in terror and counter-terror related fatalities in 2019,” according to the data released by the Center for Research and Security Studies (CRSS) in Islamabad. Only two militant outfits, Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) splinter groups and the Islamic State (IS), claimed responsibility for 12 and 1 attacks respectively, but their own ranks depleted by nearly 30%. Civilian fatalities declined by about 36%.
A 30.71% drop in fatalities was observed in 2019 (from 980 in 2018 to 679 in 2019). If the Khyber Pukhtunkhwa (KP) province and the former Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) are counted as separate regions, Balochistan still remains most affected of militancy and insurgency. The largest drop in fatalities was observed in Balochistan (44.2%), followed by FATA (39%), Sindh (19%), and Punjab (11.8%).
No doubt the country owes this remarkable turn-around to intense counter-terrorism and anti-crime drives by the armed forces in conjunction with the civilian security forces. And no surprise that even the US President Donald Trump acknowledged this – of all the places at Ahmedabad, India, in the presence of PM Modi and tens of thousands of spectators on February 24.
‘My administration is working in a very positive way with Pakistan to crack down on terrorist organisations and militants. Thanks to these efforts, we are beginning to see signs of big progress with Pakistan and we are hopeful of reduced tensions, greater stability and the future of harmony for all of the nations of South Asia,” said Trump to the shock of all those present there.
