With the Mumbai terror attacks highlighting the threat from the Pakistani terror infrastructure, concerns have increased over the situation in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA).
A US based think tank has equated the situation in the FATA with the security environment in Afghanistan and has asked that the incoming Obama presidency declare the FATA a part of the territory of war in the region. The Centre for Strategic and International Studies said that the FATA region, which is a safe haven for the Taliban and the al-Qaeda, should be termed the “most dangerous place” by US President-elect Barack Obama.
A “nuclear Pakistan as a base for international terrorism is a prospect that the world cannot afford,” the think tank said in a report called ”FATA A Most Dangerous Place”, which is authored by Shuja Nawaz, a Pakistani journalist and first director of the South Asia Centre at the Atlantic Council.
The report further said that redefining the territory of war in the region to include FATA would help CENTCOM, the US Central Command, to cooperate with the Pakistan army in military and economic development efforts in a better manner.
“FATA remains a most dangerous place, with the failure of governance and the rise of militancy affecting Afghanistan and Pakistan not only individually and separately but also jointly,” Mr Nawaz said in the concluding observations.
The report further recommends that the US should forge a long-term relationship with Pakistan and warns that a failure to bring peace and stability to FATA would have repercussions not just for Pakistan and Afghanistan but also the entire world.
The report supports National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley’s remarks that the biggest foreign policy challenge for President-elect Barack Obama was not Iraq or Afghanistan, but Pakistan.
In an interview to the Wall Street Journal Mr Hadley had said that Pakistan’s border areas ie the FATA region poses a threat to India and the entire world. Mr Hadley had said that the chaos threatened the entire region and the world and that the problems in Afghanistan could not be addressed without solving Pakistan.
“Pakistan’s increasingly turbulent border region poses threats not just to the US mission in Afghanistan, but also to neighbouring India, as evidenced by the recent Mumbai terrorist attacks, as well as to urban areas of Pakistan itself — and the world beyond,” he said.
There have been reports that the Taliban militia, which is largely unchecked in the region, has been expanding its influence throughout the Pashtun border regions to the whole of Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province.
A US based think tank has equated the situation in the FATA with the security environment in Afghanistan and has asked that the incoming Obama presidency declare the FATA a part of the territory of war in the region. The Centre for Strategic and International Studies said that the FATA region, which is a safe haven for the Taliban and the al-Qaeda, should be termed the “most dangerous place” by US President-elect Barack Obama.
A “nuclear Pakistan as a base for international terrorism is a prospect that the world cannot afford,” the think tank said in a report called ”FATA A Most Dangerous Place”, which is authored by Shuja Nawaz, a Pakistani journalist and first director of the South Asia Centre at the Atlantic Council.
The report further said that redefining the territory of war in the region to include FATA would help CENTCOM, the US Central Command, to cooperate with the Pakistan army in military and economic development efforts in a better manner.
“FATA remains a most dangerous place, with the failure of governance and the rise of militancy affecting Afghanistan and Pakistan not only individually and separately but also jointly,” Mr Nawaz said in the concluding observations.
The report further recommends that the US should forge a long-term relationship with Pakistan and warns that a failure to bring peace and stability to FATA would have repercussions not just for Pakistan and Afghanistan but also the entire world.
The report supports National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley’s remarks that the biggest foreign policy challenge for President-elect Barack Obama was not Iraq or Afghanistan, but Pakistan.
In an interview to the Wall Street Journal Mr Hadley had said that Pakistan’s border areas ie the FATA region poses a threat to India and the entire world. Mr Hadley had said that the chaos threatened the entire region and the world and that the problems in Afghanistan could not be addressed without solving Pakistan.
“Pakistan’s increasingly turbulent border region poses threats not just to the US mission in Afghanistan, but also to neighbouring India, as evidenced by the recent Mumbai terrorist attacks, as well as to urban areas of Pakistan itself — and the world beyond,” he said.
There have been reports that the Taliban militia, which is largely unchecked in the region, has been expanding its influence throughout the Pashtun border regions to the whole of Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province.
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