The New Public Enemy #1
Times Online:
A 34-year-old “neo-Taleban” leader in Pakistan is now regarded as the most deadly threat to the West, replacing Osama bin Laden as Public Enemy No 1. Baitullah Mahsud, who is suspected of masterminding the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, the Pakistani politician, was named yesterday as the most significant non-state threat to global security to have emerged in the past 12 months.
Nigel Inkster, the former deputy chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), revealed that the neo-Taleban under the leadership of Mahsud were suspected of having been involved in terrorist plots in Britain and Spain.
“There is some evidence they were involved with the assassination of Benazir Bhutto and that they have dispatched terrorists to the United Kingdom and Spain,” Mr Inkster said.
Last month the Spanish police foiled a plot by ten Pakistani and two Indian terrorist suspects to plant explosives on the Metro in Barcelona. Anti-terrorist officers from Scotland Yard detained six Pakistanis who flew from Barcelona to Gatwick two weeks ago after a tip-off from the Spanish. They were questioned and deported.
The revelation that the most extreme elements of the Taleban in Pakistan had turned their focus towards the West and foreign forces in Afghanistan followed claims by President Bush last year that the Taleban posed a global threat. His remark was dismissed largely in Europe.
Mr Inkster was speaking at the release of The Military Balance, an annual publication of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), of which he is director of trans-national threats and political risk. He was asked which non-state organisation had emerged as the most serious threat and without hesitation identified Mahsud and his neo-Taleban extremists. International terrorism, he said, remained a growth industry and the neo-Taleban — the new generation of the former Afghan rulers — had earned the dubious honour of making the most progress.
Mahsud, who has been branded a senior al-Qaeda terrorist by the Pakistani authorities, lives in South Waziristan, a remote tribal region that borders Afghanistan. The Pashtun and warlord commander is considered by Pakistani security and intelligence services to be a main suspect in the assassination of Ms Bhutto in December.
Mr Inkster, who retired from MI6 a year ago, said that the neo-Taleban groups in the tribal areas of Pakistan could become a global menace.
John Chipman, director-general of the IISS, said that there was a growing security risk in Afghanistan and that there had been a rise in the number of suicide bombings.
“There were more than 140 attacks last year. Some, such as the attack on the Serena Hotel in Kabul [on January 15], showed unusual sophistication in planning and execution. We can expect more,” he said.
The insurgency in Afghanistan, he said, was “given impetus by the instability in Pakistan, which allows fighters to operate from the relative safety of the tribal areas”.
Dr Chipman said that it was important to let President Karzai make his own decisions on security and not to be seen to be led by members of the Nato force in Afghanistan.
Relations between the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force and President Karzai have deteriorated in recent weeks after the Afghan leader’s criticism of the British and US military efforts in the south, and his blocking of Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon, the former Liberal Democrat leader, as a United Nations super-envoy for Afghanistan.
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Sounds like Karzai is getting a little weak-kneed. But, then the British seem a little shaky, also. They had some suspected terrorists, questioned them and then deported them? I’ll bet they even paid their air-fare back to Pakistan.
February 6th, 2008 at 1:33 amSee? President Bush warned Europe about this a long time ago, but they refused to listen. Now they’ve got terrorists in their soil.
Hate to say he told you so.
February 6th, 2008 at 3:06 amNah…The real threat to world security comes from Mecca and Medina.
February 6th, 2008 at 3:25 amfor once I agree with Dan, though why is it that the US still support the Saudi ?
Well, as far as Afghanistan is concerned, I have the regret to tell that will be a never endness war ; in the 19th century, the British empire renounced to rule that pirats place ; the Russian empire also renounced lately (with the help of whom ?)
and most likely you also will have to leave there too.
This is a country that has always been controlled by gangs tribes ; remember Marco Polo when he travelled to China, he had to pay the right (alike a customs fee) to cross the “silk road” ;
and now, some would like to make there the”oil road” ; wether it’s the Chineses, the Russians or the Americans… the difference with the silk road is that the people would get no benefit from it, just a spoiled country with pipe-lines, Putin, US administration in ME countries, would turn on or off the tap, depending if the population there behave.
now, the origin of the evil is Meca Medina
February 6th, 2008 at 3:45 amThat hair, it almost looks like a wig, and that hat, it looks like the cap from a large mushroom.
A recent USGS survey showed that on US soil and in US waters we have over 120 Billion barrels of oil. Thats apparently more than Iran, Kuwait and Iraq combined. But the radical enviros sue and block all further progress. Couple that with the fact that no new oil refinery has been built in 30 years. At least the French have energy independence figured out and its name is nuclear.
We are dumping trillions into the coffers of the Saudis and others and it gets used against us later.
February 6th, 2008 at 6:29 amHe looks like that British punk rocker Adam Ant, You know:
, but the goofball does really look like him.
February 6th, 2008 at 6:55 am“Stand and Deliver”. (about 18th century stagecoach robbers)
For thoe that do not know but want to, Adam Ant was the name the band
chose while standing in a British lavatory noticing that the brand
name on the urinals was Adamant.
I’m sure ya all wanted to know that
howard stern?
February 6th, 2008 at 8:23 amYeah it could be stern, when you look at “it’s” eyes they almost look like there is a smile under that goofy rag.
February 6th, 2008 at 8:49 am“….claims by President Bush last year that the Taleban posed a global threat. His remark was dismissed largely in Europe.”
And largely dismissed by dem politicians in the US.
‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not mourn.’
February 6th, 2008 at 9:51 amWeird Al Yankovic?
February 6th, 2008 at 11:05 amit’s evident that the Nato countries, (except you) are waiting :
1- the next Nato meeting (I think next spring) that aims to redefine its goals, its organisation, its subventions…
2- The EU Nations know perfectly that Bush is “over”, from November there will be a new president, a new administration, new objectives… so they are not engaging more costs of persons and money in a policy that might be over at the end of this year.
3- Seems that Afghanistan doesn’t want Nato troops, but more help to form their own army
4- The conflict seems more located at the Pakistan borders ; in anycase Pakistan is the real reserve of jihadists, then, why not invadind or bombing Pakistan…
February 7th, 2008 at 2:45 am