Say Anything Blog

Alexis Debat reports the Taliban and al-Qaeda are so confident in their security with North Waziristan that “senior al Qaeda operatives have been spotted ‘walking and talking openly’ in the market of Mir Ali in North Waziristan.” Mr. Debat also notes the al-Qaeda presence in the Northwest Frontier Province has increased since the signing of the Waziristan Accord. And the Taliban are pushing a recruitment program as well.

U.S. intelligence have also noted the increasing presence of foreigners in Waziristan, Bajaur and Dir, as well as up to Chitral, further north at the border with Afghanistan, where British intelligence sources tell ABC News that the Taliban are “recruiting openly” for the jihad in Afghanistan. Pakistani militants have also opened several offices in Khar, the main city of Bajaur, to recruit volunteers for combat or suicide missions against NATO and U.S. forces in Afghanistan, according to intelligence sources

Pakistan’s appeasement to the Taliban extends beyond its own border. Now the government is openly calling for NATO to cease military activity, depose Afghan President Hamid Karzai and assist with the formation of an Afghan unity government, with Taliban participation.

Pakistan’s foreign minister, Khurshid Kasuri, has said in private briefings to foreign ministers of some Nato member states that the Taliban are winning the war in Afghanistan and Nato is bound to fail. He has advised against sending more troops. Western ministers have been stunned. “Kasuri is basically asking Nato to surrender and to negotiate with the Taliban,” said one Western official who met the minister recently.

General Jan Orakzai, the governor of the Northwest Frontier Province, “insists that the Taliban represent the Pashtun population, Afghanistan’s largest and Pakistan’s second largest ethnic group, and they now lead a “national resistance” movement to throw out Western occupation forces, just as there is in Iraq.” He also advocates more peace deals in Afghanistan that are akin to the Musa Qala surrender, where the British turned over the Helmand district to the Taliban.

An American intelligence official likens Orakzai to a “Quisling” or “shill” as he is willing to surrender Pakistan’s sovereignty to the Taliban. Orakzai is also believed to be in collusion with the Taliban. On October 15, we described Orakzai as “is a known Taliban sympathizer and is a proponent of expanding the terms of the Waziristan Accord throughout the tribal agencies.”