Peace: How has Pakistan fared better? : edit in Business Recorder, July 6, 2016

There could not be a more telling backdrop to the visit of the Senator John McCain-led congressional delegation over the weekend. In Kabul, the terrorists had ambushed five police buses and killed dozens of cadets; in Istanbul, they bombed the airport complex killing and injuring scores of passengers; they butchered 20 foreigners in a Dhaka café and exploded a car bomb in Baghdad claiming lives of some 200 Eid shoppers. In this sea of chaos and carnage, Pakistan was relatively peaceful, essentially because of the successful anti-terrorism military operation Zarb-e-Azb conducted by the armed forces, with a sharper focus on terrorist hideouts in the tribal region bordering Afghanistan. So no surprise the first Pakistani leader American legislators decided to call on was Army Chief General Raheel Sharif. They visited the Foreign Office and got a briefing from Advisor on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz after their briefing at the GHQ. They also asked for, and got, a visit to the North Waziristan because it was here that most decisive battle was given to the terrorists breaking the back of the ever lurking spectre of terrorism. Given its high altitude, tough terrain and impregnable forest this was so much a forbidding challenge. The visit to North Waziristan must have been of special interest to Senator McCain, an ex-naval aviator who carries the scars of the Vietnam War. In similar war conditions the mighty armed forces of his country had lost to the Vietcong. Hopefully, his visit helped him appreciate the merit in Pakistan’s demand for release of its F-16s, the aircraft needed so much to conduct precision bombing of terrorist hideouts in high-altitude mountainous terrains like the Shawal valley in North Waziristan. We tend to believe on return, as promised by him, “he would brief the US Congress appropriately for continued US support to Pakistan in its efforts towards economic development and complete eradication of terrorism from the country”. At the same time he would help shut down the ‘do more’ cry that keeps coming from Washington. http://www.brecorder.com/editorials/