ALI SUKHANVER

Friends need no thanks. Friendship is one of the most precious passions which can never be weighed and estimated in worldly terms. Lucky are the friends who have a common enemy; because this common enemy strengthens the depth of their relation. Pakistan and Sri Lanka are two friends sailing in the same boat. A violent torrent of terrorism vitally supported by the foreign forces has been trying to push these two friends to the brink of destruction. A lot of killings, a lot of blood-shed, economic catastrophe, political unrest and a warlike situation has ruptured the whole social fabric in these two countries but still they are determined to crush the menace of terrorism; really in a marvelous and stunning manner.

Pakistan and Sri Lanka have so many things in common. Both the lands got independence against the will of India in 1947 and 1948 respectively. Since then the Indian intelligence agencies are doing their utmost to weaken the social, political and economic fiber of the two countries. The reshaping and detracting of the Taliban in Pakistan and the illegal nurturing of LTTe in Sri Lanka are two masterly designed and heinously acted upon plans of the Indian agencies. It is said that the Lanka army had been fighting world’s most horrible civil war since the beginning of 2009 when Parbhakran, the chief of LTTe was sent to hell with many of his confidants in an encounter. After his death the LTTe movement simply expired. The LTTe had been notorious for its well-developed militia cadre, atrocities against Muslim and Sinhalese civilians, and high profile attacks, such as the assassination of several high ranking Sri Lankan politicians. It was being apprehended that the LTTe activities would one day result in throwing out the Sri Lankan government and the LTTe terrorist would become the rulers. It was surely the worst threat that the Lankan government had ever faced. Same type of fear is now being spread with reference to the Taliban in Pakistan.

Every day there is a propaganda proclamation that the Taliban have reached very close to the federal capital Islamabad and they are going to get hold of the provincial head quarter Peshawar. The Pakistan army in collaboration with the other security agencies is trying successfully to send back the Taliban to the actual land they belong to. Very soon this movement shall also meet the same end as the LTTe has met in Sri Lanka. A few days back Chief Air Chief Marshal Roshan Goonetilike of the Sri Lankan Air Force said talking to media that Pakistan was one of the few countries which backed Sri Lanka s war against the LTTE.It has also been reported in media that Sri Lanka had acquired 22 Al -Khalid main battle tanks built in Pakistan. These tanks played a critical role in the war against the LTTE.A military source of Sri Lanka approved that Pakistan had even released a range of ammunition from its own stocks to Sri Lanka. A large group of Sri Lankan officers had also received training in Pakistan. The sources said that Sri Lanka had received MBRLs (multi barrel rocket launchers) from Pakistan during battle for Jaffna. in the year 2000. There are reports that Pakistan armed forces officers had been involved in planning Sri Lanka s successful war against the LTTE but these reports could not be verified.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ The war with the LTTe continued for almost thirty years. During all this time the Indian media had been presenting the war between the government of Sri Lanka and the Tamil Tigers as a civil war. They portrayed that the Tamil tigers were fighting a war for achieving their basic rights which the Sri Lankan government had deprived them of. Later on the Sri Lankan’s think tanks and the intelligentsia tried to convince not only the nation but also the world around that this was not a simple civil war or an indigenous matter; this was a foreign-backed trouble. The Sri Lankan authorities were very much clear since the very beginning that the Tamil fighters were making all that fuss on the beck and call of India but unluckily they did not have any proof. They knew very well where the money, arms and support were coming from but found it difficult to point the finger to a country which calls itself the World’s biggest democracy, sheltered and supported by the only super power America.

The nineteenth January 2009, would always be remembered as an unforgettable day when circumstances succeeded in dawning upon the world that the LTTe was an illegitimate child of India. That was really a momentous day for the Sri Lankan armed forces. CNN, IBN and other media were rife with the reports of absconding of the dreaded LTTe leader, Velupillai Prabhakran to India. It was reported that Prabhakran was picked up by two Indian military helicopters when he was in Jaffna. It was the time when the Sri Lankan troops had succeeded in tracing out his presence there and they were just about to grab him. India had never expected that the issue would be highlighted in such a glimmering way.So the Indian authorities started claiming that the Indian helicopters had arrived there to help out the Sri Lankan forces.

A few weeks later , the Sri Lankan intelligence agencies succeeded in tracing out that Prabhakran was again somewhere in his old hide outs along the Sri Lankan coast. The Sri Lankan forces did not waste even a single moment and hit the target with full force. In this way the story of LTTe and Prabhakran came to an end. It is said that the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore was in fact a reaction to the action of the Lankan forces against the LTTe. The intelligence agencies of Pakistan had pointed out involvement of some foreign elements in the attacks on Sri Lankan team but the culprits arrested after the incident were neither from LTTe nor from India. They belonged to that fraction of Taliban which has nothing to do with Islam or the Muslims. The people belonging to this fraction have just one aim and objective: destabilize Pakistan. Investigations have proved that the Raw has inserted its agents in the groups of Taliban and these agents are misguiding and detracting the religion-loving Taliban.

A few days back the intelligence agencies of Pakistan intercepted some mobile messages conversation in Datta Khail, North Wasiristan. The two people talking were recognized as Caravan and Inqilabi. One was somewhere in Swat and the other one near Pak-Afghan borders. Both were Taliban.

Caravan:; It is not Jihad here in Swat. The people we are fighting with are our Muslim brothers. The Pakistan army is also Muslim. We fight for Allah! They also fight for Allah. It is a sin to kill anyone innocent.

Inqilabi: Same is the case here. All weapons are coming from India and America through Afghanistan. We should try to help our country. We are Taliban. We are not the enemy of Pakistan.

ƒÆ’-¡ƒ”š‚ There are so many evidences which prove the Indian involvement in worsening the situation in the tribal areas of Pakistan. India is trying to play the same game which it has been playing in Sri Lanka for the last three decades. But we should be hopeful that one day we are going to clean up all this mess. If Sri Lanka could defeat Indian plans why not we. But one thing is yet not clear; Sri Lanka is lucky enough to have a friend like Pakistan who supports it at every critical juncture; to whom should Pakistan look towards.