EDITORIAL: During the recent days terrorists have attacked seemingly unusual targets while seeking to undermine this country’s political stability and economic well-being. Last Friday, five Japanese nationals were travelling in an armoured van from their Clifton residence in Karachi to the Export Processing Zone when a suicide bomber detonated explosives near their van a bit prematurely and his accomplice opened fire on the police escort. Luckily, all the foreigners survived, but their security guard died in the ensuing shootout. Two passers-by were also injured. Investigators seized a sub-machine gun and a bagful of grenades from the scene.
Although no group claimed credit for the attack, considering that to most Pakistanis Japanese and Chinese look alike, it’s been generally assumed that the Baloch insurgents, who have frequently been targeting Chinese interests in Balochistan as well as in Karachi, mistook them for Chinese.
Further lending strength to this view a senior official of the Counter-Terrorism Department, said one of the two dead terrorists, a resident of Punjgur, was affiliated with an insurgent group, the so-called Baloch Republican Army. But it is difficult to believe it to be a case of mistaken identity.
For, mounting a suicide mission requires careful planning and identification of the target. If the organisers knew the timing, travel route and destination of the foreign visitors, surely they would have ascertained who they were.
Apparently, they had wished to strike the Japanese to scare them and other foreign investors away. In another appalling incident last Thursday, five Customs personnel were gunned down in an ambush while conducting intelligence-based operations in D I Khan district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. A passer-by and a minor girl were also killed.
Three days later in another incident in the same area, two customs personnel were martyred and some others sustained injuries when armed assailants opened fire on their vehicle. An unidentified man was also killed. No one has claimed responsibility for these vile deeds, which may have been carried out by smugglers or TTP terrorists who have regularly been striking military as well as civilian targets.
Facilitating the attacks in urban centres like the one on the Japanese is proliferation of terrorists’ cells of different groups having a common interest in causing harm to this state and society. Further complicating the situation is the state’s high level of tolerance for all sorts of violent religious extremists groups which in some cases have, knowingly or unknowingly, been providing shelter to hostile elements.
The Counter Terrorism Department and the various intelligence agencies need to have better coordination and take decisive defensive measures against terrorist organisations of different hues. They must make the environment safe for our own people as well as foreigners working on various development projects and other business enterprises.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2024
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