Burn everything

[pscot]

Recent reports in American media might lead one to believe that the Pakistani army has routed the
Taliban in some of the tribal areas. Apparently, not so much. This is from the Pakistan International Daily.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=192788

Thursday, August 13, 2009
One of the defining features of Taliban activity is their progressive destruction of the education system in the areas where they operate or have influence. In Swat and Malakand this was directed at girls' schools originally but broadened out into education more generally with hundreds of schools, which will cost billions of rupees to replace, now piles of blackened rubble. In terms of the fight they seek to win it makes sense for them to target schools because education is the greatest threat that they face in the long term. Educated minds are less pliable. For the provincial and federal governments the rebuilding of the education system in the war-affected areas is one of the most pressing needs, and it is with dismay that we see reports of the Taliban burning down seven primary schools in Buner (three boys' schools, four girls' schools) and a further five schools torched in the Shangla district.

It was expected that the provincial and federal governments and the law and order agencies would protect those education assets that were still left. Buner had been declared 'safe' and people had returned, children had started to attend their classes again, and the destruction of these twelve schools in less than twenty-four hours makes a complete mockery of the claims to have 'pacified' the area which are made almost daily by assorted government figures and representatives. These schools should have been protected; the students should have been able to see soldiers and the police on duty day and night protecting their future and the future of all of us. Their parents will feel as deprived as their children now are. They had the confidence to return, believed the government and have been once again comprehensively let down. The NWFP Minister for Social Welfare and Women Welfare Sitara Ayaz when interviewed about this matter on a private TV channel on Tuesday evening waffled helplessly and was unable to provide any reason as to why this parlous state of affairs persisted. Self-evidently the Taliban, at least in Buner and Shangla, are not 'defeated' and neither the army nor the government in any of their iterations are able to protect their most valuable assets. We are learning a lesson, but not in school.

[aquart]

1. And people are shocked when I have no sympathy

at atrocities committed upon the Taliban. They are deliberately destroying generations of lives. I'm sorry that they happen to be human beings. I am.