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Imran Khan on how the war on terror is damaging Pakistan
Imran Khan, Pakistan cricketing hero turned politician, speaks frankly about the way ahead amid the violence and turmoil that has befallen his country.
By Derek Pringle, Cricket Correspondent
Published: 7:30AM GMT 03 Dec 2009
Imran Khan is recuperating from surgery to his small bowel, though judging from his strident views over the phone this week he is over the nil-by-mouth stage.
Never shy of stirring opponents with a sharp word or bouncer during his playing days, the erstwhile Member of Parliament for Mianwali has lost none of his nip against his new adversaries: the Pakistan government under President Asif Ali Zardari and the American-led coalition in Afghanistan.
"The problem in Pakistan right now is that we have no leadership and no direction," Imran said from his home near Islamabad. "There's a lot of uncertainty and people are bracing themselves for bad times.
"The danger with America's war on terror in Afghanistan was always that Pakistan, a nuclear-armed country of 170 million people, could be destabilised in the process, and that is what's happening.
"With the Taliban insurgency, we now have a situation where the Pakistan military are bombing our own people, an act that has seen whole villages converted to fighting their own government and army. I opposed it from the start because it's a war of terror, not a war on terror."
It looks like carnage wherever you sit, with consequences emerging that neither the White House nor Whitehall had anticipated. Part of the problem, Imran suggests, is that the Taliban and al-Qaeda have become conflated as the same foe whereas they are actually very different and want different things.
"The Taliban were religious fundamentalists and a product of the Jihad against the Soviets in the 1980s. They have known nothing but war, but they are not involved in global terror. Separating them from al-Qaeda is the key to America sorting out its objectives."
He won't agree then with President Obama's troop surge or Gordon Brown's insistence that the Pakistan government do more to capture Osama bin Laden. On the run since he slipped through America's hands in Tora Bora, bin Laden is thought to be holed up in Waziristan, the border of which is just 40 miles west of Imran's constituency.
"Before 2006 we never had militant Taliban in Pakistan and no terrorist bombs, but in Peshawar this year we have one every 48 hours. We never had suicide bombers either, not until the US pressured the Pakistan army to go into Waziristan.
"All the tribes in the region are used to fighting each other but when a foreigner comes along they all get together, they've been doing it for hundreds of years. No one can see an endgame unless America leaves the region."
The situation has become critical in places like Peshawar, an edgy frontier town not far from the Khyber Pass. Three weeks ago Waqar Samad, a carpet mogul there who has furnished generations of visiting cricketers with everything from pashmina shawls to Turkoman rugs, phoned to let me know he had been forced to move to Lahore following threats to kidnap him and his family.
He blamed the Taliban but such is their cachet with Pakistan's disaffected, that just about every chancer with a gun and there are plenty of them in that part of the world claims membership.
One of the less severe casualties has been cricket, a huge source of national pride in Imran's day after his Pakistan team won the 1992 World Cup. Since terrorists attacked Sri Lanka's team bus on its way to Lahore's Gaddafi Stadium in March, all international cricket there has ceased, the national team cast adrift to play all their matches away from home in places like Abu Dhabi and England.
"It's important to restore international cricket because the public love the game in this country. But after the attack on the Sri Lankan bus no one is even thinking about cricket in Pakistan any more. This is a country that is racked with scandals at the moment.
"By the way, the official government position is that it wasn't extremists who attacked the Sri Lankan bus but a foreign hand, and we all know who they mean by that. It is interesting though.
The Taliban, whom many have blamed, always claim responsibility whenever they do an attack. Also, they tend to target the police or the army and rarely target civilians. But they have not admitted to either the Sri Lankan bus or the recent bombings in civilian areas."
Sport and politics have always mixed in Pakistan, often explosively, which may be why Imran has avoided the main pitfalls in his transition from star all-rounder to major political player.
Apart from his brief incarceration by former president Pervez Musharraf a few years ago, the biggest barb seems to have come from the political rival who claimed that Imran's grasp of foreign affairs came from the beds of London and Sydney.
For someone sniffy about cricketers who never ventured more than a six-hit from the pitch after retirement, Imran was always going to push himself after cricket. After overseeing the funding and building of Lahore's Shaukat Khanum hospital, in memory of his late mother, he established the Tehreek-e-Insaf party (Movement for Justice) 13 years ago.
As chairman, he won their only seat in 2002 before resigning it at the 2007 election in protest at General Musharraf's unconstitutional attempt to run for president. Imran plans to contest it again, confident that his party will win the seat, and several new ones as well.
"The first election I fought, the party was just a few months old, so it wasn't exactly suprising we won nothing," he said. "We were five years old when we contested the next one and we won a seat. The next election will be the first one we will fight properly prepared and I think we'll do very well.
"Obviously, if you don't win seats you can't become a force in Pakistan politics but the trends are such that we are the most popular party of the under-28s and they account for 60 per cent of the population. In a coalition of small, like-minded parties, we can have real influence."
Politics appears a deceptive, conniving business and I wondered if cricket, with its minor dramas, kitchen-sink plots and ideal of fair play, had under-equipped him for political life in Pakistan.
"The greatest lesson cricket teaches you is that you only lose when you give up," he replied. "If you have the resilience you can come back from any position. A setback is an opportunity to learn from your mistakes. That's why I think I'm better prepared than all of my competitors in politics."
Imran is certainly in no doubt what is needed to sort out the turmoil, violence and killing that has befallen Pakistan over the past four years.
"The only way to counter our problems is to have a leadership that will pull out of this war, or persuade the US to move out of Afghanistan. It has so far cost us in the region of $50 billion, much more than the aid we get from America. If cricketers don't come, imagine what is happening to investment the economy of the Frontier Province has collapsed.
"It's like that line in Alice in Wonderland 'If you don't know where you are going any road will get you there'. The only way to counter that is to have a leadership that's prepared to stand up and say enough is enough. Until that happens the bloodshed shows no sign of abating."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hopefully he is over his health issues now. He is one person in Pakistan that the West take notice of and actually respect.
Imran Khan, Pakistan cricketing hero turned politician, speaks frankly about the way ahead amid the violence and turmoil that has befallen his country.
By Derek Pringle, Cricket Correspondent
Published: 7:30AM GMT 03 Dec 2009
Imran Khan is recuperating from surgery to his small bowel, though judging from his strident views over the phone this week he is over the nil-by-mouth stage.
Never shy of stirring opponents with a sharp word or bouncer during his playing days, the erstwhile Member of Parliament for Mianwali has lost none of his nip against his new adversaries: the Pakistan government under President Asif Ali Zardari and the American-led coalition in Afghanistan.
"The problem in Pakistan right now is that we have no leadership and no direction," Imran said from his home near Islamabad. "There's a lot of uncertainty and people are bracing themselves for bad times.
"The danger with America's war on terror in Afghanistan was always that Pakistan, a nuclear-armed country of 170 million people, could be destabilised in the process, and that is what's happening.
"With the Taliban insurgency, we now have a situation where the Pakistan military are bombing our own people, an act that has seen whole villages converted to fighting their own government and army. I opposed it from the start because it's a war of terror, not a war on terror."
It looks like carnage wherever you sit, with consequences emerging that neither the White House nor Whitehall had anticipated. Part of the problem, Imran suggests, is that the Taliban and al-Qaeda have become conflated as the same foe whereas they are actually very different and want different things.
"The Taliban were religious fundamentalists and a product of the Jihad against the Soviets in the 1980s. They have known nothing but war, but they are not involved in global terror. Separating them from al-Qaeda is the key to America sorting out its objectives."
He won't agree then with President Obama's troop surge or Gordon Brown's insistence that the Pakistan government do more to capture Osama bin Laden. On the run since he slipped through America's hands in Tora Bora, bin Laden is thought to be holed up in Waziristan, the border of which is just 40 miles west of Imran's constituency.
"Before 2006 we never had militant Taliban in Pakistan and no terrorist bombs, but in Peshawar this year we have one every 48 hours. We never had suicide bombers either, not until the US pressured the Pakistan army to go into Waziristan.
"All the tribes in the region are used to fighting each other but when a foreigner comes along they all get together, they've been doing it for hundreds of years. No one can see an endgame unless America leaves the region."
The situation has become critical in places like Peshawar, an edgy frontier town not far from the Khyber Pass. Three weeks ago Waqar Samad, a carpet mogul there who has furnished generations of visiting cricketers with everything from pashmina shawls to Turkoman rugs, phoned to let me know he had been forced to move to Lahore following threats to kidnap him and his family.
He blamed the Taliban but such is their cachet with Pakistan's disaffected, that just about every chancer with a gun and there are plenty of them in that part of the world claims membership.
One of the less severe casualties has been cricket, a huge source of national pride in Imran's day after his Pakistan team won the 1992 World Cup. Since terrorists attacked Sri Lanka's team bus on its way to Lahore's Gaddafi Stadium in March, all international cricket there has ceased, the national team cast adrift to play all their matches away from home in places like Abu Dhabi and England.
"It's important to restore international cricket because the public love the game in this country. But after the attack on the Sri Lankan bus no one is even thinking about cricket in Pakistan any more. This is a country that is racked with scandals at the moment.
"By the way, the official government position is that it wasn't extremists who attacked the Sri Lankan bus but a foreign hand, and we all know who they mean by that. It is interesting though.
The Taliban, whom many have blamed, always claim responsibility whenever they do an attack. Also, they tend to target the police or the army and rarely target civilians. But they have not admitted to either the Sri Lankan bus or the recent bombings in civilian areas."
Sport and politics have always mixed in Pakistan, often explosively, which may be why Imran has avoided the main pitfalls in his transition from star all-rounder to major political player.
Apart from his brief incarceration by former president Pervez Musharraf a few years ago, the biggest barb seems to have come from the political rival who claimed that Imran's grasp of foreign affairs came from the beds of London and Sydney.
For someone sniffy about cricketers who never ventured more than a six-hit from the pitch after retirement, Imran was always going to push himself after cricket. After overseeing the funding and building of Lahore's Shaukat Khanum hospital, in memory of his late mother, he established the Tehreek-e-Insaf party (Movement for Justice) 13 years ago.
As chairman, he won their only seat in 2002 before resigning it at the 2007 election in protest at General Musharraf's unconstitutional attempt to run for president. Imran plans to contest it again, confident that his party will win the seat, and several new ones as well.
"The first election I fought, the party was just a few months old, so it wasn't exactly suprising we won nothing," he said. "We were five years old when we contested the next one and we won a seat. The next election will be the first one we will fight properly prepared and I think we'll do very well.
"Obviously, if you don't win seats you can't become a force in Pakistan politics but the trends are such that we are the most popular party of the under-28s and they account for 60 per cent of the population. In a coalition of small, like-minded parties, we can have real influence."
Politics appears a deceptive, conniving business and I wondered if cricket, with its minor dramas, kitchen-sink plots and ideal of fair play, had under-equipped him for political life in Pakistan.
"The greatest lesson cricket teaches you is that you only lose when you give up," he replied. "If you have the resilience you can come back from any position. A setback is an opportunity to learn from your mistakes. That's why I think I'm better prepared than all of my competitors in politics."
Imran is certainly in no doubt what is needed to sort out the turmoil, violence and killing that has befallen Pakistan over the past four years.
"The only way to counter our problems is to have a leadership that will pull out of this war, or persuade the US to move out of Afghanistan. It has so far cost us in the region of $50 billion, much more than the aid we get from America. If cricketers don't come, imagine what is happening to investment the economy of the Frontier Province has collapsed.
"It's like that line in Alice in Wonderland 'If you don't know where you are going any road will get you there'. The only way to counter that is to have a leadership that's prepared to stand up and say enough is enough. Until that happens the bloodshed shows no sign of abating."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hopefully he is over his health issues now. He is one person in Pakistan that the West take notice of and actually respect.
