In a significant move, 22 Republican Senators introduced a legislation in the US Senate on Tuesday seeking to impose sanctions on the Taliban and the foreign “entities” that have been supporting them. Titled “Afghanistan Counterterrorism, Oversight, and Accountability Act”, it was introduced by Senator Jim Risch and was co-sponsored by, among others, former Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney. The legislation sought “the imposition of sanctions with respect to the Taliban and persons assisting theA Taliban in Afghanistan, and for other purposes”, which potentially could extend the sanctions to Pakistan or Pakistani individuals. More worryingly for Islamabad and GHQ Rawalpindi, the Act names Pakistan when asking for a report on “entities providing support for the Taliban”. According to the sponsors of the legislation, they seek “an assessment of support by state and non-state actors, including the Government of Pakistan, for the Taliban between 2001 and 2020, including the provision of sanctuary space, financial support, intelligence support, logistics and medical support, training, equipping, and tactical, operational, or strategic direction; (2) an assessment of support by state and non- state actors, including the Government of Pakistan, for the 2021 offensive of the Taliban that toppled the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan… (3) an assessment of support by state and non-state actors, including the Government of Pakistan, for the September 2021 offensive of the Taliban against the Panjshir Valley and the Afghan resistance.”
It couldn’t get more categorical than this. And coming soon after the Congressional Research Service report stating that Pakistan is home to 12 groups designated as “foreign terrorist organizations” by the US, the move by the Republican Senators is causing much anxiety in Pakistan, with Imran Khan’s ministers playing the victim card. As Pakistan human rights minister Shireen Mazari tweeted, Pakistan was being made to “pay heavy price 4 being an ally of US in its ‘War on Terror’”. The minister went on to add, “Twenty years of presence by economically and militarily powerful US & NATO left behind chaos with no stable governance structures. Pakistan now being scapegoated for this failure. This was never our war…”
It is but natural that Pakistan will indulge in chicanery and will not mention the malign role it played in using the Taliban as its sword-arm to achieve its strategic goals in the Af-Pak region. What is, however, more significant is the US “waking up” to Pakistan’s role and for a change talking of sanctioning individuals, to start with. This legislation is likely to get bipartisan support and if so, it would be primarily because of reasons of domestic politics, where the Democrats do not want to be seen their party’s government to be soft towards the Taliban, considering the perception is raging that the mighty American superpower has been humiliated by the Pakistan-supported Taliban and that the Joe Biden administration is singularly responsible for this. The scent of defeat is all too fresh and real for the Americans, and even a Democratic party, where the Wahhabi-backing—and Pakistan-loving—leftist fringe is threatening to become mainstream, cannot afford to whitewash Pakistan’s sins. If this sanctions move comes through, this will also signify the start of the policy change towards Pakistan that Secretary of State Antony Blinken had talked about during a Congressional hearing earlier in the month.
For far too long Pakistan has got away with murder, using the threat of its nuclear weapons falling in the hands of terrorists to keep the US on a leash. It was India that first called Pakistan’s nuclear bluff by carrying out the Balakot strike. And now that the US is out of the region, it does not need Pakistan for strategic reasons, although the latter would like Washington to believe that without Islamabad the Taliban cannot be tamed. But this time Pakistan has crossed the Rubicon of “defeating the US”—and exulting about it—apart from throwing a spanner in US works by getting GHQ’s pet terrorists of the Haqqani network installed as “government” in Kabul, while sidelining the US-favoured, apparently “moderate” Mullah Baradar. It looks like that the 10-odd lobbying firms employed by Pakistan are not enough to sell Islamabad/Rawalpindi GHQ’s case to Washington, DC—something the Pakistanis need to desperately. While sanctions seem a real possibility, there is also a buzz about Pakistan likely to lose its status as a Major Non Nato Ally of the US. But of course such has been the history of US-Pakistan relations that the world will stay sceptical unless such talk distils into action. The FATF meeting that is coming up in October should provide an indication. If Pakistan worms its way out of the grey list and moves to the white list, there will be reason to believe that the US has decided to turn a blind eye to Pakistan’s misdeeds this time as well. And if not, there is still hope that one of the biggest rogues of the world will get some sort of a comeuppance for all its terrorist activities.