Quetta’s attack makes 2016’s third quarter the deadliest but there have been successes elsewhere The brazen attack in Quetta this Monday night is indicative of several troublesome trends. First, it reveals serious security lapses and failures at the highest levels. Second, it reinforces the idea that despite a concerted initial push in a state of national grief after the Army Public School attack on December 16, 2014—that claimed the lives of 144, mostly children—the political will dried up, the focus shifted to the next big catastrophe, and the government re-prioritized. This second point can be best exemplified by the fact that the first meeting by the prime minister to gauge progress on the National Action Plan (NAP) was called 19 months into its enactment. Third, and perhaps most problematically, it defies the state’s narrative that terrorism has been mostly curbed, and legitimizes the extremist element as a potent, resourceful foe. Data from the Center for Research and Security Studies ‘Pakistan Security Report, Q3, 2016’ reveals that this quarter saw a rise in violence-related casualties across Pakistan, with 651 fatalities, and 441 injuries. This is still lower than the 872 fatalities and 572 injuries reported in the first quarter of the year. The interior ministry’s claim that the number of attacks has been reduced significantly is not without merit. A comparative study reveals that there was an overall 40% reduction in violence-related casualties in 2015 over 2014. However, a deeper look also shows that the bulk of this came from a remarkable reduction in violence in Karachi, which alone accounted for well over a quarter of the country’s violence-related fatalities. Data from the first three quarters shows that violence-related fatalities have continued to decline rapidly across the country, with the exception of Balochistan. Within victims, the broad groups with the most fatalities were militants, insurgents and criminals (256), civilians (278), and...

Abysmally shameful is the only way to describe the acrimonious exchange of words among political leaders following the Quetta attack on Monday in which 61 cadets were killed at the police training centre. As condemnations poured in from global capitals, here Imran Khan, Bilawal Zardari and the Nawaz-League brigade led by Khawaja Asif sunk to new depths with accusations and counter-accusations. In the process, our real challenge was drown out. The commentary on television was no better, with trivial discussions of “cowardly act by enemies”, “merciless attackers” etc. What becomes evident amid this circus is the lack of understanding of what these terrorist incidents mean, the missing links in our counter-terror strategy, the indifference of the ruling elite to crucial issues such as institutional reform and a reinforcement of the status quo. Officials jump to declare that Lashkar-e-Jhangvi Al-Alami was linked to the attack. Some spoke of Jamaatul Ahrar. One claim came from Daesh/ Khurasan accompanied by photographs of the three suicide attackers. But regardless of who claims responsibility, one thing is abundantly clear: we are faced with multiple instruments of terrorism: TTP, IS/Daesh and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi Al-Almi and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), to mention a few. Some are handy pawns in a proxy war that is being fought in the region. The objective is the same: destabilization and instability and sowing fear. These groups use various names as a useful ploy to obfuscate their real identity and deflect focus from the real debate. These groups are part of a larger terrorist network that deploys innocent young people for such termination missions as part of a tit-for-tat strategy by the Indian, Afghan and all those establishments which believe Pakistan needs to do more to neutralize and uproot the Haqqani Network and Jamaatud Dawa. Critics of Pakistan completely disregard the proxy war factor.  They link it only to Pakistan’s flawed security policies...