President Zardari offers olive branch to India

In a moving Op Ed titled The Terrorists Want to Destroy Pakistan, Too which appeared in the print edition of NYT dated 8 December 2008, President Asif Ali ZardariAsif Ali Zardari of Pakistan expressed his feelings of empathy with the Indian people in the wake of the Mumbai terrorist attacks that recently claimed about 180 precious lives. He said that the Mumbai attacks were directed at India as well as Pakistan’s new democratic government and the peace process with India that it had initiated.

Drawing attention to the arrest on Sunday of militants suspected of being behind the attacks, he said that Pakistan would take action against the non-state actors found within its territory, "treating them as criminals, terrorists and murderers."

Other action points in his Op Ed are directed to India and the international community. He cautions that "as rage fueled by the Mumbai attacks catches on, Indians must pause and take a breath. India and Pakistan — and the rest of the world — must work together to track down the terrorists who caused mayhem in Mumbai, attacked New York, London and Madrid in the past, and destroyed the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad in September."

To meet the challenge of defeating the fanatical and well-organized terrorists, he asks the international community for help, noting that Pakistan had already committed 150,000 soldiers fighting Al Qaeda, the Taliban and their extremist allies along the border with Afghanistan — far more troops than NATO has sent to Afghanistan.

The statistics cited by Zardari in connection with Pakistan’s war on terrorism are revealing: nearly 2,000 Pakistanis in more than 600 terrorism-related incidents killed this year alone, "including 1,400 civilians and 600 security personnel ranging in rank from ordinary soldier to three-star general." Security forces have killed 600 militants in recent attacks, hundreds by Pakistani F-16 jet strikes in the last two months.

Against this background, accusations of complicity on Pakistan’s part in the Mumbai attacks would further complicate the situation, says Pakistan's President.

Zardari concludes by advising that for India, Pakistan and the United States, the best response to the Mumbai carnage is to coordinate in counteracting the scourge of terrorism. The world must act to strengthen Pakistan’s economy and democracy, help Pakistan build civil society and provide it with the law enforcement and counterterrorism capacities that will enable Pakistan to fight the terrorists effectively.