Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
09PESHAWAR124
2009-06-09 14:31:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Consulate Peshawar
Cable title:  

UPPER DIR BOMBING RESPONSE SHOWS EFFECTIVENESS AND

Tags:  MOPS PTER PGOV PK 
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C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 PESHAWAR 000124 

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 6/9/2019
TAGS: MOPS PTER PGOV PK
SUBJECT: UPPER DIR BOMBING RESPONSE SHOWS EFFECTIVENESS AND
LIMITATIONS OF LASHKARS

REF: A) 08 Islamabad 3337 B) 08 Islamabad 3332

CLASSIFIED BY: Lynne Tracy, Principal Officer, U.S. Consulate
Peshawar, Department of State.
REASON: 1.4 (d)
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 PESHAWAR 000124

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 6/9/2019
TAGS: MOPS PTER PGOV PK
SUBJECT: UPPER DIR BOMBING RESPONSE SHOWS EFFECTIVENESS AND
LIMITATIONS OF LASHKARS

REF: A) 08 Islamabad 3337 B) 08 Islamabad 3332

CLASSIFIED BY: Lynne Tracy, Principal Officer, U.S. Consulate
Peshawar, Department of State.
REASON: 1.4 (d)

1. (C) Summary: The June 5 mass-casualty bombing of a mosque in
Upper Dir and resulting June 7-9 punitive action by a tribal
lashkar have highlighted the long-standing tension in Upper Dir
district over militant activity there and its recent
exacerbation by the military operations in neighboring Swat
district. This recent unrest also provides an example of the
effectiveness with which lashkars may be deployed if conditions
are right. A comparison of this incident with other instances
of lashkar formation, however, reveals that conditions are not
often right. Lashkars have been most effective in areas with
strong tribal systems in which the balance of forces clearly
favors the tribes rather than the militants, or where they have
backing from Pakistani security forces. In the Waziristans,
targeted killings and intimidation have taken a severe toll on
community leadership. Elsewhere in the Federally Administered
Tribal Areas (FATA) as well as much of the settled areas of the
Northwest Frontier Province (NWFP),there has been a steady
deterioration of tribal bonds. The limited purpose, duration,
and operational space of a lashkar also work against viewing it
as a long-term "hold" force for the FATA or parts of the NWFP.
Lashkars are a narrowly focused and uncertain tool at best in
countering militancy along Pakistan's northwestern border as we
have seen in Bajaur and Kurram in fall 2008 (reftels). End
summary.

Mass-casualty Attack; Mass Armed Response
--------------


2. (C) During Friday prayers in the afternoon of June 5, a
militant wearing an explosive vest detonated himself at the
primary Sunni mosque in the village of Hayagai Sharqi in Upper
Dir. The explosion and subsequent collapse of part of the
building killed over forty and injured dozens more; many of
those killed were children. According to Upper Dir resident and
former NWFP Health Minister Inayatullah Khan, seven of those
killed were elders who had participated in a weeks-long jirga
called in April to expel militants residing in villages in the

area of Doog Darra and in the lashkar that was its enforcement
mechanism. Upper Dir nazim (note: equivalent to a mayor)
Saqibzada Tariqullah told us that the Hayagai villages are a
center for this jirga and lashkar's leadership, particularly
including influential anti-militant malik Mutabbar Khan, who
survived the attack.


3. (SBU) The local reaction to the suicide attack was quick in
coming. Over June 6, a lashkar formed (with the encouragement
of the government, according to District Coordination Officer
Atif-ur-Rehman) from hundreds of the armed residents of the
villages around Hayagai Sharqi and some of the villages of Doog
Darra. On June 7, it attacked several of the villages within
Doog Darra known to house militants. Operating with arms and at
least some tactical support from security forces (including
aerial surveillance of militant positions and helicopter
bombardment),the lashkar claimed to have burned 21 houses,
destroyed a training camp, and killed over twenty militants,
including two commanders. Fighting continued through June 8 and
was still ongoing by June 9. District Police Officer Ejaz Ahmad
said around 200 militants were trapped by the lashkar and were
putting up stiff resistance.


4. (C) According to other Consulate contacts, unregistered
Afghans have resided in Doog Darra for years. The area has
therefore become a center for militants transiting the region,
but the armed citizenry of the area and their hostility toward
the militants had deterred significant militant operations in
the region. FATA Secretariat Additional Chief Secretary
Habibullah Khan, who has served in a number of positions in
Malakand Division, told Peshawar PO that he feared militants
fleeing Swat would use the high rugged mountain passes of Upper
Dir as an escape route via Chitral into Afghanistan and possibly
doubling back into Bajaur or Mohmand. The snow is melting, he
said, making these passes more inviting.

Lashkar Background
--------------

PESHAWAR 00000124 002 OF 003




5. (C) A lashkar is a tribal militia - a group of men from the
community who join together on the decision of the tribal jirga
(and at times a government representative such as the Political
Agent or District Coordination Officer) to address a specific
security issue. In addition to a limited purpose, the lashkar
operates on a limited territorial basis along tribal and clan
lines. The lashkar is supported by the community, which
provides the group with weapons, food, vehicles, housing, etc.
In the FATA, particularly Bajaur, since the fall of 2008, the
GOP, specifically the Frontier Corps and the Interior Ministry,
actively encouraged the formation of lashkars to supplement
understaffed security forces and mobilize communities against
militants.

Upper Dir's Suitability for Lashkar Formation
--------------


6. (C) The strong and sustained action by the Upper Dir lashkar
against militants in Upper Dir is an encouraging sign of local
resistance against militant expansion, but it also illustrates
some of the necessary preconditions for the effective use of
lashkars. Upper Dir is an unusually rugged region, with poor
infrastructure and poor central governmental control. As a
result, Upper Dir has retained very strong tribal structures
used to dealing with law-and-order problems on their own.
Influential tribal elders appear to have opposed from the first
the relatively small number of militants present. The
ruggedness and backwardness of Upper Dir has made it a
less-promising transit point between Afghanistan and Swat than
Lower Dir had been (until the current military operation there).
The area's poverty and lack of resources has also made it a
poor source of revenue for militants. As a result of these and
perhaps other factors, it has never attracted a large number of
militants to the area.


7. (C) Those militants who were present in Upper Dir appear to
have come primarily from outside. Like the Afghans among whom
they moved, they were not part of the community and appear to
have had serious difficulty in attracting locals, bound strongly
to their respective clans, to their ranks. Their activities,
such as the early May kidnapping of sixteen locally-raised
Levies (a local policing force) and the June 6 suicide bombing
at the mosque, directly threatened local equities. Finally,
there appears to have been significant government engagement
both in the formation of the jirga and lashkar and in its
deployment on a large scale.


8. (C) Similar conditions have applied to the formation of
previous effective lashkars. The lashkar raised from the
Salarzai tribe of Bajaur agency in 2008, which repeatedly
engaged local militants in late 2008, took advantage of a strong
tribal structure, a predominantly rural and armed population,
and the close proximity of a supporting Frontier Corps (FC)
presence. While the Salarzai engaged a stronger militant
element than the Upper Dir lashkar has yet seen, that militant
element in Bajaur was primarily based in the rival Mahmoond
tribe and therefore never successfully recruited in Salarzai
areas. Others of the more effective lashkars have been formed
among homogeneous, indigenously-led, and government-supported
locals in tribe-dominated regions such as the heavily
feud-ridden southern outskirts of Peshawar city, various tribal
territories in Khyber agency, and the Kohistani regions of Upper
Swat.


9. (C) Even in such favorable circumstances, the lashkars and
the tribal systems underlying them have shown themselves to be
highly vulnerable to militant action against tribal leaders. A
case in point is the Orakzai agency where tribal hostility to
militants had made Orakzai one of the most secure of the
agencies. When a suicide attack on a jirga in early October
2008 killed over 100 elders, tribal resistance to militants
appears to have evaporated entirely, allowing Tehrik-i-Taliban
lieutenant Hakimullah Mehsud to quickly take effective control
of most of the agency without a fight.


PESHAWAR 00000124 003 OF 003



10. (C) The June 6 suicide attack on the Upper Dir mosque seems
to have been an attempt to create a similar leadership vacuum
that militants could exploit. Upper Dir nazim Tariqullah told
us that the bomber had asked to speak with Mutabbar Khan and
then detonated himself before entering the mosque, when
challenged to produce his identification card. The bomber might
otherwise have expected to kill a greater number of elders,
including Mutabbar Khan, thereby hamstringing any local reaction
to the attack. If militants fleeing Swat continue to pass
through or rest in Upper Dir, further such attacks may be
coming. It is difficult to predict whether and how much the
Upper Dir social structure will be able to stand firm against
such violence.

Comment: Lashkars Least Effective Where Most Needed
-------------- --------------


11. (C) The events of the past few days in Upper Dir serve as a
reminder that under the right conditions, within a defined area
of local interest, and during the short term, local tribal
structures and lashkars can be effectively used by the Pakistani
government to counter militant activity where the government
does not have the forces to do so. In much of the FATA and the
NWFP, however, some or all of these conditions do not apply.
This is particularly the case in the areas of ongoing and
upcoming operations for the Pakistani government. The limited
purpose, duration, and operational space of a lashkar also work
against viewing it as a long-term "hold" force for the FATA or
parts of the NWFP.


12. (C) In North and South Waziristan, where an armed population
and strong and homogeneous tribal structures once existed, the
tribal structures have been gutted by the targeted assassination
of nearly 300 tribal elders over the past few years and the
overwhelming strength of the various militant warlords. Frontier
Corps Commander General Tariq Khan explored the possibility of
raising a lashkar in South Waziristan last fall and met with
failure; people were simply too afraid.


13. (C) In Bajaur, where the FC is gearing up for another
operation, lashkars have had mixed success. The recently
replaced Bajaur Political Agent (PA) had been unable to get any
traction in the Mahmoond tribal areas in building up local
tribal authorities and lashkars degraded by months of domination
by militants. The PA of Mohmand agency has complained of the
same thing in his agency's Safi tribal areas, where militant
activity had been the strongest prior to the FC operation there
earlier this year.


14. (C) In Swat, none of the necessary conditions for effective
lashkar formation apply, despite calls by some local leaders
such as Afzal Khan Lala that the local populace be armed against
the militants. Swatis in general are unused to participating in
combat, heavily de-tribalized, alienated from the local
landowners who would make the most obvious leaders, traumatized
by living under effective militant control for two years, and
distrustful of the government and the armed forces after two
previous failed campaigns against the militants. If the
Pakistani government wants to hold any of these areas after it
has finished clearing them, it will have to be prepared to
commit its forces for the long term.
TRACY