GOVERNMENT HOLDS JIRGAS AROUND WAZIRISTAN TO ISOLATE TTP

C O N F I D E N T I A L PESHAWAR 000216


E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/5/2019
TAGS: MOPS PTER PGOV PK
SUBJECT: GOVERNMENT HOLDS JIRGAS AROUND WAZIRISTAN TO ISOLATE TTP

REF: A) PESHAWAR 213; B) ISLAMABAD 2607; C) PESHAWAR 147; D) PESHAWAR 119


CLASSIFIED BY: Candace Putnam, Principal Officer, U.S. Consulate
Peshawar.
REASON: 1.4 (b),(d)



1. (C) Summary. As fighting continues in South Waziristan, the
Pakistani government has expanded its historic divide and
conquer strategy with the Wazir and Mehsud tribes of the North
and South Waziristan Agencies (NWA and SWA) to include military
and civilian leaders and public relations initiatives. The
effort has exposed the extent to which both the military and the
civilians need a complex mix of active and passive tribal
support to succeed during both ongoing combat operations and
post-conflict reconstruction. If the Army can restore the writ
of government in South Waziristan, there will be more options
(and fewer excuses for not taking action) to move against
extremists in North Waziristan.


2. (C) Between late September and late October, the GOP held
four major jirgas (three with elders from the Mehsud, Ahmadzai
Wazir, and Utmanzai Wazir and one with stakeholders in the Lakki
Marwat district) in and near SWA. Chief of Army Staff General
Kayani has launched a very public appeal to the Mehsuds, and PM
Gilani has publicly embraced "patriotic" Mehsud tribesmen as
distinct from the enemy comprised of foreign fighters. In the
settled districts of Tank and Lakki Marwat, the GOP seeks to
shore up local support and block the exit of militants into NWA.
In the Ahmadzai Wazir areas of SWA, the government has secured
its supply routes based on the short-term interests it shares
with a local militant commander. In NWA, the government feels
it must maintain the tenuous alliance of local militant
commanders if it hopes to conduct a successful campaign against
the Tehrik-i-Taliban (TTP).


3. (C) Awami National Party President Asfundyar Wali Khan fears
a neutrality pact with the Wazirs is translating into safe
harbor for militants fleeing into NWA and hopes that,
eventually, the Pakistani military will have to move into NWA
where it will clash with its proxy forces that continue to
attack U.S. troops in Afghanistan. There is no evidence so far
to support that hope. Meanwhile, the FATA Secretariat is
working with Mehsud elders to control the IDP situation and
convince the sons of slain Mehsud tribal leaders to help
re-establish civilian governance after the fighting ends. (See
Ref A for more discussions on post-conflict assistance to South
Waziristan.) End Summary.


Recent Jirgas in Tank and Lakki Marwat...
--------------


4. (SBU) During an October 30 visit to Peshawar, PM Gilani
publicly embraced "patriotic" Mehsud tribesman as distinct from
enemy foreign fighters. This followed a series of civilian and
military initiatives. On October 20, NWFP Governor Owais Ghani
had held a jirga in the city of Tank with Mehsud tribal elders,
intended as a follow-up to the October 19 letter by Chief of
Army Staff General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani that had called for the
people of the Mehsud tribe to rise up against the TTP. The
jirga declined to take any significant steps to condemn or form
a lashkar against the TTP; however, it requested that government
allow Mehsuds with temporary residences in the settled areas to
register as IDPs, a request that the government declined. The
jirga also asked that the government provide assistance to
noncombatant Mehsuds attempting to escape the combat zone (Note:
now underway - see septel),and that Pakistani security forces
give the benefit of the doubt to fleeing Mehsuds who did not
possess identification cards.


5. (SBU) On October 22, the government held a jirga with the
attendance of tribal maliks and notables from throughout the
district of Lakki Marwat, which shares a small border with the
Mehsud area of South Waziristan. The jirga asserted its
intention to cooperate with the government by re-forming its
occasional lashkar, which will patrol against militant
incursions and punish any Lakki Marwat residents who give
sanctuary to militants. The lashkar demonstrated its
seriousness of intent by destroying a fortified building
previously occupied by militants in the restive Shah Hasankhel
area of Lakki Marwat.


Earlier Jirgas in Wana and Miram Shah
--------------


6. (C) Ghani's very public appearance at the Mehsud jirga and
the heavy attendance at the Lakki Marwat jirga contrasted
substantially from the much lower-profile, but more significant,
jirgas held prior to the operation among the Mehsud tribal
neighbors, the Ahmadzai Wazirs (whose lands lie to the south and
west of the Mehsuds') and the Utmanzai Wazirs (whose lands lie
to the north). On September 30 in Wana, JUI-F-aligned cleric
Maulana Deendar led the Ahmadzai Wazir delegation in its meeting
with Shehab Ali Shah, the Political Agent for SWA. The Ahmadzai
agreed to allow the Pakistani military safe-passage through
Ahmadzai-controlled territory, asking in return only that the
Pakistani military not launch military operations targeting
Ahmadzai territories.


7. (C) The jirga at which Utmanzai neutrality was achieved, on
the other hand, was more contentious; while it took place
September 24, most of the issues raised remain unresolved. The
Utmanzai elders present promised that their members would allow
the Pakistani military safe passage through its territory, and
the government made clear that it would hold accountable any
Utmanzai giving sanctuary to fleeing TTP members. In return,
the jirga requested several Pakistani government concessions.
They asked that funds that had allegedly been previously
allocated for development projects in NWA, but never actually
spent, be released. They also asked that curfew be lifted so
that businesses could reopen and that alleged drone attacks
cease. The jirga asked for assurances that the government would
not close Razmak Cadet College, a quasi-military preparatory
school for boys that has remained closed since a June evacuation
in which 46 of the students were briefly kidnapped by militants
(ref D).


8. (C) The government gave the requested assurances that Razmak
Cadet College would not be permanently shuttered or moved. They
made no commitment to answer any of the jirga's other demands.
However, the North Waziristan Political Agent contacted USAID
Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI) shortly after the
conclusion of the jirga to request that twenty OTI projects
directed toward North Waziristan that the government had
previously shelved, citing security, should be reactivated as
conditions had now improved. A Consulate contact also noted
that military patrols of North Waziristan areas outside of the
army's primary logistical routes had diminished.


In South, Jirgas to Reinforce Position
--------------


9. (C) The four major jirgas held by the Pakistani government
in the area around SWA over the past month are only the latest
in a flurry of meetings that the government has held since its
June announcement of intent to mount an operation into
Waziristan. However, the results of these jirgas give insight
into the varying level of government confidence in its ability
to control events in these various areas.


10. (C) In the Mehsud diaspora in the districts of Tank and
Dera Ismail Khan immediately to the east of South Waziristan,
government-backed anti-TTP militant groups drawn from the Mehsud
and Bhittani tribes have effectively ended a TTP reign of terror
through extrajudicial killings of their own over a period of
several months beginning in spring of 2009. The jirga held in
Tank did not represent the interests of these anti-TTP militant
groups, however. The leaders and other participants in this
jirga were traditional tribal elders and religious figures, a
class decimated by TTP assassinations over the past two years
whose lack of an armed following was reflected in their refusal
to commit to a stance against the TTP. According to FATA
Secretary of Law and Order Tariq Hayat Khan, the government is
now attempting to build up these elders as intermediaries
between itself and the Mehsuds outside of South Waziristan, in
hopes that they will be able to transition into a leadership
role within South Waziristan once the campaign has concluded.


11. (C) In the district of Lakki Marwat, the long-time militant
control in North and South Waziristan have never translated into
the insecurity faced over past years by its neighboring
districts of Bannu, Tank, and DI Khan. Consulate contacts
attribute this to the district's system of community defense
groups, who have intimidated would-be militants and kept local
police informed of suspicious activities. Lakki Marwat is being
studied as a model for engagement between security forces and
community in other areas at high risk of militant penetration,
such as the recently secured portions of the Malakand division;
the government has little fear of insecurity in this district
but is merely continuing its usual procedure of rallying local
population to guard against militant incursions.


12. (C) In the Ahmadzai Wazir areas of South Waziristan,
Consulate contacts believe the government's writ does not extend
outside of its headquarters in the city of Wana and the various
troop encampments in and near certain Ahmadzai villages; the
rest of the territory is controlled by militant leaders
affiliated with militant commander Maulvi Nazir. The jirga in
Wana, held in advance of the operation in SWA, was held to
secure the army's access to logistics through this area.
Consulate contacts say that the local maliks who attended the
jirga were speaking on behalf of Nazir, whose long-time
opposition to the presence of Uzbek foreign fighters who support
the TTP (ref C) and clashes with the TTP in August give him a
shared interest in the TTP's defeat. A consulate contact who
attended the jirga said that other attendees had told him Nazir
had urged the delegation to give the government these
guarantees.


In North Waziristan, Worries About Militants' Neutrality
-------------- --------------


13. (C) In North Waziristan, Consulate contacts say the
government's writ does not extend outside of the city of Miram
Shah and troop encampments in and near certain towns. Much of
the rest of the territory is controlled by militant leaders
allied to militant commander Hafiz Gul Bahadur. In order to
block a TTP retreat to the north, the government must position
and resupply a large force in North Waziristan - impossible
without the acquiescence of the militants. Unlike in the case
of the Ahmadzais, the Utmanzai maliks who participated have
received relatively little guidance from Bahadur and therefore
are essentially speaking for themselves. Bahadur has not yet
broken the informal truce that has held for the past few weeks.
However, the Pakistani authorities are not confident that this
will hold and have been scrambling to minimize irritants between
the military and the Utmanzais - North Waziristan's Political
Agent told us October 27 that he had held six jirgas in the
previous eight days.


14. (C) Frontier Corps chief MG Tariq Khan recounted to CG
November 3 that he had predicted to Chief of Army Staff General
Kayani that the NWA Wazirs would stay out of the fight against
rival Mehsuds with our without jirga negotiations. "That is one
of the peculiar dynamics of the Waziristans." For his part
Awami National Party leader Asfundyar Wali Khan told CG that he
feared the militants would exploit a neutrality pact with the
NWA Wazirs and use the Pakhtunwali tradition of shelter to find
shelter. Like FATA Secretariat Chief Habibullah Khan (ref A),
he expressed the hope that the Army eventually would have to
tackle North Waziristan. MG Khan did not rule out that
possibility, especially if local support for the militants
continues to erode.


15. (C) Comment: The GOP's extensive efforts to variously
cajole, neutralize and threaten the Mehsud and Wazir tribes
demonstrated the complexity of the Waziristan environment, both
for ongoing combat operations and post-conflict development
work. So far, there have been no concrete signs the Army plans
to take on extremists in North Waziristan. But if they can
restore the writ of government in South Waziristan, there will
be more options (and fewer excuses for not taking action) in
North Waziristan. End comment.


PUTNAM