A Territory Plagued By Lawlessness

The taking hostage of 250 children in the town of Bannu, in Pakistan's North West Frontier province, was more an act of desperation than a deliberate political move.

The gunmen fled to the school after botching the kidnap of a health worker, eventually surrendering after tribal officials negotiated an end to the crisis.

Even if the hostage-taking amounted to no more than an act of opportunism, the incident was a stark reminder of the general lawlessness - the word lawless and Pakistan's north-west always seem to go together - that plagues a large swath of Pakistani territory bordering Afghanistan.

For the president, Pervez Musharraf, the hostage-taking is doubly embarrassing. During the past week, Musharraf has been touring Europe, assuring western leaders that Pakistan was not slipping into chaos and that he was the man best equipped to lead the country to a "soft" political landing after declaring a state of emergency last year.

The west - and many in Pakistan - are not so sure. Last week, more than 100 retired senior officer wrote an open letter to the president, urging him to step down so the country could get on with the task of effectively fighting militants.

The militants are growing in strength in the north-west of Pakistan, the tribal areas that have provided sanctuary for the al-Qaida and Taliban forces driven out of Afghanistan in 2002.

The unrest stretches across not only North West Frontier province, the smallest of Pakistan's four main provinces, but also to the nearby areas of south and north Waziristan.

Waziristan has been the scene of heavy fighting in recent months. Earlier this month, the Pakistani army launched an air and ground assault on the mountain stronghold of Baitullah Mehsud, the Taliban commander accused of being behind the assassination of Benazir Bhutto.

Hundreds of soldiers, supported by tanks, helicopter gunships and an artillery barrage, encircled Mehsud's home territory in South Waziristan, sending refugees fleeing into North West Frontier province, some on foot.

The offensive followed months of clashes in Pakistan's north-west, where Islamists have grown increasingly bold in confronting Pakistani troops.

Last week, Pakistani forces killed up to 30 militants in clashes near the city of Peshawar, after fighters seized four trucks laden with ammunition and other paramilitary supplies.

As Pakistan's north-west becomes increasingly restive, the US has shown signs of waning confidence in Musharraf, even though he insisted at a press conference in London today that Pakistani forces were succeeding in the fight against al-Qaida and the Taliban.

Such statements, however, are hard to square with reports of increased militant activity in the Swat valley, a picturesque area in the north-west that is no longer so safe for tourists.

It is certainly not the perception of the Bush administration that Musharraf is succeeding against militants in the north-west. The White House is putting pressure on him to allow the CIA a freer hand to operate in the tribal areas where al-Qaida and the Taliban are active.

According to US media reports, two top US intelligence officials traveled secretly to Pakistan earlier this month to make the point directly to Musharraf.

But the Pakistani leader rejected proposals to expand any US combat presence in his country, either through covert CIA missions or by joint operations with Pakistani security forces.

Musharraf can only be aware that too close an embrace with the US amounts to a political kiss of death in a country where anti-US sentiment already runs high.

In any case, he is on firm grounds to reject an offer of US boots on Pakistani soil. It is hard to see how the presence of a few US troops would make any appreciable difference when around 100,000 Pakistani forces have been unable to completely stamp out al-Qaida and Taliban remnants.

On the flipside, it is all too easy to see how a US presence, with the use of air strikes, would lead to increased civilian casualties through friendly fire incidents, feeding anti-US feeling and driving more recruits into the hands of anti-government forces.

The unrest in Pakistan's north-west may have taken a turn for the worse, but Musharraf is almost certainly right in thinking that the presence of US forces would only exacerbate the situation.