Nuclear-armed Pak spinning out of control: Oz experts

Melbourne, Mar.5 (ANI): A senior reporter with The Australian newspaper and author of the book "In the Shadow of Swords: On the Trail of Terrorism from Afghanistan to Australia", has reiterated that nuclear-armed Pakistan is spinning out of control.

Sally Neighbour's reaction to Tuesday's attack on Sri Lankan cricketers in Lahore, is that it has reinforced her belief that a force like the Taliban, which has been created by the Pakistani military and intelligence services, now is bent on destroying its benefactor.

"The country's powerful security forces seem impotent to stop terrorist atrocities such as Tuesday's attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore that have seen the country branded as the new epicentre of global terrorism," Neighbour says.

"It is clear that the roots of the militant uprising and the new wave of terrorism lie next door in Pakistan, where a far graver crisis looms," she adds.

William Maley of the Asia-Pacific College of Diplomacy at the Australian National University in Canberra observes: "There are huge problems in Afghanistan.

Confidence has plummeted because of the insecurity, but people haven't turned against the democratic transition, they are still strongly committed to it, and that may well carry Afghanistan through."

"But in Pakistan there is a profound crisis of confidence in the political system. It's a failing state and a decidedly roguish state. And this is why a lot of Western leaders are becoming profoundly concerned," he adds.

Maley says that the latest deal between the NWFP Government and the Taliban in the Swat Valley should only seen as a " balloon-squeezing exercise".

The militants will simply pop up somewhere else. The likeliest place seems to be the nearby Swat Valley, where the Pakistani Government last month agreed to allow sharia law in return for a ceasefire.

Like many experts, Maley predicts this will prove disastrous, merely creating a new sanctuary for the extremists bent on destroying the Pakistani state. (ANI)