Trump calls out Pak even as security situation betters

Bloomberg

When US President Donald Trump accused Pakistan of continuing to provide a “safe haven to agents of chaos, violence and terror” it evoked memories of general lawlessness across the country in the years after 9/11 that drove investors from South Asia’s second-largest economy.
While militants the US identifies as terrorists find refuge in Pakistan, safety within the nation has improved dramatically after it launched a costly, now four-year long military crackdown on domestic insurgent and criminal groups, driving recent economic optimism. In the last fiscal year, foreign investment rose to $2.4 billion, the highest since 2009, while the stock market’s benchmark index has increased 134 percent in four years, Asia’s best performer in the period.
It’s a far cry from a few years ago at the height of a gang war in the infamous Karachi neighborhood of Lyari, when criminals armed with rocket launchers fired on a police patrol of two armored vehicles. One rocket ripped into the lead vehicle, blowing up and disabling the engine, as gunmen sprayed the police officers with bullets.
Mohamed Bashir, a bearded 47-year-old cop and front line veteran of Pakistan’s urban warfare, said the gang “had more modern weapons than the police force.” Lyari’s police used to let off 3,500 rounds in one patrol on a busy day and pick up bodies near piles of garbage, Bashir said over tea in a dingy restaurant near the port of Pakistan’s commercial hub. Now paramilitary forces patrol Karachi’s streets and attacks of magnitude are rare.
However, the crackdown has been so successful it has given the military more powers and may be difficult to roll back, even as costs begin to strain the national budget.

TRUMP ACCUSATION
While Islamabad has the capacity to target militants in Pakistan — and protect billions in Chinese infrastructure projects — Trump reiterated, as he pledged more troops for neighboring Afghan-istan, a long-held claim that the nation allows other groups to attack Afghanistan and arch-rival India. The US this month designated Hizbul Mujahideen, a pro-Pakistani Kashmiri group, as a terrorist organization, which Pakistan called “saddening.”
Yet Pakistani politicians and the military bristle at the suggestion that they too haven’t paid a price in the war against terror. No country has sacrificed or done more to counter terrorism, Pakistan’s foreign ministry said in a statement late. One defining moment came in December 2014, when more than 100 school children in Peshawar were massacred by the Pakistani Taliban, prompting a renewed push against insurgents.
Pakistan’s assistance to the US in Afghanistan has also led to a “heavy human and economic cost,” Imran Khan, the leader of Pakistan’s second-largest opposition party and a former cricket star, said on Twitter. “Our economy suffered over $100 billion in losses.”