Pakistan_ A Hard Country - Anatol Lieven [1]
Whether in official service or the media, Maleeha Lodhi has been unfailingly kind, helpful and insightful. Her comments on parts of the manuscript were extremely valuable. I must also thank Shuja Nawaz, Asad Hashim and Hasan-Askari Rizvi for their comments. Of course, responsibility for the contents of this book, and the opinions expressed in it, is entirely my own. Among legions of Pakistani journalists and analysts who have helped me over the years, I must especially mention my old colleague Zahid Hussain, together with Zafar Abbas, Ejaz Haider, Imran Aslam, Behrouz Khan and Mosharraf Zaidi.
In Peshawar, I am most grateful to Rahimullah Yusufzai for all his help, and to Amina Khan and her family, to Brigadier Saad, Brigadier Javed Iqbal, Khalid Aziz, and Fakhruddin Khan. It was also most kind of General Zafrullah Khan and the Frontier Constabulary to invite me to stay in their mess in Peshawar in the summer of 2009. Similarly, I must thank the Vice-Chancellor of Faislabad Agricultural University, Professor Iqraar, for inviting me to speak there and putting me up at the university guest house, Dr Faisal Zaidi and the staff of Broomfield Hall in Multan for inviting me to speak there, Dr Mohammed Amir Rana and the staff of the Pakistan Institute of Peace Studies and Ambassador Tanvir Khan and the Institute of Strategic Studies in Islamabad. I am also most grateful to Professor Ali Khan Shehriyar, Dr Lukas Werth, Dr Shandana Mohmand and their colleagues at the Lahore University of Management Sciences for inviting me to speak, offering very helpful comments on my work and sharing their knowledge of Pakistani society.
General Athar Abbas, Colonel Haidar Malik, Captain Nasireh and other officers of Inter-Services Public Relations helped me greatly by arranging a whole series of meetings with senior military figures. Colonel Ali Awan and Mrs Saira Ahmed of the Pakistani High Commission in London helped not only with meetings but with extremely valuable advice. I am grateful to them and all the officers and men of the Pakistani armed forces who have helped me over the years.
In Sindh, I am deeply grateful to Sardar Mumtaz Ali Bhutto and his family for two very pleasant and interesting stays separated by twenty years, and in particular for inviting me to the boar hunt described in this book; and also to Ellahi Baksh Soomro and other members of the Soomro family for a fascinating stay with them in 1990. The Mayor of Karachi, Mustafa Kemal, gave generously of his valuable time. In Quetta, Nawabzada Aurangzeb Jogezai and Ashfaq Durrani very kindly entertained me in their homes.
I could also not have written this book without the help of assistants and translators in different parts of Pakistan. I am grateful to Zuhra Bahman not only for her help, but also for her family’s hospitality. Watching Russian television in Peshawar during the Georgian – Russian war of 2008 was a somewhat surreal experience, but one worth remembering. I am also deeply grateful to Tauseef-ur-Rehman of The News, whose insights and contacts in Peshawar helped me enormously. Similarly, to Hasan Kazmi in Karachi, Naeem Daniel of Reuters in Quetta, Ali Gardezi in Multan, and Furrukh Khan and Hirra Waqas in Lahore, who also translated pieces from the Urdu media for me, and to Liz Harris in London.
In Britain, Sir Hilary Synnott, Colonel Christopher Langton, Dr Marie Lall and Dr Stephen Lyon provided me with help and advice. In the US, Joshua White helped me with his unparalleled insights into Islamist politics in the North West Frontier Province, as did Stephen Tankel with regard to Lashkar-e-Taiba. Lynne Tracey of the US Consulate in Peshawar kindly invited me on a number of occasions. Khatib Alam and Gul Hafeez Khokar of GHK Consulting helped me with advice, introduced me to Faisalabad and impressed me with their achievements in helping to improve administration in that city. This was also true of Riaz Kamlani, Colonel Anwar