The primary duty of any state is to protect its citizens. The continued violence in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Kurram district demonstrates that the state is either unwilling or unable to stem this violence. The claim by state functionaries that the violence “stems from a tribal dispute” has been proven incorrect by recent events.
As an editorial in Dawn noted, while tribal disputes over land and water have played a key role in exacerbating tensions, “sectarian groups and terrorist outfits have exploited these differences to establish footholds” in the district, while “the state has fumbled for responses.” Now it appears that after an attack on a convoy in Bagan that resulted in the deaths of security personnel a counterterrorism operation is possible.
As the Dawn editorial lamented, “if the state had moved with alacrity when violence initially flared up last year, such bloodshed could have been avoided. But it seems that the administration was in denial, letting the Kurram cauldron boil until it was ready to explode, which it certainly has.”
