Asia
Indian tycoon Adani hit by more losses, calls for probe
Losses for the troubled Adani Group, India's second-largest conglomerate, deepened on Friday as shares in its flagship company tumbled another 25%, extending over a week of declines that have wiped out tens of billions of dollars in market value.
The debacle, which led Adani Enterprises, the group's flagship company, to cancel a share offering meant to raise $2.5 billion, has drawn calls for regulators to investigate after a U.S. short-selling firm, Hindenburg Research, issued a report claiming the group engages in market manipulation and other fraudulent practices. Adani denies the allegations.
Opposition lawmakers blocked Parliament proceedings for a second day Friday, chanting slogans and demanding a probe into the business dealings of coal tycoon Gautam Adani, who is said to enjoy close ties with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The government has remained silent. A Finance Ministry spokesperson told The Associated Press there were no plans for any comment. Amit Malviya, the governing Bharatiya Janata Party’s information and technology chief, said in a television interview that the opposition was using Adani’s crisis to target the Modi government and that “regulators are looking into” what happened.
India’s market regulator, the Securities and Exchange Board of India, also has not commented. The Economic Times newspaper reported, citing unnamed sources, that the agency had asked stock exchanges to check for any unusual activity in Adani stocks.
Shares in Adani Enterprises fell as much as 30%, to 1,017 rupees ($12) Friday before recovering to trade about 15% lower. The company's share price has plunged by about 66% since Hindenburg released its report last week, when it stood at 3,436 rupees ($41). Stock in six other Adani-listed companies were down 5% to 10% on Friday.
Adani, who made a vast fortune mining coal and trading before expanding into construction, power generation, manufacturing and media, was Asia's richest man and the world's third wealthiest before the troubles began with Hindenburg's report.
Read more: Adani cancels a $2.5 billion share offer after stock fraud allegations
By Friday, his net worth had halved to $61 billion, according to Bloomberg’s Billionaire Index, where he dropped to the 21st spot worldwide.
He has said little publicly since the troubles began, though in a video address after Adani Enterprises cancelled its already fully subscribed share offering he promised to repay investors. The company has said it is reviewing its fundraising plans.
Hindenburg's report said it was betting against seven publicly listed Adani companies, judging them to have an “85% downside, purely on a fundamental basis owing to sky-high valuations.” Other allegations in the report included concerns over debt, use of offshore shell companies to artificially raise share prices and past investigations into fraud.
Adani's speedy, debt-led expansion in recent years caused his net worth to shoot up nearly 2,000%. Even before last week, critics said his ascent was aided by his apparent close ties to Modi and his government. Analysts say he has been successful at aligning his priorities with that of the government by investing in key sectors, but point out that he also has major infrastructure projects in states that are ruled by opposition parties
Official: 17 people killed in bus-truck crash in NW Pakistan
A head-on collision between a passenger bus and a speeding truck trailer near a tunnel in northwest Pakistan overnight killed at least 17 passengers, including women and children, a rescue official said early Friday.
The crash happened in Kohat district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, according to the local emergency official and state-run media.
“We have transported all the dead and injured to a hospital in Kohat,” rescue official Rehmat Ullah said.
TV footage showed images of the destroyed bus.
Azam Khan, the caretaker chief minister in the province, has expressed his deep sorrow and grief over the tragic accident.
Read more: Passenger bus in Pakistan crashes, catches fire killing 40
On Sunday, a passenger bus crashed into a pillar and fell off a bridge in Baluchistan province, catching fire and killing 40 people.
Deadly accidents are common in Pakistan due to poor road infrastructure and a disregard for traffic laws.
US, Philippines agree on larger American military presence
The United States and the Philippines announced an agreement Thursday to expand America's military presence in the Southeast Asian country, with U.S. forces granted access to four more Philippine military camps, effectively giving Washington new ground to ramp up deterrence against China.
The agreement between the longtime treaty allies under a 2014 defense pact was made public during the visit of U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, who has led efforts to strengthen America’s security alliances in Asia amid China’s increasing assertiveness toward Taiwan and in the disputed South China Sea.
The allies also said in a joint statement that “substantial” progress has been made in projects at five Philippine military bases, where U.S. military personnel were earlier granted access by Filipino officials under the Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, or EDCA. Construction of American facilities in the camps has been underway for years but has been hampered by unspecified local issues.
Austin thanked President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., whom he briefly met in Manila, for allowing the U.S. military to broaden its presence in the Philippines.
“I have always said that it seems to me that the future of the Philippines and for that matter the Asia-Pacific will always have to involve the United States simply because those partnerships are so strong,” Marcos told Austin.
In a televised news conference later with his Philippine counterpart, Carlito Galvez Jr., Austin gave assurances of U.S. military support and said the 1951 Mutual Defense Treaty, which obligates the U.S. and the Philippines to help defend one another in major conflicts, “applies to armed attacks on either of our armed forces, public vessels or aircraft anywhere in the South China Sea.”
“We discussed concrete actions to address destabilizing activities in the waters,” Austin said without elaborating. “This is part of our effort to modernize our alliance and these efforts are especially important as the People’s Republic of China continues to advance its illegitimate claims in the West Philippine Sea.”
Austin and Galvez declined to provide more details on the agreement. The U.S. defense chief said it did not mean the re-establishment of permanent American bases but noted that “it’s a big deal.”
Galvez said there was a need for more consultations, including with local officials in provinces where visiting U.S. forces would establish a presence in Philippine military camps.
China claims the self-ruled island of Taiwan as its own territory, to be taken by force if necessary, and Beijing has sent warships, bombers, fighter jets and support aircraft into airspace near Taiwan on a near-daily basis, sparking concerns of a potential blockade or military action.
Philippine military and defense officials said in November the U.S. had sought access to five more local military camps mostly in the northern Philippine region of Luzon.
Also Read: Philippines seeks to cleanse police force of drug ties
Two of the additional camps where the U.S. wanted to gain access are in Cagayan province near Luzon island’s northern tip, across a sea border from Taiwan, the Taiwan Strait and southern China. Other camps that would host American forces are along the country’s western coast, including in the provinces of Palawan and Zambales, which face the disputed South China Sea.
China and the Philippines, along with Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan have been locked in increasingly tense territorial disputes over the busy and resource-rich South China Sea. Washington lays no claims in the strategic waters but has deployed its warships and fighter and surveillance aircraft for patrols that it says promote freedom of navigation and the rule of law but have infuriated Beijing.
“The Philippine-US alliance has stood the test of time and remains ironclad,” the allies said in their statement. “We look forward to the opportunities these new sites will create to expand our cooperation together.”
The Philippines, Washington’s oldest treaty ally in Asia, used to host two of the largest U.S. Navy and Air Force bases outside the American mainland. The bases were shut down in the early 1990s after the Philippine Senate rejected an extension, but American forces returned for large-scale combat exercises with Filipino troops under a 1999 Visiting Forces Agreement and the EDCA pact.
The Philippine Constitution prohibits the permanent basing of foreign troops and their involvement in local combat. The EDCA pact allows visiting American forces to indefinitely stay in rotating batches in barracks and other buildings they construct within designated Philippine camps with their defense equipment, except nuclear weapons.
Austin is the latest high-ranking American official to travel to the Philippines after Vice President Kamala Harris visited in November in a sign of warming ties after a strained period under Marcos’s predecessor, Rodrigo Duterte.
Duterte had nurtured cozy ties with China and Russia and at one point threatened to sever relations with Washington, eject American forces and abrogate the Visiting Forces Agreement that allows thousands of American forces to come each year for large-scale combat exercises.
“I am confident that we will continue to work together to defend our shared values of freedom, democracy and human dignity,” Austin said. “As you heard me say before, the United States and the Philippines are more than just allies. We’re family.”
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Associated Press journalists Joeal Calupitan in Manila, the Philippines and Kiko Rosario in Bangkok, Thailand contributed to this report.
Militant who killed 101 at Pakistan mosque wore uniform
A suicide bomber who killed 101 people at a mosque in northwest Pakistan this week had disguised himself in a police uniform and did not raise suspicion among guards, the provincial police chief said on Thursday.
Moazzam Jah Ansari said the bomber had been identified and police were close to arresting members of the network that was behind Monday's attack, one of the deadliest ever in Peshawar, the capital in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
“We will avenge the martyrdom of each and every policeman," Ansari told a news conference.
The blast collapsed the roof of the 50-year-old mosque, killing 101 people, mostly policemen. Two hundred twenty-five people were injured.
Ansari spoke a day after dozens of police officers in a rare move joined a peace march organized by the members of civil society groups in Peshawar, demanding protection for themselves.
Also read: Pakistan blames 'security lapse' for mosque blast; 100 dead
Hours after the bombing, Pakistan's Defense Minister Khawaja Mohammad Asif accused the Pakistani Taliban, known by the acronym TTP, of carrying out the attack, saying they were operating from neighboring Afghan territory. Pakistan wants the Afghan Taliban to take action against the TTP group.
Shortly after the bombing, a TTP commander claimed responsibility, but more than 10 hours after the attack the chief spokesman for the group distanced the TTP from the carnage, saying it was not its policy to attack mosques.
On Wednesday, Afghanistan’s Taliban-appointed foreign minister, however, had asked Pakistani authorities to look for the reasons behind militant violence in their country instead of blaming Afghanistan. The comments from Amir Khan Muttaqi came after Pakistani officials said the attackers who orchestrated Monday’s suicide bombing were using Afghan soil to target civilians and security forces.
More than 300 worshippers were praying in the Sunni mosque, with more approaching, when the bomber set off his explosives vest. Ansari said the attacker was not searched because guards assumed that he was one of their colleagues.
“Yes, I admit that it was a security lapse and I take responsibility for it," Ansari said.
Pakistan Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif visited a hospital in Peshawar after the bombing and vowed “stern action” against those behind the attack. Pakistan, which is mostly Sunni Muslim, has seen a surge in militant attacks since November when the Pakistani Taliban ended a cease-fire with government forces.
The violence has increased in Pakistan since the Afghan Taliban seized power in neighboring Afghanistan in August 2021 as U.S. and NATO troops pulled out of the country after 20 years of war.
The TTP is separate from but a close ally of the Afghan Taliban.
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Associated Press writer Munir Ahmed contributed to this story from Islamabad
Adani cancels a $2.5 billion share offer after stock fraud allegations
NEW DELHI (AP/UNB) — Embattled Indian billionaire Gautam Adani said Thursday his conglomerate will review its plans for raising capital after calling off his flagship company’s $2.5 billion share offering following the loss of tens of billions of dollars in market value due to claims of fraud by a U.S.-based short-selling firm.
Adani Enterprises canceled the share sale late Wednesday, citing “market volatility.” Stocks in the coal mines to ports empire sank after Hindenburg Research, which has a track record of sending stock prices of its targets tumbling, accused the group of “brazen” stock market manipulation and accounting fraud, among other financial abuses.
The share sale was seen as a crucial test of investor confidence in Adani, whose net worth shot up about 2,000% in recent years as share prices for his listed companies soared.
By the time trading closed Wednesday, Adani Enterprises was down by a whopping 28%. But the share offering had drawn nearly 51 million bids, exceeding the 45.5 million offered to the public. Stock in six of Adani’s other listed companies sank between 2% and 19%.
Early Thursday, Adani Enterprises was down by 5%. Stocks in four of Adani’s other listed companies were down by 10% and two others sunk between 5% and 8%.In a video address Thursday, Adani said the decision to scrap the share offering was made “to insulate the investors from potential losses.”
“For me, the interest of my investors is paramount and everything else is secondary,” he said.
Adani Enterprises said in a statement that it would withdraw the transaction and return the money to its investors. The decision would not “have any impact on our existing operations and future plans,” it said, adding that the group’s balance sheet was “very healthy” with strong cashflows and secure assets.
Adani made a vast fortune mining coal as energy-hungry India grew swiftly after its economy was liberalized in the 1990s. Adani companies operate airports in major cities, build roads, generate electricity, manufacture defense equipment, develop agricultural drones, sell cooking oil and run a media outlet.
Hindenburg said it was betting against the group, accusing it of “pulling the largest con in corporate history.” It said it judged the seven key Adani listed companies to have an “85% downside, purely on a fundamental basis owing to sky-high valuations.”
Most of the allegations involved concerns about the group’s debt levels, activities of top executives, use of offshore shell companies to artificially boost share prices and past investigations into fraud. It listed 88 questions for the group to answer.
Adani Group dismissed Hindenburg’s allegations, and called its report a “calculated attack on India, the independence, integrity and quality of Indian institutions, and the growth story and ambition of India.” On Sunday, it issued a 413-page report that rejected its questions, saying none were “based on independent or journalistic fact finding.”
Adani’s response included documents and data tables. It said the group has made all necessary regulatory disclosures and abided by local laws.
The stock losses on Wednesday cost Adani his title as the richest man in Asia and in India. Adani also slid from a ranking of being the world’s third richest man to the 13th as his fortune plummeted to $72 billion, according to Bloomberg’s Billionaire Index. Prior to the Hindenburg report, his net worth was about $120 billion.
Leaked docs suggest US, UK oil and gas field contractors made profits in Myanmar after coup: Guardian report
According to tax records obtained by The Guardian, in the two years following a ruthless junta’s takeover of Myanmar, some of the largest oil and gas service companies in the world have continued to profit handsomely from projects that have supported the military government.
The United Nations’ special rapporteur on Myanmar said that since the military took over in February 2021, it is “committing war crimes and crimes against humanity daily.”
According to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, more than 2,940 individuals have been slain, including children, pro-democracy activists, and other civilians, The Guardian report adds.
In the midst of this unrest, it appears that US, UK, and Irish oil and gas field contractors – who offer vital drilling and other services to Myanmar’s gas field operators – continued to make millions of dollars in profit in the nation after the coup. This information comes from leaked Myanmar tax records and other reports.
Investigative journalism organization Finance Uncovered, The Guardian, and the Myanmar advocacy group Justice for Myanmar all conducted analyses of the records after they were obtained by the transparency non-profit Distributed Denial of Secrets.
The documents indicate that, in some cases, the subsidiaries of major US gas field service companies continued to operate in Myanmar despite the US State Department’s warning that there were significant risks associated with doing business there in January of last year. This included working with state-owned companies that financially support the junta, like the national oil and gas company Myanma Oil and Gas Enterprise (MOGE).
Read More: International community urged to support all efforts to hold Myanmar military responsible for HR violations, abuses
More Myanmar-related sanctions were issued by the US, UK, Australia, and Canada on Tuesday, including those affecting the managing director and deputy managing director of MOGE. However, they refrained from sanctioning MOGE specifically.
In view of the “intensifying human rights violations in Myanmar” and the “substantial resources” MOGE offers the junta, the European Union was the first region to issue penalties against MOGE itself in February.
European businesses are unable to participate in oil and gas field development projects in Myanmar due to EU sanctions. However, such regulations have not yet been implemented by the US or the UK, and such work, which may involve transactions with MOGE directly or indirectly, is not forbidden, The Guardian reports.
According to The Guardian, tax documents that were leaked reveal:
-- The Singapore-based company of US oil services firm Halliburton, Myanmar Energy Services, recorded pre-tax earnings of $6.3 million in Myanmar for the year ending in September 2021, which included eight months when the junta was in power.
-- In the six months leading up to March 2022, Baker Hughes, an oil services business with headquarters in Houston, recorded pre-tax profits of $2.64 million in Myanmar.
-- In the fiscal year that ended in September 2021, the US company Diamond Offshore Drilling recorded $37 million in fees, followed by another $24.2 million from October 2021 to March 2022.
The involvement of western gas field contractors in Myanmar's gas and oil business after the coup, according to activists, renders them complicit in the junta's aggressive campaign.
Both US-based Chevron and France’s Total, which have long been criticized for running gas projects there, announced last January that they were leaving Myanmar.
The US has imposed sanctions on Myanmar’s state-owned gems, pearl, and timber sectors, but Myanma Oil and Gas Enterprise, a key in the junta’s main source of foreign income, is still unaffected, according to The Guardian report.
India to raise spending on job creation ahead of election
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government presented to Parliament on Wednesday an annual budget of $550 billion that calls for ramping up capital spending by 33% to spur economic growth and create jobs ahead of a general election next year.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said private investment was rising after the pandemic and the government should focus on driving growth.
India’s economy is projected to grow 7% in the fiscal year ending in March. The government forecasts growth of 6%-6.5% next year.
The country's population is expected to overtake China's in size this year, and its economy last year surpassed that of the United Kingdom to become the world's fifth largest.
But despite steady economic growth, the Modi government has struggled to quash unemployment concerns and is under pressure to generate enough jobs, especially as it faces key state polls this year and a general election in 2024, which it is favored to win.
“The budget makes the need once again to ramp up the virtuous cycle of investment and job creation,” Sitharaman said.
According to the Center for Monitoring Indian Economy, the unemployment rate stood at 8.3% in December, up from 6.5% in January 2022.
The government is aiming for a budget deficit of 5.9% of India's gross domestic product for the 2023-24 financial year, lower than the 6.4% for this fiscal year.
Despite worries that the world economy is headed for a slump, the finance minister she was confident the country's future was bright. “India is on the right track,” she said.
Read more: India raises interest rate to 5.4%, in 3rd hike since May
Apart from raising capital spending on construction of schools, airports, heliports and other infrastructure to $122 billion, the budget extended a $24 billion scheme to provide free grains to vulnerable households for one year.
The government will also increase by 66% its spending on providing affordable housing to the urban poor, Sitharaman said, and prioritize “green growth” with a $4.3 billion investment towards helping India meet its goal of going carbon neutral by 2070.
The budget also announced new tax relief measures aimed at bringing some respite for India's large middle class. But it slashed spending by 30% on India's rural jobs program, a boon for the country's most vulnerable, triggering criticism from activists and the opposition.
On Wednesday, Modi praised the budget as laying a strong “foundation for the aspirations and resolutions of a developed India," and said the government's investment into infrastructure has increased by more than 400% since 2014 when he first became prime minister.
Sitharaman's budget speech was briefly interrupted by opposition lawmakers chanting “Adani, Adani,” after a tussle between Indian billionaire Gautam Adani and a U.S.-based short-seller dominated headlines this week.
Political opponents have urged India's market regulator to investigate Adani after the short-selling firm accused his conglomerate of stock market manipulation and accounting fraud. The allegations led investors to dump Adani-related shares, wiping out tens of billions of dollars worth of market value for his business empire.
Critics of the 60-year-old billionaire say his rise has been boosted by his apparent close ties to Modi. The Adani Group has denied the allegations.
The budget requires approval from both houses of Parliament, but it is bound to be enacted as Modi's party holds a strong majority.
India's finance minister announces new clean energy funds
Indian finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced several new clean energy initiatives in the government's annual federal budget speech on Wednesday, saying “green growth” is a top priority for the country.
More than $8 billion dollars were announced for projects like mangrove restoration which help suck carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, converting waste into biogas and speeding up renewable energy initiatives. But details of how the funds will be spent are yet to be disclosed.
The minister said the injection of 35,000 crore rupees ($4.3 billion) into India's energy transition will be channeled through the ministry of petroleum and natural gas to help India reach its goal of net zero emissions by 2070. India is currently the world's third highest-emitting nation.
The new funds form part of the government's $550 billion budget aimed at ramping up spending to spur economic growth and create jobs ahead of the general election next year. Sitharaman mentioned the scaling up of clean energy for the economy and jobs within the first few minutes of her speech.
Sitharaman also proposed government incentives for energy storage systems in India that would aid round-the-clock renewable energy use and announced a new framework for pumped storage systems for hydropower.
She set out an additional 20,700 crore rupees ($ 2.5 billion) to facilitate new clean energy production in the Himalayan region of Ladakh, where electricity grid infrastructure remains a key sticking point.
Other programs to incentivize the use of alternative, less-polluting fertilizers and to cut down on chemical fertilizers were also announced, but details of how much will be spent were unclear.
Import taxes for components required to produce lithium-ion batteries, a key component in many electric vehicles, will be slashed, Sitharaman said. But no exemption was provided for protective taxes in the solar power sector.
The budget will now be debated by both houses of parliament before it can be enacted, which is likely to happen as Modi’s party holds a strong majority.
The move toward clean energy and away from fossil fuels has increasingly become a priority for India and nations around the world as countries try and limit global warming.
India's government recently announced a green hydrogen initiative for clean fuel and a climate action program to encourage more sustainable lifestyles. But the country is still heavily dependent on planet-warming coal burning for its energy needs.
Peshawar, the city of flowers, becomes epicenter of violence
Pakistan’s Peshawar was once known as “the city of flowers,” surrounded by orchards of pear, quince and pomegranate trees. It was a trading city, situated at the gates of a key mountain valley connecting South and Central Asia.
But for the past four decades, it has borne the brunt of rising militancy in the region, fueled by the conflicts in neighboring Afghanistan and the geopolitical games of great powers.
On Tuesday, the city with a population of about 2 million was reeling after one of Pakistan’s most devastating militant attacks in years. A day earlier, a suicide bomber unleashed a blast in a mosque inside the city’s main police compound, killing at least 100 people and wounding at least 225, mostly police.
Analysts say the carnage is the legacy of decades of flawed policies by Pakistan and the United States.
“What you sow, so shall you reap,” said Abdullah Khan, a senior security analyst.
Read: Pakistan army: Boating accident death toll rises to 51
Peshawar was a peaceful place, he said, until the early 1980s when Pakistan’s then-dictator Ziaul Haq decided to become part of Washington’s cold war with Moscow, joining the fight against the 1979 Soviet invasion of neighboring Afghanistan.
Peshawar — less than 30 kilometers (20 miles) from the Afghan border — became the center where the American CIA and Pakistani military helped train, arm and fund the Afghan mujahedeen fighting the Soviets. The city was flooded by weapons and fighters, many of them hard-line Islamic militants, as well as with hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugees.
Arab militants were also drawn there by the fight against the Soviets, including the scion of a wealthy Saudi family, Osama bin Laden. It was in Peshawar that bin Laden founded al-Qaida in the late 1980s, joining forces with veteran Egyptian militant Ayman al-Zawahri.
The Soviets finally withdrew in defeat from Afghanistan in 1989. But the legacy of militancy and armed resistance that the U.S. and Pakistan fueled against them remained.
“After the Russian withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1980s, Americans abandoned mujahedeen, Americans even abandoned us, and since then we are paying a price for it,” said Mahmood Shah, a former Pakistani army brigadier and a senior security analyst.
The mujahedeen plunged Afghanistan into civil war in a bloody fight for power. Meanwhile, in Peshawar and another Pakistani city, Quetta, the Afghan Taliban began to organize, with backing from the Pakistani government. Eventually, the Taliban took power in Afghanistan in the late 1990s, ruling until they were ousted by the 2001 American-led invasion following al-Qaida’s 9/11 attacks in the U.S.
During the nearly 20-year U.S. war against the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan, militant groups blossomed in the tribal regions of Pakistan along the border and around Peshawar. Like the Taliban, they found root among the ethnic Pashtuns who make up a majority in the region and in the city.
Read: Pakistan blames 'security lapse' for mosque blast; 100 dead
Some groups were encouraged by the Pakistani intelligence agencies. But others turned their guns against the government, angered by heavy security crackdowns and by frequent U.S. airstrikes in the border region targeting al-Qaida and other militants.
Chief among the anti-government groups was the Pakistani Taliban, or Tahreek-e Taliban-Pakistani, or TTP. In the late 2000s and early 2010s, it waged a brutal campaign of violence around the country. Peshawar was scene of one of the bloodiest TTP attacks in 2014, on an army-run public school that killed nearly 150 people, most of them schoolboys.
Peshawar’s location has for centuries made it a key juncture between Central Asia and the Indian subcontinent. One of the oldest cities in Asia, it stands at the entrance to the Khyber Pass, the main route between the two regions. That was a source of its prosperity in trade and put it on the path of armies going both directions, from Moghul emperors to British imperialists.
A heavy military offensive largely put down the TTP for several years and the government and the militants eventually reached an uneasy truce. Peshawar came under heavy security control, with checkpoints dotting the main roads, and a heavy presence of police and paramilitary troops.
TTP attacks, however, have grown once more since the Afghan Taliban returned to power in Kabul in August 2021 amid the U.S. and NATO withdrawal from that country. The Pakistani Taliban are distinct from but allied to the Afghan group, and Pakistani officials regularly accuse the Afghan Taliban of giving the TTP free rein to operate from Afghan territory.
Ahead of Monday’s suicide bombing, Peshawar had seen increasing small-scale attacks targeting police. In another spillover from Afghanistan’s conflict, the regional affiliate of the Islamic State group attacked Peshawar’s main Shiite mosque in March 2022, killing more than 60 people.
Shah, the former officer, warned that more TTP attacks could follow and said that Pakistan needs to engage the Afghan Taliban and pressure them to either evict the TTP or ensure it doesn’t launch attacks from Afghan territory.
“If we are to have peace in Pakistan, we should talk to TTP from the position of strength with help from the Afghan Taliban,” he said. “This is the best and viable solution to avoid more violence.”
How Myanmar is faring 2 years after army ousted Suu Kyi
Two years after Myanmar’s generals ousted Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government, thousands of people have died in civil conflict and many more have been forced from their homes in a dire humanitarian crisis.
Myanmar’s economy, once one of the fastest growing in Southeast Asia, now lags behind where it stood before the Feb. 1, 2021, military takeover compounded the country’s struggles with the pandemic.
Ten years earlier, Myanmar had emerged from decades of military rule, gradually transitioning to a civilian government, opening its economy to more foreign investment and entrepreneurship and relaxing censorship of the media.
A modern consumer culture took hold, with glitzy shopping malls in the biggest city, Yangon, and use of Facebook and cellphones the new normal. The army takeover brought thousands into the streets in peaceful protests that were suppressed with lethal force.
WHAT HAPPENED ON FEB. 1, 2021?
The army arrested Suu Kyi and top members of her governing National League for Democracy party, which had won a landslide victory for a second term in a November 2020 general election. The army said it acted because there had been massive voting fraud, but independent election observers did not find any major irregularities. Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, best known for his role in a 2007 crackdown on pro-democracy protests, now leads the government.
The ouster of the civilian government provoked widespread demonstrations and civil disobedience. As weeks dragged on, security forces crushed shows of opposition with violence. So far, nearly 3,000 civilians have been killed and tens of thousands forced from their homes by fighting between security forces and civilians who took up arms, sometimes allying themselves with ethnic armed groups that have been fighting for autonomy for decades.
Read: UN chief backs democracy for Myanmar 2 years after coup
The military’s seizure of power drew international condemnation. Many governments have shunned the army-led leadership and imposed sanctions, cutting off some financial flows. But neighboring countries in Southeast Asia and Myanmar’s most powerful ally, China, have balked at taking such actions.
WHERE IS AUNG SAN SUU KYI?
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Suu Kyi, 77, was the de facto head of government, holding the title of state counsellor, when the army arrested her and took power. In December a court sentenced her to seven years in prison for corruption in the last of a string of politically tinged criminal cases against her, leaving her with a total of 33 years to serve in prison.
Suu Kyi’s supporters and independent analysts say the numerous charges against her and her allies were an attempt to legitimize the military’s seizure of power while eliminating her from politics before an election promised for later this year.
Suu Kyi, the daughter of Myanmar’s martyred independence hero Gen. Aung San, spent almost 15 years as a political prisoner under house arrest between 1989 and 2010. She is being held in a newly constructed separate building in the prison in the capital, Naypyitaw, near the courthouse where her trial was held.
WHAT IS LIFE LIKE UNDER MILITARY RULE?
Two years after the army seized power, life in Yangon and other big cities has inched back toward normality but fighting in much of the countryside has left the country deeply mired in civil conflict.
Read: China accuses Washington of abusing export controls
Rights advocates say the military and security forces have carried out arbitrary arrests, torture and other abuses to quash dissent. Human rights monitoring groups said Tuesday that Myanmar’s military is increasingly turning to airstrikes with deadly results to try to crush stiff armed resistance,
While the military is responsible for massive use of violence throughout the country, militants in the opposition have carried out bombings and assassinations of military officials and their supporters. Min Aung Hlaing on Tuesday accused opponents of army rule of trying to take power with “wrongful forcible means.”
The World Bank forecasts the economy will grow a meager 3% this year, with some strength in agriculture and industries such as garment making. But it remains smaller than it was in 2019, before the pandemic and then the military takeover.
The military’s return to power has stymied a decade of reforms and left 40% of the population living in poverty.
Despite stringent foreign exchange controls and uncertainty over rules and regulations under army rule, some businesses are finding ways to operate by using informal payments and trade channels. The reopening of Myanmar’s trade routes with China also has helped.
But risks have been heightened by security issues due to the civil conflict.
WHAT LIES AHEAD?
The way out of the crisis remains unclear. The military-controlled government enacted a law on registration of political parties that will make it difficult for opposition groups to mount a serious challenge to army-backed candidates in the general election set to take place later this year.
Critics have already said the military-planned election will be neither free nor fair because there is no free media and most of the leaders of Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party have been arrested.
The party has declared it will not accept or recognize the election, which it has described as “fake” and a ploy by the military to gain political legitimacy and international recognition. The vote is also opposed by the National Unity Government, which was established by elected lawmakers who were prevented from taking their seats when the army seized power and serves as an underground parallel national administration.
Units of the People’s Defense Force, the armed wing of the banned pro-democracy movement, have been attempting to disrupt preparations for the election by attacking personnel of the military government who are conducting a population survey that could be used to assemble voter rolls.