This week's Analysis presenter Owen Bennett-Jones
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BBC Radio 4's Analysis: Preserving Pakistan is broadcast on Monday 13 July at 20.30 BST.
The current fighting in Pakistan is vicious. On the one hand, there have been the Taliban's beheadings and child suicide bombers. On the other, the army's offensive taking few prisoners. The battleground is the tribal areas which lie on the border with Afghanistan. For over a century they have been ungovernable, wild and remote. But the fighting today is no longer a local affair. It has global implications and some believe it could lead to a new revolutionary state. In this edition of Analysis, Owen Bennett-Jones, an author and reporter who has followed events in Pakistan closely for many years, explores the story behind the recent headlines about military campaigns.
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Pakistan is at war. We are fighting a war in the tribal areas and now in the North West Frontier Province
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He discovers through a recent visit that this is not only a military struggle but also an ideological one - a conflict between two competing visions of Pakistan. He hears from top officials and influential thinkers in Pakistan about the nature of the threat posed by the Taliban and from its most prominent leader Baitullah Mehsud who's Pakistan's most wanted man with a five million dollar bounty on his head. He has also attracted recruits from Britain. The programme explores how a weak Pakistani state and passive religious tradition have left the door open for militant growth. And it also tests the striking ideas of one of the most pessimistic of experts on Pakistan, Mahboob Mahmood, who believes the country could turn into a Sunni militant fascist state. But do recent changes of public opinion in Pakistan, with mainstream Pakistanis expressing their concern about Taliban advance, mark a turning point?
Contributors include: Mahboob Mahmood, Professor, INSEAD Business School Khalid Aziz, Former Chief Secretary of North West Frontier Province Christine Fair, Georgetown University Malik Naveed Khan, Chief of Police, North West Frontier Province Farzana Shaikh, Author of 'Making Sense of Pakistan' Jugnoo Mohsin, Newspaper Editor, Lahore
This is the last programme in the current series. Analysis will be back on air on 21st September 2009.
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