by Shuja Nawaz
5 August Baitullah Mehsud, head of the TTP, killed by two Hellfire missiles from a US drone in South Waziristan.
14 September President Zardari announces that former President Musharraf has left Pakistan under a deal.
24 September US Senate passes Kerry–Lugar Bill.
7 October Pakistan Army issues public reservations against Kerry–Lugar–Berman (KLB) bill to aid Pakistan over five-year period.
10 October Terrorists attack Pakistan Army General Headquarters in Rawalpindi. Five attackers killed. Four militants manage to enter GHQ and take hostages. Initial reports indicate at least four army men killed. One militant captured.
11 October Pakistan Army launches attack to regain GHQ and free hostages. Final tally: nineteen killed, including eight militants.
15 October Terrorists attack Federal Investigation Agency, Manawan Police Academy and Elite Force Headquarters in Lahore. twenty killed. Over forty injured.
President Obama signs KLB law to give Pakistan $7.5 billion over five years.
17 October Pakistan Army launches offensive Operation Rah-e-Nijaat (Path to Salvation) to retake territory from militants in South Waziristan.
1 December After another review of his Afghanistan and Pakistan policy, President Obama declares at West Point: ‘I have determined that it is in our vital national interest to send an additional 30,000 US troops to Afghanistan . . . After eighteen months, our troops will begin to come home . . . First . . . a military strategy that will break the Taliban’s momentum and increase Afghanistan’s capacity over the next eighteen months . . . Second, we will work with our partners, the UN, and the Afghan people to pursue a more effective civilian strategy . . . Third . . . our success in Afghanistan is inextricably linked to our partnership with Pakistan . . . [T]he absence of a timeframe for transition would deny us any sense of urgency in working with the Afghan government . . .’
Taliban emboldened by withdrawal timetable. Pakistan’s hedging policy on Afghan Taliban bolstered.
30 December All provinces agree on 7th National Finance Commission Award on revenue-sharing among the provinces of the federation and between them and the federal government.
2010
6 February US jury trial of Dr Afia Siddiqui finds her guilty on seven counts, sentences her to eighty-six years in jail.
2 March FC says it has taken back control of all of Bajaur Agency of FATA.
9 March DG-ISI Lt. Gen. Pasha given one-year extension.
8 April 18th Amendment of the Constitution passed in the National Assembly. Massive devolution of powers of the president and other changes.
16 April Pakistan Senate passes 18th Amendment.
19 April President Zardari signs the 18th Amendment into law.
4 May Pakistani American Faisal Shahzad is caught in a failed attempt to blow up a car in Times Square, New York.
22 July PM Gilani announces three-year extension for Army Chief Gen. Kayani.
29 July Massive floods and heavy rains in Pakistan. Death toll reaches 108 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
11 August Marine Gen. James Mattis takes over as Commander CENTCOM from acting commander Lt. Gen. John Allen. (Mattis was later prematurely removed by President Obama on 22 March 2013 due to differences on a number of issues, including the number of troops needed to remain in Afghanistan and how to deal with Iran.)
26 September NATO helicopters intrude into Pakistan and kill thirty suspected terrorists. Two Pakistani soldiers killed. Ground Lines of Communication (GLOC) shut down.
9 October Pakistan reopens GLOC for NATO supplies to Afghanistan.
20 October During strategic dialogue at White House, Gen. Kayani hands President Obama thirteen-page White Paper outlining Pakistan’s concerns and suggesting the way forward in Afghanistan and the region.
27 October New US Ambassador Cameron Munter presents his credentials to President Zardari.
28 October Afghanistan and Pakistan sign historic Transit Trade Agreement (TTA), supported by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
2011
3 January Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) resigns from coalition with PPP.
4 January Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer killed by his own police guard Malik Mumtaz Qadri because he asked for a review of the blasphemy law and justice for accused Christian woman Aasia Bibi.
27 January US CIA contractor Raymond Davis kills two persons on the streets of Lahore and is taken into custody.
1 March Minister for Minority Affairs Shahbaz Bhatti, a Christian, killed for pleading on behalf of Aasia Bibi in her blasphemy case.
16 March Raymond Davis released under blood money deal with the families of the two persons he killed in Lahore, flies out of Pakistan with US Ambassador Munter.
2 May US Navy Seals invade Pakistan on helicopters from Jalalabad, Afghanistan, and kill Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad—take his body, documents and computer drives back to Afghanistan. Pakistan shuts down GLOC.
22 May Militants attack and occupy Mehran Naval Station in Karachi. Nine killed. Two P3-Orion aircraft destroyed.
31 May Journalist Saleem Shahzad who wrote an exposé about the Mehran attack found dead in a canal near Jhelum, some 70 miles away from Islamabad, after being abducted from Islamabad.
8 July Admiral Mullen blames Pakistan government for Shahzad’s death. According to BBC: ‘I have not seen anything that would disabuse that report that the government knew about this,’ Adm. Mullen told journalists in Washington on Thursday. ‘It was sanctioned by the government, yeah,’ he said. Adm. Mullen added that he did not have a ‘string of evidence’ linking the death to the ISI. ISI denied any link. Crime remained unsolved.
11 September Gen. Kayani presents Pakistan’s regional perspective on the tenth anniversary of 9/11 at NATO defence chiefs’ meeting in Seville, Spain, as a follow-up to a paper given to President Obama and the US reply of February 2011.
23–24 September US General Jim Mattis arrives to deliver tough message to the Pakistani military after attack on the US embassy in Kabul, reportedly linked to Pakistan-based terrorists. Kayani shares the paper delivered at NATO meeting in Seville with Mattis.
10 October Pakistani American Mansoor Ijaz publishes an article in the Financial Times, hinting at Pakistani civilian government’s conspiracy to seek US help in cutting Pakistan Army down to size. He later suggested that Pakistan ambassador to the US, Husain Haqqani, had worked with him on drafting a secret memorandum in May, after the bin Laden raid, from the civilian authorities in Pakistan asking for US help against the Pakistan Army. Thus began the so-called ‘Memogate’ issue leading to Amb. Haqqani’s resignation.
26 November US forces attack two Pakistani posts on the Afghan border near Salala and kill twenty-eight Pakistani soldiers and officers. Pakistan closes the GLOC again and asks US to evacuate the airbase at Shamsi, used for drone launches, among other things. ISAF commander Gen. John Allen, Maj. Gen. Mick Nicholson Jr and Maj. Gen. James Laster arrive in Rawalpindi to discuss past and future operations, among other things, with Pakistani counterparts, but do not mention operation near Salala. Pakistan stops GLOC to Afghanistan. ALOC kept open.
2012
5 January TTP murders fifteen Frontier Constabulary soldiers in Orakzai Agency after kidnapping and keeping them for over a year. Each body had forty bullet wounds and showed signs of torture.
9 January Ten Pakistani soldiers missing since December 2011 found dead in upper Orakzai.
12 January Baloch Liberation Front insurgents ambush and kill fourteen soldiers.
15 May After Pakistan’s foreign minister says it would consider reopening the GLOC to Afghanistan, NATO says it will invite Zardari to NATO Summit in Chicago, where Zardari fails to reach agreement on the opening of GLOC.
18 May While debating the National Defence Authorisation Act, US lawmakers in the House of Representatives vote 412-1 for an amendment to block up to $650 million in proposed payments to Pakistan unless Islamabad reopens the GLOC.
23 May A senate panel approves
a foreign aid budget for the following year that slashes US assistance to Islamabad by more than half, and threatens further reductions if it fails to reopen supply routes for NATO in Afghanistan.
25 May The Senate Appropriations Committee votes to cut aid to Pakistan by a symbolic $33 million—$1 million for each year of jail time handed by Pakistan to Shakil Afridi, a Pakistani doctor who allegedly assisted the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in locating Osama bin Laden.
3 July After talks by Peter Lavoy in Islamabad, followed by discussions in Washington involving Amb. Sherry Rehman, and negotiations by Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar, Pakistan agrees to reopen supply routes into Afghanistan. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says she is sorry for the loss of life in a ‘horrendous’ air raid on Salala in November 2011.
17 July Amb. Richard Olson named for Pakistan post, replacing Amb. Cameron Munter.
9 October Taliban shoot Malala Yousafzai in her face and two of her friends are wounded on a bus in Swat. She is evacuated to Birmingham, England, for treatment.
31 October US Ambassador Rick Olson starts in Islamabad.
2013
10 January Terrorist attacks in Quetta kill some 100 persons.
25 March Mir Hazar Khan Khoso appointed caretaker prime minister to conduct fresh elections.
11 May General elections held in Pakistan.
5 June Nawaz Sharif elected prime minister for the third time.
30 July Manmoon Hussain of PML-N elected twelfth president of Pakistan.
1 November Hakimullah Mehsud, leader of TTP, killed by a US drone attack in North Waziristan.
29 November Pakistan Chief of Army Staff (COAS) Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani retires. Gen. Raheel Sharif becomes the next COAS.
11 December Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry retires. Succeeded by Justice Tassaduq Hussain Jillani.
2014
9 February Gunmen attack an Islamic religious gathering in Karachi, eight persons killed.
17 February Former president Pervez Musharraf appears in a civil court for the first time.
31 March A Pakistani court charges former president Musharraf with high treason under Article 6 of the Pakistan Constitution for imposing Emergency rule in 2007, but avoiding the same issue of high treason for his 1999 usurpation of elected PM Nawaz Sharif.1
21 May Pakistan Air Force jets bomb suspected militant hideouts in North Waziristan, killing approximately sixty militants and injuring another thirty.
13 August Another Long March and dharna or sit-in organized by the Pakistan Tehreek-e Insaf (PTI) of Imran Khan and Pakistan Awami Tehreek of cleric Tahir-ul-Qadri in Islamabad.
10 October Malala Yousafzai becomes the second Pakistani to win a Nobel Prize, sharing the Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts on behalf of girls’ right to education.
16 December Taliban gunmen storm a military-run Army Public School in Peshawar, killing at least 141, including 132 children and nine school employees. All seven gunmen killed by the military.
24 December Prime Minister Sharif announces twenty-point National Action Plan (NAP) to fight terrorism and militancy and that envisages the establishment of special courts for speedy trial of terror suspects and a crackdown on jihadi and sectarian outfits.
2015
25 January A massive blackout strikes Pakistan, leaving as much as 80 per cent of the country without electricity.
13 February Pakistan announces the arrest of twelve TTP members in connection with the attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar in December 2014.
11 March Sindh Rangers, under direction of the military, though reporting to the interior ministry, move into MQM headquarters in Karachi and arrest dozens of party workers and uncover arms and ammunition.
15 March A church bombing in Lahore kills at least eleven people, with forty-eight more injured.
19 May Russia closes down a key military transport corridor that allowed the US and its NATO allies to supply forces serving in neighbouring Afghanistan via the Russian transhipment hub at Ulyanovsk.
The transit route was used by NATO for non-lethal cargo since 2008 and for military shipments since 2010. The official reason cited by Russia is the end, in December 2014, of the UN mandate authorizing the US-led military mission into Afghanistan.
16 June PPP co-chairman and former president Asif Ali Zardari lashes out publicly at the Pakistani military establishment for overstepping its domain. He was reportedly disturbed over the corruption cases lodged against some of his key colleagues.
23 July A three-member judicial commission headed by the Chief Justice of Pakistan rejects all three allegations of the PTI on rigging in the 2013 general elections.
18 September Terrorists attack a Pakistan Air Force camp near Badaber area of Peshawar, killing twenty-nine personnel, including an officer.
17 November US Ambassador Rick Olson leaves his post to become US SRAP for one year. He is succeeded by Amb. David Hale.
25 December Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi pays a surprise visit to Lahore and Raiwind on his way back from a visit to Kabul, kindling hopes of an entente cordiale. He attends Nawaz Sharif ’s granddaughter’s wedding.
2016
18 January Former president Pervez Musharraf acquitted in the murder trial of Akbar Bugti, the Baloch tribal leader who died in a military operation in 2006.
3 April The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and a German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung publish millions of confidential documents from the Panamanian legal firm Mossack Fonseca, which provide detailed information on more than 214,000 offshore companies, the identities of shareholders and directors, including noted personalities and heads of state. PM Nawaz Sharif ’s family is named in the papers, as are other leading Pakistanis. ‘Panamagate’ comes into being.
29 April US Department of State, under instructions from the senate, refuses to subsidize sale of F-16 planes to Pakistan.
23 May Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansour reportedly killed by US drone strike inside Pakistan en route from a visit to Iran.
2017
20 January Donald J. Trump is sworn in as the forty-fifth president of the United States of America. Names former CENTCOM Commander Gen. James Mattis as Secretary of Defense.
21 January A bombing at a vegetable market in Parachinar kills twenty-five people.
16 February A suicide bombing at the shrine of Lal Shahbaz Qalandar in Sehwan, Sindh Province, kills over ninety people.
14 March Pakistan’s sixth census launched. Slated to be decennial, this one was held nineteen years after the previous census in 1998.
28 July The Supreme Court of Pakistan unanimously disqualifies Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif from office for life, over the controversy emerging from the Panama Papers, regarding withheld information of business interests abroad and potential earnings from those interests.
1 August Shahid Khaqan Abbasi sworn in as prime minister, succeeding Nawaz Sharif.
21 August President Trump announces a new strategy on Afghanistan and criticizes Pakistan’s lack of cooperation.
13 October Trump tweets: ‘Starting to develop a much better relationship with Pakistan and its leaders. I want to thank them for their cooperation on many fronts.’
23 October President Ashraf Ghani of Afghanistan states the Afghanistan–Pakistan Transit Trade Agreement of 2010 is to end since Pakistan did not allow Afghan trucks to go into Pakistan, while Pakistani trucks could enter Afghanistan fully loaded.
24 October US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson gets frosty welcome in Pakistan. Tillerson later said he told Pakistani leadership that Washington would implement its new strategy with or without their support.
4 December US Secretary of Defense James Mattis visits Islamabad for the first time in his new position. He meets with Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and Minister of Defence Khurram Dastigir Khan, and with COAS Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa and the DG-ISI Lt. Gen. Naveed Mukhtar. While acknowledging Pakistan’s earlier efforts, Mattis rei
terates that Pakistan must redouble its efforts to confront militants and terrorists operating within the country.
2018
2 January In his first tweet of the year, President Trump threatens to cut aid to Pakistan for allegedly lying to the US and offering ‘little help’ in hunting ‘terrorists’ in Afghanistan.
‘The United States has foolishly given Pakistan more than $33 billion in aid over the last 15 years, and they have given us nothing but lies and deceit, thinking of our leaders as fools,’ Trump said. ‘They give safe haven to the terrorists we hunt in Afghanistan, with little help. No more!’
3 January US suspends about $900 million of assistance for Pakistan. Calls suspension temporary, depending on Pakistan’s change of behaviour regarding war in Afghanistan.
25 July General elections held in Pakistan. Imran Khan’s PTI wins big at the Centre and in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, forms government in Punjab and in coalition in Balochistan. PPP wins big in Sindh. MQM loses support.
17 August Imran Khan elected prime minister—pledges to fight corruption and bring corrupt politicians to justice. Faces huge economic issues, including repayment of loans. Foreign exchange reserves falling.
4 September In advance of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s 5 September visit to Islamabad with Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman, US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Kone Faulkner states: ‘Due to a lack of Pakistani decisive actions in support of the South Asia Strategy the remaining $300 million was reprogrammed.’ The cancelled aid was to come from the Coalition Support Funds (CSF).
19 September Imran Khan visits Saudi Arabia to seek economic assistance. Returns with $6 billion aid package.
3 November Imran Khan in China seeking financial concessions and aid. China also pledges to support IMF programme for Pakistan.
10 November IMF team arrives to begin discussions with Pakistan on a potential financial programme. (US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had earlier opposed the idea of US taxpayers’ funds going via IMF to repay Pakistan’s Chinese loans.)
2019
14 February A local Kashmiri suicide bomber Adil Ahmad Dar attacks an Indian security convoy on the Srinagar National Highway at Pulwama killing forty personnel of the Central Reserve Police Force. The attack is linked to the Jaish-e-Mohammed. India blames Pakistan for the attack. Pakistan condemns it.
