Events in South Asia in the last 72 hours are testimony to the fact that a 'triangle of terror' has emerged, which is now the principal focus of the global 'war on terror' that began after Sept 11, 2001.

On July 15, the trial in Pakistan of those responsible for kidnapping and killing American journalist Daniel Pearl ended with the death sentence meted out to the main accused, British-born Pakistani Ahmed Omar Sheikh.

Pearl, a regional correspondent for New York's Wall Street Journal newspaper, was kidnapped in Karachi on Jan 23, 2002, and killed by his captors subsequently. Human remains believed to be his body was discovered later.

On July 13, nine European tourists travelling in a coach through Mansehra, a city in Pakistan's Northwest Frontier Province (which borders Afghanistan), were the targets of a grenade attack.

Although there were only minor injuries to the tourists and no deaths, this attack is viewed by Pakistani investigators and American security officials as part of an emerging pattern of attacks on Western targets in Pakistan after Islamabad's unstinted cooperation with Washington in its military action against Afghanistan and its 'war against terror'.

In March, two Americans were killed after a church was bombed in Islamabad. In May, a bus carrying French engineers was bombed and left seven occupants killed. In June, the US consulate in Karachi was attacked, without any American casualties.

20 arrested in refugee camp

On July14, the Pakistani police announced the arrest of 20 persons from an Afghan refugee camp, in relation to the attack against the European tourists.

The day before on Saturday, an incident that threatens to add further tension to already cold ties between India and Pakistan took place 28 civilians died after indiscriminate firing on a shantytown near Jammu in the Indian part of Kashmir.

Although India quickly blamed Pakistani-based groups for the attackwithout substantiating its claim, the government of Pakistan was prompt in denouncing this act of terrorism.

On Sunday, Indian Foreign Minister Yashwant Sinha said "it is clear that all this is being carried out with the inspiration of Pakistan", a charge vehemently denied by Pakistan.

This was the biggest act of terrorism in Indian-occupied part of Kashmir since the May 14 attack, again in Jammu, that killed 34 people, including families of Indian soldiers.

That act had raised tensions between India and Pakistan, which put a million men under arms facing each other on the border. The standoff was defused after active Western diplomacy.

Nation must fight terrorism

Just a day before the latest Jammu attack, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf in his address to the nation on July 12 told the people that "the whole nation must fight terrorism".

Referring to the joint Pakistan-US military campaign against al-Qaeda remnants on the border with Afghanistan, he added: "We cannot tolerate foreign elements, whether they are on our borders or had entered our cities".

These events have brought into focus Pakistan's vital role in the United States' campaign against terrorism and three aspects are key in understanding the emerging regional scenario.

First, the disputed territory of Kashmir where some 750,000 Indian troops are battling a homegrown insurgency since 1989 will remain a flashpoint until efforts are made to resolve the question at its roots.

Recurring acts of terror, condemned both by Pakistan and India plus the international community, have the potential to destabilise the region and bring the nuclear-armed neighbours to the brink of war. In its July 11 special report on 'Kashmir: Confrontation and Miscalculation, the Brussels-based International Crisis Group (ICG) underlined that "militancy in Kashmir and the subsequent heightened risk of an India-Pakistan war will not disappear until many things are done".

The ICG urged "steps by New Delhi to grant political autonomy to Kashmiris, improve their economic well-being, and end all human rightsabuses by its security forces in the territory".

The Line of Control

It also expressed hope that the Indian government would "reconsider its longstanding objection to deploying monitors on the Indian side of the Line of Control".

This is something Pakistan has repeatedly suggested in a move to address charges by India of infiltration across the Line of Control, which divides the two-third Indian part of Kashmir from the one third Pakistani part.

Second, the international community remains keen to defuse tensions through intense diplomacy, highlighted by repeated visits by western officials to the region seven or so months.

Later this week, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw will visit South Asia. He had already stated that he was "horrified by this attack on innocent civilians" in Jammu.

In other fortnight, US Secretary of State Colin Powell will also visit South Asia again. In a strongly worded statement condemning the Jammu killings, he said: "The people of this region deserve peace and development, not the suffering imposed upon them by terrorist thugs who are outside the pale of the civilised world".

A day before the Jammu strike, a US spokesman had publicly stated that there had been "a significant decline in infiltration", in effect saying that Musharraf had kept a Jun. 6 commitment he made to the visiting US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage.

Pakistan a laboratory

Third, after defeating the Taliban in Afghanistan last year, Pakistan has now become the key player in its 'anti-terrorism campaign' for the United States.

Indeed, "Pakistan has become a laboratory for how American power could be used to combat terror,'' the New York Times reported on Sunday.

Referring to the US role in concert with Pakistan, the newspaper stated that "the deployment, which includes intelligence officers in Pakistan, marks a shift in the Bush administration's anti-terrorism strategy''.

''The new approach is driven by the recognition that after the American military successes in Afghanistan, al-Qaeda's centre of gravity has shifted east, first into the tribal areas of Pakistan, and then into its cities,'' it added.

Given this context, the United States is likely to remain actively engaged in diplomacy to defuse tensions and to ensure that Kashmir does not become a flashpoint to destabilise a region that is now crucial in Washington's 'war against terrorism'. IPS