Pakistan, not Afghanistan, is the new Iraq

„The devastating suicide bomb attacks on a popular Sufi shrine in Lahore, which have killed at least 42 people and injured more than 200, summon images of the appalling sectarian violence that took place in Iraq at the height of the Iraqi insurgency in 2005-6.

But the obvious difference between Iraq and Pakistan is that the Iraqis were fighting against what they perceived as the American occupation of their country, while the Islamist militants who attacked the Sufi shrine have no such justification. The groups behind this bombing are affiliated to the Pakistani Taliban, and are trying to overthrow the democratically elected government. Many more attacks like this and Pakistan will soon be a country with its own civil war on its hands.”