Pakistan Edges Closer to the Abyss

Sometimes it’s the seemingly minor events – minor, that is, in the grand scheme of matters, not necessarily small or insignificant at the moment they occur – that can carry more weight than more obviously important or telling developments. Lord knows, there’s been no end of troubling news from Pakistan in recent years. But, silly as it may seem, there’s something especially terrible about today’s attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team which killed at least six policemen and injured five members of the Sri Lankan team. (See Cricinfo’s rolling updates for the latest news.)

Political assassinations, for instance, are hardly unknown in Pakistan (or elsewhere on the subcontinent) and so it’s easy – perhaps too easy – to file them in a drawer marked Terrible Stuff That Sometimes Happens. By contrast, this attack has the Shock of the New about it. As Ducking Beamers says, the ghastliness of this latest act of terrorism is increased because its intended victims were not westerners.