Above the law: Can anyone hold this child of Islamofascism accountable?

Jailed militant’s hoax calls drove India, Pakistan to brink of war
By Azaz Syed
Thursday, 26 Nov, 2009

ISLAMABAD: Omar Saeed Sheikh, a detained Pakistani militant, had made hoax calls to President Asif Ali Zardari and the Chief of Army Staff, Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, in a bid to heighten Pakistan-India tensions after last year’s terrorist attacks on Mumbai, investigators have told Dawn.

‘Omar Saeed Sheikh was the hoax caller. It was he who threatened the civilian and military leaderships of Pakistan over telephone. And he did so from inside Hyderabad jail,’ investigators said.

The controversy came to light after Dawn broke the story, exactly one year ago, that a hoax caller claiming to be then Indian foreign minister Pranab Mukherjee was making threatening calls to President Zardari.

It was on the night of Nov 26 last year that Saadia Omar, Omar Sheikh’s wife, informed him about the carnage in Mumbai. The sources said that the information was passed on to Omar in Hyderabad jail through his mobile phone, which he was secretly using without the knowledge of the administration.

All but one of the attackers who India alleged were Lashkar-i-Taiba terrorists were shot dead by security personnel.

Saadia kept updating Omar about the massacre through the night and small hours of the morning. On the night of Nov 28, when the authorities had regained control over the better part of the city, Omar Saeed, using a UK-registered mobile SIM, made a phone call to Indian External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee.

He told an operator handling Mr Mukherjee’s calls that he was the President of Pakistan.

Indian officials started verification as part of security precautions and, after some time, the operator informed Omar Saeed (who was posing to be Pakistan’s president) that the foreign minister would get in touch with him soon. Omar now made a call to President Asif Ali Zardari and then the Chief of Army Staff.

He also made an attempt to talk to the US secretary of state, but security checks barred his way.

The presidency swung into action soon after Mr Zardari’s conversation with the adventurous militant.

President Zardari first spoke to Prime Minister Gilani and informed him about the happenings. He also took Interior Minister Rehman Malik into the loop.

In Rawalpindi, Gen Kayani immediately spoke to the chief of the Inter Services Intelligence, Lt- Gen Ahmed Shuja Pasha.

According to sources, not only President Asif Zardari was taken in by Omar’s audacity but the COAS was also baffled by his cheekiness.

Gen Kayani, sharing his thoughts with close associates, said he had been bewildered by the caller’s threatening tone.

But Maj Gen Athar Abbas, the military spokesman, finds the report unbelievable. ‘I am not his (Army chief’s) operator. I don’t know who puts calls through to him, but I think this can’t be true,’ said an incredulous Athar Abbas.

Interestingly, when Omar Saeed Sheikh was making these hoax calls, the Lashkar-i-Taiba (LET) chief was also in Karachi, but it is not known whether Omar Saeed was acting under the guidance of Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi or on his own.

INVESTIGATIONS: On the other hand, investigators got into the act without wasting time, coming up with their findings within hours.

Their conclusion was that the phone call which came from the Indian external affairs ministry was actually their (Indians’) check.

They said the calls to President Zardari and the army chief were made from a Britain-registered SIM.

Gen (retired) Pervez Musharraf, in his autobiography, had alleged that Omar Saeed was an agent of MI6, the British intelligence agency.

The very next morning, Nov 29, Hyderabad jail was raided by intelligence agencies and over a dozen SIMs were recovered along with two mobile sets. Majid Siddiqui, the jail superintendent, was suspended.

‘I don’t know much but it is true that some mobile SIMs and mobile sets were recovered from Omar Saeed Sheikh when he was in Hyderabad jail.

I got him transferred to Karachi jail because that is a far better place for such high-profile terrorists,’ Allauddin Abbasi, DIG Prisons, Hyderabad, told Dawn over phone.

The authorities had a word with Saadia Omar too. She was advised to ‘control’ herself. The matter was then placed in the files of secret agencies marked as ‘secret’.

The Federal Investigation Agency never interrogated Omar Saeed about the Mumbai attacks. Dawn’s efforts for getting the viewpoint of Tariq Khosa , the FIA chief, drew a blank.

HIGH PROFILE: Omar, currently confined in a high security cell of Karachi Jail, has a long record of militancy, from kidnapping foreigners in Mumbai in 1994 to kidnapping Daniel Pearl in Jan 2002.

Omar Saeed Sheikh was freed by India in Dec 1999 as part of a deal that saw New Delhi agreeing to release a number of militant leaders in exchange for the freedom of hostages on board an India plane hijacked to Kabul.

Soon after his release from Indian captivity, Omar Saeed developed close relations with the LET leadership, including Zakiur Rehman Lakhwi.

He was invited to a training camp in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Azad Kashmir, where he spent a couple of days delivering lectures to recruits.

Sources said Lakhwi wanted Omar to join LET and give the organisation an international face. In Feb 2002, Omar was arrested for the murder of US journalist Daniel Pearl.

Source

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In defense of our Salafi (Ahl-e-Hadith) brothers and sisters

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Consequences of Zia’s misrule and Talibanization

Wasted youth: Reflections on the British Council report

By Nadeem F. Paracha
Saturday, 21 Nov, 2009

Released today (Saturday 21 November), the Pakistan British Council’s hefty report titled, Pakistan: The Next Generation, encapsulates the economics, demographics and, more importantly, the opinions of the youth of Pakistan.

The report suggests that Pakistan is in a distinct situation where it can explore what is called the ‘demographic dividend.’
This means that the country is going through a period in which there is a positive ratio of productive youth — or currently there are more industrious youth than dependants.

According to the report the window of opportunity in this respect opened in 1990, but unfortunately the country has done nothing to exploit this opportunity.

Being perhaps the first truly representative survey and report of its kind in the country, it divulges that merely 15 per cent of the Pakistani youth believe that the country is headed in the right direction.

Accurately capturing the identity dilemma the youth of Pakistan has been going through, especially after the tragic 9/11 episode and its fallout in Pakistan, the report sees the country’s youth to be passionately inclined towards nationalism but having very little trust in national or local government, the police and even courts, in spite of the reinstatement of the celebrated senior judiciary that was dismissed by the Musharraf dictatorship in November 2007.

About three-quarters of the Pakistani youth define themselves as being Muslims first and then Pakistani. Fourteen per cent see themselves as Pakistani citizens first.

The democratic dividend window that opened in 1990, according to the British Council report, is set to close sometime in 2045. This means those at the helm of economic and governmental affairs now have 35 years or so to stem the waste and start devising policies in which the country can harvest the political, social and above all, economic benefits that come associated with this opportunity. The report predicts that the positive consequences of wisely exploiting this opportunity may give Pakistan an economic growth increase by a fifth by 2030.

Also in the report are the variety of opinions held by the Pakistani youth on matters of hope, fear, religion, education and international politics.
Not surprisingly, a healthy 92 per cent of the youth believe in the importance of education. However, even though the current bout of democracy in the country is hardly two years old, there are already growing signs of disillusionment with democracy within the youth. According to the report, only a third of those surveyed believed that democracy is the best system for the country.

This is an alarming finding, especially with the number of disastrous military regimes that the country has suffered and the proliferation of alternative faith-based systems being flaunted by conventional religious parties and the largely mythic-political ones propagated by clandestine extremist groups.

Thus, more alarming becomes the report’s finding in which it sees about 60 per cent of the country’s youth having faith in the military and around 50 per cent having similar trust in religious seminaries (madrassahs), which, in the last many years have come under scrutiny from the government and the state for both propagating and initiating extreme strains of Islam.

The bi-polar make-up of the Pakistani youth is further highlighted when the report suggests that the young generation by and large is civic minded. This generation insists that the primary purpose of education is to produce good and productive citizens.

When questioned about the reasons behind the recent spat of terrorist and other violence in the country, the respondents point the finger at ‘injustice’ (30 per cent); and ‘economics conditions’ (28 per cent).

Again, not surprisingly, a large number of young men and women also blamed the international community of ‘interfering in the affairs of the country,’ and for ‘demonising Pakistan.’

The truth is, if a majority of a country’s youth have more faith in institutions that have been largely responsible for the political, social and economic disasters that the country has faced for many years (the military and the madrassahs), it will be very hard for the international community not to exhibit any alarm or concern, especially if the same country also has a nuclear arsenal.

But the British Council report is not all that concerned by this dilemma. Instead in its concluding remarks, it is actually hopeful and advises the state and the government to tap into the nationalism and civic mindedness of the youth because we still have about 35 years to convert the economic, cultural and political potential of our youth into something that can rise above cynicism and a forlorn attitude, and play a more positive, productive and inspired role.
Around 2,500 young men and women (writers, journalists, students, NGO workers) were involved in the writing and preparation of this report that can go a long way in triggering some constructive debate and, as British Council’s Fasi Zaka hopes, ‘renew an interest in a much neglected subject.’ Source
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Pakistani heroes of the Berlin Wall - Rauf Klasra

"I met General Gul, who is now retired, in his house in a military district of Rawalpindi, near Islamabad, where he lives in spacious comfort. I was shown into a reception room, and I sat on a sofa waiting for the General to appear. Beside me, on a low table, a piece of the Berlin Wall was on display—a gift, it seemed, from the West German foreign-intelligence service. The engraving read, “With deepest respect to Lt. General Hamid Gul who helped deliver the first blow.” "

For a background reading, please read the following post on Sherry's blog: http://sherryx.wordpress.com/2009/03/01/letter-from-pakistan-pashtun-code/

Here is Rauf Klasra's artcile:




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Jihadi literature - an analysis by Hamid Akhtar

Hamid Akhtar offers a detailed analysis of the jihadi literature, the role of religio-political parties in Pakistan and Afghanistan in the propagation of this literature and its implications for Muslim societies.

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Taliban / Sipah-e-Sahaba kill Iran consulate official in Peshawar

Group responsible:
The jihadi and sectarian alliance between Sipah-e-Sahaba and Taliban (who usually operate under various banners such as Jundollah, Lashkar-e-Jhangavi etc).

Motives:
To damage the inter-sectarian harmony in Pakistan
To terrorize the Shia Muslim minority in Pakistan
To terrorize Pakistani journalists and media persons

Director PR Iranian Consulate shot dead
PESHAWAR, Nov 12 (APP): Director Public Relations Iranian Consulate, Peshawar Abul Hassan Jaafri was shot dead by unknown assailants in Gulberg Colony, Peshawar cantonment Thursday morning. He was immediately rushed to the hospital where he succumbed to his injuries. It merits a mention here that late Jaafri had also served as reporter in Daily Frontier Post, The Statesman in early 90s and contributed scores of articles and features on various issues.

Pakistani Iranian consulate worker shot in Peshawar
12 Nov 2009 06:54:35 GMT
Source: Reuters

By Faris Ali

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Nov 12 (Reuters) - A gunman shot dead a Pakistani working at Iran's consulate in the city of Peshawar on Thursday, police said, in an attack likely to compound strains in relations between the Muslim neighbours.

Police declined to speculate on a motive for the killing of consulate public relations officer Abul Hassan Jaffry, which came almost exactly a year after an Iranian diplomat was abducted in the same city. The diplomat is still missing.

"As he came out of the narrow street where his house is, an attacker on foot was waiting and opened fire and then ran away," Peshawar's police chief Liaqat Ali Khan told Reuters.

Hassan died on his way to the hospital.

"No one saw the attacker. We've just got shell casings from a pistol from the spot," he said.

Ties between mostly Sunni Muslim Pakistan and majority Shi'ite Muslim Iran were strained last month by a suicide bomb attack in southeastern Iran which killed 42 people.

A Sunni Muslim rebel group, Jundollah (God's Soldiers), claimed responsibility for the attack in which 15 Iranian Revolutionary Guards, including six senior commanders, were killed along with 27 other people.

Sunni Muslim militants like the Taliban and al-Qaida believe Shiites are infidels and often target the sect

Iran says the militants operate from the Pakistani side of the border and has demanded Pakistan hand over their leader, Abdolmalik Rigi.

Pakistan has condemned the bombing and vowed to help Iran track down those responsible, but says Rigi is in Afghanistan.

Iran's consul general in Peshawar, Abbas Ali Abdolahi, said Jaffry's killing was a plot by the common enemies of Iran and Pakistan.

"It aims to strain the relationship of the two countries," Abdolahi was quoted as saying by Iranian state broadcaster IRIB on its website.

Abdolahi said Jaffry was shot by two motorcycle riders.

On Nov. 13 last year, gunmen kidnapped an Iranian diplomat in Peshawar after killing one of his Pakistani guards.

Peshawar is the capital of North West Frontier Province, which borders Taliban strongholds in lawless lands along the Afghan border.


...

AFP - PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Gunmen shot dead a Pakistani spokesman for the Iranian consulate in the northwestern city of Peshawar on Thursday as he was on his way to work, police said.

Attackers targeted Abu Al-Hasan Jaffry, director of public relations and protocol at the consulate in Peshawar, as he left for the office in his car, senior police official Nisar Marwat told AFP.

He died on the way to hospital, Marwat said. The motive for the killing was not immediately clear.

This is not the first time that an official at Iran's consulate in Peshawar comes under attack. Last year, Iran's commercial attache, Heshmatollah Attarzadeh-Niyaki, was kidnapped on his way to the consulate.

Jaffry was shot on a main road soon after leaving his home in the Gulberg neighbourhood of Peshawar, a witness said.

"Suddenly the firing started and when I reached the main road, I saw Jaffry bleeding with wounds and the attackers, probably more than two, had fled," a man, who declined to give his name, told AFP.

"Jaffry had been hit in the head and chest and his left arm was badly injured," he added.

A post-mortem examination was in progress at Peshawar's Combined Military Hospital, a police official said. A government official in Peshawar confirmed the killing.
Relations between Iran and Pakistan are close, but tensions rose last month when Tehran blamed Pakistan-based militants for a suicide attack that killed 42 people, including 15 members of Iran's elite Revolutionary Guard.

Islamabad has strongly denied that the militant group Jundallah launched the October 18 attack from its territory.

Shiites, who are a majority in Iran, account for about 20 percent of Pakistan's mostly Sunni Muslim population of 167 million. More than 4,000 people have died in flashes of sectarian violence in Pakistan since the 1980s.

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The founder and godfather of sectarianism and jihadism in Pakistan was the military dictator General Zia-ul-Haq.

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Pampering the mullah

Friday, November 06, 2009

Talat Farooq

After the government crackdown on certain madrassas in Islamabad recently, the representatives of the Wafaq-ul-Madaris aired their indignation on TV channels. They criticised the action on the grounds that madrassas have always been weapon/terror-free -- including, if you please, the Lal Masjid -- and, as such, cannot be held responsible for any anti-state activities The went on to add thatif the government officials wish to visit any of the premises, they must do so with the permission of Wafaq-ul-Madaris. In answer to such defiant outbursts, the interior minister meekly assured the Wafaq that the government never meant to violate the sanctity of these great places of learning and knowledge, and is only looking for some foreign Imams residing in some madressahs illegally. One fails to understand why the government has to be apologetic in carrying out such actions against any institution in Pakistan if it has reports of illegal activity there, especially when we are in a state of war. Madressahs, even if registered, are not sacrosanct or above the law. Unfortunately, it is this obsequiousness of our rulers toward the mullah since the creation of Pakistan that has emboldened the extremists over the last six decades.


The Muslim struggle for Pakistan did not include the Deoband or the Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Hind who opposed the idea of Pakistan tooth and nail. Nonetheless, once Pakistan became a reality the Wahabi-Deobandi groups made gradual inroads as our leaders acquiesced to their demands within a few years of independence. Since then their influence has remained unchecked by the state as it focused on short-term political goals, it is therefore not surprising that they have eventually assumed the mantle of our self-proclaimed saviours and architects of the national identity of Pakistan.

Be it the Objectives Resolution or the timing of the Anti-Ahmadiyya movement in the 50s that facilitated the first martial law; the ban on alcohol and declaration of Friday as a weekly holiday by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Naseerullah Babar's Taliban idea during Benazir's government, or Nawaz Sharif's Shariah Bill of the 90s, staying on the right side of Maulana Fazl ur Rahman by successive governments or the on-going pampering of Wafaq-ul-Madaris by the incumbent administration, the political players of Pakistan have always put their own narrow interests before the interests of the nation.

The military dictatorships on the other hand have used the mullah to further their own specific interests. From Ayub Khan to Musharraf, all military regimes have sought the cooperation of one religious sect or the other. Zia in particular played the mullah card to promote American interests and Arab culture simultaneously, destroying national institutions in the process while Musharraf's post-9/11 two-faced strategy ensured the continuity of extremism. Jointly, the politicians and the military dictators, with help from America and Saudi Arabia, have managed to create a monster that feeds on violence and bloodshed.

The religious clerics, whether Muslim or non Muslim, derive their political power from exploiting the insecurities of the masses by focusing on differences in religious and socio-cultural beliefs, thus leading to social divisions. In a multi-ethnic Pakistani society with a sizeable non-Muslim population, this has spelled disaster. Over the last three decades, the Deobandi/Wahabi mindset has transmuted ideological divisions into militant sectarianism that has been duly exploited by the Taliban and their domestic sympathisers that include mainstream religious-political parties.

Muslim states like Turkey, in keeping with the Ottoman tradition, have managed to keep their clerics under state control to ensure social order. In Pakistan, they have been given a free hand; what we are witnessing today in the shape of violence is the dark side of religiosity infused by religious extremists into the psyche of both the uneducated masses and the unsuspecting educated elite. This has transpired due to the manipulation of religious sentiments by vested interests and festering socio-economic and governance issues all rolled into one. But above all, this is due to the deliberate omission of critical thinking skills and philosophical knowledge from the national curricula, thus rendering a large majority of Pakistani population incapable of objective assessment. This omission is largely attributable to the direct or indirect influence of the mullah especially during and after the Zia era.

Today the same extremist elements continue to spread their hatred of one another as well as propagate against Pakistan's national interests by promoting conspiracy theories and blind anti-Americanism from the pulpit. And while doing so, they fail to mention the negative influence of certain policies of the Saudi government toward Pakistan. The anti-American and anti-government slogans after the Islamic University bombing would have sounded more genuine had they been accompanied with anti-Taliban slogans. Pakistan will never become a self-respecting nation unless it disengages itself from not only American shackles but also the ones imported from Saudi Arabia. This requires a mature political leadership that believes in impartial analyses and practical strategies, not to mention courage and wisdom.

The Waziristan operation is in full swing and if the religious parties cannot support it for fear of life, they can at least remain quiet. By stoking the fire of anti-Americanism to garner support for the Taliban through ill-timed rallies and referendums, they are doing no service to Pakistan. The nation is being driven into a frenzy that can only spread more intolerance and spawn fear and anxiety. Furthermore, it serves as a diversion because it deflects people's attention from the real issue of good governance and allows religious and secular leaders, whether in the government or opposition or outside the parliament, to play their petty games without having to shoulder the required responsibilities to steer the country out of the present quagmire.

Religion is a strong social phenomenon and has been employed by many in human history to serve political ends. Muslim history is no exception. The mullahs of Pakistan have employed the same dispensation since 1947 to gain political power. This has eventually led to the rise of a ferocious militant element never known in Muslim history. Not even the Hashashins of Hassan Sabah killed with such merry abandon. It is high time for the state to check the spread of unbridled hatred. It is time to stop pampering the mullah.

The writer is executive editor of Criterion, Islamabad.
Email: talatfarooq11@gmail.com (The News)

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Frankenstein’s Monster and General Zia-ul-Haq's jihadis

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Who are the Punjabi Taliban?

Muhammad Amir Khakwani

On trail of Punjabi Taliban

By Nasir Jamal
Saturday, 17 Oct, 2009

LAHORE, Oct 16: A day after the triple-strike in Lahore, officials, counter-crime experts and academics in the province grappled with the question of how to deal with the upsurge in violence and the discourse was dominated by analysis of who the Punjabi Taliban were and what background they came from.

The province’s security agencies admitted the presence of “individual” militants branded as Punjabi Taliban in southern Punjab as well as elsewhere. “The government and its security agencies are fully alive to the threat and are taking requisite action. But it would be wrong to say that militants have consolidated their position to a level where they can operate under the banner of Punjabi Taliban,” argued a senior Punjab police official who has worked with different intelligence agencies.

This was consistent with a provincial intelligence report prepared some time ago on activities of militant groups operating out of southern Punjab. Although the report dismissed what it termed the much-hyped theory that the Taliban have “set in” in the districts (of Bahawalpur, Multan and D.G. Khan divisions), it acknowledged the potential threat of Talibanisation in some areas if “timely action by law enforcement agencies, coupled with concrete development activity, was not taken”.

The report concluded: “Poverty-stricken, feudalistic, extremely religious and illiterate south Punjab could possibly provide shelter to the Taliban and other jihadi outfits. It has potential to become a nursery or a major centre of recruitment for sectarian organisations. Talibanisation appears to be in its infancy stage. Timely action by law enforcement agencies, coupled with concrete development activity, could avert this danger.”

In a talk with Dawn on Friday, a senior police official listed a number of arrests made in different parts of the province, including southern Punjab, and recovery of arms cache in the recent past and claimed that in doing so, police had averted a number of possible suicide raids and sectarian attacks.

He maintained that militant organisations like Lashkar-i-Jhangvi, Harkat-ul-Jihad-i-Islami and Jaish-i-Mohammad operating out of southern Punjab had a long history of linkages with the Taliban in Afghanistan and tribal areas of the NWFP who provide them sanctuary and support.“Nobody denies that the militants belonging to these organisations have strong links with the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan and facilitate their operations in Punjab. But this is also true for the militants operating from many other parts of Punjab and the rest of the country,” he added.

Another senior police official surmised the term Punjabi Taliban was just a myth coined and being propagated to destabilise Punjab by the so-called friends and foes (read America and India) of Pakistan. “It’s a stable Punjab which is blocking their designs to harm Pakistan,” he said.

A senior police officer from Bahawalpur wondered: “If the so-called Punjabi Taliban from south Punjab are so big in number why none of the thousands of those arrested or killed during the recent military operation in Swat was found to be from this area.”

The Punjab police say that only one militant, Abid alias Hanzala, out of 11 who had blown themselves up or were killed in as many acts of terrorism during 2007 and 2008 was from a southern Punjab district, Rahimyar Khan.

The rest of them were Mehsuds from South Waziristan. Similarly, all the eight suspected suicide attackers who were either arrested or those who were able to escape arrest during 2007 and 2008 came from South and North Waziristan, Mansehra and DI Khan. Five of them belonged to the Mehsud tribe, according to police.

But there have surely been some signs of change this year. Analysts argue that the active involvement of militants operating out of southern districts of Punjab in a series of terror attacks during this year has brought the ‘Punjabi Taliban’ into sharp focus.

“Earlier, the Punjab-based sectarian and jihadi groups, which were either involved in Kashmir or in sectarian killings within the country, used to only facilitate militants coming from tribal areas of the NWFP by providing them logistical support for carrying out terrorist operations. Now they have become entwined with militants operating under the banner of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan and changed their strategy.

“They are pursuing a different agenda, which is to challenge the state (of Pakistan) and pull it down, and are actively involved in the terrorist acts as indicated by their involvement in terror raids on Sri Lanka team and Manawan police training centre earlier this year (and multiple attacks on security installations this week),” Lahore-based defence and political analyst Dr Hasan Askari Rizvi said.

The official from Bahawalpur acknowledged that southern Punjab had proportionately produced greater number of militants because of the presence there of groups fighting in occupied Kashmir in the past. Also, he conceded, a number of top jihadi and sectarian leaders belonged to southern Punjab. But he insisted that there were no sanctuaries or training camps anywhere in the region.

On the basis of how much the official concede, shall we then say that the militants have an operational network in place in southern Punjab to build on?“That network is intact in spite of the arrests and killings of a number of militants in recent years. The area was never cleared and militant organisations and groups continue to recruit in southern districts of the province, which are also used as sanctuaries by militants after carrying out their operations elsewhere in the country,” an analyst said.

“How can you get rid of militancy without demolishing the ideological infrastructure that helps to create this mindset?” he wondered. But he acknowledged that it was a difficult task and required political consensus.

Amir Rana, an Islamabad-based analyst, said the term Punjabi Taliban was coined by Afghan Taliban groups to distinguish militants from Punjab and it became popular after the militant attack on the Danish embassy in Islamabad last year.

He said the Punjabi Taliban was not a homogenous group and also included Kashmiri and Urdu-speaking people. “You would also find some Burmese and Bengali immigrants living in Karachi in the ranks of the so-called Punjabi Taliban,” he elaborated.

Dr Hasan Rizvi said that linkages between the militants from Punjab and the Taliban in the NWFP had deepened (in recent years) as the militants shifted their training camps in the tribal areas to avoid action by the government.

He said religious extremism was not confined to southern Punjab alone. “You will find a similar situation in central Punjab as well. Religious extremism is very sharply visible in Gujranwala, Faisalabad, etc. But the problem with southern Punjab is that some of its areas are not under effective state control. There are areas in DG Khan where the government’s authority is weak, which helps the militants to find sanctuary there. Further, the close proximity of these areas to Balochistan and tribal areas of the NWFP also provides the militants an easy escape route.”

Dr Rizvi, however, dismissed calls for a military operation in the region. “It (operation) is not needed because these areas, in spite of weak government authority, are not out of the state’s control. The better option would be to gather credible intelligence on the activities of militants in these areas and then take action.” (Dawn)

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Taliban: the unholy nexus of sectarian and jihadi terrorists

Raid reveals Taliban's Punjab links

More than a hundred Pakistani civilians have died in four attacks carried out in less than a week [AFP] Officials say the latest deadly attacks reveal the extent to which the Pakistani Taliban is supported by ethnic Punjabi groups, in addition to the Pashto-speaking tribesmen of the northwestern border areas. Four attacks in less than a week have claimed over 120 lives and include a 22-hour raid on the army's general headquarters just 16km from the capital, Islamabad. The attacks show it is not only Pashtuns who are opposed to Islamabad's government as well as the Pakistani army and police force, according to representatives of Taliban. Azam Tariq, a spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban, claimed responsibility on Monday for that attack, saying "it was carried out by our Punjab unit". "And we will continue to take revenge for our martyrs and will carry out more attacks, whether it's the GHQ [the army's general headquarters] or something bigger," he said. And Major-General Athar Abbas confirmed that Muhammad Aqeel, also known as Dr Usman and a former member of the army medical corps, had led the attack on the army headquarters in Rawalpindi. Aqeel is an ethnic Punjabi. Previous attacks Aqeel is believed to have orchestrated an ambush on Sri Lanka's visiting cricket team in Lahore, a failed attempt to shoot down then-president Pervez Musharraf's jet with an anti-aircraft gun, and a suicide attack that killed the army surgeon-general in February 2008, according to Zulfikar Hameed, a police investigator. Hameed says that Aqeel was recruited into Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Janghvi, armed groups based in the Punjab province. IN DEPTH Video: Security crisis in Pakistan Video: Pakistan army HQ attacked Profile: Pakistan Taliban Witness: Pakistan in crisis Riz Khan: The battle for the soul of Pakistan Jaish and Lashkar have long been blamed for attacks on Western targets in Pakistan, as well as on minority Shia populations. Both groups are believed to have had links with Pakistan security agencies, which used their members to fight proxy wars in Afghanistan and India before 2001. The Punjab connection is significant because ethnic Punjabis dominate the army and the major institutions of the Pakistani state, Shuja Nawaz, head of the South Asia Centre at the Atlantic Council in Washington, has been quoted as saying. "Their involvement means that their break with the military and the [intelligence services] is now complete. The question is: Will the military have the capacity to take operations against them?" he told the Washington Postnewspaper. Monday's suicide bombing took place in Shangla, a Pashto-speaking area of the Swat valley region. The attacker was apparently targeting a military vehicle, but most of the victims were ordinary Pakistanis. Deadliest assault TV footage of the bombing showed vegetable stands with their wares spilled on the street, two-storey buildings with their fronts torn away and several wrecked cars. The attack killed 45 people, including six security officers, and wounded dozens of others, Mian Iftikhar Hussain, the provincial information minister, said. Deadly week October 12 - Suicide bomber targets security convoy in Shangla, near Swat valley, killing 45, including 35 civilians and six soldiers. October 10 - Fighters attack army GHQ in Rawalpindi. Commandos storm building and rescue 39 hostages. Nine suspected Taliban fighters, 11 soldiers and three hostages killed. October 9 - Suspected suicide car bomber kills 53 in Peshawar. About 100 people are wounded. October 5 - Suicide bomber dressed as paramilitary soldier attacks UN office in Islamabad, killing five staff members. There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but it was the deadliest attack in the region since the army claimed to have cleared the valley of Taliban in an offensive earlier this year. While many anti-government fighters were killed or captured in the army offensive, others are believed to have gone to rural areas or neighbouring districts. The Taliban have stepped up attacks in the past week as the military has been preparing to launch another major offensive on the border region of South Waziristan. On October 5, a bomber blew himself up inside a heavily guarded UN aid agency in the capital, Islamabad, killing five staffers. On Friday, an attacker detonated an explosives-laden car in the middle of a busy market in the northwestern city of Peshawar, killing 53 people. The raid on army headquarters in the city of Rawalpindi began on Saturday when 10 heavily armed fighters shot their way past the front gate. They then seized more than 40 hostages and held them overnight in a building inside the vast compound. Commandos stormed the building on Sunday. The army said nine Taliban members and 14 other people were killed, mostly members of the security forces.

Terrorists wanted to take senior officers hostage: ISPR

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

ISLAMABAD Pakistan: Director General of Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR), Maj Gen Ather Abbas said, Terrorists wanted to take key officials hostage, The main target of terrorists was to take the senior military leaders hostage to get their detained accomplices released, said Major General Athar Abbas, Director General Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), here on Monday.

“They sent their demands for the release of all their accomplices after making people hostage at GHQ,” Abbas said while briefing the media about the details of the operation against terrorists after they attacked the GHQ at 11.30 am on Saturday.

The DG ISPR said the terrorists had failed in attaining their desired goals by attacking the GHQ, as the Pakistan Army responded quickly. Abbas said the conspiracy regarding the GHQ attack was hatched in the South Waziristan. “We have intercepted a conversation of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) leader Waliur Rehman asking someone to pray for success as ‘Fidayeen’ attack on the GHQ has started,” he added.

He expressed fear that TTP leader Hakimullah Mehsud could be alive. “Apparently it looks that he is alive, as many videos are pointing towards this,” Abbas said. When asked about the launch of a military operation in the South Waziristan, the military spokesman said the army had taken “principle decision” to launch operation in restive South Waziristan, as this area had become breeding ground for terrorists. But, he added, the government would finally decide the time of offensive.

“It will be decided in the best interest of the nation as more than 80 per cent suicide attacks were planned in Waziristan,” he maintained. Responding to a question about the presence of Taliban in southern Punjab, the ISPR chief said splinter groups of defunct Jaish-e-Muhammad and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi were working on their own and their main training centre was South Waziristan, adding that out of 9 terrorists five were from Waziristan, while remaining four were from different parts of Punjab.

Analysis: Pakistan confronts growing terrorist menace

Pakistan's military establishment is beginning to realise the scale of the terrorist scourge in the country.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/pakistan/6310245/Analysis-Pakistan-confronts-growing-terrorist-menace.html

Analysis by Saeed Shah in Islamabad
Published: 5:00AM BST 13 Oct 2009

The danger comes not only from Taliban, who are ethnic Pashtuns from Pakistan's north-west fringe, which borders Afghanistan, but also from extremists from its heartland Punjab province, who have forged a network with the Taliban.

So Pakistan is threatened by a network of extremism that has cells throughout the country, able to mount attacks seemingly at will against any target. The militants are able to mount both suicide attacks and more sophisticated commando or "fidayeen" gun and grenade assaults, using well-trained jihadists against sometimes highly protected targets.

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Such attacks have intensified in frequency to leave more than 100 people dead in the space of a week, mostly from suicide bombings which have predominantly killed civilians.

The deadly nexus between Punjabi jihadists from more established groups, and their Pakistani Taliban comrades was exposed in the attack on the military headquarters (GHQ) at Rawalpindi at the weekend. Five of the 10 assailants were Punjabis. Their ringleader, Aqeel alias Dr Usman, was from a Punjabi extremist outfit, but the training for the operation was carried out in Waziristan, according to the army.

The "fidayeen", military-style tactics could even be used against Pakistan's nuclear sites, according to Shaun Gregory, a professor at Bradford University and an expert on Pakistan's nuclear programme. This could result in installations being bombed, set on fire or nuclear material stolen.

"The only thing that stands between al-Qaeda and nuclear weapons is the Pakistan army," said Prof Gregory. "It is an incredible shock that terrorists can strike at the heart of GHQ . Terrorists could mount this sort of assault against Pakistan's nuclear installations."

The same sort of fidayeen attack was seen in the assault on Mumbai in late 2008 by the Pakistan-based Laskar-e-Taiba (LeT), and the ambush of the visiting Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore earlier this year. Aqeel was already being hunted as the mastermind of that attack.

While Pakistan has taken on the Taliban extremists and plans to strike their sprawling stronghold in Waziristan, the menace from Punjab, a developed and highly populated area, is much harder to tackle and so far there has been no concerted military action taken against militants operating there.

Many see the strike on the army headquarters as a "wake up" call about the threat from Punjab.

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عقیل سری لنکا کرکٹ ٹیم پر حملے میں شامل تھا

آصف فاروقی

بی بی سی اردو ڈاٹ کام، اسلام آباد

جی ایچ کیو پر حملے میں شامل نو میں سے پانچ حملہ آور کا تعلق پنجاب اور چار کا وزیرستان کے محسود علاقے سے بتایا جاتا ہے

پاکستانی فوجی مرکز پر سنیچر کو حملے کے دوران زندہ بچ جانے والے واحد حملہ آور محمد عقیل کے پروفائل نے دہشت گردوں کا پیچھا کرنے والے پاکستان کے تحقیقاتی اداروں کو تحریک طالبان پنجاب کو سنجیدگی سے لینے پر مجبور کر دیا ہے۔

عمر تقریباً تیس سال، فوج کا سابق ملازم ، پنجاب کی تحصیل کہوٹہ کا رہائشی، پنجاب میں فرقہ وارانہ تنظیموں کا تربیت یافتہ اور القاعدہ کے ساتھ مراسم۔

چند ایک تبدیلیوں کے ساتھ یہ ایک محمد عقیل کا نہیں تقریباً ہر اس فرد کا پروفائل بن جاتا ہے جسے پاکستانی سکیورٹی ادارے گزشتہ چند برسوں کے دوران پنجاب اور اسلام آباد میں دہشت گردی کی بڑی وارداتوں میں ملوث ہونے کے بعد پہچان پائے ہیں۔

سابق صدر پرویز مشرف اور سابق وزیراعظم شوکت عزیز پر حملوں کے منصوبہ ساز ہو یا اسلام آباد، راولپنڈی، سرگودھا، فیصل آباد اور لاھور میں پاکستانی مسلح افواج اور سکیورٹی اداروں کے دفاتر اور بسوں پر بم حملوں میں ملوث بندوق بردار۔ سری لنکا کی کرکٹ ٹیم ہو یا اسلام آباد کا میریئٹ ہوٹل ان سب کارروائیوں میں جتنے بھی نوجوان ملوث پائے گئے ہیں وہ سب پنجاب کی فرقہ وارانہ تنظیموں کے تربیت یافتہ بتائے جاتے ہیں جنہوں نے بعض انٹیلی جنس ذرائع کے مطابق تحریک طالبان پنجاب کے نام کے تحت اتحاد قائم کر لیا ہے۔

فوجی حکام کے مطابق محمد عقیل عرف ڈاکٹر عثمان لاھور میں سری لنکا کی کرکٹ ٹیم پر ہونے والے حملے میں براہ راست شامل تھا جبکہ سابق صدر پرویز مشرف اور میریئٹ ہوٹل میں ہوئے بم دھماکوں کی تفتیش کے دوران بھی اس کا نام بار بار آتا رہا ہے۔

صدر مشرف پر ہونے والے بم حملوں میں شامل بیشتر ملزمان پاکستان کی مسلح افواج کے ارکان تھے اور ان میں سے اکثر کا تعلق بھی ضلع راولپنڈی کے مختلف علاقوں سے بتایا جاتا ہے۔

سنیچر کے روز راولپنڈی میں فوجی مرکز پر ہوئے حملے میں شامل دس میں سے پانچ حملہ آوروں کا تعلق پنجاب اور پانچ کا وزیرستان کے محسود علاقے سے بتایا جاتا ہے۔ حملہ آوروں کا یہ تناسب تحقیقی اداروں کی پہلے سے طے شدہ اس رائے کو تقویت دیتا ہے کہ پنجاب کی فرقہ ورانہ جماعتوں نے وزیرستان میں قائم تحریک طالبان کے ساتھ تعلقات قائم کر لیے ہیں اور اس کے تعاون سے صوبہ پنجاب میں دہشت گردی کی وارداتیں کی جا رہی ہیں۔

محمد عقیل کی عرفیت ڈاکٹر عثمان بتائی جاتی ہے اور اس کی وجہ یہ بتائی جاتی ہے کہ وہ پاکستانی فوج کی میڈیکل کور میں سول ملازم رہ چکے ہیں اور راولپنڈی میں مختلف مقامات پر سرکاری خدمات بھی انجام دیتے رہے ہیں۔ فوجی ترجمان میجر جنرل اطہر عباس کے مطابق عقیل نے انیس سو نواسی میں فوج میں شمولیت اختیار کی تھی تاہم سن دو ہزار چار میں وہ فوج چھوڑ کر بھاگ گئے’وہ بھگوڑا ہو گئے تھے۔‘

خودکش جیکٹ پہنے عقیل اپنے مقصد میں اتنے سنجیدہ تھے کہ جی ایچ کیو پر حملے کے دوران وہ ایک الگ کمرے میں چلے گئے اور دروازوں میں بارودی سرنگیں نصب کر کے پانچ کمانڈوں فوجیوں کو ہلاک کیا۔ وہ شدید زخمی اور بہوش حالت میں فوج کے پاس زیر علاج ہیں۔

گو کہ عقیل اور اس کی قبیل کے لوگ پنجاب میں فرقہ پرست جماعتوں پر پابندی کے بعد ہی سے صوبہ سرحد منتقل ہو گئے تھے۔ تحریک طالبان پنجاب کا نام پہلی مرتبہ گزشتہ برس اس وقت سامنے آیا جب چکوال میں شیعہ مسلک کی مسجد پر خودکش حملے کی ذمہ داری قبول کرتے ہوئے میڈیا کے ارکان کو ٹیلی فون پر اپنا تعارف بعض افراد نے تحریک طالبان پنجاب کے طور پر کروایا

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Jihad and the state

By Ayesha Siddiqa
Friday, 09 Oct, 2009

Pakistan’s support is critical in reducing the size and subsequently the threat posed by terror networks like Al-Qaeda. –Photo by AP

Pakistan’s support today is central to winning the war on terror. Hence, American aid is meant to encourage the political government and, to a certain extent, the military to cleanse the country of the thousands of jihadis that have been in Pakistan since the 1980s.

The strategy might work to a degree in eliminating some groups. Indeed Pakistan’s support is critical in reducing the size and subsequently the threat posed by terror networks like Al-Qaeda. The current assessment is that the terror outfit has in fact reduced in size and is partly relocating to Africa.

But this is not an indicator that the battle has been completely won. To vanquish the faceless enemy, the US and its allies have to achieve the harder goal of winning hearts and minds without which the war on terror is not winnable. This is because terror networks are difficult to locate, especially when they have society’s support. The problem right now is that while people in Pakistan might be anxious regarding some Taliban groups on a killing spree in the country, neither they nor the state in its entirety have complete faith in America’s war on terror or its presence in the region.

While institutions of the state have problems due to the manner in which the US chooses to fight the war, a common perception is that the Taliban imposed the war on Pakistan due to the US presence. So, to many the Taliban and jihadis essentially represent a struggle against American imperialism in Afghanistan. What, of course, goes hand in hand with such perceptions is the view that 9/11 was an American conspiracy to invade Afghanistan, the key to Central Asia. These are interesting times when the religious right begins to look like the left.

The battle for hearts and minds is essentially a part of the exercise of making the war legitimate. Currently, the argument presented by some in Pakistan, including certain prominent televangelists, is that America’s war essentially represents a clash of civilisations and is being imposed on Pakistan by an illegitimate government on behalf of the US. Notwithstanding the general suspicion regarding the US, there are two issues that need attention when it comes to the debate on what a ‘just war’ is in the Muslim world.

Firstly, what is a just war in Islam? According to some, a just war is one which is fought for the defence of Islam or for extending the religion to other parts of the world. The thinking goes that since the war on terror has been imposed by the US by falsely accusing Al Qaeda for 9/11, the struggle against it is legitimate. It would certainly add to everyone’s knowledge if Pakistani authorities disclosed how Khaled Sheikh Mohammad, who was interrogated by Pakistani forces before being handed over to America, confessed to his involvement in the bombing of the World Trade Centre.

Those that oppose the war on terror create the same categories as those that support the war of the ‘bad’ Taliban versus the ‘good’ Taliban. The latter are those fighting American hegemony in South Asia or other parts of the world. The bad ones are those that attack Pakistan on the behest of the US or Indian intelligence agencies. It becomes imperative for all Muslims to fight the US, which is threatening the survival of the Islamic civilisation, while Pakistan is considered the citadel of Islam.

So, people are caught between their dislike for violence imposed internally and the message coming from certain quarters that this violence is actually caused by the American presence in the region. Consequently, the situation would improve after America’s withdrawal from Afghanistan and Pakistan. Such perspectives received greater support after Washington’s needless expansion of the war to Iraq.

But then there is no consensus on what a just war is. Over the years, the concept of jihad has been through several interpretations depending on the times. Today, there is no consensus amongst the community of believers regarding the legitimacy of war. One of the important issues pertains to the question of who has the authority to wage a war. Is it the state or the individual’s responsibility? This question is not easy to answer as it is directly connected with another equally complex matter regarding the nature and legitimacy of the state.

The fact is that most religious opinions on war involving the individual citizen pertain to times when scholars had responded to external invasions and considered their own governments to be lacking in legitimacy to represent the people. The current times, unfortunately, don’t appear very different. However, the issue requires further thought even if the US left the region.

This brings me to the second issue of what a legitimate Islamic state is, a matter that has a direct bearing on whether the public would support the war or not. For the US, the battle to win hearts and minds becomes even more problematic considering that people in most countries of the Muslim world are not happy with their governments. This is certainly true in Pakistan where there is a lot of confusion about who has the right to govern.

The rampant corruption of the leadership adds fuel to the fire of the arguments of those who believe and profess that democracy is not suited to an Islamic system of government. Some televangelists in Pakistan, who are gaining popularity amongst the educated middle-class youth, argue that democracy as a system is foreign to Islam and hence must be abolished. Naturally, a state established on what they consider the wrong principles does not have the right to decide on which side of the fence it wants to fight.

These self-appointed preachers present a specific view on the politics of the state as if there is no space for any other perspective. Indeed, there is an ongoing debate on the relationship between politics and religion. While the concept of caliphate was supported historically, modern Muslim scholars such as Al Razik and Abdullah An-Na’im talk about the possibility of the separation of religion and politics which would allow for newer methods of selecting a government.

A debate on the aforementioned issues is no guarantee that the situation would immediately turn around for the US in Afghanistan. But it may save the world from protracted conflict on other fronts. The clash of civilisations is an ugly phenomenon and discussion in Muslim societies will help world peace.

The writer is an independent strategic and political analyst. (Dawn)
ayesha.ibd@gmail.com

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Tailpiece: 33 jihadi bhaion ki shahadat. May their souls burn in hell.

Bodies of 33 militants found

By Our Correspondent
Friday, 09 Oct, 2009

MINGORA, Oct 8: The bullet-riddled bodies of 33 suspected Taliban were found in different areas of Char Bagh on Thursday and a senior military commander said the militants had been killed in clashes with security forces.

According to reports reaching here, all the bodies were of local militants.

Sources said that troops were carrying out a search operation in Benjot, Taligram, Seir and Munglistan. In Kasona, 13 bodies were found and seven militants surrendered.

Dozens of unidentified bodies have been found since the military launched an operation in Swat and most of them have been buried.

Operation Commander Maj-Gen Ashfaq Nadeem told journalists that the militants had been killed in clashes in Char Bagh area over the past three days. He said that 95 per cent areas of Swat had been cleared of militants.

He said the remaining areas would be cleared soon and troops would start handing over a number of checkpoints to police from Oct 15. He said curfew had been lifted from several areas in Swat.

Maj-Gen Nadeem said that most of the militants in Swat had been killed, adding that troops would fully participate in the reconstruction work. He said the army would build mosques and repair the Ayub bridge in six weeks.

He said a committee would present a report about the use of Rs1 billion funds announced by the army chief.

Agencies add: The bodies of 15 Taliban militants were found on Thursday while 24 insurgents were killed in military operations in Swat.

Officials have previously reported 251 corpses dumped next to roads, beheaded or strung up in Swat since July.

“I can confirm that 15 bodies were found today and our information is that they are militants,” army spokesman Major Mushtaq Khan told AFP. “They might have been the victims of infighting among militant groups or killed by local people.” (Dawn)

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President Obama, please send one drone to the Jihadi / sectarian hub in South Punjab please!

Fears rise over militants in Punjab

Tuesday, 06 Oct, 2009 (Dawn)

Despite the ban, and repeated vows by governments to root out militancy, Jaish is thriving. — Photo by Reuters

BAHAWALPUR: Three burly gunmen stand menacingly at the gate of a mosque complex in the town of Bahawalpur as hundreds of men file in listen to a prayer for victory of Muslim fighters around the world.

This is Osman-o-Ali, the headquarters of Jaish-i-Mohammad, an al-Qaeda-linked militant group which has a long record of violence including an assassination attempt on former president Pervez Musharraf.

While Pakistan's attention is focused on the Taliban and al-Qaeda threat on the Afghan border in the remote northwest, there are fears that the militants are quietly expanding their influence and winning recruits in the country's heartland.

‘South Punjab is a fertile ground for extremists and militants,’ said security analyst Hasan Askari Rizvi.

The flourishing Jaish complex in Bahawalpur, in the south of Punjab province, illustrates the ambivalence that Pakistani authorities have long shown towards hardline Islamists.

Islamist factions were nurtured by the security agencies during the 1980s and 1990s when they sent their fighters into Afghanistan to take on Soviet occupiers and later into Indian-administered Kashmir region to battle security forces.

But Jaish was officially outlawed by Musharraf in early 2002 after it and another group, Lashkar-i-Taiba, were blamed for an attack on the Indian parliament which brought Pakistan and India to the brink of their fourth war.

Despite the ban, and repeated vows by governments to root out militancy, Jaish is thriving. It and an allied group are believed to have thousands of young cadres fighting western forces in Afghanistan and the Pakistani army in the northwest.

Plots hatched here on the dusty plains and shabby towns of southern Punjab can reach around the world.

Rashid Rauf, a British-born al-Qaeda operative and suspect in a 2006 plot to blow up transatlantic airliners, was a member of Jaish and was known to have lived in Bahawalpur with his wife.

‘Jihad hub’

Security analyst Ayesha Siddiqa says south Punjab has become ‘the hub of jihadism’ and the authorities are in denial.

The region is critical to planning, recruitment and logistical support for terrorist attacks in Pakistan and Afghanistan, she wrote recently in Newsline magazine.

Punjab provincial law minister Rana Sanaullah acknowledged the hardliners have many thousands of sympathisers but he dismisses talk of a threat to the state.

‘There is no challenge to the government,’ Sanaullah, who is also responsible for security, told Reuters in an interview in his office in the provincial capital of Lahore.

‘They can detonate bombs or carry out suicide attacks but they cannot establish their bases in Punjab,’ he said.

On the outskirts of Bahawalpur, the Jaish group has acquired a plot of land of about five acres (1.7 hectares) which some people fear could be a militant training camp.

The plot is surrounded by a brick wall but from a nearby road one can see cows and buffaloes feeding in stables.

A security official said authorities had turned a blind eye to the acquisition of the land by an outlawed group but said they would not be allowed to pursue militant activities.

‘Let me assure you they don't have the guts to challenge the government,’ said the official, who declined to be identified.

Mohammad Riaz Chughtai, a cleric with links to Jaish leaders, said the group planned to build a madrassah on the land and no militant training was going on.

But youngsters are being recruited in Punjab and sent for training on the Afghan border. Police recently detained five teenagers on charges of receiving militant training in South Waziristan, the main stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban.

‘They wanted me to become a suicide bomber. They told me that jihad was obligatory,’ 16-year-old Mohammad Ibrahim told interrogators, according to a police transcript.

Sanaullah said there were tens of thousands of such people all over Pakistan, including many who previous governments trained for war in Afghanistan and then discarded.

‘We can't kill all of them, arrest them or detain them for interrogation,’ Sanaullah said. ‘What we can do is that the one who is very active will be arrested and interrogated.’

Rizvi said government negligence and lingering sympathy for the militants in some quarters were to blame.

‘There is still sympathy for these militant groups,’ Rizvi said. ‘But they cannot establish a mini-state of their own as they did in the tribal areas.’

Also read: http://letusbuildpakistan.blogspot.com/2009/10/need-for-urgent-army-action-against.html

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Beards: a trim history

Beards: a trim history

By Nadeem F. Paracha
Sunday, 04 Oct, 2009 (Dawn)

It seems after all these years of searching for some kind of identity, many young Pakistanis have ended up finding one with the help of a beard (or hijab). —Illustration by Abro

In his biography, Mirror to the Blind, Abdul Sattar Edhi complains how he detests being called a ‘maulana’.

‘Mine was never a religious beard,’ he says. ‘It was always a revolutionary beard,’ he explains – perhaps inspired by Karl Marx, whom Edhi identifies as an inspiration during his youth. In the book he is quoted as saying that hardly any man in Pakistan used to have a beard in the 1950s.

A senior journalist, Ghulam Farooq, agrees: ‘In the 1950s and 1960s, no self-respecting Pakistani from any class would have liked to be seen with a long beard, apart from the mullahs. All this stuff about the beard having any religious significance played absolutely no role in the lives of Pakistanis. In fact, the beard was seen as a symbol of exploitation and bigotry.’

Showing me black and white photos of political rallies of the late 1960s, a former progressive student leader, Naushad Hussain, enthusiastically challenged me to point out ten men with beards among the hundreds that stood listening to Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and Asghar Khan in the photos. I couldn’t.

‘Look closely,’ he smiled. ‘There are only three.’
‘What about the ‘revolutionary beards’?’ I asked.

‘Revolutionary beards became famous in the West after Castro and Che Guevara’s revolution in Cuba,’ Naushad explained. ‘But long hair and revolutionary beards (in Pakistan) really became popular from 1970 onwards.’

A. Kabir, another progressive student leader (at the Karachi University in 1973-74), suggests that very few male students had beards even in the 1970s. ‘Ironically, only the most radical Marxists on campus went around with beards, looking like Che. Even the staunchest members of the right-wing Islami Jamiat Taleba (IJT), were clean-shaven. Being young and having a beard (and long hair) in those days meant that one was a radical leftist.’

Beards, especially heavy stubbles, also became popular as an expression of one having a creative and artistic disposition. Mahboobullah, a former graduate of the famous the NCA, Lahore, remembers that (in the 1970s), coffee houses and college canteens were full of long-haired and bearded young men sipping tea and beer, chain smoking and discussing politics, philosophy and art. ‘A young man with a neglected stubble or a beard, talking reflectively with a cigarette in his hand became a trendy pose in those days,’ Mahboobullah chuckled. ‘Women loved it!’

Karamat Hamid a former student at the Dow Medical College in Karachi in the 1970s, says that by 1976 almost all leading Pakistani TV actors had beards. ‘Talat Hussain, Rahat Kazmi, Shafi Muhammad… the creative big shots had beards. It became a global fashion. Cricketers like Dennis Lillie, Wasim Raja, Ian Chappel, rock musicians, Hollywood actors and directors, painters, college boys and even university professors all over the world had beards,’ remembers Karamat. ‘It was a fashion expressing creativity, intellect and manhood.’

So exactly when did beards stopped being a liberal/leftist aesthetic and start becoming a ‘religious symbol’?

‘I believe the trend started in the 1980s,’ says Sharib, a former member of the Islami Jamiat Taleba (who later joined the MQM).

‘I remember a lot of us were very impressed by the looks of the Afghan mujahideen. Then we started to keep beards like them,’ he explained.

In other words, one can say that the ideological symbolism of the beard had started to grow from left to the right. Fatigued by the exhaustive liberalism of the preceding decades and now under the propagandist hammer of a reactionary dictatorship, a lot of Pakistanis started rediscovering God, as it were, in the 1980s.

‘Beards started emerging on the most unlikely of men,’ laughs Talha Naqvi, a middle-aged head of an NGO. ‘It became a symbol of piety. Everyone from mujahids to smugglers to traders grew a beard,’ he said.

But according to Talha the real beard explosion happened in the 1990s: ‘This was the time when we first started hearing about people going around and asking young men to grow beards because it was an Islamic tradition. I used to say, if this was a tradition then so was riding a camel or using a brick for a pillow by early converts, so why not follow those examples as well?’

Talha says that the rising number of Pakistani men having beards for religious reasons became even more ubiquitous after the tragic 9/11 episode. ‘More and more young men today keep a beard as an Islamic edict.’

It seems after all these years of searching for some kind of identity, many young Pakistanis have ended up finding one with the help of a beard (or hijab). It’s become an exhibition of instant piety, and more so, a somewhat long-winded belief system that with their purposeful new looks they belong to a special community of chosen people; a herd-like expression of some divinely cohesive uniformity – at least in looks, which in turn may only have little to do with religion. It’s a statement very much opposed to the notion of diversity.

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