TEHRAN: Iran's interior minister on Wednesday accused U.S. spy agency the CIA of helping to fund "rioters", stepping up accusations of Western involvement in street unrest following the country's disputed election.
"Britain, America and the Zionist regime (Israel) were behind the recent unrest in Tehran," Interior Minister Sadeq Mahsouli was quoted as saying by a local news agency.
"Many of the rioters were in contact with America, CIA and the MKO and are being fed by their financial resources," he said. The MKO (Mujahideen Khalq Organisation) is an exiled Iranian opposition group.
Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said today the regime will not "back down" in the face of protests which have rocked Tehran over the disputed presidential election.
"In the recent incidents concerning the election, I have been insisting on the implementation of the law and I will be (insisting). Neither the system, nor the people will back down under force," state television quoted him as saying at a meeting with lawmakers.
Khamenei also urged MPs to cooperate with the government.
"Don't be hard on the government -- deal with the government in a friendly and nice manner," Khamenei said. "Executive affairs are difficult and on this rocky and exhausting path, the government should be helped."
TEHRAN: Iran faced mounting international pressure on Wednesday after US President Barack Obama raised ‘significant questions’ about the legitimacy of the presidential election and expressed outrage over the crackdown on opposition protesters, AFP reported.
The leadership also faced a new challenge from calls by reformist clerics for national mourning for dead protesters.
While defiant cries of ‘Allahu Akbar’ (God is great) were again heard from Tehran rooftops as darkness descended overnight, Iran’s hardline leadership, for now at least, seemed to have gained the upper hand.
Riot police and Basij militia appeared to have largely ended mass protests against the June 12 election, which reformists say was rigged to return President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to power and keep out moderate former Prime Minister Mirhossein Mousavi, sources told Reuters.
Iran has refused to overturn the results of the poll that returned hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to power, but supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has extended by five days a Wednesday deadline to examine vote complaints.
And one defeated candidate, former Revolutionary Guards chief Mohsen Rezai, has withdrawn his protest about election irregularities, in a blow to the opposition which has staged almost daily demonstrations since the June 12 vote.
‘Iran’s political, social and security situation has entered a sensitive and decisive phase, which is more important than the election,’ Rezai said in a letter on Tuesday to the Guardians Council, the top election body.
In his strongest comments yet, Obama said on Tuesday there were ‘significant questions about the legitimacy’ of the poll.
‘The United States and the international community have been appalled and outraged by the threats, the beatings, and imprisonments of the last few days.’
Obama described as ‘heartbreaking’ the shooting on a Tehran street of a young woman, Neda Agha-Soltan, whose death featured on an Internet video seen around the world and has become a poignant symbol for the opposition.
Iran has retaliated against the international backlash, accusing western governments, particularly major foes Britain and the United States, of meddling in its internal affairs.
Britain said it was expelling two Iranian diplomats after a similar move by Tehran while a number of other European nations have also hauled in envoys to protest at the election and the repression of protests.
Britain, described by Khameini as the ‘most evil’ of Iran’s enemies, is also pulling out families of embassy staff and, along with some other European nations, has warned its nationals against travel to Iran.
At least 17 people have been killed and many more wounded in the violence that has convulsed the nation since the vote, according to state media. Many hundreds of protesters, prominent reformists and journalists have also been rounded up by the authorities.
The crisis is the worst in Iran since the Islamic revolution 30 years ago and has jolted the pillars of the clerical regime, with even some top officials raising concerns about the vote.
The Guardians Council, a 12-member unelected body of Islamic clerics and jurists, insisted on Tuesday that the results of the election would stand.
‘We witnessed no major fraud or breach,’ spokesman Abbasali Kadkhodai said on English-language state television Press TV. ‘Therefore, there is no possibility of an annulment taking place.’ The council has acknowledged more votes were cast than there were eligible voters in 50 of the nation’s 366 constituencies, but denies major irregularities.
However, Ahmadinejad’s main defeated challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi, released a report on ‘electoral fraud and irregularities’ in the election that gave him just 34 per cent of the vote to 63 per cent for the incumbent.
The three-page report on his campaign website called for a ‘commission of truth and justice acceptable to all the parties to examine the entire election process.’ It denounced what it said was ‘large-scale’ official support for Ahmadinejad and spoke of ballot papers being printed on polling day without serial numbers, doubts about whether ballot boxes were empty when they arrived at polling stations and candidates’ representatives being banned from vote centres.
Independent British think tank Chatham House said in a report that the results show ‘irregularities’ in the turnout and ‘highly implausible’ swings to Ahmadinejad.
In Washington, analysts say that although the immediate flashpoint is Ahmadinejad’s disputed victory, the real struggle now is over the authority of Khamenei, who has been the supreme leader for 20 years.
Twenty-five journalists and other staff at a newspaper owned by defeated presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi were arrested, one of its editors told AFP on Wednesday.
The arrests come after the newspaper Kalemeh Sabz (Green Word) was shut down by the authorities in the wake of the disputed election that returned President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to office.
‘Among those arrested on Monday were five or six administrative employees while the rest were journalists,’ Alireza Beheshti said. ‘The agents who came to the newspaper did not show a warrant.’ He said five women among the detainees had been released on Tuesday.
Kalemeh Sabz was only launched in the run-up to June 12 election by Mousavi, a former post-revolution premier who has alleged widespread fraud in the poll.
Tehran’s streets remained tense but quiet on Wednesday, two days after the last opposition rally on Monday was crushed by hundreds of riot police armed with steel clubs and firing tear gas.
The Revolutionary Guards — echoing a call by Khamenei last week — have warned of a ‘decisive and revolutionary’ riposte to any further protests.
Mousavi, prime minister in the post-revolution era, has urged supporters to keep demonstrating but to adopt ‘self-restraint’ to avoid more bloodshed while another defeated candidate Mehdi Karroubi has called for a mourning ceremony on Thursday for slain protesters.
The foreign media is banned from reporting from the streets under tight restrictions imposed since the unrest was unleashed, but images of police brutality have spread worldwide via amateur video over the Internet.
In the latest crackdown on the media, Iran arrested a British-Greek journalist working for the Washington Times. —Agencies
On Monday, April 4, veteran journalist Ahmed Rashid addressed a select crowd at Karachi’s Mohatta Palace Museum. Not surprisingly, the subject of his talk was ‘Afghanistan and Pakistan: Quest for Peace or Recipe for War?’ He argued that Pakistan was facing a major existential crisis: ‘I no longer say that there’s a creeping Talibanisation in Pakistan, it’s a galloping Talibanisation.’ Here, Dawn.com’s Huma Yusuf presents the salient points from Mr. Rashid’s presentation. (Photograph: Fahim Siddiqi/White Star)
Where did the Taliban come from?
The myths about the Taliban need to be clarified. They are not an extension of an external threat, they are not being funded by Russia or India. In the 1990s, the Taliban in Afghanistan were fighting the Northern Alliance, and thousands of Pashtuns went to fight as foot soldiers on behalf of the Taliban. In 2001, the Afghan Taliban fled to Pakistan. Pakistani Taliban, who previously had little clout, became hosts of the Afghan Taliban and earned much money for their assistance. From 2001 to 2004, the Pakistani Taliban grew in numbers and influence and became radicalized because of their proximity to the Afghan Taliban. They planned and mobilized to establish a Taliban ‘emirate’ or state in Fata and the expansion of that idea of statehood is what we see happening today.
Pakistani Taliban expanding
The leadership of the Taliban is now in Pakistan and they have stated their intention of overthrowing the government here. The Taliban are linking up with groups in Pakistan and the Pakistani Taliban movement is turning into a multiethnic movement. Groups cultivated to fight in Kashmir have joined up with the Pakistani Taliban, and include Punjabis with organizations such as Lashkar-e-Taiba and Harkatul Mujahideen. Now, some 40 groups in Pakistan are loosely affiliated with the Pakistan – the several years of progressive diplomacy with India exacerbated the rise of different Taliban-affiliated factions. For that reason, Pakistan faces a more dangerous situation than Afghanistan, where Tajik and Uzbek fighters were not permitted to join the Afghan Taliban movement.
Issues in Pakistani governance
Pakistan is also weaker because of a raging economic crisis, the ongoing insurgency in Balochistan, and a political crisis. The PPP government has wasted one year vying with the PML-N for power rather than tackling the Taliban threat. Meanwhile, ANP, which was supposed to serve as secular face of Frontier province, has collapsed (ANP officials are being targeted by Taliban in northern areas).
Before 2008, the Musharraf government allowed the Taliban to resettle in Pakistan from Afghanistan. Musharraf wanted to maintain the jihadi nexus as a force against the Indians. Also, the emphasis then was on getting rid of Al Qaeda, the Taliban were not seen as a major threat.
After 2004/2005, when military operations did begin in Fata, the government pursued a stop-and-start policy, which involved several peace deals that did not hold. In the meantime, the Pakistan government and army failed to protect the people of the Fata and the traditional tribal hierarchies that were pro-Pakistan. About 300 maliks of tribes were killed and by 2007, there were half a million refugees from Fata in Pakistan. Having lost the goodwill of the population in Fata, the government will find it hard to reenter the area and rebuild traditional tribal structures.
American failures
How did we get from 2001 to where we are today? The Bush government got distracted by Iraq, which provided a diversion of attention and resources from the situation in Afghanistan. Instead of having an on-the-ground plan for capacity building in Afghanistan, the US supported warlords – instead of empowering the centre, regional powers were bolstered. Plus, little was done about the drug trade, which is now the main source of funding for the Taliban (it is estimated at 300 million dollars, but Rashid believes the real figures are triple that amount). Instead of defeating Taliban in Afghanistan, Americans routed them to Pakistan.
Obama policy
US President Barack Obama is now doing what Bush should have done in Afghanistan (troop surge, capacity building, securing the ground to ensure that presidential elections can take place this August). In Pakistan, however, American options are limited. There was a hope that after February 2008 elections, there would be a strong coalition government that could serve as a civilian partner for Obama to partner with. After all, army has proved unreliable ally (especially since it still thinks that India is the main enemy; army officials dislike Indian presence in Afghanistan; and army officials don’t like Karzai and other Afghan leaders). However, there is no one for America to partner with. PM? President? Opposition leader? They have all proved too weak.
As a result, US is asking for aid to help Paksitan, but there is very little trust and faith in Pakistan amongst the Congress. The aid that will be given will be packed with conditionalities that Pakistan won’t be able to accept. Congress is asking, who will we give this aid to?
India question
There is a tit-for-tat game between India and Pakistan whereby they support nationalist insurgencies in each other’s countries (so while India may be giving funds in Balochistan, Pakistan is helping out rebels in Assam). But India is not funding the Taliban. India realizes that the Taliban will be at their border next and they have nothing to gain from supporting the militants.
Regional strategy
New focus of Obama administration is regional policy – get Afghanistan’s six neighbors involved and make them sort out regional stability and set a common agenda. But first, bilateral issues will have to be sorted: Indo-Pak will have to clear the air, Pakistan and Central Asian states will have to reach understandings, and Iran and the US will have to start negotiating. This way, Afghanistan is not only a problem, it becomes a trigger for regional problem solving. This is one of the most doable and productive aspects of the Obama policy for Af-Pak.
Fallacies of Swat deal (Nizam-i-Adl Regulation)
The ANP thought that the deal would be contained within Swat, but that was very misguided thinking. The Taliban have an expansionist agenda. They make deals in one areas so that they can secure it and then move into other areas. There has also been no cessation of their killing of ANP and other government officials and they have not agreed to lay down their arms. Instead of achieving anything, the Swat deal formalises a different form of law and governance for one part of Pakistan, thus weakening the government.
The law in Swat is Taliban law, and it’s nonsense to say that the Swatis have been practicing Sharia for decades. The Taliban law has nothing to do with the mild form of Sufi-influenced Sharia that Swatis have had from 1960s.
Government was definitely taken by surprise by the speed with which Taliban moved on from Swat to Buner, Dir, etc. They will not stop and government should realise their ultimate goal of toppling Islamabad. To that end, the operation in Swat is welcome. But the question is: will it be a sustained offensive?
Also, there are already one million IDPs who have escaped from Fata and northern areas. If the army is seriously going to tackle Taliban menace, it must learn counter-insurgency tactics and get the right equipment to target Taliban without damaging entire villages.
Renowned religious scholar and head of Jamia Naeemia Lahore Dr Sarfraz Ahmed Naeemi among four others were martyred in a suicide attack at a seminary here Friday, report said. The blast that apparently was a suicide attack occurred following the Jumma prayer in Jamia Naeemia situated at Garhi Shahu area of the metropolis. According to preliminary reports, the blast was occurred in the office of Dr Sarfraz Ahmed Naeemi, the principle of one of the largest religious seminary of the city. Naeemi was present in his office at the time of the blast, says an eyewitness. An eyewitness told media that a suicide bomber, 18 to 20, blew himself up inside the office of Dr Naeemi when he arrived after leading Jumma prayer in the seminary’s mosque, of which he was the head. Dr Naeemi was severely injured in the incident and was brought to Mayo Hospital where he succumbed to the injuries. Principle of Jamia Naeemia, Dr Khalil was also among the deceased, it was reported.
Pakistan plays a key and highly conflicted--role in the global war on terror. The country is a U.S. ally in the war, but is often accused of supporting Taliban and Al Qaeda presence in its northern provinces. Pakistan also has nuclear ambitions. This timeline of Pakistan's role in the war tells the story of Pakistan's complex relationship to terrorism and the war on terror since 2001.
1990s: Pakistan Supports Taliban
•General Pervez Musharraf overthrows Pakistan government, and installs a military dictatorship.
•Pakistan serves as the primary incubator of the Taliban, a faction of the Afghan mujahideen who took refuge in Pakistan during the Soviet-Afghan war. Pakistan is one of two countries that maintains diplomatic ties with the Taliban regime (1996-2001)(the other is Saudi Arabia)
Read more: Taliban profile | Mujahideen
.2001: Pakistan Joins the War on Terror, Pakistanis Don't
•President Musharraf agrees to join forces with United States as an ally in the Global War on Terror, following the 9/11 attacks. This included realigning domestic political institutions to serve U.S. interests; granting the U.S. access to Pakistan's airfields; and overtly pledging support to the U.S. coalition.
•Pakistanis do not necessarily ally with the U.S.: "According to a gallup poll of Pakistanis in urban areas, 83 percent sympathize with the Taliban rather than the US and 82 percent consider Oslama bin Laden a holy warrior not a terrorist, although 64 percennt also believe the attack on the US was an act of terrorism" (Christopher de Bellaigue, "The Perils of Pakistan," The New York Review of Books, November 15, 2001)
.2002: More Counterterrorism ... and More Terrorism
•Musharraf again condemns terrorism, whether directed against Indian Kashmir or against Westerners. He promises to reduce support for madrasas (religious schools suspected of inculcating extreme views); outlaws a number of militant Pakistani groups; turns over Al Qaeda members to the U.S.; and impounds terrorist assets.
•Anti-Western terrorist attacks are on the rise. A grenade lobbed into a church in March kills five; in May, a car bomb in Karachi kills 14; a bomb set off near U.S. Consulate in June kills 12. Al Qaeda links are suspected. Several attacks in Kashmir are attributed to Pakistan based Lashkar e Tayyiba
Read more: Review of The Journalist and the Jihadi: the Murder of Daniel Pearl (HBO Film) | Al Qaeda Profile
.2003: U.S. & Pakistan Cooperate, but Pakistan "Talibanization" Increases
•Musharraf cooperates with the U.S. to achieve global war on terror objectives, including permitting U.S. military support operations.
•President Bush links U.S. and Pakistan goals. In July, Bush declares: "Both the United States and Pakistan are threatened by global terror, and we're determined to defeat it. Since [the] September 11th [2001] attacks, Pakistan has apprehended more than five-hundred al-Qaida and Taleban terrorists."
•The U.S. presence in Pakistan (coupled with the Iraq invasion) fosters increased anti-Americanism. Taliban members who've fled Afghanistan and Al Qaeda operatives are reportedly "re-Talibanizing" Pakistan, despite Pakistani disavowals.
Read more: Pakistan Strikes at Terrorism (VOA News, July 2003)
.2004-2005: U.S. Aborts Plan to Capture Al Qaeda Heads
•US-Pakistan joint counterterrorism efforts in military and law enforcement spheres continue. The US also says that the Pakistan has not done enough to combat Al Qaeda and the Taliban.
•Terrorist attacks continue. Several target Western interests; others perpetuate the Pakistani-Indian territorial standoff.
•Baluchistan's longstanding insurrectionist operations against the Pakistani government gathers steam, creating complications for Pakistani efforts to pursue Al Qaeda in the province
•The U.S. government scraps a plan to attack to capture top Al Qaeda members in Pakistan's tribal territory, fearing it would endanger delicate relations with Pakistan.
Read more: Commentary on the aborted Al Qaeda capture plan
.2006-2007: Pressures on Musharraf Rises as Pursuit of Taliban Continues
•Terrorist attacks continue, and the Taliban and Al Qaeda gather strength and support in Pakistan's tribal areas.
•The tension between Pakistani military and intelligence support for violent extremists, and popular anti-Anti Americanism begins to strain myth of perfect relationship between Musharraf and the U.S.
Read more: Pakistan and Afghanistan Argue over Who Does Less to Stop Terrorism | "We Are All Al Qaeda Now": How Pakistan Bombings Militarize Pakistanis | The Price of Holding Off Taliban in Afghanistan: Carnage in Pakistan
.2008: Musharraf Departs, Militants Become Focus of U.S. "War on Terror"
•President Musharraf resigns. His resignation is largely under pressure from the United States, although substantial local forces are also at work. His resignation signals his perceived failure to halt the activities of violent extremists in the Northwest provinces bordering Afghanistan. Civilan rule replaces Musharraf's military government, under the leadership of Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani.
•Analysts from the West focus attention on the ISI, Pakistan's Intelligence service. The ISI has long been suspected of supporting jihadist activities against Afghanistan, which would serve Pakistan's strategic interest in quelling potential Afghan power.
The world was reminded of the tragic paradoxes that take place daily
in Pakistan, when a young journalist was kidnapped and executed last
month while covering a march for peace. Mr. Musa Khankhel, journalist and correspondent of Geo Television disappeared on February 18, while covering a procession led by Maulana Sufi Mohammad, a religious leader in Swat, in the NWF province. The procession was to celebrate a peace agreement with the government which would see Islamic Sharia laws implemented in the valley. He was 28 years old and had been threatened several times by government security forces for his steadfast independent reporting. He had also been kidnapped and tortured twice before by security forces. As a journalist he was not popular among militant groups either, including the Taliban and the
group lead by Maulana Soofi Mohammad, Tehrik Nifa-1Shariat Mohammadi (TNSM).
After his body had turned up in the Matta sub district, the
government, TNSM and the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists (PFUJ) announced the formation of probe committees into his death. No one laid claim to the murder. The government assigned the Inspector General of police in the province to investigate the incident, but neither he nor Maulanas committee has reported any findings so far. Only the probe committee of PFUJ appears to have started a concrete investigation, and Mr. Mohammad Riaz, the chief of the PFUJ committee, has visited the area. He reports that the atmosphere there is tense and few civilians are willing to discuss Khankhel’s death; they are scared of harassment from both the sides, the militants and the security forces. The latter are known to brutally and often arbitrarily mete out punishment in the more remote parts of the country, and disappearances here are not uncommon. There are also no police in the area. Without committed government intervention – a high judicial commission – to probe the killings, Riaz says, it will not be possible to unearth the truth.
Information gathered by the AHRC points, increasingly, at Pakistan’s wayward security forces for the murder.
On the day he was murdered, friends and relatives say that Khankhel
mentioned hearing that ‘today one journalist may be killed’, through
sources in the security agencies stationed in the war zone. Because
of this he told prominent senior journalist and anchor person, Mr.
Hamid Mir, to be extremely careful, should he choose to visit the
area. Mir remembers Khankel telling him: ‘you will watch the scenes
of destruction in civilian residential areas of Kabal. You will show
live destroyed homes and mosques, and people will equate your
coverage with the bombing of Gaza by Israelis. You will become a
security risk and they will kill you in the name of national
interest. And the blame will be placed at Talibans door.’
Tragically, Khankel had not realised that he was the journalist in
question.
Khankhel had survived two assassination attempts last year, both
times, he said, by the security forces. In November he was kidnapped
and tortured for two days in custody, and was told that should he
continue his investigations, his family members would be killed. He
later told Mir, his colleague, that ’some elements in the security
forces want to eliminate me physically, due to my reporting’. The
journalist’s younger brother, Essa Khankhel, also a journalist, told
the AHRC that his brother had managed to record a death threat from
one security officer in the past.
The AHRC has learned that the day before his assassination, Khankhel was stopped and threatened by security persons at a press conference held by Mr. Bashir Bilour, the senior minister of the NWF Province. Bilour was giving a briefing on the peace pact between the provincial government and TNSM. One Major Farooq, of Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR), exchanged harsh words with Khankhel, and he was told to be careful when dealing with the armed forces.
Reports from eye witnesses in the area, particularly shopkeepers from Matta (the sub-district in Swat from where he was abducted) have pointed out that there were a good number of security personnel around when Khankhel was taken. In Matta, Musa had visited a few shops and proceeded to a spot along the route of the procession. He was trying to hail a taxi when three persons carried him forcefully away.
Provincial government ministers, including the spokespersons of
Taliban Pakistan and TNSM, are all denying responsibility, and
claiming that a ‘third force’ was involved. This ‘third force’,
ministers concede quietly, means the armed forces. A top office
bearer of the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists has observed that
when the Taliban kills, they claim it openly. Hamid Mir has written
several articles suggesting that his colleague was the target of the
army.
In the past year four journalists have been reportedly killed by the
security forces in the Swat, twenty over the last two year period.
Journalists, particularly reporting in the war torn NWFP on its
destroyed houses, schools and hospitals, observe that security forces
are generally hostile toward them, and each reporter has experiencing problems during investigations, some receiving death threats. The motive, as explained by the journalists, is to keep the reporters out of the area. Journalist Mr. Hameedullah’s house was bombed on his return to his village on 5 January, 2009. They and other residents had been forced to evacuate the area on 28 December, when the army launched an offensive against the Taliban.
Although there are conflicting reports about Khankhel’s killing; most
of the reports point in the same direction. After the war on terror,
the impunity enjoyed by security agencies saw a dramatic rise in cases of torture, abduction, disappearance and the murder of government opponents. There are more than 4000 persons disappeared for their resistance to military operations in different part in the country, and the AHRC last year determined the existence of 52 clandestine detention centres. Still, unknown actors are publicly blamed for many of the area’s most violent crimes.
To specify a ‘third force’ and name it only in private, pays no
tribute to the memory of Musa Khankhel, and to his family.
Investigations into the torture and deaths of other journalists have
sputtered and failed. Courage and an iron political will is needed
from the government to tackle this blight in Pakistan: a corrupt,
wayward and arbitrarily violent security force that has only been
encouraged, rather than reined in, over the years. A high powered
judicial commission must be formed to probe the murder, uncover the truth about the involvement of security agencies in the death of
journalists, and to bring the perpetrators to justice. It must be
shown that no one in Pakistan is above the law, in any part of the
country.
Three journalists from the NWFP were arrested by ISI for the purpose of extracting the source of news about military operations in Buneer, where the Taliban has taken over control of the city; they were however subsequently released. The ISI had earlire declared that the three journalists would
not be released until and unless the journalists, one in particularly,
Mr. Dilawar Jan disclosed the source of his news about the start of
military operation in the area.
On the other hand, Taliban Pakistan has threatened the journalists of the country that if they continue to criticize the Taliban type of justice system, the Nizam-e-Adl (NAR), they would be treated with dire consequences and would be tried in Taliban courts.
According to the information received from Mr. Hamid Mir, the
prominent anchor person of the Geo Television program, the Capital
Talk, on Wednesday, April 29, 2009, a journalist of the TheNews
International at NWFP province, Mr. Dilawar Jan, was asked by the
officials of the ISI to disclose the source of a news item about the start of the military operation in the Buneer, the Taliban controlled area. Mr. Jan, however, refused to disclose his sources as it was against the ethics of journalism. At 16 hours he was again contacted by the ISI officials and instructed to come to office of the ISI at Peshawar Cantonment, in the heart of the provincial capital. As he reached the station office of the ISI, he was detained there until the disclosure of the source of his story.
But at 18 hours the government and the military themselves announced
that a military operation has already initiated in the Buneer against
the Taliban militants, even then ISI wanted to know about the source
of disclosure of the operation before it was officially announced.
In the late hours of the same day, two other journalists, namely Mr.
Mushtaq Yousufzai and Mr. Bukhar Shah, had gone to ISI provincial
head quarters and enquired about the illegal detention of Mr. Dilawar
Jan but both of them were also held arbitrary till the disclosure of
the source of the news. Mr. Hamid Mir tried to keep in contact with the intelligence officers for the release of the journalists but he was told that they were not under arrest and they would be released soon. At 23:30 hours the Geo Television broadcast the news of the illegal detention of Mr. Dilawar Jan by the ISI, but purposely avoided to inform about the illegal detention of two other journalists as it would create panic in the journalist community and would give a bad name to the Pakistan armed forces. The spokesperson of the arm forces of the Pakistan has shown his inability to comment on the arrest of the three journalists.
The on-going operation by the Armed Forces of Pakistan against the Taliban in Swat has resulted in a massive migration out of the conflict zones. About 2 million non-combatant children, women and men have migrated almost overnight to safer areas in NWFP and other parts of the country.
musharrafThe chief of the Pakistan Red Crescent Society estimates that, in reflection of the generous hospitality of the people, about 88% of these forced migrants have already been accommodated in the homes of relations, friends or even complete strangers in NWFP itself.
That still leaves about 12% i.e. about 250,000 people to be accommodated in camps, or in other provinces. Even on this scale the task is formidable. One estimate by the UN Relief Services office in Pakistan says that about 126,000 people are moving away from the areas of violence on every single day.
As society and the State of Pakistan cope with this sudden enormous emergency whose ultimate fall-out remains unpredictable and ominous, there is an inescapable irony. Contrary to the hysterical alarm bells rung in April by global media in general and western media in particular, it is not a giant wave of the Taliban that has swept out of Swat and NWFP to overwhelm the rest of Pakistan: it is simply innocent citizens who seek shelter and security as the might of the Armed Forces confronts the mysteriously well-armed Taliban.
It becomes relevant at this stage to take stock of the reality beyond the media-spread paranoia regarding the Taliban.
Three convergent factors substantially explain the rapid advance of the Taliban up to April 2009 in parts of North-Western Pakistan. Ideology. Ethnicity. Geography. Yet the convergence is unsustainable, if not impractical, beyond the NWFP.
Even though 97% of Pakistanis are Muslim, the overwhelming majority are varied and heterogeneous in their practice of Islam. From small sects to large swathes of Sufism, from Sunnis to Shias, from one interpretation of religious texts to another, there is a dynamic diversity of viewpoints and practices. Such a range of strongly-held convictions cannot be steam-rolled by the one-dimensional, intolerant, unilateral version of the Shariah projected by the Taliban.
An All Parties Conference convened by the Government in Islamabad in mid-May included several religious parties of differing persuasions. They strongly rejected the version of Islam propagated by the Taliban and supported the Army’s action.
An ethnic Pukhtoon sense of fraternity spans dozens of tribal, sub-tribal identities which constitute the pre-dominant composition of the Taliban. This homogeneity is one of the major reasons for the fluency with which the force expanded.
At the same time, even within the NWFP, there have been several instances where purely local identities and perceptions have obstructed the movement. In the February 2008 election, the vast majority of Pukhtoons in NWFP including those in Swat, voted for the secular ANP. Such divergencies amongst Pukhtoons are far greater outside the province.
Over 1700 kilometers south of Peshawar in NWFP, the city of Karachi in Sindh has the largest number of Pukhtoons in the world. One reliable estimate is 3 million plus. However, the city throbs with a colourful diversity of over 16 million people, a virtual microcosm of South Asia and Pakistan. This scale and variety of features alongwith the pluralism within the Pukhtoons themselves become big deterrents against a walk-over threat from the Taliban.
Some madrassas and centres in and near Karachi are suspected to be sleeper cells of the Taliban only waiting for a signal to spring into action. Strategically located near vital points such as oil terminals, transport hubs, highways and roads, some concentrations of Pukhtoons are supposed to represent potential threats. Yet there is a counter-vailing diversity of other ethnic communities in Karachi. This is represented, in one major instance by the MQM, as much as by the non-Taliban dimension of many, if not most Pukhtoons. Facts such as these prevent the danger from becoming real.
In recent weeks there have been several intriguing attempts by unidentified elements to incite ethnic conflict between Pukhtoons and other communities in Karachi, and in other parts of Sindh. Fortunately, despite some bloodshed, restraint and balance have prevailed over anger and suspicion.
A recent limited influx of refugees from Swat is being misused to stoke tension but overall peace still prevails in Sindh.
There is an apprehension that the Taliban mentality has spread widely in southern Punjab. If correct, this aspect alone could negate the argument advanced earlier in this comment that neither the ideology nor the ethnicity of the Taliban have scope for concerted advance beyond NWFP.
Southern Punjab’s high poverty rate does offer fertile ground for the simple, austere, proletarian dimension of the Taliban’s otherwise religion-driven credo. But once again the sheer range and variety of ethnic, linguistic, sectarian, social and cultural features in southern Punjab ensure that the intolerant singularity of the Taliban’s message faces many obstacles. So far there is no sign of wide-spread empathy for them in this region.
Finally, the specific terrain of large parts of the NWFP’s hilly and mountainous areas has helped facilitate the elusiveness of the Taliban, their ability to evade operations by the Pakistan Army and to re-group later. This geographic advantage is not available on the same scale in most of Punjab and Sindh which together contain about 75% of the country’s population.
In Balochistan, the largest of the country’s 4 provinces (about 45% of the land) with the smallest population (only about 5% of the total) there certainly are many hilly and mountainous areas. But here too, the scope for the Taliban is splintered. While the northern part of Balochistan is predominantly Pukhtoon, there is also a strong secular Pukhtoon nationalist base amongst the people, side-by-side with religious parties.
The central and southern parts of Balochistan are the real home of the Baloch. While being mostly Muslim and conservative, the Baloch are primarily secular, intensely nationalist and deeply alienated from the Islamabad-Punjab power structure. Yet most Baloch tribal leaders use the same power structure to reinforce their own local authority and privileges. In coastal Balochistan where the tribal chief system does not exist and where a comparatively egalitarian ethos prevails, prospects for the Taliban are dim.
The foregoing optimism is not meant to under-estimate the dangers posed to Pakistan by the Taliban. Even confined to parts of the NWFP and to other northern areas they are a formidable challenge of obscurantism and brutality that feeds on a potent mixture of deprivation, pride, faith and resentment against America’s foreign policy. The violent tendency of the Taliban must be countered consistently and forcefully.
The principal response must address economic needs, strengthen governance, improve law enforcement, ensure justice and women’s rights and present them all in the idiom of a progressive version of Shariah that outflanks and debunks the narrow, punitive, false version practiced by the Taliban.
Late Tuesday night another one of the Hashwani family’s hotels was demolished in a well-planned and executed suicide attack in Peshawar, Pakistan. The Pearl Continental (PC) Hotel chain is owned by perhaps Pakistan’s most prominent Ismaili family, the Hashwanis. Major cooperations in Pakistan, when not wholly owned subsidiaries of the Pakistani Army, are most often familial enterprises such as the Hashwani’s Hashoo Group. The Hashwanis had been in talks with the U.S. government to sell it the PC Peshawar property to be used as its new consular offices in light of war-torn North West Frontier Province’s ever growing importance in U.S. foreign policy. There are rumors that the Hashwani’s were or are considering getting out of the hospitality industry altogether. Last year’s Islamabad Marriott bombing was devastating to the family’s investment portfolio though its patriarch, Saddaruddin Hashwani, issued a defiant statement to the press that he would rebuild the Islamabad Marriott and would not bow to terrorist intimidation.
While covering the Pakistani elections last year, I often worked out of the PC Lahore’s business centre and devoured some incredible international fare at the hotel’s excellent restaurant after long days trudging up and down Mall Road looking for stories. Even if I could have afforded to stay there, I wouldn’t have because of its obviousness as a high-value target in the wave of jihadist violence that had already engulfed the country by mid-2007. Partly for my safety, I stayed at a low profile guest house down the road. Sadly, it doesn’t help that the 5-star hotels in Pakistan are owned by a group of Ismailis, a branch of Shi’ism that holds the Aga Khan in highest esteem as living imam, when considering the militants takfiri ideology. The Sunni extremists that claim to adhere to takfirism believe that individuals may declare those who follow different strains of Islam apostates and can therefore justify acts of previously imaginable terror throughout South Asia and the Middle East. Takfirism is essential in creating a sense of the “Other” in the militant mind which is used to justify attacks against those praying in mosques and eating in hotel dining rooms. Shia Muslims whether the traditional Twelvers or the lesser known Ismaili Seveners are some of the Takfiri militants favored targets.
Undoubtedly, the reasoning behind the attack will be attributed to either the PC’s international clientele or its possible sale to the Americans. The Ismailis as a cultural subset are extraordinarily successful business people with Shah Karim al-Hussayni, the Aga Khan, chief among them. The Aga Khan and the Hashwanis represent immense wealth in a region wracked by poverty and illiteracy-related militancy. They both provide relatively large investment opportunities and job creation that have become a target of nihilist militants who’s ideology has become somehow even more vile.
When I was working in Afghanistan last year, the Afghan Taleban targeted the telecom company Roshan’s mobile phone transmission towers in the southern provinces after having previously attacked the Aga Khan’s Serena hotel in Kabul. The Taleban issued a communique stating they wanted the towers shut down at night because they believed their movements could be tracked by coalition forces and the mobile signals emitted from their phones were being used to target them. Ismaili business interests seemed to be under sustained assault. His charitable work, which often focuses on his Ismaili minority, is underwritten by the for profit arm of his empire with the luxurious Serena chain as its face. Now again, the Taleban’s attacks on the Roshan towers and the Serena were very likely of a purely strategic nature but the fact that the towers are owned by the Aga Khan (and his European consortium partners) doesn’t exactly help. A major segment of the Aga Khan’s charitable work is aiding remote Ismaili communities in Central and South Asia who the Taleban consider to be apostates similar to the Twelver Shia Hazaras they attempted to annihilate in central and northern Afghanistan in the 1990’s.
I had some of the same thoughts regarding the return of Benazir Bhutto. Though she was still beloved by many, she had neither the strategy nor the credibility to defeat the takfiriswho were determined to eliminate her. Not only was she Shia, like her father Zufliqar and Pakistan’s founding father Mohammed Ali Jinnah, but she came from the rich and resented zamindar feudal structure in Sindh province that is another post-colonial relict of British divide et impera strategy. As I’ve written previously regarding Sri Lanka, the Crown’s modus operandi was to favor ethnic and religious minorities over the “unwashed masses” in order to maintain control over the populace and extract the natural wealth of their colonies with as little disruption as possible. I’m sure the Pakistani Taleban didn’t need Benazir to be a land owning Twelver to declare her an enemy (and therefore punishable by death) but I doubt her lineage and status helped her case. Benzair spent the last morning of her life meeting with Hamid Karzai at the Aga Khan’s opulent Islamabad Serena (where a friend of mine photographed the two hours before Bhutto’s assassination). People across the region who depend on the Ismaili establishment for employment, sustenance and remittances have suffered enormously from the Taleban’s unforgiving insurgency and reconciliation cannot begin soon enough should the kinetic war-fighting cease anytime soon. Inshallah!