Sunday, September 30, 2007

Protest - Writing on the Wall



Picture: Daily Times, October 1, 2007

Benazir Bhutto's Remark about AQ Khan


Fuss over Bhutto's nuclear remarks By Farhatullah Babar
The News, October 01, 2007

The fuss over Ms Benazir Bhutto's remarks over cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is not surprising. Indeed it is déjà vu. Those whose pastime is to dub her as 'security risk' are at it again. The monopolists of truth and wisdom are out to make a punching bag of her. Whenever she says something that runs counter to the officially certified truth she is lambasted for presumed lack of patriotism or toeing the enemy line. It is a different matter though the critics later come round to accepting the logic and reason.

For instance, when she called for promoting people-to-people contacts and pulling down the 'invisible Berlin Wall' between India and Pakistan, she was instantly accused of betraying the martyrs' blood. Call for demolishing the invisible Berlin Wall was resented not because it meant betrayal of the martyrs but because it would take away some shine from the glittering medallions. Today even the ardent advocates of Kargil adventure acknowledge, at least publicly, the compelling logic of pulling down the barriers, easing tensions and liberalising trade in the subcontinent. They seem to recognise that normalisation should not be stalled just because talks on Kashmir have not yet produced results.

When, some years ago, she warned against the hijacking of the liberation struggle in Kashmir by extremist non-Kashmiri groups saying it was the ultimate disservice to the cause of Kashmir, she was accused of undermining jihad and even toeing the Indian line. But soon the supporters of jihadis recognised the rationale. Responsible Kashmiri leaders themselves decry the non-Kashmiri jihadi outfits. Gen Musaharraf has even cried out louder. Don't export your jihadi zeal and khudai faujdar mat bano (Do not assume the role of God's army), he warned them in his address to the nation on January 22, 2002.

It is said that wisdom dawns upon the unwise also but only after damage has been caused. What did Ms Bhutto say lately about the IAEA that seems to have let the cat into the pigeons? At the outset she said that the issue of allowing IAEA access to Dr AQ Khan was a hypothetical one and did not arise at this stage. However, she said her government will cooperate with the IAEA in questioning those who have acknowledged the role in proliferation of nuclear technology. What is wrong with it?

Has the government itself not permitted the IAEA to put written questions to Dr AQ Khan, the replies to which are then forwarded to the UN agency? Has Gen Musharraf not admitted in his memoirs sharing 'all information' about the nuclear black market with the international agencies? What must be our central concern -- protection of those who proliferated or protection of our nuclear assets? Protection of nuclear assets demands that Pakistan is perceived as a responsible state acquiring nuclear technology for its legitimate defence and economic needs and not for setting up the juma bazaar of nuclear materials and technology. It is in our interest to cooperate with the UN watchdog body to disabuse the notion that any government in the past or any state institution was involved in the nuclear black market. The protection of our nuclear assets lies in assuring the international community that ours is not a rogue state that protects the proliferators.

This has become even more important after General Musharraf made startling revelations in his memoirs about the international nuclear black market and the role of some Pakistanis in it. Chapter 27 "Nuclear Proliferation" (pages 283-294) of his memoirs reads like an FIR that also names some Pakistanis. How can we say no to investigations? According to General Musharraf, "Our investigations revealed that AQ had started his activities as far back as 1987, primarily with Iran. In 1994-94 AQ had ordered the manufacture of 200 centrifuges. These had been dispatched to Dubai for onward distribution". Further, "Dr AQ Khan transferred nearly two dozen P-1 and P-2 centrifuges to North Korea" (page 294). This is followed by a revelation that would send many into a tail spin, "To the Iranians and Libyan, through Dubai, he provided nearly eighteen tons of materials, including centrifuges, components and drawings", saying also "the deal with Libya is estimated to be in the region of $ 100 million" (page 294). Describing AQ Khan as "not part of the problem but the problem itself" (page 288), the memoirs claim "all this information has been shared with concerned investigation international agencies".

General Musharraf did the right thing in sharing nuclear black market information with international bodies. But after having informed the IAEA that 18 tons of nuclear materials were clandestinely shipped out of Pakistan supposedly by one person, can Ms Bhutto be faulted for saying that she will cooperate with the UN in unearthing the black market. Behind lambasting Ms Bhutto is the lurking fear that there could be more than just one skeleton in the cupboard. Behind it also is the doubt that General Musharraf's candid expose of the nuclear black market may not be candid after all. If we have to protect the nuclear assets there is no alternative to take out the black market roots, branches and leaves. The logic of this reasoning will also be accepted like the logic behind the peace process and disbanding the jihadis before it. One only hopes that its wisdom dawns before any damage is done.

The writer is a former PPP senator and a member of the Senate's human rights committee. Email: drkhshan@isb.comsats.net.pk

Also See: The Real Security Threat, Dawn, October 1, 2007

Pakistan Army and the Wars Within


Editorial: Pakistan army and the nation
Daily Times, October 1, 2007

The politics in Islamabad today is posited by the opposition as a battle for civilian rule and the confinement of the Pakistan army to its constitutional role. The lawyers’ community and the opposition political parties may have different agendas up their sleeves, but at the declaratory level it is the civilian-military relationship that everyone is supposed to be trying to correct. Even the ruling party, by keeping a general as president, promises a more reliable reversion to more democracy. The consensus is apparently shared by President General Pervez Musharraf himself. But the antagonists fall apart on whether the post-Musharraf period should be “transformational” or “transitional”.

A Pakistani scholar has tried to “define” the character of the Pakistan army in his forthcoming book. A journalist and an ex-IMF officer, Shuja Nawaz, in his Crossed Swords: Pakistan Army and the Wars Within (not yet published), compares it to the army of Indonesia under Sukarno and Suharto instead of the Turkish army as is often done by those who wish to posit a polarity between the army and the people. He explains that “the army has gradually expanded its remit to include protection of the national ideology, as defined by the army itself. He said this ideology has changed from a loose definition of a Muslim state at birth to an Islamic polity under Zia-ul-Haq, and now to the ‘enlightened moderation’ of General Pervez Musharraf, even as the growing urban population appears to prefer the conservative end of the social and political spectrum”.

The Pakistan army was a professional outfit in the beginning. It accepted the challenge of an anti-India nationalism after the 1947 war in Kashmir and was supported by the country’s civilian leaders. Early Pakistani nationalism was based on the warlike self-image of the subcontinental Muslim, thinking nothing of the strategic mismatch with a much larger and “unconquerable” India as “the other”. This army embraced a tactical worldview during these early years, which in time became a part of its persona. It overthrew civilian governments in a politically conflictual early phase to carry out the anti-India mission it had been bequeathed by civilian leaders but suffered defeats at the hands of India.

After the Pakistani mind began to regard the army as a defeated/discredited entity usurping political space, the army clutched at the “ideology of Pakistan”, a much safer route to its fundamental mission of fighting a “just war” with India. It did so after the last testament of Pakistan’s anti-India nationalism was framed by Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in his book The Myth of Independence (1969). He reaffirmed confrontation with India as the “grundnorm” of Pakistan’s foreign policy: “1) That the US is in a position to compel both India and Pakistan simultaneously to an arrangement compatible with its own global interests; 2) that the US thinks that its detente with the USSR, coupled with China’s continued weakness, will strengthen its power over Asia; 3) that the US and the USSR are acting in concert to force a settlement between India and Pakistan, which will effectively force Pakistan to accept Indian hegemony in the region; 4) that the US seeks peace between India and Pakistan to use them against China”.

Author Shuja Nawaz says: “It is important for the army to help create a stable national polity by subjecting itself in practice to civilian oversight and control ... [and] on its side, the civilian government needs to ensure that it follows the Constitution fully and does not involve the military in political disputes.” He warns that while the army remains a conservative institution at heart, it is not yet a breeding ground for large numbers of radical Islamists that many fear.

An unspoken consensus in Pakistan against the state’s anti-India-driven mission statement is in place today; only the politician has to begin to articulate it, not only for the economic survival of the people but also for the final “correction” of the “middle class” Pakistan Army. Pakistan’s “revisionist” nationalism has been at the root of conflict in the region and domestic supremacy of the Pakistan army. But once it has been recast in light of the new economic imperatives, redefining Pakistan’s geopolitical location, not as an obstruction to trade routes, but as a trade corridor joining two important land masses in Asia, the Pakistan army will stop representing the uncomfortable strategic “over-stretch” of the state to become a benign institution, insulated against all political upheavals inside the state because these upheavals will no longer jeopardise its mission. *

Pakistan: Police Attacks Lawyers & Journalists in Islamabad

PAKISTAN PROTESTING LAWYERS CLASH WITH POLICE ON MUSHARRAF..

One More Push Comrades...

One more push, comrades
By Ayaz Amir: Dawn, September 28, 2007 (Written and Published before saturday clashes in Islamabad)

AIK dhaka aur, comes a cry from afar, for the towers of authoritarianism are tottering, the halls of government are in dreadful confusion, the spoons (chamchas) of this order don’t know what to say, and the crisis which erupted on March 9 – always to be remembered as a glorious day in our history – enters a decisive phase.

The stakes couldn’t be higher. As a nation we either collapse into a state of collective depression or, with luck on our side, step forward into a brave new future. It’s not a question of one man’s fate.

If it were that it would be nothing. No, it is a question affecting the country’s future. For, in the next few days we have to answer the question whether we are at all fit for

self-government or only fit to be herded like cattle by one self-appointed saviour after another?

This question can also be framed in a slightly different manner. The next few days will decide whether the Pakistani dream was worth it – worth all the effort and sacrifice that went into its making – or was it, after all, an exercise in futility. For, let us make no mistake about it: subordinating the national will to the interests of an individual amounts to nullifying the struggle for Pakistan, making nonsense of Iqbal and Jinnah and whatever they stood for.

Was Pakistan created to make it safe for military rule? An absurd proposition but then no more absurd than the games we see being played around us. The Supreme Court’s decision on the question of Pervez Musharraf’s eligibility to stand as a presidential candidate while in uniform is eagerly awaited. And what is the gist of this case? Can an army chief stand for president? People around the world must be laughing at us, wondering what kind of people we are. It is sixty years since we gained independence, seven years into a new century, and some of the country’s best legal minds have spent days wrangling over the absurdity of an army chief, one past his retirement date, standing for president?

And it’s not as if it is a ‘genuine’ election we are talking about. This is a set-up affair, a fake and phony presidential election, assemblies whose term is about to end ‘electing’ Musharraf for five more years. Eight years in power already but the lust for power remains as strong as ever.

What does it matter if the nation, heartily sick of Pakistan’s lackey status to the United States, wants a change, any change as long as it is a bit different from the dispiriting performance of the last eight years. Self-interest decrees otherwise.

What’s it with us and democracy? Why is our preferred model always someone like Hosni Mubarak or Suharto? Why does the autocratic mode of governance hold sway over most of the lands of Islam?

The developed world may have embraced democracy – indeed democracy being one of the hallmarks of its progress – but why does the meaning of democracy elude our grasp?

What an historic opportunity we in Pakistan have wasted. With our British legacy of parliamentary democracy, we could have been different, a model and beacon for the rest of the Islamic world.

But driven perhaps by an all-consuming sense of insecurity, we systematically went about destroying the foundations of democracy gifted to us by the British and instead raised monuments to greed and incompetence.

Greed and incompetence becoming our national gods, it was perhaps natural that we sought comfort in dictatorships, whether civil or military. Greed and incompetence can flourish under a democratic umbrella too (remember some of our democratic heroes and heroines) but if one is really serious about looting national wealth, nothing like a shabby dictatorship to make it happen.

Marcos in the Philippines, Suharto in Indonesia, Sani Abacha in Nigeria all of them deserving Oscars for looting their countries. In a democracy, however bad, a Zardari or a Sharif can be questioned and denounced. In the kind of setup we have, there can be a sugar scam, insider trading on the stock exchange, a questionable sale of the national steel mills (mercifully aborted by the Supreme Court), and now a wheat scam and few questions are asked. If the economic wizards of the present dispensation could have their way we would be rid of most of our national assets, including the national airlines.

I am in Lahore for the past few days and the stories one hears about ‘qabza’ groups and shady financial dealings are straight out of Mafia fiction. With so much at stake, who in his right senses would think of relinquishing power?

So are we dead as a nation, immune to things great and uplifting? By no means and this is the baffling part because given all that we have had to endure our spirit as a nation should have been dead long ago. Given the slightest opportunity the Pakistani nation stirs in its sleep and comes alive, as we saw during the course of the lawyers’ movement when across the country a groundswell of support arose spontaneously for Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry and lawyers agitating on his behalf.

CJ Chaudhry may have had his faults (which mortal does not?) but something in the way he stood up to Musharraf touched the nation’s heart and so people in their thousands came out to cheer him when he took to the road to address different bar associations.

The common people of this country, those who are not into the national pastime of getting rich by fair means or foul, worship courage, they worship selflessness. They have an instinctive feeling for what is right and what is wrong. Crores if not billions of rupees are being spent on a television campaign these days extolling Musharraf as some kind of a national deliverer.

What will make fools in government realise that TV ads make a hero of no one? Pervaiz Ellahi, the Punjab chief minister, has spent billions in self-serving ads since coming to power. Does he think his public image has been enhanced because of this self-glorification?

Why don’t people come out on the streets on the call of the political parties? Because they are sick of the antics of the paper tigers who head them. Who in all of Pakistan is prepared to take Maulana Fazlur Rehman, Musharraf’s deadliest secret weapon, seriously? He only has to open his mouth on television for viewers to start sniggering, all too aware of his huge talent for false logic. Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto may have signed no public pact but who in the country doesn’t know that some kind of an understanding has been struck between them? Benazir is playing softball with the general and he with her. She continues to swear by democracy but is anyone fooled by her protestations?

As for the Sharifs it will be some before they stop paying penance for the deal they struck with Saudi help way back in 2000. What you sow is what you reap.

The Roar of Rumi - 800 years on



The roar of Rumi - 800 years on
By Charles Haviland: BBC News, Balkh, northern Afghanistan: September 30, 2007

For many years now, the most popular poet in America has been a 13th-century mystical Muslim scholar.

Translations of Mawlana Jalaluddin Rumi's - better known as Rumi - verse are hugely popular and have been used by Western pop stars such as Madonna.

They are attracted by his tributes to the power of love and his belief in the spiritual use of music and dancing - although scholars stress that he was talking about spiritual love between people and God, not earthly love.

Rumi, whose 800th birth anniversary falls on Sunday, was born in 1207 in Balkh in Central Asia, now part of Afghanistan.

I came here to see whether he has much resonance in his native country which, under the Taleban, went so far as to ban music.

Still standing

A young Afghan archaeologist, Reza Hosseini, took me to the ruins of the mud-and-brick-built khanaqa - a kind of madrassa or religious school - where Rumi's father taught and the young boy is believed to have studied, lying just outside the old mud city walls and probably within yards of his birthplace.

It is a quiet and melancholy place, the structure eroded and encroached on by shrubs and bushes.

But an amazing amount of it is still standing - the square structure, its four arches with pointed tops, in the Islamic style, and half of the graceful dome.

Mr Hosseini says the floor was originally constructed of baked bricks and lined with carpets donated by those who came to share the learning.

Sufism - or Islamic mysticism - was already enshrined here before Rumi's time and Mr Hosseini imagines that this corner of the town, by the madrassa, would have echoed to the sound of Sufi singing and prayer.

But, he says, it is unclear how widespread, or acceptable, practices such as music and dance were in the wider population.

When Rumi was barely out of his teens, Balkh was reduced to rubble by Genghis Khan's marauding Mongol invaders.

Rumi had fled in advance with his family and settled in Konya, now in Turkey.

After the murder of his close friend, a Persian wandering dervish called Shams-i-Tabriz, he was depressed for years but later wrote his greatest poetic work, the Mathnawi.

It describes the soul's separation from God and the mutual yearning to reunite.

With his injunctions of tolerance and love, he has universal appeal, says Abdul Qadir Misbah, a culture specialist in the Balkh provincial government.

"Whether a person is from East or West, he can feel the roar of Rumi," he says.

Great love

"When a religious scholar reads the Mathnawi, he interprets it religiously. And when sociologists study it, they say how powerful a sociologist Rumi was. When people in the West study it, they see that it's full of emotions of humanity."

The Sufi mystical tradition is not immediately apparent in modern Afghanistan.

But with Mr Hosseini's help, I traced a small group of eight Sufi musicians in the city of Mazar-e-Sharif whose great love is Rumi's poetry.

First there is a solo from Rumi's favoured instrument, the reed flute.

Then the flute player is joined by Mohammed Zakir, usually a shopkeeper, who fills the room with his powerful voice in interpreting the words "I'm a man who's not afraid of love; I'm a moth who's not afraid of burning".

In the third song, all the men join in with an extraordinary, percussive vocal sound which, Mr Zakir says, comes straight from the heart. It continues for nearly 10 intense minutes.

I meet Professor Abdulah Rohen, a local expert on the poet, who says that, regrettably, knowledge of Rumi - also known as Mawlana - has declined recently.

"Forty years ago the economic situation of the people was good. People would work in the summer time collecting food and would eat it in winter. In winter they were free. They would gather in mosques and sing Mawlana's poems.

'Disfavour'

"But in the past 10 or 15 years people's economic situation has deteriorated, so they are far from Mawlana."

He says the advent of communism in Afghanistan brought poetry into disfavour because it was seen as backward-looking.

Then the Taleban attempted to crush Sufism and outlawed all music, but Prof Rohen says it has since regained huge popularity.

According to him, Rumi brought Sufi mysticism away from asceticism and into the heart of the people.

Many western fans of Rumi have secularised his message.

It was in fact a religious one; and, says Prof Rohen, Christians and Jews as well as Muslims flocked to his funeral.

I ask him to sum up the poet's message and he offers a quote.

"Mawlana says - if the sky is not in love, then it will not be so clear. If the sun is not in love, then it will not be giving any light. If the river is not in love, then it will be in silence, it will not be moving. If the mountains, the earth are not in love, then there will be nothing growing."

Book Review: On Pashtuns and Tribal Areas



BOOK REVIEW: Tribal stories that reveal character by Khaled Ahmed
Daily Times, September 30, 2007

Pashtun Tales from the Pakistan-Afghan Frontier
by Aisha Ahmad & Roger Boase
Publisher: Saqi Books 2003

The foremost theme of the treasure collected in the book pertains to what the Pashtunwali terms badal or revenge. In the tale titled Musa Khan Deo, it is the jinn that has to avenge the insult of a moustache snipped by a proud princess

A scion of the great Pathan tradition in Pakistan, Aisha Ahmad, has collected the tribal stories that underpin the complex Pashtun psyche in Pakistan. Somehow Peshawar in Pakistan’s NWFP province has been associated with the recall of this collective mind. There is even a Qissa Khwani Bazaar in Peshawar where visitors have flocked again and again in vain to collect the lost tales of a great ethnic stock known in India and Pakistan as Pathans.

When Aisha went in search of the tales, she predictably failed in the Qissa Khwani Bazaar which may now resonate exclusively with the Wahhabi inspiration unleashed by the warrior-priest in the region. She finally found the bard named Saeed Baba in the Mohmand Agency in 1977 and collected what may be called the last treasure of ancestral tales that the suicide bombers of Al Qaeda may be about to destroy. Along with the radio, the modernity of “facts” is in the process of defeating the Pashtun soul.

The preface notes: ‘The traditional Pashtun way of life was seriously disrupted by the social consequences of the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan, the mass exodus of refugees to Pakistan, Iran and elsewhere, and many years of civil strife”. Over 80 percent of the 6 million refugees displaced by the intervention were Pashtuns, 12 million of whom live in Pakistan as opposed 7 million that live in Afghanistan. Saeed Baba’s fairy tales are treated with the same kind of modern disdain as the tribes treated their professional classes.

The book quickly brings to the fore the tribal denigration of the professionals. This applies to all the ‘devolved’ Pathans too that live in the plains of Pakistan and India. Employment of the state became honourable for those who climbed down from the mountains. This extended later to the employment of the British Raj, but the professions remained clean of Pathans because the ancestral memory of the highlander hinterland made fun of these callings. From barber, weaver, spinner, tailor and story-teller, the scoffing devolved to all commercial callings with the passage of time and today stands in the way of ‘modern’ normalisation of the Pashtuns.

The stories encompass the Pashtunwali, the code of life that bestows and takes away the honour of the Pashtun and makes them so attractive to the detribalised people of the plains. The foremost theme of the treasure collected in the book pertains to what the Pashtunwali terms badal or revenge. In the tale titled Musa Khan Deo, it is the jinn that has to avenge the insult of a moustache snipped by a proud princess. Even wives take up arms to avenge the insult attached to the rape of the husband’s moustache probably because the man himself was too prostrated by the grief of losing the hair on his upper lip.

The second item in the tribal code is melamstia or hospitality found in all pastoral societies where the tribe is isolated with territory strictly delimited according to its food sustainability. Melmastia goes together with nanawati (submission) when a stranger is offered hospitality and protection after he has thrown himself on the mercy of the host tribe. In both cases the delimitation of territory is significant and the relief at knowing that a stranger is not a marauder triggers large-heartedness. Prince Bahram forgives six jinns because their sister had been hospitable to him during his wanderings.

The book classifies the tales under rubrics of belief in fate, debt among peasants, importance of male heirs (read denigration of the female child), and stupidity and clownishness of the menial tribes, giving rise to much humour today under attack from the high-seriousness of hard Islam. The story of a king pondering his lack of a male heir in a secluded corner of his palace recalls stories in the plains as well where sons are even today considered more important than daughters against all available evidence. Menial tribes give rise to humour and point to the racism of the Pashtun especially when he is juxtaposed with the plainsman Punjabi.

‘The Parrot and the Starling’ expresses the fear of the black man as sexually superior, so well expressed in the tales of The Arabian Nights, which could well be the source of the tale as the Pashtuns hardly had any truck with the African slaves in their society. The miracle story, when they mixed with Islam, could have been imported too, probably from the fuzzy Shia-Sunni borders of the mystically inclined people of the plains of India. The tales of Imam Hanif, the half brother of Imams Hassan and Hussain, is definitely borrowed from the Punjabi qissa tradition sung in the streets of Lahore in the 1950s.

Ahmad and Boase have done a great job by preserving what could be the last vestige of the Pashtun mind as it was before modernity — and that includes hard Islam — overtook it. Surprisingly much of Saeed Baba’s fantasia gibes with the tales still bandied by the settled Pathans of the plains with longings of the tribal past they said goodbye to a long time ago. Their tales also include some from beyond the Pak-Afghan tribal territory and extend to the Armenian-Turkish zones of contact, mostly by those migrants who came into the Pashtun lands and Pashtunised themselves.

Saturday, September 29, 2007

Riots in Islamabad: Journalists & Lawyers Brutally Beaten by Police









Riots in Islamabad Over Musharraf
By Aryn Baker/Islamabad: Islamabad, Time, Sep. 29, 2007

Less than 24 hours after Pakistan's Supreme Court ruled in favor of President General Pervez Musharraf's eligibility to run for a second term in office, government forces laid siege to the Supreme Court grounds, where several hundred lawyers had taken refuge after a vicious attack on a peaceful protest in the capital, Islamabad.


More than 10,000 riot police and plainclothes officers were stationed around the court and the nearby Electoral Commission offices, where the nomination papers for 43 presidential hopefuls, including Musharraf, were being scrutinized for eligibility. Some 1,000 lawyers and political workers brandishing banners and shouting "Go, Musharraf go!" were forcibly prevented from entering the Electoral Commission grounds. Within minutes of reaching the gate, baton-wielding police charged the protesters. Yasser Raja, a 33-year-old lawyer from nearby Rawalpindi was beaten repeatedly on the head; when he attempted to protect himself the police continued to attack, causing extensive damage to his upraised arm. His lawyer's uniform of white shirt and black suit was soaked in blood, but he continued to shout anti-Musharraf slogans. "These things cannot stop us," he said. "We are ready to sacrifice more and more. Our blood will not be taken in vain."

It seemed as if the police were ready to take up the challenge. Someone threw a stone — though it's not clear who — and the police returned the volley with rocks of their own. Some witnesses say they saw police passing around bags of rocks, others say they simply picked them up from nearby piles of rubble. Within minutes the fighting escalated. Security forces fired tear gas shells directly into the crowd, causing a panicked stampede. The police, protected by helmets, body armor and shields, kept up the barrage of stones and gas until they forced the protesters across the street to the grounds of the Supreme Court. Aitzaz Ahsan, a leading Supreme Court lawyer and former Interior Minister, who had served as an advisor to the court on the hearing for Musharraf's candidacy, was directly targeted by the police, as were several other leaders of the protest. Ahsan was hit by a brick in the kidneys at point blank range, then beaten on the head with batons, which shattered his glasses. A colleague, who had thrown him to the ground in an attempt to protect him, was beaten so badly that the force of blows broke his arm. Several hundred protesters were dragged off in waiting police wagons, the rest took refuge in the cool halls of the Supreme Court, where the blood of the wounded pooled on the white marble steps of the main entrance. "There is blood on the steps of Pakistan's Supreme Court," said Ahsan. "The people of Pakistan have a right to protest, yet they have been brutally attacked. This whole situation is as noxious as the tear gas itself."

The crackdown on the protest came just two days after the Supreme Court, lead by Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, ruled that the government had no right to blockade streets leading into the capital, nor could it prevent protests or stop the free-flow of traffic past government buildings. Nevertheless, both Constitution Avenue, which leads past the Supreme Court building, and intersecting street Sharah-e-Jamhuriyat, which roughly translates as Democracy Avenue, were completely blockaded. "This is a massive violation of not just human rights, but of the Supreme Court ruling," said Anila Ateeq, a high court lawyer, as she dabbed her face with a water-soaked headscarf to ease the sting of the tear gas. "Our cause is the restoration of democracy, that is why we are protesting. The government has no cause, it has no mandate, it only has force."

Ambulances screamed through the gates of the Supreme Court to collect the wounded. Over the course of the day some 45 protesters were rushed to hospitals throughout the capital, the overwhelmed staff of the Supreme Court first aid clinic attended to the rest. The protesters, refreshed by dousings of water, repeatedly rushed out of the Supreme Court gates to shout a few slogans before they were forced back inside by another volley of gas and stones. Each rush, successively diminished by incapacitated colleagues, was met by increasing levels of violence, until police fired four tear gas shells directly onto the Supreme Court grounds. A few lawyers, faces wrapped in water-soaked handkerchiefs, immediately lobbed the still smoking shells back at the police before retreating to the court's entryway. But even the entrance provided no refuge; clouds of gas drifted through the open doors. "We are looking at an obscene and unnecessary show of excessive force," said Ali Dayan Hasan, South Asia Researcher for Human Rights Watch, who had come to observe the protests. "This has been wanton brutality against a professional group that is struggling to uphold the rule of law."

The excessive display of violence by government forces just a day after an unmitigated victory for Musharraf was met with incredulity by many observers. "The Day of The General" led the headlines of the local English language newspaper of record, Dawn, this morning, a line that took on a new meaning as the day progressed. "In what should have been his finest moment, General Musharraf has lost his head," said Ahsan, recovering from his wounds in an alcove of the court entranceway. For two weeks the Supreme Court debated the constitutionality of Musharraf's nomination for a second term as president, despite his ongoing tenure as Army Chief. The holding of dual offices is normally prohibited by Pakistan's constitution, but in 2002 Musharraf was able to obtain a one-term waiver. Elections, which are undertaken by an electoral college made up of national and provincial parliaments, are to be held on October 6, just three months before general elections for a new parliament are due. Many hold that the current assembly, which has been in power nearly five years and whose majority is pro-Musharraf, does not have the right to give Musharraf a new term. "Musharraf should have obtained a fresh mandate from the new assembly," said Ahsan. "Obtaining a mandate for another five years by an assembly whose shelf life is over is a fraud on democratic principals and the whole concept of representative governance. The only people General Musharraf has been able to fool and beguile are the governments of the United States and Great Britain."

By mid-afternoon the lawyers trickled slowly away from the Supreme Court grounds, bloodied, exhausted and still coughing from the effects of the tear gas. A few managed to raise a defiant slogan, but most chatted quietly among themselves. "It's just a shade short of Burma," said one bedraggled lawyer, echoing an earlier statement by Ahsan. "Yeah," said his companion. "But here they are attacking lawyers in suits instead of monks in saffron."

Also See: Pakistan cops, lawyers clash; Chicago Tribune
Pakistani lawyers clash with police: Al-Jazeera

Supreme Court Says Go Ahead Musharraf: Punjabi Judges Vs. the Rest

Picture: Police guarding roads near the Supreme Court before the Judgment

Sindh, NWFP stand out again
The same thing happened in late Z A Bhutto’s case
By Rahimullah Yusufzai: The News, September 29, 2007

PESHAWAR: Why is it so that Supreme Court judges belonging to Sindh and the NWFP often give dissenting judgments in important constitutional petitions having political implications while those from the Punjab usually uphold the government’s stance?

This question arose once again Friday when the apex court gave its verdict on the maintainability of a number of identical petitions, challenging dual offices of President General Musharraf and questioning his eligibility to contest the presidential election set for October 6.

Of the six judges who dismissed the petitions filed by Jamaat-i-Islami head Qazi Hussain Ahmad, Tehrik-i-Insaf leader Imran Khan and others, four belong to the Punjab. They are Justice Mohammad Nawaz Abbasi, Justice Faqir Mohammad Khokhar, Justice Falak Sher and Justice M Javed Buttar. Of these four, Justice Abbasi and Justice Khokhar have served as secretary law to the government.

The two other Supreme Court judges who rejected the petitions are Justice Javed Iqbal, who hails from Balochistan, and Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar, who has domicile of Sindh. In the recent past, Justice Dogar served as chief election commissioner of Pakistan. This is the job that has been generating controversy since the creation of Pakistan because the fairness of all elections in the country, with the exception of those held in 1970, has been questioned.

The three judges of the nine-member Supreme Court bench who gave dissenting note in the dual offices case belong to Sindh and the NWFP. Justice Rana Baghwandas, who headed the bench, is from Sindh while Justice Sardar Mohammad Raza Khan and Justice Mian Shakirullah Jan hail from the NWFP.

Both Justice Sardar Raza and Justice Shakirullah Jan served as chief justices of the Peshawar High Court. The former is from Abbottabad district and the latter from Nowshera. They enjoyed good reputation while serving as judges in the Peshawar High Court. By dissenting from the majority decision in this dual offices case, they have suddenly captured the imagination of those struggling for independence of judiciary and the rule of law in the country.

Some senior lawyers in Peshawar said they always expected Justice Sardar Raza to take an independent line in this and other cases pending before the Supreme Court. As for Justice Shakirullah Jan's dissenting note, these lawyers said this came as a pleasant surprise for them and had enhanced their admiration for him.

Former Senator and PPP leader Qazi Mohammad Anwar, who has been an active participant in the lawyers' movement for the independence of judiciary, noted in his comments while talking to reporters on Friday that Justice Sardar Raza and Justice Shakirullah Jan had made the NWFP proud due to their independent judgment in the dual offices case.

Another senior Frontier lawyer, Barrister Baachaa also paid tributes to the two judges for their deep knowledge of the Constitution and understanding of its spirit. He remarked that the Pashtuns were proud of the courage, commitment and integrity of Justice Sardar Raza and Justice Shakirullah Jan.

Friday's events in the Supreme Court reminded many Frontier lawyers about the apex court's majority verdict in the murder case in which former prime minister and PPP founder Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was sentenced to death. The seven-member bench in its controversial judgment sent Mr Bhutto to the gallows by a majority decision of four to three.

The four judges who formed the majority all hailed from the Punjab. They were Chief Justice Anwarul Haq, Justice Malik Akram, who was the father of Attorney General Malik Qayyum, Justice Karam Ali Chohan and Justice Nasim Hassan Shah. The last-named, who later became the chief justice of Pakistan, in the Geo TV programme, Jawabdeh hosted by Iftikhar Ahmad, conceded sometime back that it was mistake to sentence Mr Bhutto to death in the case.

The three Supreme Court judges who gave dissenting notes in the famous case were Justice Dorab Patel and Justice Mohammad Haleem from Sindh and Justice Safdar Shah from the NWFP. The way Justice Safdar Shah was later hounded out of the country is now part of Pakistan's painful judicial history.

As noted Frontier lawyer Athar Minallah recalled, one judge each from Sindh and the NWFP were cleverly removed from the Supreme Court bench that was to decide the case against Mr Bhutto. One was Justice Waheeduddin Ahmad, father of Justice (Retd) Wajihuddin Ahmad, who has been nominated by the lawyers' community to challenge President General Musharraf in the presidential election. Justice Waheeduddin was admitted to hospital in controversial circumstances and withdrawn from the Supreme Court bench. The other was Justice Qaisar Khan from the NWFP who retired from service during the hearing of the case. Both Justice Waheeduddin and Justice Qaisar Khan were honourable and independent judges and General Ziaul Haq's government was concerned that they would acquit Mr Bhutto in the murder case.

Pakistan's political history would certainly have been different, and also less painful, if Justice Waheeduddin and Justice Qaisar Khan had remained on the Supreme Court bench because in their presence the majority of the judges would not have handed down the verdict that came to be known as the judicial murder of Mr Bhutto.

The Bhutto case also fuelled anti-Punjab feelings in Sindh and, to a lesser extent, in the NWFP due to the widespread belief that the Supreme Court judges from the Punjab had sentenced a Sindhi, Mr Bhutto, to death in the murder case. This sentiment still haunts the minds of many Sindhis even three decades after the Supreme Court verdict against Mr Bhutto.

For Details about the Supreme Court judgment in favor of Mushararf, see relevant stories in Daily Times, Dawn.

Thursday, September 27, 2007

Increasing Talibanization in Pakistan's Seven Tribal Agencies: Jamestown Foundation Report



Increasing Talibanization in Pakistan's Seven Tribal Agencies
By Hassan Abbas
Jamestown Foundation, September 27, 2007

The government of President Pervez Musharraf is facing policy failure in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan. Taliban forces and their sympathizers are becoming entrenched in the region and are aggressively expanding their influence and operations (especially in Tank, Dera Ismail Khan and Swat Valley in the North-West Frontier Province). A lethal combination of Musharraf's political predicament and declining public support, a significant rise in suicide attacks targeting the army and the reluctance of soldiers deputed in the area to engage tribal gangs militarily further exacerbates this impasse. Observing this, many militants associated with local Pakistani jihadi groups have moved to FATA to help their "brothers in arms" and benefit from the sanctuary. In the midst of this, election season is descending upon Pakistan and Musharraf's survival prospects are diminishing. This dim scenario has consequences for Pakistan's policy in the FATA region. Pakistan will predictably revert to "peace deals" in the short-term, leading to a lowering of the number of military checkpoints in the area (Daily Times, September 23). If history is any indicator, this will help Talibanization in the region and provide more opportunities to the ISI to indirectly support some Taliban commanders sympathetic to Pakistan's objectives. Overall, this will likely reduce trouble in downtown Islamabad, but the Pakistan-Afghanistan border area will remain on fire.

Poor coordination between the Pakistani army and NATO/ISAF, Hamid Karzai's failure to make Afghanistan a functional state and the abundance of drug money in southern Afghanistan are some of the important variables in this context. Additionally, Musharraf himself admits that the crisis in the area is increasingly turning out to be a Pashtun insurgency. However, the factors that "limit" Pakistan's effective clampdown on all things Taliban in FATA remain linked to its fear about increasing Indian influence in Afghanistan if the Taliban are comprehensively defeated, and the lack of Pakistani public support for anything that appears to be done in pursuance of the U.S.-led global war on terrorism. These perceptions significantly affect the morale of army commanders and soldiers operating in the region. Musharraf has largely failed to make a strong case to his people about the need for strong military action against the Taliban in FATA. He has often called this policy as being in the "national interest," but has not convincingly explained how the army alone defines the national interest. More so, Pakistanis have seen the military defining such interests too often in the past with devastating effects for the state, and interpret Pakistan's current fight against the Taliban in terms of succumbing to U.S. demands and interests.

With this backdrop in view, this analysis outlines what is happening today in each of the seven tribal agencies in FATA and what the implications are for Pakistan, Afghanistan and the United States.

Bajaur Agency

Bajaur Agency overlooks Afghanistan's Kunar province, where U.S. forces are battling al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters. Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri escaped the reportedly CIA-led attack at Damadola in Bajaur on January 13, 2006, while one of his close relatives was among the 18 killed. Damadola is considered a stronghold of Tehreek-e-Nafaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (TNSM) and Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) units, and the Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Islam (JUI) has representation in parliament from Bajaur (Daily Times, February 13, 2006). Bajaur during the 1980s and 1990s was known as the "Poppy Kingdom," and many Afghan refugee camps (functioning until 2005) were a source of pro-Taliban recruitment in the area.

In August this year, talks between the Taliban and a tribal jirga (supported by the Pakistani government) to improve the law and order situation in Bajaur failed as the Taliban wanted the government to first release some arrested militants (Daily Times, August 7). Trouble had broken out in the area with the news of the proposed construction of a U.S. helipad in Afghanistan's Kunar province as the tribal leaders sympathetic to the Taliban framed it as a threat to Pakistan (Daily Times, June 17). The strength of the Taliban in the area can be gauged from two recent events: since July this year, they have successfully enforced Friday as the weekly holiday instead of Sunday, which is the official weekly holiday (Daily Times, July 14); secondly, Abdul Ghani Marwat, who headed the government's vaccination campaign in Bajaur, was killed in a bomb attack in February this year amid the Taliban-sponsored rumor that the Pakistani government-run polio vaccination drive was a U.S. plot to sterilize Muslim children (Daily Times, February 20). The rumor was so widespread (projected by Taliban fatwas) that, according to government estimates (which are always conservative), parents of around 24,000 children had refused to give them the polio vaccine (Daily Times, Feb 20).

Khyber Agency

Khyber Agency is the main artery connecting Peshawar to Kabul via the Khyber Pass. Today, many men are seen wearing traditional caps in the agency because of fear, as a local religious outfit sympathetic to the Taliban, Lashkar-i-Islam (Army of Islam), has declared it binding on all men of the agency to wear caps. The leader of the group, Mangle Bagh, in his radio address last week issued this edict and announced that violators' heads will be shaved and they will face a monetary fine (Statesman, September 22). It is pertinent to point out that there is a serious battle going on in the agency between Ansar-ul-Islam—led by Pir Saif ur Rahman—and Lashkar-i-Islam—led by Gul Maiden and Mufti Munir Shakir—since 2005-06 (Daily Times, November 17, 2006, April 1, 2006, December 3, 2006). Both factions have built their militias over the last few years and have entrenched themselves in castle-like strongholds. In essence, this is an intra-Sunni (Deobandi vs. Barelvi) war (Daily Times, March 30, 2006).

After banning music in the tribal areas, the local Taliban in Khyber Agency have also started fining taxi drivers and citizens Rs 500 (about $8) for listening to music cassettes in their cars (Daily Times, March 1). Also recently, militants started distributing pamphlets in Bara Bazaar in Khyber Agency saying that the "Taliban have finally reached Bara," while warning that "if anyone tries to hinder our movement and activities, we will launch a holy war against them" (Mashriq, September 3).

In comparison to other tribal agencies, Khyber Agency (because of its proximity to Peshawar, the capital of the North-West Frontier Province) is more accessible to Pakistani government functionaries and some development work has been done in the area. For instance, in 2005, Stephen Hadley, the then adviser on national security to President Bush, inaugurated a primary school building project in Surkamar town of Khyber Agency that was financed by the U.S. and Japanese governments in collaboration with the FATA Secretariat (Daily Times, September 28, 2005). Conditions have changed for the worse since then. The extent of the writ of the state can be ascertained from the fact that around a dozen people were killed in June this year when the Taliban attacked the house of the Khyber Agency political agent, Syed Ameeruddin Shah (Daily Jang, June 1).

Kurram Agency

Surrounded by lofty mountains and Afghan territory on three sides, Kurram Agency is the second largest tribal region in FATA. Its headquarters is in Parachinar, just about 90 kilometers from Kabul. According to intelligence estimates, it was also the first geographical point where fleeing al-Qaeda members from Afghanistan landed after the September 11 attacks. Within Pakistan, the route to Kurram goes through Kohat district of the NWFP where permits are obtained to travel to Kurram. Many al-Qaeda militants had moved on to Kohat because Kurram Agency is widely known as pro-Northern Alliance because of its significant Shiite population—a factor that has impacted Taliban objectives in the agency negatively. Shiite-Sunni violence remains the hallmark of this agency, as pro-Taliban factions believe that the Shiites of the area are active against the Taliban and al-Qaeda. Various peace jirgas were instituted to bring peace to the area, but without much success (Mashriq, April 14). In April 2007 alone, around 100 people were killed in sectarian clashes (Daily Times, April 28).

The government of Pakistan is planning to construct two small dams in the agency at a cost of 400 million rupees in fiscal year 2007-08 to improve the agricultural sector and thereby improve the economic situation in the area. This will be an important test case for Pakistan, success of which can help the state machinery to increase its control at least in this area as it is an important transit point for cross-border movement into Afghanistan.

Mohmand Agency

Sandwiched between Bajaur and Khyber agencies, this area was considered to be a relatively peaceful region. Pro-Pakistan government tribal leaders still have some control, which is evident from the fact that houses of those giving sanctuary to some proclaimed offenders were attacked as recently as last week (Daily Times, September 23). This was in pursuance of a recent peace deal inked between the Mohmand Agency political administration and the Safi tribesmen, in which the Safi tribesmen agreed to not provide any sanctuary to foreigners (The News, September 15). They also agreed to protect government property and allow the government to move freely in the area, ensuring the safety of roads that pass through the agency. The presence of 200 tribal elders during the signing of the agreement shows some element of success on the part of the government, but the very nature of the deal explains that the government's writ was failing before.

The relative peace in the agency in the last few years owed a lot to the constructive work done by the Pakistani army in the area in 2003-04—by building roads, clinics and schools (Daily Times, July 15, 2004). One of the secrets of this success was sealing the agency's 68 kilometer border with Afghanistan by the Pakistani army in late 2003 (Dawn, July 14, 2004). Unfortunately, conditions have changed since then. In recent months, Taliban militants occupied two Khasadar checkpoints in the Qandharo and Halimzai areas of Mohmand Agency and snatched weapons from officials manning the post. In early September, 10 soldiers of the Frontier Corps were kidnapped in the area as well (Daily Times, September 3). The most tragic development, however, has been the blowing up of a hospital, al-Sehat, earlier this month. It was built by an NGO and located about 10 kilometers away from the Mohmand Agency headquarters, Galanai. It was meant to discourage NGOs operating in the area as the armed men mercifully forced the hospital staff to leave the facility before the attack (The News, September 17).

North Waziristan Agency

As early as late 2005, Pakistani Taliban leaders had declared an Islamic state in North Waziristan. Pakistan opted to cut a peace deal with the power brokers in the area in September 2006 (after convincing the U.S. administration of its utility), but the strategy failed (Daily Times, March 2). Now, abductions of government functionaries and soldiers of the Frontier Corps are a matter of routine. The Taliban of the area maintain that direct U.S. attacks amounted to a violation of the peace deal and hence they are retaliating. Roadside bombs are now a common occurrence. Even those providing food to the army units in the area are targeted (Dawn, September 24). For Musharraf, this is the worst of times because given his precarious political situation, any military action before his re-election as president in October this year is expected to backfire politically. Furthermore, he has committed to give up his position as the army chief after the presidential election, which means he will no longer be actively commanding the Pakistani army.

Orakzai Agency

Orakzai Agency was also largely considered a relatively better governed area within FATA until 2005, but Shiite-Sunni battles of the adjacent Kurram Agency spilled over, creating sectarian tension that consequently attracted the Taliban to this agency. The quarrel over a shrine that both communities venerate became a point of contention. The government was tardy in resolving the dispute and the political agent of Orakzai Agency unduly sided with one of the groups, further complicating the crisis (Daily Times, October 22). Even before this issue, the Taliban patron in Orakzai Agency, Akhunzada Aslam Farooqui, was known to be a close ally of Taliban leader Mullah Omar (Dawn, November 6, 2001).

Like other agencies, Taliban activities are expanding into adjacent districts of the NWFP from this agency as well. In a recent development in Kohat, which is part of the NWFP and borders Orakzai Agency, local Taliban have warned tailors to strictly observe religious codes while sewing clothes for men and women. In a letter sent to tailors, the Taliban threatened to blow up the shops of those not following the orders (Dawn, September 24).

South Waziristan

South Waziristan is at the center of Taliban and al-Qaeda activities in the region along with neighboring North Waziristan. Recently, Mehsud tribesmen aligned with Taliban forces abducted 205 Pakistani troops (135 army soldiers and 70 Frontier Corps troops) along with seizing 20 of their vehicles. The most striking fact, however, is that the government forces offered no resistance while being kidnapped. After more than three weeks, a majority of the soldiers are still in the custody of the Taliban, and the government has been practically forced to engage in negotiations with them. This reflects government weakness in the face of their growing strength and influence, to say the least. Pamphlets being distributed in the agency, while warning local tribes not to side with government forces, assert that "like in Afghanistan, we have established suicide squads for attacks on troops and their allies in Pakistan" (Daily Times, September 3).

Earlier this year, the Pakistani army partially succeeded in tackling al-Qaeda through supporting Maulvi Nazir, a Taliban leader somewhat sympathetic to government objectives. He started an effective campaign against Uzbek militants aligned with al-Qaeda in the area and largely accomplished his goal of evicting Uzbeks from the agency. However, he is pursuing his religious agenda unabatedly, and it is hardly distinguishable from the Taliban's worldview. The death of notorious militant leader Nek Mohammad (now remembered as a hero in the area) in 2004 has helped the Pakistani army take some control out of the hands of Taliban militants, but the vacuum created by his elimination seems to now be filled, and Taliban forces have revived their influence and control.

Conclusion

A UN report released earlier this month said that 80 percent of suicide bombers in Afghanistan had come from the Waziristan agencies. Yet while the Pakistani government has offered to introduce reforms in FATA, little has been done (Dawn, September 26). Political agents continue to dole out funds to handpicked people, often in an attempt to buy peace—hardly an inclusive policy. The $750 million worth of U.S. aid for the uplift of FATA is in the pipeline, but there is no publicly known strategy in place on how to channel the funds, leading to much apprehension and conspiracy theories about who will really benefit in the area.

Furthermore, Pakistan has been rattled by 39 suicide attacks in 2007, so far killing around 350 people, and most of these attacks targeted the Pakistani army, the Frontier Corps and government officials in FATA and the NWFP (GEO TV, September 19). A series of attacks in the Rawalpindi region in August this year were especially meant to attack the Special Services Group (an elite commando unit) and the ISI. This is unprecedented in Pakistan. Many interpret these attacks as a consequence of Musharraf's tough handling of the Red Mosque crisis in July. Clearly, a majority of these attacks relate to the volatile FATA situation and the Pakistani army is now on the defensive. The killings of Abdullah Mehsud and Mullah Dadullah were expected to hit Taliban forces hard, but the Taliban are showing uncommon resilience. Indeed, Musharraf's capacity to respond militarily is curtailed because of political compulsions. For Afghanistan and the United States, this means a troublesome scenario. Pakistan's return to democracy may potentially change things for the better, but Musharraf's move in this direction is sluggish and uncertain.

For Pdf, click here

$ 20.4 million US Grant for Pakistan' Secuirty Agencies: Will it be Utilized Effectively?

$20.4m US assistance for Pakistan security agencies
Daily Times, September 28, 2007

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan and US representatives on Thursday signed a revision to an agreement to provide an additional $20.4 million assistance for Pakistani border security agencies, law enforcement reforms and anti-narcotics programmes. US Ambassador Anne W Patterson and State Minister for Economic Affairs Hina Rabbani Khar signed the revision to the letter of agreement that will add $20.4 million to a total of $300 million assistance provided to support Pakistani law enforcement agencies since 1982. This assistance will help strengthen Pakistani law enforcement agencies to implement effective border control regimes, build investigative capabilities of police and sustain counter-narcotics efforts. Patterson said, “The agreement signed on Thursday builds on the successful, longstanding partnership between the two countries. It will have lasting and positive effects for the people of Pakistan.” staff report

Naeem Bokhari and Larger Lessons for Pakistan’s Justice System



Naeem Bokhari and Larger Lessons for Pakistan’s Justice System
By Raza Rumi; Posted on September 26, 2007 (at Jahane Rumi and Pakistaniat.com)

Adil’s post on Kasuri incident has prompted me to recall the recent thrashing of Naeem Bokhari by his peers.

That Mr. Naeem Bokhari, documented a nasty invective against the Chief Justice of Pakistan remains a tragic event in our recent history. This letter, wittingly or unwittingly became a basis for that notoriously illegal reference against the top judge of the country. Bokhari should not have become a party to the typical power games as an officer of the court and he needs to explain much more than he already has.

What happened thereafter is all too well known to be repeated here. The apex court backed by the public opinion restored the honour of its Chief and effectively altered the destiny of this country. A new beginning was scripted by the citizenry with immense faith in the Constitution and its guardians. Never has the predatory executive suffered such a blow in Pakistan’s turbulent history. Ordinary, unlettered Pakistanis, joined in to conclude that due process was something intrinsic, vital and non-negotiable. Exactly after a week the Lord Chief Justice was reinstated by his brothers, while addressing a seminar, he noted:

“The last four months in our national history have changed something forever. I feel proud to say that not only the judiciary and 90,000-plus black-coated fraternity, but the entire civil society is ready to sacrifice everything to uphold the Constitution and achieve rule of law…”

A few days later, we read the news that Bokhari was manhandled by his ‘black-coated’ fraternity when he re-appeared in the Courts after a long break. Naeem Bokhari broke the silence and wrote in The News on what exactly transpired on that fateful day when the Rawalpindi lawyers’ “fury” resulted in his humiliation and ruthless thrashing. Bokhari’s license was canceled during the lawyers’ movement and later a High Court Judge had suspended that decision. However, when Bokhari tried to argue in a Rawalpindi Court, the secretary of the Rawalpindi Bar stated that the High Court order had been “passed by a Shia judge, who according to another lawyer was a tout.” Later, some of the lawyers were ready to strip him naked and thrash. The police intervened in this process but according to Bokhari the lawyers wanted his “physical custody.”

Bokhari painted a harrowing picture of his treatment. He alleges that he was “forcibly pushed out of the courtroom and hit on the head again and again.” At the end of this mob frenzy, Bokhari and his associate were severely beaten. Symbolically Bokhari’s coat was snatched and his shirt was torn. Humiliating as it is, the whole incident is reminiscent of tribal notions of justice.

While the misgivings against the perceived collaborators of the executive may be justified, such abusive treatment is not. It is plainly out of the ambit of the laws and code of conduct under which the legal profession is regulated. In fact, such incidents can taint the heroic image that the lawyers’ bodies have earned through their relentless, spectacular struggle.


Having said that, Bokhari’s contention is a little shaky that he will not apologize for his letter for which he considers “answerable to the court, not to any mob.” He is definitely not accountable to mobs but his letter was neither benign nor factually correct.

Now that the legal fraternity has won its prime battle and an independent Supreme Court and political process will tackle country’s quagmire, it is time that the Bar leaders should pay attention to the long-neglected issues concerning regulation and internal accountability of the legal profession.

The state of legal education barring a few elite institutions mirrors the general collapse of the education system. Bar Councils hold uneven entry examinations and relaxed entry policy is doing more harm than good to the profession. Countries such as Malaysia, India and Sri Lanka have improved legal education and Bar-entry examinations. We are lagging behind in this respect; and resultantly the quality of entrants is not the best. Similarly, action against erring lawyers is not always certain as the politics and electoral prowess of Bar subgroups (often organized along the lines of caste or sect) impede the process. These issues are well known to the legal community and they have the best solutions to correct this situation. This is the best time for the Bar leaders to take tough decisions to reform the way their profession is regulated.

If Bokhari’s story is true, then to uphold professional reputation and ethics, the Bar should question the members of fraternity who handled their “foes” – Bokhari and Kasuri among others - in a feudal manner. Would it be too much to ask that the Supreme Court should take suo moto notice of this incident and reaffirm that it is the ultimate guardian of constitutional rights and that it will not let its law-officers, especially in their name, behave the way an unaccountable executive governs.

And, Mr Bokahri, will have to set the record straight and apologize to the Court for unduly scandalizing the highest officer holder of the judiciary.

Raza Rumi blogs at Jahane Rumi

Musharraf's "Re-election" Prospects?

Proposers and seconders risk prosecution: Aitzaz on Musharraf’s nomination
By Nasir Iqbal: Dawn, September 27, 2007

ISLAMABAD, Sept 26: An amicus curiae informed the Supreme Court on Wednesday that persons proposing and seconding President Pervez Musharraf as a candidate for a second term would be guilty of an offence carrying imprisonment for 10 years.

Advocate Aitzaz Ahsan, who is assisting the court on its own calling as amicus, based his contention on the Pakistan Penal Code, but did not cite the specific section. He said that whosoever proposed and seconded the nomination of President Musharraf for his re-election for the second term would be guilty of the offence liable to be punished to 10 years each.

At this, Justice Faqir Khokar observed in a lighter vein that the counsel was talking about ‘getting us arrested’. “But you are not proposing or seconding the president,” Barrister Ahsan replied.

Justice Mohammad Nawaz Abbasi observed that the amicus had been called to steer the court out of difficulty and not putting it in difficulty.

A nine-member bench of the Supreme Court, hearing identical petitions challenging President Musharraf holding two offices, earlier heard Senator S.M. Zafar, also assisting the court as amicus curiae, and senior counsel Sharifuddin Pirzada, representing the president, who concluded their arguments.

Aitzaz Ahsan will complete his arguments before the break on Thursday after which Hafeez Pirzada will present his point of view.

At the outset, Sharifuddin Pirzada informed the court that he had no additional arguments to make and adopted the earlier arguments of Attorney-General Malik Mohammad Qayyum, especially on non-maintainability of the petitions.

He, however, said that the petitioners had failed to make out a case for reconsideration or revisiting earlier judgments in the Qazi Hussain and Pakistan Lawyers Forum cases. Besides, all the points raised by the petitioners could be urged in the review petition of the PLF, he said.

S.M. Zafar argued that as soon as the Election Commission announced the results of the presidential election, the president, if it happened to be President Musharraf and he said he hoped he would be, he would have to give up the second office (army chief).

The President to Hold Another Office Act, 2004, would become inoperative on that date, he said, adding: “This is the constitutional requirement.”

He said the dual-office act had a limited shelf life till November 15, 2007, and the statement submitted by a counsel for the president that “soon after the elections, but before taking oath of office” was redundant.

S.M. Zafar said he firmly believed that Gen Musharraf had the rare chance of changing the course of history, like the first leader Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah, who did change the course of history.

“I believe had Mohammad Ali Jinnah lived a decade longer, our case history would not have been burdened with the judgments on law of necessity and there would have been no Eighth Constitutional Amendment or 17th Constitutional Amendment,” he observed.

President Musharraf could end a tense, tiresome and wearisome tango that had been going on between the military and civil hierarchy for the last many years, he said, adding that President Musharraf could do so by separating the offices of the army chief and the president.

“I wish that President Musharraf could keep his promise of giving up the office of the army chief on December 31, 2004,” he observed and said in that case he himself and the nation would have immensely benefited, particularly improving the country’s democratic credentials.

S.M. Zafar contended that the Legal Framework Order (LFO) had made many amendments which had tilted the balance of power in favour of the president, but after a protest by parliamentarians and lawyers the 17th Constitutional Amendment was passed which democratised many provisions of the LFO.

It was a salutary principle that if the Constitution was to survive, judges must practise on evolutionary approaches that placed considerable emphasis on continuity, he argued.

“Stability without change is degeneration and change without stability is anarchy. The role of a judge is to help bridge the gap between the needs of society and the law without allowing the legal system to degenerate or collapse into anarchy,” S.M. Zafar said, adding that a judge must ensure stability with change and change with stability.

Aitzaz Ahsan said the president as well as the army chief had separate firewalls or fortified fortresses around them. While the 17th Amendment had given some privileges and facilities to the president to become the army chief, the amendment did not demolish constitutional legal impediments for the army chief to seek the highest political office, he argued.

He sought to establish that the office of the president was a political office and though the president had to be non-partisan, his office was not non-political as it was sought through intense political activity during which he had to ask for votes by making bargains. “But the Constitution forbids the army chief to file nomination for the president as army officers are barred from seeking votes for elections,” he said.

"5 Minutes Over Islamabad": A Conspiracy Theory Gone Wild


5 Minutes Over Islamabad By A.H Amin
26 September, 2007: Countercurrents.org

There appears to be a strong evolving consensus in the USA as well as its NATO allies that Pakistan is the centre of gravity of the Islamists in the ongoing so called war on terror.This idea gained currency in various high US policy making circles as well as think tanks around 1987-89 and then assumed a solid shape in the decade 1990-2000.After 2001 it was adopted as a policy and concrete albeit top secret planning was started to deal with Pakistan which at the ulterior level was seen as part of the problem rather than a solution.

When the Spaniards landed in Mexico their main collaborators were indigenous Mexicans themselves ! In Pakistan thus the USA made use of indigenous collaborators ! Generals whose sons had a US passport ! Bankers who were US nationals but also dual Pakistani citizens ! Thus these leaders justified collaboration with the USA after 9/11 on the grounds that what they did was the only guarantee for the survival of Pakistan !

The Pakistani military junta in 2001 was isolated internationally so it was very easy for the USA to overawe it with one telephone call ! The typical career army officers life consists of aiming to get a good annual report from his boss ! Pakistan's military leadership grasped this opportunity to get a good pat from their geopolitical strategic boss the US president and with open hands provided airbases and all logistic support to the USA ! This was a short term measure so that Pakistani military junta's survival in power was ensured ! It had no connection with survival of Pakistan as a state ! Compare how Iran is surviving as a state despite defying the USA since 1979 ! Later on a fiction that USA threatened Pakistan with bombing it to the stone age was invented ! Thus irresolution was rationalized as supreme strategic brilliance ! Ironically some so called media men who are also running private businesses were in the forefront in praising this strategic timidity as strategic brilliance !

What happened in " Real Strategic Terms" was that with Pakistani military junta's active collaboration i.e logistic support and air bases the USA was able to occupy Afghanistan very cheaply and with minimum casualties ! This was no mean strategic achievement as it placed the USA right below the soft underbelly of China as well as Russia ! More significantly it reduced the flying as well as striking time to the Pakistani nuclear as well as missile installation.Close proximity to Pakistan also enabled the USA to conduct intelligence operations inside Pakistan in a far more optimum manner than ever before.

It was theorized in secret sessions of the highest level US decision making circles that although the Islamists fighting the USA had no fixed centre of gravity which could be attacked and eliminated, Pakistan with its sympathetic pro Islamist populace and nuclear and missile assets was at least a provisional centre of gravity of the Islamists.Note that US feared , not the ISI , not the tinpot Pakistani military junta , but the sentiments of the vast bulk of the Pakistani populace and its arsenal of nuclear warheads and missiles !

Thus Afghanistan was seen as a potential US base to carry out a 5 minutes over Islamabad or Kahuta just like the Israelis with US cooperation destroyed Iraq's nuclear reactor in 5 minutes over Baghdad in 1981.

In 1945 the USA had bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki not for any direct military purpose but to overawe the USSR that no one could match US military might.The USSR had faced the challenge and developed a fine nuclear arsenal to counter US aspirations to control the world.Later China also emerged as another challenger of USA ! Thanks to USSR help many South Asian countries as well as African countries fought and won wars of liberation ! The Arabs were able to confront Israel only because of Soviet aid till the collaborator Sadaat sold his soul to the USA and Israel !

The USA was all set to reduce Pakistan to size in 1977 when it financed the anti Bhutto agitation in 1977 ! This plan was delayed because of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan from 1979 till 1989 when the USA had but no option other than using Pakistan as a base for assisting the anti Soviet War in Afghanistan.

Change of posture came very quickly when after 1990 the USA started talking that Pakistan is a terrorist state or was on the brink of being a terrorist state.This was basically a war of nerves the decisive point of which was one telephone call which made Pakistan's tinpot military junta take the so called " brilliant strategic decision" of collaborating with the USA !

After the disintegration of the USSR , strategically speaking the US military targets were the littoral states of the Indian Ocean .Thus the Iraq War of 1990 , the Invasion and capture of Iraq of 2003 and the invasion of capture of Afghanistan in 2001.

Interestingly Iraq and Afghanistan were not ultimate objectives of US onslaught but merely initial bridgeheads.This was only Phase One ! Phase Two may include Pakistan and Phase Three may include Iran ! Phase Four being Chinese Singkiang and/or Central Asian Republics ! Somewhere the Americans call it Orange Revolution whose first good example was the anti Bhutto agitation that they financed in 1977 in Pakistan ! Sometimes they call it a war on terror or war against weapons of mass destruction !

History has proved that generals fail as statesmen ! In 1936 all of Hitlers generals opposed his decision to march into Rhineland ! This is so because generals think only in tangible terms ! They do not appreciate the value of intangible factors like resolution etc ! Thus after 9/11 when Pakistan's tinpot junta wargamed being invaded by USA it only thought in military terms ! It failed to appreciate that the USA was humbled in Vietnam and in Iran in 1979 ! In the process they allowed and facilitated the USA to occupy Afghanistan in very cheap military terms ! Pakistan shall pay a heavy price for this ! Whether Armitage said it or not , the USA will bomb some parts of Pakistan to the stone age in order to denuclearize Pakistan.

Pakistan is in a strange strategic situation ! It is led by a military dictator whose sole aim is to stay in power ! Its number two the so called prime minister is a US citizen and in case he dies naturally or unnaturally his successor i.e the Chairman Senate is also a US citizen ! So politically the USA is dominant in Pakistan ! But this does not make the Americans happy ! Their aim is denuclearization and complete submission of Pakistan !

Imagine the following scenario ! Pakistan's military dictator is killed in a mysterious air crash or assassinated by a common soldier on duty like Indita Gandhi ! The USA immediately issues an ultimatum that it fears that Pakistan's nuclear arsenal may fall in the hands of extremists ! A surgical nuclear strike is launched on Kahuta and Islamabad !Another general takes over power in Pakistan and capitulates to all US demands dismantling the Pakistani nuclear arsenal and its missiles ! Rationalising this on the ground that if he did not do so the USA would bomb Pakistan to stone age ! In next ten years Pakistan is Balkanised with an independent US supported Baluchistan and an independent puppet Pashtun state in NWFP and Northern Pashtun majority districts of Baluchistan ! An independent Sindh in the South , an independent Kashmir and Northern Areas with US bases for future operations against Singkiang on the Deosai Plateau and only Punjab left as Pakistan ! No nukes , no missiles , no resolve ! Just like the Christians reduced the Muslims to Granada in Spain and finally eliminated even Granada in 1492.

This is not a pessimistic view of things but a hard strategic reality ! The writing is clear on the wall ! The war which USA is fighting is not against the Pashtun tribes of Waziristan but against all Muslims ! Bagram , Khost,Jalalabad and Kandahar airfields are being developed not against the Taliban or against the Al Qaeda but for 5 minutes over Islamabad !

In strategy everything moves very slowly and it is the greatness of a statesman and military commander to assess what will happen in next 5 or ten years ! Here in Pakistan we have a situation where our military leaders are overawed by just one phone call ! From leaders of such a caliber little resolution or strategic insight can be expected !

From 1979 to 1988 Pakistan's military junta after seizing power through the backdoor , provided the USA with an active base to destabilize and destroy Afghanistan's defacto government . All infrastructure of Afghanistan was destroyed as well as all its institutions between 1979 and 1992 .Now if the Afghan state allows the USA to do so it should not be a surprise ! And why did Pakistan's military junta of 1977-88 support the so called Afghan Jihad ! So that General Zia stays in power ! The characters were different in 1979 and 2001 , but the motivation was the same !

Someone may skeptically view the above presented scenario ! The following arguments support the presented scenario ! If Saddam was destroyed on the mere suspicion that Iraq possessed Weapons of Mass Destruction why is Pakistan not a perfectly legitimate target for USA , because it is a Muslim country and posseses WMD without any doubt ! Saddam was more secular than any Muslim leader in modern history yet his country and he himself were targeted and destroyed ! What is the aim of this so called enlightened Islam espoused by Musharraf ! To act as anesthesia for USA and destroy all resistance power of the Pakistani nation ! If not strategic brilliance at least we have good anesthetists at the top ! In war surprise is the key so the USA will not politely announce its intentions before it reduces Pakistan to size ! Musharraf , Benazir and any other general that may emerge are merely pawns in the game which can be removed by air crashes or assassinations ! Waziristan , Al Qaeda and terrorism are merely hollow slogans ! The Pakistan Army is being forced into Waziristan by the USA not to attack the Al Qaeda but to create an internal divide in Pakistan ! There have been many cases of desertion of soldiers in units in Waziristan as well as cases of refusal of officers for carrying out duties seen as against their conscience ! What kind of liberalism does Musharraf want us to practice when the enemy is at the gates and even inside the Pakistani citadel of power ! What can be expected from leaders whose sons are US citizens or who consider USA safer for their families to live than Pakistan ! What can be expected from US citizens now enjoying high political office in Pakistan after having a good time in Bank of America or CITI Bank ! What respect will the army jawans have for leaders more distinguished for deciding not to fight a battle after one telephone call or more interested in privatizing the PSO , PTCL or the Steel Mill !

5 Minutes over Islamabad is a distinct possibility ! This is the irony of a nation who supplied many pilots who were blood brothers of Syrian,Iraqis and Jordanians in downing many Israeli aircrafts over Golan , Amman and Iraq ! Today the Pakistani leaders are practicing sycophancy with Israel to gain a good pat from USA !

The conclusion is that Pakistan is led by collaborators who will go to any extent to survive while its nuclear and military assets would be destroyed with partial or active cooperation of its own leaders ! Fear made men believe in the worst but here in Pakistan we have a scenario in which Pakistan's leaders are trying to sell the idea that timid strategic collaboration is strategic brilliance ! A secret clause of Vision 2030 propaganda of Pakistani sitting leadership is that by 2030 Pakistan would be a Balkanised state with no nuclear and missile assets and kicked by all its neighbours ! Good luck to vision 2030 !

Pakistan: corruption Index

Pakistan at No 138 on TI’s transparency list
* Watchdog says corruption draining resources
* Iraq, Somalia top list of corrupt states
Daily Times, September 27, 2007

LONDON: Corruption is rampant in Pakistan and it has rated at No 138 out of the 180 countries analysed by a respected anti-graft watchdog in a report released on Wednesday.

Berlin-based Transparency International (TI) said in its annual Corruption Perceptions Index covering 180 countries that some of the world’s poorest nations were seen as having the most dishonest political and business elites.

The report showed that Pakistan, which is tied at No 138 with Ethiopia, Paraguay, Cameroon and Syria with a corruption rating of 2.4, has “rampant” corruption.

The index score relates to perceptions of the degree of corruption as seen by business people and country analysts. It ranges between zero, which is highly corrupt, and 10, which is very clean.

However, the group said that even countries believed to be the least corrupt — named this year as Denmark, Finland and New Zealand — needed to do more to combat corporate graft.t.

Corruption drain: “Despite some gains, corruption remains an enormous drain on resources sorely needed for education, health and infrastructure,” said TI Chairwoman Huguette Labelle, in a statement. It noted significant improvement among African countries such as Namibia, South Africa and Swaziland, which the organisation said highlighted that political will and reform can root out sleaze.

Iraq, Somalia top list: According to the report, the corruption in war-ravaged countries such as Iraq and Somalia is hobbling their recovery efforts. “Countries torn apart by conflict pay a huge toll in their capacity to govern,” Labelle said.

“Low-scoring countries need to take these results seriously and act now to strengthen accountability in public institutions. But action from top-scoring countries is just as important, particularly in cracking down on corrupt activity in the private sector,” she added.

TI also continued to find a strong link between poverty and graft with 40 percent of the countries scoring below three this year — indicating that corruption is considered to be rampant — classified by the World Bank as low-income states. afp

For detailed Analysis of the Report at the Transparency International Website, click here

Wednesday, September 26, 2007

Iranian President Ahmedinejad in the US



Picture: Reuters
Ahmadinejad in New York: Iranians and others react
World Views, San Francisco Chronicle, September 25, 2007

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's appearance at Columbia University in New York on Monday continues to provoke reactions and reverberations in the U.S. and abroad.

» In Iran, the state-controlled Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) reports that the heads of several academic institutions dispatched a collective letter yesterday to Columbia University President Lee Bollinger to express their sense of "outrage" at the way he publicly received his foreign guest, who had come to speak at the school's World Leaders Forum. The Iranian academic officials assailed Bollinger's "ignorance of the principle of hosting the president of Iran, a country of great civilization and a 7000-year history. "

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad during his speaking engagement at Columbia University in New York on Monday
Their letter stated that it was "a shame" that, at an academic institution like Columbia, "such hateful and impolite words" as those Bollinger had used to harangue Ahmadinejad even before he was allowed to speak himself had been "uttered" by the university's president. The letter noted (in IRNA's somewhat fractured, English-language translation): "It is regretful that the media owners easily elicit what they want the president of a reputable university to say in his lecture. Your statement about Iran was full of undocumented charges brought by the media and some of which were the outcome of misunderstanding which needs dialogue and closer study."

The Iranian academic officials' letter also posed 10 questions to Bollinger in response to the litany of questions with which he peppered Ahmadinejad in his opening remarks. Among the Iranians' queries:

· "Why did the U.S. media exert pressure on you to cancel President Ahmadinejad's lecture...and why did the U.S. TV networks broadcast programs for several days against the Iranian president and...not allow him to respond to the allegations? Does this not run counter to freedom of expression?"

· "Why did the U.S. come to the help of [the] Iranian dictator [the deposed Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi] in 1953 and launched [sic] military coup against then Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadeq?"

On Monday, just outside Columbia's campus, protesters expressed their opposition to the Iranian leader's visit
· "Why did the U.S. back Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein to invade Iran in 1980 and supplied [sic] him with chemical weapons to attack both Iraqi people and Iranian soldiers?"

· "Why does the U.S. administration support the [anti-Tehran, Iraq-based] terrorist Mujahideen Khalq Organization...[,] despite [the] fact that it has carried out terrorist operations in Iran since 1981?"

· "Why does the U.S. administration always support...non-democratic and military governments?"

» An Associated Press reporter in Tehran writes that, even though Ahmadinejad probably expected "a hostile grilling by the audience" at Columbia, "Bollinger's sardonic comments reflected a blatant disregard for the tradition of hospitality revered in the Middle East." As a result, the university president's remarks might end up "deflect[ing] some of the U.S. criticism he got for issuing the invitation to the Iranian president," but his strongly worded comments "could also backfire by drawing sympathy for Ahmadinejad, even in quarters where he would normally be sharply criticized."

Iranian broadcast media did not present Ahmadinejad's speech at Columbia live on Monday, but the country's state-run television service did offer a recording of the event yesterday. Commenting on his president's controversial appearance at the famous university, a Tehran resident told the AP's reporter: "The meeting and their approach showed that Americans, even in a cultural position, are cowboys and nothing more."

» Venezuela's president, Hugo Chávez, who has become a high-profile ally of the government in Tehran, observed that Ahmadinejad had been "the victim of an ambush" by Bollinger at the Columbia event. (El Observador, Venezuela)

» Meir Brooks, identified as "a recent high school graduate from Haifa," penned an op-ed piece in response to Ahmadinejad's Columbia appearance that was published in the Jerusalem Post. Recalling that, in his introduction of his guest, Bollinger described the Iranian leader as "a petty and cruel dictator" and as someone who is "either brazenly provocative or astonishingly uneducated," Brooks praised the university president's performance as "an academic and political tour de force." Brooks wrote: "The media had reported that this was [going to be] a 'speech' or 'debate,' but after...Bollinger's introduction, it became a trial." Thus, Ahmadinejad "couldn't really transform his podium into a platform of incitement, because he was now speaking as a man indicted....He is used to speaking unchallenged before crowds of thousands or tens of thousands. [At] Columbia, he was on trial before 800 college students. The situation...was demeaning, not empowering."

» J.H., a "World Views" reader from the Bay Area, wrote in an e-mail message received yesterday: "I was really offended to see how President Ahmadinejad [was] treated....This is not a way to conduct foreign policy...[or]...to move toward a peaceful solution to our problems with [his] government. His most controversial act...has been his association with Holocaust deniers. He now says...he agrees that some of the events took place. However, he made an interesting point. There have been many genocides in the history of the world, and yet this one has been used as a rationale for a new genocide, against the people of Palestine. You can disagree if you like, but it is a valid argument [that] deserves a respectful hearing, not an accusation of either lying or stupidity. His is not the only government to commit human-rights abuses, and I do not see the government of China submitted to similar public questioning....If [Ahmadinejad] was only allowed in this country...to be humiliated, I think that is a cheap and non-productive way to run our foreign policy and...indicative of a transparent and unfortunate push toward war."

Also See: The Ahmadinejad distraction, Boston Globe - September 26, 2007

For Text of Ahmedinejad's Interview with Charlie Rose (International Herald Tribune), click here