Monday, August 29, 2011

A New Political Storm in Pakistan

Excerpts
That’s what he said: Zulfiqar Mirza lets it all out - By Salman Siddiqui, Express Tribune, August 29, 2011

In an explosive press conference on Sunday, senior Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) leader Dr Zulfiqar Mirza not only announced his resignation from key posts within the party and the Sindh government, but also made some extraordinary allegations against his old nemesis, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM).

Dressed in a white shalwar kameez and the traditional Sindhi cap, Mirza arrived at the Karachi Press Club in a large convoy of SUVs along with his guards at around 4:20 pm. He brought a copy of the Holy Quran along with a briefcase filled with ‘documentary evidence’.
.......
Mirza also made a number of allegations against MQM leaders. Referring to the MQM’s Waseem Akhtar and Rauf Siddiqi, Mirza alleged that his predecessor home ministers were supplied two kilogrammes of cocaine by the Artillery Maidan SHO every month. “Before me, police stations were also auctioned,” he alleged.

Speaking about Ajmal Pahari, who is accused of killing over 100 people, Mirza said his interrogation has revealed that the MQM knew about the Ashura blast and that the party had planned an arson attack a day prior to the blast.

He urged the business community and industrialists to stop fearing the MQM. “I will lead you,” he said.

Mirza also targeted the current Citizens Police Liaison Committee chief Ahmed Chinoy and alleged that he was working at the MQM’s behest. “I ask Ahmed Chinoy whether the extortion racket is giving money to Baba Ladla or to your laadli (favourite).”

For complete article, click here

Zulfiqar Mirza resigns from Sindh Assembly, blasts MQM
Dawn, August 29, 2011

He said he would continue to work as an ordinary party worker. He harshly criticized Federal Interior Minister Rehman Malik and termed him a compulsive liar and a threat to Pakistan’s security.
He said he had already told his party leadership that Malik could not be relied upon. He said that only one person is responsible for all killings in Karachi and that person is Rehman Malik.

Mirza leveled serious allegations on Muttahida Quami Movement and its chief Altaf Hussain. He termed the MQM and its head responsible for target killings in Karachi. He accused the Sindh Governor Ishratul Ibad of patronizing target killers.

For complete article, click here
Related:
‘Malik hand in glove with terrorists’ - Khaleej Times
Analysis: What now after Zulfiqar Mirza’s bombshell? - Nasim Zehra, Express Tribune
MQM hits back at Mirza - Express Tribune
Mirza stirs up new political storm - The News

Friday, August 26, 2011

Mass Graves in Kashmir

Mass Graves Hold Thousands, Kashmir Inquiry Finds
By , New York Times, August 22, 2011
NEW DELHI — Thousands of bullet-riddled bodies are buried in dozens of unmarked graves across Kashmir, a state human rights commission inquiry has concluded, many of them likely to be those of civilians who disappeared more than a decade ago in a brutal insurgency.

The inquiry, the result of three years of investigative work by senior police officers working for the Jammu and Kashmir State Human Rights Commission, brings the first official acknowledgment that civilians might have been buried in mass graves in Kashmir, a region claimed by both India and Pakistan where insurgents waged a bloody battle for independence in the early 1990s.

The report sheds new light on a grim chapter in the history of the troubled region and confirms a 2008 report by a Kashmiri human rights organization that found hundreds of bodies buried in the Kashmir Valley.       
Tens of thousands of people died in the insurgency, which began in 1989 and was partly fueled by weapons, cash and training from Pakistan.

According to the report, the bodies of hundreds of men described as unidentified militants were buried in unmarked graves. But of the more than 2,000 bodies, 574 were identified as local residents.

“There is every probability that these unidentified dead bodies buried in various unmarked graves at 38 places of North Kashmir may contain the dead bodies of enforced disappearances,” the report said.
The report catalogs 2,156 bodies found in graves in four districts of Kashmir that had been at the heart of the insurgency. It called for a thorough inquiry and a collection of DNA evidence to identify the dead, and, for the future, proper identification of anyone killed by security forces in Kashmir to avoid abuse of special laws shielding the military from prosecution there.

For complete article, click here

Related:
Kashmir graves: Human Rights Watch calls for inquiry - BBC
Take steps to identify bodies in unmarked graves: PDP - The Hindu
India: Investigate Unmarked Graves in Jammu and Kashmir - Human Rights Watch
Militant group admits own men killed Kashmir cleric - BBC

Monday, August 22, 2011

Resolving Conflict in Karachi?

Crisis in Karachi
Asia Society, August 23, 2011

“Karachi, Pakistan's port city which generates 70 percent of the country's revenue, is in the grip of a serious multidimensional crisis,” says Asia Society Bernard Schwartz Fellow Hassan Abbas, of the violent unrest that has gripped the city. “More than 100 people have been killed -- many of them tortured to death -- in the last week or so. Tragically, this has become a recurrent phenomenon. Criminal gangs, armed thugs associated with leading political factions, and to a limited extent religious extremists are all playing a role in this mayhem. The government's writ has almost vanished in the face of this serious situation, and the police and paramilitary Rangers are nothing more than silent spectators. A role for the military is increasingly being discussed in Pakistani media, but history has shown that military operations have not solved any crisis in the country. Rather, its involvement has almost always led to further complications. Demographic changes, increases in crime rates due to poor law enforcement, and -- most important -- ethnic tussles for depleting city resources are the issues at the heart of the problem. There are no quick and ready-made solutions for such a complex issue.”

Deweaponise and Depoliticise: Fixing the Cycle of Violence in Karachi By Farieha Aziz, Newsline, August 2011

From hand grenades to Kalashinkovs to Uzis to rocket launchers – you name it, and this city stocks it. From political party workers to their affiliates, from mafias to petty thieves to ordinary citizens – everybody is in possession of weapons and most do not hesitate to use them. The proliferation of weapons has taken violence to another level in Karachi.

In a poll run by Newsline on its website asking citizens to share their views on how to put an end to Karachi’s violence and bloodshed, this is what one commentator felt needed to be done: “The ‘capacity’ of criminal elements in Karachi to wreak havoc, kill innocent people and hold a city of 20 million people hostage, must be diminished. Militant/armed wings in political parties need to be disbanded, and there is only one way that can happen: the ‘willingness’ of the State to protect its citizens.” Fahad continues: “If the government knows there are people in this city who can kill innocent people and destroy property at a moment’s notice, they have an obligation to dismantle such groups. The problem is that the government has a vested interest – medium and long-term political gains – in not completely restoring durable peace in Karachi. At the end of the day, it’s a question of willingness and not ability, to protect innocent citizens.”

Says another commentator, Abu Awama, “I think that the best way to avoid violence in a city as volatile as Karachi is to deweaponise it. The easiest way to deweaponise Karachi is to establish search pickets along the main roads. Anyone carrying a gun should be punished summarily, and the firearm should be confiscated. It is not essential that the sentences should be long because it’s the certainty of punishment which is a bigger deterrent compared to the severity of punishment.”

While some believe that deweaponising Karachi may be the need of the hour, they are not optimistic about the government tackling this problem effectively as they see a clear lack of will on its part. Some also view the government as being partisan and incapable of conducting an across-the-board clamp down; it’ll ensure that its own party and affiliates are exempt from the exercise. Government aside, citizens do not have any faith that political parties will take the lead either by putting their own house in order first. The consensus is that all parties need to be “made to do it,” forcibly. Despite all the flak the khakis have received of late, “call in the army” for a crackdown against criminals, to deweaponise the city and to restore peace is still a common refrain heard in Karachi whenever the law-and-order situation deteriorates, since the army is viewed as a neutral force. However, history is testament to the fact that even the army has supported and given precedence to one political group over another.

For complete article, click here

Related:
Chaos in Karachi - Editorial Daily Times
Violent intentions: Karachi killings are politically motivated, agree experts - The Express Tribune
Will Army Take Over Karachi's Control? - The News

Background:
Karachi seeting under violence and terror - CRSS Research Paper
Reforming Karachi's Police - AfPak Channel, Foreign Policy
Urban Conflict in Pakistan - By Claude Rakisitis

Sunday, August 14, 2011

The Missing Martyrs: Why Aren't There More Muslim Terrorists?


Why Aren't There More Muslim Terrorists?
— By Aaron Ross, Mother Jones, August 1, 2011
Immediately after last month's terror attacks in Norway, Islamic extremism shot to the top of almost every list of suspected culprits. Among the soothsayers of creeping Shariah, there was never any doubt who was responsible. Others' more rational, if hasty, assessments of Norway's threat matrix pointed to the same (wrong) conclusion. For all their differences, both lines of reasoning shared a common assumption: that the sheer volume of Muslim terrorists out there made their involvement likely. Or as Stephen Colbert skewered the media's rush to judgment: "If you're pulling a news report completely out of your ass, it is safer to go with Muslim. That's not prejudice. That's probability."

Charles Kurzman begs to differ. In his new book, The Missing Martyrs, the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill sociology professor rejects that Muslims are especially prone to violent extremism. "If there are more than a billion Muslims in the world, many of whom supposedly hate the West and desire martyrdom," he asks, "why don't we see terrorist attacks everywhere, every day?"

In theory, we should. After all, there's any number of ways a terrorist committed to murdering civilians could attack (and our gun lobby certainly isn't making weapons harder to get a hold of). But we don't. No Islamist terrorist attack besides 9/11 has killed more than 400 people; only a dozen have killed more than 200.

As it turns out, there just aren't that many Muslims determined to kill us. Backed by a veritable army of fact, figures, and anecdotes, Kurzman makes a compelling case. He calculates, for example, that global Islamist terrorists have succeeded in recruiting fewer than 1 in 15,000 Muslims over the past 25 years, and fewer than 1 in 100,000 since 2001. And according to a top counterterrorism official, Al Qaeda originally planned to hit a West Coast target, too, on 9/11 but lacked the manpower to do so.

For complete article, click here

7 Mystical Poems - By Akbar S Ahmed



7 Mystical Love Poems to God
Akbar S Ahmed
Huffington Post, August 12, 2011

The month of Ramadan, in which millions of Muslims are fasting throughout the world, reminds us of our need to reach out to the divine with compassion and love in our hearts. We want to love God and be loved by Him. But by creating a relationship in love, we are also able to love others whatever their religion or culture.

This is the lesson the sages and the poets from every religious faith teach us. Whether they are of the Abrahamic religions or non-Abrahamic ones, male or female, live in the West or the East, they constantly return to the theme of love.

Let me give some examples of poetic expressions that we can all share and appreciate -- all the more valuable because it is coming from other traditions. I will give the name of the writer, the title of the poem and then a sample verse.

"Close to God" by St. Thomas Aquinas

The first poem was written by Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), who is commonly thought of as possibly the greatest Catholic theologian. His personal experience led him to the conclusion that all in creation were revelations of God's infinite, eternal, expanding being.

One may never have heard the sacred word 'Christ', but be closer to God than a priest or nun.

"The Christ's Breath" by Shams-ud-din Muhammad Hafiz

It would be logical to assume the second poem is written by a Christian. After all, it is suffused with love for Christ. But a Muslim, Shams-ud-din Muhammad Hafiz (c. 1320-1389), wrote it. Hafiz is the most beloved poet of Persia and considered to be one of history's greatest lyrical geniuses. Goethe wrote that "Hafiz has no peer."

The Christ's Breath:

I am a hole in a flute that the Christ's breath moves through, listen to this music.
I am the concert from the mouth of every creature, singing with the myriad chorus.
I am a hole in a flute that the Christ's breath moves through, listen to this music.

For complete article, click here

Wednesday, August 03, 2011

Pakistan-India Relations: From 'Bombs' to 'Bombshells'?

Pakistan Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar (R) shakes hands with Indian Foreign Minister S. M. Krishna (L) prior to a meeting in New Delhi on July 27, 2011. (Prakash Singh/AFP/Getty Images)


Pakistan-India Relations Moving from 'Bombs' to 'Bombshells'?
Hassan Abbas, Asia Society, August 3, 2011

While the mysteries surrounding interactions between the CIA and Pakistan’s ISI intelligence agency continue to be partly entertaining and partly amazing, the situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating — complicating U.S. withdrawal plans.

While it is indeed debatable whether the Taliban are gaining or losing support in Afghanistan's Pashtun-dominated areas, it is evident that President Karzai and his allies are being brazenly targeted by insurgents, terrorists and militants. In the process, who among the Taliban are being co-opted by the Karzai government is an unknown but not that difficult to guess. Reconciliation efforts are in the air with no concrete achievement to date.

India-Pakistan relations, on the other hand, appear to be improving, or at least there is a recognition that continued dialogue under all circumstances is a smart strategy. Pakistan's young (and beautiful) foreign minister Hina Khar visited India recently and held parleys with her Indian counterpart S.M. Krishna. One commentator summarized Khar's visit: "First they sent bombs, now they send bombshells."

Indian media were more focused initially on Khar’s expensive handbag and bracelets, but later the discourse turned to more important matters and by and large both Pakistani and Indian media appreciated the resumption of dialogue. Distrust between the two states is still entrenched and India might think that the powerful Pakistani military’s calculus differs from Khar's diplomatic statements, but in Pakistan civilian supremacy cannot become a reality overnight.

In the midst of all this, Pakistan-U.S. relations remain tense and both countries have enforced some restrictions on the movement of the other countries' diplomats in their capitals. This is not a good omen. U.S. Congressional concerns about use of U.S. military funding to Pakistan are also at an all-time high — but so are its interests in stabilizing Afghanistan, for which it needs at least some help and understanding from Pakistan.

Hassan Abbas is an Asia Society Bernard Schwartz Fellow and project director of Asia Society’s Pakistan 2020 Study Group. He has recently returned to New York following a trip to Pakistan, Iran, and Afghanistan.

Tuesday, August 02, 2011

Celebrating Buddhist Heritage of Pakistan

Vision of a buddhaā€™s paradise 

BUDDHIST HERITAGE OF PAKISTAN -- NEW  EXHIBITION OPENS AUGUST 9
   Asia Society in New York

Melissa Chiu

Beginning August 9, Asia Society  Museum presents a landmark exhibition of Buddhist sculptures, architectural reliefs and works of gold and bronze from the Gandhara region of Pakistan, most never exhibited before in the United States.

“Against a backdrop of political turmoil and tensions in the U.S.-Pakistan relationship, securing these loans has been an extraordinary achievement,” says Asia Society Museum Director MELISSA CHIU. “We are extremely grateful to our colleagues at the Lahore Museum in Lahore and the National Museum of Pakistan in Karachi, and to countless individuals both in Pakistan and the U.S. for their efforts on behalf of the exhibition. Despite images of Pakistan as a place of violent extremism, the region has an ancient tradition of tolerance and pluralism as evidenced by the survival of these spectacular examples of Gandharan art. Through this exhibition, Asia Society aims to provide new contexts for looking at the arts and culture of Pakistan today, in keeping with our long history of programming about and engagement with the region and following our 2009 exhibition Hanging Fire: Contemporary Art from Pakistan.”

The new exhibition “The Buddhist Heritage of Pakistan: Art of Gandhara” shows the rich artistic heritage of Gandhara as a geographical and historic region and as a particular style of art. The works reveal the complex cultural influences -- from Scytho-Parthian to Greco-Roman traditions -- that fed the extraordinary artistic production of this region from the first century B.C.E. through the fifth century C.E.

Click here to view the exhibition website.

The Buddhist Heritage of Pakistan: Art of Gandhara will be on view Aug. 9 to Oct. 30 at the Asia Society Museum, 725 Park Avenue at 70th Street in New York. To arrange coverage and interviews, feel free to contact our press office at 212-327-9271 or pr@asiasociety.org

Also See: Long-Delayed Show of Buddhist Art From Pakistan Is to Open - NYT

Park 51: A Vibrant Islamic Community Centre in the Making

Developers of Islamic Center Try a New Strategy
By ANNE BARNARD, New York Times, August 1, 2011

A year after controversy engulfed plans to build a Muslim community center and mosque in Lower Manhattan, the project’s developers are quietly moving ahead: In recent months they have hired a paid staff, started fund-raising drives and continued holding prayers and cultural events in their existing building two blocks from ground zero.

But they have also embraced what they call a slower, more deliberate and more realistic approach to the project, acknowledging it will take years of hard work to determine what kind of facilities Muslim and non-Muslim visitors want and need, to raise money, and to build public support.

That means it could be five years before they even try to begin any physical transformation of the property, now a bare-bones building that once housed a Burlington Coat Factory store. And the Muslim center might never become the 15-story, $100 million edifice that the developers had once envisioned, and that some opponents had labeled a “megamosque.”

When the plans were announced last year, there were angry protests from some relatives of 9/11 victims, politicians and others who said it would be insensitive to build a Muslim institution close to where Islamic radicals attacked the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. The furor was fanned by Internet-based activists who viewed Muslim influence as a threat and called the project a “victory mosque.” The developers, unprepared for the outcry, were thrown into disarray, trying to defend a plan that was still embryonic.

Sharif El-Gamal, the lead developer, who controls the property at 45-51 Park Place, has spent the past year trying to regroup. He has severed ties with the project’s original imam, Feisal Abdul Rauf. He has crisscrossed the country to attract donors, built relationships with neighborhood groups and Muslim organizations and recruited the aunt of a 9/11 victim to his advisory board — all things he says he should have done before going public last year.

“Everything was backward,” Mr. El-Gamal, 37, acknowledged in an interview on Wednesday in his Chelsea real estate office. “We’re going back to basics.”

Mr. El-Gamal said his vision remained: a Muslim-led community center modeled on the Jewish Community Center on the Upper West Side, where his children learned to swim. It would be open to all, with a pool, a theater and cultural, religious and interfaith programming. And the site, which is already used for Muslim worship, would include a mosque.

He said the ultimate form of the center, called Park51, and its building would be determined after consultation with two main audiences, residents of Lower Manhattan and Muslims who live in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. Mr. El-Gamal also said he would assess the community response to the events now held at Park51’s makeshift space, varying from art exhibits and yoga and Brazilian martial arts classes to Muslim holiday observances and a discussion for Muslim and non-Muslim children about bullying.

“If the community only wants four or five floors, it’s going to be four or five floors,” Mr. El-Gamal said.

One thing that is not in question, he said, is the center’s location. Legally, he is entitled to operate a religious institution there; the project required no zoning approval, though it was voluntarily presented to Manhattan’s Community Board 1, which approved it in May 2010.

For complete article, click here
Visit Park 51: http://park51.org/  
Also seeNYChildren Exhibition: Let’s open Park51′s doors to the world