Pakistan Taliban taps Punjab heartland for recruits
Pakistanis are increasingly concerned over the deadly collaboration between Punjabi militants from Sargodha and the Taliban.
By Alex Rodriguez, Los Angeles Times, November 16, 2009
Reporting from Sargodha, Pakistan - One by one, recruits from Pakistan's Punjab heartland would make the seven-hour drive to Waziristan, where they would pull up to an office that made no secret of its mission.
The signboard above the office door read "Tehrik-e-Taliban." In a largely ungoverned city like Miram Shah, there was no reason to hide its identity.
The trainees from Sargodha would arrive, grab some sleep at the Taliban office and afterward head into Waziristan's rugged mountains for instruction in skills including karate and handling explosives and automatic rifles.
"Someone recruits them, then someone else takes them to Miram Shah, and then someone in Miram Shah greets them and takes them in," said Sargodha Police Chief Usman Anwar, whose officers this summer arrested a cell of returning Punjabi militants before they could allegedly carry out a plan to blow up a cellphone tower in this city of 700,000. "It's an assembly line, like Ford Motors has."
The arrests of six Punjabi militants in Sargodha in two raids Aug. 24 illustrated a burgeoning collaboration between Punjabi militants and northwestern Pakistan's Taliban that has Pakistanis increasingly concerned as the government focuses its military resources on Taliban and Al Qaeda militants in South Waziristan.
Military commanders say their troops assumed control of most of South Waziristan just three weeks after launching a large-scale offensive aimed at uprooting the Pakistani Taliban near the Afghan border. Troops are now clashing with Taliban fighters in Makeen, the hometown of slain Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mahsud.
However, evidence is growing that militants in Punjab, Pakistan's most populous province, could prove just as dangerous as the Taliban militants from the country's northwestern region that includes South Waziristan and other parts of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, or FATA.
Pakistan has been broadsided by a nationwide wave of terrorist strikes in recent weeks, and several of those attacks have involved militants from Punjab either masterminding or carrying out the violence.
A daring Oct. 10 commando raid on the army's headquarters in Rawalpindi, a heavily guarded complex that is Pakistan's equivalent of the Pentagon, was engineered by a Punjabi militant who also organized the deadly ambush of the Sri Lankan cricket team in March.
Punjabi extremists were also believed to be behind near-simultaneous attacks on three police buildings in Lahore that killed 14 people on Oct. 15.
Years ago, the agendas of the Pakistani Taliban and Punjabi militant organizations such as Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and Jaish-e-Muhammad moved in different directions. Whereas the Taliban has long focused its attacks on Pakistan's Western-allied government, Punjabi groups, which, like the Taliban, are Sunni Muslims, have traditionally targeted Indian forces in the disputed Kashmir region and members of Pakistan's Shiite Muslim minority.
Now, however, the missions of the Taliban and Punjabi militants seem to have merged. Law enforcement officials and analysts say the catalyst was the government's 2007 siege of the Red Mosque in Islamabad where Islamic extremists held scores of people hostage. The eight-day siege in the Pakistani capital ended in the deaths of more than 100 people.
Then-President Pervez Musharraf ordered security forces to seize the mosque after militants at the sprawling compound set fire to the capital's Environment Ministry building. The siege had been preceded by months of challenges to Musharraf's leadership from the mosque's radical leaders, including an insistence that Pakistan adopt Islamic law.
After the siege, Punjabi militant groups that had been tolerated -- and in some cases fostered -- by Pakistani authorities viewed the government as an enemy.
Experts say Pakistan has neglected to adequately brace for the threat posed by Taliban-trained Punjabi militants. Their cells have spread throughout Punjab province, and law enforcement officials say Punjabi militants have established their own training camps in southern Punjab, a desolate wasteland where the police presence is minimal and a feudal society dominates.
"At the moment, the government is bewildered. It doesn't know how to manage this challenge coming from Punjabi militants," said Hasan Askari Rizvi, a Lahore-based security analyst.
"In the past, Punjab militants were merely facilitating the Taliban. But now they have joined with the Taliban to engage in terrorist attacks."
Southern Punjab provides militant groups a haven to train and reconnoiter. Like the Taliban's primary stronghold in Waziristan, vast tracts of southern Punjab are regarded as tribal areas where rule is laid down by local sardars, or feudal leaders. In some places, the only glint of law enforcement comes in the form of the poorly trained border military police, who take orders largely from feudal leaders, said Maj. Gen. Yaqub Khan of the Pakistan Rangers Punjab.
In an interview on Pakistan's Express News television channel in mid-October, Khan said militants freely move between South Waziristan and the tribal area surrounding the southern Punjab city of Dera Ghazi Khan.
Khan said the jurisdiction of his paramilitary force, which is under the control of the Interior Ministry, is limited to securing a gas pipeline.
"There are no police in the region," he said. "We have confirmed reports that terrorists gather and get training in this region, and they have definite linkage with militants fighting in FATA."
Pakistanis in Dera Ghazi Khan and surrounding villages fear that, as the government continues its crackdown on Taliban militants along the Afghan border, fleeing Taliban fighters may attempt to establish themselves in southern Punjab.
"No one is serious about preventing the Talibanization of our area," said Khawaja Mudasar Mehmood, a Dera Ghazi Khan politician with the ruling Pakistan People's Party. "We face spillover from South Waziristan. Taliban militants are already passing into this area, and the border military police can't prevent it."
In Sargodha, the link to the Taliban is Mohammed Tayyab, who heads the Punjabi Taliban cell in Miram Shah and had close ties with Mahsud, said Anwar, the Sargodha police chief. Tayyab has been accused of engineering the November 2007 suicide bombing attack on a Pakistani air force bus in Sargodha that killed eight people.
After several raids, Tayyab and his militant group are keeping a lower profile in Miram Shah, but they still tap Sargodha for fresh recruits and train them in Waziristan, Anwar said. A primary conduit for recruitment was a madrasa, or Islamic seminary school,run by the father of four brothers who were arrested by Sargodha police in August, accused of planning an attack on the cellphone tower.
"Likely recruits at the madrasas are teens, 14 or 15, without strong links to family," Anwar said. "Poverty is a factor, but having no social links, no future, is the main cause."
Law enforcement officials say the military offensive in South Waziristan has accelerated collaboration among Punjabi militants, the Pakistani Taliban and Al Qaeda. Punjabi militants have been waging the attacks on behalf of their Taliban and Al Qaeda allies, government officials say, hoping to erode popular backing for military operations in Waziristan.
The problem with battling militancy in Punjab is that the government cannot undertake a crackdown on the scale of the offensives against the Taliban in northwestern Pakistan's Swat Valley or in Waziristan, experts say. Punjab is too densely populated and many in the province still cling to the belief that Pakistan's next-door enemy, India, is behind much of the terrorism in Punjab.
"People don't really recognize Punjabi militants as a threat, or they think these terrorist groups are agents of foreign countries," said Rizvi, the analyst. "So when you start arguing that the roots of the problem lie outside Pakistan, then you don't recognize the threat actually emerging here."
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Taliban under fire at Tablighi Jamaat gathering at Raiwand: A Good Omen...
Taliban under fire at Raiwind gathering
Participants vow to make Pakistan cradle of peace
The News, November 16, 2009
RAIWIND: Inayatullah Khan sits on a dusty rug and prepares to pray at Pakistan’s biggest religious gathering of 400,000 Muslims in Raiwind, cursing the Taliban for their unholy crusade against humanity.
Khan travelled all the way from South Waziristan to take part in the four-day event, one of the world’s largest Islamic gatherings, in Raiwind on the outskirts of Lahore.A resident of Kanigurram, a former Taliban hub that the military says it has captured during its ongoing five-week offensive in the northwest, Khan, 50, accused the Taliban of straying from the path of God and butchering Muslims.
“They call those who refuse to follow their brand of Islam infidels, not knowing they are inviting the wrath of Allah the Almighty by killing Muslims, which I call an unholy crusade,” Khan said.
A Muslim whose faith is important enough to make an arduous three-day journey and sleep in a tent for four days, Khan invited the Taliban “to join us in spreading Islam’s eternal message of love, affection and peace”. The Thursday-Sunday gathering in Raiwind is being held under tight security due to paced up attacks that have swept the country killing more than 2,500 people in two years.
For complete article, click here
Participants vow to make Pakistan cradle of peace
The News, November 16, 2009
RAIWIND: Inayatullah Khan sits on a dusty rug and prepares to pray at Pakistan’s biggest religious gathering of 400,000 Muslims in Raiwind, cursing the Taliban for their unholy crusade against humanity.
Khan travelled all the way from South Waziristan to take part in the four-day event, one of the world’s largest Islamic gatherings, in Raiwind on the outskirts of Lahore.A resident of Kanigurram, a former Taliban hub that the military says it has captured during its ongoing five-week offensive in the northwest, Khan, 50, accused the Taliban of straying from the path of God and butchering Muslims.
“They call those who refuse to follow their brand of Islam infidels, not knowing they are inviting the wrath of Allah the Almighty by killing Muslims, which I call an unholy crusade,” Khan said.
A Muslim whose faith is important enough to make an arduous three-day journey and sleep in a tent for four days, Khan invited the Taliban “to join us in spreading Islam’s eternal message of love, affection and peace”. The Thursday-Sunday gathering in Raiwind is being held under tight security due to paced up attacks that have swept the country killing more than 2,500 people in two years.
For complete article, click here
The ‘It-is-not-us’ syndrome: Dawn
The ‘It-is-not-us’ syndrome By Hajrah Mumtaz
Dawn, 15 Nov, 2009
A couple of months ago, I wrote a column in praise of certain Pakistani pop stars and bands, arguing that there are a fair number of songs that display political consciousness and a related sense of responsibility. I referred to such songs as Junoon’s ‘Talaash’, Shahzad Roy’s ‘Lagay Raho’ and ‘Kismet Apnay Haath Main’, Noori’s ‘Merey Log’ and Laal’s rendition of Habib Jalib’s ‘Main Nay Uss Say Yeh Kaha.’
I find now that that argument was all very well – as far as it went. Such is the manner in which we are bound by our long-cherished prejudices and mental chains that it took a report by the New York Times’ Adam B. Ellick to show me what I had completely failed to notice: the music acts’ total refusal to either touch upon the topic of the Taliban, or to even acknowledge them as a concern.
In a video report shot in Lahore, Ellick asks a few of Pakistan’s top musicians why they have spoken out against corruption, political wheeling-dealings, poverty and the manner in which the country has been done in by everyone from the politicians to the West to India – but never against the Taliban, who currently constitute the clearest and most present of dangers.
Here, verbatim, is what Ali Noor of Noori has to say:
‘We are not going to get up and say that we want to talk against the Taliban – simply because they are probably one of the smallest problems this country has. [...] It’s the West. It’s the West that is against the Taliban, because they are very heavily affected by it. We’re not.’
And here is what Ali Azmat – the man who once sang about ‘zehni ghulami’ – has to say: ‘We know for a fact that all this turbulence in Pakistan ... it’s not us. It’s the outside hands.’
What, really, can one say? The Taliban are one of the smallest problems this country has? When we’re having a bombing virtually every day, when parts of the south-west of the country were until very recently in serious danger of falling to the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan and its associated gang of goons?
Ellick comments, dryly, that this view – it’s not us, it’s ‘foreign hands’ – persists despite a spate of bombings in the country with the targets ranging from civilians and security forces’ installations to an Islamic university for women. ‘They’re [Pakistan’s pop musicians] angry about one fact: that the United States has interfered in Pakistan’s politics for decades.’
Of course Ellick focuses in his report on the anti-American angle apparent in many Pakistani pop songs, using stills from the ‘Klashinfolk’, ‘Kismet Apnay Haath Main Lay Li Hai’ and a CoVen video to press his point home. And he ignores other work such as that by Laal. Nevertheless, his point is made well enough to make me cringe: amongst the people interviewed in his report, there seems to be an utter refusal to acknowledge that the Taliban are in any way a threat, or that this is a local, home-grown problem that affects Pakistan first and most deeply.
For complete article, click here
To watch the New York Times video under discussion in the article, click here
Dawn, 15 Nov, 2009
A couple of months ago, I wrote a column in praise of certain Pakistani pop stars and bands, arguing that there are a fair number of songs that display political consciousness and a related sense of responsibility. I referred to such songs as Junoon’s ‘Talaash’, Shahzad Roy’s ‘Lagay Raho’ and ‘Kismet Apnay Haath Main’, Noori’s ‘Merey Log’ and Laal’s rendition of Habib Jalib’s ‘Main Nay Uss Say Yeh Kaha.’
I find now that that argument was all very well – as far as it went. Such is the manner in which we are bound by our long-cherished prejudices and mental chains that it took a report by the New York Times’ Adam B. Ellick to show me what I had completely failed to notice: the music acts’ total refusal to either touch upon the topic of the Taliban, or to even acknowledge them as a concern.
In a video report shot in Lahore, Ellick asks a few of Pakistan’s top musicians why they have spoken out against corruption, political wheeling-dealings, poverty and the manner in which the country has been done in by everyone from the politicians to the West to India – but never against the Taliban, who currently constitute the clearest and most present of dangers.
Here, verbatim, is what Ali Noor of Noori has to say:
‘We are not going to get up and say that we want to talk against the Taliban – simply because they are probably one of the smallest problems this country has. [...] It’s the West. It’s the West that is against the Taliban, because they are very heavily affected by it. We’re not.’
And here is what Ali Azmat – the man who once sang about ‘zehni ghulami’ – has to say: ‘We know for a fact that all this turbulence in Pakistan ... it’s not us. It’s the outside hands.’
What, really, can one say? The Taliban are one of the smallest problems this country has? When we’re having a bombing virtually every day, when parts of the south-west of the country were until very recently in serious danger of falling to the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan and its associated gang of goons?
Ellick comments, dryly, that this view – it’s not us, it’s ‘foreign hands’ – persists despite a spate of bombings in the country with the targets ranging from civilians and security forces’ installations to an Islamic university for women. ‘They’re [Pakistan’s pop musicians] angry about one fact: that the United States has interfered in Pakistan’s politics for decades.’
Of course Ellick focuses in his report on the anti-American angle apparent in many Pakistani pop songs, using stills from the ‘Klashinfolk’, ‘Kismet Apnay Haath Main Lay Li Hai’ and a CoVen video to press his point home. And he ignores other work such as that by Laal. Nevertheless, his point is made well enough to make me cringe: amongst the people interviewed in his report, there seems to be an utter refusal to acknowledge that the Taliban are in any way a threat, or that this is a local, home-grown problem that affects Pakistan first and most deeply.
For complete article, click here
To watch the New York Times video under discussion in the article, click here
Pakistan Expects Canada to lift arms ban: Toronto Star
Pakistan urges Ottawa to lift arms ban
Olivia Ward, Toronto Star, November 11, 2009
Another bloody day ended in Pakistan Tuesday with at least 24 people dead in a car bombing, apparent revenge for an army offensive along the jagged Afghan border.
It was the third attack in the past week that focused on Peshawar, the capital of the North-West Frontier Province, which borders the turbulent tribal region where the Pakistani army is battling to dismantle Al Qaeda and Taliban safe havens.
And if Canada continues its 11-year arms embargo, denying Pakistan some badly needed border surveillance equipment, said Pakistan's Toronto Consul-General Sahebzada Khan, the violence is likely to escalate.
A U.S. troop "surge" against the Taliban in Afghanistan, under debate in Washington, could intensify the embattled country's problems.
"We have told NATO and the United States that new boots on Afghan soil will push Al Qaeda into Pakistan," Khan said in an interview with the Star. "It's a very porous border, and nothing has been done to improve control there."
He is asking Canada to supply technical equipment that would help detect militants and seal the border, a suspected source of attacks on Canadian troops.
"Most of the killings (of troops) have been due to roadside bombs. What we are trying to do is neutralize the people making the bombs," said Khan, a former top foreign ministry official.
It's not the first time Pakistan has sought military aid from Ottawa. Since it began a massive offensive against the Taliban in its border region last spring, it has called for aid including unmanned drone aircraft. Ottawa turned down the requests, citing a 1998 embargo on military exports that began when Pakistan fired its first nuclear tests. Instead, Canada pledged $25 million this year in humanitarian aid for more than a million people displaced in the fighting. It also is giving $34 million in bilateral aid.
But Prime Minister Stephen Harper's visit to India next week is expected to include a deal that would relax a 35-year-old ban on nuclear trade with Pakistan's rival, which also tested atomic weapons. That would likely increase tensions between Islamabad and Ottawa.
"The Pakistanis are bitter," said Kamran Bokhari of the U.S.-based Stratfor global intelligence company, who has just returned from meetings with senior Pakistani military officials. "They say they're doing all the heavy lifting in this war against the Taliban, and getting none of the credit."
Khan said Pakistan wants Ottawa to supply non-lethal military equipment, including thermal detectors to catch militants sneaking over the border, explosives detectors, night-vision goggles, sniffer dogs and mine detection gear.
"Canadian electronics and military equipment is superior," he said. "If we don't get it, controlling the border will not be effective."
But some question why Pakistan, which has received billions of dollars in military aid from the U.S. since 9/11, is so ill prepared to fight a war against the Taliban, which now controls more than a dozen militant groups on the border.
"It's likely that the army received relevant equipment from the U.S., but the extent and challenge of growing militancy in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (the border region) convinced it that it requires much more," said Hassan Abbas, an authority on Pakistani security, and author of Pakistan's Drift into Extremism.
"Pakistan's armed forces are historically trained for conventional warfare with India, and counter-insurgency is a comparatively new concept for them. More so because the terrain of FATA, where the army is now operating, is very mountainous and tough. It needs tools and equipment that are more useful for counter-insurgency."
Olivia Ward, Toronto Star, November 11, 2009
Another bloody day ended in Pakistan Tuesday with at least 24 people dead in a car bombing, apparent revenge for an army offensive along the jagged Afghan border.
It was the third attack in the past week that focused on Peshawar, the capital of the North-West Frontier Province, which borders the turbulent tribal region where the Pakistani army is battling to dismantle Al Qaeda and Taliban safe havens.
And if Canada continues its 11-year arms embargo, denying Pakistan some badly needed border surveillance equipment, said Pakistan's Toronto Consul-General Sahebzada Khan, the violence is likely to escalate.
A U.S. troop "surge" against the Taliban in Afghanistan, under debate in Washington, could intensify the embattled country's problems.
"We have told NATO and the United States that new boots on Afghan soil will push Al Qaeda into Pakistan," Khan said in an interview with the Star. "It's a very porous border, and nothing has been done to improve control there."
He is asking Canada to supply technical equipment that would help detect militants and seal the border, a suspected source of attacks on Canadian troops.
"Most of the killings (of troops) have been due to roadside bombs. What we are trying to do is neutralize the people making the bombs," said Khan, a former top foreign ministry official.
It's not the first time Pakistan has sought military aid from Ottawa. Since it began a massive offensive against the Taliban in its border region last spring, it has called for aid including unmanned drone aircraft. Ottawa turned down the requests, citing a 1998 embargo on military exports that began when Pakistan fired its first nuclear tests. Instead, Canada pledged $25 million this year in humanitarian aid for more than a million people displaced in the fighting. It also is giving $34 million in bilateral aid.
But Prime Minister Stephen Harper's visit to India next week is expected to include a deal that would relax a 35-year-old ban on nuclear trade with Pakistan's rival, which also tested atomic weapons. That would likely increase tensions between Islamabad and Ottawa.
"The Pakistanis are bitter," said Kamran Bokhari of the U.S.-based Stratfor global intelligence company, who has just returned from meetings with senior Pakistani military officials. "They say they're doing all the heavy lifting in this war against the Taliban, and getting none of the credit."
Khan said Pakistan wants Ottawa to supply non-lethal military equipment, including thermal detectors to catch militants sneaking over the border, explosives detectors, night-vision goggles, sniffer dogs and mine detection gear.
"Canadian electronics and military equipment is superior," he said. "If we don't get it, controlling the border will not be effective."
But some question why Pakistan, which has received billions of dollars in military aid from the U.S. since 9/11, is so ill prepared to fight a war against the Taliban, which now controls more than a dozen militant groups on the border.
"It's likely that the army received relevant equipment from the U.S., but the extent and challenge of growing militancy in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (the border region) convinced it that it requires much more," said Hassan Abbas, an authority on Pakistani security, and author of Pakistan's Drift into Extremism.
"Pakistan's armed forces are historically trained for conventional warfare with India, and counter-insurgency is a comparatively new concept for them. More so because the terrain of FATA, where the army is now operating, is very mountainous and tough. It needs tools and equipment that are more useful for counter-insurgency."
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Making Sense of Pakistan By Farzana Sheikh - Asia Society Event in New York - November 18
Making Sense of Pakistan
Featuring: Farzana Shaikh, Associate Fellow, Asia Programme at the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House) in London
Nov 18, 2009 - 6:30pm to 8:00pm
Asia Society: 725 Park Avenue, New York, NY
Pakistan's transformation from a country once projected as a model of Muslim enlightenment to a state faced with a lethal Islamist challenge has dominated headlines in recent years. In her new book, Making Sense of Pakistan, Farzana Shaikh argues that while the failure of governance and the damage wrought by external powers have hastened this decline, Pakistan's problems are rooted primarily in its uncertain foundations as a nation and its ambiguous relation to Islam. Both have heightened the contestation over the meaning of Pakistan and the significance of "being Pakistani." This enduring ideological confusion has also thwarted a stable constitutional settlement, undermined the country's economic future and encouraged a new and dangerous symbiosis between the armed forces and militant groups. Together they have left Pakistan prey to the forces of extremism that today threaten international stability.
Copies of Making Sense of Pakistan will be available for purchase and signing. SHOP Asiastore for the book now.
Schedule: 6:00 – 6:30 pm Registration; 6:30 – 8:00 pm Program
Please note: this event will also be a free video webcast from 6:30 to 8:00 pm EST on AsiaSociety.org. Online viewers are encouraged to send questions to moderator@asiasoc.org.
Policy programs at the Asia Society are generously supported by the Nicholas Platt Endowment for Public Policy.
Rejecting hyper-nationalists
Rejecting hyper-nationalists
Mosharraf Zaidi, The News, November 10, 2009
The voice of Pakistan’s emerging middle class will not always be amplified in ways that serve Pakistanis’ collective interests. The overwhelming majority of the Pakistani middle class takes great pains to conduct and promote an honest and open debate about the issues. Part of taking those pains includes introspection. There is an increasingly important deviant strain of hyper-nationalism mixing itself in with the voice of the Pakistani middle class. Pakistanis need to tackle it with the same integrity and purposefulness that has enabled the establishment of this middle class voice in the first place.
While it remains true that the majority of critique of the Pakistani media is malicious and motivated by attempts to delegitimise the country’s fragile middle class voice, it is also true that the low quality of research, fact-checking and integrity among Pakistani hyper-nationalists makes their work dangerously counter-productive, and hardly strengthens the case of Pakistan. Hyper-nationalist pundits always find America and India as the root of all evil. Hyper-nationalist newspapers seem to have all the news scoops about the evil designs of the enemies, without any evidence. Their abuse of the freedoms that technology and economic growth have afforded to Pakistan is a threat to the growth and influence of the organic middle class — of whom they represent no part.
It was not so long ago, that Pakistan was forever stained by the blood of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl. The safety of foreign correspondents should be of paramount interest to anybody who loves Pakistan, and is interested in protecting its reputation, and its potential as a place where foreigners can be safe. Even the most egregiously intellectual light-weights among Pakistanis would want to ensure that foreign journalists would never again have to endure that kind of threat again. It is therefore particularly mind-boggling that in their irrational, unsubstantiated and blind rage, Pakistani hyper-nationalists thought nothing of making a target of Matthew Rosenberg, yet another Wall Street Journal reporter, causing him to be evacuated out of the country, and sending ripples of fear and trepidation among the corps of Pakistan’s foreign correspondents. Accusing someone of spying for Israel, in a permissive environment (for a reporter working for the Wall Street Journal, no less) would only be funny if it was fictional. It’s not. It is deathly serious. Already, other correspondents (like Marie France Calle of Le Figaro) are asking questions about their own safety.
For complete article, click here
Mosharraf Zaidi, The News, November 10, 2009
The voice of Pakistan’s emerging middle class will not always be amplified in ways that serve Pakistanis’ collective interests. The overwhelming majority of the Pakistani middle class takes great pains to conduct and promote an honest and open debate about the issues. Part of taking those pains includes introspection. There is an increasingly important deviant strain of hyper-nationalism mixing itself in with the voice of the Pakistani middle class. Pakistanis need to tackle it with the same integrity and purposefulness that has enabled the establishment of this middle class voice in the first place.
While it remains true that the majority of critique of the Pakistani media is malicious and motivated by attempts to delegitimise the country’s fragile middle class voice, it is also true that the low quality of research, fact-checking and integrity among Pakistani hyper-nationalists makes their work dangerously counter-productive, and hardly strengthens the case of Pakistan. Hyper-nationalist pundits always find America and India as the root of all evil. Hyper-nationalist newspapers seem to have all the news scoops about the evil designs of the enemies, without any evidence. Their abuse of the freedoms that technology and economic growth have afforded to Pakistan is a threat to the growth and influence of the organic middle class — of whom they represent no part.
It was not so long ago, that Pakistan was forever stained by the blood of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl. The safety of foreign correspondents should be of paramount interest to anybody who loves Pakistan, and is interested in protecting its reputation, and its potential as a place where foreigners can be safe. Even the most egregiously intellectual light-weights among Pakistanis would want to ensure that foreign journalists would never again have to endure that kind of threat again. It is therefore particularly mind-boggling that in their irrational, unsubstantiated and blind rage, Pakistani hyper-nationalists thought nothing of making a target of Matthew Rosenberg, yet another Wall Street Journal reporter, causing him to be evacuated out of the country, and sending ripples of fear and trepidation among the corps of Pakistan’s foreign correspondents. Accusing someone of spying for Israel, in a permissive environment (for a reporter working for the Wall Street Journal, no less) would only be funny if it was fictional. It’s not. It is deathly serious. Already, other correspondents (like Marie France Calle of Le Figaro) are asking questions about their own safety.
For complete article, click here
The dream of reality: Allama Iqbal's 132nd Birth Anniversary
Dawn, November 9, 2009
In his prose work, Allama Muhammad Iqbal foresaw the trajectory of the Pakistani masses, writes Khurram Ali Shafique.
The best resource for understanding the work of Allama Iqbal is the collective experience of the Pakistani masses, including the unschooled. Call it a dream, but I consider it to be reality.
Let me give an example. The greatest prose work of Iqbal is in English, and is called The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam. It was first published from Lahore in early 1930, and later (with some addition) by the UK-based Oxford University Press in 1934. Few Iqbal scholars claim that they can explain even half of the seven lectures contained within that volume. Hence, there is not the slightest chance that the masses of Pakistan, mostly unschooled, may have read, studied, or even heard about it.
Yet, if we divide the history of our community from 1887 to 2026 into seven periods (and this division is based on certain principles adopted from Iqbal), we discover that the topic of one lecture from the book becomes the dominant issue for the masses in each period. The sequence is exactly the same in which they appear in the Reconstruction. Of course, scholars prefer to discuss the book in its entirety (though with little results). But it is more productive to consider how one particular topic became the dominant issue for the people at each historical stage. The lectures contained in the Reconstruction are:
1. 1887-1906: Knowledge and the Revelations of Religious Experience
2. 1907-1926: Philosophical Test of the Revelations of Religious Experience
3. 1927-46: Conception of God and the Meaning of Prayer
4. 1947-66: Human Ego – His Freedom and Immortality
5. 1967-86: The Spirit of Muslim Culture
6. 1987-2006: The Principle of Movement in the Structure of Islam
7. 2007-26: Is Religion Possible?
For complete article, click here
To read, Iqbal's Reconstruction of Religious Though in Islam, click here
Visit: http://www.allamaiqbal.com/
Sunday, November 08, 2009
From Pakistan to Paris, by VW Beetle
From Pakistan to Paris, by VW Beetle
A French doctor is embarking on the 6,000-mile trip to promote a better image of Pakistan. 'It's not all about terrorism,' he says.
Declan Walsh, The Guardian, Monday 9 November 2009
Low-key is good in Islamabad these days, where the threat of Taliban suicide bombings has filled Pakistan's capital with checkposts, blast walls and a queasy air of anxiety. But one proudly conspicuous car rolled through the streets last week – a 25-year-old Volkswagen Beetle, painted in an explosion of trippy colours. At the wheel was a defiant doctor, Vincent Loos, headed for Paris.
"My dream was to return by road," says the 39-year-old Frenchman, who has just finished three years' work at a local hospital. Doctors without borders indeed – or perhaps doctors without sense. Only six months ago his ride was a dust-smeared wreck, collapsed at the bottom of an Islamabad street waiting for a final trip to the scrapyard. Loos, an intensive care specialist, restored the car to full health, then hired an artist to paint in the local style known as "truck art".
Now the "Foxy Shahzadi", or Beetle Princess, is the most distinctive car from Lahore to Lyons. The body is covered in a psychedelic array of flowers, waterfalls and the faces of famous Pakistanis. The idea behind the 6,000-mile trip is to promote the "soft side" of Pakistan. "We want to show the world it's not just about terrorism," says Loos.
Travelling by Foxy, as Beetles are affectionately known in Pakistan, Loos is paying homage to a local motoring cult. Dozens of well-maintained Beetles ply the streets. (Mine, in a cool grey, is Betsy, a proud 1967 model.)
The Beetle came to Pakistan in the 1950s with army officers and bureaucrats returning from postings abroad. The appeal has endured – Mubashir Hasan, a finance minister from the 1970s, still drives his around Lahore. Romano Karim of Islamabad's VW club estimates about 500 "Foxies" travel Pakistan's roads. "Cute, quirky, cheap spare parts – it's the ideal car," he says.
The French doctor's Foxy should reach Paris in about two weeks. His team is equipped with an ample stock of spare parts and a line of Urdu poetry inscribed on the bonnet: "Every mother's prayer is a breeze from paradise."
Islamabad police shoot dead would-be bomber: Police Deserves Appreciation
Capital police shoot dead would-be bomber
The News, November 09, 2009 - By Shakeel Anjum
ISLAMABAD: The Capital Police, foiling an attempt of terrorism, gunned a suicide bomber at a police picket on the Margalla Road near E-11 as the suspected bomber cried ‘Allah-ho-Akbar’ while trying to blow him up.
The police targeted the head of the suicide bomber just before he triggered the explosive device.Experts and bomb disposal squad defused the explosive after an hour-long struggle and cleared the situation.
Inspector General of Police (IGP), Islamabad, Syed Kaleem Imam, terming it a great achievement of the police, said, “We are proud of the personnel who foiled the terrorism bid and protected the people’s lives in such perilous circumstances.”
The IGP said the police were trying to intercept the vehicle, which had dropped the terrorist. “It is premature to say that the vehicle was explosive-laden or it only facilitated the suicide bomber,” he said.
The interior minister, appreciating the police performance, ordered one-step promotion for the personnel deployed at the police picket. Station House Officer (SHO), Shalimar Police Station, Altaf Aziz Khatak, told The News that he was standing in the middle of the green belt dividing the Margalla Road during checking of Nakas when a black twin cabin came from the E-11 Signal Chowk at about 9.40 pm, dropped a bearded young man and sped away towards the Saddam Chawk, Golra side.
Meanwhile, the young man cried Allah-ho-Akbar and started running towards the picket, the SHO said adding that he, perceiving the danger, asked the personnel to lie down on the ground. He said that he, as well as ASI Malik Mumtaz, Head Constables Moojad Shah, Nazim Hussain and Ali Raza, whipped out their guns and started firing, aiming at his head. He said that he rushed to the terrorist after he fell down and checked his body, adding that the suspected bomber was wearing a suicide jacket.
Khatak said that he informed the police control, asking it to send an ambulance and the bomb disposal unit to defuse the explosive jacket. The SHO said that the suspected bomber was about 25 years with 5.7 height and wearing Shalwar-Qamiz and white joggers. He said that he belonged to Waziristan.
The News, November 09, 2009 - By Shakeel Anjum
ISLAMABAD: The Capital Police, foiling an attempt of terrorism, gunned a suicide bomber at a police picket on the Margalla Road near E-11 as the suspected bomber cried ‘Allah-ho-Akbar’ while trying to blow him up.
The police targeted the head of the suicide bomber just before he triggered the explosive device.Experts and bomb disposal squad defused the explosive after an hour-long struggle and cleared the situation.
Inspector General of Police (IGP), Islamabad, Syed Kaleem Imam, terming it a great achievement of the police, said, “We are proud of the personnel who foiled the terrorism bid and protected the people’s lives in such perilous circumstances.”
The IGP said the police were trying to intercept the vehicle, which had dropped the terrorist. “It is premature to say that the vehicle was explosive-laden or it only facilitated the suicide bomber,” he said.
The interior minister, appreciating the police performance, ordered one-step promotion for the personnel deployed at the police picket. Station House Officer (SHO), Shalimar Police Station, Altaf Aziz Khatak, told The News that he was standing in the middle of the green belt dividing the Margalla Road during checking of Nakas when a black twin cabin came from the E-11 Signal Chowk at about 9.40 pm, dropped a bearded young man and sped away towards the Saddam Chawk, Golra side.
Meanwhile, the young man cried Allah-ho-Akbar and started running towards the picket, the SHO said adding that he, perceiving the danger, asked the personnel to lie down on the ground. He said that he, as well as ASI Malik Mumtaz, Head Constables Moojad Shah, Nazim Hussain and Ali Raza, whipped out their guns and started firing, aiming at his head. He said that he rushed to the terrorist after he fell down and checked his body, adding that the suspected bomber was wearing a suicide jacket.
Khatak said that he informed the police control, asking it to send an ambulance and the bomb disposal unit to defuse the explosive jacket. The SHO said that the suspected bomber was about 25 years with 5.7 height and wearing Shalwar-Qamiz and white joggers. He said that he belonged to Waziristan.
We will not solve the problem with troops alone: US National Security Advisor
We will not solve the problem with troops alone
Der Spiegel, November 7, 2009
US National Security Adviser James L. Jones talks to SPIEGEL about his skepticism regarding calls for more US troops to be sent to Afghanistan, the chances of Pakistan's nuclear weapons falling into the wrong hands and President Barack Obama's leadership style.
SPIEGEL: General Jones, it's now 20 years since the Berlin Wall came down and the Soviet Union imploded. Has the world become a safer place?
James L. Jones: Tremendous accomplishments were made over a number of years to bring freedom and democracy to that portion of Europe that was left out of the drive. The events that took place 20 years ago meant for the whole of Europe much more peace and much more opportunity for the citizens that had lived on both sides of the wall.
SPIEGEL: But it was not yet the "end of history," as the American political scientist Francis Fukuyama and many others predicted. What is the gravest threat to the American homeland today?
Jones: I worry most about proliferation of weapons of mass destruction in such a way that they could be acquired by non-governmental organizations, like terrorist groups, especially the radical groups that we know are trying to get these weapons. We're convinced that if they were to get them, they would use them. When a nation state has a nuclear weapon, it's a little bit easier to control the use of it, but for non-governmental groups it's much more difficult. We are obviously worried about North Korea and Iran, but the threat that's hardest to control is the non nation states, groups of individuals who could acquire such a weapon and what they would do.
SPIEGEL: Do you assume that some terrorist groups are close to that goal?
Jones: We're doing a good job nationally and internationally to make sure that we safeguard that eventuality from happening.
SPIEGEL: Is Pakistan the most dangerous place in the world, given that the Taliban and al-Qaida are increasing their sphere of influence?
Jones: Pakistan is certainly a point of strategic interest for us, for the alliance, and for much of the watching world because of the fact that they are nuclear -- they do have nuclear weapons, and they do have an ongoing insurgency.
SPIEGEL: Is it possible that the civilian government and the armed forces could lose control over these nuclear weapons?
Jones: It is something that we work on with the Pakistanis regularly. I've been assured that they're doing everything they can to make sure that these weapons are very tightly controlled and secured.
SPIEGEL: And you think the generals are assessing the situation realistically?
Jones: We are cooperating very closely. We hope that they are successful in combating their insurgencies because since 2006 this has become a real cancer on the border regions.
SPIEGEL: The Obama administration is reviewing the strategy for Afghanistan. General Stanley McChrystal, the top US commander in Afghanistan, is asking for additional troops.
Jones: Generals always ask for more troops. Take it from me.
SPIEGEL: You would know. You're also a general and you were in Afghanistan from 2003 to almost 2007 ...
Jones: ... and of course when I was there I asked for more troops. When we started in 2003, we had to develop a plan. So by definition, you have to ask for people.
SPIEGEL: And now you support General McChrystal's demand for 40,000 additional troops?
Jones: We are in the middle of a process with the president and all of his advisers in assessing the overall situation in Afghanistan. I believe we will not solve the problem with troops alone. The minimum number is important, of course. But there is no maximum number, however. And what's really important in Afghanistan is that with this new administration we insist on good governance, that it be coordinated with economic development and security, and that we have much, much better success at handing over responsibility for these three things to the Afghans.
For complete article click here
Somwhat Related:
Defending the Arsenal - By Seymour Hersh,New Yorker
Der Spiegel, November 7, 2009
US National Security Adviser James L. Jones talks to SPIEGEL about his skepticism regarding calls for more US troops to be sent to Afghanistan, the chances of Pakistan's nuclear weapons falling into the wrong hands and President Barack Obama's leadership style.
SPIEGEL: General Jones, it's now 20 years since the Berlin Wall came down and the Soviet Union imploded. Has the world become a safer place?
James L. Jones: Tremendous accomplishments were made over a number of years to bring freedom and democracy to that portion of Europe that was left out of the drive. The events that took place 20 years ago meant for the whole of Europe much more peace and much more opportunity for the citizens that had lived on both sides of the wall.
SPIEGEL: But it was not yet the "end of history," as the American political scientist Francis Fukuyama and many others predicted. What is the gravest threat to the American homeland today?
Jones: I worry most about proliferation of weapons of mass destruction in such a way that they could be acquired by non-governmental organizations, like terrorist groups, especially the radical groups that we know are trying to get these weapons. We're convinced that if they were to get them, they would use them. When a nation state has a nuclear weapon, it's a little bit easier to control the use of it, but for non-governmental groups it's much more difficult. We are obviously worried about North Korea and Iran, but the threat that's hardest to control is the non nation states, groups of individuals who could acquire such a weapon and what they would do.
SPIEGEL: Do you assume that some terrorist groups are close to that goal?
Jones: We're doing a good job nationally and internationally to make sure that we safeguard that eventuality from happening.
SPIEGEL: Is Pakistan the most dangerous place in the world, given that the Taliban and al-Qaida are increasing their sphere of influence?
Jones: Pakistan is certainly a point of strategic interest for us, for the alliance, and for much of the watching world because of the fact that they are nuclear -- they do have nuclear weapons, and they do have an ongoing insurgency.
SPIEGEL: Is it possible that the civilian government and the armed forces could lose control over these nuclear weapons?
Jones: It is something that we work on with the Pakistanis regularly. I've been assured that they're doing everything they can to make sure that these weapons are very tightly controlled and secured.
SPIEGEL: And you think the generals are assessing the situation realistically?
Jones: We are cooperating very closely. We hope that they are successful in combating their insurgencies because since 2006 this has become a real cancer on the border regions.
SPIEGEL: The Obama administration is reviewing the strategy for Afghanistan. General Stanley McChrystal, the top US commander in Afghanistan, is asking for additional troops.
Jones: Generals always ask for more troops. Take it from me.
SPIEGEL: You would know. You're also a general and you were in Afghanistan from 2003 to almost 2007 ...
Jones: ... and of course when I was there I asked for more troops. When we started in 2003, we had to develop a plan. So by definition, you have to ask for people.
SPIEGEL: And now you support General McChrystal's demand for 40,000 additional troops?
Jones: We are in the middle of a process with the president and all of his advisers in assessing the overall situation in Afghanistan. I believe we will not solve the problem with troops alone. The minimum number is important, of course. But there is no maximum number, however. And what's really important in Afghanistan is that with this new administration we insist on good governance, that it be coordinated with economic development and security, and that we have much, much better success at handing over responsibility for these three things to the Afghans.
For complete article click here
Somwhat Related:
Defending the Arsenal - By Seymour Hersh,New Yorker
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