Photos at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/04/world ... &th&emc=th
March 4, 2009
For Pakistan, Attack Exposes Security Flaws
By JANE PERLEZ
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — A coordinated, commando-style ambush on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Pakistan on Tuesday revealed embarrassing security gaps in an increasingly unstable country.
With eight dead in Lahore, not even cricket, a cherished national pasttime, seemed secure after 12 gunmen carrying sacks of weapons attacked a bus bearing the Sri Lankan team and then escaped in motorized rickshaws. A video of the attacks was broadcast around the world, destabilizing images for a nation under siege from an insurgency by Al Qaeda and the Taliban.
Most major cricket teams already refuse to risk playing in Pakistan, ever more isolated from the rest of the world.
“This happened in the heart of Lahore, the cultural capital of the country,” said Aftab Ahmad Sherpao, a former interior minister and a member of the Pakistan Peoples Party of President Asif Ali Zardari. “None of the attackers were shot or caught, and they were coming to the scene with big bags. That’s absurd.”
Mr. Sherpao called the attack a “total security lapse.”
The police said the gunmen — using assault rifles, grenades and even antitank missiles — assaulted the bus with the Sri Lankan team at a grassy traffic circle near the city’s main Qaddafi Stadium during a five day-match. Six police officers in an escort van were killed, and six cricketers were injured, the police said. Two bystanders were also killed.
The operation bore some similarity to the attack in November in Mumbai, India, in which 10 militants attacked hotels and other targets over three days, killing 163 people, security officials said.
In Lahore, the attackers also appeared to be in their early 20s. They wore sneakers and loose pants and carried backpacks loaded with weapons and high-energy snacks of dried fruit and chocolate, all characteristics of the Mumbai gunmen. The gunmen in Lahore walked casually as they fired, a stance that appeared to be part of the training of the attackers in Mumbai, security experts said.
The Sri Lankan team, including those who had been injured, arrived back in the capital, Colombo, on Wednesday morning. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.
President Zardari met with the army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, and Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani hours after the attack to discuss Pakistan’s security situation, according to a statement by the president’s office.
The senior official at the Interior Ministry, Rehman Malik, who is close to President Zardari, said: “We suspect a foreign hand behind this incident. The democracy of the country has been undermined, and foreigners are repeatedly attacked to harm the country’s image.”
American counterterrorism officials said that it was too early to determine which group was behind Tuesday’s attack, but that the Taliban and Lashkar-e-Taiba were possible suspects. One South Asia specialist also raised the possibility that Tamil Tiger rebels in Sri Lanka might have asked Lashkar-e-Taiba militants in Pakistan to attack the cricket team. If true, this would be an ominous sign of collaboration between regional terrorist groups.
American experts voiced concern that such attacks might be the new terrorist strike of choice instead of suicide bombings. “It’s likely there will be more of these kind of attacks, which are much more difficult to defend against,” said Juan Zarate, the White House’s top counterterrorism official under President George W. Bush. “Mumbai has become a terrorist exemplar.”
The attack, which began at 9 a.m. Tuesday, appeared to have been well planned. Because it occurred on the third day of the cricketers’ match, the assailants had time to carry out reconnaissance on the previous mornings.
The driver of the cricketers’ bus, Mohammad Khalil, described how a white car had swerved in front of the bus, forcing him to slow. Television images showed gunmen emerging from the large grassy traffic circle and shooting at the bus from crouched positions.
According to an account on a cricket Web site, cricinfo.com, the players ducked to the floor of the bus and shouted at the driver to speed ahead. Mr. Khalil drove through the gunshots and whisked them to the stadium.
Later, the Lahore police said they had found weapons stashes near the scene and at various points around the city, including 10 rifles, two rocket launchers, a 9-millimeter pistol and detonator cable.
Mr. Sherpao, the former interior minister, contended that it had been possible for the attack to take place because the top echelon of police officials in Lahore had been changed in the last few days.
The changes in police personnel had been ordered by the governor of Punjab, Salman Taseer, who is now overseeing the province by executive order at the behest of President Zardari, Mr. Sherpao said.
Mr. Sherpao alleged that the new team of police officials was more concerned with security at political rallies staged by Nawaz Sharif, the opposition leader. “The security team was marginalized,” Mr. Sherpao said.
Late Tuesday night, Mr. Taseer acknowledged that the top police officials had been changed, but the home secretary, responsible for security in the province, had remained in office.
The director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Robert S. Mueller III, is scheduled to visit Pakistan on Wednesday on a previously planned trip. The F.B.I. offered to help in the investigation in Lahore, but had been told by the Pakistani government that its help was not needed, a senior bureau official said.
The wounded cricketers received treatment at a Lahore hospital. Two players were treated for bullet wounds, a spokesman for the Sri Lankan High Commission said. The team flew home on Tuesday night.
The Sri Lankan team had been particularly welcomed because it had agreed to play in Pakistan after other major world teams had refused to come, citing Pakistan’s poor security. Last year, the Australian, British and South African cricket teams said they would not take part in the Champions Trophy, a major world cricket event scheduled in Pakistan.
After the Mumbai attack, the Indian team refused to come for matches planned in 2009.
The series with Sri Lanka represented a sort of coming out for Paksitani fans starved of first-class cricket at home.
Cricket is as important to the sports psyche in Pakistan as baseball is in the United States. The matches with Sri Lanka were the first international cricket contests in Pakistan in 14 months.
To persuade the Sri Lankans to visit, the Pakistanis offered presidential-style security, Pakistani television reported.
But to show that the Sri Lankan cricket team did not receive the security it had asked for, the Dawn television channel on Tuesday night showed the elaborate motorcades with bulletproof vehicles traveling at high speed with flashing lights used by senior Pakistani officials.
In contrast, the television report showed bullet holes in the windows of the cricketers’ bus.
Pakistan is scheduled to host the World Cup cricket tournament in 2011. “How do you expect a foreign team to come to Pakistan now?” said Wasim Akram, a former captain of the Pakistan cricket team.
Reporting was contributed by Waqar Gillani from Lahore, Somini Sengupta from New Delhi, Alan Cowell from Paris, and Sharon Otterman from New York.
*****
March 4, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
Lahore Murder Mystery
By ALI SETHI
Lahore, Pakistan
YESTERDAY afternoon, Ali Raza went to the hospital. A 25-year-old constable in the Punjab police department, Ali Raza was accompanying an old man who needed an M.R.I. scan. In the reception area, he noticed that the waiting patients had abandoned their chairs and were standing around the television. They had been watching the same images all day: a dozen unidentified gunmen, two wearing backpacks, firing at a van near the Liberty Market roundabout. The intended victims, the TV stations had reported, were members of the Sri Lankan national cricket team, in town here to play Pakistan. The dead: eight Pakistanis, including six of Ali Raza’s fellow police officers.
“Everyone at the hospital was saying the same thing,” Ali Raza told me later that night, as we stood in line at a brightly lighted stall selling paan — a mild stimulant made with betel nuts — near the Main Market roundabout, just a short walk away from the site of the attack. “They were saying that this was done to show the Indians that we in Pakistan are also the victims of terrorism.”
“You think our own government did it?” I asked.
“No one else could get away with this kind of thing,” he insisted.
He described the attackers’ feat: they appeared out of nowhere at one of the city’s busiest intersections and fired for more than 20 minutes at the van carrying the players to Qaddafi Stadium, and then fled in rickshaws.
“I know the kind of precautions we have to take when we are in a V.I.P. motorcade,” the young officer told me. “And this was a ‘V.V.I.P.’ motorcade. Every house in that neighborhood was surrounded by the police. My friend was there and he told me the attackers didn’t receive a single wound.”
A young man in a T-shirt who was standing next to us at the paan stall asked, “Was your friend hurt?”
Ali Raza said, “He is fine, by the grace of God.”
This kind of talk was not limited to paan stalls. There had been all sorts of opinions expressed on the privately owned TV channels, which now bring live video and commentary from the sites of terrorist attacks to much of Pakistan’s urban population. The governor of Punjab Province, who last week ousted the elected provincial government on the orders of President Asif Ali Zardari, was on camera immediately after the attack, and compared it to the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India, last November.
Others were more specific: a member of the opposition Pakistan Muslim League said he “had no doubt” that this was the work of the Indian intelligence agencies. A former head of Pakistan’s security service, the I.S.I., agreed with him. An analyst from Islamabad, discussing the attack later in the day on a popular chat show, said that “from every angle” it was evident that India, by attacking a foreign cricket team in Pakistan, had gained. “Who benefits?” she said. “You have to ask who benefits.”
Another guest on the show, an elderly sage in a dark blue suit and a bright blue tie, wearing spectacles and speaking with slow, slotting movements of his hand, said that the blaming of one country by another was always counterproductive because, in the end, it took the focus away from domestic troubles. He gave the example of Benazir Bhutto’s assassination, which had immediately led to conspiracy theories but was still awaiting a proper inquiry. “When there is confusion,” he said, “the only people who benefit are the miscreants.”
A former intelligence official I know had a different theory. He said he had seen a report some weeks ago warning of exactly this kind of attack in Lahore, possibly against a cricket team. He said it came from the rumor mill that “leads back to Waziristan” in Pakistan’s tribal areas. “So this is a security failure,” he said. “But it’s not an intelligence failure.”
Later at night it was reported that the government had found bags that held guns, hand grenades and almonds. This was followed by the televised funeral of one of the slain policemen. His female relatives were sitting around his corpse, wailing and beating their chests. His father, surrounded by cameras, was looking at the floor and saying that he was proud of his son for serving his country.
Again at the paan stall, now surrounded by listeners, I asked Ali Raza if he thought there was a chance that the attack was the work of terrorists or criminals. “There is a chance,” he admitted. “But it could be the agencies. It could be the government. It could be India also.”
I asked, “What about other people?”
“Which other people?”
I said, “The people who kidnap journalists and bomb the homes of politicians and slit the throats of government spies.”
He was thinking about it.
The man operating the paan stall was lining moistened betel leaves with spices and condiments. He had on a tattered apron, which is worn by men like him to keep the notoriously messy paan juice from staining their clothes. He smiled at us and said, “Whoever has done this has a lot of intelligence.” He paused. As he did, I looked over the crowd, and thought that for all our various theories, it was a point we could agree on. And then he finished, “For poor people, everything is the same.”
Ali Sethi is the author of the forthcoming novel “The Wish Maker.”
ASIA
There is a multimedia linked at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/13/world ... &th&emc=th
March 13, 2009
As Indian Growth Soars, Child Hunger Persists
By SOMINI SENGUPTA
NEW DELHI — Small, sick, listless children have long been India’s scourge — “a national shame,” in the words of its prime minister, Manmohan Singh. But even after a decade of galloping economic growth, child malnutrition rates are worse here than in many sub-Saharan African countries, and they stand out as a paradox in a proud democracy.
China, that other Asian economic powerhouse, sharply reduced child malnutrition, and now just 7 percent of its children under 5 are underweight, a critical gauge of malnutrition. In India, by contrast, despite robust growth and good government intentions, the comparable number is 42.5 percent. Malnutrition makes children more prone to illness and stunts physical and intellectual growth for a lifetime.
There are no simple explanations. Economists and public health experts say stubborn malnutrition rates point to a central failing in this democracy of the poor. Amartya Sen, the Nobel prize-winning economist, lamented that hunger was not enough of a political priority here. India’s public expenditure on health remains low, and in some places, financing for child nutrition programs remains unspent.
Yet several democracies have all but eradicated hunger. And ignoring the needs of the poor altogether does spell political peril in India, helping to topple parties in the last elections.
Others point to the efficiency of an authoritarian state like China. India’s sluggish and sometimes corrupt bureaucracy has only haltingly put in place relatively simple solutions — iodizing salt, for instance, or making sure all children are immunized against preventable diseases — to say nothing of its progress on the harder tasks, like changing what and how parents feed their children.
But as China itself has grown more prosperous, it has had its own struggles with health care, as the government safety net has shredded with its adoption of a more market-driven economy.
While India runs the largest child feeding program in the world, experts agree it is inadequately designed, and has made barely a dent in the ranks of sick children in the past 10 years.
The $1.3 billion Integrated Child Development Services program, India’s primary effort to combat malnutrition, finances a network of soup kitchens in urban slums and villages.
But most experts agree that providing adequate nutrition to pregnant women and children under 2 years old is crucial — and the Indian program has not homed in on them adequately. Nor has it succeeded in sufficiently changing child feeding and hygiene practices. Many women here remain in ill health and are ill fed; they are prone to giving birth to low-weight babies and tend not to be aware of how best to feed them.
A tour of Jahangirpuri, a slum in this richest of Indian cities, put the challenge on stark display. Shortly after daybreak, in a rented room along a narrow alley, an all-female crew prepared giant vats of savory rice and lentil porridge.
Purnima Menon, a public health researcher with the International Food Policy Research Institute, was relieved to see it was not just starch; there were even flecks of carrots thrown in. The porridge was loaded onto bicycle carts and ferried to nurseries that vet and help at-risk children and their mothers throughout the neighborhood.
So far, so good. Except that at one nursery — known in Hindi as an anganwadi — the teacher was a no-show. At another, there were no children; instead, a few adults sauntered up with their lunch pails. At a third, the nursery worker, Brij Bala, said that 13 children and 13 lactating mothers had already come to claim their servings, and that now she would have to fill the bowls of whoever came along, neighborhood aunties and all. “They say, ‘Give us some more,’ so we have to,” Ms. Bala confessed. “Otherwise, they will curse us.”
None of the centers had a working scale to weigh children and to identify the vulnerable ones, a crucial part of the nutrition program.
Most important from Ms. Menon’s point of view, the nurseries were largely missing the needs of those most at risk: children under 2, for whom the feeding centers offered a dry ration of flour and ground lentils, containing none of the micronutrients a vulnerable infant needs.
In a memorandum prepared in February, the Ministry of Women and Child Development acknowledged that while the program had yielded some gains in the past 30 years, “its impact on physical growth and development has been rather slow.” The report recommended fortifying food with micronutrients and educating parents on how to better feed their babies.
A World Food Program report last month noted that India remained home to more than a fourth of the world’s hungry, 230 million people in all. It also found anemia to be on the rise among rural women of childbearing age in eight states across India. Indian women are often the last to eat in their homes and often unlikely to eat well or rest during pregnancy. Ms. Menon’s institute, based in Washington, recently ranked India below two dozen sub-Saharan countries on its Global Hunger Index.
Childhood anemia, a barometer of poor nutrition in a lactating mother’s breast milk, is three times higher in India than in China, according to a 2007 research paper from the institute.
The latest Global Hunger Index described hunger in Madhya Pradesh, a destitute state in central India, as “extremely alarming,” ranking the state somewhere between Chad and Ethiopia.
More surprising, though, it found that “serious” rates of hunger persisted across Indian states that had posted enviable rates of economic growth in recent years, including Maharashtra and Gujarat.
Here in the capital, which has the highest per-capita income in the country, 42.2 percent of children under 5 are stunted, or too short for their age, and 26 percent are underweight. A few blocks from the Indian Parliament, tiny, ill-fed children turn somersaults for spare change at traffic signals.
Back in Jahangirpuri, a dead rat lay in the courtyard in front of Ms. Bala’s nursery. The narrow lanes were lined with scum from the drains. Malaria and respiratory illness, which can be crippling for weak, undernourished children, were rampant. Neighborhood shops carried small bags of potato chips and soda, evidence that its residents were far from destitute.
In another alley, Ms. Menon met a young mother named Jannu, a migrant from the northern town of Lucknow. Jannu said she found it difficult to produce enough milk for the baby in her arms, around 6 months old. His green, watery waste dripped down his mother’s arms. He often has diarrhea, Jannu said, casually rinsing her arm with a tumbler of water.
Ms. Menon could not help but notice how small Jannu was, like so many of Jahangirpuri’s mothers. At 5 feet 2 inches tall, Ms. Menon towered over them. Children who were roughly the same age as her own daughter were easily a foot shorter. Stunted children are so prevalent here, she observed, it makes malnutrition invisible.
“I see a system failing,” Ms. Menon said. “It is doing something, but it is not solving the problem.”
Hari Kumar contributed reporting.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/13/world ... &th&emc=th
March 13, 2009
As Indian Growth Soars, Child Hunger Persists
By SOMINI SENGUPTA
NEW DELHI — Small, sick, listless children have long been India’s scourge — “a national shame,” in the words of its prime minister, Manmohan Singh. But even after a decade of galloping economic growth, child malnutrition rates are worse here than in many sub-Saharan African countries, and they stand out as a paradox in a proud democracy.
China, that other Asian economic powerhouse, sharply reduced child malnutrition, and now just 7 percent of its children under 5 are underweight, a critical gauge of malnutrition. In India, by contrast, despite robust growth and good government intentions, the comparable number is 42.5 percent. Malnutrition makes children more prone to illness and stunts physical and intellectual growth for a lifetime.
There are no simple explanations. Economists and public health experts say stubborn malnutrition rates point to a central failing in this democracy of the poor. Amartya Sen, the Nobel prize-winning economist, lamented that hunger was not enough of a political priority here. India’s public expenditure on health remains low, and in some places, financing for child nutrition programs remains unspent.
Yet several democracies have all but eradicated hunger. And ignoring the needs of the poor altogether does spell political peril in India, helping to topple parties in the last elections.
Others point to the efficiency of an authoritarian state like China. India’s sluggish and sometimes corrupt bureaucracy has only haltingly put in place relatively simple solutions — iodizing salt, for instance, or making sure all children are immunized against preventable diseases — to say nothing of its progress on the harder tasks, like changing what and how parents feed their children.
But as China itself has grown more prosperous, it has had its own struggles with health care, as the government safety net has shredded with its adoption of a more market-driven economy.
While India runs the largest child feeding program in the world, experts agree it is inadequately designed, and has made barely a dent in the ranks of sick children in the past 10 years.
The $1.3 billion Integrated Child Development Services program, India’s primary effort to combat malnutrition, finances a network of soup kitchens in urban slums and villages.
But most experts agree that providing adequate nutrition to pregnant women and children under 2 years old is crucial — and the Indian program has not homed in on them adequately. Nor has it succeeded in sufficiently changing child feeding and hygiene practices. Many women here remain in ill health and are ill fed; they are prone to giving birth to low-weight babies and tend not to be aware of how best to feed them.
A tour of Jahangirpuri, a slum in this richest of Indian cities, put the challenge on stark display. Shortly after daybreak, in a rented room along a narrow alley, an all-female crew prepared giant vats of savory rice and lentil porridge.
Purnima Menon, a public health researcher with the International Food Policy Research Institute, was relieved to see it was not just starch; there were even flecks of carrots thrown in. The porridge was loaded onto bicycle carts and ferried to nurseries that vet and help at-risk children and their mothers throughout the neighborhood.
So far, so good. Except that at one nursery — known in Hindi as an anganwadi — the teacher was a no-show. At another, there were no children; instead, a few adults sauntered up with their lunch pails. At a third, the nursery worker, Brij Bala, said that 13 children and 13 lactating mothers had already come to claim their servings, and that now she would have to fill the bowls of whoever came along, neighborhood aunties and all. “They say, ‘Give us some more,’ so we have to,” Ms. Bala confessed. “Otherwise, they will curse us.”
None of the centers had a working scale to weigh children and to identify the vulnerable ones, a crucial part of the nutrition program.
Most important from Ms. Menon’s point of view, the nurseries were largely missing the needs of those most at risk: children under 2, for whom the feeding centers offered a dry ration of flour and ground lentils, containing none of the micronutrients a vulnerable infant needs.
In a memorandum prepared in February, the Ministry of Women and Child Development acknowledged that while the program had yielded some gains in the past 30 years, “its impact on physical growth and development has been rather slow.” The report recommended fortifying food with micronutrients and educating parents on how to better feed their babies.
A World Food Program report last month noted that India remained home to more than a fourth of the world’s hungry, 230 million people in all. It also found anemia to be on the rise among rural women of childbearing age in eight states across India. Indian women are often the last to eat in their homes and often unlikely to eat well or rest during pregnancy. Ms. Menon’s institute, based in Washington, recently ranked India below two dozen sub-Saharan countries on its Global Hunger Index.
Childhood anemia, a barometer of poor nutrition in a lactating mother’s breast milk, is three times higher in India than in China, according to a 2007 research paper from the institute.
The latest Global Hunger Index described hunger in Madhya Pradesh, a destitute state in central India, as “extremely alarming,” ranking the state somewhere between Chad and Ethiopia.
More surprising, though, it found that “serious” rates of hunger persisted across Indian states that had posted enviable rates of economic growth in recent years, including Maharashtra and Gujarat.
Here in the capital, which has the highest per-capita income in the country, 42.2 percent of children under 5 are stunted, or too short for their age, and 26 percent are underweight. A few blocks from the Indian Parliament, tiny, ill-fed children turn somersaults for spare change at traffic signals.
Back in Jahangirpuri, a dead rat lay in the courtyard in front of Ms. Bala’s nursery. The narrow lanes were lined with scum from the drains. Malaria and respiratory illness, which can be crippling for weak, undernourished children, were rampant. Neighborhood shops carried small bags of potato chips and soda, evidence that its residents were far from destitute.
In another alley, Ms. Menon met a young mother named Jannu, a migrant from the northern town of Lucknow. Jannu said she found it difficult to produce enough milk for the baby in her arms, around 6 months old. His green, watery waste dripped down his mother’s arms. He often has diarrhea, Jannu said, casually rinsing her arm with a tumbler of water.
Ms. Menon could not help but notice how small Jannu was, like so many of Jahangirpuri’s mothers. At 5 feet 2 inches tall, Ms. Menon towered over them. Children who were roughly the same age as her own daughter were easily a foot shorter. Stunted children are so prevalent here, she observed, it makes malnutrition invisible.
“I see a system failing,” Ms. Menon said. “It is doing something, but it is not solving the problem.”
Hari Kumar contributed reporting.
http://hinduonnet.com/fline/stories/200 ... 601600.htm
COVER STORY
Towards theocracy?
PERVEZ AMIRALI HOODBHOY
State and society in Pakistan today.
EMILIO MORENATTI/AP
Women in burqas and children from the Bajaur and Mohmand agency areas wait to be registered at a refugee camp near Peshawar in January. Today a full-scale war is being fought in FATA, Swat and other “wild” areas of Pakistan, with thousands dying and hundreds of thousands of displaced people streaming into cities and towns.
FOR 20 years or more, a few of us in Pakistan have been desperately sending out SOS messages, warning of terrible times to come. Nevertheless, none anticipated how quickly and accurately our dire predictions would come true. It is a small matter that the flames of terrorism set Mumbai on fire and, more recently, destroyed Pakistan’s cricketing future. A much more important and brutal fight lies ahead as Pakistan, a nation of 175 million, struggles for its very survival. The implications for the future of South Asia are enormous.
Today a full-scale war is being fought in FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Areas), Swat and other “wild” areas of Pakistan, with thousands dying and hundreds of thousands of IDPs (internally displaced people) streaming into cities and towns. In February 2009, with the writ of the Pakistani state in tatters, the government gave in to the demand of the TTP (Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, the Pakistani Taliban Movement) to implement the Islamic Sharia in Malakand, a region of FATA. It also announced the suspension of a military offensive in Swat, which has been almost totally taken over by the TTP. But the respite that it brought was short-lived and started breaking down only hours later.
The fighting is now inexorably migrating towards Peshawar where, fearing the Taliban, video shop owners have shut shop, banners have been placed in bazaars declaring them closed for women, musicians are out of business, and kidnapping for ransom is the best business in town. Islamabad has already seen Lal Masjid and the Marriot bombing, and has had its police personnel repeatedly blown up by suicide bombers. Today, its barricaded streets give a picture of a city under siege. In Karachi, the Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM), an ethnic but secular party well known for strong-arm tactics, has issued a call for arms to prevent the Taliban from making further inroads into the city. Lahore once appeared relatively safe and different but, after the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team, has rejoined Pakistan.
The suicide bomber and the masked abductor have crippled Pakistan’s urban life and shattered its national economy. Soldiers, policemen, factory and hospital workers, mourners at funerals, and ordinary people praying in mosques have been reduced to hideous masses of flesh and fragments of bones. The bearded ones, many operating out of madrassas, are hitting targets across the country. Although a substantial part of the Pakistani public insists upon lionising them as “standing up to the Americans”, they are neither seeking to evict a foreign occupier nor fighting for a homeland. They want nothing less than to seize power and to turn Pakistan into their version of the ideal Islamic state. In their incoherent, ill-formed vision, this would include restoring the caliphate as well as doing away with all forms of western influence and elements of modernity. The AK-47 and the Internet, of course, would stay.
But, perhaps paradoxically, in spite of the fact that the dead bodies and shattered lives are almost all Muslim ones, few Pakistanis speak out against these atrocities. Nor do they approve of military action against the cruel perpetrators, choosing to believe that they are fighting for Islam and against an imagined American occupation. Political leaders like Qazi Husain Ahmed and Imran Khan have no words of kindness for those who have suffered from Islamic extremists. Their tears are reserved for the victims of predator drones, whether innocent or otherwise. By definition, for them terrorism is an act that only Americans can commit.
Why the Denial?
To understand Pakistan’s collective masochism, one needs to study the drastic social and cultural transformations that have made this country so utterly different from what it was in earlier times. For three decades, deep tectonic forces have been silently tearing Pakistan away from the Indian subcontinent and driving it towards the Arabian peninsula.
This continental drift is not physical but cultural, driven by a belief that Pakistan must exchange its South Asian identity for an Arab-Muslim one. Grain by grain, the desert sands of Saudi Arabia are replacing the rich soil that had nurtured a rich Muslim culture in India for a thousand years. This culture produced Mughal architecture, the Taj Mahal, the poetry of Asadullah Ghalib, and much more. Now a stern, unyielding version of Islam – Wahabism – is replacing the kinder, gentler Islam of the sufis and saints who had walked on this land for hundreds of years.
This change is by design. Twenty-five years ago, under the approving gaze of Ronald Reagan’s America, the Pakistani state pushed Islam on to its people. Prayers in government departments were deemed compulsory, floggings were carried out publicly, punishments were meted out to those who did not fast in Ramadan, selection for university academic posts required that the candidate demonstrate knowledge of Islamic teachings, and jehad was declared essential for every Muslim.
Villages have changed drastically, driven in part by Pakistani workers returning from Arab countries. Many village mosques are now giant madrassas that propagate hard-line Salafi and Deobandi beliefs through oversized loudspeakers. They are bitterly opposed to Barelvis, Shias and other Muslims, who they do not consider to be proper Muslims. Punjabis, who were far more liberal towards women than Pashtuns, are now also beginning to take a line resembling the Taliban. Hanafi law has begun to prevail over tradition and civil law, as is evident from recent decisions in the Lahore High Court.
K.M. CHAUDHRY/AP
Pakistan’s Ministry of Education estimates that 1.5 million students are getting religious education in 13,000 madrassas. These figures could be quite off the mark. Commonly quoted figures range between 18,000 and 22,000 such schools. Here, students at the Jamia Manzoorul Islam, a madrassa in Lahore.
In the Pakistani lower-middle and middle-middle classes lurks a grim and humourless Saudi-inspired revivalist movement which frowns on every expression of joy and pleasurable pastime. Lacking any positive connection to history, culture and knowledge, it seeks to eliminate “corruption” by regulating cultural life and seizing control of the education system.
“Classical music is on its last legs in Pakistan; the sarangi and vichtarveena are completely dead,” laments Mohammad Shehzad, a music aficionado. Indeed, teaching music in public universities is violently opposed by students of the Islami Jamaat-e-Talaba at Punjab University. Religious fundamentalists consider music haram. Kathak dancing, once popular with the Muslim elite of India, has no teachers left. Pakistan produces no feature films of any consequence.
As a part of General Zia-ul-Haq’s cultural offensive, Hindi words were expunged from daily use and replaced with heavy-sounding Arabic ones. Persian, the language of Mughal India, had once been taught as a second or third language in many Pakistani schools. But, because of its association with Shiite Iran, it too was dropped and replaced with Arabic. The morphing of the traditional “khuda hafiz” (Persian for “God be with you”) into “allah hafiz” (Arabic for “God be with you”) took two decades to complete. The Arab import sounded odd and contrived, but ultimately the Arabic God won and the Persian God lost.
Genesis of Jehad
One can squarely place the genesis of religious militancy in Pakistan to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 and the subsequent efforts of the U.S.-Pakistan-Saudi grand alliance to create and support the Great Global Jehad of the 20th century. A toxic mix of imperial might, religious fundamentalism, and local interests ultimately defeated the Soviets. But the network of Islamic militant organisations did not disappear after it achieved success. By now the Pakistani Army establishment had realised the power of jehad as an instrument of foreign policy, and so the network grew from strength to strength.
The amazing success of the state is now turning out to be its own undoing. Today the Pakistan Army and establishment are under attack from religious militants, and rival Islamic groups battle each other with heavy weapons. Ironically, the same Army – whose men were recruited under the banner of jehad, and which saw itself as the fighting arm of Islam – today stands accused of betrayal and is almost daily targeted by Islamist suicide bombers. Over 1,800 soldiers have died as of February 2009 in encounters with religious militants, and many have been tortured before decapitation. Nevertheless, the Army is still ambivalent in its relationship with the jehadists and largely focusses upon India.
Education or Indoctrination?
Similar sentiments exist in a large part of the Pakistani public media. The commonly expressed view is that Islamic radicalism is a problem only in FATA and that madrassas are the only jehad factories around. This could not be more wrong. Extremism is breeding at a ferocious rate in public and private schools within Pakistan’s towns and cities. Left unchallenged, this kind of education will produce a generation incapable of living together with any except strictly their own kind. Pakistan’s education system demands that Islam be understood as a complete code of life, and creates in the mind of the schoolchild a sense of siege and constant embattlement by stressing that Islam is under threat everywhere.
The government-approved curriculum, prepared by the Curriculum Wing of the Federal Ministry of Education, is the basic road map for transmitting values and knowledge to the young. By an Act of Parliament, passed in 1976, all government and private schools (except for O-level schools) are required to follow this curriculum. It is a blueprint for a religious fascist state.
The masthead of an illustrated primer for the Urdu alphabet states that it has been prepared by Iqra Publishers, Rawalpindi, along “Islamic lines”. Although not an officially approved textbook, it has been used for many years by some regular schools, as well as madrassas, associated with the Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Islam (JUI), an Islamic political party that had allied itself with General Pervez Musharraf.
The world of the Pakistani schoolchild was largely unchanged even after September 11, 2001, which led to Pakistan’s timely desertion of the Taliban and the slackening of the Kashmir jehad. Indeed, for all his hypocritical talk of “enlightened moderation”, Musharraf’s educational curriculum was far from enlightening. It was a slightly toned-down copy of that under Nawaz Sharif which, in turn, was identical to that under Benazir Bhutto, who inherited it from Zia-ul-Haq.
Fearful of taking on powerful religious forces, every incumbent government refused to take a position on the curriculum and thus quietly allowed young minds to be moulded by fanatics. What might happen a generation later has always been a secondary matter for a government challenged on so many sides.
The promotion of militarism in Pakistan’s so-called “secular” public schools, colleges and universities had a profound effect upon young minds. Militant jehad became part of the culture on college and university campuses. Armed groups flourished, invited students for jehad in Kashmir and Afghanistan, set up offices throughout the country, collected funds at Friday prayers, and declared a war without borders. Pre-9/11, my university was ablaze with posters inviting students to participate in the Kashmir jehad. After 2001, this slipped below the surface.
For all his hypocritical talk of “enlightened moderation”, General Pervez Musharraf’s educational curriculum was far from enlightening. It was a slightly toned-down copy of that under Nawaz Sharif which, in turn, was identical to that under Benazir Bhutto, who inherited it from Zia-ul-Haq. (From left) Zia-ul-Haq, Benazir Bhutto, Nawaz Sharif and Musharraf.
The madrassas
The primary vehicle for Saudi-ising Pakistan’s education has been the madrassa. In earlier times, these had turned out the occasional Islamic scholar, using a curriculum that essentially dates from the 11th century with only minor subsequent revisions. But their principal function had been to produce imams and muezzins for mosques, and those who eked out an existence as “moulvi sahibs” teaching children to read the Quran.
The Afghan jehad changed everything. During the war against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, madrassas provided the U.S.-Saudi-Pakistani alliance the cannon fodder needed for fighting a holy war. The Americans and the Saudis, helped by a more-than-willing General Zia, funded new madrassas across the length and breadth of Pakistan.
A detailed picture of the current situation is not available. But, according to the national education census, which the Ministry of Education released in 2006, Punjab has 5,459 madrassas followed by the North West Frontier Province (NWFP) with 2,843; Sindh 1,935; Federally Administrated Northern Areas (FANA) 1,193; Balochistan 769; Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) 586; FATA 135; and Islamabad capital territory 77. The Ministry estimates that 1.5 million students are getting religious education in the 13,000 madrassas.
These figures could be quite off the mark. Commonly quoted figures range between 18,000 and 22,000 madrassas. The number of students could be correspondingly larger. The free room, board and supplies to students, form a key part of their appeal. But the desire of parents across the country is for children to be “disciplined” and to be given a thorough Islamic education. This is also a major contributing factor.
Madrassas have deeply impacted upon the urban environment. For example, until a few years ago, Islamabad was a quiet, orderly, modern city different from all others in Pakistan. Still earlier, it had been largely the abode of Pakistan’s hyper-elite and foreign diplomats. But the rapid transformation of its demography brought with it hundreds of mosques with multi-barrelled audio-cannons mounted on minarets, as well as scores of madrassas illegally constructed in what used to be public parks and green areas. Now, tens of thousands of their students with little prayer caps dutifully chant the Quran all day. In the evenings they swarm around the city, making bare-faced women increasingly nervous.
Women – the Lesser Species
Total separation of the sexes is a central goal of the Islamists. Two decades ago the fully veiled student was a rarity on Pakistani university and college campuses. The abaya was an unknown word in Urdu; it is a foreign import. But today, some shops in Islamabad specialise in abaya. At colleges and universities across Pakistan, female students are seeking the anonymity of the burqa. Such students outnumber their sisters who still dare show their faces.
While social conservatism does not necessarily lead to violent extremism, it does shorten the path. Those with beards and burqas are more easily convinced that Muslims are being demonised by the rest of the world. The real problem, they say, is the plight of the Palestinians, the decadent and discriminatory West, the Jews, the Christians, the Hindus, the Kashmir issue, the Bush doctrine, and so on. They vehemently deny that those committing terrorist acts are Muslims or, if faced by incontrovertible evidence, say it is a mere reaction to oppression. Faced with the embarrassment that 200 schools for girls were blown up in Swat by Fazlullah’s militants, they wriggle out by saying that some schools were housing the Pakistan Army, who should be targeted anyway.
ABDUL REHMAN/REUTERS
This high school at Qambar in the Swat valley was among the 200 schools for girls destroyed by the Swat Taliban led by Mullah Fazlullah.
The Prognosis
The immediate future is not hopeful: increasing numbers of mullahs are creating cults around themselves and seizing control over the minds of worshippers. In the tribal areas, a string of new Islamist leaders have suddenly emerged: Sufi Mohammad, Baitullah Mehsud, Fazlullah, Mangal Bagh…. The enabling environment of poverty, deprivation, lack of justice, and extreme differences of wealth is perfect for these demagogues. Their gruesome acts of terror and public beheadings are still being perceived by large numbers of Pakistanis as part of the fight against imperialist America and, sometimes, India as well. This could not be more wrong.
The jehadists have longer-range goals. A couple of years ago, a Karachi-based monthly magazine ran a cover story on the terrorism in Kashmir. One fighter was asked what he would do if a political resolution were found for the disputed valley. Revealingly, he replied that he would not lay down his gun but turn it on the Pakistani leadership, with the aim of installing an Islamic government there.
Over the next year or two, we are likely to see more short-lived “peace accords”, as in Malakand, Swat and, earlier on, in Shakai. In my opinion, these are exercises in futility. Until the Pakistan Army finally realises that Mr. Frankenstein needs to be eliminated rather than be engaged in negotiations, it will continue to soft-pedal on counter-insurgency. It will also continue to develop and demand from the U.S. high-tech weapons that are not the slightest use against insurgents. There are some indications that some realisation of the internal threat is dawning, but the speed is as yet glacial.
Even if Mumbai-II occurs, India’s options in dealing with nuclear Pakistan are severely limited. Cross-border strikes should be dismissed from the realm of possibilities. They could lead to escalations that neither government would have control over. I am convinced that India’s prosperity – and perhaps its physical survival – demands that Pakistan stays together. Pakistan could disintegrate into a hell, where different parts are run by different warlords. Paradoxically perhaps, India’s most effective defence could be the Pakistan Army, torn and fractured though it may be. To convert a former enemy army into a possible ally will require that India change tack.
To create a future working alliance with the struggling Pakistani state, and in deference to basic democratic principles, India must be seen as genuinely working towards some kind of resolution of the Kashmir issue. It must not deny that the majority of Kashmiri Muslims are deeply alienated from the Indian state and that they desperately seek balm for their wounds. Else the forces of cross-border jehad, and its hate-filled holy warriors, will continue to receive unnecessary succour.
I shall end this rather grim essay on an optimistic note: the forces of irrationality will surely cancel themselves out because they act in random directions, whereas reason pulls in only one. History leads us to believe that reason will triumph over unreason, and humans will continue their evolution towards a higher and better species. Ultimately, it will not matter whether we are Pakistanis, Indians, Kashmiris, or whatever. Using ways that we cannot currently anticipate, people will somehow overcome their primal impulses of territoriality, tribalism, religion and nationalism. But for now this must be just a hypothesis.
Pervez Amirali Hoodbhoy is Professor and Chairman of the Physics Department at Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad.
COVER STORY
Towards theocracy?
PERVEZ AMIRALI HOODBHOY
State and society in Pakistan today.
EMILIO MORENATTI/AP
Women in burqas and children from the Bajaur and Mohmand agency areas wait to be registered at a refugee camp near Peshawar in January. Today a full-scale war is being fought in FATA, Swat and other “wild” areas of Pakistan, with thousands dying and hundreds of thousands of displaced people streaming into cities and towns.
FOR 20 years or more, a few of us in Pakistan have been desperately sending out SOS messages, warning of terrible times to come. Nevertheless, none anticipated how quickly and accurately our dire predictions would come true. It is a small matter that the flames of terrorism set Mumbai on fire and, more recently, destroyed Pakistan’s cricketing future. A much more important and brutal fight lies ahead as Pakistan, a nation of 175 million, struggles for its very survival. The implications for the future of South Asia are enormous.
Today a full-scale war is being fought in FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Areas), Swat and other “wild” areas of Pakistan, with thousands dying and hundreds of thousands of IDPs (internally displaced people) streaming into cities and towns. In February 2009, with the writ of the Pakistani state in tatters, the government gave in to the demand of the TTP (Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, the Pakistani Taliban Movement) to implement the Islamic Sharia in Malakand, a region of FATA. It also announced the suspension of a military offensive in Swat, which has been almost totally taken over by the TTP. But the respite that it brought was short-lived and started breaking down only hours later.
The fighting is now inexorably migrating towards Peshawar where, fearing the Taliban, video shop owners have shut shop, banners have been placed in bazaars declaring them closed for women, musicians are out of business, and kidnapping for ransom is the best business in town. Islamabad has already seen Lal Masjid and the Marriot bombing, and has had its police personnel repeatedly blown up by suicide bombers. Today, its barricaded streets give a picture of a city under siege. In Karachi, the Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM), an ethnic but secular party well known for strong-arm tactics, has issued a call for arms to prevent the Taliban from making further inroads into the city. Lahore once appeared relatively safe and different but, after the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team, has rejoined Pakistan.
The suicide bomber and the masked abductor have crippled Pakistan’s urban life and shattered its national economy. Soldiers, policemen, factory and hospital workers, mourners at funerals, and ordinary people praying in mosques have been reduced to hideous masses of flesh and fragments of bones. The bearded ones, many operating out of madrassas, are hitting targets across the country. Although a substantial part of the Pakistani public insists upon lionising them as “standing up to the Americans”, they are neither seeking to evict a foreign occupier nor fighting for a homeland. They want nothing less than to seize power and to turn Pakistan into their version of the ideal Islamic state. In their incoherent, ill-formed vision, this would include restoring the caliphate as well as doing away with all forms of western influence and elements of modernity. The AK-47 and the Internet, of course, would stay.
But, perhaps paradoxically, in spite of the fact that the dead bodies and shattered lives are almost all Muslim ones, few Pakistanis speak out against these atrocities. Nor do they approve of military action against the cruel perpetrators, choosing to believe that they are fighting for Islam and against an imagined American occupation. Political leaders like Qazi Husain Ahmed and Imran Khan have no words of kindness for those who have suffered from Islamic extremists. Their tears are reserved for the victims of predator drones, whether innocent or otherwise. By definition, for them terrorism is an act that only Americans can commit.
Why the Denial?
To understand Pakistan’s collective masochism, one needs to study the drastic social and cultural transformations that have made this country so utterly different from what it was in earlier times. For three decades, deep tectonic forces have been silently tearing Pakistan away from the Indian subcontinent and driving it towards the Arabian peninsula.
This continental drift is not physical but cultural, driven by a belief that Pakistan must exchange its South Asian identity for an Arab-Muslim one. Grain by grain, the desert sands of Saudi Arabia are replacing the rich soil that had nurtured a rich Muslim culture in India for a thousand years. This culture produced Mughal architecture, the Taj Mahal, the poetry of Asadullah Ghalib, and much more. Now a stern, unyielding version of Islam – Wahabism – is replacing the kinder, gentler Islam of the sufis and saints who had walked on this land for hundreds of years.
This change is by design. Twenty-five years ago, under the approving gaze of Ronald Reagan’s America, the Pakistani state pushed Islam on to its people. Prayers in government departments were deemed compulsory, floggings were carried out publicly, punishments were meted out to those who did not fast in Ramadan, selection for university academic posts required that the candidate demonstrate knowledge of Islamic teachings, and jehad was declared essential for every Muslim.
Villages have changed drastically, driven in part by Pakistani workers returning from Arab countries. Many village mosques are now giant madrassas that propagate hard-line Salafi and Deobandi beliefs through oversized loudspeakers. They are bitterly opposed to Barelvis, Shias and other Muslims, who they do not consider to be proper Muslims. Punjabis, who were far more liberal towards women than Pashtuns, are now also beginning to take a line resembling the Taliban. Hanafi law has begun to prevail over tradition and civil law, as is evident from recent decisions in the Lahore High Court.
K.M. CHAUDHRY/AP
Pakistan’s Ministry of Education estimates that 1.5 million students are getting religious education in 13,000 madrassas. These figures could be quite off the mark. Commonly quoted figures range between 18,000 and 22,000 such schools. Here, students at the Jamia Manzoorul Islam, a madrassa in Lahore.
In the Pakistani lower-middle and middle-middle classes lurks a grim and humourless Saudi-inspired revivalist movement which frowns on every expression of joy and pleasurable pastime. Lacking any positive connection to history, culture and knowledge, it seeks to eliminate “corruption” by regulating cultural life and seizing control of the education system.
“Classical music is on its last legs in Pakistan; the sarangi and vichtarveena are completely dead,” laments Mohammad Shehzad, a music aficionado. Indeed, teaching music in public universities is violently opposed by students of the Islami Jamaat-e-Talaba at Punjab University. Religious fundamentalists consider music haram. Kathak dancing, once popular with the Muslim elite of India, has no teachers left. Pakistan produces no feature films of any consequence.
As a part of General Zia-ul-Haq’s cultural offensive, Hindi words were expunged from daily use and replaced with heavy-sounding Arabic ones. Persian, the language of Mughal India, had once been taught as a second or third language in many Pakistani schools. But, because of its association with Shiite Iran, it too was dropped and replaced with Arabic. The morphing of the traditional “khuda hafiz” (Persian for “God be with you”) into “allah hafiz” (Arabic for “God be with you”) took two decades to complete. The Arab import sounded odd and contrived, but ultimately the Arabic God won and the Persian God lost.
Genesis of Jehad
One can squarely place the genesis of religious militancy in Pakistan to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 and the subsequent efforts of the U.S.-Pakistan-Saudi grand alliance to create and support the Great Global Jehad of the 20th century. A toxic mix of imperial might, religious fundamentalism, and local interests ultimately defeated the Soviets. But the network of Islamic militant organisations did not disappear after it achieved success. By now the Pakistani Army establishment had realised the power of jehad as an instrument of foreign policy, and so the network grew from strength to strength.
The amazing success of the state is now turning out to be its own undoing. Today the Pakistan Army and establishment are under attack from religious militants, and rival Islamic groups battle each other with heavy weapons. Ironically, the same Army – whose men were recruited under the banner of jehad, and which saw itself as the fighting arm of Islam – today stands accused of betrayal and is almost daily targeted by Islamist suicide bombers. Over 1,800 soldiers have died as of February 2009 in encounters with religious militants, and many have been tortured before decapitation. Nevertheless, the Army is still ambivalent in its relationship with the jehadists and largely focusses upon India.
Education or Indoctrination?
Similar sentiments exist in a large part of the Pakistani public media. The commonly expressed view is that Islamic radicalism is a problem only in FATA and that madrassas are the only jehad factories around. This could not be more wrong. Extremism is breeding at a ferocious rate in public and private schools within Pakistan’s towns and cities. Left unchallenged, this kind of education will produce a generation incapable of living together with any except strictly their own kind. Pakistan’s education system demands that Islam be understood as a complete code of life, and creates in the mind of the schoolchild a sense of siege and constant embattlement by stressing that Islam is under threat everywhere.
The government-approved curriculum, prepared by the Curriculum Wing of the Federal Ministry of Education, is the basic road map for transmitting values and knowledge to the young. By an Act of Parliament, passed in 1976, all government and private schools (except for O-level schools) are required to follow this curriculum. It is a blueprint for a religious fascist state.
The masthead of an illustrated primer for the Urdu alphabet states that it has been prepared by Iqra Publishers, Rawalpindi, along “Islamic lines”. Although not an officially approved textbook, it has been used for many years by some regular schools, as well as madrassas, associated with the Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Islam (JUI), an Islamic political party that had allied itself with General Pervez Musharraf.
The world of the Pakistani schoolchild was largely unchanged even after September 11, 2001, which led to Pakistan’s timely desertion of the Taliban and the slackening of the Kashmir jehad. Indeed, for all his hypocritical talk of “enlightened moderation”, Musharraf’s educational curriculum was far from enlightening. It was a slightly toned-down copy of that under Nawaz Sharif which, in turn, was identical to that under Benazir Bhutto, who inherited it from Zia-ul-Haq.
Fearful of taking on powerful religious forces, every incumbent government refused to take a position on the curriculum and thus quietly allowed young minds to be moulded by fanatics. What might happen a generation later has always been a secondary matter for a government challenged on so many sides.
The promotion of militarism in Pakistan’s so-called “secular” public schools, colleges and universities had a profound effect upon young minds. Militant jehad became part of the culture on college and university campuses. Armed groups flourished, invited students for jehad in Kashmir and Afghanistan, set up offices throughout the country, collected funds at Friday prayers, and declared a war without borders. Pre-9/11, my university was ablaze with posters inviting students to participate in the Kashmir jehad. After 2001, this slipped below the surface.
For all his hypocritical talk of “enlightened moderation”, General Pervez Musharraf’s educational curriculum was far from enlightening. It was a slightly toned-down copy of that under Nawaz Sharif which, in turn, was identical to that under Benazir Bhutto, who inherited it from Zia-ul-Haq. (From left) Zia-ul-Haq, Benazir Bhutto, Nawaz Sharif and Musharraf.
The madrassas
The primary vehicle for Saudi-ising Pakistan’s education has been the madrassa. In earlier times, these had turned out the occasional Islamic scholar, using a curriculum that essentially dates from the 11th century with only minor subsequent revisions. But their principal function had been to produce imams and muezzins for mosques, and those who eked out an existence as “moulvi sahibs” teaching children to read the Quran.
The Afghan jehad changed everything. During the war against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, madrassas provided the U.S.-Saudi-Pakistani alliance the cannon fodder needed for fighting a holy war. The Americans and the Saudis, helped by a more-than-willing General Zia, funded new madrassas across the length and breadth of Pakistan.
A detailed picture of the current situation is not available. But, according to the national education census, which the Ministry of Education released in 2006, Punjab has 5,459 madrassas followed by the North West Frontier Province (NWFP) with 2,843; Sindh 1,935; Federally Administrated Northern Areas (FANA) 1,193; Balochistan 769; Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) 586; FATA 135; and Islamabad capital territory 77. The Ministry estimates that 1.5 million students are getting religious education in the 13,000 madrassas.
These figures could be quite off the mark. Commonly quoted figures range between 18,000 and 22,000 madrassas. The number of students could be correspondingly larger. The free room, board and supplies to students, form a key part of their appeal. But the desire of parents across the country is for children to be “disciplined” and to be given a thorough Islamic education. This is also a major contributing factor.
Madrassas have deeply impacted upon the urban environment. For example, until a few years ago, Islamabad was a quiet, orderly, modern city different from all others in Pakistan. Still earlier, it had been largely the abode of Pakistan’s hyper-elite and foreign diplomats. But the rapid transformation of its demography brought with it hundreds of mosques with multi-barrelled audio-cannons mounted on minarets, as well as scores of madrassas illegally constructed in what used to be public parks and green areas. Now, tens of thousands of their students with little prayer caps dutifully chant the Quran all day. In the evenings they swarm around the city, making bare-faced women increasingly nervous.
Women – the Lesser Species
Total separation of the sexes is a central goal of the Islamists. Two decades ago the fully veiled student was a rarity on Pakistani university and college campuses. The abaya was an unknown word in Urdu; it is a foreign import. But today, some shops in Islamabad specialise in abaya. At colleges and universities across Pakistan, female students are seeking the anonymity of the burqa. Such students outnumber their sisters who still dare show their faces.
While social conservatism does not necessarily lead to violent extremism, it does shorten the path. Those with beards and burqas are more easily convinced that Muslims are being demonised by the rest of the world. The real problem, they say, is the plight of the Palestinians, the decadent and discriminatory West, the Jews, the Christians, the Hindus, the Kashmir issue, the Bush doctrine, and so on. They vehemently deny that those committing terrorist acts are Muslims or, if faced by incontrovertible evidence, say it is a mere reaction to oppression. Faced with the embarrassment that 200 schools for girls were blown up in Swat by Fazlullah’s militants, they wriggle out by saying that some schools were housing the Pakistan Army, who should be targeted anyway.
ABDUL REHMAN/REUTERS
This high school at Qambar in the Swat valley was among the 200 schools for girls destroyed by the Swat Taliban led by Mullah Fazlullah.
The Prognosis
The immediate future is not hopeful: increasing numbers of mullahs are creating cults around themselves and seizing control over the minds of worshippers. In the tribal areas, a string of new Islamist leaders have suddenly emerged: Sufi Mohammad, Baitullah Mehsud, Fazlullah, Mangal Bagh…. The enabling environment of poverty, deprivation, lack of justice, and extreme differences of wealth is perfect for these demagogues. Their gruesome acts of terror and public beheadings are still being perceived by large numbers of Pakistanis as part of the fight against imperialist America and, sometimes, India as well. This could not be more wrong.
The jehadists have longer-range goals. A couple of years ago, a Karachi-based monthly magazine ran a cover story on the terrorism in Kashmir. One fighter was asked what he would do if a political resolution were found for the disputed valley. Revealingly, he replied that he would not lay down his gun but turn it on the Pakistani leadership, with the aim of installing an Islamic government there.
Over the next year or two, we are likely to see more short-lived “peace accords”, as in Malakand, Swat and, earlier on, in Shakai. In my opinion, these are exercises in futility. Until the Pakistan Army finally realises that Mr. Frankenstein needs to be eliminated rather than be engaged in negotiations, it will continue to soft-pedal on counter-insurgency. It will also continue to develop and demand from the U.S. high-tech weapons that are not the slightest use against insurgents. There are some indications that some realisation of the internal threat is dawning, but the speed is as yet glacial.
Even if Mumbai-II occurs, India’s options in dealing with nuclear Pakistan are severely limited. Cross-border strikes should be dismissed from the realm of possibilities. They could lead to escalations that neither government would have control over. I am convinced that India’s prosperity – and perhaps its physical survival – demands that Pakistan stays together. Pakistan could disintegrate into a hell, where different parts are run by different warlords. Paradoxically perhaps, India’s most effective defence could be the Pakistan Army, torn and fractured though it may be. To convert a former enemy army into a possible ally will require that India change tack.
To create a future working alliance with the struggling Pakistani state, and in deference to basic democratic principles, India must be seen as genuinely working towards some kind of resolution of the Kashmir issue. It must not deny that the majority of Kashmiri Muslims are deeply alienated from the Indian state and that they desperately seek balm for their wounds. Else the forces of cross-border jehad, and its hate-filled holy warriors, will continue to receive unnecessary succour.
I shall end this rather grim essay on an optimistic note: the forces of irrationality will surely cancel themselves out because they act in random directions, whereas reason pulls in only one. History leads us to believe that reason will triumph over unreason, and humans will continue their evolution towards a higher and better species. Ultimately, it will not matter whether we are Pakistanis, Indians, Kashmiris, or whatever. Using ways that we cannot currently anticipate, people will somehow overcome their primal impulses of territoriality, tribalism, religion and nationalism. But for now this must be just a hypothesis.
Pervez Amirali Hoodbhoy is Professor and Chairman of the Physics Department at Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad.
March 14, 2009
Bangladeshi Premier Faces a Grim Crucible
By SOMINI SENGUPTA
DHAKA, Bangladesh — Sheikh Hasina survived when gunmen executed her father and extended family late one summer night in 1975. She survived again when assassins hurled 13 grenades at her political rally in 2004, killing two dozen people.
Today, about two months into her tenure as prime minister of this fractious, poor and coup-prone country, she confronts her greatest crucible yet: an unusually savage mutiny by border guards last month that left soldiers buried in mass graves and widened the gulf between her fragile administration and the military.
Altogether, 74 people were killed, mostly army officers in command of the border force.
Two separate investigations are under way to identify those responsible: one by the army, another by Mrs. Hasina’s government. Whether either will yield credible results is unknown. Mrs. Hasina’s fate and the stability of the country depend on the outcome.
In an interview this week, Mrs. Hasina called the mutiny “a big conspiracy” against her agenda to establish a secular democracy in this Muslim-majority nation of 150 million. She struck a note of defiant resolve.
More....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/14/world ... &th&emc=th
Bangladeshi Premier Faces a Grim Crucible
By SOMINI SENGUPTA
DHAKA, Bangladesh — Sheikh Hasina survived when gunmen executed her father and extended family late one summer night in 1975. She survived again when assassins hurled 13 grenades at her political rally in 2004, killing two dozen people.
Today, about two months into her tenure as prime minister of this fractious, poor and coup-prone country, she confronts her greatest crucible yet: an unusually savage mutiny by border guards last month that left soldiers buried in mass graves and widened the gulf between her fragile administration and the military.
Altogether, 74 people were killed, mostly army officers in command of the border force.
Two separate investigations are under way to identify those responsible: one by the army, another by Mrs. Hasina’s government. Whether either will yield credible results is unknown. Mrs. Hasina’s fate and the stability of the country depend on the outcome.
In an interview this week, Mrs. Hasina called the mutiny “a big conspiracy” against her agenda to establish a secular democracy in this Muslim-majority nation of 150 million. She struck a note of defiant resolve.
More....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/14/world ... &th&emc=th
March 17, 2009
Editorial
Pakistan’s Quick Fix
Pakistan’s president, Asif Ali Zardari, made the right choice on Monday in agreeing to reinstate the independent-minded former Supreme Court justice, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry. Unfortunately, it took huge street protests and the threat of chaos to persuade him to do the right thing. Mr. Zardari will have to do a lot more to calm the political turmoil and confront the extremists who threaten Pakistan’s survival.
Mr. Zardari made a major concession in agreeing to Mr. Chaudhry’s return and is weaker as a result. Nawaz Sharif, the opposition leader, was already the country’s most popular politician, and he gained even more by championing the cause of the chief justice, who was ousted by Pervez Musharraf, the former president.
Mr. Zardari and Mr. Sharif led a coalition government after Mr. Musharraf was pushed out last year but broke up ostensibly over the Chaudhry issue. With that resolved, they should try again to put aside their corrosive rivalry and work to combat the Taliban and Al Qaeda and address Pakistan’s many other urgent problems.
We are relieved that the protests led by Mr. Sharif and a vigorous lawyers’ movement ended without significant bloodshed. Pakistanis successfully demanding change from their leaders is an unpredictable new factor in the country’s politics.
Yet the process was flawed. It was unsettling to watch police officers in Lahore, Mr. Sharif’s power base, allow Mr. Sharif to escape house arrest. Pakistan’s coup-prone Army did not try to seize power. Instead, the chief of staff prodded Mr. Zardari and Mr. Sharif to compromise. That is certainly an improvement over the past. But it is also a reminder of the weakness of Pakistan’s democratic institutions.
One of the biggest questions is how Mr. Chaudhry, now a national symbol of democracy and the rule of law, will use his influence and his restored powers. Mr. Zardari supposedly opposed his return out of fear that the jurist would revive a corruption charge against him. We hope Mr. Chaudhry opts to advance the cause of impartial justice, not political retribution. Pakistan’s leaders have walked the country back from the brink. They must go much further before it reaches solid ground.
****
March 17, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
Touting Religion, Grabbing Land
By PATRICK FRENCH
London
THE demonstrations across Pakistan last week that forced President Asif Ali Zardari to reinstate the nation’s former chief justice, following the attack by militants on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore, were simply the latest phase in the broad destabilization of the country.
This was hardly to have been anticipated 18 months ago, when I flew to Islamabad with Nawaz Sharif, the former prime minister. At that time, the prospects were good: Mr. Sharif had made an agreement with his main rival, Benazir Bhutto, to return the country to democracy. “I am not afraid,” Mr. Sharif told me. “I am going home after seven years. My primary concern is to put an end to the curse of dictatorship and give some relief to the people of Pakistan.”
After we landed in Islamabad, I had dinner with the family of my brother-in-law, Sana Ullah. Sana’s family comes from the Swat Valley, a religiously conservative and beautiful region in the north known as the Switzerland of Pakistan. It is, or was, a prosperous holiday destination, attracting tourists from places like Japan because of its ancient Buddhist heritage, and it was where Pakistani film makers would go to shoot movies in a romantic mountain setting.
But the stories I heard that evening were full of foreboding. The Swat Barbers’ Federation had just forbidden “English-style haircuts” and the shaving of beards. Strange visitors — possibly Uzbeks — were engaged in military training in the forests. A teenage boy told me, almost in passing, that his female cousin’s school had been blown up.
Today the political situation is very different: Ms. Bhutto was killed in a suicide attack in December 2007, Mr. Sharif has been banned from public office, and Swat has become a killing field.
The region has been handed over to the Pakistani Taliban in a foolish bargain made on behalf of Mr. Zardari’s government. Like most violent revolutionary movements, the Taliban use social injustice and a half-understood philosophy as an excuse to grab land and power. Houses and property have been taken over, and the Taliban have announced that people should pay 40 percent of their rent to their landlords and 60 percent to “jihad.”
In the district capital, Mingora, decapitated corpses were dangled from lampposts with notices pinned to them stating the “un-Islamic” action that merited death. At least 185 schools, most for girls, have been closed. Government officials, journalists and security troops have had their throats slit. Little wonder that most of my brother-in-law’s family has fled, along with 400,000 others.
What many Westerners fail to understand is that the Swat Valley is not one of Pakistan’s wild border areas. It is only 100 miles from Islamabad. In the words of Shaheen Sardar Ali, a cousin of Sana’s who is a law professor at Warwick University in England and was the first female cabinet minister in the government of North-West Frontier Province, “Swat is not somewhere you could ever see as being a breeding ground for extremism.” She remembers going to school unveiled as a child in the 1960s and studying alongside boys. But today, any girl who goes to school is risking her life.
Shariah law has been imposed, allowing elderly clerics to dictate the daily lives of the Swati people. President Zardari’s foreign minister, Shah Mehmood Qureshi, describes this as “a local solution to a local problem,” but the deal with the Taliban represents the most serious blow to the country’s territorial integrity since the civil war of 1971, when the land that became Bangladesh was given up. When territory is surrendered in this way, it is very difficult for the state to recover it. The central premise behind the war on terrorism was that extremist groups should not be allowed sanctuaries from which to threaten the rest of the world. In that context, the loss of Swat offers the Taliban and other extremist groups a template for the future.
Pakistan’s slide toward anarchy is similar to the conditions in Afghanistan in the 1990s: it was easier then for the Afghan elite to pretend that the political situation was likely to improve than to face the truth and do something about it. The bickering factions in Kabul allowed the Taliban to take control of large areas of southern Afghanistan, refusing to see that this would only embolden the Islamists to march on the capital.
Similarly, millenarian Islamists are now seeking to destroy Pakistan as a nation-state, and realize that they have won a strategic victory in Swat. President Obama’s hope of weaning “moderate” elements in Afghanistan and Pakistan away from violence, as happened with Sunni militants in Iraq, is stymied by the fact the Pakistani Taliban know they are winning. Making a deal with them now is appeasement.
Worse, the Islamabad government has gained nothing from it. The Lahore shootings showed how fragile the security situation remains. Radical Sunni groups are more powerful than ever in the Punjab.
The Pakistani Army has been given billions of dollars by American taxpayers to defeat the Taliban, and it has failed. Some of the money even appears to have been diverted to the militants. The army has limited skill in counterinsurgency tactics or in winning hearts and minds; its main achievement over the last two decades has been in training militants to fight Indian troops in Kashmir.
“The people in Swat have no employment, no money, and they are terrified of the army,” Professor Ali told me. “Force is not an alternative, it’s too late.” Pakistan’s civilian law enforcement agencies need to be urgently reformed and strengthened.
The only way forward is for the government and those opposition politicians, such as Mr. Sharif, who still have popular support to unite with progressive elements inside the Army, and to recognize the real and immediate danger of the Islamist threat. If they do not, their country risks becoming a nuclear-armed Afghanistan.
Patrick French is the author, most recently, of “The World Is What It Is: The Authorized Biography of V. S. Naipaul.”
Editorial
Pakistan’s Quick Fix
Pakistan’s president, Asif Ali Zardari, made the right choice on Monday in agreeing to reinstate the independent-minded former Supreme Court justice, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry. Unfortunately, it took huge street protests and the threat of chaos to persuade him to do the right thing. Mr. Zardari will have to do a lot more to calm the political turmoil and confront the extremists who threaten Pakistan’s survival.
Mr. Zardari made a major concession in agreeing to Mr. Chaudhry’s return and is weaker as a result. Nawaz Sharif, the opposition leader, was already the country’s most popular politician, and he gained even more by championing the cause of the chief justice, who was ousted by Pervez Musharraf, the former president.
Mr. Zardari and Mr. Sharif led a coalition government after Mr. Musharraf was pushed out last year but broke up ostensibly over the Chaudhry issue. With that resolved, they should try again to put aside their corrosive rivalry and work to combat the Taliban and Al Qaeda and address Pakistan’s many other urgent problems.
We are relieved that the protests led by Mr. Sharif and a vigorous lawyers’ movement ended without significant bloodshed. Pakistanis successfully demanding change from their leaders is an unpredictable new factor in the country’s politics.
Yet the process was flawed. It was unsettling to watch police officers in Lahore, Mr. Sharif’s power base, allow Mr. Sharif to escape house arrest. Pakistan’s coup-prone Army did not try to seize power. Instead, the chief of staff prodded Mr. Zardari and Mr. Sharif to compromise. That is certainly an improvement over the past. But it is also a reminder of the weakness of Pakistan’s democratic institutions.
One of the biggest questions is how Mr. Chaudhry, now a national symbol of democracy and the rule of law, will use his influence and his restored powers. Mr. Zardari supposedly opposed his return out of fear that the jurist would revive a corruption charge against him. We hope Mr. Chaudhry opts to advance the cause of impartial justice, not political retribution. Pakistan’s leaders have walked the country back from the brink. They must go much further before it reaches solid ground.
****
March 17, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
Touting Religion, Grabbing Land
By PATRICK FRENCH
London
THE demonstrations across Pakistan last week that forced President Asif Ali Zardari to reinstate the nation’s former chief justice, following the attack by militants on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore, were simply the latest phase in the broad destabilization of the country.
This was hardly to have been anticipated 18 months ago, when I flew to Islamabad with Nawaz Sharif, the former prime minister. At that time, the prospects were good: Mr. Sharif had made an agreement with his main rival, Benazir Bhutto, to return the country to democracy. “I am not afraid,” Mr. Sharif told me. “I am going home after seven years. My primary concern is to put an end to the curse of dictatorship and give some relief to the people of Pakistan.”
After we landed in Islamabad, I had dinner with the family of my brother-in-law, Sana Ullah. Sana’s family comes from the Swat Valley, a religiously conservative and beautiful region in the north known as the Switzerland of Pakistan. It is, or was, a prosperous holiday destination, attracting tourists from places like Japan because of its ancient Buddhist heritage, and it was where Pakistani film makers would go to shoot movies in a romantic mountain setting.
But the stories I heard that evening were full of foreboding. The Swat Barbers’ Federation had just forbidden “English-style haircuts” and the shaving of beards. Strange visitors — possibly Uzbeks — were engaged in military training in the forests. A teenage boy told me, almost in passing, that his female cousin’s school had been blown up.
Today the political situation is very different: Ms. Bhutto was killed in a suicide attack in December 2007, Mr. Sharif has been banned from public office, and Swat has become a killing field.
The region has been handed over to the Pakistani Taliban in a foolish bargain made on behalf of Mr. Zardari’s government. Like most violent revolutionary movements, the Taliban use social injustice and a half-understood philosophy as an excuse to grab land and power. Houses and property have been taken over, and the Taliban have announced that people should pay 40 percent of their rent to their landlords and 60 percent to “jihad.”
In the district capital, Mingora, decapitated corpses were dangled from lampposts with notices pinned to them stating the “un-Islamic” action that merited death. At least 185 schools, most for girls, have been closed. Government officials, journalists and security troops have had their throats slit. Little wonder that most of my brother-in-law’s family has fled, along with 400,000 others.
What many Westerners fail to understand is that the Swat Valley is not one of Pakistan’s wild border areas. It is only 100 miles from Islamabad. In the words of Shaheen Sardar Ali, a cousin of Sana’s who is a law professor at Warwick University in England and was the first female cabinet minister in the government of North-West Frontier Province, “Swat is not somewhere you could ever see as being a breeding ground for extremism.” She remembers going to school unveiled as a child in the 1960s and studying alongside boys. But today, any girl who goes to school is risking her life.
Shariah law has been imposed, allowing elderly clerics to dictate the daily lives of the Swati people. President Zardari’s foreign minister, Shah Mehmood Qureshi, describes this as “a local solution to a local problem,” but the deal with the Taliban represents the most serious blow to the country’s territorial integrity since the civil war of 1971, when the land that became Bangladesh was given up. When territory is surrendered in this way, it is very difficult for the state to recover it. The central premise behind the war on terrorism was that extremist groups should not be allowed sanctuaries from which to threaten the rest of the world. In that context, the loss of Swat offers the Taliban and other extremist groups a template for the future.
Pakistan’s slide toward anarchy is similar to the conditions in Afghanistan in the 1990s: it was easier then for the Afghan elite to pretend that the political situation was likely to improve than to face the truth and do something about it. The bickering factions in Kabul allowed the Taliban to take control of large areas of southern Afghanistan, refusing to see that this would only embolden the Islamists to march on the capital.
Similarly, millenarian Islamists are now seeking to destroy Pakistan as a nation-state, and realize that they have won a strategic victory in Swat. President Obama’s hope of weaning “moderate” elements in Afghanistan and Pakistan away from violence, as happened with Sunni militants in Iraq, is stymied by the fact the Pakistani Taliban know they are winning. Making a deal with them now is appeasement.
Worse, the Islamabad government has gained nothing from it. The Lahore shootings showed how fragile the security situation remains. Radical Sunni groups are more powerful than ever in the Punjab.
The Pakistani Army has been given billions of dollars by American taxpayers to defeat the Taliban, and it has failed. Some of the money even appears to have been diverted to the militants. The army has limited skill in counterinsurgency tactics or in winning hearts and minds; its main achievement over the last two decades has been in training militants to fight Indian troops in Kashmir.
“The people in Swat have no employment, no money, and they are terrified of the army,” Professor Ali told me. “Force is not an alternative, it’s too late.” Pakistan’s civilian law enforcement agencies need to be urgently reformed and strengthened.
The only way forward is for the government and those opposition politicians, such as Mr. Sharif, who still have popular support to unite with progressive elements inside the Army, and to recognize the real and immediate danger of the Islamist threat. If they do not, their country risks becoming a nuclear-armed Afghanistan.
Patrick French is the author, most recently, of “The World Is What It Is: The Authorized Biography of V. S. Naipaul.”
Pakistan Will Shift Powers to Parliament, Premier Says
By ZAHID HUSSAIN
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1237399 ... lenews_wsj
ISLAMABAD -- Pakistan's prime minister said in an interview he would seek to tip the balance of power back toward parliament and away from embattled President Asif Ali Zardari, a move that could help restore democratic checks and balances in the turbulent nation and possibly help bring the opposition into the ruling coalition.
Getty Images
Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani
Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani vowed to return to parliament authority that it lost in 2002 when former leader Pervez Musharraf gave sweeping powers to the presidency, including the power to dismiss parliament.
Opposition leader Nawaz Sharif, a former prime minister, describes the current distribution of powers as Pakistan's biggest obstacle to a smoothly functioning democracy.
"We are committed to changing the system," a confident Mr. Gilani said. "My main endeavor is to end the politics of confrontation."
He added that he planned to cooperate with Mr. Sharif. Protests led in part by the opposition leader helped force President Zardari this week to allow the restoration of a former Supreme Court chief justice who had become to many Pakistanis a symbol of rule of law in the nascent democracy.
"I am sure we can work with Nawaz Sharif in strengthening the democratic process," Mr. Gilani said. "We have to return to parliamentary democracy on the lines of Westminster."
Mr. Musharraf took from the premiership and gave to the presidency the powers to appoint the chief of the armed forces, Supreme Court judges and the chief of the election commission, as well as send back for review any bill passed by parliament. Mr. Musharraf also made the president the supreme commander of the armed forces.
Restoring those powers to the prime minister would return the presidency to its earlier, largely ceremonial position.
View Full Image
Associated Press
Opposition leader Nawaz Sharif
That shift would also give more power to Mr. Gilani himself. As prime minister, however, he must answer to the legislature in a way that the president doesn't.
"The presidential system concentrates too much power in one individual whereas a parliamentary system means strengthening institutions," says Maleeha Lodhi, a former ambassador to the U.S. and a political commentator.
Mr. Zardari, the widower of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, has pledged to rescind the enhanced presidential powers. A spokesman for Mr. Zardari said the president wants to implement changes that rescind the broad powers of the office "but that requires a constitutional amendment," which calls for a two-thirds majority vote in parliament.
Mr. Zardari, as leader of the Pakistan People's Party, picked Mr. Gilani to be prime minister after elections in February 2008, but in recent months their relationship has cooled, according to people close to both men.
Mr. Gilani said he would offer Mr. Sharif the opportunity to rejoin the governing coalition. Mr. Sharif's party was part of the coalition after the elections but he quit over disagreements with Mr. Zardari.
"I hope we will go back to our relations," Mr. Gilani said. "I can offer Nawaz Sharif to join the coalition at an appropriate time.... That shows our resolve for the reconciliation."
Mr. Gilani's remarks come after his own political credibility received a big boost this week when he helped to defuse the political turmoil that threatened to engulf the nuclear-armed nation. His new assertiveness stems in part from the backing he has received from opposition parties.
As Mr. Sharif and hundreds of thousands of protesters were descending on the capital for demonstrations, Mr. Zardari agreed to reinstate the Supreme Court justice and to petition the court to lift a ban that bars Mr. Sharif from holding elected office.
Mr. Gilani was a key player in negotiations to defuse the crisis, according to members of the opposition and of the government. During those talks, Mr. Gilani said, he spoke frequently with Mr. Sharif by phone and met army chief Gen. Ashfaq Kayani several times. Athar Abbas, chief military spokesman, declined to comment.
"We need to implement the charter of democracy signed by two former prime ministers," Mr. Gilani said, referring to an agreement signed by Ms. Bhutto and Mr. Sharif in 2006 that pledged to strike down the constitutional changes made by Mr. Musharraf's military-led government.
By ZAHID HUSSAIN
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1237399 ... lenews_wsj
ISLAMABAD -- Pakistan's prime minister said in an interview he would seek to tip the balance of power back toward parliament and away from embattled President Asif Ali Zardari, a move that could help restore democratic checks and balances in the turbulent nation and possibly help bring the opposition into the ruling coalition.
Getty Images
Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani
Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani vowed to return to parliament authority that it lost in 2002 when former leader Pervez Musharraf gave sweeping powers to the presidency, including the power to dismiss parliament.
Opposition leader Nawaz Sharif, a former prime minister, describes the current distribution of powers as Pakistan's biggest obstacle to a smoothly functioning democracy.
"We are committed to changing the system," a confident Mr. Gilani said. "My main endeavor is to end the politics of confrontation."
He added that he planned to cooperate with Mr. Sharif. Protests led in part by the opposition leader helped force President Zardari this week to allow the restoration of a former Supreme Court chief justice who had become to many Pakistanis a symbol of rule of law in the nascent democracy.
"I am sure we can work with Nawaz Sharif in strengthening the democratic process," Mr. Gilani said. "We have to return to parliamentary democracy on the lines of Westminster."
Mr. Musharraf took from the premiership and gave to the presidency the powers to appoint the chief of the armed forces, Supreme Court judges and the chief of the election commission, as well as send back for review any bill passed by parliament. Mr. Musharraf also made the president the supreme commander of the armed forces.
Restoring those powers to the prime minister would return the presidency to its earlier, largely ceremonial position.
View Full Image
Associated Press
Opposition leader Nawaz Sharif
That shift would also give more power to Mr. Gilani himself. As prime minister, however, he must answer to the legislature in a way that the president doesn't.
"The presidential system concentrates too much power in one individual whereas a parliamentary system means strengthening institutions," says Maleeha Lodhi, a former ambassador to the U.S. and a political commentator.
Mr. Zardari, the widower of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, has pledged to rescind the enhanced presidential powers. A spokesman for Mr. Zardari said the president wants to implement changes that rescind the broad powers of the office "but that requires a constitutional amendment," which calls for a two-thirds majority vote in parliament.
Mr. Zardari, as leader of the Pakistan People's Party, picked Mr. Gilani to be prime minister after elections in February 2008, but in recent months their relationship has cooled, according to people close to both men.
Mr. Gilani said he would offer Mr. Sharif the opportunity to rejoin the governing coalition. Mr. Sharif's party was part of the coalition after the elections but he quit over disagreements with Mr. Zardari.
"I hope we will go back to our relations," Mr. Gilani said. "I can offer Nawaz Sharif to join the coalition at an appropriate time.... That shows our resolve for the reconciliation."
Mr. Gilani's remarks come after his own political credibility received a big boost this week when he helped to defuse the political turmoil that threatened to engulf the nuclear-armed nation. His new assertiveness stems in part from the backing he has received from opposition parties.
As Mr. Sharif and hundreds of thousands of protesters were descending on the capital for demonstrations, Mr. Zardari agreed to reinstate the Supreme Court justice and to petition the court to lift a ban that bars Mr. Sharif from holding elected office.
Mr. Gilani was a key player in negotiations to defuse the crisis, according to members of the opposition and of the government. During those talks, Mr. Gilani said, he spoke frequently with Mr. Sharif by phone and met army chief Gen. Ashfaq Kayani several times. Athar Abbas, chief military spokesman, declined to comment.
"We need to implement the charter of democracy signed by two former prime ministers," Mr. Gilani said, referring to an agreement signed by Ms. Bhutto and Mr. Sharif in 2006 that pledged to strike down the constitutional changes made by Mr. Musharraf's military-led government.
Shias under siege in NW Pakistan
Thu, 26 Mar 2009 04:27:14 GMT
Human rights groups protest against Shia blockade in Parachinar
Taliban have imposed a crippling blockade on Shia communities in northwestern Pakistan raising concerns of a 'dire humanitarian crisis'.
In a Tuesday peace summit held in northwestern city of Parachinar in Kurram Agency, political and religious leaders said the lack of government control had allowed the Taliban to pursue their aggressive agenda in the region.
The summit comes after reports of grave human rights abuses against Shias in Parachinar, which later turned in to a complete siege.
Although Shias are the majority in Kurram, they are surrounded by the Taliban-linked aggressive militants who have gone so far as to cut off roads over the past few months. The militants are also accused of kidnapping or killing those trying to deliver supplies to the Shia areas.
Shia farmers have been forced to sell their agricultural produce in Afghanistan instead of the markets in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province.
Taliban-linked militants in Parachinar, Hangu district and much of the Kurram tribal agency have killed 25 to 30 people on a daily basis over the last six months. Some local media say more than 1,300 Shia community members have been killed in the region since 2007.
They claim that security forces in the tribal regions are 'under the influence of local Taliban groups', adding that law enforcement officers have 'willingly or unwillingly' launched a clamp down on Shia Muslims.
The killing of Shias is to such extent that has caused international outrage with rights groups and regional countries including Iran expressing concern over the 'genocide'.
The leading Shia figure in Iraq, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, has issued a ruling (fatwa) with respect to the treatment of the Shia in the Parachinar. The fatwa encourages all Shia Muslims in Pakistan to do everything within their power to help their "brethren."
Shias say they make up one-third of Pakistan's 160 million-strong population. Since the 1980s, thousands of people have been killed in violence-related incidents in Pakistan by extremist groups - who have embarked on an 'ominous mission' to 'eliminate' Shia elites across Pakistan.
They have killed hundreds of Shia medical doctors, university professors, lawyers and police officers across the violence-wracked country over the past few years.
Moderate Pakistani Sunni groups believe that leaving Shias at the mercy of the Taliban is a conspiracy against the country.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=89 ... =351020401
Thu, 26 Mar 2009 04:27:14 GMT
Human rights groups protest against Shia blockade in Parachinar
Taliban have imposed a crippling blockade on Shia communities in northwestern Pakistan raising concerns of a 'dire humanitarian crisis'.
In a Tuesday peace summit held in northwestern city of Parachinar in Kurram Agency, political and religious leaders said the lack of government control had allowed the Taliban to pursue their aggressive agenda in the region.
The summit comes after reports of grave human rights abuses against Shias in Parachinar, which later turned in to a complete siege.
Although Shias are the majority in Kurram, they are surrounded by the Taliban-linked aggressive militants who have gone so far as to cut off roads over the past few months. The militants are also accused of kidnapping or killing those trying to deliver supplies to the Shia areas.
Shia farmers have been forced to sell their agricultural produce in Afghanistan instead of the markets in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province.
Taliban-linked militants in Parachinar, Hangu district and much of the Kurram tribal agency have killed 25 to 30 people on a daily basis over the last six months. Some local media say more than 1,300 Shia community members have been killed in the region since 2007.
They claim that security forces in the tribal regions are 'under the influence of local Taliban groups', adding that law enforcement officers have 'willingly or unwillingly' launched a clamp down on Shia Muslims.
The killing of Shias is to such extent that has caused international outrage with rights groups and regional countries including Iran expressing concern over the 'genocide'.
The leading Shia figure in Iraq, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, has issued a ruling (fatwa) with respect to the treatment of the Shia in the Parachinar. The fatwa encourages all Shia Muslims in Pakistan to do everything within their power to help their "brethren."
Shias say they make up one-third of Pakistan's 160 million-strong population. Since the 1980s, thousands of people have been killed in violence-related incidents in Pakistan by extremist groups - who have embarked on an 'ominous mission' to 'eliminate' Shia elites across Pakistan.
They have killed hundreds of Shia medical doctors, university professors, lawyers and police officers across the violence-wracked country over the past few years.
Moderate Pakistani Sunni groups believe that leaving Shias at the mercy of the Taliban is a conspiracy against the country.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=89 ... =351020401
Dalai Lama bid for free Tibet rejected
Chinese scholars say constitution must be respected
By Thomas Jolicoeur, Canwest News ServiceMarch 28, 2009
it has been 50 years since the Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai lama, went into exile.
Photograph by: AFP-Getty Images Archive, Canwest News Service
Negotiations with the Dalai Lama cannot proceed unless the exiled Tibetan holy man acknowledges the constitution of China, Chinese experts say.
At a Friday news conference at the Chinese Embassy, scholars in Tibetology from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences spoke of the Dalai Lama's request for Tibetan autonomy, which they view as a thinly veiled attempt to establish Tibet as an independent nation.
These demands--detailed in a memorandum of understanding issued last year -- violate not only Chinese law, but also the historical development of Tibet, the scholars asserted.
"The so-called (memorandum of understanding) on Tibetan autonomy runs contrary to Chinese constitution and Chinese laws concerning regional and ethnic authority in China," said Prof. Hao Shiyuan, the director of Tibetan Historical and Cultural Research at CASS.
The delegation said Tibet has historically been under the rule of China and, as such, any independence the region experienced before the most recent occupation by China in 1959 was illegitimate.
The delegates acknowledged Tibet's spiritual leader has never demanded outright independence from China, but that his desire to see the region as an autonomous province not directly ruled by Beijing amounts to the same thing.
"The Dalai Lama has never given up his pursuit and position in seeking whole independence of Tibet," said Hao.
Through an interpreter, Hao said the Dalai Lama has grown overly ambitious due to his influence over-seas and his immersion in western and popular culture.
As a result, he is making demands he knows contravene the Chinese constitution.
"I think the memory of the culture of Tibet of the Dalai Lama stopped 50 years ago," said Hao. "He himself has even forgotten what he was and what he did 50 years ago in Tibet."
The news conference also aimed to refute comments made by the Dalai Lama earlier this month on the 50th anniversary of China's invasion of Tibet, where he claimed the region has been a "hell on earth" since its occupation.
Hao said Tibet has seen unprecedented growth in the 50 years since the Dalai Lama's departure, and that western cultures must educate them-selves on the feudal history of Tibet before they can judge the current situation there.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
http://www.calgaryherald.com/story_prin ... 7&sponsor=
Chinese scholars say constitution must be respected
By Thomas Jolicoeur, Canwest News ServiceMarch 28, 2009
it has been 50 years since the Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai lama, went into exile.
Photograph by: AFP-Getty Images Archive, Canwest News Service
Negotiations with the Dalai Lama cannot proceed unless the exiled Tibetan holy man acknowledges the constitution of China, Chinese experts say.
At a Friday news conference at the Chinese Embassy, scholars in Tibetology from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences spoke of the Dalai Lama's request for Tibetan autonomy, which they view as a thinly veiled attempt to establish Tibet as an independent nation.
These demands--detailed in a memorandum of understanding issued last year -- violate not only Chinese law, but also the historical development of Tibet, the scholars asserted.
"The so-called (memorandum of understanding) on Tibetan autonomy runs contrary to Chinese constitution and Chinese laws concerning regional and ethnic authority in China," said Prof. Hao Shiyuan, the director of Tibetan Historical and Cultural Research at CASS.
The delegation said Tibet has historically been under the rule of China and, as such, any independence the region experienced before the most recent occupation by China in 1959 was illegitimate.
The delegates acknowledged Tibet's spiritual leader has never demanded outright independence from China, but that his desire to see the region as an autonomous province not directly ruled by Beijing amounts to the same thing.
"The Dalai Lama has never given up his pursuit and position in seeking whole independence of Tibet," said Hao.
Through an interpreter, Hao said the Dalai Lama has grown overly ambitious due to his influence over-seas and his immersion in western and popular culture.
As a result, he is making demands he knows contravene the Chinese constitution.
"I think the memory of the culture of Tibet of the Dalai Lama stopped 50 years ago," said Hao. "He himself has even forgotten what he was and what he did 50 years ago in Tibet."
The news conference also aimed to refute comments made by the Dalai Lama earlier this month on the 50th anniversary of China's invasion of Tibet, where he claimed the region has been a "hell on earth" since its occupation.
Hao said Tibet has seen unprecedented growth in the 50 years since the Dalai Lama's departure, and that western cultures must educate them-selves on the feudal history of Tibet before they can judge the current situation there.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
http://www.calgaryherald.com/story_prin ... 7&sponsor=
April 2, 2009
An Unsure China Steps Onto the Global Stage
By MICHAEL WINES and EDWARD WONG
BEIJING — Let the rest of the world dither over whether this week’s economic summit meeting in London will save the planet from economic collapse.
China arrives at the meeting with a sense of momentum, riding a wave of nationalism and boasting an economy that, more than any other, is surfing the trough of a crippling recession. While other major economies shrink this year, China’s is expected by some economists to pass Japan’s as the world’s second largest, if it has not already.
The most talked-about new book here, “China is Unhappy,” combines hypernationalism with biting criticism of Western mismanagement and of China’s reluctance to grasp its place in history.
China’s normally faceless vice president, Xi Jinping, achieved cult status in late February after cameras caught him in an unguarded moment in Mexico, attacking “foreigners who had eaten their fill and had nothing better to do, pointing their fingers at our affairs.”
It has not dampened this spirit that China — and its $2 trillion in exchange reserves — are viewed around the world as the solution to a host of problems, whether by shoring up the capital base of the International Monetary Fund or by becoming a bigger engine of growth for Asian economies long dependent on the United States market.
Yet even as Presidents Hu Jintao and Obama had their first meeting on Wednesday on the sidelines of the summit proceedings, the Chinese appeared torn between seizing their moment in the geopolitical spotlight and shying from it.
Government censors quickly deleted Mr. Xi’s remarks from Chinese news reports last month. On Wednesday, the front page of China Daily, the English-language newspaper that telegraphs government positions to the outside world, warned that China “is not as strong an economy as some people think.”
“Bailing out China is our most important contribution to bail out the world,” Tang Min, an economist at the state-financed China Development Research Foundation, was quoted as saying.
Such is the quandary of a nation whose rise to power appears both inevitable and, in the view of many experts, still a bit premature.
“China is a major global economy now. That is a fundamental reality,” Chu Shulong, who directs the Institute of Strategic Studies at Tsinghua University in Beijing, said in an interview. “What China says and does has an effect on international finance, international economics and other economies.”
But just as real, Mr. Chu and others said, are the factors that hamstring China: widespread poverty, authoritarian rule, a culture shrouded by decades of isolation and poorly understood intentions. China’s global ambitions are unlikely to be realized until it resolves those issues.
Even then, China’s economic fortunes remain deeply entangled with those of the United States, its biggest customer, rival, debtor and still — by far — the world’s biggest economy.
So although Beijing may agitate for changes in the global financial structure, and relish some schadenfreude at Washington’s expense, its interests lie very much in getting America back on its economic feet.
That does not negate China’s newly enhanced status. With most of the world in financial collapse, China’s economy has suddenly become too big — and too healthy, expected to grow by at least 6.5 percent this year — for the rest of the world to ignore.
Evidence of China’s ascension is everywhere. Three years ago, China did not have a single bank among the world’s top 20, measured by market capitalization. Today the top three are Chinese. (In 2006, the United States had 7 of the top 20 banks, including the top 2; today it has 3, and the biggest, Morgan Stanley, is rated fifth.)
China’s government-owned enterprises are buying companies, technology and resources worldwide. This year they have spent $13 billion in Europe, and plan new investments in the United States. China has struck long-term oil contracts with Brazil and Russia, and is angling for a more than $20 billion stake in three Australian mining companies.
China holds $1 trillion in United States government debt, and that is but half the foreign reserves generated by its huge trade surplus and investment inflows. The rest of the West owes China money, too.
Just as clearly, China harbors global ambitions. Military spending has grown for years at a double-digit clip, though as a share of gross domestic product, it is half of the United States’ military spending. China is slowly building a blue-water navy, and in December it sent three ships to the waters off Somalia to patrol against pirates, in the first modern active deployment of its warships beyond its home waters.
Foreign analysts uniformly say they are struck by China’s new assertiveness in diplomatic and military affairs, from tart critiques of American fiscal policy to verbal sparring over control of the South China Sea.
Kenneth G. Lieberthal, a Brookings Institution scholar who oversaw White House Asia policy from 1998 to 2000, said the Chinese traditionally deferred to Washington on major economic and strategic issues, assenting or differing only after Washington made its case.
But “in meetings with the Chinese on several issues in the last two months, I’ve been quite surprised that Chinese are sitting there talking the way you would expect a major power to talk,” he said. “They are beginning to appreciate that when countries emerge from this current economic crisis, China is likely to be either the first to emerge or right after the U.S., and that China will be one of the very few countries at the end of this crisis to emerge without having high levels of government debt.”
“There is a palpable change taking place here,” Mr. Lieberthal added, “with a sense of greater confidence that China has now become an important place and needs to act that way.”
But economic importance does not automatically translate into geopolitical heft. In China’s case, most of the other components of true global power — moral sway, military clout, cultural influence, to name a few — are in the assembly stage, or missing altogether.
Even China’s unquestioned economic clout comes with an asterisk. While Chinese megacities boom and the country’s coast has become the world’s factory, 800 million of the nation’s 1.3 billion citizens remain farmers, many mired in poverty. China remains a developing nation, still vying for first-world status.
“I would be careful calling China a superpower. It is not one,” David Shambaugh, who directs the China Policy Program at George Washington University in Washington, wrote in an e-mail message. “It has no global military reach, its soft power is limited, and its diplomatic reach, while now global, is still limited in areas such as the Middle East and Latin America.”
*****
April 2, 2009
China Vies to Be World’s Leader in Electric Cars
By KEITH BRADSHER
TIANJIN, China — Chinese leaders have adopted a plan aimed at turning the country into one of the leading producers of hybrid and all-electric vehicles within three years, and making it the world leader in electric cars and buses after that.
The goal, which radiates from the very top of the Chinese government, suggests that Detroit’s Big Three, already struggling to stay alive, will face even stiffer foreign competition on the next field of automotive technology than they do today.
“China is well positioned to lead in this,” said David Tulauskas, director of China government policy at General Motors.
To some extent, China is making a virtue of a liability. It is behind the United States, Japan and other countries when it comes to making gas-powered vehicles, but by skipping the current technology, China hopes to get a jump on the next.
More...
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/02/busin ... nted=print
An Unsure China Steps Onto the Global Stage
By MICHAEL WINES and EDWARD WONG
BEIJING — Let the rest of the world dither over whether this week’s economic summit meeting in London will save the planet from economic collapse.
China arrives at the meeting with a sense of momentum, riding a wave of nationalism and boasting an economy that, more than any other, is surfing the trough of a crippling recession. While other major economies shrink this year, China’s is expected by some economists to pass Japan’s as the world’s second largest, if it has not already.
The most talked-about new book here, “China is Unhappy,” combines hypernationalism with biting criticism of Western mismanagement and of China’s reluctance to grasp its place in history.
China’s normally faceless vice president, Xi Jinping, achieved cult status in late February after cameras caught him in an unguarded moment in Mexico, attacking “foreigners who had eaten their fill and had nothing better to do, pointing their fingers at our affairs.”
It has not dampened this spirit that China — and its $2 trillion in exchange reserves — are viewed around the world as the solution to a host of problems, whether by shoring up the capital base of the International Monetary Fund or by becoming a bigger engine of growth for Asian economies long dependent on the United States market.
Yet even as Presidents Hu Jintao and Obama had their first meeting on Wednesday on the sidelines of the summit proceedings, the Chinese appeared torn between seizing their moment in the geopolitical spotlight and shying from it.
Government censors quickly deleted Mr. Xi’s remarks from Chinese news reports last month. On Wednesday, the front page of China Daily, the English-language newspaper that telegraphs government positions to the outside world, warned that China “is not as strong an economy as some people think.”
“Bailing out China is our most important contribution to bail out the world,” Tang Min, an economist at the state-financed China Development Research Foundation, was quoted as saying.
Such is the quandary of a nation whose rise to power appears both inevitable and, in the view of many experts, still a bit premature.
“China is a major global economy now. That is a fundamental reality,” Chu Shulong, who directs the Institute of Strategic Studies at Tsinghua University in Beijing, said in an interview. “What China says and does has an effect on international finance, international economics and other economies.”
But just as real, Mr. Chu and others said, are the factors that hamstring China: widespread poverty, authoritarian rule, a culture shrouded by decades of isolation and poorly understood intentions. China’s global ambitions are unlikely to be realized until it resolves those issues.
Even then, China’s economic fortunes remain deeply entangled with those of the United States, its biggest customer, rival, debtor and still — by far — the world’s biggest economy.
So although Beijing may agitate for changes in the global financial structure, and relish some schadenfreude at Washington’s expense, its interests lie very much in getting America back on its economic feet.
That does not negate China’s newly enhanced status. With most of the world in financial collapse, China’s economy has suddenly become too big — and too healthy, expected to grow by at least 6.5 percent this year — for the rest of the world to ignore.
Evidence of China’s ascension is everywhere. Three years ago, China did not have a single bank among the world’s top 20, measured by market capitalization. Today the top three are Chinese. (In 2006, the United States had 7 of the top 20 banks, including the top 2; today it has 3, and the biggest, Morgan Stanley, is rated fifth.)
China’s government-owned enterprises are buying companies, technology and resources worldwide. This year they have spent $13 billion in Europe, and plan new investments in the United States. China has struck long-term oil contracts with Brazil and Russia, and is angling for a more than $20 billion stake in three Australian mining companies.
China holds $1 trillion in United States government debt, and that is but half the foreign reserves generated by its huge trade surplus and investment inflows. The rest of the West owes China money, too.
Just as clearly, China harbors global ambitions. Military spending has grown for years at a double-digit clip, though as a share of gross domestic product, it is half of the United States’ military spending. China is slowly building a blue-water navy, and in December it sent three ships to the waters off Somalia to patrol against pirates, in the first modern active deployment of its warships beyond its home waters.
Foreign analysts uniformly say they are struck by China’s new assertiveness in diplomatic and military affairs, from tart critiques of American fiscal policy to verbal sparring over control of the South China Sea.
Kenneth G. Lieberthal, a Brookings Institution scholar who oversaw White House Asia policy from 1998 to 2000, said the Chinese traditionally deferred to Washington on major economic and strategic issues, assenting or differing only after Washington made its case.
But “in meetings with the Chinese on several issues in the last two months, I’ve been quite surprised that Chinese are sitting there talking the way you would expect a major power to talk,” he said. “They are beginning to appreciate that when countries emerge from this current economic crisis, China is likely to be either the first to emerge or right after the U.S., and that China will be one of the very few countries at the end of this crisis to emerge without having high levels of government debt.”
“There is a palpable change taking place here,” Mr. Lieberthal added, “with a sense of greater confidence that China has now become an important place and needs to act that way.”
But economic importance does not automatically translate into geopolitical heft. In China’s case, most of the other components of true global power — moral sway, military clout, cultural influence, to name a few — are in the assembly stage, or missing altogether.
Even China’s unquestioned economic clout comes with an asterisk. While Chinese megacities boom and the country’s coast has become the world’s factory, 800 million of the nation’s 1.3 billion citizens remain farmers, many mired in poverty. China remains a developing nation, still vying for first-world status.
“I would be careful calling China a superpower. It is not one,” David Shambaugh, who directs the China Policy Program at George Washington University in Washington, wrote in an e-mail message. “It has no global military reach, its soft power is limited, and its diplomatic reach, while now global, is still limited in areas such as the Middle East and Latin America.”
*****
April 2, 2009
China Vies to Be World’s Leader in Electric Cars
By KEITH BRADSHER
TIANJIN, China — Chinese leaders have adopted a plan aimed at turning the country into one of the leading producers of hybrid and all-electric vehicles within three years, and making it the world leader in electric cars and buses after that.
The goal, which radiates from the very top of the Chinese government, suggests that Detroit’s Big Three, already struggling to stay alive, will face even stiffer foreign competition on the next field of automotive technology than they do today.
“China is well positioned to lead in this,” said David Tulauskas, director of China government policy at General Motors.
To some extent, China is making a virtue of a liability. It is behind the United States, Japan and other countries when it comes to making gas-powered vehicles, but by skipping the current technology, China hopes to get a jump on the next.
More...
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/02/busin ... nted=print
'Taleban flogging of girl' filmed
A video showing suspected members of the Taleban flogging a teenage girl is being circulated in Pakistan.
The provincial government in the north-western Swat valley recently agreed to implement Sharia law as part of a peace deal with militants there.
The video shows men who appear to be from the Taleban holding down the girl and hitting her with a strap for about two minutes as she cries out in pain.
PM Yusuf Raza Gilani has strongly condemned the "shameful" incident.
He ordered an enquiry, saying the government was taking serious notice of the flogging, which had tarnished the country's image.
Local sources said the girl had been accused of illicit relations with a man and that the flogging incident took place about three weeks ago.
Anger
The language in the video is of the Swati dialect of Pashto, says the BBC's Abdul Hai Kakar.
The woman is heard crying throughout and at one point swears on her father that she will not do it again.
Towards the end, when she stands up, an off-camera man believed to be directing the public beating, becomes angry.
Our correspondent says it is probably because the other men let the woman stand among them, something of which the Taleban do not approve.
Relatives of the man involved in the incident told the BBC he had gone to the house of the girl in the village of Kala Kalay to do repairs as an electrician but was accused of the relationship by militants.
They dragged him from the house and flogged him before punishing the girl, the relatives said.
The Taleban made her brother hold her down during the flogging, they said.
After the incident, the Taleban forced the couple to marry and instructed the man not to divorce his wife. His relatives say he has been left mentally scarred.
The incident happened shortly after the new Sharia courts approved by the provincial government were being introduced in Swat.
Mr Gilani said that the incident was contrary to Islamic principles, which taught Muslims to treat women politely and gently.
The prime minister said the government believed in the rights of women and would continue to take every measure to protect their rights.
The Sharia system was agreed in Swat to try to stop the Taleban from imposing their harsh brand of vigilante justice, the BBC's Islamabad correspondent Barbara Plett says.
Previously they had beheaded dissidents and killed women they had accused of un-Islamic behaviour.
That seems to have significantly decreased after the Taleban leader officially accepted the Islamic courts.
However, it is not clear whether this new justice system will replace Taleban rule in practice.
The courts seem to be operating with some effect in Swat's main city of Mingora but not in outlying rural areas.
There witnesses say the militants continue to exercise control, if not as brutally as before.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/s ... 980899.stm
Published: 2009/04/03 13:57:18 GMT
A video showing suspected members of the Taleban flogging a teenage girl is being circulated in Pakistan.
The provincial government in the north-western Swat valley recently agreed to implement Sharia law as part of a peace deal with militants there.
The video shows men who appear to be from the Taleban holding down the girl and hitting her with a strap for about two minutes as she cries out in pain.
PM Yusuf Raza Gilani has strongly condemned the "shameful" incident.
He ordered an enquiry, saying the government was taking serious notice of the flogging, which had tarnished the country's image.
Local sources said the girl had been accused of illicit relations with a man and that the flogging incident took place about three weeks ago.
Anger
The language in the video is of the Swati dialect of Pashto, says the BBC's Abdul Hai Kakar.
The woman is heard crying throughout and at one point swears on her father that she will not do it again.
Towards the end, when she stands up, an off-camera man believed to be directing the public beating, becomes angry.
Our correspondent says it is probably because the other men let the woman stand among them, something of which the Taleban do not approve.
Relatives of the man involved in the incident told the BBC he had gone to the house of the girl in the village of Kala Kalay to do repairs as an electrician but was accused of the relationship by militants.
They dragged him from the house and flogged him before punishing the girl, the relatives said.
The Taleban made her brother hold her down during the flogging, they said.
After the incident, the Taleban forced the couple to marry and instructed the man not to divorce his wife. His relatives say he has been left mentally scarred.
The incident happened shortly after the new Sharia courts approved by the provincial government were being introduced in Swat.
Mr Gilani said that the incident was contrary to Islamic principles, which taught Muslims to treat women politely and gently.
The prime minister said the government believed in the rights of women and would continue to take every measure to protect their rights.
The Sharia system was agreed in Swat to try to stop the Taleban from imposing their harsh brand of vigilante justice, the BBC's Islamabad correspondent Barbara Plett says.
Previously they had beheaded dissidents and killed women they had accused of un-Islamic behaviour.
That seems to have significantly decreased after the Taleban leader officially accepted the Islamic courts.
However, it is not clear whether this new justice system will replace Taleban rule in practice.
The courts seem to be operating with some effect in Swat's main city of Mingora but not in outlying rural areas.
There witnesses say the militants continue to exercise control, if not as brutally as before.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/s ... 980899.stm
Published: 2009/04/03 13:57:18 GMT
April 4, 2009
Video of Taliban Flogging Rattles Pakistan
By SALMAN MASOOD
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — The video shows a young woman held face down as a Taliban commander whips her repeatedly with a leather strap. “Leave me for the moment — you can beat me again later,” she screams, pleading for a reprieve and writhing in pain.
Paying no heed, the commander orders those holding her to tighten their grip and continues the public flogging. A large group of men quietly stands and watches in a circle around her.
The woman in the video is a 17-year-old resident of Kabal, in the restive Swat region in northwestern Pakistan. The images, which have been broadcast repeatedly by private television news networks in Pakistan, have caused outrage here and set off bitter condemnation by rights activists and politicians.
They have also raised questions once again about the government’s decision to enter into a peace deal in February that effectively ceded Swat to the Taliban and allowed them to impose Islamic law.
The two-minute video is the first known case of a public flogging of a woman in Swat. Apparently shot on a cellphone and widely circulated in the picturesque valley, it demonstrates vividly how the Taliban have used public displays of punishment to terrify and control the local population.
It was not clear what the young woman was accused of.
One account said she had stepped out of her house without being escorted by a male family member, according to Samar Minallah, a rights activist. Ms. Minallah said she distributed the video to local news outlets after it was sent to her by someone from Swat three days ago.
Another account said a local Taliban commander had falsely accused the teenager of violating Islamic law after she refused to accept his marriage proposal.
A Taliban spokesman defended the punishment to the Geo Television Network but said it should not have been done in public.
Mian Iftikhar Hussain, the information minister of North-West Frontier Province, where Swat is located, also tried to play down the flogging by claiming that the video was recorded in January, before the peace agreement. He called it an attempt to sabotage the peace agreement.
Not many seemed willing to countenance the argument.
“This is absurd,” Athar Minallah, a lawyer who campaigned for the restoration of Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, said in a telephone interview. “No one can give justification for such an act. These handful of people have taken the population hostage, and the government is trying to patronize them. If the state surrenders, what will happen next?”
Asma Jahangir, one of the country’s leading rights activists, condemned the flogging as “intolerable.”
“This is an eye-opener,” she said in a televised news briefing in Lahore. “Terrorism has seeped into every corner of the country. It is time that every patriotic Pakistani should raise a voice against such atrocities.”
She said she would join other rights activists and citizens in a rally against terrorism on Saturday in Lahore, where militants stormed a police academy this week.
“It will be a peaceful march to show that the people of Lahore will not stay silent,” she said.
Jugnu Mohsin, a peace activist and publisher of Friday Times, the country’s most popular weekly newspaper, blamed the military for allowing the Taliban to gain strength and giving the militants a free hand to commit such atrocities.
Ms. Mohsin said she had received threats from Islamic extremists.
“I know that the federal and provincial governments are innocent victims and bystanders,” she said. “The military has handed over the ownership and refuses to fight.”
In February, after 20 months of losing battles against the Taliban in Swat, the government and the military accepted a peace deal and the establishment of Islamic courts in the region.
In return, Maulana Fazlullah, the leader of the Taliban in Swat, pledged to lay down the weapons and end the violence.
Those who opposed the deal said it would strengthen the militants and give them time to regroup and tighten their control in Swat.
The government said the agreement would end the violence.
Hundreds of schools have been destroyed in Swat, several government officials beheaded and education of girls banned under the Taliban.
Both President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani condemned the flogging and ordered an investigation.
Taking notice of the video, Mr. Chaudhry formed an eight-judge panel in the Supreme Court to examine the case, a news release by the Pakistani court said.
The justice ordered the interior secretary to bring the young woman before the court on Monday.
Sherry Rehman, the former information minister and a member of the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party, demanded immediate action by the government.
“Ignoring such acts of violence amounts to sanctioning impunity,” Ms. Rehman said in a statement. “The fire in the Swat Valley and our northern regions can engulf other parts of the country, if we do nothing to put it out.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/04/world ... nted=print
Video of Taliban Flogging Rattles Pakistan
By SALMAN MASOOD
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — The video shows a young woman held face down as a Taliban commander whips her repeatedly with a leather strap. “Leave me for the moment — you can beat me again later,” she screams, pleading for a reprieve and writhing in pain.
Paying no heed, the commander orders those holding her to tighten their grip and continues the public flogging. A large group of men quietly stands and watches in a circle around her.
The woman in the video is a 17-year-old resident of Kabal, in the restive Swat region in northwestern Pakistan. The images, which have been broadcast repeatedly by private television news networks in Pakistan, have caused outrage here and set off bitter condemnation by rights activists and politicians.
They have also raised questions once again about the government’s decision to enter into a peace deal in February that effectively ceded Swat to the Taliban and allowed them to impose Islamic law.
The two-minute video is the first known case of a public flogging of a woman in Swat. Apparently shot on a cellphone and widely circulated in the picturesque valley, it demonstrates vividly how the Taliban have used public displays of punishment to terrify and control the local population.
It was not clear what the young woman was accused of.
One account said she had stepped out of her house without being escorted by a male family member, according to Samar Minallah, a rights activist. Ms. Minallah said she distributed the video to local news outlets after it was sent to her by someone from Swat three days ago.
Another account said a local Taliban commander had falsely accused the teenager of violating Islamic law after she refused to accept his marriage proposal.
A Taliban spokesman defended the punishment to the Geo Television Network but said it should not have been done in public.
Mian Iftikhar Hussain, the information minister of North-West Frontier Province, where Swat is located, also tried to play down the flogging by claiming that the video was recorded in January, before the peace agreement. He called it an attempt to sabotage the peace agreement.
Not many seemed willing to countenance the argument.
“This is absurd,” Athar Minallah, a lawyer who campaigned for the restoration of Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, said in a telephone interview. “No one can give justification for such an act. These handful of people have taken the population hostage, and the government is trying to patronize them. If the state surrenders, what will happen next?”
Asma Jahangir, one of the country’s leading rights activists, condemned the flogging as “intolerable.”
“This is an eye-opener,” she said in a televised news briefing in Lahore. “Terrorism has seeped into every corner of the country. It is time that every patriotic Pakistani should raise a voice against such atrocities.”
She said she would join other rights activists and citizens in a rally against terrorism on Saturday in Lahore, where militants stormed a police academy this week.
“It will be a peaceful march to show that the people of Lahore will not stay silent,” she said.
Jugnu Mohsin, a peace activist and publisher of Friday Times, the country’s most popular weekly newspaper, blamed the military for allowing the Taliban to gain strength and giving the militants a free hand to commit such atrocities.
Ms. Mohsin said she had received threats from Islamic extremists.
“I know that the federal and provincial governments are innocent victims and bystanders,” she said. “The military has handed over the ownership and refuses to fight.”
In February, after 20 months of losing battles against the Taliban in Swat, the government and the military accepted a peace deal and the establishment of Islamic courts in the region.
In return, Maulana Fazlullah, the leader of the Taliban in Swat, pledged to lay down the weapons and end the violence.
Those who opposed the deal said it would strengthen the militants and give them time to regroup and tighten their control in Swat.
The government said the agreement would end the violence.
Hundreds of schools have been destroyed in Swat, several government officials beheaded and education of girls banned under the Taliban.
Both President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani condemned the flogging and ordered an investigation.
Taking notice of the video, Mr. Chaudhry formed an eight-judge panel in the Supreme Court to examine the case, a news release by the Pakistani court said.
The justice ordered the interior secretary to bring the young woman before the court on Monday.
Sherry Rehman, the former information minister and a member of the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party, demanded immediate action by the government.
“Ignoring such acts of violence amounts to sanctioning impunity,” Ms. Rehman said in a statement. “The fire in the Swat Valley and our northern regions can engulf other parts of the country, if we do nothing to put it out.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/04/world ... nted=print
Time Is Short as U.S. Presses a Reluctant Pakistan
By JANE PERLEZ
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — President Obama’s strategy of offering Pakistan a partnership to defeat the insurgency here calls for a virtual remaking of this nation’s institutions and even of the national psyche, an ambitious agenda that Pakistan’s politicians and people appear unprepared to take up.
Officially, Pakistan’s government welcomed Mr. Obama’s strategy, with its hefty infusions of American money, hailing it as a “positive change.” But as the Obama administration tries to bring Pakistanis to its side, large parts of the public, the political class and the military have brushed off the plan, rebuffing the idea that the threat from Al Qaeda and the Taliban, which Washington calls a common enemy, is so urgent.
Some, including the army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, and the president, Asif Ali Zardari, may be coming around. But for the military, at least, India remains priority No. 1, as it has for the 61 years of Pakistan’s existence.
How to shift that focus in time for Pakistan to defeat a fast-expanding Islamic insurgency that threatens to devour the country is the challenge facing Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Richard C. Holbrooke, the special envoy to the region, as they arrive in Pakistan for talks early this week.
Strengthening Pakistan’s weak civilian institutions, updating political parties rooted in feudal loyalties and recasting a military fixated on yesterday’s enemy, and stuck in the traditions of conventional warfare, are generational challenges. But Pakistan may not have the luxury of the long term to meet them.
More....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/06/world ... nted=print
By JANE PERLEZ
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — President Obama’s strategy of offering Pakistan a partnership to defeat the insurgency here calls for a virtual remaking of this nation’s institutions and even of the national psyche, an ambitious agenda that Pakistan’s politicians and people appear unprepared to take up.
Officially, Pakistan’s government welcomed Mr. Obama’s strategy, with its hefty infusions of American money, hailing it as a “positive change.” But as the Obama administration tries to bring Pakistanis to its side, large parts of the public, the political class and the military have brushed off the plan, rebuffing the idea that the threat from Al Qaeda and the Taliban, which Washington calls a common enemy, is so urgent.
Some, including the army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, and the president, Asif Ali Zardari, may be coming around. But for the military, at least, India remains priority No. 1, as it has for the 61 years of Pakistan’s existence.
How to shift that focus in time for Pakistan to defeat a fast-expanding Islamic insurgency that threatens to devour the country is the challenge facing Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Richard C. Holbrooke, the special envoy to the region, as they arrive in Pakistan for talks early this week.
Strengthening Pakistan’s weak civilian institutions, updating political parties rooted in feudal loyalties and recasting a military fixated on yesterday’s enemy, and stuck in the traditions of conventional warfare, are generational challenges. But Pakistan may not have the luxury of the long term to meet them.
More....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/06/world ... nted=print
Selective abortion causes huge gender imbalance in China
Agence France-PresseApril 10, 2009
Selective abortion in favour of males has left China with 32 million more boys than girls, creating an imbalance that will endure for decades, an investigation released today warned.
The probe provides ammunition for those experts who predict China's obsession with a male heir will sow a bitter fruit as men facing a life of bachelorhood fight for a bride.
"Although some imaginative and extreme solutions have been suggested, nothing can be done now to prevent this imminent generation of excess men," says the paper, published online by the British Medical Journal (BMJ).
In most countries, males slightly outnumber females--between 103 and 107 male births for every 100 female births.But in China and other Asian countries, the gender ratio has widened sharply as the traditional preference for boys is reinforced by the availability of cheap ultrasound diagnostics and abortion.
This has enabled Chinese couples to use pregnancy termination to prevent a female birth, a practice that is officially condemned as well as illegal.
In China, an additional factor has been the "one-child" policy.
In general, parents who have a second child are liable to pay a fine and contribute disproportionately toward the child's education.
But in some provinces, a second child is permitted if the first is a girl or if parents are experiencing "hardship." And in a few others, couples are allowed a second child and some-times a third, regardless of sex.
In the paper, Zhejiang university professors Wei Xing Zhu and Li Lu and Therese Hesketh of University College London found that in 2005 alone, China had more than 1.1 million excess male births.
Among Chinese aged below 20, the greatest gender imbalances were among one-to four-year-olds, where there were 124 male to 100 female births, with 126 to 100 in rural areas, they found. The gap was especially big in provinces where the one-child policy was strictly enforced and also in rural areas. Jiangxi and Henan provinces had ratios of over 140 male births compared with female births in the one to four age group.
Among second births, the sex ratio was even higher, at 143 males to 100 female. It peaked at a massive 192 boys to 100 girls in Jiangsu province.
Only two provinces--Tibet and Xinjiang, the most permissive in terms of the one-child policy--had normal sex ratios.
"Sex selective abortion accounts for almost all the excess males," the paper said. "...Enforcing the existing ban on sex selective abortion could lead to normalization of ratios."
Other policy options are to loosen enforcement of the one-child policy so couples can have a second child if the first child is a girl, it said.
The paper does not deal with the social consequences of the extraordinary imbalance, but suggests there are rays of light. Since since 2000, the government has launched policies aimed at countering the imbalance, with a"care for girls"awareness campaign and reforms of inheritance laws, it says.
Partially as a result, the sex ratio of birth did not change between 2000 and 2005, and in many urban areas, the ratio for the first and usually only birth is now within normal limits.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
****
India seen as key to stabilizing Pakistan
Bitter relations must be overcome, says analyst
By Mike Blanchfield, Canwest News ServiceApril 10, 2009
http://www.calgaryherald.com/story_prin ... 8&sponsor=
Pakistan security forces discuss matters during a siege by terrorists at a police training school last month. Pakistan is a safe haven from which terrorists can strike Canadian and allied troops in Afghanistan.
Photograph by: Nadeem Ijaz, Getty Images, Canwest News Service
As much as he dislikes being labelled a Cassandra, Stephen P. Cohen, senior fellow in foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution, can't shake the conclusion of a book he wrote six years ago--that American inaction could transform Pakistan into its "biggest foreign policy problem."
That has proven largely true, forcing U. S. President Barack Obama to focus on Pakistan as part of his overarching strategy on winning the lingering war in Afghanistan. But Cohen realizes his country needs help in Pakistan and he is looking farther east: to India.
As South Asia's one true powerhouse, India needs to "step up to the plate" and help stabilize Pakistan, the fragile nuclear power that has become the safe haven from which al-Qaeda and Taliban terrorists can strike Canadian and allied troops in Afghanistan. That means India must set aside 62 years of enmity with its fellow nuclear neighbour, one with which it has gone to war three times, and a source of much mistrust and paranoia.
"There's been a real gap in Indian leadership on that matter," Cohen explained in an interview prior to a speech at the International Development Research Centre in Ottawa on Thursday. "I think everyone should welcome an Indian role in Afghanistan, a creative and constructive role. But it should be done in such a way that it does not add to Pakistani paranoia."
Cohen, a senior analyst and author with the Washington-based think-tank, was far less diplomatic as he described the challenges ahead.
India is playing a role in Afghanistan, spending $1 billion on foreign aid, which is good. But Cohen said it needs to take a leadership role -- "step up to the plate and start batting more than .150" -- as the leading democracy and economic powerhouse in the region.
That won't be easy.India's economy might be strong, with thriving middle and political classes, but its poorest regions are more destitute than the poorest parts of Pakistan, he noted.
Nonetheless, Pakistan has fallen well behind its neighbour economically, which only exacerbates historical antagonism, and rekindles fear that India's main goal in Afghanistan is to essentially surround Pakistan.
The two countries have been bitter enemies since India's partition in 1947,and they remain divided on their disputed border region of Kashmir. November's terrorist attack on the Indian financial centre of Mumbai has been traced back to Pakistan.
But Cohen is buoyed that the two sides avoided hostilities in the aftermath and are talking to each other --albeit through intermediaries.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
Agence France-PresseApril 10, 2009
Selective abortion in favour of males has left China with 32 million more boys than girls, creating an imbalance that will endure for decades, an investigation released today warned.
The probe provides ammunition for those experts who predict China's obsession with a male heir will sow a bitter fruit as men facing a life of bachelorhood fight for a bride.
"Although some imaginative and extreme solutions have been suggested, nothing can be done now to prevent this imminent generation of excess men," says the paper, published online by the British Medical Journal (BMJ).
In most countries, males slightly outnumber females--between 103 and 107 male births for every 100 female births.But in China and other Asian countries, the gender ratio has widened sharply as the traditional preference for boys is reinforced by the availability of cheap ultrasound diagnostics and abortion.
This has enabled Chinese couples to use pregnancy termination to prevent a female birth, a practice that is officially condemned as well as illegal.
In China, an additional factor has been the "one-child" policy.
In general, parents who have a second child are liable to pay a fine and contribute disproportionately toward the child's education.
But in some provinces, a second child is permitted if the first is a girl or if parents are experiencing "hardship." And in a few others, couples are allowed a second child and some-times a third, regardless of sex.
In the paper, Zhejiang university professors Wei Xing Zhu and Li Lu and Therese Hesketh of University College London found that in 2005 alone, China had more than 1.1 million excess male births.
Among Chinese aged below 20, the greatest gender imbalances were among one-to four-year-olds, where there were 124 male to 100 female births, with 126 to 100 in rural areas, they found. The gap was especially big in provinces where the one-child policy was strictly enforced and also in rural areas. Jiangxi and Henan provinces had ratios of over 140 male births compared with female births in the one to four age group.
Among second births, the sex ratio was even higher, at 143 males to 100 female. It peaked at a massive 192 boys to 100 girls in Jiangsu province.
Only two provinces--Tibet and Xinjiang, the most permissive in terms of the one-child policy--had normal sex ratios.
"Sex selective abortion accounts for almost all the excess males," the paper said. "...Enforcing the existing ban on sex selective abortion could lead to normalization of ratios."
Other policy options are to loosen enforcement of the one-child policy so couples can have a second child if the first child is a girl, it said.
The paper does not deal with the social consequences of the extraordinary imbalance, but suggests there are rays of light. Since since 2000, the government has launched policies aimed at countering the imbalance, with a"care for girls"awareness campaign and reforms of inheritance laws, it says.
Partially as a result, the sex ratio of birth did not change between 2000 and 2005, and in many urban areas, the ratio for the first and usually only birth is now within normal limits.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
****
India seen as key to stabilizing Pakistan
Bitter relations must be overcome, says analyst
By Mike Blanchfield, Canwest News ServiceApril 10, 2009
http://www.calgaryherald.com/story_prin ... 8&sponsor=
Pakistan security forces discuss matters during a siege by terrorists at a police training school last month. Pakistan is a safe haven from which terrorists can strike Canadian and allied troops in Afghanistan.
Photograph by: Nadeem Ijaz, Getty Images, Canwest News Service
As much as he dislikes being labelled a Cassandra, Stephen P. Cohen, senior fellow in foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution, can't shake the conclusion of a book he wrote six years ago--that American inaction could transform Pakistan into its "biggest foreign policy problem."
That has proven largely true, forcing U. S. President Barack Obama to focus on Pakistan as part of his overarching strategy on winning the lingering war in Afghanistan. But Cohen realizes his country needs help in Pakistan and he is looking farther east: to India.
As South Asia's one true powerhouse, India needs to "step up to the plate" and help stabilize Pakistan, the fragile nuclear power that has become the safe haven from which al-Qaeda and Taliban terrorists can strike Canadian and allied troops in Afghanistan. That means India must set aside 62 years of enmity with its fellow nuclear neighbour, one with which it has gone to war three times, and a source of much mistrust and paranoia.
"There's been a real gap in Indian leadership on that matter," Cohen explained in an interview prior to a speech at the International Development Research Centre in Ottawa on Thursday. "I think everyone should welcome an Indian role in Afghanistan, a creative and constructive role. But it should be done in such a way that it does not add to Pakistani paranoia."
Cohen, a senior analyst and author with the Washington-based think-tank, was far less diplomatic as he described the challenges ahead.
India is playing a role in Afghanistan, spending $1 billion on foreign aid, which is good. But Cohen said it needs to take a leadership role -- "step up to the plate and start batting more than .150" -- as the leading democracy and economic powerhouse in the region.
That won't be easy.India's economy might be strong, with thriving middle and political classes, but its poorest regions are more destitute than the poorest parts of Pakistan, he noted.
Nonetheless, Pakistan has fallen well behind its neighbour economically, which only exacerbates historical antagonism, and rekindles fear that India's main goal in Afghanistan is to essentially surround Pakistan.
The two countries have been bitter enemies since India's partition in 1947,and they remain divided on their disputed border region of Kashmir. November's terrorist attack on the Indian financial centre of Mumbai has been traced back to Pakistan.
But Cohen is buoyed that the two sides avoided hostilities in the aftermath and are talking to each other --albeit through intermediaries.
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
April 11, 2009
Graft in China Covers Up Toll of Coal Mines
By SHARON LaFRANIERE
ZHONGLOU, China — When an underground fire killed 35 men at the bottom of a coal shaft last year, the telltale signs of another Chinese mining disaster were everywhere: Black smoke billowed into the sky, dozens of rescuers searched nine hours for survivors, and sobbing relatives besieged the mine’s iron gate.
But though the owner and local government officials took few steps to prevent the tragedy, they succeeded, almost completely, in concealing it.
For nearly three months, not a word leaked from the heart of China’s coal belt about the July 14 explosion that racked the illegal mine, a 1,000-foot wormhole in Hebei Province, about 100 miles west of Beijing.
The mine owner paid off grieving families and cremated the miners’ bodies, even when relatives wanted to bury them. Local officials pretended to investigate, then issued a false report. Journalists were bribed to stay silent. The mine shaft was sealed with truckloads of dirt.
“It was so dark and evil in that place,” said the wife of one miner who missed his shift that day and so was spared. “No one dared report the accident because the owner was so powerful.”
Indeed, the Lijiawa mine tragedy might still be an official non-event, but one brave soul reported the cover-up in September on an Internet chat site. The central government in Beijing stepped in, firing 25 local officials and putting 22 of them under criminal investigation. The results of the inquiry are expected this month.
Such a wide-ranging cover-up might seem unusual in the Internet age, but it remains disturbingly common here. From mine disasters to chemical spills, the 2003 SARS epidemic to the past year’s scandal over tainted milk powder, Chinese bureaucrats habitually hide safety lapses for fear of being held accountable by the ruling Communist Party or exposing their own illicit ties to companies involved.
Under China’s authoritarian system, superiors reward subordinates for strict compliance with targets set from above, like reducing mine disasters. Should one occur, the incentive to hide it is often stronger than the reward for handling it well. A disaster on a bureaucrat’s watch is almost surely a blot on his career. A scandal buried quietly, under truckloads of dirt, may never be discovered.
China’s lack of a free press, independent trade unions, citizen watchdog groups and other checks on official power makes cover-ups more possible, even though the Internet now makes it harder to suppress information completely.
More and photo....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/11/world ... ?th&emc=th
Graft in China Covers Up Toll of Coal Mines
By SHARON LaFRANIERE
ZHONGLOU, China — When an underground fire killed 35 men at the bottom of a coal shaft last year, the telltale signs of another Chinese mining disaster were everywhere: Black smoke billowed into the sky, dozens of rescuers searched nine hours for survivors, and sobbing relatives besieged the mine’s iron gate.
But though the owner and local government officials took few steps to prevent the tragedy, they succeeded, almost completely, in concealing it.
For nearly three months, not a word leaked from the heart of China’s coal belt about the July 14 explosion that racked the illegal mine, a 1,000-foot wormhole in Hebei Province, about 100 miles west of Beijing.
The mine owner paid off grieving families and cremated the miners’ bodies, even when relatives wanted to bury them. Local officials pretended to investigate, then issued a false report. Journalists were bribed to stay silent. The mine shaft was sealed with truckloads of dirt.
“It was so dark and evil in that place,” said the wife of one miner who missed his shift that day and so was spared. “No one dared report the accident because the owner was so powerful.”
Indeed, the Lijiawa mine tragedy might still be an official non-event, but one brave soul reported the cover-up in September on an Internet chat site. The central government in Beijing stepped in, firing 25 local officials and putting 22 of them under criminal investigation. The results of the inquiry are expected this month.
Such a wide-ranging cover-up might seem unusual in the Internet age, but it remains disturbingly common here. From mine disasters to chemical spills, the 2003 SARS epidemic to the past year’s scandal over tainted milk powder, Chinese bureaucrats habitually hide safety lapses for fear of being held accountable by the ruling Communist Party or exposing their own illicit ties to companies involved.
Under China’s authoritarian system, superiors reward subordinates for strict compliance with targets set from above, like reducing mine disasters. Should one occur, the incentive to hide it is often stronger than the reward for handling it well. A disaster on a bureaucrat’s watch is almost surely a blot on his career. A scandal buried quietly, under truckloads of dirt, may never be discovered.
China’s lack of a free press, independent trade unions, citizen watchdog groups and other checks on official power makes cover-ups more possible, even though the Internet now makes it harder to suppress information completely.
More and photo....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/11/world ... ?th&emc=th
India's failing secularism
In a supposedly secular state, India's religious minorities find themselves in an increasingly precarious position
Kapil Komireddi guardian.co.uk,
Sunday 5 April 2009
As India prepares for the 15th general election since it became a republic in 1950, the country's religious minorities are anxious. The impressive economic growth that put India on the covers of major western news weeklies has not touched their lives, and they are acutely aware of their precarious position in a country that is routinely celebrated by the rest of the world as a redoubt of western-style modernity in a region associated with backwardness.
Indian Muslims in particular have rarely known a life uninterrupted by communal conflict or unimpaired by poverty and prejudice. Their grievances are legion, and the list of atrocities committed against them by the Indian state is long. In 2002 at least 1,000 Muslims were slaughtered by Hindu mobs in the western state of Gujarat in what was the second state-sponsored pogrom in India (Sikhs were the object of the first, in 1984).
Gujarat's chief minister, Narendra Modi, explained away the riots by quoting Newton's third law. "Every action," he said on television, "has an equal opposite reaction." The "action" that invited the reaction of the mobs was the torching of a Gujarat-bound train in which 59 Hindus pilgrims, most of them saffron-clad bigots who were returning home from a trip to the site of the Babri Mosque that they had helped demolish a decade earlier, perished. The "equal and opposite reaction" was the slaughter of 1,000 innocent Muslims for the alleged crime of their coreligionists.
Such an event, had it occurred anywhere else, would have destroyed that country's reputation. But, astonishingly, the years since 2002 have witnessed a steady stream of books, mostly by western authors, extolling India. The unwillingness on western intellectuals' part to engage honestly with the violent reality of India, or offer a sincere portrayal of its transformation, has much to do with their own assumptions of history and modernity; but glossing over India's treatment of its Muslims – or omitting it substantially from their analyses – must have at least something to do with the insidious apathy towards Muslim tribulations that has characterised western attitudes since 9/11.
The rise of Hindu chauvinism in India has a complex history, but the absence of any meaningful sanction from the rest of the world has certainty emboldened Hindu bigots. Last week, Varun Gandhi, the Hindu-chauvinist BJP's London-educated parliamentary candidate from the Pilibhit constituency in Uttar Pradesh, India's largest state, made remarks of a kind that even European neo-Nazi leaders would hesitate to make in public.
Addressing an exclusive gathering of Hindu voters, Gandhi talked about the injustices faced by Hindus; then he told his enthusiastic listeners that he would sever any hand that was raised against a Hindu; that the lotus (the BJP's election symbol) would chop off Muslim heads; that Muslim names were scary; that his opponent's name sounded like "Osama bin Laden".
The name of his opponent, Riaz Ahmed, does not sound remotely like bin Laden's; but listening to a "Gandhi" make such an inflammatory speech should, if it hasn't already, shatter complacent Indian liberal notions about the country's experiment with secularism. Varun Gandhi is not a fringe figure: he is the great-grandson of India's first prime minister, the staunchly secular atheist Pandit Nehru.
For decades Indian intellectuals have claimed that religion, particularly Hinduism, is perfectly compatible with secularism. Indian secularism, they said repeatedly, is not a total rejection of religion by the state but rather an equal appreciation of every faith. Even though no faith is in principle privileged by the state, this approach made it possible for religion to find expression in the public sphere, and, since Hindus in India outnumber adherents of every other faith, Hinduism dominated it. Almost every government building in India has a prominently positioned picture of a Hindu deity. Hindu rituals accompany the inauguration of all public works, without exception.
The novelist Shashi Tharoor tried to burnish this certifiably sectarian phenomenon with a facile analogy: Indian Muslims, he wrote, accept Hindu rituals at state ceremonies in the same spirit as teetotallers accept champagne in western celebrations. This self-affirming explanation is characteristic of someone who belongs to the majority community. Muslims I interviewed took a different view, but understandably, they were unwilling to protest for the fear of being labelled as "angry Muslims" in a country famous for its tolerant Hindus.
The failure of secularism in India – or, more accurately, the failure of the Indian model of secularism – may be just one aspect of the gamut of failures, but it has the potential to bring down the country. Secularism in India rests entirely upon the goodwill of the Hindu majority. Can this kind of secularism really survive a Narendra Modi as prime minister? As Hindus are increasingly infected by the kind of hatred that Varun Gandhi's speech displayed, maybe it is time for Indian secularists to embrace a new, more radical kind of secularism that is not afraid to recognise and reject the principal source of this strife: religion itself.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... uism/print
In a supposedly secular state, India's religious minorities find themselves in an increasingly precarious position
Kapil Komireddi guardian.co.uk,
Sunday 5 April 2009
As India prepares for the 15th general election since it became a republic in 1950, the country's religious minorities are anxious. The impressive economic growth that put India on the covers of major western news weeklies has not touched their lives, and they are acutely aware of their precarious position in a country that is routinely celebrated by the rest of the world as a redoubt of western-style modernity in a region associated with backwardness.
Indian Muslims in particular have rarely known a life uninterrupted by communal conflict or unimpaired by poverty and prejudice. Their grievances are legion, and the list of atrocities committed against them by the Indian state is long. In 2002 at least 1,000 Muslims were slaughtered by Hindu mobs in the western state of Gujarat in what was the second state-sponsored pogrom in India (Sikhs were the object of the first, in 1984).
Gujarat's chief minister, Narendra Modi, explained away the riots by quoting Newton's third law. "Every action," he said on television, "has an equal opposite reaction." The "action" that invited the reaction of the mobs was the torching of a Gujarat-bound train in which 59 Hindus pilgrims, most of them saffron-clad bigots who were returning home from a trip to the site of the Babri Mosque that they had helped demolish a decade earlier, perished. The "equal and opposite reaction" was the slaughter of 1,000 innocent Muslims for the alleged crime of their coreligionists.
Such an event, had it occurred anywhere else, would have destroyed that country's reputation. But, astonishingly, the years since 2002 have witnessed a steady stream of books, mostly by western authors, extolling India. The unwillingness on western intellectuals' part to engage honestly with the violent reality of India, or offer a sincere portrayal of its transformation, has much to do with their own assumptions of history and modernity; but glossing over India's treatment of its Muslims – or omitting it substantially from their analyses – must have at least something to do with the insidious apathy towards Muslim tribulations that has characterised western attitudes since 9/11.
The rise of Hindu chauvinism in India has a complex history, but the absence of any meaningful sanction from the rest of the world has certainty emboldened Hindu bigots. Last week, Varun Gandhi, the Hindu-chauvinist BJP's London-educated parliamentary candidate from the Pilibhit constituency in Uttar Pradesh, India's largest state, made remarks of a kind that even European neo-Nazi leaders would hesitate to make in public.
Addressing an exclusive gathering of Hindu voters, Gandhi talked about the injustices faced by Hindus; then he told his enthusiastic listeners that he would sever any hand that was raised against a Hindu; that the lotus (the BJP's election symbol) would chop off Muslim heads; that Muslim names were scary; that his opponent's name sounded like "Osama bin Laden".
The name of his opponent, Riaz Ahmed, does not sound remotely like bin Laden's; but listening to a "Gandhi" make such an inflammatory speech should, if it hasn't already, shatter complacent Indian liberal notions about the country's experiment with secularism. Varun Gandhi is not a fringe figure: he is the great-grandson of India's first prime minister, the staunchly secular atheist Pandit Nehru.
For decades Indian intellectuals have claimed that religion, particularly Hinduism, is perfectly compatible with secularism. Indian secularism, they said repeatedly, is not a total rejection of religion by the state but rather an equal appreciation of every faith. Even though no faith is in principle privileged by the state, this approach made it possible for religion to find expression in the public sphere, and, since Hindus in India outnumber adherents of every other faith, Hinduism dominated it. Almost every government building in India has a prominently positioned picture of a Hindu deity. Hindu rituals accompany the inauguration of all public works, without exception.
The novelist Shashi Tharoor tried to burnish this certifiably sectarian phenomenon with a facile analogy: Indian Muslims, he wrote, accept Hindu rituals at state ceremonies in the same spirit as teetotallers accept champagne in western celebrations. This self-affirming explanation is characteristic of someone who belongs to the majority community. Muslims I interviewed took a different view, but understandably, they were unwilling to protest for the fear of being labelled as "angry Muslims" in a country famous for its tolerant Hindus.
The failure of secularism in India – or, more accurately, the failure of the Indian model of secularism – may be just one aspect of the gamut of failures, but it has the potential to bring down the country. Secularism in India rests entirely upon the goodwill of the Hindu majority. Can this kind of secularism really survive a Narendra Modi as prime minister? As Hindus are increasingly infected by the kind of hatred that Varun Gandhi's speech displayed, maybe it is time for Indian secularists to embrace a new, more radical kind of secularism that is not afraid to recognise and reject the principal source of this strife: religion itself.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... uism/print
April 17, 2009
Taliban Exploit Class Rifts in Pakistan
By JANE PERLEZ and PIR ZUBAIR SHAH
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — The Taliban have advanced deeper into Pakistan by engineering a class revolt that exploits profound fissures between a small group of wealthy landlords and their landless tenants, according to government officials and analysts here.
The strategy cleared a path to power for the Taliban in the Swat Valley, where the government allowed Islamic law to be imposed this week, and it carries broad dangers for the rest of Pakistan, particularly the militants’ main goal, the populous heartland of Punjab Province.
In Swat, accounts from those who have fled now make clear that the Taliban seized control by pushing out about four dozen landlords who held the most power.
To do so, the militants organized peasants into armed gangs that became their shock troops, the residents, government officials and analysts said.
The approach allowed the Taliban to offer economic spoils to people frustrated with lax and corrupt government even as the militants imposed a strict form of Islam through terror and intimidation.
More.....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/17/world ... ?th&emc=th
Taliban Exploit Class Rifts in Pakistan
By JANE PERLEZ and PIR ZUBAIR SHAH
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — The Taliban have advanced deeper into Pakistan by engineering a class revolt that exploits profound fissures between a small group of wealthy landlords and their landless tenants, according to government officials and analysts here.
The strategy cleared a path to power for the Taliban in the Swat Valley, where the government allowed Islamic law to be imposed this week, and it carries broad dangers for the rest of Pakistan, particularly the militants’ main goal, the populous heartland of Punjab Province.
In Swat, accounts from those who have fled now make clear that the Taliban seized control by pushing out about four dozen landlords who held the most power.
To do so, the militants organized peasants into armed gangs that became their shock troops, the residents, government officials and analysts said.
The approach allowed the Taliban to offer economic spoils to people frustrated with lax and corrupt government even as the militants imposed a strict form of Islam through terror and intimidation.
More.....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/17/world ... ?th&emc=th
May 3, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
Selling Democracy (and Tea) in India
By NARESH FERNANDES
Mumbai, India
ON Thursday morning, my neighbors and I joined an orderly line in front of the election desk at the end of our street. We did what the public-service ads had been urging us to do for weeks: “Give them the finger.” The polling officer didn’t even raise her head. After dipping a plastic straw into a bottle of purple ink, she drew a blotchy line down the middle finger of my left hand. Then I stepped up to the voting machine to press a button in India’s 15th general election.
The scene was repeating itself across Mumbai. At another polling station, I saw Bollywood B-listers happily show off their ink-smeared digits to TV cameras. A practice that had originally been instituted to ward off electoral scams like ballot-box stuffing (we call it “booth capturing”) was transformed into a proud reaffirmation of faith in Indian democracy.
In the weeks leading up to this election, the ink smearing became a source of inspiration for a barrage of pun-studded campaigns aimed at getting normally apathetic middle-class Indians to fulfill their civic responsibility. The election — with more than 714 million voters — was also a fantastic advertising opportunity. An automobile parts company ran an ad of a finger imprinted with an ink mark in the shape of a car battery. “Vote for a trouble-free five-year term,” was its message. A purveyor of tea, India’s pick-me-up, declared: “If you continue sleeping, so will our politicians. Wake up and vote!”
On Thursday, many Indians ignored that advice. Turnout was sluggish across the city, but the figures were especially disappointing in affluent South Mumbai, which had been a particular focus of the get-out-the-vote effort. Only 43.3 percent of eligible voters in the area exercised their franchise, but that wasn’t much of a surprise. Rich Indians have long known that they command more powerful means to influence politicians than votes.
This contradicts India’s perception of itself as a deeply rooted democracy. Democracy is the superior virtue we claim as we smugly survey the chaos that military dictators have visited upon Pakistan. Democracy is our defense against China’s superior record of alleviating poverty and raising standards of health and literacy.
And yet our inability to protect religious minorities is obvious to the thousands of Muslim victims of the Gujarat riots of 2002. Our most famous painter, M. F. Husain, who lives in exile under threats from extremists for daring to paint Hindu deities in the nude, knows that we have yet to secure the right to free expression. And the brutality against ethnic separatist movements in the northeast and Kashmir demonstrates our unwillingness to make pragmatic compromises.
Our experiment with democracy has been far more successful than some others, but despite regular elections, it has failed many Indians. After all, in South Mumbai the government responds to its residents — whether they stand in the sun for that purple streak or not.
Naresh Fernandes is the editor of Time Out India.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/03/opini ... nted=print
*****
May 3, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
Indonesia’s Do-It-Yourself Campaign
By ENDY M. BAYUNI
Jakarta, Indonesia
IN the days and weeks after the April 9 parliamentary elections in Indonesia, employees at the mental hospital in Surakarta, in Central Java, have been working double shifts. “We’ve been overwhelmed with 200 patients a day,” said the hospital spokeswoman, Dyah Srimarwati. Other mental institutions are reporting a similar surge. Losing candidates in the election apparently account for the bulk of new patients.
All sorts of sad stories have emerged: a losing candidate in West Java hanged herself; another on Bali died of a heart attack after the polling stations announced the results; and when one man on Sulawesi discovered that most of his neighbors had not voted for him, he cut off public access to a well on his property.
About one million people from 44 parties were contesting up to 50,000 seats in the national, provincial and local legislatures. So you had an average of a 1 in 20 chance of winning. And you couldn’t expect help from your political party. You recruited your own volunteers, organized your own town hall meetings and raised your own money. If you were of limited means, this meant selling everything you had — your house, your car, your lifetime savings, even your parents-in-law’s property if you could persuade them. Or you just went deep into debt. No wonder people got very depressed as soon as they learned they had lost.
This is only Indonesia’s third free and fair election since General Suharto resigned in 1998, but April’s election, along with those in 1999 and 2004, have proven to skeptics that democracy can be practiced here, in the world’s largest Muslim nation. Over the past decade, Islamist parties have not done particularly well; most Indonesians, including the majority of Muslims, obviously feel more comfortable with the secular parties. (Preliminary counts indicate three secular-centrist parties, including the Democratic Party of the incumbent president, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, will dominate the national Parliament.)
That said, things have not always gone smoothly. Although the election commission said 171 million people were registered, millions learned on April 9 that they could not vote because their names were not on the rolls. It’s not clear yet how many were disenfranchised, but if the number is sufficiently large, say 20 million or more, it would raise serious questions about the credibility of the polls and of the elected government.
Those who did vote found the task overwhelming. Typically, a voter would get four ballot papers, each as wide and almost as tall as an adult body, with the names and symbols of the parties and the lists of candidates fielded by the parties in their respective electoral districts. In my own confusion about whom to vote for, I went for women — we have not yet had a female lawmaker convicted for corruption, so I thought that was a good bet.
The names that stood out on the ballots were not of politicians but of celebrities and comedians. Not surprisingly, some of them won and some seasoned politicians lost or may lose their seats — for instance, a popular Jakarta comedian named Mandra is leading the House speaker, Agung Laksono. Presumably, after what seems like endless scandals, many people feel that if you are going to send a bunch of clowns to Parliament, then you may as well send in the real clowns this time. At least we will all get a good laugh.
Endy M. Bayuni is the chief editor of The Jakarta Post.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/03/opini ... nted=print
Op-Ed Contributor
Selling Democracy (and Tea) in India
By NARESH FERNANDES
Mumbai, India
ON Thursday morning, my neighbors and I joined an orderly line in front of the election desk at the end of our street. We did what the public-service ads had been urging us to do for weeks: “Give them the finger.” The polling officer didn’t even raise her head. After dipping a plastic straw into a bottle of purple ink, she drew a blotchy line down the middle finger of my left hand. Then I stepped up to the voting machine to press a button in India’s 15th general election.
The scene was repeating itself across Mumbai. At another polling station, I saw Bollywood B-listers happily show off their ink-smeared digits to TV cameras. A practice that had originally been instituted to ward off electoral scams like ballot-box stuffing (we call it “booth capturing”) was transformed into a proud reaffirmation of faith in Indian democracy.
In the weeks leading up to this election, the ink smearing became a source of inspiration for a barrage of pun-studded campaigns aimed at getting normally apathetic middle-class Indians to fulfill their civic responsibility. The election — with more than 714 million voters — was also a fantastic advertising opportunity. An automobile parts company ran an ad of a finger imprinted with an ink mark in the shape of a car battery. “Vote for a trouble-free five-year term,” was its message. A purveyor of tea, India’s pick-me-up, declared: “If you continue sleeping, so will our politicians. Wake up and vote!”
On Thursday, many Indians ignored that advice. Turnout was sluggish across the city, but the figures were especially disappointing in affluent South Mumbai, which had been a particular focus of the get-out-the-vote effort. Only 43.3 percent of eligible voters in the area exercised their franchise, but that wasn’t much of a surprise. Rich Indians have long known that they command more powerful means to influence politicians than votes.
This contradicts India’s perception of itself as a deeply rooted democracy. Democracy is the superior virtue we claim as we smugly survey the chaos that military dictators have visited upon Pakistan. Democracy is our defense against China’s superior record of alleviating poverty and raising standards of health and literacy.
And yet our inability to protect religious minorities is obvious to the thousands of Muslim victims of the Gujarat riots of 2002. Our most famous painter, M. F. Husain, who lives in exile under threats from extremists for daring to paint Hindu deities in the nude, knows that we have yet to secure the right to free expression. And the brutality against ethnic separatist movements in the northeast and Kashmir demonstrates our unwillingness to make pragmatic compromises.
Our experiment with democracy has been far more successful than some others, but despite regular elections, it has failed many Indians. After all, in South Mumbai the government responds to its residents — whether they stand in the sun for that purple streak or not.
Naresh Fernandes is the editor of Time Out India.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/03/opini ... nted=print
*****
May 3, 2009
Op-Ed Contributor
Indonesia’s Do-It-Yourself Campaign
By ENDY M. BAYUNI
Jakarta, Indonesia
IN the days and weeks after the April 9 parliamentary elections in Indonesia, employees at the mental hospital in Surakarta, in Central Java, have been working double shifts. “We’ve been overwhelmed with 200 patients a day,” said the hospital spokeswoman, Dyah Srimarwati. Other mental institutions are reporting a similar surge. Losing candidates in the election apparently account for the bulk of new patients.
All sorts of sad stories have emerged: a losing candidate in West Java hanged herself; another on Bali died of a heart attack after the polling stations announced the results; and when one man on Sulawesi discovered that most of his neighbors had not voted for him, he cut off public access to a well on his property.
About one million people from 44 parties were contesting up to 50,000 seats in the national, provincial and local legislatures. So you had an average of a 1 in 20 chance of winning. And you couldn’t expect help from your political party. You recruited your own volunteers, organized your own town hall meetings and raised your own money. If you were of limited means, this meant selling everything you had — your house, your car, your lifetime savings, even your parents-in-law’s property if you could persuade them. Or you just went deep into debt. No wonder people got very depressed as soon as they learned they had lost.
This is only Indonesia’s third free and fair election since General Suharto resigned in 1998, but April’s election, along with those in 1999 and 2004, have proven to skeptics that democracy can be practiced here, in the world’s largest Muslim nation. Over the past decade, Islamist parties have not done particularly well; most Indonesians, including the majority of Muslims, obviously feel more comfortable with the secular parties. (Preliminary counts indicate three secular-centrist parties, including the Democratic Party of the incumbent president, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, will dominate the national Parliament.)
That said, things have not always gone smoothly. Although the election commission said 171 million people were registered, millions learned on April 9 that they could not vote because their names were not on the rolls. It’s not clear yet how many were disenfranchised, but if the number is sufficiently large, say 20 million or more, it would raise serious questions about the credibility of the polls and of the elected government.
Those who did vote found the task overwhelming. Typically, a voter would get four ballot papers, each as wide and almost as tall as an adult body, with the names and symbols of the parties and the lists of candidates fielded by the parties in their respective electoral districts. In my own confusion about whom to vote for, I went for women — we have not yet had a female lawmaker convicted for corruption, so I thought that was a good bet.
The names that stood out on the ballots were not of politicians but of celebrities and comedians. Not surprisingly, some of them won and some seasoned politicians lost or may lose their seats — for instance, a popular Jakarta comedian named Mandra is leading the House speaker, Agung Laksono. Presumably, after what seems like endless scandals, many people feel that if you are going to send a bunch of clowns to Parliament, then you may as well send in the real clowns this time. At least we will all get a good laugh.
Endy M. Bayuni is the chief editor of The Jakarta Post.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/03/opini ... nted=print
There is a related video and multimedia linked at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/04/world ... hools.html
May 4, 2009
Pakistan’s Islamic Schools Fill Void, but Fuel Militancy
By SABRINA TAVERNISE
MOHRI PUR, Pakistan — The elementary school in this poor village is easy to mistake for a barn. It has a dirt floor and no lights, and crows swoop through its glassless windows. Class size recently hit 140, spilling students into the courtyard.
But if the state has forgotten the children here, the mullahs have not. With public education in a shambles, Pakistan’s poorest families have turned to madrasas, or Islamic schools, that feed and house the children while pushing a more militant brand of Islam than was traditional here.
The concentration of madrasas here in southern Punjab has become an urgent concern in the face of Pakistan’s expanding insurgency. The schools offer almost no instruction beyond the memorizing of the Koran, creating a widening pool of young minds that are sympathetic to militancy.
In an analysis of the profiles of suicide bombers who have struck in Punjab, the Punjab police said more than two-thirds had attended madrasas.
“We are at the beginning of a great storm that is about to sweep the country,” said Ibn Abduh Rehman, who directs the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, an independent organization. “It’s red alert for Pakistan.”
President Obama said in a news conference last week that he was “gravely concerned” about the situation in Pakistan, not least because the government did not “seem to have the capacity to deliver basic services: schools, health care, rule of law, a judicial system that works for the majority of the people.”
More at the link provided at the beginning of the post...
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/04/world ... hools.html
May 4, 2009
Pakistan’s Islamic Schools Fill Void, but Fuel Militancy
By SABRINA TAVERNISE
MOHRI PUR, Pakistan — The elementary school in this poor village is easy to mistake for a barn. It has a dirt floor and no lights, and crows swoop through its glassless windows. Class size recently hit 140, spilling students into the courtyard.
But if the state has forgotten the children here, the mullahs have not. With public education in a shambles, Pakistan’s poorest families have turned to madrasas, or Islamic schools, that feed and house the children while pushing a more militant brand of Islam than was traditional here.
The concentration of madrasas here in southern Punjab has become an urgent concern in the face of Pakistan’s expanding insurgency. The schools offer almost no instruction beyond the memorizing of the Koran, creating a widening pool of young minds that are sympathetic to militancy.
In an analysis of the profiles of suicide bombers who have struck in Punjab, the Punjab police said more than two-thirds had attended madrasas.
“We are at the beginning of a great storm that is about to sweep the country,” said Ibn Abduh Rehman, who directs the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, an independent organization. “It’s red alert for Pakistan.”
President Obama said in a news conference last week that he was “gravely concerned” about the situation in Pakistan, not least because the government did not “seem to have the capacity to deliver basic services: schools, health care, rule of law, a judicial system that works for the majority of the people.”
More at the link provided at the beginning of the post...
There is a related multimdeia and more at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/06/world ... &th&emc=th
May 6, 2009
Pakistani Army Poised for New Push Into Swat
By CARLOTTA GALL
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Residents flooded out of the Swat Valley by the thousands on Tuesday as the government prepared to mount a new military campaign against Taliban militants and as a much-criticized peace accord with the insurgents fell apart.
People crammed into cars and buses and headed south after the local government told residents to leave Swat before a government military offensive. On Sunday, black-turbaned Taliban fighters seized control of Mingora, Swat’s capital.
Since then, Taliban and government forces have accused each other of scuttling the peace accord, and they traded gun and mortar fire.
The Taliban had dug in and laid mines in the streets, girding for battle, residents said.
President Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan is scheduled to meet on Wednesday with President Obama in Washington, where American officials have sharply criticized the peace accord and urged the government to fight the Taliban.
Two weeks ago, the Taliban used the territory all but ceded to them under the accord to push into another district, Buner, just 60 miles from the capital, Islamabad, prompting American calls for tougher action.
A new operation in Swat may signal the harder stance American officials have been looking for. But the question remains whether the Pakistani military has the will and ability to sustain its operations against the insurgents, the vast majority of whom are Pakistani.
The American special envoy for the region, Richard C. Holbrooke, said Tuesday that the situation in Pakistan was fragile, but he welcomed the turn toward wider military action.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/06/world ... &th&emc=th
May 6, 2009
Pakistani Army Poised for New Push Into Swat
By CARLOTTA GALL
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Residents flooded out of the Swat Valley by the thousands on Tuesday as the government prepared to mount a new military campaign against Taliban militants and as a much-criticized peace accord with the insurgents fell apart.
People crammed into cars and buses and headed south after the local government told residents to leave Swat before a government military offensive. On Sunday, black-turbaned Taliban fighters seized control of Mingora, Swat’s capital.
Since then, Taliban and government forces have accused each other of scuttling the peace accord, and they traded gun and mortar fire.
The Taliban had dug in and laid mines in the streets, girding for battle, residents said.
President Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan is scheduled to meet on Wednesday with President Obama in Washington, where American officials have sharply criticized the peace accord and urged the government to fight the Taliban.
Two weeks ago, the Taliban used the territory all but ceded to them under the accord to push into another district, Buner, just 60 miles from the capital, Islamabad, prompting American calls for tougher action.
A new operation in Swat may signal the harder stance American officials have been looking for. But the question remains whether the Pakistani military has the will and ability to sustain its operations against the insurgents, the vast majority of whom are Pakistani.
The American special envoy for the region, Richard C. Holbrooke, said Tuesday that the situation in Pakistan was fragile, but he welcomed the turn toward wider military action.
There is a related multimedia linked at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/17/world ... india.html
May 17, 2009
Governing Party in India Scores Victory
By SOMINI SENGUPTA
NEW DELHI — The governing coalition led by the Indian National Congress sailed to a surprisingly decisive victory in India’s grueling parliamentary elections, vaulting Manmohan Singh, a soft-spoken economic reformer, to a second term as prime minister, and sweeping away the prospect of political instability in the world’s most populous democracy.
Mr. Singh, 77, called the victory “a massive mandate” on Saturday afternoon, hours after the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party conceded defeat. The victory, in what is apparently a Congress landslide, signals the possibility of a stable and strong government in the face of stiff challenges: a sharp slowdown in economic growth, abiding poverty and instability in the region.
It also sidelines a slew of small, regional party bosses whose influence had steadily grown in Indian national politics, and potentially cuts down the power of Communists who had blocked economic reforms for most of Mr. Singh’s first five-year term.
The Congress Party’s showing vindicates the prime minister’s efforts to deepen a strategic partnership with the United States at a time when the Obama administration is deeply concerned about security in the region, chiefly in Pakistan and Afghanistan. A stronger government will also be better able to tackle issues of crucial importance to Washington, from economic reforms to climate change, although there is not necessarily agreement with the Americans on how to proceed.
By early evening, the Election Commission of India projected that the Congress-led alliance would win 259 of 543 parliamentary seats, while the opposition B.J.P.-led alliance was expected to take 160 seats, and a third alliance, dominated by Communists, 63. Congress alone was projected to win over 200 seats. Results were not yet final, but the government had finished counting ballots for 55 percent of the seats.
The projections are expected to dispel the fears of investors and analysts abroad. A smaller vote share for the Congress coalition would have almost surely led to protracted and painful political horse-trading with groups it would have been forced to ally with and engendered a weak government. The coalition will need partners to form a parliamentary majority, but it will not be nearly as dependent as it has been on allies with whom it disagrees.
Still, the seemingly large mandate also brings large expectations from various constituencies in a nation of 1.1 billion people, a third of whom remain among the poorest in the world.
The Confederation of Indian Industry called for reforms to be “fast tracked” along with investments in infrastructure to revive the economy. That could swell an already ballooning deficit and harm the country’s credit ratings.
But the party will also be beholden to the majority of Indians. Congress had campaigned on its record of spending on the rural poor, including a huge public jobs program in the countryside and a costly loan waiver program for indebted farmers.
The margin of victory surprised even party officials. “It exceeded our wildest expectations,” Jairam Ramesh, a Congress Party strategist, said in an interview in the party headquarters, as workers beat drums and set off firecrackers in the sizzling midday heat. Throughout the afternoon, Congress politicians trailed into the official residence of the party president, Sonia Gandhi, bearing giant bouquets.
At a somber and largely empty B.J.P. office, Arun Jaitley, a party leader, accepted defeat early in the day. “Something certainly did go wrong,” he told reporters. The party, which has a vocal Hindu nationalist base, had sought to capitalize on the incumbent Congress-led government’s handling of the economic downturn and terrorist attacks during its tenure.
The party’s new star was also its most controversial member: Feroze Varun Gandhi, an estranged member of the Nehru-Gandhi family, who had been jailed for making anti-Muslim speeches and was released on bail. He won by a large margin.
Among the biggest losers in the vote were the four separate Communist parties on whom the incumbent Congress-led coalition initially relied to stay in power. The four parties had successfully blocked several reform measures, including privatizing more state-owned companies. The Communists eventually withdrew their support, over a nuclear deal with the United States last July.
For Congress, the Communists’ weak performance brought sweet relief. “The left will not have a stranglehold,” Mr. Ramesh said. “There will be better cohesion on economic policy. Right now, the priority is to restore high economic growth.”
How fast the next Congress-led administration will further liberalize the economy is unclear. In the face of the global financial crisis, Congress leaders are not likely to want to open up India’s banking and insurance sectors, for instance, although they could reduce interest rates and increase infrastructure spending.
The election results, though preliminary, defied several commonplace assumptions. Several commentators had rued the absence of big ideas in these elections, yet Indians went to the polls in droves in the scorching heat. At nearly 60 percent, election turnout was higher than in 2004. There had also been widespread fears that small, regional parties might upstage the national parties or demand influential government portfolios in exchange for their support. But they remained small and regional, and some of them appear to have been trounced.
Ramachandra Guha, a historian of modern India, saw in that perhaps another important shift in the political landscape. After 20 years of the once-dominant Congress Party being challenged by the ascendance of small identity-based parties, these elections suggested something of a course correction, he said.
Not least, these elections were a test of credibility for Rahul Gandhi, 38, the fourth-generation scion of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty and his party’s inevitable leader. He became his party’s star campaigner in these elections, crisscrossing the country and attending an average of four campaign rallies a day for more than a month.
Renouncing personal power is a powerful political gesture in India, and the Nehru-Gandhi family has used it deftly. Five years ago, when Congress won a surprise victory, Sonia Gandhi renounced the prime minister’s post, bequeathing it to the professorial Mr. Singh. On Saturday, Mrs. Gandhi insisted that the top job should remain with Mr. Singh, rather than go to her son.
With a knowing smile, Mr. Singh told reporters that he would continue to try to persuade Mr. Gandhi to join his cabinet.
Hari Kumar contributed reporting.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/17/world ... india.html
May 17, 2009
Governing Party in India Scores Victory
By SOMINI SENGUPTA
NEW DELHI — The governing coalition led by the Indian National Congress sailed to a surprisingly decisive victory in India’s grueling parliamentary elections, vaulting Manmohan Singh, a soft-spoken economic reformer, to a second term as prime minister, and sweeping away the prospect of political instability in the world’s most populous democracy.
Mr. Singh, 77, called the victory “a massive mandate” on Saturday afternoon, hours after the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party conceded defeat. The victory, in what is apparently a Congress landslide, signals the possibility of a stable and strong government in the face of stiff challenges: a sharp slowdown in economic growth, abiding poverty and instability in the region.
It also sidelines a slew of small, regional party bosses whose influence had steadily grown in Indian national politics, and potentially cuts down the power of Communists who had blocked economic reforms for most of Mr. Singh’s first five-year term.
The Congress Party’s showing vindicates the prime minister’s efforts to deepen a strategic partnership with the United States at a time when the Obama administration is deeply concerned about security in the region, chiefly in Pakistan and Afghanistan. A stronger government will also be better able to tackle issues of crucial importance to Washington, from economic reforms to climate change, although there is not necessarily agreement with the Americans on how to proceed.
By early evening, the Election Commission of India projected that the Congress-led alliance would win 259 of 543 parliamentary seats, while the opposition B.J.P.-led alliance was expected to take 160 seats, and a third alliance, dominated by Communists, 63. Congress alone was projected to win over 200 seats. Results were not yet final, but the government had finished counting ballots for 55 percent of the seats.
The projections are expected to dispel the fears of investors and analysts abroad. A smaller vote share for the Congress coalition would have almost surely led to protracted and painful political horse-trading with groups it would have been forced to ally with and engendered a weak government. The coalition will need partners to form a parliamentary majority, but it will not be nearly as dependent as it has been on allies with whom it disagrees.
Still, the seemingly large mandate also brings large expectations from various constituencies in a nation of 1.1 billion people, a third of whom remain among the poorest in the world.
The Confederation of Indian Industry called for reforms to be “fast tracked” along with investments in infrastructure to revive the economy. That could swell an already ballooning deficit and harm the country’s credit ratings.
But the party will also be beholden to the majority of Indians. Congress had campaigned on its record of spending on the rural poor, including a huge public jobs program in the countryside and a costly loan waiver program for indebted farmers.
The margin of victory surprised even party officials. “It exceeded our wildest expectations,” Jairam Ramesh, a Congress Party strategist, said in an interview in the party headquarters, as workers beat drums and set off firecrackers in the sizzling midday heat. Throughout the afternoon, Congress politicians trailed into the official residence of the party president, Sonia Gandhi, bearing giant bouquets.
At a somber and largely empty B.J.P. office, Arun Jaitley, a party leader, accepted defeat early in the day. “Something certainly did go wrong,” he told reporters. The party, which has a vocal Hindu nationalist base, had sought to capitalize on the incumbent Congress-led government’s handling of the economic downturn and terrorist attacks during its tenure.
The party’s new star was also its most controversial member: Feroze Varun Gandhi, an estranged member of the Nehru-Gandhi family, who had been jailed for making anti-Muslim speeches and was released on bail. He won by a large margin.
Among the biggest losers in the vote were the four separate Communist parties on whom the incumbent Congress-led coalition initially relied to stay in power. The four parties had successfully blocked several reform measures, including privatizing more state-owned companies. The Communists eventually withdrew their support, over a nuclear deal with the United States last July.
For Congress, the Communists’ weak performance brought sweet relief. “The left will not have a stranglehold,” Mr. Ramesh said. “There will be better cohesion on economic policy. Right now, the priority is to restore high economic growth.”
How fast the next Congress-led administration will further liberalize the economy is unclear. In the face of the global financial crisis, Congress leaders are not likely to want to open up India’s banking and insurance sectors, for instance, although they could reduce interest rates and increase infrastructure spending.
The election results, though preliminary, defied several commonplace assumptions. Several commentators had rued the absence of big ideas in these elections, yet Indians went to the polls in droves in the scorching heat. At nearly 60 percent, election turnout was higher than in 2004. There had also been widespread fears that small, regional parties might upstage the national parties or demand influential government portfolios in exchange for their support. But they remained small and regional, and some of them appear to have been trounced.
Ramachandra Guha, a historian of modern India, saw in that perhaps another important shift in the political landscape. After 20 years of the once-dominant Congress Party being challenged by the ascendance of small identity-based parties, these elections suggested something of a course correction, he said.
Not least, these elections were a test of credibility for Rahul Gandhi, 38, the fourth-generation scion of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty and his party’s inevitable leader. He became his party’s star campaigner in these elections, crisscrossing the country and attending an average of four campaign rallies a day for more than a month.
Renouncing personal power is a powerful political gesture in India, and the Nehru-Gandhi family has used it deftly. Five years ago, when Congress won a surprise victory, Sonia Gandhi renounced the prime minister’s post, bequeathing it to the professorial Mr. Singh. On Saturday, Mrs. Gandhi insisted that the top job should remain with Mr. Singh, rather than go to her son.
With a knowing smile, Mr. Singh told reporters that he would continue to try to persuade Mr. Gandhi to join his cabinet.
Hari Kumar contributed reporting.
May 19, 2009
Editorial
India’s Challenges
The Indian National Congress party cannot afford a prolonged celebration after its overwhelming election victory. Much of the postvote analysis has focused on the daunting domestic agenda. But now that Congress has a stable mandate — and can shuck a fractious coalition — it is time for India to exercise the kind of regional and global leadership expected of a rising power.
It can start with neighboring Pakistan, arguably the most dangerous country on earth. A report in The Times on Monday reminds us just how dangerous: The United States believes Islamabad is rapidly expanding a nuclear arsenal thought to already contain 80 to 100 weapons.
We have consistently supported appropriate military aid and increased economic aid to help Pakistan fight the Taliban and Al Qaeda, strengthen democratic institutions and improve the life of its people. Squandering precious resources on nuclear bombs is disgraceful when Pakistan is troubled by economic crisis and facing an insurgency that threatens its very existence.
Trying to keep up to 100 bombs from extremists is hard enough; expanding the nuclear stockpile makes the challenge worse. Officials in Washington are legitimately asking whether billions of dollars in proposed new assistance might be diverted to Pakistan’s nuclear program. They should demand assurances it will not be.
India is essential to what Pakistan will do. New Delhi exercised welcome restraint when it did not attack Pakistan after the November 2008 attacks in Mumbai by Pakistani-based extremists. But tensions remain high, and the Pakistani Army continues to view India as its main adversary. India should take the lead in initiating arms control talks with Pakistan and China. It should also declare its intention to stop producing nuclear weapons fuel, even before a proposed multinational treaty is negotiated. That would provide leverage for Washington and others to exhort Pakistan to do the same.
It is past time for India — stronger both economically and in international stature — to find a way to resolve tensions with Pakistan over Kashmir. If that festering sore cannot be addressed directly, then — as Stephen P. Cohen, a South Asia expert at the Brookings Institution, suggests — broader regional talks on environmental and water issues might be an interim way to find common ground. Ignoring Kashmir is no longer an option.
India has played a constructive role in helping rebuild Afghanistan, but it must take steps to allay Islamabad’s concerns that this is a plan to encircle Pakistan. It should foster regional trade with Pakistan and Afghanistan. More broadly, India must help to revive world trade talks by opening its markets. It could use its considerable trade clout with Iran, Sudan and Myanmar to curb Tehran’s nuclear program, end the genocide in Darfur and press Myanmar’s junta to expand human rights.
India is the dominant power in South Asia, but it has been hesitant to assume its responsibilities. The Congress Party has to do better — starting with Pakistan.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/19/opini ... nted=print
*****
May 19, 2009
Young Pakistanis Take One Problem Into Their Own Hands
By SABRINA TAVERNISE
LAHORE, Pakistan — The idea was simple, but in Pakistan, a country full of talk and short on action, it smacked of rebellion.
A group of young Pakistani friends, sick of hearing their families complain about the government, decided to spite them by taking matters into their own hands: every Sunday they would grab shovels, go out into their city, and pick up garbage.
It was a strange thing to do, particularly for such students from elite private schools, who would normally spend Sunday afternoons relaxing in air-conditioned homes.
But the students were inspired by the recent success of the lawyers’ movement, which used a national protest to press the government to reinstate the country’s chief justice, and their rush of public consciousness was irrepressible.
“Everybody keeps blaming the government, but no one actually does anything,” said Shoaib Ahmed, 21, one of the organizers. “So we thought, why don’t we?”
More....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/19/world ... nted=print
Editorial
India’s Challenges
The Indian National Congress party cannot afford a prolonged celebration after its overwhelming election victory. Much of the postvote analysis has focused on the daunting domestic agenda. But now that Congress has a stable mandate — and can shuck a fractious coalition — it is time for India to exercise the kind of regional and global leadership expected of a rising power.
It can start with neighboring Pakistan, arguably the most dangerous country on earth. A report in The Times on Monday reminds us just how dangerous: The United States believes Islamabad is rapidly expanding a nuclear arsenal thought to already contain 80 to 100 weapons.
We have consistently supported appropriate military aid and increased economic aid to help Pakistan fight the Taliban and Al Qaeda, strengthen democratic institutions and improve the life of its people. Squandering precious resources on nuclear bombs is disgraceful when Pakistan is troubled by economic crisis and facing an insurgency that threatens its very existence.
Trying to keep up to 100 bombs from extremists is hard enough; expanding the nuclear stockpile makes the challenge worse. Officials in Washington are legitimately asking whether billions of dollars in proposed new assistance might be diverted to Pakistan’s nuclear program. They should demand assurances it will not be.
India is essential to what Pakistan will do. New Delhi exercised welcome restraint when it did not attack Pakistan after the November 2008 attacks in Mumbai by Pakistani-based extremists. But tensions remain high, and the Pakistani Army continues to view India as its main adversary. India should take the lead in initiating arms control talks with Pakistan and China. It should also declare its intention to stop producing nuclear weapons fuel, even before a proposed multinational treaty is negotiated. That would provide leverage for Washington and others to exhort Pakistan to do the same.
It is past time for India — stronger both economically and in international stature — to find a way to resolve tensions with Pakistan over Kashmir. If that festering sore cannot be addressed directly, then — as Stephen P. Cohen, a South Asia expert at the Brookings Institution, suggests — broader regional talks on environmental and water issues might be an interim way to find common ground. Ignoring Kashmir is no longer an option.
India has played a constructive role in helping rebuild Afghanistan, but it must take steps to allay Islamabad’s concerns that this is a plan to encircle Pakistan. It should foster regional trade with Pakistan and Afghanistan. More broadly, India must help to revive world trade talks by opening its markets. It could use its considerable trade clout with Iran, Sudan and Myanmar to curb Tehran’s nuclear program, end the genocide in Darfur and press Myanmar’s junta to expand human rights.
India is the dominant power in South Asia, but it has been hesitant to assume its responsibilities. The Congress Party has to do better — starting with Pakistan.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/19/opini ... nted=print
*****
May 19, 2009
Young Pakistanis Take One Problem Into Their Own Hands
By SABRINA TAVERNISE
LAHORE, Pakistan — The idea was simple, but in Pakistan, a country full of talk and short on action, it smacked of rebellion.
A group of young Pakistani friends, sick of hearing their families complain about the government, decided to spite them by taking matters into their own hands: every Sunday they would grab shovels, go out into their city, and pick up garbage.
It was a strange thing to do, particularly for such students from elite private schools, who would normally spend Sunday afternoons relaxing in air-conditioned homes.
But the students were inspired by the recent success of the lawyers’ movement, which used a national protest to press the government to reinstate the country’s chief justice, and their rush of public consciousness was irrepressible.
“Everybody keeps blaming the government, but no one actually does anything,” said Shoaib Ahmed, 21, one of the organizers. “So we thought, why don’t we?”
More....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/19/world ... nted=print
COMMENT: Redeeming Pakistan’s madrassas —Saleem H Ali
Although some of the radical madrassas will still need to be weeded out, embracing Islamic education with an integrated reform strategy is more likely to reduce militancy, rather than lamenting madrassas as arcane institutions
As policy-makers and the media abroad agonise over the situation in Pakistan’s Swat valley, madrassas are back on the front page in papers such as The New York Times. The linkage between extremism and education should be fairly obvious but it seems to still elude most analysts. Indeed the word “Taliban” means “students” in Pashto, suggesting an inherent connection of these militants with some form of “learning”.
Incendiary information at these Islamic seminaries is once again being considered both a symptom and a cause of Pakistan’s problems. The latest mantra appears to be that because government schools have failed, madrassas are filling a social void that offers free education and sustenance for the rural poor but causes massive radicalisation at the same time.
Madrassas in Pakistan are certainly a matter of concern but rather than finding ways to diminish their recruitment, they need to be engaged and internally reformed. These seminaries already have a major physical and financial infrastructure in the country that can be harnessed positively alongside investments in government schools.
Only four years ago, famed terrorism analysts Peter Bergen (among the few western journalists to have interviewed Osama bin Laden) and Swaty Pandey had argued in The New York Times that concern over Islamic education was all a ‘madrassa myth’. Basing their analysis on a controversial World Bank study (co-authored by two Pakistani-American academics) about the actual number of madrassas in Pakistan, Bergen and Pandey had argued that “while madrassas are an important issue in education and development in the Muslim world, they are not and should not be considered a threat to the United States” because of their relatively small number and since terrorists who attacked the West had largely not been educated in madrassas.
However, as many of the suicide bombers in recent months have been traced back to madrassas, the pendulum has swung again, as now analysts discover that civil strife in Afghanistan and Pakistan can be just as dangerous for Western interests. Focusing on the core problem of curricular reform can provide us a path out of this ambivalence about madrassas.
While growing up in Pakistan, I attended a private English-medium school but every afternoon, I would also receive Islamic learning from a religious scholar who hailed from a prominent madrassa in Lahore. As I reflect back on that time, the core problem of contemporary Islamic education remains a general antipathy towards critical thinking.
Similar concerns have existed in other religions as well, but Islamic schools in Pakistan have contended with a host of circumstances that compounded these challenges. The sectarian divide between Shias and Sunnis in Pakistan was accentuated by funding from Iran and Saudi Arabia to specific strains of madrassas, particularly in southern Punjab. Exclusionary doctrines rather than pluralistic interpretations of Islamic texts were preached by both sides to gain more adherents. Religious political parties as well as the Pakistani government and security organisations capitalised on the fruits of radicalisation since unquestioning allegiance was easy to achieve with curricula that portrayed the world in stark terms of good and evil.
But the radicalisation of madrassas should not lead us to give up in despair. In other parts of the world, madrassas have served an appropriate educational purpose. For example in West Bengal, India, a survey of Islamic schools in January 2009 found that because of the higher quality education at madrassas, even non-Muslims were actively enrolling in them. This was remarkably akin to how in Pakistan many Muslim families send their children to Christian schools because of the high quality of teaching and discipline.
Hindu enrolment in several Bengali madrassas, for example, was as high as 64 percent because many of these institutions offered vocational training programmes. Such examples can certainly be emulated in Pakistani madrassas as well. We should not give up on madrassas but rather help bring them back to their heyday of pluralistic learning.
The strategy of ‘draining the swamp’ by establishing sparkling government schools alongside madrassas, which appears to be the current approach from development donors, is likely to have limited success. Madrassas will immediately resort to a defensive strategy of labelling the government schools in conspiratorial terms and still be able to recruit students quite zealously from religious families. Investment to improve education is needed across Pakistan in all kinds of schools, including madrassas.
The only way to solve the madrassa problem is to engage in a process of reform that focuses on pluralism and conflict resolution skills that should be facilitated by the Pakistani government with the assistance of other Muslim countries and ulema.
There are already some positive moves from the ulema in Pakistan. Religious clerics from both the Deobandi Tablighi Jama’at and the Barelvi Sunni Tehreek have publicly rejected the Taliban approach to Islam. Madrassas such as the venerable Jamia Ashrafia in Lahore are now willing to initiate specific teaching modules that stress the importance of non-violence and respect for other faith traditions.
Momentum elsewhere towards such efforts is exemplified by reforms in places such as Indonesia’s Guluk-Guluk pesantren, where Islamic environmental education is being used to develop peace-building skills. During my visit to central Java last year, I visited several Islamic schools that are producing very balanced and employable young professionals. Indonesia, which is the world’s largest Muslim country, should share some of its success in improving madrassa curricula with Pakistan.
Where Western donors can help is to provide vocational training and apprenticeship programs for madrassa graduates that will be consistent with their religious values. Careers as healthcare apprentices and disaster relief professionals are particularly appropriate in this regard.
Although some of the radical madrassas will still need to be weeded out, embracing Islamic education with an integrated reform strategy is more likely to reduce militancy, rather than lamenting madrassas as arcane institutions to be eroded by naively creating an alternate market for schools.
Dr Saleem H Ali is associate professor of environmental planning and Asian Studies at the University of Vermont. His most recent book is Islam and Education: conflict and conformity in Pakistan’s madrassas (Oxford University Press, 2009). www.saleemali.net
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.as ... 2009_pg3_3
__._,_.___
Although some of the radical madrassas will still need to be weeded out, embracing Islamic education with an integrated reform strategy is more likely to reduce militancy, rather than lamenting madrassas as arcane institutions
As policy-makers and the media abroad agonise over the situation in Pakistan’s Swat valley, madrassas are back on the front page in papers such as The New York Times. The linkage between extremism and education should be fairly obvious but it seems to still elude most analysts. Indeed the word “Taliban” means “students” in Pashto, suggesting an inherent connection of these militants with some form of “learning”.
Incendiary information at these Islamic seminaries is once again being considered both a symptom and a cause of Pakistan’s problems. The latest mantra appears to be that because government schools have failed, madrassas are filling a social void that offers free education and sustenance for the rural poor but causes massive radicalisation at the same time.
Madrassas in Pakistan are certainly a matter of concern but rather than finding ways to diminish their recruitment, they need to be engaged and internally reformed. These seminaries already have a major physical and financial infrastructure in the country that can be harnessed positively alongside investments in government schools.
Only four years ago, famed terrorism analysts Peter Bergen (among the few western journalists to have interviewed Osama bin Laden) and Swaty Pandey had argued in The New York Times that concern over Islamic education was all a ‘madrassa myth’. Basing their analysis on a controversial World Bank study (co-authored by two Pakistani-American academics) about the actual number of madrassas in Pakistan, Bergen and Pandey had argued that “while madrassas are an important issue in education and development in the Muslim world, they are not and should not be considered a threat to the United States” because of their relatively small number and since terrorists who attacked the West had largely not been educated in madrassas.
However, as many of the suicide bombers in recent months have been traced back to madrassas, the pendulum has swung again, as now analysts discover that civil strife in Afghanistan and Pakistan can be just as dangerous for Western interests. Focusing on the core problem of curricular reform can provide us a path out of this ambivalence about madrassas.
While growing up in Pakistan, I attended a private English-medium school but every afternoon, I would also receive Islamic learning from a religious scholar who hailed from a prominent madrassa in Lahore. As I reflect back on that time, the core problem of contemporary Islamic education remains a general antipathy towards critical thinking.
Similar concerns have existed in other religions as well, but Islamic schools in Pakistan have contended with a host of circumstances that compounded these challenges. The sectarian divide between Shias and Sunnis in Pakistan was accentuated by funding from Iran and Saudi Arabia to specific strains of madrassas, particularly in southern Punjab. Exclusionary doctrines rather than pluralistic interpretations of Islamic texts were preached by both sides to gain more adherents. Religious political parties as well as the Pakistani government and security organisations capitalised on the fruits of radicalisation since unquestioning allegiance was easy to achieve with curricula that portrayed the world in stark terms of good and evil.
But the radicalisation of madrassas should not lead us to give up in despair. In other parts of the world, madrassas have served an appropriate educational purpose. For example in West Bengal, India, a survey of Islamic schools in January 2009 found that because of the higher quality education at madrassas, even non-Muslims were actively enrolling in them. This was remarkably akin to how in Pakistan many Muslim families send their children to Christian schools because of the high quality of teaching and discipline.
Hindu enrolment in several Bengali madrassas, for example, was as high as 64 percent because many of these institutions offered vocational training programmes. Such examples can certainly be emulated in Pakistani madrassas as well. We should not give up on madrassas but rather help bring them back to their heyday of pluralistic learning.
The strategy of ‘draining the swamp’ by establishing sparkling government schools alongside madrassas, which appears to be the current approach from development donors, is likely to have limited success. Madrassas will immediately resort to a defensive strategy of labelling the government schools in conspiratorial terms and still be able to recruit students quite zealously from religious families. Investment to improve education is needed across Pakistan in all kinds of schools, including madrassas.
The only way to solve the madrassa problem is to engage in a process of reform that focuses on pluralism and conflict resolution skills that should be facilitated by the Pakistani government with the assistance of other Muslim countries and ulema.
There are already some positive moves from the ulema in Pakistan. Religious clerics from both the Deobandi Tablighi Jama’at and the Barelvi Sunni Tehreek have publicly rejected the Taliban approach to Islam. Madrassas such as the venerable Jamia Ashrafia in Lahore are now willing to initiate specific teaching modules that stress the importance of non-violence and respect for other faith traditions.
Momentum elsewhere towards such efforts is exemplified by reforms in places such as Indonesia’s Guluk-Guluk pesantren, where Islamic environmental education is being used to develop peace-building skills. During my visit to central Java last year, I visited several Islamic schools that are producing very balanced and employable young professionals. Indonesia, which is the world’s largest Muslim country, should share some of its success in improving madrassa curricula with Pakistan.
Where Western donors can help is to provide vocational training and apprenticeship programs for madrassa graduates that will be consistent with their religious values. Careers as healthcare apprentices and disaster relief professionals are particularly appropriate in this regard.
Although some of the radical madrassas will still need to be weeded out, embracing Islamic education with an integrated reform strategy is more likely to reduce militancy, rather than lamenting madrassas as arcane institutions to be eroded by naively creating an alternate market for schools.
Dr Saleem H Ali is associate professor of environmental planning and Asian Studies at the University of Vermont. His most recent book is Islam and Education: conflict and conformity in Pakistan’s madrassas (Oxford University Press, 2009). www.saleemali.net
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.as ... 2009_pg3_3
__._,_.___
May 25, 2009
Op-Ed Columnist
Peaceful Evolution Angst
By ROGER COHEN
HO CHI MINH CITY, VIETNAM — The Vietnamese Communist Party, like its fraternal party in China, has identified the No. 1 threat it faces. The looming danger is called “peaceful evolution.”
That may sound like the weatherman warning of the menace of clear, sunlit skies. But the architects of Market-Leninism, who have delivered fast-growth capitalism to one-party Asian states, are in earnest. The nightmares they have are not about revolutionary upheaval, but the drip, drip, drip of liberal democracy.
Twenty years after Tiananmen Square, revolt is dormant and students docile from Beijing to Hanoi. They’ve bought into development over democracy for the foreseeable future. They may want more freedom, but not to the point that they will confront the system, as the Tiananmen generation did.
“The major task for China now is development,” a Peking University ecology major named Song Chao told my colleague Sharon LaFraniere. That’s the mood here in Vietnam, too, where moving up from motorbikes to cars is more likely to occupy the next generation than pushing for multiparty democracy.
As in China, this pragmatic sentiment is related to trauma. Both countries saw civil wars in the second half of the 20th century that exacted tremendous tolls. So stability is prized, especially as it has brought fast-rising living standards.
But there’s more to the shift that has made “peaceful evolution” the specter keeping Asian politburos awake at night.
Technology has taken the “total” out of totalitarian. The Stalinist or Maoist dark night of the soul has been consigned to history by wired societies. Neither China nor Vietnam is free. At the same time, neither is so un-free as to make their citizens ache for liberty.
Shi Guoliang, who researches the social outlook of young people at Beijing’s China Youth University for Political Sciences, told the Financial Times that: “Students don’t do sit-ins, they blog and use Twitter.”
Of course, the Chinese authorities block some Web sites deemed hostile. Internet freedom is limited. Here in Vietnam, where things are generally more tropical-lax than up north, that freedom is far greater. (Vietnamese rivalry with China is a constant beneath all the official fraternity.)
In both countries, communication and the online world serve as safety valves for one-party states where Communism is little more than the brand name given to power retention.
In general, I’d say the era of revolutions is over. Google has gobbled the insurrectionary impulse. That is the main difference between the Tiananmen generation and Asia’s rising “Generation Global.” Heat rises in a confined space. When walls and borders are porous, it gets dissipated.
So what’s a party functionary, having digested the lessons of Mao and Ho, to fret about if not “peaceful evolution?”
The almost noiseless implosion of the Soviet system and the velvet revolutions of central Europe have made an indelible impression on the architects of 21st-century soft repression. They’re alert not to bangs but to whimpers.
Their systems are quiet. They are based not on terror and Gulags, but on the establishment of red lines that only impinge on freedom where freedom begins to mean the right to denounce or organize against the authorities.
So what the custodians of repression-lite Communism with a capitalist face fear are not revolutionary cells armed with AK-47s but harmless-sounding nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). They’re on the watch for puffy-faced, over-educated Western idealists who, behind talk of human rights and the rule of law, may be blurring those red lines and sucking the fiber of a Communist cadre.
“You can register a company here in a day, but forget about registering an NGO or charity,” Jonathan Pincus, who runs a branch of Harvard’s Kennedy School in Ho Chi Minh City, told me. A Russian delegation was in Vietnam recently giving advice on how to counter the NGO menace.
That’s regrettable but hardly disastrous. The best should not be the enemy of the good. The rapid rise of China and Vietnam, accounting between them for some 20 percent of humanity, has ushered hundreds of millions of people from poverty since totalitarian Communism fell. The West is in no position to say it knows better.
Something there is about a single doctrine that rubs humanity the wrong way. For a brief moment, after the Berlin Wall fell, free-market, multiparty liberal systems seemed set to sweep everything in their triumphant path. But from Moscow to Beijing to Hanoi, reaction came. Markets and nationalism trumped freedom and the vote; the noble spirit of Tiananmen and Berlin faded.
America, born as a liberating idea, must be true to that and promote its values. But, sobered and broke, it must be patient. As the emergent middle classes of Vietnam and China become more demanding of what they consume, they will also be more demanding consumers of government.
They will want more transparency, predictable laws, better health care, less corruption, broader education, freer speech and fewer red lines.
One-party states will be hard pressed to provide that. Another quarter-century down the road, I’d bet on more democracy and liberty in Beijing and Hanoi, achieved through peaceful evolution, no less.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/25/opini ... nted=print
Op-Ed Columnist
Peaceful Evolution Angst
By ROGER COHEN
HO CHI MINH CITY, VIETNAM — The Vietnamese Communist Party, like its fraternal party in China, has identified the No. 1 threat it faces. The looming danger is called “peaceful evolution.”
That may sound like the weatherman warning of the menace of clear, sunlit skies. But the architects of Market-Leninism, who have delivered fast-growth capitalism to one-party Asian states, are in earnest. The nightmares they have are not about revolutionary upheaval, but the drip, drip, drip of liberal democracy.
Twenty years after Tiananmen Square, revolt is dormant and students docile from Beijing to Hanoi. They’ve bought into development over democracy for the foreseeable future. They may want more freedom, but not to the point that they will confront the system, as the Tiananmen generation did.
“The major task for China now is development,” a Peking University ecology major named Song Chao told my colleague Sharon LaFraniere. That’s the mood here in Vietnam, too, where moving up from motorbikes to cars is more likely to occupy the next generation than pushing for multiparty democracy.
As in China, this pragmatic sentiment is related to trauma. Both countries saw civil wars in the second half of the 20th century that exacted tremendous tolls. So stability is prized, especially as it has brought fast-rising living standards.
But there’s more to the shift that has made “peaceful evolution” the specter keeping Asian politburos awake at night.
Technology has taken the “total” out of totalitarian. The Stalinist or Maoist dark night of the soul has been consigned to history by wired societies. Neither China nor Vietnam is free. At the same time, neither is so un-free as to make their citizens ache for liberty.
Shi Guoliang, who researches the social outlook of young people at Beijing’s China Youth University for Political Sciences, told the Financial Times that: “Students don’t do sit-ins, they blog and use Twitter.”
Of course, the Chinese authorities block some Web sites deemed hostile. Internet freedom is limited. Here in Vietnam, where things are generally more tropical-lax than up north, that freedom is far greater. (Vietnamese rivalry with China is a constant beneath all the official fraternity.)
In both countries, communication and the online world serve as safety valves for one-party states where Communism is little more than the brand name given to power retention.
In general, I’d say the era of revolutions is over. Google has gobbled the insurrectionary impulse. That is the main difference between the Tiananmen generation and Asia’s rising “Generation Global.” Heat rises in a confined space. When walls and borders are porous, it gets dissipated.
So what’s a party functionary, having digested the lessons of Mao and Ho, to fret about if not “peaceful evolution?”
The almost noiseless implosion of the Soviet system and the velvet revolutions of central Europe have made an indelible impression on the architects of 21st-century soft repression. They’re alert not to bangs but to whimpers.
Their systems are quiet. They are based not on terror and Gulags, but on the establishment of red lines that only impinge on freedom where freedom begins to mean the right to denounce or organize against the authorities.
So what the custodians of repression-lite Communism with a capitalist face fear are not revolutionary cells armed with AK-47s but harmless-sounding nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). They’re on the watch for puffy-faced, over-educated Western idealists who, behind talk of human rights and the rule of law, may be blurring those red lines and sucking the fiber of a Communist cadre.
“You can register a company here in a day, but forget about registering an NGO or charity,” Jonathan Pincus, who runs a branch of Harvard’s Kennedy School in Ho Chi Minh City, told me. A Russian delegation was in Vietnam recently giving advice on how to counter the NGO menace.
That’s regrettable but hardly disastrous. The best should not be the enemy of the good. The rapid rise of China and Vietnam, accounting between them for some 20 percent of humanity, has ushered hundreds of millions of people from poverty since totalitarian Communism fell. The West is in no position to say it knows better.
Something there is about a single doctrine that rubs humanity the wrong way. For a brief moment, after the Berlin Wall fell, free-market, multiparty liberal systems seemed set to sweep everything in their triumphant path. But from Moscow to Beijing to Hanoi, reaction came. Markets and nationalism trumped freedom and the vote; the noble spirit of Tiananmen and Berlin faded.
America, born as a liberating idea, must be true to that and promote its values. But, sobered and broke, it must be patient. As the emergent middle classes of Vietnam and China become more demanding of what they consume, they will also be more demanding consumers of government.
They will want more transparency, predictable laws, better health care, less corruption, broader education, freer speech and fewer red lines.
One-party states will be hard pressed to provide that. Another quarter-century down the road, I’d bet on more democracy and liberty in Beijing and Hanoi, achieved through peaceful evolution, no less.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/25/opini ... nted=print
There is a related slide show linked at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/05/world ... ?th&emc=th
June 5, 2009
Taliban Stir Rising Anger of Pakistanis
By SABRINA TAVERNISE
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — A year ago, the Pakistani public was deeply divided over what to do about its spreading insurgency. Some saw the Taliban militants as fellow Muslims and native sons who simply wanted Islamic law, and many opposed direct military action against them.
But history moves quickly in Pakistan, and after months of televised Taliban cruelties, broken promises and suicide attacks, there is a spreading sense — apparent in the news media, among politicians and the public — that many Pakistanis are finally turning against the Taliban.
The shift is still tentative and difficult to quantify. But it seems especially profound among the millions of Pakistanis directly threatened by the Taliban advance from the tribal areas into more settled parts of Pakistan, like the Swat Valley. Their anger at the Taliban now outweighs even their frustration with the military campaign that has crushed their houses and killed their relatives.
“It’s the Taliban that’s responsible for our misery,” said Fakir Muhammed, a refugee from Swat, who, like many who had experienced Taliban rule firsthand, welcomed the military campaign to push the insurgents out.
The growing support for the fight against the Taliban could be an important turning point for Pakistan, whose divisions about its Islamic militancy seemed at times to imperil the state itself.
But it is an opportunity that could just as quickly vanish, analysts and politicians warn, if Pakistan’s political leaders fail to kill or capture senior Taliban leaders, to help an estimated three million who have been displaced, or to create a functioning government in areas long ignored by the state. “This is a profound moment in our history,” said Javed Iqbal, the top bureaucrat in the North-West Frontier Province, the area of fighting. “My greatest fear is whether there is sufficient realization of this among people who make decisions.”
On Wednesday, in an audiotape, Osama bin Laden specifically cited the fighting in Swat and Pakistan’s tribal areas, blaming the Obama administration for the campaign and for sowing “new seeds to increase hatred and revenge on America.”
American officials are keenly aware of the potential of the refugee crisis to spawn militancy. Less than a quarter of the $543 million the United Nations has requested for refugees has arrived, according to Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry.
On Thursday, Richard C. Holbrooke, the American special envoy, visited refugee tents as part of a three-day trip to spread the message that the United States was trying to help. The Obama administration had requested an additional $200 million, he said, noting that it was providing more aid than all other countries combined.
Even so, anti-American feelings still run high in Pakistan. Many Pakistanis blame the United States and the war in Afghanistan for their current troubles.
Pakistanis have long supported the Taliban as allies to exert influence in neighboring Afghanistan. Unlike Afghans, they have never lived under Taliban rule, and have been slow to absorb its dangers.
But that is changing, as the experience of those Pakistanis who have now lived under the Taliban has left many disillusioned.
Over more than a year of fighting, the militants moved into Swat, by killing or driving out the wealthy and promising to improve the lives of the poor. Finally, the military agreed to a truce in February that all but ceded Swat to the Taliban and allowed the insurgents to impose Islamic law, or Shariah.
The prospect of Shariah was alluring, said Iftikhar Ehmad, who owns a cellphone shop in Mingora, the most populous city in Swat, because the court system in Swat was so corrupt and ineffective. But the Taliban’s Shariah was not the benign change people had hoped for. Once the Taliban took power, the insurgents seemed interested only in amassing more, and in April they pushed into Buner, a neighboring district 60 miles from Islamabad.
“It was not Shariah, it was something else,” Mr. Ehmad said, jabbing angrily at the air with his finger in the scorching tent camp in the town of Swabi. “It was scoundrel behavior.”
Daily life became degrading. A woman was lashed in public, and a video of her writhing in pain and begging for mercy stirred wide outrage. Taliban bosses ordered people to donate money. Cosmetics shops and girls’ schools were burned.
By the time the military entered Swat last month, local people began leading soldiers to tunnels with weapons and Taliban hiding places in hotels, the military said. “These people, six months back, weren’t willing to share anything,” said a military official who was involved in planning the campaign. “Gradually they’ve been coming out more and more into the open.”
There has also been a change in other parts of Pakistan, like Punjab, the most populous province, where people used to see the problem of militancy as remote, said Rasul Baksh Rais, a professor of political science at Lahore University of Management Sciences. Now the province has become a target of suicide attacks, most recently last week in Lahore. Mr. Rais cited changes in news coverage of the military campaign and a strong stand by the political parties, even some of the religious ones, as evidence of the shift. “The tables are turned against the Taliban now,” he said. “They are marginalized.”
But the underlying causes that have allowed the Taliban to spread — poverty, barely functioning government, lack of upward mobility in society — remain. Mr. Iqbal is now working frantically to fill those gaps. New judges have recently been identified for Swat, he said, and about 3,000 new police officers will be selected this week.
The Pakistani military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss future operations, said troops would have to remain in Swat for at least six months. Support for the Taliban has not evaporated entirely.
Early this week, on a searing hot street in Mardan, a town south of Swat that has absorbed many of the people churned up in the fighting, a tall man with a long beard, Muhammed Tahir Ansari, grew angry when asked whether the refugees approved of the military operation. “It is illogical to think that people would be happy about this tense situation,” he said curtly.
He was from a charity run by Jamaat-e-Islami, one of the principal religious parties that tacitly support the Taliban, and was directing a frenzied effort to distribute water and hand-held fans.
The government, meanwhile, was nowhere in sight.
Irfan Ashraf contributed reporting from Swabi, Pakistan, and Mardan, Pakistan.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/05/world ... ?th&emc=th
June 5, 2009
Taliban Stir Rising Anger of Pakistanis
By SABRINA TAVERNISE
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — A year ago, the Pakistani public was deeply divided over what to do about its spreading insurgency. Some saw the Taliban militants as fellow Muslims and native sons who simply wanted Islamic law, and many opposed direct military action against them.
But history moves quickly in Pakistan, and after months of televised Taliban cruelties, broken promises and suicide attacks, there is a spreading sense — apparent in the news media, among politicians and the public — that many Pakistanis are finally turning against the Taliban.
The shift is still tentative and difficult to quantify. But it seems especially profound among the millions of Pakistanis directly threatened by the Taliban advance from the tribal areas into more settled parts of Pakistan, like the Swat Valley. Their anger at the Taliban now outweighs even their frustration with the military campaign that has crushed their houses and killed their relatives.
“It’s the Taliban that’s responsible for our misery,” said Fakir Muhammed, a refugee from Swat, who, like many who had experienced Taliban rule firsthand, welcomed the military campaign to push the insurgents out.
The growing support for the fight against the Taliban could be an important turning point for Pakistan, whose divisions about its Islamic militancy seemed at times to imperil the state itself.
But it is an opportunity that could just as quickly vanish, analysts and politicians warn, if Pakistan’s political leaders fail to kill or capture senior Taliban leaders, to help an estimated three million who have been displaced, or to create a functioning government in areas long ignored by the state. “This is a profound moment in our history,” said Javed Iqbal, the top bureaucrat in the North-West Frontier Province, the area of fighting. “My greatest fear is whether there is sufficient realization of this among people who make decisions.”
On Wednesday, in an audiotape, Osama bin Laden specifically cited the fighting in Swat and Pakistan’s tribal areas, blaming the Obama administration for the campaign and for sowing “new seeds to increase hatred and revenge on America.”
American officials are keenly aware of the potential of the refugee crisis to spawn militancy. Less than a quarter of the $543 million the United Nations has requested for refugees has arrived, according to Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry.
On Thursday, Richard C. Holbrooke, the American special envoy, visited refugee tents as part of a three-day trip to spread the message that the United States was trying to help. The Obama administration had requested an additional $200 million, he said, noting that it was providing more aid than all other countries combined.
Even so, anti-American feelings still run high in Pakistan. Many Pakistanis blame the United States and the war in Afghanistan for their current troubles.
Pakistanis have long supported the Taliban as allies to exert influence in neighboring Afghanistan. Unlike Afghans, they have never lived under Taliban rule, and have been slow to absorb its dangers.
But that is changing, as the experience of those Pakistanis who have now lived under the Taliban has left many disillusioned.
Over more than a year of fighting, the militants moved into Swat, by killing or driving out the wealthy and promising to improve the lives of the poor. Finally, the military agreed to a truce in February that all but ceded Swat to the Taliban and allowed the insurgents to impose Islamic law, or Shariah.
The prospect of Shariah was alluring, said Iftikhar Ehmad, who owns a cellphone shop in Mingora, the most populous city in Swat, because the court system in Swat was so corrupt and ineffective. But the Taliban’s Shariah was not the benign change people had hoped for. Once the Taliban took power, the insurgents seemed interested only in amassing more, and in April they pushed into Buner, a neighboring district 60 miles from Islamabad.
“It was not Shariah, it was something else,” Mr. Ehmad said, jabbing angrily at the air with his finger in the scorching tent camp in the town of Swabi. “It was scoundrel behavior.”
Daily life became degrading. A woman was lashed in public, and a video of her writhing in pain and begging for mercy stirred wide outrage. Taliban bosses ordered people to donate money. Cosmetics shops and girls’ schools were burned.
By the time the military entered Swat last month, local people began leading soldiers to tunnels with weapons and Taliban hiding places in hotels, the military said. “These people, six months back, weren’t willing to share anything,” said a military official who was involved in planning the campaign. “Gradually they’ve been coming out more and more into the open.”
There has also been a change in other parts of Pakistan, like Punjab, the most populous province, where people used to see the problem of militancy as remote, said Rasul Baksh Rais, a professor of political science at Lahore University of Management Sciences. Now the province has become a target of suicide attacks, most recently last week in Lahore. Mr. Rais cited changes in news coverage of the military campaign and a strong stand by the political parties, even some of the religious ones, as evidence of the shift. “The tables are turned against the Taliban now,” he said. “They are marginalized.”
But the underlying causes that have allowed the Taliban to spread — poverty, barely functioning government, lack of upward mobility in society — remain. Mr. Iqbal is now working frantically to fill those gaps. New judges have recently been identified for Swat, he said, and about 3,000 new police officers will be selected this week.
The Pakistani military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss future operations, said troops would have to remain in Swat for at least six months. Support for the Taliban has not evaporated entirely.
Early this week, on a searing hot street in Mardan, a town south of Swat that has absorbed many of the people churned up in the fighting, a tall man with a long beard, Muhammed Tahir Ansari, grew angry when asked whether the refugees approved of the military operation. “It is illogical to think that people would be happy about this tense situation,” he said curtly.
He was from a charity run by Jamaat-e-Islami, one of the principal religious parties that tacitly support the Taliban, and was directing a frenzied effort to distribute water and hand-held fans.
The government, meanwhile, was nowhere in sight.
Irfan Ashraf contributed reporting from Swabi, Pakistan, and Mardan, Pakistan.
There is a related multimedia and more at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/10/world ... hawar.html
June 10, 2009
Militants Strike Hotel in Pakistan, Killing 11
By ISMAIL KHAN and SALMAN MASOOD
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Militants opened fire on security guards and rushed a small truck packed with explosives through the gates of a five-star hotel in this northwestern city on Tuesday, detonating the payload in the parking lot and killing at least 11 people and wounding 55, Pakistani officials said.
The blast, powerful enough to leave a crater 6 feet deep and 15 feet wide, collapsed the western wing of the hotel, the Pearl Continental, one of the few in the city that cater to Western visitors. Pakistani television broadcast images of wounded people, panicked and dazed with blood-soaked clothes, being helped out of the smoke-filled lobby. The hotel’s registry was swollen at the time of the attack, which occurred about 10 p.m. local time, with officials working for United Nations agencies and other aid groups tending to the large refugee population that has been displaced by the recent fighting in Pakistan between the Pakistani Army and Taliban insurgents.
*****
June 10, 2009
Attacked, Pakistani Villagers Take On Taliban
By SABRINA TAVERNISE and IRFAN ASHRAF
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Villagers are rising up against the Taliban in a remote corner of northern Pakistan, a grass-roots rebellion that underscores the shift in the public mood against the militants and a growing confidence to confront them.
More than a thousand villagers from the district of Dir have been fighting Taliban militants since Friday, when a Taliban suicide bomber detonated his payload during prayer time at a mosque, killing at least 30 villagers.
Enraged by the bombing, men from surrounding villages began looking for Taliban militants and their supporters, burning houses and killing at least 11 men they identified as Taliban fighters, according to accounts from seven local residents, including one who took part in the fighting.
The uprising is not the first time that Pakistanis have formed their own militias to stand up to the Taliban, and previous efforts have often collapsed largely because the government and military did not come to their aid.
But the latest attempt is significant, revealing the determination of the people of Dir to keep out both the Taliban and the military and to prevent their area from turning into another war zone, like the nearby Swat Valley, where millions have fled fighting.
The rebellion, locals said, gives the government a chance to demonstrate to the Pakistani people that it is serious in supporting them this time.
Local government officials asked for help from the military, which came in the form of helicopter gunships Tuesday morning. Most missed their marks, said local people, many of them wary of inviting a larger military operation, fearing the blunt tactics the military has used elsewhere. Two villagers interviewed by telephone said people had begun to flee.
“If they are going to use indiscriminate fire, then we’ll have to leave the area, and that will give the militants safe passage,” said an elder from the village of Siah Kater.
If it can be sustained, the Dir uprising could prove strategically important as the insurgents come under increasing pressure from the Pakistani military in places like Swat and seek to preserve their havens.
Close to the border with Afghanistan, the area is used by the Taliban as a passageway to fight American forces in southern Afghanistan, local people said.
The Pakistani district, like Swat and Buner, is yet another in North-West Frontier Province where the Taliban have infiltrated in recent months from the lawless tribal areas on the Afghan border, moving to within 60 miles of Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad.
The militants had quietly been building up their strength in northwest Dir, locals said, living among what Pakistani officials and local people described as a group of Afghans who had been in the area for years. Their commander, an Afghan named Khitab, is believed by Pakistani officials to be linked to Al Qaeda.
The Taliban group, estimated to comprise 200 to 400 people, did not enjoy broad support, local people said in telephone interviews. Just 4 of the 25 villages in the area, a valley called Dog Darra, sheltered them. Village elders tried for months to persuade them to leave, under pressure from government authorities.
That is why, local people believe, the Taliban set off the bomb at the mosque on Friday.
“They wanted to tame these people and attack them,” said Abdul Kalam, a supporter of the militia fighters. “Instead of leaving the area, they retaliated in the form of this attack.”
The bomb changed everything, and even some of those who had supported the Taliban joined the hunt, local people said.
“This bomb blast proved the last straw,” said Jamil Roghani, a man from the area who is providing medicine to the wounded. “This made the people violent.”
By Tuesday, the ranks of the local people who had joined the militia to fight the Taliban had swelled to many more than 1,000 from 700 last week, according to a local police official. They had pushed the Taliban to the highest northwestern edge of the valley, into an area called Ghazigeh, and had encircled them there with trenches.
Mr. Roghani said three Taliban commanders had been killed. He identified them as Chamtu, Sultan Rehman and Musa. Four villagers have been wounded. He said local fighters saw bunkers and tunnels that had been dug deep into the earth.
“We are not quitting the area until we destroy them,” Mr. Roghani said. “We know this is not Islam. These are criminals.”
The accounts were impossible to verify because the fighting took place in a remote area to which journalists had no access.
A Pakistani military official said that the weather had stopped the helicopters from identifying their targets, but that the army would send a paramilitary unit on Wednesday, a prospect likely to worry villagers.
Many of those interviewed want the government’s involvement to remain limited to air power against the Taliban’s mountain hide-out. But others, infuriated by the brutality of the Taliban attack, favor a stronger government response.
“Now the people have the spirit, and they will support the government in all its moves to flush these people out,” Mr. Roghani said.
Fayaz Ahmad Khan Toru, an official with the government of North-West Frontier Province, said that officials knew that the government response was being closely watched, and that they were working with local people. “Failure is not an option,” he said.
Syed Muhammad, 30, a civil servant from the village of Mian Dog in the valley, said that without the military’s help, the uprising would fail. The militants were dug in too deep for the local militia to dislodge them on its own with just guns.
But he expressed cautious optimism that the local people would not be ignored, as they had been in most other operations, and that the military, now pressing ahead with its campaign against the Taliban, might be learning.
“I think that the military has now realized that the locals should be involved in these operations,” he said. “Without the support of the local people they cannot wipe out the militants.”
Ismail Khan contributed reporting.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/10/world ... nted=print
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/10/world ... hawar.html
June 10, 2009
Militants Strike Hotel in Pakistan, Killing 11
By ISMAIL KHAN and SALMAN MASOOD
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Militants opened fire on security guards and rushed a small truck packed with explosives through the gates of a five-star hotel in this northwestern city on Tuesday, detonating the payload in the parking lot and killing at least 11 people and wounding 55, Pakistani officials said.
The blast, powerful enough to leave a crater 6 feet deep and 15 feet wide, collapsed the western wing of the hotel, the Pearl Continental, one of the few in the city that cater to Western visitors. Pakistani television broadcast images of wounded people, panicked and dazed with blood-soaked clothes, being helped out of the smoke-filled lobby. The hotel’s registry was swollen at the time of the attack, which occurred about 10 p.m. local time, with officials working for United Nations agencies and other aid groups tending to the large refugee population that has been displaced by the recent fighting in Pakistan between the Pakistani Army and Taliban insurgents.
*****
June 10, 2009
Attacked, Pakistani Villagers Take On Taliban
By SABRINA TAVERNISE and IRFAN ASHRAF
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Villagers are rising up against the Taliban in a remote corner of northern Pakistan, a grass-roots rebellion that underscores the shift in the public mood against the militants and a growing confidence to confront them.
More than a thousand villagers from the district of Dir have been fighting Taliban militants since Friday, when a Taliban suicide bomber detonated his payload during prayer time at a mosque, killing at least 30 villagers.
Enraged by the bombing, men from surrounding villages began looking for Taliban militants and their supporters, burning houses and killing at least 11 men they identified as Taliban fighters, according to accounts from seven local residents, including one who took part in the fighting.
The uprising is not the first time that Pakistanis have formed their own militias to stand up to the Taliban, and previous efforts have often collapsed largely because the government and military did not come to their aid.
But the latest attempt is significant, revealing the determination of the people of Dir to keep out both the Taliban and the military and to prevent their area from turning into another war zone, like the nearby Swat Valley, where millions have fled fighting.
The rebellion, locals said, gives the government a chance to demonstrate to the Pakistani people that it is serious in supporting them this time.
Local government officials asked for help from the military, which came in the form of helicopter gunships Tuesday morning. Most missed their marks, said local people, many of them wary of inviting a larger military operation, fearing the blunt tactics the military has used elsewhere. Two villagers interviewed by telephone said people had begun to flee.
“If they are going to use indiscriminate fire, then we’ll have to leave the area, and that will give the militants safe passage,” said an elder from the village of Siah Kater.
If it can be sustained, the Dir uprising could prove strategically important as the insurgents come under increasing pressure from the Pakistani military in places like Swat and seek to preserve their havens.
Close to the border with Afghanistan, the area is used by the Taliban as a passageway to fight American forces in southern Afghanistan, local people said.
The Pakistani district, like Swat and Buner, is yet another in North-West Frontier Province where the Taliban have infiltrated in recent months from the lawless tribal areas on the Afghan border, moving to within 60 miles of Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad.
The militants had quietly been building up their strength in northwest Dir, locals said, living among what Pakistani officials and local people described as a group of Afghans who had been in the area for years. Their commander, an Afghan named Khitab, is believed by Pakistani officials to be linked to Al Qaeda.
The Taliban group, estimated to comprise 200 to 400 people, did not enjoy broad support, local people said in telephone interviews. Just 4 of the 25 villages in the area, a valley called Dog Darra, sheltered them. Village elders tried for months to persuade them to leave, under pressure from government authorities.
That is why, local people believe, the Taliban set off the bomb at the mosque on Friday.
“They wanted to tame these people and attack them,” said Abdul Kalam, a supporter of the militia fighters. “Instead of leaving the area, they retaliated in the form of this attack.”
The bomb changed everything, and even some of those who had supported the Taliban joined the hunt, local people said.
“This bomb blast proved the last straw,” said Jamil Roghani, a man from the area who is providing medicine to the wounded. “This made the people violent.”
By Tuesday, the ranks of the local people who had joined the militia to fight the Taliban had swelled to many more than 1,000 from 700 last week, according to a local police official. They had pushed the Taliban to the highest northwestern edge of the valley, into an area called Ghazigeh, and had encircled them there with trenches.
Mr. Roghani said three Taliban commanders had been killed. He identified them as Chamtu, Sultan Rehman and Musa. Four villagers have been wounded. He said local fighters saw bunkers and tunnels that had been dug deep into the earth.
“We are not quitting the area until we destroy them,” Mr. Roghani said. “We know this is not Islam. These are criminals.”
The accounts were impossible to verify because the fighting took place in a remote area to which journalists had no access.
A Pakistani military official said that the weather had stopped the helicopters from identifying their targets, but that the army would send a paramilitary unit on Wednesday, a prospect likely to worry villagers.
Many of those interviewed want the government’s involvement to remain limited to air power against the Taliban’s mountain hide-out. But others, infuriated by the brutality of the Taliban attack, favor a stronger government response.
“Now the people have the spirit, and they will support the government in all its moves to flush these people out,” Mr. Roghani said.
Fayaz Ahmad Khan Toru, an official with the government of North-West Frontier Province, said that officials knew that the government response was being closely watched, and that they were working with local people. “Failure is not an option,” he said.
Syed Muhammad, 30, a civil servant from the village of Mian Dog in the valley, said that without the military’s help, the uprising would fail. The militants were dug in too deep for the local militia to dislodge them on its own with just guns.
But he expressed cautious optimism that the local people would not be ignored, as they had been in most other operations, and that the military, now pressing ahead with its campaign against the Taliban, might be learning.
“I think that the military has now realized that the locals should be involved in these operations,” he said. “Without the support of the local people they cannot wipe out the militants.”
Ismail Khan contributed reporting.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/10/world ... nted=print
Taliban Threaten Ismaili Community and their institutions in Pakistan
leave a comment
Taliban has threatened the Ismaili Community of Pakistan to be bombed if they continue their religious, organizational and social activities in the country. The government of Pakistan has started tightening the security of the community in the country. Upon the news on different media channels in Pakistan, the Ismaili community could not offer even their daily prayers in the prayer halls. The banned Tahreke Taliban Pakistan, has threatened the community to be attacked in Islamaabad,Rawalpindi, Chitral, Gilgit and other areas if they do not shut their offices, mosques and social establishments immediately. Law enforcement agencies have been advised to critically check the vehicles going to Chitral and Gilgit areas which possibly can transport explosive material to the regions. However, the densely populated areas of the Ismailie community ironically lie along with the Afghan border in Chitral and Yasin Valley. Chitralies used to travel through Afghanistan during the times when Lawari Top, the only access route to the Pakistan, closed in Winters. There are several passes that connect the ismaili populated areas with those of the Taliban held including the Darkot Pass, which connects the Yasin Valley, with Chitral and Afghanistan through Broghil Pass.
Another route that connects Ghizer District, mostly Ismaili inhabitants, is through Batheyrate Nala to Tangir and Darel where the sympathizers of Taliban exist. During the Red Masque Operation many students from Darel and Tangir areas either were arrested or killed. The residual effect of the Red Masque and Taliban sympathy exist in the region.
The Direct threat could be through Karakuram Highway which can be used to carry arms and explosive to the region. At Besham, KKH has a direct connection to Shangla and Sawat, the trouble areas of the day.
During the “good Taliban” age, there were many people in Gilgit, Chilas, Darel, Tangir who boasted to be the proud Taliban. In “Tough Taliban” age most of them apparently went into hide. The famous Taliban weekly News Paper, Zarb-i-Momin, an anti Ismaili journal, sold like a hot cake in the regions including, Gilgit,Chilas, Bar Jungle.
In Afghanistan, Ismailies were ruthlessly attacked during the Taliban government. Rumours were circulated through Zarb-i-Momin that Ismailies intend to establish an Ismilie State in the Baghlan Province. In September 6,1998, the Taliban blasted the Eagle symbol with dynamites and bombs because in their opinion the making of statue of any living being falls under idolatry which is repugnant to the basic principles of Islam.
Ismailies were tortured, properties were confiscated and their religious prayers halls and sacred places were closed. The Afghan Ismailies, mostly, Dari speaking took refuge in Pakistan and Canada.The same Taliban funded Zarb-i-Momin for the first time propagated that the Ismailies intend to make their own state in the Gilgit Baltistan region. Religious clergy reiterate the same propaganda in their speeches, articles and audios in Pakistan until few days ago which could be one of the reasons that Ismailies are under a great threat now. Pushing Ismailies into the Ahmadi’s category has always remained a favourite political slogan.
The Shia Ismaili Muslims are a community of ethnically and culturally diverse peoples living in over 25 countries around the world, united in their allegiance to His Highness Prince Karim Aga Khan (known to the Ismailis as Mawlana Hazar Imam) as the 49th hereditary Imam (spiritual leader), and direct descendant of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him and his family). Ismailies considered respected citizen’s world wide for their economic contribution, peace loving behaviour and perfect discipline. Ismailies have a great contribution to the economy of Pakistan. They have banks, multinational companies, donar agencies like AKF, Five Star Hotels, Hospitals, Universities and Colleges, Cultural organization, tourism promotion services, Rescue and Disaster management agencies etc.
Sources said that security also has been tightened at the offices and other establishments of Ismailies in Gilgit and Chitral Areas.
http://dardistannews.wordpress.com/2009 ... -pakistan/
leave a comment
Taliban has threatened the Ismaili Community of Pakistan to be bombed if they continue their religious, organizational and social activities in the country. The government of Pakistan has started tightening the security of the community in the country. Upon the news on different media channels in Pakistan, the Ismaili community could not offer even their daily prayers in the prayer halls. The banned Tahreke Taliban Pakistan, has threatened the community to be attacked in Islamaabad,Rawalpindi, Chitral, Gilgit and other areas if they do not shut their offices, mosques and social establishments immediately. Law enforcement agencies have been advised to critically check the vehicles going to Chitral and Gilgit areas which possibly can transport explosive material to the regions. However, the densely populated areas of the Ismailie community ironically lie along with the Afghan border in Chitral and Yasin Valley. Chitralies used to travel through Afghanistan during the times when Lawari Top, the only access route to the Pakistan, closed in Winters. There are several passes that connect the ismaili populated areas with those of the Taliban held including the Darkot Pass, which connects the Yasin Valley, with Chitral and Afghanistan through Broghil Pass.
Another route that connects Ghizer District, mostly Ismaili inhabitants, is through Batheyrate Nala to Tangir and Darel where the sympathizers of Taliban exist. During the Red Masque Operation many students from Darel and Tangir areas either were arrested or killed. The residual effect of the Red Masque and Taliban sympathy exist in the region.
The Direct threat could be through Karakuram Highway which can be used to carry arms and explosive to the region. At Besham, KKH has a direct connection to Shangla and Sawat, the trouble areas of the day.
During the “good Taliban” age, there were many people in Gilgit, Chilas, Darel, Tangir who boasted to be the proud Taliban. In “Tough Taliban” age most of them apparently went into hide. The famous Taliban weekly News Paper, Zarb-i-Momin, an anti Ismaili journal, sold like a hot cake in the regions including, Gilgit,Chilas, Bar Jungle.
In Afghanistan, Ismailies were ruthlessly attacked during the Taliban government. Rumours were circulated through Zarb-i-Momin that Ismailies intend to establish an Ismilie State in the Baghlan Province. In September 6,1998, the Taliban blasted the Eagle symbol with dynamites and bombs because in their opinion the making of statue of any living being falls under idolatry which is repugnant to the basic principles of Islam.
Ismailies were tortured, properties were confiscated and their religious prayers halls and sacred places were closed. The Afghan Ismailies, mostly, Dari speaking took refuge in Pakistan and Canada.The same Taliban funded Zarb-i-Momin for the first time propagated that the Ismailies intend to make their own state in the Gilgit Baltistan region. Religious clergy reiterate the same propaganda in their speeches, articles and audios in Pakistan until few days ago which could be one of the reasons that Ismailies are under a great threat now. Pushing Ismailies into the Ahmadi’s category has always remained a favourite political slogan.
The Shia Ismaili Muslims are a community of ethnically and culturally diverse peoples living in over 25 countries around the world, united in their allegiance to His Highness Prince Karim Aga Khan (known to the Ismailis as Mawlana Hazar Imam) as the 49th hereditary Imam (spiritual leader), and direct descendant of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him and his family). Ismailies considered respected citizen’s world wide for their economic contribution, peace loving behaviour and perfect discipline. Ismailies have a great contribution to the economy of Pakistan. They have banks, multinational companies, donar agencies like AKF, Five Star Hotels, Hospitals, Universities and Colleges, Cultural organization, tourism promotion services, Rescue and Disaster management agencies etc.
Sources said that security also has been tightened at the offices and other establishments of Ismailies in Gilgit and Chitral Areas.
http://dardistannews.wordpress.com/2009 ... -pakistan/
EDITORIAL
Preventing a Taliban victory
By Pervez Hoodbhoy
Saturday, 20 Jun, 2009 | 02:32 AM PST |
NOW that the army has turned serious, Baitullah Mehsud cannot expect to stroll down Constitution Avenue any time soon, nor hope to sit in the presidency.
A few thousand mountain barbarians, even if trained by Al Qaeda’s best, cannot possibly seize power from a modern, well-armed state with 600,000 soldiers. The spectre of Pakistan collapsing in six months — a fear expressed by a senior US military adviser in March — has evaporated.
But there is little cause for elation. Daily terror attacks across the country give abundant proof that religious extremism has streamed down the mountains into the plains. Through abductions, beheadings and suicide bombings, Taliban insurgents are destabilising Pakistan, damaging its economy and spreading despondency.
Look at Islamabad, a city of fear. Machine-gun bunkers are ubiquitous while traffic barely trickles past concrete blocks placed across its super-wide roads. Upscale restaurants, fearing suicide bombers, have removed their signs although they still hope clients will remember. Who will be the next target? Girls’ schools, Internet cafes, bookshops, or western clothing stores with mannequins? Or perhaps shops selling toilet paper, underwear, and other un-Islamic goods?
The impact on Pakistan’s women is enormous. Throwing acid, or threatening to do so, has been spectacularly successful in making women embrace modesty. Today there is scarcely a female face visible anywhere in the Frontier province. Men are also changing dress — anxious private employers, government departments and NGOs have advised their male employees in Peshawar and other cities to wear shalwar-kameez rather than trousers. Video shops are being bombed out of business, and many barbers have put ‘no-shave’ notices outside their shops.
If public support were absent, extremist violence could be relatively easy to deal with. But extremism does not lie merely at the fringes. As an example, let us recall that 5,000 people crammed the streets outside Lal Masjid to pray behind the battle-hardened pro-Taliban militant leader, Maulana Abdul Aziz, the day after he was released from prison on the orders of interior minister Rehman Malik.
In the political arena, the extremists have high-profile cheerleaders like Imran Khan, Qazi Hussain Ahmad and Hamid Gul who rush to justify every attack on Pakistan’s people and culture. To them it makes no difference that Baitullah Mehsud proudly admits to the murder of Allama Dr Sarfaraz Ahmad Naeemi, the recent Peshawar mosque bombing, the earlier Wah slaughter and scores of other hideous suicide attacks. Like broken gramophone records, they chant “Amrika, Amrika, Amrika” after every new Taliban atrocity.
Nevertheless, bad as things are, there is a respite. To the relief of those who wish to see Pakistan survive, the army finally moved against the Taliban menace. But, while the state has committed men to battle, it cannot provide them a convincing reason why they must fight.
For now some soldiers have bought into the amazing invention that the Baitullahs and Fazlullahs are India’s secret agents. Others have been told that they are actually fighting a nefarious American-Jewish plot to destabilise Pakistan. To inspire revenge, still others are being shown the revolting Taliban-produced videos of Pakistani soldiers being tortured and beheaded.
That the enemy lacks an accurate name typifies the confusion and contradiction within. In official parlance they are called ‘militants’ or ‘extremists’ but never religious extremists. It is astonishing that the semi-literate Fazlullah, on whose head the government has now placed a price, is reverentially referred to as ‘maulana’. On the other hand there is no hesitation in describing Baloch fighters — who fight for a nationalist cause rather than a religious one — as rebels or terrorists.
A muddled nation can still fight, but not very well and not for too long. Self-deception enormously increases vulnerability. Yet, Pakistan’s current army and political leaders cannot alone be blamed for the confusion; history’s baggage is difficult to dispense with.
To say what really lies at the heart of Pakistan’s problems will require summoning more courage than presently exists. The unmentionable truth — one etched in stone — is that when a state proclaims to have a religious mission, it inevitably privileges those who organise religious life and interpret religious text. It then becomes difficult — perhaps impossible — to challenge those who claim to fight for religious causes. After all, what’s wrong with the Taliban mission to bring the Sharia to Pakistan?
If there was one solid unchallengeable version of the faith, then at least there would be a clear answer to this question. But conflict becomes inevitable once different models and interpretations start competing. Whose version of the Sharia should prevail? Whose jihad is the correct one? Who shall decide? Lacking a central authority — such as a pope or caliph — every individual or group can claim to be in possession of the divine truth. The murder of Dr Naeemi by the Taliban comes from this elementary fact.
For now the Baitullahs, Fazlullahs, Mangal Baghs, and their ilk are on the run. Yet, they could still win some day. Even if killed, others would replace them. So, while currently necessary, military action alone can never be sufficient. Nor will peace come from merely building more roads, schools and hospitals or inventing a new justice system.
Ultimately it is the power of ideas that shall decide between victory and defeat. It is here that Pakistan is weakest and most vulnerable. A gaping philosophical and ideological void has left the door open to demagogues who exploit resource scarcity and bad governance. They use every failing of the state to create an insurrectionary mood and churn out suicide bombers. Only a few Islamic scholars, like Dr Naeemi, have ventured to challenge them.
The long-term defence of Pakistan therefore demands a determined ideological offensive and a decisive break with the past. Nations win wars only if there is a clear rallying slogan and a shared goal. For this, Pakistan must reinvent itself as a state that is seen to care for its people. Instead of seeking to fix the world’s problems — Kashmir, Afghanistan and Palestine included — it must work to first fix its own.
A nation’s best defence is a loyal citizenry. This can be created only by offering equal rights and opportunities to all regardless of province, language and, most importantly, religion and religious sect. Navigating the way to heaven must be solely an individual’s concern, not that of the state.
The author teaches at Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad.
http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/daw ... ictory-069
Copyright © 2009 - Dawn Media Group
Preventing a Taliban victory
By Pervez Hoodbhoy
Saturday, 20 Jun, 2009 | 02:32 AM PST |
NOW that the army has turned serious, Baitullah Mehsud cannot expect to stroll down Constitution Avenue any time soon, nor hope to sit in the presidency.
A few thousand mountain barbarians, even if trained by Al Qaeda’s best, cannot possibly seize power from a modern, well-armed state with 600,000 soldiers. The spectre of Pakistan collapsing in six months — a fear expressed by a senior US military adviser in March — has evaporated.
But there is little cause for elation. Daily terror attacks across the country give abundant proof that religious extremism has streamed down the mountains into the plains. Through abductions, beheadings and suicide bombings, Taliban insurgents are destabilising Pakistan, damaging its economy and spreading despondency.
Look at Islamabad, a city of fear. Machine-gun bunkers are ubiquitous while traffic barely trickles past concrete blocks placed across its super-wide roads. Upscale restaurants, fearing suicide bombers, have removed their signs although they still hope clients will remember. Who will be the next target? Girls’ schools, Internet cafes, bookshops, or western clothing stores with mannequins? Or perhaps shops selling toilet paper, underwear, and other un-Islamic goods?
The impact on Pakistan’s women is enormous. Throwing acid, or threatening to do so, has been spectacularly successful in making women embrace modesty. Today there is scarcely a female face visible anywhere in the Frontier province. Men are also changing dress — anxious private employers, government departments and NGOs have advised their male employees in Peshawar and other cities to wear shalwar-kameez rather than trousers. Video shops are being bombed out of business, and many barbers have put ‘no-shave’ notices outside their shops.
If public support were absent, extremist violence could be relatively easy to deal with. But extremism does not lie merely at the fringes. As an example, let us recall that 5,000 people crammed the streets outside Lal Masjid to pray behind the battle-hardened pro-Taliban militant leader, Maulana Abdul Aziz, the day after he was released from prison on the orders of interior minister Rehman Malik.
In the political arena, the extremists have high-profile cheerleaders like Imran Khan, Qazi Hussain Ahmad and Hamid Gul who rush to justify every attack on Pakistan’s people and culture. To them it makes no difference that Baitullah Mehsud proudly admits to the murder of Allama Dr Sarfaraz Ahmad Naeemi, the recent Peshawar mosque bombing, the earlier Wah slaughter and scores of other hideous suicide attacks. Like broken gramophone records, they chant “Amrika, Amrika, Amrika” after every new Taliban atrocity.
Nevertheless, bad as things are, there is a respite. To the relief of those who wish to see Pakistan survive, the army finally moved against the Taliban menace. But, while the state has committed men to battle, it cannot provide them a convincing reason why they must fight.
For now some soldiers have bought into the amazing invention that the Baitullahs and Fazlullahs are India’s secret agents. Others have been told that they are actually fighting a nefarious American-Jewish plot to destabilise Pakistan. To inspire revenge, still others are being shown the revolting Taliban-produced videos of Pakistani soldiers being tortured and beheaded.
That the enemy lacks an accurate name typifies the confusion and contradiction within. In official parlance they are called ‘militants’ or ‘extremists’ but never religious extremists. It is astonishing that the semi-literate Fazlullah, on whose head the government has now placed a price, is reverentially referred to as ‘maulana’. On the other hand there is no hesitation in describing Baloch fighters — who fight for a nationalist cause rather than a religious one — as rebels or terrorists.
A muddled nation can still fight, but not very well and not for too long. Self-deception enormously increases vulnerability. Yet, Pakistan’s current army and political leaders cannot alone be blamed for the confusion; history’s baggage is difficult to dispense with.
To say what really lies at the heart of Pakistan’s problems will require summoning more courage than presently exists. The unmentionable truth — one etched in stone — is that when a state proclaims to have a religious mission, it inevitably privileges those who organise religious life and interpret religious text. It then becomes difficult — perhaps impossible — to challenge those who claim to fight for religious causes. After all, what’s wrong with the Taliban mission to bring the Sharia to Pakistan?
If there was one solid unchallengeable version of the faith, then at least there would be a clear answer to this question. But conflict becomes inevitable once different models and interpretations start competing. Whose version of the Sharia should prevail? Whose jihad is the correct one? Who shall decide? Lacking a central authority — such as a pope or caliph — every individual or group can claim to be in possession of the divine truth. The murder of Dr Naeemi by the Taliban comes from this elementary fact.
For now the Baitullahs, Fazlullahs, Mangal Baghs, and their ilk are on the run. Yet, they could still win some day. Even if killed, others would replace them. So, while currently necessary, military action alone can never be sufficient. Nor will peace come from merely building more roads, schools and hospitals or inventing a new justice system.
Ultimately it is the power of ideas that shall decide between victory and defeat. It is here that Pakistan is weakest and most vulnerable. A gaping philosophical and ideological void has left the door open to demagogues who exploit resource scarcity and bad governance. They use every failing of the state to create an insurrectionary mood and churn out suicide bombers. Only a few Islamic scholars, like Dr Naeemi, have ventured to challenge them.
The long-term defence of Pakistan therefore demands a determined ideological offensive and a decisive break with the past. Nations win wars only if there is a clear rallying slogan and a shared goal. For this, Pakistan must reinvent itself as a state that is seen to care for its people. Instead of seeking to fix the world’s problems — Kashmir, Afghanistan and Palestine included — it must work to first fix its own.
A nation’s best defence is a loyal citizenry. This can be created only by offering equal rights and opportunities to all regardless of province, language and, most importantly, religion and religious sect. Navigating the way to heaven must be solely an individual’s concern, not that of the state.
The author teaches at Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad.
http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/daw ... ictory-069
Copyright © 2009 - Dawn Media Group
July 23, 2009
Op-Ed Columnist
Terror Creeps Into the Heartland
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
KARACHI, Pakistan
It was the home of a Muslim religious teacher, but he was stockpiling more than copies of the Koran. His house blew up this month in a thunderous explosion that leveled much of his village and could be heard six miles away. Police reported that he was storing explosives, rockets, grenades and suicide vests.
But perhaps what was most dispiriting was that this arsenal, apparently intended for terror attacks, was not in the tribal areas in the northwest of Pakistan where the Taliban and Al Qaeda have long conducted operations. Rather this was in the southern part of Punjab, the Pakistani heartland.
The explosion was a reminder of what some call the “creeping Talibanization,” even of parts of Pakistan far from the formal fighting. Militants seem to be putting the entire country in play, and that’s one reason Pakistan should be President Obama’s top foreign policy challenge.
Think of it this way: It would be terrible if Afghanistan or Iraq collapsed, but it would be unthinkably catastrophic if Pakistan — with perhaps 80 to 100 nuclear weapons — were to fall into chaos.
Even here in Karachi, the pragmatic commercial hub of the country, extremists have taken over some neighborhoods. A Pakistani police document marked “top secret,” given to me by a Pakistani concerned by the spreading tentacles of jihadis, states that Taliban agents sometimes set up armed checkpoints in one such neighborhood here.
These militants “generate funds through criminal activities like kidnapping for ransom, bank robbery, street robbery and other heinous crimes,” the report says.
The mayor of Karachi, Syed Mustafa Kamal, confirms that Pashtun tribesmen have barred outsiders from entering some neighborhoods.
“I’m the mayor, and I have three vehicles with police traveling with me. And even I cannot enter these areas or they will blow me up,” Mr. Kamal said, adding, “Pakistan is in very critical condition.”
Lala Hassan of the Aurat Foundation, which works on social issues, said: “There’s no doubt militancy is increasing day by day, not only in Karachi but all over Pakistan.”
On this trip, I also traveled in South Punjab and found it far more troubled than in my previous trips to the area. Some music shops and girls’ schools have been threatened by fundamentalists, local residents said. In the city of Bahawalpur, home to a notorious militant, my interpreter asked me not even to step out of the vehicle.
The Daily Times of Pakistan described the situation as “terror’s free run in South Punjab.”
But the militants may have overreached. Their brutality, including the flogging of a teenage girl before a large crowd, has shocked and alienated many Pakistanis. It is just possible that the tide is turning as a result.
A poll of Pakistanis released this month by WorldPublicOpinion.org found that one-third believed that the Taliban intended to gain control of all of Pakistan, but 75 percent thought that would be a bad result. Two years ago, only 34 percent of Pakistanis believed that Islamic militants constituted a “critical threat.” Now, 81 percent do.
Unfortunately, the United States has acted in ways that have often empowered the militants. We have lavished more than $11 billion on Pakistan since 9/11, mostly supporting the Pakistani Army. Yet that sum has bought Pakistan no security and us no good will.
In that same poll, 59 percent of Pakistanis said that they share many of Al Qaeda’s attitudes toward the United States, and almost half of those said that they support Al Qaeda attacks on Americans.
One reason is that America hasn’t stood up for its own values in Pakistan. Instead of supporting democracy, we cold-shouldered the lawyers’ movement, which was the best hope for democracy and civil society.
If we want to stabilize Pakistan, we should take two steps. First is to cut tariffs on manufactured imports from Pakistan. That would boost the country’s economy, raise employment and create good will. Cutting tariffs is perhaps the most effective step we could take to stabilize this country and fight extremism.
Second, we should redirect our aid from subsidies to the Pakistani military to support for a major education initiative. A bill in the Senate backed by the Democrat John Kerry and the Republican Richard Lugar would support Pakistani schools, among other nonmilitary projects, and would be an excellent step forward.
In rural Pakistan, you regularly see madrassas established by Islamic fundamentalists, typically offering free tuition, free meals and even scholarships to study abroad for the best students. It’s clear that the militant fundamentalists believe in the transformative power of education — and they have invested in schools, while we have invested in the Pakistani Army. Why can’t we show the same faith in education as hard-line Muslim fundamentalists?
•
I invite you to visit my blog, On the Ground. Please also join me on Facebook, watch my YouTube videos and follow me on Twitter.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/23/opini ... nted=print
Op-Ed Columnist
Terror Creeps Into the Heartland
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
KARACHI, Pakistan
It was the home of a Muslim religious teacher, but he was stockpiling more than copies of the Koran. His house blew up this month in a thunderous explosion that leveled much of his village and could be heard six miles away. Police reported that he was storing explosives, rockets, grenades and suicide vests.
But perhaps what was most dispiriting was that this arsenal, apparently intended for terror attacks, was not in the tribal areas in the northwest of Pakistan where the Taliban and Al Qaeda have long conducted operations. Rather this was in the southern part of Punjab, the Pakistani heartland.
The explosion was a reminder of what some call the “creeping Talibanization,” even of parts of Pakistan far from the formal fighting. Militants seem to be putting the entire country in play, and that’s one reason Pakistan should be President Obama’s top foreign policy challenge.
Think of it this way: It would be terrible if Afghanistan or Iraq collapsed, but it would be unthinkably catastrophic if Pakistan — with perhaps 80 to 100 nuclear weapons — were to fall into chaos.
Even here in Karachi, the pragmatic commercial hub of the country, extremists have taken over some neighborhoods. A Pakistani police document marked “top secret,” given to me by a Pakistani concerned by the spreading tentacles of jihadis, states that Taliban agents sometimes set up armed checkpoints in one such neighborhood here.
These militants “generate funds through criminal activities like kidnapping for ransom, bank robbery, street robbery and other heinous crimes,” the report says.
The mayor of Karachi, Syed Mustafa Kamal, confirms that Pashtun tribesmen have barred outsiders from entering some neighborhoods.
“I’m the mayor, and I have three vehicles with police traveling with me. And even I cannot enter these areas or they will blow me up,” Mr. Kamal said, adding, “Pakistan is in very critical condition.”
Lala Hassan of the Aurat Foundation, which works on social issues, said: “There’s no doubt militancy is increasing day by day, not only in Karachi but all over Pakistan.”
On this trip, I also traveled in South Punjab and found it far more troubled than in my previous trips to the area. Some music shops and girls’ schools have been threatened by fundamentalists, local residents said. In the city of Bahawalpur, home to a notorious militant, my interpreter asked me not even to step out of the vehicle.
The Daily Times of Pakistan described the situation as “terror’s free run in South Punjab.”
But the militants may have overreached. Their brutality, including the flogging of a teenage girl before a large crowd, has shocked and alienated many Pakistanis. It is just possible that the tide is turning as a result.
A poll of Pakistanis released this month by WorldPublicOpinion.org found that one-third believed that the Taliban intended to gain control of all of Pakistan, but 75 percent thought that would be a bad result. Two years ago, only 34 percent of Pakistanis believed that Islamic militants constituted a “critical threat.” Now, 81 percent do.
Unfortunately, the United States has acted in ways that have often empowered the militants. We have lavished more than $11 billion on Pakistan since 9/11, mostly supporting the Pakistani Army. Yet that sum has bought Pakistan no security and us no good will.
In that same poll, 59 percent of Pakistanis said that they share many of Al Qaeda’s attitudes toward the United States, and almost half of those said that they support Al Qaeda attacks on Americans.
One reason is that America hasn’t stood up for its own values in Pakistan. Instead of supporting democracy, we cold-shouldered the lawyers’ movement, which was the best hope for democracy and civil society.
If we want to stabilize Pakistan, we should take two steps. First is to cut tariffs on manufactured imports from Pakistan. That would boost the country’s economy, raise employment and create good will. Cutting tariffs is perhaps the most effective step we could take to stabilize this country and fight extremism.
Second, we should redirect our aid from subsidies to the Pakistani military to support for a major education initiative. A bill in the Senate backed by the Democrat John Kerry and the Republican Richard Lugar would support Pakistani schools, among other nonmilitary projects, and would be an excellent step forward.
In rural Pakistan, you regularly see madrassas established by Islamic fundamentalists, typically offering free tuition, free meals and even scholarships to study abroad for the best students. It’s clear that the militant fundamentalists believe in the transformative power of education — and they have invested in schools, while we have invested in the Pakistani Army. Why can’t we show the same faith in education as hard-line Muslim fundamentalists?
•
I invite you to visit my blog, On the Ground. Please also join me on Facebook, watch my YouTube videos and follow me on Twitter.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/23/opini ... nted=print
July 28, 2009
Landowners Still in Exile From Unstable Pakistan Area
By JANE PERLEZ and PIR ZUBAIR SHAH
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Even as hundreds of thousands of people stream back to the Swat Valley after months of fighting, one important group is conspicuously absent: the wealthy landowners who fled the Taliban in fear and are the economic pillar of the rural society.
The reluctance of the landowners to return is a significant blow to the Pakistani military’s campaign to restore Swat as a stable, prosperous part of Pakistan, and it presents a continuing opportunity for the Taliban to reshape the valley to their advantage.
About four dozen landlords were singled out over the past two years by the militants in a strategy intended to foment a class struggle. In some areas, the Taliban rewarded the landless peasants with profits of the crops of the landlords. Some resentful peasants even signed up as the Taliban’s shock troops.
How many of those peasants stayed with the militants during the army offensive of the last several months, and how many moved to the refugee camps, was difficult to assess, Pakistani analysts said.
But reports emerging from Swat show that the Taliban still have the strength to terrorize important areas. The army continues to fight the Taliban in their strongholds, particularly in the Matta and Kabal regions of Swat, not far from the main city, Mingora, where many refugees have reclaimed their homes.
In those regions, the Taliban have razed houses, killed a civilian working for the police in Matta and kidnapped another, worrying counterinsurgency experts, who fear that the refugees may have been encouraged by the Pakistani authorities to go back too soon.
The rebuilding of Swat, a fertile area of orchards and forests, is a critical test for the government and the military as they face Taliban insurgencies across the tribal belt, particularly in Waziristan on the Afghanistan border.
In a sign of the lack of confidence that Mingora was secure, the Pakistani military declined a request by the Obama administration’s special envoy to Pakistan, Richard C. Holbrooke, to visit the town last week.
There was nervousness, an American counterinsurgency expert said, that the plans by the Pakistani authorities to build new community police forces in Swat would not materialize quickly enough to protect the returning civilians, who are also starved of basic services like banks and sufficient medical care.
“There is no apparatus in place to replace the army,” said an American counterinsurgency official. “The army will be the backstop.”
About two million people have fled Swat and surrounding areas since the military opened its campaign to push back the Taliban at the end of April. The United Nations said Monday that 478,000 people had returned to Swat so far, but it cautioned that it was unable to verify the figure, which was provided by the government.
Assessment trips by United Nations workers to Swat scheduled for Monday and Tuesday were canceled for security reasons, and the United Nations office in Peshawar that serves as the base for Swat operations was closed Monday because of a high threat of kidnapping, a spokesman said.
The landlords, many of whom raised sizable militias to fight the Taliban themselves last year, say the army is again failing to provide enough protection if they return.
Another deterrent to returning, they say, is that the top Taliban leadership, responsible for taking aim at the landlords and spreading the spoils among the landless, remains unscathed.
If it continues, the landlords’ absence will have lasting ramifications not only for Swat, but also for Pakistan’s most populated province, Punjab, where the landholdings are vast, and the militants are gaining power, said Vali Nasr, a senior adviser to Mr. Holbrooke, the American envoy.
“If the large landowners are kept out by the Taliban, the result will in effect be property redistribution,” Mr. Nasr said. “That will create a vested community of support for the Taliban that will see benefit in the absence of landlords.”
At two major meetings with the landlords, the Pakistani military and civilian authorities requested that they return in the vanguard of the refugees. None have agreed to do so, according to several of the landowners and a senior army officer.
“We have sacrificed so much; what has the government and the military done for us?” asked Sher Shah Khan, a landholder in the Kuz Bandai area of Swat. He is now living with 50 family members in a rented house about 60 miles from Swat. Four family members and eight servants were killed trying to fight off the Taliban, he said.
At one of the meetings, Mr. Khan said he had asked the army commanders to provide weapons so the landlords could protect themselves, as the landowners had in the past.
The military refused the request, he said, saying it would fight the Taliban. Yet Pakistani soldiers had failed to protect his lands, he said. Twenty of his houses were blown up by the Taliban after the army ordered him and his family to leave their lands on two hours’ notice last September, he said.
A letter he sent last month to Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, the head of the Pakistani military, asking for compensation has gone unanswered, he said. In the meantime, one of his tenants called asking if he could plant crops on Mr. Khan’s property. He refused but had little idea what was happening back home, Mr. Khan said.
Other landlords are equally frustrated. The mayor of Swat, Jamal Nasir, fled after his father, Shujaat Ali Khan, regarded as the biggest landlord in Swat, narrowly avoided being killed by the Taliban. Mr. Nasir, a major landowner himself, now stays in his house in Islamabad.
The top guns of the Taliban are still in Swat, or perhaps in neighboring Dir, Mr. Nasir said. “These people should be arrested,” he said. “If they are not arrested, they are going to come back.”
Another landlord, Sher Mohammad, said he was still bitter that the army refused to help as he, his brother and his nephew fought off the Taliban last year for 13 hours, even though soldiers were stationed less than a mile away. Mr. Mohammad was hit in the groin by a bullet and lost a finger in the fight.
At one of the meetings with the military in Peshawar, Mr. Mohammad, a prominent politician with the Pakistan Peoples Party, said he told the officers that he was not impressed with their performance.
“They said, ‘We will protect you,’ ” he recalled. “I said, ‘We don’t trust you.’ ”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/28/world ... nted=print
Landowners Still in Exile From Unstable Pakistan Area
By JANE PERLEZ and PIR ZUBAIR SHAH
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Even as hundreds of thousands of people stream back to the Swat Valley after months of fighting, one important group is conspicuously absent: the wealthy landowners who fled the Taliban in fear and are the economic pillar of the rural society.
The reluctance of the landowners to return is a significant blow to the Pakistani military’s campaign to restore Swat as a stable, prosperous part of Pakistan, and it presents a continuing opportunity for the Taliban to reshape the valley to their advantage.
About four dozen landlords were singled out over the past two years by the militants in a strategy intended to foment a class struggle. In some areas, the Taliban rewarded the landless peasants with profits of the crops of the landlords. Some resentful peasants even signed up as the Taliban’s shock troops.
How many of those peasants stayed with the militants during the army offensive of the last several months, and how many moved to the refugee camps, was difficult to assess, Pakistani analysts said.
But reports emerging from Swat show that the Taliban still have the strength to terrorize important areas. The army continues to fight the Taliban in their strongholds, particularly in the Matta and Kabal regions of Swat, not far from the main city, Mingora, where many refugees have reclaimed their homes.
In those regions, the Taliban have razed houses, killed a civilian working for the police in Matta and kidnapped another, worrying counterinsurgency experts, who fear that the refugees may have been encouraged by the Pakistani authorities to go back too soon.
The rebuilding of Swat, a fertile area of orchards and forests, is a critical test for the government and the military as they face Taliban insurgencies across the tribal belt, particularly in Waziristan on the Afghanistan border.
In a sign of the lack of confidence that Mingora was secure, the Pakistani military declined a request by the Obama administration’s special envoy to Pakistan, Richard C. Holbrooke, to visit the town last week.
There was nervousness, an American counterinsurgency expert said, that the plans by the Pakistani authorities to build new community police forces in Swat would not materialize quickly enough to protect the returning civilians, who are also starved of basic services like banks and sufficient medical care.
“There is no apparatus in place to replace the army,” said an American counterinsurgency official. “The army will be the backstop.”
About two million people have fled Swat and surrounding areas since the military opened its campaign to push back the Taliban at the end of April. The United Nations said Monday that 478,000 people had returned to Swat so far, but it cautioned that it was unable to verify the figure, which was provided by the government.
Assessment trips by United Nations workers to Swat scheduled for Monday and Tuesday were canceled for security reasons, and the United Nations office in Peshawar that serves as the base for Swat operations was closed Monday because of a high threat of kidnapping, a spokesman said.
The landlords, many of whom raised sizable militias to fight the Taliban themselves last year, say the army is again failing to provide enough protection if they return.
Another deterrent to returning, they say, is that the top Taliban leadership, responsible for taking aim at the landlords and spreading the spoils among the landless, remains unscathed.
If it continues, the landlords’ absence will have lasting ramifications not only for Swat, but also for Pakistan’s most populated province, Punjab, where the landholdings are vast, and the militants are gaining power, said Vali Nasr, a senior adviser to Mr. Holbrooke, the American envoy.
“If the large landowners are kept out by the Taliban, the result will in effect be property redistribution,” Mr. Nasr said. “That will create a vested community of support for the Taliban that will see benefit in the absence of landlords.”
At two major meetings with the landlords, the Pakistani military and civilian authorities requested that they return in the vanguard of the refugees. None have agreed to do so, according to several of the landowners and a senior army officer.
“We have sacrificed so much; what has the government and the military done for us?” asked Sher Shah Khan, a landholder in the Kuz Bandai area of Swat. He is now living with 50 family members in a rented house about 60 miles from Swat. Four family members and eight servants were killed trying to fight off the Taliban, he said.
At one of the meetings, Mr. Khan said he had asked the army commanders to provide weapons so the landlords could protect themselves, as the landowners had in the past.
The military refused the request, he said, saying it would fight the Taliban. Yet Pakistani soldiers had failed to protect his lands, he said. Twenty of his houses were blown up by the Taliban after the army ordered him and his family to leave their lands on two hours’ notice last September, he said.
A letter he sent last month to Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, the head of the Pakistani military, asking for compensation has gone unanswered, he said. In the meantime, one of his tenants called asking if he could plant crops on Mr. Khan’s property. He refused but had little idea what was happening back home, Mr. Khan said.
Other landlords are equally frustrated. The mayor of Swat, Jamal Nasir, fled after his father, Shujaat Ali Khan, regarded as the biggest landlord in Swat, narrowly avoided being killed by the Taliban. Mr. Nasir, a major landowner himself, now stays in his house in Islamabad.
The top guns of the Taliban are still in Swat, or perhaps in neighboring Dir, Mr. Nasir said. “These people should be arrested,” he said. “If they are not arrested, they are going to come back.”
Another landlord, Sher Mohammad, said he was still bitter that the army refused to help as he, his brother and his nephew fought off the Taliban last year for 13 hours, even though soldiers were stationed less than a mile away. Mr. Mohammad was hit in the groin by a bullet and lost a finger in the fight.
At one of the meetings with the military in Peshawar, Mr. Mohammad, a prominent politician with the Pakistan Peoples Party, said he told the officers that he was not impressed with their performance.
“They said, ‘We will protect you,’ ” he recalled. “I said, ‘We don’t trust you.’ ”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/28/world ... nted=print
There is a related multimedia and more linked at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/03/world ... 3swat.html
August 3, 2009
Trying to Heal, Pakistan Valley Fears New Battles
By JANE PERLEZ and PIR ZUBAIR SHAH
MINGORA, Pakistan — Schools have officially reopened. Soldiers stand guard at checkpoints and have established a semblance of order. Many thousands have returned here to a town that is mostly intact, if still under a military presence.
But Mingora, a battle-scarred city in the Swat Valley, remains tense. Pakistan’s efforts to restore normalcy — a vital test of the government’s resolve to stand up to the Taliban — waver between fear and hope, leaving an enduring victory over the militants a distant goal.
Beneath the surface of relative calm, there is the sense that a new and more insidious conflict may be afoot, one that could take many months to play out before the fate of this once-prosperous region is ultimately decided.
*****
August 3, 2009
Hate Engulfs Christians in Pakistan
By SABRINA TAVERNISE
GOJRA, Pakistan — The blistered black walls of the Hameed family’s bedroom tell of an unspeakable crime. Seven family members died here on Saturday, six of them burned to death by a mob that had broken into their house and shot the grandfather dead, just because they were Christian.
The family had huddled in the bedroom, talking in whispers with their backs pressed against the door, as the mob taunted them.
“They said, ‘If you come out, we’ll kill you,’ ” said Ikhlaq Hameed, 22, who escaped. Among the dead were two children, Musa, 6, and Umaya, 13.
The attack in this shabby town in central Pakistan — the culmination of several days of rioting over a claim that a Koran had been defiled — shows how precarious life is for the tiny Christian minority in Pakistan.
More....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/03/world ... &th&emc=th
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/03/world ... 3swat.html
August 3, 2009
Trying to Heal, Pakistan Valley Fears New Battles
By JANE PERLEZ and PIR ZUBAIR SHAH
MINGORA, Pakistan — Schools have officially reopened. Soldiers stand guard at checkpoints and have established a semblance of order. Many thousands have returned here to a town that is mostly intact, if still under a military presence.
But Mingora, a battle-scarred city in the Swat Valley, remains tense. Pakistan’s efforts to restore normalcy — a vital test of the government’s resolve to stand up to the Taliban — waver between fear and hope, leaving an enduring victory over the militants a distant goal.
Beneath the surface of relative calm, there is the sense that a new and more insidious conflict may be afoot, one that could take many months to play out before the fate of this once-prosperous region is ultimately decided.
*****
August 3, 2009
Hate Engulfs Christians in Pakistan
By SABRINA TAVERNISE
GOJRA, Pakistan — The blistered black walls of the Hameed family’s bedroom tell of an unspeakable crime. Seven family members died here on Saturday, six of them burned to death by a mob that had broken into their house and shot the grandfather dead, just because they were Christian.
The family had huddled in the bedroom, talking in whispers with their backs pressed against the door, as the mob taunted them.
“They said, ‘If you come out, we’ll kill you,’ ” said Ikhlaq Hameed, 22, who escaped. Among the dead were two children, Musa, 6, and Umaya, 13.
The attack in this shabby town in central Pakistan — the culmination of several days of rioting over a claim that a Koran had been defiled — shows how precarious life is for the tiny Christian minority in Pakistan.
More....
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/03/world ... &th&emc=th