BY: R.RAHI, Toronto, Canada
It’s fun no more
Witnessing our leaders
How shamelessly
Under the threat of their lives
They keep lowering their pants.
I have tried and failed
But there is still a hope
A gallant human soldier is
Gonna rise and help our
Leaders to hold tight on their belts
by Nazia Junejo, Salt lake city, USA
The writer can be reached at najunejo@yahoo.com
I do not think this could be regarded as a warning sign any more. It seems like the dreaded is already here. Our Sindhiyat was already under attack from MQM, feudals and the government (regardless of the rulers), now this new monster seems determined to engulf whatever pieces of culture and civilization we are left with. The rule of the world is to move forward ie time and tide wait for no one. The nations which got independence with us like China or India have been advancing steadily to the extent of becoming leading economies of the world. Where are we and why? Unfortuantely our nation being in the grip of so called Maulvis in one form or the other have been persistent in slowing us down. Now the recent wave of Talibanization seems to drive us even backwards to the pre historic era. I agree ,as any reasonable woman/man would. It has nothing to do with Islam or Shariah. It has to do with gaining a dangerous coercive power to satisfy murderous and barbaric instincts of a bunch of illiterate losers. We can no longer afford to sit as silent spectators in the hope of a miracle.We can also not afford to let a revolution arise from inside Sindh. The people there, as I take it are too pre occupied with efforts to combat daily life disruptions with power failures, mobile phone snatching, broken roads, corruptions in every field…. They are already overwhelmed and hence unable to deal with this new crisis-like situation. Some of them may not even see it as a crisis. I am sure SANA could at least spread awareness regarding this impending disaster. It is ironic that the so called bill to surrender the population of Swat to the mercy of bunch of lunatics was not opposed by one sensible individual in the parliament.I am actually grateful to those Maulvis for not asking for the entire country YET. Unless they revoke the ‘peace deal’and bring the area under a humane law,this infiltration of maulvis must be stopped. One way to do it might be to declare tribal areas including Swat as an independent state with strict visa rules. After all, an organ with cancer sometimes has to be removed to save the entire body.
By A. Ameer
Saturday, 18 Apr, 2009
Courtesy: daily Dawn
THE growing threat of violent extremism in different parts of Pakistan including Fata and Malakand Division is a matter of serious concern.
The harrowing factor is that the writ of the Taliban is solidifying both in the north and the south not only in the Pashtun belt but also in the heartland of Pakistan.
BUNER: Instead of pulling out of Buner as they had announced on Thursday, the Taliban of Swat moved on Friday to consolidate their hold and took control of new areas, including the shrine of Sufi saint Pir Baba. Security forces offered no resistance.
Report by: Zia Ur Rehman
It is learnt that after Manawan episode, Punjab government has started crackdown against Pakhtoon people living in Lahore in the name of action against Taliban militants, mostly were the poor fruit vendors and labours who migrated to Lahore for earning bread and butter for their families. According to the media reports, Punjab police arrested more than 400 Pakhtoon people from different parts of Lahore.
‘The day is not far when Islamabad will be in the hands of the mujahideen,’ Pakistani Taliban commander Mullah Nazeer Ahmed said.
MINGORA: Pakistani Taliban are moving into a new area in northern Pakistan, clashing with villagers and police in a mountain valley, police and district officials said on Wednesday.
Separately, a Pakistani Taliban commander said the Pakistani military and the United States were colluding in US drone aircraft attacks and the militants would take their war to the capital, Islamabad, in response.
Surging militant violence across Pakistan is reviving western concerns about the stability of its nuclear-armed ally.
Pakistan is crucial to US efforts to stabilise Afghanistan.
US envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke, and Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, were in Pakistan for talks on security strategy this week.
In a development that will deepen the west’s concerns, scores of Taliban have moved into Buner district, 100 km northwest of Islamabad, from the Swat valley where authorities struck a peace pact in February aimed at ending violence.
‘About 20 vehicles carrying Taliban entered Buner on Monday and started moving around the bazaar and streets,’ said senior police officer Israr Bacha.
Villagers formed a militia, known as a lashkar, to confront the Taliban and eight of the insurgents were killed in a clash on Tuesday, police said.
Two villagers and three policemen were also killed.
‘People don’t like the Taliban,’ Ghulam Mustafa, deputy chief of Buner, told Reuters by telephone.
Muslim Khan, a Taliban spokesman in Swat, was defiant. ‘What law stops us going there?’ Khan said. ‘Our people will go there and stay there as long as they want.’
Authorities agreed in February to impose Islamic law in Swat to end more than a year of fighting.
Critics said appeasement would only embolden the militants to take over other areas.
Pakistan’s western allies fear such pacts create safe havens for Taliban and al Qaeda fighters.
Pakistani Taliban commander Mullah Nazeer Ahmed said in an interview with al Qaeda’s media arm, Al-Sahab, that Pakistan was behind US drone attacks on militants.
Authorities were misleading the public by saying it was the United States carrying out the strikes, he said, and it was the Pakistani army that sent spies to facilitate them.
‘All these attacks that have happened and are still happening are the work of Pakistan,’ Ahmed said, according to a transcript of the interview posted on Al-Sahab’s website.
Alarmed by deteriorating security in Afghanistan, the United States has since last year stepped up drone strikes in Pakistan.
Pakistan objects to the strikes, calling them a violation of its sovereignty that complicates its effort to fight militancy.
Other Taliban commanders said recent violence in Pakistan has been in retaliation for the drone attacks and threatened more.
Ahmed said Pakistani Taliban factions had united and would take their war to the capital: ‘The day is not far when Islamabad will be in the hands of the mujahideen.’
Ahmed also blamed the Pakistani military’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency for sowing divisions between factions, saying the ISI was the Taliban’s main enemy.
Some US officials have said recently the ISI maintained contacts with militants and there were indications ISI elements even provided support to the Taliban or al Qaeda militants.
Such accusations have angered Pakistan, although a military spokesman denied reports that ISI chief Lieutenant-General Ahmed Shujaa Pasha had snubbed Holbrooke and Mullen by refusing to meet them on Tuesday.
Courtesy: DAWN
Courtesy: Daily Times Editorial
April 6th, 2009
President Asif Ali Zardari has “ordered an inquiry” into the public flogging of a 17-year-old girl in Swat, and Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry has taken his famous suo moto notice by asking the IGP NWFP to produce the girl in court. But we all know nothing can be done against the Taliban who did the evil deed, and that the girl will not come to the court unless the Taliban allow it. More likely, she may be killed instead of being allowed to attend the CJ’s court. As for the ANP government, it had better look after Peshawar because it is once again under siege from the Khyber warlord.
by Asim Kaghzi, Calgary
The girl flogging video clip is a part of documentary relayed on Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) network in Canada, the same documentary also showed public punishment of a man as well, which is equally condemnable, the documentary also showed how the state has practically dissolved on ground in Swat area, the really shocking thing is the failure of State to prove totally ineffective in administration of law and order situation, it is very much true for Swat which is documented, also in Punjab when state was trying to control Noon League Munda from coming to Islamabad from Lahore, whereas state can shoot at site people in Sindh and Baluchistan.
So what does that mean, in my humble opinion, the state has started melting and is bifurcated between winners and losers. I see extremists as winners and Sindhis and Balochs as losers.
Courtesy: SANAlist, April 06, 2009
by Aijaz Sindhi, USA, aijazsindhi@gmail.com
There was news about burying 5 women from Baluchistan quite a few months ago who were still alive in the they were first beaten by 17 tribesmen, and then hit by the speeding tractor with the blade in front. As if it were not enough, the shattered skulls women were then dragged by the tractor blade into a ditch, and buried alive.
Continue reading Spike in the Soul – The Honor Dogs of Sindh and Balochistan!
by Mansoor Hallaj
“The leader of Pakistan’s main Islamist party, the Jamaat-e-Islami, played down the incident [of the Taliban in Swat flogging a young girl].
‘It’s a small thing. We should talk about drone attacks, not minor things,’ said Munawar Hassan, referring to attacks on suspected militants by pilotless US aircraft that have angered many Pakistanis.”
http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/pakistan/Video-showing-Swat-girl-flogging-circulated–qs
Where was Jamat-e-Islami, Munawar Hasan, Professor Ghafoor, Mian Tufail and Qazi Hussain Ahmed when under their very nose this ‘SAD INCIDENT’ took place during the so-called Islamic General Ziaul Haq??? When Naked Procession of Women was forcibly taken out just for the sake of revenge.
Shameful.. shocking. .horrifying… Un-Islamic of course.
by Mirza
I saw the video on Geo TV… have been under shock the whole day… like so many others. I feel her as a member of our family… the man who went with her probably was not punished. I saw another cultural stigma…. She was shouting… Leave me.. Meree tauba meree maan ki tauba….. Since FATHERS in that culture do not apologies.
I received an unofficial information (though this was off the record, but the person reporting was reliable)… Some Talib has proposed her and the girl had refused.. and she was pinned down as soon as they got some opportunity.
video of girl’s flogging, click here
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/02/taliban-pakistan-justice-women-flogging
Girl Beaten in Swat by our so called Sharia Leaders
(Please see English Dubbed video translation also I tried ) IF THIS VIDEO IS REAL AND NOT PROPAGANDA AGAINST PAKISTAN THEN THIS IS EVIL.ITS CANCER WHICH WILL EVENTUALITY RESULT IN TERMINAL STAGE FOR PAKISTAN This grainy footage appears to show a 17-year-old girl being beaten by Islamic radicals in Pakistan’s northwestern region of Swat, where Sharia law was introduced after the government reached a truce with the Taliban in February. A local Taliban commander in the militant stronghold of Matta.
Video of girl’s flogging as Taliban hand out Justice, plz click here
by A.Latif Khuhro, latifk@hotmail.com
Roots of Such behaviors are multifaceted including jihalat to petro-dollars. Nizam Adl is approved by ANP government which is probably representative of NWFP people. They strongly are arguing in favor of that. Even amir-ul- momnin Imam of revolution Nawaz Sharif has endorsed that and has given his blessing for that
What ever is happening in Sawat PPP is not responsible for that. Story is long and recently U.S. has categorically blamed one agency for that. There is beautiful video on PBS – front line which shows how real rulers of Pakistan are dealing with that. I wish I had exact web address for that.
by Dr. Syed Ehtisham
The writer can be reached at syedmae@yahoo.com
I just called friends/family in Karachi, Lahore, Quetta and Islamabad. Reaction against the barbarism is fierce in Karachi and Lahore, muted in Islamabad, and subdued in Quetta. The last is in virtual control of Taliban.
They are begging for support, naturally asking us to write to congress men, senators, the state department.
When I offered that we will write to Pakistan embassy too, they laughed with derision, and used terminology, not suited for mixed company. The bigot groups have said not a word. Before this outrage, the new Jamat-e-Islami (JI) Chief Munawwar Hasan had actually demanded that Swat Shariah be imposed all over Pakistan. If we do not act now, Pakistan will become Afghanistan..
by Khalid Hashmani, McLean, Virginia, USA
Taliban beating the girl mercilessly, click here to see the video
This is shocking and makes me ashamed that this is happening in the same country of which Sindh is also a part. I am angry as hell! These beasts and their supporters have no shame and their hearts are devoid of peaceful teachings of Islam. Beating mercilessly the poor woman on the pretext that “She came out of her house with another guy who was not her husband” is barbaric and it is obvious they do not live in past and are bent upon destruction and treating people with such cruelty.
May Allah punish these beasts if the government lacks the courage to save the wretched country of Pakistan from these barbarians.
Continue reading Taliban Justice- A pashtoon girl flogging by Taliban
by Ayaz Latif Palijo Advocate, Sindh
The writer can be reached at ayazlatif@gmail.com
Me, my family and 2 guests have just watched the video clippings on GEO TV in which three mullahs are beating and slashing a 17 years pashtoon girl in general public, she was awarded this punishment by shareeat court of SAWAT for alleged involvement in some minor non-cognizable crime.
After seeing her agony, helplessness, humiliation and hearing her painful cries almost everybody has tears in eyes, we have asked kids to leave the room. She is encircled by Taliban rulers of swat and a crowd of more than 2000 locals and no one dares to stop those terrorist Mullas. we are shocked.
Click here to see the video of Guardian.co uk, a girl beaten by Taliban in Sawat
Continue reading 17 year Girl beaten by Mullahs in SWAT Pakistan
Please click here to see the shock video Taliban flogging girl
Pakistan crisis: Taliban seen flogging teenage girl in shock video: Militant brutality exposed in once-peaceful district Young woman accused of affair with married man
Courtesy: The Guardian
by Declan Walsh, Islamabad
3 April 2009
A video of a teenage girl being flogged by Taliban fighters has emerged from Pakistan’s Swat Valley, offering a shocking glimpse of militant brutality in the once-peaceful district, and a sign of deepening Taliban influence in the country.
The video, shot on a mobile phone, shows a burka-clad woman face down on the ground. Two men hold her arms and feet while a third, a fighter with a flowing beard, whips her repeatedly.
Continue reading Pakistan crisis: Taliban seen flogging teenage girl in shock video
Petraeus Warns About Militants’ Threat to Pakistan
By ELISABETH BUMILLER
Published: April 1, 2009
Courtesy: New York Times
WASHINGTON – Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top American commander for Iraq and Afghanistan, warned a Senate panel on Wednesday that militant extremists in Pakistan “could literally take down their state” if left unchallenged, as he and two other top officials presented a grim picture of growing dangers in the region.
by Zar Ali Khan Musazai
I try my best to forget the shocking news of a misery in mean time other engulfs me,( Khushal Khan baba)
Pashtun nation once again bled by the hands of terrorists who committed suicide attack on a mosque in Jamrud, Khyber Agency FATA in which more than 100 innocent Pashtun martyred while more than 150 were serious wounded. This is an other declaration of war against Pashtun nation when their worship place was attacked after the explosion at the shrine of great Pashtun/Afghan poet Rehman baba which was targeted by the terrorists few days ago. Pashtuns’ blood has turned cheaper than water in the area administered by the Pakistan.
Continue reading An other declaration of war against Pashtun/Afghan
Peshawar- Afghan President Hamid Khan Karzai called veteran Pashtun nationalist politician muhammad Afzal Khan lala on telephone and enquired about his health and his ordeal in Swat pakhtunkhwa which he has been facing for last more than one year. Afghan President telephoned khan lala at a time when Afzal khan lala,s life is once again under threat from the terrorists who have turned Pashtun region like a hell and most of the Pashtun have been forced to have migrated from their homes at sawt and FATA.
Continue reading Afghan President Hamid Karzai called Afzal Khan Lala
WASHINGTON DIARY: The advancing enemy (Real possibility of Taliban take over of Pak) Daily Times
by Dr Manzur Ejaz, USA
Rulers averse to an independent judiciary and an equitable socio-economic order; an economic upper class hostile to paying its fair share in taxes; self-obsessed intellectuals and media persons; and a poverty-stricken population – this presents the perfect mix for the forces of destruction.
Continue reading Real possibility of Taliban take over of Pakistan
TORONTO: This Sunday, the Canadian Pashtun community staged protests the Taliban’s ongoing and brutal oppression of Pashtun people in Northwestern Pakistan. Answering the call of the Pashtun Peace Committee for a “first-ever anti-Taliban rally in Canada.” Says rally spokesman Inayat Khan Kakar:
Continue reading Rally in Toronto Against Taliban Atrocities
Within a matter of days, events on the Afghan border seem to be creating a perfect storm of mistrust and conflict between the United States and Pakistan: The recent US heliborne attack with troops inside Pakistan’s tribal area; the report that President George W. Bush had signed off on such attacks in July, allowing US forces to conduct these raids without clearance from Pakistan; the short-term shutting down of the US supply route to Afghanistan by Pakistan, ostensibly for “security reasons”; and finally an unequivocal riposte from Pakistan’s army chief General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani that “There is no question of any agreement or understanding with the coalition forces whereby they are allowed to conduct operations on our side of the border.”
Unless good sense prevails, the US-Pakistan alliance may be heading for the rocks in a storm that could rent the tenuous alliance between these two “allies”.
There may be good grounds for the US to feel that it has been let down by Pakistan in the past. Pakistan’s ambivalent approach to the Afghan Taliban and continuing hidden links to former Afghan Mujahideen commanders, such as Jalaluddin Haqqani and his son Siraj, came to be at odds with its partnership with the US against militants in the border region. Coming clean on that score may not have satisfied the US. Hence the Bush signature on unilateral attacks even perhaps as he entertained the new Pakistani prime minister in Washington this July.
Suddenly the old policy of “a wink and a nod” that worked for President Pervez Musharraf and that appeared to be continuing under the new democratically elected Peoples’ Party government seems to have been set aside. Kayani’s tough statement appears to have widespread public support in Pakistan. The Prime Minister echoed his words. But President Asif Ali Zardari uncharacteristically has been silent. If this portends fissures in the ruling hierarchy then the signs are not good for the balance of power inside Pakistan.
Other dangerous possibilities appear likely in the US-Pakistan relationship. The next time the US physically invades Pakistani territory to take out suspected militants, it may meet the Pakistan army head on. Or it may face a complete a cut-off of war supplies and fuel in Afghanistan via Pakistan. With only two weeks supply of fuel available to its forces inside Afghanistan and no alternative route currently available, the war in Afghanistan may come to a screeching halt. The Bush approach may prove to be yet another example of short-term thinking that damages the longer term objective. The Taliban meanwhile will be applauding from the sidelines.
A major consequence of the US invasion of Pakistan’s territory will be the further alienation of the Pakistani public and a serious internal problem for the fledgling civil government that took over from Musharraf’s autocracy. The US may think it has considerable leverage over the Pakistani government because of the latter’s economic ills and financial straits and its overwhelming reliance on US aid. But it is failing to measure the power of the Pakistani street. Already, a vast majority of people in Pakistan, including inside the army, see the United States with hostile eyes. Anyone in Pakistan seen as aligning with the Americans would lose public favor. And the nationalists and religious extremists will then get a chance to say “we told you so!” and gain the upper hand.
All this is happening as the lame duck Bush presidency is getting ready to pack its bags. But the campaign to succeed Bush is heating up. Cross border US attacks inside Pakistan will distract from the war on terror in the region. They will also divert the campaigns of Senators John McCain and Barack Obama from finding solutions to hurling new rhetorical bombs at each other to prove that each is tougher in the use of military force than the other.
Both Pakistan and the United States need to rethink their actions. Pakistan must prove with actions not just words that it is willing to shed its ties to all militants. The United States must ratchet down the rhetoric and the use of force, especially against an “ally” in this war on terror, a war that will last well into the next president’s term and may be beyond. And it must fully equip the Pakistan army to fight a mobile counter insurgency in its borderlands. Otherwise, the US will not only lose an ally in Pakistan but ignite a conflagration inside that huge and nuclear-armed country that will make the war in Afghanistan seem like a Sunday hike in the Hindu Kush.
Author’s Note: This article has also appeared on The Huffington Post
By Javed Qazi, Karachi, Sindh
FATA is bleeding; its wound is going so deep in its existence that perhaps no rehabilitation can work out for them now. It is expanding to all over pakhtun area and to the Pakistan ; it is taking the subcontinent and whole the world along.
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