As the entire nation celebrated Pakistan’s 62nd birthday in recent days, the best bit of news came in the form of Swat where after years of  Taliban tyranny, green and white reigned supreme across Swat.

The Swatis were out in force and celebrated 14 August like never before as shown by numerous TV channels.  At a personal level as someone who has written at length on Swat here I cannot say how delighted it was to see grown Pashtun men dancing in Mingora and seeing Green Chowk adorned in green and white.

The Khooni Chowk  of the Satanic Taliban serves only as a distant memory and nightmare, and for this turnaroud we must praise the brilliant Pakistan army who have left the Taliban in turmoil across Pakistan.  I end with visuals that show the transformation, indeed the follwing video clip can serve as a tribute to the people of Swat and the Pakistan Army and their sacrifices:

Swat Zindabad

I am smiling as is Swat albeit slowly in delight at the good news that Pakistan’s internally displaced people have begun returning to Swat and the wider Malakand Division. No words of praise are good enough to honour the  people of Swat and Malakand Division who have sacrified their all for Pakistan. Swatis have given up their homes, livelihoods and even their lives for the peace and prosperity of Pakistan and all of Pakistan salutes them.

The real test begins now for the government must deliver for the people of Swat and Malakand Division without fail. Al Jazeera has reported on the happiness of returninh home and also the fear factor of a Taliban return that exercises the minds of the now legendary people of Swat and Malakand Division as shown in the video clip below.

Too often the Pashtun of Pakistan are taken for granted and even seen as inferior to other Pakistanis. However the real truth is that the Pashtun have been the most passionate of Pakistanis and are the jewel in Pakistan’s crown as shown in their love for the nation from 1947 to this day.

The people of Swat and Malakand Division gave up their today for Pakistan’s tomorrow, need I say more?

June’s B-side continues in the same vein as those of April and May with its twin focus on US-Pakistan relations albeit in a new context looking at Uncle Sam’s fascination with our nuclear arsenal. The second focus remains Lucifer’s litter namely the Taliban and their evil.

June’s B-side contents are:

•   Pakistan and The Bomb by BRUCE RIEDEL
•   A Tragedy of Cover Ups & Failures by ASMA JEHANGIR
•   Whither Pakistan by PERVEZ HOODBHOY

Pakistan and The Bomb by Bruce Riedel

The Pakistani army, backed by attack helicopters, is fighting intense gun battles in the Swat valley 60 miles outside the capital of Islamabad with Islamic extremists. Al Qaeda and the Taliban have struck back with suicide bombs in Pakistan’s major cities, including Lahore. A plot in Karachi was foiled but the extremists vow more carnage is imminent.

The battles are the latest in a deadly struggle for the control of Pakistan. Some are hoping this, at last, is the turning point when the army and the Pakistani government will finally defeat the extremists, but history suggests that conclusion is premature. More likely this will be yet another temporary setback for the Islamists to be followed by new advances elsewhere.

The fighting has cast a spotlight on the shaky security of Pakistan’s growing nuclear arsenal-the fastest growing arsenal in the world. Pakistan is finishing construction of several new reactors and is seeking to buy more from China to increase its production of fissile material. The United States has provided Pakistan with over $10 billion in military aid since 2001. No one outside Pakistan can say if some of that money was diverted directly to the nuclear program by the army, but undoubtedly the U.S. assistance indirectly made it easier for the army to use its own funds to accelerate the development of its nuclear weapons.

Today the arsenal is under the control of its military leaders; it is well protected, concealed and dispersed. But if the country fell into the wrong hands-those of the militant Islamic jihadists and al Qaeda-so would the arsenal. The U.S. and the rest of the world would face the worst security threat since the end of the Cold War. Containing this nuclear threat would be difficult, if not impossible.

The danger of Pakistan becoming a jihadist state is real. Just before her murder in December 2007, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto said she believed al Qaeda would be marching on Islamabad in two years. A jihadist Pakistan would be a global game changer-the world’s second largest Muslim state with nuclear weapons breeding a hothouse of terrorism.

Yet it’s not inevitable. For the past 60 years, U.S. policy toward the country has been inconsistent and mercurial, rife with double standards with Pakistan’s neighbor India. Increasing calls to “secure” the country’s nuclear weapons by force are far from productive-in fact, it’s making serious work with Pakistan more difficult.

Pakistan is a unique nuclear weapons state. It has been both the recipient of technology transfers from other states and a supplier of technology to still other states. It has been a state sponsor of proliferation and has tolerated private sector proliferation as well. Pakistan has engaged in highly provocative behavior against India, even initiating a limited war, and sponsored terrorist groups that have engaged in mass casualty terrorism inside India’s cities, most recently last November in Mumbai. No other nuclear weapons state has done all of these provocative actions.

The origins of the Pakistani nuclear program lie in the deep national humiliation of the 1971 war with India that led to the partition of the country, the independence of Bangladesh and the destruction of the dream of a single Muslim state for all of south Asia’s Muslim population. The military dictator at the time, Gen. Yahya Khan, presided over the loss of half the nation and the surrender of 90,000 Pakistani soldiers in Dacca. The Pakistani establishment determined it must develop a nuclear weapon to counter India’s conventional superiority.

The new president, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, convened the country’s top 50 scientists secretly in January 1972 and challenged them to build a bomb. He famously said that Pakistanis would sacrifice everything and “eat grass” to get a nuclear deterrent.

The 1974 Indian nuclear explosion only intensified the quest. Mr. Bhutto received an unsolicited letter from a Pakistani who had studied in Louvain, Belgium, Abdul Qadeer Khan, offering to help by stealing sensitive centrifuge technology from his new employers at a nuclear facility in the Netherlands. Over the next few years-with the assistance of the Pakistani intelligence service, the Inter Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI)-Mr. Khan would steal the key technology to help Pakistan produce fissionable material to make a bomb.

China also helped the nascent Pakistani program overcome technical challenges. According to some accounts by proliferation experts, it allowed Pakistani scientists to participate in Chinese tests to help them learn more about the bomb. Mr. Khan returned to Pakistan and with ISI built a global proliferation enterprise to acquire the technology he and other scientists needed to get Pakistan its bomb.

Mr. Bhutto’s handpicked choice for army chief, Zia ul Huq, overthrew his mentor in 1977, executed him and accelerated work on the project. By the late 1980s Pakistan had made sufficient progress that both General Zia and Mr. Khan hinted publicly that Islamabad had a bomb. According to Mr. Khan’s public account, General Zia also warned Israel not to attack Pakistan’s nuclear facilities in the late 1980s or it would destroy Tel Aviv. In 1990 the U.S. imposed sanctions on Pakistan for building the bomb and cut off the supply of F16 jets already paid for by Pakistan.

Pakistan, like the rest of the world, was caught by surprise in May 1998 when India tested its nuclear arsenal. Despite pleas from President Bill Clinton and other world leaders, Pakistan tested its own devices a few weeks after India. Mr. Clinton offered Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif a $6 billion aid program if he would not test. I was part of the team that made the offer in Islamabad. We later learned Mr. Sharif ordered the tests to proceed while we were still visiting. On the eve of the tests Pakistan claimed Israel was about to attack its nuclear facilities so it had to act. Mr. Sharif proudly announced Pakistan had “a newclear vision,” as the deliberately misspelled English phrase read on posters around the country, for the future.

Pakistan would soon demonstrate that the bomb gave its military leadership enhanced confidence to deal with India and to take risks. Less than a year after the tests, the Pakistani army initiated a limited war with India in the mountains of the Hindu Kush by crossing the line of control separating Pakistani and Indian forces in Kashmir. The Kargil War, as it is called, dragged on for several weeks.

In the White House there was growing concern the war would escalate out of control and could even go nuclear. On July 4, 1999, Mr. Clinton and I met with Mr. Sharif alone at Blair House and told him Pakistan was playing with fire. Mr. Sharif agreed to withdraw the army back behind the line of control.

Within months Mr. Sharif’s handpicked army chief, Pervez Musharraf, who had ordered the Kargil War, overthrew Mr. Sharif and sent him into exile. Mr. Musharraf poured resources into the program.

The ISI has longstanding ties to a number of Pakistan-based terrorist groups active in India. In December 2001, one staged an attack on the Indian parliament in New Delhi. India blamed Pakistan for the attack and mobilized. Again India and Pakistan appeared on the edge of nuclear disaster. President George W. Bush and Secretary of State Colin Powell needed almost a year to talk the two back from the brink.

Another ISI-backed group, Lashkar e Taiba, was behind the terror attack last November in Mumbai that kept the city in chaos for 60 hours. Again the specter of war between two nuclear weapons states was on the global agenda. Again India showed remarkable restraint in response to provocation from Pakistan, grounded in the reality that New Delhi has no attractive military options for retaliation against an opponent armed with nuclear weapons.

In short, Pakistan’s acquisition of a nuclear deterrent has worked to intimidate its opponent and to allow Pakistan to harbor terrorists who attack India and even to initiate limited military operations. What is not clear is how long India will tolerate such behavior. There are many in India who argue Pakistan must be taught a lesson for Mumbai.

Pakistan has also behaved as a major proliferator of nuclear technology. A.Q. Khan’s enterprise has become infamous for providing nuclear material and secrets to North Korea, Iran and Libya. Much of his activity was sanctioned by the Pakistani authorities and was part of complex deals to enhance Pakistan’s own deterrent-for example, by acquiring missile technology from Pyongyang. Some of Mr. Khan’s activities were pursued independently of Pakistan’s government for his own wealth. We will probably never know the exact balance between the state’s interests and Mr. Khan’s on every transaction since Mr. Khan is a national hero to Pakistanis and no government in Islamabad is ever likely to reveal all of the dirty truth. The good news is that since Mr. Khan’s televised “confession” in 2004 there has been little evidence of continued Pakistani technology proliferation activity.

There are, however, persistent reports of some kind of understanding between Pakistan and Saudi Arabia for Islamabad to provide nuclear weapons to Riyadh if the Saudis feel threatened by a third party with nuclear weapons. Then Saudi Defense Minister and now also Crown Prince Sultan visited Mr. Khan’s laboratories in a much publicized visit in the late 1990s. Both Pakistan and Saudi Arabia deny any secret deal, but rumors of one continue to surface as Iran gets closer to developing its own bomb.

Estimates of the size of Pakistan’s arsenal by outside experts in think tanks range from 60 to 100, with more being produced each year. Pakistan can deliver its weapons by both intermediate range missiles and jet aircraft, including its F16s. The bombs and the delivery systems are dispersed around a country twice the size of California, often buried deep underground.

Mr. Musharraf created a Strategic Plans Division under his control to provide security for the arsenal. Its director, Lt. General Khalid Kidwai, has lectured across the world on the extensive security layers the SPD has developed both for physical security for facilities and personnel security to prevent unauthorized activity by those overseeing protection. The U.S. has provided expertise to the SPD to help ensure security. For now most experts agree that the necessary security architecture to protect the bomb is in place and the army has control of the weapons securely.

Of course, if the Pakistani state becomes a jihadist state, then the extremists will inherit the arsenal. There would be calls from the outside to “secure” Pakistan’s nuclear weapons, but since no outsider knows where most of them are located, these calls would be a hollow threat. Even if force was used to capture some of the weapons, Pakistan would retain most of them and the expertise to build more. Finally, Pakistan would use its weapons to defend itself.

U.S. options would be severely limited by Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal. We would need to work with India, Afghanistan, China and others to isolate the danger.

Islamabad has refused for decades to sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), arguing that India must do so first. After the 1998 tests I joined then Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott in an intensive diplomatic effort to persuade both India and Pakistan to sign the CTBT. The Pakistanis were the harder sell and we never even came close to an agreement with them. The effort failed entirely when the U.S. Senate refused to ratify the treaty in 2000.

Islamabad believes it was deeply unfair for Washington to offer India a civil nuclear deal in 2005 and not give Pakistan the same opportunity. The deal gives India access to advanced nuclear technology in return for international safeguards on some but not all of its reactors. Pakistanis believe the deal with India underscores America’s tilt toward the richer and bigger India and is yet another sign of Washington’s unreliability as an ally. Pakistan’s past proliferation behavior has so far ruled it out for a similar deal.

Last year the new elected civilian leadership boldly proposed that Pakistan adopt a policy of no first use of nuclear weapons. The army made it clear that it disagreed with President Asif Zardari and would not accept a no-first-use pledge. The Mumbai attack put all talk of that pledge off the table for now, but it is a good idea that Mr. Zardari should raise again if and when relations with India improve.

U.S. policy toward Pakistan in general and the Pakistani bomb in particular has oscillated wildly over the past 30 years between blind enchantment and unsuccessful isolation. President Ronald Reagan turned a blind eye to the program in the 1980s because he needed General Zia and the ISI to fight the Soviets in Afghanistan. President George H. W. Bush sanctioned Pakistan for building the bomb in 1990, and Mr. Clinton added more sanctions after the 1998 tests. Both had no choice as Congress had passed legislation that tied their hands and required mandatory sanctions implementation.

President George W. Bush lifted the sanctions after 9/11 and poured billions into the Pakistani army, much of it unaccounted for, in return for Pakistan’s help again in Afghanistan. On his watch the CIA dismantled much of the A.Q. Khan global network.

President Barack Obama has a full agenda with Pakistan, burdened by the war in Afghanistan, the hunt for al Qaeda and the internal crisis inside Pakistan. But the nuclear issue will not go away. Mr. Obama’s call for a world without nuclear weapons and his pursuit of Senate ratification of the CTBT will inevitably mean arms control will be back on the U.S.-Pakistan agenda.

It is in Pakistan’s interest to get into the arms control debate on its own terms. Islamabad should put the no-first-use pledge back on the table with India, and it should sign the CTBT without demanding Indian adherence first. Pakistan’s arsenal works, and it does not need to test again. If it wants to get into the global arms control architecture and get a deal like the one India has gotten, Pakistan needs to show that the days of A.Q. Khan, Kargil and Mumbai are over for good and that it is addressing all the challenges it faces.

In the meantime Americans should stay away from idle talk by politicians and pundits about “securing” Pakistan’s weapons by force. Such chatter is not only unrealistic but actually counterproductive. It makes the atmosphere for serious work with Pakistan on nuclear security harder, not easier. It gives the jihadists further ammunition for their charge that America secretly plans to disarm the only Muslim state with a bomb in cahoots with India and Israel.

America needs a policy toward Pakistan and its bomb which emphasizes constancy and consistency and an end to double standards with India. Congress should quickly pass the Kerry-Luger bill that triples economic aid without adding crippling conditions. We should provide military aid, like helicopters and night vision devices, that helps fight extremist groups. We should also continue providing expertise in nuclear security and safety to Pakistan-that is in our interest.

Today some in Pakistan recognize at long last the existential threat to their freedoms comes from within, from the jihadists like the Taliban and al Qaeda, not from India. Now is the time to help them and ensure their hand is on the nuclear arsenal.

The president of Pakistan in 1971 was Gen. Yahya Khan. A previous version of this article incorrectly said the military dictator at the time was Yaqub Khan. In addition, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was president in January 1972, not prime minister, as the article incorrectly stated in a previous version.

Published in the Wall Street Journal

WASIM VIEW- Bruce Riedel is well-known in foreign policy circles as a foreign policy expert and is a former CIA man. Recently he rose to prominence when he was assigned the task of reviewing US, Pakistan and Afghanistan relations by President Obama. Consequently it is plain logic that Riedel’s views on Pakistan could be intrepeted as the views of the Obama Administration too. It is this context that the Riedel article needs to be viewed.

Riedel begins the article supporting the army action in Swat and Malakand Division but then desroys his article and his credibility by writing a blatant untruth in saying that ‘the fighting has cast a spotlight on the shaky security of Pakistan’s growing nuclear arsenal’. It is as clear as day that the Taliban cannot breach our nuclear security appratus indeed even Uncle Sam with her military and economic prowess cannot otherwise believe you me America would have done so many decades ago.

The real truth that Riedel hides is that the US media scrum (scum more like) who write on the threat of a nuclear Taliban have demonstrated shabby journalism and have done so at the behest of the US policymakers with a view to creating a nuclear bogeyman, a monster like no other which is the very embodiment of nuclear terror. The bulk of Riedel’s article is wasted on proving his case against a nuclear Pakistan and is the most pro-Indian article written by a non-Indian I have ever read. Indeed I do wonder if it is authored by Bruce Riedel or more likely ’Bharat Riedel’ for no Indian could have done a better job on castigating Pakistan. I will not repeat any of the diatribe for it is not worth the effort but I do ask readers to read paragraph seven again and again.

Riedel’s rants on Pakistan as a nuclear power need no analysis but his silence on India and the fact that they began the nuclear arms race is deafening. Furthermore any respect for Riedel’s views no matter how abhorrent they may be to a Pakistani are left dead in the water when attacks Nawaz Sharif for poor english, for a so-called White House policymaker like Riedel to engage in such behaviour in public is indicative and demonstrates him as someone capable only of  childsplay and not stateplay.

In conclusion the Riedel article is a must read for all Pakistanis who have been hooked, lined and sinkered by the Obama brand for Riedel’s venom for Pakistan and her nuclear status are clear for all to see. I repeat what was said at the very start that Riedel is a key policymaker in the Obama Administration and if the article is indicative of his mindset and consequently the Obama Administration’s too then it seems we are fast-forwarding to a rebirth of the ghost of Vietnam that will show its horror this time in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The second article is written by the one and only Asma Jehangir who is the Chairperson of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan. The HRCP report she authors is a must read for it shines a light into the dark betrayal of  the state in Swat and the wider Malakand division.

A Tragedy of Errors & Cover Ups: The IDPs and Outcome of Military Actions in FATA and Malakand Division by Asma Jehangir

The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) is convinced that the cost of the insurgency in the Malakand Division has been increased manifold by the shortsightedness and indecisiveness of the non-representative institutions and their policy of appeasing the militants and cohorting with them. While the ongoing military operation had become unavoidable, it was not adopted as a measure of the last resort. Further, the plight of the internally displaced people has been aggravated by lack of planning and coordination by the agencies concerned, and the methods of evacuation of towns/villages and the arrangements for the stranded people have left much to be desired.

Based on reports by HRCP activists in the Malakand Division and other parts of NWFP/Pakhtunkhwa, visits to IDP camps by its activists and senior board members, and talks with many displaced people and several Nazims and public figures, the commission has released the following statement on the situation, its conclusions and recommendations:

Background

The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) has reported, time and again over the last many years, on the rising exodus of IDPs from FATA and the Malakand Division, owing to deteriorating security situation, and warned the government of the consequences. IDPs in Balochistan have also been an issue of concern and separate statements on it have been issued by HRCP.

For over two decades the government of Pakistan, in particular the military, tolerated, if it did not collude with them, the religious militants and extended impunity to them as well as to all forms of acts of religious intolerance. It was common knowledge that international as well as national religious militants had safe havens in the country. After September 11, militants of all shades were reinforced and given a free hand to organize themselves at the cost of the freedom of the local population in FATA. Other parts of the country also continued to suffer but initially parts of FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Area) became the central hub of all militant groups, local, national, regional and international. The Musharraf government did not simply turn a blind eye but by all accounts, (including those of IDPs), several incidents revealed a policy to protect certain leaders of militant groups. The government has never given a satisfactory explanation on the supply lines of finances, vehicles, arms/ammunition and petrol that the militants have never been short of. This is particularly questionable in the case of Swat, which is a settled area and surrounded by territory in control of the government.

Amongst other reports, a number of credible sources (including official sources) confirmed that in December 2006, a vehicle was impounded by SHO Amir Zaman of police station Kabal, which was full of explosives. The destination of this pick-up was the Dera (house) of Fazallullah, popularly known as Maulana Radio. The SHO who impounded the vehicle was ordered by phone to stop all proceedings till higher police officials instructed him to proceed in the matter. As the DIG of the area was on leave, SP Qudratullah Marwat is said to have personally ordered that the van be released with the explosives as he had instructions from “higher authorities” to release the pick-up. In addition a number of other well placed sources confirmed that groups of militants from Waziristan were officially escorted to Swat in 2007.

During the last few years nine military operations were carried out and nine compromises made with militants operating in FATA and Swat. None of these succeeded in bringing peace. Almost all the IDPs and interlocutors interviewed by HRCP complained of having been let down by the government. They strongly felt that the government machinery lacked the will rather than capacity to dismantle the militant force in the Malakand Division. As regards FATA they were less sure of the capacity of the government to deal with the enormous challenge. They complained that the problem was deliberately ignored for many years and now the militant groups, criminal elements and drug traffickers had formed a formidable network.

A number of IDPs from Swat had left their homes twice or thrice before the recent army operation of April 2009. They admitted that generally the local population of Swat took a positive view of the last peace deal negotiated by the ANP and Maulana Sufi Muhammad. They had hoped that peace would be restored but they found that some of the worst forms of human rights abuses by the Taliban took place after the deal was struck. A large number of misled and tired youth joined the militants, who were seen as the ultimate victors and future administrators of the area. While a large number of people voluntarily joined the militants, the IDPs narrated incidents witnessed in their own families where the Swat-based Taliban forced young men to join them by threatening the families that came in their way. There were reports of summary executions through slaughter by the militants. At least, three cases of whipping of young girls were reported by IDPs living in three different camps. Hanging of bodies by the tree and killings of those cooperating with government forces were widely reported. Scores were killed including many political activists.

Reports of the devious role played by a former commissioner of Malakand were common. Earlier Syed Muhammad Javed, former Commissioner of Malakand, was posted as DCO Swat. It was common knowledge that he fully patronized Maulana Fazalullah, son-in-law of Sufi Muhammad. While posted as DCO he is reputed to have exhibited strong leanings towards the Al-Qaeda-style ideology. He would drive from Mingora to Peuchar where Fazaullah led Friday prayers. The presence of the highest official in Swat in the congregation of the faithful led in prayers by Fazallullah was a strong incentive for others to join. It is reported that there was vigorous recruitment of local people by the militants during that period. There are other allegations of abuse of human rights by the former Commissioner.

The government defended the appointment of Commissioner Syed Muhammad Javed on the ground that he had strong connections with the Taliban and could therefore be used for the purposes of brokering a genuine peace deal. However, it is now evident that the former Commissioner advanced the cause of the Taliban and exposed the locals to their wrath. The IDPs from Buner were particularly disturbed by the destructive role played by the former Commissioner. In April 2008, the Taliban tried to enter Buner. The local people resisted and hurriedly called for a jirga. They armed themselves and were supported by the DCO and the DPO of the area. Commissioner Javed, who was in Dir with Sufi Muhammad, heard of the resistance by the local armed groups. He called up the DCO and the DPO ordering them to halt the local resistance till he visited Buner the next day. According to eyewitnesses, the Commissioner arrived escorted by the Taliban and gave a dressing down to the DCO and the DPO. He ordered the local jirga to come to the Karakar forest rest house on the Swat Buner border for talks with the Taliban. The jirga members refused to go to the rest house and were then invited to the Commissioner House in Swat.

The jirga (after a day) went to the Commissioner House as instructed. They were shocked to see Muslim Khan there. Maulana Faqir Muhammad was awaited; he was arriving from Bajaur. When Maulana Faqir Muhammad finally arrived, he threatened the jirga members and the Commissioner forced the jirga members to apologise to the Taliban for raising an armed Lashkar against them. A sham compromise was made to assure the Buneris that the Taliban would not enter the area if they disarmed. However, the Taliban, despite the compromise, entered Buner the next day. They burnt down and destroyed the houses of active jirga members, including the Sultanwas houses of Afsar Khan (ANP leader) and Col. Sultanzeb. Within a few days the Taliban had complete control of the district.

Commissioner Syed Muhammad Javed is also alleged to have pressurized the family of Chand Bibi, the video of whose flogging was telecast by national television channels, to deny that the incident had ever taken place. According to some government sources the Commissioner played the lead role in providing a doctored report to the Supreme Court.

The Nizam-i-Adl Compromise

It is now obvious that the ANP government fell into a trap in the hope that a compromise with Maulana Sufi Muhammad would bring peace. It had been widely publicized that the local population wanted enforcement of the Nizam-i-Adl Regulation which was being supported by the militants and that its enforcement would bring peace to the Malakand Division. Only a few though believed that the campaign of the militants was motivated by a desire to bring in any form of justice. Their past record offered strong evidence against their interest in justice. Girls’ schools were bombed, women were restricted from leaving their homes without a mehram, video shops were destroyed, barbers were punished for shaving men and throats of suspects were slit without trial. Quite obviously the militants were making a bid for power. The Nizam-i-Adl Regulation was to be used as a tool to keep the local population in a state of fear while power would be wielded through Taliban appointed judges and law enforcement personnel.

Sufi Mohammad

Now in his mid-seventies, Sufi Mohammad belongs to Kumbar, near Maidan in Lower Dir district of the Malakand Division. As a young man he was associated with Jamat-i-Islami and was elected a BD councillor during the Ayub period. In the early nineties he joined the alliance of feudals and political agents who did not want FCR to be replaced with the Pakistan code and raised the demand for the enforcement of the Shariah law. He gained prominence when his supporters in the Tehrik-i-Nifaz-i-Shariat-Mohammedi (TNSM) blockaded the Malakand pass and made a violent bid to capture Saidu Sharif, capital of Swat, in which several lives were lost. The government reached an understanding with TNSM and the result was Nizam-i-Adl Regulation of 1994. After 9/11 Sufi Mohammad led thousands of ill-equipped tribals into Afghanistan to fight by the side of the Taliban. Many of his companions were killed and those who survived blamed him for their plight. He himself was arrested when he returned to Pakistan in 2001. Many thought the administrations thus saved him from his frenzied followers that were out to harm him. He stayed in prison till November 2007 when he was transferred by the caretaker regime to a hospital in Peshawar. In 2008 he was released and the provincial government signed an agreement in April 2008 with his party in the hope that he would succeed in persuading the militants, commanded by his son-in-law, Maulvi Fazaullah, to honour the peace accord. These hopes did not materialize and Sufi Mohammad himself kept raising new demands.

The militants had to rely on intimidation as in the 2008 General Election the people of the Malakand Division overwhelmingly voted in favour of the ANP and the PPP and rejected the candidates backed by clerics. As a result of excesses committed by the militants, 95,953 families (577,167 people) were internally displaced in the NWFP/Pakhtoonkhwa province before the May 2009 military operation commenced. A large number of IDPs were from Swat where the Taliban were virtually in control, Therefore it was pretty evident that the people felt themselves insecure and wanted peace – at any cost.

As was expected, the Taliban took control but soon their ambition had the better of discretion. Addressing a big public gathering in Mingora (Swat) on April 19, 2009 Maulana Sufi Muhammad rejected western-style democracy and called it “a system of infidels”.

He asserted that there was no room for democracy in Islam. Similarly he denounced the judicial system including the High Court and the Supreme Court as un-Islamic. He gave an ultimatum of four days to the government to pack up their judicial system in Malakand Division and appoint Qazis selected by himself. Lawyers, the Maulana said, had no business in his scheme of things. The public throughout the country was alarmed. The Parliament reacted strongly against his outburst and his painting of all those who disagreed with him as infidels.

The Military Operation

A number of sources claim that at least 80% of Malakand Division was already under the control of the Taliban, who nominally owed allegiance to Sufi Muhammad and his Tehrik Nifaz Shariat-e-Muhammadi, before the army operation started on 26 April, 2009. Most political parties supported the military operation. A large section of civil society was also convinced that it had become unavoidable to take some military action, particularly as police officials in the Malakand Division were killed and leaders and workers of the ruling provincial party (ANP) were liquidated. A large number of police functionaries serving in the Malakand Division had deserted or were virtually confined to their police stations. Representatives of the provincial government admit that the situation was grim enough for them to experiment with any available recipe, as long as the people of their province had some breathing space. They disclosed that they had received no support from the federal government to their efforts to raise the capacity of their law-enforcement personnel. The military merely smiled at their request for assistance while the federal government dragged its feet and remained clueless about dealing with rising violence, tensions and internal displacement.

Regrettably, the intensity of a full fledged military operation could have been avoided if the militants had been confronted, discouraged, deported and captured earlier, after several emphatic public denials of support to them. It took a number of years after September 11 for the Musharaf government to acknowledge that militant groups had taken refuge in FATA. The military operation was an unfortunate option also because no effective measures had been taken in the past to meet the challenge. As one interlocutor commented the country is a patient whose ailment has been ignored too long and who is even now being treated without a complete diagnosis, while his ailment has travelled to all parts of his body. There are several public statements on record where chief of ISI and military leaders have praised the “patriotism” of jehadi groups. Sufi Muhammad was touted out as a saviour and champion of peace and justice. It confuses the population that is consistently misled by those in authority.

The urgency of a military action cannot be discounted but any armed action by the state must, under all circumstances, follow the principles of humanitarian law and in particular Article 51 of the Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts (Protocol 1). It must be a measure of last resort rather than a measure that becomes unavoidable because of sustained inaction in the past. Use of force must be proportionate and non-combatants should, at all costs, be assured of safety. Those trapped in the cross fighting should be provided with food and all efforts made to bring them to safety.

Tales of Suffering

The IDPs from Swat unanimously complained that they were given a scandalously brief notice to evacuate. Curfew was relaxed for a few hours and thousands of families walked for miles to reach safety. A large number of them were caught in the armed conflict between the Taliban and government forces. Those fortunate enough to find transport had to pay a fortune. There are reports of loss of life and limbs caused by mines laid by the Taliban. A number of women were traumatized because the Taliban had forced the men in the family to stay back. Many others had been separated from their families. A particularly distressing story was of a woman who carried her son’s slaughtered head for burial because she was forced to leave the corpse on the wayside by the Taliban who had beheaded him.

Another woman narrated how she had left her special child behind because he could not walk. She was beside herself and told the HRCP team that she had left some water and food by the side of her disabled child and had had no news since. Families reluctantly admitted that in a panic to save their lives in very difficult circumstances they were unable to carry the very old ones and disabled children with them. A women gave birth on the way amidst the exchange of fire and hurriedly-wrapped her newborn and it slipped through the wraps during her journey.

IDPs also alleged that they saw dead human and animal bodies lying by the wayside. The stink was unbearable. They mostly corroborated the allegation that both the Taliban and the military did not allow families to pick up the dead bodies and that a high level of fatalities had occurred in the area. They disclosed that the Taliban as well as the military operation were responsible for the loss of life of hundreds of non-combatants. There were credible testimonies that the Taliban had made last-minute desperate efforts to forcibly recruit children and very young men to fight for them. Others were taken to be used as human shields.

On the other hand, the IDPs confirmed that the use of long range artillery by the military was indiscriminate. Besides militants civilians too became targets of bombardment. Reports indicate that the scale and intensity of fighting has been severe and in many cases it has been undertaken in heavily populated areas. It is feared that several hundred people have been unable to flee to safety due to the intensity of the fighting and imposition of constant curfews. The stranded civilian population is without electricity and they have no means of communication.

Medical assistance is not available while food and water are scarce. According to UNHCR, the affected area has over six million population. The estimates of the people displaced have risen to nearly three million. This is a strong indication that large numbers are either trapped or missing. It is reported by the incoming IDPs that fatalities and casualties amongst civilians are significant. The infrastructure has also been massively damaged by government forces as well as the Taliban. An unconfirmed report doing the rounds in the IDP camps and in urban centres of NWFP/Pakhtoonkhwa province says that some seven Taliban were captured after three commandos had been brutally butchered by the Taliban. They were thrown out of an helicopter at a high altitude. Such stories must be thoroughly probed and strongly refuted if found exaggerated. Reports of slaughter of military personnel and relatives of off duty police by the Taliban are circulating in the camps and have been confirmed by many IDPs. The loss of soldiers and police officers is a heavy blow to the country and especially demoralizing for the security forces. HRCP deeply regrets it but must continue to stress that the distinction between the behaviour of non-state and state actors must be fully comprehended.

IDP Camps

It is estimated that by May 24 1,206,213 people had fled from Swat Valley, Lower Dir, Buner and Shangla districts. According to available data, the total number of IDPs on that date was estimated at 1,783,380. Some 80% have taken shelter with local host families or in rented accommodation. As the number of IDPs keeps increasing, the capacities of host families and communities are being overstretched.

When HRCP teams visited the area there were 23 official camp sites; eleven old and 12 new ones set up after the late April/May influx. The largest camp, Jalozai II was set up before April 2009. It population is 71,344. Of the new camps, the Dargai camp at Malakand has 96,148 people. Other camps are smaller in size, mostly having under 10,000 people.

The task of organising IDP camps is gigantic and poses a huge challenge. Even more difficult it is for host families to sustain their hospitality beyond a certain period. It is absolutely remarkable the way the people, particularly in Swabi and Mardan, have opened their houses to those fleeing conflict. Had the citizens not acted in a prompt and generous way protection for the IDPs would have become virtually impossible. It also appears that foreign agencies like UNHCR, ICRC and UNICEF had foreseen such an eventuality. The government, federal as the provincial, were totally at a loss in the first few weeks. The provincial government is beginning to stir but the federal government remains clueless and has no forward looking strategy. More worrying is the revelation that neither the federal nor the provincial government could explain the overall objective of the military operation. Short-term and long term tasks have so far not been comprehended, neither was anyone certain of the next phase of the operation. The military sees it as a “jump in and out” operation, the provincial government has expressed concerns over it. They point out that holding the areas that are cleared of the Taliban till civil administration is put in place is crucial. The federal government is solely concentrated on fundraising and has so far not looked ahead.

A few families (mostly men) returned to Buner after announcements were made at camp sites that people could return for 10 days to harvest their crops. Others took up courage to return to Buner after the Interior Minister announced that Buner was safe and people could return. Families at IDP camps reported that some of their family members were stopped by the military from proceeding ahead but some went through to find that many parts of Buner were not safe and fighting was continuing. At least two families interviewed by HRCP teams lost family members, who had returned on the advice of the government.

There are serious concerns regarding security. There is no checking on arms inside the camps. IDPs admitted that some low level Taliban had also taken refuge in the camps. Foreign aid agencies point out that security has to be taken care of by the government but no effort was being made to this end. However, when VVIPs visit camps a large number of police force is seen on the spot with the entire administration hanging around waiting for endless hours for the VVIP to turn up. HRCP monitors saw red carpets rolled out in camps and huge tents with public address system being set up for a visiting VVIP. Such show of pomp can hardly please the destitute.

The IDP camps are by no means perfect. There is a dearth of all kinds of essential commodities and the infrastructure is very make-shift. Medical facilities are inadequate and heat is a main problem. The distribution system is being improved but not sufficiently fast enough. The registration system is very slow and cumbersome. It is especially difficult for IDPs living outside the camp facilities to secure registration. The IDPs were given a bag of wheat each by a foreign donor. They had no facilities to cook or to get the wheat ground. Most used the bags to sit on. The IDPs were nervous because they had no access to news on a regular basis. They hoped that the camp sites could have radios for those interested in getting information. Aid agencies complained that a number of individuals and VIPs were an obstacle to their delivery work. They gave examples of how humanitarian aid was kept undistributed because two political parties laid claim to it and could not decide who should distribute the goods. In the meanwhile, the desperate IDPs looted the goods and the most vulnerable amongst them went empty-handed.

HRCP is especially concerned that the IDPs have been virtually barred from entering Sindh. In Punjab they are not being registered but are not barred. However, the federal government has announced that all rental deeds must be executed in police stations so that the police can “keep an eye” on the IDPs from leaving NWFP/Pakhtoonkhwa. The Punjab government has issued instructions that property cannot be sold to anyone from outside the province without a no-objection certificate. This is demoralizing for IDPs who are the worst victims of the Taliban’s wrath and the governments’ utterly indefensible policies.

The effects of Talibanisation are not confined to the NWFP/Pakhtoonkhwa province alone. That part is directly affected but bomb blasts, threats and rise in crime across the entire country is a major fallout of Talibanisation and the fighting. The Taliban openly threaten the people even today. Very recently, medical representatives in Peshawar were warned not to wear pants. They were beaten because they took no notice of the warning. Male students have been instructed through a government notification, after threats from the Taliban, to wear shalwar kameez. Women in Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi have been stopped by men and told not to drive by themselves and to cover their heads.

Journalists, particularly, of electronic media told HRCP of the heavy censorship on news. There can be no discussion on the number of civilian fatalities or casualties. Independent media and international or national humanitarian groups have no access to the conflict area. This is worrying and HRCP remains concerned about the lack of independent information from the conflict area. Telephone lines are disconnected, therefore those trapped or who stayed back cannot reach anyone when in distress.

HRCP believes that the challenge faced by the country goes beyond Swat. The government of Pakistan is under great strain in dealing with this complex issue, which is mostly a legacy of the Zia-Musharaf regimes. The victims of the Taliban’s militancy have mostly been Pakistanis – civilians, law enforcement people and the military. Over the years, Pakistani jehadi groups have formed a network of supporters that are entrenched in all institutions of the country. Their close links to foreign militant groups have put more resources at their disposal and they now operate in a strategic way. Pakistan’s government has to draw a comprehensive policy – taking the military and other political parties on board – so that a long-term strategy is developed to confront the forces of militancy and intolerance. The government should seek partnership with international entities and other countries to effectively challenge militant groups and their supporters.

Conclusions and Recommendations

1. The spread of the Taliban influence in the Malakand Division and the suffering of the internally displaced people (IDPs) are the result of arbitrary policy-making by non-representative institutions. There has been no evidence of the transparent policies and reference to the people that were vitally needed. The situation though has improved under the democratic government -despite the system being fragile and lacking in many ways. Those criticizing the Taliban and religious fanatism are not snubbed and most political forces recognise the enormous challenge they face from militant Islamic groups.
2. A white paper should be issued on the official patronage extended to the militants in the Malakand Division. Government officials and other individuals who helped the militants in their unlawful pursuits, exploited the situation for narrow personal gain, and played with the lives of innocent citizens must be made to account for their misdeeds.
3. The implications of the use of force, even when unavoidable, were not taken into consideration, particularly in relation to the principle of proportionality and the need for due regard to the safety of non-combatants, specially children, women and the disabled. The measures needed to protect life through an early warning system and to minimize suffering by mobilizing resources at the earliest to help the civilians fleeing from the conflict zone were either inadequate or not there at all. According to information available to HRCP, not enough time was given to people who were required to flee to safety, no transport was arranged by the government and the people had to walk for miles without help or guidance. The safety of passage was not guaranteed. Not even a warning of mines was issued in some sectors.
4. No proper count of civilian casualties has been issued. They appear to be significantly higher than the figures mentioned by the ISPR.
5.  The displaced people have suffered in the camps because of quite a few problems that could have been managed. These include: lack of coordination among the various administrative services, shortage of trained personnel, flawed staff orientation, and lack of transport. The supply of goods to these camps often does not match the displaced people’s needs (for instance, supply of wheat instead of flour). The various agencies have no institutional framework for consultation and problems are addressed on an ad hoc basis.
6. The camps do not have oversight mechanisms to check corruption, misappropriation of relief supplies, and exploitation of the vulnerable. It is necessary to provide for processes for redress of grievances and complaints.
7. There are gaps in services provided at the camps. There is need for efficient information centres at all camps and effective procedures for the search and recovery of separated or missing members of the displaced families.
8. The plight of families stranded in towns/villagers must be seriously addressed. Ways should be found to establish communications with them, to ensure supply of food to them and to guarantee their safety.
9.  The large population of displaced people outside the camps should immediately be brought within the support network so that they are not driven by circumstances to rush towards the camps where resources are already stretched and the threat of adverse weather looms large.
10.  The policy of censoring reports about the military operation and its impact on the citizens life and matters is manifestly counter-productive. The people will better face the situation if they are taken into confidence and trusted with the truth.
11. The authorities must have a sound exit strategy – how the civilian administration will be restored once the operation is over. Who will guarantee the people’s security and how? Who will ensure that the law enforcement staff is adequately trained and equipped?
12. Finally, the government must develop a well considered plan as to how FATA and the Malakand Division will be administered after peace is restored. In particular it is necessary to decide what kind of judicial system will be followed in these territories and what arrangements will be needed to protect women, children and the minorities that have borne the brunt of the militants atrocities.

WASIM VIEW- I have written extensively on Swat on OP as seen here. However the HRCP report authored by its passionate chairperson Asma Jehangir has not nly confirmed my worst suscpisions but made me angry ten-fold.  Suscpisions that the state of Pakistan has authored a policy of its own choosing of appeasement to militant terrorists has come back to haunt us all. Winston Churchill was only too right in saying that ‘an appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile – hoping it will eat him last’. Pakistan and ordinary Pakistanis have paid the price for such state folly, none more so that Pakistanis in FATA, Swat and the Malakand Division.

The Pakistai state’s lack of will to tackle the sons of Satan that are the Taliban in Swat and Malakand Division are clear for all to see and are an indictment of our collective folly as a nation and as a people. The facilities for the IDP’s who have sacrificed their today for Pakistan’s tomorrow is a scandal and just not acceptable.

Neither is the lack of world support for these Pakistanis especially with the Muslim states it seems oblivious to Pakistan’s plight whilst the so-called ‘Great Satan’ has pledged the most support of any country. That said would it not have been for US folly in Afghanistan, Pakistan and ordinary Swatis would be relatively peaceful and so the dollars are in effect payment for services and crucially deaths rendered.

The HRCP report is a must read for all Pakistanis and its recommendations make eminent sense and I support them all.

The final article is written by no less a luminary than the well-respected Dr Pervez Hoodbhoy.

Whither Pakistan by Pervez Hoodbhoy

First, the bottom line: Pakistan will not break up; there will not be another military coup; the Taliban will not seize the presidency; Pakistan’s nuclear weapons will not go astray; and the Islamic sharia will not become the law of the land.

That’s the good news. It conflicts with opinions in the mainstream U.S. press, as well as with some in the Obama administration. For example, in March, David Kilcullen, a top adviser to Gen. David Petraeus, declared that state collapse could occur within six months. This is highly improbable.

Now, the bad news: The clouds hanging over the future of Pakistan’s state and society are getting darker. Collapse isn’t impending, but there is a slow-burning fuse. While timescales cannot be mathematically forecast, the speed of societal decline has surprised many who have long warned that religious extremism is devouring Pakistan.

Here is how it all went down the hill: The 2001 U.S. invasion of Afghanistan devastated the Taliban. Many fighters were products of madrassas in Pakistan, and their trauma partly was shared by their erstwhile benefactors in the Pakistan military and intelligence. Recognizing that this force would remain important for maintaining Pakistani influence in Afghanistan–and keep the low-intensity war in Kashmir going–the army secretly welcomed them on Pakistani soil. Rebuilding and rearming was quick, especially as the United States tripped up in Afghanistan after a successful initial victory. Former President Pervez Musharraf’s strategy of running with the hares and hunting with hounds worked initially. But then U.S. demands to dump the Taliban became more insistent, and the Taliban also grew angry at this double game. As the army’s goals and tactics lost coherence, the Taliban advanced.

In 2007, the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, the movement of Pakistani Taliban, formally announced its existence. With a blitzkrieg of merciless beheadings of soldiers and suicide bombings, the TTP drove out the army from much of the frontier province. By early this year, it held about 10 percent of Pakistan’s territory.

Even then, few Pakistanis saw the Taliban as the enemy. Apologists for the Taliban abounded, particularly among opinion-forming local TV anchors that whitewashed their atrocities, and insisted that they shouldn’t be resisted by force. Others supported them as fighters against U.S. imperial might. The government’s massive propaganda apparatus lay rusting. Beset by ideological confusion, it had no cogent response to the claim that Pakistan was made for Islam and that the Taliban were Islamic fighters.

The price paid for the government’s prevarication was immense. A weak-kneed state allowed fanatics to devastate hitherto peaceful Swat, once an idyllic tourist-friendly valley. Citizens were deprived of their fundamental rights. Women were lashed in public, hundreds of girl’s schools were blown up, non-Muslims had to pay a special tax (jizya), and every form of art and music was forbidden. Policemen deserted en masse, and institutions of the state crumbled. Thrilled by their success, the Taliban violated the Nizam-e-Adl Swat deal just days after it was negotiated in April. They quickly moved to capture more territory in the adjacent area of Buner. Barely 80 miles from Islamabad (as the crow flies), their spokesman, Muslim Khan, boasted the capital would be captured soon. The army and government still dithered, and the public remained largely opposed to the use of military force.

And then a miracle of sorts happened. Sufi Mohammed, the illiterate, aging leader of the Swat sharia movement, while addressing a huge victory rally in early May, lost his good sense to excessive exuberance. He declared that democracy and Islam were incompatible, rejected Pakistan’s Islamic constitution and courts, and accused Pakistan’s fanatically right-wing Islamic parties of mild heresy. Even for a Pakistani public enamored by the call to sharia, Mohammed’s comments were a bit too much. The army, now with public support for the first time since the birth of the insurgency, finally mustered the will to fight.

Today, that fight is on. A major displacement of population, estimated at 3 million, is in process. This tragedy could have been avoided if the army hadn’t nurtured extremists earlier. For the moment, the Taliban are retreating. But it will be a long haul to eliminate them from the complex mountainous terrain of Swat and Malakand. Wresting North and South Waziristan, hundreds of miles away, will cost even more. Army actions in the tribal areas, and retaliatory suicide bombings by the Taliban in the cities, are likely to extend into the foreseeable future.

Meanwhile, the cancerous offshoots of extremist ideology continue to spread. Another TTP has recently established itself–Tehrik-e-Taliban Punjab. So one expects that major conflict will eventually shift from Pakistan’s tribal peripheries to the heartland, southern Punjab. Indeed, the Punjabi Taliban are now busy ramping up their operations, with a successful suicide attack on the police and intelligence headquarters in Lahore in May.

What exactly do the Pakistani Taliban want? As with their Afghan counterparts, fighting the United States in Afghanistan is certainly one goal. But still more important is replacing secular and traditional law and customs in Pakistan’s tribal areas with their version of the sharia. This goal, which they share with religious political parties such as Jamat-e-Islami, is working for a total transformation of society. It calls for elimination of music, art, entertainment, and all manifestations of modernity and Westernism. Side goals include destroying the Shias–who the Sunni Taliban regard as heretics–and chasing away the few surviving native Christians, Sikhs, and Hindus from the frontier province. While extremist leaders such as Baitullah Mehsud and Maulana Fazlullah derive support from marginalized social groups, they don’t demand employment, land reform, better health care, or more social services. This isn’t a liberation movement by a long shot, although some marginalized Pakistani leftists labor under this delusion.

As for the future: Tribal insurgents cannot overrun Islamabad and Pakistan’s main cities, which are protected by thousands of heavily armed military and paramilitary troops. Rogue elements within the military and intelligence agencies have instigated or organized suicide attacks against their own colleagues. Now, dazed by the brutality of these attacks, the officer corps finally appears to be moving away from its earlier sympathy and support for extremism. This makes a seizure of the nuclear arsenal improbable. But Pakistan’s “urban Taliban,” rather than illiterate tribal fighters, pose a nuclear risk. There are indeed more than a few scientists and engineers in the nuclear establishment with extreme religious views.

While they aspire to state power, the Taliban haven’t needed it to achieve considerable success. Through terror tactics and suicide bombings they have made fear ubiquitous. Women are being forced into burqas, and anxious private employers and government departments have advised their male employees in Peshawar and other cities to wear shalwar-kameez rather than trousers. Coeducational schools across Pakistan are increasingly fearful of attacks–some are converting to girls-only or boys-only schools. Video shops are going out of business, and native musicians and dancers have fled or changed their profession. As such, a sterile Saudi-style Wahabism is beginning to impact upon Pakistan’s once-vibrant culture and society.

It could be far worse. One could imagine that Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani is overthrown in a coup by radical Islamist officers who seize control of the country’s nuclear weapons, making intervention by outside forces impossible. Jihad for liberating Kashmir is subsequently declared as Pakistan’s highest priority and earlier policies for crossing the Line of Control are revived; Shias are expelled into Iran, and Hindus are forced into India; ethnic and religious minorities in the Northern Areas flee Pashtun invaders; anti-Taliban forces such as the ethnic Muttahida Qaumi Movement and the Baluch nationalists are decisively crushed by Islamists; and sharia is declared across the country. Fortunately, this seems improbable–as long as the army stays together.

What can the United States, which is still the world’s preeminent power, do to turn the situation around? Amazingly little.

In spite of being on the U.S. dole, Pakistan is probably the most anti-American country in the world. It has a long litany of grievances. Some are pan-Islamic, but others derive from its bitter experiences of being a U.S. ally in the 1980s. Once at the cutting edge of the U.S. organized jihad against the Soviet Union, Pakistan was dumped once the war was over and left to deal with numerous toxic consequences. Although much delayed, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s recent acceptance of blame is welcome. But festering resentments produced a paranoid mindset that blames Washington for all of Pakistan’s ills–old and new. A meeting of young people that I addressed in Islamabad recently had many who thought that the Taliban are U.S. agents paid to create instability so that Pakistan’s nuclear weapons could be seized by Washington. Other such absurd conspiracy theories also enjoy huge currency here.

Nevertheless, the United States isn’t powerless. Chances of engaging with Pakistan positively have improved under the Obama administration. Real progress toward a Palestinian state and dealing with Muslims globally would have enormous resonance in Pakistan.

Although better financial monitoring is needed, Pakistan’s support lifeline must not be cut, or economic collapse (and certain Taliban victory) would follow in a matter of months. The government and army must be kept afloat until Pakistan is fully ready to take on extremism by itself. The United States also should initiate a conference that brings Iran, India, and China together. Each of these countries must recognize that extremism represents a regional as well as global danger, and they must formulate an action plan aimed at squeezing the extremists.

Thus, Pakistan’s political leadership and army must squarely face the extremist threat, accept the United States and India as partners rather than adversaries, enact major reforms in income and land distribution, revamp the education and legal systems, and address the real needs of citizens. Most importantly, Pakistan will have to clamp down on the fiery mullahs who spout hatred from mosques and stop suicide bomber production in madrassas. For better or for worse, it will be for Pakistanis alone to figure out how to handle this.

Published in The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

WASIM VIEW- Pervez Hoodbhoy is reviled by the right and revered by the liberals in Pakistan. However no Pakistani doubts his intellectual prowess nor his love for Pakistan. Hoodbhoy’s article is a good one for it rubbishes the Pakistan in peril and doom stories that make the news daily, yet it does well to identify key challenges for both the Pakistani state and its citizens.   

The myth of the Taliban as confused heroes is laid bare by Hoodbhoy and he does well to paint the picture of a Taliban Pakistan bereft of tolerance, education , culture and even smiles if possible. I disagree with Hoodbhoy’s enthusuiasm for the new Obama Administration nor his plea to see India as a partner and not as an adversary. Indeed nothing would make me happier to see good Pakistan-India relations but India has demonstrated that they are hell-bent on destroying Pakistan and their acts of evil in FATA and Balochistan are not conspirancy theories but plain and simple facts. It is the weakness of the Gillani government that allows India free reign to cry foul on terrorism when it is her that unleashes her terror in Pakistan by supporting anti Pakistan activity as Christine Fair, a foreign policy expert found and reported in Foreign Policy magazine. The most relevant quotes are repeated below:

I think it would be a mistake to completely disregard Pakistan’s regional perceptions due to doubts about Indian competence in executing covert operations. That misses the point entirely. And I think it is unfair to dismiss the notion that Pakistan’s apprehensions about Afghanistan stem in part from its security competition with India. Having visited the Indian mission in Zahedan, Iran, I can assure you they are not issuing visas as the main activity! Moreover, India has run operations from its mission in Mazar (through which it supported the Northern Alliance) and is likely doing so from the other consulates it has reopened in Jalalabad and Qandahar along the border. Indian officials have told me privately that they are pumping money into Baluchistan. Kabul has encouraged India to engage in provocative activities such as using the Border Roads Organization to build sensitive parts of the Ring Road and use the Indo-Tibetan police force for security. It is also building schools on a sensitive part of the border in Kunar-across from Bajaur. Kabul’s motivations for encouraging these activities are as obvious as India’s interest in engaging in them.

Hoodbhoy’s article nevertheless is well worth a read especially for non-Pakistanis who remain confused at what is happening in Pakistan. Indeed Pakistanis too suffer this ailment and the same tonic is advised for them too.

Today, I share a story told and narrated by Swati women, these are women who suffered the most at the hands of Lucifer’s litter and it is a story I promise that will break your heart for its horrors diminish and degrade us all as they took place in our Pakistan and on our watch. 

The Women who Walked and Walked

We write here some of the stories the women of Swat told us. They come from Kabbal, Mingawera (Mingora), Qambar, Kanju and other parts of Swat. Some are from Buner and Maidan in Lower Dir. Their lives were affected in many more ways than the lives of their men.

When we entered the large tent a few women looked up and smiled. Some got up and put out their hands to greet us. They seemed surprised that we could converse in the same language. “Sit down. We can’t even offer you tea” said one laughing, “look at us and what we have been reduced to.” Their children were lying on the floor, red because of the heat, tired and listless in the hot air of the fans. The women had been sitting in silence before we went in. We could hear no noise from the tent which was full of about forty women and children. What could they share with each other? Each story was the same as the other. It was a pall of misery and silences that hung over their heads. These women were lucky; they had a common place to come to, out of their tents. In most camps, the women sit in the heat of the tents, not being allowed to go out. They wait for their men to come before they can use the toilets. Their children defecate outside the tents as they cannot take them to the toilets. In some schools, they feed their children first and, at times, do not eat.

One by one they spoke their ordeal, their flight from the bombing, the endless days of walking with children and the elderly and the dead they had left behind. Soon each one wanted to tell her story. They sat closer and closer to us, listening to the others and telling us about themselves. Most of them had fled from Mingawera and other places in Swat–walking for days, avoiding the curfew by moving off the roads and taking to the mountains to walk, walking day and night; hiding their sons in trucks for fear that the Talibs would take them away to fight. One woman had walked for nine days with three children under ten. We cannot recall the number of women who told us about how their homes were shelled and how they had buried their dead without bathing them, in hurriedly dug graves. One had lost her baby on the way down, had dug a ditch beside the road, torn off part of her chadar, wrapped her child in it and buried her in the ditch. She walked on, to save what was left, her own life. Another spoke of how in the madness of the bombing, she had asked her husband to pick up her baby from the bed. When they were out of the village, the husband realized he had picked up the pillow and left the six month old child behind. They still kept walking.

Another woman spoke of how they were eating peacefully when a mortar had hit her house. The word ‘mortar’ was a regular part of their conversation. ‘Matr’ and ‘karpee’ which we finally realised was ‘curfew.’ Another told us how her neighbours’ home was shelled. Four men had died on the spot. People had run helter-skelter. The helicopter passed and the men ran and started digging graves to bury the dead before fleeing the village. They told the women to collect what they could and the women started to round up their children. As the men dug, the helicopter returned to shell. The men left the bodies and ran for cover. The helicopter fired again and flew past. The men returned and dug what they could and dumped the bodies into the graves.

Another woman in a school camp spoke of how her family had left food in their plates and hot tea in their cups when the shelling began. She was brave and then her brown eyes filled with tears and she said ‘my young son, he was in class ten, was hit on the back of his head and he died. I lost my young son’ and then her tears flowed. The others sat looking at her, thinking of their own miseries. We sat in silence, nobody consoling, and nobody talking. ‘At least they should have told us, why did they not tell us they were going to bomb?’ She wiped her eyes hurriedly and continued to talk. ‘They are beasts these Taliban. They are not human. May God finish them all like they have finished us.’ We were surprised, surprised that her anger turned to the Taliban when her son was killed by military shelling. She was a strong woman and continued to talk with a vengeance. ‘May God punish these animals for what they have done to us. I hope the army finishes every last one of them.’

From one place to another, from one tent and school to another, we heard them tell us how they were unable to leave their homes for fear of being beaten or killed or flogged, how their men had been dragged out of their homes and slaughtered. One of the men said he lived on the chowk where the Taliban slaughtered people. He told us how they walked into homes and led out their victims in silence. He told us of the sounds he heard when these men were slaughtered, like cattle, on the chowk.

Each woman talked of the slaughter of men, whether they had been through it or whether they had heard it – it had terrorised them into silence and acquiescence. They also spoke of how ‘disgraced’ they felt as they fled with only a dupatta on. One of them laughed and said: “Burqa, burqa, which is all we heard in Swat but when we ran we were hardly covered [with burqas] and the whole world was looking at us.” The men did not think this was funny. The humiliation they felt at this had outraged them – the humiliation at their women being in these camps, being seen by other men, the humiliation of standing in line for food. Perhaps that is why there were so many children standing in line for food at the camps.

In one of the schools, a group of women led us to meet their friend. She could not speak because she could not stop crying. They kept saying ‘Show them; show them what they did to you.’ She was a widow and the Taliban had taken her 12 year old son away to join them. The women said that they used to come to all their homes and ask for their sons. They were too scared to resist. Some boys were taken by force, others went themselves, and others simply disappeared from madressahs. The widow had gone and taken her son back from the madressah. They had come into her house, taken all her jewellry and cut of all her hair. She cried for her own humiliation and did not speak a word. Women from Buner spoke of how the Taliban had no respect for the Pakhtun way of life, for Islam or for women. How they would enter any house they wanted, whether to take away their sons or to take refuge. They spoke of incidents of the younger women being raped, after which their breasts were cut off. They told us how their men were beheaded and hung from electricity poles with their chopped off heads placed between their legs. They would leave notes on these bodies for no one to touch.

So why did they let this happen? Why could they not get together to stop it? We repeatedly asked them this. Who ARE these people? This is when the admittance came. They were honest, honest about the power of Mullah Radio and his constituency of women listeners. “There was peace in Swat. Shut in their homes many women listened to ‘Raidu Mullah.’ He addressed them directly. “He used to talk about Islam, about praying five times a day, about going to the madressah and learning the Quran. We all thought he was a good man.” As his popularity grew, women would line up outside his madrassah and donate. They donated whatever little jewelry they had. Even the poorest women would donate her nose-pins.

This captive, gullible audience, shut in their homes became the main source of Mullah Radio’s power and support. They encouraged their sons to join his madrassah. They provided the Taliban with a ready following. They provided them their sons which they soon realised were fodder, fodder for suicide bombings and ‘jihad.’ It was only when they realised and resisted this that the Taliban turned on their own people. “They would knock at our doors, and would say, ‘give us your sons in the name of Islam’. Those who resisted were slaughtered.”

Many said their families approached the army and the government for help. But nobody listened. A few said that anyone who informed the army did not live long. They kept quiet. Even today parts of their areas where the Taliban have fled to are not known to the army. They will not speak. Suddenly in a fit of rage one of them started shouting: “Where were this army and this government when our people have been relating these incidents to them for almost two years?” This is only a question to be answered by those responsible for what is happening to our people today.

“We have been fooled. We have been fooled by the Taliban, the Army and the government. We knew two years ago that this was not Islam but nobody would help us. Why did the army not do something two years when the Taliban were fewer in number and that when they could be controlled? When they knew exactly where they were. What is the reason for their friendship with these animals? Where were this army and this government when we were screaming for help and going to them?”

What answer can one give to these poor, helpless women? Who is going to be held accountable for the violence they have suffered. Their questions can only be answered by those who know what they have done. And if they do not answer them in this world, they will for sure answer them in the next.

This is an abridged version of a recent report by AIRRA (Aryana Institute for Regional Research and Advocacy) based in Peshawar, whose members travelled to the IDP camps for these interviews.

Published in The News

As a Pakistani I am ashamed at how Swat was left to the vile Taliban by our rulers and the ruled. It must never happen again and I apologise to the people of Swat and the wider Malakand Division and FATA regions for being part of a bystander Pakistan that in truth looked the other way.

Lessons have been learnt, the Indian-funded sons of Satan will fail and Pakistan will rise stronger with one voice and one purpose, to create the Quaid’s Pakistan.

As the brave sons of the soil fight and defeat the vile Taliban in Swat, Buner and Dir,  good news and hope must be the staple diet for Pakistan. In this regard I wish to share a video from a Buneri playing music in days gone by.

However I remain optimistic that the Taliban will be routed this time hence this post seeks to share some hope. So Pakistan and Pakistanis stand tall and united, fear not for the dark hour will pass.  Dir, Buner and Swat will sing again and soon.

URGENT APPEAL: PLEASE HELP PAKISTAN’S IDP’s

This is a personal and urgent request for national and international help to save Pakistan’s internally displaced people now numbering over 1 million.  Time is of the essence and I beg of you to help in any way you can either financially or by publicising the gravity of the situation to family, friends and contacts so others can contribute locally wherever they live.

I am working hard to gather global support for a global appeal on the platform of the Disasters Emergency Appeal if possible. Furthermore please rest assured that all money will get to those who need it as all the agencies working on the ground are of impeccable character. Morevoer,  I have contacts with people on the ground who can guarantee that your help will make the difference and please contact me if you need assurances via a comment.

It is hoped that you will support by the way of financial donation or by publicising the urgency for support of the work of the following charities. Please click on the name of the charity to arrive at its website.

• UNHCR United Nations Refugees Agency
• Edhi Foundation
• Oxfam
• Plan International
• International Medical Corps
• International Rescue Committee
• Pakistan Red Crescent Society
• Help Pakistan Now
• Sungi
• Al-Khidmat Foundation
• Islamic Relief
• Muslim Hands
• Action Aid

With thanks to Chapati Mystery blog and  Awab Alvi aka Teeth Maestro for most of the links.

Guest Blog by NADEEM ARIF NAJMI

Pakistan is a country fighting a battle for its very survival thanks to the frantic efforts of its ever-hostile Eastern neighbour, the ineptitude of Uncle Sam on the Western border and its constant drone attacks on Pakistani areas, and General Zia’s legacy – a generation of fanatical Mullahs hell bent on destroying everything that the founders of Pakistan lived and died for.

Hardly a day passes when some depressing sorry about Pakistan does not dominate the national and increasingly the international headlines. From the Taliban imposing their tyranny on the peace loving people of Swat Valley, to the daily bombings and acts of wanton violence that blight Pakistan’s name throughout the world; to the trouble in Balochistan. Pakistan seems increasingly like a lost cause, a failed state on the brink of imploding.

Yet we must not lose heart. We must at this dark hour seek solace in the words of the Quaid: ‘Musalman musebat main ghabraya nahin karta!’ “A Muslim does not panic when adversity strikes”. The words of the Quaid’s beloved master (saw) as found in the Holy Quran are even more inspiring for the sorry state we find ourselves in “Fear not, Allah is with us”.

Yet we must not delude ourselves that a horde of angels will descend from a golden cloud and fight our battles for us. The Lord helps those who help themselves. We must overcome this nightmare ourselves with full faith that Allah will reward our efforts and Pakistan will emerge stronger than ever inshallah.

I have thought long and hard about how we can deal with the multiple challenges we currently face. Here follow my suggestions for dealing with these complex problems, I welcome feedback from readers so we can further develop these ideas and send some sort of draft policy plan to the movers and shakers in Islamabad in the (perhaps, slightly naive) hope that some of these ideas might be heeded to:

1. Break ranks with the USA. Announce that Pakistan will not tolerate any further drone attacks or breaches of its sovereignty. Pakistan will in the first instance expel the US ambassador, then take the issue to the United Nations and finally strike down any planes or drones that fly into our territory. If this leads to an aggressive stance from the US, withdrawal of aide, sanctions and possible military strikes then so be it. Pakistan will eventually be the target of the American war machine, no matter how obedient we are. So better to keep our self-respect and fight to save Pakistan than to lose our dignity as well as our country and nuclear assets.
2. Pakistan should ask NATO to seek a speedy exit from Afghanistan and ask the various factions within that country to come to the table to work out a joint strategy to govern that country. This will obviously include the Afghani Taliban. If NATO bows before the US, we should consider blocking Pakistan’s supply routes to NATO troops in Afghanistan.
3. The Government, opposition and all other stakeholders should come together and with the ‘US attacks’ excuse stripped from the terrorists a Pakistani anti – terrorist strategy should be worked out based on dealing with Jirgas, isolating the terrorist leaders and reconciling the elements who came to arms as a result of the policies of Musharraf. The deals signed should be unequivocal and should brook no compromise with those who want to establish their own mini-states or implement their own brand of Sharia. The deals should be purely based on a renunciation of violence, the arrest and trial of the main leaders of the terrorist groups and plans to develop and reconstruct the affected areas. If use of force is required against small groups of hardcore terrorists than Pakistan should not shrink from the task and seek to enrol the support of tribal or local lashkars in these attempts. Any military actions should be a last resort and carried out with due concern for minimising harm to civilian infrastructure and ordinary people.
4. Convince misguided Jihadis that fighting a war against the state of Pakistan is creating fasaad in the earth – not Jihad- and those guilty of taking up arms against the government that exists according to the principle of shura (mutual consultation as demonstrated during elections) is a worse crime than any other, being a rebellion against the Sharia itself. They should be nudged to include this in capital letters in the syllabuses of Madrassahs. It should made clear to the would be islamists that Islam cannot be implemented by coercion, and they should carry out tabligh to convince the majority to support sharia rule. This is the only legitimate way to create the kind of state that they would like to see. Madrassahs associated with people like Javed Ghamidi and others willing to give this message should be set up across Pakistan and especially in the areas where extremism is strong.
5. The government should stem the tide of rising extremism and talibanisation by promising to bring the laws of Pakistan into conformity with the Sharia. The way to do this already exists in the constitution. The recommendations of the Islamic ideology council should be brought to Parliament and discussed and debated, and brought into force as soon as they are agreed. The media should be made to obey a code of conduct that restricts shamelessness and immoral behaviour on television, radio and the print media. Law-enforcing agencies should announce a Jihad against prostitution, drugs, alchohol and gambling carrying out raids and punishing perpetrators across the country. No new laws or Taliban style moral police should be created for this Jihad. The present law of the Islamic republic should be implemented in full. As for the other ‘Islamic’ laws that Taliban supporters would like to see (like banning music, films and forcing women to stay at home in veils or strict penal laws) the moderate ulema would be utilised to convince them that they should try to ‘educate’ Muslims about the need for these laws so that a majority votes for parties willing to carry out these changes. If they can’t they should simply try to reform individuals and groups rather than raise arms against the state. All these points can be made with reference to the Quran, Sunnah and opinions of the Imams and ulema whom they respect.

No doubt some of these things might be easier said than done, and others might open up a Pandora’s box of new problems. Yet I am certain we will find no solution to our problems by ignoring the danger posed by the extremists and pretending that all the terrorists are CIA or RAW agents. Nor can we close our eyes to the hatred generated by our docility before the American aggression and its role in motivating poor, illiterate and impressionable young people to fight against their own country.

If we remain true to our principles of unity (seeking reconciliation with all reconcilable Pakistanis not least the tribals) faith (seeking to implement the Islamic provisions of the constititution) and discipline (imposing the writ of the state from a position of strength) we can and we will inshallah, save Pakistan and begin the process of creating that ‘Other Pakistan’ the Quaid’s Pakistan.

For fear of flogging a dead horse and no pun is intended, be warned that this is another article on the video nasty from Swat. In its aftermath Taliban apologists have at the very least been economical with the actualité a la Alan Clark; instead they have come up with a plethora of excuses for the flogging. A top ten list of excuses compiled by Afzal Siddiqi has included:

1. The flogging never occurred.
2. The flogging did occur, but not in Swat.
3. The flogging occurred before the ‘peace deal’ was signed.
4. The girl is lucky as it had happened before the ‘peace deal’, otherwise she would have been stoned to death.
5. The flogging should have happened indoors.
6. The men holding the girl down are her ‘mehram’.
7. The people criticising the act of flogging are ‘enemies of peace’.
8. It is a US-UK-Indian-Israeli conspiracy plotted by the CIA-MI6-Raw-Mossad jointly.
9. The NGOs are slaves of the west and enemies of Pakistan.
10. It is all because of the drones, duh!

Excuse 8 is a favourite for many Pakistanis, if not a favourite pastime. However let us entertain it, let us entertain the notion that the flogging of Chand Bibi in Swat by the Taliban is a lie and a deliberate campaign to defame Pakistan and Islam, it is a saazish in Swat. The real culprits are of course the CIA, M16, RAW and MOSSAD, an axis of evil if there ever was one. So let us consider another narrative, and the story goes like this …..

Chand is not a young girl from Swat, in truth she is an American girl called Charlotte who a la Paris Hilton likes partying the night away. Charlotte is a stunning girl in frame, sweet as honey and popular too in Swat. Her closest friends call her Charlie for short and as a tribute to comrade Charlie Wilson of yesteryear who helped Pakistan during the Afghan Jihad secure funding from the great Satan aka America. Charlie and her friends are fondly known as the ‘Charlie’s angels of Swat’ comprising of Charlie as well as her equally suave friends Amy and Lucy. All three angels are Texans from George Bush country who are busy on a school project in Swat during their gap year working for the US Consulate in Peshawar (read CIA operatives)

Recently after a late night of fun and frolics at a consulate party held in Swat, Charlie woke up with a hangover of sorts and a craving for caffeine. Charlie was surprised that the fan over her head was still providing her relief from the pulsating heat and was glad load had not been shedded as yet. Desperate for a ‘cuppa’ as the British say, Charlie found the kettle not working and called her friend Amy who was an electrician of sorts who arrived and succeeded in making the kettle work again.

Charlie and Amy sat down with cups of tea, given that both had still not recovered from the exploits of the night before. Both friends began recalling the horror story they had heard about in the Consulate the night before concerning Taliban rule in the tribal areas. From public beheadings to the flogging of women they heard it all and it wasn’t easy to let it go. Just then an idea came to the fore, why not take a chill pill, let us dumb it down a little a la Abu Ghraib, surely a spoof on Taliban rule was the order of the day.

Charlie went to work later and discussed the spoof plan with her colleagues in the US consulate who loved it with female flogging winning the support of the men for obvious reasons. And so the plan came into being, a spoof that would involve female flogging with Charlie flogged by her fellow angels dressed up as bearded men. The title of the movie would be ‘Charlies Angels of Swat’ and would be a permanent memento of Pakistan for the girls who were leaving in a few months to return to Texas.

The rest as they say is history as we all have seen the video and so please lay off the Taliban, as its clearly a spoof ordered by the CIA. The Pakistani masses did not see Chand crying out in the video, it was Charlie singing the Chris De Burgh classic ‘Lady in Red’. The crowd who swelled to see Charlie were US consulate colleagues (read fellow CIA operatives) and not Swatis, duh!

The above narrative is all a deliberate fabrication conjured up to prove that the saazish in Swat excuse is not an excuse but an exercise in dodging the issue for those Pakistanis who see conspiracy in everything and who look the other way. In doing so millions of Pakistanis are guilty of a gross abdication of responsibility and this article seeks to reawaken such Pakistanis. So Pakistan, wake up and smell the coffee or chai if you prefer?

Pakistan is under attack from savages who seek to force their warped view of a great faith on us all. Baitullah Mehsud is a Pakistani who has accepted responsibility for the terrorist attacks in Lahore, end of. Men like him who kill Pakistanis are our enemies, end of. There is no saazish, end of.

Swat, Swat and Swat is all that I think about alongside the fall of FATA. The fall of both pains me no end as shown in my previous posts here. Today I remain angry and upset as is most of Pakistan.

However yesterday I was pleased to read an excellent article by Ejaz Haider in the Daiily Times which spoke some home-truths and in doing so hit the nail on the head. Hence I publish it here so that it can serve as a wake up call to Pakistan so we can fight the enemy within that seeks to destroy our great nation. Ejaz Haider’s article says it all below:

Up Shitcreek by Ejaz Haider

Apropos the faith -reviving video from Swat: let me congratulate, not necessarily in the same order, various people — Mr Imran Khan, the Jama’at-e Islami leadership, Lt-Gen Hameed Napoleon Gul, the ANP government in the NWFP, the majority of Urdu-language columnists, some English ones who write poetic prose, and yes, tv anchors and my fellow Pakistanis.

Finally, we have something to emulate, straight from the pure times of the rightly-guided caliphs. Islam, ladies and gentlemen, is here. General Zia’s dream has been fulfilled. Allah be praised.

Since yesterday I have this strange sensation coursing through my veins, the feeling one gets after reading about the brave Muslims of yore in a Naseem Hijazi novel. I can’t forget the sight of three specimens of Islam’s purity, two of them pinning down a fallen young woman and one flogging her backside for having allegedly committed zina while the girl, may she be damned, cried and repented.

This is Islamic justice at its most effective. It is simple, straight, speedy, effective, earthy and devoid of the meanderings and trappings of modern existence, historical accretions and bid’a-infested innovations. That’s the stuff the satanic West is made of.

Okay, sure. I am bullshitting. But really? How far from the truth am I? Let me recount.

Columnist upon columnist has been writing about the brave Taliban in Afghanistan; how Taliban rule had recreated khilafat-e rashida; how there was peace in that country; how everyone was secure and so on.

Mr Khan has been hell-bent on reversing all his great contributions to this country, both as a scintillating cricketer and a remarkable philanthropist, by misguiding this nation on issues of politics and inter-state relations — about which his knowledge rivals only that of a kindergarten student. He has been talking incessantly about ghairat, how this is not our war and how our sovereignty is under attack from outside etc etc.

The Napoleon, Lt-Gen Gul — or shall I say Hans Guderian, since Gen Gul is an armoured corps officer and not a gunner — has been mouthing his conceptions of grand strategies even as he carries the weight on his shoulders of the shameful defeat in Jalababad, a veritable fiasco.

The religious parties, especially JI, have been fudging issues and telling lies about everything under the sun.

C’mon folks. Go back and focus on the discourse in this country. From news anchors and tv hosts to columnists and experts and politicians. Revisit the days of the extraction operation against Lal Masjid and how we dealt with that. Recall how we have done everything possible to pull down the state in our enthusiasm to voice dissent on the basis of democracy which, incidentally, will be the first concept to lick the dust when the warriors come knocking on the doors.

I had a hard time deciding how to deal with this issue of the flogging of a girl in Swat: express my deep resentment at the obscenity I saw or congratulate fellow Pakistanis for having successfully brought the state to this. Listen carefully to what people say on tv; deconstruct the discourse; discover the lies; the dissembling; the fudging and you would know why the flogging happened in Swat.

I carried an article some weeks ago in these pages by Nasir Abbas Mirza (“How we lost Swat”, Daily Times, March 9). Go and reread it to see how and why Swat has been lost and how and why we are likely to lose the rest of Pakistan. I see outrage now. Why? Was everyone sleeping?

The Urdu-language tv channels, for the most part, should be ashamed of the role they have played in giving airtime to the likes of Mr Khan, our various Napoleons and moronic politicians; for asking leading questions; for allowing them the opportunity to mouth crap; for supporting extremists in the name of jihad; for giving these thugs an aura of respectability and acceptability.

So what the hell are we shocked about? Sow the wind and reap the whirlwind. It’s as simple as that. We are still unclear and confused about the threat. Every outrage begets a standard response: “Muslims can’t do this; this is a conspiracy”. In which case, we deserve what happened in Swat; in fact, far from expressing any outrage, we should celebrate the incident.

The truth, however, is that Muslims can do this and more. They are doing it and will continue to do it. Listen to Haji Muslim Khan on tv channels. What kind of system and society would have him, with his pathetic knowledge of almost everything, including Islam for which he supposedly stands up, as a public figure?

Listen to his fudging and his threats. Listen to what ANP minister Zahid Khan had to say about this being the tip of the iceberg. The question is not about when this incident was filmed but the fact that it did happen; also, that the Taliban, according to their admission, have been giving these punishments and will continue to do so since this is what shariat calls for.

Well, how about telling them to stuff it; that we do not accept such barbaric and medieval practices in today’s world; that Pakistani society is sophisticated enough to reject, in categorical terms, the obscenity the Taliban stand for.

Are we prepared to do it; or will we remain confused about the nature, direction and extent of this threat?

Finally, hello Pakistan Army. Are you guys there? I remember the in-camera briefing given to a select group of analysts back in November 2007. We were told that come March 2008, Swat would be reclaimed. Whatever the hell happened to that? Would someone tell me?

But before I sign off, let me make a confession. Insert in all spaces whatever expletives you can think of because they are all there. That’s the kind of column I wanted to write.

Who gives a f*** about niceties, intellectual and of other varieties, in the face of an existential threat that a collection of people has brought upon itself simply because they have some morbid notion of religion coursing through the body politic. I don’t.

So, fellow Pakistanis, here you are: up shitcreek without a paddle. Enjoy!

Ejaz Haider is Consulting Editor of The Friday Times and Op-Ed Editor of Daily Times. He can be reached at sapper@dailytimes.com.pk

Published in the Daily Times

The fall of Swat pains me as my previous posts on Swat have shown here. As a Pakistani I feel ashamed of how the state has sold Swat to savages  to so-called sharia rule. A video has surfaced on the horrors of Swat and I am posting that video today knowing that it will pain all who see it.

The video shows a young female being flogged by the Taliban under the guise and lie of Sharia rule.  Let me say it here, this is not Sharia and I challenge anyone to dispute this especially supporters of the satanic Taliban as per their warped view of Islam.  Swat  is under satanic rule, full stop

DISCRETION ADVISED FROM HERE – THE VIDEO BELOW MAY UPSET READERS

I laud the fact that the Chief Justice of Pakistan has taken suo moto notice of this evil committed in the name of Islam and Pakistan. Let us hope the this  will give a shot in the arm to the Pakistani state and galvanise the state to act to save Swat and proves that the superior judiciary is seeking to work and strengthen the executive to ensure justice for all, especially Swatis.