Several injured, arrested at Sunni Ittehad Council rally

Pakistan

Several injured, arrested at Sunni Ittehad Council rally

Agencies
November 27, 2010

The workers of Sunni Tehreek (ST) arriving on board Khyber Mail were arrested at Rawalpindi Railways station. — File Photo

ISLAMABAD: Over a hundred local leaders and activists of Sunni Ittehad Council were arrested on Saturday. Police stopped the rally near ‘Soha Rawalpindi, where the activists had held a sit-in protest and were determined to move forward.

Police in twin cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi jump-started into action since Saturday morning in a bid to stem Council’s Long March from Islamabad to Lahore. Hazrart Bari Imam Shrine was sealed.

The workers of Sunni Tehreek (ST) arriving on board Khyber Mail were arrested at Rawalpindi Railways station.

According to Cantt Police Station, at least 50 people were taken into custody. Meanwhile, Sunni Council spokesman claimed over 200 of their workers were nabbed.

In view of security apprehensions, the government was in top gear since yesterday to stanch Islamabad-Lahore Long March announced by Sunni Ittehad as the march to ‘Save Pakistan’.

Islamabad’s exits and entry points especially those roads leading to Bari Imam Darbar were heavily guarded with baton-wielding police contingents armed with tear-gas shells and armored personnel carrier (APC).

Police were given duties outside madaris in support of Sunni Tehreek. Also, some local leaders were browbeaten into staying back.

Police took 19 Tehreek workers including a local leader during an operation in Jhelum.

According to Rawalpindi officials, over 100 people have been taken into custody. – Agencies

Chief of the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) Sahibzada Fazal Karim on Saturday said the SIC will not allow the repeal of the blasphemy laws. He said terrorism had distorted Pakistan’s image across the globe, adding that those persuading people for suicide bombings were not loyal to Pakistan.

Hundreds of SIC activists started a nearly 200-mile long march on Saturday in a protest against Taliban attacks on the country’s religious sites.

Authorities warned that militants could attack the procession which was being led by Sahibzada Fazal Karim.

Police escorted the convoy out of Islamabad, where the journey had started.

The participants, travelling on foot and in cars, plan to rally in Lahore, where 47 people died in a suicide bombing at a Sufi shrine in July.

While addressing the participants of the long march at Islamabad’s Bari Imam shrine, Karim said the government had not accepted the SIC’s demand for legislation to curb terrorism and called for an All Parties Conference on the issue.

He further demanded the release of the arrested SIC activists.

The local administration had imposed Section 144 in Rawalpindi and several activists from various religious seminaries had been arrested.

Following intelligence reports of possible terror attacks, the Punjab government had banned the long march to avert any untoward incident.

©2010 DAWN Media Group. All rights reserved

URL: www.dawn.com/2010/11/27/we-will-not-allow-repeal-of-blasphemy-laws-sic.html

Opinion: How can Pakistan turn over a new leaf?

Opinion Home / Worldview

Opinion: How can Pakistan turn over a new leaf?

The only chance to cleanse the state is to return to a secular identity.

By Sonya Fatah — Special to GlobalPost
Published: July 18, 2010 10:35 ET in Worldview

Pigeons fly over the Wazir Khan Mosque in the walled city of Old Lahore on July 9, 2010 in Pakistan. (Daniel Berehulak/Getty Images)

NEW DELHI, India — It isn’t a topic that’s making headlines in Pakistan. But it’s a debate that’s been raised countless times since the country’s birth in August 1947: Should Pakistan be secular?

Dogged by internal crises, the rise of a growing intolerant extremist segment and a deliberately apathetic state and military response, Pakistan’s future seems bleak.

Imagine a reinvention. Get rid of the “Islamic” part of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Shred all copies and records of the 1973 constitution and repeal a series of self-serving amendments to the constitution as well as bigoted anti-minority and anti-women laws. What you may be left with is the skeleton for a secular democracy.

A spate of recent terror attacks suggests this might be Pakistan’s only way of battling its inner demons. On May 28, armed militants attacked two mosques of the Ahmadiya community in Lahore. Ninety-seven people died and dozens were wounded.

Then on July 1 there were twin suicide attacks on Data Darbar also in Lahore, one of the largest and most visited Sufi shrines in Pakistan. The attack on the shrine was extraordinarily bold because it was an attack on Pakistan’s majority of Sunni barelvi believers. Some 43 people died.

In Faisalabad, on July 2, two Christian brothers were arrested for violating the Blasphemy Law. They’ve been accused of writing a pamphlet with derogatory comments about Prophet Muhammad. [Both of them were killed on 19th by an unknown gunmen in fron of City Court, while in Police custody.] In Waris Pura, a locality of some 100,000 Christians, Muslim mobs have been threatening to burn homes and kill Christians if both brothers are not executed.

The simple fact is that the state has, especially over the last 40 years, allowed for the persecution of its minorities. It has rewarded its majority to discriminate against them.

Sound harsh? A little exaggerated? Here are the facts.

Lets start with the Ahmadiyas. In 1974, under the supposedly liberal leadership of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, parliament passed a law declaring Ahmadiyas non-Muslims. This was a reward to the Jamaat-e-Islami party in Pakistan for spreading virulent anti-Ahmadiya hate speech and demanding their removal from the esteemed list of Pakistan-approved Muslim identities.

As if that wasn’t enough, Pakistan’s favorite general, General Zia ul Haq — whose arched eyebrows would have given Jack Nicholson some sleepless nights — presided over Ordinance XX in 1984. The ordinance spelt out the following: Ahmadiyas were not allowed to call themselves Muslims, to pray in regular mosques, to read out Quranic verses, or to “pose as Muslims.”

Move now to Faisalabad where street protests against two Christian brothers are mounting. No one has witnessed the brothers writing the pamphlet. As members of a tiny minority they’re unlikely to have wanted to defile anything Muslim in public or in private.

But the problem for Rashid and Sajid Emmanuel is something called the Blasphemy Law. Another gift of Zia ul Haq, the 1986 law carries the penalty of death for anyone who desecrates the Quran or defiles the name of Prophet Muhammad.

Many dubious claims invoking blasphemy have been made against innocent Muslims, Hindus and Christians alike since the law was first passed. Surrounded by a volatile public whose religious sensitivity is beyond reason, the accused often gets his or her death sentence before the matter even reaches the court.

Pakistan has always struggled to define itself. In the absence of a concrete identity, Islam has been used and manipulated for political ends. In 1958 the official tag of “Islamic” Republic was added to its name.

Pakistan’s founder, the barrister Mohammad Ali Jinnah, had no such plan for Pakistan. On Aug. 11, 1947, when addressing the first constituent assembly, he told Pakistanis, “You are free; you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or to any other place of worship in this State of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion or caste or creed — that has nothing to do with the business of the State.

“You will find that in course of time Hindus would cease to be Hindus and Muslims would cease to be Muslims, not in the religious sense, because that is the personal faith of each individual, but in the political sense as citizens of the State.”

That was not Jinnah’s singular speech on secularism.

Sadly, he died in 1948 and what has happened since then is a sad and dangerous tale.

As the 2010 report of the United States commission on International Religious Freedom puts it: “Religiously discriminatory legislation has fostered an atmosphere of intolerance” in Pakistan.

Over the years Pakistanis have watched as minority groups and women have been targeted. Yet with the exception of a few activist groups and human rights organizations, the majority of Pakistanis have maintained a condemnable silence.

The difference was palpable in national reactions to the two, separate attacks on religious communities in Lahore.

“This act of violence was unanimously — politicos, religiosos and all — vociferously ‘condemned’ and the country saw many protests, demos and city shut-downs,” Amina Gilani wrote, referring to the attacks on Data Darbar, in The Tribune, one of Pakistan’s English-language dailies. “A somewhat different reaction to the event of May 28 … The reaction of the majority — politicos, religiosos and all — was comparatively rather muted. It raised no suggestions for a national get-together.”

How does Pakistan turn over a new leaf? Pakistan’s only salvation to cleanse the state and its mindset is to return to a secular identity.

“[We] will need a revolution of the national mindset and a whole new constitution,” said Ardeshir Cowasjee, a longtime writer and editorialist. “[We] will also need a whole and entire new brand of politicians, or leaders of whatever type. We need to do away with ‘Islamic’ and with the Objectives Resolution before we can even begin to make progress — plus ditch quickly the Hadood Ordinances and the blasphemy laws and all Islamic provisions, which govern this country. So it has to be secularism all the way.”

That’s a lot of work for any country, more so for one in crisis.

Still there are forces moving in that direction. On Christmas Day last year, Haji Adeel, a major political leader of the Awami National Party and a Pakistani senator, advocated a return to secularism. Adeel found himself the target of a host of critics including the Islamic right. But he also found supporters, and set off debate in various circles about the idea.

Now that Saudi-style and Saudi-funded Wahhabi Islam has reached the popular shrine of Data Ganj Baksh, perhaps more Pakistanis will see that the anti-American, anti-Israeli and anti-colonialist body that defines itself as the Taliban, is also anti-them.

Still, even if secularism is Pakistan’s yellow brick road to saving itself, it’s going to take a lot more than changing the constitution and axing a few laws. This is a battle for changing mindsets, and Pakistanis are in it for the long haul.

URL: www.globalpost.com/dispatch/worldview/100714/lahore-pakistan-religion-islam

Pakistani Bombings Highlight Theological Tensions

Feature

Pakistani Bombings Highlight Theological Tensions

Posted in:  Feature
Sameea Kamal | Jul 15, 2010 | 1:53 PM

Police officials take bribes to file false blasphemy charges against Ahmadis, Christians, Hindus, and occasionally Muslims

In a series of deadly attacks around Pakistan, a suicide bombing in Northwest Pakistan on last week killed at least 105 people, and injured at least 115 — the deadliest attack in the country this year.

Two suicide bombers struck two areas seconds apart in the village of Yakaghund — a northwest tribal region called Mohmand- near a government office.

The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack, saying they were targeting a gathering of pro-government tribal elders — including those setting up militias to fight against the Taliban.

Though the elders were in the government building, none was hurt, said Mohmand chief administrator Amjad Ali Khan.

Women and children were among the victims.

About 70 to 80 shops were damaged or destroyed, and a damaged prison building allowed 28 criminals to flee, said local government official Rasool Khan. None of the escaped prisoners were militants, however.

The latest attack comes shortly after the bombing at a Sufi shrine in Lahore ,when two suicide bombers attacked the famous Data Darbar shrine in the country’s cultural hub. At least 43 people were killed, including women and children, and about 180 were injured in a continued streak of violence against minority Muslim groups.

The attack occurred while visitors were in the midst of worship and ablution late on Thursday night at about 10:50 p.m. at the burial site of Sufi saint Syed Abul Hassan bin Usman bin Ali al-Hajweri, where many worshippers come to pay respect.

While the two bombers have not been identified with any group, a rise in attacks by the Taliban and other pro-militant groups has occurred against groups deemed heretics according to extremist thought. Similar attacks have been carried out against Sufi Shrines in the northwest Pakistan as well.

Footage from Pakistan’s CCTV showed the suicide bombers rushing into the shrine complex after evading police guards and volunteers standing at a gate.

Since the attack, the CCPO Lahore admitted there was a lapse in the security arrangements that were revealed through preliminary reports of the incident. Five police officers were dismissed after the incident due to negligence of their duty.

43 bodies had been received at the city’s morgue the day after the attack, according to Salman Kazmi, a senior official at Mayo Hospital in Lahore. Several of the victims died as a result of their wounds in the hospital, he said.

Of the 180 injured, doctors described 20 as being in serious condition.

In another attack on May 28, a group identifying itself as the Punjab provincial chapter of the Pakistan Taliban attacked two mosques each filled with about 1,500 people during Friday prayers, killing at least 80 people and injuring at least 78.

At least seven men armed with grenades, high-powered rifles and suicide vests stormed the mosques at the end of the Friday congregational prayers. The group was described by the Washington Post as an “amorphous Sunni Muslim organization” based in the mountainous tribal regions.

The attacks showed the Taliban’s ability to “strike forcefully in urban centers and pointed to rising sectarian tensions in Sunni-majority Pakistan,” reported the Washington Post.

The May 28 attacks, which took place minutes apart, targeted mosques of the Ahmadi sect of Islam, a minority group that was declared non-Muslim by Pakistan law in 1974 due to differences of opinion on religious matters, according to Dr. Ahmad Chaudhry, spokesperson of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, USA and a member of the Executive Board of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community Youth Organization.

Prior to the law, these differences were always kept in the religious sphere and not brought into the sphere of the State, Chaudhry said.

In 1984, Ordinance XX was passed, titled the “Anti-Islamic Activities of the Quadiani Group, Lahori Group and Ahmadis (Prohibition and Punishment) Ordinance.”

The act “prohibits Any person of the Quadiani group or the Lahori group (who call themselves ‘Ahmadis’ or by any other name), who, directly or indirectly, poses himself as Muslim, or calls, or refers to, his faith as Islam, or preaches or propagates his faith, or invites others to accept his faith, by words, either spoken or written, or by visible representations, or in any manner whatsoever outrages the religious feelings of Muslims.”

Violation of the law, and the specific “Anti-Islamic activity” it outlies, may result in imprisonment of up to three years and may also be fined.

Religious minorities in Pakistan- including Christians, Hindus, Sikhs, and Shiites, say the blasphemy laws are “widely misused” against them. A report written by human rights organization Minorities Concern of Pakistan states that, “it is evident that in majority of cases the charges are mala fides – such as personal enmity, religious rivalry, property disputes etc.”

The organization has repeatedly demanded that the Pakistani government repeal the laws, “as soon as possible to save the lives of many innocent people and to bring harmony in the society which has been shattered since the promulgation of these contentious laws,” said Aftab Alexander, Mughal of Minorities Concern of Pakistan

“Blasphemy laws provide harsh sentences, including the death penalty, and injuring the ‘religious feelings’ of individual citizens is prohibited. Incidents in which police officials take bribes to file false blasphemy charges against Ahmadis, Christians, Hindus, and occasionally Muslims continue to occur, with several dozen cases reported each year,” says the Freedom House Report “Freedom in the World — Pakistan (2010)”, issued this month.

The report says that while no convictions have withstood appeal to date, the charges alone can lead to lengthy detentions, ill-treatment in custody, and persecution by religious extremists.

“The anti-Blasphemy laws have essentially made it impossible for a member of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community to publicly practice their faith,” said Chaudhry.

“These laws, which are regularly enforced, have led to men, women and children being imprisoned for doing nothing more than practicing Islam,” he said.

“For a State to officially declare a group, by name, as non-Muslims when they themselves claim to be Muslims defied logic,” he said. “This was not the way of the Prophet (saw) of Islam.”

Ahmadi Muslims differ from Sunni Muslims primarily in their belief that the Messiah, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad of Qadian, came 100 years ago.

“Ahmad came to simply revive the teaching of true Islam, not to add or subtract a single thing from the Law of the Prophet Muhammad (saw),” Chaudhry said. “This revival was of a moderate Islam where Jihad through violence was no longer applicable but rather a Jihad of the Pen and ideas was promoted.”

His writings promoted separation of State and religion, universal human rights, and protection of the rights of minorities — nothing new to Islam, Chaudhry said.

Saad Karamat, a southern Califiornia resident whose uncle was gunned down and killed in one of the May 28 attacks, said the institutionalized discrimination has resulted in hatred against Ahmadis, and acts of violence.

“We’re not allowed to call the mosques mosques, they’re called places of worship,” Karamat said. “If I identify myself as Ahmadi and say ‘Asalam-u-alaikum’, or recite a verse from the Holy Quran, I could be put into jail according to the Pakistani constitution.”

There are many examples of the discrimination in Lahore, including billboards that say Ahmadis, Christians and Jews are worthy of death, according to Karamat.

“Authorities have come with hammer and chisel to our mosques to forcefully remove stone that had the kalima carved in it. Can the government really believe it is doing Islam a favor by desecrating mosques?” Chaudhry said. “When open declarations that members of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community are worthy of death are made in newspapers, on television and on billboards, what else do people expect? The situation is made worse when the government offers no real protection to the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community despite repeated threats.”

Extremists are only exposed to one narrow perspective, Karamat said.

“Their (religious leaders) are misguided, they’re preaching nothing but hate,” he said. “I don’t know how it could be justified, but they actually feel they’re going to attain heaven by killing minorities.”

“I’ve always been taught that the way to defend Islam is through the propagation of pen, the jihad of the pen - that’s one of the primary things the founder of the community advocated for,” Karamat said. “He strongly condemned any form of violence in the name of Islam.”

The UC Berkeley senior said that despite the inclination to “perpetuate the state of violence and chaos,” the community has not reacted to the attacks with violence.

“Our khalifa (caliph), on that (Friday), said the only thing we can do is pray, for our community and the perpetrators of these heinous acts,” he said. “I’m not giving up faith, in certain situations people may totally give up faith, and start taking up arms, but if you look at all the past Prophets -Moses, Jesus, and the life Muhammad, peace be upon him, their communities had to endure so much persecution during their times.”

The attacks have been denounced by the international community, and leaders worldwide have vowed to support Pakistan against people who wish to destabilize the country.

“We condemn this brutal crime and reaffirm our commitment to support the Pakistani people in their efforts to defend their democracy from the violent extremists who seek to destroy it,” US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in a statement.

UN chief Ban Ki-moon, British Foreign Secretary William Hague, and EU foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton all spoke out against the attacks.

In Pakistan, the Pakistan People’s Party Punjab and Lahore chapters strongly condemned the terrorist attacks at the shrine.

Acting president Samiullah Khan Durrani, Deputy Secretary Malik Muhammad Usman and Media Secretary Iqbal Sialvi told the Daily Times that the attack on the Data Darbar “clearly reveals that the terrorists have no consideration for any religion, faith or belief.”

The leaders said that terrorists neither respect human values nor care for human lives, and that terrorists were the real enemies of Pakistan who wanted to destabilize the country to fulfill their agendas.

“Ahmadi Muslims have been single out in the law, specifically by name, but all minority religious views are under constant threat in Pakistan,” Chaudhry said.

Despite the recent violent activity, there have been fewer attacks in Pakistan this year than in previous years, particularly in the northwest.

In the last three months of 2009, more than 500 people were killed in a surge of attacks in the country.

URL: www.illumemag.com/zine/articleDetail.php?Pakistani-Bomb...nsions-13127

Punjab govt’s inaction against militants irks GHQ

FROM THE PAPER » FRONT PAGE

Punjab govt’s inaction against militants irks GHQ

   By Baqir Sajjad Syed

   Thursday, 08 Jul, 2010

At least 37 people were killed in an attack on Data Darbar shrine, Lahore. — AFP

ISLAMABAD: While public attention has been focused on the political barbs flying between Islamabad and Lahore, behind the scenes the Pakistan Muslim League-N has earned itself a new and very powerful adversary thanks to its inaction against the ‘Punjabi Taliban’ – the Pakistan Army.

It is now evident that the Punjab government led by the PML-N and the army, which is spearheading counter-terrorism operations, are on a warpath.

At a recent meeting at the General Headquarters (GHQ), senior intelligence officers conveyed their serious concern to the Punjab government over its failure to act against terrorists based in the province on the basis of information provided to it.

Other issues that were discussed included the lax handling of detained terrorists, especially of an injured assailant apprehended after the recent attack on Ahmadi places of worship (he was allowed to communicate with his accomplices from his hospital bed by a cellphone which allowed them to launch an attempt to free him).

Sources say that the meeting was attended by the top officials from both sides.

Nonetheless, officially both sides are denying any knowledge of this exchange. Punjab Government’s Public Relations Director-General Raoof Hassan said he was not aware of any such meeting since it did not appear on the official schedule. He also declined, in his capacity as one of Punjab government’s spokesmen, to assist in getting the comments of Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif on the issue.

Long before the attack on Ahmadis, an alert was circulated by an intelligence agency warning that a group of militants led by previously little-known Qari Daud had been tasked by the banned Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) leadership to attack the community in Punjab. However, the warning was not heeded.

It is said that warnings about an attack on Data Darbar were also ignored by the provincial authorities.

Besides citing specific instances, sources in the national security apparatus said it was particularly worrying that the PML-N government was in a state of total denial about the existence of the problem in the province which was in the militants’ line of fire.

This spat between the Punjab government and the army turned into a more serious war of words after a news report based on leaks by the provincial authorities surfaced.

The report said the army and intelligence agencies were not cooperating with the Punjab government in investigation into terrorist attacks.

Senior officers, who spoke on condition of anonymity, scoffed at the report. “Nowhere in the world do spies stand in the witness box and give testimony,” one of them said.

They also questioned why had the provincial government failed to crack down on militant bases identified by intelligence agencies, including the Bahawalpur seminary run by Maulana Masood Azhar of the banned Jaish-i-Muhammad.

“What has the Punjab government done to round up middle- and low-ranking activists and office-bearers of these outfits? Has it confiscated hate material churned out by them?” are other hard-hitting questions the officers are now raising.

“We have time and again told them to act against the Bahawalpur madressah where a number of militants are hiding. But they are not ready to do so,” one official said. He alleged that the Punjab government was sitting on the fence as far as sectarian-cum-militant organisations were concerned.

Earlier criticism by the federal government was ritually dismissed by the provincial leadership as political point-scoring.

A security analyst said militants always benefited from poor civilian intelligence; a politicised police force; and de-motivated, poorly trained and ill-equipped local law-enforcement paraphernalia in the province.

But now they had a new advantage – those in the provincial political leadership, bureaucracy and LEAs who are willing to turn a blind eye to their activities, he said.

Investigators said that most terrorist attacks in Punjab were linked to the TTP and Punjabi Taliban in contrast to claims by certain quarters that the so-called ‘foreign hand’ was involved in them.

The message from the terrorist groups perpetrating these attacks is that the government should negotiate with the militant organisations and stop its efforts to help the Afghan government reconcile with various warring factions, notably the Haqqani network.

Security officials said they felt encouraged by the federal government’s position of not entertaining any such demands.

However, they revealed that they were taken aback by PML-N chief Mian Nawaz Sharif’s recent media remarks articulating views similar to those of the Taliban and their sympathisers.

Recent media reports had quoted the Punjab home department as having planned action against 23 militant organisations working under new names.

But, the sources say, no notification has been issued to proscribe the outfits that have resurfaced under new names after having been outlawed.

Police officials say they now have new, specific orders to act against terrorist groups. The police, they say, are already working against ‘suspicious elements’.

©2010 DAWN Media Group. All rights reserved

URL: www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-l...tion-against-militants-irks-ghq-870-hs-08

Fire breathing clerics call for revenge

Pakistan Punjab

Fire breathing clerics call for revenge

By Rana Tanveer
July 03, 2010

Protestors express their anger over the attacks at the Data Darbar, and call for punishing
people involved in the incident. PHOTO: EXPRESS

Addressing a charged protest demonstration outside the Data Darbar on Friday, with over 3,000 emotional participants, the leaders of the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) openly advocated violent revenge.

Several SIC members vowed to ‘seek revenge’ for ‘the attack on Sunni honour’ and urged violence against those responsible. Instigating the cheering and vulnerable mass of participants, Allama Abdul Tawab Siddiqi questioned, “Are you a devotee of the saint in name only or do you want to seek revenge and prove your allegiance?”

Tempers and emotions ran high as the protestors raised their hands in unison, heeding the call and promising to prove their loyalty. Allama Siddiqi then administered them a collective oath.

A masked gunman fired a round from the midst of the crowd to mark the end of Allama Siddiqi’s speech and as a symbolic gesture of the crowd’s respect and agreement.

Raghib Naeemi then took the stage and read out a list of demands for the government. He said that all the individuals responsible for the Thursday night’s suicide attack should be arrested and publically hanged preferably in front of the Data Darbar. He demanded that all literature spewing hatred against Sunnis should be destroyed and banned.

Raghib urged the government to protect the lives and properties of the Sunni community. He suggested that Rana Sanaullah should be dismissed from his position as law minister for his alleged links with terrorist organisations.

Moreover he demanded that Abdul Rehman Jullendhari (member Wafaqul Madaris Qari Hanif) and Maulana Ahmed Ludhianvi (member Sipah-i-Sahaba) should be named in the FIR.

Other speakers alleged that the Punjab government and the Auqaf Department were equally responsible for the attack on the saint’s shrine by failing to ensure its security.

Qari Zawar Bahadar claimed that the government was promoting terrorism by continuing to finance various factions. He said that the government had banned various militant organisations owing to international pressure but had continued to support them under new names. He said that the government needed to give up its duplicity on terrorism.

The council announced a shutter-down strike for Saturday in a joint meeting at Jamia Naeemia.

Despite the public declarations and incitement, the protest was not interrupted and the police superintendant present at the scene made no move to arrest any of the leaders or the participants or to stop them.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 3rd, 2010.

URL: http://tribune.com.pk/story/25377/fire-breathing-clerics-call-for-revenge/