Pro-Taliban Cleric Pulls Out of Cease-Fire, Citing Sharia Law Dispute

By VIVIAN SALAMA

ABCNews.com

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, April 10, 2009

A pro-Taliban cleric has pulled out of a fragile peace accord between the Pakistani government and Taliban militants in western Pakistan.

Sufi Mohammad expressed his frustration with the peace process, stating that the government’s promise to implement Islamic law, or sharia, in the Swat Valley had not been fulfilled.

The deal, brokered in February, had prompted a cease-fire, halting more than a year of bloodshed in the embattled Swat Valley, a one-time tourist haven, dubbed the Switzerland of the East by various travel guides.

Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari has agreed to allow the practice of sharia law in Swat on the condition that law and order is first restored in the region. Muhammad, who had been camped out in the valley’s main town of Mingora with hundreds of black-turbaned supporters, uprooted Thursday in protest of Zardari’s “negative attitude.”

“From now on, President Zardari will be responsible for any situation in Swat,” the white-bearded cleric told reporters. “The provincial government is sincere, and our agreement with the provincial government is intact, but we are ending our peace camp.”

Militants rearmed and pushed into a neighboring area this week 60 miles northwest of Islamabad, where they clashed with villagers and police.

One Swat-based reporter, speaking today on the condition of anonymity, said, “There is a lot of uncertainty and fear among residents since this announcement happened,” adding, “things were much better for the past few weeks since this deal took place, so it is terrible to think that fighting may return to this area.”

The heat is now on Pakistan’s government to find a solution to its militant problem before it threatens to destabilize the nuclear-armed state.

Suspected militants ambushed a convoy in the northwest’s Kurram tribal agency this week, killing a security guard and wounding six other people, including the area’s top government official. Militants also planted a bomb in Khyber Agency that destroyed six tankers supplying fuel to NATO troops in neighboring Afghanistan.

Calls for Sharia Law in Swat

“Right now, there are so many terrorists, al Qaeda based people, there are so many bombs and mortar holes in Swat,” said Rayat Allah Khan, the director of the Female Human Rights Organization for Swat. “There is so much ammunition in the valley that threatens to destroy the entire area.”

Until its unification with Pakistan in 1969, the Swat Valley had observed its own tribal system of governance.

Longtime calls for a return to a sharia-based system as an alternative to Pakistan’s drawn-out federal legal proceedings may have contributed to the rise of jihadist preacher Maulana Fazlullah, the son-in-law of Sufi Mohammed, and the valley’s subsequent Talibanization, mirroring that of nearby Afghanistan.

Once a hot spot for tourists from around the world, women have been banned from walking the streets of much of the region in recent years. Hundreds of girls’ schools have been blown up by militants who regard female education as un-Islamic.

Hinna Khan, 14, was among the girls forced to stay home after Taliban militants banned on female education. She claims that militants would patrol the streets of her town, threatening to throw acid in the faces of young girls who tried to attend classes. Her family fled to Islamabad last year so that she and her three younger sisters could live in safety.

“They are not scared of blood,” she said. “They kill people in open, like you would sacrifice an animal. They are not warmhearted; they fire openly and detonate bombs.”

But many say the crossfire between militants and armed forces is to blame for more than 1,500 deaths in recent years. Thousands more people have fled for their lives since fighting began in late 2007.

“Things in Swat are so bad that these people don’t have money for food or fare. Its like living life in jail,” Khan of the Female Human Rights Organization said. “The government of Pakistan has provided no help to the people of Swat.”

U.S. Worried About Pakistani Concessions to Taliban

U.S. and NATO officials have expressed concern that the Pakistani military, spread thin by the year-long offensive, is now making concessions to the Taliban.

While military operations have been widely unpopular among Pakistanis, previous efforts to broker a deal with militants diplomatically have fallen short. In 2006, a ceasefire under former military ruler Pervez Musharraf with militants in South Waziristan was blamed for giving Taliban and al Qaeda forces a stronger foothold in the region.

After a meeting with President Zardari in Islamabad Tuesday, U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke said that the situation in Swat had helped persuade more of Pakistan’s political elite to team up with American in its battle against extremism.

A number of attacks in recent weeks have raised concerns that the threat of extremism is now spreading beyond the beleaguered border region with Afghanistan. A deadly ambush on a police training facility outside the relatively safe city of Lahore last week sparked fears that extremists have penetrated Pakistan’s largest cities.

Pakistan’s chief justice expressed outrage last week about an online video that shows suspected Swat-based Taliban militants flogging a 17-year old girl for an alleged affair. Now under investigation for authenticity, the video sparked fresh concerns that the implementation of sharia law will embolden hardliners to carry out merciless punishments, particularly where women are concerned.

Sherry Rehman, Pakistan’s former information minister and prominent member of the ruling Pakistan People’s Party, said that while she holds reservations about the implementation of sharia law in Swat, it may be the only option for peace.

“I worry about sharia law because it often manifests in the extreme ways, in ways we don’t read in the Koran,” she said. “If the only way to achieve peace is through a partnership with the Taliban, then so be it. But if they are going to do anything in partnership, then there needs to be absolute clarity as to what form of law you have because it is important to have uniform laws.”

Copyright © 2009 ABC News Internet Ventures

Vivian Salama / Islamabad

Time.com

WARNING: Some of the images in this video may be disturbing for some

A viral video is raising an outcry in Pakistan — and highlighting the fact that in some parts of western Pakistan, the government is no longer in charge and the Taliban is. Filmed in the Swat Valley, where the government recently signed a controversial peace deal with the Taliban, the video apparently shows a 17-year old girl pinned down by as many as three men — among them her brother — while a fourth flogs her repeatedly, chastising her for having an alleged affair. She lets out a shriek with every lash, pleading for mercy. Dozens of men watch on but nobody speaks out to stop the lashing. (See the video that has raised alarms in Pakistan.)

The government’s agreement with the Taliban in Swat included the imposition of religious law in the area, a move many legal experts and women’s rights groups had cautioned against. The valley, once a prime destination for Pakistan’s honeymooners and hippies, was transformed in recent years into the frontline for Pakistan’s domestic war on terrorism. More than 1,500 people have been killed there and at least 100,000 have fled. A cease-fire is now in place in exchange for the imposition of Shari’a law. But reports of the curtailment of women’s rights and activities are now rampant; women have been banned from leaving their homes and simply walking in the streets of many towns. (See pictures from Pakistan’s tense border with Afghanistan.)

Human rights activists from the region insist that the 17-year old in the video and the countless other victims in Swat, are too helpless to speak out. “Who can stop the Taliban when they claim to be working in the name of Islam?” asked Yasmine Khan, Program Coordinator for the Female Human Rights Organization (Fehro) for Swat, who recently fled to Islamabad after allegedly receiving death threats by Taliban militants. “Things are out of hand and the government cannot control things.” (See pictures of the frontline in the war against the Taliban.)

However, the Swat-based Taliban organization denies that the incident took place in the valley. Several officials and commentators have expressed skepticism that the men in the video were Taliban militants performing the punishment. One local news organization noted that were it up to the Taliban, the victim “would have been shot.” The 17-year old girl allegedly in the video now denies that she was the burqa-clad woman beaten in the footage. She failed to appear at Pakistan’s Supreme Court for a hearing on Monday. Journalists in Swat speak of an atmosphere of fear in the valley; reporters say they are fearful of speaking out as well, afraid that they will be targeted by Taliban angry at the leaking of the video. One journalist, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said “we are the prime suspects.” (Check out a story about Talibanistan.)

The Supreme Court and its Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry are not keeping silent, however. While Chaudhry says that the authenticity of the video must be established (noting that it could be part of a scheme against those in Swat “demanding the application of Shari’a law”), he voiced outrage at what the footage appeared to portray. “[This] certainly constitutes a serious violation of law and fundamental rights of the citizens of the country,” he declared on Monday during a hearing into the incident. Chaudhry reprimanded several senior officials, including Pakistan’s Attorney General Sardar Latif Khosa, for failing to take immediate action: “Before the video became public, what were you doing?” Chaudhry has asked the court to reconvene following a 15-day investigation.

Pakistanis see Chaudry’s comments as his first act of political muscle flexing since his dramatic restoration to power. The Chief Justice had been dismissed two years ago by then-president Pervez Musharraf because he would not support Musharraf’s assumption of dictatorial power. When Musharraf’s successor Asif Ali Zardari reneged on an agreement to restore Chaudry to the Supreme Court, widespread demonstrations a few weeks ago led to his reinstatement. Chaudry probably has the highest reserve of moral authority in the country.

But is it enough to safeguard rights guaranteed by the country’s secular constitution? Hours after the Chief Justice’s calls for an inquiry, federal investigators were reported to have taken testimony from the alleged victim. However, she once again denied being the woman in the video. Sherry Rehman, the former information minister and member of the ruling Pakistan People’s Party beleives in Chaudhry’s commitment to pursuing the case. “If anything like this surfaces again,” she says “It will not be tolerated.” But Reddy notes that the government will proceed with caution for fear of disrupting the fragile cease-fire.

Khan, the women’s rights activist, however, is pessimistic that even Chaudhry can get anything done. She says the Supreme Court inquiry is merely smoke and mirrors, and that it will take a “miracle” to bring justice to Swat. “Until now nobody knows who murdered Benazir Bhutto,” she says. “Where is that committee? Where are those results? Do you think anyone will investigate or help the poor people of Swat?”

I’ve been a bit tunnel visioned this weekend on a project I’m working on and so I only heard in passing that Pakistani Taliban militant commander Baitullah Mehsud has claimed responsibility for the siege on the immigration office in Binghamton, New York. Accused of having masterminded the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, Mehsud also claimed responsibility for last week’s attack on the police academy outside Lahore.  He attributed this violence on incessant drone attacks in Western Pakistan, which just today claimed another 13 lives.  President Barack Obama vows to continue these drone attacks — even without the blessing of the Pakistani government — so long as Taliban and Al Qaeda militants continue using the semi-autonomous border region with Afghanistan as a sanctuary.  

A report today from Bloomberg:

By Khalid Qayum

April 4 (Bloomberg) — An explosion killed six security personnel in Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, about 4.5 kilometers (3 miles) from the office of President Asif Zardari.

The blast was a suicide bomb attack, Islamabad Deputy Police Chief Bin Yamin said by telephone from the city. Eleven other troopers were injured, he said.

The explosion, at the paramilitary Frontier Constabulary in northern Islamabad, was followed by gunfire, according to eyewitnesses. Nobody claimed responsibility for the attack.

“We could hear the bullets smacking into the houses around us,” Sohail Iqbal, the chief editor of Pakistan’s Online news agency, said in a telephone interview from the city. “The shooting lasted for eight to 10 minutes.”

The top commander of Pakistan’s Taliban movement, Baitullah Mehsud, vowed in a telephone interview with reporters four days ago to carry out an attack in Islamabad, as well as in the U.S., in retaliation for American missile strikes by Predator drone aircraft in the Pashtun ethnic belt of western Pakistan, near the Afghan border.

I have been really intrigued (and saddened) by the situation in Pakistan’s Swat Valley where Taliban militants have virtually taken over and implemented their unforgiving rule of law.  A friend of mine is a native of Swat and a journalist for a network I will not name.  He rang me yesterday to tell me that violence continues in this embattled region and he is not optimistic that peace will come anytime soon. It is truly heartbreaking (if you refer to an article I wrote just over a week ago, Swat was once a tourism paradise and a haven for everyone from hippies to honeymooners.  Now, unfortunately, even natives are fleeing for their lives. – vms

SCHOOLS OPEN IN SWAT BUT GIRLS PREFER TO STAY HOME

Vivian Salama

The National

ISLAMABAD // Hinna Khan will never forget the day last year when Taliban militants threatened to throw acid on her face for an act they declared to be un-Islamic. Her crime: attending school

The then-13-year-old native of Pakistan’s embattled Swat valley was just one of tens of thousands of young girls barred from attending school following an extremist order that deemed female education to be a violation of Islamic teachings.

“The girls were scared,” she said. “They saw girls being killed; they saw girls being skinned; and they were scared of this happening to them.”

Now safe in Islamabad after her parents opted to flee their hometown with their five children, Hinna is far more fortunate than the majority of her friends in Swat.

Left to Right: Siblings Irfan Ullah, 10, Sara, 12, Hinna, 14 and Lalina, 8 work on their homework together in their new Islamabad home one year after escaping from the embattled Swat Valley (by Vivian Salama)

After more than a year of fighting between insurgents and the Pakistani army, a ceasefire signed last month has brought an eerie calm to Swat. The agreement, regarded by many as a victory for the Taliban, granted their longtime demand of imposing a form of Sharia in Swat.

In return, the Taliban has agreed to allow girls to return to classes. Officials estimate that attendance at schools in Swat was at a mere 40 per cent last week, citing security fears as a deterrent for many.

The government has thus far re-opened all boys’ schools, but only the primary section – up to age 10 – in girls’ schools.

Nearly 200 schools have been bombed by the militants since they launched their campaign against girls’ education over a year ago. Government officials estimate that as much as 800 million rupees (Dh36.7 million) is needed to rebuild the damaged schools.

Militants said they would allow girls to return to school provided they wore a veil and observed purdah – the practice of total separation from men and boys. However, some remain sceptical about the Taliban’s sincerity.

Yasmine Khan, a women’s rights activist and Swat native, said promises to reopen the schools this week were merely a facade. “Many of the schools’ doors have opened but the girls are not going – they won’t go. They are very, very scared,” said Ms Khan, the programme co-ordinator for the Female Human Rights Organisation (Fehro) for Swat.

While many in the region welcomed the ceasefire and enforcement of Islamic law, Hinna and many other Pakistanis fear that peace in Swat remains far too fragile.

“The girls are scared that if they go back to school, the Taliban will once again come out on to the streets, so they will not go back to school” said Hinna. “Just because the government and the militants say that peace has been established in the region, it doesn’t mean it’s true.”

Over the past two years, the Swat valley, a one-time honeymooners’ haven and Pakistan’s only skiing destination, has transformed into the front line for Pakistan’s domestic war on terrorism. More than 1,500 people have been killed and at least 100,000 have fled. Women have been banned from walking in the streets in many towns and kidnappings and beheadings of those citizens, as well as journalists, deemed to have violated the Taliban’s strict interpretation of Sharia are common.

Until its unification with Pakistan in 1969, the Swat valley had observed its own tribal system of governance. Longtime calls for a return to a Sharia-based 

system as an alternative to Pakistan’s drawn-out federal legal proceedings may have contributed to the rise of the jihadist preacher, Maulana Fazlullah, and 

the valley’s subsequent “Talibanisation”, mirroring that of nearby Afghanistan.

 The subsequent year-long operations by the Pakistani military led to a bloody clash, with civilians caught in the crossfire.

“The whole thing is very disgusting and we the people of Swat are so helpless,” Ms Khan said.It remains to be seen whether the ceasefire will stay in place. It was signed with Taliban leaders in the Malakand region, which includes Swat, as well as in Bajaur, one of seven Federally Administered Tribal Areas along the Afghan border. Many here doubt whether the government will be able to heal the recent wounds of Swat and restore law and order to the valley.

“I don’t think the deal will hold, I don’t think the Taliban will disarm and I don’t think students and teachers will return to Swat in a big hurry,” said Ahmed Rashid, a journalist and the author of a best-selling book, Taliban. “But because of the terror campaign in Swat, nobody has the courage to speak out against it.”

My latest story in TIME about the deterioration of the Swat Valley. It is a sad story and one that many fear may become the norm for this region in Pakistan.

Thursday, Feb. 19, 2009

Pakistan and China: A Fraying Friendship?

There is an old Chinese proverb that says to attract good fortune, spend a new penny on an old friend. On Friday, an old friend is due to come calling in China. Pakistan’s President Asif Zardari will make his second visit to China in four months for meetings with senior political and business leaders. A key ally in the U.S.-led “War on Terror,” Pakistan — desperate for money and in need of a good friend — has recently found itself beckoning China for rescue. But is China willing to invest its pennies in Pakistan, much less play superhero for an old but now problematic ally?

Once an “all-weather friend,” China stood with Pakistan during its old confrontations with India. Ties between the two countries date back to 1950 after Pakistan joined a small handful of nations in recognizing the communist People’s Republic of China. In 1962, war broke out between China and India over the disputed Himalayan border region, further aligning China and Pakistan in the name of a common enmity toward India. Since then, Beijing has often offered its support to Islamabad in the way of economic assistance, but also with no-strings-attached military aid and support to Pakistan’s nuclear program.

Although China has not signed an official nuclear agreement similar to the civilian nuclear pact between the U.S. and India, it has invested heavily in the construction of several nuclear power plants in Pakistan. Unlike its relationship with the U.S, Pakistan’s agreements with China seldom came with conditions. “The U.S. hasn’t offered to support nuclear projects with Pakistan, so we go to China where we know we are always very warmly welcomed,” says Muhammad Saleem Mazhar, director of the Center for South Asian Studies at the University of Punjab in Lahore. Various Chinese-funded projects are also currently underway to boost Pakistan’s infrastructure, including the development of a port on the Strait of Hormuz at Gwadar.

However, with Pakistan’s security situation growing increasingly volatile and economic conditions turning dire, there may be a turn in tide between these once intimate friends. “The situation is much different now than once upon a time,” says William Kirby, T. M. Chang Professor of China Studies at Harvard University. “India has emerged as a much more powerful force in the region and Pakistan has not succeeded in the way that hopeful and loyal supporters had once imagined. It is now one of the great security risks in the region.”

Instead of increasing assistance to its old ally, Beijing has apparently been keeping a distance from Islamabad. During Zardari’s visit in October, the Chinese snubbed the Pakistani President’s request for a full-blown economic bailout. While Beijing did grant Islamabad a soft loan last year worth $500 million, it was nowhere near the estimated $14 billion experts say is needed to get Pakistan back on its feet. “The cooperation we saw during the Musharraf era just isn’t there anymore,” says Sayem Ali, an economist with Standard Chartered Bank in Karachi. “China would rather develop better relations with India and the U.S., which is not great news for Pakistan because it has always relied on China’s help.”

The recent instability along Pakistan’s Western border with Afghanistan, as well as a series of abductions of Chinese nationals, could lead China to look elsewhere for more reliable friends in the region — allies who can at least guarantee some sort of stability for China to pursue its strategic and economic interests. “Pakistan today needs China more than China needs Pakistan — that is why there is more enthusiasm in Pakistan about its relations with China than vice-versa,” says Shabbir Cheema, director of the Asia-Pacific Governance and Democracy Initiative.

China, however, cannot afford to turn a blind eye to a nuclear-powered Pakistan that seems to be constantly teetering on chaos. For one, Uighur separatists in China’s Xinjiang province often find inspiration and support in the turmoil in Afghanistan, a conflict entangled in the politics of Pakistan’s tumultuous North-Western Frontier Province. “We are now looking at a situation where China and India are on their way to becoming global powers and Pakistan is really in a position of endemic crisis,” says Kirby. “China can longer afford to make any unconditional guarantees — particularly where Pakistan is concerned.”

Chinese nationals in Pakistan are in as much danger as other foreigners. In the aftermath of a tentative cease-fire between Pakistan and Taliban radicals in the beleaguered Swat Valley, militants there released Long Xiaowei, a Chinese engineer abducted six months ago — an incident that drew unusually forceful language from Beijing.

Pakistan’s troubles, however, are likely to keep China involved in keeping its old ally afloat. Ahmed Ejaz, an expert on Asian security at the University of Punjab, believes that for China, the stakes are far too great for it to turn its back on Pakistan. “An unstable Pakistan will lead to an unstable China,” says Ejaz. “They know this so they will never leave us alone.”

Vivian Salama, Correspondent

The National

LAHORE // Nearly 30 Pakistani police officers captured during a long day of fierce battles between Taliban militants and Pakistani security forces have been released unharmed.

Officials with the Northwest Frontier Province (NWFP) government confirmed that Taliban insurgents had abducted the officers on Wednesday when they seized control of the Shamozai police checkpoint in the volatile Swat Valley. They were released less than 24 hours later.

“They did not harm us,” policeman Abdul Haq told Reuters. “The Taliban have given us a new lease of life.”

Since late 2007, militants have infiltrated the valley from Taliban and al Qa’eda strongholds just across the border in Afghanistan, implementing austere Islamist rule.
A statement released by the Pakistani army earlier this week said that about 16 militants had been killed in the latest military operation in Swat. However, efforts to maintain law and order have been complicated in recent weeks with a growing number of Swat police forces deserting duties or dying in clashes.

“We cannot leave our people at the mercy of terrorists,” said Pakistan’s minister of information Sherry Rehman. “It is important to pursue a strategy that incorporates political and social measures to build the architecture of sustainable peace in Swat, and in the Tribal Areas.”

Despite the police and military action, local media reports reveal that control over the Swat Valley has essentially fallen into the hands of the insurgency.

News of the takeover recently sparked an international outcry after militants closed girls’ schools across the valley, later torching and bombing many. 

Women have been forbidden from walking in the streets and at least 50,000 girls have been banned from attending school. Militants have also utilised an illegal FM radio frequency to broadcast their authoritarian teachings.

“We are extremely concerned because the civilian population in Swat is caught in crossfire between militants and security forces,” said I A Rehman, the secretary general of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, which has a significant presence across the NWFP.

Officials estimate that about 1,200 civilians have been killed and about 2,000 wounded in Swat since 2007.

The escalating violence has triggered a mass exodus, with hundreds of thousands of civilians reportedly fleeing the valley, a popular holiday and honeymoon destination, described as “Switzerland of the East” by the popular travel guide Lonely Planet. Government estimates reveal that as much as one-third of Swat’s 1.5 million residents may have fled the valley since fighting began more than one year ago.

“The death toll is rising every day and we are extremely concerned about the people who have been dislocated,” Mr Rehman said. 

Concerns are mounting that the insurgency may seep into the heart of Pakistan. Located a mere 160km from Islamabad, the Talibanisation of this picturesque region has hit close to home for many. 

“People here just can’t believe it,” said Nadeem Sheikh, a businessman based in Lahore. “Swat is such a popular tourism destination for people from Lahore, Karachi and Rawalpindi and now it is becoming fundamentalist – this is not the Pakistan we know.”

US President Barack Obama has said he intends to take a firmer stance with Pakistan to ensure Afghan militants do not slip through the cracks, using the country’s semi-autonomous tribal border region as a sanctuary. 

Pakistan has been a key partner and staging ground for the Bush administration’s military operations in Afghanistan, as well as the broader “war on terrorism”. Some analysts believe that US cross-border military operations will only exacerbate Pakistan’s security woes.

“The terrain and local resources and political problems are extremely complex in the region and something the Pakistani military is dealing with a lot better than the US can,” said Rasul Bakhsh Rais, a professor of politics at the Lahore University of Management and Economic Research.

For Mr Sheikh and many like him, this popular holiday spot may be gone forever. “The way things are in Swat now, it seems it will never be the same.”