Talibanization of Pakistan

I wonder whether this article tells the truth ...

http://www.newstatesman.com/

The Talibanization, Pakistan-style, is nearing its completion. <<<<< although what ur saying makes no sense... talibanization is a term not clearly defined,.... but if ur talking about an ideological islamic revolution based on islamic law and ONLY on quran and sunnah which allows scholors and elites to vote on new laws within islam just like the 1000+ year old islamic state used to be,.... then all i can say is ... INSHALLAH... i hope that day comes soon and without violence.

Re: # 195
imransuhgail,

I think I wrote what I describe as Talibanization, Pakistan-style when I wrote, `` A different sort of Talibanization though, where the jurisdiction of religion is expanded to every walk of life, from legislation to education and from sports to personal conduct of private citizens, is not only possible but is in steady progress in Pakistan. ``

You wrote, ``ideological islamic revolution based on islamic law and ONLY on quran and sunnah which allows scholors and elites to vote on new laws within islam just like the 1000+ year old islamic state used to be``.

Who gets to decide who these ``scholars and elites `` are? I would be really interested to know what you have in mind.

Regards,

Rafi Aamer

Re: # 196
imransuhail

Sorry for misspelling your name.

Rafi

Jihadi media thrives in Pakistan

ISLAMABAD: A newspaper warns that Jews and Christians are engaged in “genocide” against Muslims. A website says children should love guns instead of cricket. A video shows a child beheading a militant accused of betraying his comrades.

Despite government promises to crack down, hate-filled jihadist propaganda is thriving in Pakistan, especially in print and on the Internet. Critics say it is contributing to the demonisation of the West and the “Talibanisation” of Pakistan.

Some of the most vitriolic material is produced by affiliates of supposedly banned groups.

“I feel it has increased and the tone has become more hostile,” said Mohammad Shahzad, who runs a media monitoring service in Pakistan for clients including think tanks and embassies. “The level of extremism and fanaticism has gone up.”

Shahzad said there are no statistics on the output of extremist groups. However, examples are plentiful.

Tayyabat, a magazine for women published by Jamaatud Dawa says Pakistan’s support of the US war on terror amounts to surrendering to an America bent on eliminating Muslims.

“A white flag will not put out the fire from the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon. They are thirsty for the Muslim’s blood,” an article in February said.

A government ban against the al-Rashid trust, an Islamic charity proscribed in February for alleged links with terrorist groups, has failed to stop the associated Daily Islam newspaper from publishing in Karachi. Its content is not overtly militant, but often inflammatory.

“Jews, Christians and their allies are engaged in genocide of Muslims but Islam is spreading and its enemies are losing their nerve,” a recent article said.

Hardline religious propaganda is still far from the mainstream in Pakistan, where the thriving private media have, in particular, revolutionised TV with more liberal programming. But as in other Muslim countries, the call for jihad, or holy war, against the West has also gained resonance here amid widespread anger over the US-led invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.

Abdullah Muntazir, spokesman for Jamaatud Dawa, defended the group as a peaceful organisation exercising its right to freedom of expression. He complained that anyone publishing anti-American material in Pakistan is immediately accused of “promoting jihad”.

But many observers worry that Pakistan’s military-dominated government is doing too little to prevent extremists from publishing incendiary material that potentially drums up recruits and donations for militant attacks in Pakistan and beyond.

“There are laws against hate speech. They haven’t even applied those,” said Samina Ahmed, an analyst for the International Crisis Group.

“The fact that there are no curbs on them (extremists) or that the government backs down the moment there is the slightest resistance on the part of Islamic organisations has encouraged them to circulate their message.”

Tariq Azeem, minister of state for information, defended the government’s record against extremist media. He said any media promoting violence, including suicide bombings and sectarian attacks, were “totally illegal and will not be tolerated.”

Some action has been taken.

Markets in key cities such as Peshawar and Karachi that openly stocked jihadist videos a year ago no longer do so - although some merchants still whisper they can get them on request.

That is despite an increased output of videos promoting the stepped-up Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan. In a shocking example last week, a video obtained by the Associated Press showed a boy beheading a Pakistani militant accused of betraying a top Taliban leader.

Azeem said the advent of the Internet and the ease with which pirate radio operators can change frequencies made it impossible to clamp down completely.

The website affiliated with the Al Qaida-linked group Jaish-e Mohammed - which was banned in 2002 - still lavishes praises on those who fight jihad.

One recent post by a writer identified as Abu Khabib Mardanvi urged youngsters to shun the “dirty and useless game” of cricket and opt instead for militancy. “I pray that God may staunch the love of the bat from the hearts of today’s youth and bless them with love for the gun,” he wrote. ap

Those who can read Urdu, kindly visit the following liknk & read the very interesting article
published on 5th April ``Hikmat kee zaroorat``.

http://kashifhafeez.com/mazameen.php

Thanks ! Happy reading

#190 by SaintSoprano on April 27, 2007 9:22am PT


Maybe you should have had a we`ll-do-whatever-is-best-for-Pakistan doctrine..

The fact is that you signed up on the US side of the cold war because you expected to get arms and aid that you would then use to dislodge the cowardly bania out of kashmir and plant the paki flag in srinigar...

Perhaps you know there is something called Truman Doctrine of March 12th, 1947 (Truman was a US president during 2nd world war). Truman Doctrine was an American foreign policy designed to contain Communism. Aside from helping Greece and Turkey with economic and military aid to prevent them from falling into Soviet block, it was decided that Islamic organizations in every risk country should be provided economic aid to counter Godless Soviet influence.

Jamal Abdul Nasir of Egypt, Musaddiq of Iran, Baath party of Iraq, Syria (almost all of them were secular socialist democrats influenced by Soviet Union) - Under Truman Doctrine, Ikhwaan-ul-Musleeman, Syed Qutb, Saud (now Saudi Arabia), Wahaab - they were all strengthened to weaken socialists` effect in the middle east. It`s no coincidence that most of these socialist leaders were killed at different points. Now that we see that once democratic secular socialist middle east (only in 50s/60s) is now Islamized monarchies or dictatorships. Thanks to Truman Doctrine.

When Pakistan came into being in 47, there was the same danger of it falling under Soviet influence, hence, under Truman Doctrine, US backed the religious forces in Pakistan as it was doing around the world and turned Pakistan from a secular state to a Islamic state to counter Russians. Then came Afghanistan War, General Zia`s era of active Islamization. Rest is history and everybody who has read even one non-text book knows about it.

It`s so funny to see that US is now desperately trying to clean after its own poop that it created under Truman Doctrine.


The timing when Liaquet Ali Khan made that speech of objective resolution is pretty interesting.. only months after Jinnah died and one and a half year after Truman signed off that foreign policy.


Here is a wiki reference on Truman Doctrine. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truman_Doctrine

#188 by zeemax

If you mean that the Sun and Moon are both stars but Sun appears bigger (actually it appears the same size as the moon) and brighter because it is closer to earth than the moon, I give up :)

Zee bhai, where did I claim that the moon is a star? I only said that the Sun is just one among the millions of stars out there, but appears bigger and brighter because it is the closest to us.

#187 by harish_hyd,

The Sun need not necessarily be the biggest or the brightest star, it is just that because it is the closest to the Earth, it appears bigger and brighter than any other star we see.

If you mean that the Sun and Moon are both stars but Sun appears bigger (actually it appears the same size as the moon) and brighter because it is closer to earth than the moon, I give up :)

#178 by zeemax

Yaar Harish, what`s your argument?

Zee bhai, my argument is that the Sun is just like millions (perhaps billions or trillions) of other stars in the Solar System that emanate light. The Sun need not necessarily be the biggest or the brightest star, it is just that because it is the closest to the Earth, it appears bigger and brighter than any other star we see. Distant stars that may be millions of light years away from the Earth emanate light too, and the tiny specks of light rays that we see may have started millions of years before you and I were even born.

This is what I learnt at school and from Carl Sagan`s Cosmos (here I must confess that I haven`t read too many other books on the subject) of which I was an avid viewer, I haven`t ever read or heard anything that contradicted the above. But when I read what you wrote, I must say I was surprised. Just for a moment, I thought maybe my eyes were deceiving me :-)

#178 by zeemax on April 26, 2007 5:13am PT



why it`s called a `solar` system and not a `star` system in the first place)


Why is zeemax`s house called zeemax`s house and not a human house? either people aren`t getting the joke or you`re dumber that we thought you were before....

Feature

Interview With Ex-Taliban Foreign Minister

By

Chris Sands

Journalist - Afghanistan

A site of a huge blast
in an ammunition shop in Kabul,
March 14, 2007.(Reuters photo)

There was a time in recent memory when the people here had nothing but God and  a Kalashnikov to keep them safe. In the 1990s Afghanistan was imploding but few in the West cared. Those with power abused it, those with wealth flaunted it, and everyone else lived in the knowledge that each morning could be their last.

Back then, Mullah Wakil Ahmad Mutawakil was just another young man whose father had been killed during the Soviet occupation. He needed a reason to hope and one day he found it. By his mid-20s he was at the forefront of a movement that first stabilised the country, then allegedly helped bring war to America and changed the way Islam was perceived across the world.

“At the time I started with the Taliban every village had its own government and very dangerous issues threatened Afghanistan,” he said. “Every government was making a new currency, every government had its own ministry of defence, everyone had their own private airports.

``We had no other purpose, it was just to give the country freedom. We did not represent any other government.``

“For the purpose of stopping the division of the country and solving the problems inside the country ? improving the transportation system and saving innocent people from warlords and their rockets ? the Taliban movement was set up. And a thousand people like me joined it. We had no other purpose, it was just to give the country freedom. We did not represent any other government and we did not stand for anyone else.”

The kind of impoverished, deeply religious young men still found across Afghanistan formed the Taliban. They were initially welcomed as saviours by a population tired of having old Mujahideen commanders kill and kidnap at will.

``We wanted a peaceful Afghanistan and good relations with other countries,`` Mutawakil said. ``Now people think the Taliban wanted to make a country full of terrorists, but we didn`t want that.``

Less than two years after capturing Kandahar, they rolled into Kabul, bringing a fragile peace to the devastated city and imposing their strict interpretation of the Quran on its people.

With Mutawakil working as spokesman for Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar and later as foreign minister, the new government banned music and kite flying, sanctioned capital punishment and forced all men to grow beards.

``We hoped our laws would bring freedom to everyone in every part of their life, but we did not have lots of facilities,`` Mutawakil said. ``Nowadays lots of countries are giving donations to Afghanistan, but at that time they were only wagging their fingers at us and complaining.``

The most notorious edicts were aimed at the female population. Women were not allowed out alone and when they were in public they had to cover their entire bodies. It was said that girls were stopped from going to school.

“We are against co-education, but we are happy with separate education,” Mutawakil insisted. “For example, in Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries people are studying separately, which is according to Islamic law. If women wear the hijab they can go to school.”

Hard Times in Power
``The only solution was for the Arabs to live here quietly, safely, as immigrants ... not as fighters.``

After capturing the south and Kabul, the Taliban pushed onwards in an effort to establish control over the whole country. A movement of rival warlords known as the Northern Alliance put up fierce resistance and appealed for outside support in its struggle against the new government. Untold numbers of people were maimed and killed by both sides, many of them civilians.

But the West only really began to take notice of what was happening when Osama bin Laden returned to Afghanistan, a country he had helped liberate from Soviet occupation while fighting alongside other jihadists.

The Saudi was now regarded as a terrorist by Washington and he soon became a close ally of the Taliban, encouraging more foreign militants to come and join those who had remained in the country since the 1980s.

“We did not hate them, we had a  sort of love in our hearts for them. But it was not worth the price for us ? it was not worth putting our lives in danger, which is what happened,” Mutawakil said.

“The only solution was for the Arabs to live here quietly, safely, as immigrants. They should have lived here as immigrants, not as fighters.”



Mutawakil denied the Taliban had any prior knowledge of  9/11 and he believes the US may already have been planning to overthrow the regime before New York and Washington were hit.

Four months after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan started, the foreign minister handed himself over to the local authorities.  He was held for a night and then transferred to American custody, where he remained for most of the next two years.

``I think inside the Afghan government there are people who are far worse criminals than the Taliban.``

It is not easy to meet Mutawakil now. Private security guards stand watch outside his home and he claims the government keeps track of his every move.   

On a freezing cold January morning he agreed to this exclusive interview. A friendly bespectacled man, he talked in Pashto for almost two hours about his life and the difficulties Afghanistan faces.

“All of our problems were not solved under the Taliban,” he said. “But the interesting thing from that time, and lots of people are remembering this now, is the tight security there was in the country.

“When the new regime came people had lots of hope, but one day they found out nothing was happening and they had even lost the tight security they had under the Taliban.”

New Return?

``The biggest problem now faced by the world is that it does not know the exact definition of terrorism``About 4,000 people are estimated to have died in the insurgency last year, a body count roughly four times higher than in 2005 and the worst since the invasion. Indiscriminate suicide attacks are common now, as are reports of NATO-led forces killing civilians in air strikes and shootings. The Taliban already control areas close to Kabul city and further violence is expected following the winter.   

Mutawakil believes the only way to stop the situation escalating into a nationwide jihad is for the Karzai administration and its allies to open high-level talks with the insurgents.

“Now the foreigners think all the Taliban are terrorists,” he said.  “I think inside the Afghan government there are people who are far worse criminals than the Taliban, they have committed many crimes.

“So the best way is to forgive everyone. It’s better to start negotiations. Of course there will be problems as the foreigners don’t like the Taliban and call them terrorists, and the Taliban don’t like the foreigners, but the best way is to start negotiations. By negotiations we can move forward step by step.

“The biggest problem now faced by the world is that it does not know the exact definition of terrorism; who is a terrorist, where are the terrorists. I think that terrorism can be in every society, it’s not unique to any tribe, to any religion, to any person –you can have it everywhere.”

But with NATO determined to defeat the insurgency by force, corrupt warlords still holding the reins of power and more heavy fighting due in the spring, it looks like the kind of anger that first launched the Taliban will explode into the open once again.

“There is no hope for the people - their hearts are broken,” Mutawakil said.

Chris Sands is a British freelance journalist and photographer who has lived in Kabul since August 2005. Before making Afghanistan his home, he spent four years reporting from the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Iraq, Kuwait, and the United Arab Emirates. His work is published by a number of international newspapers, magazines, and websites. Click here to reach him. 

harish_hyd #175, #177

Re: zeemax #174, #176, #178

It is a great credit to Chowk that it attracts famous scientists of the caliber of zeemax to drop in here and get the rest of us up to speed on undergraduate material. BTW, check out Olbers’ paradox if you don’t know about it already.

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