Re: Govt MUST pursue Religious Fanatics everywhere - DAWN editorial
http://thenews.jang.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=64552
**The surge of extremism **
By Mir Jamilur Rahman
Today’s column is dedicated to SSG Lt Col Haroon Islam and other valiant soldiers of the Pak Army who sacrificed their lives at Jamia Hafsa. Sacrificing one’s life for the national cause is the most selfless act. They have offered the most precious gift, their lives, so that their countrymen could sleep in peace. The two maulanas, Abdul Aziz and Abdul Rashid, have caused the death of over 100 people; the younger Maulana Rashid has perished too. Maulana Abdul Aziz would also have met the same fate had he not escaped from Jamia Hafsa camouflaged in a black burqa, the Madrassa uniform of the female pupils. Abdul Rashid and many young male students could not leave because they were not allowed to do so by the militants who were now in command of the Hafsa brigade. After the exit and subsequent arrest of Maulana Aziz, the latter did make a half-hearted appeal to the Hafsa inmates to give up fighting, but nobody paid any heed. The direct negotiations with Maulana Rashid yielded no results. Reluctantly, the Operation Silence was launched to establish the government writ and to clear the Hafsa and Lal Masjid of the terrorist and extremist elements. A peace agreement between the government and Maulana Rashid was never on. The government’s stand was very clear: the Operation Silence will be aborted only after the extremists holed up in Hafsa, including Maulana Rashid, had surrendered to the writ of law. Maulana Rashid on the other hand was insisting that he and his colleagues should be given a safe passage. The gulf between the two proposals was very wide. It was impossible to narrow it because Maulana Rashid did not want to face law under any circumstance. Safe passage to where? The destination of safe passage was never mentioned in the negotiations, which were dragging on without reaching any purposeful conclusion. The term ‘safe passage’ is generally used in the US and Europe by bank robbers, kidnappers and terrorists holding hostages and whose escape routes are blocked by the police. In exchange of the hostages, they demand vehicles or aircraft to get away from the law. However, the law has long arms and invariably catches up with the law-breakers, safe passage or no safe passage. It is out of question that any country including those Muslim countries which practise Shariah would have welcomed Maulana Rashid and his accomplices. In their eyes Maulana Rashid despite being a maulana was a terrorist and a kidnapper. If Maulana Rashid had succeeded in entering another country, he would have been arrested and imprisoned for life or repatriated to Pakistan to face the law. Maulana Rashid might have been contemplating safe passage to a place in FATA. Evidence is emerging that he had connections with people in that area. It would not be far-fetched to assume that he had links with the Taliban and Al Qaeda. The Taliban are mourning his death by killing innocent people and Al Qaeda has asked the people of Pakistan to launch jihad against the government. Maulana Rashid knew that his desire to take refuge in FATA was faulty because it would have left him and his partners at the mercy of their hosts, which was not a comfortable prospect. Therefore, he adopted a new line. He abandoned the demand for safe passage and instead asked for general amnesty for himself and his partners in extremism. At this late stage he also disclosed the presence of foreign militants in the Hafsa which added a new and dangerous dimension to the process of peace negotiations.
The government agreed to almost every demand for the sake of innocent lives that were entrapped in Hafsa. It agreed that Maulana Rashid would not be ‘arrested’, but confined to a rest house. He would not be made a butt of ridicule. However, the government unequivocally rejected the proposal of granting general amnesty to Maulana Rashid and his militant friends. The people who were involved in kidnapping policemen, Pakistani and Chinese citizens, arson, and killing of Lt-Col Haroon Islam would have to answer for the heinous crimes in a court of law. Maulana Rashid was at the brink of agreeing to these proposals and asked for ten minutes to reply to them. But those ten minutes never ended. The government was left with no choice but to take military action to establish the writ of law that had been badly damaged by the two maulana brothers. It is a preposterous accusation that President Musharraf had sabotaged the agreement in order to push the military action. To be certain, there was no agreement at all, so how could it be sabotaged. There were only proposals which were floating between the two parties. In fact, President Musharraf in expectation of an agreement had postponed the operation by about two hours. When the operation was launched at 4am, it was nearly daylight, thus depriving the commandoes of the advantage of darkness. The soldiers engaged in the ‘Operation Silence’ have exhibited great patience and good judgment. A soldier is trained to use brute force to attain the goal and get it over with quickly. He is not trained to be diplomatic or be mild or hesitant. At Hafsa the commanders acted diplomatically, mildly and hesitantly and very rightly so. They kept on extending the deadline at regular basis. It was due to this strategy that 3300 young pupils, males and females, made their escape good before and during the operation. A question arises why the two maulana brothers were hoarding arms and ammunition in the House of God. When and where they wanted to use it and for what purpose? It is obvious that they could not have conquered Islamabad with this sorry assortment of weapons. Most probably they were planning to unleash a reign of terror in Islamabad. A bomb blast or a suicide bombing or a burst or two of Kalashnikov at a busy market would have a horrible impact nationwide if carried out in the federal capital. The linkage of the two brothers with the Taliban and Al Qaeda does lead us to believe that they were planning subversive activities in the capital to pave the way for Talibanization.
President Gen Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz have both made declarations that never again the Lal Masjid like situation would be allowed to develop. The president has warned that no mosque or madrassa would be allowed to be used for militancy and terrorism. PM Shaukat Aziz has echoed the words of the president that attempts to use madrassas for promoting militancy and extremism would not be tolerated. Regrettably, declarations are not enough to stop the surge of extremism in Pakistan. Very concrete steps and honest commitment is needed to stop the virus bug of extremism from infecting the young and raw minds.