i dont care what the reason is. No matter what your grievance is you do not have the right to create an organization that orchestrates bombings in civilian areas, in hospitals and schools.
well if you dont care about their civilian population i find it very hypocrite of you trying teach them a lesson on human rights
Read what I said carefully. No matter what the reason, you cannot create an organization that orchestrates bombings in civilian areas. This does not mean I dont care about their civilian population.
I care about, for example, kidney disease in Pakistan. More people die of kidney disease every year in Pakistan than drone attacks or suicide bombing. I would not ever justify, support or minimize the effect of someone who's relative died a preventable death from kidney disease and so decided to blow PIMS up.
Killing random civilians is not a valid way to express disagreement with state policy on afghanistan war.
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well any one can take credit, who know who they are. i call up some day and take credit with what ever new name.
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This is ridiculous. I can then say that there is no drone attacks its just images on our TV screens that Americans sometimes take credit for. Propaganda to make us afraid.
Who do you imagine Muslim Khan is? What do you think it means, when Muslim Khan claims the bombings, sometimes in front of cameras?
For that matter, what do you think is meant by the term TTP. Tell me if it exists as a concept, and what it maps to.
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so your memory only works from drone attacks onwards lol
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Fine. Give me the chain of causal events that led to the TTP taking over Swat due to grievances of their houses being bombed.
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i dont know, they do what they think they can do best. cause no one wants to talk to them or negotiate and every ones is like just kill them kill them. what do you expect in return, roses
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So you do admit they bomb. What was the point with that 'i can make telephone call too'? You contradict yourself.
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yeh and it took them a long time. we went in there in 2001 with afghanistan
this is 2010 now. i think ten years are more than enough for any group get orqanised
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Once again explain the causal chain of events from 2001 with the afghanistan invasion to TTP taking over Swat and Buner.
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this is such a joke. like why was there peace in pakistan before 2001, before americans invaded afghanistan, before we decided to support an un just war on the worlds poorest country which happened to be our neighboring country. i can see and connects the dots very well. i just fail to understand why you cant ?
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Just because two events occur after 2001 doesnt mean they are causally linked. Just because someone takes advantage of anti-american sentiment to organize a militia to take over parts of a country doesnt mean you have to back them.
Afghanistan borders other countries than Pakistan, to my knowledge all backed the invasion, none of them have insurgencies as a results.
why dont you tell me this time. what TTP is in your opinion, i would like to know. you are atleast not like those to bhindians so you might have some thing logical to say.
what is it?
who is funding?
what is the purpose?
and under what circumstances did they fee the need of such organization
why dont you tell me this time. what TTP is in your opinion, i would like to know. you are atleast not like those to bhindians so you might have some thing logical to say.
what is it?
A militant organization that aims to bring hardline sharia law in the areas under their control, and seek the expand into new areas.
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who is funding?
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Cant say. Rumours of Indian funding but dont know how substantiated they are. Other theories include extortion, kidnapping and opium trade etc.
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what is the purpose?
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Power. Money. Maybe religion for the hardcore. I dont know for certain, I cant be arsed to find out. A rat is a rat regardless of how it came to be one.
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and under what circumstances did they fee the need of such organization
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They use american presence in afghanistan etc as propaganda tools to a) recruit religiously motivated walking bombs and b) ideological cover to prevent society from rejecting them en masse.
Notice that I answered every single question you asked me. You are yet to answer the simple questions I have been asking you. You repeatedly assert some sort of 'my house was bombed' excuse for the TTP's actions. I have asked you to provide any such causal link for the TTP taking over Swat and Buner. Which houses were bombed in Swat and Buner. By whom, and when.
1st of all I respect you for your understanding and moderate behavior. This last post of yours shows we dont have much difference in opinion. now
A militant organization that aims to bring hardline sharia law in the areas under their control, and seek the expand into new areas.
that is true apperently but what I suspect is it just an excuse and even if we implement sheria law they are not gonna stop doing what they are doing. They have politically motivated goals. who ever is investing in them would want some return.
Cant say. Rumours of Indian funding but dont know how substantiated they are. Other theories include extortion, kidnapping and opium trade etc.
I agree but the presence of tens of indian embassies Afghanistan makes me suspect bhindian involvement it.
Power. Money. Maybe religion for the hardcore. I dont know for certain, I cant be arsed to find out. A rat is a rat regardless of how it came to be one.
yes but it wasnt a rat until we made it one. I believe their goals are more political and religion has nothing to with it. these afghans were fighting with each other before 2001, not for the religion
They use american presence in afghanistan etc as propaganda tools to a) recruit religiously motivated walking bombs and b) ideological cover to prevent society from rejecting them en masse.
why give them a reason, why did we help America with out any investigation. we should have taken a stand then. Our then ruler didnt even bother to consult with the people and sitting there in the army house decided our fate and now we are suffering the consequences. these military operation have gained nothing instead escalated the whole problem.
Notice that I answered every single question you asked me. You are yet to answer the simple questions I have been asking you. You repeatedly assert some sort of 'my house was bombed' excuse for the TTP's actions. I have asked you to provide any such causal link for the TTP taking over Swat and Buner. Which houses were bombed in Swat and Buner. By whom, and when.
i m not talking about the bombing in swat. I was referring to the bombing of afghanistan. People who took over swat most of them were outsiders as my friend from swat told me.
Again, if we had not participated, all this would have not happened. Pakistan and Afghanistan had a very good relationship and the presence of america has successfully made us enemies.
If the Taliban are so great, why aren’t they in Islamabad. They are a fighting a corrupt, cowardly and incompetent PPP administration, and yet still fail to overthrow it. Topling Zardari should be cake walk. Yet they spent more time blowing up mazaars and girls schools. These guys are no one’s saviours. If saying that means that I am Bhindian or Tinda or whatwever, then so be it.
Firstly you can disagree with a foreign policy decision without blowing up civilians. Secondly I am confused as to your point. Sometimes you say its all propaganda we are not like this, then you blame Musharraf’s uturn for the violence (suggesting strongly that there is a reaction to this decision by Taleban)
Regardless of your views on decisions made in 2002, it is completely unacceptable to defend or justify bombings today. Musharraf making a uturn does not mean nothing is forbidden anymore, we can go around murdering and pillaging with no rhyme or reason and then say Musharraf made auturn in 2002, so suffer the consequences. There is still morality after 2002, there is still judgement after 2002, and not a single murder of an innocent goes away because the murderer knew if he said “musharraf!” people will say oh yes, he did make a bad decision, lets let it go.
Evidence such as ‘my friend told me’ is always shaky ground to draw conclusions. The leaders/influential players during the whole fiasco were local people, such as Mullah Fazlullah, Muslim Khan, Faqir Muhammad and others. Whether or not some of the foot soliders come from Afghanistan, the leadership is mostly Pakistani.
So given this fact, would you agree that theses terrorists did not have the emotional rationale you attributed to them.
Firstly this is hypothetical. TTP started organizing around 2005/2006, and started taking over areas around 2007. The Afghanistan invasion occurred in 2001. The people taking over the areas were not Afghanies. (not that that would be any better).
Pretty much every single neighbour of Afghanistan fell in line during the US invasion. If this is revenge why single Pakistan out? Why not Iran or Uzbekistan etc?
the reason for pakistans civil war is not musharrafs uturn. people didnt take up arms against the state for that, but did dis-approve. i think nobody including the militants over-estimates what pakistan could have done in october 2001 but im not saying the decision was right.
the rebellion started after the deaths of 700(maybe much much higher) of 'theirs' and only then did the u-turn also figure in the demands. 'their' mosques and madrassas were blown up, and we never batted an eye lid. 'their' body parts were launched into the next village and we never even mourned
I was also wondering because as per my info, it were some 'NGOs' which started their operations in FATA & claimed to carry out development projects in the area. These NGOs were handed over & received the financial support being sent for FATA development projects. But all that monetory funds / support never made it to the claimed causes. As per my info, those NGOs have disappeared into thin air since after the facts were disclosed by the locals.
There still has not been any follow up to the original article in The News or any other publication, TV program or by a politician. Perhaps it was the article in The News that was fake.
At a time when the entire country was under the threat of militants, I not only brought the attention of the country to this video but also condemned it at the risk of my own life. Much to the disappointment of many “professional conspirators”, the video was made by the Taliban and not by me
A year has passed since we heard the screams of a girl from Swat and saw how she was flogged by the Taliban in open view of the public. The Taliban spokesman, Muslim Khan, admitted in clear terms that the Taliban had carried out this act. Not only did he say on international electronic media that the Taliban flogged the girl in public, he also admitted that the case had not been investigated properly before the girl was punished. In addition, he has said it on record that the punishment was not carried out in the manner prescribed by Islam, where a child is supposed to administer the lashes to women. And he said that the girl should not have been flogged in the open, in the clear view of the public. Having heard all that loud and clear on TV, are we still disputing the fact whether the incident took place or not? If an Islamabad-based NGO allegedly paid money to filmmakers and actors in Swat to make a ‘fake’ video, then did the Taliban spokesman also take money to say that the Taliban indeed carried out the flogging? For those who still think the entire country suffers from memory loss, please have a look at the video at this web address, in order to refresh your memory and help you decide sensibly:
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Much to the disappointment of our ‘conspiracy theorists’, the entire country condemned the incident. People came out on the streets and the Taliban and their supporters conveniently termed it as a western conspiracy and a video produced at the behest of “anti-Islam forces”. The same Taliban apologists are again attempting to engage the people in this nonsensical argument. They ignore how the Taliban used violence against women and men, cutting throats, hanging body-parts in public places and executing people without any judicial process. They seem to have conveniently forgotten all those gruesome beheading videos in CDs that were sold openly as ‘Swat-1’ and ‘Swat-2’. All this was not only filmed by the militants but also proudly owned and disseminated by them. None were ‘fake’, none were funded by any anonymous NGO based in Islamabad. The entire world knew about them. Alas, short is the memory of our many so-called armchair analysts! “Always tell the truth. That way, you don’t have to remember what you said” — Mark Twain.
An article recently published in a local English daily alleging that the video was fake, does not bear the name of a journalist. It does not specify the name or identity of the ‘Swati man’ who claims to have made the video. It does not give the name of the NGO that supposedly paid the ‘local actors’ for acting in the ‘fake’ video. If all these were paid actors, does that imply that the Taliban leaders who admitted that the incident had happened were paid too?
At a time when the entire country was under the threat of militants, I not only brought the attention of the country to this video but also condemned it at the risk of my own life. Much to the disappointment of many “professional conspirators”, the video was made by the Taliban and not by me. My role was merely to bring it to public attention. No NGO made millions by ‘launching’ the video because the video was already on mobile phones and the internet since weeks. The only thing “added” to it was open and clear condemnation from me.
In the words of Rehana Hakim from Newsline in April 2009, “Everyone, it appears, had been silenced into submission by the Taliban guns, including the ruling ANP government. It was shocking to hear an ANP spokesperson remark that the incident had taken place before the Swat peace agreement, and that the video clip released by a Pukhtun activist to TV channels was intended to break the peace-deal! Did the incident, whether it happened now or six months back, not warrant investigation or condemnation?” If this was not the ‘right time’ to raise a voice in support of the Pakistani girl who was flogged, can someone tell me when is the ‘right time’ to do such a thing?
Thanks to the distraction and maligning campaign, I have received death threats, my credibility has been questioned, again, but only by people who do not matter. The rest have given me strength and support.
The people of Pakistan came out onto the streets so that no other girl should be treated in this manner. As for myself, I have been giving voice to the women of this country for the last 15 years, and will continue to do so. I have spoken against all forms of violations and abuse against women. If the news item titled ‘Suicide bombers have set out in search of Samar Minallah’ (Daily Mashriq, April 8, 2009) could not deter me, nothing will.
Enough of gimmickry has occurred in the name of politics and religion! Now, for yet another u- turn, again for portraying the perpetrators of the past as the heroes of today, I and many other conscious citizens of Pakistan will not let the women’s voices be muffled yet again. For all the self-proclaimed analysts who sit on their comfortable sofas commenting on how the girl could get up after she was flogged and the authenticity of the incident, a resident of Kala Kalay said, “I witnessed the flogging myself, so there is no reason to doubt the occurrence”, which was quoted in a local English daily. “At that time about 200 militants and 130 villagers were present to see the flogging of the girl. The flogging was a shocking development for the villagers. They had assembled to watch the screaming girl but everyone was frightened and helpless while the militants were unmoved,” he said.
If this is ‘fake’, what about the way Shabana was brutally killed in front of many silent spectators? All those (visible and invisible) Muslim Khans who remained unmoved have not only defamed our religion but also the integrity of each and every man and woman of Pakistan.
As for me, I will continue to challenge those who misuse Islam for power and politics. I will continue to raise my voice against individuals and political parties who use my religion to spread hatred. I will continue to expose and challenge the ‘conspiracy’ and ‘propaganda’ theories that try to befool the people of this country.
For those who continue to sit on the fence, I urge you to please join together to make our voices heard. It is essentially the sane voice of the silent majority that matters. In the words of Martin Luther King, “The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people, but the silence over that, by the good people.”
The writer is a research anthropologist and documentary filmmaker with an MPhil from the University of Cambridge, UK. She is the Director of an NGO, Ethnomedia. She can be reached at [email protected]
you'll be standing in front of Allah one day and be accountable for defending your opinion which goes totally oppose to teachings of your Nabi(SAW).
Who are YOU to decide about what is according to Prophet's teachings and what is not?
And if you still insist on imposing your religious views over others then the proper venue for such a discussion would be Religion section.
There still has not been any follow up to the original article in The News or any other publication, TV program or by a politician. *Perhaps it was the article in The News that was fake. *
And it is not the first time The News/ Jang has shown their love of Taliban and complete disregard of Islamic teachings.
The Swat flogging video embarrassed the provincial government to the extent that its ministers accused the person who had personally brought the video out before the world. The video was also termed as a means to sabotage the ‘peace’ deal
Swat has witnessed many
harsh and cruel days. For about two years, it presented a view of Afghanistan during the heyday of the Afghan Taliban. The man who ignited the situation against the state of Pakistan — Sufi Mohammad — was spared (seemingly by design) for about three years. The MMA was then the ruling government in the province. In 2008, a half-hearted operation was launched under the name of Rah-e-Haq but it was evident then that the action being taken against the insurgents was not serious. However, soon the situation became very grave and serious when the hanging of slit-throated and beheaded bodies became a routine, and the Grain Chowk in Mingora became notorious as the ‘Khooni Chowk’. Upon intense pressure from the people of Swat and the media, the government decided to try and settle the issue peacefully. A long deliberation and negotiations were carried out at the start of 2009 to reach a settlement. In the wake of this endeavour, a peace deal was signed with the Taliban in February 2009. Emboldened by the very apparent capitulation on the part of the government, the militants expanded their writ to the nearby districts of Buner and Dir. The people’s reaction to the peace deal was mixed. Some thought it would bring permanent peace to the Valley but there were many who were cynical and thought that the peace deal was carried out on the terms put forward by the militants. They were of the opinion that since the Taliban were non-state actors, they would not comply with the truce. Their apprehensions proved true and the Taliban extended their ‘rule’ beyond Swat.
When the dilemma reached its peak, there appeared a video sometime in April, wherein the Taliban were reportedly flogging a girl. The video took the media and civil society by storm. To many Swatis the video was not surprising as they had witnessed incidents much more brutal than the flogging being shown in the video. It was perhaps the timing of the video that made headlines and breaking news, or perhaps the fact that seeing is more shocking than hearing or reading. The video embarrassed the provincial government to the extent that its ministers accused the person who had personally brought the video out before the world. The video was also termed as a means to sabotage the ‘peace’ deal. The social activist who dared to show the video was harassed and was shown crying out for help.
Reaction from the Taliban over the video was also confusing but their spokesman accepted responsibility on the grounds that Islam allowed such punishments for adultery. He went on record saying that the girl deserved harsher treatment than the mere flogging but she was spared, thanks to the Taliban.
Now, almost a year has lapsed since the video was shown to the world. On March 30, 2010, headlines announced that the video was, indeed, found to be a fake after investigation. It was claimed that a ‘local’ from Swat confessed that he had been paid Rs 0.5 million by an NGO to shoot the video. This latest scenario about the validity of the video has created some pertinent questions.
First of all, the timing of this news about the bogusness of the video is very important. Is this information meant to malign the military, which has successfully cleared Swat after a yearlong operation? If looks are anything to go by, it appears so.
Secondly, is this a new move to mentally prepare the people of Swat for a comeback of militancy? The news doubting the originality of the video will certainly warm some hearts towards the Taliban. Is all this an initial episode of yet another conspiracy against the people of Swat?
Thirdly, does this video refutation not imply a significant amount of bad press for the NGOs that are contributing towards the rehabilitation of Swat? As the main blame is on an NGO that, as the news would like us to believe, bribed a certain ‘local’ to shoot the video, the people of Swat will eventually begin resenting the humanitarian agencies that are operating there.
Fourthly, why has it taken a full year to investigate the matter? All this could have been concluded in the very beginning.
Lastly, who is this local person and the others who were interrogated in the investigation? When the video was first shown, it was understandable to speak up in the media while requesting anonymity as Swat was in the grip of anarchy. Now, when Swat is in the safe hands of our military, why are these locals still anonymous and unidentified?
I have interacted with many educated and well aware Swatis about this latest development. All were very cynical and angry. They consider this current piece of information to be a part of some big conspiracy.
Amidst such a clumsy situation, they appeal to the Supreme Court of Pakistan to take up the issue and investigate the matter in depth so as to let the people of Swat, and Pakistan in general, know the facts about the real situation. A free and fair investigation in this regard by the country’s apex court will unravel the conspiracy.
The writer is a freelance analyst based in Swat. He can be reached at [email protected]
Controversy has raged in recent days over whether the video of a 17-year-old girl being flogged by the Taliban, released last April, was real or staged. The initial news report published in an English-language daily alleged that Ethnomedia, the Islamabad-based NGO that released the video, paid a “local” half a million rupees to have the video produced.
The report also claimed that the girl shown in the video, which was so instrumental in galvanising public outcry against the Taliban, also received a payment of Rs100,000. The matter was even taken up by Pakistan’s Senate last month. In a debate held on the issue, Jamaat-i-Islami Senator Khursheed Ahmed demanded action against the NGO which he accused of having “defamed Islam and the nation”.
In response Interior Minister Rehman Malik, expressing grave concern over media reports of the matter, ordered an inquiry into whether or not the video was authentic. In the midst of the outcry Samar Minallah, the founder of Ethnomedia, wrote in defence of the video’s authenticity drawing attention to the fact that Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) spokesperson Muslim Khan had publicly accepted responsibility for the video, admitting even that the case had not been properly investigated before the girl was punished. Ms Minallah reminded those questioning the authenticity of the video of the fact that videos entitled Swat I and Swat II, easily available in any marketplace in the region, showed the Taliban engaged in even more brutal acts such as beheadings and amputations.
Yet to view the controversy as an isolated case connected only to the veracity of the events depicted in the video would be to miss the trajectory of the transformation being planned for the Taliban by the political and military leadership of the country. With the completion of the Pakistan military’s Rah-i-Nijat offensive in Swat, and the near culmination of operations in North Waziristan, the endgame of a long and bloody counter-insurgency operation is now visible.
Such an endgame requires, arguably by necessity, the co-option of those among the enemy that have not been eliminated, into the inevitable ‘peace deal’ that will mark the end of hostilities and tempt with concessions those still left standing. The imperatives of the classic counter-insurgency doctrine thus dictate that the internal enemy, the Taliban, must be transformed into a friend.
The army’s strategic local objective is not the only factor dictating the reinvention of the Taliban that is under way via the Swat video controversy. Undoubtedly, the United States has been mulling over talks with the Taliban for the past several months with advisors close to President Obama emphasising their necessity as a solution to the AfPak crisis.
With the success of the Kayani-Qureshi pilgrimage to Washington DC, the delicious dreams of nuclear deals on par with India and the acknowledgment that peace between India and Pakistan is crucial to the success of the war in Afghanistan, the timing is ideal for the deployment of such an endgame. On March 11, the Los Angeles Times reported several US officials as saying that the Taliban in Pakistan were increasingly at odds with Al Qaeda militants in the area.
The distinction is notable because in distinguishing between the two, valued space is created for saying that the Taliban can indeed be rehabilitated and transformed into potential partners in peace – unlike Al Qaeda which must be eliminated at all costs. On the same day as the LA Times report was published, British Foreign Secretary David Milliband sounded the same note, emphasising in an interview the need for “political talks” with the Taliban as part of the ultimate solution to the region’s problems.
Unsurprisingly the same sentiment was echoed by Pakistani diplomatic sources four days later in a story published on March 14 in this newspaper. The sources, who refused to be identified, blamed the series of Lahore bombings on those Taliban that were “still allied to Al Qaeda militants”, echoing the American project of resuscitating some of the Taliban as possible partners in a post-war deal. Insisting that the reformed Taliban were refusing to assist Al Qaeda even in exchange for payment, the sources suggested that most of the hardcore fighters had either already been eliminated or would soon be, leaving behind those that could possibly be co-opted within a post-operation framework.
The project confronted by Pakistan’s military and civilian leaders, in exchange for the military and civilian goodies inveigled from Washington, is that of making the ‘good’ Taliban palatable to a Pakistani public ravaged by their brutality. Casting doubt on a video that mobilised so many against the Taliban is one tiny part of this larger strategy that necessitates delivering some sort of ‘victory’ to the United States before the commencement of its troops’ withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Minor hitches in this project of reinventing the Taliban include civil society groups and NGOs such as Ethnomedia, that draw attention to annoying details: to give just a few examples, the over 200 girls’ schools bombed, the scores of beheaded villagers, the blast-stricken markets and the many thousands of dead civilians that the Taliban have left in their wake. Accusing such NGOs of faking a video that showed an incident that was acknowledged by the TTP is thus a convenient way of rewriting history so that the enemies of the past may become the friends of the future.
In a country where the truth is ever slippery and the suffering of women always subjected to doubt, the controversy over the Swat flogging video merely illustrates the ramparts of the revised version of the Taliban era that is to be presented to the Pakistani public. In the calculations of the civilian-military leadership, undermining the tragedy of a few women is a meagre price to pay for the successful reincarnation of the Taliban as peace-loving allies who could soon become members of Pakistan’s legislatures.
The writer is a US-based attorney teaching constitutional history and political philosophy.