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August 7, 2006

Pakistan: Deadline For Lashkar-i-Islami, The "Islamic Army"

News from the Pakistan Daily Times states that the government of President Musharraf has given an Islamist militia a deadline of August 17 to cease its activities, or it will be faced with a crackdown. The Islamist militia is called Lashkar-e-Islami (also Lashkar Islami or Lashkar-i-Islami), the Army of Islam.

The decision was arrived at at a jirga or meeting in the Khyber Agency, in North-West Frontier Province, which adjoins the Afghan border.

The representative of the government, the assistant political agent (APA), convened with the elders of Zakha Khel Bazaar, a community in the Bazaar valley in the agency. 300 tribal elders attended the jirga.

The APA said that 400 khasadars (tribal policemen) who had been suspended would be reinstated, along with their salaries Unfortunately, to be vulgar, all this will amount to piss and wind. The 400 khasadars will be expected to act as the government's mercenaries, acting where even the government admits it has little control.

North-West Frontier Province has its own Assembly, and governor, but parts of the province, including Khyber Agency are not officially under the government's legal control. These areas are called FATA or Federally Administered Tribal Regions, and contain seven "Agencies". The Pakistan government says on a FATA website that some regions are regarded as "inaccessible". The document states that until recently: "Around 30% of the total area of FATA was inaccessible politically and around 50% was inaccessible physically."

The FATA document further states: "The upper Bara Valley of Khyber Agency i.e Afridi tirah and Bazaar Zakha Khel Areas continue to be of great concern for the Government of Pakistan." The Zakha Khel Bazaar is the area in which the government expects to launch a "crackdown".

Even regions which are officially under Pakistani jurisdiction in NWFP, such as North and South Waziristan, are not under government control, but have been taken over by the so-called Pakistan Taliban, and in March, a sharia court was established in Wana, regional capital of South Waziristan.

On July 7 we stated that the "Talibanized" regions of North and South Waziristan, which are known to house both Al Qaeda and Afghan Taliban were subject to a conciliation process with the Pakistan government. This conciliation led to the reduction of Pakistan troops in the region, who had numbered 70,000.

However, that rapprochement was led by MMA (Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal), the Islamist opposition coalition, who comprise most of the NWFP Assembly. MMA is led by the extremist Qazi Hussain Ahmed. His Jamaat-e-Islami party has exactly the same aims as the Islamists in the region, wishing to impose sharia law and to destroy the Musharraf government because of its ties to the US.

As a result, the tenuous reduction in hostilities has already started to break down in Waziristan. Even Afghanistan has complained that nothing is being done to prevent Taliban from crossing the border.

Today, a man's decapitated body was discovered in the village of Madikhel, 22 miles south of Miranshah, regional capital of N. Waziristan. Next to the headless corpse was a letter saying the man had been "executed" because he was a spy for the United States. This is the first time that such an "execution" has taken place since June 25, when a "Grand Jirga" of politicians and tribal leaders negotiated a reduction in hostilities.

So who are the Lashkar Islami?

We first reported on this group on March 29, when fighting between two rival clerics led to bloodshed and virtual war in Bara in the Khyber Agency, fourteen miles west of Peshawar, which saw 24 people killed and women and children taken hostage. The two clerics had been ordered on February 16 by a jirga to cease making radio broadcasts, but had ignored the decree of the council.

Both Mufti Munir Shakir and Pir Saifur Rehman were putting out radio broadcasts on FM transmitters, each denigrating the other's religious beliefs. The war of words on the airwaves became explosive.

Pir Saifur Rehman follows the sect of Barelvi Islam, which encourages music, sees Mohammed as a figure of semi-divine status, a personage of light, whereas Mufti Munir Shakir follows the puritanical Deobandi form of hardline Sunni Islam. Most of the Taliban regime leaders in Afghanistan were educated at the Deobandi madrassa of Haqqania, including Mullah Omar. Haqqania is in Khyber Agency.

The two broadcasting sheikhs had been warring on the airwaves since December 2005.

While Pir Saiur Rehman wittered on about the ever-present spiritual manifestations of Mohammed, Mufti Munir Shakir used his broadcasts to encourage people to join the Lashkar-i-Islami. And with the two opposing views becoming more polarised, the violence of March erupted quite naturally. On March 25, 19 followers of Pir Saifur Rehman were killed, with 16 of these being Afghan nationals.

Ironically, neither Rehman nor Shakir came from Khyber Agency. Munir Shakir had been expelled from Khurram Agency because he was regarded as divisive, espousing sectarian views. Munir arrived in Khyber Agency in 2003. Munir had formerly worked for the tribal warlord and Taliban-like figure of Haji Namdar, who had set up a regime in 2003-4 in Khyber Agency called Amr bil Maroof wa Nehi Anil Munkir which had its own prisons. Shakir eventually fell out even with Haji Namdar.

Pir Saiur Rehman had come originally from Afghanistan, and had settled in the region since the 1970s.

The followers of both Shakir and Rehman would kidnap and kill supporters, even after their divisive broadcasts stopped. And all the while, the Army of Islam, under the leadership of Mangal Bagh Afridi, a former driver, grew more powerful and more militant.

After the killings and the hostage-takings of women and children at the end of March, government forces began to take a more pro-active stance against the rising powers of the Lashkar-i-Islami. Mangal Bagh Afridi and his followers had then been located in the region around Bara tehsil, scene of the interclan war, but on Friday, March 31 they moved on to Tarkhukas in the remote and inaccessible Tirah Valley.

On this date, states Pak Observer, the Khasadar forces and Mehsud scouts surrounded the headquarters of Mufti Munir Shakir. The former radio star refused to surrender until 1pm the following day. The Lashkar-i-Islami headquarters was given up without a struggle. Those still in the compound handed over to the political FATA administration. They had been urged to do so at a jirga led by a leader of the left-wing Awami National Party (ANP).

The administration also ordered Mangal Bagh Alfridi, the leader of Lashkar-i-Islami to abandon possession of his house in Sheikhabad Spin Qaber in Bara tehsil, for it to be demolished. Similar orders were given to other activists of the Army of Islam.

Mufti Munir Shakir and Pir Saiur Rehman were officially expelled from Khyber Agency by the political administration. Pir had already left in February, reputedly to go to Lahore. But the fighting between their followers continued. In April five people were killed in a clash between the religious factions.

In May, Mangal Bagh threatened to block all routes leding into the Tirah valley if his men who had been made to surrender were not released.

On June 11, Starategy Page noted that "several hundred armed members of the Lashkar Islami ( Army of Islam) briefly occupied the town of Bara, but left when security forces approached. Officials in Bara said it was all a misunderstanding, as the Lashkar Islami had been called in to help restore order in the town, which had been suffering from the violent side effects of tribal politics."

The Khyber Agency political administration went into action on Monday, June 12, when they carried out their vow to demolish the home of Mangal Bagh Alfridi. The four storey house was torn down in Bara, and sixty shops were also demolished. Tribespeople put up no resistance to this show of strength. The administration had decided to stop its previous attempts to bring Laskar-i-Ilsam on board. They had been offering the group the chance to become involved with restoring order to the region, but the group had not complied. The administration was now demanding the surrender of Mangal Bagh.

At this time, the Islamic Army had set up new headquarters in Gagarrana area in the Tirah Valley, in Landi Kotal tehsil. During their brief stay in Bara, they had handed out notices to the populace, saying they were going to institute a body calling itself the Amn Committee. They issued a 14 point decree, saying that peace would be brought to Bara tehsil through imposing major penalties on crimes which included adultery, drinking liquor, etc and fines of Rs.5000 ($83) on the owners on all kind of video shops and cable operators.

The decree stated that a murderer would pay a fine of Rs, 500,000 ($8,299), Rs 50,000 ($830) for having a dish antennae, and Rs 500 ($8.30) for not offering prayers five times a day. No woman would be allowed in market areas without one of her blood relatives.

After the demolitions, tribal and FATA representatives called for a Grand Jirga to resolve the situation, to be held on June 20.

On Wednesday, July 5, the agency authorities mounted a sweep of the village of Gagrina in the Tirah valley, where Mangal Bagh's followers were based. 70 militants from his army were arrested, all members of the Zakhakhel tribe. The administration also closed local routes, and mounted an economic blockade, and stopped all privileges to tribesmen. No identity cards were being issued, and troops patrolled in most bazaars.

These activities brought many zones in the Agency to a standstill. An official announced that the crackdown on Gagrina would continue, and also be repeated in other parts of Tirah and Landi Kotal.

450 tribesmen from various areas of Khyber Agency gathered in Pakhai in a jirga, where they voiced support for the administration's crackdown on Mangal Bagh and his followers. They came from Brag, Karamna, Alacha, Ziara, Dargai, Khyber and other areas. The jirga decided to impose a fine of 500,000 rupees ($8,299) to anyone who gave shelter to Mangal Bagh. They also ordered that anyone who allowed their house to be used as a refuge for the Islamic Army leader would additionally have their house burned down.

One bearded commander of Lashkar-i-Islami claimed: "It is just a reformative organization for the betterment of the tribesmen of Khyber Agency. I have the support of 98 per cent local populance and those who are against me are the people involved in wrongdoing."

On Monday July 17, Dr Tashfeen, the Khyber Agency political agent, demanded that the Zakhakhel tribe hand over Mangal Bagh Afridi within one week. Failure to do so would invoke punishment, including withdrawal of government incentives.

On Tuesday, July 18, Mangal Bagh Afridi, who now was making his own broadcasts on his own FM radio station, bequeathed by Munir Shakir. Bagh decided to be openly defiant. He announced on his "show" that he would mount violent protests if the Khyber Agency administration did not refuse to drop its demands for him to surrender. He even threatened that he would bring in cross-border support from Afghanistan to assist in his threat of terror.

He said: "It has now become difficult for us to remain peaceful. I assure you that unlike Waziristan, our armed struggle would go beyond the frontiers of the tribal territory"

Mangal Bagh added: "If you cannot make a government servant (political agent) abide by the constitution and (yet) have accepted him as the ruler of the agency, then you (parliamentarians) have no right to represent us in the assembly."

The following day, paramilitary forces were sent to guard the residence of Maulana Khalil Rehman, who represented Khyber Agency in the National Assembly. Rehmin said that his own policies of moderation had made Lashkar-i-Islami hostile. He said that he would not close down businesses, as this would punish the wrong people.

It appears that the local administration is hoping that by appealing to the local tribespeople, and hoping to appease them through conciliatory measures to act in a hardline manner to Mangal Bagh. Now the administration has the "agreement" of elders of the Zakhakhel tribe. But even if Mangal Bagh does get handed over to the administration, the FATA-installed authorities have such a tenuous grip on the tribespeople's loyalties, there will be more Mangal Baghs to replace him.

His army is not going to simply revert to being loyal to the Khyber Agency administration, particularly after the fickle way in which it has responded to the threat, attacking whole communities. The way in which the administration has allowed the Deobandi/Barelvi and other conflicts in the region to fester, only acting tough when severe violence breaks out, will only weaken the power of the government in the region.

In the words of Dr. Ashok K Behuria, Research Fellow at the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, New Delhi: In the absence of an imaginative plan to counter such an assertive ideology at the grassroots level, Pakistan will continue to labour under a million mutinies, which will increasingly weaken the capacity of the state in the days to come.

Posted by Giraldus Cambrensis at August 7, 2006 11:58 PM

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Posted by: Idreesafridi at April 17, 2008 4:03 AM

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