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October 30, 2006

Pakistan: Protests Over Islamic Seminary Bombing

The Pakistan authorities early on Monday bombed a madrassa in the borderland territory adjoining Afghanistan. The school was said to be full at the time of the attack, and it is believed that 80 people have been killed.

The news is covered by BBC, New York Times, Le Figaro, Le Monde, Washington Post, the Times, Telegraph, Guardian, AKI and the Washington Times.

The attack took place at 5 am local time, before dawn, by Pakistan military, accompanied by helicopter gunships. The madrassa is located in Bajaur agency, one of the seven tribal regions which comprise FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Region) in North-West Frontier Province. The school was located at Chenagai village near the town of Khar, the main town in the agency. The funerals of those who died took place before sundown, and locals protested that those at the madrassa were merely students.

Army spokesman Major General Shaukat Sultan said that the madrassa had been observed for some time and the madrassa was a refuge of Islamists. He said: "These militants were involved in actions inside Pakistan and probably in Afghanistan."

"We received confirmed intelligence reports that 70 to 80 militants were hiding in a madrassa used as a terrorist-training facility, which was destroyed by an army strike, led by helicopters."

He denied that any women or children were present at the madrassa.

"The information that we are receiving so far is that majority of the facility has been destroyed and most of the miscreants present there, they have been killed. There is no house within about a 100-meter radius of this madrassa. As per information that we had, there were no women or children present there."

Some reporters at the scene had claimed that they saw several children, one as young as seven, pulled from the rubble, states the Guardian.

There were reports that the deputy leader of al-Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahiri, was in the area at the time of the attack. Sultan denied this, saying: "It is all wrong, speculative and we launched this operation on our own to target a training facility."

The madrassa was run by an extremist cleric, Maulvi Liaquat Hussain. He was killed in the assault on the madrassa. There have been suggestions made that the United States was behind the attack, but this has been denied by Taslima Hassan, the foreign ministry spokesperson.

The suggestions of American involvement and also the involvement of Zawahiri probably stem from the incident which happened on January 13, when US hellfire missiles hit a target in the village of Damadola in Bajaur agency. The US had information that Ayman al-Zawahri was due to visit that village, which lay six miles from the Afghan border.

18 people were killed in the raid, including four Islamists. It was later revealed that Al Qaeda's chemicals and explosives expert Mudhat Mursi al-Sayid Umar, aka Abu Jhabab al-Masri, had been killed in the Damidola raid.

At the time of the January attack in Bajaur agency, members of the six-member Islamist opposition, the Mutahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) protested against American involvement, and Qazi Hussain Ahmad, head of the MMA coalition, was arrested.

Once again, the MMA are protesting about the incident, and blaming the Americans for the attack on the madrassa. General Sultan also insisted there was no US involvement. "It was done purely by the Pakistan authorities. There was no American involvement."

The MMA has called for demonstrations on Tuesday. As a result, Britain's Prince Charles and his wife have announced that they have cancelled a planned trip to a madrassa in Peshawar, capital city of North-West Frontier Province. On Saturday, the Times had said the Prince and his partner were to view the inside of a "new model madrassa" which was under Pakistani government patronage. This madrassa was said to have smartly dressed students who learned the Koran and also took computer studies. The prince arrived in Pakistan late on Sunday night and on Monday spoke with President Musharraf.

The Telegraph reported that a royal spokesman stated: "The visit to Peshawar has been cancelled on the advice of the Pakistani government. An alternative programme for their Royal Highnesses for Tuesday is being considered. The Prince and the Duchess are disappointed not to be going."

The issue of the Bajaur agency and militancy has been a matter of international concern for some time. The Damidola bombing only highlighted the ease with which militants could pass from Afghanistan's Kunar province into Pakistan and back again. Another region of the North-West Frontier Province, Waziristan, has similarly been a source of concern.

In March, the so-called "Pakistan Taliban" took over this region. They established a sharia court in Wana, capital city of South Waziristan, and executed their first person on March 26. On Thursday December 1 last year in North Waziristan, a missile strike on the village of Haisori, near Miranshah killed Al Qaeda's third-in-command, Abu Hamza Rabia.

The Pakistan government has had about 70,000 to 80,000 military personnel posted in the border regions, as Afghan Taliban and Al Qaeda operatives have been hiding in the borderlands.

On September 5 the Pakistan government signed an "accord" with the Taliban in Waziristan. 45 Taliban members attended a jirga (tribal council) in Peshawar days after the deal was signed, where the governor of North-West Frontier Province, Ali Muhammad Jan Orakzai, rewarded each member of the jirga with 100,000 rupees apiece ($1,658). This was for their work in brokering the accord.

The accord agreed that the Taliban leaders would act to prevent militants from crossing over the border into Pakistan, and would also end the practice of "targeted killings". While the leaders in Peshawar were pocketing their rewards, the first of several victims of such targeted killings began to be discovered.

The accord was further proved meaningless when on October 19 there was a battle between Islamists and Afghan troops in Barmal district of Paktika province, southern Afghanistan. Most of the Islamists were killed or blew themselves up. Captured fighters claimed that they had come from Waziristan, and had been urged to fight by Muslim clerics in the region. The Taliban in Pakistan had not kept to their side of the accord agreements, by allowing fighters to cross the border.

Despite the obvious failure and impotence of the accord, the Pakistani government had intended to initiate a similar accord in Bajaur agency. The accord would have been signed on Monday, but as a result of the attack upon the madrassa near Khar, this did not happen.

The Pakistan Daily Times reported that on Saturday, a jirga took place in Bajaur agency, where pro-Taliban militants and elders gathered. They called Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar "heroes of the Muslim world", and also vowed to have joint efforts to fight the "enemies of peace" in Bajaur. The Times said that 5,000 militants attended this jirga, whereas the Guardian gave the figure as 3,000.

Last week, nine suspected al-Qaeda militants were released by the political administration of Bajaur Agency. It was widely believed that this move was a preliminary step before agreeing on a peace accord.

The madrassa which was bombed had been repeatedly warned to close down, the military states, and said that militants could not hide behind peace deals. Major General Shakaur Sultan said that the militants at the madrassa had received "clear warnings" before the attack. "They were told to close the madrasa, but they refused." He suggested that peace talks would still continue. "The prospects for peace are there," he said.

The Jamaat-e-Islami, the Islamist party which is headed by Qazi Hussain Ahmad, leader of the MMA, condemned the attack on the Chenagai madrassa as "brutal and barbaric". The MMA parties hold the majority of the seats in the North-West Frontier Province National Assembly. One member of the Assembly's cabinet, Siraj Ul Haq, has said that he will resign in protest against the attack.

Ul Haq said: "This is against Islam and the traditions of the area. This was an unprovoked attack on a madrasa. They were innocent people."

In Islamabad, Qazi Hussain Ahmad said: "It was an American plane behind the attack and Pakistan is taking responsibility because they know there would be a civil war if the American responsibility was known."

Ahmad said that only three students survived at the Madarisa Zia-ul-Uloom Taleem-ul-Quran, as it was called, states IRNA. He also claimed that 25 of the students were under 15, and that they had been bombed as they were preparing for morning prayers.

In Chenagai there were protests on Monday, as well as in Khar, where 2,000 tribesman and shopkeepers shouted "Death to Musharraf! Death to Bush!" During the Chenagai protest, states the Washington Post, one protester held aloft a severed charred hand.

Posted by Giraldus Cambrensis at October 30, 2006 7:03 PM

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