A Housewife's Weblog » Politics

Imran Khan: Why I believe America created Taliban

phw — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 18:22:55 +0000

Liz Hoggard writes in London Evening Standard

imran khan

I don’t have to do this,” Imran Khan tells me earnestly. “I could have a very easy existence. I could go on TV and make so much money, live like a king.” Instead the retired international cricketer, and former husband of Jemima Khan, has dedicated his life to politics back home in Pakistan. Jemima, the daughter of the late financier, Sir James Goldsmith, may just have bought a £15 million stately pile in Oxfordshire, but Imran lives hand-to-mouth on a farm outside Islamabad. He grows his own vegetables and tends cows on his land in the foothills of the Himalayas.

Since he founded his party, Tehreek-e-Insaf (the Movement for Justice), in 1996 on an anti-corruption platform, he has campaigned against the elite hogging all the resources. He personally sold all his cricketing memorabilia to fund a cancer hospital in memory of his mother, who died of the disease, and he has opened a vocational college in a poverty-stricken area of Pakistan.

Imran, 57, took nothing from Jemima’s fortune when they divorced, so when he runs out of money he does a brief stint as a TV pundit. But he is completely unmaterialistic. “You achieve inner peace when you give away what you have,” he says.

This week he is in London to talk about the crisis in Pakistan, but he has never liked city life. His parents used to take him up in the hills each summer as a boy, and now he takes his sons Sulaiman, 13, and Kasim, 10, hiking and shooting partridge when they visit his farm. He has built them a mini-cricket ground. “They are quite good,” he laughs.

Gone is the handsome playboy who spent his nights in Annabel’s and squired gorgeous women, including Susannah Constantine and painter Emma Sergeant, around town. He still has those patrician looks but these days Imran would rather stay up all night talking politics than nightclubbing.

Last week I watched him give a talk to students in London. Mostly bright, politicised young Pakistani-Muslims, they treated him like a rock star. His sense of urgency was palpable, as is his fear that Pakistan might implode at any minute.

Already, it is routinely described as a “failed state”. From day one he opposed the War on Terror and “the American puppet politicians in Pakistan”. The decision to send the army into the tribal areas of the North West Frontier, to flush out al Qaeda terrorists, simply fuelled extremism. “It’s civil war in the making,” he says shaking his head. “They were like a bull in a china shop, fighting one or two guerrillas with aerial bombing of villages. That turned people against the army and a new phenomenon was created: the Pakistan Taliban.” It’s made him believe even more passionately in socio-economic justice. “You will have no problem with extremists in Pakistan if you have democracy with a welfare state,” he tells the audience.

By the end of the evening he looked shattered. Half his life is spent in transit and his close friend tells me he is wearing jeans instead of the usual suit because he forgot to pack a belt. When I meet him two days later at Ormeley Lodge, near Richmond Park, he is still fielding calls about a wave of bombings in Pakistan, and trying to have high tea with his sons. The Georgian childhood home of his former wife is where Imran stays whenever he is in London, as a guest of her mother, Lady Annabel Goldsmith. The wing where we meet is modest: with a pool table and well-worn sofas.

He speaks cordially — if carefully —about his ex-wife. “It’s a very tricky thing, divorce, and toughest on the children. But as divorces go, ours has been the most amicable. The anger and bitterness comes when there is infidelity. But there was no infidelity,” he says firmly. “I realised her unhappiness in Pakistan and she, after trying her best, found she just couldn’t live there. So that’s why it ended, it was just a geographical problem, and we couldn’t sustain a marriage like that. If you care for someone you don’t want to see them unhappy. My connection with the Goldsmith household is just as it’s always been. They [Jemima's siblings, Zac and Ben] are like my younger brothers. And Annabel is as close to me.”

His marriage suffered because of his political zeal — he didn’t stand in the 2007 election, arguing that there could be no democracy while the judges were still controlled by the ruling party. But now politics is a mission for him, not a career. “If someone offered me a political career, I would shoot myself. Having to get votes through making compromises, no thank you. “The classic example in Englandis Tony Blair.

How did the people go wrong with him lying all the way? He sold the idea that there were weapons of mass destruction. If there had been conscientious politicians in your assembly who weren’t worried about their political careers, he would never have got away with it.” Many people think his involvement in politics is a way to keep alight the adulation he craved as a cricketer, but after leavingAitchison College in Lahore (the equivalent of Eton), he studied politics at Keble College, Oxford. Former cricketing colleagues — Imran played for Worcestershire and Sussex — recall an intense young man who hated pubs (as a Muslim he doesn’t drink) and public speaking. He returned to cricket once more at the World Cupin 1992, aged 39 when he captained Pakistan to victory.

But his spiritual awakening had come in his early thirties after witnessing his mother’s agonising death from cancer, without access to proper treatment and painkilling drugs. “She was in such agony that after she passed away I had to consciously discipline myself to shut out the memory of her pain.”

He consulted a mystic who “made me realise I had a responsibility to society because I was given so much. It created selflessness”. Imran approached Pakistan’s richest men — many had been schoolfriends — for help in raising £25 million to build a cancer hospital, but quickly learned that wealth and generosity don’t always go hand in hand. Instead, he took to an open jeep and toured 29 cities in six weeks, asking ordinary people for help. “In those six weeks I changed. I realised the generosity of tea boys, taxi drivers, the poorest people bringing 10 rupee notes — and also their faith. I collected £14 million in those six weeks.” Today the hospital treats 70 per cent of patients for free.

Although the dictatorial president, Pervez Musharraf, resigned in 2008, Imran has no faith in the current “democratic” government, now headed by Asif Ali Zardari, the widower of Benazir Bhutto. Imran talks passionately about how the rich in Pakistan travel by jet and have tax-evading bank accounts in Switzerland.

He may insist that support for his Movement for Justice party is growing, but the truth is he is still perceived as a maverick outsider. And his romantic past hasn’t helped. Conservative voters bring up the love child with Sita White (Imran has never publicly acknowledged Tyrian, now 17, as his daughter; but since her mother died in 2004, he has been involved in her upbringing). And of course there’s his marriage to Jemima, a half-Jewish, half Catholic heiress.

Despite converting to Islam and learning Urdu, Jemima — 20 years Imran’s junior and still at university when they met — was accused (falsely) of trying to smuggle antique tiles out of Pakistan. The final straw, says Imran, was in 2002 when she was accused of studying under “the blasphemer Salman Rushdie” because his book, The Satanic Verses, had appeared on her university reading list. Protesters torched posters of Jemima. “She was really shaken up by that and moved to England, so that was a big crisis for me.”

Two years later the marriage ended. Jemima has continued to impress as Unicef special representative — and a passionate advocate for democracy in Pakistan. “Frankly I never understood the media image of her as a socialite,” Imran tells me. “I never thought she would fit into that role because she’s very bright, she’s very political.”

But then Imran is a mass of contradictions himself. In the past, he has argued that the pressure on women to work has contributed to the breakdown of society in the West: “My mother was the biggest influence on my life, a proper mother.” Yet he believes that “a woman should be able to reach her full potential”, and he set up his university in a remote, conservative part of Pakistan precisely so local women could get an education for the first time in the region’s history. And he reminds me his three sisters are high-powered career women with children.

Pakistan is Imran’s passion and he feels little nostalgia for London — except as the place where his sons live: “Fatherhood has given me the greatest pleasure in my life. And hence it was very painful, the divorce, because that [being separated from them] was the main aspect. But I am basically a goal-orientated person, it’s never been about making money or a job. My passion is there so I only come to England to see my children.”

Imran has a core group of friends he has known for 40 years here. Setting up this interview, I came across a devoted group of Londoners — from lecturers to hairdressers — who give up time and money to support his party. “They know I do not have to do this, that it’s a big personal sacrifice,” he says.

He finds it desperately sad that he has to defend being a Muslim. “The most important thing to understand is what’s happening in Pakistan, and this war on terror is not a religious issue, it’s a political issue.” No religion allows terrorism, Imran insists, but “people pushed into desperate situations will do desperate acts”.

It doesn’t make him popular. He’s been dubbed a Taliban supporter by the same enemies who once called him a Zionist sympathiser. Critics say his politics are idealistic and unworkable in a country bailed out of chaos periodically by military regimes, but Imran insists democracy can be a street movement: “Yes there’s a fear, will Pakistan survive? But in a way it’s very encouraging because you can see the politicisation of the youth. That’s how it starts, in the campuses. Sixty-five per cent of Pakistanis are below the age of 25.”

This probably explains why four days ago, with the help of Jemima, Imran set up his own Twitter page. Back home, he says current affairs programmes get higher ratings than Big Brother.

“Our Paxmans are the most watched in Pakistan today.” Is he handing over the baton? He smiles wearily. “Basically I want the young to come in and upset the whole equation.”

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Tags: Cricket, General, himalayas, imran khan, islamabad, jemima khan, london, london evening standard, oxfordshire, Pakistan, Politics, sir james goldsmith, Star Pakistanis, tehreek-e-insaaf

Poor Pelicans Vs Oil Leakage

phw — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 06:27:23 +0000

poor pelican

On watching this picture my son exclaimed “Poor pelican! They can’t fly, can’t breate or eat! Its my favorite bird.”

The oil well under water is still leaking 20,000 to 40,000 barrels per day since the April 20 rig explosion that killed 11 workers and set the disaster in motion. This is a threatening situation for fish, sea birds and other wildlife. I wish humans are more careful and thoughtful. These birds faced an attack from an unseen enemy. My heart goes out to them. Most birds arrive at rescue centers hungry, dehydrated and exhausted, having neglected eating in the frantic struggle to clean themselves.

What are the chances of survival for a pelican (like the one in the picture)?

Scientists with the Marine Wildlife Veterinary Care and Research Center in California said it costs them $600 to $750 to clean a bird. Cleaning a single pelican can require 300 gallons of water. How many birds can these rescue missions save? Not many. I still appreciate their effort as they are trying to make a difference in the lives of our generations to come.

On the other hand more important role is to be played by the developed countries who claim to be the masters and have acquired the role of cleaning the world from all the elements endangering life on planet earth.

Their role somehow is amusing and confusing at the same time. The developed world does not want their citizens to be killed by weapons and yet they are the major producers and ‘users’ of these destructive weapons. The developed world wants the enviroment to be preserved and safe but they are the major destroyers as they produce maximum chemicals that leave the water, air and earth polluted. Only from 2000 to 2009, 72 spills dumped 18,000 barrels of oil into U.S. federal waters only.

Please save wildlife, save earth.

Crying for help

http://www.stuff.co.nz/world/americas/3802244/US-doubles-Gulf-spill-estimate

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Tags: BP oil spill, General, gulf of mexico, News, oil pelican, pelicans and oil spill, Politics, sea birds, wildlife, World

Pakistan celebrates Youm-e-Takbeer

phw — Fri, 28 May 2010 16:04:52 +0000

Nuclear club

Bombs kill !! Should we celebrate making a bomb?

Lets have a look at the other nations who have this ability. This elite group does not include any poor, weak, underdeveloped and uneducated country. They are all “powerful” and developed countries. But Pakistan entered this club after their nuclear tests in 1998 in reply to Indian explosions . That made Pakistan the seventh nuclear nation of the world and first Muslim state equipped with deadly arsenal.

People argue why should we possess them in the first place. Having them does not mean we will use them too. If I have a gun at home for self defence this doesn’t mean I will go out and shoot someone. It is only for the neighborhood to know your ability to fight back if attacked. In this world with so many divisions and strict beliefs such powers are only meant to retain the balance. Either everyone should give up these deadly weapons and lets make our world nuclear free or lets celebrate having them.

Pakistan exploded its nuclear devices at Chaghi on 28th May twelve years ago and we are celebrating this day today. Happy Youm-e-Takbeer to all Pakistanis. Allah o Akbar!

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Tags: cartoon, chaghi, General, india pakistan, may 28, nuclear club, Pakistan, pakistan nuclear weapons, Pakistani Housewife, Politics, World, youm-e-takbeer

Faisal Shehzad succeeded in Destroying our Image

phw — Mon, 24 May 2010 08:13:12 +0000

Faisal Shahzad & wife

Faisal Shahzad Succeeded in Destroying the Image of Every Pakistani

I sat down with my breakfast and laid my eyes on the newspaper a few days ago. There was a picture of a young model like man on the front page. Such pictures appear when a huge advertisement campaign uses the front page too but on a closer look I realised it was a serious news. This was Faisal Shahzad who became a known face overnight but all for wrong reasons. He tried to bomb the Times square NY.

If any sane Pakistani who is educated, employed, married and “was” living a normal life acts in the way Faisal did ….its hard to believe. Who would like to put his life, family, career and country on stake for attempting to kill innocent people? This is not Islam. Smells like consiracy.

His insanity has stamped a question mark on the face of every normal Pakistani living in the world who is trying to earn and live a peace life like everybody else. All of us are sad on becoming a culprit without doing anything. Such Pakistanis are damaging this country.Why did he do this? is this an adventure? was he out of his mind?

His family profile doesn’t depict him to be someone desirous of bombing New York. Having a father who was an officer of the Pakistan Air Force (Air Vice Marshal Baharul Haq), a brother well-settled in Canada, a paternal uncle, Major General Tajul Haq, former Inspector General of the Frontier Corps (IGFC), a father-in-law Iftikhar Mian who runs a successful business in Karachi and a well-educated wife, Huma Mian, who is an American national, Faisal Shehzad simply doesn’t fit the conventional profile of a Jihadi terrorist.

He failed in his attempt to bomb the “times square” but succeeded in destroying the image of every Pakistani. He is also responsible for a dark future of his kids who will always be termed as children of a terrorist. He gave this pain to his parents in this age…. I wish to find out the true reason behind his insanity.

Faisal Shahzad's house Pakistan

Times Square, By Dr Farrukh Saleem

phw — Sun, 23 May 2010 17:01:54 +0000

Dr._Farrukh_Saleem

Dr Farrukh Saleem writes ….He raises some very logical points.

America would look after its interests. We must look after our own.

America is neither Pakistan’s friend nor its foe. Of the 192 countries on the face of the planet America loves just one. And, that country is: America. Everywhere else it’s American national interests – political, economic and strategic.

On March 8, Phantom Fireworks sold a box of M-88 Silver Salute consumer-grade firecrackers (that sell for $10.99 for a 36-count box each containing 50 milligrams of explosives, the size of a quarter of a tablet of aspirin). In April, a Bridgeport teenager sold her dark blue 1993 Nissan Pathfinder SUV for $1,300.

On May 1, the Minskoff Theatre was showing the musical The Lion King. At 6:28 p.m., a dark blue 1993 Nissan Pathfinder SUV entered Times Square and was parked, engine left running and hazard lights on, at 1 Astor Plaza, 1515 Broadway. At 6:30 p.m. Aliou Niasse, a Senegalese Muslim photograph vendor, cautioned an officer of the New York City Police Department (NYPD) of a dark-blue, smoke-emitting Nissan Pathfinder SUV, with fireworks cracking inside, parked at 1 Astor Plaza.

NYPD’s remote-controlled robot found two travel alarm clocks in the rear of the SUV both connected to two five-gallon cans of gasoline. In between the cans of gasoline, was a box of M-88 firecrackers. The SUV also had three 20-gallon tanks of propane, a metal pressure-cooker and eight plastic bags full of urea-based fertiliser.

On May 3, at 11:45 p.m., 53 hours after NYPD’s robot diffused Nissan’s explosives, US Customs and Border Protection agents boarded Emirates Flight 202, that was about to take off from John F. Kennedy Airport in Queens for Dubai and then to Islamabad, and took Faisal Shahzad, an American citizen of Pakistani descent, into custody.

Here’s what we have so far: a plane ticket from Pakistan to the US and another one from New York to Dubai. Living expenses plus $3,600 rental for three months. An SUV for $1,300, firecrackers, gasoline and propane. Everything included under $7,000.

To be certain, the bomb was diffused some two weeks ago and now its politics. Pakistan’s national interests would be served better if there isn’t a Waziristan connection. America, in the meanwhile, will press that there is a connection so as to pressurise Pakistan into clearing safe-heavens in North Waziristan.

Did the suspect now under custody really intend to kill innocent Americans? Was he a ‘lone wolf’; a person living, acting and/or working alone without a formal command structure? Is there a North Waziristan connection? We may never find out for sure.

This is what we know for sure: since 2003, Pakistani fatalities in terrorist violence stand at 27,756 of which 3,065 have been security forces personnel. There are forces out there killing our army jawans and officers. Since 2002, there have been 241 suicide bomb attacks. Since 2001, there have been 2,284 bomb blasts across Pakistan. There are forces out there wanting to capture physical Pakistani terrain and impose their own set of laws – and all that through the use of extreme violence. What we also know for sure is that for the past 30 years our public schools have been preaching – not teaching – lessons of hate, animosity, hostility, bigotry and intolerance.

America would look after its interests. We must look after our own.

P.S. The probability of the Taliban recruiting a naturalised American citizen of Pakistani descent – awfully wary that they are of getting infiltrated by an American agent – is very, very low.

The writer is a columnist based in Islamabad. Email: farrukh15@hotmail.com

Technorati Tags: america, Dr Farrukh Saleem, dr farrukh saleem 16 may 2010, nissan pathfinder, Pakistan, times square, waziristan

Tags: america, Dr Farrukh Saleem, dr farrukh saleem 16 may 2010, nissan pathfinder, Pakistan, Pakistan, Politics, times square, waziristan

Karamatullah K. Ghori writes

phw — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 15:54:50 +0000

PAK US

US plans for ‘imperial’ presence in Pakistan

Pardon the Pakistani news media going gaga over Washington’s plans to beef up, extraordinarily, its diplomatic presence in Pakistan. The plans are staggering and stupendous, for want of more descriptive adjectives. But they are, for the record, just geared to Washington’s diplomatic stake in Pakistan, lest the Pakistanis routinely clobbered in the ‘civilised western world’ for their outbursts of emotions over supposedly petty little things.

‘The Americans are coming, and coming big,’ according to media pundits in Pakistan. And none should blame them for going over the top because the figures being bandied about are, to say the very least, flabbergasting.

What’s on the drawing boards in Washington and Islamabad are the blue prints for vastly increasing the number of American personnel manning one of the most important diplomatic presence in the 21st century for the Americans in Pakistan. Apparently, Washington feels that its battery of 750 men and women stocking the American Embassy in Islamabad is far too inadequate to cope with the job on their hands. They need to be given a big injection to inflate their muscles. The magic potion said to be brewing would add at least another thousand people on what’s being described as a ‘war footing.’ That would take US diplomatic presence in Islamabad way above the current largest American diplomatic mission in Beijing, China; the number there stands at a paltry 1450.

The US Congress agrees with the mandarins at the State Department and has allocated 940 million dollars for the embassy in Islamabad and a number of American consulates, particularly those in Karachi and Peshawar. The fortress-like new consulate on Karachi’s Arabian Sea is spread over six acres of prime land, given to them at a throw-away price, of course. What are friends for, after all, and the Americans, don’t forget, have powerful friends in very high places in Pakistan.

(Meanwhile, US ambassador Anne Patterson, reacting to media reports, has said that the number of Marines in the new embassy would be less than 20. They would be accommodated in a bomb-proof facility. At present the embassy has 250 regular staff, 200 visiting American staff and 1,000 local personnel. Another 500 would be added in next three years.)

The government of Pakistan is obviously chipping into these plans with a magnanimity that our ruling elite is so well-known for, as far as their overseas ‘friends’ are concerned. They may be tight-fisted and niggardly to their own people but for minders and mentors from the world beyond Pakistan, sky is the limit.

Little wonder, therefore, that a huge parcel of 18 acres of prime land in Islamabad’s exclusive diplomatic enclave has been ‘sold’ to the American Embassy for just one billion rupees, a fraction of its market worth. What is 18 acres between friends; peanuts when you think of how magnanimously Pervez Musharraf presented the whole of Pakistan to his American mentors over just a phone call from Colin Powell. It was a friendly transaction between two soldiers.

So the fortress in Islamabad, when built, will dwarf the mini-fortress of Karachi. It will be a city in its own right, a typical American enclave on Pakistan’s soil, with its own residential colony for the staff and all the requisite paraphernalia of entertainment and security to convey the American sense in spades to its denizens.

But wait. The Pakistani pundits have nothing to grudge the Americans their plans to replicate their America on a little patch of Pakistan. What worries them is what’s at the core of these huge plans of expansion, and what kind of people are coming in droves to Karachi, Islamabad and Peshawar with the obvious intent to cover all the bases in Pakistan.

Pakistan can’t seem to get rid of its perennial problem of being hyphenated with this or that of its neighbours in Washington’s esteem. It was India until not too long ago when American relations with India were taken to another, high, pedestal, with Pakistan left in a limbo to search its own station in American evaluation.

For a moment Pakistan thought it had jettisoned, for good, its hyphenated syndrome. But that feeling didn’t last long. The US is immersed deep into its Afghan adventure and Pakistan is back in its role of a key, front-line, ally. Hence Pakistan can’t be separated from Afghanistan; hence it must play out to the hilt its role of a soldier in a forward trench whose mission is to pull Washington’s chestnut out of the Afghan fire.

It doesn’t matter how Pakistan got involved in the Bush war on terror, or how Musharraf succumbed to the pressure. The ground reality, no matter how tart or unpalatable to a lot of Pakistanis, is that Pakistan is up to its eyeballs into America’s war and must pay the price of the follies of its rulers, past and present.

The US drew a seminal lesson from its involvement in World War II and that’s that America can best be protected, if not insulated from the outside world, by drawing its lines of defence in far off lands, in places wherever a threat to US security or its quest for global dominance may occur and must be pre-empted with maximum force.

The American wars in Korea and Vietnam were triggered by this policy of offence-being-the-best-defence. George W. Bush, an ardent practitioner of Pax Americana couldn’t be more articulate than coining the shibboleth of ‘taking the war to the enemy.’ The invasion of Afghanistan, on the heels of 9/11 was justified on this premise, besides being a prop to Bush’s dream of an imperial America holding the world in its thrall.

Barack Obama may be poles-apart from Bush on so many other things but shares his perception of fighting the enemy on its terrain. Add to it his own vision of winning the war in Afghanistan at any cost. So no price is too high once you commit yourself to achieving a goal; and Obama has his heart set on ferreting out victory of any sort in Afghanistan after having lost the one in Iraq.

But wars can’t be won cheap. They require elaborate logistics. Pakistan has become a cockpit of conflict and chaos spawned by its involvement in the Afghan imbroglio. So Pakistan must be primed to deliver according to Washington’s expectations. Logistics must be so arranged as to deal with Pakistan’s chaotic and turbulent scenario according to Washington’s master-plan for the area.

The logistics involve the building of fortresses bristling with hi-tech gadgetry that keeps the troublesome Pakistanis, or the Pakistani Taliban and their ilk, at a safe distance. That’s an essential tool of 21st century imperialistic reach. In the olden days of imperialism they used to occupy whole countries and convert them into colonies. Technological sophistication and advancement has offered better alternatives, dispensing with the archaic practice of outright colonies to intimidate the locals. Hence the logic and imperative for modern-day fortresses like the ones springing up from one end of Pakistan to another.

Those who have followed the American adventure in Iraq know what havoc mercenary American defence contractors wreaked there. Blackwater was a principal mercenary outfit to which the State Department outsourced its obligations in Iraq. Its gung-ho mercenaries raped and murdered Iraqis at will to such an extent that even the supine government of Noori Al-Maliki was forced to impel Washington to pull Blackwater’s notorious murderers out of Iraq.

The same Blackwater is now getting ready to replicate its Iraqi tactics in Pakistan and some of its operatives are already believed to be in action in Peshawar and its environs. The word has gone out that the Americans are keen to buy Peshawar’s lone 5-star hotel in order to accommodate the likes of Blackwater in luxury for special operations within Pakistan and beyond, in Afghanistan, of course.

The State Department has obviously drawn no lessons from its skewed Iraqi operations and seems willing to retry them in Pakistan. One shudders to think of the fallout of a lethal confrontation between the rogues of Blackwater, running berserk across the troubled North West Frontier Region just as they did in Iraq, and the trigger-happy Pakistani Taliban to whom these provocative aliens would be like red rag to an enraged bull.

The US is a global power charged with a self-anointed mission to fight wherever necessary to keep the terrorists away from its shores. Its history of such messianic adventures not only justifies war by any means but also sanctifies its actions. The question troubling the Pakistani minds is why should their rulers be so blind to this deadly game being played out on the Pakistani turf?

K_K_ghori@yahoo.com

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Blackwater, the world’s largest private army

phw — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 18:32:49 +0000

black water

Blackwater, the world’s biggest private army, faces a terrible charge – that they were on a crusade to wipe out Muslims
By ZOE BRENNAN

(The Daily Mail) The convoy of SUVs threading through Baghdad’s busy streets came to an abrupt halt at Nisour Square.
Inside the vehicles were a team of black-clad security guards from the infamous Blackwater private military contractor – the American private army accused last week of embarking on a ‘crusade to eliminate Muslims’.
This supposed ‘crusade’ has earned the company’s mysterious founder, Erik Prince, over $1billion for government security contracts alone. But, as we shall see, this huge pay-cheque certainly wasn’t gained without getting some hands dirty.
For the Blackwater guards who stopped at Nisour Square were bristling with guns. What happened next is now the subject of a court case.

According to one observer, the American mercenaries began shooting at random into the Iraqi crowd. ‘The shooting was so heavy it was like rain,’ says Farid Walid, who was shot in the attack two years ago, a massacre which left 17 Iraqis dead.
‘I saw lots of people getting shot. The driver who had been in front of me died and his wife fell out of the car. Her child was killed as well. The shooting went on for about ten minutes.’
Umm Tahsin, widow of one of the men killed, says: ‘They [Blackwater] are a group of criminals. [It] was a massacre. They destroyed our family.’

Blackwater insists its guards returned fire against armed insurgents threatening American diplomats.
However, an Iraqi government official has claimed the U.S. security men opened fire because they were stuck in traffic, throwing stun grenades in order to clear the road.
An eyewitness backs up his story. Hairdresser Suhad Mirza, 29, was working in her salon about 250m from Nisour Square when she heard sirens. ‘I went outside the shop to see a convoy of SUVs with security guards shooting randomly at people,’ she says.
‘Apparently, the guards wanted to make their way through the traffic jam made by an Iraqi army checkpoint. Minutes later, the ambulances arrived to pick up the wounded and dead.’

‘Murdering Iraqis under Christian supremacy’

At a congressional hearing in October 2007, following the controversy related to Blackwater’s conduct in Iraq and Afghanistan, he refused to discuss his company’s finances, saying: ‘We’re a private company. There’s a key word there – private.’

He also objected to the use of the word ‘mercenaries’, a ‘slanderous term’ or an ‘inflammatory term they use to malign us’, saying he preferred to call his employees ‘loyal Americans’ who ‘bleed red, white and blue’.

That may be, but the John Doe No2 affidavit alleges that Prince likes to recruit men to Iraq ‘who shared his vision of Christian supremacy, knowing and wanting these men to take every available opportunity to murder Iraqis’. In a statement, the company said it would respond ‘to the anonymous unsubstantiated and offensive assertions put forward’ in its brief, to be filed on August 17.

A spokesperson added: ‘It is obvious that plaintiffs have chosen to slander Mr Prince rather than raise legal arguments or actual facts that will be considered by a court of law. We are happy to engage them there. We question the judgment of anyone who relies upon an [reiterates] anonymous declarations.’

The company failed to respond when I contacted it for further comment. Five Blackwater guards who pleaded not guilty to manslaughter charges are awaiting trial over the Nisour Square attack. A sixth guard pleaded guilty.

For his part, Abu Suhad, a Baghdad local, has no time for company spokesmen and official statements. He lost his daughter in 2007 when she was driving her car near the Iraqi foreign ministry in central Baghdad.

He says: ‘Eyewitnesses told me that four white Blackwater cars went by her. They were already past when the last one shot her in the head at close range and killed her. The bullet came from the driver’s window, which means that he got next to her when he shot her.

‘The bullet entered from under the ear and left from the upper side of her skull. There were bits of her hair and skin on the car roof.’

As he mourns his daughter, he is left wondering why a security company was supposedly allowed to act above the law by the U.S. government. It is a decision that might yet come back to haunt the American military.

Read full story

Blackwater operational in Pakistan

American NGOs cover for Blackwater in Pakistan

Blackwater spread fear in Peshawar

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US Embassy in Islamabad Expands

phw — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 10:04:13 +0000

Some worrying developments are taking place in our capital. Islamabad has changed so much since this war on terror started. Our residental areas have concrete blockages, our main streets like (Margalla Road at various points, Road in F6 which leads to ICG) are closed for public use. CDA made so much effort in spreading this road network but now “VIP” security has made all these newly made roads UGLY!!!

US embassy

By Baqir Sajjad Syed

ISLAMABAD: The US plans to have a bigger presence in Pakistan in the pursuit of its strategic interests in the region have raised several eyebrows in Islamabad.

The two most obvious indications of US intentions are the upcoming large-scale staff surge at the Islamabad embassy, which includes hundreds of marines, and the massive expansion work at the embassy premises.

The Americans intend to spend about $1 billion for the upgradation of their Islamabad presence, including an expenditure of $405 million for the reconstruction and refurbishment of the main embassy building; $111 million for a new complex for accommodating 330 personnel; and $197 million for constructing about 250 housing units.

For this purpose the American embassy has acquired about 18 acres of land for a meagre Rs1 billion, courtesy of the Capital Development Authority. The CDA had recently, in another transaction, sold just six acres of land for Rs6 billion. A Turkish firm has already built a 153-room compound for the embassy.

The upcoming fortress-like embassy is meant for accommodating close to 1,000 additional personnel being sent to Islamabad as part of the US administration’s decision to increase its staff in Pakistan. The new staffers would augment the 750-strong American contingent already based in Pakistan against a sanctioned strength of 350.

What appears to be more alarming is that this staff surge would include 350 marines.

Additionally, the Americans are pressuring Islamabad to allow the import of hundreds of Dyncorp Armoured Personnel Carriers.

Jonathan Blyth, director of external affairs at the Bureau of Overseas Buildings Operations in Washington, in a media statement justified plans for the greater footprint in Pakistan, saying they were necessary for meeting future requirements in view of the ‘greater commitment shown by the Obama administration towards Pakistan’.

Deputy Chief of US Mission in Islamabad Gerald Feierstein told Dawn that upcoming large-scale programmes needed more staff, but quickly added that nothing was final as yet. Others in Washington are justifying the expansion of the embassy on security grounds.

Despite all these explanations, the situation remains puzzling and is definitely straining relations between the US State Department and the Foreign Office in Islamabad.

Are these arrangements being made just to cater for the enhanced security needs of the American embassy and their diplomats based here, or are they aimed at micromanaging Pakistan? This is just one question nagging Pakistani officials as they warily scan the developments and insist that there is something more than what meets the eye.

Some of these reservations were expressed by former foreign secretary Shamshad Ahmed Khan. He told Dawn recently that indications were very clear that America wanted to ‘remote-control’ the region from Islamabad.

‘The US is eying a long-term presence in the region to protect its interests and Islamabad is an ideal place for that purpose technologically, diplomatically and personnel-wise.’

Another former diplomat said he saw no justification for such a huge US presence in Islamabad. ‘Clearly these are people who would be coming under cover of diplomatic assignments for covert operations that would be detrimental for Pakistan’s security interests.’

Courtest Dawn News

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Tags: American marines, dawn, islamabad, News, Pakistan, Politics, US embassy Islamabad

Will Musharraf follow Altaf Hussain, Benazir and shokat Aziz?

phw — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 12:14:16 +0000

We have a history of not holding our leaders accountable (I do not mean in a revengeful way) when they are holding the office. When they leave the office after committing gross crimes like violation of constitution , events which led to East Pakistan saga, killing of Akbar Bugti, tradgey of Lal Masjid and the list may go on and on even then they are allowed to flee to foreign lands. Why is time always not right to question these culprits or the nation will be fooled into forgiving them everytime!

I was praising Musharraf the other day that he stayed back in Pakistan even after resigning but today we are hearing that he is advised to stay out of Pakistan.

The sources close to the former president claim that the retired general has no problem in staying on in London. In case he finds some difficulty in living in the British capital, he could move to California where his son Bilal Musharraf is living. It is yet to be determined how the US administration would react to the plan of the former president to enter the United States this time.

Pervez Musharraf could also shift to Chicago where his brother is living. The sources said that Musharraf would make a decision about his future course of action in September next and till then he would avoid returning.(Read more)

This shows their(leaders) lack of trust on the judicial system but the question is who kept the judiciary weak? Weak,corrupt and for-sale judges are not in the interset of the nation but they are kept that way to protect these very politicians and leaders when they are in power!

I wish to ask why are we holding only Musharraf accountable ? what about his close aids, advisors and other benefitiries like Mr Shokat Aziz. Mr Aziz after all used all his banking and finance experience to fool poor Pakistanis (his resume holds the wheat crisis, power crisis and the stock exchange crisis), just to secure his very own future!!! We heard he was already a rich man but then how much is enough for these people ?????

Will Musharraf also settle out of Pakistan like Altaf Hussain, Shokat Aziz and others….

Technorati Tags: Akbar bugti, bilal musharraf, lal masjid, musharraf, pakistan politics, shokat aziz

Tags: Akbar bugti, bilal musharraf, lal masjid, musharraf, Pakistan, pakistan politics, Politics, shokat aziz

Musharraf chooses to defend himself

phw — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 12:17:03 +0000

musharraf defends

Former President General (r) Pervez Musharraf has vowed to return Pakistan to face the trial being carried out by the Supreme Court of Pakistan in a case filed against his extra-constitutional steps on November 3, 2007. Musharraf, while talking to newsmen after holding meetings with his legal advisors and former political allies, told the newsmen Thursday that he was ready to appear before the court “if needed”.

The former President General (rtd) Pervez Musharraf constituted a committee of lawyers to defend him in cases filed against him at the Supreme Court, a private TV reported Friday. The legal committee of the former president will be headed by Abdul Hafeez Pirzadah with Khalid Ranjha, Malik Abdul Qayyum and Chaudhry Fawwad as committee members. Talking to Chaudhry Fawwad by phone from London, Pervez Musharraf said he did everything during his era for national interest. The former President is quoted saying, ‘I saw good time, will see bad times now.’ It should be noted that the Supreme Court issued summon notice to the former president directing him to appear before court on July 29 in cases relating judges’ appointment and emergency.

I hope and pray that one day a charge sheet is put up against the MQM Leader Altaf Hussain and we will all see if he is brave enough to come and face the charges in Pakistan.

Jemima interviews Musharraf

Karan Thapar talks to Musharraf

List of Pakistani Newspapers

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