Analytical Report The young members of Pakistan Peoples Party are not happy with their party leadership in Gilgit – Baltistan. Two senior members, Manzoor Bagoro and Babu Astori, have openly led protests against the Chief Minister, who is also the party’s president in GB. The dissatisfied group, with the help of some nationalists, like Kashif [...]

Pakistan needs rule of law and de-politicisation of police. Those engaging criminal offences like hate speech, threats and incitement to violence, and vigilante violence must be charged, tried, prosecuted, and punished. We will not allow people in public office or public positions, like political parties and traders’ unions to go around supporting hate-campaigns and violence. Please sign this petition demanding an end to violence against religious communities in Pakistan

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STOP VIOLENCE AND THREATS OF VIOLENCE AGAINST PAKISTAN’S RELIGIOUS COMMUNITIES

The President of Pakistan, Mr. Asif Ali Zardari
Prime Minister of Pakistan, Mr. Yusuf Raza Gilani
Leader of the Opposition, Mr. Ch. Nisar Ali Khan
Chief Minister of Punjab Mr. Shahbaz Sharif, PML-N
President Markazi Anjuman-i-Tajran Malik Shahid Ghafoor Paracha

We urge you to intervene and stop the killing of Pakistan’s religious communities, including Sunni (Barelvi), Shia (including Hazara) and Ahmedi communities that are facing a virtual genocide simply for following their religious beliefs and practices.

You are no doubt familiar with Quaid-e-Azam, Muhammad Ali Jinnah’s speech to the Constituent Assembly on Aug 11, 1947, in which he said: “You are free; you are free to go to your temples. You are free to go to your mosques or to any other places of worship in this State of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion, caste or creed –that has nothing to do with the business of the State.”

The recent attacks on the 12 Rabiul Awal processions in various cities around Pakistan (including Gujranwala, Mansehra, Gojar Khan, Mirpur, Khairpur and Karachi) are evidence of the menace of bigotry and intolerance. The government must act with all of its might to put a stop to this. It needs to be done NOW.

The evil lurks in the belly of the so-called Diffa-e-Pakistan Council, a coalition comprising several ‘religious parties’ including some banned organsiations whose views dont resonate with the majority but are able to use their armed status and street power to attack others with impunity. The activities of this coalition need to be curtailed before it becomes the Destroy Pakistan Council.

Many of those involved in the DPC are also active in the hate-campaign against the Ahmadiyya community. Most recently, hate-mongers have proposed the demolition of the Jamaat Ahmadiyya’s Aiwan e Tawheed building in Satellite Town Rawalpindi. We express our disappointment at the participation of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leaders in an anti-Ahmedi rally of Jan 29, 2012, attended by Member of Punjab Assembly Zia ullah Shah and traders union leader Sharjeel Mir (nominee for a PML-N ticket). It is also shocking that a leader of the traders community at this occasion made a threatening speech against the Ahmedi community.

We strongly condemn these threats of violence, and urge the establishment of a code of ethics, across the board that prohibits any political party supporting those who victimize others.

The Government, both at the Federal and Provincial levels, must take immediate action against violence, threats and intimidation, including those in the name of religion.

A witness protection plan must be instituted and the police empowered, enabled and de-politicised to act against those who violate basic human rights in Pakistan.

The full force of the law must be employed to ensure that no one attacks or threatens members of any community simply for following their religious beliefs and practices.

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Sincerely,

[Your name]

The United States (US) Committee on Foreign Affairs is set to convene a congressional hearing on Wednesday (February 8), for an exclusive discussion on Balochistan.

The extraordinary event has generated great interest among followers of Pakistan-US relations, as the allies’ mutual relationship seems to be deteriorating. The powerful House of Representatives committee oversees America’s foreign assistance programs and experts believe it can recommend halting US assistance to Pakistan over human rights violation in Balochistan.

Calls for ‘independence’
While Islamabad has strictly treated Balochistan as an internal matter, the debate on such a divisive topic by the powerful committee has highlighted the level of American interest in Balochistan and its support, if any, for the nationalist movement. On its part, Pakistan has kept Washington at arm’s length on the Balochistan issue, by refusing to grant it permission to open a consulate in Quetta.

A Republican Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, who recently co-authored an article with Congressman Louie Gohmert expressing support for an independent Balochistan, will chair the hearing.

“Perhaps we should even consider support for a Balochistan carved out of Pakistan to diminish radical power there (in Pakistan),” Rohrabacher wrote in his piece.

According to Asia-Pacific Reporting Blog, “it is expected that the hearing will tackle issues related to whether or not the US Congress should tie human rights issues in Balochistan to Pakistani aid.”

Witness box
Another area of interest is of the controversial witnesses who will testify before the committee. The three-member panel comprises of defence analyst Ralph Peters, Georgetown assistant professor, C. Christine Fair and Ali Dayan Hasan, Pakistan Director of the Human Rights Watch.

Ironically, the panel on Balochistan does not include a Baloch representative, an issue which has disappointed the Baloch diaspora in the United States, who fear the misinterpretation of their stance by people they view as unfamiliar with the Baloch conflict.

One of the witnesses, Ralph Peters, attracted scathing criticism by right-wing Pakistani strategists in June 2006, when his article Blood Borders was published in the Armed Forces Journal with a map of Free Balochistan. Peters, 59, a former US army officer, is expected to support in his testimony the idea of an independent Balochistan comprising of the Balochistan provinces in Pakistan and Iran and parts of Afghanistan.

On the other hand, Dr Christine Fair is known as a passionate supporter of Pakistan with an anti-India stance. The Pakistani media quoted Dr Fair in March 2009, for allegedly linking India with the Baloch insurgency. She was reportedly questioned the role of the Indian consulates in Afghanistan and Iran.

“Having visited the Indian mission in Zahedan,” she told a roundtable organized by the Foreign Affairs magazine, “I can assure you they (Indians) are not issuing visas as their main activity.” Later on, however, she told Outlook, an Indian news magazine, in an interview that the Pakistanis had blown her comments out of proportion.

On Twitter, a week ahead of the hearing, Dr Fair called Ralph Peters, the fellow witness, a “nut” and asked “WHAT does he know?” On Saturday, she also irked the Balochs by questioning their majority status in Balochistan while in another Tweet she warned the separatists not to “expect me to support an independent Balochistan”.

Public debate
Dr. Akbar S. Ahmed, Pakistan’s former high commissioner to the United Kingdom, told Dawn.com that the congressional hearing was a “significant step” in highlighting Balochistan’s problems. “The information provided in the event,” he said, “will not only be used by members of the US Congress but will also be picked up by the world media.”

“The shocking stories of torture and murder in Balochistan will become part of the public debate. It is in the interest of Pakistan to quickly and effectively resolve the situation in Balochistan bringing back the Baluch with honor, respect and dignity,” said Dr Ahmed, who is currently the Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies at the American University in Washington DC.

Dr Ahmed, who served in 1980s as the Commissioner of three districts in Balochistan, says the hearing can potentially create a great deal of negative publicity for Pakistan.

Close watchers
In the United States, the conflict in Balochistan has been gaining remarkable attention of late. While some officials from the government and non-governmental organizations have only expressed concern over the situation, other individuals, including former army soldiers, State department officials and members of the US Congress, have now begun to publicly assert support for an independent Balochistan.

For instance, on January 15, Victoria Nuland, the State Department spokeswoman, expressed America’s “deep concern” over the ongoing violence in Balochistan, especially targeted killings, disappearances and human rights violations.

“This (Balochistan) is a complex issue. We strongly believe that the best way forward is for all the parties to resolve their differences through peaceful dialogue,” she said.

Last year on November 16, the State Department deputy spokesman, Mark Toner, had also observed during a press briefing, “You know, more broadly, we do have concerns about the situation in Balochistan. We’ve addressed those concerns with the government of Pakistan.”

Nationalist view
Baloch nationalists are cautiously monitoring Wednesday’s hearing.

“To be honest, we are not very optimistic about this meeting,” Sardar Akhtar Mengal, a former chief minister of Balochistan, told Dawn.com, “but both support and attention from the US are significant because the presence of the US cannot be overlooked in South East Asia. It is essential that the US gives attention to Balochistan, as the aid that is given to Pakistan in the name of war against terror is being spent to commit atrocities in Balochistan.”

A political expert in Washington DC, who requested anonymity, said during the election year, the Republicans are likely to bring up the Balochistan issue to castigate Democratic President Barrack Obama for deliberately keeping quiet against Pakistan, an ally in the war on terror, for allegedly misusing American assistance to fight the secular Balochs instead of quashing the Taliban.

After the killing of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan, many American policymakers have become disillusioned with Pakistan and now some of them propose an independent Balochistan to fight religious extremism. Last month, Louie Gohmert, another Republican Congressman from Texas, suggested that the US should, “talk about creating a Balochistan in the southern part of Pakistan…they love us. They’ll stop the IEDs (improvised explosive devices) and all the weaponry coming into Afghanistan, and we got a shot to win over there.”

Sardar Mengal, who leads the largest Balochistan National Party (BNP), says the hearing does not mean that the Washington is going to support the Baloch cause in the future.

“What the US can do for us is to care for the Baloch as human beings. Since Washington is apparently a committed supporter of human rights, it is obligatory that the US should stop the genocide of the Baloch nation by the authorities as it has done in other parts of the world, supporting their right of self-determination.”

M. Chris Mason, a Senior Fellow at the Center for Advanced Defense Studies, who recently retired from the US Foreign Service, has emerged as another ardent proponent of free Balochistan in the United States.

In an article, Mason, who lecturers at the prestigious National Defense University, argued an independent Balochistan would solve many of the [Af-Pak] region’s most intractable problems overnight and would create “a territorial buffer between rogue states Iran and Pakistan.”

“The answer to the current Pakistani train-wreck is… recognizing Balochistan’s legitimate claim to independence… to help the Baluchis go the way of the Bangladeshis in achieving their dream of freedom from tyranny, corruption and murder at the hands of the diseased state,” he wrote.

Routine matter
Hassan Abbas, a scholar based in Washington DC who until recently was Quaid-i-Azam Chair Professor at Columbia University in New York, seriously doubts if the US will officially support Baloch nationalists at this time as this will complicate US-Pakistan relations.

“I think the hearing is a routine matter as all security related issues in Pakistan are being analyzed in the policy world with keen interest as well as concern. The hearing will discuss human rights issue as well as politics,” says Abbas, who is also a Senior Advisor at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, “but the hearing itself will not create any serious diplomatic row. The US Congress must listen and understand that there is a variety of perspectives on the subject.”

Dr Ahmed, meanwhile, attributes the deepening crisis in Balochistan to Islamabad’s failure to understand that time is running out for it.

“The leaders of Pakistan are so focused on the power struggles in Islamabad that they seem to have little will or imagination to deal with the urgent issues that concern the country’s largest province of Balochistan.”

How will Islamabad respond to the hearing?

“Pakistan’s establishment is quite sensitive about the Balochistan crisis and they will follow the hearings closely and sceptically,” says Hassan Abbas, whose book, Pakistan’s Drift into Extremism, was published in 2005.

According to Abbas, hawkish elements in Pakistani media are likely to create a lot of hue and cry over the hearing. Yet he cautions, “They will serve Pakistan better by focusing on projecting the concerns of the ordinary Baloch people, who are disenfranchised, distressed and increasingly getting disenchanted.”

Sardar Mengal of BNP, who was detained in Karachi for several months during the Pervez Musharraf regime, predicts there would be a definite reaction from the government.

“They can only display their superiority to the ones who are weaker, and in this case, the Baloch are the weaker ones,” he says and warns, “But if there is a reaction from Pakistan toward us, this time it will be once and for all. Either the Baloch will swim across or sink as a nation.” (Courtesy: Dawn, Pakistan)

 Monitoring Desk Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif has distributed portfolios of several ministries after being criticized by opposition for holding the portfolios and concentration of power. However, Shahbaz Sharif still holds the health ministry despite severe criticism over the deaths of dozens of patients in Lahore caused by taking spurious drugs provided free of cost [...]

Asim Iqbal Gilgit, February 1: Chief Minister Gilgit Baltistan Syed Mehdi Shah has ordered release of all NCP vehicles which had been confiscated during a special operation some months ago. Talking to media he said that NCP vehicles were only source of income of many families in the region and owing to confiscation they were [...]

GB Government is raising expectations, not resources! PT Report Gilgit, January 31: Formation of Diamer Division, comprising of District Astore and Diamer, was announced today by Chief Minister Syed Mehdi Shah. The administrative change leads to formation of a reduced Gilgit Division, comprising of District Gilgit, District Ghizar and District Hunza – Nagar. It is [...]

Monitoring Desk Islamabad, January 25: The Chief Minister Gilgit-Baltistan‚ Syed Mehdi Shah has said that a peace plan has been devised and started implementation on it for durable peace in the province. Talking to media-men in Islamabad on Wednesday he said that a committee headed by Chief Secretary would call on Ulema of different schools [...]

PT Report Islamabad, January 25: Chief Minister of Gilgit – Baltistan, Syed Mehdi Shah, called on the Iranian envoy here in the capital city. Matters related to investment opportunities in the region were discussed. According to the Embassy’s website, the Chief Minister of while welcoming the Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and referring to [...]

Foremost among these is the raging controversy surrounding Salman Rushdie’s scheduled appearance at the Jaipur Literature Festival, a saga that neatly encapsulates both the virtues and vices of the Indian polity. The gathering has fast emerged as the largest and most prestigious literary event in Asia, and it is a fine example of the soft power strengths India brings to the competition with China for influence in the region. This year’s installment attracted some 250 writers from South Asia and beyond (including talk show maven Oprah Winfrey, new age guru Deepak Chopra and Joseph Lelyveld, whose book on Mahatma Gandhi was greeted with a blast of invective from the Indian political class last year) as well as 70,000 visitors. Yet the imbroglio over Rushdie, who was supposed to be the main attraction at this year’s festival, has tarnished India’s credentials as emerging Asia’s brightest exemplar of democratic freedoms.

Rushdie, who was born in Mumbai to a Muslim family of Kashmiri descent, is the author of the 1988 novel, The Satanic Verses, which inflamed Muslim sentiment throughout the world and lead Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Iran’s supreme leader, to issue a notorious fatwa against his life. Concerned about the potential for upheaval among its sizeable Muslim population, the Indian government quickly banned the book, part of its familiar but disgraceful ritual of proscribing books that touch on sensitive issues or arouse passions in certain quarters. Rushdie, who continues to live under the threat of death, has traveled to India without incident numerous times in the years since, including an unannounced 2007 visit to the Jaipur gathering that is credited with putting it on the world’s cultural map.

But his headline participation at this year’s event brought forth a torrent of umbrage and threats. Muslim clerics started things off, including those at Darul Uloom Deoband, an influential Islamic seminary in Uttar Predesh, India’s most populous state which will hold legislative elections next month that many believe are critical to the survival of the Congress Party-led national government in New Delhi. Another seminary issued a fatwa calling for protests against the visit and a number of Muslim groups warned of “unprecedented protests” and burned Rushdie’s effigy.

Predictably enough, politicians soon took up the cudgels, many of them Congress Party leaders fearful of losing the allegiance of Uttar Pradesh’s large bloc of Muslim voters, who formed about a fifth of the state’s electorate. Ashok Gehlot, chief minister of Rajasthan, the northwestern state where the festival takes place, and a former general secretary of the All India Congress Committee, reportedly pressed the organizers to rescind their invitation to Rushdie and appeared indifferent to the threats being made against Rushdie’s safety. Chandrabhan Singh, head of the Congress Party’s Rajasthan unit, declared that “Rushdie has hurt the sentiments of many Indians. He must not be allowed to come to India.” Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi, the party’s national leader, maintained a studious silence, while one of Singh’s Cabinet members pronounced that Rushdie’s “presence is not desirable.”

In contrast to the poltroon instincts of the political class, India’s boisterous media leapt to Rushdie’s defense. The Times of India accused the Congress Party of playing identity politics and argued that “by catering to such intolerance, the Congress has further contributed to creating an increasingly illiberal atmosphere in the country.” The Hindu called the affair “a national shame” and charged that “India has again betrayed its heritage of providing sanctuary to persecuted individuals and ideas, not to speak of its Constitution.”

If the saga had ended at this point, it would have amounted to an embarassment to the country’s reputation. Instead it unexpectedly morphed into an outrage against free expression. On the eve of the festival’s opening, Rushdie suddenly withdrew when the Rajasthan police warned him of an assassination plot being hatched by a Mumbai underworld boss who has close ties to the Pakistani security establishment. Media outlets, however, soon reported that the death threat was concocted by authorities to scare him away. When Rushdie made plans to address the gathering via video link, Rajasthan officials attempted to throw up new impediments. In the end, the video conference was abruptly cancelled by the venue’s owner following police warnings about violent protests.

In solidarity with Rushdie, four Indian writers at the gathering staged an impromptu reading of passages from The Satanic Verses, a prohibited act that drew quick police notice. Advised by legal counsel that they had unwittingly opened themselves up to criminal charges, the writers hastily departed Jaipur and, in some cases, the country.

Unfortunately, the Rushdie affair stands out for its prominence but not its singularity. Currently, the Delhi High Court is considering a petition that seeks to hold Google and Facebook liable for not censoring content that might offend the sensibilities of Hindus, Muslims and Christians. The judge overseeing the matter ominously warned that if the companies could not police their own sites, “like China we may be forced to pass orders banning all such websites.” Prime Minister Singh’s government has lent its imprimatur to the petitioner’s cause.

Late last year, Kapil Sibal, a Harvard-educated lawyer who serves as Mr. Singh’s telecommunications minister, likewise threatened to censor social networking sites for objectionable content (here and here).  Similar to the rhetoric directed at Rushdie, he argued that “religious sentiments of many communities and of any reasonable person is [sic] being hurt because of content which is on the sites.” Last June’s death of M. F. Husain, the most acclaimed painter of modern India, also recalled how he had been hounded into self-exile by Hindu nationalist groups incensed at his nude depictions of Hindu deities. Prime Minister Singh called Husain’s passing in a London hospital “a national loss” but he did nothing to dampen the mob culture that caused Husain to spend the last years of his life outside of India.

Indeed, over the last two years, India’s illiberal tendencies have been in particular bloom:

• A fictionalized biography of Congress Party supreme Sonia Gandhi was banned;
• Government officials helped put the kibosh on plans to make a movie based on Indian Summer: The Secret History of the End of an Empire, a non-fiction book that sheds light on Jawaharlal Nehru’s furtive relationship with the wife of the British Raj’s last viceroy;
• An outcry organized by the family of Bal Thackeray, a Hindu nationalist politician, forced the University of Mumbai to drop Rohinton Mistry’s novel, Such a Long Journey, a finalist for the prestigious Man Booker Prize, from its English-language syllabus;
• And Arundhati Roy, a perennial bete noire to the political establishment and a Man Booker Prize-winner for her 1997 novel, The God of Small Things, was charged with sedition for her remarks on the Kashmir dispute.

All democracies are continuous works in progress. But this year’s Republic Day reveals just how far India still remains from the ideals of free expression.

Monitoring Desk Skardu, January 14: Chief Minister Gilgit-Baltistan Syed Mehdi Shah says the Government is working for strengthening of the democracy and supremacy of Parliament under the leadership of President Asif Ali Zardari. Addressing a function held at Radio Pakistan Skardu on Saturday‚ he said the Gilgit-Baltistan Government and people have full confidence on the [...]

PT Report Gilgit, January 9: Sectarian conflict has taken the form of personal and familial enmities in Gilgit. Religious and sectarian organizations have been barred from interfering in state and government organizations. Those spreading sectarian hatred will never be spared. These views were expressed by GB Chief Secretary, Saifullah Chattha, while addressing a press conference [...]

PT Report Gilgit, January 7: Police and other law enforcing agencies in Gilgit have been authorized to shoot terrorists at sight. The decision was taken in view of the dangerous violence that has gripped by region by fear, as dead bodies keep falling almost every day. Chief Minister Syed Mehdi Shah, who has been accused [...]

PT Report Gilgit, January 6: A signed press note released by the Registrar of Supreme Appellate Court states that the Chief Minister or any other member of the executive cannot interfer in administrative affairs related to the judiciary and judicial processes. The press note states that the “Court is closed due to winter vacation and [...]

Monitoring Desk Former Technocrat member of NALA, Attiqa Ghazanfar, has blamed the government of Chief Minister Mehdi Shah of practising double standards for the protesters of his home town, Skardu, and Hunza. “No Anti-Terrorism cases were not registered against violent protesters in Skardu who damaged public property but in Hunza hundreds of the youth were implicated in [...]