Pakistan pursues Peace in Swat By Dr.. Abdul Ruff Colachal

On 2009 April 13 Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari has signed a historic but controversial bill introducing Islamic Sharia law to the Swat region. The move comes after parliament passed a resolution urging Zardari to honour a promise made to the Taleban. The implementation of Islamic justice was agreed in February in return for an end to the Taleban insurgency. Zardari had previously resisted signing the deal, which has been criticized by his Western allies. There are concerns it could lead to human rights abuses and provide help to militants in the region. But Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said parliament had committed itself to implementing the Sharia system. President Zardari had been expected to sign the bill directly into law.

I- A Pro-Islamic Pakistan

The bill introducing Sharia courts in the troubled Malakand division, comprising six north-western districts including Swat, was sent to parliament for consideration. Sharia courts have already begun operating in the region, after reopening last week. Putting the issue before parliament was apparently meant to develop national consensus on an issue which is highly controversial and over which many within the country and abroad have expressed reservations. Gilani told lawmakers that they had committed to implement the system and the whole nation should support it: "We want consensus of the whole nation. We want to take the house into confidence. We don't want to bypass the parliament". The parliament then unanimously passed a resolution urging Zardari to sign the deal. One party, the Karachi-based Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), abstained from the vote, with members saying they had "apprehensions" about the agreement. "We can't accept Islamic law at gunpoint," said Farooq Sattar, an MQM party leader. However, he refused to say why they did not do it all by themselves. The “secular” ANP party, which governs North West Frontier Province (NWFP) and which negotiated the bill with a cleric, Sufi Mohammad, was also unhappy with Zardari’s decision to send the bill to parliament.

The decision of the TNSM leader to leave Swat in frustration has caused dismay throughout the country and especially among those people who viewed the peace deal as an effective instrument for restoration of much-needed peace and tranquility in the region. People had heaved a sigh of relief over agreement between the Provincial Government and the TNSM as a result of which normal life was limping back to the scenic but troubled Valley.

It seems, on the other end, there is a move to bring together all factions to speed up Islamization in the region. In a recent declaration, Pakistan's other two Taleban factions - led by Maulvi Nazir and Hafiz Gul Bahadur - said they had formed an alliance with  Mehsud. The two belong to the Wazir tribe, the Mehsud's traditional enemy. The Wazir is the larger tribe and exists on both sides of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. They are keen establish an Islamc Sharia’ rule in Islamic Pakistan which the USA and its anti-Islamic allies like India, with their hidden agenda for the region, dreaming state terrorism and criticizing private terrorism, blatantly oppose.

II- Why US-India & allies grumble?

It is a known fact that the anti-Islamic forces led by the Pentagon are not yet ready to quit the occupied Islamc nations, including Pakistan. The western media aided by these notorious gangs keep fueling crises and make the terror forces kill more Muslims as suspected terrorists because none in the world is capable to stopping global terrorists in civilized uniforms.

Rumors are successfully spread by the occupying forces and their media about “terrorists” in region and war must go one. What exactly the terror forces also looking for in the region is unknown as yet, but western media project the region as the most dangerous one more than the secret torture camps set up b the CIA, and bluff that Everybody from Osama bin Laden to the trans-Atlantic bombing suspect, Rashid Rauf, has at one time or another said to have been based in this territory. They bluff that it is an indication of how much the power of the Taleban has grown and how secure they feel in their safe havens along the border with Afghanistan. In particular, the Waziristan tribal region - part of which is controlled by Mehsud - stands out as the place which currently supposedly harbors some of “the most wanted” men in the world, however the global terrorist Bush is not there. The terror war experts want to kill every Muslim there.

During the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Waziristan remained the vanguard of the struggle. The occupiers now are afraid of a site of an ambush over half a century earlier when Mehsud tribesmen supposedly surrounded and annihilated a 300-member British force in the last days of the Raj. The most famous and notorious of the Taleban warlords remains Baitullah Mehsud and not the American GW Bush or Israel Ehud Olmert. Invaders say Mehsud and hisTehrik-e-Taleban (TeT) organization are responsible for much of the spread of Taleban ideology across Pakistan.

Occupying US Intelligence officials say that it was the help and training of TeT which enabled the Swat Taleban to demand and achieve a separate legal system in that Pakistani district. They also say that his support was crucial to the Taleban in nearby Bajaur, enabling them to reach a peace deal with the army despite the military having much of the upper hand. They try to connect TeT to networks as far afield as the southern port city of Karachi. Increasingly, it has grown as a clear and present danger to the state of Pakistan.

In a series of tactical campaigns, starting in 2004, the Taleban have all but pushed the security forces out of Waziristan. The few that remain are confined to their forts. Over the last year, the only thing that has penetrated the Waziristan tribal region are the US drones. These have killed hundreds of people, many of them were civilians. That has angered ordinary Pakistanis and raised anti-American sentiments to an all-time high. Pakistan's security forces say the drone strikes also prevent them from acting more strongly against the “militants”. The attacks have largely united all Taleban factions in Pakistan. 

III- Happy Beginning

Who wants to see Pakistan to be destabilized? Who gains form the destabilized Islamic Pakistan?  A lot of Islamic blood has flown under the various global bridges and still the anti-Islamc forces are not fully satisfied with the death toll. US-led terror forces have added misery to Pakistani people by killing more Muslims regularly on US and Indian requests. After destroying Afghanistan and killing its people, US terror bands have moved on to Pakistan to try Pakistani blood.

It seems those who are keen to destabilize Pakistan and make it a weapons depot of both USA and India, are suing the usual notorious pressure tactics to coerce President Zardari to scuttle the peace move initiated in Swat. Zardari is not expected to play a naughty boy’s role in keeping the boil on in his country. It looks all anti-Islamic as well as anti-Pakistan forces, including some news media, have got aligned together to stall the peace movement in Swat and, with a view to appeasing the anti-Islamic world, possibly on payment basis, to block any Islamization in Pakistan. Unfortunately, the bulk of newspaper media in Pakistan look to Hindustan and America for guidance and applause, in stead of Islamic Sharia’ and Islamic democracy.

As a result, apart from the historic threat from India, now the USA has also become a painful ‘drone” burden to Pakistanis. In the face of declining public support for the bloody and entrenched fighting with serious losses against a battle-hardened enemy, Pakistan government should opt for a balanced pro-Islamic position in favor the less developed regions like Waziristan and Balochistan and less fortunate sections of the people, disregarding the angry rhetoric of anti-Islamic, anti-Pakistani forces as well as those Pakistanis who long to make Pakistan a non-Islamic and pro-western entity.  

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Yours Sincerely,

DR. ABDUL RUFF Colachal

Columnist & Independent Researcher in World Affairs, The only Indian to have gone through entire India
South Asia.