Mr. Shaheen Shebai [Former Correspondent of Daily Dawn Pakistan, Former Editor of The News International, Ex Director News of ARY ONE TV Channel, Former Director of GEO News Network, and presently on of the many Editors of The News International, Jang Group of Newspapers, Pakistan]
Mr Shaheen Sehbai says....
The language in which the scholar, Husain Haqqani, now Pakistan’s ambassador in Washington and the main proponent of the Kerry-Lugar Bill, had urged Washington to put these conditions on Pakistan would shock everyone, when read in today’s context. On pages 327 to 329, Haqqani says: “Unlike governments in other Muslim countries like Egypt and Turkey, Pakistan’s government - particularly its military - has encouraged political and radical Islam, which otherwise has a relatively narrow base of support. Democratic consensus on limiting or reversing Islamisation would gradually roll back the Islamist influence in Pakistani public life. Islamists would maintain their role as a minority pressure group representing a particular point of view, but they would stop wielding their current disproportionate influence over the country’s overall direction. Reference: Mystery of Kerry-Lugar conditions solved? By Shaheen Sehbai Friday, October 09, 2009 News Analysis http://www.thenews.com.pk/TodaysPrintDetail.aspx?ID=24919&Cat=13&dt=10/8/2009
The language in which the scholar, Husain Haqqani, now Pakistan’s ambassador in Washington and the main proponent of the Kerry-Lugar Bill, had urged Washington to put these conditions on Pakistan would shock everyone, when read in today’s context. On pages 327 to 329, Haqqani says: “Unlike governments in other Muslim countries like Egypt and Turkey, Pakistan’s government - particularly its military - has encouraged political and radical Islam, which otherwise has a relatively narrow base of support. Democratic consensus on limiting or reversing Islamisation would gradually roll back the Islamist influence in Pakistani public life. Islamists would maintain their role as a minority pressure group representing a particular point of view, but they would stop wielding their current disproportionate influence over the country’s overall direction. Reference: Mystery of Kerry-Lugar conditions solved? By Shaheen Sehbai Friday, October 09, 2009 News Analysis http://www.thenews.com.pk/TodaysPrintDetail.aspx?ID=24919&Cat=13&dt=10/8/2009
Personal feud between Hussain Haqqani and Shaheen Sehbai has been turned into a National Issue:
Hussain Haqqani [Pakistan Ambassador to the United States]
The present mess in the media is created by Shaheen Sehbai, Dr Shahid Masood, Kamran Khan and Ansar Abbasi about Kerry Lugar Bill.
About Shaheen Sehbai [he is angry because he demanded the Diplomatic Position and was refused]. He is filing reprts after reports against Hussain Haqqani in The News International whereas the same Hussain Haqqani [Pakistan's Ambassador in USA] and Wajid Shamsul Hassan [Pakistan High Commission in UK] and many others used to be the regular contributor for his Internet Magazine South Asia Tribune [based in USA], Mr Sehbai often activate deactivate his deceptive internet magazine as per his interests. Read Hussain Haqqani in SATRIBUNE.
About Shaheen Sehbai [he is angry because he demanded the Diplomatic Position and was refused]. He is filing reprts after reports against Hussain Haqqani in The News International whereas the same Hussain Haqqani [Pakistan's Ambassador in USA] and Wajid Shamsul Hassan [Pakistan High Commission in UK] and many others used to be the regular contributor for his Internet Magazine South Asia Tribune [based in USA], Mr Sehbai often activate deactivate his deceptive internet magazine as per his interests. Read Hussain Haqqani in SATRIBUNE.
Lt Gen (R) Hamid Gul. [Former Chief of ISI & MI] General (R) Hamid Gul violated article 6 of 1973 Constitution http://chagataikhan.blogspot.com/2009/08/general-r-hamid-gul-violated-article-6.html
Yesterday General Hamid Gul while talking to Sajjad Mir on NEWS ONE condemned Hussain Haqqani while quoting Shaheen Sehbai's Story published in the The News International whereas the same Shaheen Sehbai was the one who published the review on Hussain Haqqani's Book. Read complete background of Shaheen Sehbai's myesterious escpae from Pakistan under Musharraf to attain Exile in USA and his return back to Pakistan under the same Musharraf. Read the background of Shaheen Sehbai's Internet Magazine.
Sajjad Mir [Former Editor of Daily Nawa-e-Waqt Pakistan, played a part in PTV Media Trial Campaign against Benazir Bhutto and PPP, nowadays Anchor for a Private TV Channel of Pakistan NEWSONE/TVONE] Nawaz Sharif, Kamran Khan, National Interest & Geo TV http://chagataikhan.blogspot.com/2008/12/nawaz-sharif-kamran-khan-national.html
Hussain Haqqani used to be the regular contributor for Mr Shaheen Sehbai's Internet Magazine South Asia Tribune [when Shaheen was in exile in USA during General Musharraf's Martial Law, due to story Shaheen filed against Pakistan Army and ISI! "QUOTE"
The Deceptive Cloak of Musharraf's Enlightened Moderation WASHINGTON DC, June 15, 2005 ISSN: 1684-2057 http://www.satribune.com/ By Husain Haqqani http://antisystemic.org/satribune/www.satribune.com/archives/200506/P1_hh.htm
The Deceptive Cloak of Musharraf's Enlightened Moderation WASHINGTON DC, June 15, 2005 ISSN: 1684-2057 http://www.satribune.com/ By Husain Haqqani http://antisystemic.org/satribune/www.satribune.com/archives/200506/P1_hh.htmHussain Haqqani [Pakistan Ambassador to the United States]
WASHINGTON, June 15: The arrest in California of a Pakistani father and son allegedly linked to terrorism highlights, once again, the superficiality of the Pakistani regime’s rhetoric about changing the country’s direction.
So far no evidence has been presented by US officials of the California detainees being linked to Al-Qaeda, except an affidavit by one of the accused admitting to attending a militant training camp near Rawalpindi. It is possible that the Pakistanis arrested in California turn out to be innocent of Al-Qaeda links, joining the ranks of hundreds of Muslims caught in America’s currently over-zealous law enforcement. It is equally possible, however, that they were associated with a Pakistani Jihadi group, which in turn might be linked to the global network loosely described as Al-Qaeda. The Pakistani Foreign Office was, as usual, quick in denying that any Al-Qaeda facility exists in Pakistan. Of course, it is the same Foreign Office that, through its permanent representative to the United Nations has been periodically debating the definition of terrorism at the UN even though Pakistan has ostensibly been a crucial ally in the US-led global war against terrorism. One could ask Pakistani officials how they can be America’s partners in fighting terrorism if they do not agree with the US definition of terrorism but that argument is not the subject of our immediate concern.
The same week that the California arrests served as a reminder of the Jihadi presence in Pakistan, the famed victim of a gang rape whose rapists had earlier been set free was detained and forbidden from traveling abroad. The “enlightened moderate” State in Pakistan chose to extend its protection to the perpetrators of the gang rape rather than Mukhtaran Mai, the victim.
With the passage of time, differences between the “Islamist” dictatorship of General Ziaul Haq and the “modernizing” regime of General Musharraf are clearly a lot less pronounced than Musharraf’s supporters make them out to be. The military regime’s priority appears to be to suppress or deny bad news rather than to change the circumstances that give rise to it.
In case of the California arrests the Pakistani authorities should have obtained full information and checked the facts on ground before setting their spin machine in motion. One of the California accused reportedly told his interrogators that he attended a Jihadi facility run by Maulana Fazlur Rehman at “Tamal in Rawalpindi.” Given that the FBI officer writing the Pakistani detainee’s statement was unfamiliar with both Rawalpindi’s geography and the who’s who of Pakistani Jihadism, it is perfectly possible that he simply failed to figure out the information he was given.
Maulana Fazlur Rehman Khalil, originally of Harkat-ul-Ansar has maintained a Jihadi facility at Dhamial in Rawalpindi for many years. Had the Pakistan Government been serious in its claims of uprooting militancy and terrorism, it would have paid some attention to this possible link between last week’s arrests in California and a shadowy group that participated in the officially sanctioned Afghan and Kashmir jihads. Maulana Khalil was one of the signatories of Osama bin Laden’s 1998 fatwa against the United States and was reportedly in the camp struck by US cruise missiles in Afghanistan in 1998. In January 2004, the Los Angeles Times reported that Maulana Khalil remained openly active despite government-imposed bans on him and his organizations. Khalil had survived the ban in 1995 on Harkat-ul-Ansar and renamed it Harkat-ul-Mujahideen. When Harkat-ul-Mujahideen was banned after September 11, 2001, he emerged as the leader of Jamiat-ul-Ansar.
Instead of doing anything about Maulana Khalil or his followers after the publication of the LA Times report, Pakistani security services threatened the newspaper’s Pakistani reporter. The reporter’s reporting, rather than Maulana Khalil’s activities appeared to irk Pakistani officials more. Maulana Khalil was finally arrested with considerable publicity in March 2004 only to be released quietly seven months later.
He has reportedly gone underground after the recent arrests of his followers in California. Unlike Mukhtaran Mai, the rape victim, Pakistani authorities are unable to find and detain him. Ironically, the same Pakistani officials who had no qualms about keeping Asif Ali Zardari (husband of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto) in prison without a conviction for almost eight years have never found sufficient reason to detain Maulana Khalil – or several other militant Jihadi leaders for that matter.
It should be obvious to all but the most naïve that General Pervez Musharraf’s U-Turn in the aftermath of September 11, 2001 has been selective and aimed more at pleasing the United States than at ridding Pakistan of domestic militant groups. General Musharraf made his views clear in an interview with the Washington Post in 2002, in which he made a distinction between various elements of Pakistan’s militant problem and stressed that the militants fighting in Kashmir were freedom fighters.
“There are three elements of terrorism that the world is concerned about,” Musharraf said in that interview and went on to list these three elements. “Number one, the Al-Qaeda factor. Number two is what [the Indians] are calling cross-border terrorism and we are calling the freedom struggle in Kashmir. Number three is the sectarian [Sunni vs. Shia] extremism and sectarian terrorism in Pakistan...The third one is more our concern, and unfortunately, the world is not bothered about that. We are very much bothered about that because that is destabilizing us internally.”
Thus, in the General’s world view sectarian terrorists were the real source of trouble while Al-Qaeda’s Arab members had to be apprehended to ensure the flow of US support. Homegrown militants trained for operating in the region were the least of Musharraf’s concern at the time of that interview. But Pakistani authorities cannot eliminate the international terrorist network or the sectarian militias without decapitating the domestic Jihadi networks. All Islamist militant groups sympathize with one another and in some cases, such as Kashmiri Jihadi groups and sectarian militias, have overlapping memberships. From the point of view of Pakistan’s Islamist militants and their backers in the establishment, Jihad is only on hold but not yet over. The major Kashmiri Jihadi groups retain their infrastructure that could be pressed into service at a future date. Afghanistan’s Taliban also continue to find safe haven in parts of Pakistan as recently as the spring of 2005. Afghan and American officials complain periodically of the Taliban still training and organizing in Pakistan’s border areas but their protests are rejected summarily with rhetoric similar to the one about domestic militant groups.
The Musharraf regime has been careful to take all steps necessary to retain the goodwill of the United States and its rhetoric of “enlightened moderation” has won it America’s support. President Bush described Musharraf as “a courageous leader” who had risked his life to crack down on the Al-Qaeda terrorist network. Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, declared during a March 2005 visit to Pakistan that Pakistan “has come an enormously long way...This is not the Pakistan of September 11. It is not even the Pakistan of 2002.”
American officials regularly express the belief that Pakistan had turned the corner and could now be trusted as an American ally. The United States sees Pakistan’s glass as half full rather than half empty. For Pakistanis faced with on-ground realities, such as militants living in their midst and the treatment of gang rape victims like Mukhtaran Mai, there is little in the glass that gives them satisfaction.
The writer is Associate Professor of International Relations at Boston University and author of the forthcoming book 'Pakistan Between Mosque and Military' (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2005, Title Top Left)
In Pakistan Its Not Rule of Law But Law of the Ruler That Matters By Husain Haqqani WASHINGTON DC, July 13, 2005 ISSN: 1684-2057 http://www.satribune.com/ http://antisystemic.org/satribune/www.satribune.com/archives/200507/P1_hh.htm
So far no evidence has been presented by US officials of the California detainees being linked to Al-Qaeda, except an affidavit by one of the accused admitting to attending a militant training camp near Rawalpindi. It is possible that the Pakistanis arrested in California turn out to be innocent of Al-Qaeda links, joining the ranks of hundreds of Muslims caught in America’s currently over-zealous law enforcement. It is equally possible, however, that they were associated with a Pakistani Jihadi group, which in turn might be linked to the global network loosely described as Al-Qaeda. The Pakistani Foreign Office was, as usual, quick in denying that any Al-Qaeda facility exists in Pakistan. Of course, it is the same Foreign Office that, through its permanent representative to the United Nations has been periodically debating the definition of terrorism at the UN even though Pakistan has ostensibly been a crucial ally in the US-led global war against terrorism. One could ask Pakistani officials how they can be America’s partners in fighting terrorism if they do not agree with the US definition of terrorism but that argument is not the subject of our immediate concern.
The same week that the California arrests served as a reminder of the Jihadi presence in Pakistan, the famed victim of a gang rape whose rapists had earlier been set free was detained and forbidden from traveling abroad. The “enlightened moderate” State in Pakistan chose to extend its protection to the perpetrators of the gang rape rather than Mukhtaran Mai, the victim.
With the passage of time, differences between the “Islamist” dictatorship of General Ziaul Haq and the “modernizing” regime of General Musharraf are clearly a lot less pronounced than Musharraf’s supporters make them out to be. The military regime’s priority appears to be to suppress or deny bad news rather than to change the circumstances that give rise to it.
In case of the California arrests the Pakistani authorities should have obtained full information and checked the facts on ground before setting their spin machine in motion. One of the California accused reportedly told his interrogators that he attended a Jihadi facility run by Maulana Fazlur Rehman at “Tamal in Rawalpindi.” Given that the FBI officer writing the Pakistani detainee’s statement was unfamiliar with both Rawalpindi’s geography and the who’s who of Pakistani Jihadism, it is perfectly possible that he simply failed to figure out the information he was given.
Maulana Fazlur Rehman Khalil, originally of Harkat-ul-Ansar has maintained a Jihadi facility at Dhamial in Rawalpindi for many years. Had the Pakistan Government been serious in its claims of uprooting militancy and terrorism, it would have paid some attention to this possible link between last week’s arrests in California and a shadowy group that participated in the officially sanctioned Afghan and Kashmir jihads. Maulana Khalil was one of the signatories of Osama bin Laden’s 1998 fatwa against the United States and was reportedly in the camp struck by US cruise missiles in Afghanistan in 1998. In January 2004, the Los Angeles Times reported that Maulana Khalil remained openly active despite government-imposed bans on him and his organizations. Khalil had survived the ban in 1995 on Harkat-ul-Ansar and renamed it Harkat-ul-Mujahideen. When Harkat-ul-Mujahideen was banned after September 11, 2001, he emerged as the leader of Jamiat-ul-Ansar.
Instead of doing anything about Maulana Khalil or his followers after the publication of the LA Times report, Pakistani security services threatened the newspaper’s Pakistani reporter. The reporter’s reporting, rather than Maulana Khalil’s activities appeared to irk Pakistani officials more. Maulana Khalil was finally arrested with considerable publicity in March 2004 only to be released quietly seven months later.
He has reportedly gone underground after the recent arrests of his followers in California. Unlike Mukhtaran Mai, the rape victim, Pakistani authorities are unable to find and detain him. Ironically, the same Pakistani officials who had no qualms about keeping Asif Ali Zardari (husband of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto) in prison without a conviction for almost eight years have never found sufficient reason to detain Maulana Khalil – or several other militant Jihadi leaders for that matter.
It should be obvious to all but the most naïve that General Pervez Musharraf’s U-Turn in the aftermath of September 11, 2001 has been selective and aimed more at pleasing the United States than at ridding Pakistan of domestic militant groups. General Musharraf made his views clear in an interview with the Washington Post in 2002, in which he made a distinction between various elements of Pakistan’s militant problem and stressed that the militants fighting in Kashmir were freedom fighters.
“There are three elements of terrorism that the world is concerned about,” Musharraf said in that interview and went on to list these three elements. “Number one, the Al-Qaeda factor. Number two is what [the Indians] are calling cross-border terrorism and we are calling the freedom struggle in Kashmir. Number three is the sectarian [Sunni vs. Shia] extremism and sectarian terrorism in Pakistan...The third one is more our concern, and unfortunately, the world is not bothered about that. We are very much bothered about that because that is destabilizing us internally.”
Thus, in the General’s world view sectarian terrorists were the real source of trouble while Al-Qaeda’s Arab members had to be apprehended to ensure the flow of US support. Homegrown militants trained for operating in the region were the least of Musharraf’s concern at the time of that interview. But Pakistani authorities cannot eliminate the international terrorist network or the sectarian militias without decapitating the domestic Jihadi networks. All Islamist militant groups sympathize with one another and in some cases, such as Kashmiri Jihadi groups and sectarian militias, have overlapping memberships. From the point of view of Pakistan’s Islamist militants and their backers in the establishment, Jihad is only on hold but not yet over. The major Kashmiri Jihadi groups retain their infrastructure that could be pressed into service at a future date. Afghanistan’s Taliban also continue to find safe haven in parts of Pakistan as recently as the spring of 2005. Afghan and American officials complain periodically of the Taliban still training and organizing in Pakistan’s border areas but their protests are rejected summarily with rhetoric similar to the one about domestic militant groups.
The Musharraf regime has been careful to take all steps necessary to retain the goodwill of the United States and its rhetoric of “enlightened moderation” has won it America’s support. President Bush described Musharraf as “a courageous leader” who had risked his life to crack down on the Al-Qaeda terrorist network. Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, declared during a March 2005 visit to Pakistan that Pakistan “has come an enormously long way...This is not the Pakistan of September 11. It is not even the Pakistan of 2002.”
American officials regularly express the belief that Pakistan had turned the corner and could now be trusted as an American ally. The United States sees Pakistan’s glass as half full rather than half empty. For Pakistanis faced with on-ground realities, such as militants living in their midst and the treatment of gang rape victims like Mukhtaran Mai, there is little in the glass that gives them satisfaction.
The writer is Associate Professor of International Relations at Boston University and author of the forthcoming book 'Pakistan Between Mosque and Military' (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2005, Title Top Left)
In Pakistan Its Not Rule of Law But Law of the Ruler That Matters By Husain Haqqani WASHINGTON DC, July 13, 2005 ISSN: 1684-2057 http://www.satribune.com/ http://antisystemic.org/satribune/www.satribune.com/archives/200507/P1_hh.htm
Hussain Haqqani [Pakistan Ambassador to the United States]WASHINGTON, July 13: The hesitation of the Pakistani authorities in issuing a new passport to former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif highlights Pakistan’s greatest weakness. Pakistan is a country run on the whims of its rulers rather than on the basis of its constitution and laws enacted by elected legislatures.
Under Pakistani law, every citizen is entitled to a passport upon presentation of proof of citizenship, usually a national identity card. There is no dispute that Mr. Sharif is a Pakistani citizen. The Government’s claim that he agreed on December 9, 2000, under a deal brokered by Saudi Arabia, to live in exile for an unspecified period is irrelevant to his right to a passport as a citizen. How can an unlawful deal between a captor and a captive trump one’s citizenship rights?
In any case, the Government has failed to produce the agreement it claims was reached between the Sharif family at the time Mr. Sharif was released from prison and sent into exile. Mr. Sharif was toppled in a coup d’etat in 1999 and imprisoned, later to be charged with several “crimes.”
If he was, as the military Government claimed, a criminal, General Musharraf had no right to release and pardon him without completing the due process of law. If, however, he was innocent, there was no justification in imprisoning him simply because the military found him to be unworthy of running the country. In either case, where does Pakistan’s constitution (even after its many mutilations) empower the Chief of Army Staff to deprive a Pakistani of the right to return to his country or to secure a passport for travel abroad?
Even if General Musharraf’s claim is right and Mr. Sharif went into exile voluntarily, the alleged agreement was political rather than a legally binding one. If General Musharraf can go back on his political agreement with the Opposition regarding relinquishing his military uniform at the end of 2004 due to changed circumstances, what prevents Mr. Sharif from backing out of his unwritten commitment not to return to Pakistan?
In any case, what does any of this have to do with Mr. Sharif’s right to possess a Pakistani passport? Not long ago, Pakistani authorities appeared to link renewing Ms. Benazir Bhutto’s passport to knowing her travel plans. Ms Bhutto and Mr. Sharif’s are General Musharraf’s political challengers. The General has a political interest in keeping them in exile. But the question of when and how a Pakistani citizenship gets his or her passport should be a matter of law not of political expediency.
One has read several news stories about how different branches of Pakistan’s Government, from the intelligence services to the Interior Ministry and the Foreign office, are waiting for General Musharraf’s decision on whether or not a passport is to be issued to Mr. Sharif.
This leads to a question that would best be answered by the British High Commissioner to Pakistan, Sir Mark Lyall-Grant, who recently took it upon himself to declare that the current system of governance in Pakistan cannot be called a dictatorship. What other word in the English language describes a system of governance where basic decisions such as whether a citizen gets his passport or not are made by one man and not on the basis of well-defined laws? Not long ago, General Musharraf acknowledged that he had ordered the inclusion of rape victim Mukhtaran Mai’s on the Exit Control List (ECL). Mukhtaran Mai’s passport was also taken away by officials, only to be returned to her after intervention by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. General Musharraf claimed he took these steps to prevent Mukhtaran Mai being manipulated by some NGOs into spoiling Pakistan’s image.
Ironically, the Exit Control List is meant to prevent criminals and those under investigation for crimes from leaving the country. Nothing in the law gives the country’s ruler the right to put a rape victim on the ECL even if the purpose of such restrictions is to protect the country’s image.
Once again, Her Britannic Majesty’s High Commissioner might care to introduce us to the political science term in the English language that describes an unelected ruler whose word becomes law and whose definition of national interest can only be changed by him.
The reluctance of the Government to issue Mr. Nawaz Sharif his passport is not the first time in Pakistan’s history that citizenship rights have been arbitrarily determined by the country’s rulers. In 1971, after the creation of Bangladesh, several hundred thousand Pakistani citizens were stranded in their country’s former Eastern wing. These people and their families had migrated from India to Pakistan at the time of the 1947 partition to become Pakistani citizens.
When the country was torn into two, they chose to remain Pakistanis and demanded the right to come to the remaining part of Pakistan. Any other country would have recognized that right without any argument and arranged for their repatriation. But successive Pakistani Governments argued that the repatriation of stranded Pakistanis from Bangladesh would upset the ethnic balance in West Pakistan and put an undue burden on the country’s economy. In a tragic farce, General Ziaul Haq’s military regime tied repatriation of Pakistanis stranded in Bangladesh to availability of international assistance. Saudi Arabia helped create a trust to fund the return of Pakistanis stranded in Bangladesh to Pakistan. But since when are citizenship rights a matter of economics?
What other country has refused to allow its citizens the right to return to their homeland on grounds that the Government did not have enough money left from its defense spending to enable them to live in their own country? The Pakistanis in Bangladesh should have been issued Pakistani passports based on their citizenship and their inalienable right of return to their country of citizenship. They would have found a way of eking out a living just as tens of millions of other Pakistanis do.
The military-bureaucratic complex that controls Pakistan’s destiny saw the matter, not from the lens of citizenship rights but from the prism of its ability to manage the country. That management approach, where the boss is always right, contributes to Pakistanis having a lesser sense and feeling of citizenship than in many other countries.
Not only are Pakistan’s citizens not allowed to choose their own rulers, the country’s rulers arrogate to themselves the authority of determining whether a citizen has any rights at all or not.
The disregard for law in relation to passports, but in the reverse direction, was witnessed in 1993 when the Pakistani military wanted to install Mr. Moeen Qureshi as caretaker Prime Minister. Mr. Qureshi had lived in the United States for several decades, had taken up US citizenship and by most accounts had not regularly renewed his Pakistani passport or obtained a Pakistani National identity card.
Mr. Qureshi was issued both his national identity card and passport in Singapore so that he would not arrive in the country without these documents before becoming Prime Minister. He was, of course, entitled to Pakistani citizenship and there is no reason to impugn his commitment or services to Pakistan.
The issue is that it was not Mr. Qureshi’s right as a dual citizen but rather the desire of the army commander at the time to name him caretaker Prime Minister that secured him his passport. Had it been a matter of right, Mr. Sharif’s right to a passport would have received the same attention at the Pakistani Consulate in Jeddah that Mr. Qureshi’s did at the Pakistan Embassy in Singapore.
The writer is a Visiting Scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and Associate Professor of International Relations at Boston University. He is the author of the forthcoming book 'Pakistan Between Mosque and Military'
London Bombings and Pakistani Connection: A Pakistani View By Husain Haqqani WASHINGTON DC, July 20, 2005 ISSN: 1684-2057 http://www.satribune.com/ http://antisystemic.org/satribune/www.satribune.com/archives/200507/P1_hh2.htm
Under Pakistani law, every citizen is entitled to a passport upon presentation of proof of citizenship, usually a national identity card. There is no dispute that Mr. Sharif is a Pakistani citizen. The Government’s claim that he agreed on December 9, 2000, under a deal brokered by Saudi Arabia, to live in exile for an unspecified period is irrelevant to his right to a passport as a citizen. How can an unlawful deal between a captor and a captive trump one’s citizenship rights?
In any case, the Government has failed to produce the agreement it claims was reached between the Sharif family at the time Mr. Sharif was released from prison and sent into exile. Mr. Sharif was toppled in a coup d’etat in 1999 and imprisoned, later to be charged with several “crimes.”
If he was, as the military Government claimed, a criminal, General Musharraf had no right to release and pardon him without completing the due process of law. If, however, he was innocent, there was no justification in imprisoning him simply because the military found him to be unworthy of running the country. In either case, where does Pakistan’s constitution (even after its many mutilations) empower the Chief of Army Staff to deprive a Pakistani of the right to return to his country or to secure a passport for travel abroad?
Even if General Musharraf’s claim is right and Mr. Sharif went into exile voluntarily, the alleged agreement was political rather than a legally binding one. If General Musharraf can go back on his political agreement with the Opposition regarding relinquishing his military uniform at the end of 2004 due to changed circumstances, what prevents Mr. Sharif from backing out of his unwritten commitment not to return to Pakistan?
In any case, what does any of this have to do with Mr. Sharif’s right to possess a Pakistani passport? Not long ago, Pakistani authorities appeared to link renewing Ms. Benazir Bhutto’s passport to knowing her travel plans. Ms Bhutto and Mr. Sharif’s are General Musharraf’s political challengers. The General has a political interest in keeping them in exile. But the question of when and how a Pakistani citizenship gets his or her passport should be a matter of law not of political expediency.
One has read several news stories about how different branches of Pakistan’s Government, from the intelligence services to the Interior Ministry and the Foreign office, are waiting for General Musharraf’s decision on whether or not a passport is to be issued to Mr. Sharif.
This leads to a question that would best be answered by the British High Commissioner to Pakistan, Sir Mark Lyall-Grant, who recently took it upon himself to declare that the current system of governance in Pakistan cannot be called a dictatorship. What other word in the English language describes a system of governance where basic decisions such as whether a citizen gets his passport or not are made by one man and not on the basis of well-defined laws? Not long ago, General Musharraf acknowledged that he had ordered the inclusion of rape victim Mukhtaran Mai’s on the Exit Control List (ECL). Mukhtaran Mai’s passport was also taken away by officials, only to be returned to her after intervention by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. General Musharraf claimed he took these steps to prevent Mukhtaran Mai being manipulated by some NGOs into spoiling Pakistan’s image.
Ironically, the Exit Control List is meant to prevent criminals and those under investigation for crimes from leaving the country. Nothing in the law gives the country’s ruler the right to put a rape victim on the ECL even if the purpose of such restrictions is to protect the country’s image.
Once again, Her Britannic Majesty’s High Commissioner might care to introduce us to the political science term in the English language that describes an unelected ruler whose word becomes law and whose definition of national interest can only be changed by him.
The reluctance of the Government to issue Mr. Nawaz Sharif his passport is not the first time in Pakistan’s history that citizenship rights have been arbitrarily determined by the country’s rulers. In 1971, after the creation of Bangladesh, several hundred thousand Pakistani citizens were stranded in their country’s former Eastern wing. These people and their families had migrated from India to Pakistan at the time of the 1947 partition to become Pakistani citizens.
When the country was torn into two, they chose to remain Pakistanis and demanded the right to come to the remaining part of Pakistan. Any other country would have recognized that right without any argument and arranged for their repatriation. But successive Pakistani Governments argued that the repatriation of stranded Pakistanis from Bangladesh would upset the ethnic balance in West Pakistan and put an undue burden on the country’s economy. In a tragic farce, General Ziaul Haq’s military regime tied repatriation of Pakistanis stranded in Bangladesh to availability of international assistance. Saudi Arabia helped create a trust to fund the return of Pakistanis stranded in Bangladesh to Pakistan. But since when are citizenship rights a matter of economics?
What other country has refused to allow its citizens the right to return to their homeland on grounds that the Government did not have enough money left from its defense spending to enable them to live in their own country? The Pakistanis in Bangladesh should have been issued Pakistani passports based on their citizenship and their inalienable right of return to their country of citizenship. They would have found a way of eking out a living just as tens of millions of other Pakistanis do.
The military-bureaucratic complex that controls Pakistan’s destiny saw the matter, not from the lens of citizenship rights but from the prism of its ability to manage the country. That management approach, where the boss is always right, contributes to Pakistanis having a lesser sense and feeling of citizenship than in many other countries.
Not only are Pakistan’s citizens not allowed to choose their own rulers, the country’s rulers arrogate to themselves the authority of determining whether a citizen has any rights at all or not.
The disregard for law in relation to passports, but in the reverse direction, was witnessed in 1993 when the Pakistani military wanted to install Mr. Moeen Qureshi as caretaker Prime Minister. Mr. Qureshi had lived in the United States for several decades, had taken up US citizenship and by most accounts had not regularly renewed his Pakistani passport or obtained a Pakistani National identity card.
Mr. Qureshi was issued both his national identity card and passport in Singapore so that he would not arrive in the country without these documents before becoming Prime Minister. He was, of course, entitled to Pakistani citizenship and there is no reason to impugn his commitment or services to Pakistan.
The issue is that it was not Mr. Qureshi’s right as a dual citizen but rather the desire of the army commander at the time to name him caretaker Prime Minister that secured him his passport. Had it been a matter of right, Mr. Sharif’s right to a passport would have received the same attention at the Pakistani Consulate in Jeddah that Mr. Qureshi’s did at the Pakistan Embassy in Singapore.
The writer is a Visiting Scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and Associate Professor of International Relations at Boston University. He is the author of the forthcoming book 'Pakistan Between Mosque and Military'
London Bombings and Pakistani Connection: A Pakistani View By Husain Haqqani WASHINGTON DC, July 20, 2005 ISSN: 1684-2057 http://www.satribune.com/ http://antisystemic.org/satribune/www.satribune.com/archives/200507/P1_hh2.htm
WASHINGTON, July 20: The July 7 terrorist bombings in London have led to greater scrutiny of Pakistan’s role in fomenting global Jihad. The London bombers were Britons of Pakistani origin and at least three out of the four visited Pakistan recently. It is natural for the international community to wonder why so many elements of Islamist extremism have a Pakistani connection.
Pakistan’s pro-US ruler, General Pervez Musharraf, has responded to the London attacks by ordering a crackdown on extremist groups. Pakistan’s suave diplomats, western educated technocrats and articulate generals can be expected over the next few days to highlight their government’s cooperation in the war against terrorism since Musharraf abandoned support for Afghanistan’s Taliban regime in 2001.
The main theme of the Pakistani establishment’s argument has already been articulated by Mr. Munir Akram, Pakistan permanent representative of the United Nations. Mr. Akram told the BBC that the UK “should try not to blame foreign countries for influencing the London suicide bombers” and that “Britain had to look at its own problems to understand the root causes of terror.” According to the Pakistani UN ambassador, “You have to look at British society - what you are doing to the Muslim community and why the Muslim community is not integrating into British society,... and not try to externalize the problems Britain faces with regard to race and religious relations.”
Of course, Mr. Akram’s argument fails to explain why other communities in Britain subjected to racism or discrimination have not turned to terrorism and why the argument about not externalizing domestic problems should not apply to Pakistan.
For decades, Pakistan’s aloof bureaucratic rulers have blamed everyone but themselves for Pakistan’s problems. “The British role in partition was unfair, leaving the unfinished business of Kashmir that Pakistan has had to resolve through Jihad; The US did not assist Pakistan in achieving a decisive victory against India in the 1965 war; The Indians divided Pakistan in 1971 and the Americans did nothing to save the country’s unity; Sectarianism in Pakistan is the result of the Iranian revolution; The Taliban rose to power because the Americans lost interest in Afghanistan; Extremism in Pakistan is the result of Pakistan’s crucial role in the anti-Soviet Jihad in Afghanistan.” Etcetera. Etcetera.
Perhaps it is time for Pakistan’s ruling oligarchy to wake up to its own mistakes and face its own history, instead of constant spin. The Muslim League’s failure to win over Shaikh Abdullah before partition probably contributed more to depriving Pakistan of Jammu and Kashmir than did the inequities of the British, who partitioned India in a hurry.
Pakistan’s generals made enormous miscalculations while blundering into the 1965 war and should have known that the US would not come to their rescue. The arrogance of Pakistan’s military-intelligence combine and the mistreatment of Pakistan’s then majority population, the Bengalis, led to the creation of Bangladesh.
Pakistan’s unpopular rulers chose to encourage sectarianism in an effort to contain the potential of popular support for the Iranian revolution.
Pakistan’s role in Afghanistan was a conscious decision of the country’s establishment but the establishment failed to match its ambitions with competence.
It is time for Pakistan’s ruling oligarchy to face its cumulative mistakes and start addressing the culture of blame and prejudice that has been part of officially sponsored discourse in the country. Of course, Pakistan has legitimate security interests and must pursue these with intelligent diplomacy. But the policies of constant invoking of religion in affairs of state, unconventional warfare against neighbors as a means of containing their power, and duality in dealing with the west have failed and that failure must now be accepted.
Pakistanis cannot go around seeking western aid in return for strategic cooperation while hating the west at the same time.
There is no doubt that Musharraf has selectively cooperated with the United States and other western governments since 9/11 and Pakistan has made some high profile Al-Qaeda arrests. But Pakistan has yet to acknowledge, let alone deal with, the ideology of hatred and militancy that has been cultivated as state policy for over four decades.
The threat of terrorism to the west does not come exclusively from Arabs formally affiliated with Osama bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda, whom the Pakistan government has done much to pursue. Other groups organized to “avenge” real and perceived humiliation of Muslims are an equally significant menace, operating as “baby Al-Qaedas.” Afghan, Kashmiri and Pakistani Islamist groups share Al-Qaeda's ideology even when they have no direct links to bin Laden's network.
Some of Pakistan’s madrassas are no longer just bastions of medieval theology, which they were for centuries without giving rise to terrorism. They have evolved into training centers for radical anti-Western militancy. Pakistan’s school curriculum cultivates the sentiment of Muslim victimhood and inculcates in young minds the hatred of Jews and Hindus, in particular, and non-Muslims in general.
When it emerged as an independent state in 1947, Pakistan was considered a moderate Muslim nation that could serve as a model for other emerging independent Muslim states. Pakistan’s founder, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, was a Shia Muslim. Its first law minister was a Hindu. Its foreign minister belonged to the Ahmadiyya sect, which opposes Jihad. Although Pakistan’s birth was accompanied by religious riots and communal violence, the country’s founders clearly intended to create a non-sectarian state that would protect religious freedoms and provide the Muslims of South Asia an opportunity to live in a country where they constituted a majority.
Over the years, however, Pakistan has become a major center of Islamist extremism. The disproportionate influence wielded by fundamentalist groups in Pakistan is the result of state sponsorship of such groups.
Pakistan’s rulers have played upon religious sentiment as an instrument of strengthening Pakistan’s identity since soon after the country’s inception. Fears of Indian domination were addressed by embracing an Islamist ideology. Islamist militants were cultivated, armed and trained during the 1980s and 1990s in the Pakistan military’s efforts to seek strategic depth in Afghanistan and to put pressure on India for negotiations over the future of Kashmir. Although Musharraf has restrained some of these home-grown groups since 9/11, he has refused to work towards eliminating them completely.
In an effort to justify the ascendancy of Pakistan’s military in the country’s affairs, a national ethos of militarism was created. An environment dominated by Islamist and militarist ideologies is the ideal breeding ground for radicals such as the July 7 suicide bombers. In their search for identity, British-born Pakistanis have been drawn into the whirlpool of their parents’ homeland.
The United States and other western nations have put their faith in the promises of General Musharraf’s military to move Pakistan away from its Islamist radical past and towards “enlightened moderation.” But the London attacks point out the deep-rooted problems in Pakistan.
The major Kashmiri Jihadi groups retain their infrastructure because the Pakistani military has not decided to give up the option of battling India at a future date. Afghanistan’s Taliban also continue to find safe haven in parts of Pakistan as recently as the spring of 2005.
Western policy makers would rather see Pakistan’s glass as half full rather than half empty and Pakistan’s ruling oligarchy would like to keep things that way. This approach distracts Pakistan’s rulers, and their western supporters, from recognizing the depth of Pakistan’s problem with Islamist extremism and a violently irresponsible attitude towards the rest of the world.
The writer is author of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace book “Pakistan Between Mosque and Military.” He was Pakistan’s Ambassador to Sri Lanka from 1992 to 1993 and teaches International Relations at Boston University
"UNQUOTE"
Everyone have strong reservation on the acts and omissions (political) by very few bad individuals in ISI, in the past. But, whole institution cannot be condemned.
Pakistan’s pro-US ruler, General Pervez Musharraf, has responded to the London attacks by ordering a crackdown on extremist groups. Pakistan’s suave diplomats, western educated technocrats and articulate generals can be expected over the next few days to highlight their government’s cooperation in the war against terrorism since Musharraf abandoned support for Afghanistan’s Taliban regime in 2001.
The main theme of the Pakistani establishment’s argument has already been articulated by Mr. Munir Akram, Pakistan permanent representative of the United Nations. Mr. Akram told the BBC that the UK “should try not to blame foreign countries for influencing the London suicide bombers” and that “Britain had to look at its own problems to understand the root causes of terror.” According to the Pakistani UN ambassador, “You have to look at British society - what you are doing to the Muslim community and why the Muslim community is not integrating into British society,... and not try to externalize the problems Britain faces with regard to race and religious relations.”
Of course, Mr. Akram’s argument fails to explain why other communities in Britain subjected to racism or discrimination have not turned to terrorism and why the argument about not externalizing domestic problems should not apply to Pakistan.
For decades, Pakistan’s aloof bureaucratic rulers have blamed everyone but themselves for Pakistan’s problems. “The British role in partition was unfair, leaving the unfinished business of Kashmir that Pakistan has had to resolve through Jihad; The US did not assist Pakistan in achieving a decisive victory against India in the 1965 war; The Indians divided Pakistan in 1971 and the Americans did nothing to save the country’s unity; Sectarianism in Pakistan is the result of the Iranian revolution; The Taliban rose to power because the Americans lost interest in Afghanistan; Extremism in Pakistan is the result of Pakistan’s crucial role in the anti-Soviet Jihad in Afghanistan.” Etcetera. Etcetera.
Perhaps it is time for Pakistan’s ruling oligarchy to wake up to its own mistakes and face its own history, instead of constant spin. The Muslim League’s failure to win over Shaikh Abdullah before partition probably contributed more to depriving Pakistan of Jammu and Kashmir than did the inequities of the British, who partitioned India in a hurry.
Pakistan’s generals made enormous miscalculations while blundering into the 1965 war and should have known that the US would not come to their rescue. The arrogance of Pakistan’s military-intelligence combine and the mistreatment of Pakistan’s then majority population, the Bengalis, led to the creation of Bangladesh.
Pakistan’s unpopular rulers chose to encourage sectarianism in an effort to contain the potential of popular support for the Iranian revolution.
Pakistan’s role in Afghanistan was a conscious decision of the country’s establishment but the establishment failed to match its ambitions with competence.
It is time for Pakistan’s ruling oligarchy to face its cumulative mistakes and start addressing the culture of blame and prejudice that has been part of officially sponsored discourse in the country. Of course, Pakistan has legitimate security interests and must pursue these with intelligent diplomacy. But the policies of constant invoking of religion in affairs of state, unconventional warfare against neighbors as a means of containing their power, and duality in dealing with the west have failed and that failure must now be accepted.
Pakistanis cannot go around seeking western aid in return for strategic cooperation while hating the west at the same time.
There is no doubt that Musharraf has selectively cooperated with the United States and other western governments since 9/11 and Pakistan has made some high profile Al-Qaeda arrests. But Pakistan has yet to acknowledge, let alone deal with, the ideology of hatred and militancy that has been cultivated as state policy for over four decades.
The threat of terrorism to the west does not come exclusively from Arabs formally affiliated with Osama bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda, whom the Pakistan government has done much to pursue. Other groups organized to “avenge” real and perceived humiliation of Muslims are an equally significant menace, operating as “baby Al-Qaedas.” Afghan, Kashmiri and Pakistani Islamist groups share Al-Qaeda's ideology even when they have no direct links to bin Laden's network.
Some of Pakistan’s madrassas are no longer just bastions of medieval theology, which they were for centuries without giving rise to terrorism. They have evolved into training centers for radical anti-Western militancy. Pakistan’s school curriculum cultivates the sentiment of Muslim victimhood and inculcates in young minds the hatred of Jews and Hindus, in particular, and non-Muslims in general.
When it emerged as an independent state in 1947, Pakistan was considered a moderate Muslim nation that could serve as a model for other emerging independent Muslim states. Pakistan’s founder, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, was a Shia Muslim. Its first law minister was a Hindu. Its foreign minister belonged to the Ahmadiyya sect, which opposes Jihad. Although Pakistan’s birth was accompanied by religious riots and communal violence, the country’s founders clearly intended to create a non-sectarian state that would protect religious freedoms and provide the Muslims of South Asia an opportunity to live in a country where they constituted a majority.
Over the years, however, Pakistan has become a major center of Islamist extremism. The disproportionate influence wielded by fundamentalist groups in Pakistan is the result of state sponsorship of such groups.
Pakistan’s rulers have played upon religious sentiment as an instrument of strengthening Pakistan’s identity since soon after the country’s inception. Fears of Indian domination were addressed by embracing an Islamist ideology. Islamist militants were cultivated, armed and trained during the 1980s and 1990s in the Pakistan military’s efforts to seek strategic depth in Afghanistan and to put pressure on India for negotiations over the future of Kashmir. Although Musharraf has restrained some of these home-grown groups since 9/11, he has refused to work towards eliminating them completely.
In an effort to justify the ascendancy of Pakistan’s military in the country’s affairs, a national ethos of militarism was created. An environment dominated by Islamist and militarist ideologies is the ideal breeding ground for radicals such as the July 7 suicide bombers. In their search for identity, British-born Pakistanis have been drawn into the whirlpool of their parents’ homeland.
The United States and other western nations have put their faith in the promises of General Musharraf’s military to move Pakistan away from its Islamist radical past and towards “enlightened moderation.” But the London attacks point out the deep-rooted problems in Pakistan.
The major Kashmiri Jihadi groups retain their infrastructure because the Pakistani military has not decided to give up the option of battling India at a future date. Afghanistan’s Taliban also continue to find safe haven in parts of Pakistan as recently as the spring of 2005.
Western policy makers would rather see Pakistan’s glass as half full rather than half empty and Pakistan’s ruling oligarchy would like to keep things that way. This approach distracts Pakistan’s rulers, and their western supporters, from recognizing the depth of Pakistan’s problem with Islamist extremism and a violently irresponsible attitude towards the rest of the world.
The writer is author of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace book “Pakistan Between Mosque and Military.” He was Pakistan’s Ambassador to Sri Lanka from 1992 to 1993 and teaches International Relations at Boston University
"UNQUOTE"
Everyone have strong reservation on the acts and omissions (political) by very few bad individuals in ISI, in the past. But, whole institution cannot be condemned.
Now what Shaheen Sehbai did, he gave a detailed interview (while in Washington to save his skin) to one Shobha John and that interview published in Times of India dated March 18, 2002, in which he narrated and offered a painted picture of oppression and harassment by ISI people due the story he filed in the News International on the death of Wall Street Journal Journalist Daniel Pearl.
Mr. Shaheen Shebai [Former Correspondent of Daily Dawn Pakistan, Former Editor of The News International, Ex Director News of ARY ONE TV Channel, Former Director of GEO News Network, and presently on of the many Editors of The News International, Jang Group of Newspapers, Pakistan]
Minor example as to how CIA and other agencies use Journalists even Senior Correspondents like Shaheen Sehbai. Brigadier Imtiaz used to hate him when Imtiaz was NUMBER 2 IN ISI and Number 1 in IB. But same Shaheen Sehbai, Ansar Abbasi, Rauf Klasra and GEO TV give this Rascal much more importance than Imtiaz deserved.
Minor example as to how CIA and other agencies use Journalists even Senior Correspondents like Shaheen Sehbai. Brigadier Imtiaz used to hate him when Imtiaz was NUMBER 2 IN ISI and Number 1 in IB. But same Shaheen Sehbai, Ansar Abbasi, Rauf Klasra and GEO TV give this Rascal much more importance than Imtiaz deserved.
Mr. Shaheen Shebai [Former Correspondent of Daily Dawn Pakistan, Former Editor of The News International, Ex Director News of ARY ONE TV Channel, Former Director of GEO News Network, and presently on of the many Editors of The News International, Jang Group of Newspapers, Pakistan] I hope you remember the background of Mr Shahin Sehbai [One of the Editor of The News International and earlier he was in Dawn], he had escaped from Pakistan [to save himself from the wrath of the Establishment headed by General Musharraf and Co particularly after the Controversy of Shaheen Sehbai's Story on the Murder of Daniel Pearl after the start of War on Terror] and Mr Shaheen used to run a Web Based News Service i.e. South Asia Tribune but suddenly Mr Shaheen Sehbai reappeared and closed his website [whereas Mr Shaheen during his self imposed exile in USA used to raise hue and cry against the Military Establishment that he and his family member's life is in danger] he returned to Pakistan and that too under the same Martial Law of General Musharraf and joined ARY TV Channel then GEO and then The News International [where he is presently working].
Same Shaheen Sehbai
THE ENEMY WITHIN – Peril in Pakistan Don’t be fooled by Musharraf’s nice-guy pose. By SHAHEEN SEHBAI Saturday, March 23, 2002 12:01 A.M. EST [Wall Street Journal]
THE ENEMY WITHIN – Peril in Pakistan Don’t be fooled by Musharraf’s nice-guy pose. By SHAHEEN SEHBAI Saturday, March 23, 2002 12:01 A.M. EST [Wall Street Journal]
The primary instrument of change in achieving this devil’s pact is Gen. Musharraf’s recasting of the ISI as a more docile institution, ostensibly purged of Islamist hard-liners and Taliban sympathizers. But buyers beware.
Over 20 years ago, another military dictator, Gen. Zia ul-Haq, created the first reign of the ISI when he empowered the agency to run a different war in Afghanistan–the one against the Soviets. Billions of American taxpayer dollars and weapons of every imaginable type flowed through the ISI into mujahedeen hands–while the U.S. government looked the other way as Zia built Pakistan’s nuclear capacity, trained Islamic militants and inculcated radical Islam into the barracks and the schools. Rogue terrorist armies were born and no one paid attention.
In 1985, under an absolutist formula for controlling press dissension, Zia tried to patch together political legitimacy at home under farcical nonparty elections, and by handpicking his parliament and prime minister. An August 1988 plane crash that killed Zia left a power vacuum filled by out-of-control intelligence outfits. The birth of America’s present-day nemeses, the Taliban and al Qaeda, were–in the eyes of the all-powerful Islamist generals–the ISI’s most important contributions to Pakistani national security after the bomb.
Another intelligence disaster now looms. Its similarities to the Zia days are remarkable. Gen. Musharraf, the military dictator of the day, is the new darling of the West fighting the new enemy in Afghanistan. Billions of American taxpayer dollars are again set to flow. A beautiful facade has been crafted for external consumption, on everything from press freedoms and elections to a corruption-free economy and an Islamist-free state. The reality is harshly different.
Over 20 years ago, another military dictator, Gen. Zia ul-Haq, created the first reign of the ISI when he empowered the agency to run a different war in Afghanistan–the one against the Soviets. Billions of American taxpayer dollars and weapons of every imaginable type flowed through the ISI into mujahedeen hands–while the U.S. government looked the other way as Zia built Pakistan’s nuclear capacity, trained Islamic militants and inculcated radical Islam into the barracks and the schools. Rogue terrorist armies were born and no one paid attention.
In 1985, under an absolutist formula for controlling press dissension, Zia tried to patch together political legitimacy at home under farcical nonparty elections, and by handpicking his parliament and prime minister. An August 1988 plane crash that killed Zia left a power vacuum filled by out-of-control intelligence outfits. The birth of America’s present-day nemeses, the Taliban and al Qaeda, were–in the eyes of the all-powerful Islamist generals–the ISI’s most important contributions to Pakistani national security after the bomb.
Another intelligence disaster now looms. Its similarities to the Zia days are remarkable. Gen. Musharraf, the military dictator of the day, is the new darling of the West fighting the new enemy in Afghanistan. Billions of American taxpayer dollars are again set to flow. A beautiful facade has been crafted for external consumption, on everything from press freedoms and elections to a corruption-free economy and an Islamist-free state. The reality is harshly different.
Shaheen Sehbai in 2002 [but why exile in a country who were the backers of Musharraf Regime and why and how Shaheen Sehbai turned up in Pakistan in under the same Musharraf]
Exile in Virginia
“If you expose corruption, you pay,” said Sehbai, who now lives in self-imposed exile in Virginia and publishes the crusading South Asia Tribune on the Internet. He said police are harassing relatives he left behind, including several who have been jailed for questioning on what Sehbai insists is a trumped-up charge that he robbed his former brother-in-law’s house at gunpoint. A cousin’s 18-year-old son has been in jail since late August without charge. Qureshi, Musharraf’s spokesman, insisted that police are acting independently in a criminal investigation. Sehbai fled Pakistan with his wife and four children in February, after publishing a story that said Ahmad Omar Saeed Sheikh, convicted in the murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, had admitted links to Pakistan’s Inter-ServiceIntelligence agency. Sehbai said he was urged to apologize to the ISI’s political and media chief, Maj. Gen. Ehtasham Zamir. But he refused.
Exile in Virginia
“If you expose corruption, you pay,” said Sehbai, who now lives in self-imposed exile in Virginia and publishes the crusading South Asia Tribune on the Internet. He said police are harassing relatives he left behind, including several who have been jailed for questioning on what Sehbai insists is a trumped-up charge that he robbed his former brother-in-law’s house at gunpoint. A cousin’s 18-year-old son has been in jail since late August without charge. Qureshi, Musharraf’s spokesman, insisted that police are acting independently in a criminal investigation. Sehbai fled Pakistan with his wife and four children in February, after publishing a story that said Ahmad Omar Saeed Sheikh, convicted in the murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, had admitted links to Pakistan’s Inter-ServiceIntelligence agency. Sehbai said he was urged to apologize to the ISI’s political and media chief, Maj. Gen. Ehtasham Zamir. But he refused.
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