On blasphemy, clerics and intolerance

On blasphemy, clerics and intolerance
Sher Khan
Express Tribune
December 4, 2010

Maulana Sheerani became the controversial new head of the CII earlier this year

Intolerance is making headlines again. One can elucidate that local cleric Qari Salam’s decision to facilitate an FIR against Aasia Bibi or the appointment of JUI-F cleric Maulana Mohammad Khan Sherani as the 12th chairman of the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) show that we are victims of our own social confusion.

I couldn’t help but notice that the history of intolerance and ignorance has always been battling against humanity. One of my colleague who visited Aasia Bibi’s village in Nankana to interview Qari Salam was astonished by the lack of remorse he felt regarding the decision to facilitate the FIR filed against her. When asked about pardoning Aasia Bibi, he went on to say that if it was his own “personal matter” he could consider pardoning her. Furthermore, he also hinted at potential public backlash from such a decision. The point I am getting at is that there was societal dynamics, which trumped anything supposedly rational.

Discussing the idea of social confusion, KK Aziz in his book “The Pakistani Historian” worried that changing society had been replaced by apathy and a lack of thought. The truth is we have reached a point where lack of education and moral strength has bred this confused circle of intolerance. Various facets of life ranging from politics to religion and even culture has challenged this attitude to live for the “now” as Aziz puts it.

Furthermore, with the death of pan-Islamic thought, our society’s ethical and moral debate has been hijacked by the religious cleric. By any means, the Council of Islamic Ideolgy has failed to even raise a proper voice against terror because religious parties remain confused about how religious beliefs fit into the concept of Pakistan. Furthermore, the state’s endorsement of Sherani is a sign that clerics retain political power during a time when academic Islamic scholars are forced to live in exile.

It seems that while living for the present, we have forgotten our past. As we boast laurels about old Islamic empires and hope for a new Saladin to come to our rescue, remember that the difference between then and now was an inherent attitude of tolerance. Tolerance in education, thought, and life in general meant that there was a collective will to strive and adapt to the changing times.

Hardline Pakistan Islamist offers reward to kill Christian woman

Fri Dec 3, 2010 12:41pm GMT

By Faris Ali

Reuters

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - A hardline, pro-Taliban Pakistani Muslim cleric Friday offered a reward for anyone who kills a Christian woman sentenced to death by a court on charges of insulting Islam.

The sentence against Asia Bibi has renewed debate about Pakistan's blasphemy law which critics say is used to persecute religious minorities, fan religious extremism and settle personal scores. Non-Muslim minorities account roughly 4 percent of Pakistan's about 170 million population.

Maulana Yousef Qureshi, the imam of a major mosque in the northwestern city of Peshawar, offered a $5,800 (3,700 pounds) reward and warned the government against any move to abolish or change the blasphemy law.

"We will strongly resist any attempt to repeal laws which provide protection to the sanctity of Holy Prophet Mohammad," Qureshi told a rally of hardline Islamists.

"Anyone who kills Asia will be given 500,000 rupees in reward from Masjid Mohabat Khan," he said referring to his mosque.

While Qureshi is not believed to have a wide following, comments by clerics can provoke a violent response and complicate government efforts to combat religious extremism and militancy.

Qureshi, cleric who has been leading congregation at the 17th century Mohabat Khan mosque for decades, later told Reuters he was determined to see her killed.

"We expect her to be hanged and if she is not hanged then we will ask mujahideen and Taliban to kill her."

Bibi, a 45-year-old mother of four, is the first woman to be sentenced to death under the blasphemy law.

Blasphemy convictions are common in mainly Muslim Pakistan. Although the death sentence has never been carried out as most convictions are thrown out on appeal, angry mobs and fanatics have killed many people accused of blasphemy in the past.

In 2006, Qureshi and his followers announced rewards amounting to over $1 million for anyone who killed Danish cartoonists who drew caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad that had enraged Muslims worldwide.

After her conviction, Bibi appealed to President Asif Ali Zardari to pardon her, saying she had been wrongly accused by neighbours due to a personal dispute.

Last week, a government minister said an initial inquiry into the case showed she had not committed blasphemy. The Lahore High Court last month prevented Zardari from granting a pardon and ruled that the High Court should be allowed to decide her appeal.

"No president, no parliament and no government has any right to interfere in the commandants of Islam. Islamic punishment will be implemented at all costs," said Qureshi.

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Islamic terrorists getting what they deserve.

Taliban targets descendants of Alexander the Great

For centuries, the blond-haired, blue-eyed people of the Kalash tribes of North West Pakistan have lived a libertine lifestyle.

Dean Nelson in New Delhi

Children of the Kalash tribe in Northern Pakistan: Taliban targets descendants of Alexander the Great
Children of the Kalash tribe in Northern Pakistan Photo: EPA

The group, believed to be descendants of Alexander the Great's invading army, were shielded from conservative Islam by the steep slopes of their remote valleys.

While Sikhs, Hindus, and Christians were slowly driven out of Pakistan's North West Frontier Province by Muslim militants, the Kalash were free to drink their own distilled spirits and smoke cannabis.

But the militant maulanas of the Taliban have finally caught up with them and declared war on their culture and heritage by kidnapping their most devoted supporter.

Taliban commanders have taken Professor Athanasion Larounis, a Greek aid worker who has generated £2.5 million in donations to build schools, clinics, clean water projects and a museum.

They are now demanding £1.25 million and the release of three militant leaders in exchange for his safe return.

According to local police, it was Professor Larounis's dedication to preserving Kalasha culture that Taliban commanders in Nuristan, on the Afghan side of the border that made him a target.

Confirmation of the Taliban's role in his kidnapping came as their leader Mullah Omar urged American and Nato leaders to learn from the history of Alexander the Great's invasion of Afghanistan and his defeat by Pushtun tribesmen in the 4BC.

He was kidnapped on Sep 8, when five masked Taliban broke into the three storey museum where he was living, killed a policeman guarding the building, tied a teacher to a post and grabbed the professor from his bed.

Ajmeer Kalash, a Kalash teacher who witnessed the incident, said he had saved his own life by pretending to be a Muslim.

"I did not understand their language and they did not understand mine. I tried to make them understand in Urdu language that I'm a teacher at the school."

He said the men asked for his religion and "I told them that I'm a Muslim by reciting Kalma, though I'm a Kalash."

"They brought out the Greek national and they opened fire at his police guard. The policeman died on the spot. They took me and the Greek citizen to the forest. There they tied my hands to a tree and left me there and went away," he said.

Locals said the professor had been visiting the area since 1994 when he first came as a tourist and fell in love with the area's unique culture and its people's links to his own in Greece and Macedonia.

Today there are an estimated 3,000 Kalasha left in three remote and steep valleys in Chitral in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province. The children wear their hair in orthodox Jewish-style ringlets and sport bright coloured topi hats. The women occasionally have tattooed faces, wear long black robes with coloured embroidery.

The Kalash are known as 'Black Kafirs' to local Muslims who regard them, and their women in particular, as immoral. They are scornful of their festivals and rituals, which include a rite of passage in which a prepubescent boy is fattened in the mountains over a summer and then when he returns is allowed to have sex with any woman he chooses.

Married Kalash women are able to elope with other men if the object of their desire accepts a written proposal and agrees to double her dowry to the abandoned husband – often in cows.

Professor Larounis, who is believed to have been living in the Kalash Valleys with his wife, had generated around two and a half million pounds in aid for 20 projects in the Kalash Valleys, including clean water schemes, and the museum in Broon village in Bumburet.

Since his kidnapping Kalash women have demonstrated for his release, while elders have travelled to Nuristan to try to negotiate with his kidnappers.

Other Islamist threats in Pakistan

The other Islamist threat in Pakistan

By Selig S. Harrison | June 17, 2009

Boston Globe

THE DANGER of an Islamist takeover of Pakistan is real. But it does not come from the Taliban guerrillas now battling the Pakistan Army in the Swat borderlands. It comes from a proliferating network of heavily armed Islamist militias in the Punjab heartland and major cities directed by Lashkar-e-Taiba, a close ally of Al Qaeda, which staged the terrorist attack last November in Mumbai, India.

Pakistan’s failure to crack down on Lashkar-e-Taiba militias and the recent release of two of its leaders jailed after the Mumbai attack led to an angry exchange on Monday at a meeting in Russia between Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Pakistan Prime Minister Asif Ali Zardari.

No new US aid commitments should be made to Islamabad until it takes decisive action to disarm Lashkar-e-Taiba in accordance with Article 256 of the Pakistan Constitution, which bars private militias. The administration wants to provide $3 billion in new military aid on top of the $10 billion already showered on Pakistan since 2001, together with a five-year, $7.5 billion program of economic aid. Surprisingly, while congressional leaders are seeking to attach a variety of conditions to the aid package, they have so far ignored the critical issue of the militias.

Disarming Lashkar-e-Taiba should be the top US priority in Pakistan because it would greatly reduce the possibility of a coup by Islamist sympathizers in the armed forces. The closet Islamists in the Army and the powerful Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI) are not likely to risk a coup in Islamabad unless they can count on armed support from Lashkar-e-Taiba and its allies to help them consolidate their grip on the countryside.

Equally important, a strong US stand on Lashkar-e-Taiba is necessary to defuse India-Pakistan tensions that could lead to another war and to sustain the improvement now taking place in US relations with India, a rising power eight times larger than Pakistan.

New Delhi fears a repeat of the Mumbai massacre, in which 166 were killed, and views US readiness to pressure Islamabad on the militias as a litmus test of US friendship.

To be sure, the Pakistan government did make a show of cracking down on Lashkar-e-Taiba after the Mumbai tragedy. It banned it, placed two of its leaders under house arrest, and jailed and arrested six of its operatives on charges of “facilitating a terrorist act.’’ But the two leaders were released on June 2. The government stopped short of breaking up the militias and destroying the weapons stockpiles at their four training camps near Muridke and Muzaffarabad, and it has yet to prosecute the six prisoners or to arrest Zaki-ur-Rahman Lakhvi, identified by US and Indian intelligence sources as the ringleader of the Mumbai attack, who is still at large.

Under a new name, Jawad-ud-Dawa, Lashkar-e-Taiba has continued to operate its militias, its FM radio station, and hundreds of seminaries where jihadis are trained, in addition to its legitimate charities and educational institutions. When the UN designated Jawat-ud-Dawa as a terrorist group, the Pakistan government issued another ban and Jawat-ud-Dawa changed its name to the Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation.

The “foundation’’ now has 2,000 members doing relief work in war-torn Swat with the approval of the Pakistan government, amid credible reports that it is using its humanitarian cover to recruit new members as it did after the 2002 Kashmir earthquake.

Lashkar-e-Taiba is on the Sunni side of the Sunni-Shia doctrinal divide in Islam and has its deepest roots in a 20,000-square-mile swath of southern Punjab between Jhang and Bahawalpur, where it champions the cause of landless Sunni peasants indentured to big Shia landowners.

“It is common knowledge that the local police are in their pocket in much of that area,’’ retired diplomat Tariq Fatemi, a former ambassador to Washington, told me recently.

Sunni extremist groups have been active in the Punjab since the creation of Pakistan and became the nucleus of Lashkar-e-Taiba when the ISI, with US funding, built up a jihadi movement to fight against Soviet forces in Afghanistan. Lashkar-e-Taiba and key allies such as Lashkar-e-Jhangvi still get ISI support and have close ties with other intelligence agencies, but how much and how close remain uncertain.

Like Al Qaeda to Americans, Lashkar-e-Taiba is a powerful emotive symbol to the 1.2 billion people of India. Hindu nationalists use this symbolism to fan fears of another Mumbai and to step up demands for reprisals against Pakistan. Increasingly, they are criticizing the United States for giving Pakistan money and weaponry without monitoring whether they are being used to strengthen Pakistan forces on the Indian border.

Why, they ask, should the United States give another $10.5 billion in aid, on top of the $14 billion already provided since 2001, to a government in Islamabad that is unwilling or unable to disarm home-grown terrorists who threaten India?

Why, indeed.

Selig S. Harrison is author of “Pakistan, The State of the Union,’’ a report just published by the Center for International Policy, where he is director of the Asia program.

Video : Pakistan on the Brink

ABN Link

Pakistan, Can You Hear Me?

Where is the conscience of a nation? Where are the protests and the million-man marches? Where are the voices that rally dormant citizens to action -- on television, in the newspapers, on Facebook even?

RAKESH MANI
Outlook India
February 24, 2009

The recent suicide attack in Dera Ismail Khan that targeted the funeral of a Shia Muslim cleric, Sher Zaman, who was gunned down, was shocking enough. But what is even more shocking is the sheer passivity in the reaction of people in Pakistan to recent events in Dera Ismail Khan and Swat.

It is appalling to think that Pakistanis are ever-ready to take to the streets, shouting slogans and burning effigies, when Salman Rushdie writes something controversial or when offensive cartoons are published in Danish newspapers but are curiously silent when the funeral of a religious leader is bombed in sectarian violence. Or when Taliban forces capture Swat and start beheading people for religious insubordination.

Where is the conscience of a nation? Where are the protests and the million-man marches? Where are the voices that rally dormant citizens to action -- on television, in the newspapers, on Facebook even?

If no one protests, it just sends a signal that this is OK. It is OK to bomb a Shia funeral, but it is not OK to write an irreverent story or draw cartoons that poke fun at religion. Where are people�s priorities? How much deeper into the abyss is Pakistan going to sink?

Islamic fundamentalism�s biggest draw is that it is a utopian alternative to the miserable realities of people�s lives. But everywhere that fundamentalists have come to power, their sheen has worn off. Think of Bangladesh, Turkey and Iran. People realize that mullahs can preach all day, but they can�t run a country. So if sectarianism, and militancy in the north-west areas is Pakistan�s big problem, then perhaps it is also Pakistan�s big solution.

Maybe the harsh Zia era was not enough. Maybe what Pakistan needs, finally, is for the Islamists to actually come to power, impose draconian edicts and provide the country with a final inoculation against excessive religiosity.

Maybe then, after suffering through medieval laws against adultery and blasphemy, ordinary Pakistanis will shed their passivity, agitate to separate the state from the tentacles of the mosque and loudly cry no to religious education in high schools, to religion lines on their passports and to rhetoric that urges them to subordinate their citizenship to their religious beliefs. Perhaps Pakistan needs a bitter pill that will forever taint this notion of the religious right being the ultimate defenders of flag and faith.

At the heart of Pakistan�s crisis is a national tendency to over-emphasize religion, whether in politics, or at home. Sure, religion can be a good thing. But this seems to be a case of too much of a good thing. It will only help if Pakistan begins a massive religious re-discovery movement, its own vernacular version of Protestantism.

But must we go down that dangerous path? Is it really not possible for people to realize what is happening to what is left of their country? Atrocities like the bombing of funerals and the usurping of freedoms from the people of Swat provide opportunities for everyone to clearly see the many evils of excessive religious zeal and of outfits like the Taliban.

Pakistan is the global epicenter of Islamic fundamentalism because of a dysfunctional political system and its fundamental challenge of being an Islamic state since its inception. Even today, there are too many in Pakistan�s upper echelons � bureaucrats, politicians, power players, journalists and intellectuals � who are uncomfortable with the prospect of secularism, modernism, growth and an open society.

Pakistan�s elites are a paradox. They are largely secular and confident in their professional and social roles. In New York and London, they announce themselves as a part of the modern world.Pakistani men and women throng Wall Street banks and the hottest Manhattan nightclubs. But in Karachi they are more guarded and cautious, and readily cow down to orthodoxy. How they change and fit their modern lifestyles into parochial Pakistan is one of the greatest exercises in hypocrisy.

But as they continue to avert their eyes, Pakistan is being overrun with cruel, medieval attitudes toward women, education, economic liberalization and modernity in general. Bringing change to Pakistan � reforming a political system and revolutionizing an entire culture � sounds like an impossible challenge. But all the mullahs in the world can�t stand up to the combined will of an agitating and determined citizenry.

There are positive signs coming from Pakistan, however. Yeh Hum Naheen � an NGO headed by producer and media consultant Waseem Mahmood � has put together a musical movement that stands up against terrorism and tells the world that the Pakistani people sing the songs of peace. They claim that more than 62 million people have put their name to the organization�s petition against terrorism, more than the number who voted in the last election in Pakistan. And as Barkha Dutt eloquently pointed out in a recent column, "Pakistan�s media understands that if it doesn�t speak up, their country�s existential crisis could spiral out of control." In light of the tremendous dangers at hand, we must concede that the media in Pakistan has done an extraordinary job, she writes.

But clearly more Pakistanis must come out on the streets to protest against the Taliban, against violence and against the murder of their own people. And for peace and dignity and friendship with their neighbours. Let them pressure their state to take action and soon enough the world will unite around their courage and share in their battle.

But if they decide to stay at home and say nothing, they will be sanctioning evil itself.

Rakesh Mani is a New York-based writer.
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Shia trader, three sons killed in Quetta attack
Rescuing Pakistan from the Taliban
Enemy of my enemy
Intrigue lurks below surface
Army and Taliban reconsider
U.S. training Pakistan's military

Barbarians at the gate, are we ready?

Colonel Anil Athale (retd) | February 19, 2009 |
ReDiff

The recent surrender by the Pakistani State to the Taliban in the Swat valley may well turn out to be a watershed in the history of the Indian subcontinent. In terms of long-term impact, this may even overshadow the recent Mumbai massacres. All signs point to the 'Talibanisation' of Pakistan. Here are several pointers:

* I A Rehman writing in the Dawn newspaper on February 12 says 'the Pakistani armed forces were indoctrinated in General Zia-ul Haq's rule to reserve senior posts for genuine Islamists. The Pakistan army may have the capacity to kill hordes of people, but it will not -- and cannot -- do that.' The army and the State may well disintegrate if it does.
* General Ashfaq Kayani, son of a former soldier, is the first non-elite chief of the Pakistani army. Given his socio-economic background, he is more likely to be part of the 'natural' constituency of the Taliban.
* We have the example of Iran -- on February 11, 1979, when the mass upsurge to impose 'Islamic rule' reached its zenith, the Iranian army declared its 'neutrality' in the ongoing conflict. This sealed the fate of the Shah of Iran. A similar happening in Pakistan is very likely.
* Slumdog Jihadis: The Dawn on December 18, 2008, quoted the Pakistan Planning Commission's Deputy Chairman Sardar Asef Ahmad Ali that poverty had skyrocketed to above 40 per cent in the country, leaving millions helpless. It is these poor/unemployed/uneducated people that are cannon fodder for the jihadis. The interrogation of the lone surviving Mumbai terrorist Ajmal Kasab's story fits the bill. There are such 48 million Ajmals waiting in Pakistan to be primed against India.

As a student of military history, I found it extraordinary that Indians were always blissfully unaware of developments in their neighbourhood. No ruler of Delhi ever woke up when the enemy crossed the Khyber Pass. The first stirrings of action were usually when the enemy was at the gates, at Panipat, just a day's march from Delhi.

Indians have been made to totally forget the holocaust that they faced in past; the name Hindukush itself means 'Hindu killer', a reminder of the days when thousands of Indians died on the mountain slopes while being taken to Central Asia as slaves.(the Encyclopaedia Britannica quoting a 12th century traveller Ibn Batua).

Nearer our times, the 1981 UN declaration of Universal Human Rights writes; 'Among the genocides of human history, the highest number of people killed in the small span of time is in Bangladesh in 1971. An average of 6,000 to 12 000 people were killed every single day. This is the highest daily average in history.' The lower estimate shows that 15 lakh were killed, a majority of them Hindus. A commission of inquiry appointed by the Pakistan government, the Hamidoor Rehman Commission, has recorded testimonies of Pakistani army officers who have quoted General Amir Abdullah Khan Niazi asking the question 'How many Hindus have you killed today?' as a matter of routine. We have forgotten this recent episode as well.

Demography is destiny

Pakistan has a very high rate of population growth. Although it has declined from three percent at the time of the census in 1981 to the present 1.9 per cent it is still the highest among populous countries of more than 50 million, except Nigeria. The more reliable indicator of population growth is the total fertility rate -- the number of children born to a woman in her reproductive span. Pakistan's TFR is four. A TFR of 2.1 is considered replacement level which leads to a stable population.

In Pakistan, the under-15 population is 37 per cent of the total. Given the poor education, health and skills of this youth, they are fodder for jihad and little else. With the mullahs constantly drumming that all of Pakistan's ills are due to the evil Hindu India/Zionist Israel/Christian America troika, Pakistan's biggest export for a long time is likely to be terror.

If by some miracle, Pakistan is to implement population control tomorrow, it will take two to three decades for it to take effect. Even if the re-brainwashing was to begin now, again it is bound to take time. The sad fact is that neither of these things is happening either tomorrow or any time soon.

Impact of the economic meltdown

For decades over 25 percent of the Pakistani labour force was employed in the oil-rich Middle East. With the economic downturn and lower oil prices, the boom is over. The Dubai shopping festival was a flop this year. The returning labour force will only add to the unemployment in the country.

In any case, Pakistan has very little industry and its agriculture is confined to Punjab and parts of Sindh. Most of the country's landmass is arid and unfit for agriculture. Rural poverty will gallop in the near future.

Ripe for implosion

The politics of extremism as represented by the Taliban, the economic meltdown and demographic pressure all point to a major implosion in Pakistan. Are we ready for the fallout?

Despite this threat staring in our face there is a palpable lack of national unity -- another Indian trait. In the last four years, we have let our defence apparatus go to seed, so much so that we have lost the conventional edge over Pakistan.

Given this situation the only option for India is to 'isolate and contain' Pakistan. That still leaves the million dollar question about Pakistan's nuclear weapons. Here one hopes that all those joint exercise with special forces of the US, UK, Israel, China and Russia were in preparation for this very contingency.

If not, then God save the world!

Colonel Dr Anil Athale (retd) is a former joint director, war studies, ministry of defence, and co-ordinator of the Pune-based Initiative for Peace and Disarmament.

Pakistan: One step forwrad - 10 steps back

Pakistan agrees to sharia law to end Swat fighting
Reuters Blogs
Posted by: Myra MacDonald
February 16th, 2009


Pakistan has agreed to introduce sharia law in the Swat valley and neighbouring areas of the north-west in a peace deal with Taliban militants. Religious conservatives in Swat have long fought for sharia to replace Pakistan’s secular laws, which came into force after the former princely state was absorbed into the Pakistani federation in 1969. The government apparently hopes that by signing a peace deal in Swat it can drive a wedge between conservative hardliners and Islamist militants whose influence has been spreading from the tribal areas on the border with Afghanistan into Pakistan proper.

Critics are already saying the deal will encourage Taliban militants fighting elsewhere in both Pakistan and Afghanistan and could threaten the integrity of the country itself. Britain’s Guardian newspaper quotes Khadim Hussain of the Aryana Institute for Regional Research and Advocacy, a think-tank in Islamabad, as calling the peace deal a surrender to the Taliban. It also quotes Javed Iqbal, a retired judge, as saying, ”It means that there is not one law in the country. It will disintegrate this way. If you concede to this, you will go on conceding.”

News of the peace deal followed an acknowledgement by Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari that the Taliban had “a presence in huge amounts of land” in Pakistan and were trying to take over the country. In an interview with CBS, he said Pakistan was fighting to survive.

The militants in Swat had been pushing for the enforcement of a hardline version of Islamic law. They had already banned female education, outlawed music and dancing, and carried out summary executions.

According to Pakistan’s Daily Times the peace deal envisages a more moderate interpretation of sharia, seen by many of the people in Swat as more efficient than the country’s bureaucratic secular judiciary, and also includes a commitment to reopen girls’ schools. But it questions whether this moderate interpretation will survive.

“The people of Swat want quick justice, the kind enforced by the Wali of Swat, as if in a city-state utopia, but they are bound to get more than they have bargained for by rejecting the dilatory system obtaining in the rest of Pakistan,” it says. “They will get the “munkir” (forbidden) part of the sharia dealing with forbidden acts plus the “maruf” (approved) part dealing with acts of piety. The “praiseworthy” acts of piety such as the saying of the nimaz five times a day in the mosque will be greatly approved, but those who don’t observe the ritual will suffer physical and financial pain. And the list of the “maruf” stretches endlessly, which means that you can be thrashed for a number of things you thought were not “penal”. It is probable that the scared people of Swat simply don’t know what they are in for.”

So will this peace deal help take the steam out of the Taliban insurgency, using time-honoured tactics of divide and rule, and give the government some breathing space for bigger battles ahead? Or is it the beginning of a slide into the Talibanisation of Pakistan?

(Reuters file photos of people fleeing fighting in the Swat valley)

See also: Pakistan's deal with the devil


A recent example of this enlightened "legal' system: Killing women vs stealing Goats

Update: As expected the world is appalled:

February 18, 2009
World Briefing | Europe
Belgium: NATO Objects to Pakistan Truce With Taliban
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

NATO warned Tuesday that a truce between the Pakistani government and Taliban militants in a restive region near the Afghan border risked giving the extremists a “safe haven.” The truce effectively ceded the Swat Valley to the Taliban and ended Pakistan’s military effort to defeat them there. Many NATO troops face attacks by fighters for the Taliban and Al Qaeda who are believed to be taking refuge in pockets of Pakistan’s northwest. “We should all be concerned by a situation in which extremists would have a safe haven,” a NATO spokesman, James Appathurai, said in Brussels. “Without doubting the good faith of the Pakistani government, it is clear that the region is suffering very badly from extremists, and we would not want it to get worse.”

links February 9, 2009

Bosnia chief Imam supports Wahhabis
February 8, 2009 – 8:39 pm

Bosnian MUslim chief Imam Mustafa Ceric has expressed his support for the growing Wahhabi brand of Islam in Bosnia and condemned those who are worried over the spread of this extremist islamic doctrine for “spreading islamophobia”.

“Those that are accusing us that their situation is bad because of Islam and the ‘new’ Muslims are joining the islamophobia that is us, Bosnian Muslims, old and new remind on the experience of the survived genocide,” said Ceric during the ISlamic prayer on Friday in the mosque in the eastern town of Sokolac.
[..]

Wahhabis have been reintroduced to Bosnia during the 1990s when Bosnian Muslims waged Jihad against Bosnian Christians and invited holy warriors from Middle East to Bosnia granting them citizenship and marrying them off with Bosnian Muslim women.

[..]

February 8, 2009
SERBIANNA

January 12,2009: Mullah Osman Musliu, chairman of the Islamic Community in Drenas in central Kosovo had been attacked and beaten by nine Wahhabi extremists
The Second Kosovo War Kosovo faces a new threat: Agents of the Saudi-financed, ultrafundamentalist Wahhabi Muslim sect have sparked open violence in Kosovo. This new conflict in ex-Yugoslavia comes after years of Wahhabi infiltration and provocation in Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Muslim areas in Macedonia and South Serbia, where they have made significant gains, as well as in Albania, Montenegro, and Kosovo.
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Taleban execute Polish engineer on video
From Times Online UK
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The Sunday Times UK
January 18, 2009
Taliban’s punishment terrifies Pakistan
February 9, 2009
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US presses Sri Lanka to drop Anti-Conversion Bill
Daily Mirror (Sri Lanka)
Saturday, February 07, 2009
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Thomas Malancheruvilla Christian Preacher held for disrespecting national anthem
February 2009
Sindh Today
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It was Christian fundamentalism, cynicism and hypocrisy that killed Lasantha Wickrematunga
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Saudi Arabia says only mosques allowed
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Mohammad Alam, 38,A Pakistani factory Worker in Japan is arrested in the stabbing death of a 23 year old russian woman.