Thu, Oct 11, 2001 page5

• Pakistani clerics urge Muslim revolt

  GROWING PROTESTS Hardline clerics are telling the country's Muslim masses to overthrow the Musharraf government and fire nuclear missiles at US `terrorists'

  • THE GUARDIAN
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  The hardline cleric fast emerging as the leader behind a series of violent protests across Pakistan, Tuesday called on his followers to incite a nationwide revolt.

  As the military regime of General Pervez Musharraf tried to control growing anger over the military strikes on Afghanistan, it placed three leading Islamist clerics under house arrest for three months.

  Within hours other religious leaders stepped up to take their place.

  

  A Pakistani man stares at several foreign journalists while attending a rally as others yell anti-US slogans amid a call for jihad against the US and its allies, during a pro-Taliban demonstration of 5,000 angry Islamic fundalmentalists on Tuesday in Karachi.

  PHOTO: AFP

  Maulana Atta-ur Rehman, the newly appointed leader of Jamiat Ulema-e Islam (JUI), one of the country's most extreme religious groups, told hundreds of supporters in Peshawar that it was their duty as Muslims to turn against the government.

  "We will have an open war against Jews, Christians, Israel, America, everyone," he shouted to the cheering crowd outside a mosque in the narrow lanes of the old city. "The Pakistan nation should seize their nuclear weapons and fire them at America."

  "We condemn General Musharraf for supporting the Americans. He is the dog of America," he said. "The Pakistan army is paid by the nation, so they should turn against those who are supporting the American terrorists."

  Police have placed his brother, Maulana Fazal-ur Rehman, who usually leads the JUI party, under house arrest in Dera Ismail Khan, 194km south of Peshawar.

  Two other religious leaders with links to the Taliban were also kept under police guard at their homes: Maulana Sami-ul Haq, who runs a mosque school near Peshawar where many senior Taliban officials were educated, and Maulana Azam Tariq, who heads the feared Sipah-e Sahaba Pakistan, a Sunni militant group involved in sectarian killings.

  "In an Islamic society, there is no room for extremism and violence against any other religion or group," General Musharraf said Tuesday.

  Fewer than 1,000 demonstrators took to the streets of Peshawar and were met with only a moderate police and military presence.

  As Rehman called on the army to mutiny, soldiers nearby appeared unmoved by his words. Plain-clothes intelligence officers noted down the cleric's threats.

  The police presence has been notably restrained since the World Trade Center attacks. Public protests were banned last year and on two occasions thousands of political activists were arrested days before planned demonstrations.

  Now no such arrests are being made to stop religious protests. It is clear the religious parties have greater freedom for manoeuvre because their militant wings play a vital role in Pakistan's policy on the disputed state of Kashmir.

  For the past decade Pakistani-based militant groups have fought a guerrilla war against the Indian army in Kashmir which Islamabad has used as a diplomatic and political tool in its efforts to have the Muslim-majority state seceded to Pakistan.

  Rehman's JUI party was behind rioting in Quetta, in Pakistan's western deserts, on Monday when a Unicef office was set alight and one man was shot dead.

  Yesterday JUI activists organized a protest in Hangu, a town south of Peshawar, when a mob burnt down two local banks and looted another. The office of an international aid agency working with Afghan refugees was also set alight. At least 13 people were injured.

  Several JUI leaders were among 45 people arrested.

  The party is one of the largest political Islamist organisations in Pakistan and has close links to the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

  Many Taliban leaders were schooled in JUI madrasahs, or mosque schools, in Pakistan.

  Rehman's call for revolt was echoed by other hardline clerics. Maulana Fazal Haq, the provincial leader of Sipah-e Sahaba, told protesters in Peshawar that US President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair had embarked on a war against Islam.
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