Pakistan_ A Hard Country - Anatol Lieven [242]
Raising local lashkars (independent militias) to fight is an ancient Pathan tradition – indeed, the Taleban in Afghanistan operate largely through temporarily raised local lashkars – and was also much used by the British. Like the Pakistani army today, they would raise a lashkar from one tribe or clan who were local rivals of another clan which had revolted. As of 2008 – 9 this was being touted by the Pakistani military as a key part of their new strategy, but it carries obvious risks both of multiplying local civil wars and of creating Frankenstein’s monsters.
Until mid-2007, militant attacks outside the tribal areas were restricted to individual acts of terrorism, such as the murder of Daniel Pearl, and attacks on French technicians and the US Consulate in Karachi. In July 2007, however, an incident took place at the Red Mosque (Lal Masjid) complex in Islamabad, which led to the end of the truce, to an explosive growth of militant action in the tribal areas and beyond, and to the formation of the Pakistani Taleban, or Tehriq-e-Taleban Pakistan (TTP), under the leadership of Beitullah Mahsud.
Since January 2007 the Red Mosque complex had become a base for militants who were launching vigilante raids on video stores and Chineserun ‘massage parlours’ in adjacent areas of the city. In the NWFP and FATA this kind of thing was happening constantly without the government taking action, but the Red Mosque is situated less than 2 miles from the presidential palace and the parliament. The damage to the government’s prestige was becoming intolerable.
On the other hand, the mosque is the oldest in Islamabad, and the clerical family which ran it was exceptionally well connected within the Pakistani establishment. Moreover, the complex included a religious college for women, and many of the militants engaged in vigilante actions in Islamabad were women from this college. The government was extremely afraid – and, as it turned out, with good reason – of the effects on public opinion of a battle in the mosque leaving women dead. However, when Chinese massage girls were arrested by the militants, the Chinese government sent a strong message to President Musharraf that he had to act. Given China’s importance to Pakistan both as a strategic ally and as a source of development aid, that message was listened to (in response, militants killed three Chinese engineers in the NWFP).
On 10 July 2007, after repeated negotiations for surrender had failed, Pakistani troops stormed the complex. According to official figures, a total of 154 people, including 19 soldiers and some of the women militants, were killed in the ensuing battle, during which militants retreated to the cellars of the building and fought to the death.
The Red Mosque affair illustrates some of the appalling dilemmas faced by Pakistani governments in confronting Islamist militancy. In the months leading up to the military action, the Musharraf administration was constantly reproached by the Pakistani media for its failure to take action. He was accused not merely of negligence, but of deliberately helping the militants in order to prove to Washington that he was facing an Islamist revolt and therefore needed unconditional US support – something for which there is no actual evidence whatsoever.
When Musharraf finally ordered an assault there was a storm of condemnation from the media and civil society. Leading members of the Human Rights Commission and of the Lawyers’ Movement have told me that, even after resigning from office, Musharraf should be imprisoned or even hanged for ‘murdering thousands of people at the Lal Masjid’, and that ‘this issue could have been resolved through