NEW DELHI: Former military dictator of Pakistan Pervez Musharraf said this week that he is banned terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba s (LeT) biggest supporter and that he s aware they like him too. When asked by Pakistan s AryTV if he s similarly appreciative of LeT s founder and mastermind of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks Hafiz Saeed Musharraf nodded saying Saeed is involved in Kashmir and he supports that involvement. Saeed a United Nations-designated terrorist was freed from house arrest last week on an order from the Lahore high court. Musharraf meanwhile was declared a fugitive from justice by Pakistan in August this year. I am the biggest supporter of LeT and I know they like me and JuD (Jamaat-ud-Dawa) also likes me said Musharraf referring to both groups founded by Saeed. JuD is the LeT s charitable wing. The US has also branded Saeed a terrorist and put a 10 million bounty on Saeed s head after the 2008 Mumbai terror attack. Musharraf claimed Saeed was not involved in the Mumbai terror attack in 2008 because Saeed himself denied the charges of being the attacks mastermind. Former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf stirred fresh controversy by saying that he loves LeT and that the LeT l... https://t.co/1UkJyLlgjq TIMES NOW (@TimesNow) 1511925163000 The LeT is banned in Pakistan since 2002 and it was in fact the Musharraf government that banned the group. When reminded of that fact Musharraf said he didn t know much about Saeed at the time. He implied that he wouldn t have banned LeT if he had known more about Saeed. We had banned LeT because the situation was different at that time. We were moving towards peace and as such I thought we should reduce mujahids (religious warrior) and increase political dialogue and frankly I had very less knowledge about him said Musharraf. LeT though banned it is widely believed to orchestrate attacks in India especially in Kashmir. For Musharraf that makes Saeed a-ok. I was always in favor of action in Kashmir and of suppressing the Indian Army in Kashmir and they (LeT) are the biggest force. India got them declared as terrorists by partnering with US said Musharraf. The former military dictator was also reminded that he calls himself a liberal and a moderate. The interviewer wondered if that was at odds with Musharraf s admiration for LeT. He said it isn t. Yes I am liberal and moderate... these are my thoughts but that doesn t mean I am against all religious leaders said Musharraf. This kind of hypocrisy is typical of Pakistan s establishment. On the one hand you will have Pakistan s foreign minister saying on a public forum that Saeed is a liability for Pakistan - like minister Khawaja Asif did in New York in September - and on the other you have the country s army and its intelligence agency providing safe havens for terror groups and terrorists. Which is why the president of an infuential US think tank said this week it s a mystery why Pakistan is still considered a major non-Nato ally . Richard Haass president of the prestigious think tank Council on Foreign Relations tweeted this week saying Pakistan has harbored terrorists for years and provides sanctuary to the Taliban and others including Saeed The Council on Foreign Relations president joins what s becoming a chorus of influential domestic voices asking that Pakistan s status as a major non-Nato ally be taken away. After Saeed was freed last week a top American counter-terrorism expert told PTI news agency that it s time to remove Pakistan non-Nato ally status. Nine years after 26/11 its mastermind still eludes justice. It is time to rescind Pakistan s status as a major non-NATO ally said Bruce Riedel a top U.S. expert on security South Asia and counter-terrorism. Saeed s release by the Lahore High Court came despite entreaties by a senior Pakistan finance ministry official who said that freeing Saeed would bring diplomatic and financial problems to the country reported Pakistan s Dawn newspaper. Those entreaties obviously fell on willingly deaf ears as the emboldened Lahore High Court even ignored the US administration s August threat to cut off all aid to Pakistan if it doesn t stop providing safe havens to agents of chaos and terror . The US hasn t really followed up with stringent punishment since those fighting words in August from US President Donald Trump. In fact a significant alteration to a bill that would have pinned Pakistan down on the Saeed-founded and banned organisation Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) was watered down last week in its final iteration. The US Congress decided against including action against terror group LeT as a condition to reimburse Pakistan for its cooperation in the war on terror . In September the version of the bill passed by the US Senate said Pakistan must show it has taken steps to demonstrate its commitment to prevent the Haqqani Network and Lashkar-e- Taiba from using any Pakistan territory as a haven and for fundraising and recruiting efforts . Now Pakistan must only show it has acted against the Afghanistan-oriented Haqqani Network (no relation the Haqqani cited in this article) and not the India-focussed LeT.
Written by Nirupama Subramanian | Updated: November 28 2017 1:01 am Under the Pakistan army s benign gaze: Protesters hurl back tear gas shells fired by a hapless police force during clashes in Islamabad. AP photo Related News US working on new approach with India Pakistan on AfghanistanPakistan Law Minister Zahid Hamid resigns amid violent clashesPakistan protests: Army silent as Islamists police clash again Mumtaz Qadri s father told me he wanted to kiss his son s face one last time before they took him away from Adiala Jail after his hanging. He told me that when the ambulance door was opened and he entered it Mumtaz Qadri sat up in his coffin that when he leant forward to hug his son Mumtaz Qadri saw policemen approaching the van and he lay down in his coffin again . The crowd of protestors squatting on the arterial flyover connecting Rawalpindi with Islamabad murmurs in awe as Khadim Rizvi the wheelchair-bound leader of the Sunni organisation Tehreek-i-Labaik Ya Rasool Allah (TLY) speaking in earthy Punjabi gives more examples of miracles wrought from the grave by the man who on January 4 2011 killed Salman Taseer then the Punjab Governor for his support to a Christian woman jailed for alleged blasphemy. For twenty days with his expletive-peppered speeches and dramatic flourishes Khadim Rizvi kept enthralled his audience of about 2 000 (mostly young) men drawn from different Barelvi Sunni organisations the TLY the Sunni Tehreek Pakistan (ST) and the Tehreek-e-Khatme-Nabuwwat and effectively brought the government to its knees. The episode has dealt a body blow to Pakistan s stop-start democratic politics and reinforced the supremacy of the Pakistan military in national affairs. The dharna ended on Monday with the government accepting several key demands of the protestors including the Law Minister Zahid Hamid s resignation. The document of agreement negotiated by the army ends with fulsome praise for it. It thanks Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa for special efforts noting We are thankful to him for saving the nation from a big catastrophe . On Saturday after a spectacularly botched-up attempt to clear the protestors by an 8 000-strong force of police Punjab constabulary and Frontier Constabulary the government asked the Pakistan Army to help. General Bajwa refused and instead counselled Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi that both sides must avoid violence as it is not in national interest urging the government to handle the dharna peacefully . Ten years ago the-then Pakistani army ruler General Pervez Musharraf launched a commando operation to flush out militants camping inside Lal Masjid and the Jamia Hafsa a women s seminary. Over a 100 people including commandos were killed. Musharraf never recovered from that. The Lal Masjid militants were affiliated to a smorgasbord of terrorist groups who called themselves the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan or TTP (different from the Afghan Taliban but with robust links to them) whose interpretation of Islam came from Pakistan s Deobandi madrassas and Wahhabism imported from Saudi Arabia. It took years after that for the Pakistan military to be convinced that it had to take on the TTP then too only after they were painted as an India/R&AW proxy. Bajwa was certainly not going to risk the huge institutional image that the army has managed to rebuild since the Musharraf years to now clear using force a demonstration by Barelvi Sunnis who form the majority of Pakistan s Muslims (in Punjab). He is reported to have conveyed that force could not be applied against (our) own people as the people of Pakistan love and trust (the) army which can t be compromised for little gains . Also considering that the protests were triggered by what the Barelvi groups saw as an attempt to dilute the anti-Ahmadiyya provisions in the Elections Act Bajwa had another reason not to walk into the hornet s nest at his appointment rumours flew that he was an Ahmadiyya. Looking back it is sweet that Pakistan in the infancy of its new democratic phase that began in 2008 desperately tried to prop up the Barelvis against the Taliban. The gunning-down of Salman Taseer by his own bodyguard a Barelvi named Mumtaz Qadri and the massive support he received from his community was the rude awakening. In March 2016 when Qadri was hanged the same organisations that blocked the Faizabad flyover this month mobilised over 30 000 people in protest. The clear victory of their muscle power as apparent on Monday is sure to be making the TTP envious. At last year s post-Qadri hanging Barelvi mobilisation the government called in the military for help to clear Islamabad. The army secured buildings like Parliament House the Prime Minister s House and the Supreme Court as protestors overran Islamabad s Constitutional Avenue but did not engage with them directly. Earlier too in 2014 during a sit-in by politician Imran Khan and Pakistan Awaami Tehreek chairman Tahir-ul-Qadri s supporters the army secured government buildings. Eyebrows were raised but Nawaz Sharif who was the PM then was still able to project that he was in charge. This time there was no Nawaz. For weeks his substitute Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and Interior Minister Ahsan Iqbal were clueless on how to handle the situation. Ironically the army s refusal to move in showed decisively it was in charge. It has been seen more often since Nawaz Sharif s exit. Sharif s efforts to project his ouster as an unstated military coup showed he had not given up the fight. Now there is no doubt about which way civil-military relations are tilting. While the PML(N) government was paralysed for three weeks conspiracy theories swirled about who was actually behind the protests. But the question is really cui bono who benefitted? The army-prodded government surrender before religious extremists shows that whether or not anyone was pulling the strings on the ground the military and the mullahs did. With Parliamentary elections in about six months this bruising standoff raises many questions to which only one answer is clear the Pakistan army is on top. In the recent by-election for Sharif s seat the TLY stood third. It got 7 130 votes compared to Sharif s wife Kulsoom s 61 745 votes. But its success on the street under the military s benign gaze has set a precedent. It could embolden the TLY and others of its ilk. This is a blow not just to the PML(N). It would be worrying the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Imran Khan s right-wing Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) even more and all democrats in Pakistan. nirupama.subramanian@expressindia.com For all the latest Explained News download Indian Express App More Related News Protesters contacted India claims Pakistan Interior Minister Ahsan Iqbal Pakistan protests: All roads leading to Nawaz Sharif s residence closed commandos deployed Tags: Pakistan
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