Pakistan serves the US heads, not
tales By Syed Saleem Shahzad
KARACHI - Tiring of the carrot and stick
approach, and with US presidential elections only a few
months away, the US has taken an aggressive role in
Pakistan in the hunt for "big-name" al-Qaeda figures.
Yet the Pakistanis, although appearing to
accommodate their "most trusted" American allies in the
"war on terror", remain obdurate.
Qari Mohammad
Noor, an Afghan, was arrested with three associates last
week in the central city of Faisalabad, where he had
been teaching at a madrassa (seminary) for the
past three years. The arrest followed the US Federal
Bureau of Investigation (FBI) specifically
pointing him out to Pakistani authorities, although he
was a well-known figure in the area. He was suspected of
being in contact with top Taliban and al-Qaeda
operatives and running one of their powerful rings in
Faisalabad.
On Wednesday this week, while still
in Pakistani custody, he died, and his body was dumped
in front of his house. According to police officials,
Noor died of cardiac failure, yet according to an
unidentified police official, his body was full of
torture marks.
Security sources who spoke to
Asia Times Online point out that Noor had openly lived
in Faisalabad for three years, yet no action had been
taken against him over alleged al-Qaeda ties despite the
fact that the city's madrassas are well known for
their links to firebrand jihadi groups. Further, the
sources questioned why he was not handed over to US
authorities, raising the fact that "dead men tell no
tales".
In the past, the FBI and Pakistan's
Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) have collaborated, but
in terms of a recent agreement any people taken into ISI
custody at the behest of the ISI must be handed over
within a matter of days to what is called the Special
Investigation Cell (SIC). The SIC includes
representatives from Pakistani security forces and the
FBI, who conduct joint interrogations, but most of the
time the FBI on its own grills suspects.
In
another incident, following information provided by the
FBI and being told to take action, Pakistani authorities
drew a bead on Abdul Aziz, the head of a madrassa
in Islamabad, Lal Masjid, which is located just over a
kilometer from the headquarters of the ISI. Al-Qaeda
operators are known (once again from the US) to have
visited the madrassa, while Aziz received a
letter from Uzbek Tahir Yuldevish, the leader of the
Harkatul Islami Uzbekistan, which has al-Qaeda links. In
the letter, Yuldevish is said to have commended Aziz for
denouncing the Pakistan army's ventures into South
Waziristan tribal agency in search of foreign suspects.
A large raid was launched on Lal Masjid, but
Aziz was nowhere to be found. He is still at large.
News of Noor's death on Wednesday came as
Pakistan published pictures of six "most wanted
terrorists" and announced rewards totaling US$1.1
million for information leading to their arrest. The six
included al-Qaeda's Libyan planner Abu Faraj Farj,
described as the new number three in Osama bin Laden's
network, and Pakistani militant Amjad Hussain Farooqi.
More than 60 suspected al-Qaeda figures have been
arrested in the past weeks in Pakistan. A person named
Usman, believed to be bin Laden's personal servant, is
also believed to have been rounded up in Islamabad.
At the same time, raids were conducted on
seminaries in Lahore, Islamabad and Faisalabad, again at
the insistence of the FBI, which provided strong
evidence of untoward goings-on. These operations
followed the recent high-profile arrests of Maulana
Fazalur Rehman Khalid and Qari Saifullah Akhtar.
The raids in Faisalabad are significant in that
they are the first to be made against seminaries in that
city, even though they are known as radical hot-beds.
Over two years ago, Wall Street Journal reporter
Daniel Pearl became deeply involved in investigations
into the arrest of Abu Zobaida, a chief al-Qaeda
operator, in Faisalabad. He was in the process of making
a connection between ISI-backed groups and the
seminaries of Faisalabad when he was abducted and
subsequently murdered. One of the characters involved in
Pearl's murder was Amjad Farooqi, who hails from a
district in Faisalabad (Toba Tek Singh) and whose face
was splashed all over newspapers in Pakistan on
Wednesday as one of the six most-wanted terrorists. He
belongs to the militant Lashkar-i-Jhangvi.
The
Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal, an alliance of six religious
parties on the opposition benches in parliament, has
reacted strongly to the raids, and already set into
action a series of street protests, as well as using
covert channels within the administration of President
General Pervez Musharraf to have the hound dogs called
off.
However, this time the game is beyond
Pakistan's control. The US will have its way, and
the best Pakistan can do is obfuscate, while at the same
time the opposition fires that burn across the country
glare all the brighter.
Syed Saleem
Shahzad, Bureau Chief Pakistan, Asia Times Online.
He can be reached at saleem_shahzad2002@yahoo.com
(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All
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(FBI) specifically
pointing him out to Pakistani authorities, although he
was a well-known figure in the area. He was suspected of
being in contact with top Taliban and al-Qaeda
operatives and running one of their powerful rings in
Faisalabad. 
