Pakistan’s President Musharraf presides over a state terrorist regime, with the backing of both Britain and the US.
The Guardian – Comment Is Free – 24 January 2008
The Pakistani dictator Pervez Musharraf is in Britain to drum up support for his tyrannical regime. His visit is a desperate PR ploy, designed to repair the political damage caused by his repressive policies. These include the imposition of emergency rule late last year, which led to media censorship, violent suppression of popular protests, mass arrests of opposition party leaders and activists and the crushing of the independent judiciary, with the detention of over 60 supreme court judges.
Musharraf misleadingly justified emergency rule in the name of a crackdown on terrorism. In truth, instead of arresting terrorists, he seized thousands of peaceful opposition party officials and members, plus journalists, lawyers and human rights defenders. Since Benazir Bhutto’s assassination, tens of thousands more have been detained.
Gordon Brown refuses to meet the Zimbabwean dictator Robert Mugabe, but on Monday he will embrace the despot of Pakistan at 10 Downing Street. No surprise there. After all, Britain and the US are long-time allies and supporters of Musharraf’s dictatorship. Despite occasional mild admonishments, our government, in our name, supports him politically, diplomatically, economically and militarily, selling Musharraf the weapons he uses to suppress his own people. In 2006, the UK government approved the export of weapons and small arms to Pakistan valued at £27.5m. On a much larger scale, since 2001 the US has bankrolled Musharaff to the tune of $US10 bn. US-supplied fighter planes are used to bomb and strafe civilian areas in annexed and colonised Baluchistan. Without western aid to support this state terrorism, Musharraf’s regime would fall.
Musharraf will, as usual, claim that he is saving Pakistan from Islamic fundamentalism and holding the fort against the terror threat of al-Qaida and the Taliban. He will portray the “tribal regions” of Pakistan, like Waziristan and North West Frontier, as hotbeds of extremism and terrorism that only he can control; willfully suppressing all knowledge of the gross human rights abuses perpetrated by his subjugating army in the these regions and the legitimate liberation struggles of the people there.
Our Prime Minister will fall for this hogwash and spin. He will parrot Islamabad’s line that we need Musharraf as an ally in the so-called war on terrorism and that without him the country would be taken over by Islamist extremists.
Nonsense. The extremists are already in the Pakistani government, army, police and intelligence services. These state agencies are heavily infiltrated by fundamentalists and Musharraf has failed to remove them.
Moreover, if there were free and fair elections, the opposition parties would win and could start addressing some of the underlying injustices in Pakistani society that have allowed fundamentalist ideas to gain a foothold. Democracy is the best safeguard against dictatorship, whether of the Musharraf or Islamist variety.
The elephant in room during Monday’s Downing Street meeting with Gordon Brown will be Musharraf’s possible complicity in the assassination of Benazir Bhutto and the subsequent attempted cover-up. We recall, with derision, how his government initially suggested that Bhutto died when she fell and hit her head.
According to critics, the Pakistani leader has form with regard to political assassinations. In 2006, his forces murdered the frail 79 year-old Baluchistan nationalist leader, Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti, a former provincial governor and Chief Minister of Baluchistan. Previously, an independent nation, Baluchistan was invaded and occupied by Pakistan in 1948. Another Baluch leader, Balaach Marri, was killed by Pakistani agents last November.
So far as Bhutto’s murder is concerned, Musharraf was the main beneficiary. He has gained the most from her death. She was his main political rival and a likely election winner. With Benazir dead, Musharraf’s chances of election in next month’s poll are much improved.
Many people in Pakistan believe that he either personally ordered Bhutto’s assassination or that he failed to control rogue elements in the military and intelligence services who killed her. Others say that Islamist radicals committed the murder but partly blame Musharraf, alleging that he neglected to provide Bhutto with adequate personal security and refused her requests for greater protection. Musharraf therefore bears at least some responsibility for Benazir’s assassination, according his critics. They say the buck stops with him.
Musharraf has, however, preferred to pin the blame on the rebel leader Baitullah Mehsud – a claim endorsed by the US Central Intelligence Agency, although the CIA has not revealed its evidence or sources.
This report by Mushtaq Yusufzai and Javed Afridi for the Pakistani newspaper, The News, casts doubt on these claims. I cannot vouch for the allegations made in this story, but they strike me as plausible and deserving of serious consideration:
PESHAWAR: Militant commander Baitullah Mehsud, accused of masterminding the suicide attack that killed former prime minister and PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto in Rawalpindi, has rejected the allegations as baseless.
“We are equally grieved by the tragic death of Benazir Bhutto and extend our sympathies to her family and party workers in this hour of grief,” said Maulvi Omar, a spokesman for Baitullah Mehsud.
“Why on earth would we kill her? We had no enmity with her and more importantly she had done no wrong to us,” Maulvi Omar said.
“By blaming us for the murder of an important political leader like Benazir Bhutto, the government is in fact misguiding the world,” he claimed.
“We want to assure the Pakistan People’s Party leaders and its workers that we can’t even think of killing their leader. We are with them in this hour of grief and sorrow,” claimed the militants’ spokesman.
He alleged that the government was attempting to portray the tribal areas as centres of terrorists so as to earn dollars from, what he termed as, Western masters.
Accusing the secret agencies for the crime, he said the modus operandi and precision of the strike revealed that the gruesome act was committed by professional hands.”
The International News – Baitullah denies hand in Benazir’s assassination
While there is good reason to be skeptical of such denials, in the past Mehsud has never been shy of claiming responsibility for his military operations. Moreover, he stood to gain from Bhutto’s election. She had, after all, promised greater autonomy for the provinces and an end to Musharraf’s brutal suppression of minority tribes and nationalities. Although Mehsud may have ordered the assassination, it seems questionable. Indeed, Bhutto’s own party officials believe Mehsud is being used as a scapegoat to disguise possible government involvement in Benazir’s murder.
Gordon Brown’s willingness to fete a despot like Musharraf is an insult to the millions of Pakistani people who oppose tyranny and yearn for democracy and human rights. New Labour is yet again colluding with oppression. It is siding with a dictator against his victims.
When the Prime Minister embraces Musharraf on Monday, I will be joining the Pakistani protests outside Downing Street at 11am. We will be there in solidarity with the people of Pakistan who want an end to Musharraf’s dictatorship. I hope some of you will join us.