Pakistan wakes up to the hatred within

Pakistan wakes up to the hatred within
(Filed: 14/07/2005)

Ahmed Rashid reports on the link between Lahore and Leeds that has flourished over two generations but may now have been hijacked by militant Islamic fundamentalists

For the past few days at dinner parties, bazaars and newspaper offices in Lahore there has only been one topic of conversation, the fear and expectancy that the London bombers would turn out to be Pakistani.

Most were convinced that that would be the case and when the truth came out they were immediately on their mobiles, spreading the news repeating: "What did I tell you, I told you so, this will really be the last straw."

Many were depressed at the thought of being dubbed a nation that could export a handful of terrorists along with T-shirts, Sufi music and mangoes.

Until Tuesday the fear of a Right-wing backlash against Pakistanis living in Britain had also dominated the headlines. That is because Pakistanis are deeply sensitive about their own, even though after 58 years they still cannot agree on the nature of their nation - Islamic fundamentalist or democratic.

Those who have lived in Bradford and Leeds for two generations still come home to marry, party, holiday and celebrate religious festivals such as Eid, or Ramadan, the month of fasting.

Flights to and from London are packed in the summer.

Youngsters in sneakers, the latest jeans and speaking English in broad Yorkshire accents can be heard in Lahore's shopping malls during any holiday period.

However more conservative parents in Yorkshire take leave of absence for their teenage sons from their British schools and send them home to study for a couple of terms. They either join madrassas - Islamic schools - or secular schools, learning Urdu, the Koran and making friends.

Those boys who join madrassa boarding schools are often indoctrinated with fundamentalist views and return home to Yorkshire changed people - urging their sisters to cover their heads and their friends to pray regularly.

In the winter of 2002 Maulana Akram Awan, a fundamentalist religious leader and politician from Chakwal in central Punjab, set up camp outside Islamabad with thousands of followers. He threatened to march on the capital to force the military regime to enforce Islamic law.

Among those camping out in the fields with him were dozens of madrassa students from Yorkshire. The elite's fear of a backlash against British Pakistanis is heightened by the fact that London is their second home, the favourite holiday destination to escape the summer heat, shop till they drop and still the best place to send their children to university. Now, during the summer sales, a visiting Pakistani can hardly walk down a street in Knightsbridge or Kensington without bumping into a Pakistani he knows from home.

On Tuesday night the first thought for many of them was how suspiciously they would be viewed when they showed their passports at Heathrow. But when they sit down to reflect as more emerges about the London bombers, they are likely to become even more depressed.

It is already clear that one or two of the bombers visited Pakistan recently, possibly to train with an extremist group.

For the past two decades a small number of militants have killed and maimed their fellow citizens in the name of Islam, various Islamic sects or self-created concepts of male honour. These killing fields in the name of Islam, abhorred by the majority of their fellow citizens, were then exported abroad where Pakistani militant groups supported fellow extremists in Kashmir, Afghanistan, Central Asia, Chechnya and the former Yugoslavia.

Pakistani extremists have been closely linked to the army which saw in them a cheap and non-attributable opportunity to keep India at bay, maintain the country's Islamic influence abroad and undermine any chance of civilian democracy at home.

This "military-mullah" alliance is widely assumed to have been born in 1977 after the army coup that bought General Zia Ul Haq to power. However in a new book called Pakistan - between Mosque and Military, scholar-diplomat Hussain Haqqani shows how the alliance goes back as far as 1951.

Many Pakistanis hoped that September 11 2001 would give the army a chance to change its disastrous policies and end its alliance with the mullahs.

General Pervez Musharraf's military regime could make peace with Afghanistan and India, crack down hard on militant groups and turn its back on extremism.

Gen Musharraf promised a policy of enlightened moderation but little has been done. Thousands of religious schools still spew out hate against non-Muslims and leaders of militant groups still wander the country giving sermons.

Gen Musharraf has squandered the lavish aid and support given to him by the US and Britain after September 11. Extremism continues to flourish and democracy is further away than ever.

This month the widely circulated magazine Herald reports that a dozen training camps for militants, which closed down after September 11, were revived in May with official blessing.

Last month several Pakistani-Americans arrested on terrorism charges in California, admitted to training in such camps. The London bombers were probably in touch with a local Pakistani group rather than al-Qa'eda.

Pakistanis are fed up with being in the eye of the storm and just want to lead a normal life. They want to see an end to violence at home and a bad image abroad. When that will happen is anybody's guess.