Missile kills Pakistan tribal head

ISLAMABAD (CNN) -- A tribal leader accused of harboring Al Qaeda militants in Pakistan's western border region was killed Thursday night in a targeted missile strike, according to Pakistan intelligence sources. The Associated Press quoted an army spokesman Friday as identifying the tribal leader as Nek Mohammed, a former Taliban fighter.

He was killed late Thursday at the home of another tribal chief, the spokesman said.

"We were tracking him down and he was killed last night by our hand," Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan told The Associated Press.

A background on Noor Alam aka Abdullah Mahsud (a friend of Nek):

http://www.hipakistan.com/en/detail.php?newsId=en72739&F_catID=&f_type=source

Abdullah Mahsud - from Guantanamo to Waziristan - By Rahimullah Yusufzai

PESHAWAR: Abdullah Mahsud, the commander of the Islamic militants who ordered the kidnapping of two Chinese engineers in South Waziristan tribal agency three days ago, spent 25 months in custody at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay before his release in March this year.

As a young man, the 29-year-old Mahsud fought on the side of the Taliban against the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan. He lost his left leg in a landmine explosion a few days before the fall of Kabul to the Taliban in September 1996. A landmine planted by the retreating forces of Afghan defence minister Ahmad Shah Masood blew up as he and other Taliban fighters drove into the Wreshmin Tangi gorge while marching on Kabul.

"I was injured two days before the top Taliban commander Mulla Borjan got killed in the battle for Kabul. A few days later on September 27, Kabul fell to the Taliban," he recalled in an interview on the phone with The News.

The young Mahsud was taken to Karachi for treatment. He got an artificial leg, but his urge to fight took him to Afghanistan again. Other Pakistani Taliban had also joined the Afghan Taliban, developing friendships that have proved durable.

Mahsud surrendered along with several thousand Taliban fighters to the forces of Uzbek warlord, Abdul Rasheed Dostum, in December 2001 in Kunduz, northern Afghanistan and was lodged in the notorious Shiberghan prison in Jauzjan province. Going back on his promise, Dostum turned over a few dozen Taliban, including Mahsud, to the US military authorities. He was subsequently transferred to the specially built US prison at the Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

Mahsud, who walks with an artificial leg, has received both religious and college education. He studied at the primary school in his village, Nano, in South Waziristan before shifting to Peshawar.

He did his D-Com from the Government Commerce College, Peshawar. He also attended a seminary, where he befriended Afghan Taliban and later joined their movement in Afghanistan.

Mahsud, whose real name is Noor Alam, is a Pashtun, and belongs to the Seemikhel branch of the Manzai Mahsud tribe. Since his return from Guantanamo Bay, Mahsud has become a hero to anti-US fighters active in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. He was one of the comrades of another tribal militant commander Nek Mohammad, who was killed by the Pakistani military in a missile strike near Wana in June. In fact, Mahsud entered the scene in March this year after his release from Guantanamo Bay. Around that time, the authorities had demolished the homes of Nek Mohammad and other wanted men as punishment for harbouring al-Qaeda and Taliban suspects. One soon started hearing stories about a young man with long tresses and artificial leg who had been a prisoner at Gauntanamo. We were told the tall and handsome man delivered long lectures to tribal elders sent by the government to negotiate with Nek Mohammad and his lieutenants and explained to them the blessings of "jihad".

Now a wanted man, Mahsud is often on the move. Sometimes, he rides a camel or horse while visiting his fighters in his mountainous abode. On other occasions, his men drive him in a vehicle and protect him round-the-clock.

Just like Nek Mohammad, he keeps long hair and has a daredevil nature. All this has made him a colourful and interesting character. Mahsud speaks Pashto, Urdu and Persian. In his own words, he also speaks "a little bit of English", which he picked up in captivity from American soldiers at Guantanamo Bay.

Mahsud said he led his fighters by example by taking risks and surviving in tough conditions. Criticizing US policies toward Muslims, he said the American occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan was a provocation for the followers of Islam and must be avenged. He said he didn't want to fight the Pakistan Army but was constrained to resist the occupation of the semi-autonomous South Waziristan tribal region at the behest of the US.

Mahsud said he was opposed to the government of President General Pervez Musharraf as it was toeing US policies in the region.

Mahsud claimed he has three sets of fighters. "The Fidai squad undertakes dangerous missions, such as the kidnapping of the Chinese engineers. The Mujahid squad comprises ordinary fighters willing to die for our causes. And we have the Suicide squad whose members haven't yet been unleashed," he explained.

When reminded that he was living a dangerous life after taking on the might of the Pakistani state and refusing to release the captured Pakistan Army soldier Mohammad Shaban and the two Chinese engineers, Mahsud remarked that he doesn't fear death and had willingly taken this course. "There is no going back for me and my colleagues. We would fight America and its allies, which includes the Musharraf government, until the very end."

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/FJ15Df05.html

Foreign hands fuel Pakistan's sectarian strife
By Syed Saleem Shahzad

KARACHI - The latest round of countrywide sectarian violence in Pakistan that has claimed scores of lives is fueled in part by general hatred and the desire to create chaos and anarchy, as well as strong feelings among militants of both Sunni and Shi'ite groups to eliminate "foreign connections".

As a result of the sectarian violence, which has claimed more than 75 lives in the past fortnight, a countrywide crackdown has begun on all types of religious organizations, including non-sectarian religious political groups, such as the Jamiat-i-Ulema-i-Islam, and non-sectarian jihadi outfits, such as the Jaish-i-Mohammed and Harkatul Mujahideen.

Law-enforcement agencies have rounded up more than 500 activists from central and southern Punjab in the past few days, and the volatile southern port city of Karachi has been placed on high alert after a tipoff of a further large sectarian incident.

The current wave of violence began with the killing late last month of Amjad Farooqi in the southern city of Nawabshah. Farooqi, a suspected senior al-Qaeda figure, was gunned down by security forces, setting off a chain reaction.

Sectarian minefield
Most of the cases of apparent sectarian violence in 2003-04 are in fact less a result of religious differences than a struggle between pro- and anti-Taliban people.

The recently arrested high-profile serial killer of Shi'ites from the southwestern province of Balochistan, Daud Badini, informed his interrogators that he and his accomplices had taken up arms against the Hazara community, which happens to be Shi'ite, and anti-Taliban.

The Hazaras originally hailed from the Afghan province of Bamiyan. Hundreds of families migrated to Iran and (present Pakistani) Balochistan about a century ago, yet they retained their family ties in Afghanistan and even kept their culture alive. After the mass migration from Afghanistan after the Soviet invasion of 1979, the numbers of the Hazara community in Quetta soared to 300,000, outnumbering the locals almost three to one.

According to security officials, the suicide bomber of the Shi'ite mosque Ali Raza in May, Mohammed Ali Memon, in which several dozen people were killed, had previously stated that the mosque was being used to spy on the activities of jihadis in the area.

After the recent incident in Multan, in which more than 50 Sunni members of the defunct Sepah-i-Sahab (renamed as the Millat-i-Islamia) were blown up in a car-bomb attack, Asia Times Online contacted the central spokesperson of the organization, Mujeeb Inqalabi, who was quick to blame intelligence agents from Shi'ite-majority Iran for supporting the attack.

The first sectarian organization in the country was founded soon after the Iranian revolution of 1979, the Tehrik-i-Nifaz-i-Fiqah-i-Jaferia - TNFJ - which was banned and subsequently renamed the Islamic Movement. The organization emerged to demand religious rights for the Shi'ite minority in Pakistan, including a separate syllabus of Islamic learning and national public holidays on Shi'ite mourning days. General Zia ul-Haq's government succumbed to all demands.

There is no census available in the country that confirms the exact number of Shi'ites and Sunnis, but the Shi'ites claim 20%, while different Sunni organizations claim that Shi'ites only constitute 7-8% of the country's 150 million population. The median of these figures is probably closer to the truth.

Pakistani intelligence quarters believed that the TNFJ had connections with Iran as its leader, Ariful Hussaini, later murdered in the 1980s, was close to the Iranian clergy and acted as an intermediary between the two countries on a number of occasions.

Pakistan had traditionally been a part of the US camp and therefore also friendly to Iran, but after the Islamic Revolution things changed. Tehran suspected Pakistan of allowing the US Central Intelligence Agency to launch intelligence operations from Balochistan to fan anti-revolutionary movements in Zahedan, a bordering Iranian province. In turn, Iran allowed India to open a consulate in far-flag Zahedan, and funded the TNFJ to increase Iranian influence in Pakistan.

Even though Pakistan and Iran had minimal trade ties, Iran opened consulates in the Pakistani cities of Quetta, Lahore and Peshawar, besides its embassy in Islamabad and a powerful consulate in Karachi. In addition, cultural centers were used to project the Iranian revolution, notably in smaller places such as Multan.

The emergence of the Sepah-i-Sahabah in the 1980s is largely seen as a reaction to the TNFJ, although its rapid rise can also be attributed to the Arab money it received. The Iranian revolution was largely perceived as a threat to Arab dictators and kings and they made all-out efforts to contain its spread. Countries such as Saudi Arabia and Iraq were at forefront in this regard and they showered millions of dollars on anti-Shi'ite organizations, which, along with the Sepah-i-Sahabah, had mushroomed in the 1980s in Pakistan.

The growth of anti-Shi'ite organizations forced Iran to revamp its operations, and instead of being obsessed with the TNFJ, Iranian intelligence invested in anti-Salafi Sunni organizations such as Sunni Tehrik. Sunni Tehrik activists were trained in Iran and then launched into Pakistan, where they only took on jihadi outfits. However, the timely intervention of the state machinery largely marginalized the Sunni Tehrik in Pakistan.

After the Gulf War of 1991, defeated Iraq was no longer in a position to support anti-Shi'ite organizations, and US-friendly Saudi Arabia was also not interested in funding countries that had sided with Saddam Hussein.

At this time Pakistan's state machinery gradually took Sepah-i-Sahabah under its fold and persuaded it to give up its militancy. The mainstream organization agreed, but a rebellious splinter group emerged in the form of the Lashkar-i-Jhangvi (LJ), with the sole objective of killing Shi'ites and harming their interests. In reaction, a splinter group emerged among Shi'ites, called the Sepah-i-Mohammed. The LJ flourished in the Taliban's military training camps in Afghanistan, while Sepah-i-Mohammed militants were trained in Iran.

According to security documents of the Punjab police on Shi'ite terrorists, Zulqarnain Haider, who hails from central Punjab, is an example of someone who acquired his religious education from Qum, Iran, and remained in constant touch with Iranian intelligence. At present, he is in the Netherlands. Another person with the same name is from Karachi and is believed to have killed seven people.

Dr Qaisar Raza of Multan is another example cited in Punjab police records. He was funded by Iranian intelligence to carry out a bomb attack in a Lahore court on January 18, 1997. He is now in Iran. In this attack, the chief of the Sepah-i-Sahabah was seriously wounded. Police arrested one Mehram Ali, who during interrogation admitted that Iranian intelligence had provided funds for the operation. Mehram Ali was later hanged for his part in the attack. Mureed Abbas of Muzzafar Gargh was president of the TNFJ in a medical college in Bahawalpur, and is accused of killing several people in Bahawalpur. He now works in Iran as a medical teacher.

Security sources say that Sunni terrorists are generally linked with the Taliban or al-Qaeda and have little or no interaction with the underworld. On the other hand, many Shi'ite terrorists came from the underworld before they became religious zealots. For instance, Zohair Abbass of Tokar Niaz Baig and Anwar Haider Shah of Lahore and Tahir Abbas, alias Tony of Tokar Niaz Baig, were all known dacoits (bandits) and cases are registered against them. They are all office bearers of the Sepah-i-Mohammed.

The recent murder of high-profile pro-Taliban cleric Mufti Jameel Ahmed Khan is reckoned to have been committed by members of a Shi'ite militant organization, with foreign funding.

Security sources tell Asia Times Online that more sectarian trouble is likely, with a strong proxy war being fought under its cover

Shall we him him a week...
http://www.dawn.com/2004/10/16/top4.htm

Efforts stepped up to capture Mehsud

ISLAMABAD, Oct 15: Security forces on Friday stepped up their hunt for Abdullah Mehsud, an Al Qaeda-linked former Guantanamo Bay prisoner who had masterminded the kidnapping of two Chinese engineers, government officials said.

In a commando operation, one of the Chinese and five kidnappers were killed on Thursday. Abdullah Mehsud, who spent 25 months in the US-run Camp X-ray until his release in March, had ordered the kidnapping to pressurize the government into halting counter-terrorism operations in the tribal region bordering Afghanistan.

"Our security forces are all geared up and we are taking all measures to bring to justice those behind the kidnapping," Information Minister Sheikh Rasheed Ahmed told AFP.

He said the kidnapping was a conspiracy to hurt Pakistan-China relations, adding that Islamabad would do "everything to eliminate such a threat." "We have to hunt him down. Now we will evolve a strategy and do some planning," a security official told Reuters. "The man has become too big for his shoes."

Journalists have been taken to meet Abdullah Mehsud at secret locations by tribal go-betweens and he could prove difficult to find as he has been using a long-range cordless telephone harder to detect than a satellite phone. But the man may find it difficult to evade the capture too long after angering the members of his own tribe who had tried unsuccessfully to negotiate the release of the Chinese hostages.

"By kidnapping the Chinese citizens, Mehsud and his handful of supporters have lost all respect," said National Assembly member Maulana Mirajuddin Khan, who had led this effort.

"They have disgraced the movement against US influence in the region," he told the Washington Post. "I've a feeling Abdullah will soon get a missile through his window just like Nek Mohammad," said a diplomat, referring to another militant killed a couple of months back in an operation. "The military doesn't like Robin Hoods floating around the tribal areas," he added. -Agencies

Body of Chinese hostage killed in Pak returned

Oct 17, 2004 07:14:00 AM

Beijing, Oct 17 (PTI) The body of Wang Peng, one of the two Chinese hostages killed in Pakistan, returned to Jinan, capital city of east China's Shandong Province late last night on board a special Pakistani military aircraft. Wang Peng, an engineer, was killed in a military operation launched by Pakistan forces Thursday to free the two Chinese hostages. Wang Ende, the rescued hostage, had returned to Beijing on Friday night.

On behalf of the Chinese government, Vice Governor of Shandong Xie Yutang extended condolence to Wang Peng and expressed sympathy for his family and for Wang Ende.

The Chinese side strongly condemned the terrorist act to kidnap hostages, Xie said, noting that governments and peoples of China and Pakistan will continue to make efforts for promoting friendly and cooperative ties between the two sides.

Pakistani ambassador to China, Riaz Mohammad Khan extended grief from the Pakistani government and people, saying that it is the crime of terrorism that caused this tragedy, Xinhua news agency reported.

The Pakistani government will ensure the security of Chinese friends there within capacity, he said.

Gunmen kidnapped Wang Ende and Wang Peng, the engineers working on a water dam and a canal in the region for the China National Water Resources and Hydropower Engineering Group Corporation, on October 9 near Jandala in Pakistan's restive South Waziristan Tribal Agency bordering Afghanistan.

In order to deal with the aftermath of the kidnapping issue, the Chinese side had dispatched 'working teams' to Pakistan. PTI

http://www.turkishpress.com/turkishpress/news.asp?ID=30964

Japanese official says North Korea holds nuclear weapons
AFP: 10/17/2004

TOKYO (AFP) - North Korea has already completed the development of plutonium-based nuclear weapons with the help of Pakistan, a senior Japanese official said.

The remarks by Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda represent the first time a Japanese official has confirmed North Korea's claim to have manufactured nuclear weapons, the Sankei Shimbun said.

"North Korea is near finalising development of nuclear weapons," Hosoda told a ruling party meeting in the western town of Shimane on Saturday, the Sankei said.

Pyongyang has not finished developing uranium-based nuclear weapons, but has completed the development of a plutonium bomb similar to the one dropped by the United States on Nagasaki at the end of World War II, Hosoda said.

"It is urgent to make (North Korea) abandon them," Hosoda said, without giving any evidence to back up his claims.

Hosoda said North Korea and Pakistan had cooperated in the manufacture of nuclear weapons. "It is disgraceful," he said.

Pakistani nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan publicly confessed in February to leaking nuclear secrets to Iran, Libya and North Korea.

Pakistan has refused to allow he International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN's atomic watchdog, to interview Khan to discuss the international nuclear black market he used to run.

A North Korean foreign ministry spokemsan said last month the Stalinist state would never dismantle its nuclear weapons unless the United States drops its "hostile policy" towards the country.

Six-nation talks aimed at convincing North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons programs have failed to make concrete progress so far.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/FJ16Df03.html

Hostage death adds to Musharraf's woes
By Syed Saleem Shahzad

KARACHI - The killing of a Chinese hostage during a rescue operation in the Pakistani tribal area of South Waziristan on Thursday once again throws the spotlight on the troubled region and Islamabad's response to growing unrest there.

The government's immediate task will be to track down the mastermind of the kidnapping, Abdullah Mehsud, and then to prepare for further major plots being hatched in South Waziristan aimed at destabilizing the administration of President General Pervez Musharraf.

In dramatic developments on Thursday, members of the Special Services Group of the Pakistani army dressed themselves as local tribals and stormed the mud house in Chagmalai, South Waziristan, where two Chinese hostages were being held. In the ensuing gunfight, Wang Peng and the five hostage takers died. Another Chinese, Wang Ende, escaped unharmed.

The two Chinese engineers had been working on Pakistan's Gomal Zam Dam project for China's state-run Sino Hydro Corp in the restive province when they were abducted last Saturday.

The commando action was carried out after Abdullah demanded that the abductors be given a safe passage to Jandollah, in South Waziristan, where Abdullah and other insurgent tribals are hiding. The one-legged Abdullah is a veteran jihadi who fought alongside the Taliban for may years. He was captured by the US in Afghanistan in 2002 and sent to Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, but he was released early this year after the Pentagon said he was no longer a threat to the US and that he had no intelligence value.

The Pakistanis rejected Abdullah's demand for the safe passage of the kidnappers, and when their deadline for the release expired, they took the offensive.

Earlier in Jandollah, Mehsud tribals played out an ancient ritual. A woman holding the Koran and a sheep was sent to Abdullah to request the release of a Pakistani paramilitary man who was also being held hostage. As per tribal tradition, Abdullah was obliged to give respect to the woman, and he accepted her request. On Thursday, despite the commando action in Chagmalai, in the presence of local and international media, he handed over Mohammed Shaban, who hails from Wehari (Punjab) to Major-General Niaz Khattack. The major had flown into the remote and generally inaccessible area by helicopter with only a few staff.

The horizon expands
Up to August this year, the fight in the tribal areas was between a few branches of Wazir tribes and the Pakistani military, which was tasked with rooting out foreign militants, including al-Qaeda, from the area.

The Mehsud tribes are the most educated segment of Pashtun society and centuries-old rivals of the Wazir. Though both tribes live in the remote high mountains, many Mehsud tribesmen adopted a successful urban life and even joined the Pakistan army and civil service, often reaching high positions, including generals and top bureaucratic posts. These two factors - their rivalry with the Wazir and their association with the establishment - pitched them on the government side when military operations in the tribal areas started early this year.

This correspondent has witnessed first-hand how Mehsud tribesmen blocked several arteries to prevent Wazir fighters from escaping the army.

However, when Pakistani planes bombed South Waziristan on September 10, killing dozens of local tribals, including women and children, the situation changed and Wazirs and Mehsuds (Panthers and Wolves, as the British military once referred to them) joined hands with the single agenda of getting rid of the "Punjabi army" from their areas.

A compact disc depicting the destruction caused by the bombing is widely available in North and South Waziristan, and copies were sent to the media throughout the country. Mehsud tribals also visited major press clubs, including in Karachi, Rawalpindi and Lahore, where they showed their wounded children, and also claimed that Pakistani forces had used special chemical weapons against them.

The next battlefield
Independent sources, including the local media and tribals in South Waziristan, claim that the army is mobilizing for an extraordinary offensive, and that militants have already taken up positions in the high mountains. The army has already begun to put pressure on villages situated near the mountains where the militants are hiding in an effort to force them to stop fighting or face the music. This strategy has been used in the past, and always results in unnecessary trouble between peaceful villagers (who couldn't stop the militants even if they wanted to) and the military.

Similarly, the militants have appealed to allies in mainland Pakistan to increase the pressure on the authorities by launching attacks. In the past, attacks have been carried out on the corps commander's house in Peshawar and on the corps commander's motorcade in Karachi.

Al-Qaeda deviates
In the past, al-Qaeda and its affiliates in Pakistan were not interested in targeting the country's rulers. Their struggle centered on the US and its interests, which they see as the main force in the occupation of Muslim territories. However, Musharraf's support for the US-led "war on terror" changed this, and they began to form small cells under the name of Jundullah, which randomly struck military targets or at targets that would undermine Musharraf's government. Several of these cells have been caught.

Asia Times Online sources claim that "a big mission" has been assigned from South Waziristan that is aimed at shattering the writ of Musharraf in the country. When, where and how are the questions now occupying the full attention of the three premier intelligence agencies in country - the Intelligence Bureau, Military Intelligence and Inter-Services Intelligence

http://www.pakistanlink.com/headlines/Dec03/01/05.html

The controversy of two Eids and moon sighting

PESHAWAR (NNI): The celebration of two Eids in the country this year has held legality of the central Ruet-e-Hilal Committee in question once again on the basis of moon sighting witnesses in NWFP as well as Islamabad.

Though, majority of people in NWFP celebrated Eid on Tuesday like Saudi Arabia and the neighbouring Afghanistan, several districts of the province did not join the provincial government and instead celebrated Eid on Wednesday in line with the announcement of the federal government.

It was not only in Pakistan, accustomed to the controversy almost every year, it was also perhaps for the first time in so many years that Eid-ul-Fitr was celebrated on two different days in Iran as well.

The controversy of celebrating Eid-ul-Fitr by NWFP ahead of the rest of the country is not new because no evidence of moon sighting is acceptable to the central Ruet-e-Hilal Committee from the province, but the rejection of evidences by the committee from religious leaders in Islamabad is of course some thing new.

Newspapers have reported that moon sighting evidences were sent to the committee from Masjid Abu Bakkar in G-9 and Masjid-e-Qaba Islamabad on Monday evening, which were rejected by the committee and the administration moved to stop faithful from offering Eid prayers on Tuesday.

The entire MMA government approved celebrating Eid on Tuesday and Chief Minister Akram Khan Durrani offered Eid prayers in his native Bannu district, however, NWFP Governor Syed Iftikhar Hussain Shah chose to celebrate Eid on Wednesday.

So much so that now the chairman of Central Ruet-e-Hilal Committee, Mufti Munibur Rehman has termed celebrating Eid by NWFP as Un-Islamic, which has also thrown a challenge to the religious scholars and leaders to clarify their position.

Jamaat-e-Islami chief Qazi Hussain Ahmad MNA has felt the need to hold a seminar on the topic and try to bridge the widening gape between the two governments on observing Ramazan and celebrating Eid the same day.

The size and visibility of the Eid moon on November 26 proved the argument of the Frontier government almost accurate that Ramazan moon was sighted on October 27 in NWFP and Balochistan against the stand taken by the federal government insisting to observe Ramazan on October 28.

The MMA government has even demanded disbanding the Ruet-e-Hilal Committee, which it believed, failed to bring unity or accept the moon sighting evidences collected in NWFP. But the provincial government would also be required to take action and discourage formation of the plethora of self-styled moon sighting committees in Bannu, Peshawar, Charsadda, Mardan and Sawbi districts as well.

The MMA government, its detractors said, failed to officially announce celebrating Eid on Tuesday and only mobilized district governments in selected districts in the middle of the night to make announcements through the public address system from the mosques.

Unlike the past, there was a split decision even in Malakand division this time, which used to observe Ramadan and celebrate Eid in line with the announcement of the federal government. People in Dir celebrated Eid, but Chitral, Swat, Buner and Shanglapar districts did not, and so was the entire Hazara belt, where Eid was celebrated on Wednesday.

Who is at fault, every government in NWFP or the Central Ruet-e-Hilal Committee, an oft repeated question, which boggles the minds and puts the entire responsibility on the federal government and the religious leaders to decide about the issue, which otherwise, should be a non-issue.

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