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JUI-F condemns arrest of foreign seminary students
The Coordination Committee of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) on Tuesday condemned fresh raids on seminaries and the arrest of foreign seminary students throughout Pakistan.
"Nope. Nope. Can't have people rounding up terrorists indiscriminately like that..."
The committee said the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) would support the Ittehad-e-Tanzimat-e-Madars-e-Denya (ITMD) in this regard. Addressing here a press conference, MMA Deputy Parliamentary Leader Hafiz Hussain Ahmed said the government had restarted the campaign against seminaries and the police raided various seminaries and arrested foreign students, which was a ‘condemnable act’. He said the government raided the seminaries to please the United States and to blackmail the MMA on the Legal Framework Order (LFO) issue. “We have talked to ITMD Coordination Secretary Qari Hanif Jalandhri and assured him of the MMA’s support of whatever the ITMD chalks out as a strategy,” Mr Hussain said. He said the meeting also passed a resolution to condemn the measures taken by the government against seminaries, particularly a proposed change in the education syllabus. He accused the government of stating to the press that it had included 77 seminaries on the watch list. JUI-F General Secretary Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Heidry said seminaries were educating 35 percent of the population, but the government was trying to destroy them just to make the US happy. He said more than 90 percent of seminary students were not only poor, but also orphans. He also said the JUI-F was not separating from the MMA.
35 percent of the population? I think I might see where the problem lies...

Posted by: Fred Pruitt 2003-09-24
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=19026