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Pakistan imposes indefinite 24-hr. curfew after festivities
A Shiite Muslim cleric was ambushed Saturday as he drove through the once serene Himalayan tourist destination of Gilgit, setting off a rampage of sectarian violence and arson that left at least 14 people dead, including a family of six that was burned alive in its home. Authorities imposed an indefinite 24-hour curfew and army troops patrolled Gilgit to contain the violence, the second bout of unrest between rival Shiites and Sunnis there in six months. Security forces also blocked roads into Gilgit, about 150 miles north of the capital, Islamabad, and national carrier Pakistan International Airlines suspended flights to the town. "We don't know yet when the flights will be resumed," said Mohammed Abbas, a PIA official.

Police said hundreds of Shiites and Sunnis had clashed, setting fire to shops, homes and government buildings. The town was calm on Sunday, but the death toll rose to 14 after three people died of their injuries overnight, said Jamil Ahmed, regional chief administrator. The fatalities included six members of one family who were burned alive in their home, among them a government forestry official. Also, the local health chief Sher Wali - a Sunni - was shot dead.

The trouble started long before when unidentified gunmen shot and wounded a prominent Shiite cleric, Agha Ziauddin, as he traveled through the city in a car.
A quick look at the Rantburg archives for Gilgit shows that
.... a Shia cleric from Gilgit working in Karachi tipped off the police about the presence of (Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's nephew) Arooshi in the house of Abbas Khan. (T)he Al Qaeda leadership suspect that the Shia members of the Hazara community in Balochistan and of the Kashmiri community in Gilgit in the Northern Areas had been collaborating with the US intelligence in its hunt for the dregs of Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Many in Karachi claim that Masoob Arooshi was actually arrested on a tip off by the US authorities, who, in turn, got their information from the Shia cleric.

My money's on a contract hit, although Dire RevengeĀ™, sunspots, or the heartbreak of psoriasis can't be ruled out...
His private security guards, one of whom was killed, fired back, killing at least one attacker. The motive for the attack on Ziauddin, who was hospitalized in stable condition, was not known. Fearing the unrest could spread to other parts of the country, the Interior Ministry instructed authorities in each of Pakistan's four provinces to step up security for Muslim clerics and at places of worship, a ministry official said on condition of anonymity.

Gilgit, a town set amid steep mountains, suffered sectarian unrest in June, when Shiites staged protests, demanding changes in Islamic textbooks used in state schools. The protests spiraled into violence that claimed several lives. Authorities imposed a curfew for 13 days and had to airlift out some foreign tourists who were stranded in the city. Although tensions had since eased, some schools have yet to reopen in the Gilgit area.

About 80 percent of Pakistan's 150 million people are Sunnis and 17 percent Shiites _ although Shiites are in a majority in Gilgit and some other mountainous northern areas. Most of the Muslims live together peacefully, but a teeny tiny minority small groups of militants on both sides stage attacks.
Posted by: Seafarious 2005-01-10
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=53283