If the Lal Masjid crisis was created by the “agencies” as some believe, “then they have landed themselves with a Frankenstein’s monster; not a big one as yet, but one they no longer know what to do with,” writes Anatol Lieven in the liberal online news and opinion portal, Open Democracy. | Is there an echo in here? ... an echo in here? ... an echo in here? ... an echo in here? ... an echo in here? |
Lieven, who visited the Lal Masjid last month where he interviewed Abdul Rashid Ghazi, calls the 43-year old cleric “an immensely good talker, with an acute sense of what arguments will appeal most to western critics of Bush administration policies and just enough of a visible glint of steel behind his friendliness to keep his interlocutors off-balance. “He refused to have anyone else interviewed, including the students holed up there. He writes that it would be a mistake to assume, as some of the western media reporting seems to imply, that Ghazi’s group came in from outside to seize control of the mosque. Since Ghazi believes that his father was shot by the ISI, “it would argue quite strongly against him being a willing tool of the ISI.” The British journalist, now aligned with a Washington think tank, noted that the mosque complex does not seem very heavily defended, and could be stormed with relative ease. However, he found a genuine dread among officials of the mass Islamist backlash that may result if women students are killed by male police or troops, with some scenes doubtless being successfully filmed for propaganda purposes. There is also a fear that Ghazi’s followers may have packed the buildings with explosives, and intend to kill themselves and as many of the security forces as possible if the army attacks. Credence to this belief has been given by the increasing number of suicide-bombings by Islamist militants in Pakistan, including one which narrowly killing the federal interior minister.
Lieven writes that Gen. Musharraf himself is detested by the militants both for his support for the US “war on terror” and for his generally secular agenda. He speculates that Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain has been negotiating with Ghazi and his followers to find a peaceful solution, which in turn forms part of what seems to be the PML leader’s strategy of laying the basis for a possible coalition between his party and the MMA, to prevent the PPP returning to government.