Only 14, Bangladeshi girl lashed to death

By Farid Ahmed and Moni Basu

Shariatpur, Bangladesh — Hena Akhter’s last words to her mother proclaimed her innocence. But it was too late to save the 14-year-old girl.

Darbesh Khan and his wife, Aklima Begum, had to watch their youngest daughter being whipped until she dropped.

Her fellow villagers in Bangladesh’s Shariatpur district had already passed harsh judgment on her. Guilty, they said, of having an affair with a married man. The imam from the local mosque ordered the fatwa, or religious ruling, and the punishment: 101 lashes delivered swiftly, deliberately in public.

Hena dropped after 70.

Bloodied and bruised, she was taken to hospital, where she died a week later.

Amazingly, an initial autopsy report cited no injuries and deemed her death a suicide. Hena’s family insisted her body be exhumed. They wanted the world to know what really happened to their daughter.

Sharia: illegal but still practiced

Hena’s family hailed from rural Shariatpur, crisscrossed by murky rivers that lend waters to rice paddies and lush vegetable fields.

Hena was the youngest of five children born to Darbesh Khan, a day laborer, and his wife, Aklima Begum. They shared a hut made from corrugated tin and decaying wood and led a simple life that was suddenly marred a year ago with the return of Hena’s cousin Mahbub Khan.

Mahbub Khan came back to Shariatpur from a stint working in Malaysia. His son was Hena’s age and the two were in seventh grade together.

Khan eyed Hena and began harassing her on her way to school and back, said Hena’s father. He complained to the elders who run the village about his nephew, three times Hena’s age.

The elders admonished Mahbub Khan and ordered him to pay $1,000 in fines to Hena’s family. But Mahbub was Darbesh’s older brother’s son and Darbesh was asked to let the matter fade.

Many months later on a winter night, as Hena’s sister Alya told it, Hena was walking from her room to an outdoor toilet when Mahbub Khan gagged her with cloth, forced her behind nearby shrubbery and beat and raped her.

Hena struggled to escape, Alya told CNN. Mahbub Khan’s wife heard Hena’s muffled screams and when she found Hena with her husband, she dragged the teenage girl back to her hut, beat her and trampled her on the floor.

The next day, the village elders met to discuss the case at Mahbub Khan’s house, Alya said. The imam pronounced his fatwa. Khan and Hena were found guilty of an illicit relationship. Her punishment under sharia or Islamic law was 101 lashes; his 201.

Mahbub Khan managed to escape after the first few lashes.

Darbesh Khan and Aklima Begum had no choice but to mind the imam’s order. They watched as the whip broke the skin of their youngest child and she fell unconscious to the ground.

“What happened to Hena is unfortunate and we all have to be ashamed that we couldn’t save her life,” said Sultana Kamal, who heads the rights organization Ain o Shalish Kendro.

Bangladesh is considered a democratic and moderate Muslim country, and national law forbids the practice of sharia. But activist and journalist Shoaib Choudhury, who documents such cases, said sharia is still very much in use in villages and towns aided by the lack of education and strong judicial systems.

The Supreme Court also outlawed fatwas a decade ago, but human rights monitors have documented more than 500 cases of women in those 10 years who were punished through a religious ruling. And few who have issued such rulings have been charged.

Last month, the court asked the government to explain what it had done to stop extrajudicial penalty based on fatwa. It ordered the dissemination of information to all mosques and madrassas, or religious schools, that sharia is illegal in Bangladesh.

“The government needs to enact a specific law to deal with such perpetrators responsible for extrajudicial penalty in the name of Islam,” Kamal told CNN.

The United Nations estimates that almost half of Bangladeshi women suffer from domestic violence and many also commonly endure rape, beatings, acid attacks and even death because of the country’s entrenched patriarchal system.

Hena might have quietly become another one of those statistics had it not been for the outcry and media attention that followed her death on January 31.

‘Not even old enough to be married’

Monday, the doctors responsible for Hena’s first autopsy faced prosecution for what a court called a “false post-mortem report to hide the real cause of Hena’s death.”

Public outrage sparked by that autopsy report prompted the high court to order the exhumation of Hena’s body in February. A second autopsy performed at Dhaka Medical College Hospital revealed Hena had died of internal bleeding and her body bore the marks of severe injuries.

Police are now conducting an investigation and have arrested several people, including Mahbub Khan, in connection with Hena’s death.

“I’ve nothing to demand but justice,” said Darbesh Khan, leading a reporter to the place where his daughter was abducted the night she was raped.

He stood in silence and took a deep breath. She wasn’t even old enough to be married, he said, testament to Hena’s tenderness in a part of the world where many girls are married before adulthood. “She was so small.”

Hena’s mother, Aklima, stared vacantly as she spoke of her daughter’s last hours. She could barely get out her words. “She was innocent,” Aklima said, recalling Hena’s last words.

Police were guarding Hena’s family earlier this month. Darbesh and Aklima feared reprisal for having spoken out against the imam and the village elders.

They had meted out the most severe punishment for their youngest daughter. They could put nothing past them.

SCBA warns of creeping “judicial dictatorship” and attitude of intolerance

Americans For Pakistan

The President of Pakistan’s Supreme Court Bar Association, Asma Jahangir, warned of creeping “judicial dictatorship” and an attitude of intolerance towards other government institutions following a recent Supreme Court decisions. Though the Chief Justice may believe that his court is acting in the best interest of the nation, it is important that he allow other institutions to grow and develop independently.

At issue is the appointment of retired Justice Deedar Shah as chairman of the National Accountability Bureau, the nation’s primary anti-corruption agency. Earlier this month, the Supreme Court ordered Justice Shah to step down following claims by opposition politicians that the retired Justice is a supporter the governing Pakistan People’s Party (PPP). According to Pakistan Muslim League – Nawaz (PML-N) spokesman Siddiqul Farooq, the constitutional requirement for consultation on the appointment “means seeking the consent of the opposition.”

Ms Jahangir does not take issue with the need for a consensus-based consultation, but strongly objects to the court, “as it provided for the chief justice of Pakistan to decide the matter if the leaders of the house and opposition were at dispute over the appointment.” This is not the first time that concerns have been raised over the court’s interference in politics.

The core question is not regarding the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court, but rather what is the effect of extending the sphere of the Court’s influence to matters that belong to the public sphere or other branches of the government. The 18th amendment case is an example of the Supreme Court ruling on (and possibly against) the unanimous consensus of the elected representatives of the people.

Another example is the suo moto (of its own motion) notice taken by Lahore High Court’s Divisional Bench on the high price of sugar in the country. The superior courts in Pakistan are empowered to take suo moto cognizance of any matter the court feels is in public interest. In general terms, this power means the court can take up a matter and rule on it without anyone approaching the court. The court fixed the price of sugar at 40 Pakistani Rupees per kilogram, ignoring the market forces influencing the price. The court’s credentials in economic management are open to debate. Although driven by the best of motives, the outcome was that neither the price nor the supply stabilized. This was question for the economists and Parliament, not for the courts. Similar examples can be found in the Supreme Court declaring the levy of the Carbon Tax as invalid and the annulment of the privatization [PDF] of the Pakistan Steel Mill.

Pakistan’s political parties demonstrated earlier this year that, while negotiations may appear to be messy at times, the parties are learning how to work together to reach consensus on important issues. This learning process must be allowed to continue without interference from the courts. Pakistan’s justices may believe that they are acting in the interests of the people, but by circumventing due process and intervening in political affairs, the courts are stunting the maturation of Pakistan’s democratic system.

Diplomacy, or just 2 guys watching cricket?

Leaders to meet as India and Pakistan play, but what they’ll discuss is a mystery

With careful diplomatic scripting, India and Pakistan began talking again this week. Officials from both countries convened in New Delhi to discuss security issues and pave the way for future meetings between more powerful officials. The talks were billed as baby steps, a modest restarting of a critical but stalled diplomatic dialogue.

Then, unexpectedly, a cricket match intervened – and almost overnight, the scope of the dialogue has suddenly changed.

When India and Pakistan meet Wednesday afternoon for a semifinal match in cricket’s World Cup, the prime ministers of both countries will be seated together in the stands. Now, the question is what exactly they will talk about and whether a breakthrough is possible between the two nuclear-armed neighbors.

The surprise development is the latest gambit on Pakistan by the Indian prime minister, Manmohan Singh. Last weekend, when it became clear that both countries had advanced to the semifinal, Mr. Singh issued a surprise invitation to his Pakistani counterpart, Yousaf Raza Gilani, to join him for the match in the Indian city of Mohali. Mr. Gilani eventually accepted. (Pakistan’s president, Asif Ali Zardari, declined an invitation.)

For the Indian subcontinent, where few things stir public passions more than cricket and politics, the twinning of such a high-stakes cricket match with such high-stakes diplomacy has created an irresistible spectacle. An enormous audience, possibly in the hundreds of millions, is expected to watch the match on television, while India has ordered a massive security clampdown in Mohali, including a no-flight zone over the city, to protect against terrorism.

Mr. Singh’s invitation is another example of how he has repeatedly tried to advance diplomacy with Pakistan, even when some members of his own Indian National Congress party have resisted. In New Delhi, Mr. Singh’s overture has drawn a mixed reaction; some analysts have praised his determination to push forward, while others have expressed skepticism, seeing the meeting as something of a political stunt that risks undermining the lower-level talks that began this week.

”It has caught everybody by surprise,” said Brahma Chellaney, a strategic affairs analyst in New Delhi. ”In diplomacy, you have to do the preparatory work first if you want to have a result. This sounds like an impulsive move.”

Harish Khare, a spokesman for Mr. Singh, described the invitation as a ”spur of the moment” decision made after it became clear that the two countries would meet in the semifinals. He said there is no specific agenda, nor any structured dialogue; rather, he said, the meeting is an opportunity to build trust, enjoy the match and have ”an exchange of ideas.”

”The prime minister just said, ‘Come along,”’ Mr. Khare said. ”Of course, there will be some talk. But it is not a summit meeting. And it will not interfere with the ongoing dialogue.”

The unsettled relationship between India and Pakistan lies beneath many of the festering problems in south Asia. The two countries have a decades-old dispute over Kashmir and a host of other conflicts. Diplomatic progress was shattered in 2008, when Pakistani-based militants conducted terror attacks in Mumbai that killed at least 163 people. The United States has long prodded both countries toward negotiations in hopes that defused tensions, especially over Kashmir, would encourage the Pakistani military to shift resources away from India toward fighting terror groups inside Pakistan.

The initial step in this latest resumption of dialogue was supposed to be the meetings that began Monday in New Delhi. The Pakistani interior secretary, Qamar Zaman, met with the Indian home secretary, G.K. Pillai, to discuss the Mumbai attacks and other security issues. (On Tuesday, the two said in a joint statement that Pakistan had agreed to a visit by an Indian judicial commission investigating the attacks, The Associated Press reported.)

But these meetings were quickly upstaged by Mr. Singh’s cricket overture.

Analysts note that ”cricket diplomacy” has been tried in the past, with mixed results. In 1987, Pakistan’s then-president, Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, attended an India-Pakistan match, but relations soon deteriorated. More recently, in 2005, Mr. Singh invited then-President Pervez Musharraf to an India-Pakistan match in New Delhi, ushering in a period of secret back-channel talks that almost culminated in a breakthrough deal on Kashmir.

Now, though, many analysts say the political situation is far different. Both Mr. Gilani and Mr. Singh are politically wounded at home; Indian analysts argue that Mr. Gilani is actually far less politically powerful than Pakistan’s military chief, Gen. Ashfaq Pervez Kayani. Meanwhile, Mr. Singh has been battered by allegations of corruption leveled against his government.

Yet the cricket invitation does seem to have enhanced a feeling of good will on both sides. Pakistan announced the early release of a longtime Indian prisoner – if, admittedly, by only a few months.

”You will see relations become more friendly and cordial, even outside the cricket grounds,” predicted Abid Saeed, the press counselor for the Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi. He said a delegation of about 50 ministers and officials was traveling with Mr. Gilani to the match.

C. Raja Mohan, a senior fellow at the Center for Policy Research in New Delhi, applauded Mr. Singh’s gambit, noting that for all the diplomacy and highly structured meetings by lower-level officials over the decades, progress is usually only made when the top leaders are directly engaged. Mr. Mohan said that if the cricket diplomacy results in warmer relations, Mr. Singh should visit Pakistan as his next bold gesture.

”Right or wrong, India’s Pakistan policy has always been driven by the gut instincts of the prime ministers rather than the carefully crafted approaches by the diplomatists,” Mr. Mohan wrote Tuesday in The Indian Express, a leading English-language newspaper. ”If the mood at Mohali turns out to be good, Dr. Singh and Gilani might help give the dialogue at the bureaucratic level a much needed boost.”

Night of the General

The woman was a phenomenon. Easily the most influential figure during Pakistan’s second military regime, with the slightest gesture of her bejewelled hand she could guarantee employment, ensure promotions and bring about unwelcome transfers. Yet, interestingly, few even know her real name: Akleem Akhtar. General Rani she was, and remains to all but an intimate few.

There are enough reasons for the lady’s ascension to local legend status. In her glory days she seemed omnipotent and was brazen about her exploits. And now, even while suffering from breast cancer that has led to metastasis in the liver and kidney, bedridden and in semi-seclusion, she remains spirited and outspoken.

Yet, doing a story on her was probably the most difficult assignment I have undertaken. For one thing, everyone I was certain was acquainted with her, was reluctant to even own up to the fact that they knew her. So, for starters, I made a call to her daughter, Aroosa Alam, the defence journalist for the Pakistan Observer and the news coordinator for the Middle East Broadcasting Company, and pop star Fakhre Alam’s mother.

Aroosa nipped all efforts at contact with her mother in the bud, claiming that not only was General Rani far too unwell to entertain visitors, but also, her brothers were completely against their mother appearing in the press. “My mother has been hurt sufficiently by the media already; we don’t want her private life exploited any further,” stated a stern Aroosa.

A call to Naureen and Arshad Sami, Adnan Sami Khan’s parents, proved equally unsuccessful. Although General Rani is Naureen’s maternal aunt, she politely but firmly denied even knowing the lady. There was a similar response from Zil-e-Huma, whose mother Madame Nur Jehan’s friendship with General Rani was legion. Huma completely denied any knowledge of the woman.

A journalist working for the Jang group, Maqsood Butt nearly had an apoplexy when I mentioned the story I was working on. While in the past Maqsood Butt had written extensively on this topic and is said to have close ties with the family, he has for several years, refrained from even bringing up her name in an article.

“I promised her that I would never talk about her or her family again,” he stated nervously and refused to help me in any way.

Clearly, the woman I was seeking out was no ordinary woman. As I kept running into a blind alley and became increasingly despondent, General Rani’s lawyers, S. M. Zafar and Ijaz Batalvi, Mustafa Khar, and a few journalists and government officials who wish to remain anonymous, appeared like beacons and lit my way.

A sneak visit was arranged to General Rani’s house and thereupon begins this story.

The house General Rani resides in is rather small, with little more than a handkerchief-sized lawn in front, and the main door opening into a virtually non-existent hall that leads straight to her room. There was an air of neglect about the house; the garden was unkempt and the floor unswept. General Rani was lying in bed. My first impression was one of shock. Having visualised an elegant, elderly woman, I was instead confronted by a dark, overweight woman. Her hair had obviously suffered due to heavy doses of chemotherapy, and the loss of hair accentuated the pock-marks on her face. But though visibly ill, she was in good spirits and happy to entertain visitors – a commodity I suspect, is a rare treat nowadays.

General Rani hails from a village in Gujarat. Her father was a zamindar and the family was reportedly well-to-do. Those who knew her family describe their house as one of the bigger mansions in the area, with a number of servants running around to the residents’ bidding.

From the outset, Akleem was an independent spirit. She was a tomboy, fond of outdoor sports and hunting. And though she did not even complete her matric, her sharp intelligence more than compensated for her lack of education.

At a tender age she was married to a police officer many times her senior. Though the marriage lasted for some time and she bore six children, General Rani was never happy. Her husband was a traditionalist and believed that a wife’s primary duty was to serve her husband. A woman as strong and independent as she found this hard to digest, and squabbles were common between the two. The sham their marriage was eventually reduced to, collapsed one day – right on Murree’s Mall Road.

One summer, when the family was vacationing in Murree, a burqa-clad Rani and her husband went for a stroll on the Mall. As was customary for him, he walked a step or two behind her so as to keep an eye on her. Suddenly there was a gust of wind – “a lovely breeze” says she, and quite spontaneously Rani lifted the naqab covering her face to allow the breeze to caress her cheeks.

Her husband immediately tapped her with his walking stick to reprimand her. Enraged and insulted, she threw caution to the wind and flung her naqab to the ground, and her abaya into a cracking fire. She then turned to face her husband with a defiant gleam in her eyes.

She explains her reaction in these words: “I just felt I had had enough. The anger and frustration had been building up inside me for many months, but that day, it just all came oozing out. I wanted to tear my husband’s muffler into bits, scratch his face, pull his hair out, and do all sorts of damage to him. The only thing that stopped me were the people on the Mall.”

Though this incident marked the end of her marriage, the official divorce process (if there was one) took place later. Most sources agree that Rani was only married once, but one of her closest friend states that there was a second marriage, much later in her life and of an extremely short duration. Whatever the truth of that marriage, the dramatic end of her first proved a turning point in her life and transformed Rani irrevocably. She began to thrive on her independence and her life philosophy evolved into a specific ambition. As she puts it, “I was determined to beat men at their own game. Since my husband was in the police, I had been observing men in positions of power throughout my married life and I had realised that all men in positions of power needed a vent and the vent they require the most is a bedmate provided through a reliable agency. The higher a man’s position, the greater his demand.”

In one interview, Rani stated: “I knew that dumb, pretty girls who come with no strings attached are a universal failing of men in power. After my marriage collapsed and I had to find the means to support myself and my children, I decided to become the provider of such girls to men in need.”

In yet another conversation, she talked about the understanding she gained of the workings of the government by listening to her husband’s complaints. “I realised that in this country everything worked on mutual favours and the profession that I had chosen for myself entitled me to these favours.”

This outspokenness notwithstanding, Rani maintains she personally never allowed herself to be used or even thought of as any man’s keep. She contends she maintained her dignity and saw herself as a sexless mother figure. She says she was always the woman behind the scenes, there to run the show and mop up the mess.

The gods were obviously smiling on her, because soon after she adopted this profession, the man who was soon to run the show took a shine to her. She describes her first meeting with Yahya Khan. “At that time Agha Jani was posted at Kharian and I was living in Gujarat. We met by chance at a party in Pindi club. Though I would often frequent such parties, I never joined in the drinking and dancing. Rather, I preferred sitting some distance away from the party and usually found a seat near the men’s room, well aware of the fact that the more they drank the more visits they would have to make to the toilet and hence past me.

“Agha Jani was in full swing at this party. He was completely drunk, and was continually traipsing back and forth from the men’s room. During one of these visits, he saw me and took a fancy to me. I remember asking about him and after we were formally introduced, I invited him to Gujarat.”

Thereafter Yahya Khan began making frequent journeys from Kharian to Gujarat. Somewhere along the way she earned the title of General Rani and the name stuck. While speculation about the exact nature of her relationship with Yahya Khan rages – they were said to be friends, lovers, shared a sibling relationship or one of demand and supply at various times through the course of their relationship – the general consensus among Rani’s more intimate circle is that they never had a physical relationship. Various explanations are put forth to explain this. “Yahya never desired her,” says a friend. “She was a woman of principles and from day one, she made it clear to him what her limits were,” states another.

Nonetheless, after he became the martial law adminstrator, Rani became a cornerstone in his life. Yahya’s weaknesses were drink and women and Rani masterfully catered to both. Among the women she introduced him to were film actress Taranna – film actress Andleeb’s mother – Madame Nur Jehan and Nael Kamal. She relates how Yahya’s fascination with Nur Jehan began.

“One night Agha Jani came to visit me and was somewhat agitated. The moment he entered, he inquired if I had heard the song “cheeche da chala” from the film Dhee Rani. I smiled and stated that I had no time to listen to songs. So, he called the military secretary and ordered him to have a copy of the song delivered to my house at once. It was two o’ clock in the morning and the MS had to specially have an audio shop opened up in order to obtain the album. But the command was obeyed and within an hour, Agha Jani was blissfully listening to the song.

“Observing him I smiled and stated that since he seemed to enjoy the song so immensely, I would bring the singer to his house on his birthday. This greatly pleased him and so the very next day, I took a flight to Lahore. In those days, a suite at the Intercontinental Hotel was permanently reserved for me and so from the airport, I went directly to the hotel. From there I called Nur Jehan and asked her to come and meet me. Till now, I had never been formally introduced to her; I just knew of her, as she knew of me. Well, Nur Jehan came, and we talked, and the next week she arrived in Islamabad to dance and sing for General Yahya Khan.”

Madame Nur Jehan’s relationship with General Yahya Khan subsequently came under great scrutiny. At first, Madame persistently denied that she was on friendly terms with the general, but when objectionable pictures of both of them were printed, she resorted to another defence and officially stated that General Rani, had time and, again tried to get her involved with the general. In response to this, Rani laughed and commented that Madame was hardly a suckling infant who could be coerced into doing what others wanted her to do. The Rani-Nur Jehan tussle was played up by the press, until eventually, some time before the latter’s death, the two made up. Following is an extract from an interview General Rani gave after Madame’s death.

Q: Why did you introduce Madame Nur Jehan to General Yahya Khan?

A: Some tax inspectors were bugging Madame Nur Jehan and the poor woman was in great distress. She asked me to help her out and I introduced her to Agha Jani.

Q: How would you define your relationship with Nur Jehan?

A: She was just like my sister and I often called her baji.

Q: How would you describe her character?

A: She was an exceptionally brave and confident woman, who brought up her children singlehandedly. The only flaw she had was her greed for money.

Q: It is said that Madame tried to drive a wedge between you and Yahya Khan?

A: I don’t want to say anything on this issue. If Rani catered to Agha Jani’s every whim, there is no question that she was royally compensated. During Yahya Khan’s time, General Rani prospered way beyond her wildest expectations. There are endless reports of how she would use her ‘special relationship’ with Yahya to fill her coffers. She would ask for a plot of land or a house in return for a favour and those desperate for a job or promotion would readily fulfill her demands. During this time, politicians were also eager to win her approval and among the many who curried her favour were Mustafa Khar and Z. A. Bhutto.

General Rani describes her relationship with these two men: “Both Mustafa Khar and Z. A. Bhutto would come and sit at my house for hours on end, begging me to introduce them to the General. Mustafa Khar was particularly fond of listening to the poems I used to write. In fact if you compare Yahya Khan to these two, I would say that I was closer to Bhutto and Khar and arranged more parties for them than I did for Agha Jani.”

It was a closeness that was not to endure. As soon as Bhutto came to power, General Rani was put under house arrest and her telephone connection was cancelled. Her crime in the words of an eminent lawyer was that, “she knew too much.”

Thus began General Rani’s downfall. Once the issue of house arrest was resolved (courtesy S. M. Zafar) and her subsequent jail terms ended (the most recent for drug-trafficking), General Rani never really reverted to her former glory. By now the money that had so freely flowed into her hands had also freely flowed out.

Financially wrecked, socially ostracised, dependent only on the kindness of a few whose affections for her have endured, General Rani lives largely in the past – in the memory of days of wine and roses.

Pakistan to compensate US drone strike families: official

MIRANSHAH: The government will pay compensation to the families of 39 people who died in a US drone strike last week, an official said on Saturday.

Civilians and police were among those killed when missiles hit a compound in Datta Khel on March 17.

Civilians and police were among those killed when missiles hit a compound in Datta Khel in North Waziristan on March 17. In protest, Pakistan refused to participate in a trilateral meeting with US and Afghan officials and belligerent condemnation came from the prime minister and the army chief.

Tribal administration official Asghar Khan said that a compensation package was ready for the victims’ families. “Each of the families will be paid Rs300,000, while Rs100,000 will be paid to each of the six injured,” Khan said, adding that payments would commence from Monday.

Compensation is paid to police and civilians who are killed in bomb blasts or terror attacks but this is the first time that compensation has been announced to US drone attack victims even though hundreds have reportedly died in the attacks that increased steeply when US President Barack Obama took office.

Syrian Troops Open Fire on Protesters in Several Cities

CAIRO – Military troops opened fire during protests in the southern part of Syria on Friday and killed peaceful demonstrators, according to witnesses and news reports, hurtling the strategically important nation along the same trajectory that has altered the landscape of power across the Arab world.

Syrian protesters shouted anti-Assad slogans outside the Umayyad mosque in Damascus. Thousands of Syrians took to the streets Friday demanding reforms.

Tens of thousands of demonstrators in the southern city of Dara’a and in other cities and towns around the nation took to the streets in protest, defying a state that has once again demonstrated its willingness to use lethal force.

It was the most serious challenge to 40 years of repressive rule by the Assad family since 1982, when the president at the time, Hafez al-Assad, massacred at least 10,000 protesters in Hama, a city in northern Syria.

Human rights groups said that since protests began seven days ago in the south, 38 people had been killed by government forces – and it appeared that many more were killed on Friday. Precise details were hard to obtain because the government sealed off the area to reporters and would not let foreign news media into the country.

“Syria’s security forces are showing the same cruel disregard for protesters’ lives as their counterparts in Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen and Bahrain,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch.

The new round of protests and bloodshed came one day after the Syrian government tried to appease an increasingly angry popular revolt with talk of improved political freedoms and promises of restraint.

Instead, it unleashed its forces, firing on peaceful demonstrators in and near Dara’a, according to a witness. There were reports of security forces firing on civilians in cities around the country, as well. For the first time since the protests began, crowds called for the downfall of the government and in one instance tore down a billboard-size photo of Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad.

Ahmed Sayasna, the imam of the Omari mosque in Dara’a, said the violence began after crowds set a fire under a statue of former President Hafez al-Assad, the current president’s father. Speaking by telephone, Mr. Sayasna said thousands of people gathered near the statue after Friday Prayer when officers from Syria’s central security forces lobbed tear gas canisters and opened fire with live ammunition. He said about 20 people were killed, and many more wounded.

In Sanamayn, a city of 27,000 people about 40 miles north of Dara’a, a video posted on YouTube showed at least seven bloodied bodies lying on stretchers, at least three clearly with gunshot wounds. Mr. Sayasna said 10 to 15 people were killed there, while residents told The Associated Press that as many as 20 people had been killed. These figures could not be independently confirmed. In the capital, Damascus, several hundred protesters tried to rally, but were quickly dispersed by security forces as pro-government supporters took to the streets honking car horns and waving photographs of President Assad. In the city’s majestic Umayyad mosque, some men rose from prayer shouting “God, Syria and freedom only” – a counterpoint to the chants of pro-government supporters. There were also reports of troops firing on demonstrators in the suburbs of Damascus.

In Latakia, President Assad’s hometown, two people died as protesters faced off against pro-government supporters, a witness said. A video posted on YouTube shows the body of a young man with a bullet wound being carried by protesters. There were reports of scattered protests and scores of arrests in several other cities.

On Thursday, a longtime minister and adviser to the president, Bouthaina Shaaban, appeared to edge close to an apology for the deaths, insisting that the president had ordered security forces not to fire. Ms. Shaaban then laid out what she framed as concessions, saying that the government promised to consider lifting a state of emergency in place for decades and would consider more political freedoms – offerings that were dismissed out of hand by the public because they had been put forth before, in 2005, and never carried out.

President Assad “doesn’t want the bloodshed at all, and I witnessed his directives on not using live bullets whatever the circumstances as he is keen on every citizen,” Ms. Shaaban said.

“This doesn’t mean that there are no mistakes or practices which were not unsatisfactory and not up to the required level,” she said.

Less than 24 hours later, witnesses reported that live fire was again turned on unarmed protesters.

“This is exactly what has been happening around the Arab world,” said Ayman Abdel Nour, a Syrian opposition activist who is living in self-imposed exiled in the United Arab Emirates. “Sixty percent of Syrian society is less than 24 years old, and they want to be part of drawing and designing their future.”

Mr. Sayasna, the imam in Dara’a, whose prominence in the community allows him to speak openly, unlike others there, said: “We are hoping for peace and quiet. The people only want freedom and dignity and an end to the emergency law.”

Syria’s emergency law, in place since the Baath Party took power in 1963, has long been a focus of critics, who say it grants the government license to jail anyone with little pretext.

Syria has few resources, but a strategic location bordering Iraq, Israel, Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan that its leaders have often tried to use as leverage. It has rankled the West and its Arab neighbors by forging close ties to Iran and by helping to sponsor Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas, the militant group controlling the Gaza Strip.

The cascading events in Syria bear a remarkable resemblance to the course taken in other nations in the Arab world, where a relatively small incident – in this case the arrest of children who scrawled graffiti: “The people want the fall of the regime” in Dara’a – led to protests and a lethal government response. That in turn fueled wider rage, prompting government talk of concessions that were too little, too late.

“There’s a real change in attitude from a couple of months ago, when Syrians were watching this take place in other countries,” said one Western diplomat in Damascus. “Now it’s here, and the government is very concerned.”

The Syrian government “is sending a very mixed message – holding out carrots like the concessions announced on Thursday, and then beating and arresting and even opening fire on protesters,” the diplomat said. “I assume that indicates a lack of agreement or coordination in the government.”

Karim Émile Bitar, a researcher at the Institute for International and Strategic Relations in Paris, said: “They tried to use the classic Baathist method: You wave a few carrots with one hand, while the other one is holding a huge stick. But the massacres in Dara’a are only going to strengthen the protest movements.”

Syria has a liability not found in the successful uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt – it is a majority Sunni nation ruled by a religious minority. The ruling Assads and their circle are Alawite, a sect of Shiite Islam. Hafez al-Assad forged his power base through fear, co-optation and sect loyalty. He built an alliance with an elite Sunni business community, and created multiple security services staffed primarily by Alawites. Those security forces have a great deal to lose if the government falls, experts said, because they are part of a widely despised minority, and so have the incentive of self-preservation.

The killings in Hama, when the Muslim Brotherhood, a conservative Sunni organization, moved against the government, resonate to this day – both for a resentful populace and for a government that fears revenge for its past actions.

“These minority regimes are galvanized against defections and splitting,” said Andrew J. Tabler, a Syria expert at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “They believe if the regime comes down, they fear being slaughtered by the Sunni majority after what happened in the past. It makes it likely if these protests get bigger, it will be very bloody.”

Sectarian tensions did not initially motivate this conflict. But they have begun to emerge. Mr. Tabler and Joshua M. Landis, director of the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, said the demonstrators had started chanting: “No to Iran, to Hezbollah. We want a leader who fears God.”

That, they said, is a direct reference to the Alawite faith of the leadership.

“What makes this all surprising at this point is this is an area of Syria that is traditionally pro regime,” Mr. Tabler said. “So what the regime has been doing is suppressing a major Sunni base, all because a group of kids wrote graffiti on the wall.”

The government had initially insisted that the protests and deaths were the work of criminals brought across the border from Jordan. A vice president and former foreign minister, Farouk al-Sharaa, who is from the Dara’a region, said Thursday, “We are not opposed to the Islamic currents that are rational and broad-minded which understand their true roots, but as for Al Qaeda and the Taliban, which take their instructions from America and pretend that they are against it, they are condemnable.”

And yet, even government supporters appeared taken aback by the decision to use lethal force. “The government believes we have to give people more freedom,” said Muhammad Habash, a moderate Islamist cleric and member of Parliament. But he added: “There was a very clear decision by the government to use guns. We are against using guns against people, there is no justification for using violence.”

But Syria state television behaved as if the violence and protests had simply not occurred: it broadcast images of government demonstrations in every Syrian city, with crowds shouting “God, Syria and Bashar only.”

Taliban trying to enter India: Malik

ISLAMABAD: Interpol Secretary General Ronald Nobel has revealed that terror bid during world Cup 2011 has been thwarted, Geo News reported.

He was addressing a joint press conference following his meeting with Interior Minister Rehman Malik.

Rehman Malik said that Taliban tried to enter India, adding that some people were arrested but none of them was Pakistani national.

Rehman while demanding immediate action against those fanatics involved in desecration of the Holy Quran urged Interpol secretary general to play his role. Ronald said that this act would encourage terrorists’ agenda.

He said that a man who traveled to Maldives from Karachi was arrested during the world cup, adding that the man had desires to conduct terrorism in Sri Lanka.

On the occasion, Rehman Malik said Pakistani had shared intelligence information to foil terrorism bid.

Flights to Lebanon suspended

News Meat

Bahrain has suspended its flights to and from Lebanon a day after it warned its nationals not to travel there following declarations of support by Iranian-backed Shi’ite group Hezbollah for protests by Bahrain’s Shi’ite.

The decision highlights growing tensions in the world’s largest oil-exporting region between Sunni-ruled Arab countries and non-Arab Shi’ite power Iran, just across Gulf waters.

Bahrain’s state-run Gulf Air also said in a statement on its website that all flights to Iran and Iraq had been suspended until March 31, without giving a reason.

Iran, which supports Shi’ite groups in Lebanon and Iraq, has strongly criticized the intervention in Bahrain by its neighboring Sunni-led Arab states.

Street protests against the intervention have also been held in Iraq and Lebanon, which along with Bahrain, are of the few Arab states where Shi’ites outnumber Sunnis.

“This decision was taken after the irresponsible comments and stances from Lebanon against Bahrain, its people and leaders,” state-owned Bahrain news agency cited a statement from the Civil Aviation Affairs department as saying.

Flights by Gulf Air and Bahrain Air to and from Lebanon have been suspended indefinitely, it added.

On Tuesday, Bahrain’s Foreign Ministry warned Bahrainis not to travel to Lebanon for their own safety and said the ban was due to threats and interference.

The ferocity of Bahrain’s crackdown on demonstrators, which banned protests, imposed martial law and called in forces from the island’s fellow Sunni-ruled neighbors, has stunned its majority Shi’ites.

Lebanon’s Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah criticized Arab states for backing Bahrain’s rulers, who called in troops from Sunni-led Saudi Arabia to help them quell protests by mainly Shi’ite protesters.

Bahrain has withdrawn its top diplomats from Iran in a protest over the Islamic Republic’s criticism of last week’s crackdown on mainly Shi’ite protesters in the island kingdom.

Shi’ite clerics and political leaders in Iraq have denounced the deployment of troops from Sunni-led Gulf states in Bahrain.

More than 60 percent of Bahrainis are Shi’ites and most are campaigning for a constitutional monarchy; but calls by hardliners for the overthrow of the monarchy have alarmed Sunnis, who fear the unrest serves Iran.

Bahrain also said on Wednesday it had reduced curfew times by two hours in a bid to bring life back to normality in the kingdom that has been gripped by its worst unrest in years.

Last week, Bahrain imposed a curfew on large swathes of the capital Manama from 4 p.m. to 4 a.m., later reducing those hours in some areas. The curfew now runs from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. from Seef Mall, through the Pearl roundabout and the financial district to the diplomatic area.

Syrian forces shoot protesters, kill 6 in mosque

Syrian forces killed six people on Wednesday in an attack on protesters in a mosque complex in the southern city of Deraa, and later opened fire on hundreds of youths marching in solidarity, witnesses said.

At least four youths were killed when the security forces intercepted them at the northern entrance of Deraa, witnesses said. Their bodies were seen at a clinic in the city.

There were unconfirmed reports that dozens more bodies were taken to Tafas hospital outside the city, they added.

“Bodies fell in the streets. We do not know how many died,” one witness said.

“You didn’t know where the bullets were coming from. No one could carry away any of the fallen,” another resident said.

The 10 people residents said were killed in the two attacks brought to 14 the number of civilians killed by Syrian forces in six days of demonstrations for political freedom and an end to corruption in the country of 20 million.

Snipers wearing black masks were seen on rooftops. Parents were seen crying in the streets during the evening, and loudspeakers from mosques around Deraa called on those whose relatives had died to go to clinics to collect the bodies.

“Peaceful, peaceful,” the loudspeakers echoed — a cry taken up by protesters across the Arab world to emphasize the peaceful nature of their demonstrations against entrenched and undemocratic rulers and corruption, and their demands for freedom.

Another witness saw 20 army trucks carrying soldiers heading to the city.

Deraa, on the Jordanian border, has long been a stronghold of the ruling Baath Party, which recruits cadres from the region. But in recent days it has become a focus of unprecedented protests against President Bashar al-Assad’s rule.

The shooting on Wednesday began just after midnight, when security forces attacked protesters in the vicinity of the Omari mosque in the city’s old quarter, the focal point of the Deraa protests, residents said.

Electricity was cut off and telephone services were severed. Cries of “Allahu Akbar (God is greatest)” erupted in one quarter after another as the shooting at the mosque began.

The bodies of two people killed in the mosque attack, a man and a woman called Ibtissam Masalmeh, where buried in Deraa on Wednesday. Thousands marched in the funeral chanting calls for freedom, and — for the first time since protests broke on Friday — slogans against Iran and Lebanon’s Hezbollah

“Honorable Syrians don’t rely on Iran or Hezbollah,” they chanted, breaking a taboo of criticizing Syrian foreign policy, which is largely built on an alliance with the Shi’ite Islamic Republic and the armed Shi’ite movement.

YouTube footage showed what was purported to be the street in front of the mosque before the attack, with the sound of gunfire audible and a person inside the mosque grounds yelling: “Brother don’t shoot. This country is big enough for me and you.”

The United Nations, France and the United States condemned the violence. U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called for a “transparent investigation” into the killings and for those responsible to be held accountable.

“We are deeply concerned by the Syrian government’s use of violence, intimidation and arbitrary arrests to hinder the ability of its people to freely exercise their universal rights,” said U.S. State Department spokesman Mark Toner.

“We call on the Syrian government to exercise restraint and refrain from violence against these peaceful protesters.”

“ARMED GANG KILLED DOCTOR”

Those killed included Ali Ghassab al-Mahamid, a doctor from a prominent Deraa family who went to the Omari mosque to help victims of the attack.

An official Syrian statement said: “Outside parties are transmitting lies about the situation in Deraa,” blaming what it described as armed gangs for the violence.

It said they had “stocked weapons and ammunition in the mosque and kidnapped children and used them as human shields.” State television showed guns, grenades and ammunition it said were found in the mosque, but activists said the protest was peaceful and there had been no weapons.

An official statement said later that Assad had sacked Deraa governor Faisal Kalthoum. But a main demand of the protesters is an end to what they term as repression by the secret police, headed in Deraa province by a cousin of Assad.

The Baath Party has banned opposition and enforced emergency laws since 1963. But the wave of Arab unrest which has toppled leaders in Tunisia and Egypt presents Assad with the biggest challenge to his rule since he succeeded his father Hafez al-Assad, who ruled Syria for 30 years until his death in 2000.

Assad, a close ally of Iran, a key player in neighboring Lebanon and supporter of militant groups opposed to Israel, has dismissed rising demands for fundamental reform in Syria where his Baath Party has held a monopoly on power for 48 years.

Former colonial power France urged Damascus to carry out political reforms without delay and respect its commitment to human rights.

REFORM PLEDGE

On Tuesday, Vice President Farouq al-Shara said Assad was committed to “continue the path of reform and modernization in Syria,” Lebanon’s al-Manar television reported.

Authorities arrested a leading campaigner who had supported the protesters, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Tuesday. It said Loay Hussein, a political prisoner from 1984 to 1991, was taken from his home near Damascus.

In Damascus, authorities released six female protesters on Wednesday who took part in a silent demonstration last week supporting the release of political prisoners, lawyers said.

Assad has lifted some bans on private enterprise but ignored calls to end emergency law, curb a pervasive security apparatus, develop rule of law and freedom of expression, free political prisoners and reveal the fate of tens of thousands of dissidents who disappeared in the 1980s.

Pakistan gives CIA license to kill Pakistani – asserts ex-CIA Undercover Operative

Teeth Maestro

Talkhaba interviews Robert Anderson a CIA operative who operated in Vietnam some 60 years back recently he wrote an article on CounterPunchon what the undercover work CIA did back then and the similarities with CIA now in terms of running operative like Raymond Davis working in Pakistan

Robert Anderson teaches economics and political science at a U.S. community college. He served in the U.S. Air Force (like Bruce Gagnon) and saw combat during the 1967-68 Tet Offensive in Vietnam. Later, he helped form the Vietnam Veterans Against the War. He traveled to Wounded Knee, South Dakota, in 1973 to support the indigenous struggles for sovereignty. In 2006 he was arrested and banned from the University of New Mexico for pointing out it was wrong for the university to be supporting the Reliable Replacement Warhead (RRW) without public comment. He is now co-director of Stop the War Machine which has organized major demonstrations opposing Star Wars and the Iraqi war. Bob can be called the Raymond Davis of 60s – Raymond Davis to us Pakistanis is synonymous to CIA Killer Machine.His recent article in Counterpunch titled “I Had Ray Davis’s Job, in Laos 30 Years Ago; Same Cover, Same Lies” led us contact him for an interview for Karachi based newspaper. He sent us his reaction over Raymond Davis release. Please read on:

The release of Davis in my opinion is just a green light for more killings and assassinations by the US government and the CIA in your country. The pillage and slaughter of Pakistani will increase most likely in the quest of the US for imperial power over your country and region.

The question of justice has been replaced by money. This is the typical way the US works, kill and buy people off.

Pakistan, in my opinion, missed a historic opportunity with Ray Davis to affirm its sovereignty and now has basically returned to its former colonial status, only under the U.S. rather than the British.

Talkhaba: Since you have been undercover CIA official during Vietnam War, you were a witness to the events during an important part of history. How do you relate the history . . . the working of covert agents of your time to present CIA espionage tactics?

Robert: I tried to paint in my article a picture of the scope of how this is done by various agencies of the US government. I was not an official of the CIA but a regular military man put on loan to the CIA for covert work. It is extensive and way beyond my scope to detail. It involves thousands and thousands of people. There is a lot of literature around on this by others too, especially some ex-CIA agents and people like John Perkins.

Talkhaba: You are the Raymond Davis of the past; your period extends over years. What sorts of tactics were adopted during that period? Were these upgraded with time? If yes, then would you share some details with us?

Robert: You could read up on the Phoenix Program and COINTEL programs and get a good idea of what went on in the 60s. Read of the murder of Fred Hampton, for instance. Ward Churchill has some good books on this too as it relates to Native Americans. I would imagine the tactics have changed some but still also rather simple, assassinations where bribery and threats do not work. The torture of Pvt. Bradley Manning by our military is a good example.

Talkhaba: According to your knowledge how many undercover agents were working in Vietnam? How many agents may be working in Pakistan?

Robert: In Laos and other areas, the reports are: a large number. I have no idea as there is a fuzzy line between the official military people and the covert forces. They are all out for the same goal, to destabilize and corrupt and overthrow governments. Sometimes it is done directly with the military sometimes it is done with covert acts. You must know well the coup in Iran in 1953 by the CIA. That is the model that all the rest of this flows from.

No idea of how many of them must be there in Pakistan but I would think the number is quite big given the key position Pakistan occupies in the U.S. plan for the conquest of Eurasia.

Talkhaba: John Perkin has informed his readers of a special tactic. According to him, they had been using women as a blackmailing tool as well as a source of top secret information. Are similar tactics being used by CIA and FBI? How do you see the use of this tactic in Pakistan?

Robert: I have no such information on the ground knowledge of events in Pakistan but it would not surprise me if this tactic was being used there too.

Talkhaba: How do you see American demand for blanket immunity for Raymond Davis, the CIA operative and killer of two Pakistanis?

Robert: Typical. Deny; cry that he is a victim of the folks who don’t understand the greatness and goodness of US intentions. Just some people don’t get the word they say. It is entirely up to Pakistan to decide what to do.

Talkhaba: Given the capability of Tehreek-e-Taliban, Pakistan, some defense analysts assert that terrorist attacks in Pakistan can’t be carried out by Taliban; instead these are planned and perpetrated by CIA? In the light of your experience in Laos, can you endorse and substantiate this assertion?

Robert: It is possible but I don’t know any details. This is done a lot; it is called False Flag operations. The CIA has had plans to kill Americans to get its plans going here too.

Talkhaba: John Perkin in his book “The Secret History of the American Empire” has exposed the World Bank and other monitory organizations as tools of American Imperialism. Do you think CIA, FBI and US secret agencies are working for the same cause on other fronts?

Robert: Of course. They all think the US has a manifest destiny to rule the world, or as some say it, to be the world’s policeman. But what they are after are the resources of other nations.

Talkhaba: Blackwater/Xe Worldwide has been working as CIA’s operative in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. Prior to the advent of these mercenaries, CIA had been doing all this work by itself. What made CIA to out source its work to various operatives like Xe? Are these operatives crueler up to the requirements?

Robert: I suppose to try to hide it from the American and other people. But anyone with awareness knows what is going on.

Talkhaba: CIA has its network in nearly all countries. Are they freely working in all countries alike or, unlike Pakistan, it will be difficult for it to work in the countries having severe relationship with US or relationship based on the principle of equality and respect for each other’s sovereignty?

Robert: From what I can tell they do this to everyone, friend and foe alike.

Talkhaba: How do you see the America’s “War on Terror”? How far is it tarnishing the very image and interest of USA inside and outside?

Robert: It is corrupting our political system from top to bottom.

Talkhaba: Your article published in “Counterpunch” gives the impression that American masses remain ignorant of truth. It’s also believed worldwide that Americans top the list of nations blindly following their rulers. Has your educational system any relevance with this phenomenon or some other causes compose this highly “educated” blind nation?

Robert: Patriotism and religious self-righteousness is what blinds many people here. The educational system is not teaching the truth, mostly myths and lies.

Talkhaba: What is your experience says about 9/11 tragedy. Do you believe it was done by some Muslim Groups? What is our assessment of Al-Quaida and Taliban?

Robert: Seems to be. They don’t like U.S. intervention in their countries.

Talkhaba: Can you give some advice to Pakistan how to get rid of current terrorism?

Robert: More education of the public and help in understanding that the U.S. can be as terroristic, and a problem, as any other group. Stand up strong and don’t let things like Ray Davis go away.

Talkhaba: Is there anything which I haven’t asked and you want to share with our readers?

Robert: No, you have done well. Keep working for truth and justice.