CPA - The Guardian

In the wake of the Pakistan’s army offensive against the armed Taliban, more than 1 million people have been forced to flee their homes. The Pakistan Peace and Solidarity Council (PPSC) sent out an urgent appeal last week to the “philanthropists, donors, supporters, international relief organisations and international community” for humanitarian aid to assist the some “1.3 million displaced people” from Swat, Bunir, Dir and Malakand, the semi-tribal areas located in the north of North West Frontier Province near the Pakistan-Afghan boarder.

The People’s Weekly World newspaper spoke to one peace activist, Mr Pasha, who left with his family from Dir and currently is living in Mardan, a large city near the Afghan-Pakistan border.

Pasha said he and others are “talking to the common people, collecting food and medical supplies” for the displaced. He put the numbers of displaced at 2 million with the majority of families going to government buildings, and not the camps. Pasha, who worked in education in Dir, said they are opening schools that are now closed to help with the huge population. “This city has doubled in size,” he said in a telephone interview from Mardan.

The PPSC and others report that there is “dire need of the food, shelter, medicines and other daily use items.”

Plus, children and women suffer from serious medical problems, made worse by the lack of female doctors. “Pregnant women are in danger. Children suffer from eye disease. And there is fear of outbreaks,” Pasha said.

In the PPSC statement they said, “The children have no recreational or education facilities inside the camps and hence the families, and specially mothers, face difficulty.”

The growth of the Taliban in the border regions and the military clashes have alarmed the Pakistani people. A great majority of Pakistanis are opposed to the brutality of the Taliban and reject its ideology. On the other hand there is deep mistrust and anger at the military, which has ruled the country more years than any civilian government.

Analyses throughout the region refer to the Pakistani Taliban as “Frankenstein’s monster” pointing directly to the US support for Pakistan’s military dictatorships and religious extremism for anti-communist Cold War ends.

Pakistan has received billions of dollars in military aid from the US over the years to prop up dictators, train “mujahideen” and launch operations against the former Soviet Union and the left-led Afghan government in the 1970s and ’80s.

The US bolstered the Zia-ul-Haque, the general who orchestrated a coup and overthrew the government headed by Benzir Bhutto’s father, Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, in 1977. Zia ruled until his death in 1988.

According to Pakistani analysts, Zia played a major role in mobilising the youth of the North-West Frontier Province to fight the Soviet Union in the 1980s.

What started under the presidency of Jimmy Carter with Zbigniew Brzezinski’s secret, dirty war in Afghanistan to undermine the Soviet Union – whose Central Asian republics bordered Afghanistan – was developed fully under Ronald Reagan.

The CIA and ISI set up military training camps and madrasas, financed in part by the Saudis, to indoctrinate the young population with extremist ideology to fight the “communist infidels.”

Even current US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recognised that historical fact in recent congressional testimony. “Let’s remember here the people we are fighting today, we funded them 20 years ago…” She went on to warn the committee that you harvest what you sow.

Mr Pasha said drone attacks in Pakistan and US and NATO forces in Afghanistan are counterproductive. He fears the Pakistan military and some forces in the government are using the Taliban issue to get more military aid. President Zardari’s trip to the United States and the timing of the military offensive add to the people’s distrust of motives, he said.

When will the fighting end? “It’s not easy to say,” Pasha said.

Pasha said the peace council sees an alternative to both the Taliban terror and military operations. “Empower the civilian forces, like the police,” he said. “The military only promotes the Taliban. With the police, they are loyal and courageous, and the Taliban can be eliminated in 10 days.”

Pakistan Peace and Solidarity Council said it is providing food, drinking water and assistance to the displaced people. To provide assistance to the Pakistan Peace and Solidarity Council you can contact, pscpak@gmail.com or www.pscpak.org.

People’s Weekly World

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