|
Ok - So important
figures from Pakistani Military are slowly
coming out of the closet. The latest in the
series of disclosures is Brig Imtiaz, who was
the ISI's poster-boy in/after Zia's regime
working directly under Gen. Hamid Gul.
According to Brig Imtiaz, IJI (Islami
Jamhoori Ittehad) was a brain-child of
Pakistani Military namely Gen. Aslam Beg who
was the then Chief of Army Staff. The
motivation behind it for the Military was to
create a right-wing political alliance to
contain left-leaning Benazir Bhutto and her
People's Party. The money for this, according
to him, came directly from the Presidency of
Ghulam Ishaq Khan. Qazi Hussain Ahmad, Maulana
Sami-ul-Haq, Fazal-url-Rahman and Nawaz Sharif
were all aware of this Military conspiracy and
took full participationt. Brig Imtiaz met with
Altaf Hussain in Karachi and spent five hours
convincing him to be a part of this alliance.
According to him, Altaf Hussain refused it
because his vision of the party was
left-center and he didn’t want to be a part of
a right-wing alliance.
According to the then
Corp Commander of Sindh, General Naseer Akhtar, who
was supervising the 1992 Operation Cleanup
against MQM, he had no information about the
alleged maps of Jinnahpur. He says he is not
aware of who came up with such maps. Military
never found them during the operation.
People who are not aware
of the history of 1992 Operation should
compare this story with US Military not
finding any WMDs in Iraq as it was quoted by
the administration to be the very reason for
the War in Iraq.
More than 15,000
young men were killed in that Operation.
Thousands jailed, displaced or went
underground leaving families shattered.
Education system collapsed. I personally
know dozens of people who have not gone back
since they left their homes in 1992. Imagine
not being able to see your mother for 18
years. Imagine not seeing your younger
brothers growing up; imagine last seeing your
sister when she was 9 and then hearing from
your mother that she is getting married now;
imagine not being able to attend your
father's funeral. The Operation left MQM viciously
demonized specially in Punjab and NWFP to the
point that the only notable secular political
party representing the poor, working class
people of Pakistan became a curse word for the
rest of Pakistan. Even today, it is hard to
find a news favoring MQM in Punjab's
newspapers.
The very reason the truth
is coming out now is not because Pakistani
Military has suddenly grown a conscience
overnight, but because Military
establishment now wants to use secular forces
to counter the Monster of Islam and Jihad they
so proudly created. I am not much concerned
about MQM being redeemed or absolved today
of high treason by the very people who accused
them of one, I am just not sold on the
motivations behind Military absolving MQM now.
The reasons look awfully suspicious and shady.
Back then the real
rulers of Islamic Republic needed the right to
counter the left and for that they even
created a right when one didn’t really exist.
Now, they need the left to counter the right.
MQM must never trust the Military Junta.
Askari
|