Bomb attack on Shia pilgrim buses kills 35, injures 25 in Mastung

#karachi:Athar Shah&Uzair Shah,Imambargah Shaheedan Karbala Feature Colony k trustee Lej ki firing sy Murghi Khana Malir pr Shaheed #Karachi:Shahed Ather Shah ki body Imamia J1 Area,Korangi Shft,N.Janaza kal bad_Zohryn Shahidan_Karbala Landhi m hogi R>sm.ali #ShiaGenocide صرف ایک دن میں 35 مومنین بم دھماکے کا نشانہ بن کر شہید ہوگئے!! معلوم نہیں ہم کہا جارہے ہیں؟ کب تک خیالی اور خوابوں کی دُنیا میں رہینگے، کب تک ہم فقظ خود ساختہ نعروں کا جواب دیتے رہینگے؟ کب تک ہم non-issue کو issue اور issue کو non-issue بناکر ایک مظلوم قوم کو بیوقوف بناتے رہے گے!! ہم مایوسی نہیں پھیلا رہے، مایوسی تو اُس وقت ہوگی جب ہم کہے کہ شیعہ تم سے کچھ نہیں ہونے والا گھر بیٹھ جاو، مگر ہم تو کہہ رہے ہیں کہ تم بہادر قوم ہو تمھیں خوابوں کی دُنیا میں بھیج دیا گیا ہے!! یاد رکھو! کوئی باہر سے نہیں آئے گا ہمیں خود اپنے خطے میں اپنے آپ کو محفوظ کرنا ہوگا، یہ خیالی دُنیا سے باہر نکلو اور حقیقت سمجھو!! ہم شیعوں کو تو پوری دُنیا کے مذاہب کے لوگوں کو تحفظ دینا ہے اُن کو مذہبی آزادی دینی ہے مگر ہم یہ کام اُس وقت کرسکتے ہیں جب ہم خود محفوظ ہو، By AFP Published: December 30, 2012 Remotely-triggered bomb hit convoy of three buses. PHOTO: EXPRESS MASTUNG: A car bomb attack on buses carrying Shia pilgrims to Iran killed 19 people and injured 25 in Mastung on Sunday, officials said. The remotely-triggered bomb hit a convoy of three buses in Mastung district and set one of them ablaze, said Tufail Baluch, a senior government official in the district. “At least 19 people have been killed and 25 injured. All of them were Shia pilgrims,” he told AFP, adding most of those killed were burnt to death. “The bomb was planted in a car. The condition of some of the injured is critical,” Baluch said. Some 180 Shia pilgrims were on their way to Iran in the buses when the bomb ripped through one of them, said Akbar Hussain Durrani, a senior government official in Quetta. One bus carrying some 45 pilgrims was badly damaged, he said. Mastung is some 30km south of Quetta. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack. ====================== Tintinnabulations of a vandalised future Posted: December 18, 2012 in Cross Posted, Newspaper Articles, Terrorism/Extremism Tags: Ahmed Ludhianvi, ASWJ, Clean drinking water, Lashkar e Jhangvi, LeJ, pakistan muslim league, pakistan muslim league nawaz, PML-N, polio, politics, Punjab, Punjab Government, Rana Sana Ullah, Raza Rumi, Salman Taseer, Shahbaz Sharif, Shahbaz Sharif and his admirable running of Punjab, Sipah-e-Sahaba, SSP 0 Editor’s NOTE: The following op-ed, penned by me, was published in Daily Times on December 17, 2012. I’m pleased to cross-post the article on my blog from Daily Times without any editing. (Ali Salman Alvi) Any government can remain in check if the opposition played its role vigilantly and the ruling party’s lapses are reported by the media. However, when media fails to report on sensitive but rampant cases, and the opposition is no better when they come in power but do only lip service to make their position look intact to voters and justified to their critics, it is the responsibility of society to make a note of the ongoing political, social and economic atrocities. For instance, more than 475 Shias have been killed this year in Pakistan to date, with this number increasing every day. The opposition is nowhere to be seen and the indifference of mainstream media to the gravity of the issue is making matters worse. Whilst I hold the federal government responsible for the law and order situation in Pakistan, I cannot give a clean chit to the provincial governments, which ought to provide security to their citizens. A few days ago, my friend Raza Rumi wrote an op-ed titled, ‘Shahbaz Sharif and his admirable running of Punjab’ that was printed in a national daily. Apart from admiring Mr Sharif for the good things done by his government, he expressed his concern about the rise of extremism and militancy owing to the fragile implementation of law in the province in the following words: “There is a perception that the PML-N is soft on extremist and sectarian groups, due to reasons of electoral adjustment and perhaps, ideology as well. This is a serious omission, which might haunt the party if it comes to power in the next election, as there will be no excuse of a ‘hostile’ federal government and its failures to curb terrorism.” I, strongly but respectfully, disagree with the notion that the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s (PML-N) leniency towards groups like Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (now working under the label of Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat [ASWJ]) is a mere perception. The ‘lovey-dovey’ liaison of the PML-N and ASWJ/SSP is nothing new. The PML-N has time and again sought the SSP’s support to contest elections and the latter has rarely disappointed the former. In the recently concluded by-elections in which Punjab saw a thumping win for the PML-N, the ASWJ announced to support the PML-N’s candidate, Haji Nawaz Chohan, in Gujranwala’s constituency PP-129. The announcement came from the ASWJ’s district president Arshad Hameedi at a religious seminary as the latest display of public affection between the two parties. Electoral alliances are not aimed at charity; these alliances are established as a trade-off between two parties and they are motivated by a shared ideology. In February 2010, the provincial law minister, Rana Sanaullah, visited Jhang on a by-election campaign for a provincial assembly seat. He was seen interacting with Ahmad Ludhianvi of the ASWJ as he took the hardliner cleric to a drive in his open top jeep with official patronage. Is it appropriate for a provincial law minister to take a radical cleric with him on an election campaign? Did Mr Sharif take any action against his law minister for giving an unprecedented protocol to the head of an organisation that considers Shias as infidels? In an interview expressing his biggest concern, the slain former Punjab governor, Shaheed Salmaan Taseer said, “I worry about terrorism. The Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz)‚ which is in government in the Punjab‚ has old linkages with and a natural affinity for extremist organisations like Sipah-e-Sahaba‚ Lashkar-e-Jhangvi… Let’s face it: terrorists need logistical support from within — somebody funds them‚ somebody guides them‚ and somebody looks after them — and that support is coming from the Punjab… You can’t have your law minister [Rana Sanaullah] going around in police jeeps with [outlawed Sipah-e-Sahaba’s] Ahmed Ludhianvi‚ whose agenda is to declare Shias infidels and close down their places of worship‚ and then say you want harmony in this province. You can’t have the chief minister [Shahbaz Sharif] who is also the home minister‚ standing at Jamia Naeemia pleading with the Taliban to please not launch attacks in the Punjab because he shares the same thinking against the US as they do. What message does this send out to the local magistrate and police officer?” As per the report, ‘Pakistan: The Militant Jihadi Challenge’ by the International Crisis Group published in 2009, “The recent upsurge of jihadi violence in Punjab, the Northwest Frontier Province (NWFP), the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and Balochistan’s provincial capital, Quetta, demonstrates the threat extremist Sunni-Deobandi groups pose to the Pakistani citizen and state. These radical Sunni groups are simultaneously fighting internal sectarian jihads, regional jihads in Afghanistan and India and a global jihad against the West… The Pakistani Taliban, which increasingly controls large swathes of FATA and parts of the NWFP, comprises a number of militant groups loosely united under the Deobandi Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) that have attacked not just state and western targets, but Shias as well. Their expanding influence is due to support from long-established Sunni extremist networks, based primarily in Punjab, which have served as the army’s jihadi proxies in Afghanistan and India since the 1980s. Punjab-based radical Deobandi groups like the Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP) and its offshoot Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LJ) provide weapons, recruits, finances and other resources to Pakistani Taliban groups…The SSP and LJ are also al Qaeda’s principal allies in the region.” Mr Sharif’s government needs to see the writing on the wall. Promoting, appeasing and pandering to such extremist outfits can win the PML-N an extra seat or two in the next elections but in the long run, it will be devastating for the fabric of our society and the law and order situation in the province. According to another media report, the PML-N and ASWJ has struck a deal on electoral adjustments in the provincial and National assemblies in the upcoming general elections. It is just a matter of time before the two parties end up contesting elections together. I agree that the good things being done by the government must be appreciated but at the same time, we must not condone government officials festering extremism this or that way. On the other hand, in February this year, the Supreme Court of Pakistan expressed its resentment over the performance of the Punjab government when the court was told that several water filtration plants had not yet been completed in the province despite being started many years ago. Non-existent or insufficient infrastructure for clean water and sanitation poses serious health risks. In countries like ours, up to 80 percent of all environmental diseases are because of lack of clean and safe drinking water. Less than 50 percent of Pakistan’s most populous province Punjab has access to piped drinking water. Less than 30 percent of the rural population has access to safe drinking water. Assisting the apex court on polio and hepatitis, Professor Dr Faisal Masood and Professor Dr Javed Raza Gardezi informed the court that the poor and unprivileged class is bound to drink contaminated water because this is all they are being offered. The absence of clean drinking water is resulting in increased infectious diseases like polio and diarrhea. Punjab government is far from being an admirable one. CM Shahbaz Sharif and his running of Punjab can be best described as the old adage goes “Among the blind, the squinter rules.” Instead of dumping billions of rupees running a parallel education system (Danish Schools) Mr Sharif could have made the existing system more viable. We must appreciate the positive steps being taken by the incumbent government but we should avoid going over the top in praise of a government that has many serious questions to answer. Source: VIEW : Tintinnabulations of a vandalised future — Ali Salman Alvi =============== Pakistan militants kill 41 in mass execution, attack on Shi'ites Sun, Dec 30 05:51 AM EST 1 of 2 By Jibran Ahmad PESHWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - Pakistani militants, who have escalated attacks in recent weeks, killed at least 41 people in two separate incidents, officials said on Sunday, challenging assertions that military offensives have broken the back of hardline Islamist groups. The United States has long pressured nuclear-armed ally Pakistan to crack down harder on both homegrown militants groups such as the Taliban and others which are based on its soil and attack Western forces in Afghanistan. In the north, 21 men working for a government-backed paramilitary force were executed overnight after they were kidnapped last week, a provincial official said. Twenty Shi'ite pilgrims died and 24 were wounded, meanwhile, when a car bomb targeted their bus convoy as it headed toward the Iranian border in the southwest, a doctor said. New York-based Human Rights Watch has noted more than 320 Shias killed this year in Pakistan and said attacks were on the rise. It said the government's failure to catch or prosecute attackers suggested it was "indifferent" to the killings. Pakistan, seen as critical to U.S. efforts to stabilize the region before NATO forces withdraw from Afghanistan by the end of 2014, denies allegations that it supports militant groups like the Afghan Taliban and Haqqani network. Afghan officials say Pakistan seems more genuine than ever about promoting peace in Afghanistan. At home, it faces a variety of highly lethal militant groups that carry out suicide bombings, attack police and military facilities and launch sectarian attacks like the one on the bus in the southwest. Witnesses said a blast targeted their three buses as they were overtaking a car about 60 km (35 miles) west of Quetta, capital of sparsely populated Baluchistan province. "The bus next to us caught on fire immediately," said pilgrim Hussein Ali, 60. "We tried to save our companions, but were driven back by the intensity of the heat." Twenty people had been killed and 24 wounded, said an official at Mastung district hospital. CONCERN OVER EXTREMIST SUNNI GROUPS International attention has focused on al Qaeda and the Pakistani Taliban. But Pakistani intelligence officials say extremist Sunni groups, lead by Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) are emerging as a major destabilizing force in a campaign designed to topple the government. Their strategy now, the officials say, is to carry out attacks on Shi'ites to create the kind of sectarian tensions that pushed countries like Iraq to the brink of civil war. As elections scheduled for next year approach, Pakistanis will be asking what sort of progress their leaders have made in the fight against militancy and a host of other issues, such as poverty, official corruption and chronic power cuts. Pakistan's Taliban have carried out a series of recent bold attacks, as military officials point to what they say is a power struggle in the group's leadership revolving around whether it should ease attacks on the Pakistani state and join groups fighting U.S.-led forces in Afghanistan. The Taliban denies a rift exists among its leaders. In the attack in the northwest, officials said they had found the bodies of 21 men kidnapped from their checkpoints outside the provincial capital of Peshawar on Thursday. The men were executed one by one. "They were tied up and blindfolded," Naveed Anwar, a senior administration official, said by telephone. "They were lined up and shot in the head," said Habibullah Arif, another local official, also by telephone. One man was shot and seriously wounded but survived, the officials said. He was in critical condition and being treated at a local hospital. Another had escaped before the shootings. Taliban spokesman Ihsanullah Ihsan claimed responsibility for the attacks. "We killed all the kidnapped men after a council of senior clerics gave a verdict for their execution. We didn't make any demand for their release because we don't spare any prisoners who are caught during fighting," he said. The powerful military has clawed back territory from the Taliban, but the kidnap and executions underline the insurgents' ability to mount high-profile, deadly attacks in major cities. This month, suicide bombers attacked Peshawar's airport on December 15 and a bomb killed a senior Pashtun nationalist politician and eight other people at a rally on December 22. (Additional reporting by Saud Mehsud in DERA ISMAIL KHAN and Gul Yousufzai in QUETTA; Writing by Katharine Houreld; Editing by Michael Georgy and Ron Popeski) ===============