Criterion Vol 4 No 4.Indd

Publisher Director Finance S. Iftikhar Murshed Ismet Murshed Editor-in-Chief Business Development Manager S. Mushﬁ q Murshed S. Rashed Manzur Executive Advisers Cover Design by S. Mashkoor Murshed Fariha Rashed Riaz Khokhar Aziz Ahmad Khan Printers Faizullah Khilji Lawyersown Press Dr. Tariq Hassan 28, Alfalah Askaria Plaza, Committee Chowk, Rawalpindi. Editors Talat Farooq (Executive) Contact Iffat Rashed Editor The Criterion House 16, Street 15, F-6/3, Islamabad Tel: +92-51-2822659 Fax: +92-51-2822689 www.criterionpk.com ‘Criterion’ is a quarterly magazine which aims at producing well researched articles for a discerning readership. The editorial board is neutral in its stance. The opinions expressed are those of the writers. Contributions are edited for reasons of style or clarity. Great care is taken that such editing does not affect the theme of the article or cramp its style. Quotations from the magazine can be made by any publisher as long as they are properly acknowledged. We would also appreciate if we are informed. Subscription: Pakistan Rs. 200 per Issue or Rs. 800 for Annual Subscription (Inclusive of Postage) Overseas US $ 20 per Issue or US $ 80 for Annual Subscription (Inclusive of Postage) Winter Issue Price: Rs 200 Spring Issue US $ 20 Summer Issue Autumn Issue Criterion July/September 2009 Volume 4, Number 3 Terrorism and the Blasphemy Laws of Pakistan Editorial 3 Notes on the Financial Crisis, Global Faizullah Khilji 8 Imbalances, Recovery and the East Asian Response: What We Know and What We Do Not Know The SINO-PAK Boundary Agreement A.G. Noorani 49 The Afghan Turmoil From 1747 to 2001 S. Iftikhar Murshed 86 Internal Security Challenges for Pakistan Shahwar Junaid 133 Promoting Political Parties and an Independent Legislature in Afghanistan Niloufer Siddiqui 149 Institutional Role Behind Civil-Military Equation Muhammad Ismail Khan 186 Essays A Strategy to Fight Militancy? Cyril Almeida 211 Between Dreams and Realities Iqbal Ahmad Khan 222 Cooperative Mechanism to Save Kashmir Environment and Water Wars Iftikhar Gilani 228 The Price of ‘Sea Blindness’ Muhammad Azam Khan 242 Editorial TERRORISM AND THE BLASPHEMY LAWS OF PAKISTAN “Oh Liberty, what crimes are committed under thy name,” exclaimed Madame Marie-Jeanne Roland as she mounted the platform to be guillotined during the Reign of Terror at the height of the French Revolution. More than two hundred years later, a similar reign of terror but this time in the name of religion was unleashed, particularly against the minorities of Pakistan, under the blasphemy laws introduced by General Zia-ul-Haq. In 1982 Section 295 B was added to the Penal Code prescribing life imprisonment for “defiling the Holy Qur’an” and in 1986 Section 295 C was incorporated mandating the death penalty for the “use of derogatory language in respect of the Holy Prophet.” Blasphemy laws have existed in the statute books of British India since 1860 and in 1927 Section 295 was included to deal with “deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious belief.” Thus the law was non- discriminatory and designed to protect equally all faiths. Furthermore, conviction depended exclusively on proof that the accused had deliberately injured or insulted another individual’s religious feelings. This was the law that prevailed in Pakistan during the first forty years of its existence and there was relative inter-faith harmony till the 1980s. Zia-ul-Haq’s blasphemy laws are vaguely formulated and cater only to the sensibilities of Muslims. Even worse, they have been arbitrarily enforced. After its meeting in Geneva from 26 August to 2 September 2009, the World Council of Churches issued a statement which noted that Editorial “on the testimony of a complainant, a person charged with blasphemy is immediately placed in detention. The penalty includes a mandatory death sentence for defaming the Prophet Mohammed and life sentence for desecrating the Holy Qur’an. Under the provisions of the present law, conviction is made possible without proof of deliberate attempt on the part of the accused. This is a violation of the fundamental rights guaranteed by the constitution of Pakistan.” Edmund Burke believed that bad laws are the worst form of tyranny and this has been vividly demonstrated by the blasphemy laws of Pakistan. Though 50 percent of the victims have been Muslims, it is the impoverished and under-privileged Christian minority, constituting a little more than 1 percent of the population, which has faced the brunt of the fanatical cleric-instigated violence. They have undergone imprisonment on frivolous unproven accusations, many have been killed and some even been burnt alive. Their homes have been razed to the ground, their places of worship destroyed, their sacred scriptures desecrated through an endless night of terror. So intense has this persecution been that in desperation the Reverend John Joseph, the first Roman Catholic bishop from the Punjab, shot himself to death in a Sahiwal court on 6 May 1998. A few years earlier he had kissed the feet of a murdered Christian during the latter’s funeral and swore that his would be the next death because of the blasphemy laws. Eleven years after Bishop John Joseph took his own life, a 22- year-old Christian, Fanish (Robert) Masih, was imprisoned in Sialkot for allegedly desecrating the Holy Qur’an. He was kept in solitary confinement even though it had been established that the charges against him were fabricated. He hanged himself in his cell on 15 September 2009. Though innocent civilians have been ruthlessly killed in blasphemy- related mob hysteria as in the Gojra outrage of 30 July 2009 and also in cold-blooded pre-meditated violence, the two suicides poignantly demonstrate the loss of all hope. In the first, a learned man of the frock, 4 CRITERION – Volume 4 No.4 Editorial who had taught his flock that all life was sacred, ended his own in the hope that this supreme sacrifice would rekindle the conscience of those in power and spur them to rescind the infamous blasphemy laws. In the second, a terrorized poverty-stricken youth had convinced himself that he could not escape the gallows for a crime he had never committed. Justice cannot prevail if judges are intimidated and fear for their lives. In an editorial after Fanish Masih’s death, the Daily Times of Lahore recalled that a few months earlier hundreds of clerics wreaked havoc in a court after the judge had granted bail to a Christian couple who had been sent to prison for merely possessing a Qur’an. The accusation against them was that they had defiled the scripture because they were unclean as a community. Their plea that they had kept the holy book in their home out of respect for its teachings fell on deaf ears. They were subsequently charged with blasphemy but this did not deter the mob from ransacking the court. The few judges who dared to oppose the tidal-wave of fanaticism became its victims. On 19 October 1997, Justice Arif Iqbal Hussain Bhatti was gunned down in his office in Lahore because in 1995 he had acquitted two Christian brothers accused of defaming the Prophet. So intense and immediate was the clerical reaction to the ruling that the brothers had to be smuggled out of the country and sent to Germany. The police did nothing to protect Justice Bhatti though they were aware that he had been receiving threatening letters from extremists who were so convinced about the righteousness of their cause that they had no hesitation in disclosing their identities and contact particulars. In several instances the law enforcement authorities not only abetted but also participated in the violence which they regarded as retributive justice for insulting the Prophet or desecrating the Qur’an. In 1997 a frenzied mob of 20,000 which included 500 policemen went on the rampage in the Shantinagar-Tibbi Christian colony following reports about defiling the Qur’an. On 24 May 2004 a police constable bludgeoned Samuel Masih to death as the latter had been accused of spitting on a mosque wall. The CRITERION – October/December 2009 5 Editorial policeman had no qualms of conscience, no sense of guilt, no remorse. He said that as a Muslim it was his duty to kill Masih. This cannot be brushed aside as an aberration or as the outpourings of a demented, semi- literate mind because the contagion of religious extremism has spread to all levels of society. The constable was probably aware that barely four years earlier none other than a judge of the Lahore High Court, Justice Nazir Akhtar, had publicly declared that blasphemers should be killed on the spot. Since the introduction of the blasphemy laws in the 1980s, the senseless slaughter of ordinary citizens, vandalism, arson and the destruction of churches - all brewed from an alarmingly fascist religious narrative - keep recurring with startling frequency. The symbiotic relationship between religion-motivated extremist violence and terrorism is obvious. The 30 July 2009 carnage in Gojra was the work of the banned anti-Shiia terrorist outfit Sipah-e-Sahaba and with each such incident the authority of the state is being progressively subverted. The Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan is no longer the exclusive breeding ground for terrorist outfits. Southern Punjab, the home of the Sipah-e-Sahaba and its offshoot the Lashkar-e- Jhangvi as well as other extremist groups notably the Jaish-e-Mohammad, shares that distinction with FATA. The seminaries in south Punjab, sponsored by these and other groups, churn out ideologically motivated diehards who have been responsible for sectarian killings, the slaughter of minorities and Muslims alike on concocted allegations of blasphemy as well as many of the most dramatic terrorist attacks in recent years.

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