The Londoner

BY SIKANDER HAYAT Today, I am thinking about writing on the issue of Balochistan and its delicate ethnic balance but first here are some facts about the demographic situation in Balochistan. According to various sourses on the web, “Balochistan has a population of around 10 million inhabitants. Overall, the Baloch and Brohi tribes comprise 50% of the province's population. The rest are mainly Pashtuns, Hazaras and Sindhis. Baloch are concentrated in the sparsely populated north-west, west, east and south; Brohis in the centre of the province, while the Pashtuns are the majority in the north. Quetta, the capital of the province, has a Pashtun majority with Baloch, Hazaras and Punjabi minorities. Near the Kalat region and other parts of the province there are significant numbers of Brahui speakers. Along the coast various Makrani Balochis predominate. In addition, 769,000 Afghan refugees can be found in the province including Pashtuns, Tajiks, and Hazaras. Many Sindhi farmers have...

East Timor's First Female Dictator Hailed As Step Forward For Women

Are Violent Video Games Adequately Preparing Children For The Apocalypse?

BY SIKANDER HAYAT I hope that today’s verdict by the Supreme Court to declare Nawaz Sharif & Shahbaz Sharif ineligible from the electoral politics of Pakistan has not been taken on the behest of President Asif ali Zardari. If Mr Zardari was involved in any way in this debacle by the judiciary (which was appointed by Mr Musharraf and widely seen as corrupt and incompetent) then I foresee a long period of political disharmony in Pakistan. Pakistan cannot afford any such situation at the moment but it seems that it is the writing on the wall that long march on Islamabad, called by the lawyers movement and Imran Khan’s justice party, will lead to the kind of instability which is an ideal breeding ground for the fundamentalist forces the likes of which are operating currently in North West Pakistan. Mr Zardari’s reign so far has been that of broken promises on judiciary, political reconciliation and high incompetency in handling events related to foreign relations. Leaving Mumbai debacl...

Sufi Muhammad, born in Dir, is the founder of Tehreek-e-Nafaz-e-Shariat-e-Mohammadi (TNSM), a Pakistani militant organisation with Wahabi and Deobandi leanings (declared a terrorist outfit and banned in 2002) vying for implementation of Sharia in Swat and Malakand Division. It operates mainly in the Dir, Swat, and Malakand districts of North-West Frontier Province. He is the father-in-law of Maulana Fazlullah, who assumed the leadership of TNSM during Muhammad's imprisonment. During the 1980s Sufi Muhammad actively participated in Jamaat-e-Islami. In 1992 he split from the group to form TNSM. Sufi Muhammad remained in prison until 2008 when he agreed in talks with the chief minister of the NWFP to use his influence to work towards peace in the region. Maulana Sufi Muhammad took part in negotiations with the government that led to the announcement of a temporary ceasefire in the Malakand region on February 16, 2009. The Pakistani government agreed to allow the implementation of Sha...

By Aijaz Hussain The Associated Press updated 11:53 a.m. ET Feb. 21, 2009 SRINAGAR, India - Thousands of angry villagers protested in India's portion of Kashmir on Saturday, accusing the army of fatally shooting two men and critically wounding another, police and residents said. Men in combat gear fired at a vehicle in Bumai village on Saturday evening, critically wounding all three passengers, said B. Srinivas, inspector general of police. Two of them died en route to a hospital, Srinivas said. Bumai lies 38 miles (60 kilometers) northwest of Srinagar, the main city in Indian Kashmir. Local residents blamed the army, and as news of the killings spread to the nearby town of Sopore, thousands of people took to streets chanting slogans against India and its military, and demanding independence for the Himalayan region. An estimated 700,000 Indian soldiers are deployed in Kashmir. There were some reports of stone throwing. Srinivas said police were trying to pacify the protesters. ...

Nawaz Sharif has fired the opening shots to usher Pakistan into a period of new political instability. He gave warning to Asif Zardari that if the old judiciary, which was fired by the Mushraf government was not reinstated soon, he and his party will conduct a long march concluding in Islamabad.

By Sikander Hayat Before I write anything else, I must say that I did not know Musa Khan’s name before this tragedy but he is no less a martyr than those Pakistani soldiers who are dying on the front line. He fought valiantly with his pen and might of his pen was not liked by some people. The manner in which his name has been splashing all over television screens in last few hours is just a reminder that there are powerful forces who do not want the issue in Swat to settle. May he rest in peace and remembered for ever along with all those who sacrifised there lives to save Pakistan from the evil clutches of tyranny of the Taliban. Now I shall come to topic that I must also write about as a matter of urgency because Pakistan is at a defining moment in its history where its people have taken up arms to enforce a law which its elite promised it for a long time. Pakistan’s independence moment was based on the promise that once liberated it will run on Sharia law but after its independence,...

By Sikander Hayat I believe that the problem is on the eastern front as Pakistan cannot trust India. Indians occupied East Pakistan in 1971 and turned it into Bangladesh. In that historic perspective and given that it happened just over 30 years ago does not fill Pakistan and its people with confidence towards India. Pakistan believe that Taliban, unlike India , no matter how strong they become are always manageable and even if they become successful in overtaking Pakistan, they are not a threat to its territorial integrity. In other words, Pakistan will stay as it is but just with different rulers and under Sharia law. Hence the refusal of Pakistan to abandon a national-security policy which is founded on the principle that India is Pakistan’s mortal enemy and Pakistan must safeguard itself against this threat. The truth behind this belief lies in recent actions by Pakistan after the Mumbai attacks. The speed with which the Pakistani army rushed to embrace the threat of an Indian ...

By Sikander Hayat Something is happening for the first time in the history of Pakistan and therefore I must remark on this. For the first time ever Pakistan People’s Party has become the party of the establishment and Pakistan Muslim League has become the other. The role of “other” was eternally played by the PPP but the advent of National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) has resulted for the first time in a PPP which is completely and utterly in compliance with the powers of the Pakistani establishment. If Benazir was alive today, would she have taken the same route, we shall never know that for certain. In Pakistan today, there are political parties of right of centre such as PML (N), Tehreek-e-Insaaf of Imran Khan, PML (Q) ----there are parties of right such as Jamaat-e-Islamai, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam ( Fazal)-----there are regional chauvinistic parties who do there their electioneering on the base of language, cast, region and most of all hatred of others and conduct us & them pol...

By Sikander Hayat There has increasingly been talk of a new establishment in Afghanistan as many insiders and outsiders have started to believe that current president Hamid Karzai is part of the problem and not part of the solution. Failures of Hamid Karzai 1. Taliban surge back with every year of fighting—this week insurgents killed at least 20 people in attacks on three government buildings in Kabul 2. The perception of Afghanistan as an opium-fuelled officially sanctioned corruption” 3. Change of Afghanistan from a drug free country under Taliban to an Afghanistan as a “narco-state” under the current establishment 4. Fighting has intensified and spread—insurgent attacks were up by a third and civilian casualties increased by 40% last year over 2007 5. Mr Karzai is seen as indecisive and a poor administrator, using his “pocketful of mobile telephones” to deal with endless petitioners rather than running a proper government 6. A sense of injustice amon...

By Sikander Hayat I am expecting a rise in Pakistan’s compliance to Indian demands, given that responsibility of Samjhota Express massacre, which was carried out by Hindu terrorists, was excepted initially by the Pakistani government to be the handy work of it’s nationals and now they have excepted the responsibility for the Mumbai tragedy as well. If it is true ( based on Pakistan’s own investigation and not some dodgy dossier from India) that Pakistani nationals are indeed behind the Mumbai atrocities than any involved individual must be punished. It is also paramount that India must provide Pakistan of any details of the Indian accomplices of these attackers who gave shelter, ammunition, rations etc to these individuals which will help Pakistan in making a case in the court of law and also expose the underbelly of growing extreme form of Muslim assertiveness in India. India must also understand that by supporting the terrorists in areas like Swat, Waziristan and Balochistan, it...

Pasni (Balochi: پسنی ) is a medium-sized town and a fishing port in Balochistan, Pakistan. It is located on the Makran coast on Arabian Sea about 300 km from Karachi. Administratively, Pasni is the headquarters of the Pasni sub-division of Gwadar district that includes Pasni and Ormara Tehsils as well as Astola Island which lies 40km ESE of Pasni, in the Arabian Sea. The city of Pasni is itself administratively subdivided into two Union Councils. The topography of the area is marked by low jagged hills of the Makran Coastal Range, while flat land is more common towards the coast. Jabal Zarain is a small hill astride a promontory (Cape or Ras Jaddi) south of Pasni and marks the highest point (416' ASL) in the area. The unspoilt and pristine beaches of Pasni offer some of the most enchanting sceneries along the Arabian Sea. Shadi Kaur (river) fed by adjoining rain water streams, drains into the Arabian Sea just north of the town. Vegetation is sparse and consists mostly of hardy ...

It is one of 26 in that province, and encompasses an area of 6,621 km². The population of the district is estimated to be over 400,000 in 2005. The district is governed from the city of Kalat. Kalat was notified as a district on February 3, 1954. At that time Khuzdar and Mastung districts were sub-divisions of Kalat (which then also included Bolan, Jhal Magsi and Naseerabad (Dera Murad Jamali); these were separated in 1965 as Kachhi District). Khuzdar became a separate district by notification of 1 March 1974, while Mastung was announced to be separate district on 18 February 1992. The district draws its name from the ancient city of Kalat. The old name of the district headquarters was Kahan. The current district consists of two sub-divisions, i.e. Kalat and Surab, five tehsils: Kalat Mangochar, Johan, Gazgz, and Surab, 81 patwar circles and 614 mauza (villages). The climate is arid, hot in summer and cold in winter, with most rainfall occurring in the winter. The terrain is mountaino...

Former BBC Afghanistan correspondent, William Reeve, was beside the pitch to cheer the team on at their latest victory in Buenos Aires. The sport of cricket is new to Afghanistan. Just over 10 years ago, while reporting for the BBC during Taleban rule, I was astounded one day to come across a game of cricket. There in front of me in Kabul, on a wide open space, was a group of Afghans totally absorbed in having fun, at a time when there was so little other entertainment in the country. Cinemas, television, music and so many other things had been banned by the Taleban but not, evidently, cricket. Before long I was chatting away to the players, all dressed in traditional Afghan shalwar kameez, baggy cotton trousers under loose long shirts. Welcome respite They pointed out they had very little equipment. They used an old tennis ball wrapped in plastic tape. The stumps and bats were home-made and the pitch was dusty and rough. They explained that they were practising for the first serious m...

WASHINGTON, Feb. 4 (Xinhua) -- U.S. special envoy Richard Holbrooke will visit Pakistan, Afghanistan and India following the Munich security conference in Germany this week, said the State Department on Wednesday. The envoy left for London on Wednesday and will travel from the British capital to Germany's Munich, where he is due to take part in the annual conference on international security policy, spokesman Robert Wood told reporters. "Then from there he will head to Pakistan, Afghanistan and India, in that order," said Wood, adding that Holbrooke told him "in essence this is an orientation trip." "He's not carrying any messages to any of these governments from either the secretary or the president," said the spokesman. "He's not going there to lecture, he's going there to listen. And then he will report back to the secretary and the president," added the spokesman. Holbrooke, known well for his role in brokering...

KARACHI (AFP) — Cricket legend Imran Khan warned Wednesday that Pakistan's national game was being damaged by the government's involvement in the US-led "war on terror". Khan, who was responding to the International Cricket Council's (ICC) decision on Sunday to relocate the elite eight-nation Trophy from Pakistan to an undecided venue, said association with conflict was hugely damaging. "From economy to daily life to cricket, everything is hurt in Pakistan only because of our unnecessary involvement in war. Teams are refusing to come to Pakistan because of that war," Khan told AFP. Former US President George Bush launched his so-called war on terror soon after the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington. Pakistan joined up, providing logistical support to US forces who led an invasion of neighbouring Afghanistan and deploying its troops to fight Taliban and Al-Qaeda extremists hunkered down in the northwest of the country. More than 1,500 p...

Today's important articles which I think are worth reading: 1. Time Magezine talks about the dynamics in South Asia with Richard Holbrooke in town and its impact on Kashmir. http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1874627,00.html 2. Pakistan blocks its players from IPL http://content-www.cricinfo.com/ipl2009/content/story/388728.html 3.Kashmiris to continue struggle for self-determination:Syed Ali Shah Geelani http://www.tehrantimes.com/Index_view.asp?code=188481