Again i m reminded of beautiful poem by sahir ludhyanwi


Zulm phir zulm hai, baRhta hai tau miT jaataa hai

Zulm phir zulm hai, baRhta hai tau miT jaataa hai

Khoon phir Khoon hai, TapkaY gaa tau ja'm jaayega

Khaak-e-sehra pe jamey yaa kaf-e-qaatil pe jamey

Farq-e-insaaf pe yaa paa-e-salaasal pe jamey

TeGh-e-bedaad pe yaa

laasha-e-bismil pe jamey

Khoon phir Khoon hai TapkaY gaato ja'm jaayega


Laakh baiThaY koi chhup chhup ke kameeN gaahoN maiN

Khoon Khud deta hai jallaadoN ke maskan ka suraaGh

SaazishaiN laaKh uRaati rahaiN zulmat ka naqaab

laY ke har booNd nikalti hai hatheli pe charaaGh

Zulm kee qismat-e-nakaarah-o-rusvaa se kaho
Jab’r kee hikmat-e-purkaar ke eemaa se kaho

Mehmal-e-majlis-e-aqwaam kee laila se kaho

Khoon deewana hai, daaman pe lapak sakta hai

Sho'la-e-tuNd hai, Khirman pe lapak sakta hai


tum ne jiss Khoon ko maqtal maiN dabaanaa chaaha

Aaj vo koochaa-o-bazaar maiN aa nikla hai

kaheeN sho'la kaheeN naa'rah kaheeN patthar ba'n ke

Khoon chalta hai to rukta naheeN sangeenoN se

Sar jo uThtaa hai to dabtaa naheeN aaeenoN se


Zulm ki baat hee kiya, zulm ki auqaat hee kiya

Zulm bas zulm hai, aaGhaaz se anjaam talak

Khoon phir Khoon hai, so shak'l badal sakta hai

Aisi shaklaiN ke miTaaoo tau miTaaye na banaY

AisaY sho'laY kaY bujhaao tau bujhaaye na banaY

AisaY naa'raY kaY dabaao tau dabaaye na banaY

What was the crime he committed? He dared to challenge the military might of this country. He warned the nation of infiltration of Jihadists into Pakistan's security institutions. Now when it has reached to the nation that internal elements from within Pakistan Navy were the helpers of attackers on Mehran Base. Why are we silencing all the voices of sanity and liberty in this country? Saleem Shehzad's wife is under severe pressure from ISI. The family requested Nawaz Sharif not to visit them. She said she was leaving Islamabad and going to Karachi forever and wanted nothing but safety of her children. Where the hell we are living? Is it really a state or just an oppressed territory occupied by rogue state elements on one side and the religious militants on the other side?

Then they came for me

Babar Sattar
Saturday, June 04, 2011


The writer is a lawyer based in Islamabad.

The pall of gloom, anger and despondency in Pakistan has deepened with Saleem Shahzad’s gruesome murder. If the past is any guide, we will neither discover verifiable facts about his murder, nor will his killers be brought to justice. But let us revisit what we do know. Saleem Shahzad was called in by the ISI in October last year to discuss a story that he had filed for Asia Times Online and felt that he had received a muffled threat. He shared the details with his family, employers and some friends, including Human Rights Watch. Shahzad had written the first part of a story this past week suggesting that Al-Qaeda/Taliban had infiltrated the navy and the attack on PNS Mehran was a consequence of efforts to weed them out. Shahzad was abducted from a high-security zone in Islamabad while he was on his way to participation in a TV talk show. He was tortured to death and his body dumped in the canal close to Rasool Barrage a couple of days later.

Who could have abducted a journalist from one of the most fortified areas of Islamabad? If all this was the handiwork of Al-Qaeda/Taliban, why did they not make demands in return for his release, as they often do? If they didn’t abduct him for ransom or barter, why did they not claim credit for his assassination? Why did they not hold him out as an example for others they see as enemies or double agents, rather than silently dumping his tortured body, followed by an anonymous burial in Mandi Bahhauddin? Was the local representative of Human Rights Watch conspiring with Al-Qaeda and their “foreign” patrons when (according to reported conversations with interlocutors) he disclosed that Shahzad was being held by the ISI and would be released soon? Shahzad feared for his life and had pointed fingers. Should we simply disregard his account now that he is dead?

No terror group has claimed responsibility for Shahzad’s murder. But the ISI has denied involvement in his torture and killing, and resolved “to leave no stone unturned in helping bring the perpetrators of this heinous crime to justice.” Let us assume that the ISI is being truthful here. How did we come to this pass where our leading intelligence agency is the prime suspect in the brutal murder of a journalist and, conscious of such a perception, feels obliged to issue a contradiction? Was Umar Cheema of The News really tortured by spooks or did he just imagine security personnel shaving his head? Was Kamran Shafi’s house never attacked? Is there some bright line rule that people will be roughed up but not killed? Or are the countless reported episodes of intelligence personnel intimidating journalists all lies? Has the US-Indian-Israeli nexus successfully manipulated the minds of our media and intelligentsia? Is this the best explanation for the suspicion that segments of our national security apparatus arouse?

Back in January 2010, I wrote about “reforming khakis.” I had endeavoured to identify multiple facets of the khaki mindset, as I understood them. “The first is an undaunted sense of righteousness,” I had argued. “This indoctrinates the military with the belief that its vision and definition of national security and national interest is the perennial manifestation of wisdom and truth. Any involvement of civilians with matters deemed to fall within the domain of national security is seen as unwarranted interference and an affront to its interests. This protective sense encourages the military to guard its proclaimed territory as a fief. The second facet of the khaki mindset is the military’s saviour instinct. Despite being a non-representative institution, the military has assigned to itself the role of deciphering aspirations of Pakistanis and protecting them. And the most insidious facet of this mindset is the unstated sense of being above the law that binds ordinary citizens.”

Consequently, I was “invited” to the ISI headquarter to meet with a brigadier who looked after internal security. I was offered a “tea break” while being informed that people within the GHQ had taken offence at my article. The brigadier read out “objectionable” excerpts from my article back to me and read from hand scribbled notes that spread over half-a-dozen pages to educate me on how I was wrong. He spoke for about 45 minutes before I sought permission to interrupt his speech and engage in a dialogue. At some point in this conversation he told me quite categorically that the army was more patriotic than the rest of us!

I wasn’t directly threatened at any point. However, I was informed, as a matter of historical record, that there was a time when the agency dealt with people only with the stick; but now things were different. During the meeting I felt obliged to reiterate my fidelity and loyalty to my country and was later ashamed and angry with myself for doing so.

I did not walk away from the ISI headquarters with a sense that this was another free exchange of ideas with a state official who disagreed with my opinion on how best to secure our national interest. In what is hard to describe accurately, I felt an eerie sense of anxiety and a need to protect my back. Not from the Taliban or terror groups but from the same security apparatus that is mandated by law to protect and defend my constitutional right to life, liberty and physical security.

The narration of this personal experience is important in Saleem Shahzad’s context because it is not an isolated one. Others within the media and civil society have had similar exchanges.

The ISI statement on Saleem Shahzad’s murder acknowledges his meeting with officials of the ISI’s Information Management Wing and asserts that “it is part of the Wing’s mandate to remain in touch with the journalist community...the main objective behind all such interactions is provision of accurate information on matters of national security.” From where does the ISI derive this entitlement to summon journalists, seek details of their sources or question their views? Is viewpoint censorship a part of our national security doctrine that the ISI is mandated to enforce? Does Article 19A of our Constitution not declare that access to information is a fundamental human right? Does Article 19 not endow citizens with freedom of speech and expression? And does Article 9 not guarantee the right to life and liberty? Should access to information and the right to hold and express an opinion be curtailed through intimidation? What kind of Animal Farm have we reduced this country to where exercising one’s right to free speech and information extinguishes the right to life?

Notwithstanding the legality or desirability of censorship, a shrinking world and superior technology have made it extremely hard to kill information or ideas, if not people. You cannot sell a terrible product on the back of a vigorous marketing campaign that relies largely on tyranny. More and more citizens are questioning Pakistan’s national security policy because they worry about the direction in which it is pushing this country. It is not allegiance to an enemy but the love for their homeland and concern for their future, and that of their kids, that motivates them to demand course correction.

There is one mother who spoils her kids rotten. And there is another who disciplines them, grooms them, and nurtures their character by teaching them to distinguish right from wrong. Both these mothers are acting out of love. But only the second is being constructive. This is time for all Pakistanis, and especially the more thoughtful ones within the security establishment, to engage in introspection instead of snapping at anyone holding the mirror to them.

Speculations ... Ideas .. Circumstantial evidence..Banishing by certain media elements to our covetous prime intelligence agency, which itself is vehemently denying its involvment in gruesome murder... ..

Nevertheless, may Almighty give patience to bereaved family. amin.

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'Thee woh ik shakhs kay tasawar saay - abb woh ranayee khayal kahaan'

Does this deletion of data records not point out who killed Syed Saleem Shehzad?

LAHORE:

The record of slain journalist Saleem Shahzad’s cell phone activity has been mysteriously erased – with the network log of the 18 days leading up to his abduction and murder being wiped clean from the system.
According to data obtained by The Express Tribune, the “last” call made by Shahzad was back on May 12.
Saleem Shahzad worked for Hong Kong-based Asia Times Online and Italian news agency Andkronos International. The police are yet to register an abduction-cum-murder case against Shahzad’s killers.
The case is starting to look a lot like that of Umer Cheema, another journalist who was kidnapped and tortured recently and whose cell phone data was also deleted from the system in a similar manner.
Hamza Ameer, the brother-in-law of the slain journalist, found Saleem Shahzad’s mobile phone switched off when he tried to contact him at 5:42 pm on May 29.
According to data obtained by The Express Tribune, Shahzad made his “last” call on May 12 near a cell phone tower installed atop a bank in Islamabad’s Blue Area, Plot No94, Deen Pewalian in Islamabad.
Shahzad, according to cell data, was in Islamabad between May 1 and 8:27 pm on May 12.
The “second last” call received by Shahzad was made by his wife and it lasted slightly over a minute (the call was made between 12:165 and 12:17:19).
His wife’s “last” call received by Shahzad lasted just 13 seconds (made between 7:51:16 and 7:51:29).
Furthermore, Hamza Ameer said that police are yet to register a proper case of abduction and murder of Saleem Shahzad.
He said that he had filed a complaint after Saleem Shahzad had gone missing (The record shows the complaint No43 was filed at 2:20 am on Monday, May 30).
The complaint reads: “My brother in-law Syed Saleem Shahzad, the bureau chief of Asia Times Online, left today at 5:30 pm to appear in an interview on Dunya News (television), but since that time he has been missing. I request you to please probe the matter and search for him.”
Later, the Margalla police station had converted the same complaint into an FIR, without applying the section for abduction-cum-murder, Hamza Ameer said.
Another FIR was also registered in Mandi Bahauddin and Shahzad’s autopsy was also conducted in the district headquarters (DHQ) hospital in the same town on May 30.
The IGP on the direction of the CM Punjab has issued a notification regarding constitution of three-member committee headed by DIG Shoaib Dastgeer with a mandate to probe the matter.
DIG Shoaib told The Express Tribune that the investigators would meet the heirs of the slain journalist. He said that statements of eyewitnesses, if there are any, will also be recorded.
He said that because the autopsy of dead body of slain journalist had been conducted in Islamabad so according to law the murder’s section of 302 CrPC will be added by the Margala police station where the FIR was first
registered. He claimed that the team would finalise its report quickly.

Saleem Shahzad

Nisaar Main tiaree Galyoon Kay ay watan kay Jahaan
Chalee Hay Rasm kay koee naa Sir Uthaa Kay Chullay
Jo Koee Chahnay Wala Twaf Ko Niklay
Nazar Jhuka Kay Chulay,Jism-o-Jaan Buchaa Kay Chullay

Bunay hain ahl-e-Hawus Muddaee Bhee Munsif Bhee
Kisay Wakeel Karain Kis Say Munsafee Chahain

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Hoee hay jab say mukhalif hawa zamanay key......
Humain bhee dhun see hoee hay diaa jalaanay key

WASHINGTON: The US military’s top officer said Thursday Pakistan’s government may have sanctioned the killing of a Pakistani journalist, voicing grave concern over the attack.

Asked about media reports that Islamabad sanctioned or approved the killing of the reporter, Admiral Mike Mullen said: “I haven’t seen anything that would disabuse that report.”

He said he was “concerned” about the incident and suggested other reporters had suffered a similar fate in the past.

“His (death) isn’t the first. For whatever reason, it has been used as a method historically.”While acknowledging that Pakistani officials have denied the government had any role in the death of Saleem Shahzad, Mullen said the episode raised worrying questions about the country’s current course.

“It’s not a way to move ahead. It’s a way to continue to quite frankly spiral in the wrong direction,” said Mullen, who has held numerous meetings with Pakistani counterparts during his tenure as chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff.

The New York Times, citing US officials, reported Monday that the powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency ordered the killing of the 40-year-old Shahzad to muzzle criticism. Mullen said he could not confirm whether the ISI was behind the killing.

The ISI has denied as “baseless” allegations that it was involved in the murder of Shahzad, who worked for an Italian news agency and a Hong Kong-registered news site.

* Source : Pakistan govt may have sanctioned Shahzad’s death: US | Pakistan | DAWN.COM

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'Thee woh ik shakhs kay tasawar saay - abb woh ranayee khayal kahaan'

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Friday criticised as “extremely irresponsible” remarks from the top US military officer saying that Islamabad may have approved the killing of Pakistani journalist Saleem Shahzad.

Admiral Mike Mullen, when asked about media reports that the Pakistani government approved Mr Shahzad’s killing, said: “I haven’t seen anything that would disabuse that report.”

But when asked if Pakistan’s intelligence service had been involved, Mullen said he could not confirm the allegation.

The remarks aggravated relations already strained by a covert US raid north of Islamabad in May that killed Osama bin Laden and the killing of two men by a CIA contractor in Lahore in January.

In a statement released by the information ministry, the government described Mullen’s remarks, if true as attributed, as “extremely irresponsible” and said it “does not help” in getting to the bottom of Shahzad’s death.

The government last month set up a judicial commission to investigate how the reporter died and the information ministry said such comments could be considered an attempt to influence the outcome of the inquiry.

* Source : Mullen

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'Thee woh ik shakhs kay tasawar saay - abb woh ranayee khayal kahaan'