CPJ.Pakistan.Roots.of.Impunity

THE MQM HAS EFFECTIVELY COURTED THE WEST, AN EDITOR
SAYS, SELLING THE IDEA THAT IT IS THE LAST SECULAR STAND
AGAINST EXTREMISM.
same businesses which the ANP leadership indulged
into. They are partners in crime,” Subzwari says, conflating
the Taliban with the ANP (a secular Pashtun
party) and by implication the Pashtuns.
“One has to connect the dots. There is an ANP leadership
who is notorious, who has benefited economically,
commercially under the garb of politics. There
was a home minister [Mirza] who is a xenophobe in
his remarks against the Urdu-speaking community,
when he said, at the house of the ANP chief, that the
Urdu speakers, the immigrants who came from India
to Pakistan, came here starved and naked. They had
nothing with them. And this country has given it all to
them. That was a xenophobic remark. That was a racist
remark. It showed his inner bias towards us. Since the
MQM are 85 percent coming from Urdu-speaking
background, we took it very seriously.”
In the next breath, Subzwari brings up the extrajudicial
killings of MQM in the 1990s. Then there’s the
problem of an MQM motive. “MQM wants to eliminate
Pashtuns. Oh really? Now there are hundreds of Pashtun
journalists operating in Karachi. For an educated
Pashtun, MQM is the only hope and largest representative
in Karachi. … We are the only liberal party in Pakistan.
The others represent ethnicity or family politics.”
So the MQM had no motive, he says. “Wali Khan Babar
wasn’t even covering a political beat; his was the civic
beat and culture,” Subzwari claims, although that wasn’t
true. He quickly adds, “On that fateful day, yes, he was
used as a crime reporter where the ANP party and
PPP were fighting over extortion money.” Actually, the
MQM were heavily involved in that turf war, too.
Subzwari was careful to end our meeting with a
reminder to me of the MQM’s liberal values. “MQM is
the only party to raise concerns about the murders of
Ahmadis in Lahore. MQM is the only party which said
Talibanization is going on in Karachi. I asked for repatriation
and a check on mass migration of Pashtuns
from Swat and what happened? Osama bin Laden’s
widow was in Karachi. Khalid Sheikh Mohammad was
here. How many Pashtun extremists are here?” What is
revealed in Subzwari’s speech is the psychology behind
the MQM’s philosophy; party leaders harbor an underlying
belief that unless they are the toughest guys on
the block, they will be wiped out by demographics if
not turf wars. They have positioned themselves as the
defenders of women and minorities, and as a bulwark
against jihadis. It was a dazzling, speedy performance.
There was truth here and there. But he never really addressed
the fact that the suspects belong to the MQM
or that the witnesses who accused the MQM have
been murdered. Subzwari had his eye on his watch.
The British high commissioner was on his way.
The MQM has brilliantly and effectively courted the
West. “They have managed to sell the idea to Western
embassies that they are the last secular stand against
extremism,” a prominent newspaper editor said. “At
the worst times, when major crackdowns were happening,
the militants got visas to Britain and the U.S.”
“Westerners don’t want to discuss the ANP-MQM
turf war,” the editor went on to say. “The Pashtuns have
come to Karachi. The shanty towns multiplied and
that’s where the turf wars have accelerated. Taliban
have found refuge in those ghettoes and it’s impossible
for police to go in there. The Americans want violent
Islam to be taken out by violent secularists and if human
rights are violated, so what.”
Ahmed Rashid, author of Taliban and Descent Into
Chaos, and a CPJ board member, said “there’s some
kind of treaty between the MQM and the British
government. Pakistanis are amazed and upset at the
way the MQM and its leaders are tolerated in Britain
when they’ve been involved in so much of the killing
in Karachi over the years.” Muhammad Khan Buriro,
the original prosecutor in the Babar case, put it this
way: “Canada labeled them a terrorist organization. If a
commonwealth country calls them a terrorist organization,
why does Britain differ? Because the MQM promised
to secure the British infrastructure in Pakistan. In
any riots the British organizations, whether BP or others,
will not be affected.” Even if this is an exaggerated
claim, it is a widely held perception in Pakistan.
The British government does little to dispel the
notion that it condones the MQM’s behavior. When I
mentioned that Pakistanis believe the British have a sort
of pact with the MQM, that they have given protection
to men accused of running a militia in Karachi, embassy
spokesman Jonathan Williams said the British engage
with the MQM because it is a democratically elected
party. As far as particular cases, such as MQM leader
Hussain’s receiving asylum or an extended visa in England,
Williams said, “We can’t comment on individual
cases of asylum or visas in particular.” He apologized for
what he called the limited nature of his reply.
Today the MQM is on the demographic defensive,
and that is in part why the last few years
have been filled with violence. According to a
1998 government census, Muhajirs made up
48 percent of the population of Karachi while Pashtuns
ROOTS OF IMPUNITY 11