Pakistan

The article below is a joint statement released by left parties from Pakistan and Afghanistan, who took part in a conference in Lahore over December 21-22. It is reprinted from Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal.

* * *

The progressive and democratic forces of Pakistan and Afghanistan met in Lahore for two days in the first ever joint conference.

When US forces crossed into Pakistan from Afghanistan and killed 24 Pakistani border guards on November 26, it further strained Pakistan-US relations, already complicated by the fact the Pakistani elite, in particular the military, maintains close links to both the US and the Taliban.

This collaboration with both sides of the Afghan war has continued despite the November 26 incident being far from unique. Both the Taliban and the US-led forces routinely kill Pakistani civilians, as well as soldiers and police.

Power loom workers in Faisalabad went on a series of major strikes and demonstrations in mid-2010. Six leaders the Labour Qaumi Movement (LQM, the organisation of Faisalabad power loom workers) were arrested by the police.

Once detained, they were charged under anti-terror laws. The six have been sentenced to a total of almost 490 years' jail (served concurrently). The jailed LQM leaders are also members of the Labour Party Pakistan (LPP).

Left-wing political parties, trade unions, social activists and student groups at a press conference in the Labour Party Pakistan (LPP) office invited people to join them in an Occupy Lahore anti-capitalist camp at Nasir Bagh in the city centre. The camp will continue for at least two days. A program for the camp will be announced soon.

The camp is being set up in solidarity with the worldwide Occupy movement and the growing unrest among peoples caused by the global economic recession.

The statement below is a call for solidarity with jailed Pakistani activists, including the Labor Party Pakistan’s Baba Jan. It was released on September 22. To add your support to the statement email politic.ofthepoor@gmail.com.

* * *

On August 11, Pakistani police used live bullets against people demanding payment of compensation allowances following a devastating landslide which had happened a year before in the valley of Hunza, on July 4, 2010.

Baba Jan, a federal committee member of the Labour Party Pakistan (LPP), surrendered himself to an "anti-terrorist court" in Gilgit Baltestan in early September.

He had been on the run after police opened fire on a demonstration demanding compensation for those affected by the Atta Abad Lake floods last year, killing two

Jan has since been taken from jail and the LPP fears the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) is torturing him.

Jan’s “crime” was to organise rallies and demonstrations against the police killings.

Last year's floods were the worst in Pakistan's history. Twenty million people were affected and about 2000 lost their lives.

Now there is record flooding for the second year in a row.

“This is not a natural disaster”, Farooq Tariq , the national spokesperson for the Labour Party Pakistan, told Green Left Weekly. He was referring to widespread and unprecedented monsoonal flooding that has hit Pakistan over the last few days, already killing hundreds of people and making nearly a million homeless.

And this is just the beginning of the monsoon season.

Farooq Tariq, a spokesperson for the Labour Party Pakistan, released this article on July 24. It is reprinted from http://www.europe-solidaire.org .

See also:
Right-wing attack in Norway

* * *

Three-two-year-old Norwegian, Anders Behring Breivik, who killed 92 on July 22 in Oslo has used similar techniques in bomb blast and shooting of the children from his most hatred enemy, the Muslim fundamentalist.

Media outlets from the Dawn Media Group, Pakistans leading media house, published the first set of WikiLeaks files relating to Pakistan on May 20.

The leaked US cables revealed that the Pakistani military is complicit in US drone strikes in Pakistan's tribal areas, bordering Afghanistan.

Each set of cables published by the group has had a ripple effect, with the leaked US cables widely reproduced.

At first, embarrassed military spokespeople and politicians exposed by the leaks denied the contents. Later, they tried to ignore them.

Osama Bin Laden, the mastermind behind the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States that killed about 3000 people, will not be mourned by many people around the world. But his killers used Bin Laden’s crimes to justify wars on Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq that have killed many thousands more. These wars are continuing. The May 3 US Socialist Worker article abridged below says bin Laden’s death should not be used to justify further killings in the name of the “war on terror”.

* * *