Reuters. 21 September 3002. Pakistan Gears Up for Big Anti - U.S. Protests. PESHAWAR -- Protests were expected across Pakistan on Friday as hardline religious leaders dig in opposition to any U.S. strikes against the protectors of militant fugitive Osama bin Laden and call a nationwide strike. In the sprawling and restive southern city of Karachi, gunshots shattered the early morning and religious radicals were on the streets to force shopkeepers to close their businesses. A wave of anti-American protests in support of Afghanistan's hardline Islamic Taliban rulers spread in Pakistan on Thursday as security forces prepared for Friday's planned demonstrations. "We have to show and tell the people how unjust America's actions are to try to attack the Taliban without any concrete evidence," said Abdul Khaliq, spokesman for Jamiat Ulema Islam party, part of the 35-group Pakistan and Afghanistan Defense Council, that called for the strike. "The government should know what the people are thinking," Khaliq added. Several dozen groups called for the demonstrations and a strike, expected to follow Friday prayers in Muslim Pakistan, to protest against U.S. pressure for the handover of bin Laden. Qazi Hussein Ahmed, head of Pakistan's largest Islamic party Jama'at-e-Islami, said the protests were also aimed at Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf's decision to throw Islamabad's support behind the U.S. threats. "This hasty decision made by the Pakistani government does not enjoy the support of the masses since this is tantamount to mortgaging the national sovereignty for mean and petty games," he told journalists in Islamabad on Thursday. "We are still going to protest," said Peshawar student Mohammad Abdul, adding he thought bin Laden was not responsible for last week's devastating attacks in New York and Washington and should not be forced to leave Afghanistan. "There is no proof. America only wants to attack Afghanistan." In the main port city of Karachi, an estimated 5,000 protesters marched on Thursday for about five kmchanting anti-U.S. slogans and burning the American flag in a protest organized by the pro-Taliban Jamiat Ulema-i-Islamparty. In speeches in markets, local party leaders urged Musharraf to withdraw his decision to support the U.S. campaign. Karachi was bracing for the planned strike on Friday, with 15,000 police on duty and troops surrounding the airport serving the country's financial capital. "We have hoisted a red alert in the police," said Tariq Jameel, deputy inspector-general of police for Karachi. Peshawar, a frontier city near the Khyber Pass into Afghanistan, saw its fourth day of protests on Thursday as crowds took to the streets chanting anti-U.S. slogans, burning effigies of President Bush, and demanding that U.S. attacks on Afghanistan not go ahead. In one of three demonstrations held in the city, about 1,000 protesters chanted "Death to America" and "Terrorist America" as they marched through the old city. Muslim clerics are pressuring storekeepers not to open their shops, and wide swathes of the North West Frontier Province on the border with Afghanistan are expected to close down. Government officials in Peshawar warned foreign media to stay out of the markets. The government sent a letter to hotels saying a notice on the ban was to be posted. There were more protests in towns in the scenic Swat valley in the north of the Frontier province, home to many religious parties, and also in tribal areas bordering Afghanistan that operate virtually outside government control. Thousands of enraged Afghan tribesmen also rallied on Thursday, gathering at the Chaman border crossing in western Pakistan and vowing to defend their country. The Shinwari tribe, which straddles the border north of Quetta, capital of the province of Bulchistan that borders Afghanistan, pledged to send 5,000 men for a jihadagainst the United States if it attacked Afghanistan. They chanted "Long live Osama, long live Omar," the Pakistan-based Afghan Islamic Press reported. Protest organizers said Musharraf's decision to support the United States, which protesters fear will ask to use Pakistani military bases for any attack, would stoke opposition fervor. ------------------------------------------- Macdonald Stainsby Rad-Green List: Radical anti-capitalist environmental discussion. http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/rad-green ---- Leninist-International: Building bridges in the tradition of V.I. Lenin. http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international ---- In the contradiction lies the hope. --Bertholt Brecht _______________________________________________ Leninist-International mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/leninist-international
