The declared agenda of the Difa-e-Pakistan Council is to oust the United States from the region, break Pak-US ties, back Taliban militants, force the government to revoke the Most Favoured Nation status being granted to India and stop the NATO supplies pass through Pakistan. But that's not going to benefit Pakistan, writes Amir Mir
Pakistan is a sovereign state and the Defa-e-Pakistan Council will not allow the country to become an "Indian market", Lashkar-e-Taiba founder Hafiz Mohammad Saeed said on Saturday.
Minister for Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony Noor-Ul-Haq Qadri was seen seated near Saeed as he addressed an All Parties Conference organised by the Difa-e-Pakistan Council on Sunday.
"The Palestine government has told Ali that he was not anymore its envoy to Pakistan," Haija said.
He was the chief of the hardline political party Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Sami.
Pakistan's largest grouping of religious and extremist groups today said it would organise a 'long march' from Lahore to Islamabad on July 8 to protest the government's decision to reopen North Atlantic Treaty Organisation supply routes to Afghanistan.
Following the announcement of $10 million bounty on Lashkar-e-Tayiba founder Hafiz Saeed by the United States, religious groups across Pakistan have strongly condemned the decision, and have termed it as an attack over 'Islam' and 'Muslims'.
A former Pakistani lawmaker on Monday offered a $200,000 bounty for anyone who kills the maker of an anti-Islam film during a protest against the movie in Peshawar, days after a federal minister announced a reward of $100,000 for eliminating the person behind the video. Ikramullah Shahid, thea leader of a faction of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, made the offer before a crowd of 15,000 people during a rally led by the Defa-e-Pakistan Council.
An alliance of over 40 religious and extremist groups forged by Lashkar-e-Tayiba founder Hafiz Mohammad Saeed has vowed to march to the Afghan border to force Pakistan government to close NATO supply routes.
Jamaat-ud-Dawah chief Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, blamed for the Mumbai terror attacks, has demanded that the Pakistan government should announce a date for parting ways with the United States and abandoning its war on terrorism.
A combative Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, Jamaat-ud-Dawah chief, on Wednesday dared the United States to carry out a military raid against him like the one that killed Osama bin Laden, saying he was not hiding and would inform the Americans himself about his whereabouts.
Banned terror outfit Jamaat-ud-Dawa has officially condemned the United States' announcement of a 10 million dollar bounty on its chief Hafiz Saeed, calling it "another attack by the American government on Muslims and Islam".
Outlawed Jamaat-ud-Dawah chief Hafiz Mohammad Saeed and Ahl-e-Sunnat Wal Jamaat leader Ahmed Ludhianvi played a cat-and-mouse game for almost six hours with the police and paramilitary forces who were trying to prevent them from entering the Pakistani capital.
Saeed has pledged to tour the country to mobilise the people against any decision by the government to reopen the supply routes, which were closed after a cross-border NATO air strike killed 24 Pakistani soldiers in November.
The Defa-e-Pakistan Council, a grouping of 40 radical groups cobbled together by LeT founder Hafiz Saeed, has warned that it will not allow even food supplies for NATO forces in Afghanistan to pass through the country.
An alliance of religious and extremist groups on Saturday said Pakistan should settle the Kashmir issue and differences over sharing river water before it normalises trade relations with India and gives it Most Favoured Nation-status. The Defence of Pakistan Council, which includes the Jamaat-ud-Dawah and Ahl-e-Sunnat Wal Jamaat, made the demand in a joint declaration adopted at a meeting of the top leaders of the various groups.
The Palestinian foreign ministry also denied this information, saying, "Our ambassador in Pakistan is in Palestine and our position was declared by our official statement which we have published last week."
The perpetrators of the 2008 Mumbai attack, who shot dead 166 people, had confessed to details that should have been enough to hang him, but Pakistan enjoyed his anti-India rhetoric and let him spread his tentacles. A revealing excerpt from Khaled Ahmed's Pakistan's Terror Conundrum.
The JuD's Muslim Medical Mission would request the Pakistani government for help in this regard.
The madrassa in Akora Khattak in Nowshera district of the province is known for having several top Afghan Taliban leaders among its alumni, including former Taliban chief Mullah Omar who received an honorary doctorate from the seminary.
photographer Fahhad Rajper made a series of powerful photographs of women called #TryBeatingMeLightly featuring Pakistani women of all ages reacting to the Council of Islamic Ideology's ridiculous bill about 'beating wives lightly'.
Pakistan is expected to discuss with the US, the alleged role of India's external spy agency RAW in abetting violence in the country.
The remarks by Dar, a close aide of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, came within days of the World Bank saying in a report that Pakistan will benefit from granting Most Favoured Nation-status to India.
"When we asked the US, to play facilitating role...Why do we ask? Simply because we are not engaging bilaterally," he said.
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