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| India-Pakistan |
| Pakistan in turmoil as Bhutto buried |
| 2007-12-28 |
| The ripples of the assassination of Pakistan's former prime minister Benazir Bhutto on Thursday continued to widen on Friday morning as the slain opposition leader's funeral was stained by skyrocketing violence throughout the country and outside it. As Bhutto was being laid to rest, her furious supporters across the country ransacked banks, waged shootouts with police and burned train stations in a spasm of violence that threatened to plunge the country into deep turmoil less than two weeks before a crucial election. So Islamic, it brings a tear to my eye. President Pervez Musharraf's government allowed police to open fire on rioters disrupting the funeral, as the series of terror attacks sparked by the assassination continued. A roadside bomb went off near a vehicle carrying a local leader from the ruling party in northwestern Pakistan, killing him and three of his associates, police said. Early Friday morning, at least nine people were killed in clashes across the nuclear-armed US ally. In Indian-controlled Kashmir, Police clashed with hundreds of stone-throwing demonstrators protesting the assassination of Bhutto. Cause it's all the Hindus fault! |
| Posted by:g(r)omgoru |
| #12 Wake me when the rioters go for the nuke sites. |
| Posted by: Abu Uluque6305 2007-12-28 16:45 |
| #11 Good find on 'the kleptocrat in a hermes scarf' article John - the articles in 'The Times' today were suitably fawning, but, perhaps its too early after her death to be 'honest' about her. This is the MSM we're talking about after all. |
| Posted by: Tony (UK) 2007-12-28 13:34 |
| #10 Sardar Patel handled the accession of all the princely states except one - Kashmir. Nehru, who was himself Kashmiri, handled that himself.. and botched the thing up. In the end it was Patel who had to give the order... from an interview with Field Marshall Sam Manekshaw.... At the morning meeting he handed over the (Accession) thing. Mountbatten turned around and said, ' come on Manekji (He called me Manekji instead of Manekshaw), what is the military situation?' I gave him the military situation, and told him that unless we flew in troops immediately, we would have lost Srinagar, because going by road would take days, and once the tribesmen got to the airport and Srinagar, we couldn't fly troops in. Everything was ready at the airport. As usual Nehru talked about the United Nations, Russia, Africa, God almighty, everybody, until Sardar Patel lost his temper. He said, 'Jawaharlal, do you want Kashmir, or do you want to give it away'. He (Nehru) said,' Of course, I want Kashmir (emphasis in original). Then he (Patel) said 'Please give your orders'. And before he could say anything Sardar Patel turned to me and said, 'You have got your orders'. |
| Posted by: john frum 2007-12-28 10:22 |
| #9 The Khan of Kalat (now in Pak Balochistan) also resisted amalgamation into Pakistan at partition. He was made to sign the instrument of accession at gunpoint. On the Indian side, the Maharajah of Jaipur accompanied the Indian home minister Sardar Patel as he visted each of the 565 Princely states and informed each Maharajah quite bluntly that the old days were over. Under the Indian Independence Act passed by the UK Parliament, they had to give up power and join either India or Pakistan. |
| Posted by: john frum 2007-12-28 10:17 |
| #8 That was Hyderabad.. Junagadh was another state |
| Posted by: john frum 2007-12-28 10:07 |
| #7 I remember, John. You showed us pix of the rubies once. :: sigh :: |
| Posted by: Seafarious 2007-12-28 09:49 |
| #6 Her Grandfather was also a klepto. One of his last acts as prime minister of the princely state of Junagadh (absorbed into India at Partition in 1947) was to loot the entire state treasury and cart it off to Pakistan. |
| Posted by: john frum 2007-12-28 09:40 |
| #5 From In From the Cold... While the death of Mrs. Bhutto and her supporters is a human tragedy, it would be a mistake to characterize the late Prime Minister as some sort of political savior or saint. As the Abu Muqawama blog observed: The folks on NBC, though, are making it sound as if Bhutto was some brave liberal alternative to the Musharraf regime, swallowing hook, line, and sinker this narrative that Benazir Bhutto was some kind of Pakistani Aung San Suu Kyi. Okay, folks, we all know she was eloquent, went to Harvard and Oxford and was a darling of the English-language media. But she was arguably the most corrupt woman in the history of South Asia. She was removed from office not once but twice on corruption charges. And ruthless? She killed her own brother in 1996. |
| Posted by: tu3031 2007-12-28 09:11 |
| #4 hell assasinate 5 every week and they will eventually kill each other off |
| Posted by: sinse 2007-12-28 08:52 |
| #3 a kleptocrat in a Hermes scarf the difference is that Benazir is a pro at playing to the West. And that's what counts. She talks about women and extremism and the West applauds. And then conspires. Of all Pakistan's elected leaders she conspicuously did the least to help the cause of women. She never, for example, repealed the Hudood Ordinances, Pakistan's controversial laws that made no distinction between rape and adultery. She preferred instead to kowtow to the mullahs in order to cling to power, forming an expedient alliance with Pakistan's Religious Coalition Party and leaving Pakistan's women as powerless as she found them. |
| Posted by: john frum 2007-12-28 07:33 |
| #2 One of Benazir's most famous speeches was to a crowd in Muzarrafabad, Pak Kashmir A better looking Abu Mazen. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2007-12-28 07:28 |
| #1 In Indian-controlled Kashmir, Police clashed with hundreds of stone-throwing demonstrators protesting the assassination of Bhutto. One of Benazir's most famous speeches was to a crowd in Muzarrafabad, Pak Kashmir. She declared the campaign in Kashmir "Holy Jehad". Whipping the crowd into a frenzy she screamed Jagmohan ko jag-jag mo-mo han-han kar do making chopping gestures with her hands. (chop Jagmohan into pieces) Jagmohan was then the Governor of Indian Kashmir. |
| Posted by: john frum 2007-12-28 07:17 |