KARACHI, 5 March — Interior Minister Moinuddin Haider served a fresh warning to the militants yesterday, asking them to behave or face a further crackdown.
He issued the statement after being informed on return from abroad that although sectarian killings have to a great extent been controlled after the Jan. 12 ban on the extremists, isolated incidents had continued almost on a daily basis. Even yesterday, a medical doctor was done to death outside his clinic, causing alarm and despondency among citizens about their life and property. Moin agreed with the fears expressed during his meeting with editors and senior journalists and remarked that the “banned militant organizations were not getting the message right. Until now we have been trying to make them understand. We will now have to give a much tougher message to them that security and safety of life and property of the people is the responsibility of the state, which the administration is duty-bound to discharge”.
“I am not yet satisfied with the law and order situation. Let there be no mistake about government’s ability to deal with terrorists and those indulging in sectarian assassinations” he said and disclosed that data on those endangering the life and honor of the people was being collected, and intelligence agencies were being equipped and strengthened to deal sternly with them.
The problem, the minister said, was that people were afraid to give evidence against members of the militant organizations for fear of reprisal. Some 600 terrorists and killers were in jails but there was no evidence against them. This is a cause needing public support. The government therefore has decided to create an awareness among the citizens to do their duty toward their country and the state, and not leave everything for the administration to handle.
Moin disagreed with suggestions that police had failed in its duty to protect the Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl who was declared dead on Feb. 22. The efficiency of the Pakistani police has won appreciation from the American government, and also from the widow of the slain reporter, he said.
Asked how would he justify statements from President Musharraf and others that Daniel was alive, he asked “how could we declare him dead when there was no evidence to support that contention?” The government announced his death only when the video was released, Moin said and dismissed suggestions that even the president was kept in the dark.
In reply to a question, the minister said that “we are looking for four more people (accomplices of Jaish-e-Muhammad activist Shiekh Omar Ahmed Saeed, now in police custody) in connection with the kidnap and murder of the US reporter.”
