ISLAMABAD: A deal between the Pakistani government and the Taleban to restore peace in the Swat Valley yesterday collapsed with a mediator withdrawing from the pact he helped broker, reports said. “Maulana Sufi Mohammad announced his withdrawal from Swat peace deal on Thursday,” Geo TV reported.
The pro-Taleban peace broker lashed out at Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari yesterday for not ratifying a deal imposing Islamic law in Swat Valley, holding him accountable for any return to violence.
February’s agreement between Mohammad and Pakistan’s government to implement Shariah law in the northwest valley triggered alarm around the world, raising fears it would embolden Taleban and Al-Qaeda extremism.
Shariah courts were reported last month to have started work in the valley, but Zardari had not yet signed the agreement into law, as had been agreed in terms of the peace deal, Mohammad said.
“I am ending my peace camp in Swat and if any bloodshed occurs, President Zardari and the federal government will be responsible,” Mohammad told a news conference in Mingora, the main town in the former ski resort of Swat.
Thousands of Taleban followers spent nearly two years waging a terrifying campaign to enforce Shariah law in Swat - beheading opponents, bombing girls’ schools, outlawing entertainment and fighting government forces.
“The provincial government is sincere in implementing the based-based justice system but President Zardari is not signing it so I am leaving my peace camp,” said Mohammad. He said that he was making the move “in protest” and charged that “without Shariah there cannot be any peace in Swat.”
The cleric, who was jailed for six years in Pakistan after leading thousands of supporters into Afghanistan to fight US-led troops, had camped out at a preaching center in Mingora since signing the Shariah deal in February.
Mohammad’s spokesman Ameer Izzat emphasized that no one had quit the peace agreement, only that the cleric was moving to another place in Swat where a consultative council would decide the next course of action.
“We have ended our camp here and going to Aman Darra. The peace agreement is not over. The Shoura council will meet and decide about the future,” Izzat told AFP.
The February Shariah deal came under further controversy last week when a video broadcast on Pakistan television showed the public flogging of a veiled girl in Swat that incensed the Muslim nation of more than 160 million.
Pakistan’s top judge, Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, who was reinstated by Zardari’s ruling party last month nearly two years after he was sacked, has opened a hearing into the case, apparently involving a 17-year-old girl.
Information minister in North West Frontier Province, Mian Iftikhar Hussain, said that he hoped the issues surrounding the Swat Shariah agreement could be resolved through dialogue. “Our agreement is intact and our straightforward strategy is that we want peace,” Hussain told AFP. “It is a public demand and we also demand that the president put his signature on the law as soon as possible.”
Hasan Askari Rizvi, a political and military analyst, said Zardari may have delayed signing the agreement because of concerns within the year-old civilian government over negotiating with militants.
“The opinion is divided,” Rizvi said. “A good number of people in the government think that this is not the right approach.” Zardari’s foot-dragging also lets him save face with Western critics of the deal, he said.
