Our alliance with Pakistan is not worth the banknotes of aid it’s printed on, says a s h smyth |
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As predicted, Friday saw Pakistan's major conurbations grind to a halt as thousands of protesters poured into the streets to yell about death and burn effigies of the Queen, Tony Blair, and Sir Salman Rushdie. Odd, isn't it, how the Muslim street always erupts in 'spontaneous' protests on a Friday?
In case it wasn't already clear where Pakistani sympathies lay, on Thursday the Pakistan Ulema Council (a gathering of some 2,000 Islamic scholars) retaliated against Sir Salman's knighthood by conferring the title 'Sword of God' on Osama bin Laden.
Their sentiments were echoed by a coalition of Islamabad traders who united to put a $140,000 bounty on Rushdie's head, and by the Speaker of the Central Punjab provincial assembly, who announced that he intended to murder any blasphemer he could find. |
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| Friday saw thousands of protesters pour onto the streets of Pakistan |
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No denunciation of these bloody tirades has been issued from Islamabad. Far from it; the response of the Pakistani parliament has been to pass (unanimously) resolutions condemning Sir Salman's 'blasphemy', demanding the withdrawal of the knighthood, and insisting that the British government apologise.
Furthermore, a member of Pervez Musharraf's government, the minister for religious affairs Mohammed Ijaz ul-Haq, declared open season on Rushdie all over again by saying that the faithful were entitled to bomb him.
In a subsequent display of disgusting cowardice (perhaps under pressure from his boss), ul-Haq tried to wriggle out of what he had said by citing - blackest of ironies - his concerns about the damage Britain was doing to interfaith harmony and the fight against terrorism.
He needn't have bothered; his colleagues had long since trotted out the tired non-truth that, by defending freedom of expression, it is actually the British who are the cause of  |
