SWAT
batling the radicals holed up in Lal Masjid, Pakistan security forces are gearing up to take on another set of well entrenched extremists led by a cleric, in a tribal area, who has issued a decree asking people to attack anyone supporting the crackdown on the Islamabad mosque.
Government has decided to launch a massive operation against the banned Tehrik-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat Mohammadi leader Maulana Fazalullah in the tribal Malakand agency of the North West Frontier Province, media reports said.
Fazalullah is a close associate of Lal Masjid cleric Abdul Aziz, arrested while trying to sneak out from the besieged mosque in a burqa four days ago, and his younger brother Abdul Rashid Ghazi. Fresh deployment of troops started following an announcement of war against forces by Fazalullah after the operation against Lal Masjid, the Post daily said.
Situations is alarmingly deteriorating in Swat district as most of the students of the madrassas are hailing from the region. Also, after the security operation, Fazaullah had said anyone who supported the crackdown was an 'infidel'. He called the religious leaders supporting the present government as "rebels of Islam".
BAJAUR
Around 20,000 Pakistani tribesmen vowed Monday to take revenge on President Pervez Musharraf for the siege of a radical mosque in the capital Islamabad, witnesses and officials said, cited by AFP.
"We are ready for jihad!" cried the protesters -- some of them armed with Kalashnikovs and rocket launchers -- who rallied near Khar, the main town in the troubled Bajaur tribal district bordering Afghanistan.
Local pro-Taliban commanders told the gathering that there should be a holy war in return for the standoff at the Red Mosque.
The confrontation has so far left at least 24 people dead, according to the government, but the mosque's leaders say more than 400 students have been killed.
"We beg Allah to destroy Musharraf and we will seek revenge for the atrocities committed at the Red Mosque," militant commander Maulvi Faqir Mohammed told the gathering.
Mohammed had links to a hardline madrassa, or Islamic school, that was bombed by Pakistani forces in October 2006, killing around 80 people.
The tribesmen shouted slogans including "Death to Musharraf", "Death to America" and "Those who are friends of America are traitors."
"Musharraf should immediately end his atrocity against the mosque," Mohammed added.
__________________
ALLAH RASOOL QURAN SUNNAH JIHAD JANNAH INSHAALLAH