Lal Masjid: Bodies Bodies Bodies everywhere
How does one make hundreds of bodies disappear before dawn?
posted by maverick @ 6:17 PM
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
About Me
- Name: maverick
- Location: Boston, Massachusetts, United States
I don't quite know how I became a consultant, I wanted to be a journalist but my parents thought that wasn't a profession for a decent person to follow... after that it was simply about following the herd. Ended up as a physicist. And now am suffering through the consequences.
Previous Posts
- Lal Masjid: That Troublesome Credibility Issue
- Lal Masjid: The Death of Maulana Abdul Rashid Ghazi
- Lal Masjid: Musharraf makes his last assault
- Lal Masjid: The core issue in Pakistan's current c...
- Lal Masjid: A desperate attempt to avoid an utter ...
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- Lal Masjid: On The Matter Of The Physical Space
- Lal Masjid: The Moral Fallout
- Lal Masjid: Aabpara Presses The Pause Button
- Lal Masjid Saga: The Calm Before the Storm
7 Comments:
The same way as David Copperfield managed to make the Statue of Liberty disappear. Make the people look in the wrong place. hh
hi m,
1)i tried googling to figure out the number of men & women who were inside the lal masjid. But no one has given exact figures. can you help me in that?
2)Do you really think that jehadis will react violently against Musharaff or even the PA. To take on against there mentors one will require arms and of course money. Will saudis help these jehadis.
3)The only scenario where jehadis take on Musharaff is when sections of ISI & Army join hands with the jehadis. The actions of 111 bde will have to be keenly watched.
He said later in the day as the cleanup operation was almost complete that 73 bodies had been collected, and none of them were of women.
However, a promised tour of the compound for the media was delayed from Wednesday to Thursday, and restrictions on journalists visiting hospitals in Rawalpindi and Islamabad remained in place. [DTh]
Hi Anonymous,
I don't think we will know the exact numbers. The numbers I am hearing are in the hundreds. I don't know how they are going to make that many bodies disappear.
The head of the wifaq board has already denounced the government's claim that the civilians were "hostages". This is pre-positioning to put the blame on the government for all fatalities.
I think this is the clearest sign that the Deobandi leadership that initially signed off on Musharraf's right to rule, is now at a parting of ways with him.
Hi Nitin,
Directly down the road from Masjid is Aabpara Chowk, beyond the Kashmir road is the sports complex. This complex is currently being used to dump the dead. I suspect they will create a mass burial site on the land to the east of the complex as it is sufficiently secluded.
I doubt that the bodies can be buried in a mass grave inside the masjid or the Navy compound nearby as there are too many underground facilities there.
Also some bodies are being interred in a grave yard in H-11 which is down Kashmir road from Aabpara chowk.
Ghazi's body is currently being interred in his ancestral village of Rojhan Mazari in Rajanpur. There is no word on his mother's body. The burial is being conducted by the military itself and the participation of the relatives has been reduced to a minimum. There is a curfew in the town itself.
This is not like Gilgit Baltistan where the Pakistan Army could drive into a town in the middle of the night and dump off a body. If they do that to the bodies of the students killed in this raid, they will light unquenchable fires in the cities.
Hi Nitin,
The way they are currently doing it now is that before the bodies are interred in unmarked graves they are taking fingerprints and DNA samples from the bodies.
The parents with missing children are being asked to submit their DNA samples and these are being compared with the DNA from the bodies.
This procedure ensures that they do not have to tell every parent at once that their child is dead and they can break it slowly to them over a longer period of time. Also as the funerals are already done, the parents can then be released the information about the bodies (or the bodies can be exhumed if the parents can afford to pay for it) at a later date.
By delaying media access to the facilities by an effective curfew in G-6 and surrounding areas, Musharraf has ensured that no photos of the crisis have circulated in the media. Needless to say that a number of western media groups are complicit in this "Operation Silence".
You may recall that the same media groups weren't so happy to cooperate with us after Bluestar, as a matter of fact one high and mighty editor made his career by publishing photos of the Akal Takht taken right after the operation concluded. This photo graces every gurudwara outside India whenever Khalistani political fortunes rise.
I estimate that between the assault force and the "Jihadis" killed in the seige about a company of SSG (serving and "on extra regimental duties") have bene killed in this operation.
Maverick,
I doubt that clearing the complex took two whole days as the official line says. It took two days to clear the complex and effect the cover-up of the number of people killed while doing so.
Who exactly does Shortcut, Waheed, and other assorted mouthpieces think believe them when they go around telling whoever will listen that there were no unarmed civilians killed while clearing the complex? Do they not realize how surreal that sounds with a few hundred unarmed civilians inside the complex?
Some data points:
(1) The Army asked for 800 funeral shrouds after 300 had already been sent. Obviously they deny it.
(2) Even now, all the hospitals in Rawalpindi and Islamabad remain closed off to inquiring people. Some who pushed their luck were told they would be shot if they pushed too hard. Obviously they deny these threats as well. I suspect this is to keep the actual number of military dead and wounded under wraps.
(3) The disreputable forum reports that Aaj TV mentioned that 285 unclaimed bodies were going to be buried together and that there was some footage of people digging trenches for that. This might be what the first 300 shrouds were for.
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