Government unveils 'Paigham-i-Pakistan' fatwa against terrorism

[Abdullah719]

Political party leaders and religious scholars called for unity and a unanimous narrative to counter terrorism in Pakistan at a ceremony announcing the 'Paigham-i-Pakistan' fatwa in Islamabad on Tuesday.

President Mamnoon Hussain, while speaking at the ceremony, expressed confidence that the unanimous fatwa issued by religious scholars belonging to various schools of thought would help address the challenges posed by terrorism, extremism and sectarianism, Radio Pakistan reported.

Issuing a fatwa drafted by means of a consultative process is a step in the right direction, the president said, adding that it would portray a "soft and positive image of Pakistan" and highlight Islam as a religion of peace, brotherhood, tolerance and accommodation.

Interior Minister Ahsan Iqbal, while addressing participants of the ceremony, underlined the urgent need for Muslim nations to progress and have something positive to show over the next 400 years, and touted the fatwa as a means to obtain national unity.

"If we want to correct our direction for the future, it is necessary that society is peaceful and stable because without them we cannot embark on this journey. We must introspect and look within instead of hypothesising about conspiracies. We need to be ready and accountable in order to undertake this journey," he said.

"Pakistan was not created so it could be just one more addition to a list of the world's poorest countries. It is necessary to show the world that even in this modern day and age, the Muslims of South Asia have the ability to form a successful nation on the basis of Islamic principles," he stressed.

"It is a matter of concern that after 70 years, the dream for Pakistan, the dignity and justice we had to provide the nation, were not realised. All of this is only possible when the ethos of a nation or group of people is apparent to them," he said.

"When the nation ceases to believe in self-reliance and its narrative pertaining to itself is scattered, then it becomes a group of people who have differences with each other. When differences are prevalent, then the outcome is that which we are seeing today," he said.

"The fatwa will provide a platform for national unity... So that in the 21st century, we can make Pakistan a distinguished country, an Asian tiger, and bring the Quaid's dream to fruition," he claimed.

"We have been fighting regional conflict, and the events we face today are not completely of our doing. To a great extent, the world powers who fought the Soviet Union are responsible," Iqbal said.

"But when the Soviet lost in Afghanistan, the world powers dusted off their hands and disappeared, leaving behind piles of weapons and the poorest segments of those societies," he said.

Foreign Minister Khawaja Asif at the ceremony urged the nation to own the narrative the fatwa is based on, and to back all national institutions that are working against terrorism.

"With this narrative, we make it clear to the entire world that all national institutions are united against terrorism," Asif said.

"We have rejected all forms of terrorism and extremism," he asserted.

"The land of Pakistan at no time shall be allowed to be used for the propagation of any kind of terrorism," he said, adding that this included training and recruitment of terrorists, along with execution of terror activities in other countries "and other such ulterior motives".

The outcomes of this narrative will be evident to the nation soon, Asif vowed.

Speaking to APP on the eve of the unveiling of the Paigham-i-Pakistan, religious scholars had urged collective efforts by state institutions, within the ambit of the Constitution, to cleanse society of the menaces of extremism and terrorism.

Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-F (JUI-F) chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman had said that "all religious parties and scholars are with the state and Constitution for the welfare of people.

Religious scholar Maulana Rafi Usmani described the unveiling of the narrative as 'historic'. He said that scholars from all sects had deliberated over each word in the document for months before preparing a decree.

"We hope that the Paigham-i-Pakistan will help improve the present situation in the country and set a future course to lead the nation to a destination of peace and prosperity," he added.

https://www.dawn.com/news/1383306/govt-unveils-paigham-i-pakistan-fatwa-against-terrorism

 

[DW44]

How groundbreaking. After the resounding success of the National Action Plan, this is precisely what we needed to hammer in the final nail in the coffin of terrorism. Kudos.

 

[MenInG]

As if people who blow themselves up actually care about this?!

 

[Abdullah719]

Ashraf Ghani questions Pakistan's anti-terror fatwa

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has questioned a recent Pakistani religious ruling declaring suicide bombings un-Islamic.

Speaking at a gathering in the capital, Kabul, on January 17, Ghani asked how the January 16 antiterror edict could only be limited to Pakistan.

"Aren't Islamic religious principles universal for all Islamic countries? Or can they be limited to one country?” he asked. “Unlike [Joseph] Stalin’s socialism, Islamic teachings cannot be limited to one country because they are universal.”

Repeating his government’s longstanding stance that the insecurity in Afghanistan is prompted by Islamabad’s support for the Afghan Taliban and its military wing, the Haqqani network, he added, “This is why this fatwa first needs to be implemented in relation to Afghanistan.”

In a book titled Pakistan’s Message published by the government, more than 1,800 Pakistani clerics representing various Islamic sects declared suicide bombings to be forbidden or "haram" under Islamic principles. They also called for a complete ban on violence in the name of jihad by non-state groups.

"This fatwa provides a strong base for the stability of a moderate Islamic society," Pakistani President Mamnoon Hussain wrote in the book, adding that Pakistanis can "seek guidance" from the fatwa "for building a national narrative in order to curb extremism in keeping with the golden principles of Islam."

Ghani, however, said that by supporting groups such as the Afghan Taliban Islamabad is undermining the stability of its neighbouring Islamic country.

“Supporting terrorism is similar to rearing snakes,” he noted. “Those who raise snakes in their backyard are ultimately bitten by them.”

For decades, Afghans have blamed Pakistan for acting to undermine their country’s stability. In the 1970s, Islamabad began training Afghan Islamist guerrillas long before the communist coup and subsequent Soviet invasion of the country.

For many Afghans, the Soviet withdrawal in 1989 didn’t change Islamabad’s calculus when it continued supporting hard-line Islamists, which ultimately led to the Taliban controlling most of Afghanistan by the turn of the century.

Islamabad supported the U.S. war on terror in ending the Taliban regime in late 2001 for hosting Al-Qaeda and affiliated groups. But months after the demise of the Taliban, US and Afghan officials accused Islamabad of allowing the hard-line movement and its international allies to retreat into Pakistan.

For the next 16 years, Washington celebrated Islamabad as an ally while frequently criticising its counter terrorism efforts. It gave Pakistan billions of dollars in military and development assistance but also conducted hundreds of drone strikes inside the country. The United States also claimed credit for killing Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in 2011 and Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Mansur in 2016, both inside Pakistan.

Washington’s frustration with Islamabad appeared to reach a tipping point when U.S. President Donald Trump accused Islamabad of giving “safe haven to terrorists we hunt in Afghanistan.” In a January 1 post on Twitter, he also accused of Pakistan of taking $33 billion in aid over the past 15 years while offering back "nothing but lies and deceit."

In Kabul, Mawlawi Abdul Basir Haqqani, the head of a clerical association, says the Pakistani religious ruling or fatwa is connected to the latest warning from Trump.

“Why didn’t they issue the fatwa a few years ago?” he asked in an apparent reference to a decade of violent attacks by militant groups that killed more than 60,000 Pakistani civilians and soldiers. “It is also important to note that the religious scholars of other Muslim countries, including Afghanistan, had no role in framing this fatwa.”

In a hint at how Ghani wants to end the war in his country, he called on the Taliban to make peace with his government.

“If you are Afghan, do not allow a neighbouring country to decide on your behalf,” he said. “Do they want peace to return to this country?”

The Pakistani religious edict is unlikely to placate domestic and international critics who frequently accuse the country’s security services of covertly supporting Islamic militants to utilise their irregular warfare expertise and act as proxy forces to achieve Islamabad's goals in Afghanistan and India.

https://www.dawn.com/news/1383753/ashraf-ghani-questions-pakistans-anti-terror-fatwa

 

[Pakistanian]

^All they do is whine, y'all ain't creative enough to create your own fatwa so you rippin on ours. Get outta here.

 

[saeedhk]

How groundbreaking. After the resounding success of the National Action Plan, this is precisely what we needed to hammer in the final nail in the coffin of terrorism. Kudos.

Exactly.

Evidence: Aurangzeb Farooqi and Ludhianvi were among the guests at the ceremony.

 

[MenInG]

ISLAMABAD: In October last year, Army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa traveled to Kabul as part of efforts to improve strained ties between Pakistan and Afghanistan. One of the decisions, according to Kabul, reached during the visit was that Pakistan would seek a ‘fatwa’ or religious decree from its religious scholars against suicide bombings inside Afghanistan.

Pakistan officially never acknowledged if the army chief made any such commitment. However, now a senior official, who was privy to the outcome of Gen Qamar’s visit to Kabul, confirmed the development.

What is significant, though, is the revelation by the official that the Afghan government was just telling ‘half-truth.’

The official, who requested not to be named because of the sensitivity of the subject, told The Express Tribune that it was a ‘mutual commitment’, meaning that both the sides would seek fatwa from their respective religious scholars against suicide bombings.

1,800 Pakistani religious scholars declare suicide bombings ‘haram’ in new fatwa

Therefore, it was not just Pakistan but also Afghanistan, which agreed to obtain a ‘fatwa’ from its religious scholars, declaring suicide attacks being perpetrated by outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and its affiliates inside Pakistan as un-Islamic.

“But, we have yet to see any effort by the Afghan government to honour its commitment,” the official said while pointing out that Pakistan had already made good on its promise by securing a religious decree recently from around 1,800 scholars against the suicide bombings.

Afghanistan, however, is not convinced with Pakistan’s move, insisting that Pakistani fatwa should have explicitly mentioned Afghanistan.

President Ashraf Ghani said the Pakistani fatwa should have included the entire Muslim world including Afghanistan.

Foreign Minister Khawaja Asif, however, clarified that the suicide bombing was un-Islamic “whether it takes place on the moon or in any part of the world” in an effort to dispel the impression the move was not sufficient enough to cover Afghanistan.

Giving rare insight into the recent high-level discussions between the two neighbors, the Pakistani official revealed how Afghanistan dragged its feet on certain commitments.

To substantiate his claims, the official cited the firsthand account of a meeting between Afghan President Ghani and his delegation with the army chief last October.

During the meeting, the official said, the Afghan president spoke highly of Pakistan calling Afghanistan and Pakistan as “inseparable brothers”.

On Ghani’s encouraging remarks, the army chief requested the Afghan president to make this part of a joint statement in order to send a positive message. The Afghan president instantly agreed.

But the moment, the high-powered talks concluded between the two sides, Ghani was surrounded by his aides and others to question how he could make such a commitment with Pakistan.

“And the rest was history. His (Ghani) positive sentiments were never allowed to reflect in a joint statement,” the official said in order to explain that how certain elements within the Afghan government were running the show in Kabul.

Security report calls TTP ‘still a potent threat’

“Of course, those were the same elements who never wanted any improvement in the relationship between the two countries,” the official lamented.

But the story did not just end there.

According to the official, the Afghan government was also reluctant to respond positively to a Pakistan proposal, envisaging establishment of different working groups not only to remove trust deficit but also enter into a cooperative relationship.

The different working groups covered the entire gamut of relationship — including security, military, intelligence, political and economic between the two estranged neighbors.

“The dithering on part of Afghanistan is incomprehensible,” regretted the official.

https://tribune.com.pk/story/1614575/1-pakistan-awaits-afghan-fatwa-ttp-affiliates/