Author:
Publication: www.pbs.org/
Date: March 2004
URL: http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/pakistan/thestory.html
"Kashmir is not just the cause of
extremists," says FRONTLINE/World's Obaid. "It's a deeply felt issue, embedded
in Pakistan's identity." There's even a national holiday, Kashmir Day,
and Obaid sees angry Pakistani nationalists burning an effigy of India's
prime minister."
Spring has arrived in Pakistan,
and the season has brought a thaw in the Cold War between Pakistan
and India, bitter enemies for more than 50 years. A train is now allowed
to cross the border. FRONTLINE/World correspondent Sharmeen Obaid boards
this "peace train" in India and travels home to Pakistan to see how people
are reacting to the cautious attempts to settle differences between the
two countries.
Born and raised in Pakistan, Obaid
is now a graduate student at Stanford as well as a reporter for New York
Times Television who has covered the dramatic political and social changes
in Pakistan since 9/11 and the U.S. intervention in neighboring Afghanistan.
On the train Obaid meets a woman
who is on her way to a reunion with her children and grandchildren in Pakistan.
"I've prayed for the day the borders would open," she tells Obaid. As the
train pulls into the city of Lahore, Pakistan, Obaid witnesses the meaning
of reconciliation as long-separated families and friends embrace each other.
All this is possible because of a historic handshake between Pakistan's
President Pervez Musharraf and India's Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee,
who agreed to begin peace talks in January 2004.
That night in Lahore, Obaid sees
the start of Basant, a festival celebrating the advent of spring. Originally
a Hindu holiday, Basant has long been embraced by Pakistan's Muslim majority.
It is a time of kite flying, dancing, even drinking. As she wanders the
gaily-lit streets at night, Obaid speaks with Pakistanis who tell her they
are hopeful about the possibility of a real peace with India. But there
is also a note of caution. "Ask me another time," an older steet vendor
tells her. "If this interview is aired, we will both be jailed. This is
Pakistan!"
Observing the mix of local and Western
billboards, fast food outlets and banks in the city, Obaid describes Pakistan
as "a country of secrets and paradoxes, still emerging from its recent
past, before 9/11, when it was the Taliban's main supporter." She knows
that her country is "determined to be part of the modern world," but finds
itself at a "dangerous crossroads."
Obaid's first interview is with
Jugnu Mohsin, the publisher of the Friday Times newspaper and a woman who
thinks Pakistan is moving in a positive direction. "I may be being very
unconventional here, but I'll say to you that 9/11 has been very good for
Pakistan," Mohsin tells Obaid. "Suddenly, overnight, we had to choose which
way to go. The state decided to dump the Taliban -- not a moment too soon,
I can tell you as a woman."
Mohsin notes that the economy has
improved and that there is a groundswell of popular support for peace with
India. "We don't want to fight a thousand-year war with India," she declares.
"Not least because both countries are armed with nuclear weapons."
Obaid points out the nuclear monuments
that have been erected in Pakistan -- replicas of the mountain where Pakistan
first tested its atomic bomb. And during her trip, the controversy over
Pakistan's nuclear program becomes an international scandal when it is
revealed that Pakistan had been sharing nuclear secrets with Iran, Libya
and North Korea.
In a dramatic televised speech,
Dr. A.Q. Khan, the "father of Pakistan's bomb," apologizes for proliferating
nuclear technology, then President Musharraf calls a televised press conference
to pardon Dr. Khan and assert that the esteemed scientist was acting unilaterally,
for his own financial benefit, and that the government and the military
were not involved. In effect, this puts a lid on further investigations.
The United States and India seem
appeased, but Obaid shows that the Pakistani public generally supports
Khan. He is considered a national hero for matching India's nuclear arsenal.
Ahmed Rashid, a prominent journalist
and critic of the government, tells Obaid it is "impossible" that Dr. Khan
acted alone. He says it was the Pakistani army that needed the missiles
they got in a nuclear barter deal with the North Koreans. "I think General
Beg, as army chief, I am sure was involved."
Obaid is able to secure an interview
with General Mirza Aslam Beg, former army chief of staff, at his home in
Rawalpindi, although he is in no mood for questions. "Allegations have
been made that you knew of the nuclear proliferation," says Obaid. "Why
do you think you haven't been arrested?"
"Just to disappoint you," General
Beg shoots back. "And my American friends and their stooges here in Pakistan,
they still want me behind bars for sins which I have not committed." Beg
views the nuclear revelations as an American "conspiracy to destabilize
Pakistan."
Obaid also manages to interview
Pakistan's former spymaster, Lieutenant General Hamid Gul, the head of
the country's notorious ISI intelligence agency before 9/11, when Pakistan
openly supported the Taliban. When the nuclear program was going strong,
Gul was one of the most powerful men in Pakistan. He, too, denies that
the military was involved in nuclear proliferation. "This is fibbing, this
is speculation," he insists. Gul blames America and Israel for trying to
undermine Pakistan and take away its nuclear capability. "Islam is the
target, Islam is the new enemy," he proclaims.
Obaid discovers that Gul's strong
anti-Americanism, and his paranoia, are widespread in Pakistan. "More and
more the nuclear scandal feels like a Pandora's box," she says. "Who knows
what would happen to Pakistan if it were opened?"
Obaid then sets off for the northwest
frontier to meet one of President Musharraf's unlikely allies and sharpest
critics, Sami ul-Haq, a senator and founding member of Pakistan's powerful
fundamentalist political movement. No friend of the United States, ul-Haq
is a friend of Osama bin Laden, though he says he hasn't seen him lately.
The militant cleric asserts that Pakistan has a duty to share its nuclear
technology with other Muslims: "If we gave it to Iran, what's the crime?
If we gave it to Libya, what's the crime?"
Ul-Haq tells Obaid that he believes
President Musharraf has cut a deal with Washington, allowing U.S. troops
to cross the Afghan-Pakistan border in a spring operation to hunt down
bin Laden and al Qaeda. "They will leave our border in shambles. They want
Muslims to be tied up like goats and sheep, so they can slaughter us at
their will."
Musharraf, says Obaid, is caught
between the demands of fundamentalists at home and his promise to the United
States to fight terrorism. "Musharraf is under enormous pressure," confirms
journalist Ahmed Rashid. "He's seen as toeing the American line, making
peace with India, blaming the scientists for this nuclear proliferation."
Rashid thinks it is impossible for Musharraf to continue to appease both
radical Islamists at home and his Western supporters.
In December 2003, President Musharraf
narrowly escaped two assassination attempts. In the first attack, explosives
ripped apart a bridge just seconds after his presidential convoy passed
over it. Then only two weeks later, on Christmas Day, someone tried to
kill him again.
Obaid vists the site of the second
assassination attempt, when two cars filled with explosives rammed into
the presidential motorcade. Seventeen people died in the blast and more
than 40 were injured. Visibly shaken by the assault, Musharraf appeared
on television and vowed to crack down on domestic terrorists. At the crime
scene, Obaid interviews eyewitnesses and an argument erupts between those
denouncing religious extremists and those defending them.
In the rubble of the December 25th
blast, investigators found one suicide bomber's cell phone with the memory
chip still intact. The phone numbers on it linked the attempted assassin
to a militant Pakistani group with links to al Qaeda. The group is fighting
in Kashmir, the disputed, mostly Muslim territory between Pakistan and
India.
"Kashmir is not just the cause of
extremists," says FRONTLINE/ World's Obaid. "It's a deeply felt issue,
embedded in Pakistan's identity." There's even a national holiday, Kashmir
Day, and Obaid sees angry Pakistani nationalists burning an effigy of India's
prime minister.
Now that Musharraf is trying to
make peace with India and resolve the long-standing conflict over Kashmir,
he has declared that Kashmiri jihadis are terrorists. The jihadis have
been forced underground. But Obaid manages to arrange a clandestine meeting
with a leader of one of the banned groups.
At a secret location, illuminated
only by candlelight, Obaid interviews the jihadi, who obscures his face
but vehemently denounces India for committing atrocities in Kashmir. "We
are not terrorists," he insists. "We are fighting a war for the liberation
of Kashmir." He denies that Kashmiri jihadis are responsible for the recent
attacks on President Musharraf, blaming them instead on India and Israel.
Obaid leaves worried that the chances
for peace are more fragile than she thought. What chance do peace agreements
have when jihadis are prepared to die to make Kashmir part of Pakistan?
Obaid also fears that the spring military offensive against al Qaeda could
bring more trouble to her country and to President Musharraf, particularly
if U.S. troops cross into Pakistan.
On the other hand, she can't imagine
what would happen to Pakistan if Musharraf is ousted or killed.
Back in Lahore, Basant is still
going strong -- kites fill the air and Sufi dancers whirl in the streets.
There is still an atmosphere of hope and renewal.
Obaid's final stop is the Indian-Pakistan
border at Wagah. Every day there's an elaborate ceremony watched by eager
crowds on both sides of the frontier. Pakistani soldiers in dark green
uniforms and their Indian counterparts in khaki brown engage in "a ritualized
shadow play" -- strutting and confronting each other.
"But on this day," Obaid observes,
"I saw something different. For the first time, in a gesture of friendship,
they shook hands. And the crowd broke out in cheers. On both sides."
