On the Passing of Pervez Musharraf

By Nadrat Siddique

The former dictator of my country, Pervez Musharraf is dead. Among his other ignominies,

- Musharraf turned a Muslim woman scientist, Dr. Aafia Siddiqui, over to the CIA, to be raped, tortured, and brutalized, her children forcibly removed from her and separately imprisoned. She was ultimately sentenced to 86 years in prison for a crime she could not have committed;

- Musharraf turned over the Islamabad-based Taliban ambassador, Mullah Abdus Salaam Zaeef, never mind his diplomatic status, to the U.S. The soft spoken, scholarly ambassador was then sent to the U.S. torture center at Guantanamo Bay and held for 4½ years before being released. He was never charged nor tried.

- During the early years of the WOT ("War on Terror"), Musharraf allowed the U.S. to put out a dragnet to seize all manner of innocents from Pakistani soil. These men and boys, including some as young as 14, were sent to secret prisons, where they endured horrific torture. Many of these were sent on to the U.S. torture center at Guantanamo Bay, where they were held for indefinite periods, without charge or trial, deprived of counsel.

- Post 9-11, Musharraf subverted Pakistan's economy to serve the U.S. WOT.

- Musharraf ordered the military assault and siege of Lal Masjid, a major mosque in Islamabad, which he perceived to be too hard line. He ordered the murder of its imam. The imam's mother and numerous other members of the mosque were also killed in the assault.

- In conjunction with the Lal Masjid assault, Musharraf ordered the Pakistan Army to attack Jamia Hafsa, an Islamic seminary for young Muslim women. Jamia Hafsa was contiguous to, and associated with Lal Masjid. Large numbers of Jamia Hafsa students were detained. Many of these "disappeared" indefinitely.

- Musharraf authorized the Pakistan Military to conduct the aerial bombardment of hundreds of mosques in the Northwestern frontier of Pakistan, setting off what became known as the Waziristan War.

- Musharraf authorized unfettered use of Pakistani air space by the U.S., allowing the latter to conduct thousands of drone strikes across the Pakistani frontier, as well as in Afghanistan. These resulted in the deaths of thousands of Pakistani and Afghan civilian deaths.

I, for one, will not be mourning Pervez Musharraf. He can most charitably be characterized as an imperialist sycophant and king of munafiqs. The pain of his medical treatment for amyloidosis will pale in comparison to what Allah (AWJ) has in store for this war criminal. Inshallah.

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