Pakistan bans Jamaat-ud-Dawa
So US commands and the slave-state jumps again, though is it really going to make any difference?ISLAMABAD: In a move that appears to be aimed at curbing militancy and extremism in the country, Pakistan has decided to ban 12 organizations, including Jamaat-ud Dawa (JuD), the frontrunner of banned Lashkar-e-Taiba, Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation, a welfare wing of the JuD, and the Haqqani Network.
The decision came a day after the US State Department declared Mullah Fazlullah, the chief of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) as a 'Specially Designated Global Terrorist'. Fazlullah, nicknamed Mullah Radio, had accepted responsibility for the last month attack on school in Peshawar, which left 142 children dead.
The carnage at school prompted Pakistani leadership review its security policy besides swiftly taking stringent measures, including lifting of moratorium on death penalty and establishment of military courts, to counter the scourge of terrorism.
"It's our first step towards execution of the National Action Plan. The nation will see more positive steps towards dismantling militant groups. Both civilian and military leadership decided to ban the Haqqani Network and JuD," The Express Tribune quoted a senior intelligence official as saying.
While JuD continues to operate openly in Pakistan, and its leader, Hafiz Saeed, holds public rallies and often gives TV interviews, the Haqqani Network, a yesteryear friend of Pakistan's spy agency, Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), was using the tribal region of North Waziristan as its springboard.
The US State Department had last year named the JuD as a "foreign terrorist organisation", while India blames its leader Hafiz Saeed for the 2008 Mumbai attacks.
Asif Khursheed, JuD Islamabad's spokesperson, revealed that last week the "home department sent us a letter informing us that the Jamaat is being kept on the watch-list with some two dozen other organisations".
"Jamaat-ud-Dawa is a purely welfare and charity organisation and has never been involved in bad motives. Even, the Supreme Court of Pakistan has justified our stance in the past," he told media.
According to Amir Rana, the executive director of the Pakistan Institute for Peace Studies, the banning of an organisation means freezing its assets, blocking its funding sources and proper monitoring of its activities. "In the next move, the offices, infrastructures and networks of the proscribed groups will be banned," he reportedly said.
Pakistan had banned 12 organisations days before US Secretary of State John Kerry visited Pakistan this week. With this latest addition of 12 more outfits, they the number of proscribed organizations in Pakistan has reached 72.
Harkat-ul-Jihad Islami, the organisation accused of conducting terrorist attacks in Pakistan and India is also among the newly banned groups. Its operational commander, Ilyas Kashmiri, was killed in a US drone strike in South Waziristan in 2011.
The list also features Harkat-ul-Mujahidin, the group accused of operating in Kashmir, and Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation, a welfare wing of the JuD.