It has been suggested that this article be merged into The Establishment (Pakistan) . (Discuss) Proposed since November 2024. |
The Pakistan Armed Forces have been criticized for eroding democratic processes in Pakistan, for being the largest business conglomeration in the country and for excessive control over the domestic and foreign policies of Pakistan. In 2019, The Economist blamed Pakistan Army for the poverty in Pakistan. [1]
Critics of the Pakistan Army, such as human rights activist Manzoor Pashteen, have been jailed while like-minded Pakistani citizens are warned against criticizing the military establishment. [2] [3] In Pakistan, the military is considered a part of what is known as The Establishment; they control the state through a backdoor and are a part of a working deep state.
The Establishment's runs a military–industrial complex in Pakistan with more than 50 business entities worth over US$20 billion; owned through Army Welfare Trust, Defence Housing Authority, Fauji Foundation ,and Shaheen Foundation; runs Pakistan's largest business empire ranging from petrol pumps to huge industrial plants, banks, bakeries, schools and universities, hosiery factories, milk dairies, stud farms, and cement plants, as well Defence Housing Authority townships. [4]
The Establishment has control over the foreign, [5] and domestic policy of Islamisation of Pakistan. [6] [7] [8]
According to the historian Professor Mubarak Ali, textbook "reform" in Pakistan began with the introduction of Pakistan Studies and Islamic studies by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in 1971 into the national curriculum as a compulsory subject and the military dictator Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, under a general drive towards Islamization, started the process of historical revisionism in earnest and exploited this initiative. 'The Pakistani establishment taught their children right from the beginning that this state was built on the basis of religion – that's why they don't have tolerance for other religions and want to wipe-out all of them.' [9]
Core principles/values of the Establishment are the policy of treating India as an arch-rival and existential threat, the Kashmir liberation from hindus , Islamisation of Pakistan, Punjab as the heartland/core of Pakistan, strategic use of non-state militants and other Islamic states as Pakistan's natural allies. [10]
During the rule of General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq a "program of Islamization" of the country including the textbooks was started to ingrain school kids with Islamised fundamentals. [11] [12] According to the Sustainable Development Policy Institute, since the 1970s Pakistan's school textbooks have systematically inculcated hatred towards India and Hindus through historical revisionism. [13] These school books played a key role in spreading hatred against non-Muslims, particularly against Hindus and distorted the history. [14] Professor Marwat blamed General Zia for “sowing seeds of discord in society on religious and ethnic lines by stuffing school curricula with material that promoted hatred now manifested in the shape of extremism, intolerance, militancy, sectarianism, dogmatism and fanaticism ... after the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965 countless lessons and chapters were introduced that spread hatred among the students and portrayed India as the biggest enemy of the Muslims. That stuff should be done away with." [15] According to Tufts University professor Seyyed Vali Reza Nasr, Indophobia in Pakistan increased with the ascendancy of the militant Islamist Jamaat-e-Islami under Sayyid Abul Ala Maududi. [16] Indophobia, together with Anti-Hinduism and racist ideologies, such as the martial race theory, were the driving factors behind the re-writing of school textbooks in Pakistan (in both "secular" schools and Islamic madrassahs) in order to promote a biased and revisionist historiography of the Indian subcontinent that promulgated Indophobic and anti-Hindu prejudices. These narratives are combined with Islamist propaganda in the extensive revising of Pakistan's history. By propagating concepts such as jihad, the inferiority of non-Muslims, India's perceived ingrained enmity with Pakistan, etc., the textbook board publications used by all government schools promote an obscurantist mindset. [17]
The Establishment is allegedly responsible for the thousands of kidnapping and disappearances. [18] and described as epidemic by Human Rights Watch (HRW), [19] forced appearances, extrajudicial killings and targeted killings of people which the establishment consider enemy of the state. [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] Through direct involvement of military and ISI in these activities. [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] [34] In July 2011, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan issued a report on illegal disappearances in Balochistan which identified ISI and Frontier Corps as the perpetrators. [35] The Establishment in Pakistan is responsible for the ongoing forced disappearance in Pakistan, a form of kidnapping, torturing and extrajudicial killing its own citizens without any judicial due process. After the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, forced disappearance in Pakistan began during the rule of military dictator General Pervez Musharraf (1999 to 2008). [36] After Musharraf resigned in August 2008, he was charged with various human rights violations. [37] During Musharraf's tenure, many people were forcibly taken away by government agencies. [37] [38] [39]
Shariazation of Pakistan as "primary" policy of Pakistan [7] [8] was initiated and implemented by the government of military dictator General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, the ruler of Pakistan from 1977 until his death in 1988, who is "the person most responsible for turning Pakistan into a global center for political Islam". [6]
Despite the partition of India, and resulting creation of Pakistan based on the concept of separate Islamic nation for the self determination of Muslims, [40] [41] [42] Constitution of Pakistan has Islam as its state religion, [43] teaching of quran and islamiyat is compulsory, [44] [45] Only Muslims can become Prime Minister or President of Pakistan [46] and non-Muslims have not been raised to the highest level in the government recently. However, there remains a precedence of appointing non-Muslims to higher offices as well.
In the judiciary, Rana Bhagwandas and Alvin Robert Cornelius have served as former Chief Justices of Supreme Court. [47] [48]
In the government, Muhammad Zafarullah Khan served as Foreign Minister of Pakistan. Between 1961 and 1964, he was Pakistan's Permanent Representative at the United Nations. From 1962 to 1964, he was also the President of the UN General Assembly. He later rejoined the ICJ as a judge from 1964 to 1973, serving as President from 1970 to 1973. [49]
In the military, General Akhtar Hussain Malik, overall commander for Operation Grand Slam in the Second Kashmir War is regarded as a war hero. His brother, Lieutenant General Abdul Ali Malik, has also served in the army as a 3-star general and commanded the I Corps during the third war with India in 1971. Major General Iftikhar Khan Janjua is the most senior Pakistani officer to have been killed in action [50] and has held command of formations such as 6 Armoured Division, which has seen action in notable battles such as Battle of Mogadishu.
In Pakistan Air Force, non-Muslims have been promoted to the highest ranking position in the past. [51] This is demonstrated by the promotion of Zafar Chaudhry, to the post of Chief of Air Staff. [51] He has also served as managing director of the Pakistan International Airlines. [52]
However, Ahmadis are constitutionally banned from calling themselves Muslims. [53]
The Establishment also engages in the institutionalised persecution of minorities in Pakistan, specially Ahmadiyya, Shias and Hazara after the Islamization of Pakistan by the military dictator General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq who took over the power through military coup. Pakistan is known for widespread discrimination against religious minorities, with attacks against Christians, Hindus, Ahmadiyya, Shia, Sufi and Sikh communities being widespread. These attacks are usually blamed on religious extremists but certain laws in the Pakistan Criminal Code and government inaction have only caused these attacks to surge higher. [54] [55] Sunni militant groups operate with impunity across Pakistan, as law enforcement officials (The Establishment) either turn a blind eye or appear helpless to prevent widespread attacks against religious minorities. [55] The rise of The Establishment in Pakistan-backed Taliban in Pakistan has been an influential and increasing factor in the persecution of and discrimination against religious minorities in Pakistan, such as Hindus, Christians, Sikhs, and other minorities. [56]
Bleed India with a Thousand Cuts is a military doctrine followed by Pakistani Establishment against India. [57] [58] [59] It consists of waging covert war against India using insurgents at multiple locations. [60]
According to scholar Aparna Pande, this view was put forward in various studies by the Pakistani military, particularly in its Staff College, Quetta. [61] Peter Chalk and Christine Fair cite the former director of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) explicating the strategy. [62] This doctrine was first attempted to flame the Punjab insurgency and then Kashmir insurgency using India's western border with Pakistan. [63] [64]
In a 1965 speech to the UN Security Council, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto declared a thousand-year war against India. [65] [66] Pakistan Army Chief General Zia-ul-Haq gave form to Bhutto's "thousand years war" with the 'bleeding India through a thousand cuts' doctrine using covert and low-intensity warfare with militancy and infiltration. [67] [64] [63]
Ajmal Kasab, a Pakistani [68] [69] member of Pakistan-based [70] globally banned terrorist organization [71] by the United States, [72] [73] Lashkar-e-Taiba, which operates several terrorist training camps in Pakistan-administered Kashmir, [74] launched 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks [75] [76] killing 72 people. [77]
The U.S. Country Reports on Terrorism describes Pakistan as a "Terrorist safe haven" where terrorists are able to organise, plan, raise funds, communicate, recruit, train, transit, and operate in relative security because of inadequate governance capacity, political will, or both. [78] [79] Pakistan's tribal region along its border with Afghanistan has been described as a safe haven for terrorists by western media and the United States Defense Secretary. [80] [81] [82] In 2019, US issued series of official statements asking Pakistan to immediately end support and safe haven to all terrorist groups. [83] A report by Saban Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution states that Pakistan was "the world's most active sponsor of terrorist groups... aiding these groups that pose a direct threat to the United States. Pakistan's active participation has caused thousands of deaths in the region; all these years Pakistan has been supportive to several terrorist groups despite several stern warnings from the international community." [84] Pakistani government's top leaders and Pakistan Army's top leaders are often seen in public sharing stage with the UN and US designated terrorists. [85]
In July 2019, former Prime Minister of Pakistan Imran Khan on his official visit to the United States admitted the presence of 30000-40000 armed terrorists in the country and that the previous governments were hiding this truth particularly from the US in the past. [86] In 2018, former Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif admitted that the Pakistani government played a role in the 2008 Mumbai attack. [87] Former Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf, a military dictator who took over the power by military coup, conceded that his forces trained militant groups to fight India in Indian-administered Kashmir. [88] He confessed that the government ″turned a blind eye″ because it wanted to force India to enter into negotiations, as well as raise the issue internationally. [88] He also said Pakistani spies in the Inter-Services Intelligence directorate (ISI) cultivated the Taliban after 2001 because Karzai's government was dominated by non-Pashtuns, who are the country's largest ethnic group, and by officials who were thought to favour India. [89]
The Politics of Pakistan takes place within the framework established by the constitution. The country is a federal parliamentary republic in which provincial governments enjoy a high degree of autonomy and residuary powers. Executive power is vested with the national cabinet which is headed by Prime Minister of Pakistan, who works with the bicameral parliament and the judiciary. Stipulations set by the constitution provide a delicate check and balance of sharing powers between executive, legislative, and judicial branches of the government.
Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq was a Pakistani military officer who served as the 6th president of Pakistan from 1978 until his death in 1988. He rose to prominence after leading a coup on 5 July 1977, which overthrew the democratically elected government of prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. Zia subsequently imposed martial law, suspended the constitution, and served as chief martial law administrator before assuming the presidency. Zia served as the 2nd chief of the Army Staff from 1976 to 1988, a position he later leveraged to execute a coup in 1977, which was the second coup in Pakistan's history of coups; the first occurred in 1958 under Ayub Khan.
The Pakistan Muslim League Urdu: پاکستان مسلم لیگ (ق); Pākistān Muslim Līg (Qāf), Acronyms: PML(Q), PML-Q, PMLQ, "Q League" is a political party in Pakistan. As of the 2024 parliamentary election, it has a representation of five seats. It previously served as an ally of former prime minister Raja Pervez Ashraf's government, and led a joint election campaign in 2013 alongside Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) in Punjab and Balochistan provinces against its rival Pakistan Muslim League (N), a fiscally conservative and centre-right force.
Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan (JIP), is a Pakistani Islamist political party. The aim of this political party is to make Pakistan an Islamic state, governed by Sharia law, through a gradual legal, and political process. It opposes capitalism, liberalism, socialism and secularism as well as economic practices such as offering bank interest. It is the Pakistani successor to Jamaat-e-Islami, which was founded in colonial India in 1941. JIP is a "vanguard party", whose members are intended to be leaders spreading party beliefs and influence. Supporters not thought qualified to be members may become "affiliates", and beneath them are "sympathizers". The party leader is called an "ameer". Although, it does not have a large popular following, the party is quite influential and considered one of the major Islamic movements in Pakistan, along with Deobandi and Barelvi.
Jaish-e-Mohammed is a Pakistan-based Deobandi jihadist terrorist group active in Kashmir. The group's primary motive is to separate Kashmir from India and merge it into Pakistan.
The insurgency in Jammu and Kashmir, also known as the Kashmir insurgency, is an ongoing separatist militant insurgency against the Indian administration in Jammu and Kashmir, a territory constituting the southwestern portion of the larger geographical region of Kashmir, which has been the subject of a territorial dispute between India and Pakistan since 1947.
Islamization or Shariazation, has a long history in Pakistan since the 1950s, but it became the primary policy, or "centerpiece" of the government of General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, the ruler of Pakistan from 1977 until his death in 1988.
Operation Tupac is the codename of a military-intelligence contingency program that was run in the 1980s by Pakistan's main intelligence agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). It has a three-part action plan to provide covert support to anti-India separatists and militants in the insurgency in Indan-administered Jammu and Kashmir. The program was authorized and initiated in 1988 by the order of the then-President of Pakistan, Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq. It has since been diminished since the Early 2000s by the later Military Dictator and President of Pakistan, General Pervez Musharraf.
Rahimuddin Khan was a general of the Pakistan Army who served as the 4th Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee from 1984 to 1987, after serving as the 7th governor of Balochistan from 1978 to 1984. He also served as the 16th governor of Sindh in 1988.
The situation of human rights in Pakistan is complex as a result of the country's diversity, large population, its status as a developing country and a sovereign Islamic democracy with a mixture of both Islamic and secular law.
This is a timeline of Pakistani history, comprising important legal and territorial changes and political events in the region of modern-day Pakistan. To read about the background of these events, see History of Pakistan and History of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan.
The Sipah-e-Sahaba (SS), also known as the Millat-e-Islamiyya (MI), is a Sunni Islamist banned Deobandi organisation in Pakistan. Founded by Pakistani cleric Haq Nawaz Jhangvi in 1989 after breaking away from Sunni Deobandi party Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (F), it was based in Jhang, Punjab, but had offices in all of Pakistan's provinces and territories. It operated as a federal and provincial political party until it was banned and outlawed as a terrorist organization by Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf in 2002. Even though it has been banned by the Pakistani government on numerous occasions, the Sipah-e-Sahaba has continued to operate under a different name throughout the country; it has significant underground support in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The organization was also banned by the United Kingdom, where there is a significant Pakistani diaspora population, in 2001.
Sectarian violence in Pakistan refers to violence directed against people and places in Pakistan motivated by antagonism toward the target's religious sect. As many as 4,000 Shia are estimated to have been killed in sectarian attacks in Pakistan between 1987 and 2007, and thousands more Shia have been killed by Salafi extremists from 2008 to 2014, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW). Sunni Sufis and Barelvis have also suffered from some sectarian violence, with attacks on religious shrines killing hundreds of worshippers, and some Deobandi leaders assassinated. Pakistan minority religious groups, including Hindus, Ahmadis, and Christians, have "faced unprecedented insecurity and persecution" in at least two recent years, according to Human Rights Watch. One significant aspect of the attacks in Pakistan is that militants often target their victims places of worship during prayers or religious services in order to maximize fatalities and to "emphasize the religious dimensions of their attack".
The political history of Pakistan is the narrative and analysis of political events, ideas, movements, and leaders of Pakistan. Pakistan gained independence from the United Kingdom on 14 August 1947, when the Presidencies and provinces of British India were divided by the United Kingdom, in a region which is commonly referred to as the Indian subcontinent. Since its independence, Pakistan has had a colorful yet turbulent political history at times, often characterized by martial law and inefficient leadership.
There are or have been a number of separatist movements in Pakistan based on ethnic and regional nationalism, that have agitated for independence, and sometimes fighting the Pakistan state at various times during its history. As in many other countries, tension arises from the perception of minority/less powerful ethnic groups that other ethnicities dominate the politics and economics of the country to the detriment of those with less power and money. The government of Pakistan has attempted to subdue these separatist movements.
Antisemitism in Pakistan is the presence of hostility and discrimination against Jews in Pakistan based on prejudices against the Jewish people and/or the religion of Judaism. Alongside the prevalence of general stereotypes, Jews are commonly subjected to negative views, feelings and rhetoric in Pakistan, most of which overlap with and are directly related to the antisemitic views prevalent throughout the Islamic world. Widely regarded as miserly within Pakistani Muslim circles, Jews residing in Pakistan have also faced periodic intolerance by the state, which has intensified since the Islamization period of the 1980s under Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, who propelled Pakistan towards the adoption of strict and highly-conservative Islamic practices and laws. The Jewish population of Pakistan has rapidly decreased since the state's founding and separation from neighbouring India in August 1947, and as of 2019 estimates, stands at less than 200 people amidst Pakistan's total population of over 200 million, the majority of whom are Muslims.
Human rights abuses in the province ofBalochistan refers to the human rights violations that are occurring in the ongoing insurgency in Balochistan. The situation has drawn concern from the international community. The human rights situation in Balochistan is credited to the long-running conflict between Baloch nationalists and Pakistani security forces.
The history of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan began on 14 August 1947 when the country came into being in the form of Dominion of Pakistan within the British Commonwealth as the result of Pakistan Movement and the partition of India. While the history of the Pakistani Nation according to the Pakistan government's official chronology started with the Islamic rule over Indian subcontinent by Muhammad bin Qasim which reached its zenith during Mughal Era. In 1947, Pakistan consisted of West Pakistan and East Pakistan. The President of All-India Muslim League and later the Pakistan Muslim League, Muhammad Ali Jinnah became Governor-General while the secretary general of the Muslim League, Liaquat Ali Khan became Prime Minister. The constitution of 1956 made Pakistan an Islamic democratic country.
The 1988 Gilgit massacre was the state-sponsored mass killing of Shia civilians in the Gilgit District of Pakistan who revolted against military dictator Zia-ul-Haq's Sunni Islamist regime, responsible for vehement persecution of religious minorities as part of its Islamization program.
The Establishment, also referred to as the military establishment, is a term commonly used in Pakistan to describe the influence of the Pakistan Armed Forces, intelligence agencies, and associated pro-military entities within the country's governance structure. Since Pakistan's independence in 1947, the Establishment has periodically assumed direct control of the government through military coups and has frequently played a substantial role in influencing political and security policies during civilian administrations. It is widely regarded as an influential force in Pakistan's political and strategic affairs, particularly in areas concerning domestic policies, national security and foreign relations. This includes state policies introduced during various periods of military rule, including the Islamization measures implemented under General Zia-ul-Haq.
Zia ul-Haq is often identified as the person most responsible for turning Pakistan into a global center for political Islam. Undoubtedly, Zia went farthest in defining Pakistan as an Islamic state, and he nurtured the jihadist ideology ...
... Zia made Islam the centrepiece of his administration.
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ignored (help)A Pakistani human rights group that has accused the military of widespread abuses as it battles Islamist militants in Pakistan's rugged border region with neighboring Afghanistan has emerged as a force among the country's Pashtun minority, drawing tens of thousands to rallies to protest what it contends is a campaign of intimidation that includes extrajudicial killings and thousands of disappearances and detentions.
Several Pakistani journalists and scholars in the United States interviewed over the past week said that they were approached regularly by Pakistani officials, some of whom openly identified themselves as ISI officials. The journalists and scholars said the officials caution them against speaking out on politically delicate subjects like the indigenous insurgency in Baluchistan or accusations of human rights abuses by Pakistani soldiers. The verbal pressure is often accompanied by veiled warnings about the welfare of family members in Pakistan, they said.
In Pakistan, everyone says they have incontrovertible evidence about India's involvement in destabilizing Balochistan. They only won't share the evidence with you because they insist that when evidence is already too evident then why should one make the evident, evident?
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: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)Pakistan's security apparatus has in the past angrily rejected politicians linking it to militancy. Nawaz Sharif, the former prime minister, faced treason charges last year after an interview where he suggested the Pakistani state played a role in the 2008 Mumbai attack that killed 166 people.