Cleric rejects calls for unconditional surrender

THE top-ranking cleric of a radical mosque besieged by government forces in Pakistan’s capital rejected calls for an unconditional surrender yesterday, saying he and his die-hard followers were ready for martyrdom.

At dusk on the third day of the siege, a half-dozen explosions rocked the area around the Lal Masjid, or Red Mosque, shooting debris high above the treetops along with plumes of smoke and dust. Explosions and gunfire also were heard earlier in the day, but troops appeared to be holding back.

There were no immediate reports of injuries and it was not possible to determine who initiated the latest round of shooting.

“We will not surrender. We will be martyred, but we will not surrender,” cleric Abdul Rashid Ghazi told GEO television, a private channel. “We are more determined now.”

The government was keen to avoid a bloodbath that would further damage President Pervez Musharraf’s embattled administration and said troops would not storm the mosque while women and children were inside.

“For the Pakistan army to go in is no problem, but safely is our foremost objective,” government spokesman Tariq Azim said. “We don’t want to harm any innocent lives. We already know that these people are being kept as hostages.”

Mr Azim told Dawn News Television that Mr Ghazi’s talk about martyrdom was a bluff, noting that his brother, chief cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz, had said the same thing and then was arrested trying tosneak out of the complex disguised as a woman.

The violence brought to a head a six-month standoff between Mr Aziz and Pakistan’s US-backed government. Mr Aziz has challenged Mr Musharraf with an anti-vice campaign that has included kidnapping alleged prostitutes and police officers.

Troops surrounded the mosque on Wednesday, a day after tensions between government security forces and mosque followers who have sought to impose Taliban-style rule in the city erupted into deadly street clashes.

Militant students had streamed out of the mosque Tuesday to confront security forces sent there after the kidnapping of six alleged Chinese prostitutes. The brief abduction drew a protest from Beijing, and proved to be the last straw following a string of provocations by the mosque stretching back six months.

Two dozen parents and other family members waited behind security barriers some 200 yards from the mosque, with about 10 allowed to approach the shrine’s entrance.

Religious affairs minister Ijazul Haq said that “militants” were in command and that Mr Ghazi was just being used for “media management”.

He said indirect negotiations were proceeding, with clerics trying to persuade Mr Ghazi to give up.