Cricketer turned politician Imran Khan claimed victory on Sunday at the end of his peace march against US drone strikes, despite failing to reach his intended destination Kotkai way inside South Waziristan Agency.
Khan defied official warnings to lead thousands of supporters beyond Tank, the last town before the semi-autonomous area which is a purported refuge of heavily armed Taliban and al Qaeda militants.
Kotkai is notorious as the place where the Taliban used to train suicide bombers. However Khan and his rally had to turn back before reaching the district border after the army warned it was unsafe to stay in the area after nightfall.
More than 20,000 people thronged the streets of Tank for the final rally, according to police, and well-wishers lined the streets of villages along the route from Islamabad to welcome the convoy as it passed through on its two-day journey. But the turnout at the final rally was well below the 100,000 predicted by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) in the run up to the event, and the vast majority of those taking part in the march appeared to be party activists.
Khan insisted the march – a motorcade that included several thousand vehicles by the end, according to police – was a success. “We have given our message – it has gone across the world,” he told supporters. “We have succeeded in raising this issue. We came here to raise this issue, we came here to take a stand against drones.” Addressing the participants at Tank, Khan said: “We strongly condemn the US drone strikes in the FATA as they are against the international laws and a complete violation of human rights.”
“Drone attacks create hatred against the US and should be stopped immediately,” he said, adding that the tribesmen were brave and courageous and were not afraid of the drone strikes. He also asked President Asif Ali Zardari to shun American bondage and raise a voice for the people of Pakistan. “Mr Zardari,
America is not God, Allah (Almighty) is.”
Khan said if the PTI supporters could come to South Waziristan, they could certainly reach Islamabad. The PTI chief also criticised JUI-F chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman, saying he had tried all to deter PTI from taking out the peace march.
He said the government was hypocrite, as it told one thing to the people but another to the Americans.
“No political leader has ever dared to come even to Tank to show solidarity with the war-torn people and IDPs,” the PTI chief said. Khan said the PTI would focus on education and employment opportunities for the tribal people after coming into power and fully tap the rich mineral potential of FATA and Waziristan, which would alleviate the condition of the locals.
He said FATA would be made a cradle of peace and development. Khan said the PTI was a national party and would continue struggling for the socio-economic emancipation of masses. He added that the PTI would repeal the Frontier Crime Regulation (FCR) immediately if voted to power. The PTI chief said he was proud of his workers, women and Insaaf Students Federation (ISF) for making the peace march successful. He also appreciated the Tank and DI Khan police for providing foolproof security to the rally.
Khan said he was calling off the march without reaching the destination as darkness could prove fatal for the participants, whose safety was dear to him.
Authorities had earlier said the protesters would not be allowed to enter the tribal belt – where missiles fired by US drones routinely target militants – and blocked the road to Tank with shipping containers at several places. But charged protesters removed the containers, meeting little resistance from police, allowing the convoy to approach Tank. Activists scuffled with police at one point and threw stones at the containers. The march reached Tank four hours behind schedule, and a PTI spokesman blamed police delaying tactics for the failure to reach Waziristan.
Student Fakhruddin Shinwari accused the Pakistani government of trying to hide the real situation in the tribal belt. “There’s no security risk. If Imran Khan goes to Waziristan, the situation made up by the United States and Pakistan will be exposed. There are no terrorists there — it will be exposed as a lie.” There was a heavy security presence along the road to Tank, which a senior police officer had said earlier was not safe and was targeted by roadside bombings.
Before the march began its second day on Sunday, Khan urged activists to stay peaceful and to avoid confrontation with the authorities. Medea Benjamin, leader of a delegation from the US peace group CodePink, apologised for the drone attacks, saying: “We are so grateful that you understand there are Americans in solidarity with you and against our government policy.” However, the US peace campaigners left the convoy before it reached Tank, with their spokeswoman saying they felt they had achieved their goals. Clive Stafford Smith, the British head of the legal lobby group Reprieve, said whether the group reached its intended destination was irrelevant.
“It’s already a wonderful success,” he told reporters. “It doesn’t matter what happens from here on. We’ve generated a huge amount of publicity not just in Pakistan but across the world.” Militants have killed thousands of people in Pakistan since 2007, and US officials say the drone strikes are a key weapon in the war on terror. But peace campaigners condemn them as a breach of international law.
Pakistanis call them a violation of sovereignty that breeds extremism, and politicians including Khan say the government is complicit in killing its own people. Casualty figures are difficult to obtain, but a report commissioned by Reprieve estimated last month that 474 to 881 civilians were among 2,562 to 3,325 people killed by drones in Pakistan between June 2004 and September 2012. Khan, who is campaigning before a general election next year, has made opposition to the drone programme a key plank of PTI policy. Critics accuse him of ignoring atrocities blamed on Islamist militants and abuses by the Pakistani Army.
Mission accomplished
