On Easter Sunday, the Gulshan-e-Iqbal Park is crowded. There are Christians and Muslims. The bomber advances to a playground. It detonated in front of the swings. “We went to the park to enjoy this Easter. Suddenly, there was a huge explosion, I saw a huge ball of fire, and four to six people in my family were injured, two seriously, “told to the Agence France-Presse, Arif Gill, a man of 53 years.
Rescuers have found lead shot, projected in the explosion to increase the number of victims. Among the 72 dead included 29 children and 6 women. The attack left more than 200 wounded. Dozens of them had to be treated on the floor and in the corridors of overcrowded hospitals. According to an official of the Lahore police, the majority of victims are Muslim. A breakaway faction of the Movement of Pakistani Taliban (TPP), the Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, claimed responsibility and said that Christians were the target.
Why do Christians have been targeted by terrorists?
Minority which represents between 2% and 3% of the 190 million Pakistanis, Christians are an easy and vulnerable target for terrorists. They are from the former “untouchables”, socially discriminated for generations and confined to low paid jobs (garbage collectors, maids, drivers, etc.). Despite the many recurring attacks or acts of violence in recent years against minorities, including Shia, the Pakistani state had neither the political will nor the means to protect them, entangled in significant energy and economic issues and the fight against the Taliban terrorism.
Christians also are they victims of Pakistan’s power?
Not directly. In recent years many Christians – and mostly in Punjab province, where the attack took place – were the target of false accusations of blasphemy. In this Islamic republic regularly shaken by radicalization and intolerance, blasphemy law, defended by Islamists, is a serious matter. It provides for life imprisonment for desecration of the Coran and the death penalty in cases of insulting Muhammad. But is often manipulated to settle private disputes or to target minorities and liberals, and falsely to implicate innocent. Most of the defendants are Muslims, who can get by with supports or good lawyers.
But Christians accused, poor and without support, find themselves relentlessly crushed in an unfair judicial gear: they are thrown in jail pending a hypothetical trial or sentenced to death, as the young village Asia Bibi, languishing in prison without hope of revision trial. The case of the young woman and several others of the same type are regularly singled out by Western countries who denounce this persecution.
Why attack now?
In Pakistan where attacks are frequent, the period is more conducive to extremist actions since early March and running Mumtaz Qadri by the authorities. Qadri is the assassin of former Punjab Governor, Salman Taseer, liberal political figure in the country which had proposed to amend the blasphemy law. After this assassination perpetrated in the heart of Islamabad, Mumtaz Qadri had been erected as heroes of the most conservative fringe of this society, struggling with difficulty against radicalization and religious intolerance. Saturday, no fewer than 25,000 people demonstrated in Rawalpindi, twin city of Islamabad, in support of Qadri. They demanded that it be elevated to martyr and demanded the execution in retaliation of Asia Bibi. Sunday began another rally of several thousand people in support of Qadri continued Monday in the avenue that runs along the Parliament in Islamabad.
Sunday’s attack could also be a response to the dramatic operation by security forces in July 2015, against the chief of Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ), a Sunni extremist group that specifically targets Shiites. Its leader, Malik Ishaq, both son and other officials were killed. Malik Ishaq was believed to have been designated by the Islamic State to be its representative in Pakistan. Aware of the extreme danger posed by them, Pakistani authorities are doing everything to prevent its implantation in the country.
How are the negotiations with the Islamist movements?
Nowhere. They are non-existent and there is no reason they soon resumed. There has been discussion of attempts in 2013 between the government of Islamabad and the Movement of Pakistani Taliban, but they quickly aborted. The powerful Pakistani army, that left hand on the subject to civil authorities, has returned to the center stage in 2014 stating that there would be no “good or bad Taliban”, leaving them the choice between submission or death. It launched an operation against the bases and camps in the Pakistani tribal areas on the border with Afghanistan, but not against known refuges in South Punjab. The “zero tolerance” of the army has been further strengthened since the attack against a school run by the army in Peshawar December 16, 2014, a carnage that killed over 130 children and adolescents, and traumatized the country.
TTP has burst into dissident factions, some of which have agreed to settle down. But the most radical, like Jamaat ul-Ahrar, responsible for the attack in Lahore, refused any agreement and refuge is abroad, including in Afghanistan. They are likely to conduct spectacular attacks to attract support and funding, particularly from ISIS.
Translante from the french article on Liberation website
Source URL: https://diplomatie-humanitaire.org/en/the-plight-of-christians-in-pakistan/
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