Musharraf regime sending Pakistanis to secret prisons for US bounty

The Pakistan Governments mass arrest of terror suspects is being done for bounty worth thousand of dollars, Amnesty International fears.

Islamabad, Nov 28 : The Pakistan Government's mass arrest of terror suspects is being done for bounty worth thousand of dollars, Amnesty International fears.

"Mass arrests of terror suspects - often for bounties of thousands of dollars - have led to detainees being taken away to the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, transferred to secret CIA detention centers, unlawfully transferred to other countries or held in arbitrary and often secret detention in Pakistan itself," Amnesty reported this month.

"Pakistan's involvement in the U.S.-led 'war on terror' has been characterized by widespread violations of human rights," it added.

According to USA Today, Masood Janjua who left his home for three days never came back. On July 30, 2005 he slipped into a black hole of secret prisons and interrogations. His wife has not seen him since.

The magazine further said that Pakistan has rounded up hundreds of suspected terrorists since 9/11 and kept them in hidden prisons without charges. Some detainees have been turned over to the United States.

These days, though, the disappearances are causing a backlash and playing a role in Pakistan's deepening political crisis.

The uproar began in March when President General Pervez Musharraf tried to sack the Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, who had championed the cases of the disappeared.

On November 3, Musharraf declared a state of emergency and fired Chaudhry and other judges. He said the courts had interfered with attempts to fight terrorism, a reference in part to Chaudhry's support for families of the disappeared.

Musharraf has also admitted in his book the Line of Fire, "We have earned bounties totalling millions of dollars."

He also wrote that those who habitually accuse "us of 'not doing enough' in the war on terror should simply ask the CIA how much prize money it has paid to the government of Pakistan."

Director of the Interior Ministry's National Crisis Management Cell, Javed Iqbal Cheema, said that Pakistan has 200 prisoners in secret detention; however, Amnesty International puts "enforced disappearances" at over 2,000.

Cheema rejects the idea that Pakistani security forces are America's bounty hunters.

"Pakistan itself has been the worst victim of terrorism. It is the defining threat to our national security. If we do not deal effectively with this menace, it will destroy our society," he said. .

The layer fraternity feel that if the government says that they are terrorists the administration must prove it.

"The government says they are terrorists: OK, prove it," says lawyer Basharat Ullah Khan.

The families of the disappeared found an ally in Chaudhry, as he had asked the security forces to file cases against the disappeared by Nov. 13 or face charges.

Ten days before the deadline, Musharraf imposed the emergency and put Chaudhry under house arrest.

"We got a ray of hope from the chief justice," said Zainab Khatoon mother of 26-year-old Faisal Faraz, who vanished after leaving house in Lahore in July 2005.

"Now, I have lost my hope for Pakistan. ... I want to wake up the whole world and get my son back," she added.

ANI