In search of real Pakistan15: 00 14/03/2010, Amil Khan, comment, comment is free, global terrorism, guardian.co.uk, Islam, Pakistan, Taliban, U.S. for

In search of real Pakistan15: 00 14/03/2010, Amil Khan, comment, comment is free, global terrorism, guardian.co.uk, Islam, Pakistan, Taliban, U.S. foreign policy, world news, Guardian Unlimited

With this extremism, it is more important than ever to support tolerance, peaceful elements of Pakistani society

What exactly is Pakistan? The international media will tell you that is one of the most dangerous places on Earth, plagued by sectarian warfare and religious extremism. Well-heeled Pakistanis disagree. His country, they say, is composed of an overwhelming population that likes to buy the latest fashions, listen to the latest music and read about the mystical poetry.


In fact, Pakistan is aware of these things and many more in between. The country has spent most of his life ruled by military dictators, but each of them was regularly lampooned in cartoons in the newspaper. Today, society has a largely rural and conservative, but one of the most popular machines in the country show Dame Edna style is a transvestite. It has a politically engaged people are tuned into the many current affairs programs broadcast in over 70 private channels with sufficient regularity to ensure that the Pakistani media one of the few in the world to turn a profit. His biggest media group has led an attack on the perceived corruption of politicians with a ferocity that makes the costs of parliamentarians in the scandal of the limits of the United Kingdom in comparison.


Many Pakistanis distrust Western intentions, but that does not mean that aid to Pakistan is to fight against the character of the country. The greatest strengths of Pakistan to contribute to their most pressing problems. An ideology of government inherited from the British still values freedom of the press and independent civil society. At the same time, a relatively hands-free approach to religion has allowed local militants to build local infrastructure with large external financing. As the world now knows, that extremism is nurtured and exploited by the general whiskey love (with the tacit support of Western powers) for short-term benefit and has now turned against the state.


Extremism is not limited to the Taliban in Northwest Frontier Province (NWFP), but is bleeding into the rest of society. In a restaurant tucked in a corner of the luxury shopping district of Islamabad, I met a 20-something Pakistani friend with an encyclopedic knowledge of rap lyrics and Indian film stars. After ordering a beer at the restaurant illicit stash, he told me why he thought that their relatives held more conservative response to social and economic problems of Pakistan. "In my uncle's family, the women cover their faces and they have brought to your television, banned music and disconnected from the Internet ... They had the strength to follow Islam correctly. I would have. If all of us, Pakistan would to be weak, "he said.


However, many Pakistanis oppose this kind of perspective. It's not just the rich, isolated and educated in the West. In Attock, a small village on the border of Punjab and NWFP, met local people who had decided that they were witnessing growing extremism among young men fell to the serious lack of educational opportunities, social services and proper Islamic knowledge . They are working on building a girls' school, a hospital and a mosque with a teacher capable of challenging the cult of suicide bombings and the ideology of religious hatred punished. However, despite the U.S. commitment to provide $ 7.5bn to strengthen Pakistani civil society in the next five years, the inhabitants of Attock - who lack adequate connections - have been unable to find anyone to help with your project.


During the last five months I have been working in Pakistan on a project to support the many elements of Pakistani society who think they hate other religions or different Islamic communities is against the nature of Islam. Our project, Karvan-e-Amn (Caravan of Peace) has a job to do, not because their message abroad, but because we are trying to argue against an ideology that has been deliberately built over 30 years with billion in foreign financing.



Pakistan's future is far from decided. We need help to become a peaceful, prosperous and stable, and those who are willing to help find through its diverse society partners. They might also be surprised by a nation that wants dearly to deny its representation in the international media.

Pakistan
Global terrorism
Islam
Taliban
U.S. foreign policy
Amil Khan


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