For the information of our Islamist friends, a sizable population of Swatis lives in NY -- wtf:
Date:18/02/2009 URL:
The Hindu : Opinion / News Analysis : From Pakistan, Taliban threats reach New York
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From Pakistan, Taliban threats reach New York
Kirk Semple
Pakistani immigrants from Swat Valley say some of their families are being singled out for threats, kidnapping and even murder by Taliban forces.
The fate of the Swat Valley dominates conversation among the Swati immigrants in the U.S. The picture shows displaced Pakistanis arriving in a secure area of the troubled Swat Valley.
Last June, Bakht Bilind Khan, who was living in the Bronx and working at a fast-food restaurant, returned to his village in the volatile Swat Valley of northern Pakistan to visit his wife and seven children for the first time in three years. But during a dinner celebration with his family, his homecoming suddenly turned dark: several heavily armed Taliban fighters wearing masks appeared at the door, accused Khan of being an American spy and kidnapped him.
During two weeks of captivity in a nearby mountain range, Khan says, he was interrogated repeatedly about his wealth, property and mission in the United States. He was released in exchange for an $8,000 ransom. His family, threatened with death if it did not leave the region, is now hiding elsewhere in Pakistan.
Our Swat, our paradise, is burning now, said Khan, 55, who returned to the U.S. and is working at a fast-food restaurant in Albany, trying to reimburse the friends and relatives who paid his ransom.
Pakistani immigrants from the Swat Valley, where the Taliban has been battling Pakistani security forces since 2007, say some of their families are being singled out for threats, kidnapping and even murder by Taliban forces, who view them as potential American collaborators and lucrative sources of ransom. Some immigrants also say they have been threatened in the U.S. by the Taliban or its sympathisers, and some say they have been attacked or kidnapped when they have returned home.
The threats have brought an added dimension of suffering for the immigrants, who say fresh reports of hardship arrive in New York every day, sometimes several times a day, and spread quickly among the several thousand Swati immigrants in the region: families driven from their villages, houses being destroyed, relatives disappearing. The fate of the valley dominates conversation among the exiles.
Its 24/7, said Zakrya Khan, 30, owner of two gyro restaurants in New York whose staff of 15 is almost entirely Swati. This is their only concern now.
Though every community of exiles from a conflict-ridden country suffers when relatives who remain behind are caught in the fight, the immigrants from Swat also bear the burden of believing that their presence in America is endangering their relatives back home, where the Taliban has imposed its authority over much of the region.
More than that, Swati immigrants say they have been left with the sense that the more they try to help their families back home, the more harm they may do, an excruciating dilemma that has filled many with a combination of helplessness, fear, sadness and guilt.
If they speak out, they fear, it could lead to retribution for them or their relatives in Pakistan. Some exiles who have participated in anti-Taliban political demonstrations or agitated in support of Swat residents say they and their families have come under pressure as a result of these activities. And few dare leave the U.S. for fear of losing the single largest income stream their families have.
The Pakistan government announced on Monday that it had struck a tentative deal with the Taliban amid a 10-day ceasefire to establish Islamic law in the region and suspend military operations there.
But some Swati immigrants said they were sceptical the deal would hold two other accords in the last six months failed and they were bracing for a resumption of violence.
Before the start of the Talibans incursion into the region in 2007, Swat was treasured as a vacation spot, particularly among Pashtuns, the dominant ethnic group in the region. Known as the Switzerland of Pakistan, it has snowy peaks, fruit orchards, lakes and flower-covered meadows. But the tourism industry has evaporated amid the Talibans uprising, and by some estimates, hundreds of thousands of residents have abandoned their homes, fleeing for Mingora or other regions of Pakistan.
Immigrants have been coming from the Swat Valley for years, well before it became a front in the war between the Taliban and Pakistani troops. There are an estimated 6,000 to 7,000 people from the Swat Valley in the U.S., about half of whom live in the New York metropolitan region, said Taj Akbar Khan, president of the Khyber Society USA, a Pakistani charitable and cultural organisation.
Many Swatis suspect that the Taliban has spies among them, and that insecurity mirrors the rampant mistrust in the valley where many residents fear the Pakistani security forces almost as much as the Taliban and do not know whom to trust. Perhaps with the help of state-side sympathisers, the Taliban has been adept at tracking the flow of money from the U.S. and has turned to kidnapping recipients of the money with the goal of securing hefty ransoms, the exiles say.
Ajab, owner of a fried chicken shop in Paterson, said the Taliban kidnapped a brother-in-law last year near the familys village in the Swat Valley. During 75 days of captivity, the Taliban fighters told the brother-in-law that one of the reasons they had kidnapped him was that he had relatives in the U.S., including Ajab. The fighters released him after the family paid a $20,000 ransom. We are sad that because of us, our relatives are getting into trouble, said Ajab, 51, who spoke only on the condition that his last name not be published to protect his familys identity.
Not all of the violence visited upon the families of exiles has been due to the exiles presence in the U.S. But the difficulty of watching it at such a remove has been no less agonising. Leaving behind his family in Swat, Jihanzada came to the U.S. in 2001 to earn money to build his dream house back home and to pay for the future weddings of his five children. He did numerous menial jobs in Boston and New York.
Everything I earned I sent back home, he said in an interview last week at a fast-food restaurant in Brooklyn where he works. He, too, spoke on the condition that he not be fully identified for fear of alerting the Taliban to his presence in the U.S. If they knew I was here, they would definitely harm my family, he said.
The house was completed early last year; Jihanzada still has not seen it: he has not returned to Pakistan since he left eight years ago. But during fighting last summer between the Taliban and the Pakistani security forces, a bomb dropped by Pakistani aircraft demolished the house. Jihanzadas family had evacuated before the fighting began and are now living in Mingora. His eldest daughters wedding was postponed.
Jihanzada, who said he could not return to Pakistan because he had an asylum petition pending, received photographs of the destruction soon after the attack. Asked how he felt when he first saw the photographs, he dropped his head, concealing his face behind the brim of his brown restaurant cap and trying to stem a surge of sadness.
Finally, he continued: This is every Pashtuns dream: You earn, you build a home, your children grow up in it and when you get old you go and sit at home and enjoy life. Im sad because my struggles start again."
(Majeed Babar contributed reporting.)
New York Times News Service