Standoff at Pakistan Mosque Explodes Into Violence

At Least 12 Killed in Clashes, Dozens More Injured

By Griff Witte
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, July 3, 2007; 1:06 PM

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, July 3 -- A long-simmering standoff between the government and a radical mosque in the heart of the Pakistani capital exploded into a vicious street clash on Tuesday, with at least two soldiers and 10 others dead and more than 100 injured.

The clash began in the early afternoon and continued into the evening. Heavy gunfire echoed across the normally tranquil capital. Elite government troops fired tear-gas canisters to disperse a crowd of thousands who had gathered to show support to the leaders of the Red Mosque, and an affiliated religious school, or madrassa.

Earlier, madrassa students wielding sticks flooded into the streets and ransacked several government buildings located adjacent to the mosque, which is the oldest in the city. Thick black smoke billowed from the Environment Ministry building in the late afternoon, and by nightfall the building had been nearly gutted by fire.

The dead included at least three female students. Approximately 50 other girls were injured. The dead also included a Pakistani cameraman who was caught in the crossfire.

Each side blamed the other for promoting the violence. Government forces said they were attacked by madrassa students wielding sticks and rocks and fought back in self defense. Mosque leaders said the government began firing on the mosque without warning.

The two sides temporarily stopped fighting early in the evening after a conservative member of parliament entered the mosque and brokered a peace deal. But the fighting resumed soon thereafter, with students hurling gasoline bombs at Army rangers.

The crowd that gathered outside, egged on by Islamic songs and a voice that called for jihad over mosque loudspeakers, originally appeared to be merely observing the battle. But soon some of the observers began to join in on the side of mosque leaders, pummeling Army positions with rocks and cheering proclamations from the voice on the loudspeakers.

"We blame the government. The government tries to control this country by firing on its own people," said Malik Iqbal Hussain, an unemployed 58-year-old. "The whole of the country is with the Red Mosque."

Liberal forces in Pakistan have condemned the Red Mosque's leadership and have chastised President Pervez Musharraf's government for not doing more earlier on to keep the situation under control.

Pakistan's government had threatened for months to raid the mosque in retaliation for a series of provocations by mosque leaders, who want to topple Musharraf's government in favor of a theocracy.

The students increasingly have fashioned themselves as a kind of morality police. Earlier this year, students from the madrassa took over a children's library. Then they abducted three women alleged to be running a brothel and made them publicly confess.

Later, the students issued a fatwa, or edict, against a female government minister for hugging a man who was not her husband. (It was her parachuting instructor.) They labeled local police as spies and for a time took some officers hostage.

Students -- their faces masked and their hands gripping large batons -- have visited nearby shops selling music and videos, and told their owners they should close.

In late May, after the government massed thousands of troops around the mosque, students from the madrassa stockpiled weapons, dug bunkers and asked permission from parents to sacrifice their lives.

Tensions between the government and Islamic radicals are not uncommon in Pakistan, but the standoff over the Red Mosque reflects just how widely religious extremism has expanded -- far beyond the deeply conservative tribal areas that line Pakistan's border with Afghanistan.

The mosque itself is a short walk from Musharraf's house in the heart of Islamabad, a modern, meticulously planned city of tree-lined avenues, orderly traffic and finely manicured lawns.