"Pakistan: The Children of the Taliban": Prescient on Taliban's National Threat

Pakistan: The Children of the Taliban from PBS's Frontline, telecast last week, was prescient of the reports in this week's news about the Taliban inching closer to Islamabad in Pakistan - and should be viewed by anyone who wishes to know more about this creeping menace and how it is affecting its most vulnerable.

Pentagon chief in Taleban warning

Frontier Wisdom by Syed Saleem Shahzad of Asia Times

From the opening:

The city of Peshawar is on high alert. The Taliban are closing in, regularly attacking police convoys, kidnapping diplomats, and shooting foreigners. The fighting across this volatile region has driven thousands of families from their homes and many have found shelter in Peshawar.

Correspondent Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy is traveling across her fractured homeland to investigate the rising popularity of a new Pakistani branch of the Taliban, now threatening the major cities, blowing up girls’ schools and declaring war on the Pakistani state.

Her journey begins at a rehabilitation center in Peshawar, where she talks with many young victims caught in the crossfire of this war. 

 “We saw the dead body of a policeman tied to a pole,” an articulate young girl named Qainat tells the reporter quietly.  “His head had been chopped off. It was hanging between his legs. There was a note saying that if anyone moved the dead body, they would share its fate.”

Before the Taliban took control of Qainat’s village, the women in her family attended university and worked. But now the Taliban has banned girls from going to school.

Qainat is from Swat, a 100-mile-long valley in the north of Pakistan, three hours drive from Peshawar. Until recently, Swat was known as the Switzerland of the east, and had a thriving tourist industry.

Two years ago, hundreds of Taliban fighters moved into the valley from the adjoining tribal areas, when the Pakistani Army drove them out.

Driving through the streets of Swat filming surreptitiously, Obaid-Chinoy sees Swati women wearing the burqa. This never used to be the case.

Interview with

 

Comments

[lunettes de soleil carrera]

Pourtant, un autre film acclamé de la famille stop motion du studio qui nous a donné Wallace & Gromit.