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Militancy Labeled

01 November, 2006

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Eighty-three people, many of them children aged between 12 and 15 were killed in an air strike at a madrassah in Damadola in the Bajaur tribal region (northern region of Pakistan adjacent to Afghanistan) on Monday morning.

The bombing occurred just a day before a peace deal which had to be signed between the government and the local tribesmen in the area in line with north Waziristan peace agreement.

This was the second air strike on Damadola within a last few months. Some 18 civilians were killed in an air strike conducted by the US jets a few months back.

Pakistan's military spokesman, Maj-Gen Shaukat Sultan, said those killed in Monday's attack were all militants and denied that there had been any collateral damage.

The operation, he said, was launched following intelligence reports that the seminary was being used as a training facility for terrorist activities.

But local residents believe the air strike was carried out by fixed-wing US drones which fired hellfire missiles at the compound, killing all those inside the seminary, including its administrator Maulvi Liaqat Ali.

President General Pervez Musharraf strongly defended the overnight air strike on a madrassah saying whoever said that innocent people were killed in the air strike was lying.

They were all militants. They were doing military training there. We were working on them for last six, seven days and we know who they were and what they were doing,' the president said.

But the local people, including the senior minister of NWFP(Pakistans north west Province), Siraj-ul-Haq who led the funeral prayers of the deceased, and later resigned in protest against the air strike, contested the official statement saying the deceased were students, and were busy in studies when the jet fighters bombed the madrassah.

I have seen the charred bodies of various innocent children', Siraj-ul-Haq told the newsmen.

On the other hand, hundreds of thousands of protesters took part in anti-government demonstrations across the country to condemn the air strike, accusing the US of involvement in the attack, and vowing to send waves of suicide bombers to retaliate against Pakistani and US troops.

Here are some questions
1) Local people, and opposition parties, particularly MMA(religious political alliance) claim that air strike was conducted by US jet fighters. What do you think?
2) Was bombing of madrassah unavoidable or the alleged terrorists could have been arrested?
3) What could be the possible reaction to the killing of alleged innocent children?
4) Was air strike conducted by US forces to destroy the proposed peace deal in the area?
5) Do you think that the Pakistani army is killing its own citizens to appease USA?

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