Should we all bury our heads in the sand and hope?

[Yehtmae]

Ok, I'm trying to structure this post in a way so that it doesn't get deleted for any infringement of board rules.

 

1) It is not political.

2) It is not directly related to Thailand, but is significant to foreign visitors and residents.

3) ?

4) whatever....

 

Maybe this thread should be locked to prevent discussion, but I do believe that people should be aware of it's contents.

 

 

Friday, September 26, 2003 Excerpts: Southeast Asia Islamic education 26 September 2003

 

Agence France Presse -

 

KARACHI, 26 September 2003 - The Abu Bakar University, where police say they have uncovered a sleeper cell of the Southeast Asian terror group Jemaah Islamiyah, is typical of the madrasas (religious schools) Pakistan is trying to reform.

Seven Indonesian and Malaysian members of what security officials say was a 19-man cell were students at Abu Bakar. The university teaches only the Qur' an, Sunnah (sayings of the Prophet), Islamic literature and Arabic, all exclusively in Arabic language. There is no science, mathematics or English language in the curriculum.

 

Half of the 25-year-old school's 500 students are from overseas, mainly from Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.

 

Since early last year, Pakistan has been trying to regulate its 10,000 madrasas, drafting a law which requires them to broaden their curricula, register, and cease foreign funding. The draft law was watered down under pressure from powerful Islamic parties last year, but even its diluted form has still not been passed.

 

The move to regulate the madrasas is part of President Pervez Musharraf's crackdown on extremists following Pakistan's entry into the war on terrorism after the September 2001 terror attacks in the United States.

 

Afghanistan's Taleban regime, which harbored Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda, drew thousands of recruits and fighters from Pakistan's madrasas.

 

With many of the seminaries considered a breeding ground for extremism, Pakistan's intelligence agencies have been watching them closely as they hunt Al-Qaeda and Taleban fugitives.

 

But this month is the first time Southeast Asian students have emerged on the spy agencies' watchlists. Yemenis, Egyptians and other Arab and North Africans have previously been the main targets.

 

"This is the first time since the war on terror started that students of these countries are on our monitoring list," a Karachi-based intelligence official, who asked to remain anonymous, said.

 

Hambali's brother had been studying at Abu Bakar for four years under the name Abdul Hadi, according to a fellow student.

 

The young Indonesian was "friendly, softly spoken, and diligent," the student said, asking not to be named. On Sept. 1 he was called by police for questioning, and never came back. An Islamabad-based security official said Gunawan was arrested in the first week of September. Last Saturday police

and intelligence agents showed up again at the school and took away another Indonesian and five Malaysians.

 

Raids on at least four other madrasas on Saturday and Monday netted 12 more Malaysian and Indonesian students. The Abu Bakar University lies in eastern Karachi's crowded Gulshan-e-Iqbal district, where madrasas have mushroomed

in recent years. Staff said the campus never encouraged militancy.

 

"We don't teach extremism, only purely religious education according to Qur' anic teaching," Maulana Mohammad Aaish Tahir, a senior cleric at the school, said. "We only try to produce good Muslims and not terrorists," he said. "We

only teach in Arabic and have qualified religious scholars...We don't have science or mathematics."

 

Less than two kilometers (1.2 miles) away lies the Darasitul Islamia madrasa, where six Malaysian students were arrested Saturday, the same day Kashmiri militant chief Hafiz Saeed, former head of the outlawed Lashkar-e-Taiba group, was giving a sermon there.

 

The school is run by Lashkar-e-Taiba's political wing Jamaat-ud Dawa, led by Saeed. He travels Pakistan exhorting followers to wage jihad (holy war) against Indian forces in disputed Kashmir.

 

Saeed was known to often stay at the school. Staff and students refused to talk to journalists.

 

Jamaat-ud Dawa said the arrested students had no connection with terrorism.

 

"They were all simple students who were known for their good behavior," spokesman Yahya Mujahid said.

 

 

 

(Personaly I thought a 'madras' was a rather nice curry.... oh well)

 

[elef]

Hi,

 

as you suggest it yourself I lock this thread until P127 or KS decide to open it!

 

elef

Moderator