McGill Journal of Political Studies 2014 April, 2014 | Page 116

institutions mushroomed throughout the
90s, and were prime recruitment bases
for Taliban fighters. In addition, the arms
proliferation that has resulted from both the
1979 War as well as the U. S. Invasion has
worked to the advantage of the TTP – many
of them still use these same weapons, as well
as resources provided to them by the Quetta
Shura65. As recent as December 2013, FC
personnel recovered a massive arms cache
from two ‘bomb factories’ in the town of
Chaman which lies close to the Afghan
border. According to the Express Tribune,
“The FC seized 1650 anti-personnel mines,
480 hand grenades, 2524 kilograms of
explosive materials, seven suicide jackets,
IEDs, remote control devices and other
arms and ammunition66.” The refugee camps
along the Afghan border, as well as on the
outskirts of Quetta, have been particularly
vulnerable to Taliban recruitment67.
Sectarian Violence – The Lashkar-eJhangvi (LeJ) in Balochistan
In the past decade, there has been a sharp
surge in incidents of sectarian terrorism
targeting Pakistan’s Shia community
across the nation, particularly marked
in Balochistan. What is puzzling about
sectarian attacks in Balochistan is the
fact that they are being carried out by the
Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, a hitherto Punjab-based
Sunni militant organisation.
Originally known as the Sipah-e-Sahaba
Pakistan (SSP), the group was formed in
1985 in the Punjabi town of Jhang, under
the (Sunni) Islamist reign of General Zia
ul-Haq. The group was formerly allied with
the state, and consisted of radical Deobandi
(a sub-sect of Sunnism) elements trained
Lieven, Pakistan: A Hard Country, 428
66
S Baloch “Bomb factories raid: FC seizes huge
cache of arms, explosives in Chaman”, The Express
Tribune, 28 December 2013, accessed 15 January
2014, http://tribune.com.pk/story/651870/bomb-factories-raid-fc-seizes-huge-cache-of-arms-explosivesin-chaman/
67
Siddiqi, “Security Dynamics in Pakistani Balochistan,” 161.
65

116 | McGill Journal of Political Studies 2014

to aid the Mujahideen in Afghanistan, and
later to replicate that successful insurgency
in the disputed territory of Kashmir68. The
SSP has operated as a powerful political
party; its members have been elected to
Parliament. For instance, in 1995, the
Pakistan People’s Party appointed an SSP
leader as a cabinet member of the province
in order to gain a majority in Punjab69. The
SSP was subsequently banned by Gen.
Musharraf.
The factors which were responsible for
the rise in power of the Taliban have also
bolstered the SSP, and in fact, the LeJ has
significant links with the TTP and alQaeda70. In particular, the rise of Sunni
religious activism as a result of the SovietAfghan war is the singular most important
reason in the establishment and power
of the SSP. As in the Baloch borderlands,
the growth of Deobndi madrassahs was
encouraged by General Zia in the 1980s in
Punjab as well71. The Pakistani state, helped
by the United States and Wahabi-Sunni
Saudi Arabia, provided ample funding and
arms to these institutions and the jihadists
being trained within them. The presence of
the state education system has been lacking
in southern Punjab, which has been a key
reason for the proliferation of madrassahs
in the 90s during the jihad against the
moderate Northern Alliance72. Unlike the
TTP, however, the SSP have never been an
anti-state outfit. Their relatively organised
and hegemonic party structure, training, and
alliance with other militant organisations
have allowed them to conduct extremist
sectarian attacks with near impunity.
The SSP also came about to counteract
A Hashim “Pakistan’s Hazaras Living Under Siege”
Al-Jazeera, 18 January 2013, accessed 1 December
2013, http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/featur
es/2013/01/2013117124512947691.html; Lieven,
Pakistan: A Hard Country, 292-3
69
Yusuf, “Sectarian Violence,” 7.
70
Siddiqi, “Security Dynamics in Pakistani Balochistan,” 162
71
Yusuf, “Sectarian Violence,” 3
72
Lieven, Pakistan: A Hard Country, 291
68

growing Shia ascendancy within the
Pakistani socio-economic and political
landscape. There is a significant Shia elite
within Pakistan. In the Punjab-region,
these are the Shia landed elites, who were
granted vast tracts of land by the British,
and are often resented by the majority
Sunni peasantry73. In Balochistan, the
Hazara Shiite community, too, are relatively
prosperous and well-educated. They have
a proud and long history of representation
in the military, and enjoy a certain amount
of clout from their reputation as a warrior
race. Certainly in Quetta, where the Hazara
community constitute an urban elite because
of their high literacy levels, successful
businesses, efficient schools, and hospitals74.
Conditions of poverty and stark inequality,
coupled with feelings of relative deprivation,
made both regions ideal battlegrounds for
sectarian violence.
The 1979 Iranian Revolution also
had a hand to play in the rise of militant
sectarianism. The ascendance of an Islamist
Shia regime in Iran had an empowering
effect upon the Shia community with
Pakistan, including the Hazaras. Hazaras
share certain affinities with the Iranian
shias: the Hazaras are Shias of the Jafari
order which is also practiced in Iran, and as
farsi-speaking people, they have a linguistic
commonality75. In Balochistan, Hazaras have
come to be associated with Iran, a country
which Pakistan has strained relations with
at best, and the LeJ has opportunistically
exploited this friction in Balochistan. The
comments of the former Chief Minister
of Balochistan, Nawab Aslam Raisani,
are highly demonstrative of the apathy of
the Government to the low-level Hazara
genocide. When asked what he plann Y™