War mongering?: PU faculty condemn NATO attack, rich bankers

Students, teachers and staff to protest on Wednesday.

LAHORE:

The faculty of Punjab University, the oldest and biggest university in the province, has condemned the Nato strikes that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers as “an unannounced war on Pakistan’s sovereignty”.

Vice Chancellor Professor Mujahid Kamran, deans, department heads and senior teachers unanimously passed a resolution at a meeting on Monday backing the army and the government’s response to the attack and expressing sympathy with the families of the soldiers. The resolution said the Nato supply line to Afghanistan through Pakistan should be permanently closed.

Prof Kamran, addressing the meeting, said that the government should withdraw from the war on terrorism as it was an American war that Pakistan had lost 40,000 people in. He said American writers had also seen that the war was a “drama” staged so America could send its armed forces around the world.

He said the US and Pakistani people faced the same enemy: a group of international bankers. He said in the last 10 years, the US Congress had passed laws that had made America less democratic. The war in this region was unavoidable as it had been planned by “the US elite”, he said.

“The Pakistani people and government should accept this reality and prepare themselves in every field,” he said.

The vice chancellor said Pakistani media should cover the Occupy Wall Street movement using their own resources as foreign media would not show how the American people were rising up against the rich. He said Winston Churchill had labelled this group of rich bankers a ‘high cabal’. He said they wanted to establish a world government.

The resolution said that CIA, Blackwater and “other secret agencies” must withdraw from Pakistan and if any spies were arrested, they should be punished according to the law. It said that Pakistan did not want war, but war was being imposed on it. It said the government should prepare for “this unavoidable war” to protect the country’s sovereignty.

It demanded the immediate start of compulsory army training for all.

It went on: “We do not consider the US people as our enemy, but the enemy of Pakistani and US people is a small group of international bankers who are the owners of all major banks, oil companies, media corporations and defence industries. We stand united with the people of the world against the conspiracies of this group and also appreciate the struggle of Americans against it in this regard.”

Rally on Nov 30: Punjab University teachers, students and employees will stage a rally against the Nato attack on Wednesday, November 30 at 10:00am. The rally will start from the Institute of Business Administration and conclude at the Institute of Education and Research.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 29^th, 2011.