Yet another attack on a mosque

At least 28 people were killed in a suicide blast that took place during Friday prayers in Mohmand agency

For all their claims about espousing and upholding Islamic values, terrorists frequently target places of worship and especially mosques, the most venerated locations in any Muslim community. Mosques are attacked because they are chiefly good targets, as to achieve the goals of maximum carnage, a heightened sense of insecurity and vast amounts of media coverage. The perversity of killing worshippers as they congregate for prayer gets attention. These types of attacks have been occurring in Pakistan for over a decade now, ever since our homegrown brand of terrorism began targeting mosques through suicide bombers equipped with improvised explosive devices (IEDs). Recently there has again been an uptick in terrorist activity in the northern parts of the country and on September 16, an attack took place during Friday prayers in a village of Mohmand agency of Fata. This attack by an IED-carrying suicide bomber resulted in at least 28 dead and over 30 injured.

This part of the country has been the centre of the conflict that has been raging on between the Pakistani military and terrorist groups for the past several years. For the rest of the country, terrorist organisations are shadowy unknowns emerging from their hiding places to wreck mayhem and disappear. But for the people of Fata, these ghosts are very real indeed. They are the ones whose lives and livelihoods have been worst hit — first through having their ancestral land being used by militants and then through the army’s operation to flush out terrorists. Amidst the bombs and bullets, lives are cut short, futures snuffed out and an entire region crying out for development which is accessible to the rest of the country but only a distant dream to them. While our government receives plaudits abroad for having taken strict action against terrorists, more and more people fall victim to the ubiquitous threat of terrorism. Improvised devices which are being utilised lately are particularly deadly since these are easily smuggled into crowded spaces. One hopes our authorities will soon devise a strategy to avoid yet another tragedy of this nature.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 18^th, 2016.

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