Viewpoint: Rights activist criticises US role in war on terror

ISLAMABAD:

The majority of terror suspects held in the United States following 9/11 were trapped by “provocateurs” employed by Federal Bureau of Investigation and other US agencies. They were emotionally exploited by anti-US propaganda, mostly based on photographs and videos of Iraq and Afghanistan showing US soldiers’ excesses against unarmed civilians and prisoners.

This was said by Mauri Saalakhan, a Washington DC-based human rights advocate, currently serving as director of The Peace Thru Justice Foundation and author of several books on terrorism and justice.

He was speaking on Tuesday at the Institute of Policy Studies Islamabad during a session on “Terrorism: American Policy and People”. IPS Chairman Professor Khurshid Ahmad chaired the talk.

Saalakhan also said that the prisoners saw their reactionary statements used as “proofs of their desire to wage war against
America and its people”, adding that they were denied fair trials.

Professor Khurshid Ahmad in said that US policymakers should realise that “terrorism” was not born on 9/11. He said the US response has only resulted in the spread and globalisation of terrorism.

He said that the signature of the war on terror was only the use of violence to fulfil various political and economic objectives.

He stressed upon adopting more realistic and pragmatic approaches to the situation by not only criticising it but finding its root causes to seek political solutions to political problems.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 12^th, 2014.