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U.N. Pulls Staff Out of Pakistani City
QUETTA, Pakistan, Oct 10 (News Agencies) - The United Nations started pulling staff out of this strife-torn city Wednesday as police and firefighters prepared for further violent anti-U.S. protests.
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees spokesman Rupert Colville said his organization had cut staff numbers operating in Quetta after their offices were burned down in demonstrations here this week.
He described the destruction of their offices as "the most serious security incident UNHCR staff have experienced in Pakistan."
"The general security situation is not very good and we are not able to function at full capacity ... these attacks simply highlight the difficulties," he said.
Authorities were relieved Quetta was stable again Wednesday but feared a repeat of Monday and Tuesday's violence later in the week.
Religious leaders are due to descend on Quetta from across Pakistan for planned anti-U.S. rallies on Friday.
"At least it is quiet here. People are in their homes, some are cleaning up and others are planning for Friday," a senior military officer told Agence France Presse (AFP).
Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf on Wednesday criticized the "negligence" of law enforcement agencies in Quetta and issued a zero tolerance warning to extremist groups.
"I will take stern action against any person or organization found involved in any activity aimed at harming national interests or our national assets," Musharraf said on state-run television.
"In future, no extremist activity will be tolerated in any quarter of Pakistan."
The Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI) and the Afghanistan Defense Council, a coalition of religious parties, have called Friday's rallies.
At least five people died here Tuesday and another 28 were injured as hardline religious groups rioted and clashed with security forces in response to the U.S.-led attacks on Afghanistan's Taliban regime. One person was also killed in clashes Monday.
Police and fire stations, banks, United Nations' offices and a shopping plaza were looted and razed as tear gas and billowing black smoke blanketed the city, in western Pakistan close to the Afghan border.
Tuesday's rioting was the worst violence seen since Musharraf decided last month to back U.S. action against targets in Afghanistan, notably by allowing American warplanes and missiles to pass through Pakistani airspace.
Clashes were also reported Tuesday in the northwestern city of Peshawar, the capital Islamabad, Karachi in the south and Lahore in the northeast.
U.S. reprisals for the September 11 destruction in New York and Washington continued Wednesday with the Afghan capital, Kabul, and the southern city of Kandahar coming under attack.
Kandahar - 210 miles northwest of Quetta - is the Taliban stronghold and home of Osama bin Laden, the man suspected by the U.S. of being responsible for terrorist attacks against U.S. interests and on U.S. soil.
Respite from the riots had prompted authorities to take a convoy of 50 journalists to the Afghan border at Chaman, 150 miles northwest along the road to Kandahar.
However, the convoy was forced back to Quetta amid protests near Pishin, about 25 miles out of town.
"It looked very nasty," an Australian television cameraman said.
A French photographer added: "About 2,000 people appeared out of the desert screaming 'attack, attack'."
Pakistan's military government has arrested an estimated 300 pro-Taliban militants, including JUI faction chief Fazlur Rehman, who has urged his followers to "fight against U.S. and British terrorism."
Rehman's followers in the JUI student wing on Wednesday opened a registration booth for
jihad (struggle) outside a mosque in the northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar, also near the Afghan border.
Some young men offered to donate blood to wounded Taliban soldiers, but two promised to cross the border and fight with the militia in the event of a U.S.-led ground assault.
"We have registered our names and the moment Fazlur Rehman gives the order we will go. The moment they send land forces we will go to fight," said JUI volunteer Azizullah, who goes by only one name.
Meanwhile, Pakistani Islamic leader Abdullah Shah Mazhar threatened to launch attacks against the United States and "non-believing" forces as some 5,000 followers took an "oath of death".
Mazhar, a former leader of the Jaish-e-Mohammad group, which was included this year on an official British terrorist blacklist, claimed thousands of supporters of his new Islamist group, Tehreek-al-Furqan, were ready to die.
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