ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - President Gen. Pervez Musharraf acknowledged that
Islamic militancy was increasing across Pakistan and said tough measures were
needed to counter it, as religious students from a pro-Taliban mosque abducted
four police officers.
Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, left, salutes as
he arrives to attend the 34th session of the Islamic Conference of Foreign
Ministers in Islamabad, Pakistan on Tuesday, May 15, 2007. [AP]
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Musharraf made his remarks in an
interview aired late Friday by the private Aaj television channel after four
plainclothes officers were captured while patrolling in the capital, Islamabad,
near the Lal Masjid mosque - notorious for launching its own anti-vice campaign.
Two officers were later released.
The president said that militancy in Pakistan was increasing, and "we need to
strongly counter it." Musharraf did not elaborate.
Abdul Rashid Ghazi, a cleric at Lal Masjid, said his students detained the
officers because they were standing outside a seminary linked to the mosque
despite an agreement with authorities that police would not be deployed there.
He said the abductions were in retaliation for intelligence agents detaining
eight or nine of its students in the past two weeks.
Mohammed Anar, an area police official, said that Ghazi had freed two of the
policemen after talks with officials.
"The remaining two policemen will also be freed soon," Ghazi told reporters.
Critics have accused Musharraf's government of appeasing the religious
vigilantes - despite concerns that pro-Taliban hard-liners, intent on enforcing
a stringent version of Islamic law or Shariah, are gaining sway in Pakistan.
Last month, female students at Lal Masjid on a freelance
anti-vice campaign sprung to prominence by kidnapping an alleged brothel owner
and forcing her to make a confession. The mosque later declared it had set up
its own Islamic court, and threatened music and movie shops to close.