Pakistan Conflict Monitor

Govt Attempts to Rehabilitate "Would-Be Suicide Bombers"

Pakistan Attempts Rehabilitation of Would-Be Suicide Bombers, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 28 July 2010

EXCERPT: "As suicide bombings have become a common tactic of terrorist groups in Pakistan, the authorities are now trying to rehabilitate would-be attackers, RFE/RL's Radio Mashaal reports. A suicide bomber who killed eight people on July 26 outside the home of a provincial minister near Peshawar is representative of the suicide bomber demographic -- like the vast majority, he was a juvenile male. Mohammad Farooq Khan is a doctor at a rehabilitation center in the northern Swat district for would-be bombers. His facility is one of two in Pakistan where a total of some 175 young people are being 'treated.' Farooq Khan told Radio Mashaal that the parents of most of the patients at the center had sent their children to strict madrasahs or to Islamic fundamentalist organizations to be educated. The parents later realized that their children were being turned into extremists. Farooq Khan said many of the boys grew up without their fathers, who were usually working abroad or in other parts of Pakistan."

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Related articles:
In Afghanistan, no shortage of suicide bombers, NPR, 28 July 2010
What goes into the making of a suicide bomber, The Express Tribune, 20 July 2010

Related posts:
Beyond madrasas: Assessing the links between education and militancy in Pakistan, 23 June 2010
Poor health facilities exacerbate bomb tolls, 6 January 2010
Taliban brainwashing kids into killers: Military, 5 January 2010
Suicide bombers cause torment for Pakistani children, 17 November 2009
Lack of basic education fuels rise in Taliban, extremism, 9 November 2009

IDPs with Disabilities Lack Proper Facilities, Care

Life Tough for an IDP, Tougher Still for a Disabled IDP, Irin News, 22 July 2010

EXCERPT: "[...] Life is as hard for most of the disabled at the five remaining IDP camps in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, which OCHA said house some 105,000 people. 'For those who are old or have problems with their mobility, it’s hard to get to the sanitation areas or to move beyond their tent blocks,' Faiz Uddin, a volunteer at Samarbagh Camp for IDPs in Lower Dir District, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, told IRIN on the phone. He said most of these people could only manage 'because they received help from their families' and that few arrangements existed for them at camps. Some attempts have been made to change this. In 2009, the UK-headquartered charity Sightsavers carried out an assesment [see page 41] at Jalozai Camp for IDPs at Nowshera near Peshawar and identified 188 persons with disabilities. Along with its partner, local NGO Human Resource Development Society, Sightsavers was able to initiate a project to improve the social inclusion of the disabled by setting up sanitation facilities that offered them better access. 'In camps, the majority of disabled persons are excluded. Disability needs to be recognized as a cross-cutting issue in the implementation of service provision in the camps, like water and sanitation, inclusive education, literacy, etc,' Niaz Ullah Khan, country director of Sightsavers, told IRIN from Islamabad. 'All rehabilitation interventions in conflict areas should adopt universal accessibility standards.'"

Read the full story.
Read the full assesment [pdf].

Related reports:
From the perspective of vulnerable persons, persons with injuries/disabilities and older persons in the current IDP crisis in Pakistan: Participatory rapid need assessment report [pdf], Handicap International via OneResponse, May 2009

Related posts:
Aid program for IDPs under threat: UN, 18 May 2010
Pakistan displacement figures for 2009 at record high: Report, 17 May 2010
Psychologists warn of conflict's heavy toll on mental health, 13 May 2010
Fear, poor security hamper bomb victims' treatment, 10 February 2010
Inadequate international aid funding jeopardizes UN humanitarian projects, 12 April 2010

Psychologists Warn of Conflict's Heavy Toll on Mental Health

Pakistan Psychologists Issue Conflict Health Warning, Reuters, 13 May 2010

EXCERPT: "In the conflict between Taliban insurgents and Pakistan's army, thousands have been killed in bombings of everything from military and police facilities to crowded street markets; even a volleyball match was attacked. Countless others have been wounded. But the psychological toll often goes unnoticed, even though underfunded and understaffed hospitals are treating a sharply rising number of people who can't cope with bloodshed. 'This is alarming us,' said psychologist Najam Younes. Some people are too depressed to function. Others are gripped by anxiety attacks, paranoia and post traumatic stress disorder. Flashbacks are common. It doesn't take much to destabilize minds. Even headlines of smaller attacks that flash across news channels are enough to send people to psychiatrists seeking pills to calm them or help them sleep at night. Luckily for Pakistanis, the stigma attached to mental illness has eased, making it easier for them to seek psychiatric care, psychologists say. But the problem is that people caught up in the violence - mostly living in the epicenter of the conflict in the northwest - have no access to psychological care facilities. So they must take long, expensive journeys to cities like Peshawar for treatment."

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Related articles:
Children who stayed behind in conflict-affected areas need support, UNICEF, 10 August 2009
Shortage of psychiatrists a problem in Pakistan, The Lancet, 8 September 2007

Related reports:
Mental health promotion in post-conflict countries [pdf], Journal of the Royal Society for Promotion of Health, November 2004

Related posts:
Fear, poor security hamper bomb victims' treatment, 10 February 2010
Child, maternal health goals unlikely to be met: UN, 4 January 2010
Suicide bombers cause torment for Pakistani children, 17 November 2009

Anti-polio Campaign in N. Waziristan Halted Due to Security Situation

Anti-Polio Campaign Put Off in North Waziristan, The News International, 27 April 2010

EXCERPT: "The government on Monday postponed the three-day anti-polio campaign in the volatile North Waziristan due to continuous curfew and tense situation in the region. Officials of the health department at the Fata Secretariat said 150,000 kids would not get anti-polio vaccines in Waziristan.The authorities had made arrangements for the campaign in Waziristan, which was supposed to be launched today. Tribespeople in North Waziristan were already critical of the poor performance of the health department staff and polio teams in the area. 'They rent several vehicles before launch of the campaign and hire people for the job but never reach the children living just outside Miramshah, the headquarters of North Waziristan,' complained a tribesman, Haji Ashraf Dawar, based in Danday Darpakhel village on Miramshah-Ghulam Khan road. He claimed that there were several polio cases in North Waziristan but officials of health department as well as polio team were hiding them from the media."

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Related articles:
Pakistan launches anti-polio campaign, China View, 27 April 2010
Polio threat to Pakistani children, BBC News, 11 July 2009
Polio cases jump in Pakistan as clerics declare vaccination an American plot, The Guardian, 15 February 2007

Related posts:
Taliban ambush kills 8 troops in North Waziristan, 23 April 2010
In North Waziristan, Taliban roams free, 22 April 2010
Child, maternal health goals unlikely to be met: UN, 4 January 2010
Pakistan lagging behind in achieving child health goals, 23 November 2009

Instability and Poverty Place Children at Risk of Sex Work

Sold into Sex Work, IRIN News, 25 April 2010

EXCERPT: "[...] There are reports that rising poverty is forcing a growing number of families to sell children, with girls in particular ending up in sex work. 'We have more and more reports of people selling their children due to poverty,' I.A. Rehman, secretary-general of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), told IRIN. Boys were sometimes trafficked outside the country, and girls were generally sold into the sex trade, he said. According to HRCP, growing unemployment is a big factor contributing to poverty. According to independent estimates, the unemployment rate is 15.2 percent. Poverty levels have remained persistently high in Pakistan. According to a study completed in February 2010 by economists at the Lahore University of Management Sciences, every second household in the districts of the southern Punjab, comprising 17.49 million people, lives in absolute poverty. The fact that many wage earners have lower skill levels, due to a lack of education, is cited as a key factor in this. 'For households in the north [of Punjab Province], 14.26 percent of their income comes from remittances, which explains their comparative affluence; it is 4.4 percent in the centre [of the province], 2.14 percent in the south and 3.03 percent in the west,' the study says. Punjab is by far the most populous of Pakistan's four provinces. 'Pakistan's economy has been in recession for some years. Because of political instability and terrorism there is no investment and no growth. This means fewer jobs and other related issues,' economic analyst Sikander Lodhi told IRIN. He also said prices of many items, including food, had risen in response to rising fuel costs."

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Related articles:
Sex work a dangerous game, IRIN News via Reuters, 6 January 2009
Children at risk [op-ed], Daily Times, 12 December 2006
Lahore's street children find alternatives at UNICEF-supported centre, UNICEF, 9 November 2006

Related reports:
Global report on the status of action against commercial sexual exploitation of children [pdf], ECPAT International, 2006

Related posts:
Child, maternal health goals unlikely to be met: UN, 4 January 2010
Pakistan lagging behind in achieving child health goals, 23 November 2009

Unofficial Healthcare Discrimination against Bengalis

Unofficial Healthcare Discrimination against Bengalis, IRIN News, 7 April 2010

EXCERPT: "All housemaid Shehr Bano needed to survive the late stages of Hepatitis B was good palliative care. But despite having an official Pakistani national identity card (NIC), her Bengali origin and meagre income meant she could not get treatment and she died in August 2009. Her husband and children are all Hepatitis positive but have no means of getting treatment and continue doing their day-to-day odd jobs. Accounts of Bengali Pakistanis being turned away from public hospitals and clinics are common. It is not officially condoned by any means, but rather an underlying prejudice against this ethnic group by some health workers, experts say. 'A lot of it has to do with the mindset of people in power and that is what trickles down,' Muhammad Kamran, a community worker in Karachi, said. [...] Abdul Majeed Chutto, programme manager for HPCP in Sindh Province, told IRIN the programme treats each and every citizen as equal, and there is no bias on the basis of language or ethnicity. 'All Pakistanis are eligible for treatment under the hepatitis control programme. As far as the question of being a 'valid' citizen is concerned, we do ask the patients to provide a copy of their NIC or CNIC so as to ascertain which area they reside in and then we refer them to a public facility there,' he said. 'However, at the end of the day, it’s our aim to treat the maximum number of people and I stand by my word when I say we do so without any discrimination.' Jamal (not his real name), who works at the Lyari General Hospital in Karachi, confirmed there was no official policy of discrimination against Bengalis but that it happened frequently nonetheless."

Read the full story.

Related articles:
Stateless and desperate: Pakistan's forgotten Bengalis, Asia Calling, 25 October 2009

Related reports:
RRT Research Response [pdf], Refugee Review Tribunal Australia, 20 February 2008; Answers two questions: 1. Are those of Bengali origins included as Mohajirs? and 2. Have Pakistanis with Bengali origins who are not politically active faced serious harm or discrimination in the last five years in Karachi or elsewhere in Pakistan?

Related posts:
"Critical differences" between Baloch and Bangladeshi separatism, 19 January 2010

Fear, Poor Security Hamper Bomb Victims' Treatment

Security Fears Hamper Bomb Victims’ Treatment, IRIN News, 10 February 2010

EXCERPT: "Four days after two bomb blasts on the same day killed 35 people in Pakistan’s commercial capital, Karachi, injured survivors are still trickling into the accident and emergency department of the city’s Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre. The second bomb went off outside the state-run hospital as it was receiving victims injured in the first blast, when a suicide bomber hit a bus. 'It seems patients are afraid of coming here,' Javed Iqbal at JPMC said. A day after the explosion, as the department re-opened, 'hardly 30-40' patients had come in, compared to about 400 normally. 'There was mayhem out here when a suicide bomber hit the crowd of patients, those accompanying them, doctors, paramedics, volunteers and the ambulance teams bringing in people who were badly hurt. I received facial injuries myself, and all I could see was people lying still or screaming in pain with no one to help them,' Muhammad Javed, an ambulance driver, told IRIN. At least two doctors and other JPMC staff members were among those injured. Patients at the emergency department were rushed to other hospitals, and Seemin Jamali, head of the hospital, urged the government to provide security assistance and training for a 'war-like situation'. 'The thing is that security is never good at hospitals. It is not the kind of place that is guarded from terrorism...' The Sindh government has now tasked a committee to devise a security plan for hospitals."

Read the full story.

Related articles:
Security at hospitals inadequate, Daily Times, 7 February 2010
Security plan for hospitals sought, Daily Times, 7 February 2010
Pakistan army hits "militants" in Waziristan hospital, BBC News, 31 December 2009
Wounded civilians dying as they flee Pakistan conflict, AlertNet, 1 June 2009

Related posts:
Poor health facilities exacerbate bomb tolls, 6 January 2010

Poor Health Facilities Exacerbate Bomb Tolls

Pakistan: Poor Health Facilities Exacerbate Bomb Tolls, IRIN News, 5 January 2010

EXCERPT: "The death toll from bombings across Pakistan in recent months has been exacerbated by the lack of health facilities, especially in rural areas, health officials say. At least 1,180 people died in bomb blasts across Pakistan in 2009. Some 79 of these bombings were suicide attacks, with most of them taking place in conflict-ravaged North West Frontier Province (NWFP), where the army continues to battle militants. Two days after a suicide bombing that killed 105 people in Lakki Marwat District in North West Frontier Province (NWFP), Hasan Marwat, 25, knows he is lucky to be alive. 'I lay on the field where the blast took place for nearly an hour. Because I was slipping in and out of consciousness, people thought I was dead and left me there,' he told IRIN from District Headquarters Hospital in neighbouring Bannu District, where he is now recovering from leg fractures in both limbs and head injuries. The suicide bombing of a volley-ball game in the tiny village of Shah Hassankhel, close to Lakki Marwat town, was the worst attack in the province since a blast at a market in Peshawar in October 2009 killed 117 people. The lack of a hospital or basic health facilities in Shah Hassankhel village added to the suffering of the hundreds of victims."

Read the full story.

Related articles:
Analysis: Taliban try to bomb Pakistanis into submission, Reuters India, 5 January 2010 
New Pakistan plan to upgrade health facilities in tribal areas, The Peninsula, 3 January 2010 
Health unit, two schools dynamited in Bajaur, DAWN, 3 January 2010 

Related reports:
Pakistan/North Western Frontier Province health cluster bulletin no.19, World Health Organisation, 16 December 2009 

Related posts:
Child, maternal health goals unlikely to be met: UN, 4 January 2010 
Pakistan lagging behind in achieving child health goals, 23 November 2009 

Child, Maternal Health Goals Unlikely to be Met: UN

Pakistan: Warning Over Maternal, Infant Mortality Goals, IRIN News, 30 December 2009 

EXCERPT: "With just five years left until the 2015 UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) deadline, health care professionals have warned that the country is unlikely to reach its targets for goals four and five, child health and maternal health. 'In Pakistan, a lot of things are lacking, including quality healthcare. There is political instability and an even greater lack of awareness,' Andro Shilakadze, chief field officer in Pakistan for the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), told IRIN. 'Even small steps like focusing on and promoting hygiene and sanitation, and stressing exclusive breast-feeding can lead to improved health but these are put on the backburner.' MDG four stipulates that Pakistan must reduce its under-five child mortality rate by two thirds between 1990 and 2015; from 130 deaths per 1,000 children in 1990 to 85 per 1,000 in 2015. According to the Pakistan Demographic Health Survey (PDHS) in 2006-2007, this rate was 94 per 1,000 in 2006/7. 'This seems reachable, especially in urban centres, but things are different in rural areas. Also, the ongoing strife in NWFP [North West Frontier Province] and Balochistan has put a large number of children at risk,' said Amir Dawood, president of the Balochistan branch of the Pakistan Paediatrics Association (PPA)."

Read the full story.

Related articles:
Mother and child health week brings health services to children and mothers in Pakistan, UNICEF, 16 December 2009 

Related reports:
Morbidity and mortality report, District Swat, NWFP, Pakistan [pdf], World Health Organisation, 4 December 2009
PAIMAN baseline indicators [pdf], Pakistan Initiative for Mothers and Newborms // United States Agency for International Development // Population Council, December 2009 

Related posts:
Pakistan lagging behind in achieving child health goals, 23 November 2009 

Pakistan Lagging Behind in Achieving Child Health Goals

'"Pakistan Lags Behind in Achieving Child Health Goals"', Daily Times, 21 November 2009

EXCERPT: "Discussing the child health scenario in Pakistan, the PPA forum observed that unfortunately, Pakistan has lagged behind in achieving the child-health goals including basic immunization coverage, emphasising the need for vaccinations against illnesses like Rota-Virus-the second largest child-killer worldwide. Moreover infant and pre-natal mortality, disability, child rights violation, abuse and terrorism were also discussed, stressing the need for child-health programmes in Pakistan. The forum concluded that enabling a healthy, active and progressive next generation is the only way to ensure a bright future for Pakistan, adding that the whole nation needs to join hands for the advocacy of children in Pakistan. . . "

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Related articles:
Waziristan IDPs get measles vaccinations for first time, IRIN News, 26 October 2009
Children displaced by conflict in Pakistan, UNICEF, 8 May 2009

Related posts:
Suicide bombers cause torment for Pakistani children, 17 November 2009