The Pakistani Taliban kidnapped an eight-year-old girl and attempted to force her to carry out a suicide attack. The girl was able to save herself and others by warning police at a checkpoint in the northeastern Pakistani district of Lower Dir before her vest could detonate.
Two men and a woman kidnapped an eight-year-old girl named Sohana Javaid from Peshawar, took her to a training camp, and attempted to get her to carry out a suicide attack against Pakistani troops, according to Reuters.
“They put a handkerchief on my mouth and I fell unconscious. They took me to some place. They gave me some biscuits to eat and I again fell unconscious,” Sohana told reporters at a press conference.
The Taliban strapped a suicide vest to her body, drove her to a checkpoint in Lower Dir, and tried to get her to detonate the explosives while she was among the troops. But Sohana was able to warn off the troops, who defused her vest and took her into custody.
“I moved toward the check post but I started shouting and was taken into custody,” she said.
Sohana isn’t the first young girl to escape the clutches of the Taliban in Dir and avoid becoming a suicide bomber. Late last year, a 12-year-old Pakistani girl named Meena Gul was able to escape her Taliban handlers. Meena said she was trained to be a “human bomb” by her own sister-in-law, a cell leader who was identified as Zainab. Meena said she was brainwashed to kill Pakistani troops in one of several camps in northwestern Pakistan and northeastern Afghanistan.
The suicide cells are under the command of Qari Zia Rahman, the dual-hatted Taliban and al Qaeda commander who operates on both sides of the Afghan-Pakistani border.
There have been three suicide attacks along the Afghan-Pakistan border that have been carried out by females over the past year. Two took place in Kunar province in Afghanistan, and another took place in the Bajaur tribal agency in Pakistan.
A female suicide bomber struck for the first time in Afghanistan in Kunar province on June 21, 2010. Two US soldiers were killed and two Afghan children were wounded in the attack. Qari Zia claimed credit for the bombing.
The next female suicide attack took place on Dec. 24, 2010, in Pakistan’s tribal agency of Bajaur. The suicide bomber killed 42 Pakistani civilians in an attack at a World Food Program ration distribution point.
The Afghan Taliban claimed credit for the last strike, a June 4 suicide attack in the Marawara district in Kunar province, Afghanistan, that killed three interpreters. The Taliban released a statement on their propaganda website, Voice of Jihad, and said that a “Mujahida sister” carried out the attack.
12 Comments
I’m suprised the PAK army didn’t shoot her and watch her bleed to death.
Like the say, there’s no honor among the Taliban,
just scapegoats to carry out their bomb attacks. They don’t even have a moral code; except for some
crazy, muslim cartoon character. Oh, allah be blessed with idiots.
It might be worth mentioning that “There was no way to independently verify the story” as stated in reuters. Could be a PR stint.
It might be worth mentioning that “There was no way to independently verify the story” as stated in reuters. Could be a PR stint.
nick,
You can see the girl speak and judge for yourself: http://english.aljazeera.net/video/asia/2011/06/2011620194015119558.html
Read this piece about the schisms within the Pakistan Army. Its and opportunity. Lets strike when the iron is hot. I think it is time we drove a wedge and broke open this coffin of the Dracula to put a spear through its evil heart!
http://southasiaanalysis.org/%5Cpapers46%5Cpaper4559.html
A Tip of the Hat to the young lady may the fates stay with her and may she live a long life.
This is ‘hilarious’.
Reminds me of Nana’s Every Day Life (a tragic webcomic).
This as usual with the Taliban reeks of desperation.
Although using children as suicide bombers is a disgusting act perhaps we can hope this is a sign that they are running out of willing young men to blow themselves up.
Strange that Sohana Javaid was taken from Peshawar as isn’t Peshawar the very place Al Qaeda was created as well as being the place rumoured to be Osama Bin Laden’s refuge after Tora Bora.
I also remember reading that Bin Laden funded many “Charitable” causes in the Peshawar area.
Must be a lovely place to live, though Bin Laden obviously moved off from Peshawar, passed by Mardan and ENDED in Abbottabad
Abducting/Kidnapping a young girl is bad enough but doing it to turn her into a suicide bomber beggars belief in the normal World.
These Taliban scumbags are exactly what CENTCOM commander James Mattis referred to when he said as a 3-star several years ago:
“Actually, it’s a lot of fun to fight,” he said. “You know, it’s a hell of a hoot…. It’s fun to shoot some people. I’ll be right upfront with you. I like brawling.”
He added, “You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn’t wear a veil. You know, guys like that ain’t got no manhood left anyway. So it’s a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them.”
Of course he got in political correctness trouble for that observation.
Christopher Hitchins writes as beautifully as ever about Pakistan’s deadly double-game in Vanity Fair:
“We have been the enablers of every stage of that wretched state