Subscribe to Common Dreams News Updates
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
More Blackwater Contractors Than Cops In Pakistan's Capitol
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- There are more private security contractors from Xe, formerly Blackwater, operating in Islamabad than capital police, a religious leader said.
A helicopter of the Xe (Blackwater) mercenary firm. There are more private security contractors from Xe, formerly Blackwater, operating in Islamabad than capital police, a religious leader said Monday.
(AFP/Yuri Cortez) Maulana Fazal-ur-Rahman, the leader of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, a Deobandi political party in Pakistan, said there were as many as 9,000 Xe contractors working in Islamabad, compared with just 7,000 capital police, Pakistan's News International reports.
The Pakistani Taliban last week said attacks in the Lower Dir District of Pakistan's North-West Frontier province killed U.S. personnel, claiming the attack was an act of revenge against Xe contractors operating in the region.
Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, confirmed the deaths were U.S. military personnel but described the Taliban claims as propaganda.
Their deaths are the first known U.S. military fatalities in Pakistan.
Fazal blamed foreign contractors for instability in the country, saying they undermined an already weak democratic government. He equated Xe contractors with the insurgent Taliban.
Washington linked stability in Pakistan to the success of its counterinsurgency battle in neighboring Afghanistan, encouraging Islamabad to step up domestic security measures. Pakistan in October launched its own offensive in the volatile tribal regions near the Afghan border.
Fazal during a weekend meeting with Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari said an immediate halt to military activity in the tribal areas would bring normalcy to the region.



18 Comments so far
Show AllSooner or later the state terrorism of the U.S. had to be superseeded by privatized terrorism. Anything else would be contrary the catechism about the gross inefficiencies of governmental involvement in the nation's business. One hopes that the Pakistanis will make the appropriate distinctions and due allowances for a profit margin in their country's annihilation.
The new Praetorian Guard.
Please,
Merceneries
or Hessians if you prefer.
Terrorists?
It is really a US funded Christian Terrorist Organization.
Wasn't Jesus a terriss too?
He DID turn over the tables of the moneychangers and didn't have much good to say about them.
A pure terriss by modern definitions.
Oh man, I'm so glad I don't live in one of the USA's war zones...
Creating hell over there to keep people in line over here.
Police state? Nah, just "mass control". People gotta be led, you know. - Can't get anything done without some firm leadership. It's such a burden, but someone's gotta do it.
We should be proud of all our boys in Bagdad and Bagram and other outbacks. Them people can't control themselves - jez lookit how dirt poor they are.
Gotta have more contractors, police and soldiers everywhere, get some real safety.
Gotta have more soldiers than people.
Finally get some safety. Jez geddit done. Right?
No. No. No. "- Gotta get out of this "place", if it's the last thing we ever do..."
The US cannot be happy until everyone else is living just like we are, whether they like it or not.
Happy consumers with low levels of crime, drug use, depression, infidelity, insecurity, etc.
And of course, amusing themselves into stupidity.
And the bankster© financiers cannot be happy until the Arab world is under their usurious thumb.
I'd go on but time for my Paxil, Wellbutrin, Zoloft, Ritalin & Prozac evening cocktail.
Between the USMC conducting a 'Faluja' campaign in Helmand
and Xe(formerly...B.S. - still are Blackwater, as in diarrhea from a sick person) protecting intersections in Islamabad,
I'm sure the uninvolved civilians are scared defecationless.
What a great foreign policy for Amerika - create an uninhabited wasteland to protect the people unable to live there anymore.
The dumbing down of the US populace is beginning to bear bitter fruit in perverted foreign policy and inhumane actions.
But I could be wrong - unlikely in this case, but possible.
Destroy the village to save it.
Haven't your Raytheon dividend checks arrived yet?
Speaking of wasteland, don't forget our love of DU weapons.
It's the gift that's going to keep on giving in Iraq for generations.
Maybe, but even though they aren't there seems to be nothing anyone can do about it.
Americans are apathetic & the tuned in are margainalized to nothing.
If it's not on tv it didn't happen.
All at the courtesy of the US taxpayer. I doubt Pakistan is footing the bill.
Venality sold as a virtue.
Ain't it great Obama is in office and all those thugs who got BIG GOVERNMENT contracts from Bush are all gone now??? yeah...sarcasm!
SCREW THAT CROOK OBAMA....IMPEACH....IMPEACH....IMPEACH!
Staying the course.........
It's a race and what comes 1st: Bending the world to our pollyanna wishes or national insolvency doing it?
It's clear the sociopaths running the show have absolutely no intention of entertaining the serfs wishes.
I suggest everyone watch Terry Gilliams movie Brazil to become more comfortable living in the world we are creating.
To the world: Kill all US mercenaries, US troops, US contractors, and any one working for Xe. They want to take over your county and steal your resources.
Any questions who the real terrorist are?
Unfortunately giving Fazlur Rahman a plank to voice his opinions is almost as bad as asking The Pentagon what they think of the War in Afghanistan. Fazlur Rahman represents the worst face of Pakistani politics. Scum like him have managed to uproot real representative political parties in Pakistan through terror and manipulation. What a screwed up world we live in !!