Episode 2 of VICE on HBO premieres tomorrow night at 11PM! Sneak peek
Facedown in Chitral: Where Pakistani Muslims Go to Secretly Party
Rudyard Kipling’s “The Man Who Would Be King” is a 19th-century tale of empire, madness, and idolatry centered around two roguish British soldiers who take a perilous journey into Kafiristan, a hostile mountain region populated by pagans who kill and rob anyone foolish enough to set foot in their domain. Kafiristan took its name from the Arabic word kafir, which translates as “nonbeliever” or “infidel.” The region stretches across portions of what is today Afghanistan and Pakistan. It’s not a nice place to live, but, as I discovered, it is a great place to party.
For nearly 70 years, up until 1896, the emir of Afghanistan offered bribes to the people of Kafiristan to discourage them from robbing outsiders and slinging their bodies off of mountains. The Kafirs took the money but refused to give up their marauding ways. Abdur Rahman Khan, nicknamed “The Iron Emir,” grew so incensed by this flagrant disrespect of his power that he sent troops into the Afghan-controlled portion of Kafiristan to discipline the local population. Kafirs were rounded up and given a stark choice: Islam or death. Naturally, most chose Islam, and the Afghan side of Kafiristan was soon known by the euphemism Nuristan, or “land of light.” These forced conversions and the change of moniker, however, did little to alter the nature of its people. In his 1958 book A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush, Eric Newby cataloged some common phrases in the Nuristani language at that time: “I saw a corpse in a field this morning”; “I have nine fingers; you have ten”; and “I have an intention to kill you.”
In the end, the Iron Emir was only sucessful in converting the population on the Afghan side. Across the Hindu Kush mountains, in Pakistan, a raucous pagan animism persisted. Today the descendents of these pagans live in what are known as the Kalash valleys: Bumboret, Birir, and Rumbur. They are the last animist tribe of Central Asia—a nature-worshipping island in a sea of Islam spreading out in all directions.
The Kalash people spurn Islamic law by drinking, taking drugs, and partying. For decades, pleasure-seeking Muslims have ventured to these valleys to get drunk on Kalash wine (which tastes like sherry) and the local moonshine known as tara (which tastes like schnapps). The drug of choice is opium brought in from Afghanistan or, more commonly, nazar, an opiate-based chewing tobacco, which oftentimes makes users sick and dizzy. Just like American kids who travel to Florida or Vegas to blow off some steam, devout Pakistanis periodically head up into the mountains for a taste of the debauched pagan life.
World Peace Update: People are still killing each other.
The Taliban Just Tried to Assassinate Me
There’s a certain amount of irony when you’re accused of being pro-Taliban, only to find half a kilo of explosives under your car, which have been put there by the Taliban. But that situation is something that Hamid Mir, Pakistan’s most well-known TV presenter, has had to deal with recently.
Not only is the 46-year-old a national media celebrity, he’s also an expert in terrorism—a combination of interests that is pretty volatile in a country like Pakistan. He was the last journalist to interview Osama bin Laden before the al-Qaeda leader went underground in 2001. Two years ago, an audio tape purporting to contain aphone conversation between the journalist and a Taliban spokesman was leaked. The discussion about a former intelligence agent who was taken hostage and eventually executed sent shockwaves through the Pakistani media, but Mir strongly denies that the voice on the tape is his, claiming a set up.
Last month, he openly condemned the Taliban on Twitter for shooting the schoolgirl Malala Yousefzai in the head, and received a string of death threats in return—a silencing tactic becoming all-too familiar in Pakistan, where a recent report by the Pakistan Press Foundation (PFF) found that 35 journalists have been murdered for their work in the past ten years and countless others have been attacked, tortured, and kidnapped.
Last week, Mir found a remote-controlled bomb containing a battery, a detonator, and ball bearings strapped to the bottom of his car. It failed to detonate. The Taliban (Tehrik-i-Taleban Pakistan) promptly said they did it because Mir was targeting them with a “secular agenda”—and anyone “targeting the Taliban would be targeted with explosives.”
I spoke to him about why he’s not going anywhere any time soon.
VICE: Hey Hamid, why was there half a kilo of explosives under your car?
Hamid Mir: After the attack on Malala Yousafzai, I did some talkshows and wrote some columns about the people who attacked her. It was the Taliban that accepted the responsibility. They wrote a very long email to me, saying I am the enemy of Islam because I am supporting Malala.
That’s a big accusation. How did you react to that?
I responded back. I said, “I am not the enemy of Islam: You are not Muslims.”
And then what?
I’m writing a book, so I went to a photocopy shop in a market close to my home because I needed some photocopies of my columns published in the last five years. I spent some time in the shop and I asked my driver to come along with me to pick up some books in which my old columns were placed. He left the car unattended for about 15 minutes. That was the time it took for someone to put the bomb under my car.
They planted a bomb in my car, in the heart of Rana Market, Islamabad—the capital—in a very secure area. A lot of diplomats and foreigners shop in that market because security agencies have cleared it for them. It’s also a residential area where diplomats live. That’s the reason I went to that market, because I thought it was safe. But even there, they planted a bomb, so what can I do now?
What’s the book about?
It’s about the problems faced by the media in Pakistan, especially the targeted killing of some of my colleagues in the last four or five years. The title is not ready yet. We have lost more than 90 journalists in the past ten years. Some of them, at least four or five of them, were very close friends of mine.
How do you know the Taliban were behind this latest attack?
The Home Department in Pakistan informed me that the Taliban decided to attack me. Then my colleagues spoke directly to the Taliban spokesperson, Ensuallah Ehsan, and he told them, “We will try again. This time he is scared, but we will try again.”
I Hung Out in a Warlord’s Arms Factory
I went to the north of Pakistan last year to make a film. Before I left, my friend Sami got in touch and said that he’d been to Pakistan before too, and needed to tell me about the time he visited a warlord’s factory there. His trip was in 2005, when Pakistan was a slightly safer place, marginally less affected by American drone strikes, Islamic radicalism, and the ISI’s (Pakistan’s secret service) covert funding of the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Sami went to Peshawar, the capital of the Pashtuns, in the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. From there he headed into the federally administered tribal areas, a region of the country that governs itself free from the shackles of the Islamabad government. It’s also where Taliban fighters hide and where they slip in and out of Afghanistan from. I talked to him about the warlord’s arms factory and the little coke and heroin den he kept just off it.
VICE: First off, this wasn’t a legal arms factory, right?
Sami: I’m pretty sure it’s illegal. That whole area of Pakistan follows a law unto themselves. We could only get into the area by being smuggled under a blanket through a police checkpoint, so it’s not the most above board of places. But everyone there seemed very jolly. This short guy called, I think, Prince Al Haseem, bounced up to us when we arrived at our hotel in Peshawar and told us that he’d sort out anything we wanted to do. The number two thing on his list was a trip to the arms factory on the border of Afghanistan, about a half-hour drive from Peshawar.
It’s on the border with Afghanistan?
Yeah, it’s down south in tribally administrated areas. Warlords have always controlled it. The Taliban were in charge of the Swat area when we were there, so we couldn’t really go over there, but that area wasn’t really religiously active. Peshawar was, but the tribal areas just wanted to get on with life and weren’t that keen on Pakistani or Islamabad rule at all.
It was obviously a dangerous place at the time, but do you think you’d be able to get there again now?
No, I think it’s an absolute no-go at the moment. The Taliban arsenal is much stronger there and the area seems to be completely shut off. I haven’t heard of any foreigners going anywhere near that area. Peshawar isn’t the most popular place to go at the moment, either.
The welcoming sign at the police checkpoint.
Even at the time, though, surely people weren’t jumping over themselves to tell you to go to arms factories?
I think it was a mix of naivety and the fact that this Prince guy had convinced us that it was going to be a great little daytrip. Prince said, “let’s go to an arms factory,” and we were like, “YES.” We only realized halfway through when he said, “Duck down, duck down; I’m going to put a blanket over your head” in the taxi that it wasn’t going to be quite as simple as he had made it out to be.
What did the area look like once you got past the checkpoint?
A lot of small Pakistani towns look very similar, but as we came into this town, we started noticing that the shops looked quite different from other ones. There were a few shotguns lying against the walls and a few of the shops were selling guns. As we came to the main high street, every single shop on it was selling guns. There were AKs, Berettas, and fake M16s in every single shop window. There were barely any food shops, just guns.
VICE co-founder Suroosh Alvi travelled to Karachi to throw VICE’s first ever party in Pakistan.
(Source: youtu.be)
Sure, we hear about violence in Pakistan all the time, but in 2011, more than three times as many people were killed in Karachi than the number of people killed in American drone strikes in the tribal areas. VICE explores the seedy underbelly of this ultra-violent metropolis of more than eighteen million people, and meet the players who make Karachi one of the craziest cities on earth.
Hosted by VICE Founder Suroosh Alvi
Follow Suroosh on Twitter: @SurooshAlvi
(Source: youtu.be)
The VICE Guide to Karachi
Sure, we hear about violence in Pakistan all the time, but in 2011, more than three times as many people were killed in Karachi than the number of people killed in American drone strikes in the tribal areas. VICE explores the seedy underbelly of this ultra-violent metropolis of more than eighteen million people, and meet the players who make Karachi one of the craziest cities on earth.
Hosted by VICE Founder Suroosh Alvi
Follow Suroosh on Twitter: @SurooshAlvi
Part 1/5: http://youtu.be/xgIl1vmIchA
Part 2/5: http://youtu.be/27CnlYGlFL0
Part 3/5: http://youtu.be/kkQ32S-urjQ
Part 4/5: http://youtu.be/yLfrK8irjtU
Part 5/5: http://youtu.be/YtIT3uUEgzE
(Source: youtube.com)
Karachi Kills VICE - By Suroosh Alvi
Interviewing a “target killer” in Karachi was probably the scariest thing I’ve done in my 17 years at VICE. His gun sat between my feet in the backseat of our car as we drove in circles around his neighborhood. After our chat about killing people for a living, I felt like vomiting for three hours. I’ve been around my share of guns and violence, but sitting next to someone who has murdered 35 people (for between $550 and $1,100 per head) made me feel not so good.
So who hires these people? According to the hit man I interviewed, politicians contract about 80 percent of the assassinations in the region and the other 20 percent are related to organized crime. Twenty years ago, he said, there were a total of six guys in his profession. Today, there are more than 600 active target killers operating in Karachi. Indeed, many locals speculate that the famous Raymond Davis case—in which a CIA agent took out two armed men in Lahore last year and subsequently strained US-Pakistan diplomacy—was a failed target killing, not some random kids on motorcycles trying to rob him.
On the outskirts of Karachi, children search for scraps in one of the largest garbage dumps in the world, which is next door to what is rumored to be one of the mafia’s favorite hiding spots for its kidnap victims, Surjani Town.
I have visited Pakistan many times and know my way around the rest of the country, but this was my first time working in Karachi. This place is different. A sprawling, ultraviolent metropolis of 18 million people, it’s one of the fastest-growing cities in the world and is probably most famous in the West as the place where Wall Street Journal journalist Daniel Pearl was kidnapped and beheaded.
Karachi has a rich history of violence, dating back to 1947, when Pakistan rose from the ashes of the British Empire. The massive influx of Muslim refugees into the new country brought turf wars, ethnic diversity (as well as ethnic tensions and rivalries), political warfare, gang violence, sectarian killings, and, in more recent years, suicide bombings.
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