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FRONTLINE/WORLD REPORTS FROM PAKISTAN WHERE AL QAEDA Tuesday, February 26, 2008, at 9 p.m. ET on PBS Pakistan: State of Emergency
In “State of Emergency,” a joint project of FRONTLINE/World and the Christian Science Monitor, airing Tuesday, February 26, 2008 at 9:00 P.M. ET on PBS (check local listings), reporter David Montero travels undercover to the remote and beautiful Swat Valley where a mysterious Taliban cleric named Maulana Fazlullah has been leading thousands of followers in a guerrilla war against the government. Known as the “radio mullah” for his fiery sermons broadcast on a pirate FM station, Fazlullah represents the new face of the Taliban – young men trained in Afghanistan, who now pose a major security threat to neighboring Pakistan, and the entire region. Montero is the only Western reporter to have interviewed the reclusive Fazlullah. In a meeting last May, when the Swat Valley was still relatively quiet, Fazlullah told Montero that he wanted to wipe out the darkness of Western ideas. Last fall, Fazlullah’s forces began overrunning military and police outposts and captured sixty towns in the Swat Valley. Then they took their terror tactics a step further and began beheading local opponents, often leaving the bodies on display with a note: “Those people who serve America, the same thing will happen to them.” Many locals, fearful of Fazlullah’s rise, turned to one of Swat’s traditional leaders for guidance—Asfandiar Amir Zeb— a prince whose family has ruled Swat for a hundred years. For months, Zeb appealed to President Musharraf’s government to intervene against Fazlullah, but it was not until a suicide bomber struck for the first time in the history of Swat and as violence was spreading across the country that President Musharraf finally acted, declaring a national state of emergency on November 3rd. He ordered 20,000 ground troops into Swat, killing 300 of Fazlullah’s men and taking back the main towns in the valley. But many say it was too little, too late. Ahmed Rashid, an expert on the Taliban and one of Pakistan’s most respected journalists, told Montero, “I think that this operation has been a total disaster. The military moved in as usual far too late. This could have been nipped in the bud two years ago by a small police operation. And now you needed 20,000 troops. And none of the leadership has been captured.” In December, after the army drove Fazlullah into the hills, the Prince told Montero that he was not sure where Fazlullah was and that the future was uncertain. Two weeks later Montero received a call: A remote controlled bomb had gone off and killed the man who had stood up to Maulana Fazlullah--the prince of Swat. No one claimed responsibility, but it is widely believed Fazlullah was responsible. Compounding the grief in Swat, the prince’s assassination occurred just a day after the death of Benazir Bhutto by a suicide bomber. Another moderate voice had been silenced and Pakistan’s future made all the more uncertain. Also in this hour, on the eve of a presidential election, FRONTLINE/World reporter Victoria Gamburg follows Russia’s democratic opposition as they attempt to campaign against the most popular leader in the country’s modern history. “We’re not fighting to win elections now,” says former chess champion turned opposition figure, Gary Kasparov, of the opposition’s ambitions. “We’re fighting to have elections. But it’s a very important step forward.” Kasparov and the other opposition candidates attempt to take their campaigns to the Russian people, but they face an uphill battle—starting with an unofficial “blacklist” from appearing on state television, and only one remaining radio station where they’re free to broadcast anti-Kremlin views. Gamburg takes Kasparov’s complaints about the blacklist to Vladimir Pozner--known to American audiences as the co-host of a program with Phil Donahue in the 1980s, but now the host of one of the few live opinion programs on Russian television. Pozner admits that some opposition figures are blacklisted by the Kremlin, but he argues that most Russians are not concerned that they don’t get to hear alternative views. “I am a person who follows public opinion polls very closely and what you will find, always, without exception, is that freedom of speech is down at the bottom of the list. Most people, in this country today, I would say the overwhelming majority, really don't care about it.” Given the government’s lock on the media, President Putin’s popularity, and the weak opposition, Gamburg is most surprised to find the lengths to which the Kremlin has gone to marginalize and beat down the opposition. Most notably, the Kremlin has created a 100,000 strong youth movement called Nashi trained to be foot soldiers during the election season, filling the streets one day to celebrate Putin’s birthday, the next to heckle at opposition rallies. Gamburg attended Nashi’s summer camp where she found large posters of the political opposition candidates, including Kasparov, dressed in drag. Lena, a young leader at the camp, told Gamburg, ”These people are the fascists of our country. They betrayed Russia.” Meanwhile, in late November, Kasparov finally got on state television when he was beaten and arrested in Moscow for conducting an illegal rally. The next day at a march in St. Petersburg, the police arrested hundreds of peaceful demonstrators, including elderly women. A young reporter covering the demonstration told FRONTLINE/World the Kremlin’s heavy-handed tactics remind him of the country’s Soviet past. “My parents went to a KGB prison for listening to rock music. I know this country very well. Do you want me to say our people have changed in these few years? I don’t remember the Soviet Union, but I’d say many of our maladies are still the same.” Now, just a week before the presidential election, Putin’s choice to be his successor, Dimitry Medvedyev, is projected to win by a landslide, when, he says, he will appoint Putin as “permanent” prime minister, Cuba: The Art Revolution Finally, in Cuba, FRONTLINE/World reporter Natasha del Toro tells how visual artists have managed to create an art revolution in a country where political free speech has been largely suppressed. She meets Los Carpinteros (“The Carpenters”), Marco Castillo and Dago Rodriguez, whose huge sculptures are world-renowned and command large prices in the international art market. This allows them to live very well, Marco tells her. “Artists live much better here than lawyers. It’s the reverse of what happens in other parts of the world.” Los Carpinteros’ art chides Cuba’s political system using irony and humor. One of their boldest pieces is “The Fallen Lighthouse,” a huge sculpture of the famous Havana landmark, broken and lying on its side. Marco Castillo told del Toro,” A lighthouse isn’t supposed to be lying on its side, fallen, suffering…and of course it has to do with social commentary. I don’t want this country to be conservative and on the right. I’d like it to continue being socialist. But to the leftist fanatics, I would like to tell them that this is not the paradise that they dream it to be.” The subversive sculpture sold to the Tate Gallery in London for $100,000. Ironically, the Cuban government allows Los Carpinteros to cash in on art that criticizes the revolution and to travel freely. At the same time, the Bush Administration has tightened visas for Cuban artists and has not allowed Marco and Dago to travel to the US for exhibitions of their work. With Fidel stepping down and a new US president, maybe “Los Carpinteros” will finally get their visa. Stephen Talbot is series editor, Ken Dornstein is senior producer, and Sharon Tiller is series executive director for FRONTLINE/World. FRONTLINE/World is produced by WGBH Boston and is broadcast nationwide on PBS. Major funding for FRONTLINE/World is provided by Shell, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Skoll Foundation through a grant to the PBS Foundation and by The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. FRONTLINE/World is close captioned for deaf and hard-of-hearing viewers and described for people who are blind or visually impaired by the Media Access Group at WGBH. The executive producer for FRONTLINE/World is David Fanning.
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