Organized Crime in Pakistan Feeds Taliban

Debranya Brower
9-4-09
11:05 a.m.

Police in Pakistan are now trying to crackdown on organized crime by Taliban fighters. While in the past this deadly group has used their own city to smuggle weapons and even hold down a variety of jobs they have now added on organized crime to their list of ways to get money. The Taliban has added on bank robberies, kidnappings, and extort to their list of ways to get quick money. The police have found that they have gotten their largest amount of money through kidnappings. Police say that the group sets ransoms anywhere from $60,000-250,000 always targeting those that they know can pay the ransoms. Although many may believe that certain groups are working together based on religion, the true factors that brings dangerous groups such as this together are money and greed. Many of the people around the area are taking precautionary actions such as Idrees Gigi, a textile worker, who is building a cement wall to go along the edge of his property. The Taliban has many people afraid and any who have tried to fight or go against them have ended up dead. Police say that the worst the economy is the worst the crime will be. Although arrests have been made within the Taliban organization the group has broken off to form other groups.
I believe that poverty definitely does have a lot to do with the high amount of crime that is happening. Unfortunately many people are unable to make ends meet with the jobs that they have and they end up making stupid decisions that can hurt others. This group that has formed are truly deadly and I believe that the police are not going to get a lot of help from the people of that area so they are going to have to try to overpower them on their own. I think that these groups will be very difficult to take down simply because it seems that there are more and more of them even when the police make arrests. They seem to be very intelligent and do not have any respect for authority. Their mafia style of crime shows that they are definitely professionals. They will be tough to take down with the persistence of the police I think that this dangerous group can be disassembled forever.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/29/world/asia/29karachi.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&sq=crime%20in%20africa&st=cse&scp=3