Zardari urged to tackle militancy

Pakistan's new President, Asif Ali Zardari, takes over at a time when the threat from the Taleban appears to be growing. On Saturday, a suicide bomber killed more than 30 - and wounded scores more - in an attack near Peshawar. The BBC's Damian Grammaticas visited a hospital in the city and asked how Mr Zardari should tackle the militants.

---

"The force of the blast blew me up in the air," said Bawar Khan, lying in his hospital bed. "I was lifted about one or two metres off the ground. I fell down, and I couldn't walk. I knew it was a bomb."

Bawar Khan was lucky to survive

The 24-year-old labourer was recovering in a trauma ward in Peshawar's Lady Reading Hospital. The explosion left him with lacerations to his arm and body and in deep shock. A dressing covered a 10cm-long wound to his stomach. But his memory of what happened is remarkably clear.

"It was like an earthquake," he told me. "There was lots of smoke, almost every shop in the market was destroyed. It was really busy, there must have been 200 people there at the time."

Bawar Khan works in a shop selling chick peas in the market at Zangali, 15km (10 miles) south of Peshawar. Thirty-six people died when a Taleban suicide bomber drove a pick-up truck laden with explosives up to a police checkpoint by the market and then detonated them.

Zardari himself has been a victim of this violence... His wife was a target of the extremists Umman Ullah, Sister of bomb victim

At exactly the same time, about two hours drive away in Islamabad, lawmakers were voting to chose a new president. Asif Ali Zardari, the widower of Benazir Bhutto, and since her death the co-chairman of her Pakistan People's Party (PPP), won the ballot easily.

Pakistan's war with the militants will be President Zardari's most pressing priority. So what do Pakistanis believe he should he do about it? On the eve of Asif Zardari's inauguration we spent two hours in the Lady Reading Hospital putting that question to the relatives of those caught in the latest atrocity.

Sitting next to Bawar Khan's bed, his uncle Mohammad Amin spoke for many when he told me: "We don't know very much about this man Asif Zardari. We hope he will deliver. But we don't know what he will do.

"We just need peace and an end to terrorism," he said. "Whatever means he uses to fight militancy and terrorism, that is fine by us."

'Talk to the militants'

Because Asif Zardari has never been elected to any political office before now, Pakistanis are uncertain about what sort of leader he will be. Always overshadowed by his wife, he was thrust into the limelight after her assassination.

Mr Zardari is a controversial choice for president

"Zardari himself has been a victim of this violence," said Aman Ullah, sitting beside another hospital bed where his brother lay propped up on a pillow. "Zardari's wife was a target of the extremists. So if anyone is going to be serious about tackling this it might be him."

As he spoke, doctors were busy changing the drip connected to his brother Abdul Rehman's arm. Abdul Rehman is 30, a banana seller with six children. While he lies in hospital recovering from injuries to his stomach there is no one to provide for his family.

"I think there should be a negotiated solution," Aman Ullah told me. "If the militants demand Sharia law in some districts we should do it if it helps stop these attacks."

Asif Zardari has said he stands with the United States and Britain against extremism. Since the PPP-led government has come to power the Pakistani army has stepped up operations in the north-west against the Taleban, and there has been a surge in missile strikes by US forces.

"Zardari says he is with the Americans but General Musharraf said the same thing for eight years," Aman Ullah explained. "And the violence simply got worse. Military operations, co-operation with the US, that's not the solution. The solution is to sit down with these people and have talks."

"This is Pakistan's problem. The militants are from Pakistan. The army fighting them is Pakistan's. The people caught in the middle are Pakistanis. We should solve it ourselves."

'Americans stay out'

Across the ward lay another young man, sprawled on his bed. His hand was encased in a cast, as it had been crushed in the blast.

Shamsur Rehman was badly hurt

The mangled tips of his fingers poked out through the white plaster. His rib cage rose and fell as he drew sharp, shallow breaths.

His name was Shamsur Rehman. He had gone to the market to buy vegetables for his wife and three children. His lungs were full of so much dust from the blast he was having difficulty breathing, explained his brother Sardar Wali.

The men are refugees from Afghanistan. Shamsur Rehman, who works in a brick kiln, fled his own country, only to become a victim of violence in Pakistan.

"The militants here in Pakistan, and the militants there in Afghanistan, have links, they co-ordinate what they do," Sardar Wali told me. But when I asked him if Mr Zardari should work with US forces to curb the Taleban threat he was blunt.

"The Americans should stay in Afghanistan. It's the responsibility of Pakistanis to deal with them here."