‘KAHYAN’ International, August 2, 1971

Noontime is kebab-time in Dacca’s riverside district. There are about 20 kiosks made of tin and tree-trunks which specialist in making a mixture of flour and minced intestines of sheep that passes for “kebab”. To the teeming crowds of the district this curious mixture represents a wholesome meal. There are thousands of fishermen, vendors, fortune-tellers, crap-shooters, layabouts, boatmen, beggars, ruined peasants wandering in the town and sundry other semi-naked walking skeletons who mob the “kebab-shops” at lunch-time.
The whole meal costs one-quarter of a rupee (about 2.5 rials’) and yet most of the crowd who gather to watch the grilling thereof coveted meal cannot afford the treat. Out of every 10 by-standers at the kebab-shops only one or two can afford the meal. They eat with pleasure and look as if they have just secured a chunk of paradise. The rest of the crowd look on in envy mixed with wonder.

KAYHAN (International), Aug. 1, 1971

In the middle of Dacca’s fashionable Dhanmandi district there is a pale yellow three-storied building which is said to be haunted by ghosts in the dark nights of the monsoon. Most of the windows are broken and there are bullet marks on almost every wall. The wild ivy pursues its green conquest of the mud-brick walls encouraged by generous rain. Amid the thick leaves of the old trees there are soaked little slogans saying: Joy Bangla (Long Live Bengal).

KAYHAN International July 28, 1971

“Oh, this is now a matter for the historian,” an East Pakistani friend told me in Dacca the other day when I asked him to give his version of the events that plunged the un¬happy land into bloodshed last spring. He was perhaps right. But journalism is the writing of instant history. I decided to ask a number of people to give their accounts of what hap¬pened in East Pakistan. It might take many years before the thick fog of unreality created by propaganda and prevarica¬tion on all sides clears away. Nevertheless, it is possible to form a provisional picture approaching the reality of the events in East Pakistan. In this article, we shall see different views of the dramatic events of spring.

KAYHAN (International) July 27, 1971 THE RELUCTANT PRESIDENT

[ Kayhan International's Amir Taheri has just completed a week-long tour of Pakistan during which he visited both wings of the country. He also met a number of Pakistani leaders, including President Agha Muhammad Yahya Khan. Here he gives an account of the interview with Yahya. This is the first in a series of articles on the recent events which brought Pakistan to the brink of civil war. ]
By : Amir Taheri