MUNIR AHMED ISLAMABAD Security forces besieging a radical mosque in the Pakistani capital captured its top cleric yesterday as he tried to sneak out of the complex disguised in a woman's burqa, and more than 1000 of his followers surrendered.
President Pervez Musharraf deployed the army to subdue the remaining militants holed up in Islamabad's Lal Masjid, or Red Mosque, whose clerics have defied the government for months with a drive to impose a Taliban-style version of Islamic law in the city.
The tensions erupted into a day-long battle yesterday between security forces and students in which 16 people were killed.
The government ordered the militants to lay down their arms and surrender by yesterday morning, as it positioned armoured vehicles and helicopters around the mosque.
A security official said authorities captured cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz, after a female police officer tried to search his body, which was concealed by a full-length black burqa.
The officer shouted "this is not a woman", prompting male officers to seize him. "The suspect later turned out to be the mosque's chief cleric," the official said.
A cameraman saw police bundling the grey-bearded cleric into the back of a car.
"They have no options but to surrender," said government spokesman Javed Iqbal Cheema. "The government is not into dialogue with these clerics."
The mosque's deputy leader, Abdul Rashid Ghazi, said he was ready to talk with the government, but added: "We will continue to defend ourselves."
The city's deputy administrator, Chaudhry Mohammed Ali, said more than 1000 had surrendered. All women and children will be given amnesty, but males involved in killings and other crimes as well as mosque leaders will face legal action, said Deputy Information Minister Tariq Azim.
Minister of Information Mohammed Ali Durrani said there could be "a few hundred" people left in the mosque. It was unclear how many were hardened militants.
One who decided to give up, Maryam Qayyeum, 15, said those who stayed in the seminary "only want martyrdom".
"They are happy," she said. "They don't want to go home."
The clerics have challenged the government by sending students from the mosque to kidnap alleged prostitutes and police in an anti-vice campaign.
The bloodshed has added to a sense of crisis in Pakistan, where Musharraf already faces emboldened militants near the Afghan border and a pro-democracy movement triggered by his botched attempt to sack the chief justice.-AP
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