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13/05/2010

A Taliban Class War?

BBC World Service - Assignment, A Taliban Class War?

In Pakistan is the Taliban's appeal based on class conflict or religious faith?

For Assignment, Owen Bennett-Jones travels to Pakistan to investigate the Taliban's appeal - how much of it is based on class conflict, rather than religious faith?

The Pakistani army has quashed the Taliban in tribal areas like Swat by the ruthless use of military force. 

Now, a new and potentially much more serious threat is rising from home-grown insurgents in Punjab, one of the heartlands of the Pakistani state. 

Owen Bennett-Jones investigates the appeal of these movements to young Pakistanis. How much are they about fundamentalist Islam? And how much are they a reaction to continuing "feudalism" - the dominance of economics, politics and society by a handful of powerful families?  

Listen as Owen travels across the country, meeting both feudal landowners and the young Punjabis who are attracted by the lure of militancy.

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