The Taliban Demand That Desperate Pakistan Refuse Western Flood Aid

There is nothing more vile than playing politics with people's lives. The poor Pakistanis are experiencing a natural disaster of monumental proportions, millions of people are suffering from the terrible floods in that country, and the Taliban are calling on the country's leaders to refuse foreign international aid, and all for their own devious agenda.

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Pakistani Taliban spokesman Azam Tariq insisted yesterday that the country ‘should reject this aid to maintain sovereignty and independence’, and claimed the group would itself fund relief efforts.

And where are they going to get all the money to fund relief efforts?

Pakistani leadership has not responded to their demands, and hopefully they're not even considering the offer, but it's obvious that the Taliban are doing this to curry favor with the Pakistani people who are frustrated and fed up with the way current relief efforts are going. To refuse donations from Western countries simply because the Taliban demands it, and to actually allow the Taliban to take over relief efforts would be virtual suicide.

Militant Islamic groups linked to the Taliban and Al Qaeda have been accused of trying to exploit the crisis by distributing aid to the homeless and trying to win their future backing.

Of course, this is an incredibly clever strategy. The people are going to look to those who provided for them, when the time comes, and if the government has been unable to help quickly enough and the Taliban and al-Qaeda have, you know where their loyalties will fall.

In further efforts to make it difficult for foreign aid groups to work in Pakistan, and to run them out of the country, the Taliban have been attacking workers in the region. They claim the NGOs are there to Westernize Pakistan and told them to leave, but the truth of the matter is that they just want to regain control of the area and to take over Pakistan.

Its latest warnings over accepting donations will fuel concerns over safety at a time when the expertise of aid workers is urgently needed. Many of the worst-hit areas near the border with Afghanistan have become a safe haven for the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

Donations from countries across the world have been pouring in, with the U.S. pledging $55 million as of August 10. With an excess of 1,600 dead and more than 14 million people affected by the flooding, it is considered to be worse than the 2010 Haiti and the 2005 Kashmir earthquakes and the 2004 Tsunami disaster combined.

With billions needed to repair all the damage, Pakistan is going to need all the help it can get and certainly not from the Taliban and al-Qaeda. The difference between them and the West, is that the West and Western people donate because our hearts bleed when we see our fellow man in desperate need or in danger, not because we want to influence or buy their loyalty. The Taliban and people of their ilk want to destroy and control.

The world is praying for the Pakistani people.