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terrorism
Sangakkara’s account of the attack
By Will last year, at the start of March, 3 Comments »
You really need to read this.
3 Comments »I was sitting next to Thilan Samaraweera and close to the young Tharanga Paranavitana. For some reason I moved my head to get a better view and a split second later I felt a bullet fizz past my ear into the vacant seat. Fortunately, as a team, we remained quite calm. No one panicked. After what must have been two minutes standing still, we urged the driver to make a run for the stadium just a few hundred metres away: “Go, go, go” we shouted.
The truth is we owe our lives to the courageous Mohammad Khalil, the driver. I will forever be grateful to him. The tyres of the bus had been shot out and he was in grave personal danger, exposed to gunfire at the front of the bus. But he was hell-bent on getting us to safety and, somehow, he got us moving again. Had Khalil not acted with such courage and presence of mind most of us would have been killed.
Standing still next to the roundabout we were sitting ducks for the 12 gunmen. We only found out afterwards that a rocket launcher just missed us as we began moving and turned for the stadium gates, the rocket blowing up an electricity pylon. Khalil saw a hand grenade tossed at us that failed to explode. Someone must have been looking over us because right now it seems a miracle we survived.
The real victims are Pakistanis
By Will last year, at the start of March, 5 Comments »
I don’t have much to add to today’s news which wouldn’t feel or sound contrite. The sense of inevitability was gut-wrenchingly strong that cricketers would be used as pawns in terrorists’ games of attention-seeking. It was going to happen at some point: a high-profile event, part of daily life for peaceful Pakistanis, now disrupted to the point of ruin.
In fuelling their own flawed agenda, they’ve not only ensured international cricket won’t be played in Pakistan for a significant amount of time, but they’ve brought the country closer and closer to being a failed state. Not a bad morning’s work, really.
But the real victims are Pakistanis themselves. If the last few years have been rocky, the next decade looks every bit as unsettled.
One final question: how long before Barack Obama wades in?
5 Comments »India’s Pakistan tour in doubt
By Will 2 years ago, at the end of November, 6 Comments »
…and here we reach the most dangerous crossroads of all. The one terrorist India managed to capture happened to be of Pakistani origin, and there is increasing evidence that Pakistan were involved in the terrorist strikes. It seems inconceivable that India’s tour won’t be cancelled. Pakistan have warned the world that they’ll stop fighting the Afghanistan insurgents and turn their attention to India instead. It’s all getting a bit messy.
Steve Waugh’s thoughts on the future of the game:
6 Comments »The danger to cricket is that the game needs India and any long-term interruption will have major ramifications. At present we have Pakistan cricket crippled by the threat
of terrorism, Sri Lanka regularly blighted by a civil war and Zimbabwe mismanaged by corrupt administrators and government.
The game is on the verge of a crisis and clear, concise thinking will be required from the various cricketing bodies to make sure that the correct decisions are made.
Time is a great healer but, much like 9/11, life on the subcontinent will never be the same. The need for security will be paramount and this will affect all facets of life.
My gut feeling is that cricket will see an interruption in the short term but business will resume as normal shortly afterwards.
An overpowering bleakness
By Will 2 years ago, at the end of November, 1 Comment »
Tragedies like the strikes on Mumbai often produce extraordinary writing. Compelled by grief or shock, outrage or justice, there have been a number of great pieces but none better than this by Sambit Bal, my editor at Cricinfo.
I should perhaps be writing a piece assessing the impact of the terrorist attack on Indian cricket, and consequently on the global cricket ecosystem. But I can’t bring myself to. I feel compelled, instead, to write this. I am not sure if Cricinfo has any use for this. I will let my colleagues make the call. It’s been that kind of day.
I was on the streets of Bombay covering the communal riots in 1992, and the serial bomb blasts in 1993. I have seen a mob with swords chase a man and sever his arm from his body; I have seen rioters set an old man alight after garlanding him with car tyres; and I have faced the prospect of being burnt alive myself. For days I left home kissing my small child goodbye with thoughts of the worst. Those days return to haunt me sometimes even today.
But somehow I felt I understood what was happening then. I couldn’t relate to it, but I understood the thirst for retaliation and revenge, the hatred and the frenzy that temporarily consumed ordinary people. I even wondered about a foreseeable future when I could sit down with some of the rioters and talk about what drove them to such madness.
It’s worth five minutes of your time.
1 Comment »Mumbai terror strikes
By Will 2 years ago, at the end of November, 5 Comments »
Mumbai is under attack from terrorists.
A series of terrorist strikes in Mumbai on Wednesday night which left 80 dead and 250 injured has put a major question mark over the fate of the Champions Twenty20 League, scheduled to begin here next week, and cast a serious doubt over the second Test between India and England next month.
More (cricket angle) at Cricinfo, or the BBC, or IBN or NDTV. It’s a depressing mess out there. My former colleague, Alex Chamberlain, is unfortunately one of those involved. You can read his account of events at the BBC.
5 Comments »Terrorists considered attacking Ashes squads
By Scott 4 years ago, mid-October, 2 Comments »
I’m not altogether sure what to make of this revelation::
A friend of one of the four bombers who killed 52 people when they bombed trains and buses in the British capital on July 7 last year told The Sunday Times newspaper that the Al-Qaeda cell was initially ordered to kill the England and Australian cricket teams during the Edgbaston Test in Birmingham.
The claim was made by a family friend of bus bomber Hasib Hussain, who killed 13 people in London’s Tavistock Square. According to the 32-year-old friend, whose family has links to a terrorist training camp in Kotli in northern Kashmir, the bombers were instructed to get jobs as stewards at the Edgbaston cricket ground and to spray sarin gas inside the changing rooms.
The second Test between England and Australia began in Edgbaston on August 4 last year.
The friend – whose real name was not published – said the attack may have been called off and the Tube bombings planned instead because one of the bombers, Shehzad Tanweer, was a cricket fan.
It’s a scary thought, but sooner or later one must expect a terrorist strike on a major sporting event. Yesterday England played Macedonia in front of a crowd of 71,000. And a crowd of 100,000 is expected for the first day of the fourth Test at Melbourne.
Juicy targets for psychotic terrorists.
2 Comments »Sri Lankan tragedies keep on piling up
By Scott 4 years ago, mid-August, 1 Comment »
Sri Lanka has had more then its share of tragedies, and it appears that the country is heading into civil war again. A bomb blast in central Columbo today has killed seven people and puts into question the triangular tournament that was due to start today. Sadly, the ability of Sri Lanka to host international cricket events has to be in some doubt.
It seems that the Tamil Tiger rebel group has ruled out peace talks, which is just tragic, given the optimism that was so prevelant in the country just a few years ago. In the circumstances, international cricket will be the least of the victims of the fighting.
1 Comment »