Reiterating Pakistan's firm commitment to fight terrorism and extremism, President General Pervez Musharraf Friday gave the country's security agencies five months to curb banned sectarian and extremist organisations, dpa reported. Addressing senior police in Islamabad, Musharraf asked them to launch a countrywide campaign to check collection of donations, display of arms and holding of gatherings by banned organisations. Musharraf had outlawed six extremist and sectarian organizations in January 2002 as part of his government's efforts to curb sectarianism and militancy - but some of them continued to operate under different names. "The security agencies must also streamline and implement a strategy to remove hate material such as pamphlets, CDs and booklets from markets, which hurts feelings of different sects and promotes sectarianism," dpa quoted the president as saying. He said more than 200 people had been killed and over 400 injured in attacks on Shiite and Sunni mosques and places of worship in Karachi, Sialkot, Multan and Islamabad since last October. -- SP 2327 Local Time 2027 GMT
