For Islamic charity Jamaat-ud-Dawa, alleged supporter of terror in Pakistan, it's business as usual -- chicagotribune.com

For Islamic charity Jamaat-ud-Dawa, alleged supporter of terror in Pakistan, it's business as usual -- chicagotribune.com
Despite officials' vow to crack down after Mumbai, Islamic charity Jamaat-ud-Dawa still operates unfettered
By Kim Barker | Tribune correspondent
December 26, 2008
MURIDKE, Pakistan — The students used computers to draw Pakistani flags and houses, and the hospital patients lined up for the eye doctor. "Fire is hot," a group of 68 1st graders recited in a crowded English class.

So far, it is business as usual at the main headquarters of Jamaat-ud-Dawa, the Pakistani charity that allegedly is a front for the banned militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba, which was blamed for last month's terror attacks in Mumbai, India.

Despite the Pakistan government's announced crackdown on the group in response to pressure from India and the West, no one has shut its headquarters, a sprawling campus about an hour from the eastern city of Lahore. No one has closed the group's mosque in Lahore. Ten relief camps for victims of a recent earthquake in Balochistan province — also a Taliban stronghold — continue to operate, charity officials said.

"They may have thought we left everything and ran away to be safe," said Abu Ehsan, who runs the Jamaat complex in Muridke, known as Markaz-e-Taiba. "They may not know we have reopened."