Talk Nation Radio for May 5, 2010
Produced by Dori Smith, Storrs, CT
Total Running Time: 28:52
Download at Pacifica's Audioport, Archive.org and at Radio4all.net
The Week's Sprouts, Pacifica
Produced by: Dori Smith of Talk Nation Radio
Reedited from this week's Talk Nation interview, contains news feature
Interview with Rahimullah Yusufzai, in Peshawar, Pakistan
Left KU Channel
Thursday, May 6, 2010, 3PM EST
TRT: 29:00
Download here
http://audioport.org and either use search work "Sprouts" - or go to Weekly Shows and choose sound file: "Sprouts: Times Square Bomber Faisal Shahzad
download here
We speak with journalist RahimullahYusufzai, resident editor of The News in Peshawar. He joined us May 5th, as news reports were just coming in about the Pakistani family of would be Time Square bomber, Faisal Shahzad. Rahimullah Yusufzai talks about reaction from Faisal Shahzad's family in the Peshawar region. Faisal Shahzad is charged with making the homemade explosive device found in the Nissan Pathfinder left running, and on fire, in Time Square. He has been charged with some five terrorism related counts.
Some residents of Peshawar expressed suspicion that a deeper intrigue may be going on. In Pakistan, Rahimullah Yusufzai offers us a portrait of a man from a liberal secular family. They are expressing confusion as they try to absorb the shock of what has happened.
Details about Faisal Shahzad have been unfolding here in Connecticut where the 30 year old naturalized citizen attended college, and worked for several companies including Affinion Group in Norwalk, a finance and marketing company that also does work on identity theft and data breach resolutions for clients. Network affiliate TV stations here have said authorities investigating the case dropped their original thought of a politicially motivating right wing attack, focusing instead now on the international travels of Faisal Shahzad who acknowledged to authorities that he had visited Waziristan.
There have also been some people arrested in Pakistan in connection with the attempted bombing including Sheikh Mohammed Rehan, who has been said to have ties with a group called, Jaish-e-Muhammad.
Faisal Shahzad's parents attended his graduation in 2001 from Southeastern University in Washington DC, after which he tranferred to the University of Bridgeport to study computer science and engineering.
Bio: Based in Peshawar, Rahimullah Yusufzai is the world’s leading authority on the politics of the Pakistan-Afghanistan frontier. As the world’s attention has increasingly shifted upon the region, amid all the hyperbole Yusufzai’s voice has once again emerged as an indispensable corrective to the ignorance and propaganda that confuses debate. His reputation for fairness and accuracy is such that voices on all sides of the political spectrum defer to his authority. Yusufzai is the the Executive Editor of the Pakistani daily The News‘s Peshawar bureau. For all serious journalists and scholars seeking informed opinion on developments in the Afghanistan-Pakistan theatre, Yusufzai’s Peshawar office is usually the first stop.
