Abdul Rashid Ghazi

Abdul Rashid Ghazi (عبد الرشید غازی; c. 29 January 1964 – 10 July 2007) was a Pakistani Islamic fundamentalist who served as the vice-chancellor of Faridia University.

Prior to his death, he served as a diplomat for UNESCO.

He was the son of Muhammad Abdullah Ghazi, and younger brother of Abdul Aziz Ghazi.

Abdul Rashid was killed during Operation Silence after Pakistan Army Special Operations Commandos' teams stormed the madrasah he and his students had been using.

He was an ethnic Baloch, descending from the Sadwani (Sodvani) clan of the Mazari tribe, in the town of Basti-Abdullah near Rojhan in Rajanpur, the border district of Punjab province of Pakistan.

In his youth, Abdul Rashid defied his father's wish that he receive formal Islamic education as he wanted to live a modern life.

He completed his Master of Science degree in history from Quaid-e-Azam University Islamabad in 1987–1988.

A photo of him and his classmates still hangs on the history department's wall.

According to one of his professors, "He was a normal, modern student and a lively fellow who was well adjusted to a co-educational system."

Remembered by his friends as "a bright student and an active member of a progressive student organisation", "He could have been a diplomat in the foreign office or an educationist", his friend once stated in an interview.

He was non-religious during that time, hardly if ever going to the mosque and reading authors like Karl Marx, Max Weber and Henry Kissinger, "his greatest ambition was to become a diplomat at the United Nations", a friend added, to the extent that he stopped talking to his father, who was antagonized by his "Westernized" lifestyle.

Declan Walsh also quotes peoples who knew him during this time, saying that he was a secularized student reading the likes of Nietzsche and Rousseau, mingling with women and being fond of singing.

Having completed his M.Sc.

in History, he secured a position at the Pakistan National Commission and later joined the Ministry of Education in Islamabad as a Grade-17 officer, where he briefly served as the editor of its monthly magazine, Piyami.

He subsequently worked with UNESCO, a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN), and served in Paris.

During the Soviet–Afghan War, Ghazi's father Muhammad Abdullah Ghazi played a major role in recruiting and training Mujahideen.

Ghazi and his brother Abdul Aziz also did a brief stint of fighting.

According to a friend of Ghazi who was with him during the Soviet–Afghan War, they fought against the Soviets multiple times in Paktia Province, near the Afghanistan–Pakistan border.

Ghazi was nearly killed when a land mine exploded next to him; after this incident he assumed the title of Ghazi, meaning "warrior".

Declan Walsh quotes a friend of Ghazi who says that Ghazi was more excited by the glamour and adventure of war, than by any strictly religious aspect of it.

In 1998, Ghazi and his father met Osama bin Laden.

Ghazi, when referring to these events, stated: "The meeting inspired me to work for the establishment of Islam."

He recalled that at the end of the meeting, he picked up and drank water from a cup which bin Laden had used.

An amused bin Laden asked Ghazi why he had done so, to which Ghazi replied: "I drank from your glass so that Allah would make me a great warrior like you."

During this visit to bin Laden and Mullah Omar in Kandahar, Ghazi became radicalized and eschewed his former modernist outlook.

In October 1998, Ghazi's father was killed a week after he returned from Kandahar, Ghazi's father gave a lecture at Faridia University in Sector E-7 of Islamabad, at noon as he returned and approached Lal Masjid, a man was waiting for him in the courtyard.

The man greeted Ghazi's father and then pulled out a gun, opening fire and emptying the magazine.

Ghazi's father was badly injured, while the assassin escaped with the help of accomplices waiting outside in a car.

Ghazi's father died of his injuries on the way to the hospital.

Ghazi lodged a reported and the police began investigating the case.

A suspect was soon arrested, and several eyewitnesses identified the assassin in a police lineup.

However, he was released the next day without reason.

Ghazi protested against the release and warned the police of legal action if the suspect was not rearrested soon.

With Ghazi increasing pressure on police, he was asked to withdraw the case or face the fate of his father.

According to his friend, this was turning point in Ghazi's life, and he became disillusioned with the system.

Ghazi adopted the trappings of an Islamist, wearing a pakol (wool hat) and a checkered Palestinian keffiyeh over white robes.

Encouraged by his transformation, his brother appointed him as the deputy cleric of Lal Masjid, although he rarely led the prayers there.

Ghazi, however, still retained the courteous manner and open-minded curiosity of his student years.

He welcomed foreign visitors at his quarters, charming and cajoling them.

He first came on the political scene in 2001, when the religious parties of the country announced an organization for the defense of Afghanistan against the American invasion.