I really don't know how you negotiate with these people

Swat region in Pakistan to follow Sharia Law, in a "peace" negotiation with Taliban militants. Despite publicly calling it a "negative development", Team O! privately backed the deal, according to The Telegraph.

On Tuesday night however, US officials in Islamabad privately backed the deal as an attempt to drive a wedge between Swat's Taliban, which is focused on its demand for Sharia law, and the al-Qaeda-linked Taliban led by Baitullah Mehsud, the notorious commander who controls much of North and South Waziristan and other tribal areas along the Afghan border.

While they expressed fears that the deal might yet be sabotaged by some Swat Taliban militants who support al-Qaeda, they said that if successful, the deal would break up the alliance between the two groups, which has caused alarm throughout Pakistan and in Washington.

Wednesday, a journalist was killed while covering a peace march led by Sufi Muhammad. These are warring factions of Taliban, folks. Swat v al-Queda linked.

Tehreek-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat Muhammadi (TNSM) chief Sufi Muhammad, who signed a controversial peace deal with the NWFP government on Monday, said he hated democracy and wanted supremacy of Islam over the entire world.

“From the very beginning, I have viewed democracy as a system imposed on us by the infidels. Islam does not allow democracy or elections,” he told Deutsche Presse-Agentur in an interview held a few days before the government accepted his demand of enforcing sharia in the region. “Had the government accepted our demands in 1994, we would have not seen the violence we are seeing today,” he added. Sufi Muhammad’s son-in-law, Mullah Fazlullah, has fostered the violence in the name of Islam.

Sufi Muhammad said he was against shedding the blood of Muslims, however, added the government should have talked to the Taliban instead of taking military action. He pledged to work for complete peace in Swat if the government enforces Islamic laws, a demand which has now been met.

“I believe the Taliban government formed a complete Islamic state, which was an ideal example for other Muslim countries. Had this government remained intact, it could have led to the establishment of similar Islamic governments in many other countries,” he said.

(h/t: Gateway Pundit

Oh Boy!