Pakistani Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said on Sunday the government took action against hard-line Lal Masjid, or Red Mosque, to maintain its writ, state-run APP news agency reported.
Aziz said if the writ of the government is challenged, then the government has to take action to maintain its writ.
He made the remarks during an interview with Al-Arabia TV channel on Sunday, according to Associated Press of Pakistan.
The prime minister said the policy of the government throughout was to settle the Lal Masjid issue through negotiations, adding that the government used different channels to try to convince the people running the seminary to lay down the arms, but in vain.
He said due to the efforts of the government to resolve this issue peacefully, only around 100 people including security officials lost their lives and the rest of the people were saved.
About the reaction of action against Lal Masjid, Aziz said there was no such alarming reaction to this operation.
He said the reaction in the tribal areas was due to many other factors basically due to the tribal areas' boundary with Afghanistan.
The prime minister said the security agencies are working and security has been increased which resulted in some clashes near the Pakistani-Afghan border.
He said the government was not against the madrassahs, or Islamic seminaries.
"But if the seminaries are used to disturb peace, no government can accept that in the world," the prime minister was quoted by APP as saying.
Violence escalated in Pakistan recently, especially in the tribal areas bordering Afghanistan and North West Frontier Province.
A series of attacks and clashes since early July so far have left over 300 people killed across Pakistan, among which some were considered by local reports to be extremists' backlash from government operation against Islamabad-based Lal Masjid in July.
Vowing to impose strict Shariat in the country, hard-line clerics in Lal Masjid and the religious students in the affiliated Jamia Hafsa conducted a series of activities like occupying public library, seizing some alleged local brothel runners, attacking music shops, and law enforcers in the capital, among what were declared as "illegal and shocking" by the authorities.
After talks failed to convince armed personnel inside the Lal Masjid mosque and seminary compound to surrender who were besieged since July 3, Pakistani troops launched full-fledged operation against the compound on July 10 and ended the action on the second day.
According to government officials, a total of 103 people were killed in the clashes between law enforcers and armed personnel inside the compound from July 3 through July 11.
Source: Xinhua
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