LAHORE, July 7: Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Sami Chief Maulana Samiul Haq has urged both the government and the Lal Masjid administration to be flexible to resolve a five-day long stand-off, adding that the Ghazi brothers are naïve enough to be embroiled in the issue.

The issue is a “staged” one which the government will use to portray madrassas as dens of terrorists to the outside world, Mr Haq told a press conference on Saturday.

He also told the Lal Masjid administration if the besieged students were harmed, they would also be held responsible along with the government.

Mr Sami, also a senator, said he supported legal action against the Ghazi brothers, the administrators of the madrassa, if they were found guilty of creating the stand-off.

He demanded a safe passage for the Lal Masjid inmates to end the crisis and save women and children trapped inside the mosque and Jamia Hafsa.

Mr Sami sees the use of force a temporary solution but fatal for the country in the time to come. He warned the government `a fire’ would engulf the entire country if the standoff was made a matter of prestige.

“Gen Musharraf must keep in mind disastrous consequences of the use of force in the tribal areas and Balochistan.”

He said the army dictator had made the country a battlefield by ignoring advices of “sane souls” against joining the US-led war on terror and fighting a proxy war against his own people.

He said Gen Musharraf had no writ in any part of the country as US and Nato forces struck inside Pakistan at their will.

“What’s the good of establishing government’s writ on a small mosque when it is nowhere else in the country?” he questioned.

He demanded an inquiry into the standoff and talks with the Lal Masjid administration, saying all secret agencies and Islamabad administration should be interrogated for their “dirty” role in the issue.

“Secret agencies and Islamabad administration worsened the situation by disrupting the negotiations between Lal Masjid clerics and Pakistan Muslim League President Shujaat Husain. He said if the government tried to intervene in madrassas’ affairs taking advantage of the situation, it would be its last day.