Who are the suicide bombers? Pakistan's answer.

In Pakistan, where many of the suicide attacks do not directly target Westerners, the Al Qaeda masterminds are often well- educated, but the planners and the bombers themselves generally are not.

"There are leaders who look out for suicide bombers and usually find the simple, unemployed religious-minded youth with the help of a cleric at a mosque or madrassah," says a police investigator.

Hasan, the recruiter of suicide bombers, has an eighth-grade education. Mohammad Jamil, one of the two suicide bombers behind the Christmas attack on Mr. Musharraf, was a dropout who studied at a madrassah in Pakistan's Frontier Province. Neither Mohammad Ali Khatri nor Akbar Niazi, two suicide bombers who killed 40 worshipers at two Shiite mosques last year, completed high school.

Recent interrogations have shed light on how bombers are recruited and groomed. A police investigator quoted a detained sectarian militant, identified as Tehseen, as saying, "We isolate the boy who is willing to sacrifice his life. From then onwards he does not have any contact with his family or friends. We provide him religious books, and he prays all the time before [his] mission."

Police nabbed Tehseen after he was injured at the scene of an attack on a Shiite mosque in Karachi this month. He was accompanying the suicide bomber as a guard.

"In some cases, the suicide bomber gets terrified after reaching the target and flees. [The leaders] sometimes take the family hostage if the suicide bomber changes his mind," the police investigator says.

The suicide-bomber cells operate in small groups of five to seven people, never staying at one place for more than two nights, says a police investigator.

Moving in small cells is now a necessity for members of the larger splinter groups, which have been thrown into disarray by a persistent government crackdown, officials say. They add that the isolation of splinter groups, as well as their greater dependence on outside funding, may explain the adoption of the radical tactic of suicide bombing.

"They are on the run, and short of resources. But it is the most dangerous tactic and rather impossible to stop like elsewhere in the world," says Karachi police chief Tariq Jameel. "We have to create awareness and counter them by eliminating extremism from the society, which is the best antidote to terrorism. Otherwise suicide bombings can give these disarrayed splinter groups a new life."

Last month, a group of 58 religious scholars issued a fatwa, or religious edict, saying that Islam strictly forbids suicide attacks on Muslims. Further, those committing such acts at public congregations or places of worship cease to be Muslims.

"Killing of any non-Muslim citizen or foreigner visiting the country is also forbidden in Islam since they are under protection of government of Pakistan," said Mufti Munib-ur Rehman, one of those issuing the edict.

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