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Friends Describe Bomber's Political, Religious Evolution
Muslim cleric Qari Attaullah stands in front of a mosque where Shehzad Tanweer was said to pray in his ancestral village in north-central Pakistan. Relatives said Tanweer traveled to Lahore, Pakistan, late last year to learn how to correctly pronounce readings from the Koran.
(By Asim Tanveer -- Reuters)
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Mumtaz Tanweer, Shehzad's father, arrived in 1961 from the eastern Pakistani city of Faisalabad. He was part of a wave of immigrants from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh who established self-contained communities of South Asian culture, religion and food in the industrial heartland of north-central England.
He had come, with the help of his parents, to study for a degree in textile manufacturing, said Safina Ahmad, 23, a cousin of Shehzad who acted as spokeswoman for the family in four e-mail interviews last week. When Mumtaz Tanweer graduated, he wanted to set up his own fashion clothing business. But he lacked the start-up money. So he became a Yorkshire police officer.
In a few years, he saved enough to open a corner shop. Slowly, he built it into a thriving business that today includes a slaughterhouse and a fish-and-chips shop. Along the way, he returned to Pakistan to marry his wife, Parveen. They settled in Bradford, about 10 miles from Beeston.
Mumtaz Tanweer "always worked hard because he never wanted his kids" to struggle like he did, Ahmad wrote.
Whites sometimes hurled racist epithets at him and his brother-in-law, who also lived in Britain. But the two men never became alienated from their adopted land, relatives said. "They both remember being surrounded by very welcoming and caring communities that they felt very much a part of," Ahmad wrote.
The family moved to Beeston 20 years ago. Today, Mumtaz Tanweer is a pillar of the Pakistani community. He doles out legal and business advice freely to friends and neighbors and helps fill out forms for those in the community who can't read or write English. "If you wanted to borrow anything, he would help you," said Mohammed Ali, 36, a shopkeeper.
The Tanweers have three other children. They live in a large, two-story white house with maroon trim -- one of the largest in the neighborhood. Mumtaz drives a silver Mercedes; Shehzad was often seen driving a red Mercedes.
The family is not known for being particularly religious, friends and neighbors said. They typically attended Friday prayers at a mosque on Hardy Street, but seldom prayed five times a day, as some Beeston Muslims do. Shehzad's mother and sisters wore fashionable traditional outfits like those favored by many Westernized, urban Pakistani women, neighbors said.
"I don't understand where his hatred came from," said Saeed Ahmed, Shehzad's friend.
Finding 'Our Identity'
Shehzad Tanweer's boyhood dream was as British as it got: to become a professional cricketer. He favored tracksuits and T-shirts so he could play cricket or football at a moment's notice, said Safina Ahmad, his cousin.
"He was my best mate growing up," said Chris Whitley, who lives across the street from the Tanweers and is white. "He couldn't go a day without playing cricket."
At the same time, Tanweer wafted like smoke toward his other culture. At home, he was the obedient Muslim son. He worked in his father's fish-and-chips shop. He visited Pakistan several times with his family, but reluctantly. He learned passages of the Koran, but only after some arm-twisting.
