IAS/IPS EXAM PREPARATION

Cairo haunts Riyadh again

2011-06-08T23:56:00.001-07:00

Little did Riyadh know that the most severe strategic blow to its regional influence would come not from Tehran, or Tehran's agents in Baghdad — but Cairo, its closest Arab friend. The ousting of Mubarak did not only mean the loss of a strong ally, but the collapse of the old balance of power. The region could no longer be divided on a Riyadh-Cairo v Tehran-Damascus axis. Revolutions have struck in both camps: in “moderate” Egypt and Tunisia, as in “hardline” Damascus and Tripoli. The principal challenge for the Saudi regime is no longer the influence of Syria, Iran or Hezbollah, but the contagion of revolutions.
The Saudis had dispatched troops to the small kingdom of Bahrain to suppress a revolt against the Sunni rule of the Khalifas. And when the Yemeni revolution erupted, they moved to bolster Ali Abdullah Saleh's reign, pumping millions into his coffers to buy off tribal allegiances, and providing his army with equipment, intelligence and logistical support. Although Riyadh's rulers despise Saleh for dragging them into a messy conflict with the Houthis at their southern border in 2009, they have stood by him. But as the revolution raged on, winning the support of most tribes and causing wide defections in the army, the Saudi regime had no choice but to let go of its man in Sana'a — as long as this is perceived not as the fruit of popular pressure, but a smooth power transition within the framework of its own Gulf Co-operation Council proposal. With Saleh's forced exit after Friday's (June 3) attack on his presidential compound, Riyadh is again seeking to wrest the initiative from the street and act as the chief powerbroker in Yemen.
Sparing no expense
Although it has striven for years to isolate Syria from Tehran, it is not too keen on seeing its old enemy collapse under the blows of protesters either — and is now working to protect the Assad regime. King Abdullah has even phoned President Assad to offer “solidarity with Syria against conspiracies targeting its stability and security.”
Saudi Arabia is sparing no expense to contain existing revolutions and suppress potential ones. In spite of its fear of post-revolutionary Egypt, it has recently granted it $4bn in aid to appease its generals; $20bn has been lavished on Bahrain and Oman — another kingdom beset by popular unrest — with $400m donated to Jordan.
To Riyadh, Arab revolutions set a dangerous precedent for the subjects of monarchies, and must, therefore, be averted at all cost. This is the backdrop for Saudi Arabia's invitation to Jordan and Morocco to join the Gulf Co-operation Council, an organisation that ought to be rebranded as the Club of Arab Despotic Monarchies. Jordan, known for its powerful security apparatus, could act as a useful buffer against revolutionary penetration from Levantine Syria. As for Morocco — whose membership invitation has baffled many, located as it is at the far end of the Arab hemisphere — its principal virtue is its 35 million population, which may compensate for the loss of Riyadh's old heavyweight ally, Egypt.
Monarchy is one characteristic shared by Jordan and Morocco. Economic need is another. Their fragile economies, crippled by debt and corruption, constitute an advantage in the eyes of Saudi strategists, rendering them more amenable to bribery and manipulation.
Riyadh has been watching anxiously as demands for reform escalate. In Jordan, demonstrations have even spread into the tribal south, the regime's traditional support base. A broad alliance of Islamists and leftists has formed after the resignation of two ministers over a graft case. As the alliance's leader, Ahmad Obeidat, put it: “Tyranny and corruption are Jordan's main problems. Fighting corruption starts with reforming the regime itself.” The same state of political mobilisation characterises Morocco — north Africa's only kingdom. The February 20 youth movement has held weekly demonstrations for constitutional reform. Human rights groups report a mass arrest campaign, and regular torture. Police brutality is such that Kamal al-Ammari, a pro-democracy activist, was beaten to death at a pro—democracy rally last week in the southern city of Safa.
By trying to fortify these monarchies, Saudi Arabia is seeking not only to protect them, but preserve itself. The domino effect — one republic after another consumed by revolution — must not be allowed to strike a monarchy. The message is clear: revolutions are a strictly republican phenomenon to which kingdoms are immune. But the goal is to keep reform at bay too. There can be no talk of constitutional monarchies.
Although the Saudi regime is preoccupied by the Iranian threat, its eye is now focused on Egypt and the Arab revolutions, existing and potential. There is nothing that it dreads more than a return to the 1950s and 60s scenario of Cairo spearheading a revolutionary Arab world against pro-American conservative kingdoms. Riyadh is in the process of reproducing the 1955 Baghdad pact, forged in confrontation with Nasser and his revolutionary officers and bringing together the rulers of Saudi Arabia and Jordan (both unofficially), Pahlavi Iran and royal Iraq, as well as Turkey and Pakistan. Some of the players have been replaced, and nationalism has made way for Islamism, but the structure of the strategic game is the same.
And so is its mightiest weapon: money. In a battle where internal fears coincide with external interests, Riyadh is resuming its old role as the vanguard of a cold war against change.

India-Africa summit: from agreement to action

2011-06-08T23:55:00.000-07:00

When Dr. Manmohan Singh was the Secretary General of South Commission over two decades back, he worked with its chairman Julius Nyerere, a respected African leader and the former President of Tanzania. This relationship might have moulded Dr. Singh's perceptions on challenges facing Africa and how India should partner with it to secure a multi-dimensional partnership benefitting both sides. This explains, at least partly, why the second India-Africa Forum Summit (IAFS-II), followed by the Prime Minister's bilateral visits to Ethiopia and Tanzania, represents the high water mark in India's engagement with Africa. The recent safari may owe much to the legacy of Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. But, above all, it was a well-designed initiative by Dr. Singh's team to position India-Africa relations in the specific context of 21st century.
Backdrop
As Prime Minister, Dr. Singh travelled to South Africa in late 2006 to deepen bilateral relations and inaugurate the centenary celebrations of Satyagraha, the unique movement launched by Gandhiji in 1906. This was followed in 2007 by his rare bilateral visit to Nigeria and a brief sojourn in South Africa where he attended the India, Brazil, South Africa (IBSA) Summit. In November of that year he visited the continent again to attend the Commonwealth Summit in Kampala. In April 2008, he hosted the historic summit, IAFS-I, in Delhi that heralded the commencement of institutionalised interaction with Africa, injecting new momentum into an old relationship. Throughout 2010, India hosted numerous African dignitaries.
The political will and commitment to build ties afresh with Africa have thus been on display in abundance under Dr. Singh's leadership. This backdrop points to why he enjoys special empathy with African leaders. Echoing their sentiments, Kgalema Motlante, South Africa's Vice-President, articulated his belief in Addis Ababa that the India-Africa equation “is and should remain a mutually beneficial strategic partnership.”
Key questions
Despite ample coverage of IAFS-II, several questions demand objective answers. Was the summit well organised? What are its key outcomes? Does Africa look at India in isolation or within a rapidly changing global context? What are the prospects of a timely implementation of Addis Ababa decisions? And, finally, how would the engagement look like in 2014 when the third summit takes place?
The first question is the easiest to answer. Thanks to careful preparations in recent months and notable synergy created between Indian and African Union officials, the second summit was managed adroitly. It was helped by the absence of controversial or divisive issues. What the planners did exceptionally well was to choreograph a series of productive interactions involving not just officials and political leaders but also other segments of the target constituency — entrepreneurs, CEOs, media figures, academics, civil society, artistes and craftsmen. While taking a leaf out of the first Summit, they managed to take the B-to-B and P-to-P exchanges to new heights.
As to the key outcomes, the Addis Ababa Declaration and the Framework for Enhanced Cooperation bring out clearly that a striking convergence of views exists between India and Africa not only on bilateral matters but also on a whole range of issues. These include U.N. reforms, Africa's place in world affairs, climate change, countering terrorism, the Doha Round and South-South cooperation.
What analysts were keen to know was whether the areas of cooperation identified in 2008 would now be modified substantially, and whether India would demonstrate further financial generosity to fund new programmes. The set of seven areas chosen in 2008 remains unchanged, but details of some of them have undergone a transformation. The Prime Minister's business-like announcement of new funding for additional commitments — $5 billion for lines of credit, $700 million for new institutions and training programmes, and $300 million for the Ethiopia-Djibouti railway line — was an apt response to African expectations.
India has made it clear that capacity building would receive priority in its endeavour to deepen links with Africa at the continental, regional and bilateral levels. However, the other two pillars of its strategy, namely trade and investment cooperation and infrastructure development too would be pushed hard. On trade, further clarity and a more targeted promotion are required. A duty-free tariff regime offered by India is yet to work optimally. Preferential Trade Agreement (PTA) negotiations such as with Southern African Customs Union (SACU) seem to be moving slowly. However, the enhanced focus on infrastructure is significant. India is not leaving this field to others, engaged as it is in building roads, railways, ports and bridges. But Africa's appetite is huge: the World Bank has recently estimated that Africa needs $93 billion a year to address the infrastructure gap. For creating new opportunities for Indian companies, the government has no option but to find new methods to finance projects in future.
India-China competition?
As regards the next question, many diplomatic and scholarly voices have been heard on whether there is competition, race or rivalry between India and China for seeking a place under the African sun. Delhi's official view is unmistakable: there is no competition. Significantly, Beijing has not expressed any view. Within Africa, there are many who believe not only in the existence of competition, but also in its desirability. Western observers and scholars have, of course, been the main proponents of the theory that India-China competition in Africa has been heating up.
Whatever may be one's preferred conclusion, it can be asserted that healthy competition is generally good, not bad, and that even though the Indian and Chinese approaches are quite different, they exhibit a few similarities too. If at macro level the India-China relationship is widely seen to have three fundamental characteristics, i.e. competition, cooperation and conflict, it is hardly plausible to argue that these traits would not be unfolding in Africa.
Further, neither India nor China can afford to ignore monitoring each other's activities in Africa and drawing lessons from them. Given the fact that Africa, despite its intrinsic unity, is a diverse continent of 54 — soon to be 55 — nation-states, India and China as well as the Western and other powers would have a role to play on the African stage.
Future prospects
The last two questions pertaining to implementation are inter-related. The 19 institutions that India had proposed to establish in accordance with the 2008 Summit decisions are yet to see light of the day, but hopefully they will do so soon, probably within a year from now. The package of new institutions announced in Addis Ababa is no doubt impressive, but it will need a longer gestation period and a lot of hard work.
South Block would make a huge contribution to the India-Africa cooperation if it quickly crafts a tight calendar for fulfilling the Prime Minister's promises. Let 2014, the year of the third summit, be the final, non-negotiable deadline when all the proposed institutions become a reality. An essential pre-requisite: External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna should consider deploying an A-team of officers as the Africa desk undergoes important changes in the coming weeks. Should this happen and if promised funding is spent purposefully, the substance and profile of India's partnership with Africa are set to grow tremendously.
But, enhancing cooperation is a shared dream, working for it a joint responsibility. Leaders and other drivers on both sides of the Indian Ocean need to rise to the occasion.

Mali tackles ills — Al-Qaeda and drug trafficking

2011-02-28T01:40:00.001-08:00

The tourism minister of Mali, N'Diaye Bah, visibly bristled when asked about the possibility that Al-Qaeda's North African offshoot might kidnap foreigners in fabled Timbuktu or anywhere across Mali's northern desert.
France spread such rumours, he insisted. “They want to create this security issue that does not exist,” he said, wagging his finger. “When you come to Mali, there is no aggression against tourists. How can you say there is insecurity in this country?”
Yet the United States and French Embassies, among other foreign missions, explicitly warn against travelling to Timbuktu and indeed the entire desert that sweeps across roughly two-thirds of this landlocked West African nation. A French Embassy map colours the entire north red, a no-go area.
This uneasy, public standoff has existed for some time, reflective of Mali's insistence that it is not a font of violence like some of its neighbours, notably Algeria. But in a sign that Mali both acknowledges the issue and seeks to address it, the country is rolling out a new development plan, hoping to tackle the problem at its roots.
The problems
The dearth of jobs and prospects in the north helps drive the region's twin ills — narcotics trafficking and Islamic radicalism. By setting up military barracks, infirmaries, schools, shopping areas and animal markets in 11 northern towns, the Malian government hopes to establish a more visible government presence, foster economic activity and form a bulwark against lawlessness.
“The ultimate goal of the project is to eradicate” Al-Qaeda's affiliates in Mali, said Adam Tchiam, a leading Malian columnist.
Mali does not deny that an estimated 200 to 300 fighters from Al-Qaeda of the Islamic Maghreb (Maghreb being the Arabic term for west) have found a perch in their desert, although most are believed to be Mauritanians and Algerians. But Mali often depicts the terrorists as a problem generated elsewhere.
“We are hostages to a situation that does not concern us,” news reports quoted President Amadou Toumani Touré as saying.
Behind the scenes, however, the President has been more forthcoming. In a meeting with the American Ambassador, Gillian A. Milovanovic, and senior American military officers last year, he said the extremists “have had difficulty getting their message across to a generally reluctant population,” according to an embassy cable obtained by WikiLeaks and made available to several news organisations. Still, Mr. Touré acknowledged, “they have had some success in enlisting disaffected youth to their ranks.”
Trail of violence
In recent years, the Qaeda affiliate has left a trail of violence across Mauritania, Niger, Algeria and Mali, taking aim at tourists, expatriate workers, local residents and security forces. Hostages taken in the porous border regions have been executed or ransomed. Five French and two African workers kidnapped in Niger last September are believed to be held in northern Mali.
The Algerians and some Western diplomats accuse the Malians of being too soft on terrorism, an opinion reflected in the cables obtained by WikiLeaks. But Mali's defenders argue that the regional problem is far larger than any one poor country can address.
To that end, Mauritania recently moved uninvited troops permanently across the border in Mali to eradicate a Qaeda encampment, diplomats said, and Mali did not object.
For his part, President Touré has been trying to forge a regional consensus on the issue, but the leaked cables and diplomats suggest that Algeria has been reluctant to take part. Algerian officials regularly criticise the presence of French and American training forces, saying they constitute another threat.
Mali's own plan faces two main problems, one domestic and one foreign. Tuareg rebels fought the government in the desert for decades, with the 1992 peace treaty specifying that the government forces completely withdraw from the north. Deploying them there risks reigniting a conflict that still simmers.
Even so, some northerners endorse almost any government action in the harsh environment, where battling sand alone constitutes a daily struggle.
“There are villages that have never seen an administrator, never seen a nurse, never seen a teacher,” said Amboudi Side Ahmed, a businessman in the capital, Bamako, who was raised in the north. “You could stay in a village up there for 10 years and never see a government official.”
Then there is the question of whether these northern hubs are even feasible, given the reluctance of foreign aid workers to venture north and finance projects there. “The President says the poor protect Al-Qaeda because they do not have any means,” said Mr. Tchiam, the columnist. “Where are the means?”
While foreign governments recognise that the north needs development, the lack of security hampers it. American Embassy personnel, for example, can travel north only with express permission of the ambassador, which she said she rarely granted.
‘Development is criticial'
“Development is critical in dealing with the north,” Ambassador Milovanovic said, but “so long as security is unstable, it is hard to get those projects going.”
“We cannot just throw money up there.”
After her own visits, she has tried to meet local requests by offering training for midwives or supplying four-wheel-drive ambulances. As part of its broader efforts to counter extremism in northern Mali, the United States also underwrote a series of radio soap operas whose plot twists emphasised the dangers of extremism.
Beyond that, Washington provides basic military training, sometimes even more basic than envisioned. An exercise on what to do when the driver of a vehicle is shot dead revealed a startling truth — most Malian soldiers did not know how to drive. Lessons were instituted. But Malian officials want more.
Terror operations
“How many people in the north listen to the radio? That is never going to be strong enough to change their views on A.Q.M.I. or religious fundamentalism,” said Mohamed Baby, a presidential adviser working on fixing the northern problem, using the initials of the French name for Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. “We need to deal with development, with the lack of resources.”
Qaeda fighters have sometimes ingratiated themselves by paying inflated prices for food, fuel and other goods. Diplomats believe that the extremists have also informed local smugglers that they will pay a premium for kidnapped Westerners.
Aside from collecting ransoms for hostages, Al-Qaeda is believed to be financing its operations by exacting tolls from drug smugglers and traffickers in arms, humans and illicit goods. Since at least the 10th century, Timbuktu has been a crossroads for trade routes across the Sahara, and the modern age is no different.
A series of drug-laden planes make the loop from South America to the Sahel, but numbers are elusive, said Alexandre Schmidt of the United Nations drug office. In one notorious 2009 episode, a Boeing 727 believed to have ferried cocaine from Latin America was set on fire after it got stuck in the sand.
Both the drug smugglers and Al-Qaeda offer young men a quick route to money and symbols of prestige like a pickup truck. The government plan has no easy, short-term ways to compete, officials concede.
“They can recruit young people and undermine both the economy and the religion,” Mr. Baby said of the militants. “We have to build up some kind of resistance.”

Ivory Coast: an expert view

2011-02-28T01:39:00.000-08:00

A tragedy is unfolding in Ivory Coast that will have regional and international ramifications. More than 100 people have been killed since the election, 16,000 Ivorians have fled to neighbouring Liberia while thousands of others have been internally displaced. Ivory Coast is heading for renewed civil war.
Laurent Gbagbo is internationally isolated, but still not prepared to accept an offer from the African Union and Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas), to make a dignified exit as an elder statesman.
The standoff is the latest crisis since civil war erupted in 2002, splitting the country between north and south.
That conflict was partly over citizenship rights of many residents from the north, and fuelled by youth unemployment caused by the decline of international cocoa prices. A large French military base and French expatriate dominance of many key Ivorian businesses also fed anti-French sentiment.
A 2007 peace deal called for new elections, which were delayed several times before a vote was finally held in October, with a run-off in November.
This crisis is differs from the past, however: the opposition clearly won a significant amount of votes even in Abidjan and France, the former colonial power, is no longer trying to single-handedly influence the outcome.
The only promising aspect of this crisis is the leadership of African institutions. The Economic Community Of West African States (Ecowas) and the AU have suspended Ivory Coast, and supported sanctions and military intervention to remove Gbagbo. The U.S. and EU have slapped their own sanctions on Gbagbo and his inner-circle, while the World Bank and the West African regional central bank have cut financing.
The Jeunes Patriotes youth militia leader, Charles Ble Goude, who has agitated for Gbagbo, is already under U.N. sanctions. In 2006, when I chaired a U.N. sanctions inspection team in Ivory Coast, I saw the temporary calming effect sanctions had on his behaviour; if he unleashes the violence he has promised, he would not only destroy any future chances of running for the Ivorian presidency but risks courting the attention of the International Criminal Court.
Sanction on cocoa?
International markets have reacted to the crisis by pushing up cocoa futures prices to a four-month high, although there is no talk of an immediate sanction on cocoa — Ivory Coast is the world's top cocoa producer. Renewed civil war will further destroy one of Africa's leading economies, affect the region, and possibly divide the country for ever. ( Alex Vines is head of the Africa Programme at the Chatham House international affairs think tank in London.

Libya: in the throes of change

2011-02-28T01:36:00.000-08:00

The political survival of Muammar Qadhafi, Libya's strongman for 42 years, is under serious threat. Much of this has to do with the transformation of the opposition, now closing in on the capital Tripoli. It had started an unarmed campaign for change but, in the face of excessive State violence, has transformed itself dramatically into an armed revolutionary movement.
With the uprising raging, and eastern Libya already under opposition control, the regime's survival is now almost out of the equation. Mr. Qadhafi no longer has influential friends within and outside Libya who can bail him out. The question now is how will he go, and what will replace him? Will the regime collapse suddenly, the end brought about by a coup, or will it disappear after a brief civil war, when the debilitating ranks of Mr. Qadhafi's loyal forces, make their last stand to defend Tripoli? Alternatively, could there be an unlikely sting in the tail, which might reveal itself in a war of attrition, between Qadhafi-loyalists, whose numbers and commitment the world has underestimated, and the opposition forces, now rapidly advancing along Libya's eastern Mediterranean coastline towards Tripoli?
Mr. Qadhafi's problems have become insurmountable because he has a very thin support base left. For decades he has not been critically challenged because his regime has adopted a combination of selective tribal patronage and co-option, made possible on account of a windfall in oil revenues, and the fear that police states can instill in their citizens. In the initial years, after the 1969 coup that brought him to power, Mr. Qadhafi's firm commitment, in the footsteps of Egypt's Gamal Abdel Nasser, to revolutionary Arab nationalism, did earn him accolades at home. But when the cost of raising legions to enforce Arab unity from Sudan to Palestine became prohibitively high, and hefty oil revenues did not lead to more food on the table, Mr. Qadhafi's social contract with fellow-Libyans began to fray.
The slow accumulation of woes over the last four decades, finally appear to have exploded, leading to his undoing. Some of the resentment has come from the state of the economy. Despite Libya's status as a leading oil exporter, large sections of Libyans live on an income of less than two dollars a day.
Then, there are the forces of sub-nationalism, which refuse to go, partly because Mr. Qadhafi's personality cult, a lack of pluralistic institutions, and a denial of civil liberties that has disallowed Libyan nationalism to flower.
For long, Libya's east, which was a part of the traditional Cyrenaica, as well as the ruling power centre under the regime of King Idris, toppled by Mr. Qadhafi in the 1969 coup, has felt discriminated against. Under Mr. Qadhafi, Tripoli, a part of the old Tripolitania, became the new power centre, and members of the Qadhadfa tribe, to which the leader belongs, and who are dominant in this area, were among the chief beneficiaries of the new regime. It is therefore not surprising that the revolt, on February 15, and reflecting old animosities, began in Benghazi, Libya's capital, pre-1969.
There are also human rights issues and political demands as well, which have been brewing. The rebellion in Libya was sparked by the detention, on February 15, of Fathi Terbil, the 39-year-old human rights lawyer, based in Benghazi. Mr. Terbil represents the families of around 1,000 inmates, who were killed in 1996 by the regime in Tripoli's Abu Slim prison. His detention preceded a planned protest on February 17, in which the families of these inmates were to have participated. The revolt was also preceded by a peaceful two-year campaign for a new constitution, and demands for rule of law by a lawyers' syndicate, based in Benghazi.
Aspirations for economic justice, the rule of law, civil liberties and regional equality, seemed to have all coalesced when the uprisings, led by youth, in neighbouring Tunisia and Egypt, had successfully brought down entrenched dictatorships. As in other parts of West Asia and North Africa, these movements have transformed mindsets in Libya, imparting a powerful sense of self-belief, especially among the youth, who have realised that with careful preparation, fundamental political changes are indeed achievable.
Information is still sketchy about the role of the youth in using the internet as a tool for political mobilisation in Libya. “We will hear more about that in the days to come as the haze over the uprising settles. The only thing that I can say with certainty is that cyber-space was hyper-active ahead of the revolt,” says Tarik M. Yousef, a Libyan-American, who is currently the Dean of the Dubai School of Government in the United Arab Emirates. However, it is now emerging that unlike Facebook and Twitter, that Egyptian and Tunisian youth used effectively, some among the Libyan youth, preferred — perhaps to escape the regime's scrutiny — to use a popular football website to plan and organise the protests.
Mr. Qadhafi's slide towards isolation, driven by a combination of deep seated insecurity, and megalomania, began soon after the popular September 1969 coup. Deciding to monopolise power, Mr. Qadhafi, trusting his formidable charismatic powers, ensured that his potential political rivals have remained marginalised. He towered over the Revolutionary Command Council (RCC) comprising several military officers, where power was concentrated after the coup. A failed attempt, by Major Umar Mihayshi, a RCC member and 30 army officers, to topple him in 1975, led Mr. Qadhafi to further tighten his grip on power. In the periodic purges that have followed, several hundred people were allegedly killed, in the wake of an unsuccessful army revolt, in 1980, in Tobruk. It is, not surprisingly, one of the flashpoints of the on-going uprising.
Acutely aware of the danger that the armed forces could pose to his survival, the Libyan leader has systematically undermined the power of the conventional army. He has promoted the Revolutionary Guard Corps (RGC), an ultra-loyal well equipped force of around 3,000 men, drawn mainly from the Qadhadfa tribal groups surrounding Surt, the leader's hometown. Also called the Jamahiriya Guard, the RGC, formed mainly in the 1980s, was tied to the powerful Revolutionary Committees, another contraption of the regime embedded in work places and communities. The Revolutionary Committee buildings, a prominent regime symbol, were fiercely targeted during the current uprising in Benghazi, before protesters established their control over the city by February 20. Troops sent in to quell the revolt also turned around to join the dissidents. They are now taking the lead in military preparations to counter Mr. Qadhafi's loyalists, as they head towards Tripoli, the leader's stronghold.
In its future confrontations with the regime, the opposition is likely to encounter the Khamis brigade — a highly potent force, which has been assigned the Pretorian guard role in the defence of the regime. It could also encounter legions of mercenaries drawn out of Africa, that Mr. Qadhafi has cultivated for long to fulfill his utopian pan-Arab dreams.
Mr. Qadhafi's emergence as a target of hate-filled vendetta can also be attributed to the offensive doctrine of physical liquidation that his regime has adopted toward its opponents abroad. Some among the Libyan expatriates, who are mostly educated but left the country in droves in the early 1980s, have been lethally targeted for their anti-regime activism abroad. The regime's agents have assassinated many of them, especially those who moved to Western Europe, where they began to raise opposition groups. Given their animosity towards the regime, the expatriates are playing a significant role in fuelling the revolt. Apart from the youth, they have been making active use of the internet to help create the critical mass required for the success of the uprising.
In his aggressive campaign to deepen the “revolution,” Mr. Qadhafi has further alienated the Libyan clergy, now an important element in the revolt. His contention that his “ Green Book,” a self-acclaimed philosophical guide to chart Libya's future, is compatible with Islam and his nationalisation of properties belonging to Islamic endowments had already driven a wedge. The clergy has now formalised its break with the regime. In a statement, the newly formed Network of Free Ulema, which includes 50 prominent Libyan clerics and scholars, on February 22, condemned the use of State-violence against the protesters.
As the momentum gathers against the regime, the participation by ever-larger numbers of tribes has begun to make a critical difference to the regime's survival. In the city of Az-Zintan, 150 kilometres west of Tripoli, the powerful Warfala tribe has turned against Mr. Qadhafi. The Az-Zintan tribe, on its part, is trying to facilitate the entry of youth into Tripoli to challenge the regime. Significantly, around one-third of Tripoli's residents belong to the Tarhun tribe, which is disassociating itself from the government. Cracks are also appearing in the Qadhadfa tribe.
In the end, Mr. Qadhafi is staring at defeat, not necessarily on account of his stated ideals of Arab unity and economic equity, but because of his methods, which have revolved around authoritarianism, a personality cult and the use of brute force. As many among the Egyptian youth have recently shown, soaring idealism has a better chance of realisation when it is premised, not on force, but on principles of transparency, grassroots organisation and a political culture, which readily allows dissent and animated debate.

Another sham in Myanmar

2011-02-03T00:40:00.000-08:00

Myanmar's recently elected parliament has convened at Naypyidaw, but it would be unwise to expect first-hand accounts of the session in the media. In the “discipline-flourishing democracy” of the junta, journalists were not allowed to cover the opening day's proceedings. There can be no visitors to this parliament, and anyone other than a legislator caught entering the building faces a one-year prison term and fine. The shadow of the junta is everywhere. The new bicameral parliament has 664 members, of which nearly 500 belong to the Union Solidarity and Development Party, a proxy for the military regime that goes by the name of State Peace and Development Council (SPDC). Separately, 25 per cent of the seats in both houses go to serving military officers. Together, the junta controls, more or less, 82 per cent of the parliamentary seats. The opposition, represented by the National Democratic Force, a splinter group of Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy, has a mere 16 seats. (The NLD boycotted the elections.) Parties representing Myanmar's ethnic nationalities form another small clutch of opposition voices. But the military's brute majority ensures that the reins are firmly in its hands. Any opposition proposal seeking reforms in governance, in the Constitution, or in the political system, is certain to meet a swift end. In any case, the rules governing proceedings give opposition members little room to freely ask questions, or introduce legislation. The elections, held in November 2010, were a sham exercise in democracy; the convening of the parliament is an extension of this trickery.
The legislators are to elect a President who will head the new government that will replace the SPDC. It is certain that he will be a trusted representative of the junta. Will Senior General Than Shwe put up his own name or is it going to be another general slightly lower in the hierarchy? The military will also be well represented in the cabinet. There should be no doubt now that Ms Suu Kyi took the right step in boycotting the election. Her participation in the junta's “road map to democracy” could have only given it legitimacy. On her release from long years of house arrest, an event timed by the junta to immediately follow the election, the Nobel Laureate spoke about dialogue with the military towards national reconciliation and putting in place a genuine democracy in Myanmar. The regime has not responded to the offer. Ms Suu Kyi's shining achievement has been to demonstrate through thick and thin that she remains immensely popular with the people of her country — and therefore cannot be written out of Myanmar's political equation.

Mubarak supporters set to storm Tahrir Square

2011-02-03T00:37:00.000-08:00

In a nuanced response to the opposition's call for his immediate exit, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has agreed to quit in September this year, but on his own terms which include steering an orderly political transition.
Reinforcing his decision announced late on Tuesday over state television, and letting his detractors within Egypt and abroad know that, apparently, he too commanded significant street power and was not finished yet, Mr. Mubarak had tens of thousands of supporters, on foot, and in cars swarming the banks of the Nile. They had grouped, shouting slogans and holding banners aloft, within a short distance of the Tahrir Square, where several thousands seeking Mr. Mubarak's immediate departure converged yet again on Wednesday.
By mid-afternoon, the pro-Mubarak crowds noisily headed in the direction of the Tahrir Square, where a tense standoff had begun. By late afternoon some of the demonstrators clashed with the opposition, which charged the regime with unleashing “gangs of thugs” on them with the motive of disrupting peaceful protests. Many in the opposition claimed they had seized police identification cards from some of the pro-Mubarak supporters.
By evening, it became evident that the two opposing camps were battling for the control of the Tahrir Square, the icon of the anti-Mubarak uprising. A couple of empty green military trucks, horizontally positioned across the road, on the edge of the square, emerged as the frontline of these clashes.

Villagers better at using RTI tool than city dwellers

2011-01-19T01:06:00.000-08:00

If there is a community that deserves praise for using the Right to Information Act (RTI) effectively, the top honours should go to the humble farmers of Gujarat. This fact emerges from looking at the number of calls that Mahiti Adhikar Gujarat Pahel's (MAGP) RTI helpline receives.

What's more, while the applicants from rural Gujarat see that their applications do get them due justice, the urban class often tend to leave the battle half way. "In many cases, applicants do not receive the information sought at the first attempt and have to go for second or third appeal. It has been seen that most applicants in city find re-appealing process cumbersome, but those in villages are ready to go to any extent and keep calling us till the time they blow the lid off the corruption at the village-level administration," says MAGP coordinator Pankti Jog.

The helpline answered around 14,000 calls in 2010. And since its launch in 2006 the helpline has received more than 60,000 calls. An analysis of people calling up the helpline revealed that most of them were farmers who had questions related to their land or various welfare schemes. Teachers, public information officers, differently-abled people, social workers and small entrepreneurs also formed a sizeable number of callers.

"Rural people know more about the RTI. We receive more queries from them as compared to the urban population. Panchayat members too use the helpline to get answer to their queries. In fact, the helpline has been so successful that even public information officer (PIO) and appellate organisations contact us to ensure transparency in processing the applications," says Jog.

MAGP conducted an analysis of the calls which showed that a major part of calls involved those seeking information about land entitlement (14%), retirement dues (10%), welfare schemes (10%) and development work (8%).

"There has been an increase in the number of people calling with their queries not directly related to RTI. Also there are thousands who complaint about police not acting on their complaints or not even taking their complaints," says Harinesh Pandya of MAGP.

The study shows that while the RTI helpline has been largely successful in spreading awareness, a lot still needs to be done to increase understanding of the service and to ensure honest and speedy delivery of information from the government side.

Eye on China, Army focuses on mountain warfare

2011-01-19T01:04:00.000-08:00

After concentrating for long on taking the war to the enemy in the plains, basically a Pakistan-centric policy, the Army is now also steadily building its capabilities for offensive mountain warfare with China on mind.

This comes at a time when the Army's new doctrine and "proactive strategy", which also factor in the worst-case scenario of grappling with both China and Pakistan simultaneously in a two-front war, are now ready and the 1.13-million force is poised for a comprehensive transformation into a lean, mean fighting machine.

"As of today, we are capable of meeting any threat on our borders, whether it is simultaneous, single or double...We are also restructuring to ensure offensive capabilities in the mountains as well," said General V K Singh on Friday, a day ahead of the Army Day.

"The aim is to transform into a more agile, more lethal, networked force capable of meeting all future challenges...how our strategic assets, in terms of the strike corps (Mathura-based 1 Corps, Ambala-based 2 Corps and Bhopal-based 21 Corps) and other assets, can be synergised to deliver a more lethal punch," he added.

All this comes after creation of the new South-Western Army Command at Jaipur in 2005, between the Western and Southern Commands, for a greater offensive punch along the entire western front with Pakistan.

Since then, India is also finally taking steps to strategically counter the stark military asymmetry with China all along the 4,057-km Line of Actual Control. Apart from basing Sukhoi-30MKIs in northeast and upgrading several airstrips and helipads, two new infantry mountain divisions and the first battalion of Arunachal Scouts are now virtually in place.

With 1,260 officers and 35,011 soldiers, the two new divisions have their HQ in Zakama (Nagaland) and Missamari (Assam). Plans are also afoot to create a new mountain strike corps as well as a third artillery division.

It was after the 10-month forward troop mobilisation on the western front under Operation Parakram in 2002 that the Army began to develop the capability to mobilise fast and strike hard across the border.

China's mapping service shows Arunachal, Aksai Chin as its own

2011-01-19T00:50:00.000-08:00

China today officially launched its state-run mapping website that rivals Google Earth, showing Arunachal Pradesh and Aksai Chin in Jammu and Kashmir -- two key areas of dispute with India -- as part of its territory.

The map called 'Map World' displayed on the Internet in Chinese language is already being used in I phone and other mobile and Internet user applications in China. It shows Arunachal Pradesh that China has always claimed as "southern Tibet" as part of its territory. The map makes no specific mention of southern Tibet but its shows China's borders covered up to Arunachal Pradesh.

Also, the Aksai Chin area, which India asserts as part of Ladakh in Jammu and Kashmir has been included by the map as part of China's Xinjiang province. Both areas are part of the border dispute being negotiated between the two countries, which so far have held 14 rounds of talks.

The map, however, displays the Line of Control (LOC) in Kashmir region acknowledging the both sides of the areas respectively under the control of India and Pakistan. The unresolved border issue has been a simmering issue in Sino-India relations for a long time.

The issue of Arunachal was in the news again this month after two residents of the state were issued stapled visas by China, a development which observers said could be an indication of a change in Beijing's policy. China had earlier refused to offer visas to the residents of the state. However, China reiterated yesterday that its policy that Arunachal Pradesh is a "disputed area" remains "unchanged".

The online mapping service called MAP WORLD is meant to offer an "authoritative, credible and unified" online mapping service, state-run Xinhua news agency reported. Announcing the launch of the map SBSM vice director Min Yiren told the media that global geographic data can be accessed through the website and the data on China was "particularly detailed," covering towns and villages in China's extensive rural areas.

Search engine Google entered into a confrontation with the Chinese government over issues of censorship and hacking and also closed down its operations in the mainland for a brief period.

China then launched a blistering attack on Google and quietly began work on its own search engine. China is the biggest Internet market with more than 400 million users.
MAP WORLD has 11 million place names in it. Among them are some 120,000 points of interests including hotels, restaurants, retail businesses, government institutions, banks and roads.

People can use MAP WORLD, for instance, to find a hotel in Beijing near subways or bus stations and then plan a travel route by measuring the distance between the hotel and tourists sites like the Forbidden City, Min said.

According to him, there is no charge for using MAP WORLD's basic services, but services designed for corporate users will come with fees. The official version came out after revisions and improvements were made based on users' suggestions since the launch of the beta version last October.

Last October, China clarified that the satellite imagery data for the Map service was being provided by commercial satellites from different countries while it has Intellectual Property Right (IPR) over the software.

The clarification came after a Chinese blogger questioned the IPR of the map saying the satellite maps used in Map World most likely come from the US-based DigitalGlobe, which is the satellite imagery provider of Google Earth maps.

சூடானை இரண்டாக பிரிக்க ஓட்டெடுப்பில் முழு ஆதரவு

2011-01-16T22:18:00.001-08:00

ஆப்ரிக்காவின் சூடான் நாட்டில், பிரிவினைக்காக நடத்தப்பட்ட பொது ஓட்டெடுப்பு முடிவடைந்தது. இதையடுத்து, ஐரோப்பா வாழ் சூடானியர்களிடையே நடத்தப்பட்ட ஓட்டெடுப்பு எண்ணிக்கை பற்றிய முடிவு நேற்று அறிவிக்கப்பட்டது. அதில், ஐரோப்பா வாழ் சூடானியர்கள், பிரிவினைக்கு ஆதரவாக பெரும்பான்மை விகிதத்தில் ஓட்டளித்திருந்தனர்.

ஆப்ரிக்க நாடான சூடானில் ஏற்பட்ட உள்நாட்டு கலவரத்தால் 2005ல் மேற்கொண்ட அமைதி ஒப்பந்தப்படி, கடந்த 9ம் தேதி முதல் 15ம் தேதி வரை, நாடு இரண்டாகப் பிரிவது குறித்த பிரிவினைக்கான பொது ஓட்டெடுப்பு நடந்து முடிந்தது.
இதில், உள்நாடு மற்றும் ஐரோப்பா வாழ் சூடானியர்கள் கலந்து கொண்டு ஓட்டளித்தனர். நேற்று முன்தினம் ஓட்டுப் பதிவு முடிவடைந்ததை அடுத்து, முதல் நடவடிக்கையாக ஐரோப்பா வாழ் சூடானியர்களின் ஓட்டுகள் எண்ணப்பட்டு நேற்று முடிவுகள் அறிவிக்கப்பட்டன.
அதன்படி, பதிவான 640 ஓட்டுகளில் 97 சதவீதம் ஓட்டுகள், புதிய நாடு உருவாவதற்கு ஆதரவாக அளிக்கப்பட்டுள்ளன. இதையடுத்து, நூற்றுக்கணக்கான சூடானியர்கள் இந்த வெற்றியை ஆரவாரத்துடனும் மகிழ்ச்சியுடனும் கொண்டாடினர். ஓட்டெடுப்பின் முழு முடிவுகளும், பிப்ரவரி 6 அல்லது 14ம் தேதி அறிவிக்கப்படும் என்று எதிர்பார்க்கப்படுகிறது.

தூத்துக்குடி - கொழும்பு கப்பல் சர்வீஸ் : இரண்டு கப்பல் வாங்குகிறது இலங்கை

2011-01-16T22:17:00.001-08:00

"தூத்துக்குடி - கொழும்பு இடையே மீண்டும் கப்பல் போக்குவரத்து துவங்கவுள்ளதால், இதற்காக அனைத்து வசதிகளுடன் கூடிய இரண்டு பயணிகள் கப்பலை வாங்க திட்டமிட்டுள்ளோம்' என, இலங்கை அரசு தெரிவித்துள்ளது.

இலங்கை துறைமுகத் துறை இணை அமைச்சர் ரோகிதா அபயகுணவர்த்தனே கூறியதாவது: இந்தியாவுக்கும், இலங்கைக்கும் இடையே ஒப்பந்தம் கையெழுத்தாகியுள்ளது. இதன்படி, கொழும்பு - தூத்துக்குடி, தலைமன்னார் - ராமேஸ்வரம் இடையே, 25 ஆண்டுகளுக்கு பின்னர் மீண்டும் கப்பல் போக்குவரத்து துவங்கவுள்ளது. இந்தியா சார்பில் வாரத்துக்கு நான்கு முறையும், இலங்கை சார்பில் வாரத்துக்கு மூன்று முறையும் கப்பல்களை இயக்க திட்டமிடப்பட்டுள்ளது.
இதற்காக, விரைவில் இரண்டு பயணிகள் கப்பல்களை வாங்க திட்டமிட்டுளோம். இதுகுறித்து ஐரோப்பாவைச் சேர்ந்த இரண்டு கப்பல் நிறுவனங்களிடம் பேசி வருகிறோம். நீண்ட கால ஒப்பந்த அடிப்படையில் இந்த கப்பல்கள் வாங்கப்படும். பயணிகளின் நலன் கருதி, நவீன வசதிகளைக் கொண்ட கப்பல்களை வாங்க திட்டமிட்டுளோம். பயணிகள், தூங்குவதற்கும் இந்த கப்பலில் வசதி ஏற்படுத்தப்படும்.
கொழும்பு துறைமுகத்தை நவீனப்படுத்தவும் முடிவு செய்துள்ளோம். இந்த கப்பல் போக்குவரத்து, வர்த்தகர்கள், சுற்றுலா பயணிகளுக்கு மிகவும் உதவியாக இருக்கும். இந்தியாவிலிருந்து ஏராளமான சுற்றுலா பயணிகள் இலங்கை வருவதற்கும் வாய்ப்பு ஏற்படும். இவ்வாறு ரோகிதா கூறினார்.

பிரேசிலில் வெள்ளச்சாவு 1,000-த்தைத் தாண்டும்

2011-01-16T22:16:00.001-08:00

பிரேசில் நாட்டில் ஏற்பட்ட பெருமழை, வெள்ளப்பெருக்கு, கடும் நிலச்சரிவு காரணமாக உயிரிழந்தோர் எண்ணிக்கை ஆயிரத்தைத் தாண்டும் என்று மீட்புப் பணியாளர்கள் தெரிவிக்கின்றனர். தெரசாபோலிஸ், நோவாஃபிரைபர்கோ, பெட்ராபோலிஸ் ஆகிய நகரங்களும் பல கிராமங்களும் இந்த வெள்ளம், நிலச்சரிவில் சிக்கி பெருமளவுக்குச் சேதம் அடைந்துள்ளன. 3 நாள் துக்கம்: வெள்ளம், நிலச்சரிவில் இறந்தவர்களுக்கு அஞ்சலி தெரிவிக்கும் வகையில் 3 நாள் அரசுமுறை துக்கம் கடைப்பிடிக்கப்படும் என்று பிரேசிலின் புதிய பெண் அதிபர் தில்மா ரூசெஃப் சனிக்கிழமை அறிவித்தார். இந்த நாள்களில் விருந்து, கேளிக்கைகள் நடைபெறாது. தேசியக் கொடி அரைக்கம்பத்தில் பறக்கவிடப்படும். நாட்டு மக்கள் அனைவரும் தேசியத் துயர் களைய தங்களாலான உதவிகளைத் திரட்டித் தருவார்கள். இந்தச் சேதம் ரியோடி ஜெனிரோ நகரில்தான் அதிகம் பாதிப்பை ஏற்படுத்தியிருக்கிறது. எனவே அந்த மாநில அரசு வரும் திங்கள் முதல் ஒரு வாரத்துக்குத் தங்களுடைய மாநிலத்தில் அரசுமுறை துக்கம் கடைப்பிடிக்கப்படும் என்று அறிவித்திருக்கிறது. 14,000 பேருக்கு உதவி: ரியோ நகரிலிருந்து 60 கிலோ மீட்டர் தொலைவில் உள்ள செரானா பகுதியில் சுமார் 14 ஆயிரம் பேருக்கு உணவு, குடிநீர், மருந்து ஆகிய வசதிகளை மீட்பு, உதவிக்குழுவினர் செய்து வருகின்றனர். கேம்போ கிராண்டி என்ற கிராமத்தில் 2,500 வீடுகள் இருந்தன. ஆனால் இப்போது ஆள் நடமாட்டம் இருப்பதற்கான அறிகுறிகளே இல்லை. 4 சடல லாரிகள்: சடலங்களை எடுத்துச் செல்வதற்காக குளிரூட்டப்பட்ட பெட்டக வசதியுள்ள 4 லாரிகள் தெரசாபோலிஸ் தேவாலயத்துக்கு வெளியே தயாராக நிறுத்தப்பட்டிருக்கின்றன. மழைநீரில் ஊறியும் சேற்றில் புதைந்து அழுகியும் சடலங்கள் மீட்கப்படுவதால் அவற்றை மேலும் கெடாத நிலையில் எடுத்துச் செல்வதற்காக இந்த லாரிகள் தருவிக்கப்பட்டுள்ளன. ஆனால் மழை, வெள்ளத்தால் பல இடங்களில் சாலைகள் அடித்துச் செல்லப்பட்டும் அரித்துச் செல்லப்படும் கடுமையாகச் சேதம் அடைந்துள்ளன. சில பகுதிகளில் நூறடிக்கும் மேல் சாலைகளே இல்லாமல் மிகப் பெரிய பள்ளங்கள் காணப்படுகின்றன. பிரேசில் நாடு மலைப்பாங்கான பிரதேசம். இங்கே நிலச்சரிவு என்றால் முதலில் பாதிக்கப்படுவது தரைவழி போக்குவரத்துதான் என்பது நினைவுகூரத்தக்கது. எனவே ஆம்புலன்ஸ்களும் வேன்களும் செல்ல முடியாத நிலைமை காணப்படுகிறது. அத்துடன் மழை, பனி காரணமாக அப் பகுதிகளில் கடும் பனி மூட்டம் ஏற்பட்டுள்ளது. எனவே ஹெலிகாப்டர் போன்ற வான் ஊர்திகளையும் மீட்புப் பணியில் ஈடுபடுத்த முடியாத நிலைமை ஏற்பட்டிருக்கிறது. இந்தக் காரணங்களால் மீட்புப் பணியும் மிகுந்த காலதாமதத்துடன் நடைபெறுகிறது. கல்லறையிலேயே காத்துக்கிடக்கும் நாய்: இந்த சோகங்களுக்கு நடுவிலும் நெஞ்சைப் பிழியவைக்கும் காட்சி ஒன்று மீட்புப் பணியாளர்களின் கண்களைக் குளமாக்குகிறது. கிறிஸ்டினா மரியா டி சந்தானா என்ற பெண் இந்த வெள்ளத்தில் சிக்கி உயிரிழந்தார். அவருடைய உடலை தெரசாபோலிஸ் நகர கல்லறைத் தோட்டத்தில் புதைத்துவிட்டார்கள். அவர் ஆசையாக வளர்த்த நாய் இறுதிச் சடங்கின்போது கல்லறைத் தோட்டத்துக்கு வந்து அங்கு நடப்பதையெல்லாம் பார்த்துக் கொண்டிருந்தது. எல்லோரும் வீட்டுக்குத் திரும்பிய போதிலும் அது திரும்பாமல் அந்த இடத்திலேயே படுத்துக்கொண்டது. அந்த நாய் இன்னமும் உணவு உண்ணாமலும் நீர் அருந்தாமலும் இறந்துபோன எஜமானி மீண்டும் வரட்டும் என்று கண்ணீரோடு காத்துக் கிடக்கிறது. யாராவது போனால் அவர்கள் தங்கள் எஜமானிதானா என்று பார்த்துவிட்டு, இல்லையென்று தெரிந்ததும் மீண்டும் தலையைக் கவிழ்த்து படுத்துக்கொள்கிறது. காரிலேயே மரணம்: மீட்புப் பணியாளர்கள் ஒரு காட்டாறு ஓடி வெள்ளம் தணிந்த பகுதியில் நடந்துசென்ற போது ஒரு காரைப்பார்த்துவிட்டு அருகில் சென்றனர். அதில் ஒரு குடும்பத்தார் அப்படியே வெள்ள நீரில் மூச்சுத்திணறி இறந்து இருக்கைகளில் உட்கார்ந்திருந்தனர். காரில் செம்மண் நிறத்தில் சேறு அப்பியிருந்தது. வெள்ள நீர் உள்ளே புகுந்து பல மணி நேரம் இருந்துவிட்டு பிறகு வடிந்திருக்கிறது. வெறும் சேறுதானே என்று காலால் கிளறினால் அங்கிருந்து கையோ, காலோ, முழு உடலோ வெளியே வரும் அளவுக்கு அந்த இடம் முழுக்க சடலங்களாகவே நிரம்பியிருக்கிறது.

Taseer's killing reflects growing intolerance in Pak: Media

2011-01-05T20:17:00.000-08:00

Describing as "utter madness" the assassination of Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer by one of his guards who was angered by his opposition to blasphemy law, the Pakistani media on Wednesday said it was a reflection of the growing "cancer of intolerance" in the society. Taseer was an outspoken critic
of the blasphemy law and "paid the ultimate price for his rejection of the cancer of intolerance that has aggressively eaten away at this country for over three decades," the influential Dawn newspaper said in an editorial titled 'The Cancer Within.' The 66-year-old Governor was shot dead by policeman Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri, who was part of his security detail, at a market in the heart of Islamabad yesterday.
The headline on the front page of the Dawn read "Blasphemy law claims another life" while The Express Tribune simply headlined its report: "Paying the price: Silenced."
The Daily Times, which was owned and published by Taseer, described the Governor's killing as "yet another high profile murder of a political figure" from the ruling PPP after former premier Benazir Bhutto. It raised questions in its editorial whether the assassin had acted alone.
Referring to Interior Minister Rehman Malik's statement that the assassin confessed to killing Taseer for criticising the blasphemy law, the editorial said: "However, it would be premature to say that this indeed was the motive behind the assassin's act. This explanation sounds too pat."
"If history is any guide, such minor operatives act as tools in the hands of their cloaked masterminds and are usually killed after the deed is done...
"Only time will tell whether this was an individual act or someone orchestrated it to create political instability in the country at a time when the federal government is already teetering after losing its majority in Parliament...," said the editorial titled A Foul Murder.
The Express Tribune newspaper termed the assassination as "utter madness" and said: "...it was heartening to finally see someone speak with the voice of progressiveness and respect for human rights that the PPP had historically been associated with. And now it is revolting to see the same man done to death, so viciously, and that too by a member of his own police guard..."
Taseer had angered religious groups and Islamic clerics when he openly spoke out for the repeal or amendment of the blasphemy law after a court in Punjab gave the death sentence to Asia Bibi, a 45-year-old Christian woman, for insulting Prophet Mohammed.
Despite criticism from hardliners, Taseer had also backed calls for Asia Bibi to be pardoned.
Noting that Taseer had been targeted by hardliners in recent days, the Dawn's editorial said: "The state stood silently by, ignoring the 'fatwas' and the threats to the Punjab Governor."
Though clerics announced bounties and rewards for the killing of blasphemers, "no one was prosecuted or punished," the editorial said.
"It appears that in Pakistan if anyone decides to preface their arguments with the flag of Islam, however wrongly or cowardly, the state will stand by and advise 'tolerance' and 'understanding'. But there can be no tolerance for intolerance, no understanding for that which is patently criminal," it added.
The Express Tribune said in its editorial: "Also, lest we forget, since we all, especially in this country, tend to have very short memories, the blood of Salmaan Taseer is on all our hands. We, each one of us, are to blame for his assassination.
"And this is because, when he was being targeted by the extremists and the religious elements in our society, when some people came on television and hinted that Mr Taseer was, in effect, 'wajibul qatl' (fit to be killed) we did nothing to stand up and support him."
The News daily wrote in its editorial that Taseer died the way he lived – "controversially."
It said: "While Taseer may have angered or annoyed people, while his sometimes bombastic manner may have been irritable, there can be no doubt that he was a courageous man, willing to speak out on issues that few choose to address due to the growing fear forced on us by religious extremists."
"The shooting is evidence that it is not necessary for extremists to be in the garb of the Taliban, with their beards and turbans. They exist everywhere and come in all forms. And even those in the police may form a part of their ranks.
"The killing of the Governor by a member of his own security team could mean that even fewer will speak out on such issues. Those who have already done so – Sherry Rehman comes to mind – run a risk of falling victim to bullets," it said.
The situation is "awful," the editorial said, adding "Taseer's death highlights just how grim it is, and how difficult it will be to change our country for the better. The challenges are already immense. They grow greater by the day. We have already lost our right to express opinion freely. Extremism holds us in a vice."
"Will we ever be able to break free? That is the question we must ask before more bodies fall on our roads, staining them with blood that will perhaps never be fully washed away," it said.

Iran excludes U.S. from N-invite

2011-01-05T01:02:00.001-08:00

The Tehran government confirmed on Tuesday that it has invited world powers and its allies in the Arab and developing world — but apparently not chief critic the United States — to tour Iranian nuclear sites before a high-profile meeting late January on its disputed nuclear programme. The Associated Press reported the invitation to tour the facilities on Monday, citing a letter from a senior Iranian envoy that suggested the visit take place the weekend of January 15 and 16.
A diplomat familiar with the invitation said the U.S. and the other Western powers in the group were not invited, in an apparent attempt to split the six powers ahead of planned talks on Iran's nuclear programme this month.
An Iranian official speaking from a European capital said facilities to be visited include the nuclear enrichment facility at Natanz and the Arak site where Tehran is building a plutonium-producing heavy water reactor. Both facilities are considered suspect by the West because they could be used to make the fissile core of nuclear warheads.
On Tuesday, Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast confirmed the offer, saying it went to “the E.U, the non-aligned movement and representatives from 5+1 countries.”
The “5+1” countries are the six world powers negotiating with Iran over its nuclear programme — the five permanent U.N. Security Council members (the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China plus Germany.
Mr. Mehmanparast said Iran would identify the invited countries at a later time.
But a diplomat familiar with its contents said it was mailed to Russia, China, Egypt, the group of nonaligned nations at the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency, Cuba, Arab League members at the IAEA, and Hungary, which currently holds the rotating EU presidency.

South Sudan set for referendum

2011-01-05T01:01:00.000-08:00

Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir arrived to a red-carpet welcome at Juba airport on Tuesday, on a rare trip to the south just five days before it votes in a referendum on independence. Mr. Bashir was greeted on his arrival by southern leader Salva Kiir, senior southern politicians and a guard of honour from the combined armed forces of north and south Sudan.
Hundreds of well-wishers gathered outside the airport, while a heavy security presence was deployed in Juba, where armed soldiers were seen patrolling the streets.
“We will give him a warm welcome,” said southern Information Minister Barnaba Marial.
“His recent conciliatory statements have pleased a lot of people. We have asked our public to be courteous, welcoming and kind, because there is no competition here,” Mr. Marial told reporters in Sudan's southern capital.
The Sudanese President last week pledged to help build a secure, stable and “brotherly” state in the south if it votes for independence, in a speech delivered in northern Gezira state.
More than 3.5 million southerners are registered to participate in the referendum due to begin on Sunday, which will give them the chance to vote on whether to remain united with the north or secede.
The vote is a key plank of the 2005 north-south peace deal that ended a devastating 22-year civil war in which some two million people were killed and another four million displaced.

DRDO will set up research centre at IIT-Madras: Saraswat

2011-01-05T00:59:00.001-08:00

The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has decided to set up a research and innovation centre in the Research Park of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)-Madras, V.K. Saraswat, DRDO Director-General and Defence Research and Development Department Secretary, said on Tuesday.
After delivering a talk on the second day of the 98th Indian Science Congress at SRM University in Kattankulathur near here, Dr. Saraswat told journalists that the proposed centre would focus on materials manufacturing, aerospace, software development and nano materials.
Pointing out that there would be a “free flow” of scientists, academicians and students in the project, he said: “My scientists will work in IIT as adjunct professors. Similarly, IIT professors and students will work as scientists in my centre.”
The DRDO recently signed a contract with the IIT to implement the research and innovation centre project. It had taken one floor of the Research Park building, measuring nearly 30,000 sq. ft. The proposed centre is expected to be ready in eight months.
Dr. Saraswat admitted that in the past, some collaborative research projects had gone for a toss as they were dependent on particular faculties which were available for specific periods. To correct this, the DRDO wanted to ensure that the projects had continuity.
“Through collaborative efforts, we are binding the institution. The binding force is not at the level of one faculty but with respect to the entire community of academicians including students,” he said.
Commercial arm
Indicating the DRDO's plans to launch a commercial arm, Dr. Saraswat said that through a Rs. 20-crore programme involving the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, the DRDO had transferred to more than 15 industrial units defence technologies for civilian purposes. The units belonged to the public and private sectors. He denied any delay in setting up the commercial arm. As the mechanism had only existed to meet the requirements of the armed forces through the Department of Defence Production, the commercial arm was not originally envisaged.

Guard kills governor of Pakistan's Punjab province

2011-01-05T00:57:00.000-08:00

The governor of Pakistan's central Punjab province, a senior member of the ruling party, was shot dead by one of his bodyguards in Islamabad on Tuesday, plunging the country into a new political crisis. Interior Minister Rehman Malik said, citing initial reports, said Salman Taseer was killed because of his opposition to Pakistan's blasphemy law.
Rights groups say the law is often exploited by religious extremists and ordinary Pakistanis to settle personal scores. Islamist groups have been angered by what they believe are government plans to change or scrap the law.
The shooting occurred as Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani tried to muster support for the government after a leading partner withdrew from the coalition over fuel price policies.
A witness said Taseer was stepping out of his car at a shopping area when he was shot.
"The governor fell down and the man who fired at him threw down his gun and raised both hands," said the witness, Ali Imran.
The shooting left bloodstains on a parking area at Kohsar shopping centre in Islamabad, which is popular with foreigners.
Taseer, a liberal and charismatic politician close to President Asif Ali Zardari, had no day-to-day role in the affairs of the central government but his killing will add to a sense of crisis.
Earlier, the main opposition Pakistan Muslim League (PML-N), led by former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, said it would not demand a vote of no confidence in Gilani because to do so would aggravate instability in the South Asian country, a strategic ally of the United States.
The PML-N, believes a no-confidence vote would "damage the whole country", chairman Raja Zafar-ul-Haq told Reuters.
Sharif told a news conference he would present the government with demands such as the scrapping of fuel price rises and the dismissal of ministers accused of corruption, and gave it three days to agree, from the end of a three-day mourning period.
EVICTION THREAT
He threatened to evict members of the ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP) from the Punjab provincial government, which his party dominates. Sharif suggested there might be a need for new national elections, but did not say when.
Taseer's assassination in broad daylight will reinforce the impression that the government is nowhere near stabilising nuclear-armed Pakistan.
"We will conduct a thorough investigation to know whether it was an individual act or someone else was behind it," said Malik.
The blasphemy law came under the spotlight after a court in November sentenced a Christian mother of four, Asia Bibi, to death in a case stemming from a village dispute.
The law has widespread support in Pakistan, which is more than 95 percent Muslim, and most politicians are loath to be seen as soft on the defence of Islam.
Taseer visited Bibi in prison in a campaign for her release. He wrote on his Twitter page last Friday: "I was under huge pressure sure 2 cow down b4 rightist pressure on blasphemy. Refused. Even if I'm the last man standing."
Malik said the bodyguard, identified as Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri, confessed and had been arrested.
"Salman Taseer is a blasphemer and this is the punishment for a blasphemer," Qadri said in comments broadcast on Dunya television.
His hands and legs bound by nylon rope, the bearded Qadri smiled confidently as he spoke to reporters from the back of a police truck just after killing Taseer and surrendering.
Political analysts said Taseer's death would compound political tension as the opposition steps up its pressure on the government.
The second biggest opposition party also said it would not push for a no-confidence vote, suggesting the opposition might prefer to wear down a weak prime minister by blocking legislation or holding protests to force an early election.

Egypt church attack to fuel sectarian tension

2011-01-05T00:55:00.000-08:00

The New Year's Day bombing of a church suggests al Qaeda-inspired militants have a toe-hold in Egypt, but probably does not indicate a return to the kind of Islamic insurgency Egyptian forces crushed in the 1990s.
No clear official account has emerged of how the Jan. 1 attack, which killed 21 people, was carried out, but analysts point to a small cell, not a bigger militant group like those which challenged the government more than a decade ago.
Whoever was behind it, the attack seemed designed to upset Muslim-majority Egypt's fragile sectarian balance. It was the biggest attack in at least a decade aimed at Coptic Orthodox Christians, who form 10 percent of Egypt's 79 million people.
The reaction was swift. Within moments of the blast, Christians took to Alexandria's streets in protest. Some Muslims and Christians hurled stones at each other. A day later police fired teargas in Cairo to disperse angry crowds.
"I do not expect a spread of terrorism in Egypt and a return of terror attacks that took place in the 1980s and 1990s," said Amr Elchoubaki, an expert in Islamic movements at the Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies.
"But I am more concerned about the internal climate and the impact of any attack, even if limited, on relationships between Muslims and Christians," he said.
The government was quick to call for national unity, blamed foreign hands and pledged to track down the perpetrators.
Whether it involved Egyptians or foreigners, analysts said the scale, planning and timing suggested al Qaeda-inspired militants may have been behind it. It followed Islamist calls, made on the Web, for attacks on Coptic churches at this time.
"The first and most likely possibility is that a sleeper cell of an al Qaeda group carried out this operation and this would mean that al Qaeda has penetrated the Islamic political movement in Egypt," said analyst Nabil Abdel-Fattah.
The state crushed groups such as al-Gama'a al-Islamiya and Islamic Jihad, which targeted tourists, Christians, government ministers and other officials in a 1990s campaign for a purist Islamic state, and has kept a tight lid on such groups since.
"An attack like this would have taken probably about a dozen operatives. We cannot rule out the possibility of local elements," said Fawaz Gerges, a Middle East professor at the London School of Economics.
Safwat Zayaat, a military expert in Cairo, said the latest attack on Christians was the kind of operation "that does not require much networking but needs to identify a point of weakness. One act will echo globally and inspire many others".
By contrast, in the 1990s, Egypt had been dealing with "groups that may have been inspired by a global ideology but had a local focus to oust (President Hosni) Mubarak's government".
SPORADIC ATTACKS
Egypt has suffered sporadic attacks in the last decade, such as deadly bombings of tourist resorts between 2004 and 2006, but has avoided any return to the sustained violence of the 1990s.
Lawyer Montaser al-Zayat, who has defended militants over many years, questioned whether the perpetrators were inspired by al Qaeda, saying Egyptian militants may have become more radicalised simply because of rising sectarian strife.
However, the attack was unusual for Egypt -- officials have blamed a suicide bomber -- and it followed a series of militant threats against the church, starting with one in November issued by an Iraq-based group linked to al Qaeda.
Two weeks before the bombing, a statement on an Islamist website urged Muslims to target churches in Egypt and elsewhere, including the one hit in Alexandria. Another website after the attack said it was the "first drop of heavy rain."
An Egyptian security source said an effort was under way to list people who had arrived in Egypt recently from countries "where al Qaeda is known to recruit and train operatives".
Some say Iraq has become a training ground for Arab and other militants, just as Afghanistan was in the 1980s.
SECTARIAN WEAK SPOT
By attacking a church, militants have highlighted Egypt's growing sectarian divide, as well as what some analysts see as the government's reluctance to stir up Islamists by tackling long-standing Coptic grievances about unfair treatment.
The opposition Muslim Brotherhood, which renounced violence as a means to effect change in Egypt decades ago, said the attack showed the state's failure to protect its citizens.
"The government should have increased security measures (for churches), especially after the Iraqi threats," said Mohamed el-Katatni, a senior Brotherhood member.
The bombing was on a much bigger scale than the spontaneous scuffles or killings more typical of Egypt's brand of sectarian violence, often sparked by disputes over church-building or taboo relationships between men and women of different faiths.
In the worst such incident in the past year, six Christians were shot dead, along with a Muslim policeman, outside a church in southern Egypt on Jan. 6, the eve of Coptic Christmas.
Hisham Kassem, a human rights campaigner and publisher, said many Christians would perceive the New Year's Day bombing through a sectarian prism because they feel marginalised.
"Right now Copts feel Muslims (as a whole) struck at them, rather than seeing it as a terrorist attack by a Muslim, and it is due to this ... feeling of discrimination," he said.
Rights activist Hossam Bahgat, whose group reported in April on rising sectarian violence, said Egypt had boasted to other governments about its success in quashing militants but was not doing enough to address Christian grievances.
He said the bombing should encourage swifter action. "It will hopefully bring home the idea that this is extremely fragile and the situation could deteriorate very quickly."

Puri elected Chairman of UNSC Counter-terrorism committee

2011-01-05T00:53:00.000-08:00

Indian Ambassador to the United Nations Hardeep Singh Puri has been elected Chairman of the all important Security Council Committee on Counter-terrorism and two other key committees of this 15-member body.

A formal announcement in this regard will be made today, sources told PTI after the conclusion of silent procedure during which there was no challenge to India being elected as Chairman of these three important UNSC committees.

Elected for a two-year term, Puri would chair the UN Security Council Counter-Terrorism Committee.

He replaces Ertugrul Apakan, Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Turkey, whose term expired on December 31, 2010.

Guided by Security Council resolutions 1373 (2001) and 1624 (2005), the Security Council Counter-terrorism Committee works to bolster the ability of United Nations member states to prevent terror acts both within their borders and across regions.