Shaukat Qadir sees the light on Kashmir

Indo-Pak talks making progress? —Shaukat Qadir

Did we make any progress in this period of cricket diplomacy? That appears to be the hot question. While most people would have been circumspect and suggested that the jury would be out a long while on that question, General Pervez Musharraf has declared it an unequivocal success. There is little doubt that no one from the Pakistani side is better placed to comment on the success of his visit.

However, some information is available to citizens on both sides. Having implied it on many an occasion earlier, the Indians have finally stated in no uncertain terms that they are willing to discuss any solution to the Kashmir issue as long as it does not include redrawing boundaries. Many a Pakistani analyst would call this a defeat and claim that Pakistan must never give up its claim on Kashmir, the issue being the ‘unfinished agenda of partition’.

Personally speaking, I have been saying for a number of years now that no Indian government can survive a bargain on Kashmir beyond the Indian Union borders. I have also been stating that the moral high ground was lost on the heights of Kargil. It is unrealistic to expect anything other than the conversion of the LOC into a de facto border. As a matter of fact, since Kargil, a number of Held Kashmir leaders have accepted this reality in private though not in public.

In my view the Indian statement is a victory for diplomacy. It is the first time that the proposition of what is not acceptable to one side has been tabled for consideration. It is also time now for realpolitik to take over. It is time for the Pakistani leadership to decide their strategic objective: is it the territorial annexation of IHK or the security of their waters. The truth is that it is impossible to militarily annex territory defended by a stronger power. Our ‘policy’ — if ever it was a policy — of bleeding India has failed.

The Indians have proven that they can stay the course in a low-intensity conflict in Kashmir. It is time to reassess our options. The mere fact that despite the unambiguous statement of the Indian leadership, our political leaders have not shied away from continuing talks indicates that the reality has finally dawned upon them as well.

I suggest that we make our stand equally unequivocal on Baglihar Dam, Wullar Barrage and the Kishanganga project etc. All issues that could cause strategic damage for us in the long run must be addressed. If we are to compromise on Kashmir, it is perhaps an even more significant moment in history than the partition of India. The fate of our future generations can be settled now.

Our rotten image abroad —Khaled Ahmed’s TV Review

Our rotten image abroad —Khaled Ahmed’s TV Review

According to Khabrain (February 21, 2005) a pesh imam of Hyderabad collected separated and ragged pages of an old Quran and burnt them to get rid of them. As ill luck would have it, the pages flew up and fell on the surrounding houses while burning. The entire locality came out in protest, took hold of the cleric and beat him till he was unconscious with grievous injuries. The people did gherao of Masjid Paretabad and sealed it. The cleric was handed over to the police who put him in jail. The town in Hyderabad became endangered with threats of widespread vandalism from the incensed people.

No one really knows what happened because the people didn’t wait for a proper verdict. There was vandalism. That is what the whole thing means in Pakistan. Get up, inflict injury on the suspect and destroy property. What use is the law?

According to Khabrain, (February 21, 2005) a Christian in Chishtian in Punjab was sentenced by a civil judge to seven years rigorous imprisonment for insulting the Quran. (In prison, he could be killed by Muslim prisoners). The Christian was in the business of doing taviz-ganda (magic cure) and was supposed to have insulted the Quran.

This one news of conviction despite government orders to stagger the process under blasphemy law is enough to ban Pakistanis from Europe.

Reported in daily Insaf (February 26, 2005), Prof Ibnul Hassan of Sargodha University was to take his class in business administration in the evening when he found that the entire class was saying its namaz in the nearby mosque. He gave the pious students a dressing down on their return. His remarks on their Islamic practice were taken ill by the students who then called upon Islami Jamiat Tulaba to protest. The protest spilled into the city where all the clerics denounced the professor as a blasphemer against the Prophet (peace be upon him) and hadith. The professor was apprehended after an FIR.

This is the routine about the innocent victimised by the religious fanatic. No court will dare release the man. He will rot in jail till he is released by the Supreme Court after seven years. This is what has been happening to the blasphemy accused. No one has so far been executed for blasphemy but convicts under appeal have been killed in prisons. The magistrates cannot free them because they are scared. Therefore, the cases have to go the superior courts where the red tape takes a long time.

Quoted in Insaf (February 27, 2005) chief of Jamia Naeemiya in Lahore, Sarfaraz Naeemi, condemned actress Mira for taking part in shameless film scenes in India. He said he had seen pictures of her different poses with a Hindu actor, which had greatly offended him. He said Mira should be punished for indulging in un-Islamic activities. Another cleric said that special NOC should be issued by the government to make sure that actors did not take part in shameless activities in India. According to Khabrain, political leaders like Munawwar Hassan said that Mira was setting the wrong example for Pakistani youth. Engineer Salimullah said she should be banned from returning to Pakistan. Mira’s mother said films like Nazar were being produced in Pakistan all the time. Other film actors turned against Mira and asked for action against her.

Sarfaraz Naeemi gives two hoots for the image of Pakistan he is projecting abroad. India earns its reputation as a benign and tolerant country by honouring its film actresses. The truth is that states make good reputations through their entertainment industry. Pakistan is venomous because it hates entertainment and is constantly found proposing savage punishments to its entertainers.

Gilgit on fire?

EDITORIAL: Take Gilgit violence seriously!

Last Wednesday, Gilgit again saw sectarian violence when four Shias were shot and wounded by unidentified gunmen. The city’s old polo ground area, where the incident happened, immediately erupted in gunfire, forcing the administration to call in army and paramilitary troops to cordon off the area and search for weapons. Thirty-two people have already been arrested in connection with the incident and the city has been placed under Section 144 for two months to avoid further disruption of life.

The Northern Areas as a whole have fallen through a black-hole. Information about violence in the area reaches the rest of the country sporadically. The government has done nothing to enlighten people about what exactly is happening there. The press has made only half-hearted efforts to unearth the dynamics of sectarian tension in the region. The official response to acts of violence typically takes the form of stopgap administrative action: curfews, slapping Section 144, calling in the army, cordons and arrests. There is hardly any attempt to address the causes of sectarian unrest to return the area to normalcy on a long-term basis. The result is obviously a recrudescence of violence every now and then. In the past four months alone, official toll of casualties related to sectarian violence stands at 35.

The region has been in the grip of sectarian fever for nearly two years now. It all started with the Shia community objecting to some lessons in the Islamic studies syllabi. We do not know what the government has done to address the grievance of the community. But we do know that since then the region has seen a number of sectarian attacks. On January 8 this year a prominent Shia cleric, Agha Ziauddin Rizvi, was shot dead by unidentified gunmen. The reaction to that came down south in Karachi where a Sipah-e-Sahaba cleric was shot dead. An attempt to kill another Sunni-Deobandi cleric in Islamabad failed. Later, on March 23, a former Northern Areas police chief, Sakhiullah Tareen, was shot dead along with his police guards. Just days before he was killed, Mr Tareen had led a crackdown on sectarian groups. To add to the woes of people in the region, the Karakoram Highway has apparently become a haven for criminal gangs who loot and kill travellers at will.

Press not free in Pakistan, says Freedom House

Press not free in Pakistan, says Freedom House

By Khalid Hasan

Washington: Freedom House, which monitors the sate of freedom around the world every year, has placed Pakistan among countries where the press is “Not Free.”

According to Freedom House which released the survey this week, “Pakistan dropped from Partly Free to Not Free because of increased official harassment of journalists and media outlets, in addition to passage of a bill that increased penalties for defamation. The moves followed other aggressive measures taken over the last two years by military authorities to silence critical or investigative voices in the media. A number of journalists have been pressured to resign from prominent publications, charged with sedition, or arrested and intimidated by intelligence officials while in custody.” Only two countries - Pakistan and Kenya - registered a negative category shift in 2004, moving from Partly Free to Not Free. Pakistan was also among countries where Freedom House said “notable setbacks” had taken place. Others so listed were Kenya, Mexico, Venezuela, and in the United States itself.

Update: Freedom house report here(PDF).

Pakistani christian gets his legs broken because he won't recite the kalima

Christian injured for not reciting kalma

LAHORE: About eight people severely tortured a Christian in Chak 2 (South) near Mandi Bahauddin district for not reciting the kalma. According to a fax sent by the Holy Rosary Church to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), Shahbaz Masih, who worked as a tractor driver for a local landlord, was picked up by several people from his house on the night of April 2 and taken to an undisclosed location. Later, the people told Shahbaz’s family that they had killed him and his body was lying in a field near his village. Shahbaz’s family members went to the location and found the boy alive. They took him to hospital, where he recorded a statement with his family and church authorities. According to the preliminary inquiry by the church, both of Shahbaz’s legs were broken because he refused to recite the kalma. waqar gillani

Muslim Group in France Is Fertile Soil for Militancy(by Pakistani group Tablighi Jamaat)

Muslim Group in France Is Fertile Soil for Militancy

By CRAIG S. SMITH

T.-DENIS, France - Raouf Ben Halima, 39, sleeps on his side, never on his stomach. He enters the bathroom leading with his left foot but puts his pants on leading with his right. Instead of using a fork when he eats, he uses his index finger, middle finger and thumb.

Mr. Halima is a member of the Tablighi Jamaat, or Preaching Party, a global army of Muslim missionaries helping to expand their religion and reinforce their faith. They believe that emulating the habits of the Prophet Muhammad is the surest way to restore Islam to its intended path.

So Mr. Halima and his associates shave their upper lips but let their beards grow. They wear their pants or robes above the ankle because the prophet said letting clothes drag on the ground is a sign of arrogance.

His comments, made recently to a reporter during conversations about the growth of militant Islam, offered a rare window on the beliefs of a group that is unsettling to many here. The Tablighi are one of the primary forces spreading Islamic fundamentalism in Europe today, and many young Muslim men pass through the group on the way toward an extreme, militant interpretation of the religion.

Beyond that, little about the group is known.

Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person to be charged in the United States in connection with the Sept. 11 attacks, was once a Tablighi adherent in France. Hervé Djamel Loiseau, a young Frenchman who died fleeing the 2001 American bombardment of Tora Bora in Afghanistan was, too. Djamel Beghal, an Algerian-born Frenchman and confessed Qaeda member recently convicted in Paris for plotting to blow up the American Embassy, was a Tablighi follower in the French town of Corbeil a decade ago.

The movement got its start in the mid-1920's when a man named Mawlana Muhammad Ilyas, disturbed by distortions of Islam in the face of India's predominant Hinduism, began preaching in the poor neighborhoods of Delhi. It is now considered the largest Muslim missionary movement in the world. Its yearly November gathering in Raiwind, Pakistan, may be second only to the hajj in drawing Muslims.

The Tablighi's obligation includes proselytizing 3 days every month and 40 days once a year. Every devoted Tablighi is also expected to make one four-month trip to Pakistan to study at the organization's central mosque.

"The Tablighi only care about bringing people back to Islam," Mr. Halima insisted. "We are not political." But he said Tablighi-sponsored trips to Pakistan put young men in contact with fundamentalists of many stripes, including adherents of Salafism, a fundamentalist school of Islam whose radical fringe advocates war against non-Muslims.

Abandoning the Tablighi during such trips is discouraged, he said, but there is no stigma for those who wished to leave for more radical groups later.

He acknowledged that young men wishing to migrate from the Tablighi to more militant forms of Islam had no trouble finding their way. "Everyone knows which mosques attract Salafists, and if you go and ask, it's easy to get into the jihadi network," he said.

Muslim Man Convicted of Urging Holy War(al Timmi/Lashkar-e-Taiba)

Muslim Man Convicted of Urging Holy War

By MATTHEW BARAKAT
ASSOCIATED PRESS

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) - An Islamic scholar who prosecutors said enjoyed "rock star" status among a group of young Muslim men in Virginia was convicted Tuesday of exhorting his followers in the days after Sept. 11 to join the Taliban and fight U.S. troops.

The convictions against Ali al-Timimi, 41, carry a mandatory minimum sentence of life in prison without parole. But the judge left open the possibility that she will toss out some of the counts.

Prosecutors said the defendant - a native U.S. citizen who has an international following in some Muslim circles - wielded enormous influence among a group of young Muslim men in northern Virginia who played paintball games in 2000 and 2001 as a means of training for holy war around the globe.

Five days after Sept. 11, al-Timimi addressed a small group of his followers in a secret meeting and warned that the attacks were a harbinger of a final apocalyptic battle between Muslims and non-believers. He said they were required as Muslims to defend the Taliban from a looming U.S. invasion, according to the government.

While nobody ever joined the Taliban, four of the defendant's followers subsequently traveled to Pakistan in late September 2001 and trained with a militant group called Lashkar-e-Taiba.

Afghans shelling Pakistan

Shells fired from Afghanistan kill four in Pakistan
Pakistan Times National News Desk

ISLAMABAD: Pakistani authorities have found four dead bodies of suspected militants in the North Waziristan tribal agency, a day after artillery shells were fired from across the Afghan border area, Kuna reports quting sources.

On Saturday night the US and Afghan forces launched an operation near border after suspected Taliban fired rockets and missiles on a military camp in the Orgun area of Afghanistan.

Yet another report says that four unidentified decomposed dead bodies were found on Pak-Afghan border near Lorha Mandi village in North Waziristan Agency on Sunday.

Pakistani security forces found four dead bodies on Pak-Afghan border near Lorha Mandi, whose recognition was not possible immediately while both the Afghanistan and Pakistan officials on border were reluctant to receive the dead bodies. A team of Pakistan's security checked the dead bodies but refused to claim them as Pakistani nationals, sources added.

Kuwait news agency says that more than six mortar shells hit the hilltops of bordering Alwara Mandi village. They said on Sunday the forces found four dead bodies of suspected militants from the area being hit by the shells.

Meanwhile, some unidentified persons fired three rockets on the house of Muhammad Ayaz, a local tribesman, last night, resulting in the injuries of his son and wife. The house is located at Khushali Karhimkhel, Mir Ali, sub-division, some six kilometers from here.

The legs of his eldest son were reportedly fractured while his wife was critically injured, the local people said. The political administration started investigation.

A US statement, issued in the Kabul said on Sunday that a clash near Pak-Afghan border backed by warplanes and artillery killed four fighters.

Lt-Gen David Borno, the US commander who has been coordinating efforts of the coalition forces to hunt Osama bin Laden, Taliban and Al Qaeda activists in Afghanistan, has hinted at possible high-profile attacks by Taliban in the next six to nine months.

He said; last week a joint operation was launched in the tribal belt. Meanwhile, Islamabad has asked the coalition troops to do more to curb movement of militants from Afghanistan in Pakistan.

DailyTimes columnist sees the Kashmir issue being frozen

Realism sets in —Rashed Rahman

President General Pervez Musharraf’s visit to India and the meeting with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh have produced both hope and scepticism among commentators on both sides of the border. General Musharraf himself has characterised the exchanges in New Delhi between the two sides as constituting the irreversibility of the peace process between Pakistan and India and as a “breakthrough”. The contrast with the failure in the Agra summit in 2001 could not be more glaring. It is well to keep in mind though, that the Agra summit 2001 and the New Delhi summit 2005 are separated by 9/11. This defines and helps explain the difference between the two outcomes.

What exactly has been achieved in New Delhi 2005? On the part of the Pakistani military establishment a coming down to earth and acceptance of undeniable realities. These realities dictate recognition of the fact that India has outstripped Pakistan in economic, military and diplomatic strength. Our repeated forays into the uncomfortable territory of being the ‘most allied ally of the US’, far from reaping the touted benefits, have produced nothing but disappointment and pathos. Neither diplomatic means nor resort to war (conventional and irregular) over almost six decades helped nudge Pakistan any nearer to its goal of resolving the Kashmir issue, the greatest cause of contention between the two neighbouring countries.

Washington, meanwhile, has discovered post-9/11 the economic and strategic importance of India, especially as a counterweight in Asia and the world to the growing clout of China. Alliance with the US, even when it was prepared (fitfully) to provide modern weapons to our armed forces, did not live up to the hopes and expectations of the military establishment, Washington’s ‘best friend’ in Pakistan.

Pakistan has accepted in New Delhi that its traditional stand based on the 1948-49 UN Security Council resolutions no longer finds a sympathetic international audience. The only way out now therefore, given India’s preponderance in military, economic and strategic terms globally, and the reluctance of the Bush administration (General Musharraf’s most ardent backers in the US) to go beyond nudging both Pakistan and India to settle their issues peacefully through bilateral negotiations, is to go for a historic compromise. That is exactly what has transpired in New Delhi.

General Musharraf has accepted Manmohan Singh’s proposition that “borders cannot be redrawn” while rejecting accepting the Line of Control as an international border. In turn, India has not underlined its usual insistence on an end to the so-called “cross-border terrorism” as a precondition for meaningful talks and progress. General Musharraf has spoken of “soft” borders before embarking on his journey.

The two sides have translated this in black and white in the Joint Statement after the summit by accepting the need for an enhanced bus service between Srinagar and Muzaffarabad; allowing trucks to ply the same route to encourage trade between the two sides of divided Kashmir; a new bus route between Amritsar and Lahore, later to be extended to Nankana Sahib; and the implementation of the decision to open the Khokropar-Munabao border.

These steps represent a softening of the borders, or at the very least, normalisation of the border regime between the two countries. On the contentious issues of Siachen and Sir Creek, it is back to the drawing board. On Kashmir, the likely eventual outcome of the present series of confidence building measures will be a scaling down of the insurgency and of the Indian military and security forces’ presence in Indian-held Kashmir and an internal political compact between New Delhi and Srinagar and Islamabad and Muzaffarabad for autonomy, democracy and genuine special status to the two halves of the state. Whether this will meet General Musharraf’s criteria of a ‘final’ solution that satisfies Pakistan, India and the Kashmiris, is a moot point. General Musharraf has warned that unless such a solution is found, although he is now prepared to give it more time, the problem could erupt again some years down the road.

For the moment at least, the potential ‘spoilers’ of a series of concessions on Kashmir by both sides, have failed to create any momentum despite the attack on the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad bus service. As a consequence perhaps, the Hizbul Mujahideen, the largest Kashmiri guerrilla group, has in principle accepted the possibility of a ceasefire, should New Delhi propose any such measure.

It is axiomatic by now, but was not sufficiently clear to our military establishment and policy makers in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, that their reversal on the Afghan policy left the door ajar to the likely, reversal of jihad in Kashmir since all irregular warfare struggles would more than likely find themselves lumped into the ‘terrorist’ basket. That has now come to pass. History may therefore have passed by the armed militant movement in Kashmir. Whether they accept this or not, their best bet now appears to be to bide their time and explore whatever political openings present themselves during the continuing talks between Pakistan and India to normalise their overall relations and find a compromise on Kashmir that can prove acceptable to all.

Teaching intolerence in Pakistan- cont'd

Unenlightened worldview

SHAHID ANWAR

Supposedly, the institutions of higher education provide intellectual leadership to a society. They are the torchbearers of enlightenment and instrument of progressive change. Do we have enough courage to see the realities on ground? Just look at a few examples.
Those who have been exposed to un-academic environment of the largest university of Pakistan — The University of the Punjab — know very well about the level of academic freedom available to its students. To get an idea of dominant thinking pattern at the university, one just needs to join the Friday prayer and listen to the sermon and Dua at the end of prayer. One could find little difference between an ignorant mullah’s worldview and the views of highly educated Khateeb who is at the faculty of the university.
The (dis)credit of this decay goes to General Zia’s two pronged policy of Islamisation and Afghan Jihad. Education in general and the social sciences in particular suffered very badly due to the policies mentioned above. Zia never concealed his antipathy for social sciences. While addressing a convocation at Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad, he once pronounced that Pakistani society did not need studying social sciences. Cleansing college libraries by destroying un-Islamic books, and recruiting teachers for their piousness, suffocated the academic environment for times to come.
Without any academic pretence they just transmitted their faith-based likings and dislikings about ideas and personalities to the extent of blurring any distinction between a political activist and academician. To the utter dismay of the participants, the academy badly lacked an academic paradigm, and seemed working as mouthpiece of the MMA.
To cite a few examples of political messaging, it seems unavoidable to quote from some of the sermons. A well-known scholar denounces President for his anti-Islamic policies. He further opines, ‘While the Kashmir issue can only be resolved through a threat of war, the President is pathetically displaying cowardice vis-à-vis India’. Another statement goes on to say, ‘The West is against us, because we are Muslims. They do not let us do anything good for ourselves through their stooges, imposed on us’. Are these not the often-heard words and known views of clergy? The political Mullahs and the prayer leaders are used to blast in the same manner.

US and Afghan troops dump 4 bodies into Pakistan

US and Afghan troops dump 4 bodies into Pakistan

Daily Times Monitor

LAHORE: US and Afghan forces on Sunday threw four bodies into Pakistani territory, claiming the deceased were Pakistani nationals, Geo news channel reported.

However, Pakistani security forces refused to pick the bodies up, saying the deceased were not Pakistanis, it added.

Witnesses also said the hands and feet of the deceased had marks of cigarette burns, handcuffs and shackles, the channel added.

North Waziristan Agency’s political agent and Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) officials said they did not know who the victims were, and it would take several hours to confirm the identities of the deceased, the channel said. In a separate incident in Afghanistan, US and Afghan soldiers battled suspected militants near the border with Pakistan, and four fighters and one Afghan soldier were killed, the US military said on Sunday, agencies reported.

Dean of Pakistani university on India/Pakistan IT

Multiple education systems cannot integrate the society

TNS: It is said that the Indian IT industry benefited a great deal from the Indians working in the US IT industry as they referred back work to India. Having an important position in the US and considerable influence to go with it, did you, or other Pakistanis in similar positions, ever make an effort to divert work towards Pakistan?

DAM: It is true that one of the reasons for the success of the Indian IT industry is the influence and efforts of the Indian expatriate community to divert work towards India. But we must also realize that this was not the only reason and we also must remember why the Indian expatriate community was able to divert work to India. No company in the US is going to make an investment in any of these countries unless it makes complete business and financial sense. Companies in India have an infrastructure that is comparable to the infrastructure available anywhere in the world. This infrastructure was laid down years ago when a conscious effort was made to enable India to become a world player. There is no such overriding factor to influence companies to invest in Pakistan where there is no such infrastructure in place. It does not make any financial sense to get US companies to invest in Pakistan. Only Pakistani companies in the US will ever invest here and that too because of reasons and factors other than purely business sense.

Let me also clarify that no matter what the government says US companies still want to work in India, China and Eastern Europe which are all cheaper and yet safer alternatives to the US.

Pakistani-Americans say no ‘capitulation’ in peace with India..umm..ok...

Pakistani-Americans say no ‘capitulation’ in peace with India

By Khalid Hasan

WASHINGTON: A number of Pakistani-American organisations while welcoming the recent thaw in Indo-Pak relations have cautioned that the a “final settlement” between the two countries must be made on the “principles of peaceful coexistence.”

The organisations, including the Chicago Council of Pakistani Organizations, the Pakistani American Council of Texas, the Pakistan American Democratic Forum, the Pakistan Association of Riverside and the Pakistan League of America, have come together to express their support for peace in South Asia while opposing “all forms of capitulation.” In a joint statement sent to Daily Times, they said, “We welcome and support the current negotiations between Pakistan and India aimed at establishing just and lasting peace in the region.

“We believe that the final settlement between India and Pakistan should be based on the five principles of peaceful coexistence, namely, sovereign equality, non-aggression, non-interference, reciprocal and mutual benefit, and peaceful co-existence.

“The final settlement should also enshrine the 10 principles of the 1955 Bandung Conference with particular emphasis on “settlement of all international disputes by peaceful means, such as negotiation, conciliation, arbitration or judicial settlement, as well as other peaceful means of the parties own choice, in conformity with the Charter of the United Nations” and on “respect for justice and international obligations,” the statement said.

The organisations stressed that any creative, out-of-the-box, peaceful, just and lasting solution of the Jammu and Kashmir issue must incorporate five key factors: genuine interests of all parties, rights of religious and ethnic minorities, equitable distribution of resources, most importantly water, overall stability, and regional cooperation. “Respect for existing treaties will be paramount in building confidence and finding a lasting solution. The Indus Water Treaty signed by India and Pakistan in 1960 assigned the three eastern rivers, Ravi, Sutlej and Beas to India, and three western rivers, Indus, Jhelum, and Chenab to Pakistan. This treaty provides a useful framework to resolve serious and substantial differences over India’s 11 water management projects on rivers Chenab and Jhelum,” the statement said.

It asked the Pakistani-American community to remain engaged with discussions about the shape of peace in South Asia. A frank dialogue with Indian-Americans could help connect the peace process to a shared vision, mutually agreed criteria, thoughtfully identified milestones, and measurable outcomes. “Those seeking to help build peace in South Asia must also remain committed to restoration of democracy in all countries of the region,” the joint statement declared.

The organisations said that while “we respect the democratic right of each individual and organisation to choose any position on a given issue, we wish to prevent the false impression that the honour bestowed upon extremist BJP leader Mr. Lal Kishan Advani by the president of the Association of Pakistani Physicians of North America (APPNA) represents the majority opinion of Pakistani-Americans. Given the vigorous and widespread opposition within APPNA, it may not even be a majority decision of that organisation.”

Another honor killing

Brothers kill sister for honour

KARACHI: Two brothers allegedly shot dead their 28-year-old married sister in Jacobabad on suspicion that she had an ‘illicit affair’, an area police official said on Saturday. Bhatti said police were searching for the brothers. Violence against women is common in many parts of Pakistan, where men consider it a slur on the family honor if their female relatives have love affairs or marry without their parents’ consent. ap

UPDATE: Another one

Man kills sister for ‘honour’

Staff Report

LAHORE: A man shot and killed his sister in the name of honour in Raiwind on Saturday.

Police said that Fayyaz Bashir suspected his sister was having an affair and shot and killed her at his Laday Kuchi residence. Fayyaz was arrested and a case registered against him.

Afghanistan hits back at Pakistan over militants(attacking Afghanistan from bases in Pakistan)

Afghanistan hits back at Pakistan over militants

KABUL: Militants are using bases in Pakistan to stage attacks in Afghanistan, an Afghan general said on Saturday, intensifying a row between the two nations over operations in a border area where Osama Bin Laden is believed to be hiding.

“All terrorists come from that side of the border. They fight in Afghanistan and when they face problems, they go back, get reinforced and equipped and come back for fighting,” Afghan army General Sher Muhammad Karimi told reporters. “This issue is as clear as sun for all the world to see that fighting is in Afghanistan and armed terrorists and weapons come from other places here and are being used against Afghans.” His comments came days after Pakistan protested to the US military over a recent spike in militants sneaking across the frontier.

“In theory (Pakistani forces) show 100 percent commitment that they are fighting terrorism, but in actions it is clear that they do not have the control to abolish these hideouts totally. Possibly it is their policy that they don’t want to do it or possibly they are afraid that their tribal people may rise up against them,” he added. afp

Saudi Arabia, allies against terrorism...yeah..right..

40 Pakistani Christians detained in Saudi Arabia

RIYADH: Saudi Arabia has detained 40 Pakistani Christians for holding prayers at a house in the Muslim kingdom, where practicing any religion other than Islam is illegal, newspapers said on Saturday. A group of men, women and children were attending the service in Riyadh when police raided the house, Al Jazirah newspaper said. It said authorities also found Christian tapes and books. Another Saudi daily, Al Yaum, said the raid took place on Friday while a Pakistani preacher was delivering a sermon. reuters

Teaching intolerence in Pakistan

Lessons in Intolerance

The textbooks that form part of the present public school curriculum are lessons in bigotry, hate and a gross misrepresentation of history.

By Massoud Ansari

"Baba, what is kari?" a young girl asks her father. He ponders over how best he can explain this barbaric ritual that involves killing women in the name of 'honour' to his young daughter, and wonders where she has heard the term. He presumes she has read of it in newspapers, where such incidents are regularly reported. Before he can muster an appropriate explanation, his daughter asks if Marvi - a romantic heroine of Sindhi folklore - was a kari. She gleaned this information from one of her textbooks in school, she says.

Welcome to Pakistani public schools, which are laying the foundations of future generations, where children are introduced to bigotry and intolerance from the primary level, and the conditioning continues throughout school. The lessons of tolerance included in the country's curriculum in the first two decades of the country's existence are being systematically replaced with lessons emphasising militancy, jihad and an ideology of hate. A case in point: recently a book was returned to its authors by the Federal Curriculum Wing for not carrying enough material on jihad.

The amount of influence school textbooks wield on students' impressionable minds is indicated by a survey of schoolchildren published recently. Almost half of those surveyed do not support equal rights for minorities. A third of them support jihadi groups. Two-thirds of them want the Shariah to be implemented in letter and spirit. Nearly a third said Kashmir should be liberated by force, and nearly 80 per cent of them support Pakistan's nuclear status.

Once a platform from which healthy, informed minds emerged, Pakistan's public school system today is a cesspool of ignorance, obscurantism and corruption. A graphic example: when a high school teacher at one of Karachi's public schools asked her class students to write an essay on any subject of their choice, one of the boys came up with a detailed and rather chilling 'Autobiography of a pistol.' The student summed up his essay with the statement, "I fall into the hands of a burglar who points me at a child, and demands ransom money from his parents in exchange for my life."

Members of the six-party alliance, the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), also voiced their protest: They walked out of a National Assembly session on the grounds that a certain reference to jihad as well as some Quranic verses had been excluded from the new edition of a state-prescribed biology textbook. Liaqat Baloch of the MMA alleged, "Under the conditionalities of the US Agency for International Development, all verses containing any references to jihad or exposing the anti-Muslim prejudices of Jews and Christians are being omitted from the syllabi." And Jamaat-e-Islami chief, Qazi Hussain Ahmad, warned that his party would move a privilege motion against government censorship in the syllabi.

Federal Education Minister Zubeida Jalal responded to these charges by stating in the National Assembly that no chapter or verses relating to jihad or shahadat (martyrdom) had been deleted from local textbooks. She clarified that the particular verse referring to jihad which the MMA was up in arms over had been 'shifted' from the biology textbook for intermediate students (Classes XI and XII) to the matriculation level courses (Class X), not omitted. The minister was visibly on the defensive when she said that the government had rejected the SDPI report because the committee she had set up to look into the report had rejected it as representing an "extremist" view.

Dogfight Over India(Airbus and Boeing in India)

Dogfight Over India

Airbus and Boeing are going all out to win billions in plane orders from the nation's booming airlines

A year ago, G.R. Gopinath was not getting what he wanted from aircraft manufacturers Airbus and Boeing Co. (BA ) As founder of India's first discount carrier, Air Deccan, Gopinath needed planes, but he didn't win much attention from the two majors. So he settled for a pair of turboprops from France's ATR to prove he could profitably operate an airline. When his first short-hop flights proved successful, Gopinath leased two Airbus A320s for a longer, Bangalore-to-New Delhi flight. "First I had to sell India to them, and then the fact that I could pull off a discount airline," recalls Gopinath.

A lot has changed since then. Air Deccan has been a huge success, with 90% of its seats occupied on 106 flights daily serving 32 destinations. Last month, Gopinath ordered 30 A320s -- worth $1.9 billion before discounts -- from Airbus. And Airbus can't do enough to support his young airline. Three Airbus employees -- experts in logistics, pilot training, and engineering support -- are now stationed at Air Deccan's Bangalore offices. In January, when a plane was damaged while being towed, Airbus sent a team of engineers the very next day to set things right. "They're bending over backward to support me," says Gopinath.

Boeing and Airbus are taking Indian airlines -- even startups -- far more seriously these days. "Air Deccan's success changed everyone's mindset," says Kapil Kaul, India country head for the Center for Asia Pacific Aviation, a consulting firm. The country's air travel market is growing 25% annually, spurring the two manufacturers to redouble their efforts to win new business. With the number of passengers in the country expected to grow from 19 million annually now to 50 million by 2010, a dozen groups are planning to launch service by this time next year. All told, Indian airlines are expected to buy at least 280 new planes by 2010, worth an estimated $15 billion, and another $15 billion worth in the following decade. "India is the hottest growth market on the planet," says Richard Aboulafia, an analyst with Teal Group, an aerospace consultancy in Fairfax, Va.

The two majors have been present in India for years, but until recently have had little to show for it. The most excitement that Airbus had seen there was in 1986, when state-owned domestic carrier Indian Airlines ordered 19 A320s. In 1994, Boeing agreed to sell 20 short-haul 737 aircraft to private Jet Airways. For the past decade, Boeing has been awaiting a decision by state-owned international carrier Air India to buy new widebodies -- a ruling delayed by successive governments. As recently as last year, the company was expecting Indian carriers to buy about $25 billion worth of jets over 20 years. In February, it upped that estimate to $35 billion. "India was a sleeping giant, and it has awakened," says Dinesh Keskar, Boeing's top salesman for India. "New low-cost carriers are emerging that have significantly increased demand for new airplanes."

LAVISH COURTSHIP
The newfound dynamism in India is largely due to Praful Patel, the Civil Aviation Minister who took office a year ago. In his first week, he announced he would push ahead with a partial privatization of the dismal airports in Delhi and Bombay. The next week he boosted the ceiling for foreign institutional investment in Indian airlines from 40% to 49% and later permitted private domestic carriers to serve international destinations. That spurred even sleepy Air India and Indian Airlines to expand. Together they're planning to spend $10 billion on 110 new aircraft, and both are spinning off discount carriers of their own. Then on Apr. 14, Patel signed an "open skies" pact with the U.S., allowing airlines from each country unrestricted access to the other's market. That same week he inked agreements that will boost flights to Britain, China, and Qatar.

The potential growth has Boeing and Airbus licking their chops. Even before some airlines have gotten approval from New Delhi to operate, their promoters and managers are being courted by the two manufacturers. Dinner meetings at posh restaurants, sales calls every other day, and on-the-house invitations to both Toulouse and Seattle have been extended -- a far cry from last year, when Air Deccan's chief had to pay his own way to Airbus headquarters in France. "Right now, they are both hyperactive," says the project manager of a new airline who is watching the proceedings with amusement.

So far, Boeing is in the lead. About 80 of India's 180 commercial aircraft are Boeings. Flag carrier Air India has mostly flown Boeing aircraft for decades, as has private player Jet Airways since it began in 1993. But there has been a "flurry of deals in the past six months," says Keskar. Boeing has won about $1 billion in fresh orders: At least 30 planes from Jet Airways and newbie discounter SpiceJet, which plans to launch in May. The big prize is likely to come in early May, when Air India is expected to agree to an $8 billion deal for 50 new widebodies from Boeing, including the company's latest offering, the long-haul 787.

Airbus has not exactly been a slouch. The company has $2.6 billion in firm orders for 43 of its A319 and A320 short-haul jets from Deccan Air and Kingfisher Airlines, which begins flying domestically on May 9. It also has a commitment from Indian Airlines to buy 43 more A320s worth $2.7 billion. But so far, Airbus has found no takers in India for its newest plane, the double-decker A380.

The courtship is extravagant. As in most other markets, the aircraft manufacturers are offering discounts of 30% to 50% off the list price for their planes. Then there's free training for pilots and engineers, free spare parts for newly purchased planes, and free maintenance manuals. When a deal is close to being signed, airline executives say they receive calls from Airbus or Boeing every hour. "Boeing and Airbus are fighting tooth and nail to get orders in India," says Amitabh Malhotra, an aviation expert at investment bank N.M. Rothschild India in Bombay.

That's why the two companies need all the help they can get -- and they're not shy about asking for it. The U.S. government is pressuring India to buy Boeing planes, with President George W. Bush, Transportation Secretary Norman Y. Mineta, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice all lobbying the Indian government on the company's behalf. Airbus, usually the master of political influence, enlisted France's Trade and Foreign Affairs Ministers to talk the company up in India late last year. Presidential help. Lavish parties. Deep discounts. India's airlines aren't being ignored anymore.


By Manjeet Kripalani in New Delhi and Stanley Holmes in Seattle, with Carol Matlack in Paris

Ayaz Amir on Pakistan throwing in the towel on Kashmir

Not even Munich, simply a meltdown
By Ayaz Amir
22 April 2005

Chamberlain kow-towed before Hitler at Munich, allowing Hitler to go ahead with the rape of Czechoslovakia, assuming that this was the price for averting war. "Peace in our lifetime," he proclaimed on his return to London even as the German Wehrmacht moved into Czechoslovakia.

Although disastrously wrong, Chamberlain at least was motivated by good intentions - the old story of the road to hell being paved with good intentions. President Musharraf of Pakistan doesn't even have Chamberlain's excuse. There is no war threatening to break out between India and Pakistan. It is all quiet on the eastern front, quieter than it has ever been in living memory.

And yet, for no rhyme or reason - or at least none comprehensible to mortal man - he has just done a mini-Munich in Delhi, effectively agreeing to the Indian position on key issues and getting only bland words and good intentions in return.

No wonder India and the Indian establishment, not to forget the Indian media, are ecstatic, at a loss for words to express their elation at Pakistan, under a military ruler, no less, finally playing on India's pitch, working on India's agenda, and far from feeling any sense of loss or shame, revelling in the spirit of surrender.

If any civilian ruler - Nawaz Sharif, Benazir, et al - had the gall or temerity to show one-fortieth of this 'flexibility,' the tanks would have been put on high alert - not to move against India, perish the thought, but - to move against Islamabad, with ISPR (the military's propaganda arm) muttering through gritted teeth that the civilians were selling out Pakistan.

Don't blame India for developing a vested interest not in Pakistani democracy - for under democracy whether perfect, half-baked or imperfect, Pakistan has avoided the path of unseemly compromise - but in Pakistani militarism whence all the concessions come.

Handing over the rights to our three eastern rivers...under military rule; the folly of the '65 war...military rule; loss of East Pakistan and military defeat in the east...military rule; Kargil...not under military rule but military auspices; the abandonment of Kashmir, for that is what the new diplomacy signals ...under 'enlightened' military rule.

Going to war over Kashmir? Of course not. Folly in the past, it is not even an option now. But saying farewell to Kashmir like this, and dancing to India's tune in the process, abandoning the Kashmiris to their fate, and getting nothing in return - not even an undertaking to settle Siachen or solve the dispute over the Baglihar Dam, this surely is a novel way of waging peace.

We may have beaten India in cricket but the self-inflicted thrashing Pakistan is receiving in the diplomatic field is a higher plane of endeavour altogether. Musharraf needn't have gone all the way to Delhi to be told there could be no "re-drawing of borders in Kashmir". That's the Indian line, always has been, much before Manmohan Singh's baptism as prime minister.

While India is entitled to take what position it likes, there should have been no compulsion for a Pakistani leader to go along without even a whimper about the UN resolutions calling for a plebiscite in Kashmir, the basis, after all, of our Kashmir policy? Drive a stake through the plebiscite/self-determination principle and Pakistan is left with no leg to stand on as far as the Kashmir dispute is concerned.

But time to 'think outside the box', Pakistan's soldier-president advises. Excellent if this was a two-way process, if not only Pakistan but India too was ready for the same walk.

What do we see instead? Pakistan under military guidance doing all the visionary thing by itself: not only thinking outside the box but frantically jumping out of it, consigning the carcass of its Kashmir policy to the waters of the Arabian Sea, even as India sticks resolutely to its own box, not prepared to give so much as a centimetre either way.

In simpler times such unilateralism went by the name of 'capitulation'. Now it is called a 'paradigm shift'. Why did Musharraf invite himself to Delhi? What gates of Somnath was he hoping to bring back? What he has achieved is a lesson in Indian diplomacy: Manmohan Singh mincing no words in restating the Indian position that Kashmir geography was set in stone and that the utmost to be hoped for lay in the new mantra of 'porous borders'.

Far from getting Manmohan Singh to commit anything in return, on Siachen, Baglihar, etc, Musharraf tried to do India another favour by trying to sell the Indian line on Kashmir to the Kashmiri leadership, advising them to use their "brains" to understand the necessity of talking to India.

India doesn't give a damn for the 'soft' face of the Kashmiri leadership as represented by the Hurriyet. Its main concern is not to engage with anyone in Kashmir politically but to crush insurgency in the Valley militarily, for which it thinks this is the best time, thanks to the last of Musharraf's historic u-turns: this time on the "core issue" of Kashmir.

Musharraf could at least have argued for the release of Kashmiri prisoners in Indian jails and for an easing of the human rights situation in the Valley. There is nothing to suggest that these concerns were raised or that India conceded anything on these points.

So the situation is like this: even as Musharraf bangs the drums of peace, Indian army operations in the Valley intensify, with many top-ranking Kashmiri militants killed in recent weeks.

Pakistan should be under no illusion that once militancy in the Valley dies down, India will have the same urgency to engage with it as at present. Like it or not, the present peace process is underpinned by Kashmiri blood and tears.

Once the Indians take care of Kashmiri militancy, they will deal with the Kashmir situation on their terms. This is the lesson of history. Back to 1972: this is the direction in which the peace process is headed. Don't blame the Kashmiris for being dejected.

The foreign office now says India must stop construction on the Baglihar Dam if it was sincere in resolving the dispute. This is wonderful. In the Delhi joint statement, there are passing references to Siachen and Sir Creek, none to Baglihar. The place to make a pitch about Baglihar was Delhi, not the foreign office briefing room in Islamabad.

The joint statement as a whole is a limp document from Pakistan's point of view but from India's an undisguized triumph, breaking no new ground, merely restating old positions. If anything, the reference to Kashmir is more watered down than before.

It is a bit audacious than for the foreign office to describe the joint statement as a "landmark statement". If this is the foreign office's definition of "landmark", it will run out of adjectives if something truly dramatic were to occur.

Another aspect of this exercise in furious back-pedalling is also noteworthy. Capitulation of this kind should at the very least bring some colour of shame to Pakistani cheeks.

Instead, far from feeling sorry, the outlook of our leadership is positively jaunty as it accepts India's point of view. When the military made war, it made no sense to anyone. When it makes peace it swings to the other extreme, its pacifism making as little sense as its jingoism.

US offers to put F-16s sale on fast track

US offers to put F-16s sale on fast track

April 21, 2005 21:07 IST

In a bid to bag a lucrative deal from India, which is seeking 126 multi-role combat aircraft, the United States has offered to put the sales of its F-16 and F-18 fighter jets on the fast track

A high-level US defence team led by Lieutenant General Jeffrey B Kohler held marathon discussions on Thursday with top Indian Air Force officials and submitted detailed technical parameters of the two fighters, the F-16 Fighting Falcons manufactured by Lockheed Martin and Boeing's twin engine upgraded F-18 Super Hornets.

US officials sought to assure India's fear on sanction by saying, "stakes were much higher now and the two sides would have to think twice before precipitating any such action".

After a round of meetings to submit the Request for information, Kohler said two US companies had been allowed to bid for Indian purchases and the aviation majors would be offering the most upgraded version of their fighters to India.

He said the company officials themselves would give a more detailed presentation when they bring their fighters to India for trials.

Brit-Pakistani terrorist to run for parliament(UK)

U.S-Wanted Terrorism Suspect Runs for UK Parliament

Wed Apr 20,12:29 PM ET

By Peter Graff

LONDON (Reuters) - A British terrorism suspect jailed while fighting extradition to the United States will stand for parliament in next month's British election from his prison cell, the political party backing him said on Wednesday.

AFP Photo

Computer expert Babar Ahmad, 30, has been indicted in the United States for running a Web site that raised funds for Muslim militants in Afghanistan and Chechnya.

"There is no prohibition against someone on remand (pre-trial detention) standing in parliament," film actor Corin Redgrave, who founded the Peace and Progress party with Oscar-winning sister Vanessa, told Reuters.

"He will be a very popular candidate. There is a deep-seated sense of injustice in this country about what happened in Guantanamo."

Peace and Progress is also fielding Azmat Begg, father of a former detainee at the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, as a candidate in the May 5 election.

Ahmad's British supporters say he should not be extradited because Britain failed to find evidence to charge him with a crime at home. His cause has been taken up vocally in Britain's Muslim community.

"If you vote for Babar it is a vote for justice," Ahmad's wife Maryam told reporters outside London's Bow Street Magistrates Court, where his extradition case is being heard.

Ahmad has been held in London's top security Belmarsh jail since August last year, denied bail while his case is heard.

The case was adjourned on Wednesday until May 17, when a decision on his extradition is expected.

Ahmad will stand in Brent North, an area of north west London with a large Muslim population.

The constituency is now held by Prime Minister Tony Blair's Labour Party with a large majority. But Labour narrowly lost a one-off election in nearby Brent East last year after Muslim voters and others angry about the war in Iraq deserted it.

Begg will stand in Birmingham, his home city, which also has a large Muslim community.

Ahmad would not be the first British parliamentarian to stand for election from jail. Most famously, Northern Ireland nationalist Bobby Sands died on hunger strike in prison in 1981 after winning a seat.

Man Accused of Blasphemy Shot Dead(accused of desecrating the koran)

Man Accused of Blasphemy Shot Dead

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - A Pakistani man accused of desecrating the Koran was shot dead Wednesday after being chased by an angry crowd.

Ashiq Nabi, in his thirties, was accused of being disrespectful to Islam's holy book and had been in hiding since Monday, a senior police official said.

"Today, a mob spotted him and shot him dead," said Mazahar ul Haq, police chief of Nowshera town, about 100 km (62 miles) west of the capital, Islamabad.

Blasphemy, including desecrating the Koran, is a capital offence in deeply Islamic Pakistan and carries the death sentence, but convictions have always been turned down by high courts because of a lack of evidence.

Witnesses said the man was chased through fields and climbed a tree to get away from an angry crowd of up to 500 men. When he refused to come down, someone shot him dead, they said.

Human rights activists want the blasphemy law to be struck off the books saying it is often abused by people to settle personal disputes or religious rivalry.

US military claim angers Pakistan

US military claim angers Pakistan

A Pakistani general says US claims that Pakistan is planning a new offensive against militants in its Waziristan region are "highly irresponsible".

Lt Gen Safdar Hussain, who commands Pakistani forces in Waziristan, was responding to comments by David Barno, head of US forces in Afghanistan.

Gen Hussain said he had no reports on which to base a new operation.

Pakistan stepped up military operations a year ago against suspected al-Qaeda and Taleban militants in the region.

'Speculation'

Gen Hussain was responding to Lt Gen Barno's comments that a new Pakistani operation would happen soon.

Gen Barno was in Pakistan this week as part of counter-terrorism talks.

Gen Hussain said in Peshawar, capital of Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province: "It is only speculation that terrorists are in North Waziristan.

"We are gathering intelligence but there is no report on the basis of which I can begin an operation.

"There is no organised base of terrorists. They are on the run. I will not let them reorganise."

Gen Hussain, who met Gen Barno this week, said: "I told Gen Barno he should better take care of Afghanistan and we can do ourselves in Pakistan."

Disciplinary action

His comments came a day after Pakistani army spokesman Maj Shaukat Sultan also criticised the statement by Gen Barno, saying: "We decide for ourselves what needs to be done, when and where."

Analysts say that although Pakistan remains a key ally in the US-led war against terrorism, it is highly sensitive to suggestions of US involvement in its operations.

Pakistan has deployed about 70,000 troops to the Afghan border region in its operation against militants.

The army has said in the past that hundreds of militants, including Arabs, Afghans and Central Asians, have been based in the area.

In his comments on Wednesday, Gen Hussain also said for the first time he had taken action against soldiers involved in the killing of civilians.

The action included their replacement from command positions, stripping them of seniority and sending them home.

He refused to give any further details or numbers.

Gen Hussain also said was sure al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden was not hiding in Pakistan.

He said Bin Laden's security ring was such that any movement in Pakistani areas would have left his signature.

But he said Pakistani forces were nevertheless continuing the search.

Pakistani toady Geelani says Musharraf has sold them out

Playacting over Kashmir
By Syed Saleem Shahzad

KARACHI - "There is a lot of extravaganza between India and Pakistan through cricket, music, exchange of delegations and bus services [in Kashmir]. India has engaged [President] General Pervez Musharraf in a lot of fun activities and he is conveniently lost in it. It is ironic that Indians wanted to abandon the Kashmir issue once and for all, and now Pakistan is helping India to do so."

So said a grim Syed Ali Shah Gillani [1] in a telephone interview with Asia Times Online from New Delhi. Gillani is the chairman of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC), which Pakistan's military establishment has nurtured over the past 13 years as the icon of the Kashmiri liberation struggle.

A delegation of the APHC's Gillani group led by Gillani called on Musharraf in Delhi on Sunday at the Pakistani High Commission. Musharraf was in India ostensibly to watch a cricket match between India and Pakistan, but he also met senior Indian leaders.

By all accounts, Gillani's meeting with Musharraf left the general "shocked", and Gillani angry. "I told him [Musharraf], 'You have sold us out.'"

Musharraf's bilateral talks covered the Kashmir bus service, trade and other issues, but without reference to resolving the Kashmir dispute - the "core" issue that has traditionally been the foundation of any Pakistani dialogue with India.

"I had questions for Musharraf," Gillani informed Asia Times Online. "I maintained that Pakistan showed a lot of flexibility, but what is the Indian response? Are they ready to show any reciprocity? Is there any change in the ground realities? Human-rights violations in Kashmir are still rampant. Recently, 30 of our youths were given life sentences, there is no reduction in the presence of the [Indian] army in Kashmir. Confidence-building measures are supposed to lead to a reduction in atrocities in Kashmir, or are they just fun activities between the rulers of the two countries?

"I emphasized that good Pakistan and Indian relations should have yielded [results] for the Kashmiris in the shape of relief in political activity, a reduction in military operations by the over 700,000 Indian forces etc ... but there is none. Pakistani rulers do not appear to talk business on Kashmir, rather they are more interested in playing cricket with Indians and having some fun - and letting Kashmir bleed. We Kashmiris are watching these developments and a negative opinion is growing against Pakistan.
"Musharraf agreed, but said that [the] post-September 11 situation left Pakistan with little options," Gillani said when Asia Times Online asked for Musharraf's response.

"We are enraged not because Pakistan is retreating from its active support. The issue is that Pakistan is now playing a role which is tantamount to active support of the Indian agenda," Gillani fumed.

"Initially, General Musharraf dished out a proposal to set aside the UN resolutions on Kashmir [calling for a referendum] and meet India 'halfway somewhere'. It was the first retreat by Pakistan, but we swallowed this bitter pill and thought that it was a step to seek Indian cooperation for the resolution of Kashmir. The Indians did not show any reciprocity. Then, a further retreat, and Musharraf dished out a proposal to divide Kashmir in seven zones. India did not respond. After all of this, India played the gambit of the Srinagar-Muzzafarabad bus service. In the past, Pakistan never approved of the idea as it was an old Indian one. The incumbent so-called Kashmiri Chief Minister Mufti Saeed contested the elections with the same rhetoric in 2002, that he would open the Srinagar-Muzzafarabad road. After 57 years [since partition], Pakistan has opened that route and spoiled our struggle. We saw it as 'right-sizing' of the Kashmiri cause by Pakistan," Gillani maintained.

Showtime
The question is, does Musharraf really care what Gillani thinks and expresses? The reality is, Musharraf's main concern with regard to internal and external affairs is what the army thinks.

Yet Gillani is a by-product of Pakistan's military establishment, created to serve as a strong pro-Pakistani face in the indigenous struggle of Kashmiris in the Valley. He has always been approved by the military establishment as the only acceptable face, while all others were disapproved, and their integrity and familiarity with the Kashmir issue watched with a lot of suspicion.

In many ways, the very existence and continued pre-eminence of Pakistan's army relates to Kashmir - it has fought several wars over the issue. From the rank of major up to brigadier, all officers work in a single direction under a manual that has not changed in the past 57 years on the Kashmir issue: no quarter given.

The beads of sweat on Musharraf's forehead after his meeting with Gillani were understandable. Everyone knows that army chiefs come and go, but the military institution never changes its manuals.

Musharraf knows that he will not change the views of Gillani, who is now publicly expressing his condemnation of Pakistan and its rulers. Yet Musharraf does not have a viable option for any new "pro-Pakistan" leadership among Kashmiris as neither his intelligence apparatus would approve their integrity nor would Kashmiri armed groups accept them.

There is no doubt that what is playing out on the South Asian stage bears little resemblance to what is happening behind the stage. Kashmir has been described as a "lifeline" for Pakistan and an "integral part" of India. Glitzy presentations for the public will not change the situation overnight.

Baglihar dam complete, nothing the pakistanis can do

ndia set to complete Baglihar storage structure

From DILSHAD AZEEM
ISLAMABAD - India is all set to complete Baglihar project’s water storage structure by end of this month with the World Bank still unmoved over the appointment of a neutral expert as requested by Pakistan two months ago under the Indus Waters Treaty 1960.
“We have received reports from various sources that India will complete the water storage structure of Baglihar dam within this month. After this, it would be almost impossible to force it through the World Bank or any other third party to step back,” sources in the Ministry of Water and Power told The Nation.
After Pakistan’s refusal to hold further bilateral talks with India unless it halts construction work on the project and the World Bank’s slow response, the solution to the dispute over Baglihar is expected not to be more than a simple assurance from India to provide water to Pakistan in accordance with previous water discharge from India to Pakistan in Chenab River, these sources maintained.

Pakistan in the lurch

PLAYING down Pakistan’s expectations of appointment of a World Bank-nominated neutral expert to mediate on the controversial Baglihar dam project in accordance with the Indus Basin Treaty, the Bank has conveyed to Pakistan that it should revert to the bilateral track to find a “suitable path for resolution of the issue.” This amounts to a marked departure from the Bank’s previous stand, when outgoing President James Wolfensohn visited Pakistan in February and stated that the Bank would deal with the problem by the book and appoint a neutral expert “within a matter of weeks.” The U-turn lends credence to the argument that with far more Bank dollars circulating under many more programmes in India, it would have faced difficulties in throwing its weight behind the Pakistani stance. Though the Indian government has also called for bilateral talks, its sincerity is dubious. Not only has New Delhi refused to recognise the legitimacy of Islamabad’s claim, it has also not halted construction of the dam-which goes on at a furious pace-to allow for negotiations.

WB for bilateral talks to solve Baglihar issue

From UMER FAROOQ
ISLAMABAD - The World Bank wants Pakistan to revert to bilateral track for resolving the Baglihar Dam dispute, which has become one of the thorniest issues in the ongoing dialogue process between the two sides.
Diplomatic sources said that the World Bank has informally conveyed to Pakistan that the bilateral track could prove to be more suitable path for the resolution of Baglihar Dam issue.
This appears to be a recent development as until last month officials were quite upbeat about the appointment of a neutral expert in accordance with the provisions of Indus Water Treaty.
The World Bank president visited Islamabad in the first week of February and after meeting Pakistani leaders he had said that the appointment of neutral expert will take two to four weeks.
Pakistan had moved the World Bank for the settlement of Baglihar Dam issue after talks in the ongoing composite dialogue process broke down.
In a letter to the World Bank, Pakistani authorities had asked the bank to appoint a neutral expert in accordance with the provision of Indus Water Treaty.
However, even after the passage of more than a month the World Bank has not appointed the neutral expert for the ascertainment of the facts relating to Baglihar Dam project.
Pakistan officials recently said that under the provision of the treaty the neutral expert should be appointed within one month of application from either party to the dispute.
Reportedly, Pakistan has asked the World Bank not to delay any further the appointment of a neutral expert.

Phillipino militants trained in Pakistan

Musharraf and Arroyo to sign MOU against terrorism

The two leaders will discuss expanding counterterrorism cooperation, the promotion of interfaith dialogue and the ongoing peace process between the Philippine government and the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front, which has been fighting for a separate Muslim homeland in the south for decades, said the Philippine government in a statement.

The talks also will include the Philippines’ bid for observer status in the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, of which Pakistan is a key member.

Filipino militants have trained in Pakistan in the past and security experts say the southern Philippines is a haven for militants of various nationalities. Hashim Salamat, the late founder of the MILF, lived in Pakistan for several years. “Pakistan is one of the major problems for the Philippines,” said a former intelligence official asking not to be named. ap

Pakistani book in Norway calls Norwegians 'Satan's sons'

Book calls Norwegians 'Satan's sons'

A book that's quietly being distributed within Norway's Muslim community refers to Norwegians as the sons of Satan. The book, written by an anonymous author, has been turned over to police by Oslo's Anti-Racism Center.

In addition to associating Norwegians with the devil, the book lashes out at Norwegian ethics and morality. The author, believed to be a mullah or other Muslim religious leader living in Oslo, claims that Norwegians don't have legitimate children. "They're conceived here and there," claims the author.

Several local politicians who themselves are Muslims say they're appalled by the book. "I can't accept that this author pretends he's speaking on behalf of all Muslims or Pakistanis," Kamil Azhar of the Labour Party told newspaper VG on Tuesday. "The book's content is ridiculous and far from reality."

Azhar joined other Muslim politicians and the Anti-Racism Center's efforts to get the book labelled as illegal, on the grounds it violates Norwegian law against racist expression.

A Norwegian lawyer who specializes in free speech issues said the book, called "Satan's son," appears to teeter on the edge of legality. Turning it in to the police, however, isn't a good idea, says lawyer Kyrre Eggen.

"I believe Muslims have the same right to freedom of expression as Norwegians do in relation to Muslims," Eggen said. "The best response is open debate, not to go to the police."

The book, written in Urdu, was published by a group called the All Pakistan Muslim Society. The group isn't registered in Norway.

The author calls Norwegians "barbarians" and "poisonous snakes" who have poisoned humanity. "These white men have set off a devilish spiral in the whole world... to plague people," according to the book.

"I feel a responsibility to react when I come over something like this," Akhtar Chaudhry, also of the Labour Party, told VG. "I don't want it on my conscience that I didn't try to fight something so racist."

More on the India-China-US dance

GLOBAL VIEW
By GEORGE MELLOAN

The Courtship of Mother India
April 19, 2005

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, well-tailored, charming and eager to please, paid what some are calling a historic visit to India last week. The two demographic titans had been scowling at each other across a 2,200-mile disputed border for at least a half century, and fought a small border war in 1962. But last week's meeting was pure sweetness and light, with Mr. Wen and Indian Premier Manmohan Singh agreeing to a "strategic partnership for peace and prosperity."

It's wonderful what a few good economic policies can accomplish. Now that both countries are getting richer, their common slogan is, "make money, not war." China is sucking in over $50 billion in foreign direct investment a year, fueling an annual economic growth rate in excess of 9%. India, although far less attractive to foreign investors, is nonetheless managing over 6% growth and has lately become the new international darling, admired not only for its economic potential but also for its role as an increasingly important player in Asia's geopolitics.

George W. Bush understood this early on and has intensified the courtship of India this year. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, on her recent 17,000-mile journey to visit Asian capitals, focused her considerable charms especially on the Indians. The U.S. she said, wants a strategic relationship with India. Last Thursday in the Oval Office, Mr. Bush told the Indian external affairs minister, Natwar Singh, that he wants to take relations to "a much higher level" during his second term and is excited about his planned trip to India late this year or in early 2006.

That means that the U.S. is offering India some of its most sophisticated military technology. Included are F-16 and possibly F-18 fighter planes, high-tech command-and-control systems, and possibly technology transfers to enable the Indians to produce more of their own materiel. The Patriot missile defense system is being offered.

All this ties in nicely with the plans of the Indian military to modernize, getting rid of the obsolete MiG-21 and MiG-23 fighter planes, for example, and ancient tanks. The U.S. is also proposing joint military exercises, even at brigade level where some 4,000 troops from both sides would take the field. An expansion of joint air force and naval maneuvers is being planned along with greater opportunities for Indian officers to learn their trade in U.S. military colleges.

U.S. Ambassador David Mulford said that the U.S. wanted to help India with its ambitions to become a "global power" this century. Since India already has a large military, modernization would make it a formidable presence in Asia. The sanctions imposed by the U.S. in 1998 when India tested its first nuclear bomb are now a policy relic.

This torrid affair between the two democracies is obviously what attracted the attention of Beijing. China is jealous of America's influence in Asia and fearful that the U.S. seeks to weaken China's relations with its Asian neighbors. That's no doubt why Mr. Wen followed up Ms. Rice's goodwill tour a week later to say that China has some things to offer India as well, including greater trade and a possible border settlement.

Getting the border problem sorted out still has a long way to go, but at least it was a friendly gesture. China specifically acknowledged, for what it's worth, that Sikkim state on the border belongs to India. Mr. Wen offered support for India's bid to win a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council.

Well, there seems little reason to complain about all this bonhomie. Even India and Pakistan are on better terms, despite some carping on either side about the evenhanded U.S. offer of F-16s to both countries. The two sides have established a bus link between their respective sectors of Kashmir and Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf and Premier Singh are willing to sit down together. If Mr. Bush's proactive diplomacy has created a virtuous circle of goodwill in Asia, what's to complain about?

Russia was pleased with the Delhi-Beijing reconciliation, but not for the most positive of reasons. Moscow's government mouthpiece, Novosti news agency, commented on the Wen-Singh pact that "India-China rapprochement is a major goal of Russia's foreign policy, and the three countries have many things to do together." Russia no doubt thinks that the meeting furthered its long-standing ambition of forming a tripartite coalition of giants, a kind of Russia-India-China axis that could jointly swing more weight in world affairs than any one could alone. The frictions between China and India have been an obstacle to that plan.

The Russians are dreaming. It's not clear that either China or India wants to cast its lot in anything other than a superficial sense with a Russia that seems to be growing more and more estranged from the Western democracies. Even if that were not the case, both India and China are fiercely independent states, with ancient cultures that distinguish them from Russia and each other.

But back to the point of what economic reform can accomplish. India slumbered for 40 years in the swamps of Soviet-inspired central planning, hiding its inefficiency and poverty behind barriers to imports and investments. But in the late 1980s it began to wake up to modern realities. The Soviet experiment was collapsing. China, which had initially followed the Soviet path as well, had made a sudden course change a decade earlier. Deng Xiaoping in 1978 had opened the country up to trade and foreign investment. And what do you know? It was getting richer.

So in 1991, during a severe economic crisis, India under the leadership of Premier Narasimha Rao launched its own reforms. It began to abandon Nehruvian "industrial policy," with which the government attempted to manage investment, and began to open the economy up, á la China. It hasn't moved as rapidly as China, but at least it finally is on the right track.

That's why Washington now sees it as an attractive partner in the U.S. effort to spread freedom and prosperity around the world. As Humphrey Bogart said in "Casablanca," this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Pakistani heartburn over the Indus Water Treaty(IWT)

VIEW: Sharing water in the subcontinent —Syed Mohammad Ali

Boutros Boutros Ghali, former secretary general of the United Nations, was the first to highlight the looming threat of water scarcity facing the world and the serious threat of conflicts it will cause. Subsequently, meetings of the World Water Forum indicate a growing alarm over the scarcity of water worldwide; this is a crisis that can only get worse. The apparent tension over sharing water resources is becoming particularly acute in the subcontinent, where India and Pakistan have been sharing waters of the Indus basin.

Pakistan needs a water sharing agreement with India given that the Indus river system originates from the Himalayan range, now lying across the border. The Indus Waters Treaty was concluded in 1960 to divide the Indus basin waters by giving control of its three western rivers (Indus, Jhelum and Chenab) to Pakistan, and the three eastern rivers (Ravi, Sutlej and Beas) to India. The World Bank brokered the Treaty which has ensured undisrupted water supplies despite five decades of lingering tensions and three wars.

In the late 1990s however, India started constructing a dam at Baglihar on the Indian side of Kashmir. According to the Indus Water Treaty, India is allowed a reservoir on the Chenab only if it does not interrupt the flow of water. Pakistan believes the Baglihar project will divert significant amounts of water destined for Pakistan. India and Pakistan initially tried to resolve the differences through bilateral talks. But since no breakthrough was achieved, Pakistan has sought arbitration under the treaty. Pakistan had to ask for arbitration as India neither addressed its concerns about the design of the dam nor suspended work on the project. According to the World Bank’s International Law Group, unless a bilateral agreement emerges as a result of President Pervez Musharraf’s latest visit to New Delhi, the resolution of the Baglihar dispute could take years. [Pervez Musharraf’s visit to India has concluded without any agreement on the Baglihar dispute.] The World Bank itself is not required to participate in any discussion or exchange beyond appointing a neutral expert and managing a trust fund to meet the expenses.

If the expert rules that the ‘difference’ between India and Pakistan should be treated as a ‘dispute’, a seven-member court of arbitration is to be established. Three members of the court can be appointed by the World Bank, along with input from the UN secretary general. Pakistan and India would get to choose two members each. The World Bank is not meant to play any part in the actual court proceedings. The Treaty does not empower the World Bank with a monitoring or enforcement mechanism. This absolves the bank of having to ensure sustainability of an arrangement formulated and endorsed by it.

Pressure on the Indus Waters Treaty has grown appreciably over the past few years with the increasing demand for water. The Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly of India has even called for scrapping the Treaty to harness the enormous hydroelectric power potential of the Chenab. But scrapping the Treaty altogether will not be taken lightly by the international community — or by Pakistan.

On our side of the border, per capita water availability is declining steadily. It is expected to reach the threshold level of 1,000 cubic meters per capita by 2010. The scarcity is already causing problems between provinces. There is a visible lack of safe drinking water and irrigation supplies in many areas are inadequate. Reduction in discharge of water into the sea is already causing intrusion of seawater in the Indus delta and resulting in serious environmental damage. Given this scenario, Pakistan cannot afford to forgo any part of its share of the Indus basin waters.

Sharing water between two states is not easy. The problematic nature of relations between India and Pakistan does not make this any easier. The Strategic Foresight Group in India has argued that Pakistan needs fresh water sources in areas where dams can be built and has been trying to secure parts of the Kashmir valley and Jammu primarily to control the Chenab. The Group also believes that Pakistan will never give equal rights to Kashmiris and will instead make it a semi-autonomous region to allow the federal government to directly exercise control over its water resources.

Leaving aside the arguments concerning Pakistan’s intentions in supporting the cause of Kashmir, one cannot deny the need to find a durable solution to the water dispute. This requires a more comprehensive and sensitive approach to the problem based on a realistic assessment of the water situation and the two countries’ needs. The Group suggests a holistic approach to the Indus Basin waters and integrated infrastructure development that maximises its long- and short-term capacity. Perhaps rather than focusing only on the Baglihar dam and playing a minimal role to facilitate a painfully slow arbitration, the World Bank should also be looking into the possibility of broadening the scope of the Indus Water Basin Treaty.

I concur with the stakeholders who maintain that if water is to be managed as an essential commodity, it will be best to avoid divisive or overtly marketised policies and instead develop a bottom-up plan aimed primarily at the need to ensure sustainable access to the subcontinent’s river waters on both sides of the Pakistan-India border.

The writer is a researcher with diverse experience in the development sector. He can be reached at syedmohdali555@yahoo.com