[sacw] sacw dispatch 22 sept 1999

Tue, 21 Sep 1999 12:57:34 +0200

<fontfamily><param>Times</param>South Asia Citizens Web Dispatch

22 Septmember 1999

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#1. A Belgian in Khakhi Shorts !

#2. Do these patriarchs really care?

#3. Amnesty blames [Pak] govt for honour killings

#4. Taliban Evict Women From Villages

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#1.

Koenraad Elst a Belgian national has the rare reputation of being jewel
in the crown of the Hindu Far right in India. Over the years Elst's
work has been also published by the 'Voice of India' and other
xenophobic publishers. Elst's hatred of Islam and secularists, and
championing of the extreme Hindu right-wing agenda, is abundant in his
writings. some of which available at his homepage at the following
address:

http://www.xoom.com/KoenraadElst/index.html

His correspondence address is:

Koenraad Elst,

Postbus103, 3000 Leuven 3, Belgium

e-mail address of Koenraad Elst

<<ke.raadsrots@U...>

A scathing comment on the work of Elst and his doings are available
at:

http://www.sit.wisc.edu/~chingari/Chitti/ElstProtest.html

_______________________

#2.

<<http://www.indian-express.com/ie/daily/19990921/front.html

The Indian Express

Tuesday, September 21, 1999

Op-Ed.

Do these patriarchs really care?

by Seema Alavi 

There is a complete invisibility of women's issues in even the lip
service political parties pay to Muslim concerns. Political rhetoric is
generally based on the assumption that the Muslim community is neither
gendered nor culturally variegated. This premise informs the political
construction of a community leadership which is inevitably male and
located in the narrowly defined class of ulema (religious head). Thus
muftis of towns and mullahs of mosques are seen as the repositories of
the community's best interests and its sole spokesmen. Alongside, even
though we do not have religious electorates, Muslim MPs are invariably
viewed by political parties as representatives of their religious
community. This was most clearly evident in the Congress government's
handling of the Shah Bano case in 1986, and more recently in the demand
from Muslim MPs for a quota for Muslim women within the proposed
Women's Reservation Bill. In both these cases the opinion of the Muslim
partiarchs received political attention even aswomen demonstrated
against the unrepresentative character of the self-styled champions of
their interests.

On Shah Bano's plea for maintenance from her ex-husband the court ruled
that Muslim women fall within the purview of Section 125 of the
Criminal Procedure Code that requires husbands with sufficient means to
pay maintenance to wives or ex-wives who are unable to support
themselves. The All India Muslim Personal Law Board, which has an
almost negligible women representation, and a batch of Muslim MPs
spearheaded a crusade against the judgment. Their opinion was taken by
the then Congress government to be representative of the entire
community. This resulted in the passing of the Muslim Women's Bill
(1986) which removed Muslim women from Section 125 of the Criminal
Procedure Code which ensures maintenance to all women divorcees
irrespective of their religion. Once again, Muslim patriarchs who in
1986 pushed for the passage of the retrogressive Muslim Women's Bill
are demanding a quota for Muslim womenwithin the proposed Women's
Reservation Bill. This time again their demand does not derive from
their concern for the Muslim women. Indeed Muslim women are
apprehensive about the social implication of the quota which they fear
will only complement their legal compartmentalisation ensured by the
Muslim Women's Bill of 1986.

Theirs is a mutually beneficial relationship between the politicians
and the male bastions within the community. Political patronage, even
if it comes sparingly, adds to the power and prestige of the religious
leadership.

Why have Muslim women allowed this power game to continue for so long?
To a large extent the growth of communalism has influenced the choices
women have made on those issues of law and politics that affect their
lives. Ever since the demand for quota for Muslims was first made in
1909-10 the consciousness of one's community identity defined in
religious terms has only intensified. The partition of the country only
added to this trend and the Hindutva politics of thelast two decades
saw its rise to its highest point. Today Muslims are more sensitive
than ever about being a religious minority. For women the overbearing
concern with their minority community status intersects with their
gender identity.

This poses a serious dilemma for all classes of Muslim women. Their
response to being used as political pawns both within and without the
community is punctuated by the following concerns: Is the political
timing for airing a critique in the gender imbalance in personal laws
correct? Do they run the risk of providing yet another plank to the
BJP? Is it fair to publicly scrutinise the juridical sphere of an
already beleaguered Muslim community?

These uncertainties are revealed in the shifting and often diluted
stands Muslim women groups have taken on the Uniform Civil Code. But
while women have shown remarkable restraint the male-dominated
community forums have used their dilemmas to structure imbalanced
gender relations. What is the difference then between women livingin
Islamic theocratic states like Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan, and
liberal democracies like India? Does the absence of an `Islamic' dress
code in India mean the non-existence of the power play enacted at the
cost of sacrificing women's interests? One would think not.

The writer is an associate professor of history at Jamia Millia, New
Delhi

______________________

#

http://www.jang.com.pk/thenews/sep99-daily/21-09-99/main/main4.htm

<<http://kansas.valueclick.com/redirect?host=h0082692&b=main4&v=0>The
News International

Tuesday, September 21, 1999 

Amnesty blames govt for honour killings

by Amir Mir

LAHORE: The Amnesty International has accused Pakistan of failing to
remove widespread misperceptions that Islam promotes "crimes of
honour".

"The government of Pakistan has not only failed to educate the public
in general and women in particular about rights and freedoms laid down
in the Constitution and state law, it has also failed to remove
widespread misperceptions that Islam sanctions crimes of honour," the
Amnesty International said in its yearly report on Pakistan, entitled
'Violence Against Women in the Name of Islam'.

Expressing concern over increasing violence against Pakistani women,
the AI report says: "Pakistan has failed to ensure that its legal
provisions, law enforcement and judicial structures ensure the
enjoyment by women of their human rights. Pakistan does not appear to
have taken seriously its domestic commitments to ensure gender equality
and its international legal obligation to exercise due diligence in
preventing, investigating and punishing violations of rights of girls
and women in the context of honour."

According to the report, the government inaction has received more
public exposure since the honour killing of Saima Sarwar in Hina
Jillani's office in April 1999. "To this day, the accused identified by
eye-witnesses and named in the police complaint have not been arrested,
nor has any action been taken against those who issued death threats
against Asma Jahangir and Hina Jillani for protecting women's rights,"
it regrets.

The report reveals that a representative of the government of Pakistan
did condemn the killing of Saima Sarwar before the UN Human Rights
Commission in Geneva. And the Minister of Women Development (Tehmina
Daultana) made a statement in Washington on 10 April, four days after
Saima's murder, stressing her government's commitment to women's
advancement. However, to date the police inquiry into the (Saima)
killing has not been completed."

The report says that the (Pakistan) government's disregard for the
obligations it undertook when ratifying the UN Convention on the
'Elimination on All Forms of Discrimination against Women' has resulted
in the persistence and increase of honour killings.

It says that when the 1998 annual report of the HRCP was released in
March 1999, Information Minister Mushahid Hussain had said about its
allegations of violence against women: "These are a feature of
Pakistani feudal society, they are not part of any government policy or
a consequence of any law."

Talking about the gender bias, the report says that Pakistan government
has taken no measure to correct the widespread gender bias of law
enforcement personnel and to provide adequate gender sensitisation
training to all staff likely to deal with complaints by or about
women.

"Even when the women are seriously injured by their husbands or
families, police often discourage them from registering complaints and
advise them to seek reconciliation with their husbands or families as
any matrimonial or family dispute would bring dishonour to them and
their families if pursued," it says.

The report points out that despite its constitutional obligations to
ensure equality before the law to men and women, the government of
Pakistan has done nothing to amend laws that discriminate against women
and make full redress in the case of honour killings virtually
impossible. It adds that the law of Qisas and Diyat particularly
disadvantage women in Pakistan in this context.

The report says: "The (Pakistan) government's inaction on
honour-related violence virtually signals its indifference, if not
outright approval of the practice. The understanding of state
responsibility for human rights violations has significantly widened in
recent years to include not only violations of human rights by the
state or its agents but also abuses by private actors. If the state
fails to act with due diligence to prevent, investigate and punish
abuses, including violence against women in the name of honour, it is
responsible under international human rights law."

It then adds: "In the context of norms recently established by the
international community, a state that does not act against crimes of
violence against women, is as guilty as the perpetrators. States are
under a positive duty to prevent, investigate and punish crimes
associated with violence against women."

At the end of its report, the Amnesty International has called upon the
Pakistan government to take urgent measures in the following three
areas to end honour killings and to end the impunity now being enjoyed
by the perpetrators: (1) Legal measures including penal sanctions and
compensatory provisions to protect women against honour-related
violence; (2) Preventive measures including educational and media
strategies that will contribute to overcoming discrimination against
women; (3) Protective measures, including refugees, counselling,
rehabilitation and support services for women at risk of honour-related
violence.

___________________

#

The Associated Press

20 Sept., 99

Taliban Evict Women From Villages

By KATHY GANNON

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - Urya saw the soldiers of the Taliban
religious army approaching her village, a cluster of mud-brown homes in
the middle of a battlefield in Afghanistan.

Her husband, loyal to anti-Taliban forces, had fled already, and she
quickly gathered some clothes and food in an effort to escape with her
children. It was too late. Urya was bundled into a pickup truck packed
with women and they were started on a journey that took many of them to
Pakistan. 

The United Nations estimates as many as 20,000 women and children were
evicted from their homes last month after the Islamic militia swept
across the Shomali plains north of the capital, Kabul. The fertile
fields of the Shomali have changed hands many times since the Taliban
captured Kabul in 1996, but this was the first time the villages were
forcibly cleared of civilians.

``There emerges a systematic pattern of men arrested, a few killed, and
women and children separated and put in buses,'' Radhika Coomaraswamy,
a special U.N. envoy investigating violence against women, said last
week. 

The Taliban controls 90 percent of Afghanistan, but the opposition
alliance commanded by Ahmed Shah Massood is based in the mountains and
valleys just north of the Shomali plains.

Taliban leaders have accused the villages of supporting their enemies.
But Mullah Mohammed Rabbani, head of the Taliban ruling council, denied
in a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan that his men forcibly
relocated the area's residents.

In the letter, released Sept. 14, he also denied Taliban troops
destroyed crops or houses and said the refugees can return when the
fighting ends. 

Women who found shelter in neighboring Pakistan told a different story,
often weeping softly as they recounted being threatened by Taliban
militiamen or seeing houses going up in flames.

Most of the village men had left to join Massood, but a few were there
when the Taliban troops arrived, the women said. Some of those men were
arrested and others were shot, they said.

``They told us, 'If you don't get out of here we will set everything on
fire, even the clothes you are wearing,''' said Urya, from the village
of Charikar, 30 miles from Kabul. She only gave one name. 

Urya was taken to Jalalabad, 60 miles east of Kabul on the road to
Pakistan, but residents there didn't want to take in the refugees. 

``They offered to pay the Taliban to send us back to our homes,'' but
the militiamen refused, Urya said.

She said Taliban soldiers also taunted the women about their daughters.

``They said: 'If you have daughters, don't worry. We will find husbands
for them in Jalalabad,''' Urya said. In strict tribal tradition, Afghan
girls often are married off at puberty to men chosen by their parents.

Taliban leaders espouse a harsh brand of Islamic law that many
religious scholars say is based more on tribal customs than on Islam's
holy book, the Koran. The movement is especially strict toward women,
and its leaders have created a government ministry to ensure Afghans
follow their moral code. 

``The Ministry of Vice and Virtue is the most misogynist department in
the whole world,'' Coomaraswamy, the U.N. investigator, told reporters
after a two-week investigation.

Some Shomali women were not trucked out, but instead were forced to
walk to Kabul - a day's journey.

``They just told us to get out,'' said a woman who gave her name only
as Qudzia.

Qudzia walked through the night with her children to Kabul. As they
left, she said she could see homes in her village burning. 

``They set fire to everything we had,'' she said, holding her head in
her hands. ``I have nothing now, not food, not clothes, not shelter.''

AP-NY-09-20-99 0210EDT

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