[sacw] sacw dispatch 25-26 Nov

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Web Dispatch
25-26 November 1999
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[Indo-Pak Nuclear Tit for Tat continues]
#1. Indian Foreign Minister says Nukes for No-Clear Reason
#2. Pakistan Foreign Minister 'Pakistan to upgrade nuclear deterrent'
#3. Letter from India's Leading Anti Nuclear Activists
#4. Putting the Killers out of Work
#5. Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) defends tribal women being lashed with
chains & whips
#6. Upcoming Events at the Asia Society in New York
#7. 'Citizens for Secularism' protest march on December 6* , Delhi
[*on Dec. 6, 92 the Babri Mosque was demolished by Hindu fascists]
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#1.
TIME Asia | November 25, 1999

INTERVIEW WITH INDIAN FOREIGN MINISTER JASWANT SINGH
"India's nuclear program is neither country-specific nor threat-specific"

Excerpts :
[...]
TIME: When India tested its nuclear weapons last year, Defense Minister
George Fernandes said that one of the main reasons was to protect India
from a nuclear-armed China. Has that position changed? Singh: My good
friend George's statement has been inaccurately put across. Ministries of
Defense and Foreign Affairs tend to have different approaches to
international issues, just as the Pentagon and the U.S. State Department
do. But India's nuclear program is neither country-specific nor
threat-specific. It is an answer to a wholly iniquitous new nuclear
security paradigm that has come into existence since the end of the cold
war. Our program is aimed at acquiring for India strategic space and
strategic autonomy. We remain committed to a wholly defensive posture with
minimum credible deterrence. We are for global disarmament and for global
elimination of all weapons of mass destruction.

TIME: Did the testing accomplish its objectives by making your job easier?
Singh: Yes, it did. It was a well-thought-out project. It was a
continuity-rather than an aberration-of policy, and it achieved the
objectives of giving India additional strategic space and autonomy.

TIME: And this hasn't been diminished by Pakistan's parallel development of
a nuclear program? Singh: If you reflect on what I said about India's
program being neither country-specific nor threat-specific, then the
question would not arise. I am mindful of the fact that Pakistan has
policies and programs that are centered around what India does or does not
do. But it would be an error to assume that Indian policies and the path
that it adopts are in any sense a reaction to what does or does not happen
in Pakistan. [=8A].
-------------------
#2.
DAWN - Front Page; 25 November, 1999

PAKISTAN TO UPGRADE NUCLEAR DETERRENT

ISLAMABAD, Nov 25: Pakistan will keep a minimum nuclear deterrent and
will upgrade its systems as India builds its weapons arsenal, Foreign
Minister Abdus Sattar said today. If New Delhi conducts a new nuclear test,
Islamabad will go ahead with its own, he warned.

"Minimum nuclear deterrence will remain the guiding principle of our
nuclear strategy," Sattar told a conference in Islamabad. "The Indian
build-up will necessitate review and reassessment. In order to ensure the
survivability and credibility of the deterrent Pakistan will have to
maintain, preserve and upgrade its capability," he said. "But we shall not
engage in any nuclear competition or arms race. Pakistan entertains no
ambition to great power status or regional domination."

Sattar said if India conducted another nuclear test Pakistan would go
ahead with its own test. "If India conducts another nuclear explosion
before the CTBT enters into force, nothing inside or outside the treaty can
foreclose Pakistan's right to do the same," he said. If the test came after
the CTBT began, the treaty itself would break down, he said. (AFP)
(Posted @ 14:15 PST)
-----------------------
#3.
A LETTER FROM INDIA'S LEADING PEACE ACTIVISTS AND FOUNDERS OF MOVEMENT IN
INDIA FOR NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT (MIND)

25 November 1999

Dear SACW Members, Nuclear Disarmament and Peace Activists, MINDers, and
Comrades Without Arms,
Our book, South Asia on a Short Fuse: Nuclear Politics and the Future of
Global Disarmament has just been published!

This is not only the first full-length analysis of the causes and
consequences of the crossing of the nuclear threshold by India and
Pakistan; it is also the first comprehensive discussion of the issue
written from a standpoint firmly and intransigently committed to universal
nuclear disarmament.

The book, published by Oxford University Press, Delhi, was released by
eminent historian and public intellectual Romila Thapar at a panel
discussion at the Indian International Centre on November 22.

The panelists were Professor Krishna Kumar (educationist, Delhi
University), Tanika Sarkar (modern Indian history, JNU) and Kanti Bajpai
(security studies and international relations, JNU)

The audience, which packed the conference room to full capacity, included
some of the most distinguished scholars, teachers and activists of the
country, as well as a selection of diplomats and security studies
specialists. The book release was as a landmark success.

We plan to hold another panel discussion around the book, courtesy The
History Society, Ramjas College and OUP. This will be held in the Seminar
Room, Ramjas College, Delhi University on 3 December 1999. It will feature:
Professor Sumit Sarkar, Dr Satyajit Rath and Dr Nivedita Menon, besides
ourselves. You are cordially invited to this event.

South Asia on a Short Fuse: Nuclear Politics and the Future of Global
Disarmament is about 400 pages in closely set print. The present hardcover
edition is priced at a hefty Rs 595. But we do hope that peace groups, if
not individuals, as well as academic institutions and libraries everywhere,
can buy the book. It will be available in major bookstores in most Indian
cities by the end of this month.

This edition is for South Asia. The American edition is due to be published
soon under the title New Nukes: India, Pakistan and Global Nuclear
Disarmament by Interlink Publishing, Northampton, Mass, USA. This differs
slightly from the OUP volume in editing style and number of appendices and
boxes. But it has Arundhati Roy's excellent essay "The Bomb and I" as its
Introduction, and an updated Preface.

We hope to negotiate a Hindi edition with another publisher soon. OUP-India
is also trying to tie up with publishers/booksellers in the rest of South
Asia.

We are planning to undertake a tour of several Indian cities in December to
organise symposia and panel discussions on nuclear weapons and disarmament,
using our book as a peg.

We would be grateful for your general support, and in particular, for your
participation in forthcoming meetings, for reviews, for discussions around
the book, and for its widest dissemination.

You can order South Asia on a Short Fuse: India, Pakistan and Global
Nuclear Disarmament from any of OUP's regional offices. Their addresses in
metropolitan cities are:

Delhi: 2/11 Ansari Road, Daryaganj, New Delhi 110 002
Tel: (+11) 327.3841/42 / Fax: (+11) 327.7812

Mumbai: Oxford House, Apollo Bunder, Mumbai 400 001
Tel: (+22) 202.1029/1198 | Fax: (+22) 204.1268

Calcutta: Plot No. A1-5, Block GP, Sector V, Salt Lake Electronics
Complex, Calcutta 700 091
Tel: (+33) 357.3739/40/41 | Fax: (+33) 357.3738

In Solidarity and Peace,

Praful Bidwai and Achin Vanaik

-----------------------
#4.
[Excerpts from a paper submtted to a seminar in Dhaka earlier this year]

PUTTING THE KILLERS OUT OF WORK
by Adilur Rahman Khan

[...]
Five years ago, the genocide in Rwanda attempted to destroy an
entire ethnic group, the Tutsi, together with a section of the Hutu
Community. Unarmed men, women and children were hunted down without mercy
just because of their ethnic origins, often by people they knew.
Approximately one million people died in that genocide and the star actors
of the world community stood by and let this horrible thing happen, while
some western business houses made their fortunes on this human misery and
sold weapons to the perpetrators.

Just over a year ago, in August 1998, a radio announcement was made by a
government official of Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) that "people must
bring a machete, a spear, an arrow, a hoe, spades, rakes, nails,
truncheons=8A=8A.. electric irons, barbed wire, stones,=8A. in order, dear
listeners, to kill the Rwandan Tutsi, who are currently in Ituri district."

A 12 August 1998 government radio bulletin in Democratic Republic of Congo
(DRC) declared: "The entire population has become a military population
from today onwards=8A. You will detect enemies and massacre them without
mercy, victory is assured." The strategy of the Democratic Republic of
Congo authorities, led by President Kabila, was to foster popular hatred
and fear of the Tutsi ethnic group, whom they linked with the invading
forces from Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi.

In July 1997, Zambia police used tear gas to break up a peaceful protest
march to Lusaka city centre. A large number of demonstrators, many of them
with small children, sought refuge in a building which was again attacked
by police, who shot tear gas canisters into the building to force the
people out in the streets, where they were beaten by the police with
batons. In January 1999 Zimbabwean aircraft were reported to have
indiscriminately bombed the city of Kisangari and other towns by using the
sophisticated F7 fighter planes and attack helicopters.

In August 1998 the security forces of Togo launched attacks on the
residences of the opposition leaders using small arms and rockets. Some of
the bullets recovered after these attacks were analysed and found to have
been manufactured by a French company. Togo continues to benefit from
significant military aid from France, its former colonial power. France
provides five million francs every year to Togo as direct aid for equipment
maintenance. France has also repaired and developed the Togolese Airforce's
Canadian built Buffalo aircraft, which is designed and used for aerial
drops of paratroops and containers.

Like Togo, most of these countries of the world mentioned above have
received arms, military and security equipment or training from a select
group of counties-China, France, Germany, Israel, Romania, Ukraine, United
Kingdom and U.S.A. It can easily be found from the list that the five
permanent members states of the U.N. Security Council, who, according to
the books, are particularly entrusted with maintaining peace and security
throughout the world, are in fact contributing to gross violations of human
rights and consistently perusing a policy of hypocrisy. Apart from the five
permanent members of the security council, all other countries of this
group belong to the western world, who re, export and use of equipment
solely used for executions or for carrying out torture or cruel, inhuman or
degrading treatment. Such equipment includes electroshock belts, leg-irons
and shackles, and weapons banned under international law such as
anti-personnel landmines.

Those governments, companies and individuals who have supplied deadly goods
and services to forces violating human rights or have abetted in such
transfers are `linked in a claim of repression which stretches from the
killing grounds of Congo and Rwanda, the torture Chambers of Angola, the
streets of Togo or Kenya to quite market towns in England and France, to
the industrial heartland of Russia, to the neat classrooms and lecture
theatres of US military academics=8A=8A They are linked by a chain of sealed
cargo loaded with grenades and assault rifles flown from Israel reached at
the killers waiting at Goma airport in Democratic Republic of Congo
(Zaire)'. The citizens of the Democratic Republic of Congo (Zaire), one of
the poorest countries of the world do not want that the states around them
would play their games of geopolitics.

Amnesty International recently has taken up a campaign to disarm the
killers of Africa and urged everyone to listen to the voices of those
across the Continent to help break the chain of repression. Amnesty's
mission is to raise concern against some of the gravest human rights
violations in the world such as torture, disappearance and indiscriminate
and extra-judicial killings. In Africa itself thousands of civilians have
been massacred in recent years as all the parties have waged wars against
them and many others have disappeared or have been abducted, tortured or
raped since the outbreak of the fighting.

Amnesty has evidence that certain transfers of military, security and
police goods or services to countries where human rights violations are
occurring can contribute to further violations. Therefore, it is
campaigning for a strict control on arms and security trade to ensure that
such transfers do no occur and eventually it will lead to the future of a
better and non-violent world. The availability of weapons has contributed
to the climate of violence, paranoia and impunity. The suppliers of these
arms have contributed to this situation knowing fully well that these
supplies will contribute to gross violations of human rights. In November
1998 the UN Commission of Inquiry reported that "the danger of a repetition
of tragedy comparable to the Rwandan genocide of 1994, but on a
sub-regional scale, cannot be ruled out".

Although Amnesty opposes the transfer of arms, military equipment,
personnel or training to armed forces where it can cause human rights
violations and has raised a campaign against such transfer, the major
dealers of arms trade mostly belonging to the western "developed and
democratic" countries never paid any heed to that and continued to
contribute to such violations.

Every year landmines claim thousands of new victims. Today around the world
many regions including Afghanistan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Cambodia,
Chechniya, Iraq, Kashmir, Assam etc. are devastated by landmines. In Africa
Angola, Ethiopia, Mozambique, Senegal, Somalia and Sudan are just the
examples of the regions which are suffering from this deadly devise. Today
there are at least a quarter of a million men, women and children who have
lost their limbs or have otherwise been disabled by landmines.

World-wide there are about 60 million landmines waiting to be exploded in
the ground. These can be found anywhere in the fields, in the streets, in
the market places, villages or even in the playgrounds or in schools. Major
Western countries including U.S.A. are the exporters of these arms and
deadly devises. According to Human Rights Watch, between 1969 and 1992,
U.S.A. was responsible for exporting at least 4.4 million landmines to 32
or more countries of the world. Almost all of them belonging to the third
world.

South Asia, which contains the concentration of more than one-sixth of the
entire population of the world-and where a vast majority of the population
are living below the poverty line-has recently been put under the threat of
neuclearisation and constant military build-ups. The countries of this
region controlled by some "confrontation-monger" people, fail time and
again to address the burning issues of this region like caste system and
its violence, religious intolerance, self-determination struggles and the
exodus of refugees. They have worsened the situation by exploding nuclear
bombs, developing warheads and missile fire powers and thus ignore the
rights of the starving masses and the obligations towards them.

Apart from India and Pakistan, other countries of this region are not too
different from the ones mentioned earlier. Sri Lanka is spending billions
of dollars to feed its military budget to fight against the Tamil Tigers
and Bangladesh, which is in fact encircled by India from three sides of its
border, is spending millions to help some businessman by making
controversial arms deals-including the purchase of Mig 29 aircraft from
Russia-but failed to raise a proper defence system against any possible
attempt of invasion with the help of the civilians and "common people", who
took up arms to liberate their country in 1971.

Amnesty International has timely raised its voice for a safer world, and
put forwarded some recommendations for Arms Export controls, which are as
follows:

1. Prohibit the transfer of military, security and police weaponry,
equipment, personnel or training UNLESS such transfers will not contribute
to human rights abuses.
2. Provide parliament and the public with clear, detailed, regular and
comprehensive information about all prospective and completed transfers by
both private companies and governments agencies.
3. Ensure that adequate resources are provided to monitor the use of
military and security equipment once a transfer has taken place. All arms
contracts should require customers to pledge never to use the goods for
human rights abuses. If they do then the contracts should be rendered null
and void and further equipment, spare parts, training and repair services
halted.
4. Prohibit the manufacture [missing text]
5. Strictly regulate the activities of arms brokers and shipping
agents. All brokers must be "registered" and their activities stringently
controlled, with all arms brokering deals being subject to the licensed
approval of the government.
6. Control licensed production, the system where one company enables a
company in another country to manufacture its products under license. Such
agreements are increasingly taking the place of direct exports, and in many
cases are inadequately controlled or not controlled at all. Licensed
production agreements must be government-approved. [=8A]

References:
1. M. Huq: Reflections on Human Development, Oxford University Press,
New York 1995. P.142.
2. The Terror Trade Times. AI. Index: ACT 31/02/99.
3. Adilur Rahman Khan, "Search for a New Universality", The
Daily Star, December 13,1998.
Prepared on the basis of information given in `The Terror Trade Times'
AI Index: ACT 31/02/99. Amnesty International, October 1999.

(The author Adilur Rahman Khan is an advocate of the Supreme Court of
Bangladesh and a human rights defender)
----------------------
#5.
The Asian Age
24 nov 99

CROSSFIRE OVER STRIP-AND-PEEP RITUAL

=46ROM ANAND SUNDAS
Shamlaji (Gujarat), Nov. 24 Every Purnima Kartiki, the curse of
superstition comes to haunt the women of this tribal village.

In a macabre ritual, married tribal women are stripped to their waist,
repeatedly dunked in the Nagdhara Kund and lashed with chains, rods and
whips till they either faint or 'accept' that the evil spirit that had
possessed them has finally left.

Tribal elders, who sanction what is perhaps one of the cruellest and most
painful rituals in the world, believe that the "cleansing of the spirit by
afflicting pain on the body" will rid the tribals of their problems. Be it
infertility, family feud or illness, the tribals attribute the problem to
some malevolent spirit. Strangely enough, spirits possess only women.

The women=EDs dignity is torn to shreds as a sizeable crowd of men flock t=
o
the village to witness the gruesome spectacle.

Some, posing as journalists, even take photographs of the stripped women
being lashed by the bhuas (witch doctors). Last year, a television crew
had come down to record the ritual. This time, however, Shamlaji was under
siege by the police. Reacting to a petition by the People=EDs Union for
Civil Liberties (PUCL), Gujarat High Court had directed the state
government on Monday to =ECprevent atrocities on women on that day
(Tuesday)=EE. The government, which has to furnish a report on December 6,
despatched a heavy police contingent led by inspector-general, Ahmedabad
range, B.S. Gehlot. The force comprised 100 state reserve police
personnel, 100 policemen and 30 lady constables.

But the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) mobilised 250 Bajrang Dal activists
to stand guard near the pond and enable the tribals to conduct the rituals.

Durga Vahini chief Mala Raval claimed that the PUCL petition was
destroying an age-old belief of the tribals. She said that the question of
violation of women=EDs rights did not arise as the women went through the
ritual of their own free will.

She defended the ritual saying that the tribals sincerely believed in the
miraculous healing powers of the Nagdhara Kund. Calling the PUCL activists
pseudo-secularists, she said it was a Leftist ploy to convert people.

Sophiya Khan, a PUCL activist, said the organisation was only concerned
about the violation of human rights of the illiterate tribal women and had
no ulterior motive. Lambasting the VHP and Bajrang Dal, Khan said that the
organisations should work for genuine social development of the tribals.

Even as the war of words continued, the tribals foxed the administration
by carrying out the ritual early in the morning before the police arrived.

Central to the row yet far from the politics of tribal development and
human rights, a dazed and bruised Panuben sat slumped at her home in
Shamlaji. Her husband, Ghanshi Parmar, was a happy man. "She took the dip
in the morning and the evil spirit is not with her anymore. The
flagellation was not to hurt her, but to drive away the evil spirit
(residing in her body)."
---------------------
#6.
UPCOMING EVENTS AT ASIA SOCIETY IN NEW YORK:

Thursday, December 2, 1999
6:30 to 8:00 pm * Asia Society
725 Park Avenue at 70th Street, NYC

Asia Society invites you to meet author
GEORGE PERKOVICH
to discuss his new book
INDIA'S NUCLEAR BOMB

In India's Nuclear Bomb, George Perkovich tracks the development of India's
nuclear capability over the past fifty years and explores India's threat to
global security in the wake of the 1998 detonations. This startling account
details India's struggle for international acknowledgement and questions
dominant assumptions about the underlying motivations for seeking nuclear
capability. The author, who also serves as the director of the Secure World
Program for the W.Alton Jones foundation, will address the following
questions:
*Why did India bid for nuclear status when 149 other nations
had signed a ban on nuclear weapons testing?
* What drove India's new Hindu nationalist government to depart
from decades of nuclear self-restraint?
*How did the U.S. help India acquire nuclear capability and could
the U.S. have done anything to stop it?
*How do ethical and cultural concerns underlie India's seemingly
paradoxical stance about nuclear weapons?

Book sale and reception to follow program
_____

Thursday, December 9, 1999
6:30 - 8 p.m * Asia Society
725 Park Avenue at 70th Street, NYC

Asia Society invites you to meet author
SANJIB BARUAH
as he discusses his new book
INDIA AGAINST ITSELF:
Assam and the Politics of Nationality

Based on an analysis of conflicts in India's northeast border states-with
special focus on Assam-INDIA AGAINST ITSELF argues that despite its federal
polity, India has much too centralized a governmental structure considering
its diversity and size. Baruah blames this centralization for today's
steady slide towards illiberal democracy and for the human rights abuses by
security forces and by insurgent groups. The book combines scholarly
research, political engagement and an intimate insider's knowledge of
north-east India.
Sanjib Baruah is Professor of Political Science at Bard College.

COMMENTS on INDIA AGAINST ITSELF:

"Finally a scholarly and focused book on the troubled state . . . Baruah
has done a signal service to India and its north-east." --India Today

"Few books in recent years have come to grips so powerfully or
convincingly with what is certainly one of the central issues confronting
the Indian state . . .(A) compelling examination of the very nature of the
federal polity." --Telegraph

"A remarkably innovative line of analysis that even proceeds to suggest a
solution." --The Times Literary Supplement

Book sale and reception to follow program

India Against Itself
Thursday, December 9, 1999

------------------------
#6.

CITIZENS FOR SECULARISM MARCH PLANNED IN DELHI ON ANNUAL COMMEMORATION OF
DECEMBER 6TH
[Excerpts from a mesage from Delhi inviting people to Join in]

=46riends,
We know you share our disquiet at the growing threat to the lives and faith
of minorities in our country. It has become specially necessary this year
to observe our annual commemoration of December 6th with one effective
joint programme to protest the demolition of the Babri Masjid as well as to
draw attention to the disturbing political scenario. It has been decided to
hold a march which will start from Lal Quila at 3 pm on December 6th, going
to Feroz Shah Kotla. The march will culminate in a cultural programme, and
the taking of a pledge.

The groups which have got together under the banner of Citizens for
Secularism are: PUCL, PUDR, People's Movement for Secularism, Citizens'
Committe for Secular Action, Insani Ekta Muhim, All India Federation of
Trade Unions, All India People's Resistance Forum, NAPM, Lokdasta, Forum
for Democracy and Communal Amity, PMTU, Vidyajyoti, CBCI, Insaf, Minorities
Council, Peace, Indian Radical Humanist Association, Citizens for
Democracy, Human Rights Trust.

Please do mobilise widely for the march.

[All those who want to send the messages of solidarity to the participants
of the Dec 6 March in Delhi should send e-mail messages to SACW and they
will be collectively forwarded to the organisers] Please spread the word
and send Messages of solidarity ....

__________________________________________
SOUTH ASIA CITIZENS WEB DISPATCH is an informal, independent &
non-profit citizens wire service run by South Asia Citizens Web
(http://www.mnet.fr/aiindex) since1996.