SACW | Dec 6-9, 2009 / Afghan Women's Rights / Balochoistan Crisis / International Bureau for 'Laicite' / Bangladesh: Scuttle Parallel Justice

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire | December 6-9, 2009 | Dispatch No. 2674 -  
Year 12 running
From: www.sacw.net

[ SACW Dispatches for 2009-2010 are dedicated to the memory of Dr.  
Sudarshan Punhani (1933-2009), husband of Professor Tamara Zakon and  
a comrade and friend of Daya Varma ]

____

[1]  Bangladesh: Dealing with fatwa - Human rights activists' role is  
crucial (Editorial, Daily Star)
[2]  Afghanistan: Keep Promises to Afghan Women (Human Rights Watch)
[3]  Nepal: Peace Process Heading South (Gautam Navlakha)
[4]  Pakistan: State Response to The Crisis Balochoistan - Reflections
  (i) Balochistan: A test of resolve (I. A. Rehman)
  (ii) The Balochistan Package: Band-Aid on a Bullet Wound (Alia  
Amirali)
  (iii) The AfPak apparition (Kamila Shamsie)
  (iv) Balochistan: too small an olive branch (Qurratulain Zaman)
[5] A Transnational Platform To Take on the Fundamentalists Calls :   
International Bureau for 'Laicite' (Sign on statement)
[6] India: Resources For Secular Activists on >  
communalism.blogspot.com and sacw.net
   - Under the rubble (Harsh Mander)
   - The dialects of Ayodhya and Manmohan Singh (Jawed Naqvi)
   - Liberhan Commission; Painful wait for Justice (Ram Puniyani)
   - Incomplete Catharsis (Mahesh Rangarajan)
   - Little men re-enact Ayodhya chaos inside Parliament (Siddharth  
Varadarajan)
   - Concerned Citizens of Gujarat for Prosecution of architect of  
demolition of Babri
   - Indian American Muslim group demands immediate civil and  
criminal action against all accused in the Liberhan Report
   - British Indian Muslims urge British Government to declare the 68  
terrorists persona non grata
[7] Book Reviews:
    - Economy, Culture, and Civil War in Sri Lanka edited by Deborah  
Winslow and Michael D. Woost (Alex Argenti-Pillen)
    - A Grand Daughter's Tribute (Rita Manchanda)
[8] Announcements:
    (i) The Play “Dekh Tamasha chalta Ban” by Ajoka (Islamabad, 10  
December, 2009)
    (ii) Seminar on India-Pakistan Relations (Bombay, 10th December  
2009)
   (iii) Join UNI workers union March to Parliament (New Delhi, 14  
December 2009)
   (iv) Announcement of Health and Human Rights Course 2010

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[1] Bangladesh:

The Daily Star, December 8, 2009

EDITORIAL: DEALING WITH FATWA: HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVISTS' ROLE IS CRUCIAL

FATWA or an edict, that self-anointed rural adjudicators issue in  
collaboration with influential locals, is ruining the lives of many  
women in rural areas. Most of the victims are not in a position to  
fight for their rights as such decrees are passed in the name of  
religion. The image of religion itself is undermined in the process.

President Zillur Rahman has urged the National Human Rights  
Commission to work for elimination of the practice which is based on  
misinterpretation of religion and exploitation of religious  
sentiments of people. Obviously, the commission has to make some  
determined efforts to banish it and make sure that it does not remain  
a potent weapon in the hands of village headmen and mullahs.

Such decrees actually create misunderstanding and confusion in the  
public mind and in most cases the perpetrators are blamed for the  
punishment, often inhumane, meted out to the victims. However, the  
issue is definitely more complex than it looks. The victims are  
mostly women poorly represented in the rural power structure. There  
is nobody to plead their cases and the verdict passed often goes  
unchallenged. Regrettably, the arbitrator plays into the hands of  
vested groups, instead of taking a stand in favour of the victim.  
Nothing could be a more serious violation of the rights of women,  
that Islam protects as a matter of principle, than such crude  
application of judgment.

No less damaging for women is the social condition tilting heavily in  
favour of men. The male domination of rural society is so absolute  
that the crimes committed by men are often condoned or overlooked in  
arbitration meetings. The poor women have to suffer silently for the  
wrongs done to them by mischievous elements having a powerful  
position in society. The mock trial of some rapists in Barguna  
recently is a case in point.

So, blunting the force is inextricably linked to empowerment of  
women. The religious leaders also have a very important role in  
protecting women from being harassed, tortured or pilloried publicly  
by the exponents of so-called fatwa. They have to make a point of  
opposing the elements who have neither the competence, nor the legal  
authority, to issue fatwa. Their attempts to set up a parallel  
justice system amounts to a punishable offence.

The human rights activists have to organise a social movement against  
such manipulative tactics which allow religion to be used by self- 
seekers.

_____


[2] Afghanistan

Human rights Watch

AFGHANISTAN: KEEP PROMISES TO AFGHAN WOMEN
Extremist Threat to Women Increasing, Government Failing to Protect

December 6, 2009

The Full report is available at:
     “We Have the Promises of the World”
http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2009/12/03/we-have-promises-world


     The situation for Afghan women and girls is dire and could  
deteriorate. While the world focuses on the Obama administration’s  
new security strategy, it’s critical to make sure that women’s and  
girls’ rights don’t just get lip service while being pushed to the  
bottom of the list by the government and donors.
     Rachel Reid, Afghanistan researcher

(New York) - Eight years after the fall of the Taliban, women and  
girls suffer high levels of violence and discrimination and have poor  
access to justice and education, Human Rights Watch said in a new  
report released today.  The Afghan government has also failed to  
bring killers of prominent women in public life to justice, creating  
an environment of impunity for those who target women.

The 96-page report, "We Have the Promises of the World: Women's  
Rights in Afghanistan," details emblematic cases of ongoing rights  
violations in five areas: attacks on women in public life; violence  
against women; child and forced marriage; access to justice; and  
girls' access to secondary education.

"The situation for Afghan women and girls is dire and could  
deteriorate," said Rachel Reid, Afghanistan researcher at Human  
Rights Watch. "While the world focuses on the Obama administration's  
new security strategy, it's critical to make sure that women's and  
girls' rights don't just get lip service while being pushed to the  
bottom of the list by the government and donors."

While the plight of women and girls under the Taliban was used to  
help justify the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan, women's rights have  
not been a consistent priority of the government or its international  
backers. With fundamentalist factions in government gathering  
strength, the insurgency gaining ground, and some form of  
reconciliation with Taliban factions firmly on the horizon, the gains  
made by Afghan women and girls since 2001 in areas such as education,  
work, and freedom of movement are under serious threat.

"Women are not a priority for our own government or the international  
community," Shinkai Karokhail, a member of Parliament, told Human  
Rights Watch. "We've been forgotten."

Women in public life are subject to routine threats and intimidation.  
Several high profile women have been assassinated, but their killers  
have not been brought to justice. When Sitara Achakzai, an outspoken  
and courageous human rights defender and politician, was murdered in  
April 2009, her death was another warning to all women who are active  
in public life.

High profile women interviewed for this report say that they feel  
they are not taken seriously when they report threats. One member of  
parliament who, like some others, spoke anonymously because of the  
danger they face, told Human Rights Watch:

"I've had so many threats. I report them sometimes, but the  
authorities tell me not to make enemies, to keep quiet. But how can I  
stop talking about women's rights and human rights?"

A woman police officer who has received death threats said:

"They told me that they will kill my daughters. Every minute I'm  
afraid. I can never go home - the government cannot protect me there.  
My old life is over."

One nationwide survey of levels of violence against Afghan women  
found that 52 percent of respondents experienced physical violence,  
and 17 percent reported sexual violence. Yet because of social and  
legal obstacles to accessing justice, few women and girls report  
violence to the authorities. These barriers are particularly  
formidable in rape cases. Although women activists and members of  
parliament pushed hard and succeeded in putting rape on the statute  
books this year for the first time, the government has shown little  
willingness to treat each case as a serious crime or to engage in a  
public education campaign to change attitudes.

The lack of justice compounds women's vulnerability. One woman who  
was gang raped by a well connected local commander found that after a  
long fight to bring her rapists to justice, they were freed by a  
presidential decree. Soon after in 2009, her husband was  
assassinated. The woman told Human Rights Watch that he was killed  
because he had battled for her rights:

"I have lost my son, my honor, and now my husband," she said. "But I  
am just a poor woman, so who will listen to me?"

Surveys suggest that in more than half of all marriages, the wives  
are under age 16, and 70 to 80 percent of marriages take place  
without the consent of the woman or girl. These practices underlie  
many of the problems faced by women and girls, as there is a strong  
correlation between domestic violence and early and forced marriage.

A 13-year-old girl who was forced into marriage explained to Human  
Rights Watch that after she dared to escape she was hunted by her  
husband's family: "They came and asked for me to come back. I said  
no; they kept coming. I always say no... I can't go back. They want  
to kill me." Women activists who gave the girl shelter were denounced  
in parliament. Years later, the young woman is still fighting for a  
legal separation from her illegal marriage.

This case is just one in the report that illustrates the fundamental  
problem faced by women and girls of lack of access to justice.  
Studies suggest that more than half the women and girls in detention  
are being held for "moral crimes," such as adultery or running away  
from home, despite the fact that running away from home is not a  
crime in Afghan law or Sharia. But whether it is a high-profile woman  
under threat, a young woman who wants to escape a child marriage, or  
a victim of rape who wants to see the perpetrator punished, the  
response from the police or courts is often hostile.

"Police and judges see violence against women as legitimate so they  
do not prosecute cases," Dr. Soraya Sobhrang of the Afghanistan  
Independent Human Rights Commission told Human Rights Watch.

Law reforms that protect women's rights are important, but leadership  
is also required to help shift attitudes and prevent abuses, Human  
Rights Watch said.

"The government needs to take its responsibility to protect women and  
girls seriously," Reid said. "President Hamid Karzai has a lot of  
work to do to restore his reputation as a moderate on women's rights."

After the destruction of many girls' schools by the Taliban,  
education for girls became the most symbolic element of the  
international donor effort in Afghanistan. Despite significant gains,  
stark gender disparities remain. The majority of girls still do not  
attend primary school. A dismal 11 percent of secondary-school-age  
girls are enrolled in grades seven through nine. Only 4 percent of  
girls make it to grades 10 through 12. While the number of both boys  
and girls attending school drops dramatically at the secondary school  
level, the decline is much more pronounced for girls.

The diminishing status of women's rights in Afghanistan was forced  
back onto the agenda in March when the discriminatory Shia Personal  
Status law was passed by parliament and signed by Karzai. Faced with  
national and international protests, Karzai allowed the law to be  
amended, but many egregious articles remain that impose drastic  
restrictions upon Shia women, including the requirement that wives  
seek their husbands' permission before leaving home except for  
unspecified "reasonable legal reasons," and granting child custody  
rights solely to fathers and grandfathers.

"We welcomed the international community's words on the Shia law -  
really - they said many beautiful things, as they did in 2001" said  
Wazhma Frogh, women's rights activist. "We have the promises of the  
world. But still we wait to see what more they will do."

Karzai should revise the law to protect women's rights fully and  
appoint women who have been active defenders of women's rights to  
positions of power, Human Rights Watch said.

"The Shia law provided a timely reminder of how vulnerable Afghan  
women are to political deals and broken promises," Reid said. "Karzai  
should begin his new presidency with a clear signal to women that his  
will be a government that wants to advance equality."

Key Recommendations of "We Have the Promises of the World: Women's  
rights in Afghanistan"

     * The government and donors should make the promotion and  
protection of women's rights a main priority of the country's  
reconstruction and a central pillar of their political, economic, and  
security strategies.

     * The government, with the support of donors, should embark on a  
large-scale awareness campaign to ensure that rape is understood to  
be a crime by law enforcement agencies, judges, parliament, civil  
servants, and the Afghan public. The campaign should also aim to  
reduce the stigmatization of victims of rape.

     * The government should make marriage registration more widely  
available and compulsory.

     * The president should order the release of, and offer an  
apology and compensation to, all women and girls wrongfully detained  
on the charge of "running away from home."

     * The government, with the support of donors, should increase  
the number and geographic coverage of girls' secondary classes by  
building more girls' secondary schools, and ensure the recruitment  
and training of female teachers is accelerated.

     * The government, with the support of the UN and other donors,  
should prioritize security for women candidates and voters in  
planning for the 2010 parliamentary elections.

     * International donors and the United Nations, in conjunction  
with the Ministry of Women's Affairs, should conduct a full gender  
audit of all spending in Afghanistan.

_____


[3]   NEPAL: PEACE PROCESS HEADING SOUTH

by  Gautam Navlakha

With the peace process increasingly getting scuttled, what with India  
and the two main political parties opposing the Maoist agenda of  
civilian supremacy and implementation of the Comprehensive Peace  
Agreement of 2006, the chances of non-violent, progressive  
transformation of the Nepali state and society seem increasingly dim  
in the near future. The Maoists have now gone back to the people to  
launch a mass protest movement. As the contradictions intensify, will  
there be a takeover of power by the president with the backing of the  
army, akin to a Bangladeshi-type coup? Will there be an Indonesia- 
like massacre of the Maoists, as some fear? Or, will a national  
government led by Maoists materialise?

FULL TEXT AT: http://www.epw.in/epw/uploads/articles/14204.pdf

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[4] Pakistan: State Response to The Crisis Balochoistan - Reflections

(i) BALOCHISTAN: A TEST OF RESOLVE

Why the Baloch are angry
No student of history will deny that the Baloch have taken up arms as  
a last resort and not the first one

by I. A. Rehman
(The News, 6 December 2009)

Few things irritate the Balochistan nationalists more than the  
question by many interlocutors from outside the province as to what  
makes them angry with the central government and drives them towards  
armed struggle every few years. Such queries, in their view, betray a  
feigned ignorance of what has been done to them for six decades and  
an effort to deny the questioner's share of responsibility for it.

Throughout the country's history the people of Balochistan have  
complained of the failure of the custodians of state power to make a  
sincere effort to understand, or even acknowledge, their plight. As a  
result their lament has grown lengthier and lengthier and their  
bitterness at being abandoned deeper and deeper.

Although the whole population of Balochistan has been agitating  
against their deprivations, the Pushtuns and the Baloch have  
different sets of grievances and it is only the latter that have been  
taking up arms in support of their cause. We are at the moment  
concerned only with the Baloch's alienation form the state as it is  
the main cause of the present crisis in that region.

The Baloch have never got over their shock and anger at the way the  
accession of Kalat state was manipulated. What hurt the nationalists  
more than the military operation against the Khan of Kalat was their  
feeling of betrayal.

Unlike the Indian Congress that viewed the future of the princely  
states after the British departure from the subcontinent wholly in  
terms of the political rights of their populations, the Muslim League  
leaders persisted in a purely legalist interpretation of the end of  
British paramountcy. As a result, the Khan of Kalat and the state's  
relatively young radicals could not reconcile themselves to a  
negation of the Kalat brief that the Quaid-i-Azam himself had  
presented before the Cabinet Mission.

The result was that Prince Abdul Karim gave a call to arms. He failed  
because the people in general had been taken into confidence, or  
considered worthy of being approached even, neither by the Kalat Khan  
nor the leaders of Pakistan. The latter thought the matter ended once  
Abdul Karim was put in a jail in Lahore. No attempt was made to  
explain to the people why matters followed a particular course.

Balochistan was promised something like provincial status on the  
morrow of independence. In February 1948 Quaid-i-Azam recognised the  
right of the Balochistan people to have the same rights as were  
allowed to their compatriots in the rest of the country. A reform  
committee set up in 1949 recommended a provincial legislature, adult  
franchise and some regard for tribes' unity while demarcating  
electoral constituencies. But the people of Balochistan were made to  
wait till 1970 to attain provincial status.

Between 1949 and 1970 the centre's policy of ignoring the Balochistan  
people's opinion forced them into confrontationist politics,  
especially during 1954–70 when most of the time they had to agitate  
against the One-Unit. One of the offshoots of the One Unit scheme was  
the revolt of Sardar Nauroze Khan. The way the 80 years old chieftain  
was treated makes the Baloch angry to this day.

In 1972, the Baloch believed their rights had begun to be recognised  
but their representative government was dismissed and the central  
government chose to deal with the Baloch youth's resistance through a  
military operation instead of the democratic way of negotiation. The  
impasse ended only when Gen Ziaul Haq pretended a change of heart and  
acting contrary to the advice he had given to Mr Bhutto and PNA  
leaders he stopped military action. But there was no meeting of the  
hearts, no political discourse, and the Baloch were left to sulk and  
nourish their grievances.

The Musharraf era has been the darkest phase for the Baloch because  
in this period the government excesses started directly affecting the  
common citizen. The grabbing of the Gwadar land hit a large number of  
people who were not sardars. The exclusion of the Baloch from the  
beneficiaries of development projects radicalised the educated and  
jobless youth. The Baloch were humiliated in unprecedented ways. None  
of the politicians who crossed Gen Musharraf's path was humiliated  
the way Sardar Akhtar Mengal was. The ordinary Baloch were insulted  
on account of the hair on their face and for wearing their  
traditional shalwar. (As a reaction the young sardars and students  
who had switched over to jeans resumed wearing their shalwar and  
keeping long hair with a vengeance.) The Baloch have reached their  
present state of alienation because the centre has proved to be  
unworthy of their trust.

No student of history will deny that the Baloch have taken up arms as  
a last resort and not the first one. More often than not they have  
reacted to use of force against them.

Writing from his death cell to his favourite child (Ms Benazir  
Bhutto) Mr Bhutto observed that a settlement of the Balochistan  
crisis had been made difficult by the fact that much blood had been  
shed. His successors did not study his finding and continued to bleed  
Balochistan (i.e. Nawab Akbar Bugti, Ballach Marri, Ghulam Mohammad,  
Rasool Bakshsh, et al) and make the political tangle more and more  
intractable.

The present government started making gestures of goodwill towards  
Balochistan but it has been found wanting in capital to deliver on  
its promises. Its latest package is unlikely to generate a meaningful  
debate.

There were many occasions in the past when open-hearted dialogue  
could lead to healing of the Baloch's wounds. But killing Nawab Akbar  
Bugti was preferred to negotiations with him and Nawab Khair Bukhsh  
Marri was kept in prison instead of talking to him. Now that the  
Baloch youth have been alienated Islamabad wants to talk to any  
Marri, any Bugti, any Mengal or any Bizenjo, but neither the senior  
nor the younger leaders of the Baloch resistance are listening. They  
will not respond positively so long as their support among the youth  
continues to grow.

The real problem Islamabad faces today is that it lacks both the  
intellectual strength and the authority needed to establish a  
discourse with the Baloch youth. The situation will not improve till  
a fresh election is held in Balochistan but elections cannot be held  
until the Baloch people's over-riding concerns about missing persons  
and displaced people are addressed and decision-making powers are  
restored to civilian, elected representatives of the people.

o o o

(ii)

The Friday Times, Lahore, 4 December 2009

THE BALOCHISTAN PACKAGE: BAND-AID ON A BULLET WOUND

by Alia Amirali

     “We’ve seen this before. They say sorry. Then the military  
operation intensifies. More deaths, more disappearances, more  
destruction. I wish they’d stop apologizing. Whenever they do, it  
means something bad is brewing.” This is what a young Baloch writer  
said to me last year in the wake of Zardari’s apology to the Baloch  
people. I was skeptical. Wait and see, he said.

     The events that unfolded in Balochistan after the apology – a  
long list which includes an unabated series of abductions,  
disappearances, harassment, and torture of students and political  
workers; intensification of “security operations” in the eastern  
districts; deployment of the FC in Makkuran; the hair-raising  
treatment meted out to political leaders Ghulam Mohammad, Lala Munir,  
and Sher Mohammad (and months later also to Rasool Baksh Mengal) –  
proved the young man right.

     Many would jump in here to say: “But the package calls for an  
inquiry into their murders…” Yes, Aghaaz-e-Haqooq-e-Balochistan-  
the name given to the recently-announced ‘package’ for  
Balochistan- does call for a judicial inquiry into the murders of the  
three Baloch leaders whose bodies were found thrown in the wilderness  
some miles from Turbat, mutilated beyond recognition, in April this  
year. But alas, in the package they messed up the names! (Instead of  
Sher Mohammad, the package mistakenly says ‘Munir Ahmed’). While  
the government may pass it off as a ‘typing mistake’, it is  
telling of the center’s utter lack of familiarity- indeed its  
disconnect - with the Baloch context, their leaders and their  
aspirations.

     Considering Pakistan’s unflattering record with regards to  
parliamentary committees, inquiry commissions and apologies, the  
government must have been cognizant that this ‘Balochistan  
package’ must make a break from history and that it must go beyond  
apologies and promises. Sadly, this package does not do so. The  
language flits between ‘should’ and ‘will’ (with the former  
dominating), which belies that the ‘package’ is in fact a set of  
proposals made by individuals in the government rather than a series  
of measures being taken by the government. Why does the government  
need to ‘suggest’ or ‘urge’; why does it not act? Either it  
does not want to act, or it cannot; and the truth is probably a mix  
of both. The authors of the package argue that all issues must go  
through parliament before they can be implemented (hence the  
‘proposal-like’ nature of the package). That is fair. But  
considering the history of broken promises, particularly in the  
Baloch context, the ‘package’ should have been announced only once  
the government was in a position to act on the committee’s proposals.

     Lets move to the content. A glaring flaw in the package- and one  
of the main reasons for its unanimous rejection by Baloch  
nationalists- is the refusal to declare or even propose a complete  
halt to military operations in the province, which is tantamount to  
ignoring the ‘elephant in the room’. Viewed from another angle,  
the suggestion that the role of “federal agencies” in Balochistan  
be “reviewed” and “all operations not related to the fight  
against terrorism” be stopped is at least an admission – coming  
forth for the first time from official quarters - that there are  
“operations” being conducted in Balochistan (even though the  
word ‘military’ is conspicuously absent). Considering that  
government and military officials have consistently denied the  
existence of military operations in Balochistan, this is an  
important- even if inadvertent- admission. However, linking military  
operations in Balochistan to “the fight against terrorism” or- as  
can be seen in other ambiguously phrased clauses of the package-  
continuing to brand the Baloch guerrillas as ‘terrorists’ will  
only inflame the Baloch and mislead the Pakistani public. The Baloch  
guerrillas and independence-seeking nationalists reflect popular  
sentiment: that is a fact that Islamabad must accept. This package  
shows that we are still in denial.

     The language regarding the construction of new cantonments is  
similarly ambiguous and problematic. The new cantonments in Sui and  
Kohlu (only) will be ceased “for the time being” and already  
constructed ones will be handed over to the FC – a highly notorious  
force in Balochistan which must be withdrawn rather than strengthened  
if there is to be peace in the province. There is no mention of  
removing controversial military officials from the posts they have  
occupied since the Musharraf era. Instead of reducing the number of  
existing cantonments – which, according to a January 2007 report,  
include four mega-military cantonments, 52 paramilitary cantonments,  
five naval bases, and six missile-testing ranges – the package  
merely states that proposals for new cantonments not be formulated  
“except in frontier regions, wherever required.”

     In some ways, the most disappointing feature of the package is  
the proposal of ‘constitutional amendments’ to determine the  
“scope, form, and quantum” of provincial autonomy. The 1973  
Constitution - which provided for complete provincial autonomy within  
ten years of promulgation - does not require amendment, only  
implementation. Besides, increasing the province’s ‘share’ of  
revenues generated from its own resources will not resolve the center- 
province conflict. It is time for the government to bite the bullet.  
It must accept that complete provincial autonomy is the minimum  
necessary step towards repairing decades-worth of damage and  
exploitation. Regardless of who accepts it and who rejects it, the  
government must implement it, no strings attached. Over time, this  
step will reap fruits. It is the only way the federation can work.

     On the eve of the package’s announcement, I turned on the  
television in the hope of hearing some meaningful discussions on  
Balochistan. Instead, the anchors were merely pushing their Baloch  
guests to point out “something positive” about the package. If we  
want to ‘patch up’ with the Baloch, it is about time we stopped  
pushing them (besides, they’ve already been pushed to the wall). It  
is us – our state and our government and our people – who need to  
be pushed. We cannot allow our state to commit another Bangladesh in  
Balochistan. If we remain silent now- as we were then- the Baloch  
will be right in blaming us for their misery.

     The writer is a student at the Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad.

o o o

(iii) THE AFPAK APPARITION

The Baloch people are paying a very real price for a videogame war on  
a phantasmagorical land

by Kamila Shamsie
(guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 8 December 2009)

Someone in the American government has been reading Borges. This  
would explain the creation of a fantastical place called AfPak which  
occupies the same place on the map as the nations of Afghanistan and  
Pakistan. AfPak has much in common with the shared border region of  
the two countries – the same topography, the same militants with  
their perverted form of Islam, the same distrust of central  
governments. But there are distinctions. AfPak is, after all, an  
abbreviated place, so it takes all the complex realities of  
Afghanistan and Pakistan, ignores some, distills others – and in so  
doing, distorts the picture. And of course, the strategies drawn up  
about AfPak are carried out in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

To say that AfPak distils complex realities is not to imply that  
AfPak itself is without complications. It is one entity but in two  
parts. One part has "good Taliban", with whom US officials are  
willing to enter into discussions; the other part has only "bad  
Taliban", who must be "taken out" by military force. One part is  
approached via troops on the ground; the other via unmanned drone  
attacks.

But now it seems troops on the ground are being considered for Pak as  
well, unless the Pakistan government, already locked in battle with  
the Taliban, also takes on the militants who have fled Afghanistan  
for Pakistan. The fact that expanding the Pakistan army's remit might  
cause an even greater escalation in suicide bombings is not,  
presumably, germane to AfPak strategy. But surely there's a lesson  
about opening up too many fronts, even in AfPak world?

Or perhaps all this talk of US escalation is just laying the  
groundwork for increasing the scale and scope of drone attacks. This  
videogame form of warfare – press a button in Langley! Kill a  
terrorist in AfPak! – is at present confined to the tribal regions  
of "Pak".

A senior US official recently claimed the drone attacks have killed  
400 terrorists and only 20 civilians in Pak. This forms a sharply  
contrasting picture to the reality of Pakistan, where figures  
reported by both local and international press have placed civilian  
deaths in the hundreds. It appears the "Pak" to Pakistan conversion  
rate is about 1:50.

The AfPak strategists now want to expand drone attacks to the  
province of Balochistan, where many of the Taliban are allegedly  
based – having unsurprisingly decided to flee the drone attacks in  
the tribal areas. In the world of AfPak, Balochistan is the new safe  
haven, and so it must be the new target. Of all the distilled and  
distorted complex realities of Pakistan, this is among the most  
egregious.

The province of Balochistan has been at odds with the central  
government of Pakistan since 1947. During the 70s, the Baloch  
separatist movement – both secular and leftist – led to a five- 
year military operation, ending with the withdrawal of the army and a  
period of martial law. In the succeeding years, nothing was done to  
seriously address the political and economic deprivation of the  
mineral-rich province. Islamabad controls Balochistan's gas, coal,  
uranium and other natural resources, but returns very little to the  
province in terms of revenue or infrastructure. The Frontier Corps  
(which the United States wants to "strengthen" as part of its AfPak  
plans) is viewed as an occupying power; hundreds or, more likely,  
thousands, of Baloch are among the "disappeared people" who, in the  
last decade, have been picked up by intelligence agencies and never  
seen again. It is no great surprise that there are loud demands for  
provincial autonomy, and great anger towards the centre.

One of President Zardari's first acts was to apologise to the people  
of Balochistan for all they have suffered at the hands of the state.  
On 24 November, his government tabled a wide-ranging package of  
reform for Balochistan. There is scepticism in Balochistan about the  
package, but at least some kind of start has been made to the vital  
issue – crucial to Pakistan's hopes of coming through its  
nightmarish present – of making Balochistan feel a part of the  
federation, with a stake in its future.

What might derail the process? The AfPak videogame. Whether the  
Taliban or al-Qaida are welcomed in Balochistan under a "my enemy's  
enemy is my friend" way of thinking or not does not alter the  
desperate need to prevent bombs raining down. Given the battles being  
fought between province and centre, how could the Baloch fail to see  
a tacit complicity of the Pakistan military behind every drone?


o o o

(iv) BALOCHISTAN: TOO SMALL AN OLIVE BRANCH

by Qurratulain Zaman,

Open Democracy, 27 November 2009
http://www.opendemocracy.net/qurratulain-zaman/balochistan-too-small- 
olive-branch

About the author
Qurratulain Zam is a journalist who has worked with Pakistan’s  
leading daily “Daily Times” and Germany’s international  
broadcaster “Deutsche Welle”. She is currently working as a  
freelancer in Bonn, Germany“

Brutal rule by Pakistan’s security agencies in Balochistan has  
radicalised moderate Balochs in this largest and poorest province.  
Now Pakistan’s government has offered a conciliation package. But it  
looks as if it is too little, too late.

They ordered me to rape her. She was so thin and was crying when they  
brought her in the room. I was terrified to look at her, as I thought  
she was a spy or an agent”, says Munir Mengal, a 33- year- old  
Baloch, living in forced exile in Paris.

Munir Mengal spent 16 months in underground jails of the Pakistani  
intelligence agencies. “The low rank officers came back to the room  
and started beating me because I didn’t obey their orders. They took  
off my clothes by force, and hers too, and left us alone. In her sobs  
I heard her praying in Balochi language. She was praying for someone  
named Murad. That’s how I got to know she is my fellow Baloch. That  
gave me the courage to talk to her.” Munir says that, still sobbing,  
she told him her name was Zarina Marri. She used to be a school  
teacher. She and her son Murad, who was only a few months old, were  
picked up by the intelligence agencies from Kohlu.

Munir said, “Zarina was crying and asking me to kill her. Meanwhile,  
3 or 4 low-ranking officers came in the room with a toolbox and told  
me that if I refused to rape her they would make me impotent. I  
didn’t have a clue why they were doing this to me. I fainted.  In  
the morning, before the faj’r prayer they kicked me and took Zarina  
Marri with them. I have no idea what happened to her.”

Munir said he was tortured physically, mentally and emotionally every  
day. A chartered accountant by education and training, Munir wanted  
to open up a Baloch TV channel in Pakistan. He was working on his TV  
channel “Baloch Voice”, when he was picked up for the first time  
when he flew into Karachi international airport on April 4, 2006.
“After 5 months in an underground jail in Malir (Karachi), one day  
they took me to Major Nadeem’s office. He said they hadn’t found  
anything against me and wanted to negotiate with me.” The Military  
Intelligence (MI) officers informed Munir they had changed their  
plans. “They were going to take me to meet President Pervez  
Musharraf.  They trained me how to talk to the president. They told  
me I had to address him as ‘your Excellency’ and should not tell  
him anything about what had happened to me in the torture cell”,  
remembered Munir. “On October 26, they gave me a haircut, new  
clothes and blindfolded me. Then they took me to some military  
barracks to meet the then president, Pervez Musharraf.”
Munir said the president expressed concern about the Balochistan  
issue. “He said he would take care of my family’s future now,  
although according to him I was becoming more dangerous than the  
Baloch rebel leaders Nawab Akbar Bugti and Attaullah Khan Mengal.  He  
said it was just a few sardars, tribal leaders, who were making  
things bad in Balochistan with foreign aid. “I stayed quiet most of  
the time”, says Munir.

“They offered to make me the liberal, educated voice of Balochistan  
against the sardars. They said the’d give me and my family full  
protection. But I refused to become a part of their game. That is why  
in the end I fled Pakistan.”

Munir Mengal’s is not an isolated story.

The largest province of Pakistan, Balochistan is witnessing its 5th  
insurgency since 1947. Many Balochs say that their region was annexed  
by Pakistan. They believe the centre and the most populous province  
Punjab has usurped their resources. It is the most impoverished and  
underdeveloped province of Pakistan. Balochs will tell you, for  
example, that although vast amounts of gas are extracted from Sui,  
Balochistan, there are many parts of the province without gas until  
today.

The Baloch nationalists kept demanding autonomy and an equal share in  
the resources. However, they never got it. The Pakistan federal  
government distributes resources on the basis of population, and  
Balochistan accounts for only four percent of Pakistan’s population.

24 year old Shahzeb is a law student. He was picked up by the  
intelligence agencies in March this year. In their traditionally  
decorated first floor living room in Balochistan’s capital, Quetta,  
Shahzeb’s mother said “We were worried about Shahzeb’s life. My  
family and I prayed every day for him.” Shahzeb was taking his  
sister-in-law to a neighbouring district in Quetta when he was picked  
up.  “They tortured me every day”, said Shahzeb Baloch. “During  
interrogation, my hands were tied and I was blindfolded. They asked  
me questions about the Baloch liberation movement. They kept accusing  
me of being an agent of the Indian intelligence agency RAW and  
insisted that I had provided weapons to militants.”
Shahzeb was careful not to share details about his three months’  
ordeal in the military detention centre in front of his mother. He  
switched to English in her presence. “I don’t want to repeat all  
these things in front of her. She starts crying.  They released me on  
the condition that I won’t get involved in student politics.”
Both Munir and Shahzeb said that they came across many Baloch  
detainees in the military-run secret jails  - Munir under the  
military dictatorship of Musharraf, and Shahzeb after the civilian  
government had taken over last year. According to the Baloch Women’s  
Panel and the Baloch Student Organization (BSO), 4,000 Baloch are  
still missing. Pakistani interior minister Rehman Malik said this  
week that the government had a list of 1,011 missing people.
Most observers agree that things became worse in Balochistan during  
the Musharraf years, after Musharraf sent the army in against the  
Baloch tribes. Nawab Akbar Bugti, head of the Bugti clan, a former  
chief minister and governor of the province in his eighties, was  
forced to hide in a mountain cave and finally killed in an airstrike  
by the Pakistan air force.

Suriya Ameeruddin is a senator from the ruling Pakistan People’s  
Party in Balochistan. “A few years ago, we used to live in harmony,  
in peace. Pashtuns, Baloch, Hazaras and Punjabis - all of us used to  
live next to each other but since the day Pervez Musharraf martyred  
our Nawab Sahib, the situation has turned violent”, she said.

Relations between the different ethnic groups have become bitter.  
Senator Suriya Ameeruddin is not an ethnic Baloch, but a “settler”  
in Quetta. But she lives in a Baloch-populated area. “Every day when  
my son and daughter- in- law leave for work I am afraid. Boys come on  
motorcycles in busy markets and residential areas, kill and vanish.  
Not a single ‘target killer’ has been caught so far. No one has  
the courage to catch them. It’s the law of the jungle here.”
Quetta looks like a war-zone, with army checkpoints even in the  
markets and parks. The city is clearly divided in two parts. One is  
the “cantonment” fully controlled by the army and paramilitary  
forces; the other area is a stronghold of Baloch separatist groups –  
like Balochistan University.
  A 24- year- old former president of the Baloch Student Organisation  
(BSO) said, ‘’you feel you are entering a garrison, not a  
university. Pakistan’s security agencies have left us no political  
way forward. They have radicalised all the liberal forces by  
torturing them.’’
According to him, the BSO serves as a nursery for nationalists who  
are in hiding or fighting in the mountains. The student leader’s  
father was an active member of the established Balochistan National  
Party (BNP), which traditionally stood by Pakistan, while demanding  
more rights for the Balochs. But he and his brothers advocate a  
“free” Balochistan. ‘’We have convinced our father after long  
fights and arguments. Today he is a radical like me.’’
Not long ago, the student was a patriotic Pakistani. He had a poster  
of a war hero, Captain Karnel Sher Khan as a teenager. “Pakistan  
needs to reflect upon what made me hate Pakistan”, he said. “They  
make us feel that we are slaves. I can wear western clothes and move  
freely in the city but if I’m wearing my baggy Baloch shalwar,  
they’ll strip search me.”
The one and a half year old democratic government has finally tabled  
the long awaited Balochistan package named “a beginning of  
Balochistan rights” in the national assembly this week. Prime  
Minister Gilani promised to bring back the missing people to their  
families, to re-integrate exiled Baloch leaders into the political  
scene and to withdraw the army and paramilitary forces from the  
province.
Balochistan will finally enjoy political autonomy like the other  
provinces, and economic development, the government promises.  
However, all Baloch parties have rejected this package. They say they  
were not consulted, and after sixty years they have lost their trust  
in Pakistan.
Malik Siraj Akbar, the bureau chief of the English national paper  
“Daily Times” in Quetta, said, “although the democratic  
government has taken over, the machinery is run by the security  
agencies. The chief minister and governor have no role. There are  
more than 50 ministers in the government, but they have nothing to  
do.”
Mukhtar Chalgiri, the regional director of the Strengthening  
Participatory Organization, one of the few NGOs still working in the  
province, added:
“Ordinary people are unhappy. Inflation, poverty and a sense of  
deprivation leads to all this violence we see in our society today.  
Every cabinet member in this government is corrupt. They are selling  
jobs.”
Many Baloch parties are boycotting the political process altogether.  
Their demands have become more radical over the years.
Dr Abdul Hakeem Lehri, a senior leader of the Baloch Republican Party  
said, “we’re not interested in living with the corrupt Pakistani  
elite any more. We want freedom.”
The Baloch Republican Party (BRP) is considered the political face of  
the underground, separatist Baloch Republican Armay (BRA). Hundreds  
of their activists have disappeared. Party chief Brahamdagh Bugti, a  
grandson of the slain leader Akbar Bugti, is in hiding. For many  
youngsters, the handsome 28- year- old Bramdagh is a kind of Baloch  
Che Guevara. Pakistani officials say he is in Afghanistan, and have  
accused India of supporting him through its consulates there. But  
party leader Lehri rubbished all claims that the separatist movement  
is run by a “foreign hand”:
“If Pakistan had any real evidence that India supports us, would  
they have spared us? Every Baloch household has a reason to fight  
with them. This version is just to satisfy the Pakistani elite.”
 From his forced exile Munir Mengal too rejects the economic package  
proposed by the Pakistani government. He pointed out that many Baloch  
nationalists are socialists and abhor religious fundamentalism.  
“There is no solution with packages, and our problem can’t be  
solved with dialogues either. Our ideology is different from  
Pakistan’s. We can’t live under an imposed and fake religious  
identity. We are secular people.” And he added a question: “Do you  
really think these economic packages will satisfy Zarina Marri’s  
mother?“

Former school teacher Zarina Marri is still missing, and no official  
record exists about what happened to her after she was last seen by  
Munir Mengal in Karachi.

_____


[5] A Transnational Platform to Take on the Fundamentalists : Call  
and Sign on Statement

(i)

Press Release

For Immediate Release
9 December 2009

The Formation of an International Bureau for Laicite* Announced

A wide number of non governmental organizations and individuals from  
across Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas have signed a common  
public statement affirming the nefarious role of fundamentalist  
politics and the need to counter it internationally.

This charter highlights:
   - The flawed ideological bogey of clash of civilizations, the role  
of public policies leading to greater inequality, and the impact of  
religious fundamentalisms and right wing identity politics in  
dividing people locally, nationally and internationally.
  - Fundamentalist movements benefit from - A retreat of the state  
from the social domain that leaves the terrain open to the religious- 
political outfits to flourish. – Public support from certain groups  
on the left, that consider fundamentalists as allies in the name of  
fighting imperialism.

In this overall backdrop the signatories propose the formation of an  
international initiative called International Bureau for Laicite to  
act as a facilitating body to network, support and amplify the  
struggles for secularism.

The charter of International Bureau for Laicite has been released in  
English, French and Spanish on a day that marks the 104th anniversary  
of the legislation separating state and religion in France.

The full text of the charter is available for public consultation and  
is open for signatures at the newly created website of International  
Bureau for Laicite: www.laicity.info/bli


(* Note: The French term Laicite in the name of our platform was  
chosen because the word 'secularism' in English conveys the notion of  
equal tolerance of the state vis a vis all religions, rather than the  
notion of separation between 'Churches'/religions and the state as  
well as the total disinvestment of the state regarding religions,  
which is embeded into the French concept of laicite.)


---
[Text of the Charter]

  INTERNATIONAL BUREAU FOR LAICITE*

Considering that:
- The so-called theory of 'clash of civilisations' between a  
'Christian West' on the one hand, and a 'Muslim Orient' on the other,  
is gaining ground, in total disregard of all people the world over,  
who have been fighting in favour of a political model founded on  
principles of secularism,

- In the name of defending the 'right to difference', numerous states  
are legitimizing differences of rights between citizens depending on  
their faith, thereby fueling communalisms,

- With the help of religions, governments try to draw people into  
warlike confrontations

- In addition to fighting against existing disparities between men  
and women, women have to unceasingly defend their hard won rights,  
notably equality in the realm of social and professional rights and  
bodily rights,

- That, in many countries, the rise of different fundamentalisms has  
come to increase the subordination of women

- Despite a movement towards secularisation and the decline of  
religions, globalisation of neoliberal policies (favoured by the  
Washington consensus) that emerged in the 80's, stimulated the march  
towards privatisation and commoditisation of all human activities,  
and exacerbated inward looking communalism (the disengagement of the  
state necessitated the recourse to traditional forms of solidarity,  
substituing national solidarity with the principle of charity),

- The alliance that a communalized Left does not hesitate to make  
with religious organisations, in the name of fighting 'western  
imperialism', is damaging, as is the neoliberal disinvestment by the  
State from the social sphere  that has allowed religious  
organisations to occupy that space

-The current economic crisis has accentuated inequalities and poverty,

- However, there has been a convergence of secularist, feminist and  
social struggles, everywhere in the world ;

The organisations and persons  listed below have come together to set  
up the International Bureau for Laïcite, based on the present  
resolution, in order to promote secularism internationally.

1. We affirm our commitment to secularism. The principle of  
secularism, notably the strict separation of State and religion,  
guarantees the non interference of religion in the sphere of state  
authority; as well as a real independance of religious and faith  
based organisations of civil society vis-a-vis the state. Secularism  
guarantees to citizens the absolute freedom of conscience: the right  
to believe, the right to disbelieve, the right to change faith, as  
well as the right to freedom of expression. Consequently, the right  
to criticize religions is not to be put into question and it takes  
precedence above all moves to institute ' defamation of religions and  
their prophets' as a crime.

2. We affirm our commitment to the principle of equality and the  
universality of rights. We believe in a republican conception of  
citizenship, and we reject all systems which, in the name of  
particularisms, segment the body politic, either by privileging one  
category of citizens or by excluding it. Therefore we intend to fight  
against all forms of discriminations, notably those faced by women  
and the minorities.

3. We refuse the globalized predatory and destructive neoliberal  
policies which accentuate pauperisation, whose first victims are  
women and children;  state disengagement fosters the retreat of  
national solidarity in favour of traditional solidarities of  
'communal' type. In wake of neoliberalism, we call for the  
internationalisation of struggles.

On the 9th of December 2009**, we call on organisations and  
individuals who identify with the principles of this statement to  
support and sign it, and join us.

To sign up : http://laicity.info/bli/?cat=22

*After consultation, we finally resolve to use the French concept/ 
word ‘Laicite’ in the name of our platform. The reason for it is  
that the word 'secularism' in English conveys the notion of equal  
tolerance of the state vis a vis all religions, rather than the  
notion of separation between 'Churches'/religions and the state as  
well as the total disinvestment of the state regarding religions,  
which is embeded into the French concept of laicite. Rare scholars  
have of late started to use the neologism ‘Laicity', but we feel  
that it is not known to activists and to public at large.
** On the 9th of December 1905, France voted the Law of Separation of  
Churches and State

The founders of the BLI :
Coalition for a Secular State, Serbia
Collectif citoyen pour l'égalité et la laïcité (CCIEL), Montréal
Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain
Development Alternatives with Women for A New Era (DAWN),   
international network
Equal Rights Now – Organisation against Women’s Discrimination in  
Iran
Iran Solidarity
Iranian Secular Society
MAREA, feminist journal, Genova, Italy
Parti pour la Laïcité et la Démocratie (ex MDSL), Algérie
Protagoras, Croatia
One Law for All Campaign against Sharia Law in Britain
Organization for Women’s Liberation (OWL), Iran
Secularism Is A Women's Issue (SIAWI), international network
Union des Familles Laïques (UFAL), France
Women's Initiative for Citizenship and Universal Rights (WICUR)  
international network
Women in Black - Belgrade (WIB), Serbia
Women Living Under Muslim Laws (WLUML), international network

Zarizana Abul Aziz, lawyer, human rights activist, Malaysia
Samia Allalou, journaliste, Algérie/France
Hakim Arabdiou, militant laïque, Algérie/France
Soheib Bencheikh, théologien, spécialiste des religions et de la  
laicité, ancien mufti de Marseille, France
Djemila Benhabib, auteure de Ma vie à contre-Coran, récipiendaire du  
Prix des écrivains francophones d'Amérique et finaliste pour le prix  
du gouverneur général 2009, Québec
Codou Bop, journaliste, Dakar, Sénégal
Caroline Brancher, co-responsable du secteur féminisme et laïcité  
de l'UFAL, France
Ariane Brunet, co-fondatrice de Urgent Action Fund, Montréal,Québec
Sonia Correa, co-coordinator of Sexuality Policy Watch and Research  
Associate at ABIA (Brazilian Interdisciplinary Association for AIDS  
(Brazil)), Rio De Janeiro, Brazil.
Yvonne Deutsch, feminist peace activist, Jerusalem
Lalia Ducos, présidente de WICUR, Algérie/France
Aldo Facio, Feminist Human Rights Activist and Lawyer, Costa Rica
Gigi Franscisco, coordinator of the DAWN international network,  
Manila, The Philippines
Pierre Galand, président du Centre d'action laïque (CAL), Belgique
Nadia Geerts, initiatrice du R.A.P.P.E.L. (www.le-rappel.be/FR)
Laura Guidetti, President and co-founder of MAREA, Genova, Italy
Marieme Helie Lucas, Fondatrice du WLUML et coordinatrice de SIAWI,  
Algérie/France
Hameeda Hossein, co-chair of South Asians for Human Rights and  
Chairperson of Ain o Salish Kendra, Dhaka, Bangladesh
Ayesha Imam, Sociologist, human rights activists, Nigeria
Harsh Kapoor, founder of South Asia Citizens Web (sacw.net), India/ 
France
Sultana Kamal, lawyer and human rights activist, Executive Director  
of Ain O'Salish Kendra, former Advisor to the Caretaker Government of  
Bangladesh, Dhaka, Bangladesh,
Cherifa Kheddar, présidente de l'association " Djazairouna" des  
Familles Victimes du Terrorisme Islamiste, Algérie
Catherine Kintzler, philosophe de la laïcité, Paris, France
Monica Lanfranco, journalist, co-founder of MAREA, Genova, Italy
Azar Majedi, Présidente de l’OWL, Iran/U.K
Maryam Namazie, Campaigner, Iran/U.K
Fariborz Pooya, Iranian Secular Society, Iran/U.K
Venita Popovic, Zenica, Bosnia and Herzegovina
Mary Jane Real, lawyer and human rights activist, Manilla, The  
Philippines
Rhoda Reddock, feminist scholar, Trinidad and Tobago
Henri Pena Ruiz, philosophe de la laïcité, France
Nina Sankari, Présidente de l’Initiative Féministe Européenne  
(IFE), Pologne
Aisha Shaheed, historian and women’s rights activist, Canada/ 
Pakistan/UK
Mohamed Sifaoui, journaliste, Algérie/France
Fatou Sow, sociologue au CNRS, Dakar, Sénégal
Gila Svirsky, Women In Black, Jerusalem
Lino Veljak, Professor of philosophy, University of Zagreb, founder  
of PROTAGORAS, Croatia
Vivienne Wee, anthropologist and women’s rights advocate, Singapore  
and Hong Kong, China
Stasa Zajovic, founder of WIB-Belgrade, coordinator of the Coalition  
for a Secular State, Serbia


_____


[6] India: Resources For Secular Activists on >  
communalism.blogspot.com / sacw.net

Under the rubble (Harsh Mander)
http://tt.ly/1d
The dialects of Ayodhya and Manmohan Singh (Jawed Naqvi)
http://tt.ly/19
Liberhan Commission; Painful wait for Justice (Ram Puniyani)
http://tt.ly/1a
Incomplete Catharsis (Mahesh Rangarajan)
http://tt.ly/17
Little men re-enact Ayodhya chaos inside Parliament (Siddharth  
Varadarajan)
http://tt.ly/18
Concerned Citizens of Gujarat for Prosecution of architect of  
demolition of Babri Mosque
http://www.sacw.net/article1270.html
Indian American Muslim group demands immediate civil and criminal  
action against all accused in the Liberhan Report
http://tt.ly/1c
British Indian Muslims urge British Government to declare the 68  
terrorists persona non grata
http://tt.ly/1b

_____


[7]  Book Reviews:

(i)

American Ethnologist, Volume 36 Issue 4 (November 2009)

Book Reviews
Economy, Culture, and Civil War in Sri Lanka edited by Deborah  
Winslow and Michael D. Woost

Alex Argenti-Pillen (University College London)

Economy, Culture, and Civil War in Sri Lanka . Deborah Winslow and  
Michael D. Woost , eds . : Indiana University Press , 2004 . xiv +  
242 pp., map, tables, references, index .

This is an exceptional collection of chapters, which makes a major  
contribution to the anthropology of war and conflict. The volume  
emerged from a multidisciplinary workshop held at the New England  
Center, University of New Hampshire in 2000 where the links between  
developments in the post-1977 Sri Lankan economy and the interethnic  
conflict were explored. The debate is articulated around Newton  
Gunasinghe's seminal article "The Open Economy and Its Impact on  
Ethnic Relations in Sri Lanka" (1984, reprinted in the reviewed  
text). Gunasinghe's piece, published in the aftermath of the anti- 
Tamil riots of 1983, maps the complex connections between open  
economic policies and the increase in interethnic violence. Multiple  
perspectives on the economy are the entry point for this study, which  
the editors define as a postethnicity argument. The originality of  
this study lies in its lack of dependence on discourses about  
ethnicity and nationalism, and its focus on the new socioeconomic  
formation that developed under conditions of liberalization and  
chronic civil war.

Winslow and Woost clearly mark this move toward an economic analysis  
of Sri Lanka's civil war as differing from the stereotypical focus on  
conflict entrepreneurs and greed as a sustaining principle of civil  
war. In fact they denounce the policy recommendations of Paul Collier 
—director of the Development Research Group at the World Bank—as  
"dangerous, possibly leading to more conflict rather than less" (p.  
16). Such recommendations fail to take political grievances or human  
rights into account and, instead, focus on economic liberalization  
and growth to reduce poverty and placate greedy rebels without a  
cause. Contributors to this volume provide a nuanced antidote to such  
discourses, which circulate within a World Bank and IMF keen to  
reintegrate war-ravaged economies into the global market.

What is most striking about this volume is its predictive value, a  
rare commodity within social science research. Contributors define  
the new socioeconomic formation of violence that emerged during three  
decades of civil war in terms of people's everyday survival  
strategies. The debate on economics and interethnic warfare thereby  
becomes triangulated and developed as a tension between adaptation to  
open economic policies, wartime economic survival strategies, and  
participation in civil warfare itself. Violence continues to emerge  
at this articulation between a further developing open economy and a  
war economy on the ground. The chilling predictive quality of this  
work is based on a comparison of the economic direction taken since  
1977 and its role in fuelling ethnic violence, on the one hand, and  
current planning documents by the government of Sri Lanka and the  
World Bank (the Country Assistance Strategy), on the other. As  
liberalization and privatization played a crucial role in the  
articulation of spaces of death and atrocity in Sri Lanka, a social  
formation of No War–No Peace emerged (a term the editors borrow from  
Dr. Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu). However, the aid packages used to  
lubricate current peace negotiations reveal striking similarities  
precisely with the post-1977 economic policies linked to the  
emergence of ethnic warfare in Sri Lanka. The editors conclude: "A  
peace pact and concomitant influx of aid may make the formations of  
violence invisible but not inactive" (p. 202). They thereby challenge  
a key cornerstone of World Bank and IMF views on the role of  
development and opening up markets in war-torn societies: "Peace is  
not a matter of promoting forgiveness or reconciliation and then  
making it possible to get on with economic growth" (p. 204).

Contributors collaborated to highlight that economic growth and the  
format in which it is prescribed by global institutions was not only  
a root cause of interethnic war in Sri Lanka but also continues to  
fuel violence in its current format of postwar international  
development initiatives. Moreover the authors make the reader engage  
in a serious consideration of the fact that the situation of No War– 
No Peace might have no end in sight. Such work challenges the current  
optimism that many social scientists project into texts about  
resistance, experiences of violence, suffering and coping,  
reconciliation, and conflict resolution. Such a critical stance is  
made possible on the basis of this volume's exceptional  
multidisciplinary grounding: a macroview of the relationship between  
policy and conflict (by political scientists John M. Richardson and  
Amita Shastri), a consideration of the class and ethnicity based  
experience of open economic policies (by sociologists Newton  
Gunasinghe and Siri T. Hettige), and finally an extremely engaging  
view from below (by anthropologists Francesca Bremner, Michele R.  
Gamburd and Caitrin Lynch).

o o o

(ii) A Grand Daughter's Tribute (Rita Manchanda)

Islam, Women and Violence in Kashmir by Nyla Ali Khan Tulika Books, 2009
http://www.epw.in/epw/uploads/articles/14211.pdf

_____


[8] Announcements:

(1)  “Dekh Tamasha chalta Ban”

CELEBRATING 25 YEARS OF AJOKA
Ajoka Theatre In collaboration with PNCA and Mehergarh invites you to
“Dekh Tamasha Chalta ban”
Written By: Shahid Nadeem
Directed by: Madeeha Gauhar
On the occasion of Human Rights Day 10th December, 2009 at 6:00pm
VENUE: National Art Gallery PNCA Auditorium, Islamabad

The theme of this play is persecution of religious minorities in  
Pakistan, a problem which unfortunately is shared by many countries  
in South Asia and has been become a major political question because  
of the rise of religious fundamentalism in the region. In a bold and  
direct manner, the play exposes the rational for such persecution and  
challenges the audience, who are silent spectators of this long-  
running show. The play is very scathing about the government  
connivance, & arguments given by the religious establishment to  
deprive religious minorities. In fact it touches a very raw nerve in  
today’s Pakistan, where armed violence has become the order of the  
day among religious fanatics. It refers to the discriminatory  
blasphemy laws and sectarian violence.
  For Further Information
Ajoka: 042-36682443, 36686634 / PNCA: 051-9205273-4, 9205268 /  
Mehergarh:  051-2252203
Krishna
Mehargarh Hyderabad

o o o

(ii)

Seminar on India-Pakistan Relations & distribution of prizes &  
certificates to the participants of an essay competition India- 
Pakistan Joint Statement & Way Forward

  Speakers:
Karamat Ali (tradeunionist & peace activist, Karachi)
Prof. Pushpa Bhave
Chandra Krishnamurthy, VC, University of Mumbai to Chair.
Mrudul Nile, director of Students Welfare & Foreign Students Advisor

  Date & Time:
  Thursday, 10th December
  2009 / 3.00 pm

Venue:
  Press Club, Mumbai

Do attend and spread word.

o o o

(iii)    AN APPEAL TO THE MEDIA FRATERNITY AND SUPPORTERS OF THE  
FREEDOM OF THE PRESS IN INDIA
Come and join March to Parliament on 14 December 2009. Assemble at  
UNI at 10 AM.

December 5, 2009
Dear colleagues and comrades,

The UNI Workers Union is organising a March to Parliament on Monday,  
December 14, 2009 to highlight the plight of 800-odd employees of  
United News of India, the news agency which has just survived a  
illegal and obnoxious take-over bid of a corporate giant.

The deal would have changed the ownership structure and neutral  
character of the news agency, hitherto a co-operative of newspapers,  
and turned it into a private shop.

Following the Company Law Board’s verdict against the conspiratorial  
attempt of handing the UNI over to the media baron, the sinister  
design got defeated. However, this premiere news agency’s problems  
continue to persist. For last two years, the workers of UNI are  
reeling under a salary crisis. For last three years, they have not  
been paid their fringe benefits including bonus, LTA, Casual Leave  
Encashment, etc and they have yet to get Interim Awards of Justice  
Kurup Wage Boards duly notified by the Central Government way back on  
January 24, 2008.  Be it the question of human resource crisis or the  
financial needs for agency’s expansion and modernisation,  
appropriate government intervention is essential. We are convinced  
that if remedial steps are not taken immediately, the news agency may  
fall into an abyss beyond retrieval.

The economic recession has further worsened the situation for the  
UNI. Although the Union government has been generous in providing  
bailout packages to profit making private media establishments by  
increasing the DAVP rates by 25 percent, its not coming forward to  
rescue the finance starved news agency, running on no profit no loss  
basis and catering to small and medium newspapers. We demand a relief  
package from the Govt. to cope up section 25 company’s current crisis.

Dear comrades, The UNI has sought from the government a soft loan of  
Rs 30 crore which could prove pivotal for its survival and there is a  
precedence too. There is a precidence too. In 1992, the union  
government had extended soft loan of Rs 10 crore to the other news  
agency, Press Trust of India (PTI), which was then facing a financial  
crisis. We have also been requesting the national leadership to  
intervene in the matter of revision of Prasar Bharti’s subscription  
rates for both the news agencies. It has not been revised for more  
than last five years.

We would appreciate your participation as well as those of your  
members in the march as the current crisis strikes at the very roots  
of a free press and democratic traditions of the country as the  
existance of UNI is paramount for the multiplicity of sources of news  
to small and medium newspapers. Sir, the other news agency—Press  
Trust of India (PTI) was there, when UPI collapsed in 1958 due to  
severe financial crunch and anticepating a danger of monopolistic  
behaviour, our first Prime Minister thought it fit to create this  
second one for the nascent nation. The danger is real even now.  
Moreover, as India integrates itself with the global community, a  
free, independent and robust second news agency alone can ensure  
competition in the flow of news as well as help preserve the  
sovereignty of the nation and focus on the interest of all stake  
holders in a democracy.

Sir, the UNI workers Union would like you to come and join our  
endeavour to save the existance of the agency, which would have  
definitely succumbed to the corporate onslaught, had you all not  
joined the first phase of our agitation to save its independence and  
autonomy. The marchers would assemble at lawns of UNI (9, Rafi Marg,  
New Delhi-110001) at 1000 AM and proceed towards Parliament House at  
1200 hrs. Several prominent media personalities have already extended  
their support to our struggle.

Regards,
(Rajesh Kumar)
General Secretary

o o o

(iv) Announcement of Health and Human Rights Course 2010

Centre for Enquiry into Health and Allied Themes (CEHAT) in  
collaboration with Tata Institute of Social Sciences is organizing an  
intensive course on Health and Human Rights exploring linkages  
between health and human rights to build skills in rights based  
monitoring and use of international and national instruments,  
designed for health and human rights activists.
  Attached herewith is the detailed prospectus and application form  
for your perusal. The course will be from 18th January to 27th  
January 2010 at FIAMC Bio-Medical Ethics Centre, St’ Pius College,  
Aarey Road, Goregaon East, Mumbai -400063.

We would request you to send in your duly filled application forms  
with course fee by cheques (for Mumbai participants) and demand  
drafts (for outstation participants) in favour of ANUSANDHAN TRUST -  
CEHAT.

For more details visit http://www.cehat.org/go/HhrCourse09/Home

Last date for receiving application is 23rd December 2009.

Please send your application form on cehatcourse at cehat.org


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South Asia Citizens Wire
Buzz for secularism, on the dangers of fundamentalism(s), on
matters of peace and democratisation in South
Asia. An offshoot of South Asia Citizens Web: www.sacw.net/

DISCLAIMER: Opinions expressed in materials carried in the posts do not
necessarily reflect the views of SACW compilers.