SACW Jan 23-24, 2011 | Sri Lanka Militarisation / Shabana of Swat / Bangladesh Border Kills / Kashmir / Pak India Ties / Algeria Protests

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire -  Dispatch No. 2703 - January 23-24, 2011
From: sacw.net

[1] Sri Lanka: The Militarisation of Sri Lanka’s Diplomatic And Administrative Services (Mandana Ismail Abeywickrema)
 - Galle Literary Festival: An international appeal (Reporters sans frontières and Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka)
[2] Pakistan: Long live Shabana of Swat (Atiqa Odho)
[3] India’s shoot-to-kill policy on the Bangladesh border (Brad Adams)
    - Stop killing with impunity on India Bangladesh border: select commentary
[4] ‘Inhospitable’ India (Mohsin Hamid)
[5] Make S. Asia a zone of peace (Faisal Rahim)
[6] Way forward in India-Pakistan relations (Mani Shankar Aiyar)
[7] Kashmir - India: The fabric of belonging (Siddharth Varadarajan)
[8] India: Expunge Supreme court remarks against Graham Staines (intellectuals & activists)
[9] India’s right wing protest against European observers who arrived to attend Binayak Sen’s bail hearing
[10] North African People Power: Saturday in Algiers (Karima Bennoune)
[11] Announcements:
(i) National Meet Tracing Sangh Terror Trail and Stories of Innocent Muslim Boys (28 January 2011, New Delhi)
(ii) IG Khan Memorial lecture and Discussion (29 January 2011, New Delhi)

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[1] Sri Lanka:

Sunday Leader, 23 January 2011

THE MILITARISATION OF SRI LANKA’S DIPLOMATIC AND ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES

by Mandana Ismail Abeywickrema

Military personnel handed diplomatic and government postings despite their lack of experience in their new posts

The government in post war Sri Lanka is fast militarising the administrative and diplomatic services. The appointment of military heads to key Sri Lankan missions overseas and state institutions has become a talking point among the general public. Since the appointment of military men in civil administration work as well as the diplomatic service, questions have been raised on their roles in such positions.

The difference in military discipline as opposed to the administrative and diplomatic services has caused friction between military personnel, career diplomats and public officials.

Furthermore, the militarisation of the administrative and diplomatic services has had an adverse impact on the careers of civilians who have been graded and promoted to positions according to a set of criteria in their respective line of work.

The country boasts of a rich history in relation to the administrative and diplomatic services.

The Sri Lanka Administrative Service (SLAS) is known to be the main administrative service of the government, with civil servants working for both the Central Government and the provincial councils.

It was formed in 1963 as the Ceylon Administrative Service (CAS) after the Ceylon Civil Service, which was abolished on May 1, 1963. The head of the SLAS is the Secretary to the President.

Meanwhile, the country’s foreign service was established on October 1, 1949, following the independence of Ceylon in 1948 as the Ceylon Overseas Service with the recruitment of its first batch of cadets to deal with foreign affairs.

Following Sri Lanka becoming a republic in 1972 the service changed its name to Sri Lanka Overseas Service also known as the Foreign Service. Be that as it may, the government’s move to militarise two of the country’s key sectors has now resulted in a considerable number of diplomatic missions and other institutions being headed by military personnel. Due to their inexperience in holding the offices they have been appointed to, some of the military men in key positions have run into various problems.

Major General Udaya Perera, who was the former Director Operations of the Sri Lanka Army, is the first serving Army officer to hold a diplomatic position as High Commissioner.

Perera is Sri Lanka’s Deputy High Commissioner to Malaysia. It is learnt that Perera has played a key role in the arrest of former LTTE International Wing leader ‘KP’ and has been stationed in Malaysia in order to crackdown on LTTE activities in the region.

However, he has now been accused by members of the Foreign Service of hampering the country’s diplomatic work in Malaysia. It is learnt that Perera, unable to grasp the concept of a diplomat, was creating a mess in relation to investment and other business ties with Malaysia.

The appointment of another Major General to a Sri Lankan mission caused an uproar among members of the Tamil Diaspora.

Major General Jagath Dias, who commanded the 57 Division during the fourth Eelam war, was appointed Sri Lanka’s Deputy Ambassador to Germany.

Dias’s appointment was challenged by Tamil Diaspora associations who at the time filed a petition at the European Court of Human Rights against the Federal Republic of Germany for accepting his appointment.

Former Air Force Commander and Chief of Defence Staff Air Chief Marshal Donald Perera, who is Sri Lanka’s maiden ambassador to Israel was also in the limelight recently over a controversial statement made by him.

In an undiplomatic move, Perera was quoted in an Israeli newspaper last year saying that Sri Lanka was a staunch supporter of Israel’s fight against Palestinian terror.

However, hours after the news was published, Perera issued a statement denying the controversial remarks attributed to him and said that the report was ‘totally erroneous.’

The government also tried to set up a Sri Lankan mission in Eritrea by appointing the former Head of the Directorate of Military Intelligence, Major General Amal Karunasekera as its charge d’ affairs.

Karunasekera’s mission was to hunt down LTTE assets in the East African country.

However, Karunasekera was later recalled following investigations into the killing of The Sunday Leader Editor Lasantha Wickrematunge, who was assassinated when Karunasekera was heading the Directorate of Military Intelligence.

The government’s move to appoint military men to diplomatic missions have run into problems at an international level too.

Two such incidents were the appointment of General Shavendra Silva as the Deputy Permanent Representative to Sri Lanka’s Mission in the UN in New York and the proposal to appoint former Navy Commander, Admiral Wasantha Karannagoda as Sri Lanka’s High Commissioner to the UK. Although Silva’s appointment went ahead despite concerns raised by the international community due to allegations of war crimes leveled against him, Karannagoda was not so lucky.

The government had to shelve the plan of sending Karannagoda as the High Commissioner to the UK following strong objections raised by the Tamil Diaspora there.
Karannagoda is now tipped to be appointed as Ambassador to the Sri Lankan mission in Tokyo, Japan. He also served as Secretary to the Highways Ministry, a post that is usually held by a member of Sri Lanka’s administrative service.
Apart from the diplomatic missions, the government has also appointed military men to state-run institutions as well.
The most recent such appointments are former Army Commander Lieutenant General Rohan Daluwatte as the Chairman, National Gem and Jewellery Corporation, and the three armed forces chiefs to the Board of the Water’s Edge members-only club at Battaramulla.

Uniforms In Key Positions
Following are some of the military leaders who have been appointed to Sri Lankan missions overseas and to state institutions:

1. Air Chief Marshal Jayalath Weerakkody (former Air Force Chief) – Sri Lanka’s High Commissioner to Pakistan
2. Air Chief Marshal Donald Perera (former Air Force Chief and Chief of Defence Staff) – Sri Lanka’s Ambassador to Israel
3. Major General Nanda Mallawaarachchi (former Chief of Staff of the Army) – Sri Lanka’s Ambassador to Indonesia
4. Major General Udaya Perera (Director Operations of the Sri Lanka Army) – Sri Lanka’s Deputy High Commissioner to Malaysia
5. Major General Jagath Dias (former General Officer Commanding the 57th Division) – Sri Lanka’s Deputy Ambassador to Germany
6. Major General Shavendra Silva (former General Officer Commanding the 58th Division) – Deputy Permanent Representative for Sri Lanka in the UN
7. Admiral Wasantha Karannagoda (former Navy Commander) – Highways Ministry Secretary and tipped to become Sri Lanka’s Ambassador to Japan
8. Admiral Thisara Samarasinghe (former Navy Commander) – Board Member, Water’s Edge Complex and tipped to become Sri Lanka’s High Commissioner to Australia
9. Major General Amal Karunasekara (former Head of the Directorate of Military Intelligence) – Charge d’ affaires for the proposed Sri Lankan Mission in Eritrea
10. Major General G.A. Chandrasiri (former Jaffna security forces commander) – Northern Province Governor
11. Rear Admiral Mohan Wijewickrema (former Navy Chief of Staff) – Eastern Province Governor
12. Lieutenant General Rohan Daluwatte (former Army Commander) – Chairman, National Gem and Jewellery Authority
13. Lieutenant General Jagath Jayasuriya (current Army Commander) – Board Member, Water’s Edge Complex
14. Air Chief Marshal Roshan Gunathilake (current Air Force Chief) – Board Member, Water’s Edge Complex

The above is also available at: http://www.sacw.net/article1890.html

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GALLE LITERARY FESTIVAL: AN INTERNATIONAL APPEAL
initiated by Reporters sans frontières and Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka
http://www.sacw.net/article1888.html

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[2]  Pakistan:

The Express Tribune, January 22, 2011

LONG LIVE SHABANA OF SWAT

By Atiqa Odho

The writer is communications adviser of the All-Pakistan Muslim League atiqa.odho at tribune.com.pk

There are times when one gets tired of wondering when all the trouble in Pakistan will come to an end. I am hopeful that we shall weather these turbulent times and learn something important from them along the way. To understand our inner strength, we need to study the recent war won in Swat against terrorists who are invading and trying to destroy our country.

Swat was under attack and our army went in to control the situation, eliminate the militants and help bring normalcy to life in the area. While our army was out there doing its job, I couldn’t help but wonder why it took the civil society so long to realise how important it was to win the war against terror in the valley.

When militants started shutting girls’ schools down in the region and beheading men who opposed them, I kept thinking about how I would have felt if it were my daughters that were being robbed of an education or, God forbid, life itself. Then the horrific incident of Shabana took place where militants dragged this young woman out of her home and brutally murdered her after she refused to give up her job. Her final request — “don’t slit my throat, just shoot me” — was granted by the militants. It was a tragedy that her life was stolen but a greater one would have been if we didn’t finally wake up to fight for justice.

So on March 8, 2009, International Women’s Day, we held a public rally in Karachi where many friends came out in support of our Swati sisters. The rally went well and we made a strong statement, which, I believe, motivated others to eventually come out.

My visit to Mingora in August 2009, left me full of conflicting emotions, as I was both humbled and troubled when the locals came out in hundreds to tell me that I was the first public figure to come visit them since the trouble had started. The smiles on their faces were worth the trip. It seemed that they got strength from knowing that the rest of Pakistan was supporting them.

When I finally visited the girls’ schools that we had fought so hard for, I was overwhelmed by emotion at seeing our children back where they belonged: in the classroom. It didn’t matter that we were meeting for the first time, the important thing was that we had shared a war and won.

On March 8, 2010 we finally held a rally in Mingora itself, among our sisters there. Hundreds of women of all ages walked together to show solidarity against injustice. That day I felt as if Shabana’s voice had truly been heard and we had, as a nation, fought back injustice.

It is unfair to think that change can never happen. It can, if we put our mind to it and become united against tyranny and injustice.


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[3]  Bangladesh - India

The Guardian, 23 January 2011

INDIA'S SHOOT-TO-KILL POLICY ON THE BANGLADESH BORDER

Security officials openly admit that unarmed civilians trying to enter India illegally are being killed. Will the government act?

by Brad Adams

Do good fences make good neighbours? Not along the India-Bangladesh border. Here, India has almost finished building a 2,000km fence. Where once people on both sides were part of a greater Bengal, now India has put up a "keep out" sign to stop illegal immigration, smuggling and infiltration by anti-government militants.

This might seem unexceptional in a world increasingly hostile to migration. But to police the border, India's Border Security Force (BSF), has carried out a shoot-to-kill policy – even on unarmed local villagers. The toll has been huge. Over the past 10 years Indian security forces have killed almost 1,000 people, mostly Bangladeshis, turning the border area into a south Asian killing fields. No one has been prosecuted for any of these killings, in spite of evidence in many cases that makes it clear the killings were in cold blood against unarmed and defenceless local residents.

Shockingly, some Indian officials endorse shooting people who attempt to cross the border illegally, even if they are unarmed. Almost as shocking is the lack of interest in these killings by foreign governments who claim to be concerned with human rights. A single killing by US law enforcement along the Mexican border makes headlines. The killing of large numbers of villagers by Indian forces has been almost entirely ignored.

The violence is routine and arbitrary. Alauddin Biswas described to Human Rights Watch the killing of his 24-year-old nephew, who was suspected of cattle rustling, by Indian border guards in March 2010. "The BSF had shot him while he was lying on his back. They shot him in the forehead. If he was running away, he would have been shot in the back. They just killed him." The BSF claimed self-defence, but no weapons were recovered.

Nazrul Islam, a Bangladeshi, was luckier. "At around 3am we decided to cross the Indian border," he said. He was headed to India to smuggle cows back to Bangladesh. "As soon as the BSF saw us, they started firing without warning." Islam was shot in his arm, but survived.

Some of the victims have been children. One father recounted how his sons were beaten by BSF officers. "The BSF personnel surrounded the boys and without giving any reason started beating them with rifle butts, kicking and slapping them. There were nine soldiers, and they beat my sons mercilessly. Even as the boys fell down, the BSF men continued to kick them ruthlessly on their chest and other sensitive organs."

The border has long been crossed routinely by local people for trade and commerce. It is also crossed by relatives and friends separated by a line arbitrarily drawn by the British during partition in 1947. As with the Mexican border in the United States, the border has become an emotive issue in Indian politics, as millions of Bangladeshis now live in India illegally. Many are exploited as cheap labour.

India has the right to impose border controls. But India does not have the right to use lethal force except where strictly necessary to protect life. Yet some Indian officials openly admit that unarmed civilians are being killed. The head of the BSF, Raman Srivastava, says that people should not feel sorry for the victims, claiming that since these individuals were illegally entering Indian territory, often at night, they were "not innocent" and therefore were a legitimate target.

Though India is a state with functional courts, he apparently believes the BSF can act as judge, jury and executioner. This approach also ignores the many victims, such as a 13-year-old named Abdur Rakib, who broke no law and was killed simply because he was near the fence. Sadly, Bangladeshi border officials have also suggested that such killings are acceptable if the victim was engaged in smuggling.

As the recent WikiLeaks report about endemic torture in Kashmir underscores, Indian soldiers and police routinely commit human rights violations without any consequences. Permission has to be granted by a senior Indian official for the police to even begin an investigation into a crime committed by a member of the security forces, such as the BSF. This rarely happens.

The response of various government officials to allegations of a shoot-to-kill policy has been confusing: we do shoot illegal border crossers since they are lawbreakers; we don't shoot border crossers; we only shoot in self-defence; we never shoot to kill.

But there is some reason for hope. Under pressure, senior Indian officials have expressed revulsion at the behaviour of the BSF and have promised to send new orders to end the shoot-to-kill policy. They have committed to use nonviolent means to apprehend illegal border crossers or smugglers where they pose no risk to life. The question is whether this will be translated into action on the ground. Similar promises of "zero tolerance" for abuses have been made in Kashmir and elsewhere but have not been fulfilled.

As India's economy has grown and foreign investors have flocked in, its human rights record has largely flown under the radar in recent years. But India is a growing world power with increasing influence. It should understand that its behaviour will come under increasing scrutiny. Routinely shooting poor, unarmed villagers is not how the world's largest democracy should behave.

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SEE ALSO: 

STOP KILLING WITH IMPUNITY ON INDIA BANGLADESH BORDER
A COMPILATION OF SELECTED COMMENTARY
http://www.sacw.net/article1889.html


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[4] Pakistan - India:

Mail Today, 21 January 2011

‘INHOSPITABLE’ INDIA
by Mohsin Hamid

The Border between India and Pakistan has become less permeable, with India making it difficult for the Pakistani liberal intellectual to come calling, Man Booker Prize-shortlisted novelist Mohsin Hamid said over the phone from Lahore. Like others from the Pakistani contingent of writers slated to visit Jaipur, Hamid had difficulty obtaining a visa. But his did come through at the last minute. Fatima Bhutto, niece and critic of Pakistani president Asif Ali Zardari (and his slain wife Benazir), wasn’t that lucky. Kamila Shamsie too has been having trouble getting her papers processed in Karachi. Hamid said the passage to India for actors, musicians and writers from across the border hasn’t been easy in recent years. He said: “There are only two flights a week from Lahore to Delhi now, though there used to be more. Fewer people are travelling across.” Expressing concern over New Delhi’s recent “inhospitality” to Pakistani liberals, Hamid said, “India seems to be pursuing a relationship with Pakistan that is counter-productively hawkish.” He also challenged the idea of free speech being welcome in this country. “If in Pakistan, an affront to religious discourse could get you killed, in India, speaking for the independence of Kashmir could get you prosecuted,” Hamid said.

The way forward, he said, was to “strengthen peaceloving people on both sides”. But no one seems to be buying this line on this side of the border.

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[5]  South Asia:

Holiday, 21 January 2011

MAKE S. ASIA A ZONE OF PEACE

by Faisal Rahim

Rights activists and civil society leaders from SAARC member states at a two-day meeting here in Bangladesh capital last week failed to adopt a resolution to condemn the killing of a teenage Bangladeshi girl name Felani, who was shot dead by India's Border Security Force (BSF) jawans on 7 January after she got entangled in the barbed-wire fence along the border in Kurigram district.
   The killing came as a big shock to the nation because of the brutal way the BSF used to gun down her in the barbed-wire fence on Indian border as she was crossing it from the Indian side with her father while returning home from Delhi to get her married next day.
   She remained hanging on the barbed fence for half an hour as local people saw her cry from a distance failing to rescue her.
   The meeting, however, adopted a condemnation resolution on Pakistan's Panjub province governor Salman Tasser who was recently gunned down by his bodyguard on the plea that he had supported the amendment move of blasphemy law.
   This resolution won the support as it was tabled to condemn the religious fanaticism of the guard. But why the civil society activists failed to condemn the murder of the BSF - yet another form of fanaticism - remained unanswered.
   Sources said the condemnation of BSF action was not liked by many on the floor as the Indian participants were either not in favour of it or they were afraid of annoying them. Whatever the reason, the doing of the SAARC civil society leaders have lost their credibility. They apparently proved to be the captive of the big players in the regional group.
   Interestingly while the SAARC civil society forum failed to condemn BSF action, Indian officials meeting here simultaneously last week at the home secretary level expressed regret on the killing of Felani accepting the guilt.
   They however discussed on many issues in the meeting from politics, to regional integration, impacts of globalization and climate change and a host of common plan of actions in all fronts including a border free, peaceful new South Asia saved from war and conflicts. They also spoke of developing a new growth paradigm to ensure full exploitation of human and natural resources to the benefits of its common people.
   
   People-to-people contacts
   The discussants said, South Asia should be made a conflict-free zone. There should be more people-to-people contacts through gradual elimination of border restrictions. But national economies of member states should be allowed to prosper in areas where possible.
   Former Indian Naval Chief M Ramdas warned that regional leaders should be cautious of both internal and external machinations as the region is becoming increasingly vulnerable to external aggression. He said powers like the USA is mainly promoting the conflicts in the region to continue its arms sale and bolster her domestic economy.
   Prof Anisuzzaman said regional leaders from the elite social group have lost contacts with grassroots and therefore the SAARC process is failing to achieve the goal of achieving more integration and intra-regional development.
   
   South Asian Union
   Indian rights activist Kamala Bhasin said to achieve the gradual transformation to a common future like the South Asian Union, people should tend to ignore borders and local and national identity in favour of a common South Asian identity.
   They spoke of creating an environment for developing a 'people's regionalism' away from the process of integration that the governments of the member states are now pursuing through official platforms.
   They said they are rather exploiting the process to their advantage which meant to retain the border, their local political infrastructure and power base to perpetuate the hold on state and its resources keeping the nation divided on everlasting issues like war and such other tensions from home and abroad. 

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[6] India-Pakistan:

The Hindu, 24 January 2011

WAY FORWARD IN INDIA-PAKISTAN RELATIONS

by Mani Shankar Aiyar

Seven steps towards achieving an ‘uninterrupted and uninterruptible' dialogue.

Fifteen years ago, in a book called “Pakistan Papers,” largely comprising a long despatch I wrote in my last days as Consul-General of India in Karachi, which I was surprisingly permitted by the government to publish as representing my “personal views”, I had first suggested a process of “uninterrupted and uninterruptible dialogue” as the only way forward for our two countries. My suggestion had no takers then. It has no takers now. Yet, I see no alternative to structuring such a dialogue if we really are to effect a systemic transformation of the relationship.

I know that most in the Establishment of both countries would seriously disagree. They would argue that differences are so fundamental and intentions so hostile that to be tricked into talking without knowing where such talk would lead would amount to compromising vital security concerns, that it would jeopardise national interests and render diplomatic initiative hostage to a meandering dialogue from which there would be no escape. Better to keep the guard up, look reality squarely in the face, and leave romanticism to soft-hearted poets – and out-of-work Consuls General.

There is also the other argument, growing stronger in India by the day, and possibly among the younger generation in Pakistan, that we have lived in simmering hostility for the last six decades and can do so indefinitely, best to let matters simmer while we get on with other things instead of engaging in fruitless exchange.

I belong to that minority that thinks there are three compelling reasons why India should pro-actively engage with Pakistan. First, for the domestic reason that a tension-free relationship with Pakistan would help us consolidate our nationhood, the bonding adhesive of which is secularism. Second, for the regional reason that regional terrorism can be effectively tackled only in cooperation with Pakistan and not in confrontation with it. Third, for the international reason that India will not be able to play its due role in international affairs so long as it is dragged down by its quarrels with Pakistan.

Equally, I believe it is in Pakistan's interest to seek accommodation with India for three counterpart reasons. First, the Indian bogey has harmed rather than helped consolidate the nationhood of Pakistan. Second, Pakistan is unable to become a full-fledged democracy and a sustained fast-growing economy owing to the disproportionate role assigned to alleged Indian hostility in the national affairs of the country. And, third, on the international stage, Pakistan is one of the biggest countries in the world and instead of being the front-line in someone else's war perhaps deserves to come into its own as the frontline state in the pursuit of its own interests.

As for just turning our backs on each other, Siamese twins have no option but to move together even when they are attempting to pull away from each other.

So, what is the way forward from today's impasse? I do not think the impact on the Indian mind of 26/11 is fully comprehended in Pakistan, even as I do not think Indians are sufficiently aware of the extent to which Pakistanis are concerned about terrorism generated from their soil, whoever the target might be, India, the West or Pakistan itself. I suspect that the least positive movement in the direction of determinedly going after the perpetrators of 26/11 will generate a disproportionately positive reaction in India, enabling the stalled peace process to resume its forward movement.

Should the Pakistan government assist the Indian government in this manner to return to the negotiating table, then the first task would be to consolidate the gains of the 13-year old Composite Dialogue. Irrespective of whether progress on the back-channel is acknowledged or not, the official position of the two governments has grown so much closer to each other's than ever before that even by returning to the front table and taking up each component of the Composite Dialogue, including, above all, issues related to Jammu & Kashmir, we could dramatically alter the atmosphere in which to pursue the outstanding matters.

In such a changed atmosphere, it would be essential to immediately move to the next phase of what I hope and pray will be an “uninterrupted and uninterruptible” dialogue. Let me place before you, in outline, what I envisage as the essential elements to be structured into an “uninterrupted and uninterruptible” dialogue:

One, the venue must be such that neither India nor Pakistan can forestall the dialogue from taking place. Following the example of the supervision of the armistice in Korea at Panmunjom for more than half a century, such a venue might best be the Wagah-Attari border, where the table is laid across the border, so that the Pakistan delegation does not have to leave Pakistan to attend the dialogue and the Indians do not have to leave India to attend.

Two, as in the case of the talks at the Hotel Majestic in Paris which brought the U.S.-Vietnam war to an end, there must be a fixed periodicity at which the two sides shall necessarily meet. In the Hotel Majestic case, the two sides met every Thursday, whether or not they had anything to say to each other. Indeed, even through the worst of what were called the “Christmas bombings” — when more bombs were rained on Vietnam than by both sides in the Second World War — the Thursday meetings were not disrupted. In a similar manner, we need to inure the India-Pakistan dialogue from disruption of any kind in this manner.

Third, the dialogue must not be fractionated, as the Composite Dialogue has been, between different sets of interlocutors. As in the case of Hotel Majestic, where the U.S. side was led by Kissinger and the Vietnamese by Le Duc Tho (both won the Nobel prize), Ministerial-level statesmen should lead the two sides with their advisers perhaps changing, depending on the subject under discussion, but the two principal interlocutors remaining the same so that cross-segmental agreements can be reached enabling each side to gain on the swings what it feels it might have lost on the roundabouts. Thus, the holistic and integral nature of the dialogue will be preserved.

Fourth, instead of an agenda agreed in advance, which only leads to endless bickering over procedure, each side should be free to bring any two subjects of its choice on the table by giving due notice at the previous meeting and, perhaps, one mutually agreed subject could thereafter be addressed by both sides.

Fifth, half an hour should be set aside for each side to bring its topical concerns to the attention of the side. This will persuade the general public in both countries that the dialogue is not an exercise in appeasement.

Sixth, there should be no timeline for the conclusion of the Dialogue. This will enable both sides to come to considered, and therefore, durable conclusions without either feeling they have been rushed to a conclusion against their better judgment.

Seventh, and finally, as diplomacy requires confidentiality, there will, of course, have to be some opaqueness in the talks; at the same time, we cannot afford to swing the other way and bring in total transparency; so, what I would suggest is a translucent process where spokespersons of the two sides regularly brief the media but without getting into public spats with each other. Dignity and good will must be preserved to bridge the trust deficit.

I commend this seven-point programme for your consideration. I cannot guarantee that such a dialogue will lead to success, but I do guarantee that not talking will lead us nowhere.

( Mani Shankar Aiyar is a Member of Parliament. This is an edited excerpt from his Wilhelm von Pochhammer Memorial Lecture delivered in New Delhi, which was similar to an address given by him to the Karachi Council of Foreign Relations. The full text is available at www.thehindu.com)
 

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[7]  Kashmir - India:

The Hindu, 24 January 2011

THE FABRIC OF BELONGING

by Siddharth Varadarajan

Had the national flag which the BJP wants to unfurl in Srinagar also been dipped by them to honour the memory of the hundred young Indians who were shot dead in the valley last year, Kashmir would be a very different place.

Jammu and Kashmir is a part of India but the people of Kashmir can be forgiven for believing their country has forsaken them.

Throughout the summer of their most recent discontent, when a hundred young men and women lost their lives in police firing, leaders from the ruling and opposition parties acted as if nothing untoward had happened. Six months earlier, the mere threat of violence in Hyderabad led the Union Home Minister to declare the government had agreed to the formation of a separate state for Telangana. In Rajasthan, the blockade of national highways by agitating Gujjars produced an instant offer of dialogue and negotiation. But in Kashmir, the corpses kept piling up while the government, the Opposition (with some honourable exceptions) and civil society in the rest of India reacted with the kind of detachment reserved for death and destruction in faraway lands like Darfur and Iraq.

The interlocuters

The fact that the public mood in the valley began to soften slightly only after an all-party delegation visited Srinagar and condoled with some of the victims' families underlined something quite unpleasant about ourselves. That the indifference of mainland India to the suffering of the ordinary Kashmiri is as much a factor in the alienation of the State as the politics of separatism and the violence of extremist groups operating with the tacit and sometimes overt backing of the Pakistani military. With characteristic indecisiveness, however, the Manmohan Singh government failed swiftly to capitalise on that initiative. When a group of interlocutors was finally appointed with a fairly open-ended mandate to listen, talk and report back, the mood in Kashmir had once again begun to harden. The fact that Dileep Padgaonkar, Radha Kumar and M.M. Ansari have still managed to make some headway in their interactions is more a result of their own personal commitment to changing the terms of New Delhi's engagement with the valley than with the attitude of the Centre and of Political India, which continue to send mixed signals.

One day, the Union Home Secretary tells reporters the government is prepared to pare down the presence of the security forces in Kashmir, the next day this statement is bluntly contradicted by the Defence Minister. The Prime Minister and Union Home Minister speak of amending the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act while the Army Chief announces publicly that he will never accept this. In the Machchil fake encounter case, the same general declares that his soldiers — who are accused of kidnapping and killing three young Kashmiri men — can never get justice in Kashmir, as if the State is not a part of India. Only the Army, he said, will be allowed to investigate the matter. Of course, in the Pathribal fake encounter of 2000 — where the Army has taken the Central Bureau of Investigation all the way to the Supreme Court to prevent its officers from standing trial for murder — the Army has not seen fit to even proceed against them under its own authority. Surely such a cavalier attitude to justice ought not to be tolerated in an integral part of India?

The Government of India rightly protested when Beijing began treating Kashmir-born or Kashmir-domiciled Indians differently from the rest while issuing visas for travel to China. But the same government does not mind treating Kashmiri Indians differently when it comes to issuing passports for them to travel. A Srinagar-born colleague of mine whose family left Kashmir to live in Delhi as part of the forced migration of Pandits from the valley in the 1990s was recently told by the Passport Office that she had to provide additional documentation that other Indians are not required to do in order to obtain a passport. As for Kashmiris applying for Indian passports in Srinagar, a recent documentary film by Ashvin Kumar, Inshallah Football, documents the heartbreaking experience they have to endure before the country which so emotionally claims them as its own will allow them to travel abroad.

Hoisting the flag

As the Centre's three interlocutors plough a lonely furrow through the infertile and even hostile soil of distrust and alienation, patiently listening to and cataloguing popular grievances, the Bharatiya Janata Party wants to rekindle a sense of estrangement by staging a provocative and high profile yatra to Srinagar in order to hoist the Indian flag at Lal Chowk in the heart of the city's commercial centre on January 26.

There is nothing patriotic or noble about the BJP's plans and intentions. Instead of a reassuring voyage of solidarity and empathy aimed at reassuring the people of the State that the party will fight for the sacred values of truth, justice and inclusiveness which the flag embodies, the party is planning an expedition based on the flawed belief that meaningless symbolism is all that is required to win hearts and minds and cement Kashmir's status as a part of India.

If a sense of national belonging can be instilled and solidified by the mere hoisting of a flag, 60 years of official ceremonies in Srinagar ought to have ended the sense of alienation that is writ large over the valley. Even if the BJP goes ahead with their mindless yatra, it will not alter the realities on the ground one bit and would actually make the situation worse. Whatever we may say or do or wish, surely Kashmir will be an integral part of India in a meaningful sense only when the residents of Srinagar themselves throng to Lal Chowk and hoist the tri-colour themselves. The challenge for the Indian polity is to create the conditions for that to happen one day, however difficult that may seem today. But the BJP's proposed flaghoisting is not just an exercise in naivette or cynicism. It is the product of a mindset that considers Kashmir to be terra nullius, an empty landscape to be coveted and possessed rather than a land with a people and soul who acceded to India in 1947 on the basis of a covenant which must be respected in full measure and who have as much right to a life with dignity as those elsewhere in the country do.

A politician can drape himself in the national flag but it is the texture of his politics which will determine whether he truly cares for the nation and its peoples or not. Today, the Congress politician and businessman Naveen Jindal is known not for fighting a landmark case over the right of ordinary citizens to fly the flag but for his endorsement of the obscurantist tradition of khap panchayats. Ministers and officials will preside over flag hoisting ceremonies on Republic Day throughout India even as their policies and actions in the preceding year have bled the hallowed earth on which they stand dry. Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel and the people of India know this only too well. If the BJP really wants to do something for the country, let them take their yatra to Karnataka. There is a large plot of land in that State which the party's chief minister signed over to his relatives. Let the process of safeguarding this country from those who are undermining its foundations begin by planting the national flag there.


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[8] India: Courts and Communal bias

The Hindu, January 23, 2011

EXPUNGE REMARKS AGAINST GRAHAM STAINES: SUPREME COURT'S REMARKS “GRATUITOUS” AND “UNCONSTITUTIONAL”

New Delhi: Leading editors, media groups and civil society members from across the country have signed a statement taking strong exception to the Supreme Court's observation that the killers of Graham Staines and his two minor children intended to teach the Australian missionary a lesson for preaching and practising conversion.

While upholding the life sentence awarded to Bajrang Dal activist Dara Singh for the 1999 killings, a Bench said on Friday: “In the case on hand, though Graham Staines and his two minor sons were burnt to death while they were sleeping inside a station wagon at Manhoharpur, the intention was to teach a lesson to Graham Staines about his religious activities, namely, converting poor tribals to Christianity.”

The Bench of Justices P. Sathasivam and B.S. Chauhan went on to add: “It is undisputed that there is no justification for interfering in someone's belief by way of ‘use of force', provocation, conversion, incitement or upon a flawed premise that one religion is better than the other. It strikes at the very root of the orderly society, which the founding fathers of our Constitution dreamt of.”

Arguing that the remarks were “gratuitous,” “unconstitutional” and went against the “freedom of faith” guaranteed by the Constitution, the signatories asked that they be expunged. “Did the SC [Supreme Court] ever take into consideration the report of the Wadhwa Commission which was set up to probe the murder of Graham Staines and which had observed, ‘There has been no extraordinary increase in the Christian population in Keonjhar district between 1991 and 1998. The population had increased by 595 during this period and this could have been caused by natural growth'. The SC ruling may in fact send the wrong signals to courts trying cases of religious violence in Kandhamal, for instance, and in other places. It also tends to pre-empt possible challenges to the black laws enacted by many States in the guise of Freedom of Religion Bills.”

The signatories said the Supreme Court and other judicial forums were secular India's last hope to preserve constitutional guarantees given to religious minorities and other marginalised groups. “Judgments such as this one” and the Ayodhya verdict delivered by the Allahabad High Court were disturbing because they could be interpreted as “supporting the bigoted point of view of right wing fundamentalists such as the Sangh Parivar.”

Further, “the state cannot abrogate its responsibilities” towards preserving the secular fabric of the country. “We expect the government to ask the SC to expunge the unnecessary, uncalled for and unconstitutional remarks.”

signed by Anand Patwardhan, Fr. Dominic Emanuel, Harsh Mander, John Dayal, Navaid Hamid, H.L. Hardenia, Praful Bidwai, Ram Puniyani, Shabnam Hashmi, Shahid Siddiqui, and Seema Mustafa.

SEE ALSO:
http://communalism.blogspot.com/2011/01/aicc-statement-on-court-verdict-for.html
http://communalism.blogspot.com/2011/01/cpiml-statement-re-sc-comments-on.html

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[9] India’s right wing protest against European observers who arrived to attend Binayak Sen’s bail hearing

From: The Times of India, 24 January 2011

EU observers for Sen’s bail hearing face protests

PTI, Jan 24, 2011, 12.36am IST

RAIPUR: An eight-member team of European Union, which arrived here on Sunday night to witness Human rights activist Binayak Sen’s bail hearing tomorrow, faced protests from lawyers and ABVP workers who showed EU representatives black flags and shouted slogans against them.

The team that arrived at the airport with eminent lawyer Ram Jethmalani, a BJP MP, faced protests from members of bar council and Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, who shouted “European Union go back” and alleged the 27-member body of influencing judicial process in India.

“EU representatives come as observers but try to influence judicial process in India. We will not tolerate this,” a protester said.

Jethmalani refused to comment on the protests. The European Union delegation include representatives of Delhi based diplomatic missions from Belgium, France, Germany, Hungary, Sweden and the UK.

The hearing is scheduled to take place at the Chhattisgarh high court in Bilaspur on Monday. The bail plea comes exactly after one month of Binayak’s conviction for sedition, and sentencing to life.

Civil rights activists have been demanding his release.

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[10] North Africa:

http://intlawgrrls.blogspot.com/

NORTH AFRICAN PEOPLE POWER: SATURDAY IN ALGIERS
(Part 2 of IntLawGrrl Karima Bennoune's series on developments in North Africa; Part 1 appeared 1st at IntLawGrrls, here, and, we're proud to say, was reprinted at The Nation, here.)

Today the Algerian government tried to hold back the winds of change blowing westward from neighboring Tunisia by besieging its own capital city.
A peaceful protest called by the Algerian opposition party, the Rassemblement pour la culture et la démocratie (RCD), on the Place du 1er Mai was forcefully disrupted by large numbers of heavily armed riot police. One report claimed that 10,000 police had been deployed. Meanwhile, as many as 42 people were injured, several seriously, and others arrested, including a photojournalist. (photo credit)
Security forces encircled the RCD headquarters on the Didouche Mourad, the main thoroughfare of Algiers, and set up checkpoints to prevent protestors from arriving in the capital from other parts of the county, or from reaching the Place du 1er Mai from other parts of the city. As depicted in this YouTube video, the trapped protestors – and those on balconies above – waved Algerian and Tunisian flags and chanted “Djazaïr, horra, dimocratia.” (“A free and democratic Algeria!”)
Today’s protest had been organized around very specific demands, set forth in the poster below right:
► the lifting of the state of emergency in place since 1992,
► the opening of political space,
► the restoration of individual liberties and constitutional rights, and
► the liberation of those demonstrators arrested during the riots and protests that erupted across Algeria earlier this month who remain detained.
In fact, today’s events but illustrate the importance of those very demands.
The RCD had applied for a permit for this demonstration – and the government summarily denied permission. Hence, the gathering was technically unlawful, putting protestors at risk of arrest. The wilaya, or province, of Algiers put out a widely broadcast statement Thursday calling on the population to show “wisdom and vigilance,” and not to respond to the call to protest. According to these authorities’ Orwellian message, “protests in Algiers are not authorized and any public gathering is to be considered a breach of the peace.” They acted on those pronouncements today.
Many Algerians remember all too well the émeutes of October 1988 when a previous generation of protestors were shot – perhaps as many as 500 in a week’s time – arrested in large numbers, and tortured. And this week the United Nations said that 100 people have died in recent events in neighboring Tunisia. So, there is reason to be concerned about the safety of those who will be involved in what are likely now to be ongoing demonstrations.
In the beginning, the U.S. media and government paid little attention to the protests in neighboring Tunisia. That mistake should not be repeated. The international media should closely follow developments in Algeria so as to let the Algerian government – and democracy activists – know that the world is watching.
Today’s events come amid escalating political tensions in the country.
In recent days Ahmed Badaoui, a trade unionist, was arrested and accused of fomenting rebellion in relation to a text message he sent regarding events in Tunisia. Subsequently, a coalition of political parties, human rights groups, unemployed youth and trade unionists met and agreed to hold a joint protest on February 9, which will mark the nineteenth anniversary of the declaration of a state of emergency in Algeria.
Peaceful protests like these are crucial because real change is needed and demanded by so many Algerians:
► One is the man with desperate eyes whom I interviewed in Algeria in October, a victim of the fundamentalist terrorism of the 1990s, unable to obtain a job, traveling from government office to office unsuccessfully seeking assistance for himself and his children with his collection of ripped documents.
► Or the Algerian artists who last week braved the police in the Rue Hassiba Ben Bouali – an Algiers street named for the nationalist heroine killed by the French Army - to express their opposition to the stifling of freedom of expression.
► Then there are those who live ten to a room in the quartiers populaires with few prospects of getting a job or getting ahead, and without avenues to peacefully express their anguish.
► Or those countless harragas who as a result attempt to flee illegally by boat across the Mediterranean to Europe every year in search of a better life, and too often find an anonymous death on the sea.
► And finally, those Algerian men and women who have expressed the ultimate frustration in recent days setting their own bodies on fire as if to try and recreate Mohamed Bouaziz’s catalytic Tunisian moment.
In fact, according to the Algerian newspaper El Watan, this week these various manifestations of despair intersected when a group of young harragas set their own boat on fire after being caught by the authorities. Remember Fanon’s “the wretched of the earth”? These are the wretched of the sea. How desperate must a young person be when he would rather burn himself to death than return home?
On the subject of the rash of self-immolations, see the excellent article in the January 21 issue of El Watan by Chawki Amari, Melanie Matarese, Ramdane Koubabi and Ghellab Smail, entitled “Immolation: I burn therefore I am.” It features the testimonies of some of those who have recently tried to incinerate themselves in protest, including a 40-year-old divorced woman struggling to make ends meet, whose mother was humiliated by local officials when she went to request that their dwelling be included in a public works program, and a 34-year-old unemployed man wrapped in bandages who explained that burning himself “was the only way to denounce la hogra (the arrogance with which officials sometimes treat ordinary people), contempt and …misery...”
Algeria fought a bloody, decade-long battle to defeat armed fundamentalism in the 1990s, and many thousands of ordinary Algerians were killed by fundamentalist terrorism. (In fact, the authors of “I burn therefore I am” make a link between that experience of largely unredressed violence and the current waves of self-immolation.) The government often uses the threat of terrorism to justify the continuation of the state of emergency and the prohibition of gatherings in the capital city like the one scheduled for today. Of course, there is a considerable irony to this, as it is the same government which has amnestied all of the perpetrators of the 1990s, to the horror of many advocates for victims. Moreover, it is profoundly heartening that attempts by fundamentalists to rally early January’s demonstrators to their banner failed entirely.
In light of all this, the government of the United States would be mistaken in thinking that the best way to assure its security interests in the ongoing fight against Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) in Algeria and elsewhere is to simply overlook legitimate popular frustration in the region.
Unquestionably, the Algerian military has played a significant role in the fight against AQIM. However, it must also be noted that as of now in Algeria there is little to no popular support for AQIM, an organization descended from the remains of the armed groups that brutalized the population in the 1990s. It is especially loathed of late because of its reported involvement in kidnappings, which have also sparked large protests in parts of the country.
Although security is used to justify the stifling of peaceful expression like today’s demonstration, it is actually vital, both for human rights and for real security, that legitimate popular grievances are heard and redressed democratically. This can help to maintain the consensus against AQIM and against fundamentalism as a political alternative, while improving the quality of life for millions. And figures like Saïd Sadi, head of the RCD, have warned that if peaceful protest proves impossible and democratic changes are not made, serious violence could erupt. He argues that there is even more anger in Algeria than in Tunisia.
What happens next depends in part on how many Algerians defy the ban on peaceful protests in Algiers and attend the February 9 demonstration, and on how the authorities respond. The best ways to honor the memory of so many who sacrificed for the country, whether during the 1950s/1960s battle against colonialism, or the 1990s battle against fundamentalism, would be to allow the next “unauthorized” peaceful march to proceed without the repression witnessed today, and to permit such gatherings to be the start of a new social democratic opening in Algeria that creates a better future for all its people.
Imagine a North Africa where a truly democratic Algeria adjoins a free Tunisia…



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[11] ANNOUNCEMENTS:

(i) NATIONAL MEET TRACING SANGH TERROR TRAIL AND STORIES OF INNOCENT MUSLIM BOYS
 
January 28, 2011
10am to 6pm
Constitution Club of India, Rafi Marg, New Delhi
 
Release : ' What it Means to be a Muslim in India Today?"
12 noon, compilation of real life stories of  torture, discrimination, hate, violence, aliniation...
 
Speakers

AMIT SENGUPTA, ASHISH KHAITAN, CHITARANJAN SINGH, DIGVIJAY SINGH, FARAH NAQVI, IFTIKHAR GILANI, MANISHA SETHY , PRASHANT BHUSHAN, RAMVILAS PASWAN, SATYA SIVARAMAN, SEEMA MUSTAFA, SITARAM YECHURY, SUBHASH GATADE, SURESH KHAIRNAR, TARUN TEJPAL, VRINDA GROVER & SURVIVORS 
 
 
Organized by
ANHAD
Bhartiya Muslim Mahila Andolan
Foundation for Civil Liberties, Jaipur
INSAF
Jamia Teacher’s Solidarity Association, Delhi
SANDARBH, Indore
SIASAT, Hyderabad

(ii)

The I G Khan Memorial Trust

invites you to

LIFE UNDER AFSPA
‘Social Justice and the Armed Forces Act’
a lecture by

BASHARAT PEER
Journalist and author of CURFEWED NIGHT

Kennedy Auditorium: 11am

PANEL DISCUSSION
‘Youth and the act: Growing up under the AFSPA’

Deepti Priya Mehrotra Author and Activist
Dr Seema Kazi Researcher
Himandshu kumar Founder VCA, Dantewada
Basharat Peer

Staff club lounge: 2.30 pm

MUSIC AND POETRY FOR PEACE
Madan Gopal Singh
Dr Chef
AMU Students
GEC Lawns: 4.30 pm onwards

Event dedicated to Justice for DR BINAYAK SEN
29th January 2011, Aligarh Muslim University,
Aligarh



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South Asia Citizens Wire
Buzz for secularism, on the dangers of fundamentalism(s), on
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