SACW - 20 March 2015 | India should stay out Nepals's constitution making / Bangladesh: Silencing people / Pakistan: Church attack; death of a union leader / India: Dimapur Lynch Mob & hurt sentiments / Tunisia: Terrorists targeting democracy
Harsh Kapoor
aiindex at gmail.com
Thu Mar 19 17:30:21 EDT 2015
South Asia Citizens Wire - 20 March 2015 - No. 2850
[since 1996]
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Contents:
1. Silencing people in Bangladesh | David Bergman
2. India should stay outside the convention of constitution writing in Nepal | Kanak Mani Dixit
3. Pakistan: Lahore protest and statement in response to attack on the Churches in Youhanabad
4. Pakistan - India: Between official parleys, the unofficial ’feel good’ posturing and ’dhanda’ lobbies | Garga Chatterjee
5. Pakistan: The queen of fishing communities will never die
6. India’s World Television Discussion on Pakistan Today (March 2015)
7. Hindi leaflets - stop the Godse brigade, save India from communal hatred
8. Four years after Fukushima, India is flogging a nuclear dead horse | Praful Bidwai
9. India: Delhi Protest Mark's Modi's Three Hundred Days in Power- Report on hate and violence released
10. When mystics don the war paint | Jawed Naqvi
11. India: Gang-rape in Nadia and continuing attacks on Christians - A statement by PUDR
12. India: The Dimapur Lynch Mob and Violence of Hurt Sentiments - A statement by PADS
13. India: Death Threats to Bharat Patankar, the well known Left wing writer and activist in Maharashtra
14. India: Of Rape, Censorship & National Honour | Praful Bidwai
15. India: The real reasons for hurt sentiments | Romila Thapar
16. Full Audio: Remembering the Communist leader Govind Pansare
17. India: AIDWA Opposes The State And Union Government’s Appeal Against Ex-Gratia Payment To Rape Survivors In The Kunan-Poshpora Case, Kashmir
18. India: Who Killed Govind Pansare? | Ram Puniyani
19. RECENT ON COMMUNALISM WATCH:
- India: Sanjib Baruah on the Dimapur lynching and the imagined enemy
- India : Dimapur Lynch Mob and Hurt sentiments - a Statement by PADS (18 Match 2015)
- India: Three is a crowd
- India: Prasad cartoon on Hindutva attack on Hissar Church in Haryana
- India: Editorial in The Telegraph on the Public Lynching in Dimapur, Nagaland
- India: Maharashtra's Beef Ban (Jyoti Punwani - EPW, March 14, 2015)
- Religion, Politics and Society (Ram Puniyani)
- Tahir Mahmood: To claim that any professedly heavenly law is supra-constitutional is to live in a fool’s paradise.
- India: His Name was Khan - Smita Nair (reportage on the Nagaland Lynching , Indian Express)
- India: The prison house of identity (Ananya Vajpeyi)
- India: Let's Make Sure That Kandhamals Are Not Repeated (Medha Patkar)
- India: What is behind Dravidian parties’ silence in Perumal Murugan issue? (Sruthisagar Yamunan)
- Aryans and Others (Dorothy M Figueira)
- India: Competing communalisms (Praveen Swami)
::: FULL TEXT :::
20. India: Is AAP going the Janata Party way ? | Kuldip Nayar
21. These terrorists in Tunisia were targeting democracy | Lina Ben Mhenni
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1. SILENCING PEOPLE IN BANGLADESH
by David Bergman
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Attempts to silence journalists, writers and bloggers in Bangladesh come from all political directions, but in this country, at least, it is only religious extremists, seeking to silence those who write in support of secularism, atheism or rationalism, who go so far as to attack and kill.
http://sacw.net/article10857.html
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2. INDIA SHOULD STAY OUTSIDE THE CONVENTION OF CONSTITUTION WRITING IN NEPAL | Kanak Mani Dixit
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In Nepal, there are hurdles to the constitution drafting that have to be resolved urgently if the radical leftists and the royalist right are not to blow away hard-won freedoms. As a player in Nepal politics, the best support India can provide is by staying outside the convention of constitution writing
http://sacw.net/article10851.html
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3. PAKISTAN: LAHORE PROTEST AND STATEMENT IN RESPONSE TO ATTACK ON THE CHURCHES IN YOUHANABAD
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On the call of Centre for Human Rights Education- Pakistan and other civil society organizations hundreds of men and women got together in front of Lahore's Press Club. The protestors who were carrying [placards] and banners against the Youhanabad incident chanted slogans against the attack on Christian Community and other incidents of terrorism in the name of religion and sect.
http://sacw.net/article10831.html
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4. PAKISTAN - INDIA: BETWEEN OFFICIAL PARLEYS, THE UNOFFICIAL ’FEEL GOOD’ POSTURING AND ’DHANDA’ LOBBIES
by Garga Chatterjee
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Unrelated to the mood swings of Delhi and Islamabad, certain citizens of Pakistan and the Indian Union have been trying for decades to foster dialogue and understanding between people living on the two sides of the western Radcliffe line. The more formal subset of this is termed ‘Track 2’ where influential folks from these two nation states periodically meet and deliberate. In addition to this, there are, what I want to term as ‘dhanda’ lobbies. Merchant chambers of various kinds are important in this and often they are among the most successful given their relative disinterest in the geopolitical origins of the products they want to trade vis a vis their interest in getting a good deal. They understand, as a commentator from west Punjab pointed out, that a tomato is neither Hindu nor Muslim. It is a tomato. But beyond these hard-nosed initiatives, much of what exists is a particular kind of ‘feel good’ posturing. Much of that can be reduced to two things — religion and commonality.
http://sacw.net/article10823.html
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5. PAKISTAN: THE QUEEN OF FISHING COMMUNITIES WILL NEVER DIE
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I received the shocking news of Tahira Ali’s death on the morning of March 10 when her daughter, Yasmeen, called me from Thatta. Mohammad Ali Shah, the president of Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum and Tahira Ali, who ruled the hearts of the fishing communities like a queen, met an accident. Shah is under treatment at the Aga khan Hospital but Tahira has left us.
http://sacw.net/article10812.html
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6. India’s World TELEVISION DISCUSSION ON PAKISTAN TODAY (March 2015)
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Guests: Dr. Yaqoob Bangash (Chairman, Department of History, Foreman Christian College, Lahore) ; Dr. A H Nayyar (Senior Fellow Researcher, SPDI, Pakistan) ; Ms. Uzma Noorani (Human Rights Activist, Pakistan)
Anchor: Bharat Bhushan
http://sacw.net/article10800.html
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7. HINDI LEAFLETS - STOP THE GODSE BRIGADE, SAVE INDIA FROM COMMUNAL HATRED
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http://sacw.net/article10856.html
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8. FOUR YEARS AFTER FUKUSHIMA, INDIA IS FLOGGING A NUCLEAR DEAD HORSE
by Praful Bidwai
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It's a telling comment on the state of the Indian media that most of it blacked out the fourth anniversary of the still-continuing Fukushima nuclear catastrophe, which fell on March 11. The same media reported breathlessly on the Indian government's plans to triple domestic nuclear power-generation capacity by 2020-21, and on the “breakthrough” achieved on the nuclear liability issue during Barack Obama's recent visit to India.
http://sacw.net/article10855.html
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9. INDIA: DELHI PROTEST MARK'S MODI'S THREE HUNDRED DAYS IN POWER- REPORT ON HATE AND VIOLENCE RELEASED
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A collective protest by a wide range of civil society groups was held on 19 March 2015 against 300 days of the Modi govt. The protest was held at Jantar Mantar in Delhi from 11 am to 6 pm. A detailed report on hate and communal violence was released on the occasion.
http://sacw.net/article10847.html
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10. WHEN MYSTICS DON THE WAR PAINT
by Jawed Naqvi
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Of late, everyone seems to want to sing and, worse, patronise “the Sufi ghazal” whatever that may be. The more brazen have also discovered a sufiana dance. From the little I have observed of the latter it appears to be a mishmash of Kathak and foxtrot. I suspect the surging excitement with Sufi motifs is linked to a pervasive fear of puritan Islam.
http://sacw.net/article10847.html
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11. India: Gang-rape in Nadia and continuing attacks on Christians - A statement by PUDR
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PUDR expresses outrage at the gang-rape of a 71 year old nun by a gang of “dacoits” inside a convent in Gangnapur village, Nadia district, West Bengal on 14th March 2015. The men reportedly raided and desecrated the convent before taking away 12 lakhs. Clearly, the motive was not merely to rob and decamp but to punish the school and the community through this horrendous gang-rape. In this connection, PUDR wishes to draw attention to the disturbing trend of attacks on Christians, including their institutions and places of worship, in recent times.
http://sacw.net/article10846.html
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12. INDIA: THE DIMAPUR LYNCH MOB AND VIOLENCE OF HURT SENTIMENTS - A STATEMENT BY PADS
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Aggressive mobilisations around proclaimed community interests and assault on democratic rights of citizens is common in the so called mainland India too. This type of politics has specially spread along with the rise of Mr Modi in the national politics. The loudest are the Hindutva organisations that claim to represent the interests of the so called Hindu majority. While many thousands of minority citizens have been displaced and killed in riots, and their places of worship attacked, Hindutva forces have attacked the rights of all citizens to read books they like, see movies they wish to see, spend time with persons they like, eat what they like, and discuss and debate issues related to their lives.
http://sacw.net/article10841.html
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13. INDIA: DEATH THREATS TO BHARAT PATANKAR, THE WELL KNOWN LEFT WING WRITER AND ACTIVIST IN MAHARASHTRA
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a report in The Hindu : With Maharashtra's secular fabric ripped by the murders of rationalist Narendra Dabholkar and Communist leader Govind Pansare, noted activist-writer Dr. Bharat Patankar on Tuesday revealed that he too had received death threats in the form of hate letters.
http://sacw.net/article10840.html
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14. INDIA: OF RAPE, CENSORSHIP & NATIONAL HONOUR
by Praful Bidwai
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If the Indian government wanted to become the laughing stock of the world, it couldn't have done so more instantly and effectively than by banning the BBC documentary India's Daughter on Delhi's December 2012 gang-rape. Not only was the film watched by millions the world over; it became a cause celebre for feminists, defenders of free expression and even progressive Hollywood actors.
http://sacw.net/article10854.html
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15. INDIA: THE REAL REASONS FOR HURT SENTIMENTS
by Romila Thapar
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In the name of religious sentiments, an attempt is made to prevent the emergence of a society that can think and act for itself
http://sacw.net/article10811.html
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16. FULL AUDIO: REMEMBERING THE COMMUNIST LEADER GOVIND PANSARE
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Audio recording of the Govind Pansare Memorial Meeting of 10 March 2015 that was held at the Hindi Bhavan in New Delhi. The Speakers were: Dr Balachandra Kango, Secretary of the State Unit of the CPI Maharashtra, Praful Bidwai, well known journalist & commentator and peace activist in Delhi, Ram Puniyani, leading voice in the Anti-communalist circuit and former Professor at the IIT Bombay and Shameem Faizee the Editor of New Age. The event was organised by the Joshi Adhikari Institute of Social Studies and the All India Students’ Federation. [This audio recording is hosted here by the sacw.net document archive]
http://sacw.net/article10804.html
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17. INDIA: AIDWA OPPOSES THE STATE AND UNION GOVERNMENT’S APPEAL AGAINST EX-GRATIA PAYMENT TO RAPE SURVIVORS IN THE KUNAN-POSHPORA CASE, KASHMIR
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AIDWA condemns in the strongest possible terms the reported appeal by the Jammu and Kashmir State Government against the compensation ordered by the Jammu and Kashmir Human Rights Commission in 2012 to the victims of the infamous Kunan-Poshpora gang rape case in which almost a 100 women were gang-raped through the night by Army personnel
http://sacw.net/article10801.html
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18. INDIA: WHO KILLED GOVIND PANSARE?
by Ram Puniyani
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It’s been nearly a month since senior CPI leader Govind Pansare was shot. But police remain clueless about the murder. Following pressure from the opposition, the Maharashtra assembly on Tuesday adopted a condolence motion for Pansare. A rally has been planned in Mumbai today to protest the tardy progress in the investigation. There is a widespread belief that the authorities haven’t done enough to trace the assailants or unearth the motive behind the murder.
http://sacw.net/article10798.html
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19. RECENT ON COMMUNALISM WATCH:
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available at: http://communalism.blogspot.in/
- India: 19 March Citizens Protest & Release of Report Documenting Hate & Violnce Under Modi's 300 days
- India: Well known schools officially promoting the BJP's membership drive by urging its teachers and students to enroll
- India: Sanjib Baruah on the Dimapur lynching and the imagined enemy
- India : Dimapur Lynch Mob and Hurt sentiments - a Statement by PADS (18 Match 2015)
- India: Three is a crowd
- India: Prasad cartoon on Hindutva attack on Hissar Church in Haryana
- India: Old wounds reopened .. Old hurts return to haunt (Patricia Mukhim on the Dimapur Lynching and more)
- India - Haryana: Church vandalised in Hissar
- India: Editorial in The Telegraph on the Public Lynching in Dimapur, Nagaland
- India: Maharashtra's Beef Ban (Jyoti Punwani - EPW, March 14, 2015)
- Religion, Politics and Society (Ram Puniyani)
- India: BJP leader Subramanium Swamy says
- Tahir Mahmood: To claim that any professedly heavenly law is supra-constitutional is to live in a fool’s paradise.
- India: Goa govt drops Gandhi Jayanti from list of official holidays
- India: Violence in Lahore after twin blasts kill 15, angry mob lynches 2 suspected militants
- India: His Name was Khan - Smita Nair (reportage on the Nagaland Lynching , Indian Express)
- India: The prison house of identity (Ananya Vajpeyi)
- India - Maharashtra: The beef ban leaves a bad taste in the mouth
- India: Let's Make Sure That Kandhamals Are Not Repeated (Medha Patkar)
- India: What is behind Dravidian parties’ silence in Perumal Murugan issue? (Sruthisagar Yamunan)
- India: Tamil Nadu: TV channel attacked with bombs by Hindutva outfits / 'thaali' (mangalasutra) is not a symbol of the ancient culture of Tamils or of Hindus
- India: ‘Love jihad’ gets a Bengal reply: Bahu lao, Beti bachao, ‘purify’ Muslim brides
- India: Exposing 300 days of Modi’s rule - Zulmaton Ke Daur Main Pratirodh ke 300 din (19 March 2015 at Jantar Mantar)
- Aryans and Others (Dorothy M Figueira)
- India: Competing communalisms (Praveen Swami)
and More ...
available at: http://communalism.blogspot.in/
::: FULL TEXT :::
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20. INDIA: IS AAP GOING THE JANATA PARTY WAY ?
by Kuldip Nayar
=========================================
(The Tribune, 18 March 2015)
Kejriwal supporters gunning for critics instead of correcting his authoritarian methods
When movements get converted into political parties, they lose their original shape. The ethos of collective leadership takes a backseat and personal assertion comes to the fore. Power gets concentrated in one person. In real, the leadership acquires the meaning of one-man rule, which becomes synonymous for the party.
It was expected that the Aam Aadmi Party would be different because it was a product of people’s aspirations. The well-entrenched political parties like the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were run down because they had become part of the old furniture. When people see AAP going in the same direction, they feel betrayed because they thought that the party would introduce a new way of thinking, a fresh approach to politics — transparent, clean and open.
Unfortunately, the same one-man cult has taken over the party. Granted, Arvind Kejriwal was bound to occupy the central position because he was elected to lead the party which swept the polls in Delhi. Yet the ethos of the Aam Aadmi Party demanded that he would act as a leader of the equals. This is where the fault lies. Kejriwal tends to concentrate power in himself. Not only that, he was seen behind the ousting of the two co-founders of the party, Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan, from the Political Affairs Committee, the apex body for decision-making.
That Kejriwal had a majority in the party's executive does not mean that he would be the sole spokesman. Once there was a trial of strength, even the executive gave him a divided verdict, 11 to eight.
Every day new disclosures are coming out in the open. One is that Kejriwal had maneuvered to oust from AAP the critics of his style of functioning. The second is that he is using his official position of Delhi's Chief Minister to bash his critics. I hope that all this is not true and inner democracy that the party promised is intact. But the functioning is disconcerting.
The party's own Lokpal has also expressed his unhappiness over the manner in which AAP is functioning. He has expressed his helplessness. It is heartening to know that he is not accepting defeat but has appointed an inquiry committee for a probe. Probably, he should have threatened to quit to jolt the party and make it realise that the functioning of Kejriwal is far from healthy.
AAP is a child of a movement which Anna Hazare initiated against corruption. Why has he not taken upon himself the task to ensure that those who control the party act to complete the task of appointing a Lokpal (ombudsman) at the Centre to eliminate corruption in high places. Instead, Anna Hazare has run away from his responsibility and hidden his failure behind a movement against a land Bill.
Probably, Anna Hazare realises that his word would not be respected. This is precisely what the Gandhian Jayaprakash Narayan felt. He had founded the Janata Party, which appointed Morarji Desai as Prime Minister. The fact is that Morarji did not listen to JP should not have made him withdraw from the field. He should have joined issue with Morarji, who was only a creature of the JP movement.
I recall telling JP that the people voted at his behest and expected him to intervene to make the Central government work according to the movement's ideals. He did not contradict me but explained that his health did not allow him to go to the public again. This was another way of admitting that he did not want to join issue with Morarji, lest the Janata Party should get a bad name.
This was JP’s rationalisation. He knew Morarji would not listen to him. I thought I would approach Morarji. When I told him that JP would have come to Delhi but his health did not allow him to do so, I thought I had given a sufficient hint. Morarji understood what I wanted to convey. He said in anger that JP was mistaken that he would go to meet him. “I did not go even to meet Gandhi. JP is not above him”, said Morarji. It is not surprising that the Janata Party cracked up and practically died.
Anna Hazare can end the obsession of Kejriwal to kill dissent. The fact that he sits on dharna with Anna Hazare on the land Bill should not hide the fact that Kejriwal wants to oust the critics from the party. Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan are among the founders of AAP. Kejriwal has seen to it that they are out of the decision-making bodies. He does not realise that they have a large following of their own. He should not emulate the example of Morarji Desai, who destroyed the Janata Party, which had nominated him the Prime Minister, but did not accommodate others.
It looks as if AAP is going the way of Janata Party. It is a pity that the supporters of Kerjriwal, instead of correcting his authoritarian methods, are going for the critics. He should know that if the AAP experiment fails, it would take years for an alternative to the Congress and the BJP to build.
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21. THESE TERRORISTS IN TUNISIA WERE TARGETING DEMOCRACY
by Lina Ben Mhenni
=========================================
(The Guardian - 19 March 2015)
In the increasingly chaotic Middle East, our country has enjoyed relative stability. But Islamist
terrorists want to change that
Tunisians protest against terrorist attack
'Tunisians, outraged, gathered in their hundreds, chanting the national anthem, shouting anti-terrorist slogans and holding Tunisian flags and candles in the memory of the victims of the barbaric attack.' Photograph: Chedly Ben Ibrahim/Demotix/Corbis
Lina Ben Mhenni blogs as A Tunisian Girl. She was nominated for the Nobel peace prize
Two days before Tunisia was due to celebrate its independence day, a horrible terrorist attack has shaken the country. The barbaric, bloody assault on the Bardo museum near the parliament, that claimed the lives of 19 people, seems to open a new chapter for terrorist operations in my country. It also looks set to be the worst for foreigners in Tunisia since the attack on Djerba’s synagogue in 2002.
The symbolism of such an attack occurring in Tunisia – the birthplace of the so-called Arab spring – is significant. It was here that the self-immolation of Mohammed Bouazizi in December 2010 spawned a series of street demonstrations that culminated in the ousting of longtime president Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali. Tunisia’s reputation as the Arab spring’s “model pupil” may be questionable given that the country contributes the highest number of jihadis to countries such as Syria.
Nevertheless, it is a fact that while chaos is reigning in other countries in the Middle East, Tunisia has succeeded in ensuring a relative stability despite two political assassinations and some terrorist attacks targeting members of the security and military forces in remote areas such as Mount Chaambi. This attack occurred a few months after successful democratic and transparent elections in the country. Furthermore it happened while MPs were discussing an anti-terrorist law not far away from the museum where everything occurred. The two buildings lie within the same fence.
According to several sources, parliament was the terrorists’ target, but when they failed to reach it after being repelled by guards, they shifted their focus and opened the fire on a number of tourists getting off a bus to visit the museum. The perpetrators of the attack seem to have targeted the beacon of democracy that Tunisia has come to represent in the region. The terrorists seem to want to address Tunisians to tell them that the country won’t be spared the fate of its neighbour Libya and other Arab countries such as Syria, Yemen and Iraq, where chaos is taking hold as Islamist groups tighten their grip. They seem to address the Tunisian authorities to say that the successes they are claiming when it comes to fighting terrorism are nothing but a mirage. They also seem to target tourism – an important sector for the Tunisian economy.
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The Bardo attack has confirmed many Tunisians’ fears about the arrival of Isis in our country. For months the climate has been tense, exacerbated by events in neighbouring Libya and the threats that Isis has made to Tunisians. Terrorists and weapons are now freely circulating in major cities. Even the places that are supposed to be protected can be targeted.
At the last election Tunisians voted, in a majority, for a secular political party that they hoped would save them from terrorism and the rise of extremist groups. Yesterday, outraged, they gathered in their hundreds in the main avenue of the Tunisian capital, chanting the national anthem, shouting anti-terrorist slogans and holding Tunisian flags and candles in the memory of the victims of the barbaric attack. They gathered to say that terrorists did not succeed in instilling fear in their hearts.
Indeed many Tunisians who last October voted for the secularist Nidaa Tounes party, led by Beji Caid Essebsi, did it out of fear of the climate of insecurity that haunted the country under the rule of the troika led by the Islamist party Ennahda. Many now believe that Ennahda is the main culprit for the proliferation of terrorism in Tunisia, as terrorists could enjoy certain impunity under its rule. After these attacks, the very least we know is that a vote alone wasn’t enough to get rid of Tunisia’s growing terrorism problem. With Tunisia exporting the biggest number of jihadis to countries like Syria and Iraq, the question remains: did we really succeed in fulfilling the objectives of the revolution?
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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. Newsletter of South Asia Citizens Web:
www.sacw.net/
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DISCLAIMER: Opinions expressed in materials carried in the posts do not necessarily reflect the views of SACW compilers.
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