End the US romance before it destroys us

By Dr. Shireen M Mazari*                                   Muslim India

Two drones fired on the same day soon after Obama’s swearing in have made the new US administration’s intentions towards Pakistan clear – there will be no respect for international law in this part of the world. This is the historic duality (recall the Monroe Doctrine) that prevails in the very foundations of the much-touted US values! So it is time for our leaders to accept certain ground realities and shape their policies accordingly.

Accept that Obama has nothing positive to offer Pakistan. On the contrary, following the drone attacks, he moved to name Holbrooke as Special Envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, and to cut off a major chunk of money owed to Pakistan for military services rendered. And what has our reaction been? Without looking at Holbrooke’s record, we have welcomed his appointment, and in response to the cutting of money owed, we have declared that we will appeal to them again–as if this is part of a bargain hunt or a sale! Is this what a nuclear sovereign state does?

For heaven’s sake, our military and civilian ruling elites need to salvage some national dignity. It is time the military stopped acting as a mercenary force for the Americans. The price we are paying is simply too high–not simply in money terms but in social and political terms. This is as good an opportunity as any to reclaim our bases and applaud the US in gaining a new route for NATO supplies (though that is not yet a done deal), which we should stop immediately. This supply route has been a major factor for violence and instability in Peshawar and beyond.

It is not simply the cutting off of payments that is a pointer to the new Obama-Biden policies. Biden, much touted as Pakistan’s friend, has begun sounding a more strident tone vis-a-vis this hapless country with its bunch of servile leaders. This new aggressive tone on Pakistan was all too apparent in his Jan 25 interview on CBS where he reiterated Obama’s election campaign viewpoint that if there is an actionable target in Pakistan the US would send its troops there.

And to clarify any doubts about what the US thinks of Pakistan’s sovereignty, he refused to answer the question whether the US would notify the Pakistan before a potential US troops’ cross-border movement. He also predicted increasing US casualties, which clearly means the US intends to up the military ante and in all probability send troops across the international Pakistani-Afghan border.

As for Holbrooke, it would do well to recall that the much-touted Dayton Accord was only put in place when NATO had replaced the UN in Bosnia, and the Bosnians had been militarily abused so much by the Serbs that they eventually accepted a truncated Bosnian state. I met Holbrooke at a conference in Kazakhstan a few years earlier alongside the arch-neocon Richard Perle. And I was surprised by the similarity of views they both held towards the Muslim world in general, and towards what the US was doing post-9/11 in Afghanistan. Also, if we remember that Holbrooke was Hillary Clinton’s senior policy advisor, we will understand where he is really coming from. After all, Hillary Clinton supported the Iraq war till it became unpopular in the US!

Again, it was Holbrooke, as the US ambassador at the UN, who arranged for Israel to be admitted into a regional grouping of Western European and other nations–to allow Israel access to membership of crucial committees and other privileges. Interestingly, Scott Ritter, a UN Weapons’ Inspector in Iraq (1991-1998), has recalled how, in a television discussion in October 2001, Holbrooke had rejected any form of diplomacy in Afghanistan and had favoured only military action. Hardly the sort of man who will be open to the sensitivities of Pakistan!

The hard reality is that the US is going to become an increasingly hostile state towards Pakistan under Obama. So it is time to alter course. We need to renegotiate the entire cooperation with this new US administration, keeping in mind the now-established Indo-US strategic partnership. We need to find our own means of countering the drone attacks–rather than helplessly waiting for US goodwill.

Our Air Chief had declared we have the technical capability, and we certainly do, including our cruise missiles. So use them to attack the drones in defence of our territory. If the military is too timid for this defence of our national soil, then at least stop the mercenary intelligence sharing, close the clandestine CIA stations and troop actions in FATA and our western border. Reclaim the bases and end access to NATO supplies. All these moves can be done incrementally and we will realise the limitations of US ability to move against us without damaging their own cause. The most painless beginning can be made by recalling our ambassador to the US “for consultations.”

Meanwhile, it would be more relevant if we began focusing on national policies for Swat and FATA. The military needs to be withdrawn from both these areas and paramilitary forces under civilian command need to be put in place within an overarching political framework. We need to differentiate between Swat and FATA also, since the ground realities are different in the two areas. It would appear that in FATA the locals have coalesced with the militants and “foreigners” as a result of the erroneous policies of the Pakistani state, whose military is seen as fighting America’s war, and also as a result of the drone attacks, which have increased the operational space and recruitment of the militants.

In Swat Fazlullah initially got support from the local people. However, with the bloodshed and attacks on schools and the horrific killings and mutilation of bodies, the present relationship between the locals and the militants in Swat is one based primarily on fear and on a distrust of the military. They see the military as having failed to protect them against a Taliban force that primarily comprises outsiders, local criminals, and the unemployed and war-affected–that is, those who have lost family as a result of military action.

Unless we seek truthful answers to some crucial questions, we will not be able to restore peace in Swat. Where is the funding for the militants coming from since it runs into tens of millions? Reports from people on the spot put the daily payment for Taliban fighters anywhere between Rs300 and Rs1,000. Add to this cost of food, arms and ammunition and transport. And if we accept that there are between 5,000-10,000 Taliban, this is a costly enterprise even if we calculate on averages. Secondly, where are the weapons coming from, along which supply routes? Why, when the media can access the militant leaders, the intelligence and military seemingly cannot act against them? Is it inability or unwillingness and, if it is the latter, then the crux question: Why?

The total failure of the state to protect its citizens and assert its writ has led to the present despicable situation where the most vulnerable are being targeted: women and girls in particular, and children in general. While the militants are blowing up schools, the military is using schools as their trenches, and thereby as targets for the militants. If one looks at the casualty figures one will see who is really suffering, who is losing and who is winning. Approximately 12,000 civilians have so far been killed in Swat–again, according to the local viewpoint, mainly by firing from security forces. Around 200 security forces (FC, army and police) have been killed while approximately 75 Taliban have been killed.

The biggest losers are the civilians caught in the middle and the military, which is not only suffering high casualty rates but is being undermined in the long term by a growing chasm between itself and the nation’s civil society. This is what Pakistan’s enemies want; why are we seeking the same?

Tailpiece: The hypocrisy of the BBC is truly legendary. They refuse to broadcast a humanitarian appeal for Gaza but BBC World was broadcasting ads for the Indian army immediately before and after their news services during the Kargil crisis.

* The writer is a defence analyst based in Pakistan

A Pulverised Muslim Leadership

By Dr. Shireen M Mazari*                                                         Muslim India

Once again the tragic pulverization of the Muslim leadership has revealed itself in the mumblings and fumblings that have followed the launch of the new Israeli military campaign to annihilate the Palestinian people that dare to seek an end to Israel’s illegal occupation of their lands – or even those that simply dare to exist with a modicum of self-respecting defiance of Israeli fascism. Over 400 people killed so far by Israel’s military machine, so carefully aided and abetted by the US and its European allies. So where are the voices of the Muslim world? Where is some action to show that they will not allow Israel to commit genocide of the Palestinians? A few muted declaratory protests are all that have come so far. Is the Muslim World really so helpless in the face of Israeli abuse backed by the US?

No. The helplessness of the Muslim world is a myth. The reality is that the Muslim leadership – primarily Arab in the context of Palestine – has chosen to be pulverized into submission to the US and its more belligerent western allies. After all, despite numerous incidents of aggression and abuse at the hands of the US and Israel, the Arab leadership – barring some exceptions like Syria – continues to rely financially and militarily on the US and Europe. Their weapon systems are from these parts and their financial assets continue to lie primarily in the banking systems of the west. Both these facts could, of course, be used as a source of pressure also but that would require a strong and defiant Arab leadership and that does not seem to be on the horizon. Yet just imagine what a withdrawal of financial assets from the west would do! And just imagine how many arms industries would feel the pinch, and maybe even go under, if the Arab states did not buy their weapon systems! And one has not even begun to see the already-demonstrated-in-the-seventies power of oil.

But none of these elements of defiance will come into play so the Israelis will have a free hand in killing Palestinians by the hundreds – unless some western states with a genuine conscience and commitment to human rights, like some of the Nordic states or Canada, move forcefully but their power is limited partly by politics and partly by their still existing guilt over the Jewish Holocaust at the hands of the European monster of Nazism. It is indeed a supreme irony that the belated rejection of this European crime is allowing states to accept attempted genocides today – be it of the Bosnian Muslims, the Palestinians or the Muslims of Gujarat.

Perhaps an even greater tragedy is that the Muslim leadership has lost its will to stand up against all this abuse. If the Arabs would have taken their resources out of the west and invest it effectively in the Muslim World, especially the poorer but more technically competent Muslim states, the global picture would have been different today. If the Arab world would have stopped hosting US armed forces, so many murderous global designs of this unilateralist imperial power would have been undermined. For those Arab states that have security fears from their neighbourhood, surely dialogue and security pacts with strong Muslim states could have been a more viable alternative. As for purchasing of western weapon systems, if they are truly needed and alternatives are not considered viable, the dependency works both ways and could be exploited by the purchaser also.

But all this is mere day dreaming or wishful thinking. Or is it? After all the uplifting example of Hezbollah’s success against Israel; the Iranian nation’s steadfastness against US bullying; and even Syria’s dignified and assertive reaction to one US bombing attack on its territory that should put a militarily much stronger Pakistan to shame. At another plane, there is the Mahatir economic miracle and political assertiveness. Again, at a time when Pakistan’s leadership continues to bow ever lower to the US, a look in the easterly direction of Malaysia would not be amiss. Of course, if we could only have learnt some lessons from our long standing Chinese friends, we would have perhaps traversed less tumultuous paths.

But today we have reduced the country into a place where the rich and influential break all rules; where their children defy any institutional standards or procedures for jobs; and where repression and power grabbing are the norms, with rulers wanting absolute power – be they in uniform or in civvies. Is it any wonder then that there is no spirit left to defend against external or internal threats to our existence? The powerful grab all and move back to their nests abroad while the rest turn in despair to prayer and the life hereafter in their pillaged state.

Coming back to the self-created helplessness of the Muslim world in the face of the incessant abuse and violence unleashed by Israel and the US, one may well ask where the UN is today. Clearly it’s Security Council has been reduced to an organization that is here to defend only the US and its allies and their agendas. That is why Secretary General Ban Ki Moon has been reduced to whimpering a protest against the latest Israeli attempt at genocide of the Palestinians in Gaza. First they starved them of all amenities including basic health, food and water and now they are moving in with military attacks while the US prevents any international condemnation through the UNSC.

But the UNSC has become a highly contentious political body for some time now – especially in the face of the demise of bipolarity. After all, look at its absurdities on the terrorism issue. While the UNSC’s Committee on Taliban and Al Qaeda is Muslim-specific, the Counter Terrorism Committee is not. Yet one has seen no efforts to put the Hindu RSS and VHP violent extremist groups on the terrorist list. Nor has any thought even been given to state terrorism that the US is perpetrating in Iraq and Pakistan; that Israel is carrying out in Palestine; and that India is continuing in Occupied Kashmir. It is no wonder then that the UN feels under siege and has to barricade itself behind concrete in countries like Pakistan despite the fact that our soldiers die for the UN in the largest numbers and we continue to pay our UN contribution which helps pay the fattened salaries of the UN personnel that seem to regard Pakistan as a hostile land! Even the windows have been bricked up. What a farce! The UN may as well leave Islamabad since at the moment it is merely adding to our already many miseries. If it distrusts the people of Pakistan so much it should also look elsewhere for Blue Berets in the future.

But which Pakistani leader will have the national dignity to stand up for Pakistan? Where is the voice of protest on these counts by affected states like Pakistan? Our official voice is too busy seeking subjugation before the US grand design. That is why when US Secretary of State Rice calls India she calls her equivalent external affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee (who seems to have discovered the true spirit of Islam suddenly); but when she calls Pakistan she calls the president directly!

Yes, like so many of the resource-rich and financially powerful Muslim states, the militarily powerful and potentially resource-laden Pakistan has also been pulverized psychologically into a state with a muted and whimpering voice. Despite the military capability, our leaders are not prepared to defend their people against the daily US drone attacks, that are shrinking the space for moderation in the country (the frivolities of our leaders was so clearly laid out by Farrukh Saleem in his last column, but even that was simply one part of a much wider absurdity gripping our leaders). How are we expected to effectively raise our voice for the Palestinians then? And is it any wonder that Muslim people are being massacred with impunity today?

* The writer is a defence analyst based in Pakistan.

Democracy & Former Islamic Colonies in Asia

Prof. Michael Brenner                                             Muslim India

Dr. Michael Brenner is a Non-Resident Fellow at the Center for Transatlantic Relations. He publishes and teaches in the fields of American foreign policy, Euro-American relations, and the European Union. He is also Professor of International Affairs at the University of Pittsburgh. Brenner is the author of numerous books, and over 60 articles and published papers on a broad range of topics.

The common experience of British dependencies in Asia was direct, custodial rule over a prolonged period. I believe that this is the principal reason why constitutional democracy has fared better there than in the Arab Middle East.

That experience was shared by the two largely Islamic states that had formed part of colonial India: Pakistan and Bangladesh. Deviations from the democratic standard have occurred in both – repeatedly so. But there never has been an outright rejection of the system bequeathed by the British or the propagation of anti-democratic political ideologies. Where autocratic powers have been taken by military governments or civilian strongmen, authoritarianism has been justified in terms of exigent circumstances and accompanied by an affirmation to restore democratic rule. However delayed, that indeed has occurred – albeit often under popular pressure.

In Pakistan, the military takeover led by General Pervez Musharraf in 1999 was the latest in a series of military governments that in the past had seen a reversion to free elections and the restoration of civilian rule. The arrogation of exceptional powers, and the emasculation of the legislature, is accompanied by a continuation of local elections, in keeping with what has become established practice. The suppression of political dissent is far from total. The press and other media remain unmuzzled and feisty, although at times intermittently censored. Witness the success of anti-Musharraf Islamist parties in the Northwest Frontier Province and Baluchistan on the Afghan border in the regional elections of fall 2002 at the very time when Musharraf was expanding his extra-constitutional authority at the federal level. This pattern is qualitatively different from the autocratic regimes in the Middle East where political power has been concentrated in dictatorial hands, democratic governance has never occurred, the abuse of human rights is widespread (in some places, systematic), and the commitment to democracy is purely rhetorical or non-existent.

Pakistan introduced Shari’a, traditional Islamic law, in the early 1990s. The move was punctuated by the declaration of the country as an Islamic republic. That did not stand in the way of the return to civilian rule. Free elections, an accountable government, respect of political pluralism, an open press, and tolerance for religious minorities existed within an avowedly Islamic state. Pakistani politics during this period were dominated by two political parties, bitter rivals for power, neither of which had distinct Muslim identity. Benazir Bhutto’s Pakistani People’s Party (PPP) alternated in office with Pakistan Muslim League (PML) party led by Nawaz Sharif. Avowedly Islamist parties garnered less than 10% of the vote in the last open, nation-wide elections. The Islamists relative success in 2002 owed much to the Musharraf government’s volte-face in transforming itself from a patron of the Taliban in Afghanistan to a close ally of the United States in an unpopular war on so-called terrorists in the Tribal Areas and Northwest Frontier province. Islamist opinion was further inflamed by his public promises to rein in the Pakistan backed insurrection against Indian rule in Kashmir. Their fortunes reversed in the national elections of February 2008. The coalition of Islamist parties lost control of the regional government of the Northwest Frontier and were also-rans at the national level. Traditions of a less militant brand of Islam and a politics of accommodation reasserted themselves. The Islamists were thrashed at the polls. Radical Islamist groups today do remain a force in Pakistani politics, but more through their acts of violence than by their appeal to the populace.

The resilience of democratic norms recently has been demonstrated in Pakistan where Pervez Musharraf’s move toward autocracy, punctuated by the imposition of martial law, was thwarted by a stubborn judiciary, manifestations of popular opposition and Musharraf’s own inhibitions about taking actions that could spark a civil war. The brake on Musharraf’s ambition was Chief Justice of the Pakistani Supreme Court Iftikar Mohammed Choudry. His implacable resistance to the General’s attempts to rule by decree led his ouster. That arbitrary action itself made Chaudry the pivot of an aroused opposition led by fellow jurists and the National Lawyer’s Guild. Musharraf’s loss of credibility obliged him to move ahead with the scheduled legislative elections that proved his downfall. That bow to democratic norms proved his downfall. His coalition was thumped by the PPP, benefiting from the assassination of Bhutto, and the PML led by Nawaz Sharif who had been exiled for eight years by Musharraf.

Three features of the recent Pakistani drama underscore the crucial importance of an ingrained, inherited liberal political culture: an intractable autonomous judiciary; a vivid ‘civil society’ composed of professional associations, independent press and party organizations; and a military officer corps restrained by its own convictions from pushing for a true revolution. Further confirmation was provided by the new governing coalition’s decision not to oust Musharraf from the Presidency to which he had been elected, albeit in a tainted contest.

Bangladesh provides yet another example of a former British dependency, overwhelmingly Muslim, that has managed to maintain its democratic constitution and Bangladesh has experienced periods of authoritarian government as both military and civilian leaders have at times declared states of emergency which involved the suspension of elections and the imposition of martial law. The country went through periods of military rule in the 1970s and 1980s, triggered on two occasions by the assassination of elected prime ministers by maverick officers. Since 1990, threats to constitutional rule have receded. Democratic norms of electoral competition were reinforced. The country has observed three multi-party parliamentary elections (1991, 1996, and 2001). Domestic and international observers widely recognized them a mostly free and fair.

Two external factors played a role in ending military rule. For one thing, the United States lost its liking for strongmen devoted to keeping under control an unruly politics. For another, international donors pressed for a restoration of free elections as a condition for badly needed economic assistance. The military retreated to their barracks in a period of fierce partisanship marked by corruption and violence. The main protagonists have been the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) led by Begum Khaleda Zia, the widow of the murdered General Ziaur Rahman, and the Awami League headed by the Sheikh Hasina, herself a daughter of Sheikh Mujib who led Bangladesh to independence. Each of these two women was placed under house arrest on grounds of endemic corruption in January 2007. Each had her political rights restored and returned to partisan combat when the caretaker government cleared the way for fresh elections in February 2008.

The threat of a military coup will continue to hang over whatever civilian government emerges. The Bangladesh military has issued statements touting its “own brand of Democracy” and calling for changes in the constitution to allow military participation in politics. They play on the discontent with the woeful record of the civilian politicians to promote the idea of a unitary, ‘clean’ working only for the national welfare. This, of course, is the theme of men in uniform everywhere who are seeking political power. In Bangladesh, as in Pakistan, there is no talking of abandoning wholesale the country’s political inheritance. For the most part, the country has become an imperfect working democracy.
Bangladesh has felt the reverberations from the fundamentalism movement sweeping the Islamic world. Bengali mujahideen, veterans of Afghanistan, introduced an element of political militancy and religious fundamentalism. That effect has been reinforced by expatriates returning from jobs in the Gulf where they absorbed, to varying degrees, the strictures of Wahabi-ism. In an attempt to wellsprings of discontent and aspiration that feed it, the government introduced elements of Shari’ a law to govern domestic affairs such as marriage and inheritance. When Prime Minister in 2001, Begum Zia avidly deployed the symbols of an Islamic republic, as in Pakistan. She went as far as to place in the constitution a clause to the effect that the country’s rule would conform to “the sovereignty of Allah.” For the most part, though, Bangladesh has kept in place civil codes based on English common law. They protect civil liberties and rights of political expression. Despite manifest signs of militant jihadist sects working underground to bring down the government, there have been no draconian restrictions on rights of assembly, speech and privacy. The Bangladeshi political establishment was badly shaken by a wave of orchestrated suicide attacks in August 2005, but it refrained from imposing severe restrictions. Indeed, constitutional reforms by the Caretaker government of 2007 were designed to strengthen the independence of the civil judiciary, which has been weaker than its Pakistani counterpart, as part of a general overhaul of a criminal justice system seen to have been politicized and corrupted. The main imperative was to crackdown on corruption in all its forms. The Caretaker government sought to ”cleanse” politics by taking a criminal justice approach to dealing with the mainstream political parties’ chronic habits of self-enrichment. Domestic NGOs, international donors, and national media all gave support to the military-backed interim government.

BNP has formed alliances of convenience with two relatively new Islamist parties, Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh and Islami Oikya Jot. That has gone some way toward giving Islamists a stake in the party system. For its part, the Awami League at first shunned the Islamist movement in preference for an alignment with small leftish and secularist parties. That changed in 2007, when the party invited avowed Islamists to run under its banner. Simultaneously, they formed a tacit electoral alliance with the small Islamist party, the Bangladesh Khelefat. Still, it is noteworthy that there has been no upsurge in support for the latter, despite the countries chronic economic woes, tarnished political establishment, and the movement’s extra-parliamentary actions. Moreover, the Caretaker government took a tough stance on radical Islamist elements. Several high profile terrorists were arrested, prosecuted, and even a few death sentences were handed down.

As the December 2008 deadline for the national election approached, the interim administration released most of the high-ranking political leaders imprisoned on corruption charges, tied to an understanding that members of the Caretaker government would not be targeted by a newly elected government. The electoral outcome was a blow to the Islamist political movement and a tribute to Bangladeshi democracy.

Sheikh Hasina Awami League party won an overwhelming victory, gaining 230 of 300 seats in parliament (if only 48% of the raw vote) in a largely peaceful poll. Moreover, it did so in a campaign that contrasted its secular character with the Islamist Jamaat-e-Islama party which was aligned with the rival Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) of Begum Kheleda Zia. The Jamaat-e-Islama’s tally of seats dropped from 17 to 2. Its uncompromisingly fundamentalist line on issues of social policy and orthodoxy cost it, and the coalition, a significant slice of support among the electorate. The interim government largely delivered on its promise of laying down the conditions for a fair, neutral election that stood in sharp contrast to the country’s past experiences. The three most senior ministerial positions in the new government are held by women. Despite recent extra-constitutional developments, Bangladesh’s liberal democratic institutions have not been deformed. The country appears back on the track toward a multi-party parliamentary democracy.

Malaysia offers a striking example of the resistance to autocratic tendencies and radical Islam alike. Malaysia has experienced uninterrupted rule by the dominant United Malay National Organization (UMNO) party which has been the political embodiment of Malay nationalism. The party followed a pragmatic course in forming ties with the small CHH party that represents the country’s substantial, and economically powerful, Chinese community. Under the strong-willed leadership of Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammed, state powers were used to consolidate its domination – primarily by the soft means of deploying government resources to secure the allegiance of supporters and to punish opponents. However, there are no curbs on opposition political parties, the press is not bridled (although tending to be deferential to the government), and constitutional provisions observed. In the one notorious deviation from this norm, Mahathir in 2002 jailed UMNO Vice-president and possible rival for power, Anwar Ibraham, who was convicted on trumped up charges. Ibrahim, a popular leader of the Islamist opposition, had been co-opted by an invitation to join the government. That conformed to Mahatir’s strategy of neutralizing potential opposition rather than suppressing it. His readiness to attack Ibraham also was an indication of the government’s confidence in its ability to handle nascent Islamist forces.

Malaysian democracy is strengthened by the emergence of a civil society, including groups promoting women’s rights. They are noteworthy in a country where Islamist influence has been steadily growing, inspired by the Iranian example and the wave of Sunni fundamentalism originating in the Middle East. In reaction, Mahathir gave a pronounced Islamist cast to the Malaysian government. That policy has entailed the calculated use of Islamic symbols and rhetoric in identifying Malaysian nationalism with its Islamic roots. More concretely, beginning in the 1980s Sharia law was introduced in a number of the country’s constituent states. (Mahathir formally established it at the federal level as the basis for adjudicating domestic matters, displacing the civil codes inherited from the British.
Muslims are obliged to follow the decisions of Shari’a courts when it comes to matters of Faith and Obligations as a Muslim, i.e. marriage, inheritance and custody others. Other criminal or civil offences come under the authority of secular courts, as in Pakistan and Bangladesh. As a rule, the Civil Courts cannot overrule any decision made by the Sharia Courts in their stipulated areas of jurisdiction. This introduction of Shari’a courts has two noteworthy qualifications. The scope of the Shari’a courts’ authority is circumscribed; they have no authority over political matters or criminal acts beyond the domain of traditional social mores. Moreover, only Muslims are subject to Sharia law. Malaysia is a multi-ethnic, multi-religious society. Chinese and non-Muslim Indians represent between 35 and 40 percent of the population. Concern for maintaining the domestic peace, which has been disturbed on several occasions since independence by bloody inter-ethnic violence, has induced the government to accord non-Muslims the right to have their domestic affairs overseen by secular courts. Eagerness to keep Malaysia a hospitable place for the heavy foreign investment that has fueled the country’s economic boom points in the same direction. Characteristically, as John Esposito has pointed out, Islamic values are “equated with hard work, discipline and progress.” The Malaya version of the Islamic revival seems more associated with creating a counterpart to the Confucian ethic than the fundamentalist creed that has taken root to the West.

Malaysian democracy’s resilience was shown when Mahatir stepped down in 2003. He passed the baton to Abdullah Ahmad Bawari who succeeded as Prime minister. Bawari continued to cultivate the multi-racial National Front (Barisa Nasional – BS) political coalition as his electoral instrument. He maintained the ONUM’s alliance with the Malaysian Indian Congress (MIC), which represents Hindus, and a small Chinese counterpart. The coalition won a landslide electoral victory in 2004 that increased its parliamentary majority to over 80% of the seats. His administration was marked by perpetuation of the political status quo, sustained economic growth and signs of growing political discontent both among minorities over the government’s aggressive pro-Malay affirmative action programs and Malays of Islamist orientation in the poorer provinces of the country’s north.

A stern test – for the government and for Malay democracy – came with the national elections of March 2008. In a shock result, the BN lost five of thirteen governorates (including the industrial center Penang) and its two-thirds majority in Parliament. The opposition coalition was composed of the Chinese based Democratic Action Party (PAS), the People’s Justice Party of Anwar Ibrahim (Parti Keadilan Rakyat – PKR), and the Parti Islam se-Malaysia (PIM). It also has the support of disaffected Hindus. The coalition’s de facto head was Ibrahim, despite his still being denied his full political rights under the Internal Security Act. Prime Minister Badari reconstituted a diminished government. It was further weakened when a federal court indicted, and then convicted Anwer Ibrahim on charges of sodomy in July which were widely seen as a politically motivated fabrication. Despite his being under a legal cloud, Anwer won a seat in parliament by a wide margin in a by-election held in August. He immediately vowed to directly challenge the ruling government by forging a majority composed of his supporters and dissent elements of the BS. Were he to succeed, Malaysia will experience its first change of power since independence.

Three features of this seismic political event stand out. The results were accepted by the ruling party without protest after a fair and open election. Opposition politicians followed the pragmatic course of putting aside potentially divisive ethnic interests for the sake of electoral success. In doing so, the coalition mirrored the multi-ethnic politics of the long dominant OMUN. Finally, heightened Islamic sentiment among segments of the Malay community was channeled mainly through a party, the PIM, that was ready to play the game of democratic electoral politics.

Placed in perspective, the post-colonial history of the largely Muslim countries that emerged from the British empire in Asia supports the judgments that: (1) colonial experience is an important factor that offers a partial explanation for the divergence between the autocratic path followed by some former Muslim dependencies and the relative resilience of democratic institutions in others despite severe stresses internal and external; 2) democratic political forms can co-exist with a relatively strong Islamic self-identity, e.g. Malaysia; and 3) public authorities can enforce a policy of respect for adherents to other faiths even while acknowledging, and lending a measure of official recognition to the preponderantly Islamic nature of the society it governs. Witness Hindus in Bangladesh; Chinese, Hindus and Sikhs in Malaysia. Indeed, Bangladesh’s national anthem is based on a song composed by a Hindu – Rabindranath Tagore, the Nobel Prize winning poet and author who is viewed by all Bengalis as the fountainhead of their remarkable twentieth century renaissance.

Cut out the middlemen!

Amit Baruah, Hindustan Times

‘It looks like a students’ union is running Pakistan,’ a friend in Islamabad told me over the phone the other day. It wasn’t a flippant comment. He was dead serious. Between the two of them (and ably aided by the military establishment), President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani have reduced governance to a joke.

Pakistan’s National Security Advisor Mahmud Ali Durrani was ‘sacked’ for telling the media that Mohammed Ajmal Kasab, the 26/11 terrorist, was a Pakistani. Okay, so he was sacked. But actually, as the Pakistani media reported, he is yet to be removed from the job formally. Durrani may have the support of the Pakistani President, but where does it leave the Pakistani State? Nowhere.

In the wake of 26/11, a hoax call was made to Zardari, ostensibly by External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, threatening Pakistan with dire consequences. Mukherjee made no such call. But Zardari was scared out of his skin by Pakistan’s intelligence establishment, which wanted to ensure that Zardari abandoned his pro-India policies double-quick. And the ruse worked. Zardari called many capitals across the world in a bid to secure support against India’s imminent aggression after the hoax call.

Remember that before 26/11 punctured relations with New Delhi, Zardari was making comments on the lines of India never being a threat to Pakistan and that Islamabad wouldn’t be the first country to use nuclear weapons. Army chief Parvez Kayani wanted all this pro-India sentiment put down, as did the Lashkar-e-Tayyeba, which must have viewed with alarm the extent of Zardari’s pro-India comments.

With the benefit of hindsight, one can only wish that Zardari had been more restrained in his choice of words. But that’s now a peripheral issue. The central question today is: how does India deal with Pakistan’s weakest ‘civilian’ government ever? Who should one believe when it comes to Pakistan’s post-Mumbai actions? It’s a confusing scenario in which a divided civilian leadership seems to be bumbling along. At a time of tension with New Delhi, no one in Pakistan, including the civilian leadership, can survive by being soft on India.

After ensuring Pervez Musharraf’s ouster from the presidency in 2007, the Pakistani army has quickly distanced itself from its last chief. In fact, the country’s sole institution that actually functions is once again poised to play the role of ‘saviour-from-India’ that it has played so well. Nothing unites Pakistan more than a heavy dose of ‘anti-India’ emotion.

It looks as if Gilani is being propped up by the army to take on Zardari, who after all the tall promises of returning Pakistan to democracy, has taken on the role of an executive president, much like Musharraf. This is unconstitutional. But when has that ever bothered Pakistan’s long line of rulers, be they uniformed or otherwise? For India, which has no direct access to Kayani, the emergence of three (or two-and-a-half) power centres in Pakistan is ominous. Judging who is doing what, or even the authority of public statements, is a big job in itself.

It’s easy to say that India will deal with the government of the day. But unlike Western nations that talk of strengthening democracy in Pakistan and continue dealing with the generals to get their job done, New Delhi has no direct channel to Kayani. In the event of hostilities between India and Pakistan, the civilian leadership will be irrelevant. Only the army will matter. “For Pakistan, there is no concept of ‘limited war’. Any war with India is seen as a total war for survival. It risks losing everything the moment India crosses its border… As the battles escalate, India’s numerical and weapon superiority will become critical. If no external intervention takes place quickly, Pakistan will then be left with the ‘poison pill’ defence of its nuclear weapons,” argued Shuja Nawaz, author of Crossed Swords: Pakistan, its Army, and the Wars Within, in The Huffington Post recently.

We have moved away from the path of war-mongering. But dealing with the problem of Pakistan is likely to occupy India full-time. A middle path between resorting to military strikes and no-business-as-usual is the only option open to India.

Across the board, political opinion in India wants Pakistan to deliver. Purge the country of jihadi terrorists who have realised that the rest of India is a far better target than Kashmir. India can no longer bear the costs of an imperfect State structure in Pakistan. If Pakistan wants business as usual, then it must prosecute and convict all those behind 26/11. And nip any more terrorist strikes on India in the bud.

http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/Print.aspx?Id=9fff52c3-ba51-486c-b8e4-b8640e6f07d9

India - Pakistan: Pursue peace instead of sabre-rattling

Efforts by India and Pakistan to deal with terrorism separately will not bear fruit unless they stop demonising each other and start acting in concert. Unfortunately, both countries have become prisoners of confrontationist forces they have thoughtlessly nourished for six decades and more.

By I A Rehman                               27 December 2008                            Muslim India
South Asia Citizens Web

APART from anything else, the terrorist outrage in Mumbai put Pakistan and India to a grim test. They have not failed — so far at any rate. That is the gratifying part of the story. The regrettable part is that the South Asian twins do not seem to have struck the path of success either. As a result, the huge population of the subcontinent is in the grip of fear or anger, both antithetical to rational thinking.

Whether so designed or not, the events of Nov 26 had the potential, at the very least, to derail the process of normalisation of relations between the two neighbours and for precipitating an armed conflict between them, at the worst. The movement for a comprehensive India-Pakistan accord has no doubt suffered a setback but both sides have expressed a keenness to reduce the damage to the minimum. And they have been quite forthright in ruling out war.

However, in this state of suspended hostility the threat to regional peace will remain alive. Sadly enough, India and Pakistan are still engaged in a dangerous debate regarding the identity of the perpetrators of the horrible massacre of nearly 200 innocent people, and their sponsors. Necessary though such a probe is, total concentration on this point amounts to taking a narrow view of the matter and entertaining the illusion that the monster of terrorism can be overcome by catching and hanging a few culprits and punishing their patrons. Anyone opting for this course will be guilty of a costly failure to learn from the disastrous consequences of the Bush wars.

What is more important than the identity and parentage of the Mumbai killers is the fact that they were enemies of the peoples of India and Pakistan — they damned the Indians by killing many of them and wounding their government’s pride and they damned Pakistanis by putting them in the dock.

Without minimising the enormous hurt to the people of India it can be demonstrated that the Mumbai terrorists caused much greater harm to the world’s Muslims, including those living in Pakistan and India, just as Muslims the world over have been more the victims of 9/11 than the Americans.

The foremost task before the governments and the peoples of India and Pakistan is to make every effort to deny the terrorists success in their criminal undertaking. The assault on Mumbai was obviously a means to an end and not an end in itself.

Since the attack on Mumbai must have been planned many months earlier it is not easy to pinpoint the objectives of those who made the plot, except for a bid to pre-empt the new Pakistan government’s attempts to normalise ties with India. This should have been the overriding goal in November too when a couple of other factors — state and union elections in India and the Kashmiri people’s shift away from violent struggle — might have influenced the terrorists’ planning.

It should not be difficult to recognise the terrorists’ (regardless of their parentage) interest in helping India’s communal factions in both state and union elections, as similar to their preferences among Pakistani political formations. Terrorists everywhere like to see in power parties that are committed to the politics of exclusion, because of their common roots in intolerance. Likewise, the prospect of the Kashmiri people’s return to a non-violent political struggle for their rights cannot be welcome to all those who have thrived on conflict and confrontation between India and Pakistan, and such elements can be found in both countries. This reading of the situation offers a fair indication of the course India and Pakistan need to follow jointly and severally.

The wave of anger in India is understandable and the emotions of a large number of Indians have been whipped up to the extent of making them impervious to friendly counsel from abroad. However, India is fortunate in having a sizeable community of peace-lovers that must not surrender to the jingoism of hate-preachers. Apart from the fact that peace is the highest moral ideal for entire humankind, the Indian people must be enabled to take into account the prohibitive cost of confrontation with any neighbour not only in economic terms but also in those of an increase in intolerance of differences based on belief, ethnicity or social status.

The people of Pakistan, on their part, have to conduct an honest self-appraisal, however agonising it may be. The question whether Pakistan has fostered terrorism beyond its frontiers has become irrelevant. What is relevant today is that the world is not convinced of its disclaimers despite the fact that militants have forced a civil war on it. Now it is the international community’s perception that Pakistan is up against — and perception is often more effective than the truth. Pakistan can escape being branded an international pariah only if it undertakes a sincere and concerted campaign against extremist elements whose existence cannot be denied.

The question of seeking foreign help in the fight against terrorists that are threatening Pakistan’s very existence also needs to be studied dispassionately. A state that has no qualms about begging for aid to buy palm oil or to keep the administration running should not feel shy about asking for help to ward off the terrorists’ challenge. It is perhaps necessary to realise that the plea that Pakistan itself is a victim of terrorism, though true, could become self-incriminatory if it does not produce the required zeal in combating terrorism.

Efforts by India and Pakistan to deal with terrorism separately will not bear fruit unless they stop demonising each other and start acting in concert. Unfortunately, both countries have become prisoners of confrontationist forces they have thoughtlessly nourished for six decades and more. The leaders of both countries appear to be so helpless in the face of these forces that they may be afraid of thinking of a summit meeting right now. Such fears will be the undoing of the subcontinent as the situation demands boldness in the pursuit of peace and goodwill instead of proficiency in sabre-rattling or diplomatic sophistry.

The governments of Pakistan and India will not be able to seize the present opportunity to close the chapter of adversarial relations without the active backing of their respective civil societies. The latter alone have possibilities of silencing extremist elements in their populations and weaning their media away from their habit of fuelling tensions.

In any case both countries should make the fullest possible use of the Track-II channels to evolve an agreed approach to terrorism. The starting point has to be the realisation that terrorism is not a transitional law and order problem, that the roots of the threat to both India and Pakistan lie in the pre-Partition communal politics and that their future lies in burying that hateful legacy of religion-based politics.
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The article first appeared in the South Asian Citizens Web and the Daily Dawn internet edition.

Kashmir Conflict And The Emerging Political Scene In South Asia

By Shah Faisal                                           Muslim India

Srinagar :: The sequence of events in Jammu & Kashmir since May 26, 2008 has once again added some definite firmness to the possibility of an early conflict resolution. With the calls of separation being echoed by many czars of the Indian civil-society, it seems imminent that the familiar cycle of quiescence-chaos-quiescence may finally break now in favour of an acceptable conclusion.

However, parallel to the emergence of a novel political scene in Kashmir, a lot more action and drama has heated-up the regional and the larger global race-course also, something that will have an important bearing on the final outcome of Kashmir dispute in times to come.

To serve as a premise for further argument, three important observations need to be made at this point. One that the Indian establishment has almost frankly demonstrated now a deep seated malaise regarding the Kashmir issue. Walking away from that old and bold crown-of-the-head rhetoric, the Kashmir is now being plainly seen as a gangrene-of-the-limb scenario. This admission is in itself going to be of immense relevance in the times to come.

Secondly, the image of India as an Asian megalith has also suffered formidable insult from its defiant immediate neighbours recently. In past few months, the Nepal and Bangladesh in a fit of assertiveness have not hesitated to thumb their noses openly at India by aspiring for a warmer hand-shake with China. This is besides the ever-increasing distance between India and its other neighbours who are not enjoying the economic rise of India.

And lastly, the Nuclear Deal between US and India coupled with deteriorating US-Pakistan ties on Taliban issue will also affect the further course of Kashmiri resistance movement in their own queer ways.

When we say realisation and admission by India of the bitter realities in Kashmir, we automatically stand up to accept the inevitability of separation. The fact is that the earlier rigid stance and faked confidence has been replaced to a large extent by a strong feeling of disillusionment and surrender. Under such circumstances, India would agree to let go even tomorrow but for that handful of internal and international compulsions faced by it.

India's problem is two-fold. On one side are the questions of strategic interest. The apprehension of losing out to emboldened North Eastern and Naxalite movements. The fear of a national hue and cry against the nerve-breaking decision. But it is evident that the most important reservations are related to external circumstances of India. As has been said earlier, the India finds the possibility of secession totally adverse to its regional and international image as for now. The fear is that with birth of a China-led power-bloc in Asia, there is every risk that sooner or later India may find itself completely gheraoed by a chain of increasingly reluctant nations. As such an independent Kashmir will just complete the loop that has Pakistan and Afghanistan as one limb and China-Nepal-Myanmar as the other. After having tested missiles at the behest of Chinese technology, the Bangladesh can be seen as becoming the knot of this scary loop around India.

As such, these regional developments torpedo the scarce amount of hard-managed Indian will to go for one-time dispute resolution in wake of the present uprising in Kashmir. Thus the current Indian establishment seems to be pitched against a very tricky situation, making it difficult to handle the crisis faithfully and balance the internal and external compulsions in favour of a useful solution. So it can be said with fair degree of confidence, that unless India reassures its place in the troubled power-equation of South Asia, not much head-way can be expected on the Kashmir issue from its side. And till then it is going to be the same old story of evasion, unrest and deadlock.

Then remains the question of 123 Agreement and its affect on the Kashmir issue. It seems in the long-run this deal is perhaps going to be in favour of Kashmir, although apparently it points otherwise. By jumping into the arms of America, India has only addressed the insecurities imposed on it by the ever-rising influence of various antagonistic powers in the Asian continent. For India it is a way of dealing with this so called "Evil-Bow" formed by Pakistan-Afghanistan-China-Nepal-Myanmar and Bangladesh, despite superficial pretensions of friendship with the later trio. However, after regaining its confidence and veto in the regional matters, there is every like-hood that India will renounce its iron-fist policy on the Kashmir issue in favour of long-term gains.

These gainswill be in the form of reduced terrorism threat to India, and lesser defense expenditure, once having redefined its strategic interests and creating a higher level of deterence . Here the argument can not be refuted on the basis of a presumption that a more mighty-India will act with even more rigidity in future. It is because; India has already realized the futility of its integral-part rhetoric and the perils of a forceful military occupation.

In coming years the nations are going to be over-busy in altogether different wars of survival and a powerful India will have a new set of challenges to confront, so as to affect the course of all existent problem-phenomena, including the Kashmir issue.

In midst of all this fury, special mention of Pakistan needs to be made. The way things are shaping up, it seems Pakistan may soon solemnize its marriage to China by gradually coming out of the American charm. Under present conditions of a US-centric world order , it will cause an added disadvantage to a China-backed Pakistan by passing on the reins of Kashmir issue further into the hands of a US-aided India. That means the negotiability of Kashmir dispute may in future reduce to a differently bilateral India-Kashmir domain to sheer disappointment of Pakistan. If that happens ever, the chances of an Independent Kashmir will increase as much as scuttling the hope of a Kashmir that cedes to Pakistan.

In times to come there is going to be a lot of churning and shaking and Kashmir issue will increasingly get connected to movements on the global platform. Although no one can risk his money on betting for an early conflict resolution, the way nations are experimenting with newer power equations day in and day out, it can easily be fathomed out that the days of conflict are numbered.
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Photo: Veiled Kashmiri women voters stand outside a polling booth to cast their votes during the first phase of local elections in Bandipora, 60 km (37 miles) north of Srinagar, November 17, 2008     REUTERS/Fayaz Kabli

Shah Faisal is a Freelance Columnist based in Srinagar-190001
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