Dr Syed Mansoor Hussain
Democracy is a messy business. To repeat an oft-repeated cliché, the best treatment for a bad democracy is more democracy and not less. And free and fair elections at the right time are the only effective form of accountability that politicians understand and accept without question
According to the Mayan Calendar, the world ends in the year 2012 CE. This has spawned many ‘end of the world’ scenarios and most recently a rather graphic movie that depicts one way the world might end and soon. The movie is aptly called ‘2012’. Of course the world will end sometime and most likely in a few billion years. However, there are enough conniptions that alter the world as we know it every so often.
There have been many changes during my own lifetime that would suggest that much of the world I knew even 40 years ago has changed or if one wishes to be dire, has ended forever. However, Pakistan still exists and goes on in spite of the predictions to the contrary by the resident prophets of doom and gloom that infest our media, particularly certain TV channels these days.
Frankly I stopped watching television when the load shedding hit us a few years ago. Even though my television worked due to UPS devices attached to it, the cable company I subscribe to would shut down transmission when they lost electricity supply. So, I no longer watch television or the channels that most often highlight the ‘horsemen of the apocalypse’. Especially the one horseman that made his reputation by discussing eschatology, though I must admit that since then I have trouble figuring out whether his area of expertise is eschatology or scatology.
Recently, Pakistani politics has been thrown into turmoil after the most honourable Supreme Court invalidated the NRO. The ire of all of the horsemen of the apocalypse is now aimed at President Asif Ali Zardari. The way it looks, these horsemen expect that President Zardari must do either of two things: commit seppuku or else just ‘ride off into the sunset’. Of course they prefer the first option since they are mortally afraid that he might just make another ‘comeback’.
As far as I am concerned, I am quite satisfied with the state of politics in Pakistan. The problem with most Pakistanis, especially what passes for the ‘intelligentsia’ in this country, is that they have not really seen politics as it happens. I was in the US during the Watergate hearings when Senator Baker asked the famous question, “What did the president know and when did he know it?” President Nixon subsequently resigned and nothing really changed.
Yes, I was there when under President Ford, the US embassy in Saigon was evacuated and people hung on to helicopters while that was being done. I was there when President Carter sent in the troops to rescue the hostages held in the US embassy in Tehran and the mission failed and the US Secretary of State resigned. And yes, I watched the Iran-Contra hearings and subsequently saw senior US officials being indicted for what they did. And what about the cake sent by President Reagan to the Iranians?
The Clinton years were of course an education in politics. The White Water Scandal, the suicide of Vince Foster, the end of the healthcare initiative headed by the First Lady were all very instructive. The ultimate was of course the impeachment hearings against President Clinton about the Monica Lewinsky scandal, the entirely prurient Starr Report being the hallmark of that episode. And yet President Clinton survived and finished his term with his popularity very much intact.
In spite of his personal failings, Clinton was in modern times one of the better presidents the US has had. And he was followed by a president who was a person of great moral probity and yet gave the US and the rest of the world much sorrow. The question of course is whether it is worse for a president to have an affair with a White House intern or to attack Iraq without good reason?
Now to President Obama. The man is so clean that it is worrisome. Evidently the only weakness this man has is that he occasionally smokes cigarettes. Yet his opponents are all over the place. They claim that he is not an American citizen since he was not born in the US, or else that he is a Muslim by birth and therefore lies about being a Christian. The less virulent opponents insist that he is really a socialist. Of course his opponents cannot blame him for being an African-American, which of course is the problem most of them have with him anyway.
Back to politics in Pakistan. The government is muddling along; the opposition parties, as oppositions must do, oppose the government but are entirely confused. The major opposition party in the country after all sits in coalition in Punjab with the same party that it opposes at the Centre. And most importantly, unless the third time limit on being prime minister is reversed, nobody wants fresh elections either.
The point I want to make is simply that I do not believe that Pakistani politicians are any different from politicians anywhere else. However, for the first time in the history of Pakistan it seems that different branches of the government, including the executive, the legislature, the judiciary and the army are acting as they should. Until these four pillars of the state find the right balance, things will seem a trifle unsettling to those Pakistanis who are used to being governed by autocrats and army generals. Democracy is a messy business. To repeat an oft-repeated cliché, the best treatment for a bad democracy is more democracy and not less. And free and fair elections at the right time are the only effective form of accountability that politicians understand and accept without question. As far as ‘good governance’ is concerned, that is not an inherent but a learned ability.
And yes, neither Pakistan nor the world is ending anytime soon. President Zardari is not going to suddenly disappear either, all the huffing and puffing by his opponents notwithstanding.
Syed Mansoor Hussain has practised and taught medicine in the US. He can be reached at smhmbbs70@yahoo.com
Sunday 27 December 2009
Origins of language
Charles Ferndale
From the study of fossils, it seems clear that Homo sapiens had the physiological means to speak at least two hundred thousand years ago. Neanderthals were probably as intelligent as us, and were certainly able to communicate, but may not have had the physiological throat structures necessary for speech
I shall begin my discussion of the origins of language with a statement that I shall treat as an axiom of the life sciences. All functionally important characteristics possessed by any living creature are possessed because they conferred upon the ancestors of that creature the ability to propagate their genes successfully. And so, like all such characteristics, language was selected by the advantages it gave those who possessed it in their struggle to propagate their genes in the highly competitive struggles of life.
If the ability to communicate was selected because of the survival value it conferred upon its possessors, then a number of questions naturally arise: (i) What advantages did the ability to speak confer upon our ancestors, such that their genes out-proliferated those of members of our species who could not speak? (ii) Do any of our relatives in the animal world have the ability to speak? (iii) Can creatures communicate without language, and, if so, what additional features does linguistic communication confer on those who can do it? (iv) Can we imagine a persuasive evolutionary past that could explain the huge gulf between the abilities of humans to communicate, relative to the abilities of our closest rivals? (v) Exactly what were the selective pressures that came to bear on our ancestors and resulted in the evolution of skills so advanced that they would (apparently) not be fully needed until at least one hundred thousand years after they evolved? What we call civilisation comprises no more than eight percent of our life on earth, and advanced technological civilisation no more than 0.0005 percent of our life on earth, so why did a species that lived by gathering fruits and plants, and by using sticks and stones for weapons, need the (entirely unused, indeed unknown) ability to do all those things upon which our 21st century, technologically-driven, lives depend? We have not changed a lot over the last hundred thousand years, but the world in which we live has been changed dramatically by us. So, why did humans evolve the skills necessary to create a world so unhealthy to live in? Why did they evolve the ability to destroy life on earth? Most technological skills are language dependent. Or, put differently, why have we not evolved the skills to check ourselves from destroying the only world we have? I shall make no attempt to answer here these consequences of our mastery of language. But you should be aware of them (an interesting approach to answers to these questions can be found in: Jared Diamond: The Rise and Fall of the Third Chimpanzee and Collapse; and in Ronald Wright: A Short History of Progress).
It should come as no surprise that all the answers to these questions are still being hotly debated. Can animals other than us communicate? It depends upon what you mean by ‘communicate’, but, to be brief: yes, a lot of other animals, by many criteria, can communicate; some can even speak. What advantages does the ability to communicate confer on animals? Many: all of which depend upon the communicating animals being members of a community. Communication is restricted to social animals and is clearly an integral part of the advantages conferred by cooperation. When did the ability to communicate arise among our ancestors? Millions of years ago. When did hominids (man-like animals) first acquire the ability to speak? The answer is still debated and awaits the discovery of more bone fossils and other advances in our understanding of how speech sounds can be made. Nevertheless, from the study of fossils, it seems clear that Homo sapiens had the physiological means to speak at least two hundred thousand years ago. Neanderthals were probably as intelligent as us, and were certainly able to communicate, but may not have had the physiological throat structures necessary for speech (which is one explanation advanced for the probability that we wiped them out). When did we first evolve the ability to communicate by means of speech? It may be impossible to answer this question because speech in those early times left no traces, but art is a form of symbolism intended to be meaningful and the earliest undisputed evidence of art (75,000 years ago) comes from the Blombos caves at the most southern sea-shore of South Africa. After that there are debatable dates of cave rock carving in Australia about 50,000 years old. And, finally, the earliest cave paintings so far found in Europe (at Chauvet, in France) are just under 33,000 years old. So Homo sapiens have been communicating with symbols for at least 75,000 years.
Thus it appears that we can approach questions about the origins of language through many different fields of study. But we can also do so by studying what we might be called the logic of meaning. To do this is to analyse the necessary and sufficient conditions for successful communication among people to occur and to see how these conditions might give rise to the conventional uses of ordinary language.
I shall now construct an early human, pre-linguistic, context for communication, so we may discover what conditions must logically be met if effective communication is to occur. It might interest the reader that these conditions would apply to any attempt we might make to communicate with aliens from other parts of the universe, and that it was his failure to meet these conditions that made me think the great astronomer Carl Sagan’s attempts at communicating with aliens were bound to fail.
Imagine a world long before people began to live in settled communities, say 30,000 years ago. And imagine we are living in that world and are running along an unfrequented path through the wilds. We come suddenly upon a stretch of quicksand, well concealed by tussock grass, into which we are only saved from falling by good fortune. Now try to imagine what we would have to do to warn anyone else who came that way about the quicksand. In other words we want anyone following in our footsteps to conclude: someone is trying to tell me to beware of quicksand. For communication to occur, it would not be enough for the stranger to discover by some means (that may or may not have involved our intervention) that there was a dangerous patch of quicksand in the way of the path. That might happen if we place a cunningly concealed trip-rock on the path so that when the stranger tripped, his hands and face landed at the edge of the quicksand, but the rest of his body remained safely away from it. He might discover the quicksand, but fail to conclude that he had been intentionally warned about it by someone before him; that we had intentionally tripped him in order to tell him something. Communication would not have occurred unless, at the very least, he concluded that a communicative intention was involved. So communicative intentions logically predate communication, and probably predate them historically. Of course if the only people who might ever come that way shared a language, such as a jungle highway code, then all we should need to do was to put up a sign ‘Beware of Quicksand!’ But such a language has to grow out of something? Language use comes after the communications I am describing, which logically predate it. What are the logically necessary conditions out of which any language uses must grow? They must grow out of communally shared knowledge and assumptions. First, I must attract the stranger’s attention; I must do that in a way that causes him to believe that someone is trying to tell him something; then he must ask himself what I might mean him to conclude; then he must have a reasonable chance at arriving (guessing) at the right conclusion. Three of these four conditions necessary for successful communication require shared knowledge and presuppositions.
Once such a successful form of communication has taken place the beginnings of conventional language are in existence. Because, once the stranger shares his experience with the village to which he was travelling, it would be reasonable for the people there, when confronted by the need to communicate the same message in future, to use the same means. By accepting communally what means will be used to convey meanings, symbols with conventional meanings come into existence. What to use to say what you want to say becomes common knowledge. This is the essence of ordinary languages, of which highway codes are examples. From this analysis a very wide range of consequences flow.
The writer has degrees from the Oxford University and the Institute of Psychiatry, University of London. He can be reached at charlesferndale@yahoo.co.uk
From the study of fossils, it seems clear that Homo sapiens had the physiological means to speak at least two hundred thousand years ago. Neanderthals were probably as intelligent as us, and were certainly able to communicate, but may not have had the physiological throat structures necessary for speech
I shall begin my discussion of the origins of language with a statement that I shall treat as an axiom of the life sciences. All functionally important characteristics possessed by any living creature are possessed because they conferred upon the ancestors of that creature the ability to propagate their genes successfully. And so, like all such characteristics, language was selected by the advantages it gave those who possessed it in their struggle to propagate their genes in the highly competitive struggles of life.
If the ability to communicate was selected because of the survival value it conferred upon its possessors, then a number of questions naturally arise: (i) What advantages did the ability to speak confer upon our ancestors, such that their genes out-proliferated those of members of our species who could not speak? (ii) Do any of our relatives in the animal world have the ability to speak? (iii) Can creatures communicate without language, and, if so, what additional features does linguistic communication confer on those who can do it? (iv) Can we imagine a persuasive evolutionary past that could explain the huge gulf between the abilities of humans to communicate, relative to the abilities of our closest rivals? (v) Exactly what were the selective pressures that came to bear on our ancestors and resulted in the evolution of skills so advanced that they would (apparently) not be fully needed until at least one hundred thousand years after they evolved? What we call civilisation comprises no more than eight percent of our life on earth, and advanced technological civilisation no more than 0.0005 percent of our life on earth, so why did a species that lived by gathering fruits and plants, and by using sticks and stones for weapons, need the (entirely unused, indeed unknown) ability to do all those things upon which our 21st century, technologically-driven, lives depend? We have not changed a lot over the last hundred thousand years, but the world in which we live has been changed dramatically by us. So, why did humans evolve the skills necessary to create a world so unhealthy to live in? Why did they evolve the ability to destroy life on earth? Most technological skills are language dependent. Or, put differently, why have we not evolved the skills to check ourselves from destroying the only world we have? I shall make no attempt to answer here these consequences of our mastery of language. But you should be aware of them (an interesting approach to answers to these questions can be found in: Jared Diamond: The Rise and Fall of the Third Chimpanzee and Collapse; and in Ronald Wright: A Short History of Progress).
It should come as no surprise that all the answers to these questions are still being hotly debated. Can animals other than us communicate? It depends upon what you mean by ‘communicate’, but, to be brief: yes, a lot of other animals, by many criteria, can communicate; some can even speak. What advantages does the ability to communicate confer on animals? Many: all of which depend upon the communicating animals being members of a community. Communication is restricted to social animals and is clearly an integral part of the advantages conferred by cooperation. When did the ability to communicate arise among our ancestors? Millions of years ago. When did hominids (man-like animals) first acquire the ability to speak? The answer is still debated and awaits the discovery of more bone fossils and other advances in our understanding of how speech sounds can be made. Nevertheless, from the study of fossils, it seems clear that Homo sapiens had the physiological means to speak at least two hundred thousand years ago. Neanderthals were probably as intelligent as us, and were certainly able to communicate, but may not have had the physiological throat structures necessary for speech (which is one explanation advanced for the probability that we wiped them out). When did we first evolve the ability to communicate by means of speech? It may be impossible to answer this question because speech in those early times left no traces, but art is a form of symbolism intended to be meaningful and the earliest undisputed evidence of art (75,000 years ago) comes from the Blombos caves at the most southern sea-shore of South Africa. After that there are debatable dates of cave rock carving in Australia about 50,000 years old. And, finally, the earliest cave paintings so far found in Europe (at Chauvet, in France) are just under 33,000 years old. So Homo sapiens have been communicating with symbols for at least 75,000 years.
Thus it appears that we can approach questions about the origins of language through many different fields of study. But we can also do so by studying what we might be called the logic of meaning. To do this is to analyse the necessary and sufficient conditions for successful communication among people to occur and to see how these conditions might give rise to the conventional uses of ordinary language.
I shall now construct an early human, pre-linguistic, context for communication, so we may discover what conditions must logically be met if effective communication is to occur. It might interest the reader that these conditions would apply to any attempt we might make to communicate with aliens from other parts of the universe, and that it was his failure to meet these conditions that made me think the great astronomer Carl Sagan’s attempts at communicating with aliens were bound to fail.
Imagine a world long before people began to live in settled communities, say 30,000 years ago. And imagine we are living in that world and are running along an unfrequented path through the wilds. We come suddenly upon a stretch of quicksand, well concealed by tussock grass, into which we are only saved from falling by good fortune. Now try to imagine what we would have to do to warn anyone else who came that way about the quicksand. In other words we want anyone following in our footsteps to conclude: someone is trying to tell me to beware of quicksand. For communication to occur, it would not be enough for the stranger to discover by some means (that may or may not have involved our intervention) that there was a dangerous patch of quicksand in the way of the path. That might happen if we place a cunningly concealed trip-rock on the path so that when the stranger tripped, his hands and face landed at the edge of the quicksand, but the rest of his body remained safely away from it. He might discover the quicksand, but fail to conclude that he had been intentionally warned about it by someone before him; that we had intentionally tripped him in order to tell him something. Communication would not have occurred unless, at the very least, he concluded that a communicative intention was involved. So communicative intentions logically predate communication, and probably predate them historically. Of course if the only people who might ever come that way shared a language, such as a jungle highway code, then all we should need to do was to put up a sign ‘Beware of Quicksand!’ But such a language has to grow out of something? Language use comes after the communications I am describing, which logically predate it. What are the logically necessary conditions out of which any language uses must grow? They must grow out of communally shared knowledge and assumptions. First, I must attract the stranger’s attention; I must do that in a way that causes him to believe that someone is trying to tell him something; then he must ask himself what I might mean him to conclude; then he must have a reasonable chance at arriving (guessing) at the right conclusion. Three of these four conditions necessary for successful communication require shared knowledge and presuppositions.
Once such a successful form of communication has taken place the beginnings of conventional language are in existence. Because, once the stranger shares his experience with the village to which he was travelling, it would be reasonable for the people there, when confronted by the need to communicate the same message in future, to use the same means. By accepting communally what means will be used to convey meanings, symbols with conventional meanings come into existence. What to use to say what you want to say becomes common knowledge. This is the essence of ordinary languages, of which highway codes are examples. From this analysis a very wide range of consequences flow.
The writer has degrees from the Oxford University and the Institute of Psychiatry, University of London. He can be reached at charlesferndale@yahoo.co.uk
Sayedah Zainab’s sermon
Monday, December 28, 2009
Farhan Bokhari
“It is quite sufficient that Allah is your Judge and Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon his progeny, is your opponent and Jibraeel as the supporter (of Muhammad). All those who instigated you to do what you did and all those who put you in charge due to which you are a playing havoc with the lives of Muslims will know for certain how evil the end of the oppressors is and which of you shall have the worst place and will be the least protected.”
(An excerpt from the sermon of Sayedah Zainab bint-e-Imam Ali, the fourth caliph of Islam.)
Almost 1,400 years after the epic battle in Karbala led to the martyrdom of Imam Hussain, the grandson of prophet Mohammad and son of Imam Ali and Sayedah Bibi Fatima, the daughter of Prophet Mohammad, the words spoken by Sayedah Zainab still hold true.
In a world which has seen mounting conflict for years, including that in Iraq — where Imam Hussain’s passionate followers will come together in one of the largest annual congregations anywhere, to mark the day of his martyrdom on the 10th day of Muharram-ul-Haram, “Ashura” — Sayedah Zainab’s sermon carries profound significance.
For Imam Ali’s daughter taken as prisoner along with other women and children, after the battle in Karbala, her sermon in the Damascus court of Yazeed ibn-e Muawiya, the self-proclaimed caliph of the Omayyad Dynasty, marked her towering moment.
Surrounded by the prisoners of Karbala, including her close family members along with the well-wishers of the household of Prophet Mohammad, Sayedah Zainab pulled together unprecedented courage, seldom seen before or after her moment of grief. Indeed, she turned her grief into triumph by her courage and skill of oratory, inherited from her father, her mother and her grandfather.
For Muslims of today, Sayedah Zainab’s sermon carries great significance as a personal example to be emulated, but more importantly as a guiding principle for their lives.
Across Pakistan, in the midst of the bloodletting of the past year and a fast growing practice of Muslims killing Muslims in the name of Islam, Sayedah Zainab’s words provide much food for thought. While some may seek to dominate others through their blatant violence, there must be acknowledgement of the futility of tyranny.
More broadly for the Islamic world, seeking inspiration from Sayedah Zainab’s eloquent words must be built upon at least three guiding principles.
First and foremost, tyranny can endure for a while, even a long while, but not indefinitely. Nowhere is there a clearer demonstration of this view than in the palace once occupied by Yazeed in Damascus, where pilgrims who visit it in large numbers seek not to remember the perpetrators of the crime in Karbala but, indeed, to pay homage and respect to Sayedah Zainab. Among the most widely practiced rituals inside that towering complex, the place where Sayedah Zainab delivered her sermon, is a must stop for visitors.
Sayedah Zainab’s place of burial in Damascus has itself become a frequent destination for pilgrims. Many use their pilgrimage to remind themselves of the endurance of Sayedah Zainab’s words for all time to come.
Second, there is an equally powerful reminder for Muslims in witnessing a real-life example of the fate that must be the final outcome of empires built on tyranny. In Damascus, there is simply no evidence of a final resting place for Yazeed, his close family members or, indeed, any of his followers.
For a king who ruled through the power of the sword and claimed to be the justified ruler of his time, Yazeed’s fate is indeed no different from the fate of those before and after him who ruled through the strength of their weapons, hoping to retain their legacy for times to come.
For Muslims in today’s world, be it for those fighting Israeli occupation of Palestine or elsewhere facing occupying forces, such as in Iraq, the underlying lesson is clear. Occupation through excessive military force is capable of bringing a military victory in the short term, but the long-term sustainability of such occupations must always remain in doubt.
Finally, events leading to the tragic battle of Karbala, carry an all-too-powerful message as well. The build-up to the epic battle began when Yazeed’s accession to the throne of the Muslim empire was quickly followed by demands for Imam Hussain to formally commit his loyalty, or “bayat,” to the new ruler.
For historians, a baffling question must remain: would the course of events have been different if Yazeed had abstained from formally seeking the loyalty of Imam Hussain?
Whatever the answer, Sayedah Zainab’s prediction of the fate of oppressors would have remained unchanged, underlining the fundamental principal that empires built upon tyranny will neither establish a living legacy nor last for long in historical terms.
The writer is an Islamabad-based
journalist who writes on political and
economic affairs. His email address is: bokhari62@yahoo.co.uk
Farhan Bokhari
“It is quite sufficient that Allah is your Judge and Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon his progeny, is your opponent and Jibraeel as the supporter (of Muhammad). All those who instigated you to do what you did and all those who put you in charge due to which you are a playing havoc with the lives of Muslims will know for certain how evil the end of the oppressors is and which of you shall have the worst place and will be the least protected.”
(An excerpt from the sermon of Sayedah Zainab bint-e-Imam Ali, the fourth caliph of Islam.)
Almost 1,400 years after the epic battle in Karbala led to the martyrdom of Imam Hussain, the grandson of prophet Mohammad and son of Imam Ali and Sayedah Bibi Fatima, the daughter of Prophet Mohammad, the words spoken by Sayedah Zainab still hold true.
In a world which has seen mounting conflict for years, including that in Iraq — where Imam Hussain’s passionate followers will come together in one of the largest annual congregations anywhere, to mark the day of his martyrdom on the 10th day of Muharram-ul-Haram, “Ashura” — Sayedah Zainab’s sermon carries profound significance.
For Imam Ali’s daughter taken as prisoner along with other women and children, after the battle in Karbala, her sermon in the Damascus court of Yazeed ibn-e Muawiya, the self-proclaimed caliph of the Omayyad Dynasty, marked her towering moment.
Surrounded by the prisoners of Karbala, including her close family members along with the well-wishers of the household of Prophet Mohammad, Sayedah Zainab pulled together unprecedented courage, seldom seen before or after her moment of grief. Indeed, she turned her grief into triumph by her courage and skill of oratory, inherited from her father, her mother and her grandfather.
For Muslims of today, Sayedah Zainab’s sermon carries great significance as a personal example to be emulated, but more importantly as a guiding principle for their lives.
Across Pakistan, in the midst of the bloodletting of the past year and a fast growing practice of Muslims killing Muslims in the name of Islam, Sayedah Zainab’s words provide much food for thought. While some may seek to dominate others through their blatant violence, there must be acknowledgement of the futility of tyranny.
More broadly for the Islamic world, seeking inspiration from Sayedah Zainab’s eloquent words must be built upon at least three guiding principles.
First and foremost, tyranny can endure for a while, even a long while, but not indefinitely. Nowhere is there a clearer demonstration of this view than in the palace once occupied by Yazeed in Damascus, where pilgrims who visit it in large numbers seek not to remember the perpetrators of the crime in Karbala but, indeed, to pay homage and respect to Sayedah Zainab. Among the most widely practiced rituals inside that towering complex, the place where Sayedah Zainab delivered her sermon, is a must stop for visitors.
Sayedah Zainab’s place of burial in Damascus has itself become a frequent destination for pilgrims. Many use their pilgrimage to remind themselves of the endurance of Sayedah Zainab’s words for all time to come.
Second, there is an equally powerful reminder for Muslims in witnessing a real-life example of the fate that must be the final outcome of empires built on tyranny. In Damascus, there is simply no evidence of a final resting place for Yazeed, his close family members or, indeed, any of his followers.
For a king who ruled through the power of the sword and claimed to be the justified ruler of his time, Yazeed’s fate is indeed no different from the fate of those before and after him who ruled through the strength of their weapons, hoping to retain their legacy for times to come.
For Muslims in today’s world, be it for those fighting Israeli occupation of Palestine or elsewhere facing occupying forces, such as in Iraq, the underlying lesson is clear. Occupation through excessive military force is capable of bringing a military victory in the short term, but the long-term sustainability of such occupations must always remain in doubt.
Finally, events leading to the tragic battle of Karbala, carry an all-too-powerful message as well. The build-up to the epic battle began when Yazeed’s accession to the throne of the Muslim empire was quickly followed by demands for Imam Hussain to formally commit his loyalty, or “bayat,” to the new ruler.
For historians, a baffling question must remain: would the course of events have been different if Yazeed had abstained from formally seeking the loyalty of Imam Hussain?
Whatever the answer, Sayedah Zainab’s prediction of the fate of oppressors would have remained unchanged, underlining the fundamental principal that empires built upon tyranny will neither establish a living legacy nor last for long in historical terms.
The writer is an Islamabad-based
journalist who writes on political and
economic affairs. His email address is: bokhari62@yahoo.co.uk
The unending holiday season in India
Monday, December 28, 2009
Aakar Patel
In India, secularism is inclusive. Europe’s secularism measures distance of the state from Christianity. Indians think of secularism as equal respect for all religions. This is supposed to reflect the Hindu belief in tolerance. One famous Sanskrit line is: Vasudhaiva kutumbakam. Vasudha is mother earth and kutumb is family and so the line means the whole world is a family. However, our recent record of religious violence shows that inclusive secularism isn’t always followed. Often unhinged views on religion are tolerated under this formulation of non-interference, and journalist George Verghese described Indian secularism as ‘equal respect for everyone’s communalism’.
But the doctrine of inclusive secularism is India’s constitution and perhaps at some point we will become good enough to deserve that fine document. Since the state tries to be inclusive, every religion’s celebrations are official holidays in India. Our calendar is the most colourful in the world.
Many urban Americans now greet each other this season with the words ‘Happy holidays’ instead of ‘Merry Christmas’. This is typical European thoughtfulness of the feelings of others. The ‘happy holidayers’ want to share their joy but want not to offend Jews and others. Personally I like ‘Merry Christmas’ and see no reason why anybody should be offended that Christians are celebrating the birth of their saviour. In India, however, you couldn’t say ‘Happy holidays’ because we have them through the year. Let’s have a look.
January has four: Makar Sankranti, Vasant (or Basant) Panchami, Republic Day and Moharram. Sankranti is one of the few solar holidays we have, since the Hindu calendar, like the Islamic one, is lunar. Sankranti always falls on January 14, when the Sun transits into Capricorn. Gujaratis do not celebrate it in a religious way, though some other Hindus do, and on this day we fly kites all day and eat laddoos of til (sesame seed). All faiths celebrate it in Gujarat even though it may be seen as a Hindu festival. Surat’s best kites are made in the suburb of Rander, by Muslim craftsmen of the first calibre. I used to go with a friend’s father in the 80s, and the old man we would buy kites from had been supplying the family for 40 years.
Vasant Panchmi is the fifth day of the Hindu month of Mesh, and the first day of spring. It is essentially a North Indian festival, which is why it is also celebrated in Lahore, but not in Karachi. The reason for this is that cities like Bombay and Karachi don’t really have a winter or a spring, our seasons being: hot, warm and wet.
Republic Day is when India’s constitution was put into force in 1950.
Most Indians do not recognise Shia as separate from Sunni and we think Moharram as something all Muslims commemorate. In Bombay, the chant in the procession is: ‘Ya Hasan ya Hussain, Hum na they, hum na they’. In Calcutta, where many Muslims are not Urdu-speaking, the chant is ‘Hasan-Hussain dada-bhai’ indicating that the Imams were elder and younger brother, or simply ‘Hasan-Hussain zindabad’.
Moharram is moving, and while I was familiar with the second line of Muhammad Ali Jauhar’s famous couplet, my gooseflesh flared the first time I read the whole poem and reached its end: Qatl-e-Hussain asl mein marg-e-Yazid hai/Islam zinda hota hai har Karbala kay baad (Hussain’s murder will actually be tyrant Yazid’s end: Islam revives itself after every tragedy).
February has Maha Shivratri and Eid-e-Milad. Shiv is the god Hindus believe will ultimately destroy the universe, but is worshipped because he consumed a deadly poison and saved the world. As an offering to him, many Hindus leave (and consume) ganja or cannabis indica, the drug that is associated with the cult of Shiva.
Eid-e-Milad is celebrated with processions, but it seems to me that these are led mainly by modernist organisations like the Jamaat-e-Islami and, in Bombay, the Raza Academy.
March has the festival of Holi, marking the end of winter. We celebrate Holi by smearing colour and splashing water on each other and, unsurprisingly, young men and women enjoy it the most because there is a fair amount of licence in touching. The drink consumed is bhang, cannabis indica paste and with milk. Government-licensed stores sell it through the year in many states, and it is not difficult to see why the hippies were drawn to India.
March also has Ram Navami, birthday of Lord Ram, and Mahavir Jayanti, the day remembering the last of the great Jain saints. The Jain religion is interesting because it does not believe in god or creator. A small community, mainly found in Rajasthan and Gujarat, Jains are the most successful of India’s trading communities.
April has Good Friday, marking the crucifixion of Christ; and Vaishakh or Baisakhi, the start of the harvest season.
May has Buddha Purnima, marking the passing of Lord Buddha. For most Indian Buddhists, however, the big days are April 14, Ambedkar’s birthday, and December 6, the commemoration of his death. Dr Ambedkar was author of India’s constitution and leader of the Untouchables or Dalits. His conversion to Buddhism in 1956 began an exodus of Dalits out of Hinduism, and most Buddhists in India are today from this community. December 6 is also the day in 1992 when the Babri Masjid was torn down.
August has Independence day on the 15th, one day after Pakistan’s because astrologers held the 14th as inauspicious and asked Nehru to wait till midnight.
August also has Onam, Raksha Bandhan and Parsi New Year, which is celebrated in Bombay and Gujarat mainly. I think the Parsis are the best Gujarati community and they are the greatest of all Indian communities.
Onam is a Hindu festival celebrated in Kerala with a magnificent snake boat race. Raksha Bandhan is when girls tie a thread, a rakhi, around their brother’s wrist and seek his protection (and his cash). It is a secular festival and it is said that emperor Humayun responded to a rakhi sent to him by Rani Karnavati of Chittor when she was under attack from the Sultan of Gujarat. Humayun came too late and the Rajput women had burnt themselves. Akbar would later level Chittor in his most savage siege, in 1568.
September has Janmashtami, which celebrates the birth of Lord Krishna. On this night we play teen patti (and lose money). Punjabis are in my experience the best card players in India, because they are flamboyant and brave bettors unperturbed by bad hands. The month also has Eidul-Fitr and Ganesh Chaturthi, on which we pacify the god of obstacles. This is Ganesh with his elephant head, whose idol we bring home and later immerse in water amid dancing and singing. The festival is quite recent, and was made popular in the 1890s by Bal Gangadhar Tilak.
October has Gandhi Jayanti, marking his birthday, and Dussehra, marking the death of Ravan at the hand of Ram.
November has Diwali, the biggest Hindu festival where we celebrate the victory of light over darkness. Because we do this by setting off far too many crackers, we also celebrate the victory of cacophony over silence. It also has Bakra Eid (which I personally am partial to over other Eids because I am sent biryani) and Guru Nanak Jayanti, when the Sikhs remember the founder of their religion. The fifth of the 10 great Sikh gurus, Arjun, is cremated in Lahore, and his Gurdwara is next to the tiny, elegant tomb of Allama Iqbal in the Badshahi masjid area. A Pakistani acquaintance of mine in Islamabad is married to an Indian girl and their son is called Arjun. Though Pakistan forbids Muslims from entering the Gurdwara, we all went in anyway and the priests were delighted to cuddle the little boy.
December has Christmas, and right now it is quite pleasant around my flat in the heart of the Catholic suburb of Bandra.
All of these are just the official government holidays. We have many other local festivals including nine nights of Gujarati women dancing for fecundity during Navratri, and four days of Durga pooja in Bengal, celebrating the destroyer goddess.
We are a religious people and it shows in our life.
Indians are a billion people inflicting our pieties publicly on each other. And we are constantly demanding the attention of god, though we claim to believe — through the Hindu belief in advait (non-dualism) and the Sufi doctrine of wahdat al-wajood — that he is everywhere.
The writer is director with Hill Road Media in Bombay. Email: aakar @hillroadmedia.com
Aakar Patel
In India, secularism is inclusive. Europe’s secularism measures distance of the state from Christianity. Indians think of secularism as equal respect for all religions. This is supposed to reflect the Hindu belief in tolerance. One famous Sanskrit line is: Vasudhaiva kutumbakam. Vasudha is mother earth and kutumb is family and so the line means the whole world is a family. However, our recent record of religious violence shows that inclusive secularism isn’t always followed. Often unhinged views on religion are tolerated under this formulation of non-interference, and journalist George Verghese described Indian secularism as ‘equal respect for everyone’s communalism’.
But the doctrine of inclusive secularism is India’s constitution and perhaps at some point we will become good enough to deserve that fine document. Since the state tries to be inclusive, every religion’s celebrations are official holidays in India. Our calendar is the most colourful in the world.
Many urban Americans now greet each other this season with the words ‘Happy holidays’ instead of ‘Merry Christmas’. This is typical European thoughtfulness of the feelings of others. The ‘happy holidayers’ want to share their joy but want not to offend Jews and others. Personally I like ‘Merry Christmas’ and see no reason why anybody should be offended that Christians are celebrating the birth of their saviour. In India, however, you couldn’t say ‘Happy holidays’ because we have them through the year. Let’s have a look.
January has four: Makar Sankranti, Vasant (or Basant) Panchami, Republic Day and Moharram. Sankranti is one of the few solar holidays we have, since the Hindu calendar, like the Islamic one, is lunar. Sankranti always falls on January 14, when the Sun transits into Capricorn. Gujaratis do not celebrate it in a religious way, though some other Hindus do, and on this day we fly kites all day and eat laddoos of til (sesame seed). All faiths celebrate it in Gujarat even though it may be seen as a Hindu festival. Surat’s best kites are made in the suburb of Rander, by Muslim craftsmen of the first calibre. I used to go with a friend’s father in the 80s, and the old man we would buy kites from had been supplying the family for 40 years.
Vasant Panchmi is the fifth day of the Hindu month of Mesh, and the first day of spring. It is essentially a North Indian festival, which is why it is also celebrated in Lahore, but not in Karachi. The reason for this is that cities like Bombay and Karachi don’t really have a winter or a spring, our seasons being: hot, warm and wet.
Republic Day is when India’s constitution was put into force in 1950.
Most Indians do not recognise Shia as separate from Sunni and we think Moharram as something all Muslims commemorate. In Bombay, the chant in the procession is: ‘Ya Hasan ya Hussain, Hum na they, hum na they’. In Calcutta, where many Muslims are not Urdu-speaking, the chant is ‘Hasan-Hussain dada-bhai’ indicating that the Imams were elder and younger brother, or simply ‘Hasan-Hussain zindabad’.
Moharram is moving, and while I was familiar with the second line of Muhammad Ali Jauhar’s famous couplet, my gooseflesh flared the first time I read the whole poem and reached its end: Qatl-e-Hussain asl mein marg-e-Yazid hai/Islam zinda hota hai har Karbala kay baad (Hussain’s murder will actually be tyrant Yazid’s end: Islam revives itself after every tragedy).
February has Maha Shivratri and Eid-e-Milad. Shiv is the god Hindus believe will ultimately destroy the universe, but is worshipped because he consumed a deadly poison and saved the world. As an offering to him, many Hindus leave (and consume) ganja or cannabis indica, the drug that is associated with the cult of Shiva.
Eid-e-Milad is celebrated with processions, but it seems to me that these are led mainly by modernist organisations like the Jamaat-e-Islami and, in Bombay, the Raza Academy.
March has the festival of Holi, marking the end of winter. We celebrate Holi by smearing colour and splashing water on each other and, unsurprisingly, young men and women enjoy it the most because there is a fair amount of licence in touching. The drink consumed is bhang, cannabis indica paste and with milk. Government-licensed stores sell it through the year in many states, and it is not difficult to see why the hippies were drawn to India.
March also has Ram Navami, birthday of Lord Ram, and Mahavir Jayanti, the day remembering the last of the great Jain saints. The Jain religion is interesting because it does not believe in god or creator. A small community, mainly found in Rajasthan and Gujarat, Jains are the most successful of India’s trading communities.
April has Good Friday, marking the crucifixion of Christ; and Vaishakh or Baisakhi, the start of the harvest season.
May has Buddha Purnima, marking the passing of Lord Buddha. For most Indian Buddhists, however, the big days are April 14, Ambedkar’s birthday, and December 6, the commemoration of his death. Dr Ambedkar was author of India’s constitution and leader of the Untouchables or Dalits. His conversion to Buddhism in 1956 began an exodus of Dalits out of Hinduism, and most Buddhists in India are today from this community. December 6 is also the day in 1992 when the Babri Masjid was torn down.
August has Independence day on the 15th, one day after Pakistan’s because astrologers held the 14th as inauspicious and asked Nehru to wait till midnight.
August also has Onam, Raksha Bandhan and Parsi New Year, which is celebrated in Bombay and Gujarat mainly. I think the Parsis are the best Gujarati community and they are the greatest of all Indian communities.
Onam is a Hindu festival celebrated in Kerala with a magnificent snake boat race. Raksha Bandhan is when girls tie a thread, a rakhi, around their brother’s wrist and seek his protection (and his cash). It is a secular festival and it is said that emperor Humayun responded to a rakhi sent to him by Rani Karnavati of Chittor when she was under attack from the Sultan of Gujarat. Humayun came too late and the Rajput women had burnt themselves. Akbar would later level Chittor in his most savage siege, in 1568.
September has Janmashtami, which celebrates the birth of Lord Krishna. On this night we play teen patti (and lose money). Punjabis are in my experience the best card players in India, because they are flamboyant and brave bettors unperturbed by bad hands. The month also has Eidul-Fitr and Ganesh Chaturthi, on which we pacify the god of obstacles. This is Ganesh with his elephant head, whose idol we bring home and later immerse in water amid dancing and singing. The festival is quite recent, and was made popular in the 1890s by Bal Gangadhar Tilak.
October has Gandhi Jayanti, marking his birthday, and Dussehra, marking the death of Ravan at the hand of Ram.
November has Diwali, the biggest Hindu festival where we celebrate the victory of light over darkness. Because we do this by setting off far too many crackers, we also celebrate the victory of cacophony over silence. It also has Bakra Eid (which I personally am partial to over other Eids because I am sent biryani) and Guru Nanak Jayanti, when the Sikhs remember the founder of their religion. The fifth of the 10 great Sikh gurus, Arjun, is cremated in Lahore, and his Gurdwara is next to the tiny, elegant tomb of Allama Iqbal in the Badshahi masjid area. A Pakistani acquaintance of mine in Islamabad is married to an Indian girl and their son is called Arjun. Though Pakistan forbids Muslims from entering the Gurdwara, we all went in anyway and the priests were delighted to cuddle the little boy.
December has Christmas, and right now it is quite pleasant around my flat in the heart of the Catholic suburb of Bandra.
All of these are just the official government holidays. We have many other local festivals including nine nights of Gujarati women dancing for fecundity during Navratri, and four days of Durga pooja in Bengal, celebrating the destroyer goddess.
We are a religious people and it shows in our life.
Indians are a billion people inflicting our pieties publicly on each other. And we are constantly demanding the attention of god, though we claim to believe — through the Hindu belief in advait (non-dualism) and the Sufi doctrine of wahdat al-wajood — that he is everywhere.
The writer is director with Hill Road Media in Bombay. Email: aakar @hillroadmedia.com
Al Qaidas Flawed spawn
The attempted bombing of the Northwest Airlines flight exposes an unresolved tension at the heart of militant Islam
Almost before Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was being led down the steps of Northwest Airlines flight 253 he had been linked to al-Qaida. He himself has apparently claimed he was trained and commissioned by an al‑Qaida master bomb-maker in Yemen. Whatever the eventual conclusion about his alleged international mission – a Nigerian living in London, trained in Yemen to blow up US planes – his case should not distract us from the fact that modern Islamic militancy is primarily a local phenomenon, not a global one.
The tension between these two is the unresolved flaw at the heart of the international militant project. Al-Qaida was set up by Osama bin Laden, a Saudi, and a handful of others, many Egyptian, to overcome the disunity among the foreign volunteers who fought with the Afghan mujahideen against the Soviets in the 1980s. The global call to arms that Bin Laden issued in the 1990s was only partially effective. In a letter I found in an al-Qaida camp in Afghanistan in 2001, a Jordanian volunteer complained that his Algerian, Moroccan and Saudi counterparts kept to themselves even at prayer times.
This parochialism was obscured through the first years of the 9/11 era as bombs exploded from Bali to London and, more recently, as new al-Qaida offshoots were formed. However, beneath this apparent internationalism other elements were present. In many of the major actions, bombers struck within the country – and sometimes within the town – of their birth. Many targets were selected with an international dimension in mind, but many others were not.
One reason conspirators said they bombed the nightclub in Bali in 2002 was that it did not allow locals in. In Morocco, alongside the Jewish targets, a restaurant patronised by the local elite was hit. In Madrid, immigrants struck under a mile from where many of them lived or socialised. There was little international about the targets or the perpetrators of the 7/7 London bombings.
One key shift came in 2006. With its international global jihad increasingly rejected by the Sunni minority in Iraq, al-Qaida there tried to rebrand itself as "the Islamic state of Iraq". When the disparate factions of Pashtun tribesmen formed a coalition in Pakistan's North-West Frontier province in 2007, they called it Tehrik-e-Taliban-e-Pakistan, the union of Pakistani Taliban, a title that insists on a primarily national identity.
In Yemen and Saudi Arabia in recent years, 90% of the efforts and rhetoric of local militants have been directed against local targets. Al-Qaida in the Maghreb is actually 90% Algerian in composition and agenda. In Indonesia, Jemaa Islamiya, responsible for the Bali bombing, has decided the local situation doesn't justify violent jihad, and it has ceased military operations in the country. Recent attacks in Jakarta were the work of a breakaway group.
Al-Qaida's project is often wrongly portrayed as having roots in the protection of local specificity against a rampant globalisation. In fact, al-Qaida's ideology is as disrespectful of local difference as any other global ideology.
Where the al-Qaida project does coincide with local concerns, the combination is potent. Yet such situations are rare. The problem with "joining the dots" between the countries any individual militant may have visited is that it falsifies the picture by over-emphasising the international dimension. Ultimately, all politics is local. And, whatever the story of Abdulmutallab, we should not let it blind us to the fact that Islamic militancy is no exception.
Jason Burke
CIF Guardian
Almost before Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was being led down the steps of Northwest Airlines flight 253 he had been linked to al-Qaida. He himself has apparently claimed he was trained and commissioned by an al‑Qaida master bomb-maker in Yemen. Whatever the eventual conclusion about his alleged international mission – a Nigerian living in London, trained in Yemen to blow up US planes – his case should not distract us from the fact that modern Islamic militancy is primarily a local phenomenon, not a global one.
The tension between these two is the unresolved flaw at the heart of the international militant project. Al-Qaida was set up by Osama bin Laden, a Saudi, and a handful of others, many Egyptian, to overcome the disunity among the foreign volunteers who fought with the Afghan mujahideen against the Soviets in the 1980s. The global call to arms that Bin Laden issued in the 1990s was only partially effective. In a letter I found in an al-Qaida camp in Afghanistan in 2001, a Jordanian volunteer complained that his Algerian, Moroccan and Saudi counterparts kept to themselves even at prayer times.
This parochialism was obscured through the first years of the 9/11 era as bombs exploded from Bali to London and, more recently, as new al-Qaida offshoots were formed. However, beneath this apparent internationalism other elements were present. In many of the major actions, bombers struck within the country – and sometimes within the town – of their birth. Many targets were selected with an international dimension in mind, but many others were not.
One reason conspirators said they bombed the nightclub in Bali in 2002 was that it did not allow locals in. In Morocco, alongside the Jewish targets, a restaurant patronised by the local elite was hit. In Madrid, immigrants struck under a mile from where many of them lived or socialised. There was little international about the targets or the perpetrators of the 7/7 London bombings.
One key shift came in 2006. With its international global jihad increasingly rejected by the Sunni minority in Iraq, al-Qaida there tried to rebrand itself as "the Islamic state of Iraq". When the disparate factions of Pashtun tribesmen formed a coalition in Pakistan's North-West Frontier province in 2007, they called it Tehrik-e-Taliban-e-Pakistan, the union of Pakistani Taliban, a title that insists on a primarily national identity.
In Yemen and Saudi Arabia in recent years, 90% of the efforts and rhetoric of local militants have been directed against local targets. Al-Qaida in the Maghreb is actually 90% Algerian in composition and agenda. In Indonesia, Jemaa Islamiya, responsible for the Bali bombing, has decided the local situation doesn't justify violent jihad, and it has ceased military operations in the country. Recent attacks in Jakarta were the work of a breakaway group.
Al-Qaida's project is often wrongly portrayed as having roots in the protection of local specificity against a rampant globalisation. In fact, al-Qaida's ideology is as disrespectful of local difference as any other global ideology.
Where the al-Qaida project does coincide with local concerns, the combination is potent. Yet such situations are rare. The problem with "joining the dots" between the countries any individual militant may have visited is that it falsifies the picture by over-emphasising the international dimension. Ultimately, all politics is local. And, whatever the story of Abdulmutallab, we should not let it blind us to the fact that Islamic militancy is no exception.
Jason Burke
CIF Guardian
Rich and privileged - the gilded life of would-be plane bomber
• Banker's son expressed approval of 9/11 to teacher
• MI5 combing databases for alternative identities
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's path towards apparent Islamist militancy took him to University College London and a luxury block just off the city's Oxford Street.
But no part of his life was so seemingly anomalous to a would-be terrorist as the manicured lawns and tennis courts of the British International school in Togo, where he is believed to have first expressed extreme views.
Today, investigators were trying to establish exactly what provoked him to try to detonate an explosive device as a Northwest Airlines jet made its final descent into Detroit airport on Christmas Day.
It certainly wasn't a life of poverty. He was born in extreme privilege, of the sort few Nigerians could ever dream of, and his education reflected this. His father, Umaru Mutallab, 70, is one of the country's most respected businessmen, who retired earlier this month as chairman of Nigeria's FirstBank, the oldest bank in the country, with offices in London, Paris and Beijing.
While the family comes from Katsina state in the Muslim-dominated north of Nigeria, where funding of hardline Islamist schools by Saudi Arabia and Iran has raised concerns of militancy among young people, Abdulmutallab first became noticeably religious while studying abroad at a very different institution.
He undertook his secondary education as a boarder at the British school in Lomé, Togo's capital, which is mostly staffed by teachers from the UK and attracts wealthy students from across west Africa. Set up in 1983, the school gives pupils a decidedly English-style curriculum, taught in air-conditioned classrooms set amid grassy grounds which also feature a swimming pool and tennis courts.
While pursuing his international baccalaureat, with impressive results, Abdulmutallab's preaching to his schoolmates earned him the nickname "Alfa" – a local name for Islamic scholars, according to Nigeria's This Day newspaper.
Michael Rimmer, who taught Abdulmutallab history, and escorted him and other pupils on a school trip to the UK, said the teenager had been a model student who was keen, polite and eager to learn. However, Rimmer recalled a classroom discussion on Afghanistan's then-Taliban leaders following the September 11 attacks in 2001. All the other students, Muslims included, expressed their abhorrence of the regime, he said.
"But [Abdulmutallab], actually, thought that they had it right and he thought their views were acceptable. I thought he was maybe just trying to play devil's advocate ... At the time I just thought, well, when people are young they can have silly views," he told BBC radio.
Rimmer said that on hearing about his former pupil's arrest he was angry both with him and "the nutters who put these silly ideas in his head".
He said: "He's got wonderful parents, he comes from a lovely family, he's got lots of friends, he had everything going for him. He's a fine-looking lad, very bright. I expected great things from him and he's thrown all this away. His parents will be absolutely devastated. He should have thought about this."
According to a series of reports, after attending UCL, which has confirmed that a student of the same name studied mechanical engineering between 2005 and 2008, Abdulmutallab moved on to Egypt and Dubai, from where he severed ties with a family that was becoming increasingly concerned by his views. He also reportedly told US investigators that he was trained by al-Qaida in Yemen before the alleged attack.
Nigeria's government said today that Abdulmutallab had been living outside the country "for a while" and only returned on Thursday, shortly before he left again on his way to Detroit.
This Day quoted unnamed members of Abdulmutallab's family as saying his father was so concerned at the young man's views that six months ago he reported his fears to both the US embassy in Abuja and Nigerian security agencies. Umaru Mutallab, who began his working career as an accountant with Fuller Jenks Beecroft and Co in London in the 1960s and also served as a minister in the Nigerian government for a time, said he was "really disturbed" to learn his son had been arrested and was talking to Nigerian officials about their investigations.
The newspaper spoke to another unnamed relative who said the family had become concerned in recent years that Abdulmutallab was involved with Boko Haram, a militant Islamist group also known as the Nigerian Taliban, which seeks to impose sharia law across the country. Hundreds of people were killed when security forces tried to crack down on the group in July this year.
"We know Farouk's extreme views and were always apprehensive of where it may lead him to," the relative said. "He has maintained his distance from us and we never bothered him much. He wanted to be left alone so we respect his wishes."
Any warnings were not, it seems, relayed to the UK. Abdulmutallab tried to return to Britain as a student in May this year and was refused entry, but only because UK Border Agency officials considered the educational institution he applied for to be bogus. His name, or the name he gave, did not appear on MI5 or counter-terrorist radar screens, according to officials.
MI5 is continuing to trawl its databases to see if there is any trace of Abdulmutallab's movements in Britain and communications he had with friends or associates here. The agency's officers have not immediately found any links, the Guardian understands. Counter-terrorist officers said one of the problems was that he may not have used that name either in documents or in conversations. They are looking for what one official called "fragments of information".
MI5 has devoted extra resources to the case to find out as much as they can about the young Nigerian, and are particularly keen to uncover information in two main areas: Abdulmutallab's relations with al-Qaida, if any, and how he managed to avoid security checks before boarding the plane. "The question is, to what extent is he linked to al-Qaida. He says he is but the term can cover a very broad spectrum," said a Whitehall official.
It is not unknown for people from privileged backgrounds to become involved with al-Qaida, for example with Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman Zawahiri. However, it seems that Abdulmutallab had no direct links with the al-Qaida core leadership based on the Afghan-Pakistan border, where most of Britain's suicide bombers or convicted terrorists trained.
Abdulmutallab's actions were condemned by Nigeria's government, which has ordered an investigation into the incident. A spokesman for the senate, Ayogu Eze, called it a "strange act of terrorism".
"We are at a loss as to where he got this strange habit, because Nigeria abhors terrorism in all its ramifications," he said.
Nigeria's civil aviation authority said yesterday that Abdulmutallab bought his ticket at the KLM office in Accra, Ghana, just over a week before he travelled and paid the $2,831 (£1,775) fare in cash.
Religious leaders across faiths also added strong criticism. Muslims constitute about half of Nigeria's 155 million people, with Christians slightly fewer. In recent years thousands of people have been killed in Muslim-Christian violence.
One of the most prominent incidents occurred in Abdulmutallab's home state, where a woman was sentenced to death by stoning for alleged adultery in 2002. The decision – which was later overturned – caused several Miss World contestants to withdraw from the beauty pageant, which was being held in Nigeria the same year.
CIF Guardian
A white Christmas
Imagine the pleasant surprise I received while strolling through Barnes and Noble in Georgetown, when I received an emergency text message from the World Bank informing me that the offices were closed since the local government has declared Monday a holiday. Wow! Now it really feels like I am in a third world country
Every year, Americans yearn for a white Christmas — often not knowing what happens in the aftermath of the snow that makes a Christmas white! Well, this year, we had a rude awakening in the northeastern part of the US. Most parts of the region received over 12 inches of snow! A good five days after the blizzard dumped this tremendous amount of snow, the landscape in many parts of the northeast is still white. It may not have snowed on Christmas Day, but it certainly does not mean we did not have a white Christmas!
The snow started falling late Friday night and continued — unabated — for nearly 24 straight hours. The view outside my window changed in a short span of time. Tall, slender dark brown trees had their naked bark shrouded in white snow, almost giving them a touch of majesty. Rock Creek Parkway, which snakes through most of northwest Washington DC, was simply no longer visible! I stepped outside to brave the cold breeze and slushy snow, and encountered an odd, yet serene silence. Whoever said silence does not speak volumes must have been deaf.
Once outside, I found myself stranded as the local government cancelled all bus service and even metro rail service for stations that were above the ground. Even the one group of people that could take advantage of this situation — taxi drivers — was hardly seen! Alas, I finally made peace with the reality I could not bring myself to face earlier, that I would just have to wait it out till the weather got better.
Indeed, the weather did get better, but only to deceive us once again as temperatures plunged to several degrees below freezing. By early evening, the chill in the air gave forewarning to those still outside: find shelter, lest you slip, trip or flip on the ice! This, of course, did not hinder me from my outdoor activities. In fact, it only emboldened a friend and I, who had emerged from our dwellings to do some much-needed holiday shopping! It should come as no surprise that over that weekend, online sales spiked 22 percent compared to the same weekend last year. Of course, the bad weather hindered a lot of shoppers, leaving them no option but to make their purchases over the internet.
Imagine the pleasant surprise I received while strolling through Barnes and Noble in Georgetown, when I received an emergency text message from the World Bank informing me that the offices were closed since the local government has declared Monday a holiday. Wow! Now it really feels like I am in a third world country. Jokes aside, can someone please tell me why most major DC roadways were still not clear Tuesday morning? This has got to be part of some conspiracy hatched by the enemies of the US. It reminded me of the day two years ago when New York City received so much rain, the subway system could not expel the water fast enough, so the trains simply could not operate! If I ever see organised chaos again, I will be reminded of that fateful day.
Alas, after all the drama was over with the blizzard, I basked in the glory of a two-day work week and thought of doing something I have been putting off for several weeks now. One has to live in the US to understand what I am referring to, but I will describe it as best as possible. Every winter, beginning around Thanksgiving (mid-to-late November), radio and TV stations across North America broadcast songs that are best described as “holiday songs”. Traditionally, these songs were Christmas carols, but broadly speaking, any song that has a reference to the winter season. As you might imagine, one can think of hundreds of songs! Off the top of my head, I can think of at least a few of the more popular ones, like ‘All I want for Christmas is you’, ‘Baby it’s cold outside’, ‘Jingle bells’ and countless others.
Well, now that I finally have the time, I have figured a good way to put it to positive use is to finally create a playlist or CD of my top favourites. One of the best parts of the holiday season is listening to these songs at holiday parties or while at home in the evenings when Christmas specials are telecast. I am not about to let this opportunity slip past me — unless of course, the pile of DVDs I have been meaning to watch entices me away from this very crucial task.
When all is said and done, I will miss Christmas upon returning to the office in a few days; the music, the shopping, the festive ambience. It is enough to make one nostalgic, but more importantly, enough to make one value the things that really matter in life: family and friends. Many of us will be spending this holiday alone, but knowing that we are celebrating life and good health in our respective corners of the world and praying for those who have neither.
Zeeshan Suhail is a consultant with the World Bank in Washington DC and a board member of Americans for Informed Democracy (AID). He can be reached at zeeshan@aidemocracy.org
Every year, Americans yearn for a white Christmas — often not knowing what happens in the aftermath of the snow that makes a Christmas white! Well, this year, we had a rude awakening in the northeastern part of the US. Most parts of the region received over 12 inches of snow! A good five days after the blizzard dumped this tremendous amount of snow, the landscape in many parts of the northeast is still white. It may not have snowed on Christmas Day, but it certainly does not mean we did not have a white Christmas!
The snow started falling late Friday night and continued — unabated — for nearly 24 straight hours. The view outside my window changed in a short span of time. Tall, slender dark brown trees had their naked bark shrouded in white snow, almost giving them a touch of majesty. Rock Creek Parkway, which snakes through most of northwest Washington DC, was simply no longer visible! I stepped outside to brave the cold breeze and slushy snow, and encountered an odd, yet serene silence. Whoever said silence does not speak volumes must have been deaf.
Once outside, I found myself stranded as the local government cancelled all bus service and even metro rail service for stations that were above the ground. Even the one group of people that could take advantage of this situation — taxi drivers — was hardly seen! Alas, I finally made peace with the reality I could not bring myself to face earlier, that I would just have to wait it out till the weather got better.
Indeed, the weather did get better, but only to deceive us once again as temperatures plunged to several degrees below freezing. By early evening, the chill in the air gave forewarning to those still outside: find shelter, lest you slip, trip or flip on the ice! This, of course, did not hinder me from my outdoor activities. In fact, it only emboldened a friend and I, who had emerged from our dwellings to do some much-needed holiday shopping! It should come as no surprise that over that weekend, online sales spiked 22 percent compared to the same weekend last year. Of course, the bad weather hindered a lot of shoppers, leaving them no option but to make their purchases over the internet.
Imagine the pleasant surprise I received while strolling through Barnes and Noble in Georgetown, when I received an emergency text message from the World Bank informing me that the offices were closed since the local government has declared Monday a holiday. Wow! Now it really feels like I am in a third world country. Jokes aside, can someone please tell me why most major DC roadways were still not clear Tuesday morning? This has got to be part of some conspiracy hatched by the enemies of the US. It reminded me of the day two years ago when New York City received so much rain, the subway system could not expel the water fast enough, so the trains simply could not operate! If I ever see organised chaos again, I will be reminded of that fateful day.
Alas, after all the drama was over with the blizzard, I basked in the glory of a two-day work week and thought of doing something I have been putting off for several weeks now. One has to live in the US to understand what I am referring to, but I will describe it as best as possible. Every winter, beginning around Thanksgiving (mid-to-late November), radio and TV stations across North America broadcast songs that are best described as “holiday songs”. Traditionally, these songs were Christmas carols, but broadly speaking, any song that has a reference to the winter season. As you might imagine, one can think of hundreds of songs! Off the top of my head, I can think of at least a few of the more popular ones, like ‘All I want for Christmas is you’, ‘Baby it’s cold outside’, ‘Jingle bells’ and countless others.
Well, now that I finally have the time, I have figured a good way to put it to positive use is to finally create a playlist or CD of my top favourites. One of the best parts of the holiday season is listening to these songs at holiday parties or while at home in the evenings when Christmas specials are telecast. I am not about to let this opportunity slip past me — unless of course, the pile of DVDs I have been meaning to watch entices me away from this very crucial task.
When all is said and done, I will miss Christmas upon returning to the office in a few days; the music, the shopping, the festive ambience. It is enough to make one nostalgic, but more importantly, enough to make one value the things that really matter in life: family and friends. Many of us will be spending this holiday alone, but knowing that we are celebrating life and good health in our respective corners of the world and praying for those who have neither.
Zeeshan Suhail is a consultant with the World Bank in Washington DC and a board member of Americans for Informed Democracy (AID). He can be reached at zeeshan@aidemocracy.org
Beyond the headlines
In the moderately enlightened era of the previous government, one used to often catch the phrase 'Aayen mil keh Pakistan ka naam roshan karain' on television. Musharraf used to say it, Pervaiz Elahi loved it … I even heard the phrase being used to sell soap. Having noticed that, I’ve spent the past few years thinking – particularly when I read the foreign press – that I’d prefer us to have been aiming for merely Pakistan roshan karna; never mind the naam.
As an ordinary Pakistani with ordinary ambitions, and with the knowledge of decades’ worth of political debacles, I restrict my hopes and desires to the very ordinary: sufficient – not even plentiful – supply of items indispensable to my life, such as electricity, water, gas, wheat, sugar, edible oil and suchlike. Some basic human rights and dignity would be welcome too.
The thing is, you see, that I truly believe that in terms of making a name for itself, Pakistan has more than done the needful. It really is time now for it to rest upon its laurels.
Matters have come to such a pass that I find myself looking back with some fondness to the times when the mention of my nationality would elicit a question about whether the methods of transportation “over there” involved horses or camels. I regret the impatience and disdain with which I used to react then. Today, the world is not only far too well aware of my country’s past, present and the looming question mark of its future, but uncomfortably, those who could do something about this disaster-zone – including you and I – are busy arguing amongst ourselves to the point of total apathy.
Retired Gen Musharraf used to blame the media for having, as he once said, the habit of making public the country’s problems and embarrassments. And after the change in government, the murmur has been taken up by a few parliamentarians and politicians as well. They’re missing the point, though. It is not up to the media to refrain from pointing out errors in judgment and mismanagement on the governmental scale; it is in fact up to the government and its executive/legislative arms to try to avoid making such mistakes as far as possible.
Given that the country is facing so many, and such myriad issues, it is perhaps a good thing that they are being discussed nationally and internationally. Perhaps only then can potential solutions and avenues of redress be found.
The point for those in government and those at the receiving end to ponder, however, is why we are facing these issues at all; how the current situation vis-à-vis a host of matters from the militant terrorists to infrastructural issues to those of governance came to pass; how far earlier and which regimes were by either omission or commission complicit, and what can now be done to address our current status of international stardom.
The point is simple yet subtle, and one of vital importance. News commentators and observers are falling over themselves to take a side in the discussion about whether or not the earlier Bhutto/Sharif regimes were better than the Musharraf years, and that old discussion about whether military or democratic rule proved better for Pakistan is back on the agenda. But, the Bhutto vs Sharif vs military debate, for example, takes entirely the wrong track.
Democracy is important, not because the democratic leaders we have experienced were better but because under it the politicians themselves have a stake in the system; they cannot afford to weaken the fabric of society too far.
Leaders elected in all faith and all fairness can turn out to be corrupt or insincere, but once their credibility is destroyed in the eyes of the electorate, the voters can themselves prevent their return to power. While democracy is no magic wand, it does at least serve to level the playing field.
Because of this, democracy also means having to put up for some time with leaders that prove themselves myopic, misguided or render themselves unpopular. After all, it was during Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s government that the seeds of the ISI’s political cell, the infamous FSF, were sown. And Nawaz Sharif may be looking good today, but he did once attempt to have himself crowned the Amir-ul-Momineen.
But – and it’s a very important but – the electorate has to bear an unpopular democratic government for only the given term, after which those who have been found lacking can be voted out. In Pakistan, the legitimate term of an elected government is five years but we bore the last general for nearly double that. The politicians of today appear to be returning to earlier divisive tactics, and here’s what there is to be scared of: all a future general has to do is cite the doctrine of necessity and stamp his way in. The trouble with demanding of a general “Oh yeah? You and whose army?” is that all he has to do is point out of the window.
In Pakistan right now, the brew is poisoned further by the militant-terrorist nexus against whom our army is battling. They may have been sidelined in the news by the NRO, but we forget about them at our own – very real – peril. And what we need to succeed in the fight against them is a government with a legitimate and popular mandate; not one under siege by elements that ought to be backing it.
Before we begin to upbraid the world for “meddling in our internal affairs,” it is vital for us to put our own house in order. Significant portions of the country’s territories are in a state of war and the army finds itself at war with people of whom at least some are Pakistani citizens; the writ of the state in the north-west is a question mark, and secessionist feelings are rife in more than one province; even the viability of the federation is under debate. Meanwhile we lack an adequate supply of electricity, water or gas. And yet, we take umbrage when someone expresses disbelief in their ability to defend our nuclear arsenal.
Imagine that you live next door to a family whose lawn is unwatered and the plants are dying, whose children constantly beat each other up and the head of the household falls ever deeper in debt, whose housekeeper is slatternly, the larder is empty and the utilities are one by one being cut off because of the non-payment of bills. And then you hear that they’ve gone and bought 400 kilogrammes of TNT and are storing it in a house where everybody smokes. I don’t know about you, but I know I’d be worried.
Postscript: I read somewhere recently that “If you can’t be a good example, it could be that the sole purpose of your life is to serve as a hideous warning.”
hajrahmumtaz@gmail.com
As an ordinary Pakistani with ordinary ambitions, and with the knowledge of decades’ worth of political debacles, I restrict my hopes and desires to the very ordinary: sufficient – not even plentiful – supply of items indispensable to my life, such as electricity, water, gas, wheat, sugar, edible oil and suchlike. Some basic human rights and dignity would be welcome too.
The thing is, you see, that I truly believe that in terms of making a name for itself, Pakistan has more than done the needful. It really is time now for it to rest upon its laurels.
Matters have come to such a pass that I find myself looking back with some fondness to the times when the mention of my nationality would elicit a question about whether the methods of transportation “over there” involved horses or camels. I regret the impatience and disdain with which I used to react then. Today, the world is not only far too well aware of my country’s past, present and the looming question mark of its future, but uncomfortably, those who could do something about this disaster-zone – including you and I – are busy arguing amongst ourselves to the point of total apathy.
Retired Gen Musharraf used to blame the media for having, as he once said, the habit of making public the country’s problems and embarrassments. And after the change in government, the murmur has been taken up by a few parliamentarians and politicians as well. They’re missing the point, though. It is not up to the media to refrain from pointing out errors in judgment and mismanagement on the governmental scale; it is in fact up to the government and its executive/legislative arms to try to avoid making such mistakes as far as possible.
Given that the country is facing so many, and such myriad issues, it is perhaps a good thing that they are being discussed nationally and internationally. Perhaps only then can potential solutions and avenues of redress be found.
The point for those in government and those at the receiving end to ponder, however, is why we are facing these issues at all; how the current situation vis-à-vis a host of matters from the militant terrorists to infrastructural issues to those of governance came to pass; how far earlier and which regimes were by either omission or commission complicit, and what can now be done to address our current status of international stardom.
The point is simple yet subtle, and one of vital importance. News commentators and observers are falling over themselves to take a side in the discussion about whether or not the earlier Bhutto/Sharif regimes were better than the Musharraf years, and that old discussion about whether military or democratic rule proved better for Pakistan is back on the agenda. But, the Bhutto vs Sharif vs military debate, for example, takes entirely the wrong track.
Democracy is important, not because the democratic leaders we have experienced were better but because under it the politicians themselves have a stake in the system; they cannot afford to weaken the fabric of society too far.
Leaders elected in all faith and all fairness can turn out to be corrupt or insincere, but once their credibility is destroyed in the eyes of the electorate, the voters can themselves prevent their return to power. While democracy is no magic wand, it does at least serve to level the playing field.
Because of this, democracy also means having to put up for some time with leaders that prove themselves myopic, misguided or render themselves unpopular. After all, it was during Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s government that the seeds of the ISI’s political cell, the infamous FSF, were sown. And Nawaz Sharif may be looking good today, but he did once attempt to have himself crowned the Amir-ul-Momineen.
But – and it’s a very important but – the electorate has to bear an unpopular democratic government for only the given term, after which those who have been found lacking can be voted out. In Pakistan, the legitimate term of an elected government is five years but we bore the last general for nearly double that. The politicians of today appear to be returning to earlier divisive tactics, and here’s what there is to be scared of: all a future general has to do is cite the doctrine of necessity and stamp his way in. The trouble with demanding of a general “Oh yeah? You and whose army?” is that all he has to do is point out of the window.
In Pakistan right now, the brew is poisoned further by the militant-terrorist nexus against whom our army is battling. They may have been sidelined in the news by the NRO, but we forget about them at our own – very real – peril. And what we need to succeed in the fight against them is a government with a legitimate and popular mandate; not one under siege by elements that ought to be backing it.
Before we begin to upbraid the world for “meddling in our internal affairs,” it is vital for us to put our own house in order. Significant portions of the country’s territories are in a state of war and the army finds itself at war with people of whom at least some are Pakistani citizens; the writ of the state in the north-west is a question mark, and secessionist feelings are rife in more than one province; even the viability of the federation is under debate. Meanwhile we lack an adequate supply of electricity, water or gas. And yet, we take umbrage when someone expresses disbelief in their ability to defend our nuclear arsenal.
Imagine that you live next door to a family whose lawn is unwatered and the plants are dying, whose children constantly beat each other up and the head of the household falls ever deeper in debt, whose housekeeper is slatternly, the larder is empty and the utilities are one by one being cut off because of the non-payment of bills. And then you hear that they’ve gone and bought 400 kilogrammes of TNT and are storing it in a house where everybody smokes. I don’t know about you, but I know I’d be worried.
Postscript: I read somewhere recently that “If you can’t be a good example, it could be that the sole purpose of your life is to serve as a hideous warning.”
hajrahmumtaz@gmail.com
Yemen: the international takfiri-mullahs destination of choice
Attempted bombing of Northwest flight 253 has belatedly turned spotlight on terrorist network inside troubled state
The claim by Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab that he was trained, armed and tasked with blowing up an American airliner over US soil by al-Qaida operatives based in Yemen is the western intelligence community's worst nightmare come true.
Since the September 11 attacks, the US and allied security services hunting Osama bin Laden and his associates have focused their attention on the mountains of eastern Afghanistan and the lawless tribal areas of Pakistan.
In recent years, concern has grown about the activities of al-Qaida affiliates in North Africa's Maghreb region, notably Algeria, and in a few sub-Saharan countries such as Nigeria, birthplace of the would-be bomber of Northwest Airlines flight 253.
But in all these cases – even Afghanistan, once its Taliban rulers were deposed – the US could count on the collaboration of established, friendly governments that felt equally threatened by the spectre of Islamist terrorism.
Yemen, and Somalia, its terrible twin situated just across the Gulf of Aden, are a different matter altogether.
Both countries lack effective central government. Both, having suffered a long history of colonial intervention, are currently prey to warring factions that have no love of the west.
And both contain vast, so-called "ungoverned spaces" that offer ideal hideouts and training centres for "non-state actors", the intelligence community's polite euphemism for terrorists.
Large tracts of sparsely populated Yemen are, in effect, "no-go" areas for the forces of global counter-terrorism. These safe havens remain mostly out of sight and, despite a trailblazing CIA Predator drone attack against al-Qaida in 2002, mostly out of range.
In short, Yemen has become the international jihadi's destination of choice from which to prepare, plot and launch future terror attacks. "Only Pakistan's tribal regions rival Yemen as a terrorist Shangri-La", the Wall Street Journal said this year, citing American estimates that up to 1,500 al-Qaida-linked fighters are based there.
Now Abdulmutallab, the well-to-do, well-educated Nigerian recruit, has demonstrated what the Yemeni terrorist melting pot is capable of producing – and just how far its malice can reach.
The signs have been there for those who wished to read them. In an under-reported incident in August, a suicide bomber crossed from Yemen into pro-western Saudi Arabia, passed two security checks, and blew himself up only yards from Prince Mohammad bin Nayef, the Saudi counter-terrorism chief.
The same military explosive, pentaerythritol, that Abdulmutallab attached to his leg was used by the bomber in the Saudi attack, though the latter concealed it in his rectum. Like the Northwest passengers, Nayef escaped serious injury.
Another grim message of intent came in October when al-Qaida's Yemen-based "emir of the Arabian peninsula", Nasir al-Wahayshi, urged supporters to use any means to kill western unbelievers. He identified preferred targets. They were "airports in the western crusade countries that participated in the war against Muslims; or on their planes".
Abdulmutallab's statement to the FBI that he went to Yemen this year and received instructions from al-Qaida there is now under investigation by the government in Sana'a, which said it was co-operating fully with the US.
"The whereabouts and exact details of what he did in Yemen are still unknown, but the investigation will clear up these things in the coming days," a Yemeni official said.
Despite their Af-Pak focus, the US and allies such as Britain have not ignored the Yemen threat. In September, John Brennan, the White House counter-terrorism chief, travelled to Sana'a, and in an unusually strong statement, Barack Obama declared the security of Yemen to be "vital for the security of the United States".
Since then, Washington has provided unspecified assistance to Yemeni and Saudi crackdowns on jihadi bases and Iranian-backed Shia rebels, amid unconfirmed reports that US special forces are in the country.
Two air strikes on al-Qaida strongholds in Yemen, the latest on Christmas Eve, reportedly killed up to 60 militants. It remains unclear whether these unusual operations were influenced by knowledge of a plot to blow up a US airliner.
Yet such efforts notwithstanding, the fact remains that Yemen's security problems retain potential to destabilise Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states.
Author Christopher Boucek, in a report this year by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, warned: "The inability of the Yemeni central government to fully control its territory will create space for violent extremists to regroup and launch attacks against domestic and international targets."
Another uncomfortable fact is that Abdulmutallab pointed to western military intervention in Afghanistan as the justification for his actions. His words appear further to undercut always tendentious official arguments that the war is making western countries safer.
Next time Gordon Brown tries to explain his Afghan policy, he may do well to examine its connection to what so nearly happened to Northwest Airlines flight 253 in the skies over Detroit.
CIF Guardian
The claim by Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab that he was trained, armed and tasked with blowing up an American airliner over US soil by al-Qaida operatives based in Yemen is the western intelligence community's worst nightmare come true.
Since the September 11 attacks, the US and allied security services hunting Osama bin Laden and his associates have focused their attention on the mountains of eastern Afghanistan and the lawless tribal areas of Pakistan.
In recent years, concern has grown about the activities of al-Qaida affiliates in North Africa's Maghreb region, notably Algeria, and in a few sub-Saharan countries such as Nigeria, birthplace of the would-be bomber of Northwest Airlines flight 253.
But in all these cases – even Afghanistan, once its Taliban rulers were deposed – the US could count on the collaboration of established, friendly governments that felt equally threatened by the spectre of Islamist terrorism.
Yemen, and Somalia, its terrible twin situated just across the Gulf of Aden, are a different matter altogether.
Both countries lack effective central government. Both, having suffered a long history of colonial intervention, are currently prey to warring factions that have no love of the west.
And both contain vast, so-called "ungoverned spaces" that offer ideal hideouts and training centres for "non-state actors", the intelligence community's polite euphemism for terrorists.
Large tracts of sparsely populated Yemen are, in effect, "no-go" areas for the forces of global counter-terrorism. These safe havens remain mostly out of sight and, despite a trailblazing CIA Predator drone attack against al-Qaida in 2002, mostly out of range.
In short, Yemen has become the international jihadi's destination of choice from which to prepare, plot and launch future terror attacks. "Only Pakistan's tribal regions rival Yemen as a terrorist Shangri-La", the Wall Street Journal said this year, citing American estimates that up to 1,500 al-Qaida-linked fighters are based there.
Now Abdulmutallab, the well-to-do, well-educated Nigerian recruit, has demonstrated what the Yemeni terrorist melting pot is capable of producing – and just how far its malice can reach.
The signs have been there for those who wished to read them. In an under-reported incident in August, a suicide bomber crossed from Yemen into pro-western Saudi Arabia, passed two security checks, and blew himself up only yards from Prince Mohammad bin Nayef, the Saudi counter-terrorism chief.
The same military explosive, pentaerythritol, that Abdulmutallab attached to his leg was used by the bomber in the Saudi attack, though the latter concealed it in his rectum. Like the Northwest passengers, Nayef escaped serious injury.
Another grim message of intent came in October when al-Qaida's Yemen-based "emir of the Arabian peninsula", Nasir al-Wahayshi, urged supporters to use any means to kill western unbelievers. He identified preferred targets. They were "airports in the western crusade countries that participated in the war against Muslims; or on their planes".
Abdulmutallab's statement to the FBI that he went to Yemen this year and received instructions from al-Qaida there is now under investigation by the government in Sana'a, which said it was co-operating fully with the US.
"The whereabouts and exact details of what he did in Yemen are still unknown, but the investigation will clear up these things in the coming days," a Yemeni official said.
Despite their Af-Pak focus, the US and allies such as Britain have not ignored the Yemen threat. In September, John Brennan, the White House counter-terrorism chief, travelled to Sana'a, and in an unusually strong statement, Barack Obama declared the security of Yemen to be "vital for the security of the United States".
Since then, Washington has provided unspecified assistance to Yemeni and Saudi crackdowns on jihadi bases and Iranian-backed Shia rebels, amid unconfirmed reports that US special forces are in the country.
Two air strikes on al-Qaida strongholds in Yemen, the latest on Christmas Eve, reportedly killed up to 60 militants. It remains unclear whether these unusual operations were influenced by knowledge of a plot to blow up a US airliner.
Yet such efforts notwithstanding, the fact remains that Yemen's security problems retain potential to destabilise Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states.
Author Christopher Boucek, in a report this year by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, warned: "The inability of the Yemeni central government to fully control its territory will create space for violent extremists to regroup and launch attacks against domestic and international targets."
Another uncomfortable fact is that Abdulmutallab pointed to western military intervention in Afghanistan as the justification for his actions. His words appear further to undercut always tendentious official arguments that the war is making western countries safer.
Next time Gordon Brown tries to explain his Afghan policy, he may do well to examine its connection to what so nearly happened to Northwest Airlines flight 253 in the skies over Detroit.
CIF Guardian
Is anyone restraining the British police?
The use of narrative verdicts is working against the families of victims such as Mikey Powell, who died in police custody
An inquest reached a shocking conclusion this month, though you'd be hard-pressed to have heard about it. In a damning "narrative" verdict, the jury concluded that Mikey Powell had died from positional asphyxia following police restraint. He had been deliberately hit by a moving police car, sprayed with CS gas, struck with a baton and restrained on the ground while suffering a psychotic episode.
It was 7 September 2003 when Powell died. He was 38 years old, had three children, and worked as a team leader in a local metal factory. Known as Mikey Dread because of the extravagant dreadlocks he had worn as a young man, Powell was well loved in the Lozells area of Birmingham, where he lived. He also suffered from terrible depression, and on the night in question he cracked up. It was 11.30pm, he was raging outside his mother's house and he broke a window. His mother, Claris, called the police. She had always believed British bobbies were the best in the world, and that if there was a difficult situation you called them out for help. A couple of months earlier, when Powell had suffered another episode, she had called them out, and it had all been sorted.
But this time the police didn't calm Powell down. When the officers screamed at him to get on the floor, he took off his belt and hit the car with it. The police drove straight at him and ran him over. Then came the CS gas and baton, and he was restrained on the ground till a police van arrived to take him to the station. The inquest heard that Powell was put on to the floor of the van, face down, "like a dog". The van parked in the station yard and Powell was kept in it for three minutes before he was carried, still face down, into the "drunk cell". It was only then that officers realised he was not breathing. His cousin, the poet Benjamin Zephaniah, said that in their treatment of Powell the police had acted as a "force, and not a service".
Over the past 30 years, more than 1,000 people have died in Britain in police custody – a disproportionate number of whom are black men, and many, like Powell, suffering mental health problems.
In a now familiar pattern, death is followed by character assassination. After Powell died, a local paper reported that the police had driven their car at him only because he waved a gun at them. The gun was, in fact, his belt. When the family complained about this to West Midlands police, they were told it had been a mistake made by a source close to the investigation. By then the damage had been done. In the public mind, Powell was a crazed gunman who deserved to die. The truth was that he did not have a criminal record, and had even campaigned against gun crime.
In 2006, six officers were charged with battery and failing to treat Powell with due care and attention. All were cleared. Three years on, the family has finally gained the result it was waiting for. After the inquest, Powell's sister, Sieta Lambrias, said: "At long last the truth has come out. The jury have found that the position the police put Mikey in killed him."
It was a powerful and unusual verdict. Yet the story was conspicuously ignored by the media. The only national newspaper report was an appalling column in the Sunday Telegraph arguing that the inquest was a waste of public money.
Why the lack of interest? The reasons are alarming. In 2004, narrative verdicts were introduced at inquests. This was a descriptive verdict that answered questions rather than the traditional short-form verdict that simply stated how and why somebody had died. It was designed to provided more information for families, but its very nature meant it was less easy to sum up in a soundbite. The ultimate soundbite for a death in police custody is "unlawful killing", but since 2004 this verdict has never been reached.
Deborah Coles, co-director of campaigning group Inquest, supports narrative verdicts but she worries that they have led to less coverage of controversial deaths. "They allow more meaningful outcomes for families and can be very powerful commentary on individual and systemic failings. But the negative side is they are difficult to report on because of the detail. The significance of the narrative verdicts is being overlooked. People are not understanding how damning these narrative verdicts are."
Coupled with this are our changing attitudes to what we like to regard as "old-fashioned" policing. It has become known in legal circles as the "Life on Mars" defence, a reference to the TV satire on 1970s policing. Inquests are sometime not heard until years after the death. In the six years since Powell's death, many people in authority – from judges to newspaper editors – assume that policing has been transformed. To paraphrase, the logic goes: yes, we know officers were bent, racist and brutal, but the past is the past and let's focus on the future.
Recent deaths in custody, though, suggest this may not be the case. And if we are not interested in highlighting the potential abuses suffered by the likes of Powell, why should the police fear acting with a similar lack of restraint in future?
(From CIF Guardian)
An inquest reached a shocking conclusion this month, though you'd be hard-pressed to have heard about it. In a damning "narrative" verdict, the jury concluded that Mikey Powell had died from positional asphyxia following police restraint. He had been deliberately hit by a moving police car, sprayed with CS gas, struck with a baton and restrained on the ground while suffering a psychotic episode.
It was 7 September 2003 when Powell died. He was 38 years old, had three children, and worked as a team leader in a local metal factory. Known as Mikey Dread because of the extravagant dreadlocks he had worn as a young man, Powell was well loved in the Lozells area of Birmingham, where he lived. He also suffered from terrible depression, and on the night in question he cracked up. It was 11.30pm, he was raging outside his mother's house and he broke a window. His mother, Claris, called the police. She had always believed British bobbies were the best in the world, and that if there was a difficult situation you called them out for help. A couple of months earlier, when Powell had suffered another episode, she had called them out, and it had all been sorted.
But this time the police didn't calm Powell down. When the officers screamed at him to get on the floor, he took off his belt and hit the car with it. The police drove straight at him and ran him over. Then came the CS gas and baton, and he was restrained on the ground till a police van arrived to take him to the station. The inquest heard that Powell was put on to the floor of the van, face down, "like a dog". The van parked in the station yard and Powell was kept in it for three minutes before he was carried, still face down, into the "drunk cell". It was only then that officers realised he was not breathing. His cousin, the poet Benjamin Zephaniah, said that in their treatment of Powell the police had acted as a "force, and not a service".
Over the past 30 years, more than 1,000 people have died in Britain in police custody – a disproportionate number of whom are black men, and many, like Powell, suffering mental health problems.
In a now familiar pattern, death is followed by character assassination. After Powell died, a local paper reported that the police had driven their car at him only because he waved a gun at them. The gun was, in fact, his belt. When the family complained about this to West Midlands police, they were told it had been a mistake made by a source close to the investigation. By then the damage had been done. In the public mind, Powell was a crazed gunman who deserved to die. The truth was that he did not have a criminal record, and had even campaigned against gun crime.
In 2006, six officers were charged with battery and failing to treat Powell with due care and attention. All were cleared. Three years on, the family has finally gained the result it was waiting for. After the inquest, Powell's sister, Sieta Lambrias, said: "At long last the truth has come out. The jury have found that the position the police put Mikey in killed him."
It was a powerful and unusual verdict. Yet the story was conspicuously ignored by the media. The only national newspaper report was an appalling column in the Sunday Telegraph arguing that the inquest was a waste of public money.
Why the lack of interest? The reasons are alarming. In 2004, narrative verdicts were introduced at inquests. This was a descriptive verdict that answered questions rather than the traditional short-form verdict that simply stated how and why somebody had died. It was designed to provided more information for families, but its very nature meant it was less easy to sum up in a soundbite. The ultimate soundbite for a death in police custody is "unlawful killing", but since 2004 this verdict has never been reached.
Deborah Coles, co-director of campaigning group Inquest, supports narrative verdicts but she worries that they have led to less coverage of controversial deaths. "They allow more meaningful outcomes for families and can be very powerful commentary on individual and systemic failings. But the negative side is they are difficult to report on because of the detail. The significance of the narrative verdicts is being overlooked. People are not understanding how damning these narrative verdicts are."
Coupled with this are our changing attitudes to what we like to regard as "old-fashioned" policing. It has become known in legal circles as the "Life on Mars" defence, a reference to the TV satire on 1970s policing. Inquests are sometime not heard until years after the death. In the six years since Powell's death, many people in authority – from judges to newspaper editors – assume that policing has been transformed. To paraphrase, the logic goes: yes, we know officers were bent, racist and brutal, but the past is the past and let's focus on the future.
Recent deaths in custody, though, suggest this may not be the case. And if we are not interested in highlighting the potential abuses suffered by the likes of Powell, why should the police fear acting with a similar lack of restraint in future?
(From CIF Guardian)
Afghanistan, Pakistan ungrateful for U.S. aid
By now everyone with an opinion about the viability of President Obama's new strategy in Afghanistan and Pakistan has proffered it to anyone who would listen. But here's one important complication that has received little airtime: In both countries, they despise us.
In Afghanistan and Pakistan, the populations harbor a deep, visceral hatred of the United States born of perceived grievances, some present-day and others long past, carefully nurtured so that they can be passed from one generation to the next. To hear them tell it, America's presence in the region over the past eight years has made things only worse.
Helmand province, a Taliban stronghold, is a primary focus of Obama's troop surge in Afghanistan. In recent months, American troops have freed a handful of villages from Taliban control and found, to their dismay, that the villagers are anything but grateful.
"What are you doing here?" an unabashed village elder near Mianposhteh, Helmand, asked an American commander just after his men had won control of the area. "What are you doing in Afghanistan? You should go back to your country."
That sentiment, reported in the Washington Post, is all-too typical. Afghans, generally, don't much like the Taliban. But they like Americans less.
The United States and NATO have given up thousands of lives, billions of dollars, all sacrificed for the twin goals of eliminating al-Qaida and bringing Afghans and Pakistanis freedom to live their lives as they choose. The job is far from finished and, like every military, the West has committed blunders and miscalculations along the way.
But in both states, gratitude is the last emotion in the people's minds. Where, they ask, was the United States in the terrible years before Sept. 11, 2001? No one cared about Afghanistan then.
As Pervez Musharraf, the former Pakistani president, put it earlier this month, "Pakistan and Afghanistan were shortsightedly abandoned to their fate by the West in 1989. This abandonment led to a sense of betrayal."
The only Pakistanis who show any generosity toward the United States were government officials who depend on American aid to make their auto payments and pay their children's private-school bills.
Most telling of all was President Asif Ali Zardari's recent commentary in the New York Times. Zardari asked Americans to look at recent history "as seen by Pakistanis." As he described it, over the past few decades the United States has insulted, slighted and ignored Pakistan, all "to manipulate and exploit us."
Now, he said, the nation is insulted once again because a new law requires the United States to certify that Pakistan is actually "demonstrating a sustained commitment" to combating terrorist groups before delivering aid. That, Zardari complained, is "unfair treatment."
Well, was it fair for Pakistan to take $10 billion in American aid over the past eight years and spend it on anything and everything — except what it was intended for? For Pakistanis and Afghans, the United States is a convenient scapegoat for their own myriad failings. I, for one, have to focus hard on America's own goals before I can stomach spending another dime on those ungrateful people.
Joel Brinkley is a professor of journalism at Stanford University.
In Afghanistan and Pakistan, the populations harbor a deep, visceral hatred of the United States born of perceived grievances, some present-day and others long past, carefully nurtured so that they can be passed from one generation to the next. To hear them tell it, America's presence in the region over the past eight years has made things only worse.
Helmand province, a Taliban stronghold, is a primary focus of Obama's troop surge in Afghanistan. In recent months, American troops have freed a handful of villages from Taliban control and found, to their dismay, that the villagers are anything but grateful.
"What are you doing here?" an unabashed village elder near Mianposhteh, Helmand, asked an American commander just after his men had won control of the area. "What are you doing in Afghanistan? You should go back to your country."
That sentiment, reported in the Washington Post, is all-too typical. Afghans, generally, don't much like the Taliban. But they like Americans less.
The United States and NATO have given up thousands of lives, billions of dollars, all sacrificed for the twin goals of eliminating al-Qaida and bringing Afghans and Pakistanis freedom to live their lives as they choose. The job is far from finished and, like every military, the West has committed blunders and miscalculations along the way.
But in both states, gratitude is the last emotion in the people's minds. Where, they ask, was the United States in the terrible years before Sept. 11, 2001? No one cared about Afghanistan then.
As Pervez Musharraf, the former Pakistani president, put it earlier this month, "Pakistan and Afghanistan were shortsightedly abandoned to their fate by the West in 1989. This abandonment led to a sense of betrayal."
The only Pakistanis who show any generosity toward the United States were government officials who depend on American aid to make their auto payments and pay their children's private-school bills.
Most telling of all was President Asif Ali Zardari's recent commentary in the New York Times. Zardari asked Americans to look at recent history "as seen by Pakistanis." As he described it, over the past few decades the United States has insulted, slighted and ignored Pakistan, all "to manipulate and exploit us."
Now, he said, the nation is insulted once again because a new law requires the United States to certify that Pakistan is actually "demonstrating a sustained commitment" to combating terrorist groups before delivering aid. That, Zardari complained, is "unfair treatment."
Well, was it fair for Pakistan to take $10 billion in American aid over the past eight years and spend it on anything and everything — except what it was intended for? For Pakistanis and Afghans, the United States is a convenient scapegoat for their own myriad failings. I, for one, have to focus hard on America's own goals before I can stomach spending another dime on those ungrateful people.
Joel Brinkley is a professor of journalism at Stanford University.
Yemen: A new Mullah haven?
An insurgency in the remote Shabwa region of Yemen backed by groups claiming loyalty to al-Qaida has provided a new base for the terrorist network, which is under pressure in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Yemen, where the suspected airline bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was allegedly trained by al-Qaida operatives, has had a reputation as a terrorist haven since the 2000 suicide attack against the warship USS Cole. Seventeen US sailors died when attackers rammed the destroyer with a small boat laden with explosives in the port of Aden.
The strategically important but impoverished country is considered a key training ground for Islamist extermists along with Pakistan and Somalia. Last week a pro-al-Qaida group in Yemen said it had declared war on the US.
Since the summer, hundreds have been killed and thousands displaced by clashes between government troops and rebels with the Zaidi sect, a branch of Shia Islam in the Sunni-dominated country. Western analysts believe al-Qaida has been able to establish a regional base in Yemen because the government is weak and distracted by internal conflict.
The president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, has co-operated with Washington's so-called war on terror, receiving tens of millions of dollars of aid and security assistance in return. However, it is feared that Saleh's support for the west has drawn the ire of Islamist extremists.
Last week, the government launched an air strike against what it claimed was a meeting of high-level operatives in the Shabwa region. At least 30 militants were claimed to have been killed, possibly including Anwar al-Awlaki, a radical cleric linked to last month's mass shooting at the Fort Hood military base in Texas that left 13 dead.
Almost half of the 210 detainees at Guantánamo Bay are Yemeni, and US intelligence sources say that about 60 continue to pose a security threat. Yemen's instability is thought to be one of the main reasons why Barack Obama will be unable to meet his January deadline to shut the detention facility.
The Foreign Office advises Britons against travelling to Yemen because "there is a high threat from terrorism", and says terrorists in the country continue to plan attacks. "Attacks could be indiscriminate, including against western and British interests, such as residential compounds, military and oil facilities, and transport and aviation interests," the FCO advice states.
Yemen, where the suspected airline bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was allegedly trained by al-Qaida operatives, has had a reputation as a terrorist haven since the 2000 suicide attack against the warship USS Cole. Seventeen US sailors died when attackers rammed the destroyer with a small boat laden with explosives in the port of Aden.
The strategically important but impoverished country is considered a key training ground for Islamist extermists along with Pakistan and Somalia. Last week a pro-al-Qaida group in Yemen said it had declared war on the US.
Since the summer, hundreds have been killed and thousands displaced by clashes between government troops and rebels with the Zaidi sect, a branch of Shia Islam in the Sunni-dominated country. Western analysts believe al-Qaida has been able to establish a regional base in Yemen because the government is weak and distracted by internal conflict.
The president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, has co-operated with Washington's so-called war on terror, receiving tens of millions of dollars of aid and security assistance in return. However, it is feared that Saleh's support for the west has drawn the ire of Islamist extremists.
Last week, the government launched an air strike against what it claimed was a meeting of high-level operatives in the Shabwa region. At least 30 militants were claimed to have been killed, possibly including Anwar al-Awlaki, a radical cleric linked to last month's mass shooting at the Fort Hood military base in Texas that left 13 dead.
Almost half of the 210 detainees at Guantánamo Bay are Yemeni, and US intelligence sources say that about 60 continue to pose a security threat. Yemen's instability is thought to be one of the main reasons why Barack Obama will be unable to meet his January deadline to shut the detention facility.
The Foreign Office advises Britons against travelling to Yemen because "there is a high threat from terrorism", and says terrorists in the country continue to plan attacks. "Attacks could be indiscriminate, including against western and British interests, such as residential compounds, military and oil facilities, and transport and aviation interests," the FCO advice states.
Swats Girls rise up against Mullahism
Faiza Khan is my metaphor for Swat’s future. And if I am right, turning Swat around post-military operation should not be difficult.
I was standing in the open quad of the Government High School for Girls in Mingora, my crew setting up cameras for the shoot there, and I could see girls peering through the windows of the classrooms all around. Getting there was not easy. I had to earlier meet with the district’s education officer to get his permission. There were two problems: schools have armed police guards throughout the area and, in this particular case, cultural sensitivities were involved.
“You cannot move freely,” the principal told my producer, a young woman who was my only hope to get through the cultural shackles. With the weight of the education officer’s permission behind me and a lot of persuasion, I was told I would get limited access to a group but only after the girls had themselves covered properly. They were told to stay inside the classrooms while we set up the cameras, and yes, to keep their heads down.
Curiosity and their vigour to challenge the principal’s order came to my rescue. I could see them looking out, faces uncovered and exhibiting the artless freedom that comes natural to young women. And then one of the doors opened; I heard giggles; some girls were trying to push another out of the classroom.
But then the sluice gates went up. Another door opened and out walked this girl, uncovered head and face, confidence bordering on cheekiness. She walked up to me, extended her hand to shake mine and said in accented Urdu: “I hope I am not disturbing you, sir. But would you tell me when your programme is aired and on what TV channel?” I shook hands with her and asked her name: “My name is Faiza Khan.”
I wrote down the details of my programme for her in a notebook and while I was doing that, doors opened one after another and girls came rushing out, surrounding me, shaking hands and chattering animatedly. As I watched the footage later I was convinced, more than before, that Swati women are not just beautiful, they have it in them to turn Swat around. If only the government could understand this.
Ironically, Fazlullah, the Radio Mullah, did. When he began his FM broadcasts, his first target were women. He used them for funding as well as to motivate their men-folk. That was 2002. Six years and much bloodshed later, the people of Swat are waking up from that nightmare. This is the time for the government to use Fazlullah’s strategy to reverse that process.
The army realises this, to some extent, if not fully. It has done two things. It suggested that Radio Pakistan set up FM96, known as Radio Swat, to start broadcasting just before the operation began. Radio Swat was beamed from Islamabad through satellite and began its transmissions on March 1. Within weeks Fazlullah felt the pinch. Not only would he and his cohorts appear on the channel to present their viewpoint, Fazlullah himself allowed his men, restrictedly, to play Pashto music to counter the RJ on Radio Swat whose programme was becoming a hit. Radio Swat is now immensely popular with its multiple programmes that target women and the youth.
The army’s second post-operation contribution is the setting up of Sabaoon, Pashto for “a new dawn”. Sabaoon is a rehab centre for captured youth who were either being trained as fighters and suicide bombers or spies for Tehreek-e-Taliban Swat.
I met the doctor and her staff, all female, who are working with these boys and the results are promising. The exercise is also very useful because it is the first attempt to seriously study the phenomenon and get data on the background of these boys and the techniques used to indoctrinate them.
The checkpoints are still there, manned by the army, Frontier Corps jawans and local police. As I drove to Kanju, crossing Swat River east to west and then drove up north along the western bank of the river to various other towns and villages, it was overcast. But from the east, where the clouds were thin, a ray of sunlight had penetrated and was falling on the eastern bank. It was a perfect setting, nature depicting Swat, the murkiness of fear combined with hope.
The people are back, life is picking up, the markets have come alive, roads are too often blocked because of rising traffic. But the pickets are there, soldiers ready with guns and suspecting everyone. The suicide bomber is the lurking fear and he can penetrate through all cordons and security measures.
That is exactly what happened at the hujra of Shamsher Ali Khan, the Awami National Party member of the provincial assembly. Just as the gate opened and he was getting into his car, the lone bomber entered the compound and blew himself up.
It is very difficult to counter the suicide bomber, an army officer told me. That’s where investing in the people, in the Faiza Khans, becomes so important. The only way to stop the suicide bomber is to ensure a society where he can’t be found, bred and trained.
Ejaz Haider, Consulting Editor, The Friday Times
I was standing in the open quad of the Government High School for Girls in Mingora, my crew setting up cameras for the shoot there, and I could see girls peering through the windows of the classrooms all around. Getting there was not easy. I had to earlier meet with the district’s education officer to get his permission. There were two problems: schools have armed police guards throughout the area and, in this particular case, cultural sensitivities were involved.
“You cannot move freely,” the principal told my producer, a young woman who was my only hope to get through the cultural shackles. With the weight of the education officer’s permission behind me and a lot of persuasion, I was told I would get limited access to a group but only after the girls had themselves covered properly. They were told to stay inside the classrooms while we set up the cameras, and yes, to keep their heads down.
Curiosity and their vigour to challenge the principal’s order came to my rescue. I could see them looking out, faces uncovered and exhibiting the artless freedom that comes natural to young women. And then one of the doors opened; I heard giggles; some girls were trying to push another out of the classroom.
But then the sluice gates went up. Another door opened and out walked this girl, uncovered head and face, confidence bordering on cheekiness. She walked up to me, extended her hand to shake mine and said in accented Urdu: “I hope I am not disturbing you, sir. But would you tell me when your programme is aired and on what TV channel?” I shook hands with her and asked her name: “My name is Faiza Khan.”
I wrote down the details of my programme for her in a notebook and while I was doing that, doors opened one after another and girls came rushing out, surrounding me, shaking hands and chattering animatedly. As I watched the footage later I was convinced, more than before, that Swati women are not just beautiful, they have it in them to turn Swat around. If only the government could understand this.
Ironically, Fazlullah, the Radio Mullah, did. When he began his FM broadcasts, his first target were women. He used them for funding as well as to motivate their men-folk. That was 2002. Six years and much bloodshed later, the people of Swat are waking up from that nightmare. This is the time for the government to use Fazlullah’s strategy to reverse that process.
The army realises this, to some extent, if not fully. It has done two things. It suggested that Radio Pakistan set up FM96, known as Radio Swat, to start broadcasting just before the operation began. Radio Swat was beamed from Islamabad through satellite and began its transmissions on March 1. Within weeks Fazlullah felt the pinch. Not only would he and his cohorts appear on the channel to present their viewpoint, Fazlullah himself allowed his men, restrictedly, to play Pashto music to counter the RJ on Radio Swat whose programme was becoming a hit. Radio Swat is now immensely popular with its multiple programmes that target women and the youth.
The army’s second post-operation contribution is the setting up of Sabaoon, Pashto for “a new dawn”. Sabaoon is a rehab centre for captured youth who were either being trained as fighters and suicide bombers or spies for Tehreek-e-Taliban Swat.
I met the doctor and her staff, all female, who are working with these boys and the results are promising. The exercise is also very useful because it is the first attempt to seriously study the phenomenon and get data on the background of these boys and the techniques used to indoctrinate them.
The checkpoints are still there, manned by the army, Frontier Corps jawans and local police. As I drove to Kanju, crossing Swat River east to west and then drove up north along the western bank of the river to various other towns and villages, it was overcast. But from the east, where the clouds were thin, a ray of sunlight had penetrated and was falling on the eastern bank. It was a perfect setting, nature depicting Swat, the murkiness of fear combined with hope.
The people are back, life is picking up, the markets have come alive, roads are too often blocked because of rising traffic. But the pickets are there, soldiers ready with guns and suspecting everyone. The suicide bomber is the lurking fear and he can penetrate through all cordons and security measures.
That is exactly what happened at the hujra of Shamsher Ali Khan, the Awami National Party member of the provincial assembly. Just as the gate opened and he was getting into his car, the lone bomber entered the compound and blew himself up.
It is very difficult to counter the suicide bomber, an army officer told me. That’s where investing in the people, in the Faiza Khans, becomes so important. The only way to stop the suicide bomber is to ensure a society where he can’t be found, bred and trained.
Ejaz Haider, Consulting Editor, The Friday Times
Can we do more?
There are theorists who theorise that Pakistan's strategic thinkers look at the Taliban as a strategic asset and that is why the Pakistan army does not want to do more. I really have no way of finding out whether the theory holds much validity or not. What I am about to do, therefore, is to try to ascertain Pakistan's capacity to do more -- as opposed to the army's willingness to do more.
Consider this: the Pakistan army's 37th Mechanised Infantry Division and X Corps' 19th Infantry Division are both in Swat. XI Corps' 7th Infantry Division is in North Waziristan and its 9th Infantry Division is in South Waziristan. Special Services Group's 7th Commando Zarrar Battalion is also engaged in the anti-terror campaign.
Bajaur Scouts are in Khar, Dir Scouts in Balambat, Khyber Rifles in Landi Kotal, South Waziristan Scouts in Wana, Tochi Scouts in Miranshah plus Kurram Militia, Mehsud Scouts, Mohmand Rifles and Orakzai Scouts -- all engaged in one or another aspect of our anti-terror undertaking. Then there are 6,779 Levies and 16,828 Khassadars.
I Corps has three divisions and the 37th Mechanised Division was pulled away and sent to undertake Operation Rah-e-Rast. X Corps has three divisions and we pulled out 19th Infantry Division and sent it to Swat as well. The entire XI Corps, 7th as well as its 9th Infantry Divisions have taken on the TTP in Waziristan's Operation Rah-e-Nijat (II Corps' 14th Infantry Division is reportedly involved as well). Right now, at least 20 per cent of our combat capacity is entangled in the anti-terror effort.
The Pakistan army maintains military outposts at Wana, Jandola, Ramzak, Miranshah and Mir Ali. Miranshah also has a helicopter fleet and there are army formations in Sara Rogha, Janta, Piazha and Makeen. All in all, we have deployed some 220,000 soldiers, military and paramilitary.
Swat has largely been cleared of extremists but the two divisions there would be required to prevent militant re-infiltration. By December 12, 2009, the army had captured all major militant strongholds in South Waziristan but at least two divisions would be required to hold the cleared territory free of militants.
To be certain, all these victories have not been without a heavy cost, both human and financial. Total Pakistani fatalities in terrorist violence from 2003 to 2009 now stand at 24,624 -- compare that with 1,477 coalition deaths in the Operation Enduring Freedom. For the record, 43 countries have contributed troops to the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) but Pakistan by itself has done more -- and sacrificed more -- than all those 43 countries combined. Clearly, counterinsurgency strategy (COIN) east of the Durand Line has been far more successful than COIN undertaken west of Durand.
Can we do more? The Indian army has 6,384 tanks in its inventory (as none of those Indian tanks can cross the Himalayas into China so Arjun MBTs must all be for Pakistan). The Indian air force has 672 combat aircraft. The Indian army's XV, IX, XVI, XIV, XI and X corps are all pointing their guns towards Pakistan. Indian army's 4th Armoured Division, 12th Infantry Division, 340th Mechanised Brigade and 4th Armoured Brigade have been deployed to cut Pakistan into two halves. The Pakistan army, thus, has no choice but to defend -- defend they must -- Pakistan's eastern border.
How can the world expect Pakistan to do more than what it is already doing? America wants the Pakistan army to neutralise threats to the mainland US but the Pakistan army must first neutralise threats to mainland Pakistan.
PS: On December 24, Prime Minister Gilani said that there weren't any forces conspiring against his government. The same day President Zardari said that there were forces conspiring against his government. Could they both be right?
Dr Farrukh Saleem is the executive director of the Centre for Research and Security Studies(CRSS)in Islamabad
Consider this: the Pakistan army's 37th Mechanised Infantry Division and X Corps' 19th Infantry Division are both in Swat. XI Corps' 7th Infantry Division is in North Waziristan and its 9th Infantry Division is in South Waziristan. Special Services Group's 7th Commando Zarrar Battalion is also engaged in the anti-terror campaign.
Bajaur Scouts are in Khar, Dir Scouts in Balambat, Khyber Rifles in Landi Kotal, South Waziristan Scouts in Wana, Tochi Scouts in Miranshah plus Kurram Militia, Mehsud Scouts, Mohmand Rifles and Orakzai Scouts -- all engaged in one or another aspect of our anti-terror undertaking. Then there are 6,779 Levies and 16,828 Khassadars.
I Corps has three divisions and the 37th Mechanised Division was pulled away and sent to undertake Operation Rah-e-Rast. X Corps has three divisions and we pulled out 19th Infantry Division and sent it to Swat as well. The entire XI Corps, 7th as well as its 9th Infantry Divisions have taken on the TTP in Waziristan's Operation Rah-e-Nijat (II Corps' 14th Infantry Division is reportedly involved as well). Right now, at least 20 per cent of our combat capacity is entangled in the anti-terror effort.
The Pakistan army maintains military outposts at Wana, Jandola, Ramzak, Miranshah and Mir Ali. Miranshah also has a helicopter fleet and there are army formations in Sara Rogha, Janta, Piazha and Makeen. All in all, we have deployed some 220,000 soldiers, military and paramilitary.
Swat has largely been cleared of extremists but the two divisions there would be required to prevent militant re-infiltration. By December 12, 2009, the army had captured all major militant strongholds in South Waziristan but at least two divisions would be required to hold the cleared territory free of militants.
To be certain, all these victories have not been without a heavy cost, both human and financial. Total Pakistani fatalities in terrorist violence from 2003 to 2009 now stand at 24,624 -- compare that with 1,477 coalition deaths in the Operation Enduring Freedom. For the record, 43 countries have contributed troops to the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) but Pakistan by itself has done more -- and sacrificed more -- than all those 43 countries combined. Clearly, counterinsurgency strategy (COIN) east of the Durand Line has been far more successful than COIN undertaken west of Durand.
Can we do more? The Indian army has 6,384 tanks in its inventory (as none of those Indian tanks can cross the Himalayas into China so Arjun MBTs must all be for Pakistan). The Indian air force has 672 combat aircraft. The Indian army's XV, IX, XVI, XIV, XI and X corps are all pointing their guns towards Pakistan. Indian army's 4th Armoured Division, 12th Infantry Division, 340th Mechanised Brigade and 4th Armoured Brigade have been deployed to cut Pakistan into two halves. The Pakistan army, thus, has no choice but to defend -- defend they must -- Pakistan's eastern border.
How can the world expect Pakistan to do more than what it is already doing? America wants the Pakistan army to neutralise threats to the mainland US but the Pakistan army must first neutralise threats to mainland Pakistan.
PS: On December 24, Prime Minister Gilani said that there weren't any forces conspiring against his government. The same day President Zardari said that there were forces conspiring against his government. Could they both be right?
Dr Farrukh Saleem is the executive director of the Centre for Research and Security Studies(CRSS)in Islamabad
Fighting the Taliban in Pakistan
Pakistan will continue to fight against its own Taliban, whose insurgency is rapidly giving way to heightened terrorism that further alienates them from all sections of the population.
Over the last few weeks, the terrorists in their murderous campaign have demonstrated calculated ruthlessness in the range and spread of their attacks. The beleaguered people of Peshawar have been a particular target. But then there was a suicide attack on the mosque in Rawalpindi targeting senior army officials and the subsequent statement by a Tehrik-i-Taliban (TTP) spokesman even justified the death of children at prayer. This was followed by the carnage in a crowded bazaar in Lahore and the assault on an ISI building in Multan. As the military ground offensive in South Waziristan continues to make headway, the terrorists are at pains to reinforce the message that they can strike anywhere in the country, making no distinction between combatants and innocent men, women and children. It is a wonder that some of us are still uncertain as to whose war it is. That our politico-religious parties still fight shy of condemning outright and vociferously the most barbaric acts carried out in the name of religion even when the TTP has no qualms about acknowledging these as its handiwork is a cause for deep concern as well.
Meanwhile, we have President Obama’s decision on the request for more troops for Afghanistan by the commander of US forces in the area. In a somewhat predictable move the US president has acceded to General McChrystal’s insistence for a troops surge and sanctioned 30,000 more troops for Afghanistan. At the same time, he has announced an 18-month timetable for withdrawal of the troops, prompting criticism to the effect that this will encourage the Taliban to simply wait it out before resuming a full-fledged offensive. In subsequent statements policymakers have tried to indicate that the withdrawal timeline is not a definite one and will depend on the situation on the ground. Arguably, even in the absence of a date the troops surge is unlikely to meet the objective of defeating the Afghan Taliban. There has been a sharpening of a Pakhtun nationalist sentiment to the advantage of the Taliban, and they have used the presence of US/NATO forces and the high level of civilian casualties to legitimise themselves as a force resisting occupation forces. President Hamid Karzai’s dismal track record of governance has made their task easier.
The surge is likely to push more Taliban this side of the border and increase the difficulties for Pakistan. The US is also increasing the pressure on Pakistan because of the view that Pakistan regards the Afghan Taliban as a kind of ‘insurance policy’ against the threat of encirclement by India. As such it refuses to seriously go after the so-called Quetta shura. Recently, Senator John Kerry, who heads the US senate foreign relations committee, said in effect that Pakistan needs to take on these forces in order to ensure that the US is not driven to take matters into its own hands. There has also been the threat of using drones in Balochistan against suspected Taliban/al Qaeda elements. The US, however, is very well aware, or should be, of the consequences of increased instability in Pakistan. As for drone attacks, these have accounted for a large number of deaths of innocent people, fuelling further resentment that the Taliban have made use of, balancing out any gains that may have been made through successful strikes.
On the other hand, it is a positive sign that Senator Kerry while chairing his committee hearings referred to the need for Afghanistan, Pakistan as well as India to work together for dealing with the situation. Of course, the perception is not entirely new. Originally the special envoy Richard Holbrooke had been inducted into the proceedings with a mandate that extended to India but the latter’s vociferous protest led to that part being quickly dropped, to the detriment of the enterprise. But there is some indication of a rethink here. At this point, according to Kerry, the Indo-Pak border situation has “improved” but suspicions continue to run deep between the two countries “...these are people who have gone to war three times and who have this sort of quiet war on the front in Kashmir constantly going on...so I think that it is very, very important for us to help change that equation...I think there are things we can do and some things we should pay more attention to.”
Pakistan will continue to fight against its own Taliban, whose insurgency is rapidly giving way to heightened terrorism that further alienates them from all sections of the population. In any case, they cannot conceal their ruthless drive for territory and power under the garb of fighting an occupation force. But the India factor will continue to intrude into Pakistan’s efforts to take up the grave challenge of terrorism in the way that it should. With its nuclear cooperation treaty with India, the US now enjoys an especially close relationship with that country. It can use this to good effect by encouraging India to resolve the Kashmir dispute — it should treat the Kashmiris as key interlocutors — and significantly reduce the strength of troops on the border with Pakistan. India’s stance of making dialogue with Pakistan conditional on progress in the prosecution of those responsible for the November 2008 terrorist attack in Mumbai, or on anything else for that matter, effectively holds up the much-needed collective effort against a common enemy.
Meanwhile, Pakistan faces a crisis of governance that it needs to address relatively quickly. Under pressure or otherwise, it is a good sign that President Asif Zardari has transferred the control of the National Command Authority (NCA) to the prime minister, even if the gesture is largely symbolic. It should serve as the prelude to doing away with the 17th amendment. The effort to address the long-simmering issue of Balochistan is also very much a step in the right direction, though clearly much more needs to be done here and without too much further delay. However, for now the Supreme Court has centre-stage. It remains to be seen how far the verdict in the NRO case will go beyond individuals and technicalities in reforming the system. Given that the collective might of the Supreme Court is attending to the case, hopefully the judgment will provide some basis for curtailing individual as well as institutionalised corruption in the time to come.
Postscript: Do we have anything yet from the police or any other relevant agency on who was responsible for the firing on the Dawn columnist Kamran Shafi’s home in Wah? Or is that too much to ask for?
Abbas Rashid lives in Lahore
Over the last few weeks, the terrorists in their murderous campaign have demonstrated calculated ruthlessness in the range and spread of their attacks. The beleaguered people of Peshawar have been a particular target. But then there was a suicide attack on the mosque in Rawalpindi targeting senior army officials and the subsequent statement by a Tehrik-i-Taliban (TTP) spokesman even justified the death of children at prayer. This was followed by the carnage in a crowded bazaar in Lahore and the assault on an ISI building in Multan. As the military ground offensive in South Waziristan continues to make headway, the terrorists are at pains to reinforce the message that they can strike anywhere in the country, making no distinction between combatants and innocent men, women and children. It is a wonder that some of us are still uncertain as to whose war it is. That our politico-religious parties still fight shy of condemning outright and vociferously the most barbaric acts carried out in the name of religion even when the TTP has no qualms about acknowledging these as its handiwork is a cause for deep concern as well.
Meanwhile, we have President Obama’s decision on the request for more troops for Afghanistan by the commander of US forces in the area. In a somewhat predictable move the US president has acceded to General McChrystal’s insistence for a troops surge and sanctioned 30,000 more troops for Afghanistan. At the same time, he has announced an 18-month timetable for withdrawal of the troops, prompting criticism to the effect that this will encourage the Taliban to simply wait it out before resuming a full-fledged offensive. In subsequent statements policymakers have tried to indicate that the withdrawal timeline is not a definite one and will depend on the situation on the ground. Arguably, even in the absence of a date the troops surge is unlikely to meet the objective of defeating the Afghan Taliban. There has been a sharpening of a Pakhtun nationalist sentiment to the advantage of the Taliban, and they have used the presence of US/NATO forces and the high level of civilian casualties to legitimise themselves as a force resisting occupation forces. President Hamid Karzai’s dismal track record of governance has made their task easier.
The surge is likely to push more Taliban this side of the border and increase the difficulties for Pakistan. The US is also increasing the pressure on Pakistan because of the view that Pakistan regards the Afghan Taliban as a kind of ‘insurance policy’ against the threat of encirclement by India. As such it refuses to seriously go after the so-called Quetta shura. Recently, Senator John Kerry, who heads the US senate foreign relations committee, said in effect that Pakistan needs to take on these forces in order to ensure that the US is not driven to take matters into its own hands. There has also been the threat of using drones in Balochistan against suspected Taliban/al Qaeda elements. The US, however, is very well aware, or should be, of the consequences of increased instability in Pakistan. As for drone attacks, these have accounted for a large number of deaths of innocent people, fuelling further resentment that the Taliban have made use of, balancing out any gains that may have been made through successful strikes.
On the other hand, it is a positive sign that Senator Kerry while chairing his committee hearings referred to the need for Afghanistan, Pakistan as well as India to work together for dealing with the situation. Of course, the perception is not entirely new. Originally the special envoy Richard Holbrooke had been inducted into the proceedings with a mandate that extended to India but the latter’s vociferous protest led to that part being quickly dropped, to the detriment of the enterprise. But there is some indication of a rethink here. At this point, according to Kerry, the Indo-Pak border situation has “improved” but suspicions continue to run deep between the two countries “...these are people who have gone to war three times and who have this sort of quiet war on the front in Kashmir constantly going on...so I think that it is very, very important for us to help change that equation...I think there are things we can do and some things we should pay more attention to.”
Pakistan will continue to fight against its own Taliban, whose insurgency is rapidly giving way to heightened terrorism that further alienates them from all sections of the population. In any case, they cannot conceal their ruthless drive for territory and power under the garb of fighting an occupation force. But the India factor will continue to intrude into Pakistan’s efforts to take up the grave challenge of terrorism in the way that it should. With its nuclear cooperation treaty with India, the US now enjoys an especially close relationship with that country. It can use this to good effect by encouraging India to resolve the Kashmir dispute — it should treat the Kashmiris as key interlocutors — and significantly reduce the strength of troops on the border with Pakistan. India’s stance of making dialogue with Pakistan conditional on progress in the prosecution of those responsible for the November 2008 terrorist attack in Mumbai, or on anything else for that matter, effectively holds up the much-needed collective effort against a common enemy.
Meanwhile, Pakistan faces a crisis of governance that it needs to address relatively quickly. Under pressure or otherwise, it is a good sign that President Asif Zardari has transferred the control of the National Command Authority (NCA) to the prime minister, even if the gesture is largely symbolic. It should serve as the prelude to doing away with the 17th amendment. The effort to address the long-simmering issue of Balochistan is also very much a step in the right direction, though clearly much more needs to be done here and without too much further delay. However, for now the Supreme Court has centre-stage. It remains to be seen how far the verdict in the NRO case will go beyond individuals and technicalities in reforming the system. Given that the collective might of the Supreme Court is attending to the case, hopefully the judgment will provide some basis for curtailing individual as well as institutionalised corruption in the time to come.
Postscript: Do we have anything yet from the police or any other relevant agency on who was responsible for the firing on the Dawn columnist Kamran Shafi’s home in Wah? Or is that too much to ask for?
Abbas Rashid lives in Lahore
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
