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Human Rights Under Threat
DAY after tomorrow, the people of Pakistan will join the rest of humankind in celebrating Human Rights Day. The government too will indulge in ritualistic rhetoric. An honest approach should persuade it to do some soul-searching, for human rights in Pakistan face serious threats today. Of late, the most fundamental human right — the right to life, liberty and security of life — has come under increased strain. Several incidents have exposed as sheer obduracy the government’s rejection of a moratorium on executions until the abolition of death penalty can be rationally discussed. The other day, the Supreme Court acquitted a man who had spent 11 years in jail. He was sentenced to death in December 2005 by a sessions court on the charge of killing a villager. The high court commuted the sentence to life imprisonment. The Supreme Court rejected the evidence that the trial court had relied upon. Some days earlier, the same court acquitted a man who had spent two decades in prison for a murder in 1992. More heart-wrenching was the story of two brothers who were acquitted of the murder charge levelled against them in 2002, after they had been hanged in October 2015. Of late, the right to life, liberty and security of life has come under increased strain. The last mentioned case strengthened the argument for abolition of death penalty on the ground of its being irreversible. It also created serious doubts about the level of efficiency of an administration that hangs two men while their appeal is pending. Were those guilty of this crime — which amounts to murder by negligence if not murder in the name of law — called to account, and have any steps been taken to avoid a recurrence? The argument for action on both counts is irrefutable. All three cases throw light on a perennial theme — the law’s delays. While attempts have been made to expedite murder trials, especially through the creation of anti-terrorism courts, little seems to have been done to reduce the time murder...
Indo-Pak CBM blues
One has noted with some trepidation that many people who matter across the globe — and that includes the UN Secretary General, have resumed the erstwhile chorus of advising Pakistan and India to settle their issues through bilateral dialogue. There is a definite aura of deja vu about it! This calls for a pause for a bit of introspection. The recent incidents across the LOC and the Indian establishment’s somewhat irrational reaction on other fronts have underlined once again the futility of a dialogue based on CBMs (confidence building measures) as against one aimed at the settlement betimes of the contentious issues between the two countries. We, as a nation, appeared to be afflicted with the debilitating disease that may be called, for want of a better appellation, CBMitis? Our relations with our neighbour appear to be stuck in a groove. And yet we are goaded to do more of the same. What is hard to understand is why the world insists that we immerse ourselves headlong in the sea of CBMs. Is not our cup already overflowing with them as it is? It came to pass that we got so enamoured with this quest that at one stage in the past we went to the extent of advocating the cause of CBMs in the UN General Assembly. Our philosophy appeared to be: what is good for the goose should be equally good for the gander. It would perhaps be a wee bit impolite to butt in and point out to the powers that be that CBMs are at best the means to an end and should never be confused with the end itself. Over-obsession with CBMs could very well result in making the overall picture murky and obscure. It would be in the fitness of things to pause and take stock before we are totally engulfed by the make-believe syndrome. While on the subject of CBMs between India and Pakistan, one may well be within one’s rights to pose the question as to what happened to the (once) much-vaunted back-channel diplomacy? In the words of a screaming headline in a newspaper some summers back, it (back-channel...
Challenges for a Big Venture
The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) is not an ordinary run-of-the-mill project; it involves massive economic activity. Its impact is already being felt in Pakistan, albeit not in the way it was expected. Though the Afghan corridor, which can link the CPEC, remains unavailable due to instability, the government continues to sell the project as a game-changer for the region. This commercial project was offered formally in May 2013 to Pakistan. The diktat of China’s own priorities and needs was the prime mover behind the offer. One must realise that corridor diplomacy connects China with 60 countries, setting up potential trade with a further 4.4 billion people and boosting China’s GDP by 25 percent. The CPEC is one of the six corridors envisaged under the One Belt, One Road project (OBOR) at a cost of $900 billion. The proposed corridors are the China-Mongolia-Russia Economic Corridor (CMREC), New Eurasian Land Bridge (NELB), China-Central and West Asia Economic Corridor (CCWAEC), China-Indo-China Peninsula Economic Corridor (CICPEC), CPEC and Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar Economic Corridor (BCIMEC). Except for the CPEC, all other corridors have so far remained non-controversial. But that does not mean that they are faring better than the CPEC. Opposition from India and US was expected. India reiterated the objection it had raised in the 1960s when China and Pakistan finalised their borders and consequently built the Karakoram Highway on territory claimed by both India and Pakistan. Another reason for the Indian opposition could be the Modi government’s known policy to deny any opportunity to Pakistan to consolidate its economy. The US is worried that the CPEC would facilitate stationing of the Chinese navy in the Indian Ocean. It supports India’s position that India alone has primacy right in the Indian Ocean. This fits well in with its global agenda to prop up India to counter the rising power of China. The US and its allies deny that they want to curtail...
China Urges Parties in Iran Deal to Stick To Pact As Trump Presidency Approaches
The implementation of the Iran nuclear deal should not be affected by any changes in the domestic situations of countries involved in the agreement, China's foreign minister said. The comment comes days after the US Senate voted to renew sanctions against Iran. "Maintaining the deal's continued, comprehensive and effective implementation is the responsibility and common interest of all parties, and should not be impacted by changes in the internal situation of each country," Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said at a press conference following a meeting with his Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif on Monday. "What is important is to honor commitments and place an emphasis on good faith when it comes to differences or possible differences" over the deal, he said, as cited by AFP. Zarif later said that Iran’s nuclear deal “is a multilateral agreement and all parties should respect it. Iran and China have the same stance on this,” Reuters reported, citing Iran's Tasnim news agency. "We will not let any country infringe the agreement unilaterally," he added. "But if they do, Iran has its own options." His comments come after the US Senate voting unanimously last week to renew the Iran Sanctions Act (ISA) for another decade. It has been described as a symbolic move, but it allows the president to impose new restrictions on Tehran if it violates the 2015 nuclear accord. In November, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei warned the American government that if it renews sanctions over his country’s nuclear program for another 10 years, there will be consequences. “The current government of the United States has breached the JCPOA [Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action] on multiple occasions; the most recent being a 10-year extension of existing sanctions,” he said in a speech reprinted on his official website. “If these sanctions are put into place, the JCPOA has certainly been breached and they [the USA] should be aware that the Islamic Republic of Iran will not...
Afghanistan: Survey Finds Levels of Fear at Their Highest
Findings of Asia Foundation's 12th annual Survey of the Afghan People were released Wednesday in Kabul and found the downward trajectory in national mood, which began in 2013, has continued: in 2016, just 29.3 percent of Afghans say the country is moving in the right direction, the lowest level of optimism recorded in the Survey since it began in 2004, and down from 36.7 percent in 2015. While the drop in 2015 can be partly explained by post-election disappointments after the exuberance and campaign promises preceding the 2014 presidential elections, the lower optimism in 2016 appears to reflect a sustained change in sentiment related to perceptions of security, the economy, and government achievements, their report stated. Afghans appear to have less confidence in every level of government, yet they also have less desire to emigrate. This year's survey polled 12,658 Afghan respondents, 52.7 percent of them male and 47.4 percent female, representing 16 ethnic groups from all 34 provinces in the country. The report stated that the marked rise in civilian casualties and worsening violence has contributed to the highest recorded level of fear in over a decade. It states that Afghans in 2016 are more fearful for their security, more dissatisfied with the economy, and less confident in their government. "The national mood continued to decline, and this year marks the lowest level of optimism since the survey began in 2004," it stated. More than one-third of Afghans say their household financial situation has grown worse in the past year and most Afghans say they have no confidence in the Independent Elections Commission. "Confidence in every level of government appears to have fallen since 2015," the report stated. But this year's survey also provides some reasons for optimism. It stated that "despite the worsening economic and security environment, the desire to emigrate fell to a record low this year, a striking change from 2015, as large numbers of previous...
Sabawoon Showcase: Status of Polio Infected Persons and Government’s Plans to Erdicate Polio Virus
The latest episode of Sabawoon, flagship radio program of Center for Research and Security Studies (CRSS), focused on the status of people infected with polio in Khyber Pahtunkhwa (KP) and KP government’s plans to control and get rid of the polio virus in the region. The key points of discussion included an overview of the current scenario of polio infected persons in KP, infection of children by polio virus, transmission of this virus from infected people, polluted environment helping spread of the virus, polio vaccination campaigns, techniques to control polio, hygiene issues giving birth to polio viruses, and refusal of polio vaccination by families in KP. Furthermore, the program discussed the plans of government and international organizations to annihilate the polio problem in the region. The program was aired under the theme “Jarga Marrakka” (debate and council) on Monday. Dr. Akram Khan, Assistant Director of Expanded Programme on Immunization (EPI) Program, Peshawar(KP), participated as the studio guest in the show. A radio report, based on the aforementioned theme of the show was made part of the program. The report shed light on prevailing situation regarding the polio vaccination in district Kohat and the hurdles faced by the polio teams in promoting their campaign. The report stated that the KP province tops Pakistan with a total number of 18 polio cases in the year 2016. Lack of awareness among public is the major reason behind this fact. Approximately, 30,000 familes in KP (including 2,000 families in Kohat) refused to vaccinate their children against polio virus. The government has been taking action against the families who have refused the vaccination to their children and is implementing Section 3MPA as a punishment of refusal. 2016 was counted as the year to eliminate polio from Pakistan. However, Pakistan (as well as Afghanistan) is still polio endemic country. Live Callers on the Show: Two callers took part in the show live and urged the...
Heart of Asia Realignments: India-Afghanistan In Open Courtship As Russia Falls By Wayside
In diplomacy, the subtext is often as important as the text. As the sixth edition of the annual Heart of Asia Conference came to a close on Sunday, between the comments and declarations, the narrative and the counter-narrative, lay the contours of a new, deviatory foreign policy under Prime Minister Narendra Modi. A nation's strategic affairs are usually the result of well-curated gradualism. Major shifts are rare unless there is a confluence of circumstances and a strong leadership willing to shake off hesitations of history. At the end of the two-day summit, it does appear that India is on the cusp of a bold revision. Two things are immediately clear. One, India is no longer coy about its relationship with Afghanistan and sees the Central Asian nation as an important pivot. Two, it is fast recalibrating its historic ties with Russia. We are still a long way away from hearing the last word of an enduring strategic partnership but New Delhi is close to accepting (after staying in long denial) that the Cold War-era bonhomie with Moscow is over. Indo-Russian ties, too, have fallen prey to the sweeping currents of realignment triggered by the end of American exceptionalism and the simultaneous rise of China. Though major regional and global players met in Amritsar ostensibly to guide Afghanistan through its political and economic transition, in reality Heart of Asia platform was reduced to staging just another boxing bout between India, Pakistan and Afghanistan with Russia trying to play the referee and media in Islamabad and New Delhi in breathless anticipation for resumption of talks. As if that would serve any purpose. The way the pugilists threw their punches, it became abundantly clear that Kabul and New Delhi now see no point in downplaying the convergence of their strategic and commercial interests. In setting diplomatic niceties aside and blasting Pakistan's complicity in sponsoring terror within its borders and inflicting an "undeclared war", Afghanistan...
Ghani’s Still Pakistan’s Best Bet
‘Afghanistan is more than the “graveyard of empires.”’ Maureen Dowd once said, ‘It’s the mother of vicious circles.’ While Ms Dowd fails to point out her country’s complicity in said circles, her words ring true: ever since the other Dowd — the Russians’ sacrificial lamb Daud Khan — Afghanistan has only seen war. Yet even by Afghan standards, Ashraf Ghani just can’t catch a break. The presidency has long been the most thankless job in the world, but today’s odds are without end. With those in mind, perhaps, did Mr Ghani lambast Pakistan at the Heart of Asia Conference. Islamabad would do better, he said, to spend our development aid on fighting terror instead. And though Pakistan’s pundits were quick to whale back at an ‘ingrate’ and ‘incompetent’, it may be best to breathe. Before we bash the man, let’s take a trip in his shoes. To start with, the Taliban are in ascent everywhere, having snatched up around 40 percent of the country, more territory than at any other time in the war. Much of the Pakistani Taliban too — squashed by Zarb-e-Azb back home — are regrouping as ISIS, and turning on Kabul. Then there’s all the rest of them: around a fifth of the world’s terror orgs have lain down roots in Afghanistan, says the US’s General Nicholson (another ironic source). Speaking of the Americans, the US is mentally making for the door. Before he backtracked, then went back on the backtracking, Donald Trump summed it up thus: ‘(…) it’s a mess. It’s a mess. And at this point, you probably have to (stay) because that thing will collapse about two seconds after they leave.’ Yes, ‘that thing’ again: in its grand tradition of taking Afghanistan apart and leaving, Mr. Trump echoes another Republican hero, George H W Bush. With the Kremlin gone (but Kabul ablaze), Mr. Bush reportedly asked his cabinet, ‘Is “that thing” still going on?’ As we ready ourselves for more of that thing, we get to everything else: the Afghan National Army’s attrition rate is among the highest in the...
Afghanistan Will Be the Trump Administration’s First Foreign Policy Crisis
Many hotspots and geopolitical adversaries are constantly in the news and likely at the forefront of the foreign policy issues President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team is focused on. Yet the issue that is most likely to be the first real foreign policy crisis of the Trump administration is the one that received no discussion at all during the presidential debates – Afghanistan. Remember Afghanistan? The longest war in U.S. history? Where the United States, its allies in NATO, and several partner nations still have in excess of 13,000 troops on the ground? Where the United States last year spent approximately $3.6 billion on security force assistance alone? Where the United States has been dropping ever-larger numbers of bombs since President Obama gave U.S. forces more expansive authorities to achieve so-called “strategic effects?” As was the case when Barack Obama took office in 2009, Afghanistan is again the “forgotten war,” taking the backseat to a war in Iraq. And just as President Obama inherited a war trending in the wrong direction, so too will President Trump. Today, Afghanistan’s economy is in decline, with its gross domestic product (GDP) having decreased each of the past three years. The country’s government is in a state of routine chaos, with the parliament having just dismissed seven government ministers and the first vice president having just publically beaten and kidnapped a political rival. The security situation is no better. The commander of U.S. Central Command recently cited district control statisticsthat suggest 60 percent of Afghanistan’s population live in districts under the government’s control or influence, while about 10 percent live in districts under insurgent control (the rest of the population lives in areas that are contested). Yet these categorizations have been called into question – and anyway, they miss the point of the Taliban-led insurgency’s strategy and operational design, which is to first capture sparsely...
Youth Alone Can Sway the Hope
In the past 35-year-old war, the largest victims who were killed, maimed or traumatized in Afghanistan are mostly young people. Yet, the Afghanistan’s population remains the world’s youngest and fastest growing. Half of them are under eighteen. The Afghan Central Statistics Organization in 2014 disclosed that almost 47 percent of the country’s 27.1 million people were under fifteen and 37 percent between fifteen and thirty-nine. Combined, 84 percent were under forty. The ubiquitous violence of the past and present scar their memories. But to insist that they do not understand the political causes of the war and thus are unable to break free of prejudices is not reflective of the reality discernible at least among university going students in Kabul and Mizar-e- Sharif. The instability spiral in Afghanistan has failed to undermine their resilience to rebuild their war-ravaged country. In fact, the Afghan universities are preparing the youth to be a political factor in new Afghanistan. Youths are seen holding responsible positions in government as well as parliament. The pace of change is slow but there is no slackening of efforts despite the shrinking labor market for almost 400,000 new job seekers each year. Since 2008, Afghanistan’s nation-wide literacy rate has increased by 5%; since 2005, the youth literacy rate has increased by more than 16%. According to the Afghan Central Statistics Organization, public university enrollment has increased from 7,800 in 2001 to 174,425 in 2015, 21% of which are women, and demand for higher education continues to grow. The Afghan civil society has, of late, started engaging these educated young people as part of their consultation with government, religious leaders, international community to effectively contribute to the decision making processes and promote solidarity and unity between people from different communities to national level. Some such initiatives even go beyond local politics, out-reaching neighboring...
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TESTIMONIALS
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I am also a member of National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Information and Broadcasting. Recently, we held a meeting with the Director General of Radio Pakistan and we told them to initiate such local programs (like Constituency Hour) in regional languages to educate and inform people. Even Indian Radio can be heard in FATA which is being used for propaganda purposes and must be closed. Therefore, we should launch some standard and quality programs like CRSS that will change the taste of the listeners.