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EU’s Secret Ultimatum to Afghanistan: Accept 80,000 Deportees or Lose Aid
When international donors and the Afghan government convene in Brussels next week, the EU secretly plans to threaten Afghanistan with a reduction in aid if the war-torn country does not accept at least 80,000 deported asylum seekers. According to a leaked restricted memo (pdf), the EU will make some of its aid “migration sensitive”, even while acknowledging that security in Afghanistan is worsening. Meanwhile, the Afghan government is also struggling with internal turmoil, and has failed to revive the economy or produce jobs for the young who leave the country in droves. It would be challenging for Afghanistan to absorb 80,000 deportations. So far, in 2016, about 5,000 Afghans have returned voluntarily from Europe. “This is putting unreasonable pressure on the Afghan government, which is not able to respond to such numbers,” said Timor Sharan, senior analyst for the International Crisis Group in Afghanistan. Afghans make up the second largest group of migrants arriving in Europe, with1 96,170 applying for asylum (pdf) last year. At the two-day summit in Brussels, which begins on 4 October, international donors are expected to roughly match the $4bn (£3bn) annually pledged at the 2012 Tokyo conference over the next four years. The pressure on Afghanistan is part of a broader EU strategy of making aid to poor countries conditional on them accepting deported migrants. The best known example is the €6bn deal (£5.2bn) offered to Turkey in exchange for taking back asylum seekers and improving border controls. Other targeted countries include Niger, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Lebanon and Libya. The EU has also considered similar deals with Eritrea and Sudan, the governments of which are accused of crimes against humanity and war crimes. In Afghanistan, analysts warn that the EU is sending people back to danger and destitution. Yousuf* fled Afghanistan in 2011. His father was a policeman under the communist regime of the 1980s. Yousuf, 28, himself a communist, received threats...
SCO Starts First-Ever Military Exercises In Kyrgyzstan
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization is conducting its first joint military exercises in Kyrgyzstan, just weeks after a suicide bomber attacked the Chinese embassy in Bishkek. The 2016 version of the SCO's Peace Mission exercise kicked off on Thursday at the Edelweiss training center near Lake Issyk-Kul. As is often the case, the scenario of the exercise involves an "anti-terror" operation with considerably heavier firepower than is usually employed against terrorists. Chinese helicopters, for example,practiced using air-to-air missiles. "The need to conduct such exercises is dictated by modern realities," said Colonel Ruslan Mukambetov, the Kyrgyzstan officer commanding the exercises. "They have repeatedly proven their relevance and significance amid the current international situation, both in the SCO area of responsibility and in the world at large... In addition to its direct purpose - the fight against terrorism, extremism and separatism - they also promote closer military cooperation between our countries’ armed forces." There seems to be some discrepancies in the reporting of how many troops are involved: The official Chinese People's Liberation Army news site said that it was 1,100, while Mukambetov said it was 2,000. The Russian contingent is reportedly 500 strong, and the Chinese, about 300. In any case, that's a big drop from the last iteration of these exercises, in 2014 in China, when7,000 troops took part. The China Defense Blog noted that the numbers involved are "a far cry" from the scale of past exercises. The fact that the exercises coincide so closely with the attack on the Chinese embassy in Bishkek is a coincidence, as these were planned long in advance, but it's nevertheless one that's given the drills an extra resonance. The July 30 embassy attack involved "Uighur terrorist groups," Kyrgyzstan's State Committee on National Security announced. That raised the specter of the long-running Uighur insurgency in Xinjiang, just across the...
Putin Submits Treaty on Anti-Terrorist Cooperation With China for Ratification
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday has submitted an agreement between Russia and China on cooperation against terrorism, separatism and extremism for ratification by parliament, according to the State Duma's electronic database. MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Oleg Syromolotov was appointed the official representative of the president in the State Duma and the Federation Council for the ratification procedure. The agreement between Russia and the People's Republic of China was signed in Beijing on September 27, 2010. It envisions the development of bilateral cooperation in counterterrorism strategy, including joint measures for prevention, detection and suppression of terror activities. It stipulates an exchange of data concerning terrorist organizations, their proposed operations, the sources of financing, as well as information about illegal use of explosives, weapons and ammunition. The agreement is aimed at strengthening of Russia-China cooperation against terrorism based on the Shanghai Convention on Combating Terrorism, Separatism and Extremism, signed on June 15, 2001, and the SCO Convention Against Terrorism, singed on June 16, 2009, in Yekaterinburg. This article originally appeared on www.sputniknews.com, September 29 2016. Original link. Disclaimer: Views expressed in the article are not necessarily supported by CRSS.
Next SCO Exercise Peace Mission Due in Russia In 2018
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization’s member-countries will hold the next joint military exercise Peace Mission in Russia in 2018, the deputy chief of Russia’s General Staff, Sergey Istrakov, told the media on Tuesday. "The SCO chiefs of general staffs met in session to make a decision that their next meeting and next Peace Mission exercise will be held in Russia in 2018," Istrakov said. The SCO military officials reviewed the performance of the SCO regional anti-terrorist structure, the military-political situation in the region and measures to combat terrorism and religious extremism. They underscored the need for the defense ministries to present a common front in joint resistance to threats to security," Istrakov said. The current Peace Mission-2016 exercise is underway in Kyrgyzstan. It began on September 15 and will end tomorrow, September 21. Military contingents from Kazakhstan, China, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Tajikistan are taking part. This article originally appeared on www.in.rbth.com, September 20 2016. Original link. Disclaimer: Views expressed in the article are not necessarily supported by CRSS.
Should We Rethink Kashmir?
PRIME MINISTER Nawaz Sharif has perhaps done all that he could to draw the international community’s attention to the Kashmiri people’s ordeal. He and members of his large entourage spoke of India-held Kashmir to whoever they met in New York. By all accounts offered by our media services, the Kashmir mission, carried out with unusual vigour, went off well — this despite a slight slip while drafting the press release on the meeting with US Secretary of State John Kerry and the attempt by Pakistan’s enemies to sabotage its efforts by attacking the Indian military camp at Uri. But was the world listening? The question is unavoidable in view of, among other things, the international community’s decision some years ago to delete the Kashmir issue from the list of its concerns. While voices may continue to be raised here and there in sympathy with the victims of oppression in any part of Jammu and Kashmir, the issue has been left to be resolved bilaterally by India and Pakistan. For many years now, the friends of India and Pakistan , and also of the people of Kashmir, have not gone beyond offering help to facilitate a negotiated settlement. Pakistan’s establishment has traditionally held the view that large-scale disorder in the Kashmir valley, gross violations of human rights, or a popular uprising there will oblige the world community to intervene and help the Kashmiri people gain their rights. Despite being tested several times this thesis has not been confirmed. What will happen in future cannot be foretold, but political realism cautions against putting excessive reliance on the international community’s capacity to intervene effectively. The whole of South Asia is paying heavily for the India-Pakistan confrontation. Now that bilateral talks offer the only way to settle the Kashmir issue, Pakistan cannot but continue to give priority to efforts in that direction. That India has responded with frenzied sabre-rattling, belatedly tempered with guile, is not...
Hidden Costs of CPEC
AN important announcement from the government went relatively unnoticed given the atmosphere that prevails, so let me reconstruct a timeline here to give everybody a better idea of what is going on. Last year on April 21, the day after Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Pakistan, the military put out a press release announcing the creation of a ‘Special Security Division for Pak-China Economic Projects’, which would consist of nine army battalions and six wings of civil armed forces, to be commanded by a major general. The force was supposed to be one of several being created for protection of Chinese investments and personnel in the country. The fact that the press release came the day after Xi Jinping’s visit, during which he also met the army high command, suggests that the matter was discussed between them during the meeting. In May, the finance minister told a Senate standing committee that Rs136 billion would be required for completing the military operation in North Waziristan, including the cost of rehabilitating the displaced people, and other security-related expenditures, which according to at least one report included the cost of raising the CPEC security force. The funding was programmed into the budget in June, and a waiver was obtained from the IMF from including this expense in the ceiling on the fiscal deficit, since it was a “one-off” measure. By September of that year, the fiscal deficit target had already been blown by more than Rs100 billion, and the finance minister was busy putting together a package of new, midyear revenue measures to help plug the shortfall. This package became a prior action under the IMF programme, which said in its eighth review that the federal government took measures to contain its expenditures “despite unforeseen expenditures of PRs 53 billion on account of Zarb-i-Azb military operations, hosting of Temporarily Displaced People (TDPs)”. Security expenditure has been growing at an alarming rate over the...
Countering the Indian Narrative
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif used very specific language in his address before the UN General Assembly on Wednesday. He stated that the struggle of the Kashmiri people is a “legitimate one for liberation from alien occupation”. This phrasing has immense legal significance, perhaps not fully understood by the domestic audience. Let us examine it from an international law perspective. ‘Legitimate’: the word is premised on several UN Security Council Resolutions affirming the right of self-determination of the Kashmiri people. The right does not extinguish with the passage of time, rather its continued denial becomes all the more blatant a violation of international law. Therefore, the Kashmiri struggle is a legitimate one. ‘Liberation’: a struggle for liberation imbued with the legitimacy mentioned above permits the use of force to achieve this goal. International law is a pragmatic genre of law, and no sub-specie of international law is a better example of this than International Humanitarian Law (IHL) or the Law of Armed Conflict. IHL is a pragmatic marriage between the high ideals of humanity and the harsh realities of war, aimed at limiting the brutality of conflict while at the same time recognising that violence is a military necessity in war. India itself actively supported Bangladesh’s independence on this ground. A Kashmiri armed liberation struggle is, therefore, lawful as the Kashmiri right to self-determination is recognised by international law as legitimate. ‘Alien occupation’: where the right to self-determination exists, it can only exist against an occupying power or regime. As India does not have legal title to Jammu and Kashmir, it is unequivocally an occupying power. The Indian claim of title to Kashmir based on the Maharaja’s Instrument of Accession and actions of the 1951 Kashmir Constituent Assembly are of little relevance under international law. UNSC 91 of 1951 categorically states that any action of the constituent assembly “to...
India Pulls Out of Pakistan-Hosted 19th Saarc Summit
India has decided to pull out of the upcoming Saarc summit in Islamabad, said the official spokesperson for the India's Ministry for External Affairs (MEA) Vikas Swarup in a tweet on Tuesday. The announcement comes amid growing tensions between the two nuclear-armed neighbours following the attack on an Indian army base in held Kashmir. "India has conveyed to the current Saarc Chair in Nepal that increasing cross-border terrorists attacks in the region and increasing interference in the internal matters of member states by one country has created an environment that is not conducive to the successful holding of the Saarc summit," said the statement released from the Indian foreign ministry. The statement added that India, under the prevailing circumstances, is unable to participate in the proposed summit in Islamabad. India also claims in the statement that it remains steadfast in its commitment for regional cooperation. Pakistan had offered dialogue to India for the resolution of the Kashmir issue, but the offer was rejected. "Regional cooperation and terror don't go together," said Swarup. The 19th Saarc summit is due to be held in November this year. Pakistan had formally extended an invitation to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to attend the Pakistan-hosted 19th Saarc summit. FO terms India's withdrawal as unfortunate The Foreign Office, in its response after India’s withdrawal from the upcoming Saarc summit, termed the Indian announcement as unfortunate in an official statement released. The statement also added that India has not officially conveyed in this regard yet. “Pakistan remains committed to peace and regional cooperation. We will continue to work to that end in the larger interest of the people of this region,” said the statement. The FO’s statement also mentioned India’s support for terrorism in Pakistan. “As for the excuse used by India, the world knows that it is India that’s has been perpetrating and financing terrorism in Pakistan.”...
Blocking of Water by India Will be Act of War: Pakistan
The Adviser to the Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs, Sartaj Aziz, on Tuesday said that the Indus Water Treaty (IWT) was an international agreement and India could not revoke or alternate it unilaterally and if that happened it would be considered an act of war. Speaking in the Senate and National Assembly, Sartaj Aziz noted that the international law stated that India could not unilaterally separate itself from the treaty. After reluctance by the Indian Supreme Court to entertain an application in this regard, there was a possibility that India would not revoke the agreement fully. He said the Indus Commission and the ministry had been asked to brief on this issue and an inter-ministerial group had been formed to identify possible misuse or interference into the treaty by India. The National Assembly on Tuesday passed a unanimous resolution condemning the Indian claim in the UN General Assembly (UNGA) that Jammu and Kashmir was an integral part of India and threats being issued by the Indian prime minister to unilaterally terminate the Indus Water Treaty. Responding to a calling attention notice in the NA, the adviser said there was no provision of suspension in the treaty. “As per sub provision 3 and 4 of provisions of Article 12 of the Treaty, it cannot be altered or revoked unilaterally,” he said. He maintained that Pakistan would not accept Indian aggression in any form and any Indian step for disrupting water flow as upper riparian would carry considerable risk of war and hostilities. “If India tries to violate the treaty, there will be a befitting reaction from Pakistan,” he said. Dr. Shireen Mazari and other PTI parliamentarians who moved the calling attention notice wanted to draw attention towards the Indian government’s belligerent attitude on Occupied Kashmir and threat of unilaterally suspending the Indus Water Treaty. Sartaj Aziz pointed out such an Indian act may also provide China with justification to consider suspension of water of Indian...
The Afghan Refugee Crisis
Afghan refugees in Pakistan constitute the largest and most prolonged refugee population under UNHCR’s directive. Until June this year, Afghans could enter Pakistan without a visa, though Pakistanis required a visa to enter Afghanistan. After a recent mandate was issued to return refugees to their home-country, Pakistan has extended the deadline for a third time till March 2016. By December 2015, Germany hosted around 360,000 Syrian refugees. This year, Germany has pledged an additional 39,987 places for Syrian refugees which makes up about 54 per cent of the EU total. The refugee crisis has caused deep political divisions in the EU and was one of the key reasons for Britain’s exit from the Union. Not all members of the Union are ready to accept their share of the migration burden especially following the terrorist attacks in France and sexual assaults on German women. Even before the refugee crisis, the EU ordered 168,000 illegal Pakistani migrants to leave between 2008 and 2014. From a total of 5 million Syrian refugees, the US has accepted 10,000 refugees, mostly women and children. Their plans to raise that number to 110,000 in 2017 appear to have little chance at coming to fruition with the election of either of the leading presidential candidates. Trump has stated that no Muslims will be allowed in and Hillary said that the US should accept 65,000 refugees. Pakistan has hosted approximately three million Afghan refugees since 1979. The US had allocated $950 million for assisting Afghan refugees and returnees. However, according to a recent report by the US Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, most of that money has been severely mismanaged and lost to corruption. The report specifically mentions a 2013 assessment of a land distribution programme run by the Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation, which found that it was “afflicted by institutional corruption”. Similarly, a report by Amnesty International stated that Afghanistan had...
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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.