| December 30, 2002 | Monday | Shawwal 25, 1423 |
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North Korean alarm
Gas tragedies
THE signing of a multi-billion dollar natural gas pipeline agreement on Friday between Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan marks yet another milestone in the project’s almost 10-year-long off-again, on-again journey. In the middle 1990s, the pipeline had become a reality — almost. But the chaos that gripped Afghanistan in the mid-1990s caused multinational companies interested in the project to abandon it for security reasons. Now with the installation of the Karzai government in Kabul early this year, the security environment in that country is hopefully on the mend. And by the time the Asian Development Bank-funded feasibility report on this project is completed in July 2003, international companies engaged in the field would hopefully find the project safe and attractive enough to make a bid for it.
There is no doubt that the three countries which signed the agreement on Friday stand to gain immensely from the pipeline project. Turkmenistan is awash with natural gas. But as a landlocked country, it could sell only a fraction of this to far away Russia. It has been selling some gas to Iran as well, but in limited quantities, because Iran itself is surplus in that commodity. But with the collapse of the Soviet Union, Turkmenistan’s access to warm waters as well as to the whole of South and South-East Asia through Afghanistan and Pakistan could be smooth, quick and economical. It can sell as much of its gas as it wants in this vast market for profit. By allowing the proposed pipeline to go through its territory Afghanistan will gain commercially not only in royalties but also during and after the pipeline’s construction as this will generate jobs for its people. Pakistan will in addition be able to have quick and economical access to Turkmenistan gas whenever its supply and demand position so requires. The setting up of a liquefaction plant at Gwadur will also be highly beneficial for Pakistan’s economy.
However, if one goes by expert opinion, the pipeline, which could have a capacity of 20 billion cubic metres, will only be feasible if it supplies gas to India as well. So, the missing link in this pipeline of peace and prosperity is India. It is perhaps because of India’s worry about the pipeline’s security that the Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project too is being delayed. Perhaps in order to sidestep Indian fears, Pakistan has now offered Iran to join in with Qatar which proposes to set up a pipeline extending to Gwadur. And after liquefaction at the plant there, both Turkmenistan and Iran gas could be exported to India to make the two projects economically more feasible. Meanwhile, Turkmenistan, Iran, Qatar and Afghanistan could try to convince India that its anxieties about the security of the pipeline passing through Pakistan were misplaced. Pakistan is unlikely to violate international law and agreements and also cannot ignore the involvement of four friendly Muslim countries with the project in question. In fact, a pipeline linking the economies of Pakistan and India can be a guarantee against minor provocations and irritants igniting high tensions and bellicosity between the two countries as often happens these days.
EVEN if the spectacle of someone cocking a snook at the US might be found appealing by some at this time of American bluster worldwide, North Korea’s nuclear posturing is worrisome. It has expelled UN International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors, broken the seals of a nuclear storage site, and moved fresh fuel rods there. It says it is reactivating nuclear facilities frozen under an agreement with the US in 1994 because it needs electricity following the suspension of fuel oil supplies by the West. The suspension itself came after revelations in October by North Korean officials that they were developing a uranium enrichment programme that could be used to make nuclear weapons. According to the 1994 agreement, the Clinton administration had persuaded North Korea to close down its nuclear power station programme in exchange for a $5-billion commitment to construct two proliferation-free nuclear reactors and to supply the north with 500,000 tons of oil each year.
Why North Korea suddenly announced two months ago that it was thinking of reactivating its nuclear programme, thus inviting suspension of its fuel requirements, is not clear. Pyongyang has said Washington is forcing it to abandon its atomic programme. It is also clear that at some point the Bush administration decided to abandon the path of reconciliation adopted by the Clinton government and downplayed even its ally South Korea’s “sunshine” policy of friendship and reunification with the North, instead describing North Korea as part of an “axis of evil”. The US, with its own huge nuclear arsenal and its plans for nuclear missile shields, as well as its refusal to even acknowledge Israel’s atomic weapons, hardly holds the high moral ground to impose disarmament on North Korea, Iraq or any other country. But that does not legitimize attempts by others to add to the already dangerously high stocks of nuclear weapons. US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has said his country can take on both Iraq and North Korea simultaneously and at the same time continue its “war on terror”. Such war talk can only make a bad situation worse and further harden attitudes. North Korea must have peace to tackle its daunting swathe of problems, and it should be engaged in dialogue rather than be ostracized or threatened.
THE death of a family of five people in Rawalpindi last Thursday is yet another grim reminder of how gas tragedies have become common in the winter months in this part of the country. The entire family had huddled into one bedroom and left the gas heater on as they slept. The room had no ventilation, and the heater either went off and gas continued to leak or the burning heater depleted the oxygen in the closed room. Only an eight-month old baby girl was found alive but unconscious. The surviving baby is now an orphan; she will be lucky not to have sustained any brain damage from the prolonged exposure to poisonous gas and lack of oxygen.
The tragedy is a reflection of the cruel apathy and callousness of society towards the dangers that gas heaters can pose. First and foremost, it is the responsibility of the manufacturers of these gas heaters to more forcefully warn their customers of the dangers of having the gas heaters on in a closed room with poor or no ventilation at all. Customers should be told to switch off the heater before sleeping because even in a well-ventilated room there is also the danger that the heater might go off in the middle of the night because of low gas pressure and later on cause a deadly leak in the room. It is time the local governments, concerned NGOs, the electronic media and other civic bodies woke up and played their part in raising public awareness about the proper and safe use of heating appliances and thus prevent needless loss of human lives.