The brewing storm of discontent

ON the potholed road from Gwadar airport to the city, scattered wall graffiti hails ‘Pak-China’ friendship. Much of this officially sanctioned bonhomie is reserved for the Harbour Engineering Company (HEC), one of China’s largest state owned firms entrusted with the task of developing the Gwadar deep-sea port. Even for an outsider, the company’s larger than life presence in the area is overwhelming.

For the desperately poor people of the area, however, the air-conditioned enclaves of our Chinese friends have become symbols of mass alienation. It is their unethical business practices that evoke much more bitter discontent though. On the rare occasions that local services are hired, salary payments can often take several months. The alleged highhandedness of the HEC staff often leads to strikes and protests by employees.

Like all official mega projects, the mainly Chinese financed Gwadar Deep Sea Port project, unveiled by the military-led regime in March 2002, promised unprecedented development and prosperity for the entire Makran coast. But promises of better lives, more jobs and modern civic services ring hollow in the face of pervasive unemployment, rampant poverty, and chronic water and electricity shortages. While port development is still in early stages, residents of Gwadar have ample reasons to be sceptical.

Beijing’s interest in the area is mainly informed by a desire to expand its commercial and possibly naval presence in the region, not out of any love for Pakistan or its people. Located on the tip of the Persian Gulf and across the Strait of Hormuz, Gwadar’s strategic importance to China in the region cannot be overstated. Already a naval base, its potential economic benefits for Pakistan can be enormous. The port can technically serve as a regional transshipment hub and a vital trade link to the Gulf and Central Asian republics.

For Gwadar’s ills, one cannot find fault with the Chinese alone. They are only pursuing their strategic national interests. Nothing really wrong with that. And in disregarding the local population’s needs and sentiments, Pakistani authorities fare no better. In the agreement signed with the Chinese, the government is believed to have ignored even the legitimate share of jobs that are reserved for locals.

The highway authority building the Gwadar-Karachi coastal highway has recruited hundreds from outside the area. The residents allege that the Frontier Works Organization (FWO) does not even consider their applications for jobs. Since most construction and development work is outsourced, contractors from Karachi, Lahore and other parts of the country often hire their own people. No doubt, technical skills are locally in short supply. But not much of the manual work involved requires complex techniques.

Besides, the federal and provincial governments have done precious little to upgrade the technical capacity of Gwadar’s untapped manpower. Training institutes and polytechnic colleges remain a pipe dream so far.

The employment controversy is just the tip of the iceberg. While the provincial government has banned sale and purchase of land in Gwadar, thousands of acres have already been sold to outsiders in shady, often unauthorized deals. Allegations that the military authorities have bought most of the prime land at throw-away prices are rife. According to local officials, over 80 per cent of the plots in the Gwadar Singhar Housing Scheme have been arbitrarily allocated to outsiders, many of them senior army and civilian officials.

Gwadar’s woes do not stop there. The much-touted devolution of powers remains a farce in the face of centralized control over the area’s resources. The Gwadar Port Authority (GPA), for instance, is run by a retired admiral based in Karachi. The city’s Master Plan, prepared by the National Engineering Service of Pakistan (NESPAK), is another no-go area for local authorities; even provincial authorities were virtually bypassed in its formulation.

The controversial plan betrays NESPAK’s complete disregard for local sensitivities or socio-economic conditions. For one, locals fear that the under-estimation of present and future population may lead to their conversion into a minority in the future. The plan envisages the relocation of a large chunk of the old city’s population but without any concrete, stated resettlement plan, lending credence to public fears of mass dislocation.

Despite promises from federal and provincial authorities that the plan will be amended to address local concerns, it remains largely unchanged. During Prime Minister Jamali’s recent visit to the area, NESPAK presented the controversial plan in its old form. The secrecy surrounding what should be a public document has made matters even worse. The district assembly has rejected the plan after several requests that it be taken into confidence fell on deaf ears. Even the provincial assembly’s motions have failed to elicit a response from the concerned authorities.

It is hardly surprising that deep nationalist resentment fuelled by what is largely perceived as the centre’s attempts to appropriate provincial resources is growing. Shutter-down strikes in Gwadar and throughout the Makran area are now common. Baloch nationalist parties are in the process of forging a broad new alliance to press for their demands. During a well-attended meeting in Khuzdar in late May, leaders from the BNM, BNP, PKMAP and others lambasted Islamabad for denying the people of Balochistan their due rights. They had a valid point to make. If the people of Makran do not demand their rights now, who will pay heed to their protests once the Gwadar port has been completed?

The conflicts brewing in this serene coastal zone of Balochistan should not be taken lightly by Islamabad. For too long, have the country’s myopic national security managers have dismissed regional tensions as ‘fissiparous tendencies’ and genuine regional demands and expectations ignored as products of narrow nationalist ambitions. Demands for provincial autonomy have been met with brute force rather than negotiation and accommodation.

But repeated bunglings of fragile inter-ethnic relations have only further exacerbated provincial fears of majoritarian rule. Gross neglect of their development needs, denial of provincial autonomy and the lack of participatory institutions have encouraged resort to extreme means. Lest we forget, the last time regional demands for economic and political rights were ignored in East Pakistan, it culminated in a bloody civil war and the dismemberment of the country.

For all its flaws, and there were plenty, eleven years of “sham” democracy had helped partially integrate nationalist forces in the political mainstream. Centralized military rule, the failings of which are amply reflected in Gwadar’s development plans, augurs ill for political stability and the health of the federation. Presumably, the situation in Gwadar is still manageable. If the federal government continues to ignore the apprehensions of its people, however, things can go awfully wrong. Is there any hope?

Yes. The people of Balochistan and their elected leaders must be taken into confidence on all issues that concern them. The centre must treat them with the respect all citizens of the federation deserve, not as a second rate minority. The decision to use their resources as Balochs see fit is simply not Islamabad’s to make. The sooner it sheds its colonial hangover, the better.

Oceans in danger

A NEW report by the Pew Oceans Commission describes America’s oceans as in danger of permanent ecological damage. Permitting the continued destruction of biodiversity in an area larger than the land mass of the territorial United States would gravely injure America’s economic interests.

It would also constitute a tragic betrayal of the duty of stewardship over irreplaceable environmental treasures. Americans have accepted their responsibility for this country’s lands and its air quality. The report’s stark conclusion is that unless Americans develop a similar commitment to preserving the health of oceanic ecosystems — and adopt dramatic policies in furtherance of that commitment — the oceans as we know them will not survive.

Some of the threats outlined in the report are obvious, some subtle. Overfishing is driven by an attitude that encourages maximizing the short-term harvest, rather than maintaining fisheries at a sustainable level in the long run. Cruise ships dump huge volumes of sewage and chemical wastes in a largely unregulated fashion.

Agriculture — even far inland — and unchecked coastal development encourage runoff of toxic chemicals and excess nutrients. These nutrients cause algae blooms that make life impossible for other species. The introduction of nonnative species into oceans, meanwhile, causes genetic interbreeding with native species and creates competition for food.

The oceans have long been regarded simultaneously as an unlimited font of resources and a vast dump for waste. Neither is sustainable.

The report offers a long series of recommendations: an independent national oceans agency to protect oceanic environments, a national system of protected marine reserves, the extensive revamping of fishery policies and the curtailing of land-use policies that threaten coasts, to cite a few examples. Many of the recommendations, no doubt, will be controversial.

—The Washington Post

The triangle of riddles

IT IS but natural that President Musharraf’s forthcoming visit to Washington has raised high expectations in the country. Even in ordinary circumstances, an American visit by Pakistan’s chief executive or head of state has always evoked unusual interest. In the difficult and uncertain situation in which Pakistan finds itself today, arising from the Iraq war fallout and the developing Indo-US entente, the coming visit has acquired far more significance than the previous ones.

There is no question that President Musharraf has breathed a new life into Pakistan-US relations. It is also true that, as a result of policies followed by him since September 11 and his steadfastness against mediaeval throwbacks in the country , he has succeeded, to a large extent, in repairing the tarnished image of Pakistan in the western world. His last year’s visit to Washington was a success as it won substantial political and economic support for Pakistan from the United States. But we shall not be doing any service to the country if we fail to put things in their proper perspective and analyze objectively the difficulties and obstacles he is likely to encounter in Washington.

In order to have realistic expectations from the visit we should keep in mind that the Bush administration is almost following the same South Asian strategy as was evolved during the second Clinton tenure. Until then, the US had followed a single policy for the two countries by equating Pakistan with India, to the great annoyance of New Delhi.

But the Clinton administration started to follow separate policies towards India and Pakistan which implied that the pattern of relationship with each country would have different contents and orientations. This significant change in America’s South Asian strategy has become even more pronounced under the Bush administration, if recent developments are any indication.

In order not to have any utopian expectations from the Musharraf visit, we should keep in mind the following factors likely to impact on the development of closer Pakistan-US relations:

* There has been a shift in the US strategic focus from Euro-Atlantic to Asia, particularly the Middle East and the Asia-Pacific theatre. The trend that had come to the surface after the end of the cold war became more pronounced after the opposition of the “old Europe” to US military action in Iraq.

* The US now sees India as an important and reliable friend in the changing global scenario. There are unmistakable signs that political and strategic engagement between the two countries has been growing for some time.

* The Bush administration wants India to play a US-friendly role within the parameters of Washington’s evolving strategic calculus. Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff General Richard B. Myers stated, after his official visit to India last year, that the US-India military relationship “is central to long-term stability in Asia”. General Myers was echoing what Mr. Vajpayee had stressed during his last official visit to Washington, saying that India and the United States were “natural allies and their partnership” was important for Asia.

After the recent visits to Washington of Vajpayee’s National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra and Deputy Prime Minister L.K.Advani, there have been press reports suggesting that the United States and India are discussing a plan that will give New Delhi a greater role in Asia and bring about a major geopolitical change in the entire region.

* It may be recalled that Secretary of State, Colin Powell, appearing before the Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee in March 2001, talked about India’s potential for maintaining peace and security in the Indian Ocean and its vast periphery and the importance of Washington supporting such a role.

* Washington has requested New Delhi to send Indian troops to Iraq as part of a stabilization force in that country and that request, as indicated by Advani, is being favourably considered by his government. Advani has stressed that his discussions in Washington, including the one with President Bush who “dropped in”, were focussed on “ever-broadening bilateral relations” between the two countries.

* In an unscheduled meeting with Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Advani emphasized the need for strengthening defence cooperation between the United States and India. In a rare gesture, Mr Rumsfeld visited the Indian leader at his hotel and stressed the need for India’s participation in the reconstruction of war-ravaged Iraq.

* Indian-Americans are becoming increasingly important in US politics. The caucus on India has nearly 160 members in the House of Representatives. It is perhaps the largest single country caucus in the US Congress. In addition to that, three-way ties between Israel, India and the United States are growing fast Recently, Washington gave the go-ahead to Israel to sell its advanced Phalcon air-borne reconnaissance system to India in a deal worth about one billion U.S. dollars. Reportedly, the Bush administration is about to approve the more expensive sale of Israel’s Arrow anti-missile system, which was developed jointly with the United States.

Such a system could go far to neutralize the threat of Pakistani missiles carrying nuclear weapons. Despite India’s concerted efforts to acquire sophisticated weaponry from every possible source, Pakistan continues to be denied F-16s. India is already the biggest customer of Israel’s sophisticated military hardware. Almost one half of Israel’s total military sales last year of $4.2 billion dollars went to India.

It is also significant that the Pentagon, in particular, has of late increasingly accused Pakistan’s intelligence services of protecting Taliban and Al-Qaeda forces in the border region with Afghanistan, who have launched lethal attacks on Afghan security forces and American and other western soldiers operating in Afghanistan.

We should, therefore, be realistic in our expectations from the Bush-Musharraf talks at Camp David. The real problem with us, during more than half a century of our existence as an independent nation, has been that most of the time we have preferred to live on the fringe of reality and indulge in self-deception. No doubt, we are a strategically located Muslim nation that has its importance for the Americans. But that does not mean that we are more important for them than the Indians. We should never expect that Washington will ever do any thing that militates against New Delhi’s vital interests. It is in our national interest to reconcile to this bitter truth and the sooner we do the better it is.

It is also very important that we stop nursing unrealistic expectations regarding US help in resolving the Kashmir dispute. The Americans have already made it clear that the only thing they could do is to be a “facilitator” for a dialogue on Kashmir. Islamabad must have noticed that they scrupulously avoid referring to Kashmir as a ‘dispute’ and prefer to call it an ‘issue’ — a description the Indians like to use.

The real gains from the Musharraf visit are likely to be in the domain of economy. Pakistan may get what our commerce minister has described as “a comprehensive and substantial economic package” in acknowledgement of the help it has been rendering in the fight against terrorism since 9/11 attacks. A further waiver of around one billion dollars Pakistan’s bilateral debt is likely to be a salient feature of this package. The attitude of the IMF, the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank will continue to be sympathetic. Major donors may even enhance the level of economic assistance to Pakistan.

But we should not expect any major breakthrough on the strategic plane. Even Islamabad’s willingness to do Washington’s bidding in the region will not make any difference to the evolving Indo-US entente, though it poses a threat to our security interests. Islamabad will no doubt continue to be important for Washington, at least for the near future. But New Delhi seems to have succeeded, for the first time since independence, in evolving a framework for Indo-US relationship that looks far beyond the Pakistan question and will enable India to play an important role in Asian affairs.

The writer is a former ambassador.

Dangers exotic pets pose

CAVE paintings showing men hunting with dogs prove that the desire to domesticate animals is as old as civilization itself. Unfortunately, contemporary humans are not always so wise in their choice of pets.

The recent outbreak of monkeypox — a relative of smallpox that likely was brought into the United States by pet Gambian rats and spread via pet prairie dogs — is only the latest example of the multiple dangers that the importation of exotic pets poses to both animals and humans.

Certainly this is not the first time pets have transmitted diseases to their owners. In 1975 the Food and Drug Administration banned interstate commerce in small pet turtles after they were found to have transmitted salmonellosis to children. The Humane Society also has compiled a list of several dozen cases of dangerous exotic animals, mostly wild cats, mauling their owners or their owners’ children.

Animals transported long distances pose threats to other animals too, spreading diseases such as rabies around the country. And diseases borne by wild animals are poorly understood and hard to treat. The cruelties involved in trapping and transporting wild animals across the country and around the world weaken the animals as well, probably making them more susceptible to disease and certainly killing many.

Nevertheless, regulation of the trade in wild animals is strangely lax. State by state, rules vary enormously. Massachusetts has a near-total ban on the ownership of many wild animals, while in Texas, hunting ranches featuring exotic game are common. For the most part, federal regulation applies only to interstate commerce and the licensed import of certain species and has little to say about the breeding or care of captive wild animals.

Trade in wild birds is heavily restricted, as is trade in primates, which are known to transmit diseases to humans. Trade in other species is not. As a result, it is still frighteningly easy for anyone to get hold of tigers — there are some 5,000 in captivity in the US, possibly more than there are in the wild — and other exotic species. The trade in wild species for medicinal purposes is no less dangerous, as the appearance of the northern snakehead fish in Maryland amply demonstrates.

—The Washington Post