| 06 December 2004 | Monday | 23 Shawwal 1425 |
Why this Annan-bashing?
Illegal radio stations
The agreement reached between Pakistan and India on Friday in Islamabad regarding the re-opening of the Khokhrapar-Monabao rail link gives hope to many in southern Pakistan who have relatives living across the border.
Railway officials from the two countries agreed "in principle" to restore the rail link between Sindh and Rajasthan that was severed during the 1965 war - without committing themselves to a specific timeframe.
Islamabad says that it needs to lay a 123km-long broad-gauge track as it does not have the narrow-gauge rail coaches anymore that used to service this sector. It says that the track rehabilitation alone is expected to cost Rs2.1 billion and may take over a year's time to complete.
India says that it also needs some rehabilitation work done on its side of the border, though not on such a big scale, which it expects to complete by October next year. The two sides have agreed to meet again at a later date in Mumbai to review the progress made on the project. One hopes that a specific date will then be given for the actual resumption of the rail link.
The decision to resume the Sindh-Rajasthan train service is part of the confidence-building measures that Pakistan and India had agreed to last January when President Musharraf met former Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee in Islamabad during the Saarc summit.
Progress on the commitments both sides then made to initiate a number of confidence-building measures has been reassuring. The only existing road and rail links between Lahore and Delhi, which were broken off by India in January 2002 following a terrorist attack on Indian parliament the year before, have been re-opened.
Air services between Karachi and Mumbai and Lahore and Delhi have also been restored, and so have been the cricket ties between the two countries. Exchange of visits by journalists, intellectuals, parliamentarians and NGO workers in pursuit of track-II diplomacy have also materialized. Given all these positive developments, the two countries have come a long way in restoring and strengthening bilateral relations since the Kargil crisis.
Luckily, this time round, leaders on both sides have realized that divisive political issues are not all that there is to their bilateral relations. An emphasis on facilitating people-to-people contacts and exploring possibilities of cooperation within the Saarc framework as well as building consensus on international issues affecting South Asia as a whole is the right approach.
In the economic sector too, such an approach will help the two countries ready themselves for the World Trade Organization agreement on the abolition of trade quotas that comes into force next month, and the subsequent coming into force of the South Asia Free Trade Agreement in January 2006.
In this regard, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz's disclosure on Friday before the country's top bankers in Islamabad that he has taken up the issue of establishing banking ties with India on a reciprocal basis is significant.
The need now is to keep up the momentum of such positive thinking on both sides. Reopening of Indian and Pakistani consulates in Karachi and Mumbai and the start of a bus service between Muzaffarabad and Srinagar should be the next logical steps.
Positive developments in these areas will help the two countries prepare themselves for discussions on more contentious issues such as Siachin, Baglihar and, indeed, the future of Kashmir in the months ahead.
Why this Annan-bashing?
Annan-bashing is now the latest fad. With Yasser Arafat dead, the UN secretary-general is America's latest bete noire. Till now, it is the American press and Congress which have been demonizing Mr Kofi Annan; it is, however, for the first that President George Bush has joined the anti-Annan chorus.
Talking to newsmen at the White House on Thursday, Mr Bush called for "a full and fair and open" probe into the oil-for-food programme in which Washington has detected corruption.
Even though this programme has been in existence in Iraq since the end of the Kuwait war, Annan-bashers have discovered corruption in it now. However, what has triggered Annan-baiting is his stance on Iraq.
The UN secretary-general did not stand up to the world's only superpower when it was planning Iraq's invasion without a UN authorization. Lately, however, Mr Annan has been somewhat candid. First, he said that the Iraq war was illegal; next, he followed this up by saying that the war on Iraq had not made the world any safer.
Then he seemed to register a protest against America's monopolization of oil-rich Iraq by saying that the world body had not been involved in the post-war scenario, especially with regard to the proposed election.
He also warned that an all-out attack on Fallujah would cause bloodshed, and this could upset the election schedule. All this was obviously too much for Washington, where the only voice of sanity, Secretary of State Colin Powell, is on his way out. Now Mr Annan's son, too, is being accused of corruption.
Fortunately, the vast majority of UN members are with the secretary-general. That is one reason why Mr Bush did not call for Mr Annan's resignation - a demand made by the chairman of the Senate committee investigating the case.
In office now for eight years, Mr Annan has been, relatively speaking, a more forceful UN chief than his predecessor - Mr Boutros Boutros-Ghali. America would do well to listen to him and try to correct itself rather than attempt to undermine Mr Annan's moral position - a crusade in which it has little support among the UN members.
Illegal radio stations
The existence of five FM radio stations broadcasting in FATA's Khyber Agency without government permission, and reportedly airing extremist and sectarian views, is cause for concern.
According to a report, the local authorities in the agency have been turning a blind eye to the presence of these channels, which have been used by rival groups to launch propaganda against each other.
The appearance of these radio stations comes amidst reports that groups of local tribesmen have set up illegal check posts in the agency to collect toll from vehicles bringing in smuggled goods from Afghanistan.
Those living in the tribal agencies are known for their independence and are governed directly from Islamabad. However, this should not mean that they be allowed unchecked to indulge in activities that fuel sectarianism or incite others to resort to violence as a method to impose their religious views and notions on others.
Those behind the radio stations are justifying their activities by saying that they are only broadcasting programmes on religious matters. In fact, they have managed to enlist the support of college students who say that any move to close down the broadcasts will be fiercely resisted.
The authorities will hopefully know that to ignore the presence of these illegal FM stations will encourage other like-minded obscurantist elements to start transmissions of their own, to spread their own brand of politico-religious views.
In fact, one wonders why, despite reports in the past (when only one FM station was broadcasting), the government failed to act, knowing fully well that parts of the tribal areas are a haven for remnants of the Taliban and all kinds of other retrogressive elements.
Before this disturbing trend snowballs into a full fledged war of contention and mutual denigration in the air in a highly sensitive area of the country, the government should act swiftly to close down all illegal FM stations.