| 28 December 2004 | Tuesday | 15 Ziqa'ad 1425 |
Attacks in Balochistan
Indian involvement in Nepal
The death toll from Sunday's tsunamis, giant tidal waves triggered by a massive earthquake off Indonesia, had touched 22,000 by Monday afternoon. It is expected to rise as those missing are eventually accounted for.
The destruction caused to beach settlements, towns and cities is immense. Eight countries have been left reeling from one of recorded history's worst earthquakes, which measured nine on the Richter scale.
Its epicentre was said to be near the island of Sumatra in the Indian Ocean. After-shocks are feared, and it is now believed that a severe earthquake close to Tasmania in Australia on Thursday/Friday, although barely felt, might have loosened forces that led to Sunday's catastrophe.
The international community has responded by pledging support to the nations hit by the tsunamis and sending in medical aid and relief supplies. For countless people, the last Sunday of 2004 has been marked by great tragedy. There is shock and sadness everywhere.
The world's readiness to prepare for and cope with natural disasters is still rudimentary. Nature's fury can be cataclysmic and sudden. Floods, cyclones, tidal waves, earthquakes, hurricanes and tornadoes repeatedly ravage large parts of the globe, leaving a trail of destruction in their wake, adding to the havoc caused by man's inhumanity to man and the lust for power and control.
Great strides have been made in the developed countries in tracking storms and keeping watch on unusual atmospheric changes. But in developing countries like ours, both forecasting and disaster management remain hopelessly inadequate.
It is reported that some warning signs were ignored in Sri Lanka, one of the countries worst hit, and its top relief coordinator has said no lesson was learnt from last summer's huge floods.
Bangladesh is regularly battered by cyclones, and yet durable measures to predict such occurrences and to minimize loss of life and property still elude the country's planners.
One shudders to think of what would happen if, God forbid, our own systems are tested by a natural calamity of this scale. On the rim of the Pacific Ocean, weather centres have been established, and it is believed that they play a major role in limiting casualties by timely forecasting.
But this is not just a question of technical preparedness and the availability of scientific expertise. In countries in this region, teeming with huge populations, it reflects also an attitude of fatalistic indifference towards the value of life.
Scores of people die every day on the highways, and nothing is done beyond removing the injured to ill-equipped hospitals and laying out the dead on the roadside to be identified by their relatives.
Creaking boats and ferries overloaded with passengers sink in the rivers, and yet no step is taken to make riverine traffic safer. Religious festivals routinely see stampedes in which pilgrims are killed, but crowd-control continues to be ignored.
Droughts wreck the existence of desert communities, and all we can think of is to build bigger dams to help the irrigated areas. There has to be greater compassion for the safety and security of our people, particularly of those belonging to the lower-income groups who suffer the most in natural disasters.
It is strongly suggested that in its forthcoming summit in Dhaka, Saarc should make coordination in early warning techniques and in disaster management as one of the top items on its agenda.
Attacks in Balochistan
This weekend's attack on Frontier Corps personnel in Balochistan in which four FC men were killed reflects the troubling situation prevailing in the province. The province has had many incidents of violence that have left 94 dead and 303 injured in this year alone.
Most prominent of those was the attack in March on a religious gathering in Quetta that left 33 dead and the killing of three Chinese engineers working on the Gwadar port project in May.
In between, there has been an attempt on the CM's motorcade as well as several attacks on pipelines and other government installations. While a number of high-profile projects are currently under construction in Balochistan, concerns expressed by the local population over their fate once they have been completed remains a matter that the government has not addressed so far.
Such a situation can lead to a heightened sense of alienation among the people of the area, which in turn would affect the prospects of these projects. To further complicate matters, apart from the nationalist lobby, Balochistan also hosts a number of former Taliban cadres. These people pursue their own agenda against Islamabad.
An earlier attempt at engaging Balochistan's leaders politically seems to have fizzled out. The government's knee-jerk reaction has been to try and solve the issue by force.
This tactic has not worked in the past and is unlikely to do so in the future. Instead, issues raised by various quarters in Balochistan need to be addressed on an urgent basis.
The representation of locals in Gwadar, for example, should be enhanced immediately so that the people of the area, and not outsiders alone, have a say in the affairs of the town.
Similarly, the question of royalties that have to be paid to the Balochistan government for use of Sui gas must be settled. More attention needs to be paid to developing local human skills and resources while neglected sectors like education, health, water and transportation should receive better attention.
It is important for the government to give priority to Balochistan since recent events and incidents provide an indication that the people there are getting restless over their poor share in employment and fruits of development.
Indian involvement in Nepal
Even as Maoist rebels step up violence and continue their blockade of Kathmandu, Nepalese citizens will be heaving a sigh of relief at the postponement - caused by the death of former Indian prime minister Narasimha Rao - of King Gyanendra's trip to New Delhi.
The Nepalese are not particularly enamoured of their monarch, whose toffee-nosed attitude towards his subjects renders him vastly different from his much loved late brother King Birendra.
Neither have they taken kindly to the king's myopic political outlook that has led him to tamper with the institution of constitutional monarchy in Nepal, and to try and turn the clock back to the days of absolute rule.
But for many Nepalese, the postponement has meant at least a temporary reprieve from the possibility of a strengthened role for India in their country's internal affairs as many among them fear that the king would sign a security pact with their giant neighbour. This would make it possible for India to have an even greater say than it does at present in Nepal's domestic affairs.
While India, that shares a long border with Nepal, is just as concerned as the Himalayan kingdom on the need to rein in the Maoists, New Delhi's interest in Nepal's water resources and its unilateral decision to undertake river projects harming Nepalese interests have also not gone unnoticed.
Apart from a 1950 treaty between the two countries, there have apparently been secret agreements that have allowed India the upper hand. It is quite possible that New Delhi will, whenever King Gyanendra visits, call for the holding of elections and the restoration of multiparty democracy in Nepal.
But it may also forge more secret deals, that given the domestic crisis facing the Nepalese monarchy may find favour with the king. This has to be avoided, and any agreements signed must be transparent.