What next on the peace process?

Abandoned by the Arab-Islamic world, the Palestinian people go to the polls today without Yasser Arafat amidst them. The election to the office of the president of the Palestinian Authority is crucial from one point of view: will the enemies of the Palestinian people negotiate honestly and sincerely with the new leadership with a view to finding a solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict? Since President George Bush came to power in 2000 and Mr Ariel Sharon in 2001, both America and Israel shunned all contacts with Arafat. Negotiating with Arafat would have meant conceding the basic principle behind the Oslo process - land for peace - and its implications.

The idea behind the Oslo peace process was getting Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories and ensuring the emergence of an independent Palestinian state with Al Quds as its capital. None of these principles has been acceptable to America and its proconsul in the Middle East since the Bush-Sharon duo came to power. This was in contrast to the relatively neutral stance adopted by President Clinton and Mr Sharon's predecessors.

On Sept 13, 1993, Arafat and the then Israeli prime minister signed what President Clinton called the peace of the brave. The agreement provided for the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the occupied territories and the creation of a sovereign Palestinian state. If things had gone according to the plan, the final settlement, including the future of Al Quds, would have been in place by September 1999.

However, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was murdered by a Jewish fanatic, and his successors - Mr Benjamin Netanyahu and Mr Ehud Barak - had no intention of fulfilling their obligations under the 1993 accords signed on the lawns of the White House. They reneged on solemn international treaties and had them virtually re-negotiated. The series of summit conferences that followed served no purpose except that of obfuscating the real issue.

Whatever chances peace had evaporated when Mr Sharon visited the Islamic holy sites despite advice against such a visit. The result was the beginning of the second intifada, which has so far cost nearly 5,000 lives, mostly Palestinian. What was most unfortunate was Mr Sharon's behaviour. Not working for peace is one thing; destroying it altogether is another.

Mr Sharon not only did not negotiate with Arafat; he went about systematically scuttling the peace process. His crimes included the massacre at Jenin, the assassinations of Hamas founder Sheikh Yassin and his successor, Abdel Aziz Rentissi, and the destruction of Arafat's headquarters and his virtual imprisonment. But he failed to destroy Arafat's nerves and make him sign on the dotted lines.

In all these brutalities and the violation of solemn agreements, Mr Sharon received America's full support. In fact, President Bush called him "my friend". Also, the US president focussed on inanities to sidetrack the real issue - the Israeli occupation of the territories. Instead, the world was told that the real issue was the need for reform in the Palestinian Authority. Then, in April 2003, President Bush unveiled a roadmap to peace.

It called for Israel's withdrawal from the occupied territories, a halt to settlement activity, and the coming into being of a Palestinian state by 2005. Within a few months, President Bush torpedoed the roadmap which had been crafted by the US in cooperation with Russia, the EU and the UN. First he said that even after withdrawing from Gaza, Israel would retain some land in the West Bank, and then he said 2005 was an "unrealistic date" for a Palestinian state to emerge.

Will this obfuscation and dilly-dallying continue? The outcome of today's election will be a challenge both for the winner and for the US. For the victor - most probably Mr Mahmoud Abbas - the challenge will be to show the negotiating skill and courage that were Arafat's forte. He must walk through the minefield of America-Israel diplomacy while keeping one and only one goal spot lit in view - ending the Israeli occupation of Gaza and the West Bank and creating an independent and sovereign Palestinian state with Al Quds as its capital.

As for America, it is Washington's commitment to peace in the Middle East that will be on trial. If President Bush did not talk to Arafat, will he talk to Mr Abbas, or whoever becomes Palestinian president, with honesty and sincerity? The Oslo process was destroyed by Mr Sharon; the roadmap too was torpedoed by him with a helping hand from Mr Bush. With Arafat's death, the pretext for not taking to the Palestinian leadership has disappeared.

The US must now resolve to pressure Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories. The Oslo process and the roadmap are dead, but the principle behind these two documents - land for peace - is still valid. If America and Israel do not begin negotiations with the new Palestinian leadership and no headway is made towards peace, the Palestinian people will be justified in resorting to armed struggle to achieve their goal.

Spurious drugs

The Punjab health minister has announced that the Drug Act, 1976, will be amended to enable the provincial governments to proceed against the makers and sellers of spurious non-allopathic (unani, ayurvedic and homoeopathic) drugs. This is a welcome move. Given that more and more people are now turning to alternative medicine, it is important that some checks be employed on this sector which has so far been hardly regulated.

The absence of registration of the practitioners of the various branches of medicine and the failure to exercise any control over them has enabled a large number of quacks to come up and play havoc with the lives and health of the people. Hence this should be a good beginning in the field. But it needs to be pointed out that the allopathic drugs which are still the more commonly used ones and which come under the purview of the 1976 drug act are faring no better.

In their case it is not the lack of a legal framework that prevents the government from taking action against the manufacturers and sellers of spurious drugs. It is the failure to implement the law and the absence of an effective and efficient mechanism to monitor the drugs which are commonly on sale.

The fact is that the health ministry which is responsible for ensuring that drug inspectors are appointed in the provinces to keep an eye on the pharmaceutical market is not doing its job. The inspectors are either not there or if they have been appointed they are turning a blind eye to the spurious and counterfeit drugs with which the market is flooded. If it were not so, how is it that the WHO has found 50 per cent of the drugs available in the market to be spurious? Moreover, if effective control was there, it is unlikely that the chemists and pharmacists would have been openly selling two qualities of the same brand after inquiring from the customer if he wanted the one or the other quality.

It is this aspect of the problem that needs immediate attention. Undeniably, the health ministry has proved unable to play this regulatory role. A better option at this stage would therefore be to set up an autonomous drug control authority not under the health ministry but comprising independent professionals and persons of high public standing and integrity. That body should be patterned on the Federal Drug Administration of America. Such an agency will doubtless be better placed to act effectively and check the menace of spurious and sub-standard drugs.