FROM time immemorial humanity has been divided into groups owing to vanity and self-conceit, based on race, caste or creed. In early times Greeks hated the non-Greeks, Romans despised the non-Romans and Arabs held the non-Arabs in contempt, calling them “Ajam” (meaning dumb).

Similarly, Egyptians under Pharaohs treated Israelites as helots, reducing them to social and political serfdom. When the Israelites rose to power they tried to crush the Christians and other people. The Christians in their turn, left no stone unturned to eliminate the Jews from the face of the earth.

It is really one of the saddest moments for humanity that in the present age, considered to be the age of advanced civilization and culture, the evil effects of regional and racial discrimination continue create tensions in different parts of the world. The UN which originally aimed at stopping the exploitation of the weak by the strong and ensuring fundamental rights for mankind, has failed in its objective simply because some of its prominent members are still indulging in their old games of differentiating between whites and blacks, high caste and low caste people.

Going back through history, one finds that the concept of human values in Islam and its practical application have been totally neglected. Islam contains a message of human values as its basic law. Islam has a complete and comprehensive code regarding honour of human beings and there are injunctions of the Holy Quran and Sunnah in this respect. In Islam the right to honour is also guarded and much significance has been given to it in the Holy Quran. Muslims are commanded to respect others and not to abuse others. In this regard Allah says, “O ye who believe, let not some men among you laugh at others. Do not defame nor be sarcastic to each other by offensive nicknames ... nor speak ill of each other behind their backs.” (46:11-12)

The Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), in his farewell pilgrimage, delivered a lecture at the pulpit of Kaaba in which he said, “No Arab has any superiority over a non-Arab, nor does a white man have any superiority over a black man. You all are children of Adam and Adam is created from clay.”(Sahi Muslim)

Islamic teachings give importance to moral virtues and human values. The Holy Prophet (PBUH) has said, “The Lord has sent me down as His Messenger in order that I may evolve the moral virtues to the highest perfection.” He also said, “The Muslims who possess better morals are the most perfect in faith.” The Holy Quran stresses the importance of human values in the following way: “Verily, we have honoured the children of Adam” (Surah al-Isra: 70)

Even in respect of persons who are hostile and maliciously disposed towards the Muslims they are directed to be kind and considerate and to return evil with good as far as possible: “the goodness and the evil deed cannot be equal (for goodness is the virtue and evil deed is a sin). Return the evil deed with one which is better.” (41:34)

At another place Allah says: “Return thee with that which is best. We are well acquainted with the things they say (against you).” 23:96 The Holy Quran declares at one place that those devout servants of Allah who practise returning evil with good will be given a double reward:

“Such persons will be given their reward twice over, for that they have kept patience, that they return evil with good and that they spent (in charity) out of what We have given them.” 28:54

The spirit of the teaching of the Holy Quran can well be observed from the fact that the Holy Prophet (PBUH) himself was advised by Allah to be kind and forgiving to his enemies and those who deceived him: “....Thou wilt not cease to discover treachery from all (of them) except a few (persons). But (in spite of this) forgive them and overlook (their misdeeds): for Allah loveth those who are kind.” (5:14)

If one wants to see the “Love thine enemy” in practical form he should see it in Holy Prophet’s (PBUH) life. Not only on one or two occasions but several times the merciful Prophet demonstrated it. For instance, Abu Sufyan, the worst enemy of the Holy Prophet (PBUH) and Islam, the instigator of the battles of Badr, Uhud and Ahzab, the one whose sword had fed on Muslims’ blood, the person who had plotted the Prophet’s (PBUH) assassination several times, who opposed Islam at every step of its progress, was brought as a prisoner before the Prophet (PBUH) on the occasion of victory of Makkah. His record of heinous crimes deserved severe punishment, but the Holy Prophet, instead of taking revenge, not only forgave him but made his house a place of shelter and general pardon.

The wife of Abu Sufyan, the woman who sang songs of war to encourage the soldiers of Quraish against Muslims, the woman who treated with cruelty the corpse of Hazrat Hamza, the beloved uncle of the Holy Prophet, chewed his liver, cut his heart, nose and ears to make a garland of them, and when she came in front of the Prophet, he forgave her too. And she exclaimed, “Muhammad (PBUH)! I hated no tent more than yours but now I love no tent more than yours.”

Thus promotion of human values is one of the basic aims of Islamic teachings. The Holy Prophet (PBUH) has taught mankind to cultivate human values and moral virtues such as politeness, kindness, love, mercy, forgiveness, generosity and humility, etc. And if one was malicious, the Prophet also taught us how to deal with such a person, and how to bring about a change in him while practising Islamic teachings.

Islam does not approve the concept of “tit for tat”. It is a religion of peace and harmony, which spreads love not hatred. Let’s pray that Allah gives all of us wisdom to understand the teachings of Islam and act on them accordingly as exemplified by the Holy Prophet (PBUH).

PRESIDENT BUSH squandered an invaluable opportunity during a recent televised speech to address the existing political and security realities of how to extricate American troops from Iraq and help the beleaguered country from becoming a cauldron for global terror networks.

Instead, the president persisted with his administration’s facile assumptions about 9/11 and Iraq. With escalating instability in Iraq and increasing deadly assaults on American forces, deliberations and apprehension about the US mission in Iraq is now eclipsing hubris and militaristic idealism with amplifying calls for an exit strategy. Withdrawal at this juncture — while Iraq is engulfed by political and societal chaos — because of insidious insurgent attacks against Americans is politically untenable and will haemorrhage American standing in the Middle East.

When, an American military helicopter carrying seventeen servicemen becomes casualty of enemy fire in Afghanistan, yet in another theatre of American war on global terror, the administration’s task becomes doubly challenging: either continue with hawkish unilateralism with glib generalizations about invasion and success in Iraq or embrace practical idealism in addressing the security and military challenges associated with terrorism and governance.

Influential Senate Foreign Relations Committee member Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican, who otherwise had been a supporter of Bush’s Iraq policy, recently suggested that the White House had departed from reality with its optimistic assessments of Iraq, and said outright that Americans were losing to the insurgents. The administration has embraced political expediency, however, to counter excessive exhortations for an exit from Iraq. Without accounting for the political realities in Iraq, the Bush administration endorsed the idea of convening the Iraqis to draft a constitution, codified under the auspices of American-occupied forces.

What if the US was to stipulate to the Iraqi government that unless a functional constitution is expeditiously drafted, American troops will be pulled out? Or, what if multiple insurgent attacks unfold and lead to heavy American casualties? What will be the implications for Iraq and US-Iraq and the Middle-East policy in the region? After all, a growing number of Americans — both Democrats and Republicans- in their collective opposition, although for varied reasons, are calling for a “detailed timetable” about leaving Iraq.

However, Mr Bush rightly asserted in his speech that “setting an artificial timetable would send the wrong message to the Iraqis, who need to know that America will not leave before the job is done.” Otherwise we will be left with a situation like pre-9/11 Afghanistan where competing ethnic groups will create their fiefdoms; oil wealth will be exploited by the outgrowth of sub-state actors for partisan activities; and regional and extra-regional parties will exploit different groups — as seen in Afghanistan — for competing political and economic interests.

The United States must not abnegate its responsibility of helping Iraq develop now. Iraq would turn into an epic centre of terrorism, if left in a chasm of political chaos. It would be a victory for terrorists and the forces of autocracy but counterproductive for the broader United States policy of helping democratize the Middle East.

In the cold war, most presidents opted for stability at the price of liberty when they had to choose. Mr Bush, as his second inaugural address made clear, has underscored stability and liberty together: “America’s vital interests and our deepest beliefs are now one.” As he has said, “Sixty years of western nations excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe — because in the long run stability cannot be purchased at the expense of liberty.”

The Middle East is a pivotal region for various reasons, besides its endowment of hydrocarbon wealth. President Bush’s ambitious Middle East partnership initiatives such as the formation of a Middle East Free Trading Area (MEFTA) by 2013, the accelerated progress underway amongst the six Persian Gulf states (GCC) to form a custom union, and an array of bilateral trade initiatives will be at peril if the US were to exit now.

Practical idealism should now configure prominently in Mr Bush’s Iraq policy, which must be multifaceted and not exclusively focused on abstract formulations revolving around democratization. Political and security stakes would be infinite if the US were to quit now, especially when the insurgency has engulfed the entire country and a nascent government is struggling to incorporate disparate ethnic groups into a functional, governing party. Establishing a working independent Iraq is not going to solve America’s terrorism problem; however, it would be better to prevail in Iraq than to be forced to withdraw in humiliation.

The writer is a researcher in the department of political science, University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.

LAST week, I wrote about developing Kashmir’s vast potential in hydropower and making it the anchor of a large programme for the area’s economic development. I continue today with focus on some other sectors. Indian-held Kashmir’s second major potential — tourism — used to be the source of a significant amount of capital flow into the state as well as the source of employment for the area’s workforce. It also provided the state with links to the outside world. However, a major consequence of the insurgency that has lasted for a decade and a half resulted in the destruction of the infrastructure that supported tourism in addition to turning people away from the state on account of lack of security.

The state became a major destination for Indian tourism in the 1980s; by 1981 the number of visitors from India had reached 600,000. The occupied state also attracted some foreigners but not in the number that could have visited the area given its many attractions. The proportion of foreign tourists remained about one-tenth of the total. The year before the beginning of the current insurrection, tourists visiting the state almost reached the level of three-quarters of a million. This was to be the peak year for tourism in the state. Thereafter, the number of visitors declined rapidly contributing to the economic problem faced by the area.

The plan proposed here aims to turn Kashmir along with Pakistan’s northern areas into destinations for international tourism and not just an attractive place to visit for tourists from India and Pakistan. This way Kashmir and its adjoining areas would get reconnected with the world and help to wean away the young from the destructive forces unleashed by Islamic extremism.

Tourism is the fastest growing part of the service sector in the global economy; there are new consumers entering the sector as populations age and personal incomes increase. There are reports that some 100 million Chinese may be prepared to join the tourist trade as consumers. Pakistan’s northern areas and Kashmir would offer attractive places for the Chinese to visit since much of that country’s ancient history has roots in these areas. The same applies to tourists from Japan and other East Asian countries.

To achieve this will require considerable amounts of investment in developing the infrastructure and training people to manage the industry. The infrastructure required includes roads that can take heavy traffic, airports, hotels and restaurants. New museums would need to be built and sites that hold appeal for East Asian tourists — Kashmir was once an important centre of Buddhism — will need to be developed. An investment of some $5 billion would be required over a period of 10 years — most of it from the private sector — to get tourists in large numbers to come to the area. Benefits would flow to Kashmir, and to the northern parts of India and Pakistan.

Kashmir’s third major economic assets are its forestry and orchards. Once again the products offered by these sectors have considerable external demand not only in the West but also in China. Kashmir has the raw material and skills needed to develop a high value added furniture industry, again one of the more rapidly growing items of international trade in manufactures. With security returning to the area it should be possible to engage major transnational corporations that specialize in manufacturing and distributing products in this sector to develop this part of the economy.

Much of the investment required could come from these corporations; they would also be able to provide management expertise and improve project design. Resource commitment by the public sector would not be large although the state will need to establish training institutions needed to develop the requisite skills. India could help in this respect, using its well developed institutional infrastructure to provide technical assistance.

The state’s well-earned reputation as an “orchard of the East” is based on a combination of good soils, appropriate altitude and supporting climate that makes the land attractive for cultivating a wide variety of fruits that have markets in the West and in the Middle East. To achieve full potential in this area the government, with help from transnational corporations, will need to develop an integrated development programme with detailed costs and cost sharing. The total amount of expenditure envisaged for this sector is of the order of $4 billion over a period of 10 years.

Before India and Pakistan gained independence, Kashmir’s physical infrastructure — mostly roads — catered to tourism. The state was not part of the area the British had either regarded strategically sensitive (as was the case with Punjab, the Frontier province and, to a lesser extent, Balochistan) or economically important (as was the case with Punjab and Sindh provinces). Strategic and economic consideration had resulted in massive investments by the British to develop road, railways, and irrigation systems in Punjab and Sindh.

There were no such compulsions present in the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir. The small amount of investments that were made aimed to facilitate the movement of tourists into the area, most of them British.

The road from Rawalpindi climbed steeply towards Murree, hugging the foothills of the Himalayas. After reaching a height of 7,000 feet it wound down towards Muzaffarabad, a small city in the western part of Kashmir, situated on the confluence of two mighty rivers, the Neelum and the Jhelum. From Muzaffarabad the road crossed the Jhelum and went on first to Baramula and then on to Srinagar. There were also road links, albeit less travelled ones, between Jammu and Sialkot in Pakistan. The only railway link was between Sialkot and Jammu. On the Indian side, the railway system terminated at Pathankot short of the boundary with Jammu and Kashmir. In other words, Kashmir’s natural communication links were with Pakistan.

A programme for infrastructural development in the state would have two components: the development of communications within the state to serve not only the major centres of economic activity centred on high value agriculture, forestry and tourism. It would also require better connections for the state with the world outside. Most of this would have to be through Pakistan, exploiting the road and railway networks that already exist in that country.

Pakistan’s well developed Karakoram Highway that links Islamabad with Kashgar in western China provides an easy access to Kashmir via the roads to Rawalpindi and along the Neelum River to Abbotabad. The railway link between Sialkot and Jammu that is now in an advanced state disrepair could be put back to use, linking the state with the railways systems of India and Pakistan through the city of Lahore.

Pakistan’s recent investment in a modern airport in Lahore could bring in feeder services from Srinagar, Jammu and other cities in the state to points to India and the world outside. Lahore already has a well developed facility for handling air cargo for export of some of the items that would be of interest to a revived Kashmiri economy. Woollen shawls, animal skins, wooden artifacts are delicate products that need to be air freighted. This could be done through Lahore.

The programme of infrastructure development suggested here is less ambitious than that for the development of energy resources. It is estimated to cost $3 billion spread over a 10 year period from 2005 to 2015.

An important component of the plan would be to improve the quality of human resource in Kashmir by providing education and skills to the young that would help them to participate in the modern economy. The quality of human resource has suffered a significant decline since the beginning of the insurgency in the state. One way of assessing the impact is to use the human development index developed by the UNDP for use in the organization’s Human Development Reports.

According to the Indian Planning Commission, the ranking of the state of Jammu and Kashmir declined from 19 among 32 political jurisdictions in 1981 to 21 in 1991. The Commission’s Human Development Report, 2001 did not estimate the value for Kashmir. In 1981, the HDI index for the state was calculated at 0.337 as against the Indian average of 0.302. Chandigarh, with a value of 0.550 had the highest ranking while Bihar at 0.237 was the lowest ranked. In 1991, Kashmir’s HDI was estimated at 0.402 with Chandigarh, still in the first place at 0.674 and Bihar still in the last place at 0.308. The overall value for India was 0.381.

The state did particularly poorly in terms of literacy. In 2001, the literacy rate was only 54.5 per cent for the entire population while it was 60.1 per cent for males and 41.8 per cent for females. On this score, the state ranked 33rd among 35 jurisdictions in all of India. The Indian average for that year was 65.4 per cent — 75.9 per cent for the male population and 54.2 per cent for females.

Before the start of the insurgency, the state’s economy had a very small modern component. Much of the non-agricultural employment was in the tourist industry. The development of the modern sector suffered because the uncertainty created by the insurgency discouraged new investment. Tourism has had a major setback because of the poor security situation. The revival of the state’s economy if undertaken according to the plan proposed here would create entrepreneurial and employment opportunities in several sectors.

To prepare the population to participate in these sectors would require large amounts of additional investment in education. It would also need the establishment of specialized institutions linked with those already working in India and Pakistan as well as in more advanced countries. The total cost of this effort is estimated at $2 billion over the 10 year period between 2005 and 2015. How would such a plan be financed and implemented will be the subject of the article next week.

THE Bush foreign policy squad has not had much to cheer about lately. The Iraqi insurgency won’t die. Iran is suspected of seeking nuclear weapons. North Korea already appears to have acquired a small stash. But as the president met with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh last week, the White House could take heart from what’s happening in South Asia.

For starters, nuclear weapons have promoted peace in that volatile region, it turns out.

When India and Pakistan went nuclear in 1998, most people in the West believed that South Asia had become a more dangerous place. That was a gloomy assessment, considering that the subcontinent had seen full-scale war between India and Pakistan, intermittent skirmishes and terrorist attacks.

But now South Asia is more stable than it was a decade ago, and the prospects for a settlement of the competing claims to Kashmir are better, arguably, than they have ever been. What accounts for the turnaround?

As was true for the Soviet Union and the United States, nuclear weapons magnify the risk of conflict and thereby concentrate the minds of leaders. The danger that a crisis could escalate and bring nuclear weapons into play is not an academic abstraction, it’s a reality. Which is why India and Pakistan have been building mutual trust since 1998. Occasionally, they’ve approached the line of conflict, but they have taken care not to cross it.

After the attack on the Indian parliament by Kashmiri terrorists in late 2001, India massed troops on the border with Pakistan but stopped short of firing and eventually disengaged. And even under a hawkish Indian government, leaders from both countries met (Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf visited India, his birthplace; India’s foreign minister went to Islamabad) to promote political dialogue, cultural exchanges and trade.

Both countries have also been trying to cut the Gordian knot on Kashmir by jettisoning shopworn, intractable positions. Musharraf has put forward some tantalizing ideas. The specifics remain hazy, but he seems ready to drop Pakistan’s traditional demands, including an internationally supervised plebiscite to determine the region’s future.

India’s leaders have refused to be rushed by Musharraf’s warning that there is a brief window for making dramatic progress on Kashmir, but they too have tried to maintain the momentum. They have allowed bus service to resume between the Indian and Pakistani parts of Kashmir, and a delegation of leaders from Indian-controlled Kashmir was permitted to travel to Pakistan-held Kashmir for talks.—Dawn/Los Angeles Times

The writer is a professor of international relations at Lehigh University, US, and a fellow at the New American Foundation.