Flexing muscles

TEHRAN has reacted strongly to the IAEA board of governors’ resolution recommending Iran’s case to be sent to the UN Security Council. President Ahmadinejad has moved the Iranian Majlis to speed discussion of a bill asking the government to scale back its cooperation with the UN atomic agency. In other words, the scope of the nuclear inspections Iran agreed to in late 2003 will be restricted. This will heighten the crisis that has already been brewing between the IAEA and Iran since August when Tehran decided to resume its uranium conversion process. After 18 months of patient negotiations, it appears that the EU-3 and the IAEA have succumbed to United States’ pressure to harden their stance. But will this resolve the problem of nuclear proliferation?

As things stand at present, Iran has not violated the NPT and is not at the moment making nuclear weapons as its government has reaffirmed. Even its uranium enrichment programme is not prohibited by the NPT which allows a non-nuclear signatory to use nuclear technology for peaceful purposes. Enriched uranium can be used as fuel for a nuclear reactor or it can go into the making of an atomic bomb. Iran’s reassurances have to be taken at face value, especially because it was accommodating enough to sign the Additional Protocol to the NPT in 2003 which provides for surprise IAEA inspection. Since then it has been cooperating with the IAEA inspectors. True, these inspectors have not been too pleased with the level of transparency about Iran’s nuclear programme. Yet the IAEA has admitted that its inspectors have found no evidence of nuclear weapons being manufactured. The point to keep in mind is that in the face of the US pressure and threats, Iran may well be acting out of national honour rather than planning to make the bomb.

In this situation, it was surprising why the EU-3 and the IAEA’s board of governors decided to act so hastily. Admittedly, the resolution does not ask for Iran’s case to be referred to the Security Council immediately. In fact, no timeframe for Iran’s compliance has been laid down. That means that the matter could be allowed to go on indefinitely. But unlike President Khatami, who blew hot and cold throughout the period of his government’s dialogue with the EU-3, President Ahmadinejad has decided to show his displeasure. Both sides have been hasty and this could affect the peace and stability in the region. Even if the West doesn’t attack Iran, as Britain has assured, the region could be destabilized in view of the US being perceived as wielding the big stick on flimsy grounds against a weaker state, albeit a major oil producer. The only redeeming feature is that a number of countries have refused to toe the American line. The non-aligned states (with the exception of India), China and Russia have abstained from voting, sending a powerful message that it is not wise to upset the applecart at this stage. India’s move was tantamount to its submitting to US pressures, presumably for the nuclear technology it has recently been offered by Washington. But in the process it has annoyed Iran and broken ranks with NAM which still has the potential of acting as a powerful group. At a time when China and Russia (both veto-wielding members of the Security Council) are displaying the capacity to stand up to the US, it is surprising that India voted in favour of the resolution that will intensify polarization on the issue.

Siachen: no winners

WHILE it is a feat of human endurance that Pakistani and Indian troops have clung on to the icy heights of the Siachen glacier in a state of battle readiness for more than 20 years, it is now time for them to start their descent. There is no doubt that the Indians were the aggressors in this case. In 1984, after years of careful planning, they surreptitiously took over the strategic terrain widely seen as belonging to Pakistan — a perception that had hardly been challenged by the Indians prior to their glacial adventure. Since then, both sides have vacillated over the issue of withdrawal. Several rounds of talks have been held ever since hopes for an early settlement were scuttled by Rajiv Gandhi in 1989. These proved futile and both sides remained in a position of confrontation. Hopes were once again raised recently after India and Pakistan appeared willing to pull back troops from the world’s highest battleground, but now a quarrel has arisen over the verification of positions, according to Indian Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee.

Does this mean a further delay in withdrawal? One hopes not. The cost of maintaining troops in this corner of the Karakoram range has been too high — especially for the Indians — not merely in terms of the billions of rupees that could have been well spent on development that both countries desperately need, but also in terms of loss of human life. Sub-zero temperatures and the lack of oxygen have claimed many lives while soldiers on both sides are being exposed to psychological trauma and the crippling effects of frostbite in a situation where there are no winners — only losers. Moreover, the closure of this chapter in Indo-Pakistan ties would mean that both sides could get on with resolving other pressing issues including Wullar Barrage and Sir Creek, as they inch towards a final solution of Kashmir. Recognizing that “not a blade of grass grows on Siachen”, as General Ziaul Haq once said, it is time concrete steps were taken to convert the territory into a “mountain of peace”.

E coli in water

THURSDAY’S revelation that E coli bacteria was found in 102 out of 144 water samples tested by the city government’s health department in Karachi is a serious cause for concern. It explains the recent spate of water-borne illnesses and deaths in various parts of the city. Statistics about contaminated water are depressing: it causes 80 per cent of illnesses in this country while the World Health Organization says that 19 per cent of all deaths are caused by water-borne illnesses. Against this backdrop, to learn of the presence of E coli, a harmful fecal bacteria, in Karachi’s water is disturbing for it proves just how unfit for human consumption the water truly is. E coli can lead to long-term complications, like kidney failure, if not treated immediately. So the government’s first priority should be to raise awareness of preventative measures — like the importance of boiling water for longer time to ensure that all bacteria is eliminated. It is equally important for hospitals to be fully equipped with the necessary medication to deal with any epidemic — like the situation caused by a spread of water-borne diseases.

This disclosure only highlights failure of the government to ensure the supply of safe potable water to the residents. The Senate’s recent resolution recommending the provision of clean drinking water will remain a pious wish until the government and the relevant agencies act on it and ensure safe water supply for the people. For this, The Karachi Water and Sewerage Board will have to adopt a war-footing strategy and strictly monitor existing water supply lines which are broken at places and often tampered with, resulting in the intrusion of sewage into main supply lines. This plays havoc with people’s health and lives and needs to be checked at the earliest.

The power of images

EVER wondered about the difference between light and highlight? Information is softly diffused light across a flat surface. Highlight is the little bits we journalists select and treat as news.

Information has no dimensions. It may not be totally accurate, since deadlines are the soot that nourishes the fog of fact; but it is more objective. News is subject to the journalist’s assumptions, convictions and prejudices even when he (or, increasingly, she) tries to be carefully neutral. Patriotism leaves a natural and even understandable tint across the telescope when you view distant events. When you are British, sitting in London, and two British soldiers have clearly messed it up in spades, the heavy weight of the media elbow dams and diverts the free flow of information towards preferred contours.

So let’s take a test. What do you remember of the dramatic events in Basra recently, in which two British soldiers were stopped, arrested and later rescued by units of the British force but not before two tanks were lost to petrol bombs, and their occupants pelted with stones as they fled in flames?

Do you recall that:

A: The British soldiers were disguised as Arabs?

B: That there was a substantial cache of arms in the car they were driving?

C: That, when questioned, they refused to show their documents to the police (which, of course, might have ended the whole fracas before it blew up into a crisis)?

D: That the Iraqi police were only doing their duty: it is their job to stop cars being driven by “Arabs” who look suspect (the British disguise may not have been totally clever)?

E: That no explanation has been given by the British authorities as to the nature of this undercover operation; nor has the press probed to find out, although soldiers have been given permission to grant interviews to convey their side of the story?

F: That the British soldiers shot and killed an Iraqi police officer who was doing his duty, and that this murder was unprovoked since there are no reports of the Iraqi policemen opening fire on the disguised British soldiers?

G: That the initial attempt to suggest that the arrested soldiers were handed over to some dreaded militia (very useful, that Moqtada al-Sadr) was quietly forgotten after it had served the purpose of muddying the sand, to reposition a phrase?

H: That the British blasted open the jail in which the soldiers were held, and in the process permitted over a hundred prisoners at the very least to escape, doubtless strengthening the insurgents thereby?

I: That the justification offered for this illegal invasion of a country’s prison was that “75 per cent” of the Iraqi police had become loyal to anti-Occupation militias, and therefore could not be trusted with the lives of British soldiers? And that if it is indeed true that 75 per cent of those who are meant to fight alongside the British forces in Basra have turned, then Britain and America are arming, training, feeding and building a force in which 75 per cent are ready to turn their weapons against the British and Americans. Even Vietnam cannot boast of a somersault at such speed.

I quote from a conservative British newspaper, reporting from Basra: “The two men were held in a building belonging to the shadowy internal affairs department.” Hullo. The official internal affairs department of the Iraqi government in Basra has become “shadowy”? Where’s the light then, Brother Blair?

J: That, by the rules laid by George Bush, who has said that anyone not in uniform is an illegal combatant and therefore not entitled to the protection of the Geneva Convention, the two British soldiers could not claim the status of prisoners of war?

I could, as you might imagine, go on. I dwell on the chiaroscuro of journalism not in an accusatory spirit, but as self-criticism. All journalists privileged to work in the few nations with genuine press freedom are prone to such lapses. We in India hardly deserve the right to accuse. But the strength of free media is that even if the details are sometimes wrong, we almost always get the big picture right. And that is what, in the end, matters.

In London, the first reports of the Basra incidents were drowned out by the power of the image, particularly on television. The sight of two British tanks in flames in the heart of Basra was stirring enough, but was eclipsed by the shot of a soldier leaping from his burning Warrior armoured vehicle, his uniform in flames; and a third picture of a British soldier being pelted with stones as he escaped from his private hell.

All around were young men, their faces wracked with anger against the tanks and soldiers, each face condemning the British as invaders and occupiers rather than liberators.

Those images, in a profound sense, shaped the big picture that emerged by columnists of all persuasions. Boris Johnson, the Tory MP and editor of Spectator, concluded in the Telegraph: “Whatever we achieve in Iraq, we will not have made our world safer, or make the risk of terrorism less likely: quite the reverse... That claim (that the Iraq campaign was part of the war on terror) was a lie, and whatever good may come out of the Iraq war, we should never forget that it was based on a lie.” Above his column was a brilliant cartoon by Nick Garland.

The official photograph of the two British captives had blurred their faces to protect their identity. In Garland’s blur, you discern the faces of Bush and Blair, who have become the two great captives of the Iraq war. Deborah Orr in the Independent, ruing the many “bad reasons why this country was occupied”, notes, “People continue to be dragged from their homes, just as they were in Saddam’s day, to be executed in the squares and public places of frightened cities.”

Patrick Cockburn reports from Baghdad how the credibility of their so-called sovereign government is collapsing. He quotes a goldsmith, Abdul Hamid: “People here have seen that our government has no authority in Iraq. The British did not respect them when they smashed into the jail, so why should we respect our own leaders?” The political class is no longer afraid to demand a phased return of British troops from Iraq. Ken Clarke, frontrunner-aspirant for the Tory leadership, has called the invasion a major mistake. Charles Kennedy, leader of the Liberal Democrats, thinks it is the worst foreign policy fiasco since Suez.

One answer that Tony Bush-Blair has found is to up the ante at home so that fear can remain his chief weapon. Simon Jenkins in the Guardian exposed the faultlines of a law that threatens to lock up — for five years! — anyone who “glorifies, exalts or celebrates” a terrorist act committed in the last twenty years. Master Blair’s government intends to list a series of “historic terrorisms” and the punters are waiting anxiously to see whether Stalin and Mao are included in the Gospel according to Blair.

Tony Blair, caught out, survives by shifting the goalposts. Once weapons of mass destruction were assiduously sold as the reason for a war ordered by Bush; and now the world is being saved from terrorism. The latest, and crumbling excuse for remaining in Iraq is the old excuse trotted out by the French king before the revolution: After me, the deluge. Amend that too, after we leave, chaos. Except that chaos is already there.

Common sense suggests that a force will be needed to help Iraqis restore order, while they set about creating a law for their future. A joint force of Arab countries as well as units from nations whose credibility has not been destroyed, working under the UN flag, can help fill the breach for the limited period needed to calm the country.

George Bush and Tony Blair are the problem in Iraq. They can no longer be the solution. I am not alone in saying this. This is written on every Iraqi face in Basra.

The writer is editor-in-chief of Asian Age, New Delhi.