Quake relief imperatives

THE earthquake of October 8 has been the worst ever natural calamity to hit Pakistan. The loss in terms of human lives has been beyond belief. The present official figure of the dead is 73,000, though other estimates are far higher. The number of wounded is no less. Then there are those who have lost their limbs, those whose lives have been shattered, the orphans, the destitute — all of this constitute a heart-rending human tragedy.

In addition, there is the loss of property. There are the cities, towns and villages which have been flattened, and the infrastructure destroyed. This is truly a tragedy of epic proportions and its impact has been brought home to most people in Pakistan by the unprecedented media coverage.

A calamity of this kind also shows how helpless man is before the ravages of nature. Muslims and non-Muslims are all equally exposed to them. Those who had rejoiced in the sufferings caused by the recent cyclones in the US as God’s punishment to that country need to ponder why something far worse should have happened to us. Indeed, this kind of thinking shows total heartlessness towards the thousands of children and innocent people who perish in natural calamities.

The Oct 8 earthquake was of a magnitude never before experienced in Pakistan. The epicentre of most earthquakes in northern Pakistan has generally been the Hindu Kush, or the Pamirs. This time, it was the Himalayas. The epicentre was also much closer to the surface and hence far more destructive. There was no way we could have been prepared to expect such a terrible earthquake to happen. It is no use trying to make anyone a scapegoat for not giving advance warning of the earthquake, or for blaming the government or anyone else for not being sufficiently prepared for such a calamity. In this context, the example of Japan is relevant. Earthquakes are a regular occurrence in Japan and, thus, people there are much better prepared to face them.

It is also rather pointless to criticize the government for not knowing the full magnitude of the tragedy within a few hours. This could hardly be done when the communication system had been destroyed or made inoperative, roads had been blocked and the government machinery in the affected area was no longer functioning. There were also remote villages in the high mountains to which access was difficult in the best of times. It was clearly not possible for any government to judge the magnitude of the losses within a few hours or even a few days.

Even more ingenuous was the criticism on a TV channel that their individual reporter had managed to arrive at a certain place, and so why had not aid reached that spot? The answer, of course, was that for any aid to reach that area there had to be road access for trucks and other vehicles. In this kind of criticism, again, one can see a tendency to look for scapegoats. This has also been a case of playing politics with a great humanitarian issue, by those who have an agenda of their own to settle scores with the present government.

It would be only fair to say that the response of the government was quick and whole-hearted. Of course, no government possesses a magical lamp that can instantly bring relief to hundreds of thousands of people in a vast region. In such a situation, it always takes some time to mobilize efforts. It was very creditable that three divisions of the army were deployed quickly in the largest-ever operation of this nature. These soldiers have performed well under very trying circumstances. The fact that President Pervez Musharraf continues to hold the post of army chief has, no doubt, helped in this kind of prompt involvement of the army in the rescue operations.

The response of the Pakistani people in extending help to the victims of the tragedy has been truly magnificent. Nothing like this has been seen since the days of the Pakistan movement. Karachi has led the way, but everyone has chipped in. All of this is heart-warming and shows the goodness, as also the innate patriotism of our people.

If one must find fault, it is with the coordination of the relief activities. The services of the volunteers could have been better utilized. The relief effort could have been more focused, concentrating on the essentials and eliminating the superfluous. The great enthusiasm of the people in collecting relief goods could have been channelled towards securing items that were most needed. There has been a certain element of waste in the relief goods so generously donated by the people. In the affected areas, there are reports that relief goods have often been obtained by the undeserving, those whose houses have not even been damaged, whereas the most deserving have often been unable to get the help they badly need.

The international community has responded very generously in this hour of Pakistan’s need. A kind of air bridge of relief supplies has been established with Islamabad airport. The UN has mobilized international donors. A great many countries have on their own extended aid in many forms. Medicines, blankets and tents have been the most urgently needed items and have been rushed from all over the world. Food and clothing has also come in abundance. Medical teams and rescue experts have come from so many countries.

The US responded promptly in particular to supply the urgently needed helicopters that have played such an important role to reach people in the otherwise inaccessible areas. Prompt help has also come from many other western countries. For some time, the US has been receiving a great deal of abuse from so many people in Pakistan. Yet, in our moment of need, it has been the largest donor of aid to us. One has to wait to see if this will reduce the demonization of the US by so many quarters in Pakistan.

In comparison, we have not received the degree of help that we had expected from the Islamic world. For example, the countries in our vicinity in the Gulf region have plenty of helicopters but, for whatever reason, they were not made available to us. No doubt, these countries did extend help in many other ways, but more could have been done. Of course, help from China has been extremely generous and very purposeful, including making available experts in seismology.

Natural calamities, unfortunately, keep occurring quite regularly in many parts of the world. Last year’s tsunami in the equatorial areas of Asia was most terrible. A great deal of assistance came for the tsunami victims from the international community. Our earthquake came at a time when there were reports of donor fatigue and the drying up of relief from the international community for any new calamity. Against this background, the help extended to Pakistan has been very generous.

In part, this help is due to the realization in the West and elsewhere that Pakistan is a very important country which has been playing a key role in the global war against terrorism, particularly after 9/11. Some of our religious parties that keep criticizing Musharraf for making a U-turn after 9/11 remain oblivious of the fact that had we not changed course at that stage, we would have isolated ourselves totally and would have run into the most serious threats to our security and welfare. The western world and others would also not have been willing to extend to us the kind of assistance that we have received for the earthquake.

In keeping with their head-in-the-sand attitude, some of our religious parties have objected to receiving military personnel from Nato who have come to help in the relief effort. In the kind of desperate situation that we face, it is obvious that help from any quarter should be welcome. By no stretch of the imagination, can the few hundred Nato military personnel on our soil be any kind of threat to our security. In fact, this is the first time in its history that Nato has made a humanitarian gesture of this kind. It has shown both a concern for the plight of those affected by this awesome tragedy, as also a gesture of appreciation for Pakistan’s policies in the international arena.

Equally significant has been the help extended by India, consisting of relief goods and willingness to provide helicopters. While Pakistan could not obviously accept that the helicopters should be flown by Indian military pilots in a sensitive security area, the Indian gesture was nevertheless praiseworthy. President Musharraf then made a bold gesture by offering to open the Line of Control so that relief could reach the divided families living on either side of the LoC. After rather delayed talks, the LoC has now been opened at some points.

Apart from the humanitarian angle, there is clearly a political symbolism in this decision to open the LoC. It will lead to a reduction of tension in an area of eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation between the two armed forces for more than 50 years. It is a step forward to allow interchange between the Kashmiris and to transforming the iron curtain at the LoC into a linen one. Pakistan hopes that the next step would be the demilitarization of Kashmir. This may not be acceptable to India. Still, it can be said that the humanitarian tragedy may, in some way, contribute towards relaxation of tensions in Kashmir and eventually lead to a solution of the issue.

Reconstruction of the devastated areas will be a long drawn out process. But we need to develop a strategy of self-reliance rather than keep looking for continued international assistance in this respect. That is likely to dry up with the passing of time. Incidentally, some of us seem to think that it is the duty of the world to help us in such a calamity. This is not a justifiable expectation and merely creates unnecessary disappointment. There is no such duty and we should not take the generosity of the international community for granted.

The writer is a former ambassador.

Greasy deal and Natwar’s stigma

IF by hurling abuses at America — as some are doing — and believing that they can rub off the stigma of the Volcker committee’s indictment of former foreign Minister K. Natwar Singh and his Congress Party, they are living in a fool’s paradise.

That America is imperialistic in its policies or that it is responsible for the Iraq war and its fallout may well be true. But how does the US come into the picture except that Paul Volcker who chaired the committee is an American?

There were also other members on the committee. I hope the charge is not that President George Bush told Vocker to indict Natwar Singh of whose existence the latter did not know. Natwar Singh, too, before handing over his portfolio, said, in order to placate the left, that if a resolution was placed at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), his recommendation to the government would be to revise the vote. (India voted with America against Iran.) Because of such an irrelevant discussion, we are missing the main point.

The question to which we have to seek an answer is whether Natwar Singh and the Congress profited from Iraq’s oil-for-food programme allowed on humanitarian grounds. Saddam Hussein selected individuals and firms which purchased oil at less than the market price even though he added his commission to what the UN had fixed. Saddam reportedly earned $1.6 billion. The Volcker committee that looked into the deals has mentioned both Natwar Singh and the Congress as the beneficiaries in the report. Whether or not it sent notices to the two is irrelevant. All that is required to be known is if Natwar Singh and the Congress received the money.

The Manmohan Singh government has done well in appointing a fact-finder in Varinder Dayal, a former bureaucrat, and a former chief justice of India, R.S. Pathak, a one-man judicial commission, to look into the entire matter. Dayal will collect documents and the related information, while Pathak will give his verdict on the involvement of Natwar Singh and the Congress in the scam. Where the government has gone wrong is in its selection of the fact-finder. He is a retired bureaucrat, known to Natwar Singh intimately. Dayal may have been a good officer but he does not make the grade of an eminent citizen supposed to be collecting the relevant facts. This task is subjective in nature. It will depend on the fact-finder which document or information he considers relevant. The ex-chief justice will give his verdict only on the basis of the material sifted by Dayal.

There are no witnesses and none to be cross-examined. Even an iota of suspicion about the material collected can reduce the entire exercise to one of futility. The opposition is already voicing its doubts. An eminent person in place of Dayal would have shut the wagging tongues.

The Volcker committee took 16 months to write a 620-page report. Even if the fact-finder and the judicial inquiry take half that time — both Dayal and Pathak have to go through the Saddam government’s files on which the Vocker committee based its report — it means eight months. Let us say, at least six months. How can the tarnished Natwar Singh continue in government till then? He will be attending the meetings of the cabinet and its sub-committees. He will be participating in the discussion on highly secret subjects and may at times tilt the decision one way or the other.

Is this fair to the country which is above Natwar Singh and the Congress Party? If Natwar Singh’s position as foreign minister was untenable, how can it be tenable as a minister without portfolio? The Congress has given it out as a compromise formula. Letting a minister who has been named in the report to be a cabinet member is, indeed, compromising on the high standards and values that a nation seeks to uphold. A statement here or an observation there does not absolve Natwar Singh of his involvement. The Congress is unnecessarily exaggerating bits of information which some UN aide is dishing out.

The prime minister should at least not say anything till Pathak’s findings are complete. By announcing that the allegation against Natwar Singh and the Congress is “unsubstantiated” amounts to pronouncing a verdict before the judicial commission has come to any conclusion. The Volcker report was not meant to substantiate the money transactions of the beneficiaries of the oil deal. The substantiating part begins now. Already there is smoke.

The enforcement directorate has questioned Andaleeb Sehgal, a close friend of Natwar Singh’s son, Jagat Singh, and proposes to question the latter. Sehgal is the owner of Hamdan Exports, the firm that is said to have paid $748,540 on behalf of another firm Masefield AG which lifted Iraqi oil allotted to Natwar Singh and the Congress.

Saddam’s oil deals have always been suspect in the eyes of the West. I recall when I was India’s High Commission to the UK in 1990 the then foreign secretary Douglas Hurd called me to his office. Britain suspected our motives, as if by sending ships for the dispatch of food and medicine, we were trying to help Saddam indirectly. I found him unhappy over the then foreign minister I.K. Gujral’s statement asking for “a negotiated settlement” on Iraq and warning that the “continuing tension in the Gulf region is likely to lead to further alienation of South Asians.”

Although the subsequent pronouncement by India cleared the air, Hurd wanted me to explain our stand. I told him that our policy was to support the UN resolutions but at the same time we favoured a peaceful solution to the Kuwait problem.

Referring to our shipments, Hurd said there was enough food available in Kuwait and India’s initiative might encourage Saddam Hussein. “I do not think that the supplies of food and medicines are anything but a humanitarian act,” I said. “Medicine yes, but not food,” was his reply. “Everything depends on the UN sanctions committee and I believe you are in touch with them,” he said as a closing remark.

I took the opportunity to discuss the post-war scenario in the Gulf. “Intertwined with the situation is the lack of democracy in the region,” I said. “Arab leaders have to be acceptable to their people and there is no running away from free, fair elections.” In principle, Hurd did not disagree with me but wanted the matter to be left to the region itself. “Nothing should be imposed from outside,” he said. “They have their own traditions.” A few days later, I asked a senior British official whether something would be done to ensure the people’s say in the area. He said: “You can’t be serious. We have gone to safeguard oil, not democracy.”

The writer is a leading columnist based in New Delhi.

Checking FBI spying

IN the past few weeks there have been two significant disclosures concerning the rules that govern domestic spying, just as the House and the Senate are preparing to reconcile versions of a bill to reauthorize key provisions of the USA Patriot Act.

The first was a release by the FBI of internal reports documenting violations of the rules of domestic surveillance in national security cases. The second was a report revealing that the number of “national security letters” — a kind of administrative subpoena used by the FBI to obtain normally private records — has exploded since the passage of the Patriot Act and now reaches 30,000 per year.

These reports open a timely window onto the question that animates the debate over the Patriot Act: How responsibly is the government using its spying powers? Though they don’t provide a complete answer, the new disclosures are troubling.

The surveillance reports, generated by the FBI general counsel’s office and released under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, are heavily redacted. Still, they show that there have been at least 13 cases between 2002 and 2004 of violations serious enough that the FBI itself determined they must be reported to an executive branch agency called the Intelligence Oversight Board.

Moreover, the case numbers on the released documents suggest that there were hundreds of potential violations examined by the bureau during that period. This is cause for concern. Errors happen in any complex bureaucracy, and it isn’t clear that these are serious ones in civil liberties terms rather than mere technical mistakes.

Moreover, in some sense, the existence of these documents is encouraging. They are the results of the bureau’s internal reporting of errors, and the general counsel’s office appears to be giving conscientious review to those cases that come its way — at least in cases the bureau chose to release. In other words, this limited cache of documents could reflect dangerous carelessness in the field or a good system for catching mistakes — or even both at the same time.

Similarly, the data on national security letters are worrisome, but it’s not quite clear what they mean. These demands for records, which can include such things as phone and bank transactions and Internet subscriber data, get sent out on the bureau’s own initiative under a very low standard and without the oversight by Justice Department prosecutors that takes place in a regular grand jury investigation.

Policy changes since Sept. 11, 2001, have allowed greater retention and dissemination of information that gets collected — including, disturbingly, to governmental and private parties outside the FBI. While bureau officials will not discuss the number of national security letters, they do say that for about 10 out of every 11 people whose records are collected, the information is telephone subscriber data that are already in the public record.

—The Washington Post