| July 30, 2007 | Monday | Rajab 14, 1428 |
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Moscow praises Musharraf
Ahmed Shah Abdali Durrani
Lal Masjid
Secular extremism
Foreign aid
The inspiring dawn
Old wine in new bottle
Trade with China
No excuses
Readers are requested to restrict their comments to a maximum of 400 words. We reserve the right to edit letters for reasons of clarity and space. Letters, including those by e-mail, should carry the complete postal address of the sender. The views expressed in these columns do not necessarily reflect the views of the newspaper.—Editor
HAS America chosen a right person for the realisation of its dreams — to curb religious extremism (Taliban) in the region? I think this time the Washington gurus blundered by relying on a military dictator in Islamabad. As a matter Talibanisation was brought into the scene by brain not by brawn. The use of military force blatantly failed to suppress an ideology, rather opened a more horrible channel.
After the unfortunate accident of 9/11 America took a U-turn toward its Taliban policy and again Pakistan helped to topple the Taliban regime. No doubt, this time the use of force dismantled a bunch of militants but failed to change the decades old mindset. Force can eliminate part of the evil but not the root-causes. Needless to say, religious extremism has spread it tentacles to a point where military force will never be able to trace out the forces where they sprouted from.
Pakistan’s military dictator started an operation to hunt down the Taliban in different parts of the country which took more innocent lives than miltants’. This inhumane policy resulted in hatred against the Pakistan army, America and moderate forces. The whole country has been engulfed by terrorism and plunged to an abyss where the peace and security of common man a distant possibility. The military regime does not and will not pose a pragmatic solution to this global nuisance.
Military dictatorship has completely failed to fight this war. Now the time is ripe for America and western powers to help Pakistanis empower democracy and stop supporting a dictator because in this new set of circumstances the military will miserably fail and will be the main reasons of conflicts like the saga of Red Mosque. General Musharraf is barking up the wrong tree. Only democracy will address the root-causes of these crises. A democratic process will revolutionise the prevailed mentality through confidence building and elimination of anger and hatred against the national or international moderate powers. Democracy will apply the same formula of paradigm shift as it was used during the creation of jihadi ideology.
In a nutshell, America and its allies will never afford to wage a war against an unseen enemy. A well-orchestrated and joint effort is needed not to muster the frustration but to eliminate it. Once again, America will never bungle to batter an evil by another evil if it continues its support for illegal military dictatorship.
HUSSAIN A USAFZAI
Riyadh, KSA
PERHAPS, by way of comparing the Islamabad Mosque tragic events with those in Russia where hundreds of innocent civilians, including children, were killed at Moscow Theater (2002) and Beslan School (2004) in military operations to "obtain peace" at any cost, Russian government has appreciated the recent Lal Mosque Operation Silence in Islamabad, where several persons were murdered by the military operation.
Russia probably thinks that its military operation against the Chechens is fully justified. The RIA Novosti on July 13 was all praise for Musharraf's timely action to avert further disaster. The statement does not however dwell upon the circumstances that led to Lal Mosque killings.
The hostages issue at Beslan and Moscow Theatre were different from Islamabad Lal Mosque crisis and it was not terrorism that was put down there with force, but an anarchical situation. The Pakistani Army began withdrawing on 12 July from Islamabad after completing a 36-hour operation to retake the mosque, seized and held by Islamic radicals for a week.
About 1,000 Taliban-inspired students barricaded themselves in the mosque, a hotbed of Islamic radicalism in Pakistan's capital, July 3, following clashes with government troops. The students had been demanding the Pakistani authorities promote stricter Islamic values in the country.
"Russia resolutely condemned terror in all forms and practices", said Mikhail Kamynin, a Russian Foreign Ministry, adding that the use of troops against Islamic militants at the Red Mosque was a forced measure, designed to save innocent lives. "We expect Pakistan's political and religious leaders to display solidarity in the face of the challenge issued by terrorists," he said in a statement posted on the ministry's official Web site. Russia hopes that Pakistan's political and religious groups will pool their efforts in the fight against terrorism following the recent Red Mosque siege in Islamabad.
Pakistani officials said a few days later that the students were holding women and children inside the mosque.
Moscow's praise for Pakistan's handling of mosque stand-off cannot however justify the Kremlin 's military operation to kill all the school children at Beslan, aimed mainly at discrediting the freedom fighting Chechens internationally. Moscow arranged a series of bomb blasting in Moscow and elsewhere, killed the spectators at Moscow Theater taken over reportedly by the Chechen rebels demanding independence. One is confused as to know if it was an act of terrorism that the Pakistani military forces ruthlessly put down and the sentiments suppressed in Islamabad. Terrorism means different to different people and is understood in different denominations.
It looks like terrorism can now be ascribed to any fight by a group of people for a cause which the state forces would stop by killing the people mercilessly. Worse, if Muslims are involved in a protest, they are bluntly called the terrorists. The world can this way justify any killings of Muslims by branding them as terrorists.
DR.ABDUL RUFF
Freelancer
India
In your lead editorial "Zahir Shah's country," (July 25) you say, 'Ever since it (Afghanistan) was created as an independent state in the 18th century on the ruins of the empire founded by Nadir Shah Afshar, the Iranian (Persian?) soldier of fortune, Afghanistan survived as a tribal confederacy in which the tribal chiefs pledged loyalty to the central government in Kabul provided the latter did not interfere in their internal affairs."
Although what you state is perfectly correct it lacks substance and accuracy. Afghanistan was created in 1747 when the holy man Sabir Shah anointed Ahmed Khan with a stalk of wheat and named him 'Badshah,' Ahmed Khan became Ahmed Shah Abdali (Abdali being the name of his tribe) and the first ruler of the independent state of Afghanistan. Ahmed Shah Abdali's policy of conquest and appeasement put together a Muslim Empire that stretched from the Oxus in the north to the Arabian Sea in the south and from Meshad to Nepal. It was the second largest Muslim Empire after the Ottoman Empire.
No Afghan leader before or after Ahmed Shah Abdali has ever achieved anything on a scale that was attained by this great Abdali/Saddozai king. He was a giant among Afghans, writes Wazirzada M. Yusuf. I would go a step further and say, he was a giant in the annals of military history and the art of leadership. Don’t you think Mr. Editor he needs a place in your editorial?
SARDAR AHMED SHAH JAN
Peshawar
MASJID E Zarar had become a place of fitna during the time of Prophet Mohammed (MPBUH) and we all know he burned it. Similarly, Lal Masjid administration and those who commit to their acts of extremism as a result of their brainwashing, with the latest being supporters who have chanted slogans, painted the mosque red, and screamed al jihad are illustrating it is not a place worthy to be deemed a place of worship but a place of barbarism.
The latest incident on the eve of the opening of 27th of July illustrates the buffonry led by Mr. Liaquat A Baloch, a treacher and thief of the bait ul mal who was in London at the time of the actual crisis, along with those who chanted slogans of Al Jihad led by a former Minister of NWFP, stood above and around the mosque and hoisted flags, and painted the mosque red, wasting thousands of rupees that could benefit the hungry, orphaned and dying, did nothing that signifies Islam and Friday, or Juma or Ijmaa and hindered worship by preventing hundreds from praying, and above all a Minister appointing himself as the leader
We urge President Musharraf to speak to Imam e Kaba regarding this issue as it is getting out of hand.
DRS. M. OSMAN KHALID
SHAIKH, AISHA O. SHAIKH
Mississauga, Canada
Our society — the liberal-minded, which is the majority, has become victim of the same propaganda that we accuse Fox News and CNN of. We categorise everyone showing religious tendencies as extremist and worry to death about what the west will think of us. The transformation has been taking place for over the last few years. We now have two extremes — the suicide bombers on one hand and the majority who deep inside are afraid of themselves and see themselves from the lens of the western media and the Jewish lobby.
We need to discuss the root causes. We need to talk about how people resort to unconventional methods when they are oppressed, as they are in the West Bank and Gaza, when dictatorial governments throughout the Muslim world are armed to suppress their own citizens. There are no systematic commands and controls or generals commanding these people; groups and bands of people shoot on there own. Some adapt the right way, others the wrong way. But this is inevitable. Force is never going to solve this problem. An injustice will give rise to more hatred and more violence.
AYAZ KHAN
Canada
No subject has occupied more time at international conclaves than foreign aid. It’s been called North-South transfers, debt forgiveness and the .7% solution. Back in 2005, Tony Blair’s G-8 summit pledged $25 billion annually in new government assistance to Africa by 2010 on top of the $25 billion a year already in the pipeline. The G-8 is nowhere near meeting that commitment. So how about turning all foreign assistance over to the private sector?
That’s already happening in the U.S., with good results, as reported in the recently released 2007 Index of Global Philanthropy.
Published by the Hudson Institute, the philanthropy index is a remarkable compendium of private help for developing nations. It reports that in 2005 Americans donated some $95 billion in cash, goods and volunteer time to the developing world. Add the $27.6 billion in U.S. official development aid, and total US giving in 2005 was nearly $123 billion.
US foundations sent $2.2 billion overseas in 2005, with nearly 55% of it going to health programs in the developing world. US corporations gave $5.1 billion, with Africa a big beneficiary of U.S. corporate philanthropy. Bristol-Myers Squibb, for instance, “worked with the government of Botswana to build Africa’s first pediatric AIDS hospital in Gaborone, collaborating with Baylor College of Medicine.” Gifts-in-kind and volunteerism are both playing a greater role in corporate giving.
Private voluntary organizations gave $13.4 billion in foreign aid that year. The Hudson index draws special attention to the importance and effectiveness of many smaller volunteer groups that depend on private generosity and engage in people-to-people problem solving in Africa, Asia and Latin America.
Universities and colleges gave $4.6 billion internationally. Religious organizations sent even more — $5.4 billion. The single largest source of U.S. private giving abroad in 2005 — $61.7 billion — were remittances sent by workers in the U.S. back home to families and communities.
All this generosity counters the claim the US isn’t pulling its weight in foreign aid. When private aid is added to official assistance, US giving to developing countries comes to .98% of gross national income, putting it well above “the .7% solution” that international aid lobbyists have decided is fair.
It puts the US well ahead of France, Germany, Japan and 12 other countries in the Group
of 22.
This year the index also examines the instruments that governments claim as official “aid.” Get this: Countries now include the cancellation of Third World debt and decades of interest build-up — “often more than double the principal” — in official aid calculations. In 2005, debt and interest write-offs accounted for more than 20% of “aid” from Austria, Germany, Italy, the U.K., France, Japan and Spain. Other sources of what the index calls “phantom aid” are donor-countries spending on refugees and on students from the developing world.
The Hudson report is food for thought. Yes, the wealthy world must attempt to pull lagging nations into the expanding global economy. But an aid system that duns middle-income taxpayers for cash that is routed through Beltway contractors and into often corrupt Third World governments isn’t the only way to do this. Those middle-class taxpayers seem to know how to give effectively on their own, and they have every incentive to be more careful and efficient with their own money. The report finds that while a moderately priced US government consultant working in a developing country costs $300,000 per year, the private sector hires the same skilled professional at just over $100,000.
In a speech to a Family Foundations conference last year, former AOL Chairman Steve Case spoke of a “new entrepreneurial, collaborative kind of philanthropy” that would combine “the innovation of the business world, the passion and humanity of the non-profit world and the inclusive, networked culture of the digital world to generate transformative change.” It’s a truism now to say that everything changes, which means it’s past time to recognize that private giving can do more than the old models of government foreign aid.
SAMI-UL-HAQ
Mardan
WITH the restoration of Mr. Iftikhar Muhammad Ch. in his office, almost all the sectors in public have boosted up a strange type of encouragement is observed in the majority of individuals in Pakistan. Some people are so excited with the decision that they have established a lot of predictions from the judicature for future days. A majority of public is not looking the restoration of Chief Justice merely a restoration but end of monarchy.
The undaunted effort on the part of bars has proved on the society that a movement needs sacrifice for its success and whenever a people has true devotion and commitment to achieve its realistic goals, it must be facing a lot of hurdles and hindrances in its way and only the unconditional and spiritual contributions lead it to the way of success. Although it is an inspiring dawn for whole of the nation but the time demands a major tribute for those great entities which played very vital role in the success of lawyers’ movement. A movement starting in the leadership of a single chamber of society was highly assisted by various political and social sectors.
It is clear here that the silence of public was just due to historical phobia of military rule but now there must be a change in the public attitude and enthusiasm. Although we have restored our judicature to the start of March 2007 yet its potential has definitely observed a major change and a dynamic era of independent judiciary has been triggered up.
CH. ASIM HAFEEZ
District Bar Association
Gujranwala
The year 2007 can be defined as the year of change of names of various arms of the government of Pakistan, under the garb of restructuring and reorganisation. First, Export Promotion Bureau (EPB) was re-named as Trade Development Authority of Pakistan (TDAP). Then, Engineering Development Board (EDB) became Engineering Authority. The latest in the series is the Federal Bureau of Revenue (FBR), which was previously known as Central Board of Revenue (CBR).
The change of name of these organisations is simply a matter of cosmetics. TDAP is a typical example of showing negative performance; it has not been able to achieve export target of US$ 18.6 billion set for the fiscal year 2006-07. Pakistan’s total exports by June 30 amounted to $ 17.5 billion instead, thus missing the target by 6%. Shockingly, exports to as many as nine countries that are among top 40 of our export markets have gone down by about 30% in terms of value during the period. It really is a case of pouring old wine into a much smaller bottle.
HUSSAIN SIDDIQUI
Islamabad
THIS is with reference to Sultan Ahmed’s article “Expanding trade with China” (July 12) in which he mentions the facts and figures which will be undertaken as a result of Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between China and Pakistan. But Mr Ahmed does not express his own views regarding the possible and expected outcomes for Pakistan should it enter this agreement.
I believe Pakistan will be losing a lot if it goes ahead with the agreement. Before entering FTA participating countries must be sure of certain factors such as: they must be sure that their cost of production is low so that exporters can produce goods at an affordable price, hence this ultimately increases the volume of exports. Secondly it should be confirmed that the goods produced for exports meet the standards of quality, otherwise it will be very difficult to capture a portion of the foreign market. Thirdly, it should also be kept in mind that the price set for the exported goods is affordable to the local people of participating countries of FTA.
Hence until the country does not have a competitive advantage in the above mentioned factors it will be losing a lot from FTA. Pakistan is not in a strong position in any of the aforementioned factors and this agreement could also cause various other social problems. Our policy-makers leaders must explain what prompted it to enter into FTA with China.
BISHARAT A. KUNBHAR
Karachi
WE, as Pakistanis, can’t excuse ourselves out of a situation we have created in the last 30 years. Lal Masjid’s ongoing debacle and the loss of so many lives and resources is a very heavy price to pay for myopic policies of the past. The Lal Masjid episode may be over but many other similar institutions are still thriving in the country. The likes of Abdul Aziz and Abdur Rashid Ghazi were criminals in ‘maulana’ disguise and pushed agendas of external players for ‘unaccounted-for donations’ at their disposal. Such men have an independent ideology, tactfully cloaked in Islamic values, which militates against Islam and the ideology of Pakistan.
It is about time we learnt from the experience, shed our political differences and unite for the sake of the motherland and Islam.
It is time to wipe out extremism from our society and an opportunity to redesign our education and welfare policies in a way that militant organisations and other anti-state elements are unable to exploit. I mourn the loss of very precious blood of my dear friends and appeal that we should not let their sacrifice go astray.
ZAHIR KAZMI
Rawalpindi
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