A recent Sandia National Laboratories study offers insight into how a federal transportation security officer’s thought process can influence decisions made during airport baggage screening, findings that are helping the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) improve the performance of its security officers.

The TSA-funded project, led by Sandia researchers Ann Speed and Kiran Lakkaraju, focused on the impacts on threat detection when transportation security officers are asked to switch between the pre-check (indicated by TSA as TSA Pre✓) and standard passenger lanes. The pre-check lanes, introduced recently, speed passengers through considerably faster, since pre-approved passengers are not required to remove shoes or items from their carry-on bags.

The research project assessed whether TSA’s airport security officers experience cognitive impacts when switching from the pre-check lane to a standard lane, and vice versa. “We know that expectations have an impact on how people make decisions, and that the actual rate of target items in a sample can also impact decision making. So we designed an experiment to independently test the effects of expectations and threat rates,” Speed said.

Though she can’t reveal specific details from the study, Speed says some mitigations based on their findings likely will be rolled out to airports across the country. “It’s really exciting to know that your work has had that kind of impact,” she said.

Human behavior studies and other Sandia contributions to homeland security

Sandia has a long history of important research and development for homeland security needs, including breakthrough tools and technologies such as explosive detection devices, chemical and biological countermeasures, border security, and nuclear and radiological security systems.

The labs’ human behavior studies are less well-known, though Sandia has about two dozen researchers with expertise in cognitive psychology and neuroscience. Speed earned her doctorate in cognitive psychology from Louisiana State University.

“More and more around the labs, people are starting to realize that the human element can be just as important as the hardware, software or engineering,” Speed said.

TSA projects focus on supervisor pressures, image resolution

TSA has funded much of Speed’s Sandia work since 2009, with other funding coming from the Department of Homeland Security’s Science and Technology directorate.

From 2009-2010, Speed’s colleague Andrew Cox spearheaded an experiment that analyzed what happened when security officers got advice from expert peers on whether carry-on bags contained threats. Speed led the experiment and a second project that independently manipulated supervisor emphasis on either accuracy or throughput, as well as image resolution of screened baggage, and the impact of each on security officers’ decision-making. The study focused on whether higher resolution reduces the effects of supervisor pressures on security officers by helping them feel more certain of their decisions.

More specifically, the study asked how such pressures influence a security officer’s decisions. Does the supervisor stress speed and quantity of passengers and baggage screened? Or is he or she more concerned with accuracy of found threats? With image resolution, the questions are similar: how do the varying degrees of image resolution affect the decisions of security officers charged with detecting threats? Does image resolution slow activity at the X-ray station? Does it improve accuracy?

This earlier work on TSA supervisor emphasis, Speed said, informed some of the mitigations developed as a result of the recent lane-change study.

Data, data and more data

Data are the bread and butter of human behavior studies. As she does with all of her TSA projects, Speed used several computers for the lane-change study, machines loaded with software that allowed her to present about a thousand images of baggage to the TSA officers. The images were captured by actual Smiths Detection AT-2 X-Ray scanning machines used at airport checkpoints.

The experiments involved statistical analyses of how effectively the officers identified prohibited items that are found in some of the images. The analyses were performed with up to 200 TSA officers.

“This kind of data collection and analysis can tell us how officers are making their decisions, their accuracy, and the rate of false alarms,” Speed said. “We’re capturing and analyzing their responses and decision times in different operational environments. In the end, the data inform us and our customer about the factors that impact officers’ accuracy.”

The work, Speed adds, was – and is always – reviewed and approved by Sandia’s Human Studies Board, TSA officials and the Department of Homeland Security privacy office.

The success of the work has led directly to additional TSA-funded efforts, including a current project that explores how long officers can look at scanned images before their performance starts to degrade due to fatigue or other factors. Another project aims to understand the attributes airport security officers bring to their jobs prior to training that may influence their ability to perform duties other than the X-ray examination of bags.

“TSA’s security officers serve many purposes, each of which requires different kinds of communication skills,” said Speed. “For instance, there are duties like communicating with passengers about things to divest, such as laptops or liquids, and communicating with passengers in the event a pat-down is required. They also need to possess the ability to keep passengers calm and compliant while performing the tasks required by the standard operating procedure.”

In addition to the increased level of attention that TSA is giving to Sandia’s research, Speed said other organizations have taken notice as well. Sandia recently signed a memorandum of understanding with the Allen Institute for Brain Science, for example, and continues to explore opportunities with the Department of Defense and others.

An external advisory board of distinguished scholars, cognition scientists and others has repeatedly acknowledged that Sandia has a differentiating capability in this area.

“There is no other place that can do what Sandia can do in the area of human decision-making in high-consequence threat scenarios,” Speed asserts. “We are it.”

By Orsetta Bellani

Fabiana wakes every morning at 4:30 a.m., like all the women in her community. She grinds the corn she boiled the night before until it becomes soft dough, from which she forms a few balls that once flattened and cooked on a griddle become tortillas. Fabiana, who is ethnically Tzotzil Maya, is 23 years old, with a husband and two children, and also a member of the support base for the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN).

She works at home almost all day, every day, while toting her youngest child. Her husband helps with some chores traditionally considered “women’s work,” like shelling corn or plucking poultry, and sometimes he takes care of the children while she cooks.

“I was born in the town of San Juan Chamula, in the Chiapas highlands. When I was 10 years old my family became Zapatista and the Council for Good Government gave us a parcel of land in this community,” Fabiana told Latinamerica Press. “I met my husband here. We are very happy with our children and we decided we don’t want more.”

Triple oppression

Family planning is one of the rights established by the Women´s Revolutionary Law the Zapatistas wrote in 1994. The law, which is in effect in areas under EZLN influence, also provides for women’s right to hold military and political office, to benefit from a dignified wage, education, and health services, to be free from abuse and free to choose their couples.

“Historically the condition of the indigenous population in Chiapas has been one of exclusion, and the women have lived under a triple oppression: [they are] women, poor, and indigenous,” Guadalupe Cárdenas, of the Mercedes Oliveira Feminist Collective (COFEMO) of San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, told Latinamerica Press. “Their political participation has always been rendered invisible, but with the Women’s Revolutionary Law this changed; they started going to rallies, taking the microphone and speaking, holding political office. There was a great change in attitude in Chiapas — even outside of the Zapatista movement — and men began to value women, at least in word; it is no longer politically correct to exclude the participation of women.”

In Fabiana’s community also lives Teresa, who is 15 years old and said she is very proud to be a member of the EZLN. In the afternoons, Teresa and her cousin sit across from the town’s communal store and watch the boys go by. They talk about how the girlfriend of one of the guys left him, and now he has another girlfriend who isn’t Zapatista.

That girlfriend, the girls explained, has said she wants to become a Zapatista. Otherwise, the boy would have had to leave the organization. The teens described how in the communities that are part of the resistance, couples choose each other and then meet the respective families, whereas before the EZLN took root, the tradition had been that the man would choose a wife, and then would arrange with her family the payment of a dowry. When asked whether she would want to marry and have children, Teresa laughed, answering that she thinks she does, but for now she’s too young.

A few kilometers away, in the Tzotzil Maya — and not Zapatista — community of San Juan Chamula, girls marry before they become women. On Mar. 12, a 14-year-old girl left her husband after three years of abuse. A judge issued a warrant for her arrest for abandoning her home and fined her 27,400 Mexican pesos (approximately US$2,100). The girl, who had been purchased for 15,000 pesos (about $1,150), claimed she spent 29 hours in the municipal jail with no food or blankets, surrounded by trash and human feces.

The Zapatista law doesn’t allow rulings that are so openly harmful to human dignity, however it’s impossible that just by decree the ingrained practices of a community’s culture and conscience have changed.

Resisting within the resistance

The Zapatistas themselves, in booklets about the participation of women in the autonomous government that were published in Aug. 2013, noted that in the last 20 years, there has been great progress in their communities, yet gender equality still hasn’t been achieved. According to the booklets, which were part of the course “Freedom according to the Zapatistas” that was conducted within the so-called Escuelita Zapatista, or Little Zapatista School — a week-long course in which each participant lived for a week with a host family in a community engaged in resistance —, the difficulty in accepting that female Zapatistas can hold political office comes as much from men as it does from women, because of an upbringing that doesn’t teach women they have rights.

“Once, several militiawomen became pregnant, and the order from the Zapatista leadership was that they have abortions, along with the aid of some non-governmental organizations. If the women wanted to keep the baby they needed to cease being militiawomen and live their lives as housewives, while the men who got them pregnant faced no consequences,” recounted Cárdenas, who worked in the Zapatista area until 2000. “However, I believe the Zapatista women are learning to resist from within the resistance, [where] they are clandestine within the clandestine. They learned the way of resistance to neoliberalism, so they can take up the path of resistance to the patriarchy. In fact, they are already doing so. They disagree with many things in their organization and their culture, and they are changing them. It’s slow but they are taking charge of the changes they need.”

By Geethanjali Nataraj and Garima Sahdev

Where politics disappoints, economics gives a hope. The Sino-Indian ties are emblematic of this proposition. Once bitter neighbours, India and China have for years been trying to integrate economic ties to help resolve their territorial dispute, and trade between the two countries has steered bilateral relations for the last decade. The bilateral trade has travelled a long way since the two sides signed the Most-Favoured Nation Agreement in 1984, crossing the $10 billion mark in 2004, and China becoming India’s biggest trading partner in 2011.

That said, the bilateral trade has seen a downward trend since 2011, with 2013 registering a 1.5% decline. The current trade deficit with China stands at $ 31.42bn. The leadership of both the countries have set an ambitious target of $100 billion to be achieved by 2015- which looks implausible now.

Alarming levels of deficit and the rising imports from China has cast a shadow on the once flourishing trade. China’s predatory trade practices which include a mulish refusal to allow free flow of its currency making its exports advantageous; low wages; local tax incentives and aggressively subsidising domestic players- all make the current trade between these two countries unsustainable. Besides, Indian exporters are routinely confronted with market access issues in China.

It would be difficult to sustain good trade relations between the two countries unless some concrete steps are taken by both the sides to bridge the growing deficit. This is a problem that India is grappling not only with China but with several of its trading partners including Indonesia and a few other ASEAN countries. There are quite a few reasons for the growing deficit with China.

India’s economic growth has seen a shift from agriculture to the services sector over the years. The software services and IT enabled services exports, in particular, has been one sector where India has not only had a competitive edge globally, but also as against China. However, this golden industry faces restrictions in the Chinese market with the country’s increasing focus on developing its service industry in an attempt to create more employment for its youth. The International Data Corporation says that China, with a 10% share of global software developers, is already ahead of India which has 9.8% of the world share. The threat is notably serious because China is wooing Indian investment to help set-up its own software services industry. While Indian software and services industry exports are focused on the developed markets, and the industry as such does not face a slowdown; India needs to eye the Chinese software industry to arrest the fast-widening trade deficit with China. Further, there is a need to build on the value chain in software services.

The farm sector and agro-processing industry also face limited access in Chinese market, continuing the Chinese trend to allow limited access in the higher-value sectors. In the past, China has banned several agricultural exports from India, including Basmati exports without providing sufficient scientific evidence as is required under the Agreement on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures.

The Pharmaceuticals and auto component exporters confront similar issues in China. Thus nearly all the sectors in which India enjoys a comfortable and comparative advantage are routinely subjected to non-trade barriers in China.

Apart from market-access issues and China’s unfair trade practices, India’s own set of structural hurdles- some of which are deep-rooted- and productivity gap with China are to be blamed for the ballooning trade deficit with China. This is because in defiance of the 159 anti-dumping cases against China since 1992, the largest among foreign nations, across a broad spectrum of sectors- steel, pharmaceuticals, consumer goods, etc- trade deficit looms large. India’s manufacturing industry relies on inexpensive and skilled labour, and the manufactured products are cost-effective; yet the competitiveness is not maintained owing to low labour productivity. On one hand, the business regulatory environment is quite cumbersome; on the other the infrastructural bottlenecks and inflexible and archaic labour laws make it worse for the growth of manufacturing sector.

Besides, India hasn’t even been able to make the best of its comparative advantage with China. For instance, even after the lifting of the ban on Basmati exports, India has failed to tap the under-exploited Chinese market. India faces tough competition from rival Pakistan, which continues to rule the world’s largest rice market with its price competitiveness. Raw materials like iron ore, bauxite and cotton which make up bulk of India’s exports to resource-hungry China have also continued to post a downward trend owing to mining bans in Karnataka and Goa by the Supreme Court. Before the bans, India was the largest exporter of steelmaking raw-materials to China- a slot replaced by Australia and Brazil; while iron-ore remains China’s top import commodity. A sharp decline in their exports in the last two years has pulled down India’s overall exports to China by about 25%. For a country rich in mineral resources, caps on production and exports greatly minimise the scope of sustainable capitalisation of these resources.

During his visit to India last year, the Chinese Premier Li Keqianq promised to address India’s concerns by opening up the market, and proposed to step up investments in India by establishing Chinese investment parks. But while China honors its tardy commitments, India must look to diversify its trade basket, especially in labour-intensive sectors such as textiles, as China battles rising labour costs and unfavourable demographics, challenging its low-cost manufacturing advantage. But more importantly, while the trade-diversification process is still in its gestation period, India must look at the areas where it enjoys a comfortable competitive edge- skill intensive sectors like IT and pharmaceuticals which make the perfect use of India’s intellectual capital; agro-processing; raw materials and intermediate products- and thus improve the productivity gap. Bridging the trade deficit with China would go a long way not only in sustaining the trade relations but also help in enhancing them.

(The writers are Senior Fellow and Research Assistant respectively at Observer Research Foundation, Delhi)

By Jeffrey Young

Earlier this month, the U.S. technology company Hewlett Packard agreed to plead guilty to bribery charges involving its Russian, Polish, and Mexican subsidiaries.

Hewlett Packard admitted to the U.S. Department of Justice that it bribed Russian officials in hopes of landing a lucrative contract with Moscow’s Office of the Prosecutor General. In Poland, HP admitted to bribery connected to contracts with the national police agency, while in Mexico, the illicit cash was tied to deals with Pemex, the state oil company.

What snared Palo Alto, California-based “HP” is the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), a groundbreaking law enacted nearly four decades ago.

HP’s agreement to pay US$108 million in both criminal and civil penalties is the tenth largest settlement ever under the FCPA. Other corporations that have been caught in FCPA’s net include Walmart, Halliburton, KBR, Siemens, BAE Systems, and Daimler AG.

Julie DiMauro, Executive Editor of the anti-corruption FCPA Blog, describes the impact upon HP for getting caught. “The penalty amount,” she says, “might not be the true deterrent here. What could be, to it and other companies, is the ample negative publicity it is getting for its actions in multiple countries.”

The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act was signed into law by President Jimmy Carter in December, 1977. It was enacted in the wake of a U.S Securities and Exchange investigation that found more than 400 U.S. corporations had collectively paid more than $300 million in bribes to foreign officials and political parties.

“The passage of the FCPA itself was revolutionary,” says Sarah Pray at the good governance and accountability organization Open Society Foundations. “In an era when you could still deduct bribes from your taxes in some countries, the United States took a stand.”

The FCPA casts a broad shadow covering both corporations and individuals. Under the law’s provisions, anyone – regardless of nationality – is in violation of the law if they engage in bribery while in the United States. That denies legal haven to foreigners engaging in corrupt activities offshore while in the U.S. The FCPA also applies to U.S. citizens’ financial actions overseas. And, since 1997, it covers foreign corporations that are traded on U.S. stock exchanges and securities markets.

The FCPA also blocks the use of proxies to engage in illegalities.

“The FCPA’s third party liability provisions,” says Washington attorney and FCPA expert Lucinda Low, “makes it a crime to make a payment to any person, knowing that the payment or other value will be passed through in whole or in part of a foreign government official or other covered [by the FCPA] recipient.”

Interestingly, though, so-called facilitation or “grease” payments to foreign officials may be legal under FCPA, if done to expedite that official’s performance of duties. And, payments to foreign officials may also be legal if the host country permits such activity.

Enacting the FCPA promoted a number of other nations to follow suit. Britain passed the Bribery Act, while Canada enacted a similar law. Anti-corruption laws have been enacted in China, Thailand, Malaysia, Brazil, and many other countries. The United Nations has responded by enacting the U.N. Convention on Corruption, while the 40 state Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) enacted, in 1997, an Anti-Bribery Convention, though the anti-corruption group Transparency International chides the OECD for not insisting its member states more aggressively enforce the provisions of that agreement.

While the FCPA has a broad reach, a former Justice Department FCPA prosecutor says it has a limitation – time – that needs to be changed.

“I think there are statute of limitations issues [within the FCPA],” says Kathleen Hamann. ”A lot of complex economic crimes in the U.S. have a 10 year statute of limitations. But, the FCPA has a five year statute of limitations.” Hamann, now in private practice, adds”I think there are a lot of individuals who end up not being prosecuted because the statute of limitations has run out.” She says “I think we need to treat it [bribery and other crimes covered by FCPA] as what it is, a complex financial crime.”

Sarah Pray calls for the FCPA’s expansion in another direction.

“The United States should outlaw all commercial bribery, not just bribery of foreign officials. Secondly,” Pray adds, “the United States should outlaw ‘facilitation payments. The line between a bribe and a facilitation payment is a blurred one, and this distinction should be eliminated.”

Along with penalties for misbehavior, Lucinda Low says the FCPA has compelled the business world to become proactive. “FCPA”, she says, “created expectations that companies will institute internal programs and controls to prevent, detect, and remediate bribery and corruption throughout their organizations. “

The post US Anti-Corruption Law Snags Major Tech Company appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Dozens are reportedly dead in Yemen, including at least three civilians, as the result of a series of drone strikes that started in the southern part of the country on Saturday and is alleged to still be occurring two days later.

By noontime in Washington, DC on Monday, the Associated Press reported that 55 Al-Qaeda militants were among those that had been killed in an hours-long series of strikes that targeted a training camp operated by the group, according to Yemen’s interior ministry. The United States is alleged to have carried out the strikes using unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, but does not legally have to acknowledge any operations conducted by its Central Intelligence Agency and has not commented.

While reports consider the strikes carried out by US-operated drones, outlets like The Bureau of Investigative Journalism say that, as of early Monday evening EDT, it is ultimately unknown whether Yemen military forces were involved or if the attacks were indeed executed with unmanned drones. A “high-level Yemeni government official” told CNN the attacks were “a joint US-Yemeni operation.” He added that, “unfortunately, a civilian truck was also hit.”

Among the 55 believed to be killed in that series of strikes, the AP reported, were three senior but unnamed Al-Qaeda leaders. The AFP also corroborated that claim by reporting that witnesses on the scene in Shabwa province early Monday said three alleged militants were indeed killed when a missile struck the car the men were traveling in that morning.

At the same time on Monday, an anonymous Yemeni government official briefed on the strikes told CNN that the strikes had yet to cease and that at, by his count, at least 30 alleged militants had been killed. Statistics regarding the death toll remain fluid, but preliminary reports concerning the strikes suggest that the number of those killed since Saturday is in the dozen.

Yemen’s Saba news agency reported that a drone strike in the central province of Bayda on Saturday killed 10 suspected militants and three civilians. A Yemeni military officials added to the AP that a car carrying the alleged militants was struck by a missile as it drove by a vehicle carrying civilians, and an eyewitness who survived the attack said a second strike occurred soon after. Three civilians were injured in addition to those slain in that attack, the AP reported.

“Minutes after the first attack, a second attack took place, killing three of my friends,” eyewitness Salem al-Kashm told CNN after. “The drone then kept going in circles after the attack to ensure that none of the militants were able to escape.”

On Sunday, US drones reportedly targeted an Al-Qaeda training camp in the nearby province of Abyan and killed another 30.

The post US Unleashes Three Days Of Drone Strikes On Yemen, 55 Killed appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The Government of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is very mindful of its image in the world. One cannot fault her for such an attitude, after all, it is the second largest economy and much of its success owes it to the perception it has been able to create.

So, as I expected, after publication of my article (written with Dr. Imtiyaz of Temple University) about Xinjiang in March, an article from Mr. Meng Hua has appeared in a English daily in Bangladesh on Sunday, April 20, 2014. It was a stark attempt to whitewash Beijing’s repression of the Uyghurs in the occupied territories.

There is no better way to justifying the grabbing of anything than to claim that it ‘historically’ belonged to the grabber. Mr. Meng Hua’s response once again underscored that all-too-familiar tactic. It seemed like a leaf taken from standard Chinese Government propaganda 101 that not only tries to skirt off its accountability for the current unrest in the Xinjiang region plus its monumental failure in integrating the Uyghur Muslims in China through a plethora of criminal policies but also tries to deny, let alone distort, the native Uyghur people’s national history, culture and heritage by falsely claiming that it was part of the Han Empire. Thanks to revisionist history fed in classrooms, most Chinese Han have grown up ignorant of Uyghur history. They probably never heard about Uyghur historians like Muhammad Imin Bughra who wrote the book – A history of East Turkestan - and Turgun Almas who incorporated discoveries of Tarim mummies to conclude that Uyghurs have over 6400 years of history.

Even if one were to accept for the sake of argument the Chinese government propaganda that the region was once a part of the Han dynasty some 2000 years ago, there are overwhelming evidences to show that Hans were not the first settlers to the region. But more importantly, how could one deny the people’s history of the region since then? Before the communist takeover, Xinjiang, known previously as East Turkistan, had an unmistakable Islamic identity where amongst the various Turkic people the Uyghurs formed the vast majority. Its people never accepted Chinese occupation and have fought back. They declared their independence in the 1930s and 1940s before the Communist regime was able to subdue them through a series of brutal measures.

As Dr. Imtiyaz and I have shown elsewhere in an academic paper, since the 1950s, successive Chinese political leaderships have systematically formulated policies and carefully implemented action plans to ensure the total de-empowerment of the Uyghurs in Xinjiang: politically, socially and economically. We have called such policies and actions as Hanification. The Hanification is primarily carried out in two folds: settlements and language.

The Chinese policy to settle the Han-Chinese in the Xinjiang region to alter the regional demography thrived well. The Han population “increased from nearly 300,000 in 1953 to nearly 6 million in 1990, in addition to more than one-half million demobilized soldiers in the Production and Construction Corps.” This increase was made possible “as a result of state-sponsored population transfers from other parts of China.” (Arienne M. Dwyer, The Xinjiang Conflict: Uyghur Identity, Language Policy, and Political Discourse)

A second massive Hanification in the form of systematic colonization took place in the 1990s soon after the collapse of the Soviet Empire. Mindful of the emergence of the Central Asian republics, the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) offered an attractive economic incentive program called the “Big Development of the Northwest” to the poor Han-Chinese to transfer them from the underdeveloped areas of the country. The CCP’s calculated attempts brought success. It brought between one and two million new Han-Chinese settlers to Xinjiang. Today, the Han–Chinese population makes up more than 40 percent of Xinjiang’s total population of 22 million, from what was only 6 percent in the early 1950s.

The CCP’s westward movement and economic development came together with a combination of massive subsidies, oil exploitation and rapid urbanization. But the Uyghurs were systematically denied opportunities to be a part of the rising program. The state’s policies worsened the economic condition of the native Uyghurs vis-a-vis the Han-Chinese settlers.

The language policy adopted since the 1950’s by the CCP denied the basic rights for Uyghurs to continue their education in their own language. Uyghurs were forced to continue education (from primary to university level) in what they consider a foreign language. During the Cultural Revolution period (1966-1977), the CCP shut the door for the Uyghurs to practice and develop their language, and vigorously institutionalized the standard Chinese, known as Putonghua among the Uyghurs. Since 1978 the CCP has been systematically promoting Putonghua (Mandarin Chinese) in the Xinjiang region. The instruction in Uyghur has been eliminated except in a handful of primary schools. For advance to college and university level, however, the students must take the tests in Mandarin.

The current trend in the Xinjiang region is the overwhelming dominance of the Chinese language at all levels of instruction. The policies of the CCP compel Uyghur parents to send their children to Chinese-language-only schools in the region. Some direct witnesses suggest that even when a Uyghur learns Mandarin and passes exams they are heavily discriminated in the job sector simply because of their distinctive Uyghur identity. Based on his trip to the region, James Palmer similarly noted in the Atlantic Magazine that local “dialects” are discouraged in the media and in education, and heavy accents turn many employers off. (September, 2013)

Mosques in Xinjiang are under constant surveillance and anyone frequenting the mosques, especially for religious teachings, is deemed an ‘extremist’, and thus, a ‘separatist.’ Contrary to government propaganda, many mosques remain locked and only a few are functional. The CCP also makes it mandatory for Muslim Imams to attend political education camps that are run by state authorities.

During the communist era, Muslim farmers were forced to raise pigs (which are considered filthy in Islam) in their farms. Even to this very day school children in many Chinese schools are taught that the reason that Muslims don’t eat pig is because their ancestors were pigs! Muslim children routinely face taunting from fellow Han students in such schools. University staffs routinely force Muslim students to break their fast and eat during the daytime of the month of Ramadan.

Uyghurs have viewed government measures as assaults on their religious practices and as part of a wider political agenda by the CCP, which is aimed at weakening the Uyghur control over the region.

Xinjiang has all the signs of a police state. Even the foreign journalists and human rights observers trying to operate in Xinjiang are not immune from constantly being followed by the security services, making it difficult to assess the situation on the ground. They are reminded that “the walls have ears” and that “no-one was allowed to talk out about what was going on” inside Xinjiang. (BBC News, March 3, 2014)

Furthermore, to strengthen the Hanification, the institutions controlled by the CCP strictly implemented China’s one-Child policy in the region. However, such one-child, family planning policy does not apply to any ethnic Han couple relocating to Xinjiang. (See, e.g., Sean Roberts, Understanding Ethnic Clashes in China, Washington Post, July, 2009) According to Dr. Paul George, an independent analyst specializing in issues of international security and development policy, “China’s strict one-child policy has been waived for Han Chinese willing to move to Xinjiang; they are allowed to have two children – a fringe benefit which encourages further immigration.” (Islamic Unrest in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, Commentary No. 73, CSIS, Spring, 1998)

Not surprisingly, such incentives have altered the demographic mix significantly diluting Uyghur population. In recent decades the Han-Uyghur ratio in the capital of Urumqi has shifted to 80:20 from what was 10:90 in 1953. With the growth of the bingtuan (Chinese for a military corps) towns, mushrooming all across Xinjiang, there is little doubt that the dilution policy started by Mao Tse Tung appears to be continuing unabated. According to Census figures the Han (Chinese) population grew by 32% in the 1990′s, compared to a growth of only 16% for the indigenous Muslims.

The bingtuan operates its own schools, hospitals and newspapers in Xinjiang. It has its own courts, police and prisons as well as a 120,000-strong militia force which is the reason for its military-sounding names. Many Uyghurs are resentful of such a large, economically powerful and politically autonomous entity in Xinjiang that employs so few of their own ethnic group. To make matters worse, the bingtuan partly justifies its existence by saying it is needed to maintain stability in Xinjiang, or more properly, for keeping Uyghurs quiet.

In recent decades while the GDP of Xinjiang has increased substantially, the vast majority of Uyghurs have no share in this economic prosperity further alienating them. Unemployment runs highest among them. They feel robbed and betrayed in their mineral-rich native land. Even their legitimate grievances continue to be met by deaf ears of the Han authorities further alienating them. Hanification naturally is creating an environment of distrust between the Uyghurs and the Han-Chinese settlers, while eroding Uyghur faith in the system.

The Uyghurs face routine discrimination in China, at a level that even State media has acknowledged and deplored. It is rare for hotels in central or east China to accept Uyghur guests; if their names or ID cards don’t give it away during the booking, they’re turned away without explanation or apology when they try to check in.

Beijing’s rigorous attempts to assimilate, and not integrate, the Uyghurs through a series of measures, which include suppression of religious freedom, hurting religious sensitivity, daily persecution and harassment, denying rights to assembly and practice of language and Islamic culture, widespread discrimination in education and job sectors, plus the systematic introduction of Han Chinese immigrants into the region to alter the demography have fomented deep-rooted anti-regime sentiment.

Taking advantage of President Bush’s so-called War on Terror after 9/11, the Chinese government is also guilty of practicing unprecedented repression and committing unfathomed violence against the unarmed Uyghurs further fueling resentment. The communal riots of 1997 and 2009 – in which many Uyghurs were killed, maimed, robbed and rendered homeless – were brutal, and set the stage for Uyghur-retaliation or reaction.

Even a minor protest against the Han authorities in occupied Xinjiang and Tibet is looked through the lens of ‘three evil forces’ of terrorism, separatism and extremism, so well-parroted by Mr. Hua. The Chinese official media are notorious for use of such seductive words to bemuse their already brainwashed Han citizens. However, such words, no matter how and bewitching, cannot evade government culpability and only plant more distrust and anger amongst the already demonized natives.

It is of little surprise that there have been sporadic uprisings against Chinese domination. Sadly, if history is any barometer to predict the future, the sad incident of Kunming Railway Station on March 1 won’t be the last one unless the Chinese government embarks on a fresh policy that brings a sense of belonging to the Uyghur people. They simply cannot be pushed to a corner and treated as an alien race in their own ancestral land. If Beijing fails to correct her failed policies, it won’t be too long when the Uyghur people play the Crimean card to decide their fate with much support from the international community that has refused to be duped by silly Chinese propaganda.

The Chinese attitude towards the occupied Xinjiang has been no different than those of the French in Algeria, the Russians in Chechnya and the Indians in Kashmir, and yet it refuses to concede the obvious. As Chinese economy grows so has her imperial ambition not just over already occupied territories of Xinjiang and Tibet but also over parts of India, Vietnam, and Japan, just to name few. Pointing out such parallels is not only taboo in China but is almost unthinkable. To a Han, “imperialism” and “colonialism” are things that happened to China, not things that China does. In so doing, it suffers from cognitive dissonance that the very name Xinjiang in Chinese means “New Frontiers.”

The post Whitewashing Beijing’s Repression In Xinjiang Won’t Do The Trick – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By PR Chari

One can only be bemused by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s exhortation while inaugurating a recent conference on nuclear disarmament that the need was to establish a global no-first-use convention relating to nuclear weapons. His relevant remarks are:
“More and more voices are speaking out today that the sole function of nuclear weapons, while they exist, should be to deter a nuclear attack. If all states possessing nuclear weapons recognise that this is so and are prepared to declare it, we can quickly move to the establishment of a global no-first-use norm. In many ways, this can open the way to gradual reductions and, finally, elimination through a Nuclear Weapons Convention. Such a Convention would require necessary verification measures. It would also require political measures to ensure that stability is maintained as the level of nuclear arsenals approaches zero.”

Why Manmohan Singh chose to make this radical declaration in the twilight days of the UPA government after its insouciance over the last ten years can only be speculated upon, especially when all bets are off about its returning to power after the forthcoming elections. It is also unfortunate that, shortly thereafter, two kiss-and-tell-all biographies published by former aides of Manmohan Singh have further dented his soiled image. Moreover, the historical record informs that India’s ‘no-first-use’ policy owes, not to the Congress and UPA, but to the BJP party and NDA government that took the decision to conduct the nuclear tests in May 1998. Shortly thereafter, the incumbent Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, declared that India would pursue a no-first-use policy in regard to employing nuclear weapons, which was later reaffirmed in a statement before Parliament in December 1998. This pledge was reiterated in the draft nuclear doctrine issued for public discussion in August 1999, and later incorporated into the decisions of the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) promulgated in January 2003.

This potted history of how India’s ‘no-first-use’ policy evolved clarifies that it was a BJP innovation; it was adopted by the Congress Party, which is now seeking its global remit. However, India’s pledge not to be the first to use nuclear weapons was severely qualified. It is thus unclear whether Manmohan Singh was promoting the Indian version or a ‘no-first-use’ pledge in its pristine purity. This conundrum needs an explanation.
• First, the CCS decision of January 2003 made clear that India would not use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapon states, which left open the question how India would respond if a nuclear weapon state positioned its nuclear weapons in a non-nuclear weapon state for and utilisation against India. Very conceivably, Afghanistan could host nuclear weapons belonging to China or Pakistan that could target India.
• Second, the CCS decision also mentions that “in the event of a major attack against India, or Indian forces anywhere, by biological or chemical weapons, India will retain the option of retaliating with nuclear weapons.” A host of problems arise here. How does one define ‘major’? Would a cross-border raid or air attack qualify? Would a Mumbai-type attack be considered ‘major’? Or, would ‘major’ only include a full-scale conventional attack employing all arms and services of the national armed forces? Does that rule out sub-conventional warfare and attacks by non-state actors which constitutes the present and imminent danger?
• Third, this problem gets more complex when applied to chemical and biological weapons, since the tricky question of forensics enters the equation. How can a nation ascertain with certainty the identity of the attacker, which could be either a non-state or state actor? Or, a non-state actor promoted by a state actor. Current happenings in Syria underline this dilemma of identifying the attacker.

To contextualise these issues is germane: How do China and Pakistan treat the ‘no-first-use’ issue? China declared its ‘no-first-use’ pledge immediately after conducting its first nuclear test in October 1964. But, it later excluded its own territories from the ambit of this declaration. The catch here is that China believes Taiwan and Arunachal Pradesh are parts of its territory, the implication being that, if the conflict extended into these ‘disputed’ territories, China was entitled to use nuclear weapons. Pakistan, of course, has never countenanced the ‘no-first-use’ doctrine urging that the weaker conventionally armed power has to rely on nuclear weapons to assure its security. Incidentally, the NATO powers had steadfastly abjured a ‘no-first-use’ declaration during the Cold War years, despite the Soviet Union making this pledge, on the premise that the Warsaw Pact powers possessed superior conventional forces that could overrun Europe. No doubt, this example also informs Pakistan’s decision to deploy tactical nuclear weapons in a battlefield mode to counter India’s Cold Start strategy.

Many loose ends must be tied up before proceeding with Manmohan Singh’s fervent plea to establish a global no-first-use convention. More thought would need to be bestowed by New Delhi’s next rulers to decide whether and how to review this ‘no-first-use’ pledge in the broader context of India’s nuclear doctrine that has remained unvisited since 2003.

PR Chari
Visiting Professor, IPCS

The post India And No First Use: The Doctrinal Conundrum – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Nicolas Birns and Juan E. De Castro

The death of Gabriel García Márquez, on April 17, 2014, of pneumonia, probably the consequence of his long struggle with lymphatic cancer, brought a period of Latin American and, perhaps, world literature to an end. García Márquez was best known for One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967), the work that popularized magical realism—a style characterized by the presentation of fantastic events as if they were ordinary. This novel told the story of the jungle backwater town of Macondo, ‘a village of twenty adobe houses’ and of several generations of the Buendia family, and was redolent of the bizarre, stagnating world in which the writer grew up, one which he loved despite all but which he saw desperately needed to change. He was also the author of other widely admired novels, like Chronicle of a Death Foretold (1981), a story of honor killing told with such intensity that we read on even though the outcome of the story is revealed at the beginning, and Love at the Time of Cholera (1985), a moving and dignified story of love regained in old age. Autumn of the Patriarch, (1975) was the ultimate ‘dictator novel’ which is both riveting and strangely horrifying, an elegy for a despicable state of political being. The General In His Labyrinth (1992) concerned Simón Bolivar, telling the story of his successful campaign to win independence for much of South America against the Spanish. This was a case of one of the greatest of Latin Americans writing about perhaps the greatest Latin American, and an enlightening overview on what historically, has gone both wrong and right with Latin America. Though García Márquez’s portrait of Bolivar was far from heroic, the novel’s warts-and-all presentation gave the most compelling representative of the Latin American independence movements in fiction. Lest one think García Márquez could only work on a large canvas, the novella Leaf Storm, also set in Macondo, has all its events transpire in one room. García Márquez was a master of the small as well as the large. His early work in journalism grounded him in reality, while his grasp of the novel’s potential for imaginative enlargement allowed him to create worlds of entrancing, mesmerizing, and sometimes horrifying characters, many of whom represented the tragic situation of a Latin America not yet freed from its burdens of history and domination. Though García Márquez’s writing contained elements of humor and satire, much of it was colored by a tragic if exuberant pessimism, as seen in the famous final line of One Hundred Years of Solitude, “because races condemned to one hundred years of solitude did not have a second opportunity on earth”.

García Márquez won nearly every prize of pertinence within the Spanish speaking world, was granted the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1982: “for his novels and short stories, in which the fantastic and the realistic are combined in a richly composed world of imagination, reflecting a continent’s life and conflicts.” Although, as evidenced by the Nobel Prize, his work was celebrated by critics and writers as among the most important of the twentieth century—with, perhaps, some exaggeration Pulitzer Prize winning novelist William Kennedy famously declared One Hundred Years of Solitude “the first piece of literature since the Book of Genesis that should be required reading for the entire human race”—it was also embraced by readers worldwide. Not only were his major novels bestsellers at the time of their first publication, but also both One Hundred Years of Solitude, in January 2004, and Love in the Time of Cholera, in October 2007, were included in Oprah’s Book Club. García Márquez, with his disciple Isabel Allende, were the only Latin Americans included in the American talk show host’s popular canon.

Gabriel García Márquez was perhaps the most successful high-literary writer of his era. Indeed, if one were to list writers who were most influential in the twentieth century, one would have to list his name alongside James Joyce, Franz Kafka, and T. S. Eliot as one of the four most influential writers of the twentieth century. Given that all the others were born in the late nineteenth century, one might say that, perhaps alongside Samuel Beckett, García Márquez is the only writer born in the twentieth century to have become a household name throughout the world. What is notable indeed is how global this influence has been, in other words hardly restricted to Latin America, where, in recent years, Jorge Luis Borges has become consecrated as the major canonical writer. Salman Rushdie, whose breakthrough book Midnight’s Children was nearly an overt homage to García Márquez, would never have had the career he did without García Márquez; nor would the Australian novelist Peter Carey. Many writers working in the last decades of the twentieth century wanted to use the innovative formal techniques of modernism but not to lose touch with living subject matter: place, people, and history. García Márquez’s techniques, particularly the way he told the story of a place over several generations, allowed writers of the century’s second half to give modernism a local habitation and a name. They also enabled a growing political relevance free of the reductive ideology of naturalism or socialist realism. Finally, even though García Márquez rarely employed fantasy outside his best-known novel, the success of One Hundred Years of Solitude opened the door for a wide spectrum of visions that sampled both reality and fantasy, and also encouraged the use of fantasy to depict situations, such as political oppression in Latin America, that seemed beyond the reach of conventional realism, yet urgently demanded imaginative attention.

García Márquez was born in Aracataca, a small town in the Magdalena department on the Colombian Caribbean coast in 1927. Although he enrolled as a law student, first at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Bogotá in 1948, and later, after it was closed due to the political violence, at the Universidad de Cartagena, his first profession was that of a journalist. Journalism would always be one of his main concerns. In 1984, he helped found the important Mexican center-left newspaper La Jornada and, in 1991, the Colombian TV news magazine program QAP, which ceased broadcasting in 1997.

His early work as a journalist, which included writing film reviews, also helped foster in him a passion for the movies. He even enrolled in 1955 at the Centro Experimentale de Cinematografía in Rome. In 1965, having moved to Mexico, he wrote, with fellow novelist Carlos Fuentes, the screenplay for El gallo de oro (The Golden Cockerel). Although he would write several more screenplays and have more than twenty of his novels and stories adapted into movies, his major contribution to the region’s film-life was his participation in the founding of the Escuela Internacional de Cine y Televisión in Cuba.

In the 1960s, he was a central figure of what came to be known as the Boom of the Latin American novel, together with the Argentine Julio Cortázar, the Mexican Fuentes, and the Peruvian Mario Vargas Llosa, himself the recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2010. While one can easily argue that there were important novelists writing before the 1960s—Alejo Carpentier published the proto-magical realist The Kingdom of this World in 1949, Juan Rulfo’s 1955 Pedro Páramo, a work that García Márquez claimed as a major influence on his best-known novel, José María Arguedas published Deep Rivers in 1958—the Boom brought the Latin American novel to the attention of what has been called “the world republic of letters.” In fact, the success of García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude frequently led readers and even some critics to mischaracterize the Boom as a whole as magical realism. However, magical realism was never the dominant narrative mode in the region. For instance, Vargas Llosa is a realist, Cortázar, an experimental writer, and Fuentes, though more of a maverick, only occasionally flirted with magical realism. Moreover, with the obvious exception of One Hundred Years of Solitude, García Márquez has mainly written works that are not primarily magical realist, including Chronicle of a Crime Foretold and Love in the Time of Cholera.

It is easy to forget in the midst of the current posthumous multitudinous commemoration of García Márquez’s life—his death is on the front page of newspapers throughout the world, President Juan Manuel Santos has declared him to be “the greatest Colombian of all time,” and he is mourned by figures as varied as Ian McEwan, Bollywood star Soha Ali Khan, and René Pérez of reggaetón group Calle 13—that one of the defining traits of Latin American narrative during the last twenty years has been the rejection of magical realism. For instance, Roberto Bolaño, unquestionably the most influential Latin American writer after the Boom, dared to criticize García Márquez and magical realism: “Who are the official inheritors of García Márquez? Isabel Allende, Laura Restrepo, Luis Sepúlveda, and others. Every day García Márquez seems to me to resemble more and more Santos Chocano or Lugones.” Bolaño, who was not beyond contradicting himself, would in other occasions, however, claim to admire the Colombian master, though never his disciples. For many younger Latin American writers magical realism became a cliché, more applicable to how outsiders imagined Latin America than to what the region actually was. One can add, in an ironic touch that reminds one of García Márquez best known novel, that his country’s Ministry of Tourism, Foreign Investment, and Export Promotion is currently promoting tourism to the country with the slogan “Colombia is Magical Realism.”

Nevertheless, one cannot avoid also seeing a connection between this rejection of magical realism and, to a much lesser degree, García Márquez and his work, with a generational repudiation of the Nobel Prize winner’s unapologetically traditional leftwing politics. The more neoliberalism in its various avatars became de rigeure, the less currency García Márquez’s vision exercised in the region. Unlike Vargas Llosa and Fuentes, who would distance themselves from the Cuban government in reaction to the “Padilla Affair”—the jailing of Cuban poet Heberto Padilla and some of his associates and their later freeing after confessing to their anti-revolutionary activities—García Márquez became a close-friend and confidant of Fidel Castro. One cannot underestimate the importance of the friendship with Castro in the life of García Márquez. . Even his move from his native Colombia to a Mexico that, at the time still under the rule of the old-style PRI, was friendlier to Cuba than most Latin American countries can be seen as an expression of this closeness. There was clearly something personal as well as political in their friendship: the two most famous Latin Americans of their time, who both came up the hard way Castro also got something out of the relationship, the allure of a kind of socialist cosmopolitanism which belied the reality of the Cuban regime’s often harsh and intolerant treatment of writers. [WA1] At a time when Latin American intellectuals saw the right-wing regimes of Augusto Pinochet in Chile and Jorge Rafael Videla in Argentina as far more menacing than Castro’s Cuba, García Márquez’s friendship with the Cuban leader did not hurt him. Nor did it impair his popularity with the US center-left; both president Bill Clinton and President Barack Obama have embraced García Márquez’s fiction in a way that positioned it as both imaginatively fruitful and ethically relevant. There was a bit of a sense that García Márquez’s enthusiasm for Castro was a justifiable anti-American acting out, explicable in terms of previous US arrogance in the region (particularly relevant to a Colombia that had lost Panama to US economic ambitions). Once world opinion shifted rightward in the 1980s, attitudes towards García Márquez’s embrace of Fidel became less tolerant. It may be symptomatic of the political changes that have taken place in the region that Mario Vargas Llosa, despite having become the best-known Latin American advocate for free market, is seen by many younger writers as an example if not a mentor, while García Márquez had long before he died become a classic rather than a living influence. (One must also note that García Márquez’s health problems that began with his cancer diagnosis in 1999, and which necessarily led to the diminution of his public activity, also played a role in his loss of influence among younger writers).

García Márquez made Latin America visible to the world. When he first started publishing, Latin America was a backwater, the world’s seemingly least interesting and pertinent region. The Cuban revolution garnered Latin America headlines. But it was the fiction of García Márquez that made the world realize Latin America could produce figures of world cultural eminence and that the stories of the region were worth being told and had talented writers to tell them. Any Latin American writer or artist who has attained world success since the publication of One Hundred Years of Solitude owes a good deal of their visibility to García Márquez, as well as does the very possibility of the wide scale study of Latin American literature in the US academy.

García Márquez’s status as a classic is indisputable and his impact in Latin American and world literature undeniable. While he has had direct Latin American disciples, such as Chilean novelist Allende and Mexican Laura Esquivel, who in different ways rewrite One Hundred Years of Solitude in a female clef, and the late Peruvian Manuel Scorza, who radicalized the politics of magical realism as he fused it with indigenismo, it is internationally that his influence has been greater and less problematical. For many U.S. Latino and Latina writers, including Sandra Cisneros, Rudolfo Anaya, Helena María Viramontes, or Cristina García, magical realism has become a marker of identity. Internationally renowned novelists Rushdie, Toni Morrison, Ben Okri, and Edwidge Danticat have acknowledged the importance of his influence on their development as authors. García Márquez’s ability to mix reality and fantasy helped bring a viable postmodernism into the British novel in the works of Graham Swift and Julian Barnes, and helped sanction the imbrications of fantasy and the large-scale American social novel in writers like Jeffrey Eugenides, Michael Chabon, and Jonathan Lethem, and also affected the fiction of women writers such as Joyce Carol Oates and Toni Morrison, who as with García Márquez was powerfully influenced by Faulkner, another writer of experimental technique and uneven social development. Many ‘Third World’ novelists, such as the Nigerian, Ben Okri, and the Ghanaian, Kojo Laing, were influenced by García Márquez…the list can go on forever. García Mârquez became a model for any writer from a particular region that had been affected or afflicted by uneven development, that seemed to lag behind the advanced West. It is this association of novelistic technique with uneven social development that has made the example of the Colombian writer relevant even to writers depicting out-of-the-way regions of First World countries like the US, much less Ghana, Nigeria, and India.

Perhaps it is best to end this brief overview of García Márquez’s brilliant literary career with a brief quotation from the Colombian writer’s Nobel address: “The Solitude of Latin America.” One of the most eloquent pieces of writing he ever penned, it expresses with passion and precision the utopian desire that informed all of his writing: “We, the inventors of tales . . . feel entitled to believe that it is not yet too late to engage in the creation of [a] . . . new and sweeping utopia of life, where no one will be able to decide for others how they die, where love will prove true and happiness be possible, and where the races condemned to one hundred years of solitude will have, at last and forever, a second opportunity on earth.”

Nicolas Birns, Senior Research Fellow and Juan E. De Castro, Guest Scholar

Both De Castro and Birns teach at Eugene Lang College, the new School for Liberal Arts, in New York City. With Will H. Corral, they recently co-edited The Contemporary Spanish American Novel (Bloomsbury). All rights remain with the authors

The post Gabriel García Márquez: Giving Life To A Continent’s Imagination – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By P.K. Abdul Ghafour

Health Minister Dr. Abdullah Al-Rabeeah has been relieved of his post and Labor Minister Adel Fakeih has been named acting health minister, a Royal Decree said on Monday.

“Dr. Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al-Rabeeah has been relieved of his position as health minister and named adviser at the Royal Court with the rank of a minister,” said the decree issued by Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah.

“Adel bin Mohammed Fakeih has been advised to do the job of health minister in addition to his current job as labor minister,” the decree added.

No reasons have been given for the removal of Al-Rabeeah, but some Saudi bloggers indicated that it might be in response to complaints made by citizens, especially after the rising cases of MERS.

The toll rose to 78 on Monday with the death of three more patients in Jeddah, Najran and Madinah, the Health Ministry said, adding that the virus has infected 244 people.

The Cabinet, however, expressed satisfaction over the ministry’s efforts to control the deadly virus in coordination with WHO and other specialized international bodies.

Dr. Khaled Mirghalani, spokesman of the ministry, emphasized the Kingdom’s ability to deal with infectious diseases during the Haj and Umrah seasons. “We have got accumulated experience and we have taken all precautions to control the virus,” he told Arab News.

Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi political analyst and general manager of Al-Arab news channel, said: “We don’t know the exact reason for Dr. Al-Rabeeah’s removal. It may be the increasing number of MERS deaths or his failure to carry out some hospital projects.”

Praising Al-Rabeeah’s efforts to introduce a health insurance scheme for Saudis, Khashoggi told Arab News: “Handling the Health Ministry is one of the toughest jobs in Saudi Arabia. Many ministers have lost their jobs in the past.”

Stressing the need to expand private health services, he said: “Al-Rabeeah prepared the scheme but could not implement it. I hope the new minister would focus on this scheme.”

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US Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs, Victoria Nuland, in an interview with CNN confirmed that Washington has allocated 5 billion “to support the aspirations of the people of Ukraine to a stronger, democratic government.”

Earlier media has published video performances of Nuland at a conference on Ukraine, which was held in Washington in December last year. During her speech, Nuland said the US invested five billion dollars to support democracy in Ukraine since the collapse of the USSR.

Later Russian presidential advisor Sergei Glazyev said that developments in Ukraine were largely provoked by the United States and other NATO members. He also mentioned information that was presented by Nuland regarding the multibillion-dollar aid.

In an interview with CNN, excerpts of which were published on the channel’s website, Nuland nevertheless recognized that the United States allocated five billion to support democracy in Ukraine.

“This money has been spent to support the desire of the people of Ukraine to a stronger, democratic government that represents their interests,” said Nuland. But she stressed that the US “did not spend money to support the Maidan.” According to her, it was a “spontaneous movement”.

In Ukraine, on February 22 a change of government took place, which had signs of a coup. Verkhovna Rada has ousted President Viktor Yanukovych from power, changed the constitution and appointed a presidential election on May 25. Moscow doubts the legitimacy of the Rada’s decisions. Federation Council gave the right to President Vladimir Putin to use the Russian armed forces in Ukraine to normalize the political situation in that country. The Russian Foreign Ministry explained that the consent of the Federation Council does not mean that this right will be quickly implemented.

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Yulia Tymoshenko, leader of the Baktivshchyna Party and candidate for the Ukrainian presidency, has cancelled her visit to the United States after congressmen refused to meet her, local media outlets have reported Monday, ITAR-TASS informs.

They say the trip was scheduled April 23, however Tymoshenko, once prime minister of Ukraine, has herself cancelled it in the long run, after none of the high-ranking politicians in Washington had confirmed readiness to meet with her.

According to some media reports, the congressmen who Tymoshenko and her representatives had contacted, implied that she should not be running for a president, ITAR-TASS points.

Last week, Tymoshenko appealed to the US Congress for military support to Ukraine. She said that the country needed “comprehensive assistance, including military-technical aid that would include air defense and anti-tank munitions, as well as assistance in the training of military personnel”.

The post Tymoshenko Cancels US Visit After Congressmen Refuse To Meet Her appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Linda S. Heard

You have to hand it to the Lebanese they’re arguably the world’s greatest survivors. This tiny Mediterranean country has battled against all odds for decades — sectarian conflict, invasions, war with Israel, assassinations, a refugee influx — but, somewhat mysteriously, succeeds in carrying on regardless.

The Lebanese people are stoic faced with adversity; they shrug off problems that would traumatize others and often bury their fears in favor of living for today. I’ll never forget the laid-back attitude of my landlord in Beirut to an explosion in the apartment block next door. While my heart was pounding, he leisurely emerged from his apartment clad in a silk robe and leather slippers puffing on a cigar. “Calm down,” he said. “My building has stood tall for 150 years and it’ll still be here when we’re gone.”

However, the Lebanese need more than courage and bravado to withstand current pressures. They’ve been successful in pulling back from the brink of disaster on multiple occasions but nothing is forever. Put simply, Lebanon needs advice, major reform and material assistance from its friends, now more than ever.

A major roadblock is the absence of political consensus, which won’t be solved in the foreseeable future because the two major political blocks — the Hezbollah-dominated March 8th and the Hariri-led March 14th Alliance — hold widely divergent world views and are at odds over Hezbollah’s decision to send fighters to Syria to face-off against anti-Assad opposition forces. The country muddled along for 10 months without a functioning Parliament or government until “a Cabinet of national interest,” bringing together the two sides in an uneasy truce, was born in February.

But with President Michel Sleiman’s term ending, Parliament will conduct a presidential election on Wednesday, in which candidates must be Maronite Christians according to the country’s outdated confessional system. The result could either elicit a storm of protest or produce a stalemate resulting in yet another power vacuum.

The frontrunner is former warlord Samir Geagea now head of the Armed Forces, who’s a forthright critic of Hezbollah and has long pressed the Shiite organization to disarm. On Friday, the March 8th bloc announced it would only rubber-stamp a candidate that supports the resistance. The sole potential candidate fitting that bill is the equally controversial Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun who signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Hezbollah in 2006.

It’s rumored that Amine Gemayel, who served as president from 1982 to 1988 is poised to step forward. If so, he could be a compromise candidate accepted by all sides; otherwise, it’s exceedingly unlikely that any presidential hopeful can garner the mandatory two-thirds of parliamentary votes. What stands out to an interested onlooker is the fact that the political scene is still dominated by the same old faces and dynasties and is bereft of new strategies and fresh ideas.

Whoever rides in to power on the ballot, he would need a miracle to solve the country’s problems not least the economy, which is crippled by public debt and a growing fiscal deficit. Tourism and investment from Gulf states has dwindled mostly due to Hezbollah’s involvement in Syria but also because of sporadic bombings, civil unrest and strikes by employees seeking higher wages.

But Lebanon’s most pressing problem is without doubt the huge numbers of Syrian refugees fleeing across the border. Over one million are registered with the UN but there are thought to many more fending for themselves and those are beginning to be resented by local people for taking Lebanese jobs. With an additional 500,000 expected to flock-in before the year’s end, the Acting UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in country has appealed to the international community to help “bear the brunt of the pressure on Lebanon.” Some prominent Lebanese politicians are advocating the repatriation of refugees to “safe” areas of Syria. That might sound harsh but it’s understandable that the Lebanese, who’ve provided refuge to 500,000 Palestinians for many decades, are feeling swamped.

Lebanon will crack at the seams unless it implements necessary political/fiscal reforms and receives global financial assistance to smooth the way ahead. That said those measures are merely a band aid to stop the bleeding. Unless and until the Lebanese come together with one voice and put sectarian differences aside to shun meddling foreign entities it will never be more than a proxy plaything for geopolitical gamers.

Email: Sierra12th@yahoo.co.uk

The post No End To Lebanon’s Woes – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

A united system of naval bases for ships and next-generation submarines will be created in the Arctic to defend Russia’s interests in the region, President Vladimir Putin said.

He urged the government to provide full state funding for the socio-economic development of the Russian Arctic through 2017-20.

Putin said that a separate state agency should be created to implement Russian policy in the Arctic and to improve the quality of governance and decision-making in this area.

“We do not need a bulky bureaucratic body, but a flexible operational structure, which will help better coordinate the activities of ministries and departments, regions and businesses,” he said.

At a Russian Security Council meeting Tuesday, the president said that suggested “strengthening of the naval component of the Federal Security Service (FSB) border guard group.”

“At the same time, we should strengthen the military infrastructure. Specifically, I’m referring to the creation of a united system of naval bases for ships and next-generation submarines in our part of the Arctic,” he added.

Putin emphasized that even the smallest aspects of the integrated security system in the Russian Arctic needed attention.

“All security issues should be thoroughly worked out during multiagency exercises and training sessions, in which the units of the Defense Ministry, Emergencies Ministry and other structures should take part on a regular basis,” Putin said.

“Russian oil and gas production facilities, loading terminals and pipelines in the Arctic must be protected from terrorists and other potential threats,” he added.

“It makes sense to create a body similar in status to the state commission with broad authority, as it was previously done for the Russian Far East,” the president said, adding that he would await specific proposals from the government.

The president urged Russian experts to “be active in bilateral and multilateral consultations with governments of the Arctic states and assert every piece of the continental shelf of the Russian Arctic marine areas.”

Putin said that Russia is already successful in this field, as the country managed to come up with a strong argument to prove its indisputable right to a piece of land in the Sea of Okhotsk.

During the 33rd session of the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf in March, Russia staked a claim for the area of “52,000 square kilometers in Sea of Okhotsk, which is a continuation of Russia’s continental shelf,” he said.

The problem of establishing the international legal border of the Russian continental shelf in the Arctic Ocean requires urgent and careful attention, the president said.

Putin said that the construction of new nuclear and diesel icebreakers should be accelerated to develop an effective economic model for the Northern Sea Route.

“The turnover of the Northern Sea Route must be at 4 million tons by 2015,” he said.

The president urged the speedy completion of modern navigation infrastructure, communications, technical services and emergency care to be established along the Northern Sea Route – from Russia’s Far East to Murmansk on the Barents Sea.

“We need to make sure that it would be profitable and convenient for shipping companies to operate under the Russian flag, so that the majority of transport in the Arctic would be carried out by vessels under our jurisdiction,” he stressed.

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Ukraine has become a cauldron of dissimulation and provocation. Pro-Russian and pro-coup agitators are engaging in an open brawl, nudged by respective supporters and factions from East to West. The recent annexation of Crimea has but the authorities in Kiev on guard – what next? Certainly, anti-government forces seemed to be gaining the upper hand, seizing control of official facilities and buildings in Donetsk. The Crimean copybook was being pursued.

In an effort to stave of Putin’s next extensive chess move, four-party (US-EU-Ukraine-Russia) talks in Geneva were held. On April 17, a somewhat ill-formed US Secretary of State, John Kerry, decided to turn the tables on the pro-Russian protesters in Donetsk. The anti-coup protesters operating in the east of Ukraine were the only authentic neo-Nazis in the nationalist melee. Those in the pro-coup camp were, well, so inconsequential to Kerry as to not worth mentioning.

His source of inspiration was a rather odious flier that had been circulating, one suggesting that Jews register for a cost “on pain of deportation”, bearing striking similarity to German leaflets distributed during 1942-1944. The document, purportedly printed by the People’s Republic of Donetsk, directed all Jews over the age of 16 to pay a fee of $US50 and register with the newly installed authorities or face the prospect of expulsion or loss of citizenship.

For Kerry, “this was not just intolerable; it’s grotesque. It is beyond unacceptable. And any of the people who engage in these kinds of activities , from whatever party or whatever ideology or whatever place they crawl out of, there is no place for that. And unanimously, every party today joined in this condemnation of that kind of behaviour.”

Such a tense situation was bound to spawn a few propaganda nasties, an incarnation being Kerry’s cited example. There was only one crucial problem: it was a fraud. A range of sources immediately called the leaflets out. Israel’s Haaretz noted that the signature of the pro-Russian separatist leader in Donetsk was of similar quality. As Denis Pushlin, head of the self-proclaimed People’s Republic of Donetsk sought to clarify, “Some idiots yesterday were giving out these fliers in targeted areas” (Haaretz, Apr 18). Little surprise that those areas were, in the main, synagogues.

The US Anti-Defamation League had little time for the fliers. They were “sceptical about the authenticity”. Julia Ioffe of the New Republic (Apr 17) could only observe that Kerry had been had. From the snapshot of one of the fliers taken by a passerby, to its dissemination in Israel, to its embrace by Kerry after a social media storm – the sirens of mindless publicity had nabbed the Secretary of State with effortlessness. There was little prospect of “Holocaust 2.0 just yet.”

Donetsk Jewish community representatives only found room to see the documents as an attempt to stoke the fires. According to Fyodr Lukyanov, editor of Russia and Global Affairs, “It’s an obvious provocation designed to get this exact response, going al the way up to Kerry.”

Similar efforts have been made in other parts of the east. According to Ioffe, these have spluttered largely because of firmness of purpose from individuals such as Dnepropetrovsk’s regional governor, Ihor Kolomoisky.

None of this suggests the purity of motives, or a monopoly of anti-Semitism. Behind an extreme fraud, ill-lit truths can be found. Such fliers suggest what might be happening with anti-Maidan alternative, a set that is not all that attractive either. Many of the agitators would happily find mirrors in the opponents they wish to repel.

It also notable that Russian politics, and its followers within Moscow’s tetchy “sphere of influence” are far from immune in terms of playing the oversized race card. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s cultivation of ultra-nationalism in the form of groups such as Nashi (“ours”), a youth movement given over to the ceremonial of camping ritual and embodying rallies, doesn’t leave much room for other groups to cosy up to them. It’s all of us against the rest of them.

It is also clear that Putin has made a conscious move in shifting the ethnic slant of late, using the Crimean annexation as a turning point. The term Rossisskii, an all-encompassing term that would include other ethnicities, be they Ukrainian, Tatar or Chechen, was omitted from his address to both houses of Parliament in March. “Crimea is primordial ‘Russkaya’ land, and Sevastopol is a ‘Russkii’ city.” As for Kiev, it was the “mother of ‘Russkie’ cities” (Washington Post, Mar 18).

Lukyanov’s words tend to be a sober point of reference in the tormented sea. “I have no doubt that there is a sizeable community of anti-Semites on both sides of the barricades, but for one of them to do something this stupid [releasing the fliers] – this is done to compromise the pro-Russian groups in the east.”

Nationalism is a terrible toxin, and one that can overdose the political body. Authorities tend to be careful with administering it – hate can go a long way, in small doses. Kerry seems oblivious to the process, and negotiated in Geneva with vast, self-imposed blinkers. Having called on pro-Russian groups to disarm, he has celebrated the use of military elements by Ukraine’s coup government against unruly forces. He might well have detected that nationalism is at issue – but it is a savage sword that cuts both ways.

The post John Kerry’s Self-Deception – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Jordan has summoned the Israeli ambassador to Amman to protest against a recent attack on Palestinian worshippers at the al Aqsa Mosque compound in East al-Quds (Jerusalem).

The Jordanian Foreign Ministry on Monday condemned “radical Israeli attempts” to break into the mosque under the protection of Israeli forces and the arrest of worshippers at the holy site, the state-run Petra news agency reported.

The Jordanian ministry also called on Daniel Nevo to convey the country’s protest and rejection of Israel’s treatment of Palestinian worshipers.

Jordan also urged an end to the violence and warned that such Israeli attacks are “violation” of international agreements.

Witnesses said Israeli troops on April 20 used tear gas and sound bombs to disperse the worshippers in the mosque’s compound. Sixteen people were also arrested.

The latest clashes erupted when a group of extremist Israeli settlers along with a Knesset (Israeli parliament) member entered the holy site. The move triggered clashes with Israeli troops raiding the compound to protect the settlers.

The new skirmishes came amid reports that Israeli officials have unveiled the model of a Jewish temple to be constructed near the compound that reportedly has a big hall and can accommodate hundreds of visitors each day.

The Al-Aqsa Foundation for Endowment and Heritage says the move is a direct threat to the mosque.

The mosque compound, known to Jews as the Temple Mount, is Islam’s third-holiest site after Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia.

Original article

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By Cheryl Pellerin

President Barack Obama will begin his fifth visit to the Asia-Pacific region April 23 — a six-day trip that includes stops in Japan, South Korea, Malaysia and the Philippines — to underscore his administration’s continued focus on the world’s largest emerging region.

Ben Rhodes, deputy national security advisor for strategic communications, announced the trip April 18, noting that the president had to postpone planned visits to Malaysia and the Philippines last year during the Oct. 1-16 government shutdown.

National Security Advisor Susan Rice joined Rhodes for the announcement.

“Over the next five years, nearly half of all growth outside the United States is expected to come from Asia,” Rice said.

The region includes several important U.S. allies, developing democracies and emerging powers, she added, “so we increasingly see our top priorities as tied to Asia, whether it’s accessing new markets or promoting exports, or protecting our security interests and promoting our core values.”

Japan, Korea, Malaysia and the Philippines intersect with the administration’s priorities, Rice said, which include modernizing alliances, supporting democratic development, advancing the Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, and commercial ties, investing in regional institutions such as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN, and deepening cultural and people-to-people exchanges.

The TPP is a proposed trade agreement under negotiation by Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States and Vietnam. The agreement seeks to enhance trade and investment among TPP partner countries; promote innovation, economic growth and development; and support job creation and retention.

“Expanding American trade and investment links with Asia is also fundamental to our efforts to access new markets, create American jobs [and] export more goods from here in the United States to that very important region,” Rice said. “Throughout the trip, the president will … meet with business leaders and promote initiatives like SelectUSA that support investment in the United States.”

SelectUSA seeks to highlight advantages the United States offers as a location for business and investment.

“The TPP is a focal point of our effort to establish high standards for trade across the Asia Pacific and ensure a level playing field for U.S. businesses and workers,” Rice added.

In visiting Japan and Malaysia, two of the 12 key TPP partners, she said, the president will have a chance to continue to make progress on the agreement.

The trip also will give the United States a chance to affirm its commitment to a rules-based order in the region, the national security adviser said, at a time of ongoing regional tensions, particularly with regard to North Korea and territorial disputes.

“There’s a significant demand for U.S. leadership in the region, and our strategy of rebalancing to Asia includes economic, political, security and cultural interests in Northeast and Southeast Asia,” Rice noted.

“No other nation … has a network of alliances and partnerships in Asia that match ours,” she said, “and our alliances remain the foundation of our strategy.”

The United States is focused on modernizing these alliances to make them more relevant to the 21st century and to security challenges, while building them into platforms for cooperation on regional and global challenges, the national security advisor added.

Modernizing alliances also was a focus of Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel’s April 1-10 visit to the Asia-Pacific region, his fourth in less than 12 months.

Hagel began the trip with in Hawaii for a meeting that he initiated and hosted with defense ministers of the 10 member countries of ASEAN — Burma, Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

Hagel had invited them to Hawaii during the previous year’s Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, and it was the first ASEAN defense ministers meeting held on American soil.

During the meeting, the ministers met Rajiv Shah, administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, and Kathryn Sullivan, administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NOAA, part of the Commerce Department, has a new building in Honolulu, and its Pacific Tsunami Warning Center’s 24/7 operational team and other experts there deliver tsunami warnings for every country in the Pacific and the Caribbean.

As Hagel’s military aircraft had flown over the Pacific Ocean toward Hawaii the previous afternoon, in fact, an 8.2 magnitude earthquake had struck the coast of northern Chile, killing five people and prompting tsunami advisories by the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center as far away as Hawaii.

By the time Hagel and the ministers were briefed at the NOAA center about typhoons, tsunamis and sea-level rise, the advisories had been cancelled.

Charles McCreery, the center’s director, showed Hagel and the ministers a simulation of the March 2011 magnitude 9.0 earthquake near the east coast of Honshu, Japan, and the resulting tsunami that killed nearly 16,000 people and injured more than 6,000, according to Japan’s National Police Agency.

Afterward, Hagel, Shah, Sullivan, the ministers, Navy Adm. Samuel J. Locklear III, commander of U.S. Pacific Command, and others participated in a roundtable discussion on disaster preparedness and relief.

According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the Asia-Pacific region is hit by more than 70 percent of the world’s natural disasters. In his remarks before the roundtable, Shah praised Hagel’s vision of using the ASEAN Defense Forum to build greater cooperation across the range of issues that bring the region together as a community.

Broadly, the ministers also focused on military-to-military relationships and joint exercises that secure and stabilize the region, Hagel said at the meeting, assuring that all nations have commercial options, and on regional security issues.

As the forum ended, Hagel said success during the first U.S.-ASEAN Defense Forum held in the United States had strengthened friendships among nations and increased partnership opportunities that will help everyone in the region deal with new and enduring Asia-Pacific security challenges.

After his stop in Hawaii, Hagel also visited defense and government leaders in Japan, China and Mongolia.

In the White House briefing on Obama’s upcoming trip, Rice said that given its rapid economic growth and political clout, Southeast Asia has been another cornerstone of the administration’s strategy.

“And the president’s historic visit to Malaysia, the first since Lyndon Baines Johnson [visited in 1966], as well as to the Philippines, will advance our engagement with this critical region,” Rice added.

During the trip, she said, the president will reaffirm the United States’ steadfast commitment to allies and partners who allow the nation to deter threats and respond to disasters, and “he will build on the progress of his recent trilateral meeting with Japan and Korea in The Hague as we seek to advance trilateral defense cooperation more broadly.”

The president also will reaffirm the U.S. commitment to peaceful resolution of maritime and territorial disputes consistent with international law, and underscore the U.S. commitment to help in responses to humanitarian and other disasters, Rice added.

“Our Asian partners frequently look to the United States as a partner of first choice, given our significant and unique capabilities, and our technical expertise,” she said. “And indeed, in each of the countries we will be visiting, we have seen in the last few years tragedies of the sort that have been exceedingly taxing and traumatic for the people of those countries.”

In each instance, she added, the United States has been able to lend prompt and effective support to its friends and partners in support of their response.

“We have demonstrated throughout — whether from the Japan earthquake in 2011, the 2013 typhoon in the Philippines, the Malaysian Air flight 370 tragedy, and now the ferry disaster in South Korea — that we are there for our friends and partners when they need us most.”

The post Obama To Begin Fifth Trip To Asia-Pacific Region appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Dibya Shikha

The High Court of Bangladesh declared the Jamaat-e-Islami in Bangladesh as illegal in August 2013 on the grounds that the party’s charter was against the secular provision of the 1972 constitution. The election commission did not allow the party to contest the tenth general elections held in January 2014.

Earlier, one of the main agendas of the Shahbagh movement was to push through the demand to hang the leaders who were actively involved in war crimes in the 1971 Bangladesh liberation struggle and ban Islamic parties such as the Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) who sided with the Pakistani army and opposed the formation of the nation. However, less than two months after the national elections, when the nationwide Upzila or sub-district elections took place, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and JI contested and performed exceptionally well. These results have challenged the umbrella view that the JI is a hated organisation across Bangladesh. The Liberation War Affairs Minister AKM Mozammel Haque said that the JI may be banned in June 2014. Where does the JI stand in Bangladesh today? And where would it go from here?

Where Does JI Stand?

JI has always been on the wrong side of history in Bangladesh. During the Liberation War of 1971, the party worked hand-in-hand with the Pakistani army, and the provisional government of Bangladesh banned the JI in 1972. Now, the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) has convicted its leaders as propagators of crimes against humanity. As a result, the JI may be banned.

The last few years have been difficult for the party: the top leadership is in jail for alleged war crimes and the second rung of the leadership is in jail for opposing the war crime trails. Hence, the party is basically run by leaders of the third and fourth generations. There is significant internal debate within the JI on the limitations, in the current context, of a strategy that originated with Prof Ghulam Azam.

One section, which is led by the business wing of party (with strong financial connections to Gulf countries), wants to modify the party on the lines of the Turkish Justice and Development Party (AKP). But the other section, led by former Chhatra Shibir members, wants to take direct action. This group was mainly responsible for the coordinated violence across Dhaka and other cities during the Shahbagh uprising.

Upzila Elections: An Opportunity for the JI?

JI won substantial seats in the fourth Upzila elections – the son of condemned war crime convict Delwar Hussain Sayedee was elected as chairperson of the Ziangar Upzila.

What prompted the people to vote for the JI despite their alleged involvement in war crimes? Is an Islamic identity slowly overpowering the secularist democratic ethos of Bangladesh?

Though JI claims to be a ‘moderate force’ working for peace, their main agenda is to establish an Islamic state. In both Pakistan and Bangladesh, the main strategy of the JI has been ‘infiltration’: keeping faithful people in important state positions, gaining a stronghold in non-State sectors, and trying to capture power at the right time.

To gain legitimacy and popular support, the JI has tried to make strategic alliances with the BNP and AL (Awami League) at different points in time. Activists of its student wing, Islami Jamiat-e-Talaba (IJT) andIslami Chhatra Sangha (ICS) have embedded themselves in universities and colleges and established a strong base for radical politics.

Analysts suggest that the reason behind JI’s strong performance is more due to its grassroots organisational capacity rather than disorganisation and dissent within its arch-rival, AL. The importance of JI is often underestimated on the grounds that they do not have much of a hold in electoral politics. However, the kind of influence JI has over Bangladeshi society resurfaced when they succeeded in garnering support in Upzila elections.

Jamaat-e-Islami: The Way Forward

Since religion is important part of the sociological and political life of South Asia, JI will continue to play an important role in Bangladeshi politics. By distinguishing themselves from radical Islamic groups, the JI already has the sympathy of Western governments, policy-makers and analysts who are in dire need of ‘progressive’ Islamic groups in Muslim countries.

The main strength of JI lies in a well-organised political structure, committed cadres and supporters, and an image of being incorruptible, which is lacking in almost every other political party in Bangladesh.

The AL decision to ban JI will depend on their assessment of whether secular youth would be able to overwhelm the conservative politics of Islamic groups and how much rural/conservative support AL is ready to lose. Furthermore, JI has a strong back-up of professionals such as doctors and engineers and AL would not like to make them hostile by banning JI.

During the recently held Upzila elections, relations between the BNP and JI became strained over seat-sharing issues. Hence, it will also be interesting to see how the BNP reacts to the banning of its alliance partner in the changing political dynamics of Bangladesh.

The second session of Jatiya Sangsad, which may begin at the end of May 2014, is likely to decide the future of the JI.

Dibya Shikha
Research Intern, IPCS
Email: dibyagolden20@gmail.com

The post Jamaat-e-Islami In Bangaldesh: Where To From Here? – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Ayesha Khanyari

Iran and Russia are negotiating an oil-for-goods agreement worth US$1.5 billion a month that would see Iran export oil to Russia in exchange for unspecified goods and equipment from Moscow. The deal would further enable Iran to raise oil exports substantially, undermining Western sanctions that helped persuade Tehran in November 2013 to agree to a preliminary deal to curb its nuclear programme in exchange for temporary and modest sanctions relief.

It is not surprising that the US government has been quick in criticising Russia for trying to seal an oil-for-goods agreement with Iran. If the deal materialises, it would raise serious concerns as it defies the terms of the P5+1 agreement with Iran. It could possibly trigger fresh US sanctions.

Though the oil-for-goods agreement has been rumoured for months, new reports highlighting positive developments towards the finalisation of the deal have emerged. These developments came as tensions between Russia and the West flared up after the US and the European Union enacted a series of sanctions targeting Moscow, in response to the Crimean crisis. By negotiating this agreement publicly, both Russia and Iran are sending a message to the Obama administration.

Iran’s Objectives

First, periodic reports have emerged ever since Hassan Rouhani’s election, discussing the possibility of Moscow’s interest in building new nuclear plants inside Iran – there have been negotiations over four new nuclear plants. While there has been no confirmation about the oil deal from either side, it is likely that the oil exports would be able to finance the new nuclear plants in Iran.

Second, the barter agreement could pave the way for Iran to gain access to the highly advanced Russian weapons industry, which Tehran has always been interested in. The trade deal has also sparked concerns that Russia will import sanctioned military hardware, capable of violating the terms of the interim nuclear deal signed by Iran. Iran could benefit from the transfer of items of significant value to Iran’s military and nuclear programme.

Third, the deal would ease the pressure on Iran’s battered energy sector and further help restore Iran’s links with Russia. It will ease economic pressure and benefit the Iranian economy.

Finally, it is not clear whether the deal would be implemented before the finalisation of a nuclear agreement between Iran and the six world powers by July 2014. The agreement could act as a positive motivator for Iran. The deal could be used to pressurise the US in the talks, particularly amid reports that the Senate is nearing agreement on a bill that would call for new sanctions on Iran.

Russian Motivations

Russia is willing to expand its market and shift towards the Asian countries so that it becomes less dependent on Germany and the EU, is hence looking for options in countries like Iran and China.

Russia has not imposed sanctions on Iran, unlike the US and the EU. Although it is involved in the nuclear negotiations with Iran along with the other five nations, the fact is that Russia is least concerned about the prospects of a nuclear or non-nuclear Iran.

In the latest round on the nuclear negotiations in Vienna, Russia and the US worked together, unaffected by the unfolding events in Ukraine. However it would be wishful thinking to assume that Russia will continue to cooperate and not square accounts despite the tensions building up between Russia and the West. If cornered, Russia will be tempted to use all levers at its disposal to retaliate against the penalties imposed by the West.

Apart from the barter agreement between Iran and Russia, Moscow could also go ahead and resume transactions with entities in Tehran. Trade routes which were opposed by the US could also be revived.

Will the Deal Go Through?

While Russia and Iran might strategise to gain leverage with the US, their ability to cooperate against it is limited. There are grim chances of this deal translating into a long-term relationship between Russia and Iran; each would gladly give up its commitment towards the other in exchange for concessions from the US.

Iran will also be mindful of whether or not to meddle in the east-west tensions. Iran has maintained a cautious stand in its reaction to the Crimean crisis. Moreover, the decrease in the dependence on Russian oil and gas opens a window of opportunity for Iran as an alternative energy exporter for EU nations.

Also, both Iran and Russia are oil exporters and producers and thus rivals in the market, which will make it difficult for the two countries to come closer. It is harder to strike a deal with a fuel exporter like Russia than importer like China. Hence it will be a tough deal to seal.

Hassan Rouhani does not want to reverse the inroads and risk his country going back into deep isolation. Despite the benefits in the short-run of rekindling ties with Russia, Iran’s main objective is to fix its economy with the help of Western finance, investment and technology, not tie it to a faltering Russian economy burdened with its own set of sanctions.

Ayesha Khanyari
Research Assistant, IPCS
Email: ayesha.khanyari@gmail.com

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Rosneft President, Chairman of the Management Board Igor Sechin and Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Mozambique Oldemiro Julio Marques Baloi held a working meeting Tuesday in Moscow.

The parties discussed a wide range of issues, including possible involvement of Rosneft in production projects in Mozambique.

In 2010-2011, there were discovered a number of major shelf gas resources in the Republic of Mozambique. Gas prevails in the hydrocarbon portfolio of the Republic: shelf resources – 3.7 trillion m3, and proved reserves as of the beginning of 2014 – 1.03 trillion cubic meters.

The key gas potential of the country is concentrated in the Rovuma basin, which resources are estimated at 2.2 trillion cubic meters, and in the basins of the Mozambique river (3 continental deposits with proved gas reserves up to 95 billion cubic meters, and one shelf deposit with resources up to 56 billion cubic meters).

Current production in the country is carried out at two fields in the south of Mozambique, the Pande field and the Temane field. The production volume is 4 billion cubic meters per year.

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School authorities in India persistently discriminate against children from marginalized communities, denying them their right to education, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Four years after an ambitious education law went into effect in India guaranteeing free schooling to every child ages 6 to 14, almost every child is enrolled, yet nearly half are likely to drop out before completing their elementary education.

The 77-page report, “‘They Say We’re Dirty’: Denying an Education to India’s Marginalized,” documents discrimination by school authorities in four Indian states against Dalit, tribal, and Muslim children. The discrimination creates an unwelcome atmosphere that can lead to truancy and eventually may lead the child to stop going to school. Weak monitoring mechanisms fail to identify and track children who attend school irregularly, are at risk of dropping out, or have dropped out.

“India’s immense project to educate all its children risks falling victim to deeply rooted discrimination by teachers and other school staff against the poor and marginalized,” said Jayshree Bajoria, India researcher and author of the report. “Instead of encouraging children from at-risk communities who are often the first in their families to ever step inside a classroom, teachers often neglect or even mistreat them.”

Detailed case studies examine how the lack of accountability and grievance redress mechanisms are continuing obstacles to proper implementation of the Right to Education Act. Human Rights Watch conducted research for this report in the states of Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, and Delhi, interviewing more than 160 people, including children, parents, teachers, and a wide range of education experts, rights activists, local authorities, and education officials.

The Indian government should adopt more effective measures to monitor the treatment of vulnerable children and provide accessible redress mechanisms to ensure they remain in the classroom, Human Rights Watch said. According to the government, nearly half – over 80 million children – drop out before completing their elementary education.

In drafting the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, the central government recognized exclusion of children as the “single most important challenge in universalizing elementary education.” But many education department officials at state, district, and local levels have been unwilling to acknowledge or accept that discrimination occurs in government schools, let alone attempt to resolve these problems, Human Rights Watch said.

“The teacher tells us to sit on the other side,” said “Pankaj,” an eight-year-old tribal boy from Uttar Pradesh. “If we sit with others, she scolds us and asks us to sit separately. The teacher doesn’t sit with us because she says we ‘are dirty.’”

Marginalized groups continue to face discrimination in India despite constitutional guarantees and laws prohibiting discrimination, Human Rights Watch said. School authorities reinforce age-old discriminatory attitudes based on caste, ethnicity, religion, or gender. Children from Dalit, tribal, and Muslim communities are often made to sit at the back of the class or in separate rooms, insulted by the use of derogatory names, denied leadership roles, and served food last. They are even told to clean toilets, while children from traditionally privileged groups are not.

“Non-discrimination and equality are fundamental to the Right to Education Act and yet the law provides no penalties for violators,” Bajoria said. “If schools are to become child-friendly environments for all of India’s children, the government needs to send a strong message that discriminatory behavior will no longer be tolerated and those responsible will be held to account.”

Most state education departments have failed to establish proper mechanisms to monitor each child, and intervene promptly and effectively to ensure they remain in school, Human Rights Watch said. Because there is no common definition for assessing when a child is considered to no longer be attending school, various states have different norms: in Karnataka, students are regarded as having dropped out of school after seven days of unexplained absence, in Andhra Pradesh it is a month, and in Chhattisgarh and Bihar it is three months. This lack of a common definition hinders efforts to recognize and address the problem.

The Right to Education Act provides that children who have dropped out of school or older children who never attended school should be offered “bridge courses” to bring them up to speed so they can return to mainstream schools in an age-appropriate class. But state governments do not maintain proper records of these children, provide the additional resources needed for appropriate bridge courses, or track these children through completion of elementary schooling once they are in an age-appropriate class.

Children of migrant workers, many belonging to Dalit and tribal communities, are most vulnerable to dropping out due to lengthy absences from school while searching for work with their parents. Yet the state governments do not keep track of these children in any systematic manner to ensure that they continue their education. The labor departments at state level are not properly carrying out programs meant for bringing child laborers back to school. And state education departments are not following up once a child is admitted to a mainstream school, which often results in the child’s return to work.

Central and state authorities are not adequately supporting creative community-based mechanisms envisioned under the Right to Education Act such as “school management committees.” Parents told Human Rights Watch that they do not have adequate representation on these committees, and so they do not complain when there is injustice against their children because school authorities ignore the complaints or even reprimand the students. Guidelines adopted to address grievances have often not been implemented.

India is a party to core international human rights treaties that protect children and provide for the right of everyone to education, including the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child. International law also prohibits discrimination on the basis of religion, ethnicity, social origin, or other status. The Convention on the Rights of the Child obligates India to take measures to encourage attendance and reduce dropout rates, and ensure that the rights of the children are protected through effective monitoring.

Prior to the national elections in India in April 2014, the major national parties made commitments in their election manifestos to improve elementary school education. The central and state governments should create clear indicators to detect and address discrimination in schools, and to lay out appropriate disciplinary measures for those found responsible, Human Rights Watch said.

The government should create a system to monitor and track every child from enrollment through completion of elementary schooling, up to Grade VIII. The government should initiate proper training of teachers, so that they end exclusion and facilitate greater interaction among children of different socio-economic and caste backgrounds.

“India’s political parties focused on education during the election campaign,” Bajoria said. “But whoever takes office will need to do more to ensure that children attend classes. An important law is set to fail unless the government intervenes now.”

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