Saturday, September 13, 2008

Decisive moments for Pak politicians

Decisive moments for Pak politicians


NO explanations could justify the US decision, reportedly approved by President George W Bush, to attack targets inside Pakistan in its self-styled "war against terror." The seven missile attacks on targets near the Pak-Afghan border and a raid by helicopter-borne US commandos since Aug.13 are an infringement of Pakistan's sovereignty and territorial integrity.
Understandably, all political parties of Pakistan have come together to condemn the US attacks, and opposition members of parliament have demanded that the country should call off its co-operation with the US in the "war against terror." Of course, the government finds itself accused of simply paying lip-service in its rejection of the US actions after having secretly made a deal with Washington to allow the US military to carry out operations in Pakistani territory.
Army chief Ashfaq Parvez Kayani has denied the charges and pledged to protect the country's sovereignty. President Asif Ali Zardari and other political leaders have reiterated their commitment to fighting violent extremism but have stopped short of issuing threats to withdraw their co-operation with the US.
However, they have to tread carefully. Public opinion in Pakistan is hostile to US policy in the region and the hostility gains more intensity with every American military action within the borders of Pakistan.
Surely, Former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who heads the main opposition party, could step up popular pressure on the Islamabad government to maintain the close alliance with Washington signed up by the former military ruler and president, Pervez Musharraf.
The US does not many options either. It has seen an intensification of the insurgency across the border in Afghanistan and has been pressuring the Pakistani government to crackdown on militants operating from enclaves on its side of the border who Washington says are helping the Afghan Taliban.
The US does not seem to be in a mood to restrain itself. It said last week that it was stepping up military operations in the area aimed at eliminating militants and it is unlikely that it could be persuaded not to launch any more strikes in Pakistan unless of course the Islamabad government undertakes to use its own military and launch a massive operation in the border area. But then, the political leaders of Pakistani could not but be acutely aware that such an action could send their political careers into a wild spin, given the anti-US sentiments among their voting public.
Apart from concerns for the civilian population caught in the crossfire and political considerations, the government faces serious economic problems, with the rising tension adding to the worries of investors.
Any alienation with the US could mean a sharp reduction in US financial support and, given the depletion of its foreign reserves, the government might have no choice but to default on a sovereign bond next year, triggering a domino effect that could prove to be too devastating for the country.
Effectively, Islamabad is facing a major crisis that needs an immediate solution. But no effective solution could be worked out if the country's political parties agree to bury their political differences and join hands against the threat to protect national interests.
It would indeed be a national catastrophe if the politicians balk at taking difficult and tough decisions for the sake of the people and country. Such is the gravity of the crisis facing Pakistan that those who put their narrow political priorities first have no right to call themselves patriots and worthy of leading the country.

Friday, September 12, 2008

Lebanon faces real, immediate threat

Sept.12, 2008


Lebanon faces real, immediate threat


ISRAEL is on the move again targeting Lebanon's Hizbollah. It is only a matter of time that the Israeli military would launch strikes against Hizbollah targets in Lebanon in order to "avenge" its defeat in the war of the summer of 2006.
That Hizbollah has entrenched itself in Lebanese politics with the May deal with the government is yet another reason for Israel to attempt to cripple the group.
The Israeli military is bristling with indignation and fury that Hizbollah breached the image of Israeli invincibility and the Jewish state has not been able to hit back in the two years since then.
And now Hizbollah has consolidated its status as a legitimate resistance group and thwarted all efforts for its fighters to be disarmed.
A ministerial declaration adopted in early August allowed Hizbollah to keep its weapons, and underlined the right of Lebanon's people, army, and resistance — meaning Hizbollah — to liberate Israeli occupied areas and "defend the country using all legal and possible means."
The shift in the balance of political power in Lebanon was followed by a prisoner exchange with Israel that bolstered Hizbollah but sparked a sense of humiliation among many Israelis.
The Israelis are indeed worried and seem to be setting the ground for sweeping military action against Hizbollah and they hope would "avenge" the humiliation they suffered in the war of 2006.
They are claiming that Hizbollah is preparing for another confrontation with Israel, whereas, in reality, it is the thing that the group wants today while it is digging its heel deep into the Lebanese body politic. The Israelis are claiming that Hizbollah, with Iranian and Syrian help, has not only replenished its stocks of rockets and mortars but has also acquired anti-aircraft missiles. There is no independent confirmation that this indeed is the case.
We have been hearing increasing Israeli threats against Hizbollah for some time now, but the situation turns more alarming when we note that the Israelis are threatening Lebanon itself.
"The moment the Lebanese government confers legitimacy on Hizbollah, it must understand that the entire Lebanese state will be a target," Israel's Environment Minister Gideon Ezra said before the Lebanese cabinet move that consolidated Hizbollah's status as a legitimate resistance group . Since the Beirut government did not heed the "warning," Israel must be thinking that it is free to use whatever options it has to make good its threat.
The danger of a massive Israeli military blitz against Hizbollah is very much real, and it is anyone's guess what would follow the first Israeli bomb or missile that hits a Hizbollah target.

Thursday, September 11, 2008

Skeletons in the Sept.11 cupboard

Skeletons in the Sept.11 cupboard


TODAY, as the United States of America marks the seventh anniversary of the airborne suicide attacks on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon, the world remembers the unprecedented assaults as an event that changed the course of history, sparing no one from its direct and indirect repercussions around the globe.
Nearly 3,000 people died in the Sept.11, 2001 attacks themselves, and hundreds of thousands were killed and maimed in the two wars that followed, and tens of thousands were incarcerated, many of who remain untraceable even today. The attacks reshaped international behaviour and redefined international relations, with the US reasserting its self-assumed role as the world's sole policeman. They exposed many monstrous faces.
Indeed, the world sympathised with the victims of the Sept.11 attacks and even found some justification in the US response to what was argued as the most daring challenge ever to American national security.
Since then, however, the sympathy the world felt for the US has been violently shaken in the wake of revelations that cast serious doubts over the official American version of the attacks. Today, an big majority of the people around the world believe that there was much more than met the eye in the attacks in view of serious questions that beg for answers which no one, least of all the US, is either unable or unwilling to provide.
There has never been a logical and reasonable explanation of the sequence of events in the run-up to the attacks and how a handful of fresh arrivals in the US could successfully penetrate and demobilise one of the most heavily fortified aviation security systems of the world.
Of course, all accusing fingers pointed at Osama Bin Laden's Al Qaeda. Since then, it has become known that Bin Laden himself knew very little of the purported plan to carry out the attacks and it was possible only that someone had sought his "blessing" for the assaults against the very heart of America and the Saudi of Yemeni origin simply obliged. Bin Laden's "open admission" that his "brothers" were behind the operation came three months after the incident and that was not very convincing either.
What is even worse is the scenario that emerged after the attacks suggesting that they could have been an Israeli-inspired "inside" job designed to drive an unbridgeable divide in US-Arab/Muslim relations. The revelation that a group of Israelis had strategically pre-positioned their video-recording equipment focused on the World Trade Center ahead of the attacks and danced as the hijacked planes hit the twin towers appeared to be only the tip of an iceberg, particularly that they were actually arrested but packed off to Israel without anyone seriously questioning them.
And it was as if the US was waiting for Sept.11 to happen so that it could go ahead with its plans to launch military action against Iraq (Afghanistan was targeted first but it was and remains secondary in the book of US priorities).
Recent substantiated revelations that top Bush administration officials conspired to create an impression that Iraq had played a part in the Sept. attacks have exposed some of the lies linked to the official American version of the events.
The world is today left with a bitter taste that someone with a grand but secret agenda took the American people and the rest of the international community for the most expensive ride in history. And the ride is continuing today.
Surely, someone will open up at some point in time and lay bare the shocking skeletons of the Sept.11 attacks in the American cupboard.
The world, which paid the highest price for someone's secret agenda, has the right to know but it will have to wait.

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Israel makes hay while peace effort in limbo

Israel makes hay while peace effort in limbo

REPORTS that Israeli authorities and settlers have seized large tracts of land in the Palestinian West Bank for security zones around Jewish settlements beyond the Israeli-built barrier that runs along the occupied territory expose the reality that the Jewish state is pressing ahead with its expansionist ambitions while stonewalling efforts for a peace agreement with the Palestinians.
According to the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem, some 12 settlements east of the "separation" barrier had been fenced off under an official "special security area" plan designed to block Palestinian farmers from reaching their fields.
The group estimates that the overall area of some settlements in the plan had more than doubled. Some 300,000 Israeli settlers live in colonies that fall on the western side of the "separation barrier" and another 70,000 settlers live on the eastern side of the barrier made up of barbed wire-tipped fences and cement walls.
The Israeli army has confirmed that it had set up security zones around settlements. It says that the zones are aimed at preventing Palestinian armed attacks on the colonies.
According to B'Tselem, a rough estimate of the total territory closed to Palestinians shows that at least 450 hectares — the bulk of it privately owned by Palestinians — have been "unofficially annexed" outside the 12 settlements.
These figures become simply technical in light of the steady Israeli push to grab as much West Bank land as possible to the point that any possible deal with the Palestinians would be devoid of real territorial substance if, as and when a peace agreement is worked out. Effectively, the Israeli land grab would deprive the Palestinians of a viable and contiguous state in the West Bank.
Israeli policy has always been based on fait accomplis by creating physical realities on the ground in the occupied territories regardless of the state of peace negotiations.
This is a fact that the Palestinians have been raising with the US, but Washington, despite its self-assumed posture of a honest mediator for peace in Palestine, has done little to check the Israelis other than making sympathetic noises.

Tuesday, September 09, 2008

Sowing seeds for an unwanted harvest

Sept.10, 2008

Sowing seeds for an unwanted harvest

THE innocent civilians whose only crime is that they are living in areas near the Pakistani border with Afghanistan are paying a heavy price for the US-led "war against terror," which, in any event, has lost its relevance, given that it has only added intensity to what Washington perceives as the "threat of terrorism."
Scores of civilians, most of them women and children, have been killed in a stepped-up US military operation in Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province in recent days. Naturally, the attacks have drawn condemnation from the Pakistani parliament and the new civilian government in Islamabad. But it is clear that the US could not care less for such denunciation of its actions and is determined to press ahead with its campaign with little regard to its consequences on the civilian population in the area and the stability of the Pakistani government and military.
It has been revealed that the administration of President George W. Bush is not heeding warnings by the National Intelligence Council, one of the prime agencies in the US intelligence community, against commando raids by US troops on the Pak-Afghan border.
The National Intelligence Council said three weeks ago that such actions would carry a high risk of further destabilising the Pakistani military and government. The warning, which represented a consensus in the intelligence community, came amid intense discussions in Washington on whether to carry out commando raids against Al Qaeda and Taliban targets in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan.
That the Bush administration opted to ignore the National Intelligence Council warning was evident in its actions since then.
The foremost question among the residents of the border region is whether their government and military could offer them protection or support the US actions.
Washington is referring all questions in this regard to Islamabad as if suggesting that the US military has the implicit backing of the Pakistani government in its actions against the people of Pakistan.
Surely, it needs no elaboration that the US military incursions into Pakistan will help the political-military groups allied with the Taliban that are seeking to destabilise the Islamabad government.
The Pakistani military says that the US actions would only provoke new attacks by militants in the frontier area and destabilise the country's armed forces. The risk is that local residents who have supported the Pakistani soldiers and opposed militants the past will shift their loyalties out of anger over the killings of civilians. Bearing the brunt of the anger will be Pakistani security personnel, including the military.
The apparent helplessness of the Islamabad government and the country's armed forces to check the US military actions would also undermine the morale of the Pakistani army.
Whether Washington wants it or cares about it or seeks to prevent it, the US military actions are punishing the civilian population of Pakistan's border regions and contributing to destabilising the country's government and military. In the broader context of the US-led "war against terror," the American military attacks in the border region would only create more "militants" and "extremists" determined to fight the US anytime, anywhere.

Monday, September 08, 2008

If in kitchen, cook a fair meal or get out

Sept.8, 2008


If in kitchen, cook a fair meal or get out

'Inad Khairallah

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas was not disclosing any state secret when he reaffirmed this week his belief that chances of working out a peace agreement with Israel by the end of 2008 look scant.
The two sides remain far from each other on the key issues: The future of Jerusalem and the right of the Palestinian refugees from the 1948 conflict to return home.
In talks with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak on Saturday, Abbas made it clear that while last November's Annapolis meeting had created high hopes for peace, "despite the significant efforts each side has made (in negotiations since then), there is no certainty we can strike a deal by the end of the year because very little time is left."
Abbas also rejected the US-backed Israeli effort to work out a document containing agreements reached on some issues and putting off serious work on key issues such as Jerusalem and refugees to a later date. It is known that the administration of US President George W Bush, who promised at Annapolis that there would be an Israeli-Palestinian peace accord this year, wants such a document which it could present at the UN this month and tout it as one of the most noted accomplishments of the Bush White House.
That was the mission of the visit to the region last month of US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
Abbas on Saturday reiterated that the "solution that the Palestinians seek will have to include all the issues surrounding a permanent agreement."
Earlier, in a meeting in Italy on Friday, Abbas and Israeli President Shimon Peres declared that Israel and the Palestinian National Authority were closer to a peace agreement than ever.
However, Abbas remained firm on his rejection of the notion that he and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert might release a partial document outlining the areas in which they do agree and leaving open other issues.
"It is necessary for the agreement to address all ... issues," said Abbas. "It is all or nothing, really," he continued.
It is abundantly clear that the so-called peace process would not go ahead unless the two sides work out an agreement on Jerusalem and refugees. Israel is not ready to accept any compromise over its stand that Arab East Jerusalem, which it occupied in the 1967 war, is part of its "eternal and indivisible capital" and that the Palestinian refugees of 1948 would not be allowed to return to their land despite UN resolutions that support their right to do so or accept compensation in lieu.
As far as the Israeli posture is concerned, the problem of refugees is purely an Arab issue and the Arab World solve it without any Israeli input.
Peres, who has had enough experience with failed peace negotiations with the Palestinians during the 1990s, should know well about the political, diplomatic and security situation that exist between Israel and the Palestinians and the Arab World in general. Surely, that was behind his call on Syrian President Bashar Al Assad to visit occupied Jerusalem as Egypt's Anwar Sadat did in 1997 or invite the Israeli prime minister to visit Damascus. The Sadat visit to occupied Jerusalem eventually led to the 1978 Camp David peace treaty between Egypt and Israel that effectively removed the Egyptians from the Arab-Israeli conflict while it left the Palestinian problem and the Israeli-Syrian conflict in limbo.
The issue at stake for Syria is the return of the Golan Heights, which Israel seized in the 1967 war, and there is no indication that the Jewish state is ready to give up the strategic plateau that accounts for some 70 per cent of its water sources.
The Egyptian territory that Israel returned to Egypt under the Camp David agreement did not hold any strategic importance for the Jewish state as the West Bank. That is not the way the Israelis see the Golan Heights, which they unilaterally annexed as part of Israel in 1981.
At the root of the deadlock in efforts for Arab-Israeli peace is the Israeli quest to have the cake and eat it too through imposing its will on the Arabs with little regard for the rights of Arabs. Not only that, it expects the Arabs to accept it as if it was the best deal they could ever get.
It is inevitable that there would be no Israeli-Palestinian agreement before Bush leaves office in January 2009. And it is also true that any serious US engagement with the two sides could not be expected for at least one year after Bush's successor, whether Republican or Democrat, assumes office.
As Abbas noted on Friday, if no agreement was reached while Bush remained in office, "the new administration should not wait seven years for us to start negotiations."
"It should begin immediately as soon as a new president is in the White House," he declared.
That would seem to be a tough call, given the peculiarities of the political imperatives of any new administration that would simply put a lock on any serious attention to the Arab-Israeli conflict.
An active US engagement is seen vital to Arab-Israeli peacemaking mainly because of the almost unlimited political, economic, military and diplomatic backing that Washington extends to the Jewish state. It is taken for granted that the only country which could apply any leverage on Israel is the US.
At the same time, the US alliance with Israel is part of the logjam in peace efforts. Israel would have no option but to accept a just and fair agreement with the Arabs if the multitude of international laws, conventions and charters were to form the foundation for peace. But the international community is unable to apply any of them in efforts for peace with Israel because of the protective, all-embracing umbrella that the US offers the Jewish state.
Any hope for just and fair peace in the Middle East hinges on the US opting either to remain neutral and act as an honest mediator or take its hands off and leave it to the international community to deal with its arrogant, instransigent and stubborn protege, Israel.

US spying — cest la vie

Sept.8, 2008

US spying — cest la vie

IS ironic that the Iraqi government is upset that US spied on Iraq's prime minister, Nouri Al Maliki, and has warned that future ties with the US could be in jeopardy if the report were true.
It is ironic because the Iraqis should have known that spying/information gathering is an integral part of the functions of any state and the US has proved itself to be the leader of the field.
According to a new book, "The War Within: A Secret White House History, 2006-2008," by journalist Bob Woodward, the United States spied extensively on Maliki, his staff and other government officials.
On its own, the revelation does not mean much except affirming the obvious. It becomes all the more relevant when one considers how the information gained through spying was used.
The Iraqi government spokesman, Ali Dabbagh, has warned of future bad relations between Iraq and the US if the allegations proved true. It shows a lack of trust, he said.
"It reflects also that the institutions in the United States are used to spy on their friends and their enemies in the same way," Dabbagh said.
That the White House declined direct comment on Woodward's revelation is an implicit confirmation that it is true. But then, there should never have been any doubt at all since it would have been naive to expect the US to handle Iraq without having "inside" information of how its politicians felt, talked and acted in given situations.
The Iraqis, who have lived for long under the reign of Saddam Hussein's highly effective intelligence network which did not spare his closest confidants, should have taken for granted that the US would follow the same track. Keeping close tabs on the Iraqi prime minister and indeed every member of his cabinet and members of the Iraqi parliament enables the US to be forewarned of their thoughts, ideas and actions and outsmart them by taking pre-emptive action.
A bonus, if indeed it is one, of spying is that it could yield surprising and perhaps shocking revelations that could in turn be used to pressure the person concerned and even resort to blackmail as and when needed.
Iraqi politicians are now demanding that the US deal with their country on equal terms and as a partner. Well, that is the last thing the US would be ready to do. The leaders and people of Iraq might not consider themselves to be a vassal nation within the US empire, but US President George W Bush and his administration consider Iraq to be a conquered nation and an American colony. That should explain why they are going ahead with plans to build the largest US embassy in Baghdad and set up permanent military presence in the country.
Whether the Iraqis like it or not, US spying/intelligence gathering has become part of their life and there is practically little they could do to eliminate it completely even in the unlikely event that the US decides to pack up and go home.

Israeli-American pipe dream at best

Sept.9, 2008


Israeli-American pipe dream at best

FOR the first time, some details have emerged of what Israel is offering the Palestinians in return for an agreement that it hopes would close the Palestine file once and for all.
The details of the so-called "shelf agreement" — meaning that it would not be implemented until later — were released in a report carried by the Israeli Haaretz newspaper.
The draft accord says that Israel will withdraw from some 93 per cent of the occupied West Bank while retaining all the large settlements, including those surrounding occupied Jerusalem, and some land in the northern West Bank adjacent to the 1967 "green line." In total, the land Israel will retain will represent about seven per cent of the West Bank.
In return, the Palestinians would receive alternative land in the southern desert, adjacent to the Gaza Strip, equivalent to 5.5 per cent of West Bank.
Israel will offer free passage between Gaza and the West Bank without any security checks.
Israel would immediately receive the settlement blocs, but the territory to be transferred to the Palestinians and the free passage between Gaza and the West Bank would only be delivered after the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) gains control of the Gaza Strip, which is currently ruled by Hamas, which is not a party to the negotiations.
Scepticism is high that the PNA would ever gain control of the Gaza Strip. Some even suggest that chances are better of Hamas taking control of the West Bank.
As Israeli commentator Ran Cohen notes, "this only makes the proposal more attractive for Israel: we take the goods now, but we pay only after the Messiah comes."
Israel is also proposing "security arrangements" that clearly establish that its notion of an independent Palestinian state is that of a Bantustan under total Israeli control.
We don't know how accurate the reported details are. However, we do know that the two most difficult issues, the fate of Palestinian refugees and the status of Jerusalem, are being put off for negotiations at a later stage.
The reported proposal rejects the "right of return" for Palestinian refugees, but includes a "detailed and complex formula" for solving the refugee problem. However, the report provides no details.
The report also says that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas have agreed that negotiations over Jerusalem will be postponed.
In the meantime, a joint panel of the Israeli parliament (Knesset) committees has adopted a proposal amending a bill that originally called for a national referendum on any "concession" over the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights of Syria. With the amendment, the bill now states that a vote must be held before concessions on any territory under Israeli legal jurisdiction, including Jerusalem.
What then is the relevance of the draft accord? Furthermore, whatever has been reportedly agreed upon also loses relevance because that agreement is reached in negotiations under the supervision of Olmert, who is on his way out of office anyway.
We know that Israel and the US need to maintain the image of "continuing negotiations with the Palestinians" while piling up pressure on the latter to accept Israeli-dictated terms and conditions.
In all probability that is what has been and is happening during the negotiating rounds since last year's Annapolis conference. Nothing has been agreed on, but the Israelis and Americans claim otherwise. And that raises the prospect that they are hoping to twist the Palestinian arm to an extent that the Palestinians would have no choice but to nod and that would be taken as acceptance of the Israeli terms.
However, it has to happen before the end of November so that it could be called the realisation of US President George W Bush's pledge at Annapolis in November 2007 that there would be an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement in place in one year from then. It was always a pipe dream and it remains very much so today.

Sunday, September 07, 2008

That is the way democracy works

Sept.7, 2008

That is the way democracy works

Asif Ali Zardari, the widower of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, has won a sweeping victory in Pakistan's presidential election. Many in Pakistan say Zardari won by default if only because of his late wife's victory in the general elections held this year where her Pakistan People's Party came home impressively. However, that does not and should not have any bearing on the reality that Zardari won the presidency through democratic means and that is how democracy works.
Judging from the intensity of comments appearing in the Pakistani media as well as on Internet chat sites, the people of Pakistan are not sure whether their new president represents a way out of the political, economic and security crises facing them. They do hope Zardari will have more success, but they see little under the present circumstances in the country to encourage such hopes.
While the media highlighted such issues as the reinstatement of judges fired by the former military rule and the presidential election itself, it was clear that most people are really interested in issues of daily life.
Indeed, Zardari, arguably the most controversial figure in Pakistan in view of the corruption allegations against him, has proved to be a skilled politician.
For years he has been hounded by charges massive corruption and spent 11 years in prison although he has never been convicted. He pulled the right strings at the right time and place to corner former military ruler Pervez Musharraf and prompt him to resign rather than risk being impeached. And then he made room for himself to be his party's candidate for the presidency.
Zardari faces a tough mission ahead as president of Pakistan, which severe economic problems and a rampant insurgency that are threatening the country's stability. Many of his countrymean fear a return to an old-style politics of confrontation at a time when the government needs to focus all its attention to improve the economy and deal with the insurgency.
Zardari in deemed to be pro-Western and a supporter of the US-led "war against terror" and this might help him secure Washington's backing. However, he has to deal with the strong anti-American sentiments among his people and the imperatives of the country's powerful military and intelligence establishments.
The people of Pakistan — and indeed the region itself — are looking anxiously to find out whether Zardari's political skills that propelled him to the presidency includes the ability to grab the initiative and lead the country from the front out of its crises.
Zardari cannot afford to lose sight of the fact that the people of his country are pinning their hopes on him.

Saturday, September 06, 2008

Golan can wait, but Tripoli can't

Sept.6, 2008

Golan can wait, but Tripoli can't


SYRIAN President Bashar Al Assad knows well that there is little sense in hoping for any breakthrough for peace with Israel before a new government is installed in the Jewish state and a new administration replaces that of George W Bush in Washington. However, that has not stopped him from continuing indirect talks with Israel and handing proposals for peace to Turkish mediators. He is seeking American participation before entering direct talks and Washington does not seem to be interested. That is only expected because nothing concrete could be expected to happen before the elections in the US and Israel.
At the same time his calculated moves have taken him far ahead in ending his country's alienation with the Europeans as evidenced in his July visit to Paris and this week's presence in Damascus of French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who holds the rotating European Union presidency, for a four-way summit that included Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa Al Thani. who chairs the Gulf Co-operation Council, and Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan on stability and peace in the Middle East.
As Assad noted at the summit on Thursday, the future of peace negotiations rests on who becomes prime minister in Israel to replace scandal-hit Ehud Olmert and whether the new leader will be committed to pursuing peace with Syria. The postponement of a fifth round of indirect talks between Syria and Israel as a result of the resignation of the chief Israeli negotiator is an example of the uncertainties clouding the negotiations.
The call from Damascus on Israel to agree to return the Golan Heights to Syria and thus clear the way for an agreement has fallen on deaf ears, because there is no such idea in Israel as giving up the strategic plateau, which holds the sources of more than 70 per cent of the Jewish state's water needs. The summit recommendations are unlikely to produce any real movement for peace and stability in the Middle East, the simple reason being that Israel wants to impose its will and interests its neighbours.
More pressing than the Golan at this juncture in time appears to be the situation in northern Lebanon. Assad on Thursday accused external forces of stirring up trouble in northern Lebanon just across the border from Syria. More than 20 people have been killed in Tripoli in the last three months in sectarian fighting linked to Lebanon's broader political troubles. A separate bomb attack in August in the city killed 15 people, including 10 soldiers.
The tensions in Tripoli have clouded Lebanon's return to political stability after Qatar mediated an end to an 18-month power struggle that had paralysed the country. Something needs to be done urgently to check the situation in northern Lebanon from turning worse. Any worsening of the security situation in Lebanon will benefit no one but Israel.

Friday, September 05, 2008

The key casualty in Lockerbie — the truth

Sept.5, 2008

The key casualty in Lockerbie — the truth

By PV Vivekanand


THE so-called Lockerbie affair stemming from the bombing of an American passenger plane over a Scottish town in 1988 has always been intriguing because of many unexplained aspects of the case. Now they are revived again with Libyan leader Muammar Qadhafi's son saying his country only accepted responsibility for the bombing to get sanctions lifted.
Asked if Libya accepts responsibility for the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103, Seif Al Islam said in a BBC interview last month: "Yes, we wrote a letter to the Security Council (in 2003) saying we're responsible for the acts of our employees, our people but it doesn't mean that we did it in fact."
He added: "What can you do? Without writing that letter, you will not be able to get rid of the sanction... I admit we played with the words. We had to, we had to, there was no other solution."
Seif Al Islam Qadhafi also states that he believed that Abdelbaset Ali Mohammed Al Megrahi, the former Libyan intelligence officer convicted of the bombing, was not responsible for the blast. The bombing killed a total of 270 people (259 aboard the flight and 11 on the ground) when Pan Am flight 103 from London to New York — a Boeing 747-121 named Clipper Maid of the Seas — blew up over the town of Lockerbie in southern Scotland.
Megrahi is serving a life sentence in Scotland after he was convicted by a tribunal made up of Scottish judges at a US base in the Netherlands in 2001 . His co-accused Khalifa Fhimah was acquitted. Megrahi filed an appeal but it was turned down despite the emergence of new evidence.
Seif Al Islam Qadhafi's statements came a few days before US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was due in Libya in the first such trip by a top US diplomat since 1953. It is anyone guess whether the Lockerbie issue would be raised during the visit although it is unlikely that either of them would want to reopen what, for all technical purposes, is a closed file despite an appeal hearing for Megrahi next year.

Prosecution case

The prosecution case was that the bombing was ordered by the Libyan government and carried out by Megrahi, who served as a Libyan intelligence agent. According to the prosecution, a suitcase containing a radio rigged with explosives was placed aboard a flight originating in Malta and headed for Germany and this eventually ended up in the cargo hold of Pan Am Flight 103 and exploded over Lockerbie.
Throughout the trial, confusing and contradictory explanations were heard and few could really make any sense of the prosecution version of the bombing because there were too many loopholes.
A Malta shopkeeper who identified Megrahi as the man who purchased a piece of wrapping cloth that was found in the debris of Flight 103 gave conflicting statements as a witness in the case. The defence argued that Megrahi was somewhere else at the time and date that the shopkeeper said he had sold the cloth to the Libyan.
The shopkeeper was wrong about the date and inaccurate in his description of the purchaser when he first spoke to investigators. It was also established that he was given a photograph of Megrahi before he identified the Libyan as the purchaser. That was highly irregular and not acceptable to any judicial authorities.
However, that did not prevent the trial court from considering his description as the foundation for the charge against Megrahi.
The sighting in Malta of a Middle Eastern man who was under suspicion of planning sabotage in Europe around the time of the Pan Am bombing was disregarded as evidence in the case.

Witness credibility

Much worse was the case of another witness, Abdul Majid Giaka, who claimed to be a defector from the Libyan intelligence service to the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Giaka was a complete flop on the witness stand and could not provide any evidence to support the charges. A Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agent who was supposed to have strengthened Giaka's testimony was also found to lack credibility.
Since then, it has been found that Giaka was working in a garage of the Libyan intelligence service and had approached the CIA purely driven by monetary considerations.
It emerged after the trial was over that CIA agents were in the courtroom when Giaka was questioned and they conferred with him before he replied. Observers at the trial were quoted as saying that they felt the man was being "coached" on how to answer the questions.
Despite all these gaps and shortcomings in evidence, the tribunal found Megrahi guilty.

Origin of the bomb

The Libyan appealed and the defence produced evidence showing that the cargo holding bay of London's Heathrow was broken in several hours before the Pan Am flight took off. The suggestion was that someone had planted the bomb-laden suitcase in the cargo bay with a New York baggage tag and that it was boarded on Flight 103 as a matter of routine.
Had the appeals court accepted the defence argument, then it would have pulled the rug from under the feet of the prosecution theory that the bomb was placed aboard as unaccompanied air baggage in Valletta, Malta, flown to Frankfurt, Germany, offloaded onto yet another plane to London and then put aboard Flight 103. There would have no case at all.
Jim Swire, who lost his daughter in the bombing and became a spokesman for the relatives of British nationals killed in the crash, has repeatedly said that he is convinced that the bomb originated in London.
The alleged Libyan role in the Lockerbie affair was baffling from day one. Experts always questioned by Libya would opt for a complicated Malta-Frankfurt-London-New York route, particularly when there was always room for error, what with the transfer of a baggage containing a bomb between three planes.
The experts point out that placing the bomb on the flight in London would have been much simpler and easier.

Libya a belated suspect

According to Dr. Robert Black, professor of criminal law at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, and who worked out the arrangement for trying Megrahi and Fhimah under Scottish law in the Netherlands, says that there was no evidence brought to his attention during the first two and a half years of investigations involved Libya at all.
The first suspect was the Syria-based Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) led by Ahmed Jibril. The theory was that the group staged the bombing at the behest of Iran, which was seeking to avenge the US downing of an Iranian passenger airliner in the Gulf in 1986 during the Iran-Iraq war.
A group of PFLP-GC operatives was arrested with bomb-making equipment and radios rigged with bombs and primed to explode at altitude just months before the Lockerbie attack. At that time, at least two US diplomatic missions in Europe had received information that militants were planning to bomb an American passenger airliner.
According to Black, there was obvious pressure to refocus the inquiry on Libya and the pressure was so intense that it could have come only from Washington and London. The campaign included tough international sanctions that were built and tightened to the point of nudging Libya to seek a compromise. That compromise was its acceptance to send Megrahi and Fhimah to the US Camp Zeist in the Netherlands for trial by Scottish judges under Scottish law.

The payoff

In 2003, Libya agreed to "take responsibility" for the bombing and to pay $10 million each to the 270 victims in three stages. The US balked at removing Libya from the list of "state sponsors of terrorism" on the agreed date, and Libya refused to pay the last part ($2 million each) to the families of the victims. Subsequently, the US and Libya worked out another deal under which Tripoli declared that it was abandoning a nuclear weapons programme and revealed details of who had provided the technology and equipment (that led to the exposure of Pakistan's Qadeer Khan as the culprit). Washington removed Libya from the "terrorism list" and reopened its diplomatic mission in Tripoli.
Today's Libya is very much in the good books of the US.
Surely, Seif Al Islam Qadhafi's declaration that Libya had nothing to do with the Pan Am bombing should have sent alarm bells ringing in the same quarters from the pressure to implicate Libya had come in the early 90s. They should indeed be alarmed because the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission has concluded Megrahi may have suffered a miscarriage of justice. The panel has granted him a second appeal against his conviction and the appeal hearings are expected to start in Scotland early next year. Perhaps that would be a forum for some more of intriguing details to come out in one form or another. However, one thing is absolutely clear: The full truth of the downing of Pan Am Flight 103 which took off from London to New York on Dec.21, 1988 would never be known.



 

Backlash awaits US in Somalia

Sept.5, 2008



Backlash awaits US in Somalia


A report recently released by a a major US human rights group should serve as an eye-opener to the world on how the situation has worsened in Somalia as a result of US counterterrorism policies and support for the Ethiopian-backed Transitional Federal Government.
"US counterterrorism policies have not only compromised other international agendas in Somalia, they have generated a high level of anti-Americanism and are contributing to radicalisation of the population," says the report, entitled "Somalia: A Country in Peril, a Foreign Policy Nightmare."
The report calls for a thorough reassessment of US policy, including its support for the Transitional Federal Government and the obsession with its "war on terrorism" in Somalia.
Effectively, as it has happened in Afghanistan and Iraq, the misguided US approach — defence and intelligence operations — designed to make the US "more secure from the threat of terrorism may be increasing the threat of jihadist attacks on American interests," the report says.
In fact, the situation on the ground is far worse than it was 17 years ago, when Mohammed Siad Barre was ousted from power. Some one million have been diplaced when US-backed Ethiopian and Somalia government forces swept the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) out Mogadishu and other major cities and towns. Some 3.5 million Somalis will be dependent on humanitarian aid by the end of this year.
"The situation in Somalia today exceeds the worst-case scenarios conjured up by regional analysts when they first contemplated the possible impact of an Ethiopian military occupation," according to the report. "Over the past 18 months, Somalia has descended into terrible levels of displacement and humanitarian need, armed conflict and assassinations, political meltdown, radicalisation and virulent anti-Americanism."
The US emphasis on fighting the Islamist forces of Somalia — who are in fact seen as the best group that would stabilise the country — by supporting the
the Ethiopian offensive launched in December to protect the Transitional Federal Government has been destructive if the objective was to strengthen the "moderates" in the country. Washington's move to include the Islamist Shabaab on its list of designated terrorist groups last March not only isolated opposition moderates from their own coalition but also prompted the Shabaab intensify their militancy.
US intelligence agencies are also "running" armed militiamen nominally affiliated with the transitional government. These militiamen are answerable mainly to their US operators who could care less about their behaviour on the ground, which include murder, rape and looting, as long as they serve the purpose of fighting the Islamists and tracking suspected miltiants.
As the report highlights, the US bears a major responsibility for the worsening chaos in Somalia. Its obsession with its self-styled war on terror is producing results that are not only wrecking Somalia but also strengthening the militant threat against its own security interests in that part of Africa.

Thursday, September 04, 2008

Stakes go up in Korea crisis

Sept.4, 2008

Stakes go up in Korea crisis

Reports that North Korea has started to reassemble its main nuclear facility should have come as a shock to the US, which appeared to have taken Pyongyang for granted after making the six-country disarmament-for-aid deal a few months ago.
While there is no substantiated confirmation that the North Koreans are indeed putting back into order its reactor and other plants at Yongbyon, it would appear to be a safe bet that they have started doing so, making good on threats after the United States failed to remove the country from a "terrorism" blacklist.
North Korea had indeed signalled that it was adopting a tough stand when it announced that it had suspended disabling its nuclear programme. Pyongyang issued a statement on Aug.26 saying that "the US is gravely mistaken if it thinks it can make a house search in (North Korea) as it pleases just as it did in Iraq."
Following that statement, the US State Department cautioned against getting “overly excited” about the recent increase in tensions with North Korea. The North Korean move also exposed the hollow claims in Washington that “substantive” talks with North Korea on the nuclear verification process had taken place.
For some time, it was clear that North Korea was getting increasingly angry at the intrusive verification demands on the dismantling of the programme.
Obviously, Pyongyang was expecting to pick itself up, economically and politically, after the US removes the country from the State Sponsors of Terrorism List as agreed in the six-party agreement struck this year.
Subsequently, the US attached conditions to the removal and this dealt a severe blow to North Korea's hopes. The reported reassembling of its main nuclear plant, which it disabled in late June in a dramatic gesture in the nuclear disablement process, is North Korea's way of getting back at the US and showing that it demands to be treated with respect.
Surely, the US-Russian conflict over Georgia has played a major role in prompting Pyongyang to take the decision because the Georgian crisis has weakened Washington and blunted its options.
Indeed, there would be immediate moves to convince
North Korea to reverse its move, but it is a foregone conclusion that Washington would find that the stakes have gone up dramatically when it launched fresh talks with Pyongyang.

Wednesday, September 03, 2008

From prison to presidency

Sept.3, 2008

From prison to presidency


IT is more or less clear now that Asif Ali Zardari would be elected president of Pakistan in three days from today. While the Sept.6 election is seen as helping end the political uncertainties in the country, a Zardari presidency is most likely to be troubled at best.
It is perhaps the most dramatic turn for Zardari, who spent 11 years in prison on charges of corruption and bribery while his late wife Benazir Bhutto served as prime minister of the country. For a long time, it looked as if he is destined to spend the rest of his life in prison before political changes based on personal imperatives and agendas in Pakistan came to his rescue.
Convictions and more cases against him were either frozen or set aside in the wake of the victory of Bhutto's Pakistan Peoples Party in general elections this year.
It was highly unlikely that Zardari could have even eyed the presidency had it not been for the tragic assassination of his wife shortly before the general elections.
Although Bhutto’s son Bilawal, who is finishing college education in the UK, was named as her successor at the helm of the PPP, Zardari has emerged as the de facto party leader.
It was his firm refusal to reinstate 60 judges dismissed by military ruler Pervez Musharraf last year that led to the collapse of the PPP coalition with former prime minister Nawaz Sharif’s PML-N party. That refusal was and is seen linked to Zardari's fears that Sharif might use the reinstated judges to revive the frozen corruption cases and charges against him and thus politically destroy him. He could indeed reinstate the judges after he is elected president but then it would be too late for revival of cases against him in view of the presidential immunity introduced by Musharraf.
As the date for the presidential elections comes nearer, the people of Pakistan are confused, given the stigma of corruption attached to Zardari's image, further clouded by doctors' reports that he has suffered from severe depression, dementia, and PTSD while he was in prison.
Within the party itself, there are questions about its stability, with Zardari's confidants purging many of Benazir Bhutto’s closest allies from the upper ranks of the party and reports that party workers were growing increasingly disillusioned.
The question that is being openly asked in Pakistan today is how effective and how long could Zardari function as president, given the dark clouds in his political and personal horizons. That question could not have come at a worse point in time for the country.

Tuesday, September 02, 2008

Never-say-die US desparate for deal

Sept.2, 2008

Never-say-die US desparate for deal


AN INTENSE US effort to get the Palestinians to sign an "interim peace agreement" before the end of the year has faltered. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has rejected the idea and is insisting on a comprehensive agreement that firmly sets out the foundations of a solution to the Palestinian problem. Abbas acted very much within his rights and political imperatives when he told Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert that the Palestinians could not be and would not "part of an interim or shelf agreement," least of all for the sake of pleasing the Bush administration.
Olmert's aides have made it no secret that the beleagured Israeli prime minister hoped the Palestinians would sign a document outlining any agreements reached with Israel before he leaves office next year (when his expected resignation this month takes goes into effect).
US President George Bush, who steps down in January 2009, pledged at last year's Annapolis conference that there would be an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement before the end of 2008. Desptie scepticism, the Middle East welcomed the pledge and waited for Bush deliver. Arab leaders also offered help in order to smoothen the way towards such an agreement.
However, it has become abdundantly clear since then that the Israelis and Palestinians remain wide apart of the key issues of the conflict and there is no magic wand that could produce an agreement as promised by Bush.
Frequent summit meetings and negotiating sessions have made little apparent progress on the core issues that have stymied peace efforts for decades — including borders, Jerusalem and Palestinian refugees.
The Bush administration is also convinced that there could not be a real agreement between the two sides in the timeframe the US president has set. However, Bush has to show something that could be touted as a major accomplishment during his tenure as president. An Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement fits the bill and Bush went for it, hoping to twist arms into producing an agreement that could be waved before the world as one of the most important achievements of his presidency. It is of little concern to Bush or an other member of his administration what the agreement actually contains or whether it remains valid after they leave office.
Indeed, Israel was and is willing to help Bush's plan, but it balked at stating clearly its vision of a peace agreement with the Palestinians. Clearly, the Israeli version of an agreement falls far too short of the minimum that the Palestinians could accept, and hence the deadlock.
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat summed it up clearly when he said on Sunday: "We want an agreement to end the (Israeli) occupation and establish an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital. President Abbas told Olmert that we will not be part of an interim or shelf agreement. Either we agree on all issues, or no agreement at all."
Effectively, the position rules out an accord by a January target date.
However, that does not mean that the US would give up the effort. Abbas could expect to find himself under increasing pressure to sign on the Israeli-dotted lines knowing well that there is little hope that anything that is included in the agreement stand any chance of being implemented.
Washington is desparate for that document and the world could bet anything that it would not give up whatever the cost until the last moment.

Monday, September 01, 2008

Russian bear corners the US hawk

Sept.1, 2008

Aggressive Russian bear has
US in a dangerous corner

By PV Vivekanand

THE RULES of the "superpower game" have changed, leaving the US with limited options to deal with the crisis sparked by the Georgian move to take control of the breakaway province of South Ossetia and Russia's aggressive response.
If anything, the situation is spinning out of American control, with the very essence of US-Russian relations and US policy vis-a-vis ex-Soviet republics being brought to question.
One of the last things Washington wanted was an open Russian challenge to its plans to "punish" Iran for pursuing its nuclear programme in defiance of US-led Western demand that it freeze all nuclear activities.
It is not simply that the US could no longer count on Moscow to support its campaign for a fresh wave of tough UN sanctions against Iran. Russia has tied the crisis sparked by the conflict in Georgia to its relations with the US and has brought in Iran as an important element in the equation. The scenario is no longer Georgia-specific but is linked to American forays into what the Russians consider as no-go areas for anyone but themselves and the erstwhile humiliating US treatment of the former superpower.
Mosow is reportedly threatening to supply the sophisticated S-300 missile system to Iran if Washington pursues its plans to include Russia's pro-Western neighbours Georgia and Ukraine in the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO).
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev is said to have made an implicit offer to this effect to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad during their bilateral meeting in Dushanbe on Aug. 28, 2008.
Some reports claim that Russia has already moved some basic components of the S-300 missile system to Belarus, ready for possible transfer to Iran.
The Russian move has thrown a big spanner in the US-Israeli works against Iran because possible Iranian possession of the S-300 missile system would raise a big question mark for their plans to stage military action against Iran.
The S-300 missiles, which can track 100 targets at once and fire on planes up to 120 kilometres away, will be a major boost to Iranian defences against any air strike on its nuclear sites. They could nip any Israeli plan to stage air strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities and seriously complicate any US aerial bombardment.
International military experts descibe the S-300 missile as a source of "great concern" for every Western air force, including that of the US.
Effectively, the Russians are telling the Americans that "if you do not stop meddling in our areas of influence (ex-Soviet republics and former communist states in Eastern Europe), then we would supply the S-300 to the Iranians."
There is little doubt that Russia feels that "enough is enough" of American moves in its neighbourhood and is determined to push for a showdown with the US.
Further angering Moscow was the US support for independence of the ex-Serbian province of Kosovo against Russian wishes and the signing of an agreement under which the US plans to station anti-missile missiles in Poland that could "neutralise" any threat posed by Russia's nuclear arsenal.
Acutely aware of the Bush administration's Israeli-driven "strategic obsession" with Iran, Moscow is playing a very calculated game, which is leading to a foreign policy showdown ahead of presidential elections in the US.
Washington is now grappling with the question of how far it could go in supporting Georgia and proving to its others that the US is indeed a dependable ally while also ensuring that the confrontation with Russia is snuffed out.
Unless George W Bush moves to defuse the crisis, it could prove to be one of the biggest challenges facing the next US president, whether Republican John McCain or his Democratic rival Barack Obama, both of whom have declared their support for NATO membership for Georgia.
That Russia is dead serious in its confrontation with the US was made clear on several counts, including Moscow's invitation to Syrian President Bashar Al Assad and reported proposal to station advanced missiles in Syrian territory, presumably targeting Israel, the staunchest US ally in the region.
Israel, which is raring to go with military strikes against Iran, has already made amends to placate the Russians. It has suspended military assistance to Georgia and has frozen plans to set up pipelines that circumvent Russia to pump Caspian oil and gas to Turkey and from there to Israeli ports in the Mediterranean and the Red Sea for re-export.
In the immediate context, the possibility of Russia supplying the S-300 missile system to Iran could add a sense of urgency for Israeli action to "eliminate" Iran's nuclear capabilities.
The S-300 system needs about one year to be installed and turned operational and this would mean an Israeli urgency to hit Iran before it is too late.
Tehran is playing its own game by stepping up rhetoric and thumping its nose at the US and Israel.
"Any aggression against Iran will start a world war," Brigadier General Masoud Jazayeri, a senior Iranian military commander, said over the weekend. "The unrestrained greed of the US leadership and global Zionism... is gradually leading the world to the edge of a precipice."
It is difficult to see how the US would proceed from this point. However, it is indeed cornered and it is anyone's guess how it opts to lash out.

The only constant in the Iran equation

Sept.1, 2008


The only constant in the Iranian equation

THE US seems to have developed a loss of appetite for military action against Iran, but Israel would not let go, and Tehran is exploiting the situation to step up its rhetoric and thump its nose at those who criticise its nuclear activities. The result is a blurred scenario, with the only constant being that the region would witness a devastating conflict if the US or Israel or a combination of the two were to stage military strike of any size and nature at Iran.
There is no dearth of theories and suggestions, including one that says Israeli warplanes planned to bomb Iranian targets during the recent Russian-Georgian conflict. However, the totally unanticipated aggressive Russian response to the Georgian military intervention in South Ossetia took everyone by surprise and aborted the Israeli plan, according this theory.
Earlier, it was reported that Israel has been rehearsing for air strikes at Iran using US-controlled Iraqi territory and air space.
Another report says that a Dutch ultra-secret secret service operation underway in Iran in recent years has been halted and an agent recalled in view of “impending US plans to attack Iran” within weeks.
The operation involved infiltrating and sabotaging Iran's military industry, according to the report.
The Dutch decision came ahead of an expected US/Israel decision within weeks to attack Iran's nuclear plants with unmanned aircraft, used to avoid risking the lives of air crews and warplanes, says the report.
The "disclosure" explains why Iran has been issuing a fresh spate of warnings, the latest of which came from the country's deputy Chief of General Staff Masus Jazairi , who said that any attack on Iran would mean the beginning of a new "world war."
The Iranian tough talk is highly provocative but is deemed to come from a realisation that the US administration finds itself in a difficult situation to exercise any military option against Iran, given its raging conflict with Russia. Even before the crisis erupted in Georgia, US officials have been saying that the US military is unable to wage yet a third war following the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
That seems to be a fairly accurate judgment, particularly given that the US could not expect any regional support (except of course that of Israel) for military action against Iran, which has the ways and means to retaliate and make it very painful for US interests in the region.
Israel's Ma'ariv newspaper reported on Friday that preparations for Israeli military action against Iran are under way in the event that diplomatic efforts fail.
Indeed, these are only scratches on the surface of the US-Israel-Iran equation, which is a roller-coaster course. But the region remains painfully aware that Israel, which believes in the use of military might before diplomacy, is waiting for the most opportune moment to hit at Iran with little regard for the regional consequences of such action.