#2
Finally got some pix to download. No contest. It's Pnina Rosenblum of Israel. They say she's 53 years old but she sure doesn't look it. Couldn't believe they had the nerve to put Hillary on the list. Oh well, back to work.
Ahmed Rashid, whose book Descent into Chaos has deservedly been widely acclaimed, reveals that in 1988 Pakistan could have extracted a recognition of the Durand Line as part of the agreement that ended the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, but that it never raised the issue, despite considerable prodding by the United Nations. After 9/11, says Mr. Rashid, many Pakistanis maintained that if only Afghan President Hamid Karzai had recognised the Durand Line, he would have appeased Islamabad sufficiently to halt its military support to the Taliban. Yet the military refrained from insisting on Afghanistan recognising the Durand Line despite several opportunities to do so. Neither the Afghan mujahideen government in 1992 nor the subsequent Taliban regime which depended on Islamabads support was asked to recognise the Line.
Mr. Rashid cites Sahebzada Yaqub Khan, who was Pakistans Foreign Minister during a period of the 1980s, as admitting that the military deliberately never asked for an Afghan recognition of the Line. At that time, President Zia-ul-Haq passionately worked toward creating a pro-Pakistan Islamic government in Kabul, to be followed by the Islamisation of Central Asia. This was, according to Mr. Rashid, part of Pakistans strategy to secure strategic depth in relation to India. General Zias vision depended on an undefined border with Afghanistan, so that the army could justify any future interference in that country and beyond. The logic, according to Mr. Rashid, was that as long as there was no recognised border there could be no international law to break if Pakistan forces were to support surrogate Afghan regimes such as the one led by the Taliban.
Mr. Rashids observations are relevant in todays context when we bear in mind that he is reported to be a close adviser to General David Petraeus and is even said to have directly briefed President Barack Obama. The fact that he is from Pakistan should not detract from his insights; he impresses one as being a reasonably objective analyst. Mr. Rashid confirms what India has experienced over the past decades, namely, the Pakistan establishments obsession with India, and its tendency to evaluate every situation through the prism of its impact on India. If something will help India in any way, Pakistan will oppose it. And if something will hurt India Pakistan will support it, even if, in the process, Pakistan itself might get hurt. As of today, the establishment means the Pakistan Army, of which Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) is an integral part. If, at some time in the future, democracy gets genuine acceptance in Pakistan, when the civilian government would not have to look over its shoulders to worry about the Armys reaction, this India-centric obsession might get diluted and, eventually, hopefully, disappear.
Until then, however, the international community will be making a serious mistake if it does not take into consideration this basic fact of life in the subcontinent. Bruce Reidel, who has been tasked by Mr. Obama to oversee the final version of the review of the Af-Pak region undertaken by Richard Holbrooke, will surely recognise the significance of this reality.
Several responsible leaders, including the Prime Minister of Canada and a former British Ambassador to Kabul, have said candidly that the war in Afghanistan is not winnable. The principal preoccupation of the United States currently is to formulate an exit strategy, which would enable it to leave behind an Afghanistan which can more or less maintain its own internal security and one where, the U.S. will persuade itself to believe, Al-Qaeda will not find a safe heaven from where it can plan and carry out anti-West attacks.
Influential voices in Washington are already calling for a lowering of the goals by excluding the establishment of a functioning democracy in Afghanistan. Dialogue with the so-called moderate elements of the Taliban is an important, perhaps the most important, element of this strategy in the making.
In theory it makes sense to try to divide the opposition and win over a section of it to ones side, but this seldom works out in practice. It is early days to pass a definitive judgment on whether General Petraeus tactics of co-opting, by whatever means, a number of Sunni tribal chiefs to work alongside the Americans will ensure stability in Iraq in the long term. But it certainly seems to have provided enough of a cover for the administration to announce a kind of pull-out from Iraq. There are many examples where such methods have not worked, including of Vietnam. Even in Somalia this experiment has failed to restore stability. The traitors expose themselves and their families to targeted assassinations and hostage situations.
The horrible record of the Taliban does not seem to worry those who advocate an accommodation with the good Taliban. Experts such as Mr. Rashid, who encourage the administration in this direction, are perhaps motivated by the desire to help the U.S. to extricate itself from the Afghan quagmire. It will not be fair, or helpful, to impute other motives to them, even though the end result of this approach could be the establishment of precisely the kind of regime in Kabul as is desired, short-sightedly, by Pakistan. For India as well as other neighbours, not excluding Pakistan, such an outcome will have extremely negative consequences, which need not be spelt out here.
Is it possible to think of some other direction in which to try to solve the intractable situation that Afghanistan is in at present?
Henry Kissinger, in an article in the International Herald Tribune (February 28, 2009) argued: Afghanistan is almost the archetypal international problem requiring a multilateral solution for the emergence of a political framework. Such an outcome would be possible, he suggests, only if Afghanistans neighbours, principally Pakistan, agree on a policy of restraint and opposition to terrorism. Mr. Kissinger did not propose any details of a possible framework.
In an article published in The Hindu some six years ago on December 24, 2003, which this writer had the privilege to co-author with Hamid Ansari, now the Vice President of India, we suggested the possible provisions of a political framework for Afghanistan. We proposed to combine Afghanistans traditional preference for neutrality with external guarantees of respect for such neutrality as well as of non-interference in Afghanistans internal affairs. We argued that only a combination of the two would negate the desire to interfere from without and the impulse to seek it from within. We felt that the Agreement on the Neutrality of Laos of 1962 offered a possible model for Afghanistan. That agreement spelt out the reciprocal commitments of the Laotian government on the one side and of the 14 co-signatories on the other. In Afghanistans case, the package would include the settlement of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. The Obama Administration has taken a positive initiative by convening the umbrella meeting in The Hague on March 31, inviting all the regional players, including Iran, to participate in it. India will be represented by an able and experienced hand. Hopefully, the ideas expressed here could be of some help.
The writer is a former Permanent Representative of India to the United Nations.
Posted by: john frum ||
03/26/2009 00:00 ||
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#1
We felt that the Agreement on the Neutrality of Laos of 1962 offered a possible model for Afghanistan.
The North Vietnamese were signatories, they just forgot to leave Laos. This twit seems to have amnesia and can't remember the Pathet Lao and the Ho Chi Minh Trail and all the rest of the successful aspects of the 62 Agreement. And don't forget the neutrality of Cambodia.
The similarities to Vietnam are already great, why not make it complete. At least it's a way out, never mind all the brave GIs that will give up their lives for nothing while we preform the Afghanization of the war.
Spruce up the Helo Pad on the roof of the US Embassy in Kabul.
Religion was the major weapon of the anti-liberation elements including Jamaat-e-Islami in their attempts to foil the birth of Bangladesh and in helping the Pakistani invaders, who launched genocide triggering the nation's armed struggle for independence on March 26, 1971.
"Jamaat-e-Islami cherishes Pakistan and Islam as an inseparable entity," commented former Jamaat ameer Golam Azam in 1971. He was also the chief of the East Pakistan unit of Jamaat during the Liberation War.
Jamaat's mouthpiece the daily Sangram covered a speech by Golam Azam in 1971. "Pakistan is the house of Islam for the world Muslims. Therefore, Jamaat activists don't justify being alive had Pakistan disintegrated," Golam Azam was quoted by Sangram as addressing a reception of Jamaat ministers at defunct Hotel Empire in Dhaka.
Jamaat incumbent Ameer Motiur Rahman Nizami, who was the chief of Islami Chaatra Sangha, student wing of Jamaat in 1971, said in an article, "Sacred land Pakistan is the home of Allah for establishing His rules."
Nizami, who has succeeded Golam Azam, had also labelled the freedom fighters as "khodadrohi" [rebels against Allah].
He said in that article, "The cowards [freedom fighters] who are against Allah have attacked this holy land [Pakistan]."
"Will the holy occasion of Shab-e-Qadr be able to evoke our courage to establish true peace and welfare through resisting all the attacks launched against Pakistan and Islam?" he asked.
Historical documents and news reports published during and after the Liberation War show that Nizami was the commander-in-chief of Al-Badr.
The Sangram quoted him on September 15, 1971 as saying: "Everyone of us should assume the role of a Muslim soldier of an Islamic state and through cooperation to the oppressed and by winning their confidence we must kill those; who are hatching conspiracy against Pakistan and Islam."
These are the few examples of the anti-liberation political elements, which stood against independence of Bangladesh with the Pakistani occupation forces when the freedom fighters were sacrificing their lives to liberate motherland.
Several political elements of Bangladesh had not only campaigned against liberation but also actively helped Pakistani forces commit genocide. Although some of these elements gradually disappeared from the political scene, some others like Jamaat became more and more powerful.
Jamaat leaders had also formed some paramilitary wings like Razakar and Al-Badr during the Liberation War. These wings worked as the auxiliary forces of the Pakistani military and also killed many pro-liberation people across the country.
Records show that Jamaat formed Razakar and Al-Badr to counter the freedom fighters. Razakar force was established by former Jamaat secretary general Moulana Abul Kalam Mohammad Yousuf, while Al-Badr comprised the Islami Chhatra Sangha activists.
During the nine-month bloody Liberation War, Pakistani forces and their Bangladeshi collaborators committed genocide and war crimes that left three million people killed and around quarter million women violated besides the planned elimination of the best Bangali brains on December 14, 1971.
Anticipating sure defeat, the Pakistani forces and their collaborators -- Razakar, Al-Badr and Al-Shams [mostly leaders of Jamaat and its student front] -- picked up leading Bangali intellectuals and professionals on December 14 and killed them en masse in an attempt to intellectually cripple the nation.
Demand for the trial of war criminals is one of the oldest issues of the country linked to the birth of Bangladesh.
Despite their defeat on December 16, 1971 with the Pakistani army, remnants of the collaborators have apparently never left their fight in the last 38 years. Even the nation witnessed it in the same manner in the national elections in December last year.
While the victorious Awami League had campaigned for secular Bangladesh, their main political rivals campaigned with the slogan "save Islam" through ballots.
Establishing Bangladesh as a secular state was one of the major essence of the liberation struggle and to liberate the country from the Islamic republic of Pakistan.
This historical split has not ended even after 38 years of independence as the political elements against liberation have not been tried for their war crimes.
The trial of war criminals is still a big challenge for the newly elected AL government, which led the War of Independence, even after having huge mandate for its major electoral pledges including trying the war criminals.
The demand for trial of war criminals has always been ignored due to several reasons including pressures from home and abroad to save the killers.
When the nation became hopeful about fulfilment of that demand, it has apparently been sidelined following the carnage at Pilkhana BDR headquarters in the name of a mutiny on February 25-26 that left 74 people including 57 army officers killed.
The brutality of the killings has again reminded the nation of many atrocities by the Pakistani occupation forces in 1971.
The investigators of the carnage suspect the aim of such a heinous act was, among others, to foil the government's firm move to try the war criminals..
The United States didnt ratify the Kyoto Protocol, but Canada did, and its experience is suggestive because its economy and per-capita oil consumption are similar to ours. Its Kyoto target is a six-per-cent reduction from 1990 levels. By 2006, however, despite the expenditure of billions of dollars on climate initiatives, its greenhouse-gas output had increased to a hundred and twenty-two per cent of the goal, and the environment minister described the Kyoto target as impossible.
The explanation for Canadas difficulties isnt complicated: the worlds principal source of man-made greenhouse gases has always been prosperity. The recession makes that relationship easy to see: shuttered factories dont spew carbon dioxide; the unemployed drive fewer miles and turn down their furnaces, air-conditioners, and swimming-pool heaters; struggling corporations and families cut back on air travel; even affluent people buy less throwaway junk. Gasoline consumption in the United States fell almost six per cent in 2008. That was the result not of a sudden greening of the American consciousness but of the rapid rise in the price of oil during the first half of the year, followed by the full efflorescence of the current economic mess.
The worlds financial and energy crises are connected, and they are similar because credit and fossil fuels are forms of leverage: oil, coal, and natural gas are multipliers of labor in much the same way that credit is a multiplier of wealth. Human history is the history of our ascent up what the naturalist Loren Eiseley called the heat ladder: coal bested firewood as an amplifier of productivity, and oil and natural gas bested coal. Fossil fuels have enabled us to leverage the strength of our bodies, and we are borrowing against the worlds dwindling store of inexpensive energy in the same way that we borrowed against the illusory equity in our homes. Moreover, American dependence on fossil fuels isnt going to end any time soon: solar panels and wind turbines provided only about a half per cent of total U.S. energy consumption in 2007, and they dont work when the sun isnt shining or the wind isnt blowing. Replacing oil is going to require more than determination.
#1
Petroleum is one of the reasons we were able to ban whaling. Seriously. But if I need to buy a couple of horses, a buggy and some whale oil lamps, that's OK.
I could find nothing from anyone in the MSM about this HB1388 that creates his army, even to using the word "uniform"
The House passed legislation to create Obama's promised civilian service force, ostensibly to vastly expand "volunteerism" in the U.S., via H.R. 1388. The mess passed 320-105, so you can thank BOTH sides of the aisle for the new Obama army. Bet you didn't hear much about it last night, did you! AIG! AIG! Smokescreen!
The "Gift Act" as it is called, creates several NEW corps of "volunteers" in addition to vastly expanding Americorps. I'm sure these "volunteers" will be counted in Obama's "save or create 3.5 million jobs" tally. Critics have warned that passage of the legislation is a backdoor way to require mandatory service under the guise of "volunteerism." It will require individuals, both males and females, to give 3 years of "service". George Soros is doing the happy dance.
The Congressional Budget Office estimates this one's gonna cost $6 BILLION or so. These "volunteers" will be paid, and where and how they will volunteer is determined by the government. Health care advocacy, environmental advocacy, educational advocacy, energy audits...there will be lots of opportunities modeled after ACORN/Hitler Youth/Saul Alinsky's playbook.
It's no accident that Obama's civilian service "opportunities" come at the same time Barry wants to limit your charitable donation deductions. By making donations only partially deductible, Obama will clearly reduce the amount of money available to private charities in the United States. Why would he want to do this? Why would anyone want to do this?
Click the above link to read the entire article -- Stunning
#5
Does it say what color shirts they would be wearing? And what about arm bands?
Thanks in advance...
Posted by: Grenter, Protector of the Geats ||
03/26/2009 14:57 Comments ||
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#6
I guess I don't understand how this can be made 'mandatory'. There's no such thing as a mandatory volunteer, so the Dems will just accuse whomever wrote the article as overreacting or lying.
#10
i would say brown shirts , but then the SS would have too pull another night of the long knives.The muslims did side with the nazis. I guess history does repeat itself. Pack yuor shit and move too somewhere safe like Canada or Mexico, yes i said Mexico
All new administrations stumble a bit as they seek their footing. But President Obama's foreign-policy botches have set new records for instant incompetence.
Contrary to left-wing myths, I wasn't a fan of the Bush administration. (I called for Donald Rumsfeld to get the boot in mid-2001.) But fair's fair. Despite his many faults, Bush sought to do good. Obama just wants to look good.
Vice President Dick Cheney was arrogant. Vice President Joe Biden is arrogant and stupid. Take your pick.
Don't worry about the new administration's ideology. Worry about its terrifying naivete.
Consider a sampling of the goofs O and his crew have made in just two months:
Posted by: ed ||
03/26/2009 10:30 ||
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#5
nah, Ralph's only got four samples, but he did leave off France and the gift gaffe.
But if Barry learned one thing on the South Side, it's that there is nothing money can't buy.
It may take him a while to figure out the new paradigm.
Posted by: Bobby ||
03/26/2009 12:39 Comments ||
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#6
Darth, last time I checked, you actually need a crime to impeach. Well, that and a congressional majority. And you'd need one hell of a real crime to actually convict, given the Nixon, Johnson, and Clinton examples.
It won't happen. Obama's a coward and a lawyer. The former keeps him from indulging in the cowboy political smacky-face which could get painted by the opposition as actually criminal, and the latter will probably help him skate from any procedural fuckups which could be loosely construed as criminal.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
03/26/2009 12:59 Comments ||
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#7
Darth, last time I checked, you actually need a crime to impeach.
No shit.
However, since Obama is deep in the pocket of Acorn and he is a veteran of Chicago politics and he has trouble getting his cronies vetted, I would be very, very, very surprised if he has never done a crime. It is just a matter of time if his opinion rate drops and the rats start jumping ship and they turn on THE ONE.
If the is so unpopular that anything he does is toxic to the public and the republicans gain some ground in 2010, I would expect the impeachment option to be kicked around as more dirt turns up on Obama.
#8
Well now if aint Ralphie The Playa Hayta Peters. Lets see here the Chi-coms are belligerent, the Paks are duplicitous fuck-ups, Bin Laden is still in hiding, and the Mullahs are two-faced game players. Oh yeah, and The Taliban havent laid down their weapons and joined the rest of the civilized world yet. Yep its gotta be Obamas fault. Christallfridays, didnt we hear enough of this sideline claptrap twoards the last administration?
#9
Holy shit theres a page two. Ralphs got more examples of US failure. Ok, the Norks are being run by an insane thug dictator, the Castro boyz still havent warmed up to Democracy, Hugo the Toad continues his paranoid rants, and Mexico is damn near a failed narco-state dependant on US trade. But wait theres more. Old Europe desperately covets clout and KGB incarnate is running the Big Bear. We demand results dammit not excuses!
#12
pepto bismol sales up. yoga and meditations mantras saying "i do not hate the stimulus package" forty times not working, time for the big guns like....a big gun might make me feel safer?.
#13
It both funny and tragic how the Feds are looking for all those whom conspired in 9-11, e.g. OBL, yet they don't know they call him "Mr. President" and "Commander-in-Chief". They have to obey, serve, and protect the very man they're looking for.
Nothing to do with Obama race or background, but everything to do with how he came to power.
They have to risk their lives by saving him from an assasin's bullet or other travail.
#14
They have to risk their lives by saving him from an assasin's bullet or other travail.
Crurong Gonque5089, they will risk their lives trying to prevent the unthinkable. But, statistically speaking, at some point there will come at time when they will have tried but failed.
#15
Well now...if ain't Ralphie "The Playa Hayta" Peters. Let's see here...the Chi-coms are belligerent, the Paks are duplicitous fuck-ups, Bin Laden is still in hiding, and the Mullah's are two-faced game players. Oh yeah, and The Taliban haven't laid down their weapons and joined the rest of the civilized world yet. Yep...it's gotta be Obama's fault. Christallfridays, didn't we hear enough of this sideline claptrap twoards the last administration?
Dude, remember, this is the candidate who blamed the Taliban resurgence on US bombing of civilians in Afghanistan, said we needed to be more understanding of Pakistan, and that we were being too belligerent to the Mullahs, and that all we had to do was elect him and everything would be flying unicorns defecating skittles over the surface of the whole world.
All Hail the TOTUS!
As part of the Obama Loyalty Oath and Obama Army Indoctrination Process, we at the White House monitor communications of a few ... okay, every ... member of the traditional media who has signed on with us. Last night's presser was a rousing success, in part because of individuals like the one's below. To give you FOTs an insight into why we are so successful , here is an excerpt from the texting string between two of those faithful followers. Since Google is part of the Administation, they share everything with us. The names have been changed to protect their privacy.
Keith Olbermann: Here comes the President.
Huffington Post: Oh, oh, here he comes. My God, he is magnificent.
Olbermann: He is truly our greatest natural resource. I would give up my job to move to Montana and begin carving his face on Mount Rushmore. If only I knew how to work with my hands. Cornell doesn't offer those kinds of courses ... it's an Ivy League school, you know.
FactCheck: Won't even bother with Mount Rushmore. Cornell is in the Ivy League, but not of the Ivy League, if you get my drift.
Huffington Post: Wait. He's about to say something. It sounds complicated. Apparently he is predicting we are going to have a "Good evening." See? The Obama Administration's policies are working already. One good evening begets another, and another.
Olbermann: He's talking more. This political team is so much savvier than the last Administration. You can tell because the stock market went up yesterday, and instead of hanging a sign behind the President saying, "Mission Accomplished", we all just got buttons that say that. Much more elegant and less gaudy. I think they are made of gold.
Huffington Post: You got a button?
FactCheck: These people have the attention span of fruit.
Olbermann: The President is talking about the economy, and how there is much work to be done. Oh, here comes the road and path metaphors. I never get tired of those, because when President Obama uses them, they become less like shopworn, hackneyed phrases, and more like pearls of wisdom dusted in the glitter Michelle uses to highlight her cheekbones. I am inspired enough to devote three or four days of programming to this.
HuffPo: Oh, oh, he's taking questions. Am I on the list? Do I get one?
FactCheck: No, he was not on the list.
Olbermann: I don't think I'm on the list. I missed the noon rehearsal, so I got pulled. Bill Burton is a taskmaster. I got assigned to "podium lifter" duty for a week.
HuffPo: That's why you need to get tight with Rahm and Gibbs. Arianna took care of me. You should meet her. Maybe she can help.
Olbermann: You think? She doesn't mind that I'm paid by a company that is going to accept gobs of stimulus money, and that I will be paid a bonus I have no intention of giving back or having taxed because I put it in an offshore account?
HuffPo: No, if you're part of the team, she'll be glad to help.
Olbermann: I'd really apprecaite the help. I'll be out in LA for my six-month check-up on my eyelash transplant ...
Okay, I think you get the drift. Notice how these people stopped paying attention before the questions started? This is exactly why we love, LOVE, these people. And why Ed Henry of CNN and Jake Tapper of ABC were most definitely not invited to the after-par
Six months ago, the police raided an apartment in New Delhis Jamia Nagar. Two alleged terrorists and a police officer died. By the standards a violence-scarred nation has become accustomed to, the event was unremarkable. But the Jamia Nagar deaths had an exceptional impact, precipitating charges that police forces across India were operating a large-scale shoot-to-kill policy directed at Muslims: a communal project, it was claimed, that was being camouflaged as counter-terrorism.
Participants at an October 2008 convention in New Delhi, for example, declared that there was a concerted effort by the Indian police, intelligence agencies and certain political parties to portray all members of the Muslim community as terrorists and extremists to be arbitrarily arrested, tortured and killed in fake encounters.
Members of the Coordination Committee of Muslim Organisations an alliance made up of the Jamaat-e-Islami, the All-India Muslim Majlis-e-Mushawarat, the Jamiat Ullema-e-Hind, the All-India Milli Council and the Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadis went further, demanding that during a search operation in any Muslim locality, at least one-third of the raiding force must consist of officers belonging to the minority community, and minority elders of the affected area should be taken into confidence.
Media accounts since have elevated the charge that Indias police officers are trigger-happy bigots to the level of received truth. Little effort has been made, though, to see if the allegations rest on sound empirical foundations. They dont. In fact, the police are reducing their reliance on lethal force, and shedding communal partisanship. The reason why they do not rely on force helps to explain just why Indias democracy, often reviled by metropolitan elites, is so important to hundreds of millions of voters.
No public-domain documentation exists on the religious identity of individuals killed by the police. Databases maintained by the National Crime Records Bureau set down each incident but not the religious identity of the victims. The police are obliged to report all lethal force deaths to the National Human Rights Commission. In addition, the Union Home Ministry monitors incidents involving the use of lethal force by the police. For the most part, though, the reporting of incidents by the States is less than comprehensive.
Based on the available Central government documentation, The Hindu was able to examine 750 civilian deaths in police firing which took place between January 2004 and December 2008 about two-thirds of those estimated to have been killed during this period. Spread across Assam, Delhi, Gujarat, Haryana, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and West Bengal, the data exclude deaths in insurgency and counter-terrorism in the northeast and Jammu and Kashmir. One hundred and forty-six victims, or 19.4 per cent of the sample, were identified by the police as Muslims. Given that Muslims make up 13.5 per cent of the Indian population, it would seem clear that they are disproportionately in danger from the police weapons.
A close study of the available data, though, suggests that this conclusion would be misleading. For one, the bulk of the killings have not taken place in the States most often accused of communal bias: Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and, more recently, Delhi. Gujarat saw just five police firing deaths in 2005, 16 in 2006 and one in 2007. Delhi registered just eight during the same period. Andhra Pradesh saw high numbers of killings, but mainly of Maoist insurgents of Hindu origin. Instead, an overwhelming majority of killings of Muslims by the police took place in Uttar Pradesh a State where they make up 18 per cent of the population, not dissimilar to their share of deaths in police firing. The Uttar Pradesh police offensive, targeting violent organised crime, has claimed hundreds of lives in recent years of Hindus and Muslims. In 2007, the last year for which the NCRB figures are available, the Uttar Pradesh police accounted for 102 of the 250 civilian lethal force fatalities nationwide. By way of contrast, the police fire in Andhra Pradesh led to the loss of 30 lives, while Maharashtra registered 27 deaths. Rajasthan reported 22 fatalities, most of them during caste riots. In 2006, Uttar Pradesh saw 103 fatalities, second only to insurgency-devastated Chhattisgarh. And in 2005, it recorded 42 deaths, placing the State third in police-firing fatalities after Andhra Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir.
Nationwide, half or a lesser number of civilian fatalities in police firing were the outcome of counter-terrorism operations and the ratio has been declining steadily. In 2005, counter-terrorism operations accounted for 46.76 per cent of civilian fatalities in police firing. In 2006, the figure rose to 52.12 per cent. The NCRB figures show that in 2007, though, just a quarter of civilian fatalities in police firing 54 of 252 were linked to counter-terrorism.
Put simply, there is no evidence to support the claim that there is an increased incidence of extra-judicial executions of Muslims or, for that matter, Hindus. Even though police forces across India have intensified intelligence-led operations targeting Islamist groups, the NCRB data for 2007 show a sharp decline in the use of lethal force. A large part of the decline came because of a dramatic decline in killings by the police in Chhattisgarh, where fatalities fell to seven. Andhra Pradesh also saw a sharp decline in police killings, from 72 to 45. Only in Uttar Pradesh did deaths caused by the use of lethal force remain at the 2006 levels.
By global standards, the use of lethal force by the police in India is relatively low. Figures published in 1987 show that the police in Dallas, Texas, killed 1.03 people per 1,00,000 population the previous year. San Diego was next, with 0.83 people killed per 100,000, followed by Los Angeles with 0.71 deaths. Far from being trigger-happy, these figures suggest, Indias police forces are extremely cautious in resorting to lethal force.
What these figures point to is a slow but sure process of transformation: for which the social transformation brought about by democracy deserves credit. Less than a decade ago, the police forces across India faced credible charges of communal bias. Reports of judicial commissions, which investigated the 1982 riots in Meerut, the 1978 riots in Aligarh and the 1992-1993 carnage in Mumbai, showed systematic anti-Muslim biases in everything from the use of lethal force and patterns of arrest to the treatment of prisoners.
New studies, though, have thrown up signs of change. In January 2005, the Senior Superintendent of Police, Saharanpur, Safi Rizvi now an aide to Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram conducted a study of the districts prison population. He sought to test the proposition that the police were disproportionately likely to act against Muslims and backward caste suspects. Mr. Rizvis study, however, demonstrated that the prison population of Saharanpur closely matched the districts demographic profile. Hindus made up 58.5 per cent of the jail population, closely mirroring their overall share in the district population. Muslim prisoners accounted for 39 per cent of the jail population, marginally lower than their demographic representation. While Dalits made up 21 per cent of the district population, they constituted just 19 per cent of the prisoners; Brahmins, in a twist, were somewhat over-represented in jail.
Rather than religion or caste, Mr. Rizvi concluded, class constituted an accurate marker of which sections of the population were over-represented in prisons. More than 84 per cent of the prison population, he found, was made up of the poor more than twice their share of the general population, as determined by the National Council for Applied Economic Research. It wasnt, Mr. Rizvi noted, that the poor were more likely to steal: the fact is that the poor criminal is promptly sent to jail for stealing 5 pieces of iron from the rail yard, one bicycle or pick-pocketing Rs. 50. He goes to jail for these crimes and stays there unable to afford a lawyer, sureties or patronage.
More studies are needed to see if the data from Saharanpur reflect national trends: anecdotal evidence suggests that Muslims are still significantly over-represented in the prison populations of Maharashtra and Gujarat. But if Mr. Rizvis findings are borne out by subsequent studies, it would suggest that Muslim and Dalit voters have become adroit at leveraging the political process to avoid victimisation. Police officers, the decline in police-firing deaths also shows, are increasingly sensitive to the costs of the indiscriminate use of force. Large-scale violence, or resort to extra-judicial executions, is no longer possible without inviting protest and political or judicial censure. By contrast, Uttar Pradeshs anti-crime killings have continued apace because the police are acting against groups which challenge the influence and authority of mainstream politicians.
Police forces everywhere in the world reflect the biases of the societies which give birth to them. It ought to surprise no one that some police officers in India have communal prejudices. The good news for India is that democracy appears to be making it ever more difficult for bigots in uniform to act on their beliefs.
Posted by: john frum ||
03/26/2009 06:54 ||
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#1
The DSTP is a less interesting place because of it.
Posted by: ed ||
03/26/2009 9:47 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
The House passed legislation to create Obama's promised civilian service force, ostensibly to vastly expand "volunteerism" in the U.S., via H.R. 1388. The mess passed 320-105, so you can thank BOTH sides of the aisle for the new Obama army. Bet you didn't hear much about it last night, did you! AIG! AIG! Smokescreen!
