A new taste of the countryside
Jing Xiaolei

Driving 110 km toward famous tourist attraction Tianchi Lake from Urumchi, capital of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, clusters of yurts can be seen alongside the winding road, set amid the trees. The traditional nomads’ homes all look new, each with a number printed on the door. Then a signpost catches the eye: It reads “Welcome to the Kazakh Folklore Village!”
Marziya, 39, is the owner of one of the yurts. She is a Kazakh who raised cattle more than 10 years ago on the other side of Tianchi Lake. “We used to be herdsmen and barely did any business except for selling some smoked horse meat,” she said.
Official figures show there are about 1.4 million Kazakhs in Xinjiang, accounting for 7 percent of the total population in the autonomous region.
Marziya’s yurt is No. A-2, the second yurt in the A section. According to Marziya, there are three sections in this folklore village, with sections A and B completed and section C still under construction.
“We have 58 households in section A. Each household owns two yurts, a bigger one and a smaller one. The bigger one is to accommodate tourists and the smaller one is where we live and prepare food for the guests,” she explained.
Both yurts share the same cement base. According to Marziya, the local government invested a total of 10 million yuan in constructing the folk village.
Last year there was a flood and most of the old yurts were destroyed, so the government allocated a large sum of money to rebuild their homes. “The government spent about 100,000 yuan for each family, including the cement base, the construction of the two yurts and water and electricity supplies,” said the owner, adding that the residents have to pay only 300 yuan a year for management expenses.
It costs about 150 yuan per day to rent a yurt. Each is decorated differently, according to the taste of the owner. Tourists can eat, sleep and sing karaoke inside the yurt. The food served here is home-style.
“Sometimes I hire a dance team to perform for our guests,” said Habieke, owner of another yurt in the folk village.
Habieke, also a Kazakh, used to be a tour guide and has sold handicraft articles for some time.
“Since I took up the folk tourism business here several years ago, I’m doing better and better. Last year I made a net profit of some 80,000-90,000 yuan,” he said.
Habieke is too busy to run his business alone and he employs two workers to help him. In this way, herdsmen participate in the service industry and immediately have their income increased, which is an important objective of rural development.
What’s more, as herdsmen become settled residents, it is good for the environment, since grazing does some harm, said Qin Xiaoling, a local official.
From farmer to hotel manager
Aside from the folk village experience provided for the tourists, there is another “farmhouse hotel” economy booming in Xinjiang, and Shuixigou Township is a typical example.
Only 50 km from the capital city Urumchi, Shuixigou Township is located adjacent to the Southern Mountain scenic spot, which has a favorable climate that is cool in summer and warm in winter.
Given the climate advantage, Fangjiazhuang Village, under the jurisdiction of Shuixigou Township, has developed the farmhouse hotel business. According to the village Party branch secretary, Xian Hui, the village finished reconstruction work in 2003, with all the old houses torn down and new ones built. The construction of each farmhouse cost 110,000 yuan, with 60,000 yuan paid by farmers and the rest coming from a government subsidy.
This village used to be poverty-stricken, with a small agricultural production of wheat and potatoes, but it now receives a tourist population that is growing year by year. In 2005, there were 56,000 visitors, and that number has risen to 73,000 so far this year.
“I didn’t quite understand the point of tearing down my house and rebuilding it until the next year, when I made a net profit of 100,000 yuan through accommodating the tourists,” said village resident Xian Hui.
Xian’s house is clean and bright, with a spacious guest room, two bedrooms with four beds in them, a bathroom and an entertainment room for playing mahjong. According to Xian, all the farmhouse hotels have undergone a sanitary inspection and meet those standards.
“You won’t believe that a film celebrity like Li Yapeng once stayed at my hotel,” said Xian with excitement and pride.
The neighboring Pixiliang Village, on the other hand, still looks like a construction site. Bulldozers move back and forth; a few new houses are standing but others have not yet taken shape.
Not far from the site, a ski slope is being built on one side of the Southern Mountain. According to township official Chen Kuan, the local Xinjiang Hongjing Group Co. Ltd., a telecommunications company, has invested in developing a ski resort where Pingxiliang Village used to be located. So the company has to relocate the villagers near the foot of the mountain and help them rebuild their houses. When these new houses are finished, they also will be used to operate a hotel business.
In recent years, Shuixigou Township has introduced 29 enterprises and a total investment of 1.8 billion yuan to help develop the local economy, focusing on real estate and tourism.
It seems that the efforts have paid off. In 2005, the per capita net income of the township residents was 4,317 yuan, with 47.7 percent coming from tourism.
Though there are no statistics yet on how much of a contribution this rural tourism makes to the autonomous region’s overall tourism revenue, according to Naiyimu Yasen, the head of the Xinjiang Tourism Administration, “Countryside tourism is gaining momentum and will flourish in five years.”
Dealing with problems
While the government has helped to increase farmers’ income and improve their livelihood through various channels, including tourism, the current situation for developing rural tourism does have some defects, according to Professor Chen Chuangang with the Center for Recreation and Tourism Research of Peking University.
The most universal problem, said Chen, is duplication. Sometimes investment decisions are made blindly due to a lack of proper macro-adjustment and guidance from the government. Investors also fail to do sufficient market research and planning before they jump into the heated tourism business.
Chen pointed out that rural tourism remains at the level of providing lodging and food, not going deeply enough into exploring real folk customs. As a result, rural tourism activities follow the same pattern: eat home-style food, drink tea, play mahjong and sing karaoke.
Another problem is of even more concern, said Chen. Countryside tourism in some places destroys the natural rural landscape. Ignoring the basic considerations of simplicity, naturalism and harmony, flashy and luxurious tourist facilities are being put up, which by no means fits into the countryside scene.
Rural tourism is viewed as important because it is considered to be one of the most efficient ways to improve the lives of the rural population. Without resolving the problems that occur in the process of developing countryside tourism, however, there will be no further sustainable development, Chen said.
These problems so far might be denied or overlooked by local governments, but experts have advice on developing healthy and sustainable rural tourism, the most important suggestion being to develop an integrated plan before diving into the booming business.

(The Daily Mail-Beijing Review Articles Exchange Item)


Protecting Women’s Rights: Musharraf Delivers
Nasim Zehra

When Pakistan’s military ruler Zia ul-Haq introduced what was truly a black law, the 1979 Hadood Ordinace, he proceeded in a truly dictatorial manner. His handpicked “men of religion” proposed laws in the name of Islam that blatantly violated the teachings of Islam and the Constitution of Pakistan. A more anti-women law would have been hard to legislate. It prompted hundreds of brave Pak women to rise and challenge the military dictator and his black laws. That battle lasted for a quarter of a century; much beyond the dictator’s exit.
Despite the indefatigable efforts of women’s groups, women’s issues never had a political constituency. Most political parties were not interested in repealing these laws. And those like the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) who were, never had the numbers. It was always going to be a military man, who would herd the unwilling while supporting the willing to ultimately undo the worst of these laws. And finally it was done on Nov. 15. Pakistan’s Parliament has taken the first concrete step toward unraveling the most controversial aspects of Hudood Ordinance. It passed by a majority vote the Women’s Protection Bill (WPB).
The controversial 1979 Hudood Ordinances covering zina (adultery and rape) and qazf (false accusation of zina) in many instances not only deny justice to the raped women but also expose them to false accusations and punishment for adultery. Gen. Musharraf personally ensured that all the Pakistan Muslim League-Q— parliamentarians supported the WPB. All the coalition members of the ruling party including the Mohajir Qaumi Mahaz (MQM) supported it as did the country’s main opposition party the PPP.
PPP saw this as the first step toward granting equal rights to women and the MQM rejected the Muttaheda Majlis-e-Amal (MMA)’s version of Islam. The MMA were the lead opponents of the WPB. MMA has an ideological position on it. According to their understanding of Islam, this great religion that above all promotes justice, compassion and fair play, a rape victim must produce four adult male witnesses who have actually witnessed the act of rape. They have threatened to resign on Dec. 7 and have warned that the bill would “make Pakistan a free sex zone.” They have been maintaining that the bill was meant to “appease” the United States.
Political gimmick has also been at work. Chaudary Shujaat has responded to the MMA’s criticism that it is un-Islamic by handing in his resignation to the speaker of the Parliament saying that “They (the MMA) are threatening to resign, but I am submitting my resignation if the bill contains anything contrary to Islamic teachings.” The Pakistan Muslim League-(Nawaz) and the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf also did not support it. PML-N’s leadership maintains that it opposed the WPB because it did not want to do business with a “usurper’s government.” PML-N maintained that the differing stance of the opposition parties on the WPB would damage the PPP-PML-N alliance in the Alliance for Restoration of Democracy (ARD).
Clearly PML-N has been willing to engage in business with the government over issues like privileges for parliamentarians but have refrained from supporting a move that would have repealed sections of a law that were violative of Islam and the Constitution. This WPB has been passed almost two years after the bill against honor killing was passed by the two Houses end 2004. That was the Criminal Law (Amendment) Bill, which amended the Pakistan Penal Code and the Criminal Procedure Code and prescribed death penalty for honor-killings. Although a positive first step, it was a weak bill. By its failure to make the state the woman’s wali (guardian), the bill would not preclude the possibility of the family still granting pardon to a person killing in the name of honor. And since the killer must always be a family member, there remains a strong possibility that family members would grant him pardon. This then dilutes the deterrent impact of the bill.
Encouraged by the passage of the WPB the ruling party has presented the Prevention of Anti-Women Practices Bill for consideration by the House. This seeks to put an end to practices such as depriving women of their property rights, forced marriage, divorce by pronouncing it thrice in one sitting, and exchange marriages.
In Pakistan, popular politics is now openly challenging the role of the religio-political parties, often supported and promoted by the establishment, as the guardians and interpreters of Islam. There are definite signs that Pakistan’s political landscape is undergoing change. Popular national and regional parties like the PPP, MQM, ANP and PKMAP are gathering momentum. In the coming days they will directly compete with the religio-political groups for the soul of Pakistan. Pakistan has the intellectual capacity, the democratic zeal and the political culture required to lead a reformation. In Pakistan for too long the principles of fair play have been missing. The passage of a WPB was a significant step toward establishing fair play.


War on terror: Importance of winning hearts & minds
Sir Cyril Townsend

Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller was appointed head of MI5, the Security Service, in 2002. In former years nobody in the Security Service could be named in the media. Nowadays, following the American example of the director of the CIA being known by name in public, we — the public, and we pay the bill — are allowed to know just the head boy or girl.
Dame Eliza, as the press in Britain now call her, was born into the British aristocracy in 1948. Her father was the 1st Viscount Dilhorne, a former Conservative lord chancellor, and he sent her to a private school, Benenden. She went on to Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, and was recruited by MI5 in 1974. She became deputy director-general in 1997. One gets the impression it would be unwise to mess her about; as her name suggests, she is a figure of considerable authority.
On Nov. 9 she gave an address to a carefully chosen audience in London. The meeting had been arranged by professor Peter Hennessy from the University of London. Her message was highly alarming, but she, herself, came over as a confident person, who knew her facts and also knew what needed to be done. Her subject was the unpleasant one of international terrorism and its threat to the United Kingdom — the new scourge of our time.
Just before the invasion of Iraq the government gave the impression that it was exaggerating the security case, to reinforce their case for invading Iraq with the Americans. Enough has been revealed since 2003 to know there was truth in this accusation. On one occasion Scimitar armored vehicles were deployed to Heathrow Airport for no good military reason: Together with their crews from the Household Cavalry they looked impressive on the 6 o’clock TV news.
The figures Dame Eliza gave were clear and striking. There are 1,600 suspects under surveillance. There are 30 “Priority 1” plots to kill or maim or seriously damage property. 200 terror networks have been identified in the United Kingdom. Most of this activity is under the direct control of Al-Qaeda leaders in Pakistan. The Security Service’s caseload has risen by 80 percent since January.
In her view:
“More and more people are moving from passive sympathy toward active terrorism through being radicalized or indoctrinated by friends, families, in organized training events here and overseas. Young teenagers are being groomed to be suicide bombers. It is the youth who are being actively targeted, groomed, radicalized and set on a path that frighteningly quickly could end in their involvement in mass murder of their fellow citizens, on their early death in a suicide attack or on a foreign battlefield. Killing oneself and others in response is an attractive option for some citizens of this country and others around the world.”
I find particularly chilling her belief that:
“(The) threat is serious, is growing and will, I believe, be with us for a generation. It is a sustained campaign, not a series of isolated incidents. It aims to wear down our will to resist.”
It is most unusual for the head of MI5 to make such a public speech; advice is normally given to ministers in private. It coincided, I suspect on purpose, with the conviction of Dhiren Barot, the Al-Qaeda planner, who was jailed for 40 years. He wanted to use stretched limousines, packed with gas cylinders, as bombs in public places.
MI5’s basic problem is well known. Its target in the 1990s was the Provisional IRA. It has had to switch quickly to young Muslim extremists, living in the United Kingdom, by no means down and out but often comparatively well educated and from good Muslim families.