Living on the edge
A. Siddique

THE Fourth Round of the Composite Dialogue Process (CDP) might be reaching its culmination yet the Kashmir Issue, which ought to have been the centre piece of the four years long engagement, still remains banished to the sidelines. As a saving grace the guns are silent and there is a trickle of Kashmiri population reaching out to long separated kith and kin through selected crossing points - an impossibility a few years ago - yet the peace process has failed to translate into any relaxation for the bruised and battered Kashmiri population. In fact, even as the Indian rhetoric continues to focus on the importance of confidence building measures (CBM) to improve the atmospherics for tackling the Gordian Knot of Kashmir , the level of atrocities to snuff out the Kashmiri resistance has gone many notches up. The consequence is that while peace remains elusive as ever, a life of tension and unmitigated anxiety has turned bulk of population in IHK into psychiatric patients.
The proposals for demilitarization, floated by President Musharraf in Sep 2005 to speed up the CDP, were meant to raise the comfort level of Kashmiris, who since 1989 , have had to learn to survive in an environment saturated by the Indian military presence . The proposal, suggesting demilitarization of the population centers of Sri Nagar, Baramola and Kupwara, as the first step in filtering down of benefit of the ongoing detente to the Kashmiri population, were never responded to by the Indians. Rhetoric and affected resolve aside, the indicators coming out of IHK have a different story to tell - of a life on the edge which is pushing an increasing number of civilian population - and their tormentors; the personnel of the security apparatus, beyond the edge of sanity.
A survey by Medecins Sans Frontier (MSF), an aid group, provides a window into the state of psychic trauma endured by of the population in IHK and the view is frightening. Of the 510 people interviewed, one in ten had lost immediate family members in the violence and one in three had lost members of their extended families. One in six had been forcibly displaced and 13% had witnessed rape. Virtually all had endured one or more raids by security forces and only occasionally did they feel secure - their nerves strung taut by fear of the impending midnight knock. The MSF report concluded that one third of the respondents were suffering from “psychological distress” while a similar proportion had contemplated suicide - a phenomenon that traditionally had remained extremely rare among the predominantly Muslim Kashmiri population. According to conservative estimates nearly 25000 individuals, mostly in the young-age bracket of 16 to 25 , have attempted suicide since the insurgency erupted in 1989 while the number who were ‘successful’ stands at around 4500.The suicide rate among Kashmiris which was lowest in entire India in 1980 - 0.2 per one lac of population - has shot to the top of the grisly charts at 20 per lac; registering an increase of a hundred times and notching at twice the Indian average of 11 per lac.
The suicidal tendency among Kashmiris is more of a reflection of the dark symptom of a disease than a malaise in itself. Life is universally beautiful and even centurions strive and struggle to snatch a few more years of this unique gift. But in Kashmir daily encounters with state dispensed violence causing emotional scars, stress, anxiety and depression unleashes an unending state of fear that saps the will to live. Uncertainty hangs thick; one never knows when there will be the “midnight knock” and the troops will drag persons from their beds in front of their terrified families, never to return. There are daily cordon and search operations by security forces where hooded informers nod and that may be the last to be seen of an unfortunate individual. Fake encounters abound in which even officers shoot innocents to earn fame and promotions since the body count has become a measure of effectiveness of units and commanders to claim fame and glory. People are routinely picked up to inflict revenge on the militants by abducting their brothers, fathers, relatives or even friends According to the Association of Parents of the Disappeared Persons (APDP) there are over ten thousand disappeared persons in IHK for whom their loved ones are frantically searching for a clue. Running from pillar to post their ambition is to find at least the remains of their loved ones to give them a burial. The measure of trauma confronting the population in IHK is reflected by the state of pain in a village Dardpora, where there are no male members left, only widows , half widows and orphans who are struggling to come to grips with the obtaining realities of life in the IHK.
If the Kashmiri population is turning psychic, its tormentors , too, are paying the price of their abuse of unfettered powers. Powered and protected by provisions of highly controversial and oppressive legislations, like Armed Forces Special Powers act (AFSPA), the Indian security apparatus is virtually free to conduct its operations rough-shod with out fear of accountability. Yet the resistance put up by the Kashmiri freedom fighters and the stoic defiance of the pushed to the wall general population, has inflicted an irreparable damage on the mental make up of the Indian military. The process of breakup is amply reflected by the bourgeoning number of suicides in the Indian Army’s rank and file serving in the IHK. The fault lines are also obvious through the case of fragging (shooting colleagues or superiors in a fit of uncontrollable rage over minor or no provocation) which are multiplying and have sent the Indian Army reeling to avert a mass psychological breakup. In the month of July this year alone there were eleven incidents of suicide among troops employed in IHK; bringing the total number of incidents during the current year to 58. The precariousness of the situation is evident from the fact that Indian Army’s casualties from suicides and incidents of fratricide far outnumber casualties sustained during the counter insurgency operations.
The Indian insistence on maintaining a status quo in Kashmir by sticking with its military approach has led to Kashmiri population being pushed close to and in many cases beyond the edge of sanity. The brutish tactics of fake encounters, thousands of unexplained disappearances , unending cordon and search operations supervised by turncoat renegades and the ever present “midnight knock” has generated an environment of perpetual anxiety that has affected the mental health of the Kashmiri population at grass roots level. The oppressors , too, have to contend with their wages of sins and as the incidents of suicides and fragging indicate rise, the Indian occupying force in IHK is reaching a break up point, forcing the authorities to institutionalize remedial measures. As things stand, demilitarization of the thoroughly bruised population centers, as a first step, to balm the painful wounds, may turn out to be the best CBM for imparting a timely impetus to the sputtering CDP.

Turbulent Afghanistan - The invisible hand
Furzana Shaheen

AFGHANISTAN has always been an area of instability and used by the great powers to exert influence in the ‘Great Game’. Iran is playing a growing role in the insurgency in Afghanistan. Tehran has historically been active in Kabul. After Russian withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989, Iran became the patron of Northern Alliance which is composed of the ousted ethnic Tajik President Burhanuddin Rabbani, assassinated Commander Ahmed Shah Masoud and their Jamiat-i-Islami forces, General Abdul Rashid Dostum, and the ethnic Uzbek Junbish-i-Milli party.
The recent seizure of Iranian made bombs in Afghanistan by the Balkh intelligence officials reinforces the Pakistan’s stance that these are the other regional countries and not Pakistan who are responsible for fuelling insurgency in Afghanistan. NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer announced recently that a powerful and sophisticated roadside bomb prevalent in Iraq- had been discovered near a university in Kabul. Scheffer said these weapons were smuggled from Iran into Afghanistan and were to go into the hands of Taliban insurgents.
Since 2001, Tehran has been playing an even stronger role in Afghanistan which is considered an important wedge on its geopolitical map. The moves of Iran respond to different kinds of interest. On the one hand, Tehran needs a stable Afghanistan in order to guarantee its internal stability and its economic and social interests while on the other hand Tehran has an interest in stirring up instability and disorder within Afghanistan with the aim of evicting foreign forces from Afghanistan. The insurgency in Afghanistan has many dimensions of which one is its inclination towards Tehran.
Recently British and US officials have charged that Iranian made weapons are aiding the Taliban. The extremist militia is waging a guerilla war against Kabul Government as well as the multinational forces here. The US Ambassador William Wood has claimed that an increasing number of Iranian weapons are turning up inside Afghanistan. Among the American policy makers a prevalent view is that Tehran is seizing any opportunity to complicate the stabilization efforts in Afghanistan. Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair wrote in the May edition of the Economist Magazine that, “It is clear that Taliban are receiving arms from the elements of the Iranian regime”.
US Secretary of Defence Robert Gates said that he had not seen specific intelligence indicating the involvement of Iranian Government, however, new information makes it pretty clear that there is a fairly substantial flow of weapons from Iran to insurgents in Afghanistan and that in his opinion, “It is difficult to believe that it is associated with smuggling or the drug business or that it is taking place without the knowledge of the Iranian Government” General Dan McNeil, the US Commander of the ISAF( International Security Assistance Forces) told Journalists that, “We have intercepted at least two convoys that have contained munitions or weapons. Those munitions and weapons are clearly of Iranian origin”.
According to US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns, “There is an irrefutable evidence that Iran is supplying weapons to the Taliban as part of a pattern of activity of Iranians providing weapons to militant groups in Lebanon, Iraq, and the Palestinian territories. It is certainly coming from the IRGC (lranian Revolutionary Guard Corps) command which is a basic unit of the Iranian Government”. The discovery of bombs known as EFPs (Explosively Formed Projectile) in Afghanistan is seen by many observers as fairly ­ conclusive evidence that Iran is supplying weapons to the Taliban.
The Afghan media has also published an increasing number of critical reports about Iran’s secret contacts with insurgent groups in Afghanistan. According to reports published in local Afghan newspaper, including Weesa, Iranian involvement is not limited to unofficial cooperation with militant forces but infact includes official efforts to influence the Afghan administration. According to Kabul-based analyst Ustad Faizullah Amini, “Iran has been against the Talibanization of Afghanistan, but the presence of US troops at its doorsteps has changed the direction of its foreign policy. Now, Tehran is willing to cooperate with different groups to reach the shared goal of defeating the United States in Afghanistan. Iran cooperates with all anti-American forces in the region regardless of their religion and language”. Many other regional experts argue that the current escalation of violence in Afghanistan is a direct result of Iran’s new strategy. The Guardian states that, “Military and diplomatic sources have received numerous reports of Iranians meeting tribal elders in Taliban-influenced areas, bringing offers of military or more often financial support for the fight against foreign forces”.




It’s almost too late
Emma Moore

NOBODY likes a critic—especially one in a foreign country. There’s something deeply irritating about foreigners moaning over local behavior simply because it’s different to their own norms. Different doesn’t mean better or worse, although that often seems to be the implication.
That’s why I’m glad a leading Chinese official has publicly voiced what I have privately thought since I arrived in China. In a recent front page China Daily story, Vice Minister of Construction Qiu Baoxing railed against local governments’ wholesale destruction of the country’s historical sites and cultural relics. “They are totally unaware of the value of cultural heritage,” he noted with disgust during a Beijing international conference on urban culture and city planning. Interestingly, these comments came not from an historian or a conservationist, but from the deputy head of construction.
One of the first Chinese characters I learned to recognize outside my textbooks was chai, roughly “demolish.” Take a short walk almost anywhere around Beijing and you will soon come across a wall spray painted with a circled chai character. Some of the buildings earmarked for demolition had it coming—dated, cheaply made tumbledown apartment blocks have no place in the capital’s glitzy new business districts. But many other old buildings are solidly constructed with more character in one elaborate roof gable than all their towering new neighbors together. In China’s rush to modernize, these low-rise, old-fashioned buildings are seen as blots on the modern cityscape, where prestige and success are automatically associated with newness. But with a bit of effort, they could become stylish oases of charm among their featureless replacements.
“All Chinese cities look the same,” replied my American friend with a shrug when I asked her about her trip to a city in Henan Province for a colleague’s wedding. I don’t know how many times I have heard that and reluctantly agreed. Every Chinese city I have visited that is not a major tourist hot spot does look the same. Cities tend to have a lot in common with each other in any country; but here in China, the similarities go far beyond the usual downtown shopping areas, sprawling suburbs and homogenous central business areas.
Even in well-known tourist towns the beauty lies in the detail, not in the overall impression. In the canal town of Suzhou, in Jiangsu Province, I was disappointed to find that far from being a beautifully preserved relic of the past, as its sobriquet “The Venice of the East” would have visitors believe, most of the city is much like any other in China. Yes, there are some lovely old canal areas linked by leafy lanes, but the visitor has to seek them out amongst the usual urban hodge-podge and rip-off tourist areas.
Lured by photos of Tianjin’s historic Western concession areas, I took a short train ride from Beijing, anticipating a step back into a lost era. True, not all the Western-style balconied mansions and grandly imposing commercial buildings of the city’s colorful past have been destroyed, and efforts are being made to protect and preserve some of them. But the vast majority has either been knocked down or is in such a bad state of repair that restoration is unfeasible. I was taken aback to find that the house where China’s last emperor Puyi lived after leaving the Forbidden City is now home to numerous families and their domestic animals.

(The Daily Mail-Beijing Review Articles Exchange Item)