Who is promoting separatism in Balochistan
Waqar Ahmed

IN THE recent past, separatist elements especially after the killing of Nawab Akbar Bugti and Balach Marri have intensified their anti-Pakistan activities by challenging the writ of the Government. Despite peace initiatives by the newly elected coalition government, subversive acts such as blowing up of gas pipelines, kidnapping of government functionaries and rocket attacks on official installations have continued unabated. In these circumstances at the behest of the democratic regime, the security forces have been operating against the so-called nationalists of Balochistan. In the process, a number of personnel of the armed forces have sacrificed their lives in restoring law and order in the volatile province. The ongoing violent crisis started in Balochistan when the development projects were undertaken by the government, a few years ago, to promote the backward areas of the province, providing infrastructure and employment to the people. In this regard, construction of Mekran Coastal Highway, Gwadar Deep Sea Port, Kacchi Canal, IPI gas projects—building of the Sabakzai and Mirani dams including various other educational and technical training institutes were in the interest of the country and the Balochi people. These developments are aimed at raising the status of the province equal to that of the other provinces, but this irked the eyes of Balochi feudal lords (Sardars) and their foreign supporters. The Baloch Sardars have been pursuing their vested agenda because they do not want to part with the centuries old “sardari nizam” that is why; they have been opposing all the developmental projects. They thought that these plans will create a greater political consciousness among the general masses that are likely to challenge the illegal authorities of the Sardars who had established their own private jails and forces—states within the state.
Baloch people are tired of living under such tyranny of the ‘sardari system’. It is because of this fact that when Akbar Bugti was killed, there were no prolonged protests as majority of the Balochis knew that the feudal society of Balochistan is impeding progress. Meanwhile, adding fuel to the fire, Indians continued propagating along with the Balochi tribal lords that Pakistan is exploiting the rich natural resources of Balochistan for the last sixty years at gunpoint and the local inhabitants of the province are being forcefully displaced through the development projects. On the other hand, the military operation has eliminated several farrari camps, freed thousands of innocent persons from the private jails of the Sardars and recovered substantial arsenals of weapons. When majority of Balochis understood the game of foreign exploiters and the Sardars, these internal and external conspirators started acts of subversion which is still going on. The fact of the matter is that the US, India and Kabul are implementing their collective conspiracy against the federation of Pakistan—which itself is a part of the next cold war. Rapidly developing geo-political differences among regional states and global powers in Asia shows that the next cold war between Russia-China alliance and the US-led alliance is in its embryonic stage and Pakistan is likely to play a vital role in the game due to its geo-strategic location. In this context, Gwadar deep seaport alone could prove to be the country’s most important junction with roads and railway lines, linking the Central Asian states’ transit trade with the rest of the world. Besides other strategic interests, Washington also intends to control Balochistan as an independent state in containing China and hostile Iran. It is due to new strategic developments that American CIA, Indian RAW and Khad of Afghanistan are creating instability in Pakistan by supporting some separatist elements in the Frontier Province and especially Balochistan to accomplish their evil strategic agenda.
As regards RAW, more than 50 Indian foreign offices, clandestinely established along the north-western border of the country are supporting the militants not only in the Frontier Province, but also Balochistan where a minority group called “the Balochistan Liberation Army” (BLA) has been waging a separatist war in South Western Pakistan with the aid of RAW and Khad. Though Bugti’s death was a blow to BLA, this group’s external backers did not stop their aggressive activities. After Bugti’s death his grandson, Brahmdagh Bugti is currently operating against Pakistan from Kabul. On 23 Jul 2008, in an interview with the BBC, Brahmdagh Bugti, while answering to a question in relation to getting arms from neighboring countries, replied that they have the right to accept foreign aid from anywhere including aid from India.
Despite the strenuous efforts of Islamabad, more than 3 million Afghan refugees have not retuned to Afghanistan. Some of them are serving as agents of CIA, RAW and Khad and are implementing the hidden agenda of their countries in weakening Pakistan. They have been performing their assigned job by re-initiating subversive acts in Balochistan and NWFP. Faced with new style-insurgency in the NWFP and the tribal regions, Balochistan has become focal point due to unrest created by the external plotters. Their agents work for the vested interests of their countries and disrepute the peace-loving people of Balochistan. The newly elected government has to remain watchful of anti state activities of infidel Sardars who are being supported by foreign elements. Along side, the government should start a result oriented dialogue process with the peace loving and patriot Stake holders in Balochistan so that the anti state activities of evil forces can be neutralized/isolated. There is also a dire need of strong unity among the general masses, politicians and security forces at this critical juncture.

National Day celebrations in Afghanistan
Bassam Javed

AFGHANISTAN carried out its rituals rather than celebrations on 18 August this year in a fear laden environment that kept these restricted within the fortress like structure of Ministry of Defence. Nevertheless, the day was as usual heralded with suicide attacks at the coalition forces base located near Khost. Consequent to the attacks that were carried out by the Afghan Talibans during a military parade on 27 April, Mr. Karzai preferred to avoid making a public appearance on the occasion. The venue where the occasion was to be marked officially, remained a tight secret till the last moment to avoid the repetition of parade attack incident.
The strategy adopted speaks of the large pitfalls in the prevailing security mechanism in Afghanistan vis-à-vis the fledgling allegiance of Mr. Karzai’s commanders. The attack on the bases anyhow, highlight the growing frustration amongst the Afghans with the Karzai led government during the tenure of which the major ills of the fragile Afghan society have risen to the unprecedented heights. In a society that has been developed by the Mafia like networks of the various factions of Karzai Government, Afghans are forced to depend on the money grabbed by all the wrong means. In the bazaar like economy created by the rulers, the business of buying and selling of virtually every position, favour and service, continues to thrive amongst Afghans. And a large part of Afghans who do not own farm lands or enjoy positions in the government set-ups which can be utilized for making money, remain to live in extreme poverty that has stretched them to the brink of starvation. As per one of the surveys carried out by Handicap International in Afghanistan, the country has about 80000 people with disability out of an estimated population of about 24.5 million. One house in every five houses in Afghanistan has a disabled person. About 36 percent disability in the country is physical, 26 percent sensorial, 20 percent epilepsy and 10 percent mental. Adding to the woes, the frustration amongst Afghans is reaching its peek as there is scarcity of jobs, infrastructure is under developed, absence of basic needs and human rights continue to create the perfect environment for breeding of insurgency within the masses. Though many of the privileged Afghans still would appear to prefer the government of Mr. Karzai or someone like similar to him under whom they can continue their lucrative businesses, over the government led by Talibans.
The US Defence secretary Mr. Robert Gates has announced an increase in the number of troops in Afghanistan from about 70000 to 1220,000 plus over the next five years with an estimated amount of 17 billion US dollars. One keeps wondering whether the increase in number of troops would really stabilize Afghanistan. The subjucation of a country, that too like Afghanistan, would never be brought by the power of the gun. History is a witness to this and keeps speaking volumes of this myth. It appears that Americans have not learnt lessons from the Russian and French experiences in their respective adventures in Afghanistan and the Vietnam. As per one of the recent surveys, even Afghans are becoming increasingly critical of the performances of Western forces and their failure to provide security to the Afghans outside their safe bastions. About 42 percent of Afghans polled rated US efforts in Afghanistan positively down from 68 percent that existed in 2005. History also tells us that Afghans have never accepted the presence of foreign troops in their homeland be it Talibans or the locals though the latter appears to accept their presence as long as they look away from their narcotic businesses.
With so many feelings of negativity amongst Afghans in the prevalent system of governance, holding of the annual ceremony within the confines of the ministry of defence is not surprising. For a man of the stature of Mr. Karzai, who continues to thrive on the Western and drug barons’ support, he just could not take a chance of appearing in the general public for he knows he does not enjoy popularity amongst ordinary Afghans. It is primarily for this reason that many in America and other coalition countries have started to explore possibilities of placing someone else at the helm of Afghan affairs in a hope that their 7 year old investment in Afghanistan is solidified for pursuing their long term strategic interests in the region.

Language gala
Li Li

JUST one week before world’s best athletes meet in Beijing for the Olympics, translators and interpreters from 74 countries and regions met in another Chinese metropolis, Shanghai. The International Federation of Translators (FIT), a federation of associations of translators, interpreters and terminologists, held its largest ever world congress with over 1,400 participants.
The XVIII World Congress of FIT is also the first time in FIT’s 55-year history that a congress was held in a country outside of Europe and the United States. Cultural diversity needed “Coming to China has helped FIT to be a truly international organization,” said Peter Krawutschke, FIT’s outgoing President, whose tenure was from 2005 to 2008. He said that China’s rising presence at FIT during recent years has helped to bring FIT to Asia and bring Asia to FIT.
The federation, founded in Europe, had mainly been European-dominated until the last few years. The increasing interest about this international organization from Asia, whose linguists are relative newcomers, was on display at the statutory portion of this year’s world congress. Eight new member associations were admitted, of which three were from Asia. For the time being, FIT has two member associations on the Chinese mainland, the Translators Association of China (TAC) and the Science & Technology Translators’ Association of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Huang Youyi, Secretary General of the Beijing-headquartered TAC, has been reelected as the vice president of FIT for the coming term of 2008 to 2011.
The growing diversity within the body of translators and interpreters has coincidentally highlighted the theme for this year’s congress, “Translation and Cultural Diversity.” “In the past few centuries the world was dominated by Western culture, and oriental culture is far from being understood by the West,” said the former Chinese ambassador to France, Wu Jianmin, during his keynote speech to the congress at the opening ceremony. He said the wisdom of Chinese culture has yet to be mined in solving international conflicts today.
Krawutschke, professor of German literature at Western Michigan University in the United States who has translated works in English, French and German, said it is a pity that he knew nothing about Chinese literature. Yet, in contrast, German writers Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Johann Christoph Friedrich von Schiller are household names in China, and most literature lovers in the country could name at least one or two books by each author.
Krawutschke said his mother first knew about China from a 1930s’ novel, The Good Earth, written by American Pearl S. Buck and sold in Germany. He said she was exposed to China through another Westerner’s eyes because American and European culture and literature are closer than European and Chinese culture and literature. American books are also better marketed in Europe. “Most of the world does not know Chinese, therefore there is a fear of Chinese. To bridge the gap, we need translators and interpreters,” said Krawutschke.
He suggested that a Chinese translator could sit on FIT’s literature translation committee to promote Chinese literature. He believed that FIT would support the exposure of Chinese literature in the Western world and even market the best Chinese authors in Europe, especially France. At the same interview, Huang said TAC wants to recommend that all FIT special committees have Chinese translators to help spread Chinese culture as well as learn from their foreign colleagues.
Krawutschke, who heads the Department of Foreign Languages at his university, said that he had supported the introduction of teaching Chinese and Japanese at Western Michigan University, and that Chinese has become one of the most popular foreign languages to study among his students.
 

—The Daily Mail-Beijing Review Articles Exchange Item