FEMICIDE; RAPE

Uncovering our shame

Muna Khan

Published April 7, 2024 

DAWN

I AM assisting my youngest sister in the US on a documentary, which is part personal narrative, part investigation on the closure of a bank in the 1990s. As part of ‘research’, we have been watching documentaries together, to understand narrative arcs, styles, even camera techniques and last week were incredibly moved by To Kill a Tiger. I highly recommend watching it on Netflix. The documentary is about the gang rape of a 13-year-old girl in India who, with her parent’s support, chooses to pursue a criminal case.

It exposes the deep rot of misogyny, often guised under honour and shame and how men and women enforce patriarchal values. The female lawyer of the men accused of rape, along with women village members, ask why the young girl stayed out late. Sure, what the boys did was wrong, but what was her role in their action? The lawyer goes as far as saying she wouldn’t trust her own son.

This right here is the rot in our society, too.

It is a reminder that rape culture — trivialising violence against women — is prevalent in the rural and urban in the subcontinent. It is frightening how sexual violence been normalised. Not a minute goes by on social media where women are not threatened with rape and mutilation.

You can be covered head to toe in this country and still be raped.

Former prime minister Imran Khan blamed everyone but men for the rise in rape cases in 2021. In 2005, Gen Pervez Musharraf said women cried rape to get visas to Canada. The list of misogynist comments from political and religious leaders, and their women supporters who defended these comments as ‘taken out of context’ is shameful. Conversations on our screens rarely ask ‘why didn’t the rapist listen when the woman said no’ and focus on why the woman was out driving at 2am on the motorway or, of course, what she was wearing. You can be covered head to toe in this country and still be raped. You’re not even safe in a grave.

Documentaries like To Kill a Tiger, however, fill me with a sliver of hope because they shine a light on the brave men like the father who stood by his daughter and fought his community, his village, his detractors, and the system that makes it hard to get justice. He also had support from lawyers and activists who fought tirelessly with his family’s quest for justice.

Pakistani documentarians too have done good work in highlighting the social ills in this country but they don’t get airtime here; instead, they face abuse for shaming Pakistan. We should all watch Mo Naqvi’s documentary Pakistan’s Hidden Shame about sexual abuse of boys. Most of us will not leave our children alone with maulvi sahibs but think airing this issue is part of an international conspiracy to ‘get’ Pakistan.

Is it possible to at least reduce the burden on children and women who face rape stigma?

Two incidents, almost back to back, equally gruesome, have given me reason to pause and ask if we’re nearing a tipping point. The first was the video of a man filming his brother strangling their 22-year-old sister, as their father sat next to him and watched. It has been described as an honour crime when it should be called femicide, the worst form of gender-based violence.

The second centres around a maulvi from a banned religious outfit. First, a video surfaced of him in handcuffs, being berated by a police officer for raping a boy. Then his release was reported, following the boy’s father forgiving the assailant, reportedly due to an intervention by a religious scholar. I believe the state plans to prosecute the case now.

The other day, as I began to write this column — to berate the so-called champions of democracy who always fail their vulnerable citizens — Dawn reported a story about a man observing aitikaf raping a boy observing aitikaf in Mu­­zaffargarh.

Social media is rightly fuming. The voices demanding an end to such vile crimes seem to outweigh the usual suspects deflecting or doing the whataboutery. I was heartened to see Mohammed Malick ask Allama Ibtisaam Zaheer tough questions on his TV show and others also report on the case. This is journalism at its finest.

Pakistan isn’t the country you grew up in. Its youngsters won’t stand idly by and watch these gross acts of injustice; they won’t be bullied into silence. Social media provides a platform to air demands which can no longer be ignored, even if you ban X etc. Something’s got to give. And it’s got to be the egos of the men in charge of this country who overlook rapists and terrorists because it suits … well … something.

That something has to change now — no ifs and buts or what-about-that-time-they-did-it? Our children need us and their abusers must be sent packing. We must not fear them anymore.

The writer is an instructor of journalism.
X: @LedeingLady

Published in Dawn, April 7th, 2024

Indian academic gets bail after six years without trial

AFP

Published April 7, 2024 


NEW DELHI: An Indian academic detained for almost six years without trial has been granted bail by the Supreme Court, highlighting the country’s use of harsh anti-terror laws decried by rights activists.

Shoma Sen, 66, a former professor of English at Nagpur University, was arrested in 2018.

She was one of 16 activists and academics held for allegedly inciting violence between different Indian caste groups, among them a Jesuit priest, Stan Swamy, who died in pre-trial detention three years later at the age of 84.

The National Investi­gation Agency (NIA), the country’s top anti-terror agency, also claimed that Sen and some of the other activists had links with far-left Maoist insurgents.

New Delhi has been battling armed Maoist rebels, known locally as Naxals, for decades in dense, tribal-dominated forests of central and eastern India. “At present, the appellant has been in detention for almost six years, her age is over 66 years and charges have not yet been framed,” the two-judge bench said on Friday.

“If we examine the acts attributed to the appellant by the various witnesses or as inferred from the evidence... we do not find prima facie commission or attempt to commit any terrorist act” by Sen, the court added. Another sexagenarian activist detained in the same case, Sudha Bharadwaj, was released by the Mumbai High Court in 2021.

Sen, like Bharadwaj and Swamy, was held under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), which allows indefinite detention without trial.

Critics say the law — which makes it difficult for accused people to receive bail — has been used by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government to silence dissent.

Published in Dawn, April 7th, 2024

 

Bhima Koregaon Case: After 6 Years in Jail, Activist Shoma Sen Granted Bail by SC

Newsclick Report | 05 Apr 2024

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The former Nagpur University professor was arrested in 2018 and booked under UAPA for alleged Maoist links and is yet to face trial.

Image Courtesy: Twitter Amnesty India @AIIndia 

New Delhi: Former Nagpur University professor, Dalit and women’s rights activist Shoma Sen, 62, was granted bail by the Supreme Court on Friday in the Bhima Koregaon case. Sen served six years in prison after she was arrested in June 2018 for alleged Maoist links and was booked under the draconian Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA). Her trial was yet to begin.

Sen was granted bail after a bench of Justices Anirudhha Bose and Augustine George Masih noted that the National Investigating Agency (NIA) did not oppose her bail, and hence “the stringent conditions for bail under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) would not apply,” a Bar & Bench report said.

"Section 43(D)(5) restriction should not apply to the petitioner. We have noted that Additional Solicitor General (who appeared for NIA) stated custody is no longer needed. Once we hold that 43(d)(5) of the 1967 act does not apply.... We have seen she is of advanced age and the effect of delaying trial at this stage.. in addition to her medical conditions. She should not be denied the privilege of being released on bail," the Court said in its order, as quoted by Bar & Bench.

Sen is the sixth among the 16 accused in the Bhima Koregaon/Elgar Parishad case. The other activists, academics, lawyers who got bail are Sudha Bhardwaj, Anand Teltumbde, Vernon Gonsalves, Arun Ferriera, and Varavara Rao (on medical grounds).

The English professor was arrested by the Pune Police under provisions of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the UAPA, along with human rights lawyer and Dalit rights activist Surendra Gadling, activist, actor, and publisher Sudhir Dhawale, activist Mahesh Raut, and activist and researcher Rona Wilson, for their alleged involvement in the Bhima Koregaon violence.

While granting bail to Sen, the SC laid down certain conditions, such as she would not leave Maharashtra, surrender her passport, inform NIA about her residence and mobile number that should be active.

Before approaching the Supreme Court, Sen had applied for bail in the Pune sessions court and then in the Bombay High Court, which had rejected it.

Senior advocate Anand Grover, the Counsel for Sen, had denied all the charges and also said there was lack of evidence for connecting her to the UAPA case as well as her alleged links with the Communist Party of India (Maoist). He also mentioned her advancing age, ill health and prolonged jail term in Byculla.

Greta Thunberg held twice after Dutch protest

AFP 

Published April 7, 2024 

Police detain Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg (centre) during a climate march against fossil subsidies in the Hague, on Saturday.—AFP


THE HAGUE: Climate activist Greta Thunberg was detained twice by Dutch police on Saturday after she and a group of marchers blocked a main road in The Hague to protest against fossil fuel subsidies.

Earlier, Thunberg joined hundreds of protesters on a walk from The Hague’s city centre to the nearby A12 arterial highway that connects the seat of the Dutch government with other cities including Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Utrecht.

The march was organised by the Extinction Rebellion environmental group (XR) — who previously swarmed the highway and blocked off traffic for hours before being sprayed by a police water canon and taken away.

On Saturday, dozens of police officers, including some on horseback, blocked the group from accessing the motorway, warning that “violence could be used” should the marchers try to get onto the road.

Carrying XR flags and placards saying “Stop fuel subsidies now!” and “The planet is dying!”, chanting protesters were then locked in a tense standoff with police who formed a wall of law enforcement. Thunberg joined in with the chants and slogans during the protest. “It’s important to demonstrate today because we are living in a state of planetary emergency,” Thunberg said as police blocked marchers. “We must do everything to avoid that crisis and to save human lives,” she said.

‘Here for climate’

Some activists, however, found another route and blocked a main road close to the highway where they — including Thunberg — sat down on the tarmac. Asked whether she was concerned about police action and arrest, Thunberg said: “Why should I be?” But shortly afterwards, Thunberg herself was arrested and dragged away by police to a waiting touring bus where she was detained with other activists.

She told the ANP national news agency by telephone that her arrest had proceeded “calmly”. “It’s not about the arrest. I am here for the climate,” she said.

A spokesman for the Public Prosecutor’s Office later confirmed the protesters were briefly detained before being released at a different location. Shortly afterwards, however, Thunberg and some activists returned and were arrested again, this time for blocking a nearby traffic intersection, and led away to a waiting police van.

Prosecutor spokesman Vincent Veenman said that currently no charges have been laid against the activists. “This however may change if people are arrested over and over again for the same offence,” Veenman said.

Published in Dawn, April 7th, 2024

PAKISTAN

Facebook briefly deletes popular women-only group

AFP 

Published April 6, 2024 


LAHORE: Facebook briefly deleted a women-only group in Pakistan with more than 300,000 members who used it to freely discuss taboo topics, its founder Kanwal Ahmed told AFP on Friday.

Soul Sisters Pakistan, created in 2013, acts as a support group for women who share information about sex, divorce, and domestic violence — issues often deemed inappropriate to discuss publicly in Muslim-majority Pakistan.

Ms Ahmed said Face­book deleted the group late Wednesday after warning her of an unspecified “intellectual property violation” linked to a post.

“They didn’t even show which post it was,” said Ms Ahmed, who Facebook made a community leader in 2018 for her work on the group, adding that it is devoted to “personal stories and anonymous posts”. The group was reinstated late Friday, she said.

The group enables members to offer each other informal help, ranging from legal advice to emotional support, on topics that might otherwise draw abuse if posted about publicly. “The suspension of Soul Sisters Pakistan speaks to the arbitrary and non-transparent ways in which social media platforms operate and subtle ways in which community guidelines of these platforms can work against users in the Global South,” Shmyla Khan, a digital rights researcher, told AFP.

Soul Sisters Pakistan has previously come under fire from critics who accused it of promoting divorce and “wild” behaviour challenging tradition and patriarchal norms.

Digital activists have long complained of creeping censorship in Pakistan.

The Pakistan Telecomm­unications Auth­o­rity has taken down more than one million pages from TikTok, Instagram, Face­book and YouTube for obscene or indecent material.

Published in Dawn, April 6th, 2024

Waking up the World Bank

Khurram Husain 

Published April 4, 2024

DAWN

WORDS only matter when they are spoken at the right time. And for too many years now, the World Bank has been saying the right thing but at the wrong time. It is hard to get this thought out of one’s mind when reading through their latest Pakistan Development Update (PDU).

The document rightly points out that Pakistan is emerging from a period of extreme volatility, and a fragile stability is only just beginning to strike root. Its projections show that growth will remain subdued for at least another two years, and inflation will remain high even as it comes off its peak.

Stop for a moment to think about this. Pakistan is indeed emerging from a period of absolutely historic volatility that saw the country teeter on the edge of default twice, first in the summer of 2022 and then again in the summer of 2023. It saw inflation skyrocket to a historic 38 per cent in May of 2023. The same period saw the most troubled IMF programme Pakistan has ever had, with three false starts. Through this period, the country saw four finance ministers come and go, with each one blaming his predecessor for leaving behind a mess.

I cannot recall another period quite like this. Things were bad in the late nineties, with sanctions and a coup. They were bad in 2008 with a rising arc of terror attacks and the approach of the Great Financial Crisis. But still, nothing quite compared to the volatility we have just started to emerge from.


How good a job do the PDU documents do of alerting the reader to the fact that the economy is pregnant with ferocious pressures?

Having noted this, let us ask a simple question. If we go back and read the World Bank’s PDU documents from 2021 onwards, when this volatility began, how good a job do they do of alerting the reader to the fact that the economy is pregnant with ferocious pressures that can unleash the most epic volatility the country has ever seen?

The volatility began in May 2021 when the exchange rate started to come under pressure and important inflation readings began to burst their confines and show up across a broader range of goods. Both these trends accelerated from that month onwards to reach historic proportions by May 2023.

Yet reading through the PDU released in April 2021, you get no idea that the economy teetered on the edge of a storm. It is true that the pandemic continued to cast its shadow in those days, but the signs that the economy had been pumped far beyond its ability to bear were all there. The central bank had pumped a monetary stimulus which the report says equalled 3.8pc of GDP, but would later grow to nearly 5pc of GDP. Money supply growth was like a runaway train at that time and the fiscal equation was in severe disarray as the government focused more on handing out goodies under the cover of a Covid stimulus.

Yet the report talks about inflation as if it had already peaked and was set to decline from that month on. It says a fragile stability has been found and the only uncertainty plaguing the outlook is another Covid wave. This was on the eve of the most epic storm of economic volatility Pakistan has ever endured.

In 2022, the bank acknowledged the inflationary tide that had begun to sweep the country, and made its first reference to the “buildup in domestic demand pressures” as a contributing factor and said these were “in part due to accommodative fiscal and monetary policies”.

This was too little, too late. By April of 2022, the economy was already a runaway train and the volatility was sweeping all before its path. This was the time for the government to hear loud and clear, in no uncertain terms, that the failure to rapidly unwind the fiscal and monetary stimulus administered after Covid was giving rise to epic inflationary pressures, and fuelling a malign type of economic growth that was destabilising itself as it proceeded.

That acknowledgement came finally, in October of 2022, when the PDU finally noted that “expansionary fiscal policies and the delayed monetary policy response led to economic overheating”. This was the first use of the word “overheating” by the bank, but it came too late. The finance minister himself had begun to describe the economy as “overheating” in September 2022, so it was perfectly safe for the bank to use the word now. But in truth this needed to have been said at least six months earlier for it to have any effect.

By April of 2023, the bank was beginning to find its voice. The PDU in that year began with these words: “Supported by accommodative monetary and fiscal policies, Pakistan’s economy was made to grow beyond potential in FY22.” Once again, the right words were said, but one year too late. Yet even now, some of the most critical contributors to the volatility were not identified unequivocally. That would have to wait till now, the latest PDU released two days ago.

In April 2024, the bank finally began to say out loud what everyone by now already knew. “[I]nflation pressures increased due to higher domestic energy prices and money supply growth,” says the document. This is the first mention of the words ‘money supply’ in the PDU documents released through the period of the volatility. “[T]he rapid increase in money supply in FY23 continues to exert inflationary pressures,” the document continues, pointing out that broad money grew by 14pc in this period, fed by liquidity injections from the State Bank.

But broad money had grown by 16pc in FY21 and the liquidity injections the bank refers to for the first time this year had actually begun in December 2021. Money supply was a runaway train throughout these years, but the bank could not bring itself to point this out, even as the volatility was sweeping through the economy. They have finally acknowledged that reckless money supply creation lies at the root of the volatility, but it is too little, too late.

The writer is a business and economy journalist.
khurram.husain@gmail.com
X: @khurramhusain

Published in Dawn, April 4th, 2024

The Lancet and colonialism

Zafar Mirza 

Published April 5, 2024

DAWN

SIX days ago, The Lancet published an extraordinary article, titled ‘The Lancet and Colonialism: Past, Present, and Future’. The authors include two Pakistanis: Prof Mishal S. Khan, the lead author, and Muhammad Naveed Noor, along with Thirusha Naidu, Irene Torres, Jesse B. Bump and Seye Abimbola.

The Lancet is a 200-year-old peer reviewed weekly medical journal from the UK. The first issue appeared on Oct 5, 1823, and the latest on March 30, 2024. As an influential journal it has the highest impact factor. Since its launch, the journal has expanded into a family of more than 20 specialty journals and has set up a number of global Lancet Commissions on various important issues in medicine and healthcare.

The journal has seen a lot in its last two centuries of existence — from the 1820s, when the first trains were just getting onto the track, to the present times, when we live in a hyper-connected global village powered by IT and AI. Apart from pivotal advances in medical sciences, many of which The Lancet itself reported over the 200 years, the journal also lived through many eras of political, economic and social upheaval. When it started, slavery was still the norm and colonialism was rife.

While beginning the bicentennial year, the editorial in the journal in January last year mentioned that, “while we cherish our independence and acknowledge our privileged position … we also recognise that The Lancet has, at times, been complicit in grievous violations of human rights. The legacy of colonialism inevitably looms large in our history. During the coming year, we will not only reflect on our contributions to medicine, but also invite scholars to review the journal’s role during a period of imperial expansion”.

In reinforcing existing prejudices and inequities, the journal reflected its times.

This is a brave introspection. It is also a sign of confidence and maturity. Credit goes to the maverick editor-in-chief of The Lancet, Richard Horton, who has held this position since 1995. He is a bold and bright man who has been raising issues of health inequities and social justice through the years.

This is the context in which Prof Mishal was invited to lead with an opinion piece. Below are some paraphrased key points from the article.

The launch of The Lancet took place during a time of great political agitation against colonial slavery, but the founder of the journal, Thomas Wakely, is not known for having taken any position on Britain’s Slavery Abolition Act of 1833 or against colonialism. However, research shows that the editor did publish “deliberate misinterpretations of the protest of enslaved people against oppression”, labelling them as insane.

In 1851, a US physician resorted to ‘disease mongering’, coming up with the term ‘drapetomania’ to describe the pathological mental state of an enslaved person itching for freedom. In 1874, The Lancet published “similarly ignorant views” and belittled the “insanity” of slaves who wanted to be freed.

There are also some examples of how The Lancet kept publishing on the superiority of Western medical knowledge, describing local knowledge in the colonies as “magic”, “supernatural” and “the fetish worship of native races”. This prejudice precluded any effort to explore and understand local knowledge systems.

The Lancet also helped legitimise the field of tropical medicine at the turn of the 20th century. For example, in 1904, Patrick Manson and his British colleagues were credited for linking sleeping sickness and tsetse fly bites, without acknowledging indigenous peoples’ previous discoveries on which their work was based. Similar is the case regarding the ‘discovery’ of Kwashiorkor (a protein deficiency condition among babies) by Cicely Williams in 1935. Instead of recognising the value of local African knowledge in this case, Williams noted in The Lancet that “the idea that the ‘simple savage’ has instinctive knowledge in caring for her children is without foundation”.

Of course, the journal was not alone in this; it reflected its times by reinforcing existing prejudices and inequities. That said, some attitudes have carried over — with a prevailing sense of supposedly superior medical knowledge. The idea of stringent clinical trials as a gold standard reflects such attitudes. Covid-19 has raised questions about these straitjacketed research methods.

In The Lancet’s 200-year existence, only a small proportion of the overall papers published have been primarily qualitative studies, which are considered essential for exploring and disrupting entrenched inequalities.

Another reflection of the superiority of Western knowledge and knowers is in a comment published in 2020 which analysed three Lancet Commission reports published within the previous decade and found that “more than 70 per cent of Commission authors originated from institutions based in North America and Europe, home to less than 20pc of the world’s population”.

All editors-in-chief of The Lancet over its 200-year history have been white, male and educated exclusively in European institutions.

To its credit, however, things are improving after the establishment of The Lancet‘s internal Group for Racial Equity, supported by an external Racial Equity Advisory board. The Lancet Global Health is also taking some initiatives to tackle inequities in access to the journal’s content in crediting authors from low-income and middle-income countries.

Late Prof Owsei Temkin of the Institute of the History of Medicine at John Hopkins University saw medicine as embedded in the culture and social life of a particular period and the role of the historian as interpreting, rather than merely documenting.

The Lancet’s commissioning of this viewpoint is a step in the right direction. The clock cannot be reset but continued recognition and reparation for exploitation during the colonial era are moves to redeem its inglorious history. The opening of hearts and minds and methodological pluralism will only broaden the scope of studying and improving human health and healthcare across the world.

The writer is a former SAPM on health, and professor of health systems at Shifa Tameer-i-Millat University.

zedefar@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, April 5th, 2024

PAKISTAN/BALOCHISTAN

Paramedics in Quetta protest against govt hospitals’ ‘privatisation’

Saleem Shahid

Published April 7, 2024

DAWN

QUETTA: Members of the Grand Health Alliance Balochistan hold a rally in protest against the proposed privatisation of government hospitals, on Saturday.

—PPI

QUETTA: Grand Heal­­th Alliance Balochistan staged a rally on Saturday against a plan to privatise government hospitals in the provincial capital.

A large number of government hospital employees, including paramedics and nurses, gathered in the Civil Hospital and ma­­r­­ched on the main roads and streets of Quetta.

The alliance leaders Salam Zehri, Jamal Shah Kakar, Haji Shafaa Men­gal, Lala Sultan and others addressed the protesters.

They said that instead of ensuring the provision of facilities in hospitals, the government is planning to privatise them.


The protesters chanted slogans against the government and criticised the plan.

The protesters deman­ded the removal of Balo­ch­istan Chief Minister Mir Sarfraz Bugti and decla­red him “incompetent”.

They said instead of giving hospitals into private ownership, their conditions should be improved so that free healthcare can be made available to people.

They vowed to resist the privatisation and deman­ded the government to reconsider its decision.

They also claimed that they met with the pro-vincial health secretary to discuss the issue and informed the authorities of their stance and reservations.

Published in Dawn, April 7th, 2024

BALOCHISTAN

Never-ending insurgency

Muhammad Amir Rana 

Published April 7, 2024 

DAWN

THE insurgency in Balochistan has entered its third phase.

The insurgents have intensified their terrorist attacks against the security forces, Chinese interests, and those nationalist actors who believe in the federation. The insurgency is changing its form, but the state institutions’ approach seems stagnant, as no innovation has been observed in their countering strategies.

Nationalist insurgents have carried out 62 terrorist attacks in the first quarter of the year, which killed 65 security personnel and civilians. The Makran region and its adjoining areas remain more affected, where the Balochistan Liberation Army and Balochistan Liberation Front together conducted 14 attacks in the Kech district, six in Gwadar, 10 in Panjgur, and six in the Kharan district.

Their operations are expanding to other parts of Balochistan, as insurgents attacked Mach and held the town hostage for hours. The BLA has emerged as a major violent group in Balochistan, and its operations have increased. Its Majeed Brigade targets CPEC projects and other Chinese interests in the country. Gwadar certainly faces serious threats, where insurgents launched major attacks recently.

The insurgency in Balochistan took a critical turn in 2013 when Baloch militants burned down the Ziarat residency, preserved as the last residence of the Quaid. The attack motivated the youth of the Makran region, and the intensity of the insurgency has gradually increased there. The insurgent leadership has also been transferred to the region.

From 2014 to 2021, insurgent attacks continued with varying frequency. They tried to expand their reach to Punjab. However, they mainly focused on Karachi, where they managed attacks on the Chinese consulate and the Pakistan Stock Exchange. Karachi remained a target as they continued to attack Chinese interests in the city.

However, the Makran region remained their primary focus. Every major attack against Chinese interests and security forces in the region provoked the security agencies to take strict countermeasures, including search operations and expanding security checkpoints. This, however, complicated the issue of missing persons.

The ‘securitisation’ standpoint has overshadowed political initiatives in Balochistan.

This situation cultivated angry sentiments and provoked protest movements, mainly by the fishermen of Gwadar. First, they agitated against the narrow passage for their boats on the Eastbay Expressway. Then, they protested against illegal fishing by trawlers in their waters, which caught a significant portion of the catch and sent it to China, where Gwadar’s freshwater fish market is expanding.

The second insurgency phase was the shortest, taking only two years to reach the next level. A series of attacks on the Frontier Corps in Panjgur and Noshki in 2022 triggered this stage.

During this phase, the Majeed Brigade became more organised and stronger. They launched sporadic attacks, including the killing of the staff of the Confucius Centre at Karachi University, using a female suicide bomber. The Baloch insurgency has completely slipped out of the control of exiled Baloch leaders, including Hyrbyair Marri, Brahmdagh Bugti, and Bakhtiar Domki.

The third phase began when insurgents attacked Mach town early this year and carried out a coordinated assault on the Gwadar Port last month.

At this stage, the insurgency has put pro-Constitution nationalist parties on the defensive, particularly the National Party of Dr Malik Baloch and the Balochistan National Party led by the Mengals. These parties have experienced a decline in confidence in them by the Baloch and did not perform well in the Feb 8 general elections. They have been raising questions about the fairness of the electoral process.

The level of anger has increased after the killing of Baloch youth by the Counter-Terrorism Department, triggering a long march towards Islamabad by the missing persons’ families led by Dr Mahrang Baloch. This march turned into a popular agitation movement in Balochistan.

If the insurgency continues to evolve at a similar pace, it will soon acquire a political face, which would come with consequences for the state as it would have to craft a different political strategy of engagement and reconciliation to deal with the challenge it has been avoiding for long.

The countering strategy in the first stage evolved around addressing the grievances of the province. In 2008, the PPP initiated a special package for it — the Aghaz-i-Huqooq-i-Balochistan. Similarly, former prime minister Nawaz Sharif introduced the Pur-Aman (peaceful) Balochistan initiative in 2015 to bring angry Baloch into the national mainstream. Later, the PTI government decided to continue with the plan. The initiative aligned with the National Action Plan, which promised to empower the provincial government to deal with the problem politically.

The ‘securitisation’ standpoint, however, overshadowed these political initiatives. The reconciliation processes begun by the provincial governments — including former chief ministers Nawab Aslam Raisani and Dr Abdul Malik Baloch — were abandoned on the way, without any sound reason being provided.

The security institutions preferred the ‘surrender policy’ and announced incentives for insurgents who laid down their arms. Pur-Aman Balochistan revolves around the surrender policy, although most political leaders and analysts believe this is a flawed approach. Many influential sardars and political leaders exploited the policy and managed fake surrenders for financial and political advantages. The number of real fighters, called farari, surrendering to the authorities is far less than is claimed.

The second phase of the countering strategy, led by the security establishment, was to initiate a dialogue with Baloch youth and society just after the Noshki and Panjgur attacks. The military leadership visited universities, organised public gatherings with political leaders and civil society, and tried to answer hard questions.

The dialogue helped to ease restrictions at security checkpoints, reopen and expand markets on the Iranian border, and allow oil smuggling there as a remedy to control the insurgency.

The strategy for the third phase has apparently been outlined, with the main contours being a hard approach. This includes abandoning dialogue, disengaging with nationalist political parties, and the missing persons’ movement led by Dr Mahrang Baloch.

The PPP’s designated and PML-N-backed Balochistan Chief Minister Sarfraz Bugti, would be the political face of the strategy. He believes in a non-reconciliatory approach, whatever he publicly claims.

The writer is a security analyst.

Published in Dawn, April 7th, 2024

UK

‘Progressives always want more, but the New Deal will help tame capitalism’

Mike Clancy  

7th April, 2024,  LABOUR LIST

© Matt Gibson/Shutterstock.com

Prospect does not affiliate to a political party, and we seriously try to work across the political spectrum. If I could say anything positive about the Conservatives in government then I would, but of late, it has become impossible. The mismanagement of public services and those who work in them, the labour market deregulatory fixations and the dismal attitude to trade unions leaves no space to explore any common ground.

That is why it is entirely consistent with our political independence to believe that change in government after the next general election is in the best interests of Prospect members. That belief is founded on analysis, not the transactional expectations arising from affiliation. Prospect members are a demanding audience, used to assessing arguments and data, and therefore so is their union.

I am always struck by how elements of the labour movement have a predisposition to being disappointed with the Labour Party. It’s both baffling and dangerous. Progressives always want more. That’s our nature, but our relentless drive for fairness and progress must exist in credible debate that takes account of the world we live in, not the one we aspire to longer term.

Saying Britain is broken runs the risk of ignoring what we do achieve, but sadly, it’s fair to say that it feels broken for millions of citizens in various ways. That is the landscape that Labour is dealing with, and against that backdrop, Rachel Reeves’ Mais speech will, I believe, be seen as the starting point for long-term renewal if its economic prescription is given the chance.

Reeves’ Mais speech could be a starting point for long-term renewal

“Securonomics advances not the big state but the smart and strategic state.” This signals a role for the state that will never be part of the belief system of neoliberals. It challenges notions that the state must own everything, but it also provides the framework that the state must be on the field, stimulating growth, driving productivity and ensuring fair shares.

It is anchored here: “Governments and policymakers are recognising that it is no longer enough, if it ever was, for the state to simply get out of the way, to leave markets to their own devices and correct the occasional negative externality.”

Prospect is up for this conversation, as our civil service members are key to the mission of any government determined to reimagine an active and enabling state for the 21st century. Most of our members are in the private sector, often in strategic firms and industries that will be critical to the UK’s future. Therefore, focus on outputs, skills and long-term delivery that leaves behind short-term over-reliance on markets is something we can engage with.

This Mais speech was not a eulogy of 1980s ‘sound money’ economics, but you must be willing to describe your macroeconomic stabilisers and overall philosophy or run the risk of markets taking you on. This is a fact of economic life, and the consequences of Liz Truss’s government of September 2022 remind us of that.

Reeves has shown she gets the issues – and the approach needed

But what is most welcome is the microeconomic focus on supply, the role of the firm and how that exists within a labour market regulatory framework that makes capitalism succeed but also share.

And for all the doubters who are more comfortable complaining about what is not in the New Deal for Working People as opposed to welcoming what is in it, the simple fact is that those provisions will start the reversal of the untrammelled authority that British capitalism has used to compete purely on cost inputs, as opposed to innovation and long-term thinking.

You cannot change it all in 100 days. Welcome commitments to early change should breed the patience to consider other issues carefully. For example, worker status, the balance between genuine self-employment and exploitation is not easily resolved, and this is just one issue that needs tripartite debate and consensus.

Our labour market is broken. Wages are depressed. Economic security is defined by a lack of law not an over-burden. We do not have the convening spaces to discuss economy-wide objectives, future direction and the necessary compromises between capital and labour. The commitments to infrastructure renewal and industrial strategy, if well-handled, will be as welcome to business as trade unions.

The Mais lecture suggests a willingness to learn from past mistakes of governments of the left and right. It is founded on the necessary flexibility of ideas, given the complex world we live in, which has shocks just around the corner. But it is plainly underpinned by a desire to ensure working people are not just ‘factors in production’.

The importance here, especially after the experience of the last decade, is that it demonstrates that Reeves gets both the issues of today and the approach necessary to create a stronger and more resilient future.

UK

‘The left should be very afraid of what a second Trump term might bring’

Ed Owen05th April, 2024  LABOUR LIST 

© Stratos Brilakis / Shutterstock.com

A Trump victory in November will not only pose a serious threat to a newly-elected Labour government’s ambitions on foreign policy, trade and climate change. It will also embolden the populist right internationally, not least in the UK itself.

It’s certainly not inconceivable that Keir Starmer as Prime Minister could find himself in the difficult position of having to maintain diplomatic relations with Donald Trump in Washington at the same time as being challenged by a Conservative Party opposition at home led by the Republican President’s friend and ally, Nigel Farage.

US conservatives are intensely preparing for a second Trump term

So, how bad will a Trump Presidency be? After all, for all the noise and drama, America survived his first administration, and while the institutions of government came under threat, not least from the storming of the Capitol building on January 6th, they just about held up. Perhaps a more telling answer is that provided by many of Trump’s allies and political supporters.

For most of America’s leading conservatives, the first Trump term was a missed opportunity to reshape their country. For them, the lack of preparation, administrative chaos and policy incoherence blunted its impact and allowed the federal government machine – the famed “deep state” – to resist and repel radical change. It’s a mistake they are determined to avoid a second time around.

So, for more than two years, The Heritage Foundation, an influential right-wing think tank established in the 1970s, has been leading work to unite the conservative movement behind a programme of action for a future Trump administration to implement from the moment he is inaugurated at 12 noon on January 20th next year.

Led by aides of the former President when last in office, the Foundation’s ‘Project 2025‘ has brought together hundreds of right-wing academics, policy specialists and political strategists to work on a plan for a Republican White House covering every area of policy and operations.

And it is backed by more than 100 organisations – from Christian nationalists to economic liberals, anti-immigration groups to pro-life campaigners – who have come together to support, in the words of Heritage’s founder, Edwin J Feulner, “a mandate to significantly advance conservative principles”.

The result is an extraordinary document called Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise. Running to almost 900 pages, this is not a vague manifesto or statement of general principles. Nor is it a secret effort to obscure the true intentions of what we can expect if Trump wins in November.

‘Project 2025’ outlines radical change to the way the US is governed

Published last year and freely available to those with the stomach to digest it, it is a detailed blueprint for power with a clear and stated aim to reverse “the long march of cultural Marxism through our institutions” and to “restore our Republic to its original moorings”.

It promises sweeping change of the federal government “behemoth”, which it says has been “weaponized against American citizens and conservative values, with freedom and liberty under siege as never before”. In doing so, it takes aim at a range of threats it claims threaten America’s future and constitution – from transgender rights to action against climate change, from woke education to globalisation, from Big Tech and large corporations to illegal immigration.

Two clear and defined enemies – China and the American elites “who have betrayed the American people” – lurk behind these growing threats, according to Project 2025, and the coming election is the last chance to change fundamentally the way the US is governed to defeat them.

“The solution to all of the above problems,” it says, “is not to tinker with this or that government program, to replace this or that bureaucrat. These are problems not of technocratic efficiency but of national sovereignty and constitutional governance. We solve them not by trimming and reshaping the leaves but by ripping out the trees – root and branch.”

To do so needs more than radical policies though, and Project 2025 are embarked on a deliberate effort to recruit sufficient numbers of conservative activists willing and able to take up positions in the Trump administration to drive through this cultural revolution. You can even submit your CV via its website, and the best applicants will be trained and vetted for the vital task ahead.

Presidents normally get to make up to 4,000 political appointments to government positions on entering office. But Trump, if elected, appears determined to go much further to ensure the federal system bends to his will.

By restoring an executive order known as Schedule F, signed two weeks before the 2020 election and subsequently rescinded by President Biden, tens of thousands of career civil servants across a range of departments and agencies could be purged and replaced with “America First” loyalists.

Labour will be praying the election goes Biden’s way

America’s conservatives are intent on breaking the system for good, and they are organising to do so. They are not willing to countenance another Republican failure, as they see it, and are unapologetic that a second Trump Presidency will undoubtedly have far-reaching consequences for America and the world.

Democrats are, of course, hoping that such a radical threat to the system posed by Trump and his MAGA movement will scare floating voters to back the incumbent when the election comes in November, and it’s true that many moderate Republicans will either stay at home or hold their nose and support Biden.

Yet with Trump still ahead in key swing states and public confidence in federal government at an all-time low – only one in six Americans trust it to do the right thing – this is a high-risk electoral strategy.

A lot can and will happen over the next seven months, and while keeping schtum publicly, Labour will be praying the election goes Biden’s way in November. Politics is certainly not going to be pretty in the US before November. But that may be nothing compared to what might follow.24APRIL 4, 2024