The young and unknown heroes

Italy out of World Cup Coach Marcello Lippi ignored warnings that his seasoned squad was just too old. And for the first time in 34 years, Italy is out in the first round, beaten by a Slovakian team made up mostly of young unknowns.

Reporting from Johannesburg, South Africa —

Marcello Lippi had been warned this might happen. He had been told time and again by Italian fans and the Italian media that his team was too old, that it needed some younger, hungrier players.
Take Inter Milan's Mario Balotelli or Davide Santon, they said. Take Sampdoria's Antonio Cassano, they pleaded. Take anyone but that old gang of yours, they insisted.
But Lippi ignored all the warnings and all the advice, and on Thursday evening in Johannesburg, South Africa, he paid the price.
When referee Howard Webb blew the final whistle at Ellis Park, the scoreboard showed one of the World Cup's all-time remarkable results: Slovakia 3, Italy 2.

A team playing in its first World Cup, a team made up largely of players who were unknown internationally, had defeated the defending world champions and, in doing so, had knocked them out of the World Cup.

The final line on Italy: No wins, one loss, two ties.
Arrivederci, Marcello.

Coming just days after France had been sent home with its tail firmly between its legs, it marked the first time in World Cup history that the previous tournament's two finalists had been eliminated at the first hurdle.

The moment had Italian goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon holding his head in his hands in disbelief. Buffon had to watch the match in growing frustration from the bench after being sidelined by a back injury in the opener.
On the field, forward Fabio Quagliarella was in tears. Lippi was too angry or embarrassed to stick around. He stalked off the field and into the waiting torture of the postgame press conference.
Once there, he regained his composure and his dignity. Unlike his French counterpart, Raymond Domenech, Lippi was ready to accept the blame.

"I take full responsibility," he said. "If the squad went out with fear in their legs and hearts, it means the coach did not prepare the match well tactically or psychologically."

Or perhaps it was simply a combination of relying too much on the players who had won the World Cup for him in 2006. No fewer than nine of the 23 men on the Azzurri roster are 30 or older.
That's exactly what happened, and it was the first time in 34 years, and only the third time in history, that Italy had bowed out in the first round.

"Going home in shame," said the headline in Gazzetta dello Sport, but that judgment was harsh. Italy was not shamed, merely defeated. The younger legs and fresher minds on Slovakia made the difference.

Twenty years ago is ancient history in soccer. Just look at the U.S. team then and now. For Italy, it is time to regroup and rebuild, time to consign the previous generation to its place in history.

Old warhorses such as defender Fabio Cannavaro and midfielder Gennaro Gattuso already have announced their retirement. Others will surely follow.

Dirty Games:

America’s ‘failed state’ syndrome

By S.H. Zaidi
THE 2002 US National Security Strategy report had stated that “America is now threatened less by conquering states than by failing ones.” Keeping a tally of ‘failed states’ and accusing some states of being ‘rogue states’ has thus become a favourite pursuit of many American think tanks. There is need to look into the reasons behind this ‘failed state syndrome.’

By their definition, failed states are the ones that find it difficult to function as politically and economically viable states, where government’s control over the state’s territory is loosening, and where law and order is collapsing. In a failed state, viable economy is elusive and ethnic or communal tensions make it impossible for the incumbent government to carry out its routine administrative duties.

Now we find the prestigious American journal “Foreign Policy” placing Pakistan at 9th position in the index of failed and failing states, a dubious ‘promotion’ from the 34th position in the first such list issued last year. The other two Asian states ranking in the ‘top ten’ are Iraq and Afghanistan and the remaining seven are from Africa.

Since the end of the Cold War, American policy-makers have been suffering from the absence of an ‘enemy’ to justify the huge expenditure America makes on maintaining its military machine and continuing research and development (R&D) to develop ever newer forms of destructive weaponry. Meanwhile, they have invented a number of windmills they could tilt at. These include the Islamic terror, led by Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda, practitioners and adherents of what is called ‘militant Islam’ living in both western and Muslim countries ; China, or what Samuel Huntington calls the Confucian civilization; rogue states as defined by the US state department, and, last but not the least, failed states.

According to US policy-makers, international terrorism and failed states go together and are inter-linked. Thus, keeping a tab on the so-called ‘failed states’ is a necessary exercise to allay some unexplained fears. And most of the investigative efforts to identify such states are based on preconceived notions under which the West is the only civilised part of the world and is on a civilising mission to which their ex-colonies must respond. In some cases, these exercises are part of a psychological warfare against certain advanced non-West states by the West to keep them reminding that they are inferior.

Their analyses often ignore the fact that complex changes occurring at any given time in a society ought to be seen in their correct perspective. They may be signs of social or political transformation, rather than of the state’s failure. But governments often react in a bizarre manner. An official spokesman in Islamabad attacked “the methodology adopted by the report and termed it defective,” as if some other methodology would be acceptable to him. The only sensible part of the statement is the one that recognises the report as “a shoddy piece of political propaganda.”

The opposition Alliance for Restoration of Democracy’s reaction is problematic. It has tried to make political capital out of the “Foreign Policy” magazine’s report by holding the regime responsible for Pakistan’s ‘promotion from 34th to 9th place’ in the list of failed states in one year. It seems the ARD had found an appropriate opportunity to return the accusation. The military regime had stated soon after it grabbed power in 1999 that “Pakistan was about to be declared a ‘failed state’ due to the policies of the political governments.”

By blaming each other, the government and the opposition may unintentionally play into the hands of the western propagandists and lend legitimacy to their ‘findings.’ Perhaps some of them may be regarding such reports as gospel truth. But this is not a polemical issue. It deserves a serious response than hitherto displayed by either of them.

The only plus point some parts of the report may possess for the governments concerned is that they draw attention to the flaws and weaknesses in the latter’s policies which can be taken note of and addressed in due course of time.

The report mentions the ‘mishandling’ of the tribal regions and the October 2005 earthquake as a factor in arriving at the ‘score’ that has placed Pakistan high on the list this year. Even if we assume that the ‘mishandling’ is true, we can dismiss it as an administrative failure rather than that of the state. But there are other factors that need to be tackled in earnest. Merely being able to pull on is no ground for complacency. What are these factors?

In ‘The Failed States Index’ prepared by “Foreign Policy” and ‘The Fund for Peace,’ early warning signs of a failing state are described as follows: “Among the 12 indicators we use, two consistently rank near the top. Uneven development is high in almost all the states in the index, suggesting that inequality within states — and not merely poverty — increases instability. Criminalisation or delegitimisation of the state, which occurs when state institutions are regarded as corrupt, illegal, or ineffective, also figured prominently.

“Facing this condition, people often shift their allegiances to other leaders — opposition parties, warlords, ethnic nationalists, clergy, or rebel forces. Demographic factors, especially population pressures stemming from refugees, internally displaced populations, and environmental degradation, are also found in most at-risk countries, as are consistent human rights violations. Identifying the signs of state failure is easier than crafting solutions, but pinpointing where state collapse is likely is a necessary first step.”

Is it merely a coincidence that two of the Asian states among the top ten failing states are the victims of American interference and scheming? Why Pakistan is high on the list, however, requires a convincing explanation. Pakistan, many problems aside, can, by no stretch of imagination, be described as a failed, or even failing state at the moment. Many of its problems that might have contributed to its getting a high score in their apparently ‘objective tests’ of a failing state, spring from the incumbent regime’s staunch support of the US ‘war on terror.’

However, even though pro-American policies of the regime are causing domestic unrest, we tend to ignore the fact that there are other problems peculiar to our society such as demographic pressure, primitive social customs, sectarian bigotry, ‘VIP culture,’ and disregard of human rights by both the government and powerful elites that the ruling classes care little to resolve. In our milieu, quite a few of these factors stem from ‘bad governance.’ So, such reports should provide the ruling elite some food for thought.

The most admirable steps a state can take to avoid being a failed state include support for American policies, acting unhesitatingly on IFIs’ prescriptions, premature opening of its market to foreign products, leaning too heavily on the neo-liberal ‘model’ in devising economic policies. These are the measures that successive Pakistani governments, civilian or military, have religiously followed in the recent past, yet it is these policy steps that have been the cause of uneven economic development in the country. They have not led to our ‘salvation’ and have instead widened the prevailing economic inequalities. Privatising public services has not benefited people. In fact, the cost of service has gone up and would further increase in the coming days.

As regards the allegations of ‘criminalisation of the state’ and ‘severe economic decline’ in the US magazine report, it is for the government to look into them and arrest such trends before it is too late. An honest soul-search may help to find the correctness of the allegations. An attempt to defend itself by coming up with spurious arguments and cooked-up statistics would not do.

That our leaders and politicians allow foreign think-tanks to play a cat and mouse game with them shows their lack of confidence in their own judgment that leads to their acceptance of half-baked findings of foreign experts and institutions. While they tend to attach too much importance to these institutions’ unconvincing pronouncements, they lack the will to address their own obvious failings. They are guilty of either denying all the charges or accepting the reports concerned as gospel truth.

There are genuine cases of state failure, particularly in Africa. One reason is that former ‘colonies of exploitation’ became sovereign states overnight when decolonisation took place although they often lacked necessary conditions to exist as separate viable states. Partly for want of an alternative they tried to model themselves in the image of the European ‘nation-states.’ As their development was mostly on hold through the colonial period — except what was directed by the exigencies of the colonial power to facilitate its hold over the colonies’ territories and resources — they often lacked the necessary economic base for survival.

This was exploited by the big powers. The end of the Cold War and the rise of the sole superpower, coupled with the ideas of building a ‘new American century’ of world hegemony taking birth in the minds of White House neocons, has further compounded the problems of these states, as has the ‘corporate globalisation’ and the neo-colonialism that it entails. The corporate globalisers are eager to penetrate the developing countries. They don’t mind if the countries happen to be ‘failed states’.

It is interesting to note that on the one hand they harp on the tune of ‘melting’ state borders as it is the need of globalisation, on the other they fear the dismantling of weak states as a result thereof. However, the problem goes beyond that. Interference by neighbouring states, or by distant states with vested interests, has often contributed to states’ failure to function effectively.

America’s obsession with terrorism and failed states appears to have become particularly acute after 9/11. During the Cold War, the Americans feared the communists and worried about nuclear war. Today they fear shadowy ‘terrorists’ and are worried about ‘failed states,’ which they think are ‘hideouts of terrorists and criminals’ who ‘hate America’ and could ‘attack’ it some day. This paranoiac attitude is out of proportion with the actual threat. They are not prepared to give a right of defence to other countries. For them an Iraqi fighting against foreign occupation of his country is in fact indulging in ‘terrorism.’

But their behaviour does not need a rational explanation since their actions are dictated by an aggressive resolve to preserve their political, military and economic hegemony in the world. So, Americans have made no mean contribution to the failure of certain states. In Afghanistan and Iraq, for example, all their propaganda is directed at airing ethnic and sectarian differences among people of those countries to exploit them for their own ends. Thus, while they try to control and exploit the resources of other countries, they put the blame for the resultant backwardness and the state’s failure on the people of those countries.

Pakistan making vital strides, not a failing state: US expert

Citing return of democracy, successful anti-militant operations and an expanding infrastructure network, a top United States expert on south Asia has said Pakistan is making vital strides in the face of numerous challenges and is not a failing state, as wrongly bracketted by a recent Foreign Policy Index.

“The Failed States Index is clearly only one side of the die. While sitting at a computer crunching numbers, even with expert input as the index apparently uses, the larger story is missed,” Christine Fair, an eminent political scientist, contended on the Foreign Policy magazine website.

“Pakistan has its problems and enormous challenges lay ahead, but it is far from a failed or even failing state,” wrote Dr. Fair, who is an assistant professor at the Georgetown University.

“Democracy has returned, after numerous bouts of military interventions and democritus interruptus,” she noted. Fair also referred to the important shift that recently took place politically in Pakistan when President Zardari began relinquishing the sweeping presidential powers he inherited from Musharraf.

“In April 2010, Zardari signed the 18th Amendment which returned Pakistan to a parliamentary democracy more in line with its 1973 constitution, which remains the lodestone of democratic legitimacy in Pakistan. This is the first time in recent history when a president 'willingly' ceded power to a prime minister.”

She contrasted the recent democratic advances with the fragile democratic situation besetting the country throughout the 1990s, when no democratically elected government served out its term.

“The election of 2008, despite a difficult start with voter registration and manipulation of electoral rules, was reasonably fair and peaceful, despite Taliban threats to disrupt the process. That election saw the peaceful and democratic transfer of power which brought President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani into office.”

The expert on South Asia begins her argument emphasizing Pakistan's achievements with the country's military successes in the ongoing high-stakes fight against militancy.

“Pakistan has taken the challenge of defeating the Pakistani Taliban seriously, Pakistan's army and Frontier Corps are taking up the fight and appear to have their citizenry with them,” she noted, while regretting that the massive Pakistani security effort does not get enough appreciation in the media.

“This is unfair. The Pakistan army and the Frontier Corps face a formidable foe,” she added, while also pointing out limited resources available. The expert also wrote though Pakistan has a long way to go, it has made enormous investments in its internal security apparatus.

SHe said there is clear understanding about the need for competent police forces as well as an increasingly competent Frontier Corps as key elements in the “holding” phase after clearing militants of an area.

On the socio-economic front, Fair remarked that Pakistan also continues to make progress with decreasing fertility and expanding educational opportunities. Although state run institutions such as the public schools are not performing satisfactorily, affordable private schools are spreading throughout Pakistan, she noted. In terms of development, Fair drew attention to the fact that Pakistan continues to build its infrastructure.

“Pakistan is increasingly connected with improved roads. That said, Pakistan does face enormous electricity shortages due to Musharraf's failure to make a single investment in this sector during his ten year tenure.”

In addition, “Pakistan also has made significant strides in securing its nuclear arsenal through the establishment of the National Command Authority and the Strategic Plans Directorate,” the expert observed with respect to safety of Pakistan's nuclear program. -APP

New India or New Banana Republic
While you were glued to your flat screen, with your eyeballs popping out every time the ball was hit for a six, in a dark corner of India – in a Haryana village very close to the national capital – a dog was barking. Since it was a Dalit dog (in India, even dogs have caste), the upper caste Jaats were getting all riled up. So they decided to teach the dog a lesson. A bunch of them surrounded a Dalit house and set it on fire. Inside the house were trapped an 18-year-old girl and her old father. Since the girl was physically challenged and could not move out of the burning house, she and her father were engulfed and consumed by the fire. This is how people teach a lesson to dogs in New India: by making the poor, lower castes die like dogs.

Even as you were glued to TV, watching the IPL drama – both on the field and off field – a few more things happened. Highly dangerous radioactive material affected several people in a scrap market of Delhi; more than 100 people died in the cow-belt areas as mercury touched 43 degree mark; more people died of hunger and starvation across the country; new figures revealed that the number of poor in India stands at 800 million and not 327 million as claimed by the government; and it was reported that the government was tapping the phones of important political leaders. It may also be tapping the phones of ordinary citizens.
Now, a look at the IPL muck. Though nothing has been proved so far, the whole IPL drama now looks like one big farce. In general perception, IPL is now all about money (black and white), sex, drugs, corruption, betting and match fixing. It’s only in a country like India that a minister’s daughter can pull out a scheduled flight of the national carrier and turn it into a chartered flight for an IPL team. It’s only in India that a money-minting machine like IPL can enjoy tax exemption for years. It’s only in India that a collective effort of politicians, babus, Bollywood stars, businessmen, players and match-fixers can reduce the game to a drama whose script never changes. Yet people watch it. It’s the new opium of New India.

Before he was kicked out of office, the disgraced minister Shashi Tharoor thanked the “New India” for its support to him. “We will bring the change but it will not be without pain,” tweeted the minister to his 7,00,000 plus followers, who have begun to behave like a nation within a nation. People like Tharoor and his twitter army are more concerned about Brand India and Brand IPL than propriety in public life or for the millions of issues crying for attention.

New India is nothing but a banana republic. Here the reality looks like a mythical drama and a fake drama called IPL looks like real. So when a Dalit girl is burnt to death by a gang of upper caste loonies, nothing happens, not a soul is stirred, no one comes out on streets to protest. But when Dhoni lifts a ball into the stands, thousands of people go berserk as if this is the only reality that matters, as if this the only reality that will make India stand on its feet. No one knows, how many bets are won or lost on each IPL six, how much money rides on every wide ball.

Free market is not a free license to loot, Barack Obama reminded the Wall Street honchos this week. Every dollar carries hopes and aspirations of millions of people, the US president said. Obama will look like a silly fool in India, where free market has become a synonym for crony capitalism of the worst kind. In fact, it is turning into predatory capitalism where the rich and powerful hunt the poor and weak without any fear, with the full backing of the state.

The dalit girl’s death is only one of the millions of stories of injustice and cruelty unfolding in front of us. We can’t see them because we are busy watching IPL. Or, maybe, we are watching IPL because the reality is too much to bear.

At 800 million, India is the world’s poorest nation. It’s the poorest nation ever in human history. It’s twice the population of Africa. It’s more than the combined population of North and South Americas. But who cares. New India needs its daily fix of IPL.

Pakistan: 10th most failed state: index

The US-based magazine Foreign Policy, has ranked Pakistan 10th on the Failed State Index, 2010.
The list comprises 177 countries, and is topped by Somalia, Zimbabwe, Sudan and Chad.
India is ranked 87, while China comes in at 57. Norway is ranked at the bottom of the list.
The magazine says Somalia has been the number one failed state for three years running, and none of the current top 10 have shown much improvement.
It says altogether, the top 10 slots have rotated among just 15 unhappy countries for the past six years.
The Foreign Policy magazine index ranks Pakistan 8.1 on demographic pressures, 8.9 on refugees and IDPs, 8.9 on human rights and 9.3 on external intervention.
Foreign Policy magazine has published its list of failed states. Pakistan has squeezed into the ‘Top 10’ again. Does it deserve to be there? Let’s have a look. The magazine has listed the “unique set of troubles” the world’s most failed states face. Called the 12 degrees of failure (editors love lists with numbers) these are: demographic pressures, refugees, illegitimate governments, brain drain, failure of public services, inequality, group grievances, human rights, economic decline, lack of security, factionalised elites and intervention by external actors.

Pakistan does not figure in the states named as prime examples of these failures (for instance a quarter of all Somalis are refugees and the economies of North Korea and Zimbabwe have collapsed). But it is not inaccurate to say that Pakistan, like most third world developing nations including India, does poorly on these counts. So Pakistan’s problems are not particular to it to an extent. Pakistan doesn’t figure in the watch list of “Four countries in big trouble” either.

The magazine has published data showing what life is like for the populations of the 10 most failed states. Pakistan’s per capita GDP is shown as $2,590 (presumably calculated by purchasing power). This is 10 times more than the most failed state, Somalia.

Pakistan’s child mortality under age five per 1,000 is 89. This means nine children out of 100 don’t live past the age of 5. In Chad this number is 21 children. Pakistan’s fertility rate (births per woman) is four. In Congo, ranked 5th on the list, it is six. Afghan women produce seven.

Mobile phone subscriptions in Central African Republic, at number eight on the list, are four per 100 people. In Pakistan they are 53, half the population, and the number of internet users per 100 are 11. Iraq has only one.
The length of time the average Pakistani leader spends in office is two years. But such longevity isn’t necessarily a good thing as Sudan’s average of 21 years and Zimbabwe’s 30 years show.
As these numbers show, Pakistan is quite different from the other failed states. Then why does it regularly feature on the list?
Why is China, poor and dictatorial, though growing quickly, ranked at a safe 57? Why is India rated even better at 87?
The reason is that these nations are seen by the west as improving over time. The problems of poverty and governance remain, but it is believed that they are being resolved through a secular process.
Pakistan is seen, rightly or wrongly, as a state that is moving into greater trouble because of religious intolerance. Large parts of India’s tribal areas are also not under state control, but these do not produce as much violence and extremism as the tribal areas of Pakistan. And so the same problem, lack of state presence, is seen very negatively in Pakistan’s case.

The single most significant reason for Pakistan’s inclusion on the list is the slow collapse of the state. The government, Foreign Policy magazine and other experts are convinced, is losing control over its population.
Till this perception is changed, Pakistan will continue to make this list. And it’s not just a plaything of the magazine editors. Businesses will be prejudiced against the ‘failed’ states. Investment will be hard to attract, and capital will continue to flee. Pakistan’s government needs to respond.
These lists are not very scientific and should not be taken seriously. I doubt that the authors of such reports ever get out of their cushy offices and visit any of the countries classified as “endangered”. Ask any foreigner who’s been to Pakistan and countries like Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq etc and he will laugh at your face at that comparison. India though having more insurgencies than Pakistan is ranked 87th? Even higher than China? You got to be kidding me. The media should utilize its time highlighting real issues rather than discuss these stupid lists.
I also remember a couple of years ago a similar list came out that singled out Pakistan and Mexico being “on the verge of sudden and catastrophic collapse within six months”. Well those six months are long gone and where is that collapse? On the contrary, things are generally on the upswing.
Failing state or not we are here to stay … to rule the world! Call me crazy but as Iqbal said:
SABAK PHIR PARH SADAKAT KA, ADALAT KA, SUJHAAT KA …
LIYA JAYE KA TUJH SE KAAM DUNIA KI IMAMT KA …
Pakistan Zindabad! and Indians mind your own business.

Pakistan Nukes China. Et la France?

A stumper for your next quiz night: Name all of the countries that have exploded atomic weapons in Xinjiang.

The answer: China and... Pakistan?

Crazy stuff in today's New York Times nuclear book review smorgasbord. The book in question is "The Nuclear Express: A Political History of the Bomb and Its Proliferation" due out in January.

The authors drop more than one bombshell recovered from the dustbin of atomic history:

Secret cooperation extended to the secluded sites where nations tested their handiwork in thundering blasts. The book says, for instance, that China opened its sprawling desert test site to Pakistan, letting its client test a first bomb there on May 26, 1990.

That alone rewrites atomic history. It casts new light on the reign of Benazir Bhutto as prime minister of Pakistan and helps explain how the country was able to respond so quickly in May 1998 when India conducted five nuclear tests.

“It took only two weeks and three days for the Pakistanis to field and fire a nuclear device of their own,” the book notes.

In another disclosure, the book says China “secretly extended the hospitality of the Lop Nur nuclear test site to the French.”

France!? Say it ain't so, Xiaoping. Well, it couldn't be any worse than this:

The book, in a main disclosure, discusses how China in 1982 made a policy decision to flood the developing world with atomic know-how. Its identified clients include Algeria, Pakistan and North Korea.

Alarmingly, the authors say one of China’s bombs was created as an “export design” that nearly “anybody could build.” The blueprint for the simple plan has traveled from Pakistan to Libya and, the authors say, Iran.

But why would China do something so stupid? Well, old habits are hard to kick. Nikita Khrushchev said in his memoirs that Mao's attitude towards the nuclear holocaust of World War III was, "Hey, even if China loses 300 million people we'll still have plenty left over."

Why did Beijing spread its atomic knowledge so freely? The authors speculate that it either wanted to strengthen the enemies of China’s enemies (for instance, Pakistan as a counterweight to India) or, more chillingly, to encourage nuclear wars or terror in foreign lands from which Beijing would emerge as the “last man standing.”

Sounds like the kind of plan that will definitely work out in the long run.

The battle for Pakistan

CHINA and the US are on a collision course over

Chinese plans to build two nuclear reactors in Pakistan.

This is despite the country's chronic political instability and history of selling nuclear secrets to North Korea, Iran and Libya.

China is expected to formally announce the plans to build the 650-megawatt reactors in Punjab province at a meeting in New Zealand of the Nuclear Suppliers Group - the 46 countries that dominate and try to control the world's atomic trade.

The US has already voiced its disapproval before the meeting, which starts today, and will try to forge a consensus on updating the rules designed to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons.

US officials say that the plan requires special exemption from the NSG, which China joined in 2004, as Pakistan has not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and could, therefore, divert some technology to its nuclear weapons program or to another country.

China and Pakistan disagree, pointing out that the US set a precedent by sealing a deal to sell civilian nuclear fuel and technology to India in 2006, even though Delhi had yet to sign the treaty.

That deal, which lifted a US ban imposed after India tested its first nuclear device in 1974, was seen as the cornerstone of a new partnership with Delhi designed to counterbalance China's influence in Asia. However, critics say that it undermined the international non-proliferation regime.

Having muscled the Indian deal through the NSG in 2008, the US is likely to struggle to forge a consensus against China's deal with Pakistan. "Because Washington pressed the NSG and China to exempt India from NSG trade sanctions, it is now more difficult to complain about China's desire to export reactors to Pakistan," said Mark Hibbs, a nuclear expert at the Washington-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

The dispute could also complicate US-led efforts to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear bomb, since any multilateral action requires China's support in the UN Security Council.

China has had close relations with Pakistan since the 1960s and had already built one reactor and started a second at Chashma, in Punjab, before joining the NSG. It signed the deal to build another two reactors at Chashma in February but is expected to argue that it does not need NSG exemption as it was agreed before 2004.

The US did not protest when the deal first came to light but, after intense lobbying from India, it said last week that it had asked China to "clarify the details".

The US has grave concerns about proliferation - especially since Abdul Qadeer Khan, Pakistan's top nuclear scientist, confessed in 2004 to selling nuclear secrets to North Korea, Iran and Libya.

Washington also worries about the potential for Islamic militants to attack or capture Pakistani nuclear sites. Last year, Pakistani police said they found a map of Chashma in the possession of five American Muslims arrested for plotting a terrorist attack.

China responded to the US statement last week by insisting that its nuclear co-operation with Pakistan was for peaceful purposes and under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Pakistan said that the deal was needed to help ease chronic power shortages that have caused long blackouts across the country for much of this year.

China’s decision to expand its nuclear cooperation with Pakistan in defiance of the international norms and the American reluctance to vigorously challenge it, underline the unique value of the Pakistan army for Beijing and Washington.

Further, the many challenges of our time — the changing relationship between a China that believes in its own unstoppable rise and a United States that is brooding about its relative decline, the spread of nuclear weapons, and the challenge of violent religious extremism — all come together in Pakistan.

The American and Chinese stakes in the relationship with the Pakistan army headquarters in Rawalpindi are high and rising amidst the expectations of a rapid political evolution in the Af-Pak theatre in the near future and gathering confrontation between Iran and the West. Whichever great power can shape the politics of the territories along and across the Indus that the Pakistan army holds will gain a decisive influence over the developments in the subcontinent, inner Asia and the Persian Gulf and the orientation of violent religious extremism.

Can Afghanistan tap its $1-trillion mineral wealth?

A new Pentagon report identifies rich reserves of iron, copper, cobalt, lithium and gold. But experts say extracting the minerals from the country's rugged mountains and remote regions won't be easy.

A new Pentagon assessment released Monday says Afghanistan may hold a trillion dollars in mineral wealth, but the report ran into skepticism from miners and even other U.S. government officials.

The Defense Department identified $908 billion in mineral reserves in Afghanistan, including iron, copper, cobalt and gold. It said the reserves may include up to $223 billion in oil and gas as well as lithium, used in rechargeable batteries and other consumer products.

The study was intended to identify ways to reduce Afghanistan's dependence on donor nations, which now fund nearly all security operations and key government functions.
But mining industry officials and others were skeptical that massive amounts of mineral wealth could be easily extracted from the country's rugged mountains and remote regions.

"Sudan will host the Winter Olympics before these guys get a trillion dollars out of the ground," said Luke Popovich of the National Mining Assn., which represents U.S. mining companies.

Few experts dispute that Afghanistan has immense mineral resources. But the Pentagon study, first reported by the New York Times, estimates larger reserves than previously suggested. Experts said it would probably be years before the minerals could be profitably extracted because of the lack of infrastructure, mining know-how, security and a climate conducive to business.

The Afghan government is plagued by corruption, particularly involving officials who have dealt with mineral concessions. Many of the areas of mineral deposits are in the south and east, centers of the insurgency, where there has been little development of any kind.

Nevertheless, with the United States on the hook for an estimated $7.5 billion in annual support costs for the Afghan security forces, the Pentagon has been canvassing for other funding sources for the Afghanistan government.

Ronald Neumann, a former U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan, said the mineral wealth was important in the long run but unlikely to make a difference in the war effort.

"Yes, it can make a huge difference in the economic viability of the country, but not quickly," he said. "Does it solve your problem of funding the Afghan army next year? No."

Pentagon officials Monday downplayed the idea that the U.S. was trying to find ways to pay for the war, and it emphasized that the study was simply intended to help the Afghan government as part of the overall counterinsurgency strategy.

"It is potentially good news, especially for Afghanistan," said Marine Col. David Lapan, a Pentagon spokesman.

Some experts cautioned the U.S. to avoid giving the impression that it has designs on the country's mineral wealth.

"That would play right into the extremist narrative that the West is out to subjugate Muslims and plunder their resources," said Paul Pillar, a veteran CIA official now at Georgetown University.

Critics of the Afghan war saw the release of the assessment as an attempt to counter recent U.S. setbacks in Afghanistan with positive news.

"Maybe this is somebody's idea of a 'Top Kill' maneuver that they think can stop this gusher of bad news," said Tom Andrews, national director of the Win Without War Coalition, referring to one of the unsuccessful attempts to plug the Gulf of Mexico oil leak.

The skepticism was not just confined to the antiwar left. Philip Crowley, the chief State Department spokesman, also acknowledged that mining efforts in Afghanistan faced "numerous, though not insurmountable, problems."

"This is an uphill climb for Afghanistan," he said.

Turkey looks east and makes waves

The Muslim nation is in NATO and a candidate to join the European Union. But it's busy making inroads to the east, a region looking for and suspicious of fresh leadership.

Turkey has long been a map of possibility — its eastern fringes touching Iraq and its western borders brushing Europe, a place where the music of Beethoven played amid the call to prayer.

This predominantly Muslim nation is a member of NATO and a candidate, although an unwelcome one, to join the European Union. But Turkey is peering east, dispatching financial brokers, pistachio merchants and diplomats across a restless region that is both looking for and suspicious of any gleam of fresh leadership.

By default and through its own designs, Turkey has gained stature in a Middle East where old Arab powers are fading and gulf states are preoccupied with the global financial crisis and the prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has strengthened relations with former enemy Syria, improved ties with Iran and, to the agitation of Egypt, arisen as a provocative Muslim voice for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

"The country's conservative government has an ideological fit with the Middle East and the larger Muslim world," said Asli Aydintasbas, a columnist with the newspaper Milliyet. "And, practically speaking, there's no place for Turkey in Europe, at least in the short term."

The crisis over the recent deadly Israeli raid on a humanitarian flotilla bound for Gaza upset the strategic relationship between Israel and Turkey, which has been the Jewish state's closest Muslim ally. The two cooperate on defense and amassed $2.5 billion in bilateral trade last year. But Turkey's fierce reaction to the killing of nine Turkish activists by Israeli commandos highlighted the nation's growing disenchantment with the Jewish state.

The U.S. worries that the eastward tilt of Turkey's Islamic-oriented government runs counter to Washington's ambitions. Ankara has increasingly insinuated itself into Palestinian affairs and has appeared to embrace Hamas, which controls Gaza and is considered a terrorist group by the U.S. and Israel. But this tack has turned Erdogan, who once sold sesame buns in Istanbul's poor neighborhoods, into a hero in the Muslim world.

A father in Gaza named his newborn son after him. Arab writers asked why their own leaders, regarded as corrupt and cowed by the West, weren't as scrappily eloquent in supporting Palestinian rights. Turkey has usurped the limelight from Iran, which funds and supports Hamas, and from Egypt, which for years has been trying to broker an Israeli-Palestinian peace.

This has fueled jealousies in some Middle East capitals that view Ankara as interfering in the balance of power, even as its overall regional trade has jumped to more than $31 billion from about $5 billion over the last eight years. But others in the region see Turkey's Islamic brand of democracy and free markets as a pragmatic approach not only to Israel, the U.S. and Europe but also to political cooperation and business deals with the emerging powers of China and India.

"Turkey has been a role model for Islamic countries," said Reza Kaviani, an Iranian analyst. "Turkey has proved that Iranian policy of exporting Islamic revolution has only led to extremism, in contrast with Turkish democratic policy, which has led to true sympathy toward Palestinians and further international pressure on Israel."

For Egypt, the problem with Turkey is its resonance with the "common people," said Sameh Sorour, a Cairo-based political analyst.

"Egyptians have always endorsed any regime that opposed Israel, let alone publicly condemned an Israeli act or policy.... But Turkey is also a secular country with great financial developments and close ties to the West. It represents everything the Egyptian regime is trying to stand for, and that's why Cairo won't be able to discredit Turkey," Sorour said.

Ankara's venturesome diplomacy has limits. A recent effort by Turkey and Brazil to negotiate a nuclear deal with Iran was viewed as naive and angrily discarded by Washington. Turkey faces other challenges in engaging the Middle East: ensuring that it doesn't let its improving human rights record slip and understanding that courting Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir, who is wanted on war crimes charges, may harm its image in the European Union.

Straddling East and West is the historic Turkish riddle. Founded by Kemal Ataturk in 1923 upon the ruins of the Ottoman Empire, Turkey, where the military held sway for decades, hammered itself into a secular state.

The country positioned itself as an Islamic democracy that would fit into the EU. Despite making political and human rights reforms, however, Turkey felt ostracized by Berlin and other capitals that believed a country with thousands of minarets was not truly European.

Its pride damaged, Turkey kept its Western alliances and its bid for EU membership open but shifted its focus in the opposite direction.

"The AKP party's blend of Islam and nationalism very much looks toward the East," said Mustafa Karahan, director of an energy investment company. "The party figured, 'Instead of being a small brother in the West, let's be a big brother in the East.' The only problem with this is that a lot of Arabs, especially Egyptians, don't like Turks. But Egypt's time is done. It's over."

It is not likely that Turkey will become the unifying voice in the Middle East, especially in the disparate Arab world, where these days leaders are more consumed with preserving their power.

Cultural differences and historical animosities further complicate Ankara's role. Turkey was once the seat of the Ottoman Empire, which for centuries harshly ruled much of the Middle East. But the country's ascent is a reminder that Arab states have lacked a shared vision since the 1960s, when Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser held up the hope of pan-Arabism.

"Turkey is rising. Iran is rising. Where are the Arabs?" said Mesut Ozcan, assistant professor of international relations at Istanbul Commerce University.

"Erdogan is filling this gap, but Turkey doesn't really want to be the leader of the Middle East. This is about markets and security, of creating an atmosphere to benefit Turkish businessmen. Turkey is trying to create a new language."