'Shame Games' mar India's reputation: analysts

The shambolic run-up to the Commonwealth Games has dashed India's hopes of showcasing itself as a dynamic emerging superpower and delivering an event to rival the spectacular Beijing Olympics, analysts say.

The country's old image of inefficient bureaucracy, poor infrastructure, graft and squalor has been broadcast around the

world by the international sporting event, tagged India's "Shame Games" by the local media.

"We believe tourism will not suffer much, since tourists who visit India have mostly factored in the India of yore, with snake charmers, and its dirt," said Robinder Sachdev, president of Indian image consulta

ncy Imagindia.

"But large-scale business and investment decisions in boardrooms will certainly be impacted by this colossal display of ineptitude," said Sachdev.

It is "a huge public spectacle of a large project gone wrong," he said.

The Commonwealth turmoil has been a blow to the vision the country hoped to project of a modern "shining" India that could deliver complex projects on time and within budget, analysts said.

The bad news reached a crescendo last week when a footbridge to the Games' centrepiece stadium collapsed and the Games governing body branded the athletes' village "filthy" and "uninhabitable."

The collapse raised doubts about the safety of other structures built for the Games, whose original cost was pegged by the government at less than 100 million dollars in 2003 but which later estimates have put at up to six billion dollars.

The Games should have given India a chance of "showcasing its rising economy, recent infrastructure development, and improved business environment," said Matt Robinson, a senior economist with the research arm of ratings giant Moody's Corp.

But now "confidence in India's infrastructure, its capacity to organise large events and its reputation as a tourist destination have all been brought into question," he said.

Concern about the negative impact of the Games' chaos was echoed by a leading Indian business lobby group which said it was deeply worried about the possibility of the country's humiliation over the sporting event.

"I must confess we are deeply concerned," said Amit Mitra, general secretary of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry.

"It is a sad state of affairs indeed and, psychologically, puts a question mark against India?s capacity to deliver," he said.

India, which won the Games in 2003 but only started working on them at the beginning of 2008, has "no excuse" for the last-minute rush, noted Rajeev Sharma, project manager of the Building and Woodworkers' International trade union in India.

The biggest mystery for many is the amount of time it took for the government to step in to try to rescue the event.

While the problems had been building for months, it has only been in the last few weeks that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been holding crisis meetings to jumpstart preparations for the Games.

Commonwealth Games Organising Committee treasurer A.K. Mattoo called the woes embroiling the Games a "collective failure."

Analysts say the chaotic preparations, however, will not derail the long-term economic rise of the country of 1.2 billion people.

"Despite perceptions by foreign investors of hurdles like painful bureaucracy and corruption, the huge domestic market is hard to ignore," said Deepak Lalwani, India head of London-based investment house Astaire and Partners,

"And that's especially the case since developed economies are stagnating or show anaemic growth," Lalwani said.

Even as the lead-up to the sporting event continued to generate embarrassing news, foreign investors drove India's benchmark Sensex stock index past the psychologically key 20,000 level as they bet on robust economic growth.

Analysts say the fiascos surrounding the Games preparations should be seen more as a reflection of the incompetence of India's stifling government bureaucracy rather than as a sign of the nation's long-term prospects.

"The pathetic delivery by the government" does not "mean a poor showing by the private sector. Indeed, India?s economic emergence is despite the government -- not because of it," CLSA economist Rajeev Malik said.

War correspondent Anna Badkhen returns to Northern Afghanistan in search of the friends she made in the early days of the occupation, back when it was the safest part of an unsafe land. Blighted, hopeless, still unspeakably beautiful but now overrun by the Taliban, the region is a different place entirely than the one she first encountered. Traveling from village to village, she comes to understand what went so terribly wrong in the North—and, by extension, what is going so terribly wrong in Afghanistan in general. In her dispatches, which she calls “part diary entries, part love letters from a land that stole my heart,” she offers one of the most heartbreaking, lyrical portrayals ever of Afghanistan—and a powerful warning to those seeking to force the country into a bright new future.

Anna Badkhen has covered wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Israel and the Palestinian territories, Chechnya, and Kashmir. Her reporting has appeared in The New Republic, Foreign Policy, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Boston Globe, The Christian Science Monitor, and Salon.com, among others. Her book, Peace Meals, will be published in October 2010. In April 2010, she journeyed to Northern Afghanistan on an assignment for Foreign Policy magazine to write a series of dispatches that eventually became Waiting for the Taliban.

Anna Badkhen has covered wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Israel and the Palestinian territories, Chechnya, and Kashmir. Her reporting has appeared in The New Republic, Foreign Policy, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Boston Globe, The Christian Science Monitor, and Salon.com, among others. Her book, Peace Meals, will be published in October 2010. In April 2010, she journeyed to Northern Afghanistan on an assignment for Foreign Policy magazine to write a series of dispatches that eventually became Waiting for the Taliban.



Question: In October 2001, you stepped off a plane in Afghanistan to cover your first conflict. What were your first impressions of the country and its people?

Anna Badkhen: Actually, in 2001 I did not step off a plane: Because at the time the United States was conducting its war mostly from the air, very few civilian planes and helicopters were allowed into Afghanistan. Besides, Taliban government controlled most of the country, and the sliver of Northern Afghanistan that was in the hands of U.S.-backed rebels had only one, barely functioning, airport. To get into Afghanistan I had to fly to Tajikistan, drive to that country’s southern frontier, and there, very late at night, take a rusty, diesel-powered ferry across the Pyandzh River--the Oxus of antiquity.

The Pyandzh was the border between the two countries, between war and peace. It was also a border between eras. Suddenly I was surrounded by people who eked out a living the way they had for millennia: without electricity or running water, tilling fields with primitive wooden tools, baking delicious flatbread in tandoor ovens, taking flocks of sheep to the jade hills at sunup. I fell in love with the tenaciousness and grace of these people, and with the generosity with which they shared everything: their shelter, their food, and their grief.

Question: You wrote that upon your return in 2010 you found "that the people who in 2001 had embraced the U.S.-led war are now wondering whether the Taliban’s puritanical and cruel governance may be a better option than the anarchy, corruption, and abandonment that followed the militia’s ouster." In summary, what went wrong in Northern Afghanistan over those nine years that you were away?

Anna Badkhen: After the invasion, the north--where ethnic Pashtuns, who form the core of the Taliban, are a small minority--was universally considered to be virtually Taliban-proof. NATO forces and most international donors focused their attention on southern Afghanistan, where the Taliban had retained a stronghold. The notion that the Taliban posed no threat in Northern Afghanistan spelled the region’s undoing: While the world was distracted, the Taliban quietly returned to the north, capitalizing on the disillusionment of the local population both with the UN-backed kleptocracy that governs in Kabul, and with the West, which, in their eyes, had broken its promise to improve the way people live in the region.

Question: From your sense of the people of Afghanistan, what do you think they want from the United States?

Anna Badkhen: Ninety percent of Afghans live in villages: kind, generous, religious people who live with their hands, who love their children, who want to kick back after a day of grueling manual labor, eat dinner, fly kites. They want what most people want everywhere in the world: Peace. Stability. Electricity, clean water, access to health care. They want to have enough food to feed their families. They want roads, and they want to be able to drive on those roads—whether to take their crops to market, or to visit relatives in a distant village—without being blown up by a roadside bomb, and without having to pay a bribe at every police checkpoint. They want to know that no misguided air raid will destroy their farmhouse while they sleep. It seems to me that at this point they don’t care whether all of this comes from the United States, or from some relief agency, or from the Taliban. Afghans have weathered thousands of years of invasions, fratricidal conflicts, political persecution. They are an astoundingly enduring nation. But they want a break.

Question: What’s a day in the life of an average Afghan citizen like? How can and why should an average American try to relate?

Anna Badkhen: You have done this many times: On a day off, you pack some sandwiches, water, and fruit, lock up the house, drive out of the city, and go for a hike with your friends.

One spring day, my Afghan friends took me hiking. Up a road strewn with chert, past some cotton fields drowned in stagnant water--to soak the hard soil--up a goat path that bisects a hill into a sloping wheat field and an almost vertical lea of cerulean wildflowers. Wars have swept over these hills like the smooth waves of wind that rolled the wheat ears, and many of the fields were probably ticking with landmines. But wars cannot kill our basic human need for normalcy, our appreciation of natural beauty. At the top of one hill--turtles peered out from their nest beneath wildflower stalks; an ant dragged a husk of last year’s grain to a crevice between lumps of the dry clay soil; a one-humped she-camel grazed on chamomile flowers--we sat and drank water and mango juice we had brought, snapping pictures and laughing. A little boy--my friend’s nephew--put a rose in my hair, and held my hand all the way back to the car.

Why should we relate? Because we are all human, because we share a planet, and because our world, in an era of globalized trade, the Internet, and the 24-hour news cycle, is rapidly shrinking. What separates us are a language, a set of customs, geography. These are superficial boundaries. We want the same things: friends to go hiking with, beauty to clap our eyes on, and someone’s hand to hold.

Question: In your opinion, what are the three most important things that Americans should know about the current situation in Afghanistan?

Anna Badkhen: One thing to keep in mind is that even those Afghans who initially supported the war against the Taliban no longer see it a war of emancipation, and NATO troops as liberators. They see it as another war that threatens their lives and the lives of their kin. They are not interested in Western-style democracy; their lifestyle is traditionally feudal and land-based. They rarely travel far beyond their tribal areas and the nearest market town. They want to live comfortably, they want their children to stop dying of such preventable diseases as dysentery or common cold each year.

Secondly: It is a common misconception that while the Taliban are a hardline, ultra-religious militia, their opposition--which makes up the current government--is not. Most Afghan leaders come from the ranks of mujahedeen, or holy warriors: a hardline, often ultra-religious militia formed--with the assistance of both the CIA and Osama bin Laden--to fight against the Soviets thirty years ago. Many have been accused of sanctioning mass murder, ethnic cleansing, and gang rape. The longer they remain in power, the longer their government will have no legitimacy in the eyes of many ordinary Afghans.

Finally: Nine years after the war began, life for most Afghans has not improved. Child mortality remains as high as it was in 2001: three out of four children die before they turn five. Most villages still have no electricity, no paved roads, no access to clean water. When people in the West wonder why Afghans do not appear grateful for the U.S.-led effort to rid their country of the Taliban, the question I have is: given these statistics, why should they?

Question: On a less serious note, what’s the best treat you tried while there? What did it look and taste like?

Anna Badkhen: Afghan food is a delight. During the spring 2010 trip that yielded Waiting for the Taliban, I stayed in a private house of a huge, tight-knit family. My room was next to the kitchen, and there was always something sublime cooking on the propane stove there, and mouthwatering aroma would seep into my room through the door crack. One day--it was a Friday, a day off--my hosts were having some guests over, and I helped out in the kitchen. We were making--in addition to rice pilau, meatballs, stewed lamb, salad, creamed spinach, and spiced rice pudding--mantwo, large Afghan dumplings with ground meat and onions (there is a recipe for mantwo and some other wonderful Afghan food in my book Peace Meals, which comes out in October). Four women at the counter, preparing lunch for 40. At first, the other women watched me very suspiciously: were my untrained fingers a match for the filigreed, stuffed beauties they were making? After the second mantwo, they said: “Good, you can do this,” and stopped watching. I felt as though I had been accepted into a tribe.

And the mantwo were delicious.

Is India Really Shining?
Commonwealth Games is more nostalgia, less sports

If anything, the Commonwealth Games provide a lingering aroma of the British empire that in these modern times only evokes nostalgia and little else of note. The Games have evolved from the British Empire Games, first held in 1930 at Hamilton in Canada, to the British Empire and Commonwealth Games (1954), the British Commonwealth Games (1970) to the present Commonwealth Games (1978).

The event has grown in size too, from 11 countries, 400 sportspersons and six sports to 71 nations and territories, 7,000 participants and 17 disciplines at the 2010 Delhi Commonwealth Games Oct 3-14.

The change in nomenclature also reflects the gradual break-up of the British empire as erstwhile colonies, including India, gained independence.

The last vestiges of the British Raj, as Indians refer to the pre-independence period, still remain to keep the Commonwealth Games fire burning, although top sportspersons tend to give a thumbs down to the quadrennial event.

From India's perspective, the Commonwealth Games present an excellent opportunity to score some points and medals at the international level, though overall, the collective performance has been far from satisfactory.

Pakistan Olympic Association chief Arif Hasan complained that his team's rooms were "not fit enough to live in" and gave organizers 24 hours to improve conditions or its athletes will stay in a hotel.


India's Catastrophe
As New Delhi prepares for the 2010 Commonwealth Games things are falling apart -- literally


Debacle in New Delhi
How can India be a superpower if it can't even build a bridge?

What was meant to be India's coming out party is quickly turning into a walk of shame. Only 10 days remain before the curtains go up on New Delhi's Commonwealth Games, the 19th edition of a quadrennial gathering that brings together the 70-odd nations of the former British Empire, and India's capital is a city in disarray.

In the past week, Islamist terrorists claimed credit for injuring two Taiwanese tourists in a drive-by shooting; a pedestrian bridge near the event's flagship stadium collapsed, injuring 23 workers; a Scottish official declared the athlete's village "unfit for human habitation"; and Britain, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand issued travel advisories warning their citizens of more terrorist attacks during the games.

Ratcheting up the pressure on India, officials from England and New Zealand have raised doubts about whether the games will go ahead as scheduled. On Wednesday, Sir Andrew Foster, the chairman of England's Commonwealth team, told the BBC that the future of the event remained "on a knife edge." And what was a trickle of top athletes pulling out threatens to turn into a flood. Among those who won't be in Delhi come October: Jamaican sprinters Usain Bolt and Shelly-Ann Fraser, Australian tennis stars Lleyton Hewitt and Samantha Stosur, Scottish cyclist Chris Hoy, and English triple-jumper Phillips Idowu.

Cancellation still appears unlikely. Depending on whom you ask, and on whether you include a broader aesthetic and infrastructure facelift for Delhi timed to coincide with the games, India has sunk between $3 billion and $10 billion on the event. With national prestige riding on a successful outcome, it would take a catastrophe -- say a major terrorist attack or flooding on the streets of Delhi -- for the government to throw in the towel. And decisions by individual competitors notwithstanding, few countries would risk a diplomatic row with India by pulling out over the state of athletes' apartments and amorphous fears of terrorism.

Nonetheless, the controversy over the games highlights the gulf between India's lofty ambitions and its often messy reality. Over the last 20 years, liberalization and globalization have unshackled many of the country's most productive citizens from heavy-handed socialism and raised living standards faster than at any time in the nation's history. But even as the private sector booms -- swelling the middle class and producing billionaires by the fistful -- the quality of governance remains abysmal. Neither the courts nor the electorate punish public servants for amassing private fortunes. In parts of the country, the political and criminal classes are hard to tell apart.

Commonwealth Games 2010 (CWG) or Corruption Games in India?

Even before the most recent spate of bad news, the run-up to the Commonwealth Games has been plagued with scandal: multimillion-dollar stadiums with leaky roofs, fly-by-night firms accused of collecting hundreds of thousands of dollars without a written contract, and absurdly overpriced equipment and supplies, including $8,700 air-conditioners, $19,500 treadmills, and, most famously, $80 toilet paper rolls. Needless to say, Delhi is hardly the only city in the world where politicians and building contractors collude. But somehow, in other places, overpriced roads and bridges don't seem to fall apart with such alarming regularity.

For India's burgeoning middle class, the Commonwealth Games' natural audience, daily reminders of official ineptitude and corruption are hard to swallow. A popular joke on Twitter about Suresh Kalmadi, chairman of the organizing committee and a member of the ruling Congress Party, sums up the national mood: "Suresh Kalmadi tried to hang himself but the ceiling collapsed!" Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit and national Sports Minister M.S. Gill are the other popular villains. The comparison with Beijing's immaculate hosting of the 2008 Olympics only adds insult to injury.

Of course, as with so much else in India, there's always the chance the games will come together at the last minute in the madly disorganized but ultimately enjoyable manner of a Punjabi wedding (to use the Indian media's favorite metaphor). Early troubles with stadiums appear to have been resolved for the most part -- at least until Wednesday, when part of a false ceiling collapsed at a weight-lifting venue. A frenzied clean-up job will likely make the athlete's village "fit for human habitation." And barring further mishaps, once the games begin, the media's attention will naturally shift from organizational deficiencies to athletic performance. But the games' deficiencies might actually be a home-field advantage: The absence of many international stars will likely give India's traditionally underperforming athletes their 15 minutes of Commonwealth-wide fame.

Larger questions about India's governance capabilities remain. The Indian middle class -- at best, 300 million people out of a population of 1.1 billion -- may not have the numbers to decide elections, but it needs to demand a greater say in the country's governance. This means finding ways to translate its economic muscle into political clout. Until Indian politicians are held to the same standards as their counterparts in advanced democracies, the country will have to continue to suffer the ignominy of collapsing bridges, sub-par apartment complexes, and $80 toilet rolls.

India tries to make poor disappear ahead of Commonwealth Games

The banners were erected at the little hillside enclave while everyone was at work, long blue and purple signs about 10 feet tall showing a smiling cartoon tiger proclaiming the arrival of the New Delhi Commonwealth Games.

The plastic-roofed shanties that are home to more than 200 people - laborers who have spent the last year fixing up the city's roads for the games - had disappeared behind the smiling tiger.

New Delhi's beggars have been arrested or forced from the streets, migrants have been ousted, and thousands of slum homes have been hidden from sight.

New Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, the equivalent of the city's mayor, denied that the banners, hundreds of which have been put up around the city in the past couple days, had anything to do with poverty.

Olympic Village
I read on BBC that the Olympic Village isin't in a better condition either. The walls were not covered, the toilets didin't work and some of the builders left dirt and fezes inside the rooms. Thats quite a negative propaganda. Some Indian Government sopokesman said that hygiene is a cultural issue and its concept may vary from country to country.

India over rated
this fiasco is an ultimate proof of india being over rated by US/west, people inside and outside india need to focus on lives of 400 million people who are living worst life than living in african poor states.....US just wanted to lift india against china after win over soviet's. But its too early too rely on one of the world's most corrupt goup of individuals ...The Great Indian rulers!


UnCommonwealth Games
When one always pulls all-nighters, don't expect an A+. The phrase "By the skin of our teeth" has more margin for error than this event for which all the work was supposed to be finished by 2007. I wouldn't blame the star atjhletes to be a no-show. SO are many Delhites who are taking a vacation during the two-weeks. I bet it was the "Shining India" BJP party who signed up for this event to embarrass the Congress Party.

India over rated
this fiasco is an ultimate proof of india being over rated by US/west, people inside and outside india need to focus on lives of 400 million people who are living worst life than of life in african poor states.....US just wanted to lift india against china after win over soviet's. But its too early too rely on one of the world's most corrupt goup of individuals ...The Great Indian rulers!

The pitfalls of porn

How is the global reach of explicit pornography impacting the way couples relate to each other emotionally and physically?
The porn industry has been at the forefront of technological developments such as video streaming that are giving pornographic images greater exposure around the world.
Some estimates say one quarter of all internet searches include the word "sex". The industry is estimated at $96bn a year and employs public relations firms and lobbyists to ensure its interests are being heard in the corridors of power.
In recent years the growth in profits have come mainly from increasingly explicit images known as "gonzo" porn that depict women being objectified and dehumanised.

Pakistan: Imran Farooq murder linked to rows within MQM party

Politician may have been about to endorse or join new party set up by General Pervez Musharraf, source claims

The Scotland Yard investigation into the murder in London of the leading Pakistani politician Dr Imran Farooq has been told that rows within his own party may have led to his assassination.
Farooq, 50, was stabbed to death earlier this monthduring an attack in which he was also beaten near his home in Edgware, north London. Farooq was a senior figure in Pakistan's MQM (Muttahida Quami Movement) party, and was in exile in London at the time of his death. The murder is being investigated by Scotland Yard's counter-terrorism branch because of the political dimension to the killing.

Sources say intelligence suggests his death was linked to rows within the MQM.

Farooq, once prominent in MQM, had taken a back seat. A senior Pakistani source said he may have been about to endorse or join a new party set up by Pakistan's former military ruler, General Pervez Musharraf.

The source said of the motive: "It lies within the MQM. Dr Farooq was probably going to join Musharraf."

He is vowing to leave his own London exile and return home to launch a fresh bid for power. His new party, the All Pakistan Muslim League, will launch its programme in London later this week.
Asked by the Sunday Telegraph about his reaction to Farooq's murder, Musharraf said: "It is terrible that such an assassination could happen in a place like London."

Farooq, who was married with two young sons, claimed UK asylum in 1999 alongside Altaf Hussain, the MQM's leader. Hussain, who also lives in exile in London, has said "enemies of the MQM" killed Farooq and they will try to kill him. Pakistan's media reported him as saying on Friday: "Now the enemies of the movement are after my life, but I want to tell them I am not afraid of anyone, whether it's a superpower like the United States or its Nato allies or their Pakistani agents … I fear the Almighty Allah and will never bow down before the conspirators even if they get my British citizenship rescinded."

Police in London are still hunting an attacker who, one witness said, appeared to be an Asian man. Analysts say the MQM has longstanding rivalries with ethnic Pashtun and Sindhi parties in Karachi. The MQM has also been riven by occasional internecine violence.
Before entering the UK, Farooq spent seven years on the run in Pakistan from criminal charges while the MQM was engaged in a violent battle for control of Karachi. He remained a key party figure. While MQM leader Hussain is protected by private guards and rarely appears in public following death threats, colleagues said Farooq never believed he was at risk and had played a smaller role in the party since the birth of his sons, now aged five and three.
Farooq was attacked on his way home from his job at a chemist's shop. He was found near his home after neighbours witnessed what they believed was a fight. Paramedics were called but he was pronounced dead at the scene.
MQM party officials in the party's stronghold of Karachi declared a 10-day period of mourning. Previous political killings have triggered riots and deadly clashes between rival factions. Police are keeping an open mind as to the identity of Farooq's killer and their investigation continues.
US Ambassador Anne Patterson has called on Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) leaders at party headquarters in Karachi to condole over MQM convener Dr Imran Farooq’s murder in London.
US Ambassador Anne Patterson has called on Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) leaders at party headquarters in Karachi to condole over MQM convener Dr Imran Farooq’s murder in London.
During Patterson’s visit to Nine-Zero, she met senior leaders of MQM and condemned the murder of the MQM convener.
This visit comes amidst a London-based newspaper report on Sunday which says that the murder of the MQM convener could be the result of “internal strife” within the MQM. The newspaper said Dr Farooq, who had been made inactive in the party after remaining in a prominent party position for quite some time, was planning to join a new party to be launched by former president Pervez Musharraf.

Establishment trying to eliminate me: Altaf

Earlier on Sunday, MQM chief Altaf Hussain asked his followers “to prepare themselves as powerful quarters have started moving against me. They want to remove Altaf Hussain from your fold”.

In an online message addressed to “comrades of the movement”, he accused “international power brokers of using powerful state institutions like the army, ISI and other government agencies to suppress the philosophy of Altaf Hussain” and said that after having failed to do so despite “hatching conspiracies, unleashing a reign of brutality and terror and killing thousands of comrades, the Pakistani establishment, aided by other powerful nations, is trying to eliminate Altaf Hussain”.

Pakistani woman wins International Peace Award

A Pakistani lady - Rubina Irfan Bhatti awarded International Peace Award. She is a world peace and human rights worker. She got her award by the representative of World Vision . Bill LawryBill Lawry , global representative of world vision gave her the award and 1000 US dollars. Rubina donated thousand dollars for flood victims . Previously , in 2005 she was also named for noble price .

‘Unseen heroes for peace’ recognised on International Day of Peace

Pakistani and Palestinian Peacemakers are the winners of this year's World Vision International peace prize. Ms. Rubina Feroze Bhatti of Pakistan is the recipient of the Peacemaking Award, which honours an individual and the Peacebuilding Award, which honours an organisation, goes to WI'AM; the Palestinian Conflict Resolution Center of the Palestinian Territories.

The Palestinian Territories and Pakistan have been ravaged by conflict, insurgency and natural disasters for decades. Within both populations, children have born the brunt of insecurity and poverty, resulting in generations lacking access to education, health care and opportunity.

In Pakistan, Ms. Bhatti has proven herself as a mobilize, working extensively to bring peaceful change through human rights activism, advocacy and policy engagement. WI'AM's work has gained international interest in the way it provides tangible opportunities for mobilising and empowering children, youth and women through human rights dialogue, creative programming, cultural exchanges and vocational training.

'World Vision is a witness that thousands of community members and hundreds of agencies around the world every year make huge contributions toward peace without being recognised by the world community. They are the unseen heroes for peace. We are eager to learn from these recipients. We are inspired by their acts. And we are humbled that we can help shine a light on their courageous work', said Kevin Jenkins, President of World Vision International, speaking about the two recipients of the 2010 peace prize.

'I dedicate the prize to all the people of Pakistan who have suffered so much. Not just from natural disaster, but also 'manmade ones'. I also dedicate it to the volunteers I work with - we are a movement and a team and they have gone through so much with me and they make all this work possible', said Rubina Feroze Bhatti about receiving the peacemaking award.

Asked about her dream for the children of Pakistan, Ms. Bhatti said '…Education can create enormous change, and in order for the children of Pakistan to really change the future, they need a voice and an education'.

And her vision for her country: 'To be a Pakistani, is my pride. My dream is to see a strong, beautiful and peaceful Pakistan. My dream is for the next generation not to experience inequality or discrimination. Each child, no matter their background, should equal access to education and opportunity'.

WI'AM promotes sumud or steadfastness; a strategy that builds on a pre-existing precedent for conflict resolution within Palestinian culture. 'Sumud requires that you are in harmony with your community… it is about working with and for others - it is a journey or process. It is not just planting a tree and saying 'this is sumud.' It is about how to nourish the tree, how to trim it, how to harvest it, how to create a healthier atmosphere for it and for all, how to make the field around the tree safe for the kids to play', said Zoughbi al-Zoughbi, founder of WI'AM.

Sumud insists on recognising the dignity of people on both sides of the conflict, promoting dialogue on all levels, mobilising a diverse group of peacemakers and reducing the occurrence of violence.

The World Vision International Peace Prize is awarded in honour and memory of Steve Williams, World Vision United Kingdom Senior Policy Advisor on Peace and Conflict, who died unexpectedly in December 2007.

Today, the 21st of September, is dedicated to the same cause, peace. This day is celebrated as the International Day Of Peace, worldwide. It was started in the year 1981 by the 36/76 of the United States General Assembly and was decided to coincide with it's opening session every September. In the year 2001, this day was made an annual celebration Worldwide.

The International Day of Peace is meant to be a day of non-violence and cease fire. This day witnesses, peace marches to spread the message of World Peace.

On the occasion of International Day Of Peace 2010, United Nations has asked young people from across the World to share the story of their work towards spreading the message of peace. The campaign slogan is Peace = Future, The math is easy.

Western wars vs. Muslim women

Western media is awash with reports about Taliban mistreatment of women in Afghanistan and Pakistan that feature countless voices in support of the war to secure a 'brighter future for women's rights'. Time magazine cover story is a case in point.

If Western wars 'liberate' Eastern women, Muslim women would be - after centuries of Western military interventions - the most 'liberated' in the world. They are not, and will not be, especially when liberty is associated with Western hegemony.
Afghanistan has had its share of British, Russian and American military intervention to no avail. In fact, reports from credible women's groups there signal worsening conditions for Aghan women since the US invasion a decade ago.

The Taliban's social norms might be an affront to modern values, but they cannot be replaced summarily with Western values, let alone by force.

If, as General Petreaus insists, US soldiers should "live" with Afghans in order to defeat the insurgency, expect more hostility towards the foreign invaders and their values.

White Man's Burden

The same Orientalist civilising rationale that was used over centuries to justify bloody colonial wars is being used nowadays to manipulate a war-averse public into supporting military escalation in Central Asia.

Western man's long-held fantasy of 'rescuing' veiled women from their repressive captors is being exploited to promote the idea that war can free women from the wrath of the 'bearded terrorists', as it 'liberates America' from their terrorism.

In light of such a heavy dose of surplus morality, it was particularly embarrassing for US leaders that their allies were making amends with the same shunned illiberal groups and practices.

Last year, the Obama administration publically scolded Asif Ali Zardari, the Pakistani president, for recognising Sharia in the tiny Swat valley as an "abdication" to the Taliban and rebuked Hamid Karzai, Afghanistan's president, for signing a law that reportedly permits rape in marriage among the country's Shia minority. Never mind that until recently, marital rape was legal in the UK and US, where it is still not treated as ordinary rape in a number of states.

Those who seek military solutions to social problems fail to make the distinction between Islam and the Taliban or between the cultural and religious aspects of life in Central Asia. Furthermore, they fail to explain why or how women's rights can be attained by military means.

After all, the great majority of Pakistanis and Afghans have already voted against the Taliban - and in the case of Pakistan in favour of a secular party headed by a Westernised woman, the late Benazir Bhutto, who was allegedly assassinated by the Taliban. Indeed the founders of Pakistan were no less secular than many of their Western counterparts.

Recent months have shown that the Pakistani government is capable of confronting the Taliban when necessary. And when Pakistani television showed the public flogging of a 17-year-old woman, it led to widespread outrage among the more than 170 million Pakistanis.

For decades, Pakistanis and Afghans were the victims of the medieval styled Taliban, Mujahedeen and warlords who were backed and armed by the US through the Pakistani and Saudi intelligence services.

In fact, for much of the 20th century Western-led or supported military interventions in the greater Middle East have, intended or otherwise, targeted mostly the national secular regimes in the region - from Iran's Musaddeq to Egypt's Nasser through Iraq's Hussein, not to speak of Afghanistan's Soviet installed Najibullah.

White Woman's Burden

The irony escapes the likes of conservative British politician Cyril Townsend who wrote in the Saudi owned pan-Arab newspaper Al-Hayat under the headline "Women's Rights in Afghanistan" that British female soldiers are fighting for women's rights to be realised there.

No explanation has been offered as to why, 18 years after the deployment of half a million US and British troops to liberate Kuwait and defend their ally Saudi Arabia, Saudi women still cannot vote or drive.

Similar cheering was expressed in 2001 by Laura Bush and Cherie Blair in support of the "war to liberate the women of Afghanistan", when in reality they were promoting their men's war, not women's rights.

Time magazine joined the war choir this week with a plea not to forget the plight of Afghan women. Richard Stengel, the magazine's managing editor, wrote that he did not run this story or show this image "either in support of the US war effort or in opposition to it". Perhaps, but the cover story contributes to justifying the war on humanitarian 'civilising' grounds instead of criticising it on those same grounds.

A century after English poet Rudyard Kipling first invoked the 'White Man's Burden' to explain the US' invasion and occupation of the Philippines, Washington and London continue to justify their military interventions, and occupation, on more of the same debunked falsehoods.

It is scandalous that after the sham of the 'White Man's Burden' was exposed with the blood of millions, more of the same violence is justified under the pretext of a 'White Man and Woman's Burden'.

This is especially the case when many advocate the bombing of other cultures into social parity or cultural affinity with the West. Such dangerous eschatology that hopes to build on destruction will end up destroying entire Muslim societies for the charade of attaining women's liberty as the West fancies it.

Victims of the ultimate power abuse, wars

As the foremost victims of the abuse of power, Western women are uniquely positioned to reject the most patriarchal and destructive of all power abuses: Wars.

As for Muslim women, there is no room in this war for what they stand for, their hopes or aspirations. Their voice is progressively silenced by the deafening sound of bombs and explosions.

Eastern women have been the first civilian casualty of wars. How many mourning widows, mothers, sisters and daughters will it take to reject wars of choice and expose their alleged civilising mission? After decades of war, Iraq and Afghanistan are now nations of widows - five million and counting, according to some reports.

Remember the mistreatment of women stops at no cultural or geographic borders. Paradoxically, in the US, violence against women in war veteran families is three to five times higher than in average families. This is literally a 'White Woman's Burden'.

Many women enlist in the military to attain equality with men, and more of them have fought in Iraq and Afghanistan than ever before. But I agree with those who seek to undo a man-made world of wars altogether.

At any rate, men do not go to war to save women. Rather, according to war historian Martin Van Creveld, men go to war to run away from their wives and families in search of ecstasy. Not exactly a woman's cause now , is it?

Marwan Bishara is Al Jazeera's senior political analyst.

The Captain of The Ship- Motherhood in Sufism

“Motherhood in Sufism has a distinct set-up that varies greatly from what I like to call “TV-branded popular Islam.” In the Naqshbandi path, thriving in Damascus and the path I personally follow, motherhood overrides fatherhood; it has greater jurisdiction over siblings, futures and marriage. A mother’s role in Arab societies is usually boiled down to being the secretary of the general manager (i.e. the husband), but in Sufi tradition, she is “the” captain of the ship.”

As the world assigns two days in March to observe the feminine icon (Mother’s Day and Women’s Day), stories of

interesting mothers flood to mind. Before going into that, one cannot help but note that matriarchal societies are usually remembered as societies that exist outside the Arab context. Feminine personalities who have helped shape Islamic tradition have been removed out of the historical narrative by the patriarchal “Wahhabi” stream, which inarguably positioned women as children makers with voices, bodies, hair, and existence the Devil likes to use to tempt men. This said, women who used to sit with Prophet Mohammad – in the same mosque and room with men – to learn from him at the dawn of Islam, have been eclipsed in school text books, TV religious programs, and everything that communicates the current image of Islam.

Native Orientalists at the Daily Times

"Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one."

“The more a ruling class is able to assimilate the foremost minds of the ruled class, the more stable and dangerous becomes its rule.” Karl Marx

A few days back, I received a ‘Dear friends’ email from Mr. Najam Sethi, ex editor-in-chief of Daily Times, Pakistan, announcing that he, together with several of his colleagues, had resigned from their positions in the newspaper.

In his email, Mr. Sethi thanked his ‘friends’ for their “support and encouragement…in making Daily Times a ‘new voice for a new Pakistan.’” Wistfully, he added, “I hope it will be able to live up to your expectations and mine in time to come.”

I am not sure why Mr. Sethi had chosen me for this dubious honor. Certainly, I did not deserve it. I could not count myself among his ‘friends’ who had given “support and encouragement” to the mission that DT had chosen for itself in Pakistan’s media and politics.

Contrary to its slogan, it was never DT’s mission to be a ‘new voice for a new Pakistan.’ The DT had dredged its voice from the colonial past; it had only altered its pitch and delivery to serve the new US-Zionist overlords. Many of the writers for DT aspire to the office of the native informers of the colonial era. They are heirs to the brown Sahibs, home-grown Orientalists, who see their own world (if it is theirs in any meaningful sense) through the lens created for them by their spiritual mentors, the Western Orientalists.

The Islamists and the Great Flood of Pakistan

Pakistan’s floods are now considered to be more damaging than the massive earthquake that devastated its part of Kashmir in 2005, not least because of the inability of the administration to respond quickly to the crisis. Pakistan is not alone in the region ill-prepared to cope with natural disasters. Bigger, richer India is just as unable to either eliminate or limit the destruction that its bountiful rivers unleash each monsoon, and you hear the same chorus of criticism of government apathy. Bangladesh, too, gets more than its share of cyclones and floods each season, and yet successive governments are overwhelmed each time disaster strikes.

But the one difference in Pakistan is that Islamist charities, some believed linked to militant groups, are ready to step into the breach. And that is worrying a lot of people, as the flood waters sweep over Khyber-Pakhtoonkhwa, the province in northwest Pakistan which has been the main battleground in the fight against militants, down to the heartland province of Punjab and into Sindh.

The concerns centre on Jamaat-ud-Dawa, the charity arm of the Lashkar-e-Taiba, the banned Pakistani militant group blamed for the 2008 attacks on Mumbai in which 166 people were killed. The Jamaat, which was banned by the U.N. Security Council last December, is working with Fatah-i-Insani Foundation, which is also suspectedof links to extremists, setting up relief camps and sending medical camps to the flooded northwest. It had also organised medical ambulances for emergency treatment, survivors said.

While foreign and government officials debate the security risks from venturing into the troubled northwest, the Islamists groups have penetrated even remote villages with ease, they said. As our correspondents report, they may not bring huge resources to bear, but they establish a presence in the affected areas, often setting up a canvas awning beside a road, with a banner appealing for donations and table covered with bottles and jars of basic medicine. At one village near the swollen Indus in Punjab province, our reporters saw workers of the Jamaat preparing food in huge pots over a smoky fire while four burqa-clad women sat at a charity medical post.

The New York Times said a brigade of 4,000 volunteers from Islamist groups was on the ground in Nowshera to rebuild homes in villages far too dangerous for foreign aid workers to enter.

High-level meeting at UN to discuss Pakistan’s flood situation

UN seeks record $2bn for Pak flood

The United Nations has launched the largest ever natural disaster appeal by asking global community to contribute over USD two billion to provide aid for flood-affected 14 million people in Pakistan.

The new amount includes the initial August appeal of USD 459 million, which is now 80 per cent funded, but leaves a shortfall of about USD 1.6 billion, according to the UN.

The floods in Pakistan are the worst natural disaster the United Nations has had to deal with in 65 years.

Responding to call for international donations, India has handed over USD 20 million to Ban for the 'Pakistan Emergency Response Plan'.

"The magnitude of the tragedy makes it incumbent on the international community to pool its energy and resources to assist Pakistan in its efforts to rebuild and rehabilitate the devastated energy," Hardeep Singh Puri, India's envoy to the UN, told the General Assembly.

The floods have hit an area of at least 160,000 square kilometres and impacted an estimated 21 million people.

Top diplomats from around the world will meet Sunday evening to discuss the on-going relief efforts for millions of victims of devastating floods in Pakistan. The meeting to be co-chaired by Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon—follows Friday’s launch of United Nations’ upgraded appeal to help the flood-battered country deal with the grave humanitarian situation.

The new appeal was the largest one ever issued by the United Nations.
Previously, the biggest natural disaster appeal was for victims of Haiti’s January earthquake which totaled nearly $1.5 billion.

Pakistan's strange response towards Indian aid offer

The worst floods in Pakistan's history provided a good opportunity for both the South Asian nations to come closer. Accepting Indian aid offers half-heartedly and that too after US insistence, Pakistan has given an impression that it is convinced that its policy on India cannot change.

Pakistan's initial response to the Indian offer of five million dollars was a positive one but then it was unsure how to respond. It took several days for Pakistan to finally accept the offer, saying that the aid had to come through the UN. Now, a total of $25 million Indian assistance for flood relief efforts in Pakistan has to be spent by the UN.

Pakistan's foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi had said that the delay was due to the sensitivities involved in the relationship with India. Even, a section of policymakers, conspiracy theorists in media and some India-centric elements within the Pakistani establishment blamed India for opening floodgates of its dam to inundate Pakistan's cities and towns. While building public opinion, they did not care that their contention was technically wrong. The fact is that the rivers that caused destruction in Pakistan do not originate in India.

Some defence analysts argue that Pakistan's strange response towards India's aid offer was meant not to get obliged. "Pakistan reacted politically towards Indian humanitarian gesture. The destruction is so colossal that petty politics must be avoided. Pakistan asks for help and when it is offered by a neighbour, its ego comes its way. The main hurdle was that Pakistan did not want to be obliged," argues defence analyst General Talat Masood.

Kamran Shafi, Dawn's columnist says that Indian-centric approach within the security establishment and intelligence agencies was the main predicament that the government accepted Indian offer half heartedly. "Values and wisdom demand that politics must be kept aside at time of tragedy. Pakistan needed to have warmly welcomed neighbour's goodwill gesture."

India and Pakistan have made major efforts in recent months to build confidence in their relations, which were badly strained by the Mumbai 2008 terror attacks that India blamed on militants from Pakistan. If Indian civil society, volunteers and NGO's were allowed to do relief work in the flood affected areas, this could have been an ideal confidence building measure in the relations of the two countries.

Certainly, it would have served the spirit of Thimphu where Pakistani PM Yusuf Raza Gilani and his Indian counterpart Manmohan Singh tasked their top diplomats to create CBMs. An opportunity is still not lost if governments, media and civil societies in both the countries come forward and create enough space to use this calamity into an opportunity.

MQM leader Imran Farooq murdered in London

Dr Imran Farooq, a founding leader of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) and the organisation’s first secretary general, was assassinated in London on Thursday evening. Dr Farooq also served as the party’s only convener.

On Friday, MQM leader Farooq Sattar said the void that has been created with the death of Imran Farooq cannot be filled. He further said that Scotland Yard and London police had contacted the MQM to assist in the investigations.

Television reports, quoting party and family sources, said Dr Farooq was attacked by some unidentified men with daggers near his London residence. He died of multiple wounds.

But according to one source, a lone assailant had been lying in wait inside the apartment block where Dr Farooq lived on the first floor. He was attacked with a knife when he was climbing the stairs. He died on the spot.

At first the MQM leadership tried to keep the murder under wraps. Meetings in different cities to mark the 57th birthday of the party’s founding leader, Altaf Hussain, were suddenly cancelled for “unavoidable reasons” and supporters were told by senior leader Dr Farooq Sattar to go home.

Tens of thousands of people had assembled in different places in Karachi, Hyderabad and other towns in Sindh to celebrate their leader’s birthday.

At the same time, the MQM leadership in Karachi and London went into closed-door sessions to discuss the situation arising out of the development. Reports from London said the police had cordoned off the apartment block and preliminary investigations had begun.

No one has claimed responsibility for the attack so far and no arrests have been made.

Dr Imran Farooq is remembered by Muttahida loyalists as one of the key figures who laid the foundation for the All Pakistan Mohajir Students’ Organisation (APMSO), which eventually turned out to be a forerunner of the MQM.

During the early 1980s, the APMSO was converted into a fully fledged political party to advocate the cause of the Urdu-speaking popuce, mainly in Karachi and other parts of urban Sindh.

With Altaf Hussain as its leader, the bespectacled Dr Farooq was appointed secretary general of the party. He was also regarded as one of the main ideologues and the brain behind education of the party cadre.

When in 1992 Altaf Hussain went into self-imposed exile in the wake of a military crackdown, Dr Farooq went underground in Karachi, running the party from hiding. Although he was declared absconder by the then government, he continued to dodge the authorities.

Eventually he managed to slip out of the country on a fake passport and under an assumed name. After arriving in London, he applied for political asylum.

In the initial years he was one of the main players who helped Altaf Hussain oversee the party’s restructuring from London.

However, a couple of years ago differences emerged, sending Dr Farooq into obscurity. Since then he had been living the life of a recluse, with no role in party affairs.

Even then his brutal killing sent the Muttahida rank and file into a daze, leaving them searching for answers.

Aisam's historic US Open journey

Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi made tennis history when he became the first Pakistani to feature in two finals of a Grand Slam. Aisam partnered with Kveta Peschke in the mixed doubles but eventually lost to Liezel Huber and Bob Bryan in the final. In the men's doubles, Aisam teamed up with Rohan Bopanna of India and the pair was beaten by US top seeds Bob and Mike Bryan. The 'Indo-Pak Express' were praised for their efforts to inspire peace between their two countries.

Kashmir pact was just a signature away

For most people, Kashmir is an intractable problem dividing India and Pakistan. What they don't know is that the two countries have actually an accord on Kashmir ready and had almost unveiled it in 2007.

Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri, who was Pervez Musharraf's foreign minister from 2002 to 2007, on Friday told The Times of India of this hush-hush deal that was cobbled together through secret parleys held in India, Pakistan and several foreign capitals for more than three years and could have resolved the sub-continent's thorniest security and political dispute, had not the anti-Musharraf upsurge triggered by the sacking of the chief justice convulsed Pakistan.

Kasuri said he has never spoken of this track-II success earlier, other than saying that he knew of a possible way to resolve the Kashmir problem that was acceptable to both countries.

Kasuri said in an exclusive interview that negotiators from Islamabad and New Delhi had quietly toiled away for three years, talking to each other and Kashmiri representatives from the Indian side as well as Kashmiris settled overseas to reach what he described as the "only possible solution to the Kashmir issue".

He said the two sides had agreed to full demilitarisation of both Jammu & Kashmir as well as Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, which Islamabad refers to as Azad Kashmir. In addition, a package of loose autonomy that stopped short of the 'azadi' and self-governance aspirations, had been agreed on and was to be introduced on both sides of the disputed frontier. "We agreed on a point between complete independence and autonomy," he said.

Kasuri said that both countries, realizing the sensitivity of such a deal, had agreed not to declare victory or tom-tom the negotiations. He said that hardline separatist Syed Ali Shah Gilani was the only Kashmiri leader who refused to come on board. "He would accept nothing but merger with Pakistan, which ironically is something we too wanted but knew wasn't practical. I once had a seven-to-eight hour meeting with him and even Musharraf met him but he refused to budge," Kasuri said. He refused to give details of the stance other moderate Kashmiri leaders adopted.

Kasuri said almost all the actors on the Kashmiri stage were on board the accord that was to be signed during a visit by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Islamabad that was scheduled for February-March 2007 but never happened.

"I advised the president that inviting the PM at that time would not have been possible. And that we should wait for a more peaceful moment to announce the plan otherwise all the hard work of three years by the two sides would be wasted," he said, referring to the time when Musharraf was under siege by a country-wide lawyers' campaign that had transformed itself into an anti-dictator movement. He said that since the Opposition was on a roll against Musharraf at that time, any peace plan would have been rejected by them as a "sell-out to India".

Kasuri — who is from one of the country's pre-eminent political families and whose father drafted Pakistan's constitution — refused to give details of other aspects of the solution or name Indian officials involved in the deal, saying that since he felt it was the only way Kashmir could be resolved, it could be starting point of next round of talks. He said the reason PM Gilani had appointed Riyaz Mohammed Khan, the foreign secretary under Kasuri, as the track-II special negotiator was because he was one of the key architects of the secret Kashmir pact.

Pakistan observes Jinnah’s 62nd death anniversary

Pakistan was observing the 62nd death anniversary of Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah on Saturday with a pledge to transform the country into a progressive and enlightened state.

The day commenced with prayers for the country's progress and various government officials and non-government organisations were holding programs to bring to light the different aspects of the Quaid's life.

On the occasion, President Asif Ali Zardari also visited the Quaid’s mausoleum to pay his respects and offered fateha.

President Zardari in his observations in the visitors’ book paid homage to the Quaid and to all those who rendered sacrifices for the country and for ensuring its democratic polity.

Pastor puts Quran-burning on hold, eyes NY mosque deal

A Florida pastor put on hold Thursday plans to burn hundreds of Qurans and said he would cancel the event if a controversial mosque project near Ground Zero in New York is relocated.

In a day of high-stakes religious brinkmanship, radical evangelist Terry Jones at first announced he had cancelled Saturday’s ceremony, which world leaders fear could ignite a fierce Muslim backlash around the globe. But when his claims of a deal over a proposed Islamic cultural center in New York dissolved in acrimony, he threatened to go ahead with the incendiary ceremony to mark the anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks.

“I will be flying up there on Saturday to meet with the imam at the Ground Zero mosque,” Jones said initially. “The American people do not want the mosque there, and, of course, Muslims do not want us to burn the Quran.”

But the imam leading the New York project quickly denied any agreement to move the planned mosque, which is slated for a building two and half blocks from the site of former World Trade Center which was struck by 9/11 hijackers. “I am glad that Pastor Jones has decided not to burn any Qurans,” Feisal Abdul Rauf said in a statement to CNN, but added: “We are not going to toy with our religion or any other. Nor are we going to barter.”

Jones, head of the tiny Dove World Outreach Center in Gainesville, Florida, has threatened an international crisis with his promise to immolate the Muslim holy book on Saturday, the ninth anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Concern is so high that US Defense Secretary Robert Gates put in a personal phone call to Jones to try and get him to change him mind, warning that the Quran burning would put US soldiers’ lives at risk. This rare decision by President Barack Obama’s administration to cede to Jones’s demand for direct contact followed growing worries of a disaster for US interests worldwide.