The men, hollow-eyed and matted, start coming at dawn, shuffling into the remains of the old Soviet Cultural Center, which in its day staged films celebrating the glories of a new era.
In Kabul, Aziza smoked opium at home as her children watched. More Photos »
These days, the shell of the abandoned building serves as perhaps the world’s largest gathering spot for men looking to satisfy their lust for heroin and opium. Stooping in the darkened caverns of the place, amid the waste and exhalations of hundreds of others, the men partake of the drug that has begun to wreak its deathly magic in the very country where it is produced.
One such man, who called himself Mohammed Ofzal, struck a match beneath a piece of foil and sucked in the blue smoke that rose from the liquefying little mass. Then he sat back in a crouch, legs shaking a little. His eyes, glazed and half-shut, stared blankly at the floor.
“My parents are fed up with me; they are telling me to quit,” Mr. Ofzal said. He said he was 18. His clothes, unlike nearly everyone else’s in the gathering post, were pressed and clean. He said he would go home soon; he would not be spending the night. “If you don’t take care of yourself, you could die here.”
Around him were a hundred other men, some crouching, some collapsed, some unconscious; some, perhaps, were dead. The visitors, though not the denizens, covered their faces from the smell. Mr. Ofzal lit another match and bent down to drink in the smoke.
Afghanistan, the world’s largest producer of opium, is drowning in a sea of its own making. While the country’s narco-traffickers ship vast quantities of the stuff to Europe and the United States, enough of it stays behind to offer a cheap and easy temptation to the people at home. A United Nations survey taken four years ago revealed 200,000 opium and heroin addicts in a population of about 35 million; a new study, to be completed in the summer, is expected to show even more.
Addiction in Afghanistan is rising along with the country’s opium production, which is cranking at something close to fever pitch. With much of its society and many of its institutions ruined by 30 years of fighting, Afghanistan produces more than 90 percent of the world’s opium. The money earned from narcotics accounts for more than half of the country’s gross domestic product. It feeds the Taliban insurgency.
The Soviet Culture Center is the most public of arenas in which to view the trade’s depredations on ordinary people. (For the men, that is; the center, like virtually every other public place in Afghanistan, is strictly segregated by sex.) The building sits in the Dehamatzang neighborhood of western Kabul, the scene of ferocious and prolonged fighting during the civil war that engulfed the country in the 1990s. The exterior walls are crumbled and pockmarked with bullet holes.
Inside is a landscape of extraordinary human wreckage. The rooms resemble catacombs; lightless and fetid and crammed with dozens, even hundreds, of bodies, each one clinging to his bit of space, his bit of elixir. Clouds of blue smoke rise, linger and dissolve. Almost no one speaks. In a corner, a man, seated on the floor, offers candy and cigarettes. In an ordinary day, 2,000 men pass through here. That’s on top of the nearly 600 who never leave. “Did you bring any money?” one of the men asked, as hunched and withered as a gargoyle.
“No,” said another, slipping his friend a tiny packet.
Next to them a body slumped in an improbable pose — curled, stiff, yet balanced, delicately, as if on the head of a pin. After a time the body fell over, as frozen as before. No one looked up.
Men and boys are not the only people who have fallen prey to the drug; women and girls are merely harder to find. Typically, females, prohibited from wandering the streets, stay indoors, which mitigates their helplessness but shields them from help.
A woman named Aziza, for instance, lives at home with her six children, who range in age from 18 months to 21. Aziza, who like many Afghans has only one name, is a gaunt and reduced figure, possibly beautiful once, but now a woman of papery skin and sunken cheeks and eyes sunk deep in her skull. For Aziza, as for many here, smoking opium is a way to escape a life without hope.
Two years ago, Aziza’s husband died in a car accident, and with no way of supporting her family on her own — women in this deeply conservative society do not generally work outside the home — she fell into despair. One day, a friend offered her a pipe and opium. She took it. Since then, Aziza has been smoking two or three times a day, sometimes in front of her children.
“Opium has been a good friend to me; it has taken away my sorrows,” Aziza said, seated in the corner of her one-room house, with her children looking on.
Kabul contains a tiny handful of clinics that treat drug abuse, but they have nowhere near the capacity to treat the number of people in need. About six months ago, the counselors from one clinic, alerted by the neighbors, found Aziza in her home and invited her to the clinic. Aziza stayed for 24 hours.
“When I need it, it is a kind of an attack,” she said afterward. “I can’t resist the opium; it is stronger than I am.”
With her children standing by, Aziza reached into a cloth bag and produced a filthy spoon, a bit of powder and a straw. Her 6-year-old son, Mirwais, stood to his mother’s left, 10-year-old Sonia stood to her right. Aziza, eyes glazed, struck a match but could produce no spark. She tried again and failed. Finally, Sonia took the box from her mother’s hands, struck a flame and handed the match to her mother.
Aziza bent over and breathed in the blue smoke.
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
With Taliban Threat Rising, Obama Presses Visiting Allies
President Obama said on Wednesday that the United States is deeply committed to helping Afghanistan and Pakistan defeat Al Qaeda and its extremist partners and in helping democracy endure and flourish in those countries.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton spoke about her meeting with the presidents of Afghanistan and Pakistan on Wednesday in Washington.
The president said America’s “lasting commitment” to the stability of the two countries must not, and would not, waver even though there will surely be more violence and setbacks before the forces of terrorism are subdued.
“We meet today as three sovereign nations joined by a common goal: to disrupt, dismantle and defeat Al Qaeda and its extremist allies in Pakistan and Afghanistan and to prevent their ability to operate in either country in the future,” the president said.
Mr. Obama spoke after meeting with Presidents Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan and Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan amid a day of conferences that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said was producing “some very promising early signs.”
The challenges for the United States in the region were underscored Wednesday by reports of dozens of civilian deaths from American airstrikes in western Afghanistan. Mr. Obama, who was flanked by the two presidents as he spoke late in the afternoon, said that the United States would “make every effort to avoid civilian casualties as we help the Afghan government combat our common enemy.”
The focus was on ways that Afghanistan and Pakistan, both unstable and strategically vital, could work with one another, and with the United States, to fight the militants who plague both countries. The Obama administration is stepping up pressure on Pakistan, in particular, to crack down on the Taliban in the western part of the country, near its porous border with Afghanistan.
“Our strategy reflects a fundamental truth,” President Obama said. “The security of Pakistan, Afghanistan and the United States are linked.”
Mrs. Clinton made much the same point at an earlier briefing, suggesting that it would not be incorrect to think of Pakistan and Afghanistan as “conjoined twins” that cannot be dealt with separately as the United States tries to help each tame the forces that spawn terrorism and violence.
“The confidence-building that is necessary for this relationship to turn into tangible cooperation is moving forward,” Mrs. Clinton said. . “And I think today’s series of meetings is another step along that road.”
President Obama and Secretary Clinton described the three-way talks as focusing not just on military and diplomatic moves, but on attempts to shore up the pillars of society in Afghanistan and Pakistan — by “developing alternatives to the drug trade” in Afghanistan, as Mr. Obama put it in alluding to the traditional poppy-and-opium trade, and fostering grass-roots democracy in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Mrs. Clinton’s comments, while general and cautious, reflected her own meeting in the morning with Presidents Karzai and Zardari. Based on that session, she said, “the level of cooperation between the governments of the two countries is increasing.”
While Mrs. Clinton said she could not be too specific until after the two days of talks are concluded, she tried to dispel any notion that the conferences would produce little concrete progress. “I told each that coming out of this trilateral meeting, we will basically have work plans,” she said. “We’re going to be very specific. We don’t want any misunderstanding. We don’t want any mixed signals.”
The secretary also said she was “quite impressed” by the Pakistani government’s renewed efforts against the Taliban, efforts that followed harsh criticism by Washington of the leaders in Islamabad. She credited Pakistan’s civilian and military leaders for changing their perspective “in order to be able to see this threat as those of us on the outside perceived it.”
Congressional leaders and administration officials have expressed increased concern over the deteriorating situation in Pakistan, where insurgents have taken over territory just 60 miles from the capital.
Earlier, Mrs. Clinton expressed deep regret for the loss of innocent life at a news conference with Mr. Karzai and Mr. Zardari held at the State Department.
Mrs. Clinton and the administration’s top envoy to the region, Richard Holbrooke, held an unscheduled meeting early Wednesday with Mr. Zardari. The three huddled for an hour at Mr. Zardari’s hotel, the Willard, where they discussed steps which the administration wants the government to take to deal with the Taliban insurgency, according to officials from both countries with knowledge of the meeting.
Offering her perspective, Mrs. Clinton said she had reaffirmed with Mr. Zardari “our government’s strong support for him, as the democratically elected president.”
“Being able to say ‘democratically elected president of Pakistan’ is not a common phrase,” said Mrs. Clinton, who put in a surprise appearance at the White House news room. “And I think it’s imperative that we support President Zardari and work with him, as he extends the reach of the government, not only on security, as essential as that is, but also on the range of needs of the Pakistani people.”
With President Karzai, it was a very future-oriented conversation,” Mrs. Clinton went on. “We talked about the necessity to take real, concrete actions to make the kind of progress that Afghanistan desperately needs to see, to really deliver for the people of the country. In both meetings, I thought, each president was very forthcoming.”
Speaking at the earlier State Department news conference, Mr. Zardari said that his government would act. “My democracy will deliver,” he said. “We are up to the challenge.” He alluded to the United States’ own lengthy efforts to stabilize countries in the region. “Just as the United States is making progress after seven years of engagement in Iraq and in Afghanistan, we too will make progress,” Mr. Zardari said.
In his remarks, Mr. Zardari alluded to the assassination of his wife, the former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, who was shot and killed after a rally in Rawalpindi in 2007. “Democracy will avenge the death of my wife, and the thousands of Pakistani citizens around the world,” he said.
The Willard Hotel session — held in advance of more formal meetings at the State Department and the White House — underscored the concern that has gripped the Obama administration as Taliban insurgents battle government troops closer and closer to Islamabad.
Administration officials are worried that the Zardari government will make promises in Washington to do more to contain the insurgents, but may not follow through once officials are back in Islamabad. Senior members of the Obama administration have been forthright in the last week about their concern that the Pakistani Army is overly pre-occupied with its traditional foe to the east, India, when the Taliban is taking over the western part of the country.
Mrs. Clinton also used her public remarks to announce a trade and transit accord to improve commerce between Afghanistan and Pakistan, which the leaders of the two countries agreed to conclude by the end of the year. Mrs. Clinton called the accord “an important milestone in their efforts to generate foreign investment, stronger economic growth and trade opportunities.”
The deadline of the end of this year to conclude the pact is notable because the two countries have been in talks on this agreement for more than four decades.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton spoke about her meeting with the presidents of Afghanistan and Pakistan on Wednesday in Washington.
The president said America’s “lasting commitment” to the stability of the two countries must not, and would not, waver even though there will surely be more violence and setbacks before the forces of terrorism are subdued.
“We meet today as three sovereign nations joined by a common goal: to disrupt, dismantle and defeat Al Qaeda and its extremist allies in Pakistan and Afghanistan and to prevent their ability to operate in either country in the future,” the president said.
Mr. Obama spoke after meeting with Presidents Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan and Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan amid a day of conferences that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said was producing “some very promising early signs.”
The challenges for the United States in the region were underscored Wednesday by reports of dozens of civilian deaths from American airstrikes in western Afghanistan. Mr. Obama, who was flanked by the two presidents as he spoke late in the afternoon, said that the United States would “make every effort to avoid civilian casualties as we help the Afghan government combat our common enemy.”
The focus was on ways that Afghanistan and Pakistan, both unstable and strategically vital, could work with one another, and with the United States, to fight the militants who plague both countries. The Obama administration is stepping up pressure on Pakistan, in particular, to crack down on the Taliban in the western part of the country, near its porous border with Afghanistan.
“Our strategy reflects a fundamental truth,” President Obama said. “The security of Pakistan, Afghanistan and the United States are linked.”
Mrs. Clinton made much the same point at an earlier briefing, suggesting that it would not be incorrect to think of Pakistan and Afghanistan as “conjoined twins” that cannot be dealt with separately as the United States tries to help each tame the forces that spawn terrorism and violence.
“The confidence-building that is necessary for this relationship to turn into tangible cooperation is moving forward,” Mrs. Clinton said. . “And I think today’s series of meetings is another step along that road.”
President Obama and Secretary Clinton described the three-way talks as focusing not just on military and diplomatic moves, but on attempts to shore up the pillars of society in Afghanistan and Pakistan — by “developing alternatives to the drug trade” in Afghanistan, as Mr. Obama put it in alluding to the traditional poppy-and-opium trade, and fostering grass-roots democracy in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Mrs. Clinton’s comments, while general and cautious, reflected her own meeting in the morning with Presidents Karzai and Zardari. Based on that session, she said, “the level of cooperation between the governments of the two countries is increasing.”
While Mrs. Clinton said she could not be too specific until after the two days of talks are concluded, she tried to dispel any notion that the conferences would produce little concrete progress. “I told each that coming out of this trilateral meeting, we will basically have work plans,” she said. “We’re going to be very specific. We don’t want any misunderstanding. We don’t want any mixed signals.”
The secretary also said she was “quite impressed” by the Pakistani government’s renewed efforts against the Taliban, efforts that followed harsh criticism by Washington of the leaders in Islamabad. She credited Pakistan’s civilian and military leaders for changing their perspective “in order to be able to see this threat as those of us on the outside perceived it.”
Congressional leaders and administration officials have expressed increased concern over the deteriorating situation in Pakistan, where insurgents have taken over territory just 60 miles from the capital.
Earlier, Mrs. Clinton expressed deep regret for the loss of innocent life at a news conference with Mr. Karzai and Mr. Zardari held at the State Department.
Mrs. Clinton and the administration’s top envoy to the region, Richard Holbrooke, held an unscheduled meeting early Wednesday with Mr. Zardari. The three huddled for an hour at Mr. Zardari’s hotel, the Willard, where they discussed steps which the administration wants the government to take to deal with the Taliban insurgency, according to officials from both countries with knowledge of the meeting.
Offering her perspective, Mrs. Clinton said she had reaffirmed with Mr. Zardari “our government’s strong support for him, as the democratically elected president.”
“Being able to say ‘democratically elected president of Pakistan’ is not a common phrase,” said Mrs. Clinton, who put in a surprise appearance at the White House news room. “And I think it’s imperative that we support President Zardari and work with him, as he extends the reach of the government, not only on security, as essential as that is, but also on the range of needs of the Pakistani people.”
With President Karzai, it was a very future-oriented conversation,” Mrs. Clinton went on. “We talked about the necessity to take real, concrete actions to make the kind of progress that Afghanistan desperately needs to see, to really deliver for the people of the country. In both meetings, I thought, each president was very forthcoming.”
Speaking at the earlier State Department news conference, Mr. Zardari said that his government would act. “My democracy will deliver,” he said. “We are up to the challenge.” He alluded to the United States’ own lengthy efforts to stabilize countries in the region. “Just as the United States is making progress after seven years of engagement in Iraq and in Afghanistan, we too will make progress,” Mr. Zardari said.
In his remarks, Mr. Zardari alluded to the assassination of his wife, the former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, who was shot and killed after a rally in Rawalpindi in 2007. “Democracy will avenge the death of my wife, and the thousands of Pakistani citizens around the world,” he said.
The Willard Hotel session — held in advance of more formal meetings at the State Department and the White House — underscored the concern that has gripped the Obama administration as Taliban insurgents battle government troops closer and closer to Islamabad.
Administration officials are worried that the Zardari government will make promises in Washington to do more to contain the insurgents, but may not follow through once officials are back in Islamabad. Senior members of the Obama administration have been forthright in the last week about their concern that the Pakistani Army is overly pre-occupied with its traditional foe to the east, India, when the Taliban is taking over the western part of the country.
Mrs. Clinton also used her public remarks to announce a trade and transit accord to improve commerce between Afghanistan and Pakistan, which the leaders of the two countries agreed to conclude by the end of the year. Mrs. Clinton called the accord “an important milestone in their efforts to generate foreign investment, stronger economic growth and trade opportunities.”
The deadline of the end of this year to conclude the pact is notable because the two countries have been in talks on this agreement for more than four decades.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Will Nandigram haunt the Left in polls?
Two years ago, on March 14, 2007, police firing killed 14 people in West Bengal's Nandigram village. That was when villagers were protesting acquisition of farmland for a chemical hub. Today, the Left is trying to live down the past. But will the people forget and vote?
However, Lakshman Seth -- the CPM candidate for Tamluk which includes Nandigram -- believes Nandigram is not a central electoral issue.
"Nandigram is not the central issue of the election campaign. Central issues are price hike, nuclear deal with America and unemployment," he said.
Lakshman is the man who triggered the trouble at Nandigram by issuing a land acquisition notice apparently without the government's nod.
But Trinamool's Subhendu Adhikari says that is simply wishful thinking.
Nandigram is a big issue in this election because of the atrocity of CPM and barbarism of the state government, which is exposed," he says.
When Nandigram goes to vote, it will certainly remember those victims. Now, the big question is -- how many other voters in Tamluk and the rest of Bengal will remember them when their fingers are hovering over the EVM button
However, Lakshman Seth -- the CPM candidate for Tamluk which includes Nandigram -- believes Nandigram is not a central electoral issue.
"Nandigram is not the central issue of the election campaign. Central issues are price hike, nuclear deal with America and unemployment," he said.
Lakshman is the man who triggered the trouble at Nandigram by issuing a land acquisition notice apparently without the government's nod.
But Trinamool's Subhendu Adhikari says that is simply wishful thinking.
Nandigram is a big issue in this election because of the atrocity of CPM and barbarism of the state government, which is exposed," he says.
When Nandigram goes to vote, it will certainly remember those victims. Now, the big question is -- how many other voters in Tamluk and the rest of Bengal will remember them when their fingers are hovering over the EVM button
US to pressurise Pak to shift troops to Western border
The US is expected to mount "intense pressure" on Pakistan to "shift its strategic focus" from its eastern border with India by redeploying "much of over 2,50,000 troops" to the frontier with Afghanistan to carry out counterinsurgency operations against Taliban and Al-Qaida.
At the trilateral meeting between Presidents of the US, Afghanistan and Pakistan in Washington, Barack Obama is also expected to ask Islamabad to grant "major concessions to India", including a trade corridor to Afghanistan through the Wagah land border, according to a media report on Tuesday.
"The US, which is eying a dominant role for India in the region, wants Pakistan to provide an overland trade route for Indian exports to Afghanistan," a diplomatic source told the Dawn newspaper on the eve of trilateral summit involving Obama, and his Afghan and Pakistan counterpart Hamid Karzai and Asif Ali Zardari respectively.
The Obama administration will also reiterate its demand that Pakistani institutions end their "alleged hobnobbing" with jehadis, who have long been seen by Islamabad as "strategic assets", the report said.
However, the Pakistani leadership has been opposing any concession for India, saying it would not be possible without a quid pro quo, particularly on the Kashmir issue.
"It is very significant for Pakistan. Traditionally it was our bargaining chip for the Indians to move on Kashmir.
Now they want us to do something without any movement, and are browbeating us," an official was quoted as saying.
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The US is expected to mount "intense pressure" on Pakistan to "shift its strategic focus" from its eastern border with India by redeploying "much of over 2,50,000 troops" to the frontier with Afghanistan to carry out counterinsurgency operations against Taliban and Al-Qaida.
At the trilateral meeting between Presidents of the US, Afghanistan and Pakistan in Washington, Barack Obama is also expected to ask Islamabad to grant "major concessions to India", including a trade corridor to Afghanistan through the Wagah land border, according to a media report on Tuesday.
"The US, which is eying a dominant role for India in the region, wants Pakistan to provide an overland trade route for Indian exports to Afghanistan," a diplomatic source told the Dawn newspaper on the eve of trilateral summit involving Obama, and his Afghan and Pakistan counterpart Hamid Karzai and Asif Ali Zardari respectively.
The Obama administration will also reiterate its demand that Pakistani institutions end their "alleged hobnobbing" with jehadis, who have long been seen by Islamabad as "strategic assets", the report said.
However, the Pakistani leadership has been opposing any concession for India, saying it would not be possible without a quid pro quo, particularly on the Kashmir issue.
"It is very significant for Pakistan. Traditionally it was our bargaining chip for the Indians to move on Kashmir.
Now they want us to do something without any movement, and are browbeating us," an official was quoted as saying.
Comments Post your comments
Post Your Comments Fields marked with * are mandatory
*Name:
E-mail:
*Comments:
Limit 4000 characters - 4000 characters remaining
*Secure Code:
Problem viewing this image. Click to refresh
Kindly do not post any defamatory, infringing, obscene, indecent, discriminatory or unlawful material or information. NDTV Convergence Ltd reserves the right to remove without notice any content received from users.
The US is expected to mount "intense pressure" on Pakistan to "shift its strategic focus" from its eastern border with India by redeploying "much of over 2,50,000 troops" to the frontier with Afghanistan to carry out counterinsurgency operations against Taliban and Al-Qaida.
At the trilateral meeting between Presidents of the US, Afghanistan and Pakistan in Washington, Barack Obama is also expected to ask Islamabad to grant "major concessions to India", including a trade corridor to Afghanistan through the Wagah land border, according to a media report on Tuesday.
"The US, which is eying a dominant role for India in the region, wants Pakistan to provide an overland trade route for Indian exports to Afghanistan," a diplomatic source told the Dawn newspaper on the eve of trilateral summit involving Obama, and his Afghan and Pakistan counterpart Hamid Karzai and Asif Ali Zardari respectively.
The Obama administration will also reiterate its demand that Pakistani institutions end their "alleged hobnobbing" with jehadis, who have long been seen by Islamabad as "strategic assets", the report said.
However, the Pakistani leadership has been opposing any concession for India, saying it would not be possible without a quid pro quo, particularly on the Kashmir issue.
"It is very significant for Pakistan. Traditionally it was our bargaining chip for the Indians to move on Kashmir.
Now they want us to do something without any movement, and are browbeating us," an official was quoted as saying.
Comments Post your comments
Post Your Comments Fields marked with * are mandatory
*Name:
E-mail:
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*Secure Code:
Problem viewing this image. Click to refresh
Kindly do not post any defamatory, infringing, obscene, indecent, discriminatory or unlawful material or information. NDTV Convergence Ltd reserves the right to remove without notice any content received from users.
The US is expected to mount "intense pressure" on Pakistan to "shift its strategic focus" from its eastern border with India by redeploying "much of over 2,50,000 troops" to the frontier with Afghanistan to carry out counterinsurgency operations against Taliban and Al-Qaida.
At the trilateral meeting between Presidents of the US, Afghanistan and Pakistan in Washington, Barack Obama is also expected to ask Islamabad to grant "major concessions to India", including a trade corridor to Afghanistan through the Wagah land border, according to a media report on Tuesday.
"The US, which is eying a dominant role for India in the region, wants Pakistan to provide an overland trade route for Indian exports to Afghanistan," a diplomatic source told the Dawn newspaper on the eve of trilateral summit involving Obama, and his Afghan and Pakistan counterpart Hamid Karzai and Asif Ali Zardari respectively.
The Obama administration will also reiterate its demand that Pakistani institutions end their "alleged hobnobbing" with jehadis, who have long been seen by Islamabad as "strategic assets", the report said.
However, the Pakistani leadership has been opposing any concession for India, saying it would not be possible without a quid pro quo, particularly on the Kashmir issue.
"It is very significant for Pakistan. Traditionally it was our bargaining chip for the Indians to move on Kashmir.
Now they want us to do something without any movement, and are browbeating us," an official was quoted as saying.
At the trilateral meeting between Presidents of the US, Afghanistan and Pakistan in Washington, Barack Obama is also expected to ask Islamabad to grant "major concessions to India", including a trade corridor to Afghanistan through the Wagah land border, according to a media report on Tuesday.
"The US, which is eying a dominant role for India in the region, wants Pakistan to provide an overland trade route for Indian exports to Afghanistan," a diplomatic source told the Dawn newspaper on the eve of trilateral summit involving Obama, and his Afghan and Pakistan counterpart Hamid Karzai and Asif Ali Zardari respectively.
The Obama administration will also reiterate its demand that Pakistani institutions end their "alleged hobnobbing" with jehadis, who have long been seen by Islamabad as "strategic assets", the report said.
However, the Pakistani leadership has been opposing any concession for India, saying it would not be possible without a quid pro quo, particularly on the Kashmir issue.
"It is very significant for Pakistan. Traditionally it was our bargaining chip for the Indians to move on Kashmir.
Now they want us to do something without any movement, and are browbeating us," an official was quoted as saying.
Comments Post your comments
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Kindly do not post any defamatory, infringing, obscene, indecent, discriminatory or unlawful material or information. NDTV Convergence Ltd reserves the right to remove without notice any content received from users.
The US is expected to mount "intense pressure" on Pakistan to "shift its strategic focus" from its eastern border with India by redeploying "much of over 2,50,000 troops" to the frontier with Afghanistan to carry out counterinsurgency operations against Taliban and Al-Qaida.
At the trilateral meeting between Presidents of the US, Afghanistan and Pakistan in Washington, Barack Obama is also expected to ask Islamabad to grant "major concessions to India", including a trade corridor to Afghanistan through the Wagah land border, according to a media report on Tuesday.
"The US, which is eying a dominant role for India in the region, wants Pakistan to provide an overland trade route for Indian exports to Afghanistan," a diplomatic source told the Dawn newspaper on the eve of trilateral summit involving Obama, and his Afghan and Pakistan counterpart Hamid Karzai and Asif Ali Zardari respectively.
The Obama administration will also reiterate its demand that Pakistani institutions end their "alleged hobnobbing" with jehadis, who have long been seen by Islamabad as "strategic assets", the report said.
However, the Pakistani leadership has been opposing any concession for India, saying it would not be possible without a quid pro quo, particularly on the Kashmir issue.
"It is very significant for Pakistan. Traditionally it was our bargaining chip for the Indians to move on Kashmir.
Now they want us to do something without any movement, and are browbeating us," an official was quoted as saying.
Comments Post your comments
Post Your Comments Fields marked with * are mandatory
*Name:
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*Secure Code:
Problem viewing this image. Click to refresh
Kindly do not post any defamatory, infringing, obscene, indecent, discriminatory or unlawful material or information. NDTV Convergence Ltd reserves the right to remove without notice any content received from users.
The US is expected to mount "intense pressure" on Pakistan to "shift its strategic focus" from its eastern border with India by redeploying "much of over 2,50,000 troops" to the frontier with Afghanistan to carry out counterinsurgency operations against Taliban and Al-Qaida.
At the trilateral meeting between Presidents of the US, Afghanistan and Pakistan in Washington, Barack Obama is also expected to ask Islamabad to grant "major concessions to India", including a trade corridor to Afghanistan through the Wagah land border, according to a media report on Tuesday.
"The US, which is eying a dominant role for India in the region, wants Pakistan to provide an overland trade route for Indian exports to Afghanistan," a diplomatic source told the Dawn newspaper on the eve of trilateral summit involving Obama, and his Afghan and Pakistan counterpart Hamid Karzai and Asif Ali Zardari respectively.
The Obama administration will also reiterate its demand that Pakistani institutions end their "alleged hobnobbing" with jehadis, who have long been seen by Islamabad as "strategic assets", the report said.
However, the Pakistani leadership has been opposing any concession for India, saying it would not be possible without a quid pro quo, particularly on the Kashmir issue.
"It is very significant for Pakistan. Traditionally it was our bargaining chip for the Indians to move on Kashmir.
Now they want us to do something without any movement, and are browbeating us," an official was quoted as saying.
Comments Post your comments
Post Your Comments Fields marked with * are mandatory
*Name:
E-mail:
*Comments:
Limit 4000 characters - 4000 characters remaining
*Secure Code:
Problem viewing this image. Click to refresh
Kindly do not post any defamatory, infringing, obscene, indecent, discriminatory or unlawful material or information. NDTV Convergence Ltd reserves the right to remove without notice any content received from users.
The US is expected to mount "intense pressure" on Pakistan to "shift its strategic focus" from its eastern border with India by redeploying "much of over 2,50,000 troops" to the frontier with Afghanistan to carry out counterinsurgency operations against Taliban and Al-Qaida.
At the trilateral meeting between Presidents of the US, Afghanistan and Pakistan in Washington, Barack Obama is also expected to ask Islamabad to grant "major concessions to India", including a trade corridor to Afghanistan through the Wagah land border, according to a media report on Tuesday.
"The US, which is eying a dominant role for India in the region, wants Pakistan to provide an overland trade route for Indian exports to Afghanistan," a diplomatic source told the Dawn newspaper on the eve of trilateral summit involving Obama, and his Afghan and Pakistan counterpart Hamid Karzai and Asif Ali Zardari respectively.
The Obama administration will also reiterate its demand that Pakistani institutions end their "alleged hobnobbing" with jehadis, who have long been seen by Islamabad as "strategic assets", the report said.
However, the Pakistani leadership has been opposing any concession for India, saying it would not be possible without a quid pro quo, particularly on the Kashmir issue.
"It is very significant for Pakistan. Traditionally it was our bargaining chip for the Indians to move on Kashmir.
Now they want us to do something without any movement, and are browbeating us," an official was quoted as saying.
Playing day after, the Prachandagate tapes
A day after the resignation of Pushpa Kumar Dahal, Nepal’s first Maoist Prime Minister, a video called "Prachandagate” is the talk of this Himalayan Republic.
All this doesn’t augur well for the peace process and India that has invested so much in it. New Delhi’s only recourse can be to keep its channels open with the Maoists and hope for the best. Named after Dahal’s nom de guerre (a fictitious name used when the person performs a particular social role), which means “the fierce one,” it shows Prachanda while addressing Maoist cadres, talking about how he hoodwinked everyone about the “real numbers” of his army.
"You also know we were just 7,000 to 8,000. But our strategy was to convince them that we were 35,000,” he is seen saying in the one-year-old video. “That way, we infiltrate more people into the Nepal Army.”
In the video, Dahal tells his troops that he wants control over the Nepal Army and eventually, he hopes to transform the country to a single-party rule. “That is our strategy.”
On a day where only sporadic incidents of protest were reported from Kathmandu, and a large number of political parties sat closeted inside a room trying to thrash out an alternative government, the video made top news.
Maoist leader Mohan Baidya, while confirming the genuineness of the tape, made light of it by saying this was “old strategy” and the thinking within his party had completely changed. “One should really investigate why has this tape suddenly surfaced after a year at this time,” he added.
Baidya’s hint is clear – he means the Indian government and its alleged Machiavellian role in Nepal’s politics. If Dahal was subtle in his resignation speech on Monday, his number two and the Finance Minister Baburam Bhattarai was bludgeon-like. “India was behind this. It is going to cost India dearly…” The Maoists, clearly, have decided to whip up the old anti-India blame game frenzy.
Right from the days of King Mahendra, the “blame India” game has been played out in Kathmandu’s corridors of power – often with justification. The role of the Indian Embassy here is always seen with intrigue and is considered a part and parcel of the power equation.
This time too, analysts say, Indians had a strong interest in ensuring Gen Rookmangad Katawal stayed on as Army Chief. First, Katawal has close contacts with India’s top military brass and secondly the man who would have succeeded him – Gen Kulbahadur Khadka — is seen to be close to the Maoists.
Besides, there was the China factor. Nepal’s “Big Red” neighbour usually always dealt with the royal palace. But now, after the abolition of monarchy, it has decided to increase its sphere of influence and is openly wooing Nepal’s political parties including the Maoists. In fact, had he not resigned, Prachanda was scheduled for a Beijing visit that could have led to the signing of the first Sino-Nepal Friendship Treaty. So what happens now? The 21 parties who met on Tuesday have already declared that they shall form a national government on consensus. The Nepali Congress Vice President Ram Chandra Poudel said, “We will try to form a consensual government within the time as asked by the President.”
That means as soon as Saturday, Nepal could have a new government.
But Dahal and his party, the Unified Communist Party of Nepal, are still sulking. The Maoists skipped the all-party meeting on Tuesday, instead demanding an apology from President Ram Baran Yadav for saving Gen Katawal. They have also vowed to stall proceedings in the House.
All this doesn’t augur well for the peace process and India that has invested so much in it. New Delhi’s only recourse can be to keep its channels open with the Maoists and hope for the best.
All this doesn’t augur well for the peace process and India that has invested so much in it. New Delhi’s only recourse can be to keep its channels open with the Maoists and hope for the best. Named after Dahal’s nom de guerre (a fictitious name used when the person performs a particular social role), which means “the fierce one,” it shows Prachanda while addressing Maoist cadres, talking about how he hoodwinked everyone about the “real numbers” of his army.
"You also know we were just 7,000 to 8,000. But our strategy was to convince them that we were 35,000,” he is seen saying in the one-year-old video. “That way, we infiltrate more people into the Nepal Army.”
In the video, Dahal tells his troops that he wants control over the Nepal Army and eventually, he hopes to transform the country to a single-party rule. “That is our strategy.”
On a day where only sporadic incidents of protest were reported from Kathmandu, and a large number of political parties sat closeted inside a room trying to thrash out an alternative government, the video made top news.
Maoist leader Mohan Baidya, while confirming the genuineness of the tape, made light of it by saying this was “old strategy” and the thinking within his party had completely changed. “One should really investigate why has this tape suddenly surfaced after a year at this time,” he added.
Baidya’s hint is clear – he means the Indian government and its alleged Machiavellian role in Nepal’s politics. If Dahal was subtle in his resignation speech on Monday, his number two and the Finance Minister Baburam Bhattarai was bludgeon-like. “India was behind this. It is going to cost India dearly…” The Maoists, clearly, have decided to whip up the old anti-India blame game frenzy.
Right from the days of King Mahendra, the “blame India” game has been played out in Kathmandu’s corridors of power – often with justification. The role of the Indian Embassy here is always seen with intrigue and is considered a part and parcel of the power equation.
This time too, analysts say, Indians had a strong interest in ensuring Gen Rookmangad Katawal stayed on as Army Chief. First, Katawal has close contacts with India’s top military brass and secondly the man who would have succeeded him – Gen Kulbahadur Khadka — is seen to be close to the Maoists.
Besides, there was the China factor. Nepal’s “Big Red” neighbour usually always dealt with the royal palace. But now, after the abolition of monarchy, it has decided to increase its sphere of influence and is openly wooing Nepal’s political parties including the Maoists. In fact, had he not resigned, Prachanda was scheduled for a Beijing visit that could have led to the signing of the first Sino-Nepal Friendship Treaty. So what happens now? The 21 parties who met on Tuesday have already declared that they shall form a national government on consensus. The Nepali Congress Vice President Ram Chandra Poudel said, “We will try to form a consensual government within the time as asked by the President.”
That means as soon as Saturday, Nepal could have a new government.
But Dahal and his party, the Unified Communist Party of Nepal, are still sulking. The Maoists skipped the all-party meeting on Tuesday, instead demanding an apology from President Ram Baran Yadav for saving Gen Katawal. They have also vowed to stall proceedings in the House.
All this doesn’t augur well for the peace process and India that has invested so much in it. New Delhi’s only recourse can be to keep its channels open with the Maoists and hope for the best.
It’s hands off mothers-to-be
Government-funded health workers often refuse to treat pregnant Dalit women. When they do, they demand bribes and then refuse to touch the patients while medically examining them. Even injections are administered without touching the women.
A survey by Jansahas, an NGO, and Unicef reveals these, and other, gruesome cases of caste discrimination in four districts — Jhabua, Sheopur, Katni and Ujjain —in Madhya Pradesh. Hindustan Times reported this first on Tuesday in a report titled Apartheid funded by the Indian tax-payer.
The survey has revealed that assistant nursing matrons (ANMs) or Asha Workers, who are responsible for delivering government-funded health benefits to poor people, seldom visit dalit localities. When they do, they don’t touch pregnant Dalit women while medically examining them.
And finally, Dalit women have to pay a major part of the monetary benefits they receive under the government’s Janani Suraksha Yojana (Mother Protection Scheme) as bribes to these ANMs and, sometimes, even to doctors.
The ANMs visit the villages once a month without intimation and examine pregnant women only in Anganwadi centres. “Since most of the Anganwadi centres are run from the homes of upper caste peoples, Dalit women, who are denied entry into these, are deprived of any medical attention,” Jan Sahas activist Ashif Sheikh told Hindustan Times.
In cases where they do receive treatment, Dalit women are the last to be examined — after the last non-dalit woman has left.
Then, even injections are administered without touching them, the survey showed. Injections administered in this manner increase the possibility of the needles breaking, thus, exposing the patients to medical complications.
“As many as 42 per cent of the young Dalit mothers surveyed claimed that they avoided visiting the Anganwadi centres because of caste discrimination,” he said, adding that 96 per cent of Dalit women surveyed said they had experience some form of discrimination, the most common being casteist abuses.
Around 23 per cent of Dalit women are deprived of the monetary benefits they are entitled to under the government’s Janani Surakhsa Yojana.
“Legally, they are entitled to free medical care during deliveries, but in practice, 86 per cent of Dalit women had to spend money,” said Sheikh.
courtsey: Hindusthan times
A survey by Jansahas, an NGO, and Unicef reveals these, and other, gruesome cases of caste discrimination in four districts — Jhabua, Sheopur, Katni and Ujjain —in Madhya Pradesh. Hindustan Times reported this first on Tuesday in a report titled Apartheid funded by the Indian tax-payer.
The survey has revealed that assistant nursing matrons (ANMs) or Asha Workers, who are responsible for delivering government-funded health benefits to poor people, seldom visit dalit localities. When they do, they don’t touch pregnant Dalit women while medically examining them.
And finally, Dalit women have to pay a major part of the monetary benefits they receive under the government’s Janani Suraksha Yojana (Mother Protection Scheme) as bribes to these ANMs and, sometimes, even to doctors.
The ANMs visit the villages once a month without intimation and examine pregnant women only in Anganwadi centres. “Since most of the Anganwadi centres are run from the homes of upper caste peoples, Dalit women, who are denied entry into these, are deprived of any medical attention,” Jan Sahas activist Ashif Sheikh told Hindustan Times.
In cases where they do receive treatment, Dalit women are the last to be examined — after the last non-dalit woman has left.
Then, even injections are administered without touching them, the survey showed. Injections administered in this manner increase the possibility of the needles breaking, thus, exposing the patients to medical complications.
“As many as 42 per cent of the young Dalit mothers surveyed claimed that they avoided visiting the Anganwadi centres because of caste discrimination,” he said, adding that 96 per cent of Dalit women surveyed said they had experience some form of discrimination, the most common being casteist abuses.
Around 23 per cent of Dalit women are deprived of the monetary benefits they are entitled to under the government’s Janani Surakhsa Yojana.
“Legally, they are entitled to free medical care during deliveries, but in practice, 86 per cent of Dalit women had to spend money,” said Sheikh.
courtsey: Hindusthan times
US regulators warn Procter & Gamble plant over unsanitary conditions at Puerto Rico plant
U.S. regulators warned Procter & Gamble Co. over unsanitary conditions at a plant that makes Olay skin care products and Vicks cold medicine in Puerto Rico, according to a letter released Tuesday.
The warning letter from the Food and Drug Administration said problems at the Olay LLC plant in Cayey may have caused contamination or threatened the health of consumers. It faulted failures in following procedures for cleaning maintenance equipment.
An inspection found over-the-counter drug products have been "prepared, packed and held under unsanitary conditions whereby they may have been contaminated with filth or rendered injurious to health," said the letter.
Paul Fox, a spokesman for Cincinnati-based Procter & Gamble, said none of the issues raised by the FDA compromised the safety of any products.
But he said FDA inspectors did identify areas "where we can and will make improvements," and the company has begun a review of the plant's manufacturing practices.
The FDA letter, dated April 24, described violations that inspectors found between August and November 2008. It told the company to respond within 15 days with a plan to bring the plant in line with federal regulations.
Among other problems the letter cited the plant for not investigating evidence of possible contamination, including "health effect-related complaints" for its Vick Sinex product.
Procter & Gamble, which has about 700 employees in this U.S. Caribbean territory, said last month it was cutting about 90 part-time jobs at the plant in the central town of Cayey as part of a broader restructuring.
The warning letter from the Food and Drug Administration said problems at the Olay LLC plant in Cayey may have caused contamination or threatened the health of consumers. It faulted failures in following procedures for cleaning maintenance equipment.
An inspection found over-the-counter drug products have been "prepared, packed and held under unsanitary conditions whereby they may have been contaminated with filth or rendered injurious to health," said the letter.
Paul Fox, a spokesman for Cincinnati-based Procter & Gamble, said none of the issues raised by the FDA compromised the safety of any products.
But he said FDA inspectors did identify areas "where we can and will make improvements," and the company has begun a review of the plant's manufacturing practices.
The FDA letter, dated April 24, described violations that inspectors found between August and November 2008. It told the company to respond within 15 days with a plan to bring the plant in line with federal regulations.
Among other problems the letter cited the plant for not investigating evidence of possible contamination, including "health effect-related complaints" for its Vick Sinex product.
Procter & Gamble, which has about 700 employees in this U.S. Caribbean territory, said last month it was cutting about 90 part-time jobs at the plant in the central town of Cayey as part of a broader restructuring.
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