Social media -- Liberty of man at what price?

Let us face reality. In the real world there is no such thing as complete unfettered freedom of speech. My liberty is restricted by the other man’s liberty and sensitivities. Similarly, I cannot (although it happens in India all the time) play my 2000 watt music system at full volume just because I have one, start my prayers on the loudspeaker at the crack of dawn when most of the rest are enjoying their last hours of blissful sleep, block the road for my daughter’s wedding and disrupt traffic or drive on both sides of the road.

Article 19(2) of our Constitution places some caveats to this freedom, including for reasons of morality, decency, incitement to offence, defamations and the expected reason security and sovereignty of the state. These constitutional provisions and exceptions were made when there was no Internet that is controlled in areas outside the sovereign control of any country, except in those where the servers are located. Besides, the communications revolution transcends boundaries and has not yet discovered its ultimate frontier.

Wrong call: Instead of blocking the Jihad Watch site, Indian intelligence should be watching sites like Jamat ud Da’wah, the ideological mentor of Lashkar-e-Tayyaba

If the information highway had the width of a narrow mountain trail a few decades ago where we moved at the pace set by the mule, today in comparison the highway is more than five kilometres wide and growing, with information exchanged in microseconds and also growing. As before, terrorists, criminals and other malcontents have misused all facilities the society has provided. The trick then is to prevent misuse of the highway, not just blocking it for everyone. That is retrograde.

The use of Internet, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other sites by Pakistani anti-Indian and jihadi organisations is well known. Jamat ud Dawah, the ideological mentor of Lashkar-e-Tayyaba has its own website and a Twitter account and uses YouTube to propagate its radical ideology. The Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, the military arm of the rabid Sunni organisation, Sipah-e-Sahaba renamed Ahlesunnat Wal Jamaat also has a Facebook account and several Twitter accounts with a strong anti-Jewish, anti-Christian and anti-Hindu content. These, and a host of similar other accounts and sites are the kind that Indian intelligence should be watching instead of blocking sites like Jihad Watch considered to be a counter jihad movement and especially after the experience of Tahrir Square.

It is ironic that India is now being hectored on the issue of freedoms whereas we know that US citizens are covered by one of the world’s most extensive surveillance programmes today. There is an old motto of the National Security Agency of the US — the world’s largest surveillance agency for its Interception staff, “In God we trust, the rest we monitor.” This dates back to the Cold War much before the Global War on Terror.

Post September 2001, US intelligence agencies as part of what was initially called Total Information Awareness, outsourced 70 per cent of its activities of its US $ 70 billion budget. Consequently, private corporations like Booz Allen Hamilton, Lockheed Martin, SAIC, CACI International who became partners with the CIA, NSA and Pentagon for the most sensitive foreign and domestic intelligence operations. By 2006, the NSA was looking at mass harvesting of information on social networks on the Internet.

There are protests but surveillance has to be an accepted fact of life. It also means that this capacity to eavesdrop cannot be unfettered either. The US Department of Homeland Security creates fake Twitter and Facebook accounts to scan social media networks and blogs by using key words and then tracking people through this. The FBI has also been pushing for a more intensive monitoring of Internet traffic. The former head of the British GCHQ, equivalent but much older than our NTRO, Sir David Ormand had, in April this year, recommended that social media sites be covered strictly.

This, however, is not to justify the gaucheries of the recent past when a panicky government over reacted to curb genuine civil dissent. A democracy must allow freedom of speech which must include satire and strident criticism, for this is one of the most essential ingredients of democracy. The rulers must know what the people are saying and what bothers them the most. This is a far better open source intelligence and a better yardstick than any other intelligence output on the mood of the people. We thus need to have the facility to keep a watch and separate the genuine critic and dissenter from the terrorist or agent provocateur.
In the end, ‘what price liberty of man’ remains the most difficult question.

Source : Mid Day , Mumbai , 30th August 2012, Vikram Sood , Vice President ORF Centre for International Relations.

Oh what a tangled web we weave

He was influential in the highest circles of power globally, master of intrigue, trusted by his King yet his name figured in dubious arms deals. He was phenomenally rich and travelled in a 75 million dollar Boeing 737 gifted to him by the BAe as part payback for the forty billion dollar Al Yamamah arms deal with the BAe in 1985. He was his country’s Ambassador in the US from 1983 to 2005. After that, he maintained a low profile till the onset of the Arab Spring in 2011. Gifted in arranging covert deals it is suspected that he was involved in negotiating the purchase of nuclear missiles from Pakistan. Meet Bandar Bush aka Bandar bin Sultan Al-Saud. The famous photo that showed his closeness to George H Bush with a jeans clad Bandar seated on the arm of a sofa chatting to the President says it all. It was Bandar who had helped convince Reagan to aid the Mujahedeen in Afghanistan against the Soviets in the 1980s.

Close ties: Condoleezza Rice talks with Bandar bin Sultan Al-Saud, as former US President George W Bush embraces present Saudi King Abdullah at his Texas ranch in 2005. File Pic

According to Craig Unger (House of Bush, House of Saud), it was Bandar’s influence on the Bush administration that ensured that all Saudi notables, including many from the bin Laden family, were successfully airlifted out of the US two days after the September 11 terrorist attacks. This was done despite a total ban on all flights in US airspace. Almost an eminence grise to successive Saudi kings, Prince Bandar was also mortal and on July 26 he disappeared, believed killed, barely a week after he was appointed chief of Saudi intelligence. The unintended consequences of unacknowledged actions.

The Saudis had made use of the intense hatred and fear the Americans have for the Hizbollah to launch into Syria. The Syrians had long suspected Bandar of aiding the Al Qaeda in Syria and earlier in the Lebanon. What must have stunned the Saudi government into silence was not just that Bandar was killed but that the Syrians had the reach to strike deep in Saudi Arabia.

The Arab Spring, which has had mixed results in the Arab world, has not bloomed in Syria and all that has has happened is that a lot of blood has been spilt. What we have instead, are endless threats from the West, Chinese and Russian determination to continue to support Syria, and doggedness from Bashar al Assad. The entire movement threatens to degenerate into a Shia-Sunni struggle for supremacy with the trophy actually being Iran, always seen by the neighbouring Sunni regimes as a threat to themselves. While the Syrian opposition to Assad gets equipped, armed and assisted in propaganda by a friendly West, various intelligence agencies have been playing their own shadowy games. Videos depicting violence in gruesome detail are in circulation via Beirut which will provide ammunition for a full blown civil war in the country.
Inevitably it becomes necessary to involve intelligence agencies when there is a lot of dangerous and dirty work to be done, there being no such thing as a clean war. The ubiquitous CIA and the much feared Mossad are said to be involved in Syria. The German intelligence, BND was perhaps the first to attribute bombings in Syria to Al Qaeda. The SIS (MI 6) of the UK has recently emphasised the importance of covert operations in Iran especially in the context of Iran’s nuclear programme. Egyptians have been carrying out their own battles in the Sinai against what is feared to be Al Qaeda terrorists; and, the KGB’s successor, the FIS is present in Syria and the only agency that one does not hear of is the Chinese.

The US having gone into Iraq with misplaced intentions found the regional rival, Iran on the ascendent by the time the US declared victory in 2009. This had to be rectified. Seymour Hersh, the well known investigative journalist had also said the then Secretary of State made it quite apparent that the US would support the Sunnis against the Shias in any struggle. In the games being played there is a real possibility that future conflict in the region will increasingly acquire a sectarian character with the Shias arraigned against the Sunni majority. It is not clear yet if the map of the region is being attempted to be redrawn on ethnic or religious lines or both.

Source : Mid Day , 16th August 2012, Vikram Sood , Vice President , ORF Centre for International Relations,

Let's think smart

Today is the 37th death anniversary of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Bangladesh's first president. His assassination by army officers in 1975 was followed by years of dictatorial military rule till 1991 when elections took place. The Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), a creation of General Zia-ul-Rahman, won the elections that year. But it was only two decades later that India had a friendly government in Dhaka when the Awami League (AL) led by Sheikh Mujibur's daughter, Sheikh Hasina, won in 1996.


For Bangladesh, 2013 is crucial - it goes in for elections when Sheikh Hasina's current (and second) term ends. The two main parties, the ruling AL and its rival the BNP (led by Begum Khaleda Zia) have begun jockeying for position. The fate of this bitter rivalry will determine Bangladesh's future and will also have a bearing the country's relationship with India.

The race to the top will be a close one. Since 1991, the BNP and AL have alternated in power, but the important thing is that the two had won roughly the same percentage of votes till the 2008 elections: the AL collected 49.2 % of the votes for its 230 seats while the BNP had 32.7% for its 30 seats. Can the AL repeat its victory? If so, what does it have to do retain its hold and what should the opposition do to defeat the AL? The answers will probably become clearer in the next few months.

There are several crucial issues that Sheikh Hasina will have to fix before the elections and India will be concerned about the course of events there. The India-Bangladesh relation is somewhat like the India-US relations - despite all ingredients, the full potential for a close relationship has not been realised.

One of the issues that need a closer watch - and which may cause problems - is the progress of the war crime trials on the atrocities committed during the 1971 War of Liberation. So far, the tribunal has indicted seven prominent leaders of the Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI) and two who had later joined the BNP. The nine have more than 100 charges against them. It will be a difficult task for the Sheikh Hasina government to bring about a closure before the next elections. Already the BNP has begun its belligerent protests against these trials.

Both the BNP and the JeI have dismissed the proceedings of the International Crimes Tribunal as a mockery and in June, the BNP acting secretary general threatened that the party would not contest the next elections if it is not held under a caretaker government, an arrangement that the AL has done away with. Obviously, the BNP-JeI gameplan is to ensure that the proceedings are delayed till the elections.

Sheikh Hasina has shown courage and determination to come down heavily on terrorists and has launched these long-delayed trials. With elections approaching, the issue has begun to transform into a bipartisan struggle between the AL and the BNP. Sheikh Hasina has had to battle the distorted history crafted by the army-led government and the two BNP governments. School textbooks removed all references to the war crimes and collaborations, and resorted to vague generalities about the killings and rapes up to December 1971.

A 1981 United Nations Human Rights Commission report had described the genocide in Bangladesh as the worst in history with at least 1.5 million people killed in 267 days of carnage. Other estimates say there were 3 million deaths and 200,000 women were raped. The JeI will undoubtedly appeal to its religious ideological base and allege that the government is using the trials as a means to suppress the JeI politically.

It was during the second term of Khaleda Zia that many Islamic radical groups joined forces (including the JeI and the Islamic Chhatra Shibir) and this cross-fertilisation among the groups eventually led to massive bombings on August 15, 2005, when 500 bombs exploded simultaneously in 50 cities of Bangladesh. Although the group was banned and its leaders convicted and executed, followers of organisations like Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh and Jamaat-ul Mujahideen Bangladesh still exist and the JeI would want to make use of them for its agenda. There is an apprehension that should the BNP-JeI combine regain power, this may be the last election in a long time in Bangladesh.

Sheikh Hasina has had her share of problems with the army too - there was a revolt in the ranks earlier this year. Although successfully foiled, there has been growing resentment within the army about the government's policies on fundamentalism and India, the growing influence of radical organisations like the Hizb-ut Tahrir and dissidence within the army.

Some recent developments also do not help Sheikh Hasina's cause: the Teesta water sharing agreement has not taken off and if New Delhi keeps succumbing to Kolkata's pressures, it may never come through. This failure will be exploited by the opposition. The Indian government has to be more assertive as the gains to India would also be immense.

The World Bank's abrupt withdrawal from the $2.9 billion Padma Multipurpose Bridge, a major infrastructure project that would connect south-western Bangladesh to the rest of the country, was a setback to Sheikh Hasina. While India dithered, the Chinese were off the mark quickly and offered to finance the construction; indecisions like these and the Teesta waters issue often lead to the comment: "India promises, China delivers."

As a neighbour, India would remain keenly interested in developments in Bangladesh. India should be innovative and more proactive. Otherwise, a slide into right-wing religious fundamentalism in Bangladesh will be dangerous for India.

Source : Hindustan Times, 14th August 2012, Vikram Sood , Vice President ORF centre for International Relations .

A clash of the titans

The US-led war against Iraq in 2003 was never really about Saddam Hussein's nuclear weapons programme or the presence of al-Qaeda in that country. It was about gaining control over Iraq's oil. As the US planned to pull out, ExxonMobil, an American multinational oil and gas corporation, moved into Iraq and eventually won the contract to exploit the West Qurna oil field in 2009. The firm owned some of the best oil fields after World War II, before being thrown out by Hussein in 1972. The firm has now bid for oil exploration in Afghanistan just about the time when the US is planning to pull out of the country.

For some of us, it might escape notice that ExxonMobil represents American power as much as the Pentagon and Centcom do. The company's annual revenues are larger than the economy of a large number of countries and wherever it operates, it exerts influence over the politics and security of those countries.
Given the need for natural resources and access to oil and gas, areas of the Caspian Sea and the Persian Gulf along with the continental and sea routes through the Indian Ocean up to East China have become extremely vital for continued global economic development. For the foreseeable future, till the discovery and mass usage of alternative sources of energy, the nation which controls these areas, largely controls the world. National strategies, global politics and power are thus tied with oil as a commodity.

But this time round, ExxonMobil has competitors in Afghanistan apart from Chevron. The Chinese Metallurgical Group Corporation was awarded a 30-year-old, $3-billion contract in the Anyak copper mines in 2007. The Steel Authority of India Limited (Sail) has won a $10 billion bid for investment in iron ore and Pakistan Petroleum and India's Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) are now bidding for six exploratory blocks varying from 1,220 to 2,200 square miles north of Mazar-e-Sharif. There are other contenders also but it is suspected that the Chinese have withdrawn in favour of the Pakistani bid. The blocks are estimated to contain a billion barrels of oil. Besides, India is also the largest donor of aid to Afghanistan ahead of Japan and the US.

Afghanistan has become an investment-cum-exploration destination only recently, but the Chinese have been active there for nearly a decade. Despite the efforts made in the last 17 years, Steve Levine, author of The Oil and the Glory, writes that the West has been unable to access the oil and gas fields of Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. On the other hand, the Chinese were able to get a deal for an on-shore natural gas field in Turkmenistan in 2006 and build a 1,700 km pipeline into China by 2009.

The Americans have talked of a grand plan with Afghanistan as the hub connecting it by road, rail, pipelines and electricity grids to the Arabian Sea and India, but the Chinese already have their version of the new Silk Road connecting western China to Europe via Central Asia. This would exclude the US from the scheme of things. The Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (Tapi) pipeline, driven by American interests to keep Russia, China and Iran out of the equation, while controlling the distribution of resources, is a non-starter. It is difficult to realistically visualise a pipeline that goes through Afghanistan and Balochistan. The ONGC and China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) signed an agreement in June for joint exploration in the Sudan, Myanmar and Syria, something that is viewed with scepticism. This shows just how intricate the world has become. Meanwhile, the southern route from Kunming, Yunnan to Kohima via Mandalay is something that could be considered by strategic planners.

China has taken advantage of the earlier US retreat or disinterest in Africa following its preoccupation in Iraq and Afghanistan and moved in there in strength. It has long-term interests in the Indian Ocean Region. Eventually, China will build a strong enough navy to be present in the region.

The strategy evolved in the past by former American vice-president Dick Cheney stressed on increased domestic production, controlling the oil and gas flow from the Persian Gulf, dominating the sea lanes from the Persian Gulf to the East China Sea, and ensuring Europe reduces its energy dependence on Russia. US President Barack Obama has followed this policy. Libya was more about its oil resources for Europe. The Arab Spring was collateral profit.

We have to always remember that we have an unsettled border with China, a country that has encouraged Pakistan to become nuclear and challenge our conventional superiority. Indian strategists have to keep in mind the possibility of a two-front military situation one of which may be conventional and the other sub-conventional with a perennially recalcitrant Pakistan with its jihadi brigades and China armed to the teeth in Tibet. We need to tie up with the US and South East Asia, including Japan and Australia, for the security of the Indian Ocean. India would need Iran for undersea gas pipelines and road and rail connections from Iran into Central Asia via Mashad for access to Afghanistan as well and these are our abiding interests. Relations with the Central Asian Republics and above all Russia have to be maintained. India must continue to strengthen its own naval and air strike capability for an effective deterrent and retaliation. Only when a nation has capacities can it have capabilities.

The clash of the titans is inevitable in our region and staying aloof may no longer be a viable option. We will have to manage all these contradictions in our interests.

Source : Hindustan Times , 2nd August 2012, Vice President , ORF Center for International Relations .

How many more Kokrajhars?

The seeds of violence in Kokrajhar were sown decades ago. Years of political perfidy, bureaucratic apathy and national neglect led to the present tension and violence, which is a repeat of earlier such incidents. Illegal immigration first from East Pakistan and then from Bangladesh has been the cause. Throughout these years, the politician, interested in his vote banks, had little time for national interests as he played his games, the civil servant played truant and the men guarding the borders found this game lucrative. Over time, the rights of the illegal migrant became equal to the rights of the local. Let us not obscure this basic fact.

Besides, the North East is somewhere remote for those in Mumbai and New Delhi; Guwahati the main city of the North East is 1,930 kilometres away from the national capital and 2,740 km from the commercial capital. The road from Guwahati to Kolkata is 1,003 km long just 125 km shorter than the road to Kunming, Yunnan. Many here in Delhi still look vaguely at a person from the region and wonder if he or she is an Indian. We also do not realise that the problem in the Valley of Kashmir is far less intricate than the one in the North East. We do not adequately realise in our public discourse the importance and the richness of the entire north east and therefore the need to work it into an economic infrastructure grid with the rest of India and Myanmar. Distance lends enchantment, it also creates indifference.

Not again: Bodo tribals flee their village and make their way to a camp, as paramilitary soldiers walk past in Gambaribil village, Kokrajhar district, Assam. Pic/AFP

Seething with rage at New Delhi's sustained apathy, the north east went up in flames in 1979 once the talks with the All Assam Students Union and the All Assam Gana Sangram Parishad collapsed. The secessionist ULFA and the BDLF resorted to armed rebellion, demanding the repatriation of illegal migrants. Others in other states followed in the pursuit of their grievances.

Insurgent organisations mushroomed encouraged by the Khaleda Zia government and its ally the Jamat-e-Islami. Sanctuaries in Bangladesh, financial assistance, weapons and training were provided and insurgency itself became a lucrative profession in the north east.

Terrorism watch portals like the South Asia Terrorism Portal of the Institute of Conflict Management have listed as many as 36 terror organisations in Assam, (many may have become defunct or were merely front organisations), there were 39 in Manipur, 30 in Tripura while a far fewer number in Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Mizoram. Most of us do not realise that the problem in the north east is far more serious and intricate than we care to believe. Bangladeshi immigrants have established their own organisations like the Muslim United Liberation Front and others, in retaliation to the ULFA and other forces like BTF.

The controversial IMTD Act took 22 years to be overthrown by the Supreme Court in 2005, by which time enough damage had been done to the socio-economic and political landscapes. Local leaders now seeking vote banks have converted immigration into a Hindu-Muslim issue whereas this is a local-immigrant problem. This includes other immigrants too. This just cannot be sidestepped or swept under the carpet forever.

We also need to have mutually cordial relations with Bangladesh to succeed in our efforts to control immigration. Today we have a government in Bangladesh which has co-operated in tackling our security related issues. There is no guarantee that Sheikh Hasina will retain power in the next election. The known alternative is unlikely to be too friendly to India, if not hostile. India’s interest lies in securing the peace in our north east, encouraging Bangladesh to continue to cooperate with us. In order to succeed we need to give some adequate quid pro quo, whether in the form of a Teesta Water treaty, economic and financial assistance which encourages Bangladesh’s manufacturing and trading capacities which in turn discourages search for livelihood in India. There has to be waiver of tariffs and duties of all kinds while ensuring regulated entry.

At all times, the state must have the ability to react quickly to situations, something that is always lacking. For this we must ensure adequate systems that identify illegal immigrants for repatriation while fresh immigration is prevented. Work permits are for the future not for the past. All this needs is political will, strong borders and bureaucratic determination. Otherwise we will continue to have more Kokrajhars.

Source : Mid Day , 2nd August 2012 , Vikram Sood , Vice President , ORF centre for International Relations.