MUMBAI - India and the United States plan to take their strategic and economic cooperation to a new high by launching an important dialogue on what is called ‘five pillars” during the five-day visit of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.“We see the dialogue that we are embarking upon as extremely important and is based on the five pillars which are areas of strategic importance, agriculture, healthcare, science and technology and education,” Clinton told reporters July 18 after meeting top Indian businessmen, including Ratan Tata and Mukesh Ambani.The subjects of discussion ranged from climate change, promotion of green energy and initiatives to strengthening of bilateral trade ties. To a question if export of petro-products by Reliance to Iran figured on the agenda, Clinton said the issue was not discussed. “That is something we will look at later.”Discussions with India Inc on climate change and clean energy were “extremely productive” Clinton said, adding “the point was made that there is no contradiction between poverty elimination and moving on carbon emission”.She said the US and developed countries “have made mistakes that have contributed significantly leading to the problems that we face of climate change” and hoped that India would not repeat those mistakes. “We are hoping that a great country like India does not make the same mistakes (that the US did),” Clinton said, adding “we believe India is innovative enough to deal with climate change” while simultaneously taking measures to eliminate poverty.Clinton also highlighted the country’s great achievement in the telecom sector where it has leap-frogged over technologies to reach the level it has today.Both governments were seized of the challenge posed by climate change problems and over the next few days, discussions would be held not only at the governmental level but also with the private sector on this issue, she said.“There are creative approaches (to the climate change problem) and we will share it,” Clinton said.Describing the power-breakfast with India’s corporate bigwigs as “exciting”, she said among the issues discussed were increasing agricultural production, providing micro-nutrients to infants, the need for clean energy, working together of Indian and US pharma companies and universities.In New Delhi, US officials would be interacting with their Indian counterparts on issues ranging from economic growth and development, climate change and education, non-proliferation and counter-terrorism.India and the US would jointly work on tackling global hunger and move towards clean energy in the future, she said.Climate change and clean energy are two important issues that figure on Clinton’s agenda. “Tomorrow, I will meet Indian scientists and innovators on green energy,” she said. (PTI)
The system's challengersDreams and Shadows by Robin Wright
Reviewed by Sreeram Chaulia Representations of the Middle East as changeless, frozen-in-time and regressive have crowded mainstream Western media for years owing to the region's high frequency of despotism and religious fundamentalism. But the despondent narrative of a region doomed to medievalism obscures new developments and forces pushing for democracy and decency. In her new book, Robin Wright, a senior journalist for the Washington Post, pries open a window to the Middle East's lesser-known strain of citizen activism against both dictatorship and Islamist terrorism. Having lived and traveled in the region for three decades, she focuses on the courage and sacrifice of
individuals and groups aspiring for freedom. The book's prologue draws attention to "pyjamahedeen" - emerging young players campaigning for human rights and democracy using laptops and cell phones. These activists are inexperienced and under-resourced compared to entrenched tyrants and violent Islamists. With the highest youth unemployment rate in the world, the region has enough flashpoints for extremism. A demographically fuelled revolution in expectations can therefore be easily channeled into the throes of armed jihad rather than constructive change. Wright terms these contradictory prospects the "crises of change" through which "not all new actors will succeed". (pg 18
In the Palestinian territories, the death of the patriarch Yasser Arafat
was a catalyst for change. The 2006 parliamentary election that followed was the first instance in Arab history when people peacefully and democratically turned incumbents out of power. Hamas' sweep ended half a century of monopoly over power by Fatah, but both parties then proceeded to violate the norms of democratic conduct by engaging in devastating factional fighting. Washington fanned the Palestinian deadlock by arming Fatah to the teeth, thereby extinguishing the "euphoria of the Arabs' most democratic election ever". (pg 63) The Palestinian saga, says Wright, demonstrates the volatility of change in an institutionally weak Middle East. Egypt's 2005 presidential election was typically fixed in favor of the absolutist ruler, Hosni Mubarak, but it propelled civil society watchdogs to try to hold his government to account. Their exemplary actions inspired similar movements in Jordan and Lebanon. Yet, the most energetic political opposition in Egypt is the Muslim Brotherhood rather than secular democratic networks like Kefaya. The Brotherhood presently advocates peaceful transformation but insists on the primacy of Islamic Sharia in lawmaking. Its ultimate aims of recreating the caliphate and "mastering the world with Islam" hardly inspire the country's 10% Christian population. With the US on his side as ally and the opposition scattered, Mubarak looks set to prolong his police state by spawning a dynasty. Lebanon is relatively democratic but plagued by sectarian divisions. Institutionalized confessionalism hobbles national unity in this most diverse country. The assassination of former premier Rafik Hariri in 2005 spurred a new generation of activists with a national vision. They assembled the largest mass protests ever in a modern Arab country and succeeded in ending Syria's 29-year occupation of the country. But sectarian quota systems in government remain along with warlords and clans, which still tower over fledgling civil society groups. The Shi'ite guerrilla outfit, Hezbollah, is the most powerful political actor in Lebanon. Backed by Iran and an impressive social service and Israel-resistance record, Hezbollah is a state within the state. Wright describes meeting its supremo, Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, who said "the real democratic process in our countries will often produce governments that will be Islamist". (pg 196) The author adds that Hezbollah's war against Israel in 2006 hastened "a shift from Arabism to Islamism among both major Muslim sects" in the region. (pg 210) Since 1963, Syria has been in an open-ended state of emergency under the thumb of the Ba'ath Party. Neo-Marxists have taken the biggest risks and served the longest prison stints for relentlessly opposing the Assad dynasty's oppression. Wright focuses especially on the tribulations of the long-imprisoned leftist dissident, Riad al Turk. Syrian progressives have willingly walked to the gallows with the pride that they at least "participated in saving the dignity of our people". (pg 239) Wright also profiles a Syrian lawyer who sold his personal affects to defend dissidents even though his clients had no chance of acquittal. As in Egypt, the more consistent challenge to the Assad autocracy comes from the Syrian branch of the Brotherhood. It is now open to collaborating with other opposition forces, including the leftists. With "a strong Islamic wind blowing through the region" (pg 248), says Wright, secular dissidents too are keen on bringing the Brotherhood back into the political field. But regime change looks like a long haul in this heavily militarized country. Moving to Iran's revolution-gone-sour, Wright features the views of philosopher Abdolkarim Soroush and his student, Akbar Ganji. After falling out with Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Soroush began propounding that "freedom always precedes religion" and that the reversed sequence "inevitably leads to totalitarianism". (pg 275) Ganji quit the Ministry of Culture upon realizing that "the revolution (had) started swallowing its own children". (pg 277) He chronicled the corruption and impunity of Iran's clergy and intelligence agencies and braved jail sentences to describe the Islamic republic as an "iron cage" that can only be broken through mass civil disobedience. Wright writes affectionately about the "irrepressible irreverence" and "desperate defiance" of Iranian youth. She also follows the fates of rebel clerics like Ali Montazeri, Mohsen Kadivar and Hosein Boroujerdi who exposed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's empire of abuses and paid heavy personal prices for it. Moderate insiders like former president Mohammad Khatami and former prime minister Mir Hossein Moussavi also try to humanize and liberalize the system from within, but get stopped in their tracks by Khamenei's hardliners. The most recent re-anointment of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad through a fraudulent presidential election spells greater travails ahead for democracy in Iran. Wright's chapter on Morocco, a country reeling under monarchy for the last 1200 years, highlights women as "an imaginative force for change in the Middle East." (p.352) Iconoclastic Moroccan feminists like Fatima Mernissi and Latifa Jbabdi faced state bullying and harassment from the mosque but persisted in launching collective campaigns for gender equality. Their 20-year-long struggle yielded far-reaching democratic changes in family law in 2004. But the Moroccan royalty's failure to share power or enact political reform has kept open avenues for extremist organisations like the Islamist Combatant Group. Wright reserves the final chapter to the trauma of Iraq. Before the US invasion in 2003, she recalls the apprehensions of top Iraqi Kurdish leaders that "removing a dictatorship does not mean democracy will work". (pg 383) Since the ouster of Saddam Hussein, occupying American administrators and elected Iraqi politicians have not managed to calm ethnic divisions or reduce alienation from the central government. Elections rewarded Islamist parties and failed to prevent sectarian militias (often protected by the state) from going on the rampage. Wright critiques the US neo-conservative experiment in Iraq by asserting that, "whatever its shortcomings, change is always better home-grown". (pg 409) The US attack on Iraq stranded new democracy activists throughout the Middle East and handed the initiative to violent actors. But the indefatigable spirits among the human rights groups, Wright assures us, will "keep trying". (pg 419) One need go no further than this book for a realistic appraisal of the promise and limitations of moderate agents of change in a politically pent-up region.
The system's challengersDreams and Shadows by Robin Wright
Reviewed by Sreeram Chaulia Representations of the Middle East as changeless, frozen-in-time and regressive have crowded mainstream Western media for years owing to the region's high frequency of despotism and religious fundamentalism. But the despondent narrative of a region doomed to medievalism obscures new developments and forces pushing for democracy and decency. In her new book, Robin Wright, a senior journalist for the Washington Post, pries open a window to the Middle East's lesser-known strain of citizen activism against both dictatorship and Islamist terrorism. Having lived and traveled in the region for three decades, she focuses on the courage and sacrifice of
individuals and groups aspiring for freedom. The book's prologue draws attention to "pyjamahedeen" - emerging young players campaigning for human rights and democracy using laptops and cell phones. These activists are inexperienced and under-resourced compared to entrenched tyrants and violent Islamists. With the highest youth unemployment rate in the world, the region has enough flashpoints for extremism. A demographically fuelled revolution in expectations can therefore be easily channeled into the throes of armed jihad rather than constructive change. Wright terms these contradictory prospects the "crises of change" through which "not all new actors will succeed". (pg 18
In the Palestinian territories, the death of the patriarch Yasser Arafat
was a catalyst for change. The 2006 parliamentary election that followed was the first instance in Arab history when people peacefully and democratically turned incumbents out of power. Hamas' sweep ended half a century of monopoly over power by Fatah, but both parties then proceeded to violate the norms of democratic conduct by engaging in devastating factional fighting. Washington fanned the Palestinian deadlock by arming Fatah to the teeth, thereby extinguishing the "euphoria of the Arabs' most democratic election ever". (pg 63) The Palestinian saga, says Wright, demonstrates the volatility of change in an institutionally weak Middle East. Egypt's 2005 presidential election was typically fixed in favor of the absolutist ruler, Hosni Mubarak, but it propelled civil society watchdogs to try to hold his government to account. Their exemplary actions inspired similar movements in Jordan and Lebanon. Yet, the most energetic political opposition in Egypt is the Muslim Brotherhood rather than secular democratic networks like Kefaya. The Brotherhood presently advocates peaceful transformation but insists on the primacy of Islamic Sharia in lawmaking. Its ultimate aims of recreating the caliphate and "mastering the world with Islam" hardly inspire the country's 10% Christian population. With the US on his side as ally and the opposition scattered, Mubarak looks set to prolong his police state by spawning a dynasty. Lebanon is relatively democratic but plagued by sectarian divisions. Institutionalized confessionalism hobbles national unity in this most diverse country. The assassination of former premier Rafik Hariri in 2005 spurred a new generation of activists with a national vision. They assembled the largest mass protests ever in a modern Arab country and succeeded in ending Syria's 29-year occupation of the country. But sectarian quota systems in government remain along with warlords and clans, which still tower over fledgling civil society groups. The Shi'ite guerrilla outfit, Hezbollah, is the most powerful political actor in Lebanon. Backed by Iran and an impressive social service and Israel-resistance record, Hezbollah is a state within the state. Wright describes meeting its supremo, Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, who said "the real democratic process in our countries will often produce governments that will be Islamist". (pg 196) The author adds that Hezbollah's war against Israel in 2006 hastened "a shift from Arabism to Islamism among both major Muslim sects" in the region. (pg 210) Since 1963, Syria has been in an open-ended state of emergency under the thumb of the Ba'ath Party. Neo-Marxists have taken the biggest risks and served the longest prison stints for relentlessly opposing the Assad dynasty's oppression. Wright focuses especially on the tribulations of the long-imprisoned leftist dissident, Riad al Turk. Syrian progressives have willingly walked to the gallows with the pride that they at least "participated in saving the dignity of our people". (pg 239) Wright also profiles a Syrian lawyer who sold his personal affects to defend dissidents even though his clients had no chance of acquittal. As in Egypt, the more consistent challenge to the Assad autocracy comes from the Syrian branch of the Brotherhood. It is now open to collaborating with other opposition forces, including the leftists. With "a strong Islamic wind blowing through the region" (pg 248), says Wright, secular dissidents too are keen on bringing the Brotherhood back into the political field. But regime change looks like a long haul in this heavily militarized country. Moving to Iran's revolution-gone-sour, Wright features the views of philosopher Abdolkarim Soroush and his student, Akbar Ganji. After falling out with Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Soroush began propounding that "freedom always precedes religion" and that the reversed sequence "inevitably leads to totalitarianism". (pg 275) Ganji quit the Ministry of Culture upon realizing that "the revolution (had) started swallowing its own children". (pg 277) He chronicled the corruption and impunity of Iran's clergy and intelligence agencies and braved jail sentences to describe the Islamic republic as an "iron cage" that can only be broken through mass civil disobedience. Wright writes affectionately about the "irrepressible irreverence" and "desperate defiance" of Iranian youth. She also follows the fates of rebel clerics like Ali Montazeri, Mohsen Kadivar and Hosein Boroujerdi who exposed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's empire of abuses and paid heavy personal prices for it. Moderate insiders like former president Mohammad Khatami and former prime minister Mir Hossein Moussavi also try to humanize and liberalize the system from within, but get stopped in their tracks by Khamenei's hardliners. The most recent re-anointment of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad through a fraudulent presidential election spells greater travails ahead for democracy in Iran. Wright's chapter on Morocco, a country reeling under monarchy for the last 1200 years, highlights women as "an imaginative force for change in the Middle East." (p.352) Iconoclastic Moroccan feminists like Fatima Mernissi and Latifa Jbabdi faced state bullying and harassment from the mosque but persisted in launching collective campaigns for gender equality. Their 20-year-long struggle yielded far-reaching democratic changes in family law in 2004. But the Moroccan royalty's failure to share power or enact political reform has kept open avenues for extremist organisations like the Islamist Combatant Group. Wright reserves the final chapter to the trauma of Iraq. Before the US invasion in 2003, she recalls the apprehensions of top Iraqi Kurdish leaders that "removing a dictatorship does not mean democracy will work". (pg 383) Since the ouster of Saddam Hussein, occupying American administrators and elected Iraqi politicians have not managed to calm ethnic divisions or reduce alienation from the central government. Elections rewarded Islamist parties and failed to prevent sectarian militias (often protected by the state) from going on the rampage. Wright critiques the US neo-conservative experiment in Iraq by asserting that, "whatever its shortcomings, change is always better home-grown". (pg 409) The US attack on Iraq stranded new democracy activists throughout the Middle East and handed the initiative to violent actors. But the indefatigable spirits among the human rights groups, Wright assures us, will "keep trying". (pg 419) One need go no further than this book for a realistic appraisal of the promise and limitations of moderate agents of change in a politically pent-up region.
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