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India-Pakistan

Narendra Modi's new NSA, Ajit Kumar Doval starts big, has bigger goals

2014-05-29

NEW DELHI: Ajit Kumar Doval (69), Narendra Modi's national security advisor-designate, started big on his new job -- before the PM met his Pakistan counterpart Nawaz Sharif for a one-on-one meeting, he went through a background note prepared by Doval. People familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition they not be identified told ET that Doval, a former Intelligence Bureau chief, had worked closely with Modi's Principal Secretary Nripendra Misra over the weekend. Doval and Misra had worked out talking points to be taken up with various SAARC leaders. Talks with Pakistan were especially crucial and emphasis was on improving bilateral ties and delivering a firm message on terrorism. Getting the message right was the first major task for Doval, known for having a tough approach to terror. Doval's appointment was the first file Modi's principal secretary took to the PM. The PM signed the file in the morning. People familiar with the matter said Prime Minister Modi had met Doval three times before the government formation exercise was complete."They get along really well...and have same views on many critical security issues," one person said. "Modi expects Doval to give concrete shape to India's anti-terror and anti-Maoist strategy and streamline anti-terror and anti-Maoist operations," this person added. Doval will only be the second NSA after MK Narayanan to have a professional career in intelligence. Most NSAs such as Brajesh Mishra for Atal Bihari Vajpayee, and JN Dixit, Shyam Saran and SS Menon for Manmohan Singh, had foreign service backgrounds. And the foreign service is never used as cover for intelligence.~ In fact, Narayanan started as Singh's internal security advisor, and only took over NSA duties when Dixit passed away. An official in the PMO who spoke on the condition of anonymity said Modi may appoint a deputy NSA with a foreign service background. Among the names being considered should the post of deputy NSA be created is Hardeep Puri, retired IFS, who was India's man in the United Nations. Close observers of India's security apparatus and its talent level say Doval's career as a spymaster has been among the more successful in recent past. A 1968 batch IPS officer who spent virtually all his career in IB, Doval is credited by security experts with intelligence successes like infiltrating the Mizo National Army and planning key Myanmar- and China-related missions. His intelligence work was also crucial in Operation Black Thunder, the mop-up operation that followed Operation Blue Star, the first big action against Punjab militants in Golden Temple. Undercover work in Pakistan and the tough job of being one of the negotiators in the 1C-814 hijacking episode added sufficiently to his CV so that when BJP lost power in 2004, the Congress government appointed him as IB chief, despite Doval's perceived closeness to BJP leaders. Doval retired in 2005 and was considered a certainty for NSA's job had BJP won in 2009 elections. The long wait for Doval between 2005 and 2014 was spent mostly in setting up the Vivekananda International Foundation, a Delhibased think tank with a centreright intellectual perspective.

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India-Pakistan

Communists lose power in two Indian states

2011-05-13

KOLKATA: The Trinamool Congress on Friday headed for a historic win in West Bengal, bringing down the curtain on the 34-year uninterrupted rule of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM) led Left Front. Hurrah! The Left Front - the longest serving Communist-led government in a democratic set-up headed for a rout. West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee tendered his resignation to Government MK Narayanan at 1.15pm on Friday. He lost his seat and is only the second chief minister in Bengal's history to lose the assembly seat. Prafulla Sen, the third chief minister of Bengal, was the first to lose. As the state was poised to get its first woman chief minister in Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee after about 64 years after independence, the defeat of the Left Front spanned almost the entire geographical map of West Bengal. Its candidates were losing even in erstwhile red citadels like Burdwan, Bankura and Purulia districts and in seats where the coalition had never been defeated since coming to power in 1977.

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India-Pakistan

No plan to mediate between India, Pakistan: Holbrooke

2009-04-09

NEW DELHI: The US has no plans to mediate between India and Pakistan, Washington’s Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke said during his visit to India on Wednesday. “We cannot negotiate between the two countries. Our trip was designed to move forward a process in Afghanistan and Pakistan. We stopped here to inform and consult the Indian government,” he said when asked if the US was trying to push India and Pakistan to settle Kashmir. Talking to reporters after his talks with Indian officials, Holbrooke and US Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen called for cooperation between India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and the US to fight the “common threat” and stabilise the region. The common threat is Pakistain ... Holbrooke said Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Masood was a danger to Pakistan and Afghanistan, but his threats to the US were not backed by events. The envoy expressed concern over the events in Swat. “We met people of the area to learn more about it. It was a very difficult and touching meeting. What has happened in Swat has stunned many people in Pakistan. Events in Lahore – attacks on the Sri Lankan cricket team and a police academy – have raised concerns. Everyone should know what is happening,” he said. Holbrooke said his visit to India was also aimed at moving beyond bilateral relations and involving India in global and strategic issues. “We cannot settle Afghanistan and many other issues without India’s full involvement,” he said. That'll twist a few tails in Pak-land ... The US officials had extensive discussions with India’s National Security Adviser MK Narayanan and Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon in the last leg of their whirlwind tour. Mullen separately also met navy chief Admiral Sureesh Mehta.

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India-Pakistan

India warns Obama over Kashmir

2009-02-05

India has warned US President Barack Obama that he risks “barking up the wrong tree” if he seeks to broker a settlement between Pakistan and India over the disputed territory of Kashmir. MK Narayanan, India’s national security advisor, said that the new US administration was in danger of dredging up out of date Clinton administration-era strategies in a bid to bring about improved ties between the two nuclear armed neighbours. “I do think that we could make President Obama understand, if he does nurse any such view, that he is barking up the wrong tree. I think Kashmir today has become one of the quieter and safer places in this part of the world,” Mr Narayanan said in an interview with CNBC TV18. “It’s possible that at this time there are elements, perhaps in the administration who are harking back to the pre-2000 era.” The warning comes as Richard Holbrooke, Mr Obama’s special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan, prepares to come to the region for the first time in his new capacity. Mr Narayanan is close to Manmohan Singh, India’s prime minister, and Sonia Gandhi, the president of the ruling Congress Party. Kashmir, over which India and Pakistan have fought two wars and where both countries mass troops, is a highly sensitive issue for New Delhi. Last month, David Miliband, the UK’s foreign secretary, angered the Indian government by saying that the unresolved dispute over Kashmir was a cause of terrorism in the region. Its vilification of Mr Miliband was interpreted as a tacit signal to Washington to keep out. Kashmir, which has a Muslim majority, was claimed by both India and Pakistan following partition in 1947 at the end of British rule. Since 1989 New Delhi has been battling a separatist insurgency in a struggle estimated to have cost up to 70,000 lives. Earlier this year large anti-India protests drew up to 500,000 people onto the streets and led to the imposition of a long curfew. But New Delhi was encouraged by a largely peaceful state election late last year that recorded a better than expected voter turnout. “References made by president Obama, which seem to suggest that there is some kind of link with settlement on Pakistan’s western border and the Kashmir issue certainly have caused concern,” said Mr Narayanan. But he said the new US administration and India had yet to have direct contact over the issue. C. Raja Mohan, professor of international relations at Singapore’s Nanyang University, said New Delhi’s treatment of Mr Miliband had helped persuade Washington to abandon any overt linkage of the Kashmir dispute with combating extremism in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Washington’s decision to drop India from formal inclusion in Mr Holbrooke’s special envoy mandate reflected these sensitivities. “You kill a chicken to scare a monkey,” Mr Mohan said at a recent seminar in New Delhi on US relations with South Asia. “We killed the chicken and the monkey got the message.” Mr Mohan said India and Pakistan had agreed a basic outline of a peace deal on Kashmir during the tenure of Pakistani leader Pervez Musharraf, but that the process had faltered as Mr Musharraf had weakenend and finally lost power.

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India-Pakistan

Indian home minister, security adviser quit

2008-12-01

Indian Home Minister Shivraj Patil resigned yesterday facing severe criticism for handling of internal security during the terror attacks on Mumbai. Meanwhile, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at an all-party meeting in New Delhi unveiled a set of measures to strengthen the country's anti-terror apparatus to combat terrorism, reports our correspondent Pallab Bhattacharya from New Delhi. Manmohan said the government has finalised a set of legal measures, which include setting up of a Federal Investigation Agency. He said measures have been initiated to beef up maritime and air security. "This will involve the navy, coast guard and coastal police as well as the air force and the civil aviation ministry," the Indian prime minister said. The National Security Guard (NSG), the major anti-terrorism force of India, will be given additional facilities, he said, adding that steps have been initiated to establish four more NSG hubs across the country. Patil, 74, taking "moral responsibility" for the incident sent his resignation to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh a day after Indian commandos ended a 60-hour rampage by terrorists in Mumbai. The attacks left about 200 people dead. The national security adviser MK Narayanan also tendered resignation yesterday. But the government is yet to accept his resignation, adds our correspondent from New Delhi. Political sources said Patil has been of the view that the Congress Party and the government should not suffer because of the terror attacks and that is why he had taken this decision. The resignation of Patil, considered very close to ruling Congress Party chief Sonia Gandhi, was yesterday accepted by the prime minister who appointed Palaniappan Chidambaram as the new home minister moving him from the finance portfolio. Chidambaram had been the minister of state for home under prime minister Rajiv Gandhi in late 80s. With Chidambaram having moved to the home ministry, the prime minister himself will retain the finance portfolio which Singh had held from 1991 to 1996 in the government headed by PV Narasimha Rao. India's powerful national security adviser also resigned yesterday in the wake of the devastating Islamic militant attacks in Mumbai, government officials told AFP. Confirming reports by Indian news channels, the officials said MK Narayanan handed in his resignation to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and that the premier accepted. An aide to the prime minister said "more senior members of the government are likely to be shown the door" in the wake of the attacks, which left close to 200 dead. An aide to the prime minister said "more senior members of the government are likely to be shown the door" in the wake of the attacks, which left close to 200 dead. The government sources said India's home secretary, domestic intelligence chief and head of the Coast Guard were likely to be sacked. The resignation of Shivraj Patil came soon after a meeting of the top decision-making forum of ruling Congress Party, which heads the country's United Progressive Alliance, late Saturday night. At the three-hour meeting of the Congress Working Committee presided by Congress President Sonia Gandhi, Patil offered to quit as all senior leaders of the party wanted the government to take measures to handle terrorism with a firm hand and take all measures to prevent recurrence of such attacks. Reacting to the resignation of Patil, which came ahead of an all-party meeting convened by the prime minister on security issue, the main opposition BJP, which often accused the Congress-led government of being weak in responding to terrorism, said, "It was too little too late." They always get bent out of shape over "too little too late." If they don't, they're likely to grumble about too much, too early. BJP General Secretary Arun Jaitley said, "It is a collective failure of the government and you cannot single out the most vulnerable person in the government." With tensions escalating in South Asia, Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari urged India not to "over-react" after Indian and US officials suggested the gunmen could have been members of Lashkar-e-Taiba. Lashkar, which is fighting Indian control of the disputed Kashmir region, was behind a deadly 2001 assault on the Indian parliament that pushed New Delhi and Islamabad to the brink of war. Indian media reported that the only surviving militant had identified all the Mumbai attackers as Pakistanis who had been trained by Lashkar. Ajmal Amir Kamal, 21, who was caught on a CCTV camera wearing a T-shirt with a "Versace" logo, was being interrogated in a safe house in Mumbai, reports said. US counter-terrorism officials told AFP that evidence was emerging that Lashkar could have been behind the attacks, while Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee said "elements in Pakistan" were responsible. Pakistan, which has fought two wars with India over Kashmir, moved quickly to deny any links with the attacks. Zardari warned that the militants were "looking for reaction" and said India suspected the militants could be based in Pakistan. He pledged prompt action against anyone responsible. But he hasn't had Hafiz Saeed arrested yet. Not even the usual house arrest. Lashkar, which operated openly in Pakistan until being outlawed after the September 11, 2001 attacks, has denied responsibility. It still operates openly. And it lies routinely. Around a dozen militants launched their assault on Wednesday evening when they split into groups and struck targets across Mumbai, including the main railway station and a hospital. Security forces regained control of the city 60 hours later when they killed the last three gunmen holed up with hostages inside the Taj Mahal hotel. On Friday elite troops had stormed the Jewish centre and killed two gunmen -- but found eight dead Israeli hostages. Another luxury hotel that was attacked, the Oberoi/Trident, was cleared of militants later in the day, with scores of trapped guests rescued and dozens of bodies found.

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Sri Lanka

LTTE claims killing of 52 soldiers

2008-10-09

Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers yesterday said they were beating back an army advance into their northern territory and had killed 52 soldiers, though the claims were disputed by the government. The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) also said 50 soldiers were wounded in Tuesday's heavy fighting across several fronts in the Kilinochchi district, the pro-rebel Tamilnet website reported. It did not give rebel losses but said the guerrillas had seized arms and ammunition from the military. The defence ministry, however, said troops killed 31 rebels while losing only two soldiers in fighting around Kilinochchi on Tuesday. The ministry said eight other rebels were killed in clashes across other northern fronts. Casualty figures from either side cannot be verified as the defence ministry blocks independent journalists from travelling to the frontlines. Some 7,258 rebels have been killed by troops since Sri Lanka pulled out of a Norwegian-brokered truce in January, while 707 soldiers have died in the same period. Meanwhile, India criticised Sri Lanka in a rare intervention into the island's internal affairs, saying civilian deaths during a military offensive against Tamil rebels were a cause of grave concern. India's National Security Advisor MK Narayanan summoned Sri Lanka's representative in New Delhi on Monday to convey strong reservations about the intensifying military onslaught against Tamil separatists, officials said. The 80 million population of India's southern Tamil Nadu state share cultural and emotional links with minority Tamils in Sri Lanka. Narayanan said that "the escalation of hostilities in the north and the resultant fall out was leading to a great deal of concern in India," an Indian foreign ministry statement said. Sri Lanka must "act with greater restraint and address the growing feeling of insecurity among the minority community," it said. India directly intervened in the Sri Lankan conflict in 1987 by sending troops to supervise a bilateral peace pact, but the soldiers ended up fighting Tamil Tigers. New Delhi withdrew its troops three years later after losing 1,200 soldiers. Since then, India has maintained a hands-off policy towards Sri Lanka. Not a bad idea. Perhaps you should stay quiet and let the Colombo government finish what it has started. According to Colombo, Sri Lankan troops are advancing on the Tigers' political capital of Kilinochchi in the north as part of an offensive launched a year ago. The fall of Kilinochchi would be the biggest loss in 13 years for the Tigers.

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India-Pakistan

Israel ready to provide security to Musharraf?

2008-08-17

By Hamid Mir Hamid's ISI handlers have ordered a hatchet job? ISLAMABAD: Israeli President Shimon Peres is desperately trying to help his friend President Pervez Musharraf and is putting indirect pressure on the coalition government through different diplomatic channels not to impeach him, Foreign Office sources reveal. The sources claim that Peres wants a safe exit for Musharraf and he is also ready to provide security to his friend outside Pakistan. These sources also claim that Peres and Musharraf are in regular contact with each other for the last three years. Both met first in Davos in January 2005 and since then they have been writing letters to each other and exchanging pleasantries on telephone regularly. According to the sources, Peres wrote his first-ever official letter to Musharraf in October 2007, appreciating his efforts in the fight against terrorism. Musharraf, in his response, thanked the Israeli president for his support and good wishes. These letters were exchanged through diplomatic channels of Turkey. Peres called his Pakistani friend again a few days ago. Though the details of their conversation were not available with the Foreign Office yet it is believed that Peres offered his friend some help. Informed sources are of the view that Israel has strong friendly relations with Turkey and is in a position to provide security to Musharraf in Turkey. One close friend of Musharraf is also busy in lobbying for him in the Jewish lobby in the US these days. This friend of Musharraf has met many leaders of the World Jewish Congress recently. Musharraf even praised this friend publicly in recognition of his services for facilitating him to address the Jewish lobby in New York. This special friend still enjoys ministerial status in Pakistan without being elected and despite the fact that he is an American citizen. It has been learnt that the same friend is requesting his American Jewish contacts to do something for the safe exit of Musharraf through Israeli President Shimon Peres. Peres had openly said in October 2001 that he prayed for the life of Musharraf every morning as he (Musharraf) had signed his death warrant by changing the Afghan policy of Pakistan. After that, Musharraf also came into contact with the late Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon. He also met Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak in January this year in Paris. Diplomatic sources claim that Musharraf is the most popular Pakistani leader in Israel. He was the first Pakistani leader who was invited to address the World Jewish Congress in the US in 2005. After that historic event, the then foreign minister of Pakistan Khurshid Kasuri met his Israeli counterpart Silvon Shalom in Turkey in 2005. Musharraf had asked the Foreign Office in early 2007 to prepare a plan for the recognition of Israel but it did not materialise due to the political turmoil started in March 2007. It is also pertinent to mention here that Indian National Security Adviser MK Narayanan was the first foreign leader to come out openly in support of Musharraf on Wednesday, saying his impeachment would only help extremist elements in the country. The same Indian leader had declared on December 19, 2007 that India could trust Musharraf but not Benazir Bhutto. Musharraf knows that he is still popular among the Indian and Israeli establishments and has a lot of friends in Western capitals as well. If provided a safe exit, he can find a new role for himself in international diplomacy. Highly placed sources in the coalition government claim that Musharraf is now completely isolated and he has informed Asif Ali Zardari, through the governor Punjab, that he would resign if provided special indemnity. However, the coalition government is not ready to provide him indemnity and in that case he would face the first-ever humiliating impeachment process, which would definitely make history in Pakistan. Hamid Mir is the Executive Editor of Geo TV in Islamabad and he has also interviewed Osama bin Laden, Tony Blair, Condoleezza Rice, General Pervaiz Musharraf, Hamid Karzai, L K Advani and other international leaders.

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India-Pakistan

Musharraf's exit may give militants more freedom: India

2008-08-13

India is concerned that impeachment of President Pervez Musharraf may leave a "big vacuum" that will give freedom to radical extremist elements to do "what they like in this country". In the first significant comments by anyone from the Indian government on the imminent impeachment process in Pakistan, India's National Security Adviser MK Narayanan said it is the political vacuum that exists there that "greatly worries us". In an interview to Singapore daily The Straits Times, he said it was not important for India whether Musharraf was impeached or not. "But it leaves a big vacuum and we are deeply concerned about this vacuum because it leaves the radical extremist outfits with freedom to do what they like, not merely on the Pak-Afghan border but clearly on our side of the border too," Narayanan said. "Like nature abhors a vacuum, we abhor the political vacuum that exists in Pakistan. It greatly worries us," he said. Maintaining that the situation was evolving in a manner that nobody could quite reach a conclusion, Narayanan said India thought Musharraf's impeachment might not take place. "And if at all he has to go, he will be allowed to go in grace and some sort of a compromise would be reached. Obviously that is not happening. Nawaz Sharif is very angry and there is no doubt about it," he said. He said a large number of people in the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) were unhappy about former prime minister Benazir Bhutto's assassination and most of them correctly attributed it to intelligence agencies. "While Zardari may be more conciliatory towards Musharraf the general temper seems otherwise," he said. Narayanan said India would not abandon Afghanistan in the wake of the attack on its mission in Kabul saying New Delhi and the rest of the world were not prepared for it. India would "strengthen security very substantially" for its mission in Kabul, he said. "Quite obviously Pakistan wishes to be the only country in Afghanistan so it can have Afghanistan as its client state," he said. He said Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had made it extremely clear to Pakistan at the recent SAARC summit in Colombo without raising his voice that "it could not be business as usual". "I think the message went home. Pakistani Prime Minister Gilani got the message." Coming from Dr Singh, it had the "most devastating effect," he said. The security adviser noted that one had to wait and see what Gilani could deliver. He said India was maintaining and would like to emphasise the importance of the composite dialogue.

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Sri Lanka

Once Bitten, Never Shy

2008-07-13

A covert war against the LTTE is underway as India deepens its military engagement with Sri Lanka SETTING ASIDE domestic Tamil sensitivities, the Indian government appears to have involved itself in a full-fledged proxy war in Sri Lanka. While claiming to have adopted a hands-off policy with regard to its neighbour's continuing ethnic conflict between the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the forces of the Sinhalese government, India is extending the latter its covert support. This was revealed by Sri Lanka's army chief, Lieutenant General Sarath Fonseka, last week during an interaction with members of the Foreign Correspondents' Association in Colombo. "Eight hundred of our officers are trained (in India) every year; free of cost," Fonseka is reported to have said. "India gives them an allowance for the duration of their courses there. The support from India is huge." Fonseka's remarks came on the heels of a high-level Indian delegation's visit to Colombo at a time when the government troops and the LTTE are locked in a fierce battle in northern Sri Lanka. The Indian officials' trip was kept a close secret. According to media reports, even the Lankan foreign ministry came to know about the visit of India's national security adviser, MK Narayanan, defence secretary Vijay Singh, and foreign secretary Shiv Shankar Menon only hours after they landed in Colombo on an Indian Air Force plane. Fonseka, who survived an assassination attempt last year, has vowed to achieve a military victory against the LTTE. His confidence stems from his military success against the rebels in the Eastern provinces last year and covert Indian support to his war efforts. Fonseka, President Mahinda Rajapakse and his brother and defence secretary Gotabhaya Rajapakse together form the powerful Colombo triumvirate that advocates a military solution to the ethnic strife that has claimed over 70,000 lives in the last three decades. In March, Fonseka made a six-day state visit to India, during which he met with top defence officials. Military relations between India and Sri Lanka have developed over recent years even though the two countries have not entered any formal cooperation agreement. While many in Delhi support such an agreement, it has not seen the light of day due to stiff opposition from political parties in Tamil Nadu. At present, however, India appears to have cast aside all neutrality in the Tamil-Sinhala conflict, and adopted a policy best encapsulated by an unnamed military officer to a news agency on the eve of Fonseka's Delhi visit: "India wants to ensure that the Sri Lankan army maintains its upper hand over the LTTE." India's training of Sri Lankan army personnel has never been officially confirmed by either country, until Fonseka's boast last week. More details of the military cooperation are, however, emerging. According to a July 1 report in The Times of India, in 2008-2009 alone, over 500 Lankan army personnel are to be trained in Indian institutions like the Counter-Insurgency and Jungle Warfare School at Vairengte in Mizoram and the School of Artillery at Devlali in Maharashtra. According to the report, about 100 gentlemen cadets will receive training at the Indian Military Academy at Dehradun, 39 officers at the College of Military Engineering at Pune, 15 in the School of Artillery at Devlali, 29 in the Mechanised Infantry Regimental Centre at Ahmednagar, 25 in the College of Materials Management at Jabalpur, 30 in the Electronics and Mechanical Engineering School at Vadodara, and 14 at the Military College of Telecommunication Engineering at Mhow. Support does not stop at training alone. India has been supplying 'defensive' military equipment to Sri Lanka, including the indigenouslymanufactured Indra radars. Officially, India claims it does not supply offensive weapons to Sri Lanka, but there are strong possibilities of a secret arrangement being in place already. However, in June last year, when MK Narayanan publicly cautioned Sri Lanka against purchasing arms from China and Pakistan, he also said it could approach India for any help it required. Narayanan's statement could have meant only one thing, that India was ready to meet Sri Lanka's arms demands. India's relations with Sri Lanka is seen by many from the perspective of the Chinese geopolitical strategy in the region. Sri Lanka has moved closer to China in recent years, and Rajapakse, who came to power in 2005, has been particularly adept at playing the China card against India. Sri Lanka figures prominently in Chinese naval strategy, being part of China's "string of pearls" (or strategic bases) starting from the South China Sea and extending through the Strait of Malacca, Indian Ocean and on to the Arabian and Persian Gulfs. Security experts like B. Raman, a former additional secretary of the Government of India, have been expressing concern about the Chinese threat. In a recent column, Raman noted: "The semi-permanent presence, which the Chinese are getting in Sri Lanka, will bring them within monitoring distance of India's fast-breeder reactor complex at Kalpakkam near Chennai, the Russian aided Koodankulam nuclear power reactor complex in southern Tamil Nadu and India's space establishments in Kerala." WHILE INDIA'S need to counter this threat is beyond doubt, sections of those sympathetic to the Lankan Tamil cause see striking similarities in the present developments to the situation in the 1980s, in the run-up to the signing of the Indo-Sri Lanka accord in 1987. In that period, the then Sri Lankan president, JR Jayawardene, got India embroiled into fighting the LTTE. The consequences of that flawed intervention, and the immense suffering it caused Tamils at the hands of the Indian army, are yet to be erased from the bruised memories of Tamils all over the world. Discontent over the Centre's policies in Sri Lanka continues to simmer in Tamil Nadu, with various parties urging the Indian government to stop military aid to the country. The LTTE has also made appeals. Following Fonseka's visit to Delhi in March, the outfit issued a statement against India's growing military aid to Sri Lanka, saying: "While proclaiming that a solution to the Tamil problem must be found through peaceful means, India is giving encouragement to the military approach of the Sinhala State. This can only lead to the intensification of the genocide against the Tamils." A pro-LTTE Sri Lankan Tamil MP said recently, "We are optimistic even during this darkest hour. The Sri Lankan government will ditch India in favour of the Chinese in due course. Then India will have to change its policy and support the Tamils as Indira Gandhi did during her time." Whatever may be the future twists and turns in South Asia's highly unpredictable diplomatic world, as of now India cannot disown responsibility for its part in the Eelam tragedy.

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India-Pakistan

Marxists accused over Bengal 'terror'

2007-11-29

Marxists who have governed the Indian state of West Bengal for three decades are now suffering political isolation after months of clashes over plans to acquire farm land for industry. The Marxists' armed supporters have been blamed for violence in the embattled enclave of Nandigram south-west of Calcutta where locals have been resisting plans for the development of a special economic zone. "Their political isolation in West Bengal is complete. Even their allies are openly condemning them," says political analyst Sabyasachi Basu Ray Choudhuri. Critics of the Marxists include the state's governor, Gopal Gandhi, the judiciary, opposition parties, smaller left-wing parties in the state's governing coalition and leading intellectuals in West Bengal who command huge local respect. Scores of villagers have been killed in the violence and thousands made homeless. The intellectuals - some of Bengal's best known writers, dramatists, film directors, poets and actors - have taken to the streets in open defiance of the Marxists, as they have never done before. Smaller left-wing parties have said the state's governing Communist Party of India (Marxist), and not their allies, will have to take all the blame for the violence in Nandigram. One of their ministers, Kshiti Goswami, has threatened to resign. Opposition parties in the state - the Trinamul Congress, the BJP and even the Congress party which needs CPI(M) support for its coalition government in Delhi - have demanded the imposition of federal rule to stop what they call "red terror" in Nandigram. "What has upset everyone the most is the way the administration and the state police were forced to play a silent spectator as the Marxist cadres ran amok," analyst Basu Ray Choudhuri says. He says there are parallels with the 2002 riots in Gujarat state, where the Hindu nationalist BJP government was accused of failing to protect Muslims. Last week, West Bengal police chief AB Vohra shocked people by ordering federal police units to move from parts of Nandigram to less troubled areas. "Our homeless supporters would have returned home with the help of the Central Reserve Police Force [CRPF], but now that they are being removed from the worst affected areas, the situation will surely worsen. The police chief is behaving like a stooge of the Marxists," said opposition leader Mamata Banerji. She alleged that the relocation of the CRPF was ordered after they arrested several Marxist supporters who were spreading terror in the villages of Nandigram. These Marxist supporters, now dubbed the "Red Brigade", launched a full-scale armed assault on opposition strongholds in the first week of November from their bases in Khejuri. Police stood by or were withdrawn from sensitive areas like Tekhali Khal (that separates Nandigram from Khejuri), while the "Red Brigade" set fire to and bombed village after village until the opposition, also armed, fled. Opposition leaders, journalists, TV crews and social activists alike were all prevented from entering Nandigram, as thousands of armed Marxist supporters blocked roads and bridges leading to the area. According to official reports, at least 16 villagers have been killed by Marxist supporters. But locals say the real death count is many times more because the "Red Brigade" removed or burned many bodies or dumped them in rivers. Far from condemning the violence, West Bengal's Chief Minister, Buddhadev Bhattacharya, shocked everyone by saying that the opposition had been "paid back" in kind. When peasants held violent protests in January against a proposed chemical hub in Nandigram, the chief minister, who is desperately pushing for Bengal's industrialisation, sent in the police. Fourteen peasants were shot dead by police on 14 March, and the resultant furore forced the chief minister to withdraw the project from the area. CPI(M) state party chief Biman Bose attacked the judiciary after the high court criticised the state government for the police shooting and said it was "uncalled for". "Let the salary of the judges be increased. They can run the country - the executive and the legislature are not required," Mr Bose told a Marxist rally in Calcutta at the weekend. His party central committee colleague, Benoy Konar, took aim at Governor Gopal Gandhi. "You can join the opposition Trinamul Congress, but you cannot do that so long as you are governor," Mr Konar told the same rally. Marxist leaders speaking at that rally attacked the media and the intellectuals as "opportunists". The Marxists allege that their political opponents are trying to use events in Nandigram as a "massive propaganda ploy" in the run-up to state village council elections next year. "We only ensured our supporters could return to Nandigram from where they had been forcibly evicted," Mr Bose has said. He and Mr Konar, as well as a third party colleague Shyamal Chakrabarty, have been charged with criminal contempt for their remarks criticising the high court ruling. At the peak of the Nandigram violence, Governor Gandhi issued a press statement lambasting the state government for failing to contain the unrest. His report to the federal government was equally scathing in its criticism of the state authorities. India's national security adviser, MK Narayanan, defended the governor as "a very sensible person" and said his report was taken "very seriously" by Delhi. "It is time for the Marxists to do some real introspection over Nandigram," Mr Narayanan said.

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India-Pakistan

Pakistan inciting Sikh radicals, alleges India

2007-10-18

India’s top national security official has accused Pakistan of trying to stir up Sikh militancy in Punjab, striking a sour note ahead of direct talks this week between the South Asian rivals. The accusation by National Security Advisor MK Narayanan came in the wake of a bomb blast on Sunday in a packed cinema in the state’s industrial city of Ludhiana that killed six people and injured 32. “There has been a manifest attempt in Pakistan to build up a radical Sikh environment,” Narayanan was quoted as saying by the Indian Express daily. “We have tracked intelligence information, we have studied the way such attacks take place and we can read a pattern,” Narayanan said. A home ministry official and the state’s former police chief earlier this week also blamed Sunday’s attack on Sikh separatists, who have links to Islamic rebels allegedly backed by Pakistan. Former police chief Kanwar Pal Singh Gill, who is credited with wiping out the Sikh militant movement in the 1980s in a merciless crackdown, pointed a finger at a group called the Khalistan Zindabad Force (KZF). The group wants an independent state called Khalistan carved out of India and has been linked to Kashmir-based Islamic rebel groups.

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India-Pakistan

'Terrorists using banks for funds'

2007-03-22

India on Wednesday said that the terrorists have started using banks to finance their activities. "I'd like to apply for a loan, please!" "Whaddya got for collateral?" "How about this?" "Holy shit! I mean, Allahu Akbar! If that thing goes off we're all goners!" Minister for State for Home Sriprakash Jaiswal told the Rajya Sabha that while the ‘hawala’ system was the primary source of terrorist funding, banking channels are also emerging as “significant routes” for movement of money by these elements. “As per available reports, terrorists and terrorist organisations active in India are using different channels to fund their operations. They route their funds mainly through ‘hawala’ and other informal means,” he said, adding that the government was pursuing a multi-dimensional approach to deal with terrorist operations and supporting states to neutralise their activities. To a question on the recent observations of National Security Advisor MK Narayanan on the matter, Jaiswal said the NSA had recently recounted the methods adopted by terror outfits to generate funds and had pointed towards the reported “misuse” of the formal financial system by them. He said the revenue, security and law enforcement agencies were regularly sensitised to pursue an inter-agency approach to detect these channels and that the proposals relating to such sectors were referred to the Home and Defence Ministries for vetting from the security angle.

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