varnam

Even though Einstein had declined an offer to be Israel's President, he worked for Israeli causes and one such instance was when he wrote a letter to Jawaharlal Nehru, the prime minister designate of India in 1947 for supporting the establishment of a Jewish state. Nehru was aware of the sufferings of the Jews, but did not like the idea that the new state would be located on someone else land.

Einstein's four-page letter of June 13 1947 to Nehru focused on moral and historical arguments. He opened with praise for India's constituent assembly, which had just abolished untouchability. "The attention of the world was [now] fixed on the problem of another group of human beings who, like the untouchables, have been the victims of persecution and discrimination for centuries" - the Jews. He appealed to Nehru as a "consistent champion of the forces of political and economic enlightenment" to rule in favour of "the rights of an ancient people whose roots are in the East". He pleaded for "justice and equity". "Long before the emergence of Hitler I made the cause of Zionism mine because through it I saw a means of correcting a flagrant wrong."

But then Einstein took the bull by the horns, "the nature of [the] Arab opposition. Though the Arab of Palestine has benefited... economically, he wants exclusive national sovereignty, such as is enjoyed by the Arabs of Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Lebanon and Syria [sic]. It is a legitimate and natural desire, and justice would seem to call for its satisfaction." But at the end of the first world war, the Allies gave the Arabs 99% of the "vast, underpopulated territories" liberated from the Turks to satisfy their national aspirations and five independent Arab states were established. One per cent was reserved for the Jews "in the land of their origin". "In the august scale of justice, which weighs need against need, there is no doubt as to whose is more heavy." What the Jews were allotted in the Balfour Declaration "redresses the balance" of justice and history. He concluded by appealing to Nehru to brush aside "the rivalries of power politics and the egotism of petty nationalist appetites" and to support "the glorious renascence which has begun in Palestine". [Einstein's other theory via Smooth Stone]

Nehru replied back saying that due to India's national interests (Muslim minority and Arab friendship), we could not support them and India voted with the Muslim states against partition. Einstein's exchange with Nehru recently surfaced in the Israeli archives and provides details of the mails they exchanged and the mails they did not exchange. Even though Nehru declined Einstein's request, he went and met him later in 1949.

Nehru's opposition for the creation of Israel, did not stand his way of asking their help during the 1962 war with China. Nehru asked David Ben-Gurion for help and Israelis sent military equipment. During the 1965 and 1971 wars too Israel sent mortar rounds, while our so called friends did pretty much nothing. India also demanded that while Israel sent ammunition, they remove any Israeli markings from it. The ammunition was obtained regularly as demanded and India condemned them in public and always supported the Palestinian cause.

Natwar Singh was in Washington DC today and met President Bush in the Oval Office. Rediff calls this historic, as Natwar is the first Indian Foreign Minister to enter the Oval Office. In International Diplomatic mating ritual, an invite to the Oval Office is considered as getting access to the second base. Till now, the President would drop-in while the Minister was meeting the Secretary of State or someone like that. (It is also possible that the President lost his way and reached the wrong room). So this is what is now considered progress and we have learned to become happy in symbolic gestures.

One of the major issues recently was that the United States is giving some F-16s to Pakistan. Apparently Natwar Singh did not raise the issue at all in his meeting with the President. The focus was on economic and energy coperation. The counterpoint is, even if you raise the issue, the answer will be standard canned one - vital ally in war on terror, need to strengthen him etc. Scott McClellan also mentioned that the United States believes that these F-16s do not affect the balance of power in the region.

While India seems to have accepted this decision, few folks are still fighting the F-16 sales. Gary Ackerman & Co. are going to introduce the Pakistan Proliferation Accountability Act of 2005 which demands access to AQ Khan as a condition for getting the F-16s.

One of the things the President told Natwar Singh was that he is interested in visiting India either this year or next year. It will be interesting to see the Indian Commies having to shake hands with the President. More interesting is the question - will the President visit Pakistan and if so, will he have to sneak in like Clinton?

So now it's an emotional appeal

Observing that India was a larger country, he said �??�??thus magnanimity must be shown by it�??�??. �??�??When a smaller nation shows magnanimity, it is seen as a sign of backtracking or buckling under pressure. However, for a larger nation�??s magnanimity, it is seen as large heartedness.�??�??[General lands today, PM for cross-LoC initiatives in Kashmir]

What Musharraf is trying to say is this: "We tried to get Kashmir in 1948, but that turned out to be a stupid thing to do. We tried again in 1965 and 1999. Then we tried sneaking in terrorists and called that providing "moral and diplomatic support". Our homegrown terrorists murdered lots of Kashmiris and got rid of the Hindus from the valley. But even that strategy failed. So here is my next avatar as a saint. So I beg you, show some large heartedness and give us Kashmir."

"But don't ask us to reciprocate. We have already declared that we are inflexible. I recently mentioned in my website that you guys are our arch enemy. We also rejected the visas of some Indian musicians and also denied MFN status to India. But still give us Kashmir".

"My country is in dire straits. The American embassy in Karachi is closed based on some unknown threat. Lahore and Karachi airports were put on high alert. Balochistan is revolting against us. About 50,000 PPP activists are in jail. But leaving all that I am here in India because I want my Olive tree and so please give us Kashmir".

A plot of land meant for Palestinian Embassy here has also been gifted to the PLA, he said. India has earlier also been giving assistance to Palestinian people and Minister of State for External Affairs E Ahamed himself carried vehicles and medicines there last year. [India gives Rs 65 crore aid to Palestine link via What? come again...]

The Oil-for-Food programme was a scheme under which Iraq, which was facing export sanctions, was authorized to sell oil to people of their choosing. Iraq, naturally chose to sell oil to nations and people who were sympathetic to their view. There is nothing illegal in this. But one source of illegal income was from something called "surcharges" paid on crude oil contracts and Iraq made about 228 million dollars through this.

Besides established companies, Iraq also awarded contracts to individuals in positions of influence as well and the selected people were ones who were influential in their countries, and produced pro-Iraq, anti-sanction views. Political parties and organizations too received allocations and familiarity with the oil trading market was not required. Individuals and entities other than the named contracting party are called "non-contractual beneficieries" in the Volker Report . Natwar Singh, Congress Party, and Bhim Singh are listed under this category.

The Indian Express has more

While Natwar has called these allegations ‘‘baseless and untrue’’, the fact is his son Jagat was involved in promoting M/s Hamdan Trading, which is owned by his friend Andy Sehgal, for cornering contracts in Iraq between 2000-2002. Indian diplomats posted in west Asia in that period confirm that Jagat Singh paid at least two visits to Iraq, one of them just days before Saddam’s ‘‘referendum’’ of October 15, 2002.

On condition of anonymity, these officials alleged Jagat, who is now Congress MLA from Lachchmangarh, Rajasthan, used the offices of the Indian Embassy in Baghdad to push his business interests. [Cong Saddamed by Natwar & his son]

Here is another gem

India's External Affairs Minister wanted to know why Mr. Volcker had headed the Committee and not "some independent person from the developing world."

"One thing is certain that in this era of liberalisation, corruption is a component of the system itself," he said.[Volcker report allegations baseless: Natwar]

Both the Communists and Congressmen seem to be caught off-guard with this and are trying all possible tricks from their book to get this off their back. Instead of using the old and crude techniques (like blame Paul Volker, blame liberalization, blame Darth Vader), it would be great if Natwar Singh can explain to us the role of Jagat Singh and his relation with Masefield AG, the contracting company. That would have more credibility. But that is too much to expect.

Related Links: The Acorn builds the case for why Natwar Singh must resign.

Till the Bill Clinton era, India was one notch below Pakistan for United States. From that it moved into a hyphenated equivalence and during the Kargil War and Clinton visit, it was India who had the upper hand. Now with the nuclear deal, there seems to be a lot of suspicion. Strobe Talbott uses the word "Estrangement" to describe the relations between India and United States. The relationship never became cordial due to the Pakistani tilt of the Americans. During the 1971 war with Pakistan, Americans despatched the aircraft carrier Enterprise to show off its force and that did not help relations either. As the relation between the two democracies is progressing through all the navarasas, it was amusing to read that many Americans favoured a good relation between the two countries from the 50s.

One of the first people who suggested that India should be taken seriously was Chester Bowles, who succeeded John Kenneth Galbraith as the US Ambassador to India. Bowles was of the opinion that India should not be seen as an ally of USSR, but as a developing country that had chosen democracy over communism.

After the first Indian nuclear test in 1974, Henry Kissinger visited India as President Ford's Secretary of State. Even though Kissinger did not like Indira Gandhi much, he admired the way she conducted the nuclear tests. Also in a speech to the Indian Council of World Affairs he called for a mature relationship based on Indian preeminence in the region. He also directed that United States not pressurize India on the nuclear weapons program.

Though powerful people like Kissinger held that opinion, the relationship did not reach any level of maturity that was dreamed of as United States was playing geopolitical games with Russia and needed Pakistan and India was coddling with Communist dictators in the name of Non Alignment.

[Source: Engaging India: Diplomacy, Democracy, and the Bomb by Strobe Talbott]

When you think of poverty, countries like Saudi Arabia and United States do not come to mind, but there are pockets of poverty in both these countries. In Saudi Arabia, the guess would be that the poor people would be the expatriate people and the guess would be wrong. It seems there are poor Saudis too.

The image of Saudi Arabia abroad is of a land teaming with wealth and opportunity — the “oil-rich desert Kingdom” as the international media insist on saying. Inside the Kingdom, it is a rather different picture. Yes, there is wealth and opportunity — and massive development — but there is also poverty. The slums of south Riyadh or south Jeddah are real and shocking. It is not expatriate laborers who live in such places; it is poor Saudis. They cannot afford anything better. Nor is poverty confined to places like Qarantina in Jeddah or Suwaidi in Riyadh. There is serious rural poverty as well; as elsewhere, it manifests itself in substandard, rundown accommodation.

For many years, Saudi poverty was a taboo subject, unspoken by those who saw it as shameful and who foolishly imagined that by ignoring it, it would go away. It was Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah who, as crown prince, broke the taboo. His unprecedented visit to the slums of Suwaidi just over three years ago brought poverty into the open and with it a determination address the issue. [Poverty in the Kingdom]

This city at the heart of the richest farmland in the world has been poor for so long, no one can remember it otherwise. Last month, when the Brookings Institution issued a report that said a higher proportion of poor people in Fresno lived in areas of concentrated poverty than in any other major city in the country -- pre-Katrina New Orleans was number two -- no one here was surprised. "My goodness, that's why I ran," said Alan Autry, who became mayor in 2000. "I called it 'A Tale of Two Cities.' "[In Fresno, Tackling Poverty Moves to the Top of the Agenda]

The ultimate dream for a Malayali is to go to the "Gulf". For people back home, Gulf is a place where anyone from the educated to the uneducated can get a job, send dirhams back home, and raise the quality of life of their family. Recently a friend was starting a business in Dubai and told me about the problems facing workers there. Whatever he told is mentioned in this New York Times article on the migrant workers in Dubai.

A growing number have resorted to suicide rather than return home with empty pockets: last year, 84 South Asians committed suicide in Dubai, according to the Indian Consulate here, up from 70 in 2004.

Mr. Kumaran, who earns 550 dirhams every month, or about $150, as a laborer, sends home almost half his earnings and lives on the equivalent of roughly $60 a month. That is barely enough to pay for food and cigarettes and using his cellphone from time to time. But he is not sure how he will repay the loan he took to get here.

"If I'd stayed in India and worked just as hard as I do now, I could have made the same money," he said. "And I wouldn't have needed to get a loan to come here."[In Dubai, an Outcry From Asians for Workplace Rights]

But the mass action on Tuesday was the most significant of its kind. Hundreds of workers building the Burj Dubai skyscraper chased security guards and broke into offices, smashing computers, scattering files and wrecking cars and construction machines. When they returned to work the next day, demanding better pay and improved working conditions, thousands of laborers building an airport terminal across town also laid down their tools, demanding better conditions, too. The workers also halted work on Thursday, until a settlement was negotiated.

There are many angles to this story. We are so used to fighting for our rights in Kerala that we think it will work everywhere. In countries where human rights do not exist, such protests may result in loss of job and deportation. At the same time, these countries require migrant workers to fuel their economy and do jobs which their citizens are not willing to do. Then there are people from less fortunate backgrounds who are willing to take the abuse for a good living and they can displace the protesting Malayalees.

Immediately after condemning the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, Pakistani Foreign Minister, Khurshid Kasuri suggested that the best way to deal with terrorism was to tackle the real issue of Jammu and Kashmir. What has a bomb blast in Mumbai got to do with Kashmir, you may wonder, but that seems to be the association in the Western World as well. When Michael Krasny made this association in Forum the Consul General of India, B.S. Prakash, asked him the same question.

Note that all this association was already made, very prematurely, even before the Police had clues connecting SIMI and LeT and before the congratulatory phone calls were traced. Even before this, suggestions came from various experts that the peace process should not suffer due to such terrorist activities and even thinking about reviewing the process would be falling into the terrorist trap.

Echoing the insensitive line by Khurshid Kasuri , Xenia Dormandy suggested that Kashmir is the problem and India needs to step up in offering something in Kashmir. To give her credit, and she said the right things  on her interview with Neil Conan on Talk of the Nation, that the terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan is a big problem. Now the Economist too has suggested that India and Pakistan should solve the Kashmir issue.

All this faith in the peace process is built on the assumption that once the Kashmir resolved, with major "compromises" (code word for land donation), there will be ever lasting peace process in the sub-continent. Israel has learned the hard way this week that making such compromises do not guarantee anything, other than an escalation in violence.

Last September Israel withdrew from the Gaza strip and Gaza became the first completely independent Palestinian territory. The Palestinians fired rockets from Gaza, and then later dug a tunnel from there and kidnapped an Israeli soldier. Israel withdrew from Lebanon in 2000. United Nations verified the withdrawal and was satisfied with it. Now from Lebanon, Hezbollah entered Israel and kidnapped two soldiers. Now Israel is fighting a war on two fronts.

What is the guarantee that Gaza and Lebanon will not happen to India. How can you trust a nation which does not want to dismantle the terrorist infrastructure and  which was planning Kargil, while yet another peace process was going on?<

It was last year in October that the Paul Volker, the former Federal Reserve Chairman released his report on the Iraqi Oil for Food programme. The report mentioned Natwar Singh, the Congress Party, and Bhim Singh as "non-contractual beneficiaries". The Iraqis had bribed political parties and people in position to influence their opinion.

When the report came out Natwar Singh immediately called it baseless. After that, just to prove that he genuinely had lost his marbles, he suggested that Paul Volker had political designs and was targeting opponents of the war. He also wanted to know why an American was appointed to investigate and not a person from a developing country. The Communists who are always in the race to show they are the benchmark when it comes to stupid statements contributed the gem that all this was due to the liberalization of the economy. Natwar Singh, then went so far, like George Galloway to suggest that he has no idea how a barrel of oil looks like.

It did not matter to these people that Table III in the report listed Americans, British, Italian and Spanish nationals (all from countries who made up the Coalition forces)  accused of similar crime. Since we don't trust Americans, a Committe was appointed to investigate the matter. Now the Justice Pathak Committee has found Natwar Singh and his son Jagat Singh guilty.

Andaleeb Sehgal, a friend of Jagat Singh, and Aditya Khanna, a relative of Natwar Singh, are understood to have received financial payoffs in the deal by getting oil coupons based on the letters of recommendation given by Natwar Singh.

The authority has found that Natwar and his son had misused their position in helping Sehgal and Khanna bag three oil contracts from the UN sanctioned Saddam regime.

Sehgal and Khanna, in turn, passed the contracts on to Swiss oil company Masefield AG which drew the oil and paid them a commission, the report says, adding that on a cut of five cents a barrel, Sehgal and Khanna received a total commission of $1,46,000, which they divided between themselves in a ratio of 4:1. [Natwar Singh, son indicted in oil-for-food scam

Here are some excerpts from the speeches from the Nonaligned Movement summit in Cuba

"When there no longer is a Cold War, the United States spends one billion dollars a year in weapons and soldiers and it squanders a similar amount in commercial publicity," he said. "To think that a social and economic order that has proven unsustainable could be maintained by force is simply an absurd idea." [Raul Castro]

"Under any scenario, we are with you just like we are with Cuba," Chavez told Iran. "If the United States invades Cuba, blood will run. ... We will not have our arms crossed while bombs are falling in Havana or they carry Raul off in a plane." [Hugo Chavez]

While Israel was bombing Lebanon and Hezbollah was firing missiles randomly into Israeli civilian population, the Lok Sabha passed a resolution condemning the Israeli attack on Lebanon.

‘‘Deeply concerned over escalation of this conflict which affects India’s security and other vital interests, this House calls for an immediate and unconditional ceasefire so that further destruction of Lebanon is prevented,’’ Chatterjee said, reading out the resolution reflecting what he said was ‘‘mood of the House’’.

 

The Lok Sabha in the resolution expressed ‘‘its deepest condolences, sympathy and support of the People of India to the people of Lebanon in this difficult time.’’[House slams Israel strike on Lebanon]

If there is someone you can trust these days, those are the terrorists. That seems to be the message in the world of Foreign Affairs these days. If you don't believe me, our Prime Minister, the dictator next door and the State Department can vouch for this.

Once you grab that hand it is so difficult to let it go. No, we are not talking about Meera Jasmine 's or Kavya Madhavan's hands, but Musharraf's. That seems to be the predicament of all Indian Prime Ministers starting with Vajpayee. Vajpayee went all way to Pakistan and kissed those hands which masterminded Kargil. Then came Manmohan Singh and he too did the same thing in the conclave of tyrants in Havana. Maybe it was the Cuban air, maybe Manmohan Singh is plain crazy, but India and Pakistan have agreed to put in place a anti-terrorism institutional mechanism, which is like Veeru and Gabbar Singh signing an agreement to hunt down Sambha.

If India had no reason to distrust Musharraf, Musharraf had no reason to distrust the 2500 foreign fighters linked to Taliban and al-Qaeda fighting in Waziristan. It did not matter that some of these gentlemen belonged to Islamic welfare organizations, such "the al-Khidmat Foundation run by the hard-line Islamist party Jamaat-i-Islami and some of them had tried to assassinate Musharraf. The Govt.  reached an agreement with the terrorists. They (terrorists) would not involve in cross-border terrorism and stop attacks on government installations and security forces. In turn Pakistani Army would not undertake any ground or air operation against the militants. If Musharraf wanted a template for such agreements we could have faxed him a copy from the many India has signed with various Pakistani Prime Minister and dictators.

While we are waiting for the next bomb to explode in a crowded train or temple as a result of all that forbidden love  in Pakistan, the State Department is smiling like Hugo Chavez after seeing Fidel Castro. This is the perfect world according to Richard Boucher, the Washington Bob. He thinks that the agreement between Musharraf and the terrorists has the potential to work which only shows how clueless the State Department folks are. But then the State Department has put all its eggs in Musharraf's basket and they cannot do anything else, but trust him.

Sometimes international politics and diplomacy offers more chance of fun than watching kids play in a day care center. The first one comes from Colonel Muammar Gaddafi who landed in Nigeria with some 200 armed body guards. When the Nigerians refused the body guards to carry arms, Gaddafi threatened to walk some 40 kms to the capital city from the airport. With some intervention from President Obasanjo, the Libyans backed down, though it would have been more fun to see Gaddafi walk all that distance.

The second piece of funny news from that land where Uncle Castro rules from the bed. Right now the biggest threat to Cuban national security comes from - Rock Climbers (gasp!). The reason is that Castro launched his 1959 revolution from a camp in the Sierra Maestra Mountains and now the the Cuban Govt. thinks that all people who climb mountains are about to conduct another revolution. Also some of the Cubans climb mountains with Americans. Due to this now Cubans are required to get a permit before climbing, with only one problem that no one knows how to get a permit.

If tiny countries can act juvenile, it is hard for the lone superpower to stay away. In a move which is sure to bring down the regime of Kim Jong Il, United States has banned the export of iPods, plasma televisions and Segway electric scooters to North Korea. When Kim knows that he will have to listen to music on the Zune, watch the latest James Bond movie on a normal television and will have to walk instead of zipping on the Segway, he is sure to roll back his nuclear programme and come out from the Dark Side.

I thought I would stay away from blogging for the holidays, but all these folks won't let me.

INI Signal — that’s where people are thinking out of the tank. Please update your bookmarks, your blogrolls and your feed readers and join us every day.

According to an Iraqi court Saddam Hussein was  found guilty of the massacre of Iraqis in Dujail and sentenced to death.

"Now, he is in the garbage of history," said Jawad Abdul-Aziz, who lost his father, three brothers and 22 cousins in the reprisal killings that followed a botched 1982 assassination attempt against Saddam in the Shiite town of Dujail. It was the Dujail killings of which Saddam was convicted. [Iraqis execute Saddam for mass killings]

Stating that the "American imperialism has raised a grim challenge to the world peace once again through the execution of Saddam Hussein", Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan said the Iraqi leader would be remembered forever as a martyr who heroically fought the imperialist interests.[Hartal in Kerala, leaders condemn Saddam's execution]

DOING the arithmetic is an imprecise venture. The largest number of deaths attributable to Mr. Hussein's regime resulted from the war between Iraq and Iran between 1980 and 1988, which was launched by Mr. Hussein. Iraq says its own toll was 500,000, and Iran's reckoning ranges upward of 300,000. Then there are the casualties in the wake of Iraq's 1990 occupation of Kuwait. Iraq's official toll from American bombing in that war is 100,000 — surely a gross exaggeration — but nobody contests that thousands of Iraqi soldiers and civilians were killed in the American campaign to oust Mr. Hussein's forces from Kuwait. In addition, 1,000 Kuwaitis died during the fighting and occupation in their country.
More recently, according to Iraqis who fled to Jordan and other neighboring countries, scores of women have been executed under a new twist in a "return to faith" campaign proclaimed by Mr. Hussein. Aimed at bolstering his support across the Islamic world, the campaign led early on to a ban on drinking alcohol in public. Then, some time in the last two years, it widened to include the public killing of accused prostitutes.

Often, the executions have been carried out by the Fedayeen Saddam, a paramilitary group headed by Mr. Hussein's oldest son, 38-year-old Uday. These men, masked and clad in black, make the women kneel in busy city squares, along crowded sidewalks, or in neighborhood plots, then behead them with swords. The families of some victims have claimed they were innocent of any crime save that of criticizing Mr. Hussein. [How Many People Has Saddam Killed?]

Recently on a visit to Myanmar, India's External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said in diplomatic language that we don't care if the people of Myanmar are suffering under dictatorship. India would not talk about democracy since it is not one of our exports. Mr. Mukherjee also comically said that democracy is something each country has to decide as if one fine day, the junta would decide to hand over power and fade away into oblivion.

Indian Govt. has also agreed to sell arms to the military rulers without uttering a word about the state of the Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi who celebrated her 60th birthday under house arrest. In fact our support of the dictators are  worse that when Senior General Than Shwe of Myanmar visited India, visas were refused to a number of speakers who wanted to speak about democracy.

In the most recent State of the Union Speech, President Bush mentioned that United States would continue to speak for the cause of freedom in places like Burma (The US refuses to call it Myanmar). The President also said that he would "continue to awaken the conscience of the world to save the people of Darfur".

After maintaining silence about Darfur, the word finally appeared in the State of the Union, which is due to the activism by various groups, journalists and movie stars. They believe they can cause the super power to act. Now activists are targeting companies which do business in Sudan like Siemens AG and forcing them to pull out. States like Texas, Nebraska and Colorado have introduced bills, like the one passed in California forcing state pension funds not to invest in Sudan.

These activists know that United States can exert pressure both economically and politically to prevent the genocide. At the same time when Pranab Mukherjee says that he does not care about the state of the people in Myanmar, we have to ask if any change will be caused due to India's pressure.  Our external influence extends upto Katmandu and not a kilometer more. Even that is questionable.

If, God forbid, India starts throwing its weight around, then Myanmar will just become a vassal state of China and nothing will change for the people of Myanmar. Somehow Mr. Mukherjee's statement give an illusion that we have the leverage to cause a change in Myanmar, but we refuse to. It is vastly different from reality.

(Crossposted on INI Signal)

The other day we expressed our regret at Pranab Mukherjee's silence in Myanmar on the state of affairs there and the treatment given to Aung San Suu Kyi.

Yesterday, in one speech Bishop Desmond Tutu mentioned all the things which India should support, but does not. More credit to him for saying all this while accepting Gandhi Peace Prize in the presence of both the President and the Prime Minister.

Nobel laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu on Wednesday caught the Indian leadership unaware by advocating independence for Tibet at a function to award him the Gandhi Peace Prize at the Presidential Palace.“We thank you for giving refuge to one of the greatest human beings, Dalai Lama, and pray that you help bring about freedom of his Tibet,” the South African anti-Apartheid struggle hero told the gathering that included Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in his acceptance speech after President APJ Abdul Kalam presented the award to him.

Indian officials promptly distanced Delhi from the remark, saying Tutu had only expressed his “personal” views. Former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee had articulated India’s position on Tibet in 2003 when he acknowledged the concept of “one China”. Officials said the stand had remained the same. Dedicating the peace prize to Myanmarese pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, Tutu sought India’s help to bring about the “freedom” of Myanmar and release Suu Kyi. He  also dedicated the prize to the people of South Africa and the freedom of Darfur.[Tutu’s remark on Tibet creates flutter]

Now the folks at Ministry of External Affairs will be crawling on their knees in the embassies of China, Myanmar and Sudan expressing "regret" and informing them that they can continue with their genocide and we would never interfere.

Seeing Burma's new capital city Naypyitaw, he wrote "its geometry so incredibly vast that even a crowd of half a million is unlikely to pose a political threat". He was thrilled to see Mr. Ahmadinejad, the leader of a nation which supports the Lebanese Shiite militants of Hezbollah  and such terrorist groups as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. His blog looks like a journey through the axis of evil, with an occasional diversion via an interview with a Maoist. It does not take a Sherlock Holmes to figure out that Siddharth Varadarajan works for The Hindu.

In his latest post on the events in the Korean Peninsula, he is happy that a dramatic breakthrough has happened, but he puts the blame entirely on United States for the North Korean nuclear test while making North Koreans look like saints. He says that President George Bush's remark classifying North Korea among the "axis of evil" undermined the 1994 Agreed Framework. North Koreans have not said so, but Mr. Varadarajan alone comes up with this theory. 

North Korea has a long history of terrorism and provocations against Japan and South Korea. Even though  South Korea was willing to ignore all activities of terrorism against it, but the Japanese were not. North Korea kidnapped Japanese citizens and used them for training North Korean agents for terrorism and in the six party talks, the Americans told several times to the North Koreans to settle the kidnapping issue and they did not.

When members of the Royal Navy were captured by the Iranians in March, the Iranians made sure that the British were decently humiliated. The sailors had to apologize for straying into Iranian waters and later  thank president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for magnanimously releasing them. The entire nation could do nothing, but watch this public humiliation in silence. Now displaying something called spine, the British have knighted Salman Rushdie providing employment opportunities for suicide bombers. The Iranians are upset and made the usual remarks.

There is a lesson from this for us. Now that China is making noise about Arunachal Pradesh (in the spirit of Hindi-Chini-Bhai-Bade Bhai) we can follow the British model and cause some discomfort to the Chinese. One great way would be to ask the Prime Minister of India to give the keynote on the first 'Conference for an Independent Tibet' organized by Friends of Tibet from June 23-24, 2007 in Delhi. Later in the day we could organize a discussion on the teachings of Falun Gong and compare their spiritual practices with Indian spiritual techniques.

Yes, it is juvenile, but sometimes it is the best way to get the message across.

It was the failure of Jawaharlal Nehru and V K Krishna Menon and those in India's ministry of external affairs who were their advisers to understand the Chinese mindset, which led to the national humiliation in the Sino-Indian war of 1962.

Repeated warnings from the Intelligence Bureau about the large-scale Chinese intrusions into the Aksai Chin area of Ladakh and their construction of a road there were not only ignored, but these disturbing developments were kept away from the knowledge of the public and Parliament. They fondly believed that they would be able to make the Chinese see reason and withdraw from this region by observing a policy of silence and not articulating our concerns in public. Their fond hopes were belied.

It was not the Indian intelligence and security forces which were responsible for the 1962 debacle. It was the political leadership, which was living in an illusory world of its own creation [Tawang: Some Indian plain-speaking at last!]

Not much has changed from the days of Nehru in terms of preparedness, but now it is hard to hide such information from the public and Parliament and that in turn forces the  Ministers to make hard hitting public statements.

Talking to journalists in Shillong on June 16, Mukherjee said 'he had made it clear to his new Chinese counterpart that any elected Government of India is not permitted by the provisions of the Constitution to part with any part of our land that sends representatives to the Indian Parliament.'

The minister added: 'The days of Hitler are over. After the Second World War, no country captures land of another country in the present global context. That is why there is a civilised mechanism of discussions and dialogue to sort out border disputes. We sit around the table and discuss disputes to resolve them.'

Antony told journalists in New Delhi on June 18, 'China has been building infrastructure (near the Line of Actual Control). We are also building infrastructure. Nobody can prevent both sides. There is nothing wrong in that. They have the right to build infrastructure on their territory. We have the right to do that on ours. We are also trying to hasten the development of our infrastructure. They have their perception (about Arunachal Pradesh). On our part, we are very categorical that Arunachal Pradesh is part of India.' [Tawang: Some Indian plain-speaking at last!]

I wish they tried some of our suggestions as well.