Nuclear war an option, India says

By Jan Cienski

Washington, DC, Jan. 11— India’s top military chief said yesterday the country was prepared for a nuclear war and threatened the annihilation of Pakistan if the countries’ latest confrontation over Kashmir should come to that.

General S. Padmanabhan said India would not be the first to use atomic weapons, but would retaliate fiercely if Pakistan launched a nuclear attack.

“The perpetrator of that particular outrage shall be punished so severely that their continuation thereafter in any form of fray will be doubtful,” said Gen. Padmanabhan in the Indian capital. “If we go to war, jolly good!”

Mincing no words, Gen. Padmanabhan said the massive Indian deployment along the border with Pakistan was not for show.

“We don’t play soldiers on the border,” he said. “What I’m doing is for real. I have not gone to do an exercise. I have to be ready for war to defend my country.”

A senior Indian official was quick to say the General’s bellicose remarks were not cleared or sanctioned by the Prime Minister’s office. The war talk came on the eve of a much-anticipated speech today by General Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan’s President, in which he is expected to announce further steps to clamp down on militants using Pakistan as a base to attack Indian-ruled Kashmir.

Washington is becoming increasingly nervous as the two nuclear powers ready for war, threatening to fracture George W. Bush’s carefully constructed anti-terrorist coalition.

Colin Powell, the US Secretary of State, is flying to the subcontinent next week on a peace-keeping mission.

“The President continues to call on all of the parties to recognize the importance of working to fight terrorism,” said Ari Fleischer, the White House spokesman, from Air Force One yesterday. “The President remains concerned about the region. India and Pakistan have a mutual enemy in terrorists, not in each other.”

Donald Rumsfeld, the US Secretary of Defense, warned any hostilities between India and Pakistan would hugely complicate the US effort to root out al-Qaida terrorists in Afghanistan. The US military flies most of its men and supplies from vessels in the Arabian Sea, through Pakistani airspace and on to Afghanistan.

“In the event of a conflict, Pakistan would have a very different view about the use of its airspace than it does now,” Rumsfeld said.

As it prepares for a possible war, Pakistan has quietly asked the United States to reduce its presence at two of the four bases it is using for its Afghan operations.

So far, Pakistan is maintaining troops along its border with Afghanistan, helping capture fleeing al-Qaida operatives. But if tensions with New Delhi continue to rise, those soldiers may be moved to respond to the more serious threat from India.

New Delhi blames Islamabad for supporting the two Kashmiri separatist groups it accuses of staging a suicide attack on its parliament on Dec. 13.

India is demanding that Pakistan hand over 20 terrorist suspects and has called Gen. Musharraf’s arrest of the leaders of two Kashmiri separatist groups and hundreds of supporters inadequate.

Both countries have severed diplomatic links, put their armed forces on alert and moved hundreds of thousands of troops to their joint border.

Yesterday, the two sides exchanged mortar fire along the border, with India claiming it had killed eight Pakistani troops and had destroyed 19 Pakistani bunkers.

In the state of Kashmir, where guerrillas have been waging a bloody struggle to split the majority Muslim state from overwhelmingly Hindu India, Indian troops said they had engaged in several gun battles that left six militants and one civilian dead.

A Pakistani military spokesman denied the Indian claims.

The exchange of bullets was matched by the fierce rhetoric coming from both national capitals.

In his saber-rattling press conference, Gen. Padmanabhan warned that India was “fully ready” for war. “When two forces are opposite each other, you are close to actual war,” he said.

He also said India was preparing to go ahead with military exercises along the border and, if events warranted, his forces were prepared to move on Pakistan to dismantle Kashmiri training camps.

“We may not cross [into Pakistani territory] but our weapons will have to cross. Our aircraft will have to cross,” he said.

In Islamabad, the Pakistani military spokesman warned about the consequences of India’s military buildup.

“We know the Indians have amassed troops at the border ... which is causing friction between the two countries,” said General Rashid Quereshi.

As the two sides jostle for military and propaganda advantage, India is attempting to drag the United States into the fray.

Using the anti-terrorist goals first spelled out by Bush, Lal Krishna Advani, India’s hawkish Home Minister, was in Washington this week, trying to persuade the United States that the Kashmiri problem is part of the wider war on terrorism and urging Bush to put pressure on Pakistan.

“The Pakistan government has been financing terrorists. The Pakistan government has been supplying them arms,” Advani told PBS television.

While Gen. Musharraf has moved against Kashmiri militants, he is not expected to abandon Pakistan’s tradition of support for groups trying to secede from India. The neighbors have fought two wars over the divided state since gaining independence in 1947 and the General risks a domestic backlash if he abandons Kashmir.

Source: National Post

Israel sends in its death squads and more bulldozers

By Phil Reeves

Jerusalem, Jan. 15— Israel’s government, undeterred by a barrage of criticism for illegal destruction of scores of homes inhabited by Gaza refugees, dispatched its bulldozers on another wrecking mission, this time to flatten Arab houses in occupied east Jerusalem.

As the giant machines reduced to dust the dreams of more Palestinian families on a scrubby hillside below Mount Scopus, Israel’s death squads notched up another killing of a militant in the northern West Bank. Raed-al-Karmi, from the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, was killed in a bomb blast outside his West Bank hide-out. Guerrillas from his group struck back soon afterwards, killing one Israeli and wounding another in a roadside shooting near a West Bank settlement.

The destruction of nine homes in the Palestinian neighborhood of Issawiyeh was done on the orders of Jerusalem’s municipal authorities. But all demolition orders pass through Israel’s Ministry of Interior — which supplied scores of armed border police to supervise the wrecking mission — and through the office of the Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon.

Sharon declined to intervene, defying Israeli liberals who have condemned his role in last week’s destruction of 60 homes in Rafah, southern Gaza, which made hundreds of poverty-stricken Palestinians homeless at the height of winter.

The demolitions were committed, as is usually the case, on the official pretext that the homes were built without permits, which are routinely denied to Palestinians wanting to build in east Jerusalem, occupied by Israel in 1967 and later illegally annexed. It was part of Israel’s long-term strategy of limiting the number of Arabs in the city, who make up about 30 percent of the 600,000 population.

The destroyed houses overlook a bypass road being built to connect Israeli settlements on Jerusalem’s eastern flank, part of a matrix of Jewish suburbs built to give Israel control over the metropolis.

Unlike the smashed homes in Gaza, most of the houses flattened yesterday were unoccupied. This did nothing to assuage the misery of Basim Ellayan, 43, a financial consultant who sank his $50,000 savings into building a family home, now in ruins. “I worked more than 20 years to collect the money for this house,” he said yesterday, as he stood by the wreckage. “Then they come and destroy everything in a minute.”

Anger among Palestinians of Jerusalem was deeper still in the West Bank town of Tulkarm, where crowds screaming, “Revenge” took to the streets to follow a stretcher carrying the corpse of a fugitive militia leader, killed by a bomb hidden in a wall close to his hide-out.

Israel refused to confirm that its forces assassinated Karmi, 28, a leader of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a paramilitary group affiliated with the mainstream Fatah organization. But the killing had all the hallmarks. He was high on Israel’s wanted list, and had openly boasted of killing Israelis.

The Israeli government issued a statement saying he was responsible for numerous attacks, including the murder of two Tel Aviv restaurateurs last year. The army has tried to kill him before: in September, he narrowly escaped when Israeli helicopters fired missiles at his car, killing two fellow guerrillas.

His killing blew another hole in Arafat’s ceasefire order, issued a month ago. An al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades statement said last night: “The hoax of the so-called cease-fire is canceled, canceled, canceled.” Then came the fatal shooting of an Israeli near the West Bank settlement of Shavei Shomron.

That supplied Sharon with another reason to press ahead with his long campaign to corrode Palestinian claims to build a nation in all of the West Bank and Gaza; to present Arafat as a weapons-smuggling Iranian-allied terrorist leader; and steadily to consolidate Israel’s hold on the lion’s share of the occupied territories.

At least 804 Palestinians and 239 Israelis have been killed since the uprising began 15 months ago.

Source: Independent (UK)

Protests and disturbances continue in Argentina

By Marcela Valente

Buenos Aires, Argentina, Jan. 11 (IPS)— The latest street protest in the center of the Argentine capital ended Friday with looting of shops and stone-throwing against banks, after thousands of demonstrators banged on pots and pans to demand that the government allow them to gain access to their deposits.

Banks, restaurants, phone booths, and bus stops were destroyed in the early hours of Friday morning by a small group of protesters, after more than 6,000 people demonstrated in the Plaza de Mayo in front of the presidential palace.

Foreign exchange houses opened Friday, five days after the devaluation of the peso and other economic emergency measures were announced. There has been no foreign exchange trading since Dec. 21.

The banks also resumed all of their activities, in a climate of discontent among clients, who have had to stand in endless lines over the past few weeks.

The official rate for most foreign trade and financial transactions was set Sunday at 1.40 pesos to the dollar -- a 28.6 percent devaluation after more than 10 years of stability and a currency peg that kept the peso at par with the dollar.

“Thieves!”, “Out with them!”, and “I didn’t vote for him!” were the most often repeated chants heard in the Plaza de Mayo.

Insults to political leaders also abounded, targeting former president Carlos Menem (1989-99), his successor Fernando de la Rúa, who resigned on Dec. 20, former economy minister Domingo Cavallo -- the architect of the currency board -- and current caretaker President Eduardo Duhalde, who was designated by Congress on Jan 1.

The “cacerolazos” or “pots and pans banging” protests began to be heard the day before the de la Rúa administration collapsed on Dec 20. The social uprising led first to the resignation of Cavallo, and then that of de la Rúa. Eight days later, another cacerolazo toppled interim president Adolfo Rodríguez Saá, who handed in his resignation on Dec. 30.

Duhalde, of the Justicialista (Peronist) Party, is to serve out the remaining two years of de la Rúa’s term, until December 2003. The protest that broke out Thursday night was the first against his administration. Although the demonstrators were less numerous than on previous occasions, the situation caused concern among those close to the president.

Presidential spokesman Eduardo Amadeo said the cabinet “shares the pain, the anger and the need” of those demonstrating in the streets. But he urged the public to “stay away from the violent” protesters provoking the disturbances.

“They are vandals,” said Amadeo, referring to the small group of young demonstrators who threw rocks and destroyed property, triggering a crackdown by security forces using tear gas and rubber bullets.

A handful of demonstrators wrecked furniture and computers in several banks, after shattering the windows, and even set fire to a branch of the Banco de la Provincia de Buenos Aires, although firefighters were able to put out the flames. Pharmacies, toy stores, and a supermarket were also looted.

The incidents, which ended with four detainees -- one of whom was injured -- began after thousands of people spontaneously took to the streets in around 50 Buenos Aires neighborhoods, according to federal police reports, banging on pots and pans and lighting bonfires in protest against the government and the so-called “corralito."

The “corralito” is the local name given to the restrictions on cash withdrawals, put into effect on Dec. 3 to curb a run on banks, and stiffened Thursday.

Account-holders with savings in pesos will only be able to withdraw their money in installments starting in March. Those who have deposits in dollars will not begin to recover their money until next year.

Only in 2003 will fixed-term deposits in dollars begin to be released. For those who have less than $5,000 in the bank, the gradual release of their money will begin in January of that year. But savers who have more than $30,000 must wait seven more months, and will not recuperate all of their money until 2005.

The deposits being retained by the banks total $65 billion. The government insists that the release of that money would drive the banks, which placed a large part of the deposits in now devalued government bonds, into bankruptcy.

The restrictions on withdrawals indicate continued contraction of the financial sector, and a deepening of the 42-month recession. “Who will put money in a bank again after this?” asked one saver after the new timetable for withdrawals was announced.

At the request of the banks, the Supreme Court -- another target of the protesters, who have called for the resignation of all of its members -- suspended Thursday all court orders defending the right of account-holders to recover their deposits.

The Supreme Court did not pronounce itself on the underlying question, but merely announced a freeze on the execution of the pleas filed with the courts aimed at forcing the banks to return deposits to clients who wish to withdraw their savings.

The presidential spokesman said Argentina is like a country “giving birth,” and admitted that there would likely be continued cacerolazos. Predicting that the demonstrations would gradually wane, he said “One day there will be 5,000 protesters, and the next there will be 300.”

Demonstrations against the restrictions on bank withdrawals were seen not only in the capital itself, but also in the suburbs of Avellaneda, Ramos Mejía, Olivos and San Isidro, as well as the city of Rosario, in the neighboring province of Santa Fe, where around 2,000 protesters gathered around the monument to the flag.

US under fire for POW treatment

Soldiers at Camp X-Ray at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba train in preparation for the arrival of al Qaida and Taliban prisoners.

Compiled by Sachie Godwin

Jan. 16— More Taliban and al-Qaida prisoners arrived at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, from Afghanistan on Sunday Jan. 13. The prisoners followed a first group of 20 detainees who arrived at the base on Friday Jan. 11. The United States is using the base as a detention center for prisoners from it’s “war on terrorism” in Afghanistan.

In Afghanistan, US forces have moved on to bombing border mountain ranges in the hunt for al-Qaida and Taliban holdouts.

Afghans in the mountain hamlets are living in terror. Around the clock, for 10 days, US bombers pulverized Zhawar, a mountainous province of Paktia bordering Pakistan. “The idea is to completely render this infrastructure unusable,” said Lieutenant Colonel Martin Compton, a Pentagon spokesman.

Mistreatment of prisoners

Amnesty International expressed concern at photos showing detainees hooded while under guard by US marines. Hooding suspects in detention may violate international standards prohibiting “cruel, inhuman or degrading” treatment.

“All those in US custody following the military operations in Afghanistan must be treated humanely, with full respect for international standards,” Amnesty International said.

The standards emphasize that the term “cruel, inhuman or degrading” covers mental as well as physical abuse, including holding detainees in conditions that deprive them, even temporarily, of the use of any of their natural senses such as sight or hearing or awareness of time or place.

The hooding or blindfolding of suspects during interrogation also violates international standards.

US Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld bristled at suggestions that restrictions during transport and detainment of the prisoners might be too harsh and insisted that prisoners being held are being treated humanely.

“I do not feel the slightest concern at their treatment,” said Rumsfeld. “Technically, unlawful combatants do not have any rights under the Geneva convention. We have indicated that we do plan to…treat them in a manner that is reasonably consistent with the Geneva conventions,” Rumsfeld said. “They will be handled not as prisoners of war, because they are not, but as unlawful combatants,” he added.

Human Rights Watch questioned Rumsfeld´s statement that captured fighters from Afghanistan and then shipped to Cuba were “unlawful combatants,” and not entitled to protection under the Geneva Conventions - the laws governing the treatment of persons captured during armed conflict.

“The Secretary seems unaware of the requirements of international humanitarian law,” said Jamie Fellner, director of Human Rights Watch’s US program. “As a party to the Geneva Conventions, the United States is required to treat every detained combatant humanely, including unlawful combatants. The United States may not pick and choose among them to decide who is entitled to decent treatment.”

Jeffrey Kofman, an American journalist who visited the base on Tuesday, said the facility was “very, very minimal.” The cells had concrete floors, wooden roofs and wire mesh walls. Prisoners had a foam mat to sleep on, two towels - one for washing, the other to use as a prayer mat - and some form of chamber pot, he said.

The cells resemble dog kennel cages, according to one observer.

“Housing detainees in Guantanamo in 6x8 feet chain-link ‘cages’ at least partially open to the elements would also fall below minimum standards for humane treatment,” Human Rights Watch said. Standards for the treatment of detainees require adequate shelter from the elements.

“The cages are a scandal,” Fellner said. Prisoners will receive “culturally neutral” meals consistent with Muslim custom, which forbids pork among other things. Each prisoner will also be given a Koran.

Criticism on right’s violations

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said that those being held by US forces must be counted as prisoners of war under the Geneva Convention, and were, therefore, entitled to the full protection offered by it. Some of the terms used to describe the prisoners, such as “battlefield detainees,” have no legal meaning, according to the ICRC. The ICRC has not yet been able to get access to the prisoners in Bagram and Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan, and has discovered that about 360 prisoners in Kandahar are being kept in unsheltered stockades in the bitter winter cold - a breach of the Geneva Convention.

The forcible shaving of the Muslim prisoners, before their flight to Guantanamo Bay, could also be a breach of the convention, which stipulates that religious tenets of prisoners of war should be respected.

According to the Geneva Convention, every prisoner of war (POW) is entitled to humane treatment, understood at a minimum to include basic shelter, clothing, food and medical attention. In addition, no detainee – even if suspected of war crimes such as the murder of civilians – may be subjected to torture, corporal punishment, humiliating or degrading treatment. If captured fighters are tried for crimes, the trials must satisfy certain basic fair trial guarantees.

In addition, POW’s prosecuted for war crimes must be tried by the same court under the same rules as the detaining country’s armed forces. In the current conflict, an Afghan POW could not be tried by the US-proposed military tribunals, although they could be tried by an American court-martial.

Under the Geneva Conventions, captured fighters are considered POW’s if they are members of an adversary state’s armed forces or are part of an identifiable militia group that abides by the laws of war. Al-Qaida members, who neither wear identifying insignia nor abide by the laws of war, probably would not qualify. Taliban soldiers, as the armed forces of Afghanistan, would be entitled to POW status.

Russia, China: no foreign influence in Afghanistan wanted

Asserting its right to a leading role in Central Asia, a six-nation group led by China and Russia said Monday it wants Afghanistan free of foreign influence.

A statement by a meeting of foreign ministers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a group set up in part to fight Islamic militancy, welcomed the end of the Taliban government.

But it said outside attempts to influence Afghan affairs would lead to a new crisis for the region.

“The situation in the region should be decided by the countries themselves,” said Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov of Russia.

The other members of the organization are Kazakstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

China has supported the US-led anti-terror campaign, but is uneasy about the American military presence in the region. Beijing has called for an early end to military action in Afghanistan.

Other members regard Pakistan as a rival for influence after the fall of the Taliban, which it long supported.

The statement Monday called for a “peaceful, neutral” Afghanistan and warned against “any kind of administration forced on Afghanistan, or a scheme to influence it.”

Such efforts, it said, would lead to a “new crisis for Afghanistan and the surrounding region.”

The Shanghai Cooperation Group was formed in 1996 to fight terrorism, separatism and extremism.

Deportations

US authorities are preparing to search for thousands of men in the United States from countries with active al Qaida cells who have ignored orders to leave the country, a Justice Department official said on Tuesday.

The Justice Department has already implemented a program to question more than 5,000 young men, age 18 to 33, who entered the United States on non-immigrant visas since Jan. 1, 2000, with passports issued from certain countries defined only as those with active al Qaida cells.

The Justice Department has identified about 6,000 young men for deportation.

There are about 300,000 “absconders” in the United States — foreign nationals who have remained in the country despite deportation notices - and will be the primary focus of the Justice Department.

Between 800 and 1,000 terrorism suspects have been arrested or detained in more than 50 countries, not including the more than 640 held in the United States, according to US officials. Many of the foreign arrests have not been made public.

Sources: Amnesty International, Associated Press, BBC News, Human Rights Watch, LA Times, News Telegraph, Reuters The Washington Post, The Guardian, The Independent

Group says Indonesian judges will not provide justice for East Timor

Jan. 15— The East Timor Action Network (ETAN) said today that Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri’s last-minute approval of judges for an ad hoc court on East Timor does not alter its view that the court will not bring to justice all, or even most of, those responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in East Timor.

“The multiple delays in establishing the court, its limited jurisdiction, and the continued impunity with which the Indonesian military operates throughout the archipelago only reinforce our belief that the special Indonesian court will be a sham,” said John M. Miller, spokesperson for ETAN. “The Indonesian military remains too powerful and the courts too corrupt. Without an international tribunal, those most responsible for Indonesia’s scorched earth campaigns in East Timor will escape punishment,” he added.

Over the weekend, Indonesia’s chief security minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said Megawati had finally approved the names of judges to the court. It remains unlikely that any trials will actually begin this month, as previously announced. As head of the team deciding prosecutions for crimes in East Timor, M.A. Rahman, now Attorney General, advocated only prosecuting low-ranking officers.

In September 2000, Indonesian prosecutors named 23 suspects, the highest ranking a two-star general, for violence surrounding 1999’s referendum on independence. The list was later whittled down to just 19, following the murder of one militia leader and the claim by the Attorney General’s office that they could not find several others. The list of suspects, shortened from a January 2000 list issued by the Indonesian Human Rights Commission, does not reach to the highest levels of the military command implicated by United Nations (UN) and other investigations.

Last August, the Megawati administration amended the decree establishing a special human rights court on East Timor. The revised decree falls far short of fully addressing the military’s role in orchestrating the violence and devastation. It only covers selected incidents from April and September 1999 in three out of East Timor’s thirteen districts.

“No one will be tried for the many atrocities that occurred outside of those time periods and locations, or for the coordination of the scorched-earth campaign by senior level security forces personnel. The many crimes specifically directed at women will also not be prosecuted. Many East Timorese victims and witnesses will be too afraid to travel to Indonesia and will not testify,” said Miller.

“These limitations mean that the military’s role in orchestrating the violence and devastation throughout 1999 will not be fully addressed, and meaningful convictions are unlikely. Further, no one responsible for Indonesia’s 1975 invasion of East Timor and most of the massive crimes committed during Indonesia’s two decades of occupation will be held accountable,” he added.

On Oct. 24, 2001, a coalition of East Timorese non-governmental organizations (NGOs) wrote the UN, “We all must face the reality that... [Indonesian courts are] not capable of holding those responsible to account. After initial glimmers of hope, subsequent political turmoil and instability and ensuing continual revisions to the mandate and scope of any Ad Hoc Tribunal which is to be established, have clearly demonstrated that Indonesia is both incapable and unwilling to take responsibility for prosecuting those culpable for the crimes against humanity in East Timor.”

The NGOs called for an international tribunal to prosecute those responsible. The same conclusion was reached by the UN’s International Commission of Inquiry on East Timor. The NGOs said that prosecutions are “necessary for the nation building process of and reconciliation for East Timor. Instead, we are facing the dark reality of such impunity characterizing our future.”

Last September, a US District Court held Indonesian General Johny Lumintang liable for $66 million in damages. The judge’s decision, in a lawsuit on behalf of six East Timorese victims of military and militia violence in 1999, found Lumintang, vice chief of staff of the army at the time, “both directly and indirectly responsible for human rights violations committed against” the East Timorese in 1999. Lumintang is not among the suspects to be prosecuted by Indonesia.

Following the Aug. 30, 1999 UN-organized referendum, the Indonesian military and their militia systematically destroyed East Timor, murdering at least 1500 East Timorese, destroying over 70 percent of the infrastructure and raping hundreds of women. Hundreds of thousands were forced from their homes.

Source: East Timor Action Network: www.etan.org

Colombian peace talks nearly sink amidst finger pointing

By Nicholas Holt and Sean Marquis

Jan. 16— The peace process of Colombia’s four-decade civil war nearly took a fatal turn last week, with both sides pointing the finger at one another for failure of the talks. The peace process was salvaged through the actions of an international committee just hours before a Monday- night deadline which could have seen the renewal of open warfare between the Colombian military and the insurgent Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

The latest round of peace talks had been scheduled to continue until Jan. 20, but were cut short last Wednesday when Colombian President Andres Pastrana announced the talks were over because the FARC were not negotiating “seriously.” Government officials claimed the FARC broke off the talks and Pastrana also announced the FARC had 48 hours to vacate a 16,000-square-mile area ceded to them in 1998 in order to jump start the peace process.

Among FARC demands Pastrana and government negotiators found contentious were: a halt to government patrols along the periphery of, and surveillance flights over, the ceded territory as well as a lifting of the government’s ban on allowing foreigners to enter the rebel-held territory.

Later on Wednesday, the FARC’s principal negotiator, Raul Reyes, read a statement in response to the Colombian government’s.

The FARC leader said, “The high commissioner for peace lied to the country and the international community,” when he said the FARC were the ones who broke off the talks.

“The attitude assumed by the high commissioner of intentionally throwing more fuel on the fire…is not in keeping with the duty he has been charged with,” Reyes said.

The situation grew tense over the next few days and into the weekend, with several deadlines being given and then extended, for the nearly 17,000-strong FARC to leave the ceded territory.

The Colombian government moved over 13,000 troops, including tank units, to just outside the rebel-held lands.

Also waiting to move into the area were right-wing paramilitary units of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC). Many human rights groups have proven there to be links between the AUC and the Colombian military, both of whom are battling the FARC and the National Liberation Army (ELN), another leftist revolutionary group.

The AUC and the FARC both have longstanding records for committing egregious violations of human rights including kidnapping, torture, massacres of civilians, and summary executions.

Peace table best spot for rebels

The FARC have three main options: continue hostilities, continue negotiations, or lay down their weapons and ‘go legit’, the best of which is to continue negotiations.

Many analysts agree that continued hostilities will only lead to a stalemate with neither side gaining very much. And the last time some Colombian rebels did laid down their weapons and enter electoral politics, they were killed by the Colombian military and right-wing paramiltary groups: federal senators, mayors, governors and trade unionists - all killed.

“Those who were persuaded to lay down their arms and participate in non-violent dialogue were massacred,” according to Sanho Tree, director of the Drug Policy Project at the Institute for policy Studies in Washington, DC.

In an interview with Asheville Global Report, Tree also said, “One of the most dangerous jobs in Colombia is to be mayor of a small town. Because when either side [FARC or AUC] comes in, if ‘you don’t support us’, if ‘we think you’re supporting the other side’, you’re dead.”

The biggest concern for Tree, and many human rights groups, is the fate of the civilian population in the rebel-held territories if the FARC were forced out.

“When the army comes, the paramilitaries will follow,” Tree said. “And in classic counter-insurgency doctrine, these peasants have been ‘contaminated with leftist revolutionary ideas’, and so they have to be excised…surgically removed, i.e. killed.”

Peace process

The peace talks were stitched together by an international delegation at 5:30pm on Jan. 14 -- just four hours before the final deadline of 9:30pm for the rebels to leave the ceded territory.

The delegation was headed by United Nations (UN) Secretary General’s Special Representative for Colombia, James Lemoyne, and France’s ambassador to Colombia, Daniel Parfait.

According to Agence France Presse (AFP), the countries which actively supported the peace process were: Cuba, Sweden, France, Spain, Italy, Norway, Canada, Switzerland, Mexico, and Venezuela. A report from IPS carried the same list. Noticeably absent from both -- the United States.

One of the biggest impediments to peace in Colombia is the US, which is giving the Colombian army money, training, and weapons -- including 16 Black Hawk helicopters, originally under the guise of the US War on Drugs and now under the US “War on Terrorism” as well.

According to Sanho Tree, US Ambassador to Colombia, Anne Patterson, “is as much of a problem as anything else. It seems to me that she behaves much more like a proconsul than an ambassador. I think she plays a much more activist roll” than an Ambassador should, Tree said.

“Here she is saying, ‘we’re going to back you. If you [Colombian government] want this civil war, we’re going to back you.’ Who is she to speak for the United States Congress or the United States people? I don’t think the Congress or the people have the stomach for another jungle war that has no endgame and no exit strategy.”

While the US was stoking the flames of war, other nations were trying to avert it.

AFP reported that “At the UN, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez criticized Bogota for issuing the ultimatum to the FARC, and said he was ‘ready to go to the fifth circle of hell’ to avert war in Colombia.”

Both Venezuela and Ecuador are particularly anxious about any escalation of the Colombian conflict. Both nations border Colombia and fear that a renewed civil war there will spill over into their own countries.

For now, the Colombian government and the FARC have agreed to continue the peace talks until the originally scheduled end of Jan. 20, when a further round may be announced.

Afghanistan to implement radical version of Islamic law

Islamabad, Pakistan, Jan. 12— Afghanistan’s newly appointed chief justice Fazal Hadi has announced he will implement Islamic laws in his country, saying thieves will have their hands cut off and adulterers will be lashed or stoned to death, the Afghan Islamic Press reported Saturday.

“The murder cases will also be decided under the Islamic laws,” the agency quoted Hadi as saying.

Hadi claimed that the Prime Minister Hamid Karzai has also assured him of his full support in implementing the radical interpretation of Islamic law in Afghanistan.

Source: Associated Press