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Hair-Trigger Nuclear Alert Over Kashmir
India and Pakistan, where people starve in the streets, waste billions on military spending because of the Kashmir dispute. Now some of India’s extreme Hindu nationalists warn they want to reabsorb Pakistan, Bangladesh, and even Sri Lanka into Mother India.
Aug 11, 2019
Two of the world's most important powers, India and Pakistan, are locked into an extremely dangerous confrontation over the bitterly disputed Himalayan mountain state of Kashmir. Both are nuclear armed.
Kashmir has been a flashpoint since Imperial Britain divided India in 1947. India and Pakistan have fought numerous wars and conflicts over majority Muslim Kashmir. China controls a big chunk of northern Kashmir known as Aksai Chin.
In 1949, the UN mandated a referendum to determine if Kashmiris wanted to join Pakistan or India. Not surprisingly, India refused to hold the vote. But there are some Kashmiris who want an independent state, though a majority seek to join Pakistan.
India claims that most of northern Pakistan is actually part of Kashmir, which it claims in full. India rules the largest part of Kashmir, formerly a princely state. Pakistan holds a smaller portion, known as Azad Kashmir. In my book on Kashmir, 'War at the Top of the World,' I called it 'the globe's most dangerous conflict.' It remains so today.
I've been under fire twice on the Indo-Pak border in Kashmir, known as the 'Line of Control,' and once at 15,000 feet atop the Siachen Glacier on China's border. India has over 500,000 soldiers and paramilitary police garrisoning its portion of Kashmir, whose 12 million people bitterly oppose often corrupt and brutal Indian rule - except for local minority Hindus and Sikhs who support it. A bloody, bitter uprising has flared on against Indian rule since 1989 in which some 42,000 people, mostly civilians, have died.
About 250,000 Pakistani troops are dug in on the other side of the ceasefire line.
What makes this confrontation so dangerous is that both sides have important tactical and nuclear forces arrayed against one another. These are mostly short/medium-ranged nuclear tipped missiles, and air-delivered nuclear bombs. Strategic nuclear weapons back up these tactical forces. A nuclear exchange, even a limited one, could kill millions, pollute much of Asia's ground water, and spread radioactive dust around the globe - including to North America.
India's new Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, is a Hindu hardliner who is willing to confront Pakistan and India's 200 million Muslims, who make up over 14% of the population. In February, Modi sent warplanes to attack Pakistan after Kashmir insurgents ambushed Indian forces. Pakistan shot down an Indian MiG-21 fighter. China, Pakistan's closest ally, warned India to back off.
Modi is very close to President Donald Trump and Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu, both noted for anti-Muslim sentiments. Modi just revoked article 370 of India's constitution that bars non-Kashmiris from buying land in the mountain state, and shut down its phone and internet systems.
The revocation means that non-Kashmiris can now buy land there. Modi is clearly copying Israel's Netanyahu by encouraging non-Muslims to buy up land and squeeze the local Muslim population. Welcome to the Mideast conflict East. China is also doing similar ethnic inundation in its far western, largely Muslim, Xinjiang (Sinkiang) region.
In an ominous sign, Delhi says it will separate the high altitude Ladakh region (aka 'Little Tibet') from its portion of Kashmir. This move suggests India plans to chop up Indian Kashmir into two or three states, a move sure to further enrage Pakistan and thwart any future peace settlement.
There's little Pakistan can do to block India's actions. India's huge armed forces outnumber those of Pakistan by 4 or 5 to one. Without nuclear weapons, Pakistan would be quickly overrun by Indian forces. Only massive Chinese intervention would save Pakistan.
Meanwhile, Kashmir, the world's longest-running major dispute, continues, threatening a terrible nuclear conflict. Making matters worse, both India and Pakistan's nuclear forces are on a hair-trigger alert, with a warning time of only minutes. This is a region where electronics often become scrambled. A false alert or a flock of birds could trigger a massive nuclear war in South Asia.
India and Pakistan, where people starve in the streets, waste billions on military spending because of the Kashmir dispute. Now some of India's extreme Hindu nationalists warn they want to reabsorb Pakistan, Bangladesh, and even Sri Lanka into Mother India.
Previous Indian leaders have been cautious. But not PM Modi. He is showing signs of power intoxication.
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Hundreds of Human Rights Activists Gathering in NYC for Amnesty International's 23rd Annual 'Get on the Bus' Event
This Friday, April 6, human rights activists of all ages will travel to New York City to participate in peaceful actions in front of a select group of consulate and permanent missions to the United Nations to highlight country-specific human rights violations for Amnesty International's 23rd annual 'Get on the Bus' event, a day of human rights education and activism.
Apr 04, 2018
This Friday, April 6, human rights activists of all ages will travel to New York City to participate in peaceful actions in front of a select group of consulate and permanent missions to the United Nations to highlight country-specific human rights violations for Amnesty International's 23rd annual 'Get on the Bus' event, a day of human rights education and activism.
The day will start with a Speaker's Panel inside The Cooper Union. Following the panel, activists will take part in peaceful actions outside UN Missions and Dag Hammarskjold Plaza.
This year's actions will focus on six countries: Myanmar, Sudan, Iran, Tibet, Sri Lanka, and the United States.
For Myanmar, activists will be calling on Commander-in-Chief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing to stop the ethnic cleansing against the Rohingya people.
For Sudan, actions will focus on preventing the closure of camps for displaced persons in Darfur, ending attacks on civilians, providing humanitarian aid, and releasing of detained human rights defenders.
For Iran, activists will be calling for the release of Narges Mohamadi, a human rights activist that was sentenced to 16 years in prison on unsubstantiated charges in 2016. A prisoner of conscience, Narges was imprisoned solely for her exercise of freedom of expression, association, and peaceful assembly.
For Tibet, activists will be rallying for the release for prisoners of conscience Tashi Wangchuk and Shokjang (Druklo). Tashi Wangchuk is an entrepreneur and language rights activist who has been detained by the Chinese government since 2016 on charges of inciting separatism, after working to sue the Chinese government for expanded access to Tibetan language education. Druklo is a writer who was imprisoned in 2016 on charges of separatism as a result of an article on the increased presence of Chinese security officers ahead of the anniversary of the 1959 Tibetan uprising.
For Sri Lanka, activists will be demanding justice for Raighar Manoharan and the Trinco Five. Ragihar Manoharan, a Sri Lankan Tamil student, and four fellow students gathered for a chat when a grenade was thrown at them, leaving at least three injured. A group of officers in uniform, believed to be police from the elite Special Task Force, reportedly placed the injured students in their jeep, beat them, and pushed them out before shooting them.
For the US, activists will call attention to ending the practice of family detention of asylum seekers, particularly the Berks Detention Center in Pennsylvania.
Speakers slated to speak at The Cooper Union include, Dorjee Tseten, Executive Director of Students for a Free Tibet International. Born in a Tibetan refugee settlement in India, Tseten has trained hundreds of Tibetan and Indian students through SFT's Youth Leadership Training program and has been elected as a Member of the Tibetan Parliament in Exile.
Additionally, Amnesty International USA's Executive Director, Margaret Huang, will be speaking, as well as Mani Mostofi, founder of Impact Iran, a human rights coalition focusing on advocacy with the United Nations.
The day will feature a message from Dr. Manoharan, the father of murdered student Ragihar Monoharan, as well as a speech by Denise Bell, a Researcher at Amnesty International, working on refugee and asylum cases, and a statement from Carol Anne Donohoe, an immigration attorney who works with Aldea - The People's Justice Center, to represent many families at the Berks family detention center. Participants will hold teddy bear props to symbolize the lost childhood of kids locked up at centers like Berks and write postcards to DHS Secretary Nielsen, calling her to end the practice of family detention and to release families detained now.
In the evening, there will be a film screening of The Heart of Nuba, held at the Village East Cinema with Amnesty members and the filmmakers. The documentary film takes place in the war-torn Nuba Mountains of Sudan and follows Doctor Tom Catena as he delivers care to patients suffering from medical issues ranging from malnutrition to leprosy.
For a full list of speakers and bios, please click here and for a full schedule of the day please click here.
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Chinese Editorial Denounces Gun Violence as Stain on US Human Rights Record
"It's inhumane for the U.S., which boasts about its human rights record, to turn a blind eye to gun violence, snub increasing calls for gun control, and risk more innocent lives."
Feb 23, 2018
An editorial in a newspaper run by the Chinese Communist Party sharply criticized the U.S. in the midst of the current debate over gun control--a debate that's been resolved for decades in most of the world's industrialized countries--and accused the U.S. of hypocrisy in touting its human rights record.
"It's inhumane for the U.S., which boasts about its human rights record, to turn a blind eye to gun violence, snub increasing calls for gun control, and risk more innocent lives," read the opinion column in the English-language version of the Global Times. "The U.S. has no other choice but to adopt gun control. The right of life is the most fundamental human right. The right to bear arms cannot overpower the individual's right to live."
While the U.S. government acts as an arbiter of human rights abuses around the world, the paper said, it has failed to protect its own citizens as many legislators accept donations from the National Rifle Association (NRA), the powerful gun lobby which has opposed even widely popular gun reforms like universal background checks and has aggressively marketed military-style semi-automatic weapons like the AR-15, frequently used in mass shootings, as an appropriate firearm for hunting and home-defense.
"Washington has been pointing an accusing finger at other countries over human rights... However, more Americans have been killed by gunfire in the country than American soldiers being killed in all U.S. wars," read the column. "Gun ownership in China is strictly regulated, which helps reduce gun-related crimes and deaths. The U.S. should learn from China and genuinely protect human rights."
While China has its own record of human rights abuses, its stringent gun control measures have kept mass shootings like the one the that took place in Parkland, Florida last week from becoming the regular occurrence that they are in the U.S.
In China's annual report on global human rights last year, it noted the U.S. government's "serious infringement on right to life [and] personal security."
"In 2016, the U.S. government exercised no effective control over guns, law enforcement departments abused their power, and crimes were not effectively contained," wrote China's State Council Information Office. "As a result, civil rights, especially the right to life, were seriously threatened and people's personal rights were continuously infringed upon."
The report listed several recent deadly mass shootings, and also decried the incarceration rate in the U.S.--higher than any other country in the world.
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