Dec 15, 2002 Op Eds

December 15, 2002 Opinion Editorials http://www.aljazeerah.info

Musa Keilani

Jordan Times, 12/15/02

THE PEOPLE of the Middle East, and indeed the international community, are anxiously awaiting the release of the “peace road map” worked out by the quartet on Dec. 20. From what we know so far, the plan envisages the creation of a Palestinian state in three years. What we do not know yet is what mechanism it involves in order to implement it.

In the meantime, the intensity of Israeli military crackdown on the Palestinians is being intensified by the day. It has become clear that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is emboldened to use whatever means he has without any restraint in order to make life difficult for them in their land.

Sharon's current efforts appear to be aimed at securing increased public approval of the “effectiveness” of his oppression of the Palestinian people so that it would be his ace card in the elections to be held next month.

We do know that the quartet's plan might be a non-starter if Sharon is reelected in January. He has made it abundantly clear that his vision of a Palestinian entity falls far short of the aspirations of the Palestinian people and that he would follow a take-it-or-leave-it approach when he would choose to present his offer of an agreement.

It is precisely this being aware of Sharon's stand that is troubling the Palestinians and the rest of the Arab world. However, the US is pushing hard or at least is giving an impression of pressing Israel. At the same time, there is also a growing feeling that the apparent US effort might even a partial smokescreen to pacify the Arabs as Washington prepares to launch war against Iraq.

Jordan has high stakes in the situation. Our immediate concern is the impact of a war against Iraq and it is no secret that we are also worried that Israel might use the conflict to expel a large number of Palestinians across the river to the East Bank. We have to remember that Sharon is the architect of the “Jordan is the homeland for Palestinians” theory and he has not really given up on it. There are also many in the Likud who follow the same thoughts. We have heard Benjamin Netanyahu speaking about using the expected war on Iraq as an opportunity to expel Yasser Arafat from the Palestinian territories; the very idea of such a course of events definitely opens the door to envisaging that it might not simply be Arafat who could be expelled.

We could put up many arguments against the idea and its feasibility, particularly predictions of international outcry and protests against expelling the Palestinians from their land. But we also know that Israel has never cared much about international public opinion or diplomatic norms. It has always portrayed itself as the victim of Palestinian and Arab terror and capitalised on the armed resistance put up by Palestinians inside the occupied territories and in Israel proper. It would simply scoff at a world outcry against the expulsion of the Palestinians and fence around at international forums.

That does not change the reality that we in Jordan would be left with a massive number of West Bankers. Sharon has already created the infrastructure to carry out the expulsion. There are “super highways” ready in the northern part of the West Bank which could be used to expel a massive number of Palestinians across the river in a matter of hours.

Sharon's version of a Palestinian entity does not have room for the over three million Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza. Of course Sharon would never reoccupy Gaza since he knows well that he would only be inviting a major problem if he were to do that. He would leave Gaza alone for the Palestinians but would reserve for himself the “right” to strike at targets in Gaza in retaliation for Palestinian resistance.

The West Bank is the key focus of the problem now. There is an argument that, given the peace treaty that Jordan has signed with Israel, the Israelis have a vested interest in the security and stability of Jordan. But that argument has not been put to the real test yet, and perhaps the time for that test is coming up now.

EU dreams
Arab News, 15 December 2002
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Even though it can hardly have been a surprise, Turks have been angered by their latest rebuff from the European Union. On Friday, EU leaders at their Copenhagen summit refused to start talks on Turkey’s entry before December 2004. Thus realistically, Turks cannot expect to become full EU members before 2010, assuming that is, that the talks are successful. The next decade, however, should give Turkey the opportunity to reflect upon what it really wants from European membership. It ought to consider carefully whether it will actually obtain those desires.

Europe is changing fast from an economic club to a nascent superstate. Already the world’s single biggest market, it has its own currency and increasing homogenization of business and financial standards. Ten years ago when European enthusiasts were selling the EU, they made much of the economic convergence issue. Nowadays, that is almost taken for granted. It is political convergence that is now on the agenda.

Turkey’s policy to join the EU was formulated 20 years ago by the government of Turgut Ozal and it has changed little in that time. Fobbed off initially with special associate status, which allowed the Germans to continue to isolate their Turkish guest workers and deny them citizenship, Ankara has merely continued to knock patiently and doggedly on the Brussels’s front door. But the club has changed its objectives.

Even though it has suffered its fair share of economic woes, Turkey’s economy could any time in the last two decades have survived the tough transformation necessary to realign it for the member the European Economic Community.

Now, however, the hoop is higher and smaller. The EEC has transformed itself, without, incidentally, a “by your leave” from any of its citizens, into the European Union. With increasing vigor, Brussels is sucking legislative, regulatory, legal and economic powers from individual capitals into its own domain. Taking ever more power into the center is for the EU perhaps both the source of its future strength but also its greatest danger. Even countries like the UK, well used to devolving decisions to supranational bodies, are concerned at the growing loss of power to the EU.

How much more concerned will Turks be when they are having to conform to the dictates of some faceless Eurocrat 2,000 miles away in Brussels? Given that the Turkish commercial law, undeveloped as it is, will be swept away by EU laws, along with regulations and rules that cover almost every level of life, the shock of transformation could be very great indeed.

Though it is right for the new Turkish government to continue to press Turkey’ EU claims, it is surely time that it also conducted a review of why the EU remains the overwhelming foreign policy goal. Someone needs to work out if the advantages that were apparent 20 years ago are still there for the taking.

Ataturk, the founder of the Turkish Republic, when asked to compare the Turks with other nationalities, said that, in fact, the people they most resembled were themselves. Certainly as far as Europe is concerned, the major similarities exist only as a result of the triumph of Turkish culture and arms in the Balkans and southeastern Europe.

Fawlty Towers Globalization
By M.J. Akbar, Arab News, 12/15/02

Manuel holds the key. You know who Manuel is, of course. He is the Spanish waiter in that extraordinarily brilliant BBC television series Fawlty Towers, hired by Mr. Fawlty because he is cheap, or shall we be polite and say inexpensive? Manuel no speak Inglis; Manuel say “si si si si” and bring wrong drink; Manuel send Mr. Fawlty’s nerves into triple fault; Manuel man with heart of gold and hands of brass; Manuel crazy and drive everybody crazy; but speak-no-Inglis Manuel get job in remote English countryside instead of local Englishman under spluttering Mr. Fawlty because Manuel come cheap. That is globalization. The idea of Europe as a single market, with freedom of trade, and now a remarkable single currency, took a long while to emerge, but it is a splendid culmination of a historic dream. But the reality underpinning this dream is the right of free migration in search of jobs. You cannot have globalization without finding space for economic asylum.

There are two kinds of asylum. The first, being political, is more politically correct. The world has long recognized the need for political asylum when population groups suffer the misfortune of oppression. When the Muslims and Jews were driven out of Spain and Portugal after the restoration of Christian rule, the Muslims rebuilt their lives in north Africa. (For generations they would place a key just behind the doors of their homes. This was the key of the home they had left behind in Spain, and a symbol of the nostalgic urge to return to a land that had been their home for 700 years.) The Jews also came to Morocco and Algeria, but in limited numbers. Most of the Jews sought, and received, asylum under the Caliph of the Islamic world, who ruled from Istanbul, or Islambol, in Turkey. Jews formed more than 10 percent of the capital of Turkey, and lived peacefully in their new nation until they migrated once again after the formation of Israel.

Economic asylum is more troublesome, because it is considered invasive. After all, by declaration, these are migrants who come in search of better lives. Political asylum is for survival; economic asylum is for sustenance. Political refugees can actually add to the economic wealth of the host nation. The Jews brought their skills in banking, trade and scholarship to the Ottoman empire. Punjabi and Sindhi Hindus who were driven into India after partition, quickly became substantive contributors to the Indian economy. At this moment, the Sri Lanka-Tamil refugees who have taken shelter in India from the civil war are creating a network of businesses: The traditional asset of education is a good foundation for forced entrepreneurship.

Economic asylum is tinged with less salubrious factors, greed and guilt being among them. We are not talking only about the desire for a better life that drives the poor into a richer neighborhood. There is also the aspect of the rich needing the poor for services that the privileged no longer want to spend their own time on. The syndrome is the same, whether it is the dhobi setting up shop in a posh locality in Delhi, or Britain inviting the sweeping classes from the old empire in order to keep Heathrow airport clean. The difference of course comes when this supply and demand stretches across national borders.

For the rich, the ideal solution is to use the services, pay as little as possible for them, and then ensure that the service-providers go back to where they came from, preferably to a slum that is out of sight. That is what the local British would ideally have liked to do with the Asians. But ideal prejudice does not always work in human affairs, although in some societies (like the old South Africa) it can continue for generations. But not forever. Slavery, or cruel forms of inequity like indentured labor, can never last forever. Human beings will rise above their economic origins, and then demand to live according to values that are associated with modern civilized social behavior. Conflict is inevitable, and such conflict resolution difficult. But affluent nations who want the comfort of cheap labor must enlarge their social and political space to integrate such communities, and then provide scope for upward mobility.

This is what the United States did since its inception as a refuge for refugees from Europe. The natural wealth of that continent, combined with a sparse population that proved incapable of defending itself, became a magnet as well as the engine for economic growth. The rationalization of this experience, the consequent creation of an independent nation, provided the energy, harmony and order that a national will can bring to the economic process. The harsh turmoil within the rest of the world in the 19th and 20th centuries turned America into the ultimate dream of the dispossessed, and the disinherited. Immigration was the great powerhouse that drove the American economy to the point where it is seemingly invincible. Every fresh wave of immigration brought the raw power of boiling ambition. You could trace the route map of every wave: First, the street, with jobs in either crime or services like the taxi-trade; then into the factories; then the gentrification; and then the turn of the curve in the parabola, and five-day weeks with pretty homes in the suburbs. It was normally a three-generation process.

In India we have always maintained a generous refugee-regime. It is partly to do with traditional values: The Indian has had little difficulty in finding space for the other, and then, imperceptibly but surely, converting the other into an Indian. But there is a more modern reason as well. The calamity of partition sensitized India to the tragedy of displaced lives. It was a full-blown crisis that could not have been resolved only by the government; it required, and received, the complete cooperation of the people themselves. India understood the challenge of economic asylum early. Social integration was not an issue, since the refugees were Hindus who shared the faith and culture of the host nation. But the Indian experience includes a remarkable variation of this theme that is a tribute to something unique in the Indian consciousness. This is the absorption of a huge Muslim migration into India, from Bangladesh. This is economic asylum on a large scale, with minimal friction. Even the political friction that has been occasionally drummed up by parties like the Shiv Sena and the BJP has a forced element to it. They have not been able to reverse what might be called the traditional Indian refugee-regime.

Bangladeshis have voted against both partition, and their own liberation from Pakistan, with their feet. They have proved, as indeed have other migrating communities, that the ultimate determinant of any boundary is economic. Look at the odds against a Bangladeshi Muslim migrating to Hindu-majority India. First there is the history of partition, and the horror-filled separation from India. This is followed by the mindwash evident in the Pakistan system of education, which has tended to either erase the memory of a united country, or justify separation by the exaggeration of “Hindu” villainy. Even if those at the bottom of the social ladder (who constitute the migrants) were not privileged to become uneducated through such education, since they remained illiterate, there is always the collective view that is formed through the experience/memory of riots on one level, and the transmission of such a viewpoint through the vehicles of mass culture — cinema, television, and political oratory. To come to an India that has been so vilified entails a willing rejection of this imposed historiography. It also requires a degree of faith in economic compulsions that rises above experience, most notably the evidence of continuing communal riots in India. I am willing to wager that even in December 1992 and January 1993, when the Ayodhya movement had culminated in the destruction of the Babri Mosque and widespread riots, there were Bangladeshis trickling into Siliguri offering to become cooks in middle class homes for a salary lower than what an Indian would demand.

The unity of India itself is protected, during the placidity that eats up 95 percent of time, by two facts: Free trade and free movement. India is large enough and disparate enough to become a model for the prevalent theories of multinational globalization. In a sense, the makers of the Indian constitution offered a model which Europe has now applied to its own circumstances, a mixture of local rule by linguistically different communities and a supra economic structure that is designed for the greater benefit of all. No structure can prevent imbalance, which may arise from the frailties and imponderables of human behavior. But the Indian model corrects the fallout of this imbalance by the option of economic asylum. If Bihar has not exploded into a Maoist-type anarchy, of the kind we see in neighboring Nepal for instance, it is because the Bihari below the poverty line can seek to redress his condition by free movement to wherever he can find work, whether in front of the Bombay Bakery where Salman Khan drove his infamous vehicle, or in the roadworks of Kashmir. Hunger accommodates the insolence of a superstar as much as the violence of a terrorist. Without free movement, the Indian union has no economy; and without an economy, India can hardly remain a union.

If globalization is the prevalence of free trade, then it existed before it was called so. India’s problem was that it did not extend the principles that had worked so well within India, to its economic relationships outside India. We paid a heavy price for this mistake.

But the mistake being committed by those who understand this, is when they forget that globalization must, in order to succeed, be a composite idea rather than a single-track focus. It is in danger today of becoming synonymous with injustice, and with a form of quasi-colonialism. This perception may not be wholly correct, but it is gaining strength on the street because globalization has become the private property of a number of vested interests, multinational corporations and governments of rich nations included. It is particularly astonishing that post-Reaganite America should turn its back, for instance, on immigration in such a sharp manner. You cannot take natural resources out of a country, even if you pay a notional price for them, and expect the people who once owned the resources not to share the rising value chain.

It is welcome therefore that one of the gurus of globalization, Professor Jagdish Bhagwati, argues, in a splendid paper (“A Stream of Windows: Unsettling Reflections on Trade, Immigration and Democracy”) that “the world needs a World Migration Organization to complete the international superstructure of ‘governance.’” The WTO can best survive with a WMO as its companion. The professor traverses heights of slightly non-academic eloquence when he writes: “As people walk, fly, and swim across borders, as migrants or refugees, fleeing or simply seeking a better life, and their numbers steadily rise, the time has come to address institutionally the ethics and economics of this flow of humanity instead of leaving it to the whims of individual nation-states. Anything less would be a shame.”

It would also be a mistake. Make no mistake about it: Manuel holds the key.

War talk weighs heavy

Walid M. Sadi

Jordan Times, 12/15/02

THE RHETORIC on the war against the Iraqi regime has been with us for much too long and definitely longer than most people around the globe can stomach. The debate and controversy about this war have become a phenomenon and very soon they will develop into an institution of some sorts. Needless to say, the war talk weighs heavily on everything these days, from international, regional and national markets to anxiety about security, touching the far reaches of the world.

The war talk is nerve-wrecking and has become a common topic of discussion in most homes across the globe. What cannot be understood is why all this talk about war and why for so long when usually an attacking power says very little in advance of its military campaign. I hope Washington realises the full impact of its war game on human beings, young and old.

A war will not cause losses to Iraq and its neighbouring states only; it means losses for the entire international community. The mere war talk on Iraq is already affecting the US economy and has taken a heavy toll on the equity markets everywhere. Oil prices have soared, the US dollar has taken a heavy beating, the US economy is almost deflationary. The same goes for the economies of many major powers. With the new deadline for war set around the end of January, all attention is focusing on the possibility of using one form of mass destruction weapon or another. The US has already warned that should Iraq use any chemical or biological weapon on its troops or any of its allies, it will strike back with its nuclear weapons.

Given the probability that Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein might use any weapon in his arsenal if he felt that his country was waging existential warfare, the stage is set for the deployment of the very terrible weapons that a war against Baghdad aims to neutralise.

The question is whether it is worth to continue to entertain the option of war. Assuming that Iraq has some weapons of mass destruction hidden somewhere where no UN weapons inspector can ever find, why not put in place a monitoring system to keep a constant eye on Iraq? If Iraq's human rights record is so terrible, why not keep it ostracised and isolated. Why not even suspend its UN membership for as long as grievances against the leadership remain without effective remedies?

There are so many ways the Iraqi regime can be dealt with, without the need for a war that risks to wreak havoc with mankind. Simply put, the war against Iraq can never be cost-effective from an international point of view. The gains will never outweigh the losses. It is time to cool off and take stock of the pros and cons of this anticipated war. Otherwise, the small and limited war may end up having ramification on a global scale.

Democracy: US should practice what it preaches

The Daily Star, 12/14/02

Washington says it has a plan to democratize the Arab world, and one has to hope that it succeeds. Before any optimism is justified, however, it would be nice to hear even a small indication that those behind the nascent US policy understand that which their country’s experience has helped demonstrate to the world at large: Democracy has more to do with the law than with the ballot box. The “man in the street” in the Arab world is a very different phenomenon from the vaunted but elusive “Arab street.” Unlike the relatively small numbers of the latter whose influence is so badly overestimated because they periodically protest for or against this or that cause before returning to their slumber, the man (or woman) in the street is part of what might be described as a “silent majority.” This majority includes everyone from taxi drivers and waiters to professors and physicians.The one thing they all have in common is that they want democracy. By way of a typically cruel response, various Arab regimes have attempted to deal with this longing by staging what they call “elections” in they decree which (if any) candidates will be allowed to stand against those who favor the status quo.They then go back to whatever shenanigans they were up to in the first place, protected all the while by court systems whose verdicts are as predictable as those of the handcuffed voters. If that is democracy, dictatorship is a far better route because at least its advocates are honest. As Richard N. Haas, director of the State Department’s policy planning staff, said in a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations on Dec. 4,“US relations with governments, even if fairly elected, will depend on how they treat their people and how they act on the international stage.” That is a warning to the effect that even if American guidance leads Arab countries to start holding free and fair elections, co-opted legal systems will prevent democracy from flowering. If Washington wants its new policy to succeed, it will have to start practicing what it preaches. It is unrealistic to expect Arab law to enjoy any more respect than international law, and right now the adjudication of the latter is as capricious as that of the former.And as luck would have it, the prime mover behind the manipulation and selective enforcement of international law is the same United States that says it wants to spread democracy in the Arab world. The pinnacle of American mendacity involves Jewish settlements in the Occupied Territories.Washington knows they are illegal, and not just under the UN Security Council resolutions that make the occupation itself a crime: The settlements are also banned under the Geneva Conventions. Neither category of international law can be implemented, though, so long as Uncle Sam takes it upon himself to decide which rules have to be followed and which do not, who has to obey the law and who can ignore it. That is a lot like garden-variety Arab authoritarianism, but in fact it is even worse because at least the victims of Arab bullying are Arabs.America, by contrast, bullies people outside its own borders. If Washington wants its democracy campaign to be taken seriously, it has to start by righting its own wrongs.

Dialogue 'must replace clash of civilisations'
By Nasser Arrabyee, Gulf News, 15-12-2002

Arab and European intellectuals stressed the importance of boosting dialogue between nations to replace the clash of civilisations.

Some 60 Arab and German intellectuals, who participated in a forum held here recently under the slogan At the beginning it was the dialogue, said their forum was aimed at encouraging the culture of dialogue between eastern and the western civilisations and rejecting the feelings of hatred and malice which are shown in political differences.

"No West is possible without East which founded the humane civilisation: sciences, arts, and religions, and no East without West which continued to build on the first bases and gave the contemporary civilisation its distinguished features," said Adul Azeez Al Makaleh, Chairman of the Yemeni Centre of Studies and Research, and President Saleh's Cultural Advisor.

"Our knowledge of Gunter's creation makes us celebrate him in a way which fits in with the Arab tolerant civilisation. It is known for celebrating the creation and creators who wisely sweep the injuries of the humanity and remove hatred and malice from its beautiful body," Al Makaleh added.

"Obviously, the Arab intellectuals who stand on the other side of this dialogue table realise the importance and stature of their German colleagues who share them by making contact between the two ancient civilisations which pushed humanity and its great knowledge firmly steps towards the future, until talk about one of them led willingly to the other."

The German poet Gunter Grass who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1999 was the guest of honour at the forum that lasted four days (from December 8-11). President Ali Abdullah Saleh granted Grass the Order of Merit. Poets Mahmoud Derwish and Adones were among the Arab intellectuals who attended.

Grass held a press conference at the end of the forum in which he rejected the term 'clash of civilisations' saying it is a term which is created by the hardliners in America, Israel and the Arab world.

"I don't like this term. There is always diversity inside the culture itself. When this term appeared, there was a big and wide controversy over it," Grass said, adding "it is the hardliners from America, Israel and the Arab world who coined this term and those now are conflicting with each other. We should defend ourselves against those hardliners."

He said people should not adopt the 'black or white' approach in judging others. "When one criticises the U.S. it is said he is against America, when Israel is criticised it is said he is against Semitism and when Arabs are criticised it is said he is against Islam. These are mere generalisations and I do not recognise them," he said.

Perhaps a lot of people, he added, do not know there are leading people in America who are intellectual Jews, who criticise America.

With regards to the Palestinian issue, he said he supports the right of Israel in existence in specific geographical area, but said: "I reserve my right to reject Israel, and this does not cancel my right to be a friend of the Arabs neither does it cancel my right to demand the creation of a Palestinian state."

He said killing Palestinians and killing Israelis will never put an end to the conflict.

"I do not agree with both of them, this is the wrong way to reach a solution. The Arab states must recognise Israel and this must be the reference in any future negotiations on the one hand, and Israel must withdraw from all new settlements as an essential condition for talks of peace on the other."

Grass said Bush's way to oust Saddam is wrong.

Abdul Kareem Al Iryani, former prime minister and now political advisor of President Saleh, said: "The second Gulf war was for oil and about oil but in the new game we will see death and ruins and prosperous oil fields not burning. Palestine was not an oil field and this is why it is suffering for 105 years."

Fallers at the first hurdle
Gulf News, 15-12-2002
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There will be few tears shed at the resignation of Henry Kissinger from the special 9/11 investigative committee set up two weeks ago by President Bush. Kissinger was not a popular choice among Republicans, of which party he is a member; he was less popular with the Democrats, who more or less forced his resignation. Kissinger has been surrounded by controversy right from his early days when he served Nixon and at the time of the Watergate conspiracy. Some people claimed that with knowledge of what went on then, Kissinger, who they claim has mellowed now and seeks less personal power as a place in history (for achievement), he would be the ideal "insider" to get to grips of any conspiracy surrounding 9/11.

However, it is not to be. The Democrats were insistent that Kissinger disclose all the clients deals with Kissinger Associates, to ensure there is no conflict of interest. George Mitchell, the lawyer called to settle major disputes like Northern Ireland and the Middle East conflict, similarly resigned last week, finding the conditions unacceptable.

It would seem that even before this special investigative committee has met, controversy surrounds it. Once penetrating questions are presumably set before the intelligence services, it will be interesting to see just who stands the pace.

Aceh pact falls short of rebel ambitions
By Abdullah Al Madani, Gulf News, 15-12-2002
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It is indeed premature to confirm that the peace agreement signed in Geneva on December 8 between the representatives of the Indonesian government and representatives of the Free Aceh Movement (or Gerakan Aceh Merdaka, established in 1976) for ending one of the longest running civil wars in Southeast Asia will serve its purposes.

This is because similar historical experiences have always proved that once a certain government concludes a peace agreement with a particular armed rebel group, the latter emerges to show a current that opposes the agreement and pledges to continue the struggle against it with the claim that it does not meet all the demands that the fighters have been struggling for.

Thus, instead of establishing peace envisaged by the agreement, another kind of upheaval and disturbance is created and anyone who looks at things realistically and according to the arts of politics becomes a traitor or a coward who should be fought against without recognising his previous sacrifices for the sake of his country and people.

The Acehnese rebels, who have fought against the Indonesian state and army over the past 26 years, are not an exception to this rule. Although the literature of the Free Aceh Movement insist upon claiming that its members share a common consensus and there are no divisions within its ranks in terms of dealing with Jakarta or outlining the extent of their demands, and in spite of the mystery surrounding the movement's leaders, structures and decision making methods, what has so far been noted on the ground suggests otherwise.

Autonomous rule

Since Jakarta's announcement last January that it had started implementing an agreement with the rebels to give Aceh an autonomous rule within the single Indonesian entity, a faction among the rebels seemed to co-operate with the Indonesians while another faction loudly denounced the notion of compromise, continuing armed resistance and even attacking the joint preliminary administration made up of the symbols of the Indonesian government and former leaders of the resistance.

That is not to speak about the conflicting media reactions towards the peace process among the leaders of the armed movement abroad and their colleagues inside Indonesia, something that suggest the existence of power struggle within the movement.

In this context, it is useful to mention that following the illness and incapacity to carry out duties of the movement's founder and president, Teungku Hasan di Tiro, in 1997, the Stockholm-based leadership of the Free Aceh Movement was taken over by a handful of di Tiro's relatives and close friends.

This seemed to be unacceptable to many Acehnese figures in Europe, Malaysia, and Indonesia. As a result, an 11-member council came into being as a new collective leadership and genuine political inheritor of di Tiro.

Concerns

In addition to the above mentioned facts, the December 8 peace agreement does not provide for anything more than an expanded autonomy under international supervision, a fair division of wealth between Jakarta and the Aceh province, the latter's right to apply Islamic Sharia within the province, and free local elections to be held in 2004 to enable the Acehnese to elect their leaders of the autonomous administration.

This, of course, falls short of the rebels' ambitions which have been firmly expressed in their many documents, statements and publications throughout the years. In their literatures, the Acehnese rebels are insistent on advocating self-determination and a separate entity that enjoys full sovereignty as in the case of East Timor.

This alone gives rise to concerns about the emergence of a dispute over any form of compromise between Jakarta and the Acehnese other than giving the latter an independent state.

During the last 26 years, the Free Aceh Movement successfully stressed three key issues to gain support and sympathy from abroad. By focusing on incidents of human rights violations and heavy-handed security repression by the regime of former Indonesian President Ahmed Suharto (particularly during the 1980s) the movement succeeded in winning the sympathy of human rights groups and organisations in the West which have opened their doors and mass media for the movement's leaders.

Through their focus on the organised looting of the Aceh resources and wealth (especially the natural gas which is available in huge quantities and oil which is produced at the rate of 1.5 million barrels daily) by the Suharto regime and devoting such resources for the benefit of the Javanese who dominate Indonesia's destiny, the movement won the sympathy of the people of other Indonesian provinces who have always complained of discrimination at the hands of the Javanese.

Finally, through advocating the slogan of creating an Islamic state in Aceh, the movement was able to win the backing of political groups and organisations in the Arab and Islamic worlds whose literatures advocate the same goal in their own countries.

The irony here lies in the fact that these organisations have been accustomed to ringing the warning bells in the case of East Timor on the grounds that the Timorese fight for independence was no more than a foreign plot designed to divide the Indonesian Muslim entity.

However, they have not looked at the Aceh separatist attempts from the same perspective, showing a clear double standard. Of course, the reason is clear and simply calls for no harm in dividing Muslim Indonesia if the tool is Islamic and the price is the creation of a pure Islamic entity no matter how fragile this entity is. But anything to the contrary is unacceptable regardless of the excuses and complaints.

Perhaps what gives an additional reason for pessimism among the observers of Indon-esian affairs regarding the success of the peace process is the strong belief of the Acehnese (about 5 million people living in an area of 183,000 square miles within the island of Sumatra) that they are a great nation with a distinguished identity and culture and glorious past, hence they cannot be a part of another country even with an autonomous rule.

Such a belief is based on a number of old historical facts which have been disfigured by events and changes of more than a century, but which makes its disappearance difficult even with assuming the decline of the Javan domination, the establishment of the principles of justice in the distribution of wealth, and the application of the rules of Shariah.

Artificial national identity

For further elaboration of the point, it is sufficient to read the publications of Aceh Free Movement and the early statements of its founder.

According to these publications and statements, Indonesia is not a homogeneous entity and has an artificial national identity as a result of the merger of all the provinces that were occupied by the Dutch in Southeast Asia in one central state in 1949 under the domination of the people of Java, Indonesia's biggest province in terms of area and population.

In other words, the Acehnese deny the existence of an Indonesian nation based on one history, a single culture, one ethnic origin and harmonious political, economic and social interests. To them, Indonesia is merely a geographic expression, neither the proper name of any people, nor of any country, nor of any island.

They hold that the efforts made by the father of independence Ahmed Sukarno through the struggle against the Western colonial powers and the attempts made by his successor Ahmed Suharto through the tools of repression have failed to create a single national identity. They cite a number of facts to demonstrate their difference from the remaining Indonesian people, hence their right to full independence.

One of these facts is that their region has previously been recognised as an independent sovereign state by the powers of the time, namely the U.S., Great Britain, France, Italy, Austrian-Hungarian Empire, and Ottoman Empire.

Not only that but also the conclusion of a number of treaties and relations between the independent Kingdom of Aceh Dar Al Salam and some of these states. Another fact is that Aceh was, during that period, one of the most powerful and wealthy states in Southeast Asia.

Aceh's status

The state continued to enjoy this position even after 300 years of the Dutch occupation of Java. It only fell under the Dutch control in 1873 as the last stronghold after a bold and fierce resistance.

The Acehnese claim that the Dutch government's formal declaration of war against their kingdom, the declaration of neutrality in that war by the major powers of the time, Washington's rejection to take the Dutch side as requested by the Netherlands, and the Ottoman Empire's expr-ession of solidarity with Aceh are all sufficient proof of Aceh's status as a bona fide independent sovereign state.

One more fact reiterated by the separatist movement is that sovereignty over Aceh was transferred to Indonesia, under a treaty signed on December 27, 1949 between the Dutch and the Javanese, without holding a referendum to seek the views of the Acehnese. Such an act was a clear violation of the UN Charter and every principle of decolonisation.

The movement points out to the fact that the West strongly opposed the Soviet Union's annexation of the Baltic states in 1940 but it did not adopt the same position towards the annexation of Aceh, although the two events had taken place roughly at the same time.

As the Indonesian government correctly puts it, if every ethnic group in the world is given the right to establish its own state depending on old historical facts, thousands of new entities will emerge, turning the world into a state of chaos and disorder. In response, the Acehnese maintain that if the right to self-determination had been applied to all, there would be no hegemony in the world by a handful of states!

The writer is a Gulf researcher and an expert in Asian affairs.

Legacy of racial divide remains in America
By James J. Zogby, 12/15/02
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By now the world knows that Republican Senator Trent Lott is in trouble because of the comments he made at a December 5, 100th birthday party for retiring Senator Strom Thurmond of South Carolina. At the party, Lott noted that in 1948 when Thurmond ran for U.S. president as the candidate of the "States' Rights Party" Lott's state of Mississippi had voted for Thurmond.

"I want to say this about my state. When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We're proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over the years either," said Lott.

The issue, of course, was that a central tenant of the States' Rights Party was the demand that states had the right to reject federal government pressure to end policies that existed in many states enforcing strict separation of the races - a policy called segregation.

In fact the States' Rights Party was formed primarily by Democrats from the South of the United States who left that party in protest after the Democrats had moved to support an anti-segregation platform. Thurmond, an arch-segregationist, led the movement in 1948. His presidential campaign won four southern states.

As Democrats continued to champion anti-segregation policies over the next few decades, many more southern Democrats left the party and eventually became Republicans.

In fact, the historic shift, in U.S. politics, of southern states from the Democratic to the Republican Party was a function of racial politics.

Lott's remarks, seen in this context, appeared to be a clear endorsement of Thurmond's segregationist agenda and a reminder of the deep racial divide that still plays a role in the United States today.

While segregation was officially ended as a matter of law in the 1960s, the legacy of the racial divide remains. In the past several decades Congress has enacted legislation and the U.S. government has enforced laws to end discrimination and provide equal opportunity and access for all Americans.

Segregation in education, public housing, accommodation and other services has been outlawed. Steps have been taken to provide what has been called "affirmative action" - so that African Americans who have been excluded in certain areas of employment, housing, education, etc. could now be included. The rights of African Americans to vote have been guaranteed. And most recently, former President Bill Clinton initiated a national dialogue on race in an effort to help heal the racial divide.

Nevertheless, problems remain. African Americans remain concerned by the gaps that exist in economic and educational opportunities. And some whites express resentment at the various federal programmes, which they complain put them at a disadvantage.

Politicians have, at times, exploited these fears and, as a result, race remains a powerful electoral issue.

Jesse Jackson, a prominent civil rights leaders, has noted how some politicians have resorted to issuing "coded messages" to address white audiences and exploit their concerns.

Lott's remarks were seen in this context. Some asked: "What exactly did Lott mean by 'all these problems?'"

The fact that Senator Lott is no ordinary Republican, but is poised to resume the post of Majority Leader of the U.S. Senate (a post he held from 1996 to 2001), made his remarks of special consequence.

What was intriguing, though, about this entire affair was how it unfolded. At first Lott's comments were barely noted and not widely reported. Delivered on Thursday December 5, they did not break through nationally for almost five days. At first, only some African Americans members of Congress and former Vice President Al Gore were outspoken in rebuking Lott for his comments.

By December 10, the story had become a major event and grew in prominence as more came to light about Senator Lott's record on racial issues and other similar comments he had made. First, it was reported that he had made virtually the same remarks in 1980 while campaigning in Mississippi with then candidate for President, Ronald Reagan.

Other enterprising researchers found in the public record evidence that:
- Lott began his career as a staff aide for a segregationist Democratic congressman;

- In 1978, as a member of Congress he fought to reinstate the U.S. citizenship of Jefferson
Davis, the leader of the Confederacy that fought against the U.S. government in the Civil War;

- In 1981 Lott presented an argument to the Supreme Court in favour of segregated private schools;

- In Congress and the Senate Lott voted against the Voting Rights Act, the Martin Luther King Federal Holiday Act and the Civil Rights Act Renewal of 1990.

- Lott also maintained an affiliation with the "Sons of the Confederate Veterans," and the Council of Conservative Citizens - a group that maintains a pro-segregation philosophy.

As the story grew, fuelled by new information, Democrats who had been silent expressed outrage. Conservatives, however, were of three minds. Some, like the Family Research Council, harshly criticised Lott.

In a statement issued on December 10, the group noted:
"Senator Lott seems to have little appreciation for how such comments as this are received among black Americans. The damage he's done is considerable. Words matter, despite what may have been in Senator Lott's mind when he spoke. And the senator's words, in the ears of black Americans, sound unmistakably like a repudiation of desegregation and the civil rights movement."

Others attempted to defend Lott's comments as harmless and said that they did not reflect his true beliefs. Most, sensing the growing storm, remained quiet.

President Bush at first offered a statement of mild support for Lott, but finally realised that more had to be said. On December 12, speaking at an event in support of his "faith-based initiative" effort President Bush said:

"Any suggestion that the segregated past was acceptable or positive is offensive, and it is wrong. Recent comments by Senator Lott do not reflect the spirit of our country. Every day our nation was segregated was a day that America was unfaithful to our founding ideals."

Finally, at week's end Lott appeared before the press and offered his fourth apology of the week in yet another effort to squelch the growing storm.

It remains unclear whether his efforts will succeed. Bush and other Republicans have been attempting to reach out to African Americans voters and they may feel that Lott's remarks will doom their party's efforts in this regard. If so, they may decide to press Lott to step down as Majority Leader.

Democrats, on the other hand, will continue to press for Lott's resignation and have even dismissed Bush's comments. They say that if the president succeeds in implementing his faith-based initiative, privatising education and ending affirmative action, the gains that African Americans have made will all be threatened.

The struggle resulting from Lott's comments is far from over. What all of this does point out clearly is that despite the progress that has been made, the racial divide in the U.S. is real and a potent force in U.S. political life.

Dr. James J. Zogby is the President of the Arab American Institute.

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