Author: Atul Cowshish
Publication: The Free Press Journal
Date: May 10, 2003
Many in India have been suspicious
of the United States right from the beginning of its so-called war against
terrorism. The "terrorism" that the US claims to be fighting in the
company of Pakistan is not the same scourge that India has been combating
for nearly two decades which has resulted in the death of about 70,000
people, innocent civilians as well as security personnel. What is
beginning to emerge is that terrorists have, at least for the time being
, decided to reduce the frequency of attacks on US targets - but not targets
elsewhere, especially India. This leads Washington to believe that its
fight against "terrorism" is progressing well.
Certain facts mentioned in the US
State Department's latest annual report, "Patterns of Global terrorism
2002", bear this out. This report says that "anti-US attacks" in
2002 totalled 72, which was 76 percent less than the previous year's figure
of 219 attacks. For the US this might hint a decline in terrorists
activities "globally" but the picture looks different in India where there
has been no let up in terrorist attacks.
Media reports in India have highlighted
only a small portion of the US report which does say that India, "like
the United States". Faced a "significant" terrorist threat and that terrorist
violence in India continued to be fuelled by "infiltration" from across
the international border and Line of Control in Kashmir. the media
in India has also highlighted that some terrorist outfits (Harkat ul-Mujahedin,
Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Tayyaba) based in Pakistan or Pakistan-Occupied
Kashmir have been included in the list of Designated Foreign Terrorist
Organisations. But that is not the full story as it does not tell
that the US view on the 'war' against terrorism is so different from India's
that the two countries seem to be fighting two separate wars.
A quick look at the entire list
shows that according to the US State Department, terrorist organisations
in the Middle East far outnumber those operating in India. Yet there
are many more terrorist victims in India than the Middle-East (Israel).
A thing that is likely to be received
with disbelief by many in this country is that according to the US report,
last year there were NO major terrorist attacks In India. At least
they did not attract attention of the authors of the US State Department
report on global terrorism in 2002.
Indeed, this report records that
2002 saw a significant drop in world-wide incidents of terrorist attacks
- 199 terrorist attacks in 2002, which was 44 per cent less than 2001 when
the number of such attacks was 355. In fact, for the US State Department
it was the "lowest level of terrorism in more than 30 years". The
last time the number fell below 200 was 1969., which was around the time
"modern" terrorism had raised its ugly head.
The number of persons killed in
terrorist all over the world in 2002 had declined to 725, from 3295 in
2001, the year of 9/11. The number of wounded also dropped to 2013
in 2002 from 2283 in 2001. The big drop in the number of victims
of terrorism is seen as "good news" by the US but the report also records
that India was subjected to 67 terrorist attacks in 2002 against seven
on the West Bank, eight in Pakistan and nine in Israel. Surely this
shows that there is a heavy concentration of terrorist attacks on India
and there is nothing cheerful about it if the US is really committed to
eliminating terrorism from the face of the earth.
For the US, however, "there has
been a decline in numbers of attacks (on US targets?) and the (US)_ victims
and that is good news on terrorism front." Does India share this
view? Even with its pronounced Pro-US stance, the BJP-led government is
unlikely to share the American euphoria and the claim that is on course
to "tame" terrorism when there is no significant let up in acts of terrorism
in Kashmir and elsewhere in India. And does anyone in India believe
that there was NO significant terrorist attack in India throughout 2002?
The fact is that throughout last
year, as indeed in many previous years, India continued to bear the major
brunt of terrorism. But since it is Washington's most-favoured nation
in South Asia and its "key ally" that exports terrorism to India, the State
Department naturally has to take a myopic view of the sponsor of terrorism.
It is so myopic that Pakistan comes
for lavish praise for its active support to the US campaign against "terrorism".
How, by helping the US nab fleeing al Qaeda terrorist rather selectively,
if not reluctantly? Notice that almost all the so-called Al Qaeda activists
arrested in Pakistan are Arabs and other foreign nationals. Well,
the Pakistanis who joined Al Qaeda might have turned saints in the opinion
of the State Department.
But a State Department "employee"
- if an ambassador can be called that - probably would not totally agree.
The US ambassador to Pakistan, Nancy Powell (no relation of her more famous
State Department boss) had said not very long ago that Pakistan was turning
into a "platform" for terrorism. )The Pakistanis are so much in "awe" of
the Americans in their country that they make only some polite noises about
Nancy Powell's observation but dub the US ambassador in India as a spokesman
of the Indian External Affairs Ministry though Robert Blackwill has been
more circumspect in describing Pakistan's role in abetting terrorism in
India than his counterpart in Islamabad.)
The State Department report says
that one of the reasons for "remarkable" achievements in the fight against
"terrorism" has been the arrest of more than 3000 Al Qaeda terrorists.
The report does not say how many (majority?) of them were arrested in Pakistan.
There can be no question of the US even remotely suggesting that there
is something fishy when nearly all the major Al Qaeda operatives are found
to be living - not hiding in Pakistan.
The State Department says that some
of the new rules introduced after 9/11 have also been instrumental in fighting
terrorism. More such laws are in the offing. Well, one of these laws
already in operation has seen a large number of Indians (and other foreigners)
being subjected to all manner of humiliation and harassment within the
US. If any such thing is sought to be done in India, a host of official
and non-official agencies, Amnesty International certainly among them,
will be quick to pull up New Delhi.
The US co-ordinator for counter-terrorism,
J. Cofer Black, has declared that the war on terrorism is a "success".
He says that the (US) military action in Afghanistan and Iraq has chased
terrorists of those countries and "removed the safe haven that terrorists
had once enjoyed".
The terrorists do have a safe haven
which the US refuses to acknowledge. Black himself admits that Al
"Qaeda operative captured so far was found to be involved in preparing
for a terrorist attack. He could recount bomb attacks in Bali and
Kenya as two major terrorist attacks in the world last year but failed
to mention a single terrorist attack In India because obviously the US
thinks India faced only 'minor' or insignificant terrorist attack in 2002.
What is Indian life compared to the life of a citizen from the world sole
super-power?
The US State Department in its report
on global terrorism has been naming since 1993 the same seven countries
as sponsors of terrorism - Cuba, Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Syria
and Sudan. Every Indian knows that there is a significant and deliberate
omission in this list which should have gone up to include an eighth country
which is located in India's neighbourhood.
The seven "designated state sponsors
of terrorism" says the US State Department report, "impede the efforts
of the United States and the International community to fight terrorism".
It then adds : "Without state sponsors, terrorist groups would have a much
more difficult time obtaining the funds, weapons, materials, and secure
areas they require to plaid and conduct operations."
the US State Department might care
to take look at reports filed by some other US agencies that speak of a
South-Asian country that has been doing precisely what the officially listed
state sponsors of terrorism have been doing - funding, training and providing
logistic support to terrorists for entering India clandestinely to carry
out their mission of mayhem under instructions from Islamabad.
