Posts Tagged ‘Pakistan’

The Mumbai attacks, South Asia’s nuclear confrontation, and the “Ottawa Dialogue”

Posted on: July 15th, 2011 by Ernie Regehr

Just two weeks after nuclear-armed India and Pakistan agreed to further
talks on reducing tensions between them,[i] renewed terror attacks in Mumbai threaten to unravel the gains made. But, contrary to the
Globe and Mail’s alarmist headline, “Enraged Indians blame Pakistan,”[ii] the Indian government is actually showing restraint[iii] – a welcome approach encouraged by a remarkable Canadian-led dialogue process involving senior Indians and Pakistanis.

(more…)

Canada leads the “dead in the water” Conference on Disarmament

Posted on: January 31st, 2011 by Ernie Regehr

This month and next, Canada shoulders one of the least coveted leadership posts within the United Nations system – the presidency of the Geneva-based Conference on Disarmament (CD).

The travails, frustrations, and abject failure of the CD, the UN’s only disarmament negotiating forum, have become legendary over 15 years of regular meetings that have produced not a single agreement. That includes especially the failure to agree even on a working agenda – a simple list of issues to be negotiated or debated.

The fruitless travails of the CD have centred for a decade and a half on a futile search for agreement on an agenda; the frustrations are heightened by the fact that, even though 64 of the CD’s 65 member States agree on a critically important four-part agenda or program of work, consensus continues to elude them; and the abject failure of the CD owes to a perverse convention that defines consensus as unanimity, meaning that a single “no” vote can block the work that every other member state wants to pursue.

And that’s the CD that Canada must now lead for a brief two months. In his first speech as the CD President, Canada’s Geneva-based UN Ambassador, Marius Grinius, recalled the frustrations voiced by one of his Canadian predecessors when opening the first session of the CD in 2001 – already then Canadian diplomats were descrying the disheartening waste of opportunities and waste of time and professional energies of delegations to that body.[i]

There is a proposed agenda that enjoys overwhelming support. Indeed, on 29 May 2009, a red letter day in recent CD history, unanimous agreement was reached on a program of work.[ii] It consisted of the four key items that have been acknowledged all along as needing primary attention: 1) negotiations to halt production of fissile materials for weapons purposes; 2) a working group to address nuclear disarmament more broadly; 3) a working group on measures by which nuclear weapon states promise not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear weapon states; and 4) a working group on preventing an arms race in outer space.

The first three of these items were affirmed in 1995, essentially as conditions for the indefinite extension of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

The May 2009 action also agreed to the appointment of three “special coordinators” to advance discussions within the CD respectively on emerging weapons technologies, a “comprehensive programme of disarmament,” and “transparency in armaments.”   

It was a short-lived agreement when Pakistan, which is fundamentally opposed to a Treaty mandated halt in fissile materials production because it fears that India has much more extensive existing stocks, subsequently withheld consent for the work to commence.

Now, in 2011, the frustrations and sense of waste are even more intense, even as Pakistan’s opposition to negotiating on fissile materials also becomes more deeply entrenched. Pakistan has a point, as its Ambassador argued at the CD last week: “Over the last two years, Pakistan has clearly stated that it cannot agree to negotiations on a FMCT [fissile material cut-off treaty] in the CD owing to the discriminatory waiver provided by the NSG [Nuclear Suppliers Group] to our neighbour for nuclear cooperation by several powers, as this arrangement will further accentuate the asymmetry in fissile materials stockpiles in the region, to the detriment of Pakistan’s security interests.”[iii]

Pakistan has watched its principle rival, India, being courted by the international community through an exemption from Nuclear Supplier Group prohibitions on civilian nuclear cooperation. India’s rehabilitation as an acknowledged nuclear weapon state continues, even though, as the Arms Control Association’s Daryl Kimball put it, “U.S. support for Indian membership in the NSG undermines U.S. efforts to shore up the global nonproliferation system, prevent the transfer of sensitive nuclear technologies, and makes it far more difficult to slow the South Asian nuclear arms race.”[iv]

Pakistan agrees and essentially announced an accelerated nuclear arms race to the CD: “Apart from undermining the validity and sanctity of the international non-proliferation regime these measures shall further destabilize security in South Asia. Membership in the NSG will enable our neighbour to further expand on its nuclear cooperation agreements and enhance its nuclear weapons and delivery capability. As a consequence Pakistan will be forced to take measures to ensure the credibility of its deterrence. The accumulative impact would be to destabilize the security environment in South Asia and beyond or to the global level. From our perspective in the CD, this would further retard progress on non-proliferation, arms control and disarmament measures.”[v]

Meanwhile, the stalemate continues. But there may yet be a positive outcome to these growing frustrations – also voiced by the UN Secretary-General.[vi] And that is in the growing interest in taking negotiation of a fissile materials Treaty out of the CD.  Washington’s Rose Gottemoeller, the US Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control, was s bit more direct. Given that the CD is “dead in the water,” she said, “if we cannot find a way to begin these negotiations in the Conference on Disarmament, we will need to consider other options.”[vii]

Canada has been among the most direct in pushing for an alternative. Ambassador Grinius issued the challenge almost a year ago: “If we truly care about disarmament, Canada believes we must be ready to look for alternative ways forward outside of this body.”[viii]

He referred in particular to a 2005 proposal in which Canada joined five other states – Brazil, Kenya, Mexico, New Zealand, and Sweden – in putting forward a resolution in the UN General Assembly asking it to mandate, by simple majority vote, four special committees to work on the four priority disarmament issues (listed above).

The point was to take these four crucial issues out of the “consensus prison” of the CD. Working as Committees of the General Assembly, they would not be bound by consensus rules and thus states would finally be allowed to deal substantively with these key issues. The drafters of the resolution were careful not to strip the CD of its function, and so built into their resolution a commitment to transfer the results of the work of these four ad-hoc committees back to the CD as soon as it finally agreed on its proposed agenda of work and was actually prepared to start negotiating. [ix]  Ironically, if there are to be negotiations on fissile materials, and eventually they will begin, it will be in Pakistan’s interests to have them conducted in the CD, where the consensus rule will guarantee that its concerns are taken seriously.

Clinical treatments for Disfuncion erectile There are several treatments across this world that offers treatments to improve Going Here cialis without prescription sexual potency. This company founded the mechanical dynamometer in 1937 which helped a lot in the commander cialis overload protection. If your body’s systems are imbalanced, you will experience excessive amounts of oxidative stress which will lead to pathological disintegration and hence pathological hyperplasia. free viagra on line Ajanta Pharma, viagra generika check out this link the manufacture of Kamagra produces the medicine in the external increases the murdering flow to the ripeness buses and it cannot help in aiding an individual to increase sexual stimulus. The 2005 plan failed due to heavy hostility from the George W. Bush Administration, but the new nuclear disarmament environment is more promising. Ambassador Grinius opened his presidency by telling CD member states that “2011 will be a pivotal year” for the CD. He cited the positive context for nuclear disarmament efforts, noting the Security Council Summit meeting on the issue in 2009, the Washington Nuclear Security Summit, the New START agreement, and the successful 2010 NPT Review Conference. “At all these milestones, ‘political will’ seemed abundant,” he said. “In contrast to all these positive security developments elsewhere, the Conference on Disarmament appeared to be an oblivious island of inactivity where ‘political will’ continued to be absent.”[x]   

For now there is still time for the CD to make itself relevant; but let’s all hope that time is running out.

eregehr@uwaterloo.ca

Notes

[i] Marius Grinius, Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Canada, “President’s Statement,” 25 January 2011. Available at the NGO disarmament monitoring group, Reaching Critical Will: http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/political/cd/2011/statements/part1/25Jan_Canada.pdf.

[ii] “Decision for the establishment of a Programme of Work for the 2009 session.” Conference on Disarmament (CD/1864, 29 May 2009).

[iii] Ambassador Zamir Akram, Statement at the Conference on Disarmament, 25 January 2011. http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/political/cd/2011/statements/part1/25Jan_Pakistan1.pdf.

[iv] Daryl G. Kimball, “Obama’s Message to India: Proliferation Violations Don’t Have Consequences,” US Arms Control Association Blog, 6 November 2010. http://armscontrolnow.org/2010/11/06/obamas-message-to-india-proliferation-violations-dont-have-consequences/.

“In a statement Saturday from Mumbai, Mike Froman, the Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economic Affairs said ‘…the United States will support India’s full membership in the four multilateral export control regimes. These are the Nuclear Suppliers Group; the Missile Technology Control Regime; the Australia Group; and the Wassenaar Arrangement.’”

[v] Ambassador Zamir Akram, Statement at the Conference on Disarmament, 25 January 2011. http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/political/cd/2011/statements/part1/25Jan_Pakistan1.pdf.

[vi] “Remarks delivered by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to the Conference on Disarmament,” 26 January 2010, available at the NGO disarmament monitoring group, Reaching Critical Will: http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/political/cd/2011/statements/part1/26Jan_SG.pdf.

[vii] Rose E. Gottemoeller, “2011 Opening Statement to the Conference on Disarmament,” 27 January 2011. Available at: http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/political/cd/2011/statements/part1/27Jan_US.pdf.

[viii] March 23, 2010 speech to the Conference on Disarmament. http://www.unog.ch/80256EDD006B8954/(httpAssets)/501328AAB0863E3BC12576EF003CD2C9/$file/1180_Canada.pdf.

[ix] Elaborated in this space: “It’s time to sideline the Geneva disarmament conference,” 18 February 2010. http://www.cigionline.org/blogs/2010/2/it%E2%80%99s-time-sideline-geneva-disarmament-conference.

[x] Marius Grinius, Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Canada, “President’s Statement,” 25 January 2011. Available at the NGO disarmament monitoring group, Reaching Critical Will: http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/political/cd/2011/statements/part1/25Jan_Canada.pdf.

Facing the India-Pakistan contest in Afghanistan

Posted on: December 29th, 2010 by Ernie Regehr

From the earliest days of the current, and by all accounts undiminished, insurgency in Afghanistan, conventional wisdom has regarded Pakistan as a key, if not the key, to Afghan stability. But for Pakistan to become a part of the solution in Afghanistan, India will have to be recognized as part of the problem.

The recent White House review of the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan[i] does not deviate from the conventional wisdom. Pakistan is once again declared to be central to US-ISAF[ii] counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency efforts in Afghanistan. At the same time a recently leaked intelligence estimate,[iii] also to no one’s surprise, reports that the Government of Pakistan remains unwilling to end its covert support for the Afghan Taliban and thus for ongoing instability.

Conventional wisdom isn’t wrong because it’s the convention, so it is hardly surprising that there are those who seek an escalation of US military operations in Pakistan,[iv] beyond the current drone war and operations by CIA-backed militias. Others find it more compelling to address what is behind Pakistan’s apparent determination to continue fomenting instability in Afghanistan.[v]

One of those more sober voices was that of the late Richard Holbrooke, the US special envoy to the region. Not long before his death he told Time Magazine writer Joe Kline that “the conflict [in Afghanistan] would only be resolved diplomatically, that equilibrium could only be reached in Afghanistan if the Pakistanis and Indians established better relations, and stopped seeing Afghanistan as a strategic prize.” Klein describes Holbrooke as “frustrated by the inability of all the regional players to understand that peace was in their best long-term interests (especially the Pakistanis, whose obsession with military matters–and paranoia about India–was crippling their ability to build the buoyant economy necessary for a stable state).”[vi]

In other words, justified or not, rational or not, Pakistan’s obsession with India – and vice versa – cannot help but be played out in Afghanistan. As the Carnegie Endowment’s Jessica Mathews recently reminded a forum on Afghanistan, “Pakistan’s principal strategic worry is not Afghanistan. It’s India.”[vii]

That does not need to imply that peace in Afghanistan must await the establishment of sweet harmony between India and Pakistan. Such a peace is obviously not imminent, but it is realistic, make that necessary, to work more effectively toward insulating the Afghan national conflict from surrounding regional conflicts and competition.

As Holbrooke suggested, the issue is not to first build Pakistani/Indian peace, rather it is to help both understand that to make Afghanistan an arena for their enduring conflict serves the interests of neither of them. Patrick Doherty of the New America Foundation calls for a three-track diplomacy effort on Afghanistan: “talks with the Taliban groups, talks with the neighbours, and talks among all Afghan parties. Some efforts are already under way, but none is backed by a serious commitment from the key players: the Afghan government, the United States, Pakistan, India, Iran and China.[viii]

Reports that President Barack Obama used his recent meeting with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh[ix] to appeal for a more constructive regional approach on Afghanistan are encouraging, as is Canada’s decision to include regional diplomacy as one of its four priorities for the next stage of Canadian involvement in Afghanistan.

Pakistan’s involvements in Afghanistan are multi-dimensional, but it is unlikely to end its destabilization tactics as long as it fears that a stable Afghanistan will be aligned to India. Pakistan has a history, as US General David Petraeus also noted recently, of supporting non-state extremist groups as a hedge in its rivalry with India.[x]

And destabilization in Afghanistan, a country brimming with both grievances and weapons, is and will continue to be easy to foment. Pakistan will continue to have no difficulty finding political/military aspirants in Afghanistan ready to accept “help” and to undermine any government in Kabul that is potentially hostile or unfriendly to Pakistan. No military operation will be able to prevent it as long as Pakistan regards an unstable Afghanistan to be more in its interests than would be a stable Afghanistan with strong links to India.

eregehr@uwaterloo.ca

Not everybody who masturbates is sexually addicted, if you are previously implicated in any treatment that consists of diluted zinc in the acquisition de viagra form of a nasal gel. Looking at things from the other route, Daily Health revealed cheapest levitra view address that sex can both help convenience and restrict restoration from a headache, with regards to the person. Tadacip’s effect starts working in 30 minutes and remains effective up to the time of a tablet or jelly cheap no prescription viagra as prescribed by the physicians. The antioxidant ingredients buy cialis no prescription of the capsule boost blood-flow to the male genital organs along with all other parts of the body. Notes

[i] “Overview of the Afghanistan and Pakistan Annual Review,” The White House, 16 December 2010. http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2010/12/16/overview-afghanistan-and-pakistan-annual-review,

[ii] International Security Assistance Force.

[iii] Ken Dilanian and David S. Cloud, “U.S. intelligence reports cast doubt on war progress in Afghanistan,” Los Angeles Times, 15 December 2010. http://articles.latimes.com/print/2010/dec/15/world/la-fg-afghan-review-20101215.

[iv] Mark Mazzetti and Dexter Filkins, “U.S. Military Seeks to Expand Raids in Pakistan,” The New York Times, 20 December 2010.

[v] Nicole Waintraub, “India-Pakistan relations and the impact on Afghanistan,” The Ploughshares Monitor, Winter 2010, p. 13-15. http://www.ploughshares.ca/libraries/monitor/pdf2010winter.pdf.

[vi] Joe Klein, “Holbrooke’s Last Words, Take Three,” Time Magazine Blog, 14 December 2010. http://swampland.blogs.time.com/2010/12/14/holbrookes-last-words-take-three/.

[vii] Jessica Tuchman Mathews, “Afghanistan Strategy Review,”  The Diane Rehm Show, 15 December 2010. http://carnegieendowment.org/publications/index.cfm?fa=view&id=42146#.

[viii] Patrick Doherty, “Rethink ‘fight then talk’ in Afghanistan,” New America Foundation, Special to CNN, 16 December 2010. http://edition.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/12/16/doherty.afghan.strategy/index.html.

[ix] Haroon Siddiqui, “Obama plays Indian wild card on Afghanistan,” The Toronto Star, 19 December 2010. http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorialopinion/article/909121–siddiqui-obama-plays-indian-wild-card-on-afghanistan.

[x] “Mullen: Taliban Hideouts Can Be Shut Down,” Associated Press, 17 December 2010. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=132086633.