India, Australia inching towards civil nuclear agreement
India moved a step closer to sourcing uranium from Australia, the world’s biggest exporter of the radioactive mineral, with the Foreign Ministers of both countries agreeing to hold the third round of talks on a bilateral civil nuclear agreement towards the end of this month.
External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid and his Australian counterpart Julie Bishop reaffirmed the commitment of both countries to finalise a Civil Nuclear Cooperation Agreement to enable the sale of Australian uranium to India, and announced that the third round of negotiations would be held here in the last week of November. They met in Perth on the margins of a multilateral conference.
The two Ministers also discussed energy security and the possibility of a Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement (CECA) to strengthen ties. Both sides have laid stress on the security of sea lanes as India and Australia have supplemented their coal-based energy ties with a multibillion dollar contract for sourcing Australian gas.Having held one round of dialogue, the two countries will be finalising dates for the second interaction on the subject, which will form the fulcrum of a strategic partnership with the imminent addition of uranium to ties in coal and hydrocarbons. Energy security was also discussed during Defence Minister A.K. Antony’s visit to Australia in June this year when it was decided to hold a bilateral maritime exercise in 2015.Ms. Bishop, according to an Australian High Commission statement, described advancing relations with India as a priority for the Australian government and felt her discussions with Mr. Khurshid followed the “very productive” talks between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Australian Premier Tony Abbott at Brunei on October 10. A “high quality CECA would underpin a further significant expansion of the trade and investment relationship to mutual benefit,” she added.The two Foreign Ministers confirmed that the inaugural cybersecurity dialogue would be held in the first half of 2014 and reiterated the two countries’ commitment to work together to address threats such as terrorism and transnational crime.
Australia also welcomed plans to hold a major conference of persons of Indian origin, the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas, in the country in November. India is now Australia’s largest source of skilled migrants and the second largest source of international students. “Australia is pleased with that,” Ms. Bishop noted.
India, Vietnam sign prisoner exchange treaty
India and Vietnam on Friday signed an agreement that would pave way for transfer of sentenced prisoners languishing in jails in the two countries. As part of social rehabilitation of prisoners, the treaty, which was signed by Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde and Vietnam Minister of Public Security Tran Dai Quang, will help Indian prisoners imprisoned in Vietnam or vice-versa to be near their families for serving remaining part of their sentence.India has so far signed similar agreements with United Kingdom, Mauritius, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Egypt, France, Bangladesh, Korea, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Sri Lanka, UAE, Maldives, Thailand, Turkey, Italy, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Israel and Russia, while negotiations have been concluded in this regard with Canada, Hong Kong, Brazil and Spain, an official statement said.So far, these bilateral treaties have helped in repatriation of 43 Indian prisoners from Sri Lanka, Mauritius and the U.K. Similarly, seven prisoners of the U.K. and France were repatriated to their respective countries. The 7th United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders adopted the Model Agreement on the Transfer of Foreign Prisoners in 1985 and since then many countries have arrived at bilateral and multilateral treaties.
(The Hindu;economy)
‘There are challenges yet there will be green shoots even in investment’
With the stock market touching a five-year high, an
expected bumper harvest, rising exports and the government having
managed the widening current account deficit, Finance Minister P.
Chidambaram on Friday said continued high inflation and reviving
investment sentiment were the key challenges before the government.
Addressing
a press conference here, Mr. Chidambaram said the current account
deficit (CAD) would come down to $60 billion on the back of rising
exports and declining gold imports. “Core sector growth, strong monsoon
and healthy exports augur well for economic growth. There are still many
challenges, most important being inflation and reviving investment. But
I think there will be green shoots even in investment. We are confident
that the measures taken by the Reserve Bank of India and our own
measures at maintaining fiscal discipline will eventually bring about a
moderation of inflation,’’ he remarked.
The markets
seemed happy on the eve of Diwali with the benchmark Sensex touching a
five-year high. However, it fell back after scaling a lifetime high on
the last day of the Hindu Samvat year 2069 and still ended at a fresh
closing record with a 32-point gain. The index climbed to an all-time
high of 21,293.88 in intra-day trade, surpassing the previous record of
21,206.77 reached on January 10, 2008. It ended at 21,196.81, a gain of
32.29 points or 0.15 per cent.
G. K. Pillai appointed Chairman of MCX-SX
The troubled Financial Technologies-promoted stock exchange, MCX-SX, on Friday, said it had appointed former Union Home Secretary G.K. Pillai as its Chairman.
Also, former acting Chairman of the Life Insurance Corportion, Thomas Mathew T., has been appointed as the Vice-Chairman.
Women bank to be launched on Indira's birth anniversary
The government has drawn up plans to launch country's first all women bank - Bharatiya Mahila Bank - on November 19, the birth anniversary of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.
“We have asked the Election Commission for permission. The bank might be as well inaugurated on November 19. All work has been completed. But whether we can do it on November 19, whether we can do it in Delhi or in other city, these are matters my secretary is talking to the Election Commission,’’ Finance Minister P. Chidambaram said at a press conference here on Friday.
The government is seeking Election Commission's nod for launch of the bank, proposed in the Union Budget, as the process of assembly elections in five states, including Delhi, is on. The public sector Bharatiya Mahila Bank proposes to have 25 branches by March 31, 2014. The government has already approved Rs. 1,000 crore seed capital for the women focused public sector bank.
The proposed bank, to be headquartered at Delhi, is likely to be operational by November this year. The Reserve Bank of India gave its in-principal approval for the Bharatiya Mahila Bank in June and the banking company is being set up. One of the key objectives of the Bank is focus on the banking needs of women and promote economic empowerment. The bank has invited applications through online mode from female candidates for 115 posts.
Piramal acquires Caladryl from Valeant Pharma
Piramal Enterprises Ltd. (formerly Piramal Healthcare Ltd.) has acquired over-the-counter (OTC) brand Caladryl in India from Valeant Pharmaceuticals International, Inc. for an unspecified amount.Caladryl is an anti-pruritic solution known for dermatosis application for minor skin irritations and itching.Valeant Pharmaceuticals had acquired the rights to the Caladryl brand from Johnson & Johnson in 2012.This acquisition enables Piramal Enterprises to widen its consumer products portfolio in the skin care segment, the company. The company covers more than 1,00,000 towns in the country.
Hindu ( opinion-ed)
Disquiet in West Asia
The September 27 United Nations Security Council vote which ended any foreseeable prospect of military intervention in Syria, and the subsequent telephone conversation between President Barack Obama and Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani, have caused such alarm in West Asia that the region’s political map is changing rapidly. Saudi Arabia has expressed obvious anger over these events and over Mr. Obama’s suspension of arms aid to Egypt after the military coup which overthrew the elected President, Mohamed Morsy, in July. Riyadh has threatened to reduce its collaboration with Washington and has taken the unprecedented step of refusing an elected seat on the Security Council, saying the world has failed to act effectively on Syria. Israel is said to have been acting for some time as a conduit for Arab leaders’ messages to Washington, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu now claims the Arab world recognises that Israel is not “the enemy of Arabs”. His claim would be reinforced if Tel Aviv’s neighbours were to invite him to the Manama dialogue in December. In addition, Turkey, an associate member of Nato and generally on good terms with Israel, is well aware that Iran is its single largest neighbour, with a significant Kurdish minority whose kinfolk across the Turkish border have long struggled for an independent Kurdistan.
These are all high-risk strategies, particularly for Saudi Arabia and Israel. The former bought U.S. arms worth $33.4 billion in 2012 and could put pressure on Mr. Obama with the threat of even a partial boycott of U.S. arms manufacturers, but could thereby end up feeling less well defended against its regional arch-rival, Iran. Secondly, its oil is not the weapon it once was, as the U.S. now imports under 6 per cent of its oil from Saudi Arabia. Iran has some of the world’s largest oil and gas reserves and U.S. oil majors would no doubt be very keen to resume working there. Further, Iran might then have an interest in influencing the Shia Alawite government in Syria to reach a peaceful deal and in persuading Hezbollah to engage openly in political processes. As for Israel, Mr. Netanyahu knows that he cannot control a U.S. president whose mind is made up. Détente between Washington and Tehran could make his country less important to U.S. interests, which in turn would inevitably give Mr. Obama more weight in his efforts towards an Israeli-Palestinian settlement. All in all, some of the world’s most dangerous tensions could be greatly reduced; Mr. Obama and Mr. Rouhani must therefore do all they can to reach a lasting agreement.
Putting out to sea a new vision
As global economic power shifts to the east, maintaining prosperity and stability across the diverse Indian Ocean region has become imperative.
The 13th meeting of the Council of Ministers of the Indian Ocean Rim Association for Regional Cooperation (IOR-ARC) was held on November 1 in Perth, Australia’s Indian Ocean capital. At this meeting, Australia took over as Chair of the Association from India, which has been Chair since 2011. Indonesia became the new Vice-Chair. We agreed on a new name for our Association — the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) — and charted out directions for the further development of our cooperation.
Strategic
The Indian Ocean covers about 20 per cent of water on the world’s surface. It is the third largest of the world’s five oceans. The Indian Ocean Rim countries have a population of approximately 2.6 billion, or 39 per cent of the world’s people. The Indian Ocean accounts for 50 per cent of the world’s container traffic and Indian Ocean ports handle about 30 per cent of global trade. Around 66 per cent of the world’s seaborne trade in oil transits the Indian Ocean. Roughly 55 per cent of known oil reserves, and around 40 per cent of gas reserves, are in the Indian Ocean region.
Reflecting diversity
These are important and impressive statistics. They are in part the reason why the nations of this region are members of IORA. At this meeting, Australia took over as Chair of the organisation for the first time in its 18-year history, succeeding India. Indonesia became the new Vice-Chair.
IORA consists of 20 member-states. They reflect the remarkable diversity of our Indian Ocean region. They range from small island-countries, such as Comoros and Seychelles, to G20 members such as India, Indonesia and Australia. What unite this remarkable diversity are the common bond of an ocean and a common commitment to the prosperity and sustainable economic growth of the region.
As global economic power increasingly shifts to the east, maintaining prosperity and stability across the Indian Ocean region becomes more important than ever.
At Bangalore in 2011, the Association agreed on six priority areas: maritime safety and security; trade and investment facilitation; fisheries management; disaster preparedness; academic, science and technology cooperation; tourism and cultural exchange. In Gurgaon in 2012, we set out the broad contours of our Association’s agenda for the next decade. During our meeting on November 1, IORA members committed to a range of initiatives to further develop cooperation in each of our priority areas. Member-states believe that by focussing on these key areas, IORA can make a genuine contribution to the peaceful, productive and sustainable development of the Indian Ocean region.
Challenges
The member-states are also linked by common challenges — the need to keep shipping lanes open, keep fishery stocks viable, forecast and tackle disasters like the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, and promote trade, education and tourism links across the region. With the combined population of the 36 countries surrounding the Indian Ocean forecast to rise to 3.2 billion by 2030, these challenges can only be expected to exacerbate.
Women’s empowerment
We must work hard together to ensure that the people of the Indian Ocean region have access to the best possible levels of education. The empowerment of women and girls in the region will be a high priority for IORA. During Australia’s chairing of the organisation, the Ambassador for Women and Girls will have an important role in this. We must ensure that, especially for those countries which rely heavily on the resources of the sea, that there are sustainable fisheries management practices in place. The tuna fisheries in the Indian Ocean produce about one-third of the world’s tuna — half of it caught by small-scale vessels in the waters of the coastal states.
Piracy
The common threat of piracy poses a considerable challenge to IORA’s objectives. It was notable during our meeting how many member-states reflected on the impact of piracy in our region. The World Bank estimates that piracy costs the global economy around (U.S.) $18 billion a year in increased trade costs — an amount that dwarfs the estimated $53 million average annual ransom paid. IORA members are integral players in counter-piracy efforts in the Indian Ocean. In addition to combating piracy, there are the challenges of ensuring maritime security and maritime safety across the region and preparing ourselves against the all too tragic consequences of natural disasters.
We are proud as foreign ministers of India, Australia and Indonesia, to have joined our colleagues from the 20 member-states and six dialogue partner countries to have declared our support for the Perth Principles for peaceful, productive and sustainable use of the Ocean and its resources.
These principles recognise the importance of the Indian Ocean’s diversity, including its marine life and ecosystems. They reflect our commitment to the conservation and sustainable use of its fisheries stocks, water and seabed resources, and other marine life. We recognise the important contribution this will make to eradicating poverty, creating sustainable livelihoods and decent work around the region, while helping to sustain economic growth and food security.
India, Australia and Indonesia are committed to working with our fellow IORA members to harness the diverse strengths of our region. We are confident that Indian Ocean regional cooperation is entering a significant, and indeed exciting, new phase. The commitment of member-states during our meeting, reflected in the attendance of foreign ministers from Australia, Comoros, India, Indonesia, Singapore, Madagascar, Malaysia, Mauritius, Seychelles, Sri Lanka and Yemen is perhaps the most significant demonstration of recognition that in the 21st century, the Indian Ocean region will play a vital strategic and economic role.
(Salman Khurshid is India’s External Affairs Minister, Julie Bishop, the Australian Foreign Minister, and Marty Natalegawa, the Foreign Minister of Indonesia.)
In Indonesia, the new ‘can-do’ politicians
Activists, academics and professionals are now breaching the bastions of the entrenched political classes — the military, big business, the clergy and dynastic families.
It’s a cool evening in Bandung, Indonesia’s third largest city. The crepuscular sky is threatening rain, but in Taman Balai Kota, carnival-like scenes continue to play out. A high school brass band practises marching tunes, skate boarders clatter up and down a wide ledge, senior citizens are out for their evening constitutional. In the midst of the melee, an athletic, bespectacled, man cycles about, occasionally stopping to chat with gaggles of people who seem to have much to discuss with him.
As the call to the Maghrib prayer sounds, the bicyclist waves a quick farewell and rides off to his office, a resplendent colonial building that was originally a coffee warehouse, but today, is the epicentre of political power in Bandung: City Hall or the Balai Kota. The cyclist is none other than Ridwan Kamil, Bandung’s newly elected Mayor, and the Taman Balai Kota is a patch of landscaped green that houses Bandung’s City Hall.
It would be difficult to imagine similar scenes playing out in India, where the metaphorical distance between ordinary people and their political rulers tends to be reinforced physically by sealed-off office spaces and police-escorted VIP cars.
But 41-year-old Ridwan Kamil is part of Indonesia’s new breed of local leaders, men and women who are breaching the bastions of the entrenched political classes: the military, big business, the clergy and dynastic families. And remarkably for Indonesia, doing so untainted by the corruption that is the standard hallmark of politics.
After decentralisation
They owe their rise to the country’s experiment in “big bang” decentralisation in 2001, only a few years after the downfall of military dictator Suharto in 1998. Following the decision to distribute political power centrifugally, the direct election of city mayors was instituted. Local-level leaders also gained control of regional revenues and considerable legislative powers.
Decentralisation has not been without its share of problems, having thrown up its own set of challenges including a wider diffusion of corruption and a penchant for some local governments to ignore central government legislation on sensitive issues like religious tolerance. Yet, it has also offered the opportunity to outsiders like Ridwan Kamil and, most famously, Joko Widodo, the current Jakarta Governor and former mayor of the city of Solo, to make a real difference to the lives of their constituents.
Humble beginnings
Jokowi, as Widodo is universally known, is widely regarded as the likely winner of next year’s presidential election, if he is able to secure his party’s nomination. Remarkably, the 52-year-old has never held national political office. Prior to his election as mayor of the mid-level city of Solo in 2005, Jokowi, the son of a carpenter, had run a furniture business. In the seven years that he ran Solo, Jokowi jolted the city out of its crime-ridden decline and transformed it into a thriving centre for regional arts and tourism.
As Governor of Jakarta, he has instituted universal health coverage and ended a bureaucratic culture of impunity. A heavy-metal fan, Jokowi attends rock music concerts. Eschewing the trappings typically associated with political power, he shops in open-air bazaars. He’s best known for his “blusukan,” where he makes snap visits to local government and tax offices to check up on their workings.
Increasingly, Jokowi has company around the country. His 2012 fellow nominee for the World Mayor Prize was Indonesia’s first directly elected female Mayor, Tri Rismaharini, of Surabaya. Tri has won accolades for her effectiveness in cleaning up and reviving dilapidated urban areas while re-greening the notoriously polluted city. She has been known to get out of her car and direct traffic herself when stuck in a snarl, and she hosts a call-in radio programme where she fields questions on issues ranging from blocked drains to evictions.
Looking into discrimination
Closer to Jakarta, a young political scientist, Bima Arya, has recently won the mayoral seat in Bogor, a satellite city of the Indonesian capital. An academic with a completely clean record, Bima has already promised to redress the religious discrimination that the city’s Christians say they have suffered under the incumbent, Diani Budiarto.
In Bandung, Ridwan Kamil, sits in his office at the end of a long day, looking weary, but nonetheless enthusiastic as he talks about his plans for the city. He’s changed into flip-flops and his bicycle helmet lies on the table next to him; the Mayor cycles from home to work, and back, every day.
Kamil’s predecessor, Dada Rosada, is currently in custody, having been arrested by Indonesia’s anti-corruption watchdog in connection with a bribery case. “I’ve inherited a bureaucracy with terrible morale, and a city with more bad news than good news,” smiles Kamil wanly, referring to the fact that there was no handover ceremony when he took office, with Rosada in jail.
Kamil is perhaps Indonesia’s best-known architect and has been involved in prestige design projects across Asia and the Middle East. His background in city planning and design might make him a logical choice for city mayor, but logic often has little to do with how people vote.
The fact that Indonesian voters are breaking free of vote-bank politics where identity issues and vested interests explain voter choice rather than candidate merit is laudable, specially given the fact that Indonesian democracy is barely 15 years old.
Strong backing
What explains this new wave of activists, academics and professionals who are being voted to power?
Kamil says he owes his victory to strong middle-class civil society backing, which mobilised social media into a wave of support. The new Mayor is a lecturer at the Bandung Institute of Technology, and over the years has been involved with members of the city’s academic, student and activist community in a number of community development projects. He has started urban farming movements and bike-share initiatives, among others.
He does not belong to any political party, although during his campaign he secured the backing of two parties whose original candidates were known as no-hopers. When he entered the electoral fray in March, Kamil was polling at a lowly 6 per cent. A few months later, he won the election with a strong 45 per cent of all votes. He attributes it to campaigns carried out on YouTube, Twitter and Facebook. A city of 2.5 million people, Bandung, is ranked sixth on the list of cities with the most active Twitter accounts.
For transparency
Within a month of taking office, Kamil has instituted plans to get beggars off the street by offering them jobs as municipal cleaners. He has persuaded the military to join in on the cleanliness drive with 1,000 troops taking to the streets to help clean up. He wants every neighbourhood in the city to “adopt” a park and every new building to incorporate an urban garden.
Working with Indonesia’s anti-corruption commission, he’s also setting up incentives for whistle-blowers within the administration to report corruption in the city bureaucracy. To improve transparency, all department heads have been ordered to set up Twitter accounts. It will not be easy. Kamil has sprouted grey hair only a month into the job. Yet, he remains hopeful.
In the meantime, all eyes are on Jokowi, and next year’s presidential election. If the Jakarta Governor were to win, it would be a democratic coup for Indonesia, underscoring the success of its experiment with democracy in a relatively short time. But, even if he is denied the ticket this time around, Jokowi and his fellow-local level leaders like Kamil will remain a testament to the fact that the transition from military dictatorship to democracy, even in a large, messy, diverse and relatively poor country like Indonesia, is not only desirable but also workable.
Penetrating the web of terror networks
A detailed study of the Indian Mujahideen, based on a clinical analysis of curated data, is beginning to pay dividends in understanding when the outfit will launch attacks and who its targets will be
The deadly explosions that struck a Bharatiya Janata Party rally in Patna on October 27 confirmed that terrorism will remain on top of the agenda for an over-stretched Indian police and a heavily burdened Intelligence Bureau (IB). Investigations have revealed the involvement of at least six individuals in the planting of 18 explosives (of which only seven exploded) in Gandhi Maidan. The Indian Mujahideen (IM) is the leading suspect for the daring attack. Its intentions seem clear: convert the rally into a mass fatality event, and spread fear and panic with a blatant message to the security apparatus that the IM is a force to contend with.
To the credit of the Bihar Police, some operatives from the IM’s Ranchi cell — one of its newly unearthed field entities — have been arrested in connection with the Patna bombing. Unfortunately, arresting IM operatives does not appear to prevent the outfit from launching terror attacks with relative impunity, and in fact could be a sign that further attacks are in the works.
In the forthcoming book Indian Mujahideen: Computational Analysis and Public Policy (Springer 2014), the four writers here were able to use data mining algorithms developed at the University of Maryland to identify broad conditions that were predictive of different types of terror acts carried out by the IM. Over the years, the IM has consistently carried out simultaneous attacks with multiple devices within a few months of the arrests or deaths of its top operatives. Following the arrest of Yasin Bhatkal in late August 2013, this behavioural rule led us to predict that the IM was likely to launch attacks in the last quarter of 2013 — a prediction that has unfortunately come true with the Patna attacks.
The prospect of a renewed IM terror campaign is dismaying because the next few months are going to be dominated by heightened political acrimony related to the general election and the inevitable use of valuable police resources. In contrast, organisations such as the IM and their allies (such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba) and sponsors (such as the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence) would remain focussed on creating maximum damage for India’s governments.
Soft targets
A striking feature of all IM attacks is the choice of soft targets such as crowded markets. These have caused havoc, killing hundreds of innocent civilians. The IM’s trademark has been multi-pronged attacks that maximise casualties. These attacks, such as the near-simultaneous bombing of three courthouses in different cities across Uttar Pradesh in 2007, require substantial coordination and organisational skills. After the U.P. attacks, the IM terrorised India with a string of bombings throughout 2008. In an attack in Ahmedabad in July 2008, the IM set off nearly 20 low-intensity bombs across the city, and when crowds gathered at the City Trauma Centre, it detonated a car bomb, killing dozens. Since then, the outfit has carried out at least 10 forays, including the 2010 attack on the German Bakery in Pune (possibly in conjunction with LeT) that killed 17, a triple bombing in Mumbai in 2011 that killed 27, and in February 2013, a double bombing in Hyderabad that killed 17.
There have been a few significant IM arrests in recent months. In a coup for India’s security agencies, two of IM’s top operatives, Yasin Bhatkal and Asadullah Akhtar, were captured. Unfortunately, these arrests do not seem to have caused a major dent on the IM, which retains its skill in planning operations with deadly precision and efficiency. The serial blasts in Patna, which were strikingly similar to the twin blasts in Dilsukhnagar (Hyderabad), on February 21, and the July 7 Bodh Gaya blasts this year, illustrate the IM’s capabilities. These repeated terrorist successes here and elsewhere can, unfortunately, only help to boost the morale of groups like the IM.
This raises the overarching issue of how to check terrorism in India. It is more than clear that the IM is one of the most active terrorist groups in India. Its achievements have been disproportionate to its actual strength or marginal popular appeal.
Predicting exactly when and where an attack will occur is a task that cannot be consistently done. However, the authors’ detailed study of the IM, based on a clinical analysis of carefully curated data, and employing the “big data” analytic techniques (similar to techniques used by the Amazons and eBays of the world), is now starting to pay its first dividends in understanding when the IM will launch attacks and what types of targets it will select.
The study projects an ominous scenario. Periods during which Indian-Pakistani diplomatic relations begin to warm are followed by internal IM conferences and chatter, a month or so later. These high-level internal meetings are seen as necessary to plan the IM’s signature multi-pronged bombing campaigns. These meetings are then followed by “ramped up” collaboration with other terrorist groups such as the LeT and the Harkat-ul-Jihad Isami. Pakistani terrorist groups, with the active connivance of Pakistan’s ISI, have provided funding, explosives, training and other crucial support, all of which have facilitated the IM’s emergence as a deadly terrorist organisation capable in its own right. Shortly after every strike, there are the usual arrests of IM activists. These arrests may be the result of visible IM activity in preparation for an upcoming attack. It is also possible that attacks follow the arrests of IM men, because the IM or its Pakistani allies, LeT and the ISI, want to demonstrate their resolve to carry out further attacks.
Valuable warnings
This sequence of events preceding IM bombings can provide valuable warnings of likely attacks, and highlight points in IM operations that are vulnerable to disruption by security agencies. Specifically, security agencies must subject IM operatives and their networks to extensive covert electronic surveillance. While this is routine in most counter-terror operations, travel intelligence systems must track the movement of IM operatives within India, across India’s borders, and even beyond those borders. IM operatives have previously used Indian passports to exit India to friendly neighbouring countries like Pakistan and Bangladesh — from there on, they have used fake Pakistani passports, no doubt supplied by the ISI, to travel to Pakistan and the Gulf.
One of IM’s top leaders, Mohammed Sadiq Israr Sheikh, from Azamgarh in Uttar Pradesh, is believed to have travelled from India to Bangladesh in 2000 on a legitimate Indian passport and from there on to Pakistan on a genuine Pakistani passport arranged by the ISI. In Pakistan, he met with LeT commander Azeem Cheema in Bahawalpur and trained at an LeT training camp near Muzaffarabad. At least another 10 people from Azamgarh alone, who travelled to Pakistan through various intermediate countries, have been identified.
Disrupting a network requires understanding it thoroughly in real-time so that attacks can be stopped before they occur. Closer coordination with agencies such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation and other law enforcement agencies will not only help uncover IM’s global support network, but also the detailed interlinked relationship among terror, financing, and criminal organisations.
Though it is impossible to predict the exact location and timing of an attack, data mining technology has now come of age. It can predict the types of attacks that terror groups will carry out — and the approximate time-frame (in three-month periods). This provides a valuable input to law-enforcement and intelligence agencies, enabling them to intelligently deploy scarce investigative resources. If this translates into fewer number of IM attacks over the course of a six-month period, we will have brought about a welcome and needed synergy between researchers and law-enforcement at a time when national security demands it.
Unshackling the bureaucracy
The image of an honest civil servant subjected to arbitrary transfer or suspension by the political executive at the behest of vested interests is etched in the public consciousness as a key archetype of the Indian bureaucracy. The rising public awareness of the importance of the bureaucracy in the delivery of basic services to citizens has received a welcome boost from the Supreme Court’s reformative verdict on insulating officers from political interference. Three significant administrative reforms arise out of the court’s verdict on a petition by more than 80 former bureaucrats: a fixed tenure for civil servants so that they are not transferred at the whims and fancies of the political executive; and a stipulation that all instructions by superiors be in writing, to protect officers from wrongful pressure from their superiors, political masters and vested interests. To prevent arbitrary transfers, the court has directed that the Centre and the States establish Civil Service Boards (CSB) comprising serving officers to advise the political executive on transfers, postings and disciplinary action, until Parliament enacts a law in this regard. These directions are meant to “ensure good governance, transparency and accountability” in governmental functions, the court has said.
A question that might be raised is whether the Supreme Court was overstepping its ambit by directing the constitution of a mechanism to regulate transfers and postings, especially when draft Bills are in circulation on such reforms. But it is evident that the court has taken judicial note of the various official reports and studies in this regard. It quotes extensively from past exercises — the reports of the K. Santhanam Committee on prevention of corruption, the Hota Committee and the Second Administrative Reforms Commission — that addressed these questions. These reports had recommended fixed tenures, insulation from political interference, avoidance of oral instructions, and a statutory board to decide on transfers. But these were not taken forward. The failure of the executive to frame a legislative framework to address these key concerns has forced the court to step in. The reality is that the phenomenon of the ‘politician-bureaucrat-industrialist’ nexus is so entrenched that it requires a sustained systemic effort to cleanse the administrative system. The real gain for citizens is that the Supreme Court judgment has raised the bar for good governance in this country by providing a framework to insulate bureaucrats from the pressures of a clutch of vested interests which act through the political system. Public confidence in governance is bound to rise as a result of this landmark verdict.
(The hindu miscellaneous)
Mars mission on November 5
The country’s highly anticipated Mars Orbiter Mission
will take off as planned on Tuesday, November 5, at 2.38 p.m. An ISRO
official said the Launch Authorisation Board on Friday cleared the
flight from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre. The 56-hour countdown begins
on Sunday at 6.08 a.m.
Dhoni, Kohli nominated for ICC People’s Choice award
Indian
captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni and star batsman Virat Kohli were on
Saturday nominated for the International Cricket Council’s People’s
Choice Award, the winner of which will be declared on December 13 during
the governing body’s 10th annual awards.
IFFK award for Spanish filmmaker
Veteran Spanish film-maker Carlos Saura has been selected for the 18th
International Film Festival of Kerala (IFFK) Lifetime Achievement Award.
Heritage building housing govt. press gutted
A
major fire broke out in the Government Press on Mint Street in the
early hours of Friday. The single-storeyed heritage structure, housing
the printing and binding unit, collapsed in the fire that lasted nearly
eight hours. Whatever was left standing was demolished completely by the
Public Works Department late evening. None was injured in the accident.
The
building was constructed in 1888 and it functioned as a gunpowder
manufacturing unit and printing press for the British government.
After 1947, the State government took it over and ran it as a printing press for official documents.
According
to sources in the Tamil Nadu Fire and Rescue Services, the fire started
around 2.10 a.m. following an electrical short from a recently fixed
circuit for installing new printing machinery.
The intense fire
and water from the fire hoses developed cracks on the building and
damaged a few pillars, causing the structure to slant.According to
sources in the Public Works Department that maintains the press, the
remaining portion of the structure had to be demolished as it was
damaged beyond repair and unsafe for the employees.
Northeast’s most modern prison opened near Agartala
Tripura’s
new central jail, said to be the most modern and spacious in the
northeast, was inaugurated on Friday by Chief Minister Manik Sarkar.
The
64-crore, state-of-the-art jail built in an area of 33 acres at
Bishalgarh, 20 km south of Agartala, can accommodate 975 inmates. “It
has separate provisions for convicts, undertrials and for those to be
accorded ‘division’ by courts,” said Prison Minister Manindra Reang.
A
compound for women inmates has been constructed in line with the Jail
Manual and the recommendations made by various statutory organisations,
officials said.
The prison, built by engineering Projects of
India, has all sophisticated gadgets including CCTV, an automatic alarm
and lighting systems, besides indoor and outdoor sports facilities.
There are a library, a reading room, a vocational training centre, a
20-bed hospital for inmates, and quarters for jail officials and staff.
All
inmates from the erstwhile, 139-year-old central jail in the city have
been moved to the new premises. But the government has not yet made up
its mind on how to make use of the 17-acre land on which the jail was
built in 1874 during the erstwhile royal regime.
Brazil wants IPCC to study responsibility of countries for accumulated greenhouse emissions
Brazil has proposed that the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change (IPCC) formally study the historical responsibility of
countries for the accumulated greenhouse gas emissions on the basis of
which the future emission reduction targets can be set. The proposal,
which has found the backing of other BASIC countries – India, China and
South Africa – will be formally discussed at the Warsaw talks beginning
November 11.
Developed countries, especially the United States, have till date
refused to acknowledge the importance of accounting for the emissions
accumulated in the atmosphere so far which are also referred to as
‘stocks.’ It prefers to negotiate only looking at current and future
emission flows. The U.S. is the highest emitter of accumulated emissions
so far and countries such as China, India and other emerging economies
fall much behind the developed world. The principle of historical
emissions is based on the scientific fact that carbon dioxide emissions –
by far the largest greenhouse gas – once emitted, stay in the
atmosphere for more than a 100 years and continue to heat up the planet.
The Brazil has now asked that IPCC , a pool of more than 2000 scientists
working to compile the best of science on the issue, be also charged
with developing a ‘methodology to enable Parties [countries] to quantify
national historical contributions to climate change. Such reference
methodology on historical responsibilities should guide domestic
consultation process for defining mitigation contributions during the
post-2020 period.”
Not new
The principle of historical emissions itself is not new. The U.N.
Framework Convention on Climate acknowledges its importance. The
calculations of such emissions also exist widely in the public domain.
But to get a formally recognised formulation for historical emissions
from the UN IPCC holds great political and strategic value in the
negotiations.
If the proposal gets approved at the Warsaw talks, it would ensure that
the principle of historical emissions also gets more firmly embedded in
the negotiations for the new climate pact to be signed by 2015 and
becomes one of the parameters based on which countries are held
responsible for doing less than required levels to combat climate
change. This would put a greater onus of action on the developed world
than emerging economies. Accounting more for current and future
emissions – something the developed world prefers – would put the onus
for costly climate reduction actions on emerging countries whose
economies are growing and consuming increasing amount of energy and fuel
today.
Brazil approaches India for global summit to discuss U.S. surveillance
Multistakeholder participation, processes and agenda await clarity
Global outrage against recent revelations of mass surveillance by the
U.S. government, which sparked discussions for a review of global
surveillance guidelines, has led the Brazilian government to reach out
to the Indian government for support for its proposal to host a one-off
global summit, scheduled for early May 2014.
The move follows President Dilma Rouseff’s angry speech on U.S. surveillance at the U.N. General Assembly in September.
When contacted by The Hindu, Ministry of External Affairs
spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin confirmed the news. The surveillance issue
had also come up during External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid’s
visit to Brazil in October. Mr. Khurshid and his Brazilian counterpart
had “expressed their concern” on the issue. These meetings were held in
the week following ICANN CEO Fadi Chehadé’s first visit to Brazil and
meeting with Ms. Rouseff, that resulted in the proposal for the
Brazilian “summit,” which caught all countries and Internet communities
unawares.
Surprise summit
Even ICANN’s closest constituencies — ISOC and IETF — have no clarity on
the timing, purpose, process and outcome of such a one-off summit.
Apart from India, Brazil is also reportedly in touch with other
countries such as South Korea, Australia and now more likely, Germany,
after it recently came to light that the U.S. may have monitored
Chancellor Angela Merkel’s phone for over a decade .
ICANN held multiple meetings along with the heads of ISOC and IETF last
week at the Internet Governance Forum in Bali, Indonesia to answer the
questions of various stakeholders. Business and civil society remained
sceptical about the meeting, given Brazil’s support for the ITU Treaty
and inter-governmental model for Internet governance, with fears that
this meet was being engineered to strengthen multilateral control of the
Internet without a clear process for multi-stakeholder participation in
decision-making.
Widespread scepticism
Scepticism at the Brazilian summit became acute as multiple tweets and
webcasts from the IGF in Bali showed that the Brazilian delegation
remained unclear about their stance on the multilateral versus
multi-stakeholder model of Internet governance, often using the words
interchangeably.
India’s concerns are graver. This is because, if surveillance, rather
than evaluation of a multistakeholder model for transitioning Internet
governance, remains the main issue of the Brazilian conference — in line
with President Rouseff’s U.N. speech and based on the Brazilian
delegation’s statements in Bali — this would bring India’s Central
Monitoring System (CMS) into focus.
An investigative report by The Hindu, ‘India’s surveillance
project may be as lethal as PRISM’, published on June 21, revealed that
the CMS was second only to PRISM in terms of size, lethal capability and
an extraordinary ability for intrusion into citizens’ privacy, without
much detail or guidelines in the public domain. Even at the IGF last
week, the CMS attracted criticism for its opaque surveillance
procedures.
Indian stakeholders favour removing the U.S. government’s control over
ICANN, even though that may not be directly linked to the predominant
issue of surveillance, which has sparked the present anger sweeping
global capitals. However, apart from a stronger role for the Government
Advisory Committee (GAC), there is no clear roadmap for realigning
ICANN. It is unclear whether the Brazil summit will deal with both
surveillance and ICANN’s internationalisation, or predominantly review
global surveillance procedures.
India’s dilemma
The External Affairs Ministry did not confirm if India has decided to
support the Brazilian effort. However, if it does, it will be at the
risk of defending criticism against CMS-related surveillance, while
agreeing to attack the Americans on PRISM. The Indian government has
been either defensive of, or silent on, the PRISM program since it has
benefitted from the program.
Global businesses and the civil society seem comfortable discussing
surveillance openly, but if governments — nearly all of whom engage in
widespread surveillance — will support such discussion remains a
mystery. Since the meeting in Brazil is proposed for May 2014, right in
the middle of India’s general election, the likelihood of any senior
political or bureaucratic heads leading India’s delegation also looks
dim.
