The Egyptian military has dissolved both the parliament and Constitution that were central to now-resigned President Hosni Mubarak's rule, promising free elections in six months. Mubarak's government is already disappearing, but its not clear what, exactly, will come next. As Egypt's future hangs in the balance, what's most likely to determine the outcome? Observers are now focused largely on the army, but there's much more at play that will determine the future of governance in Egypt.

At this point, a democratic transition will most likely require the army to continue to play a strong, guiding role. Now that the military is transitioning from managing the protests to running the country, it is in a position to either seize power for itself or secure a path toward democracy.

Any political transition is likely to be more successful if more and more citizens come to feel that they "own" the protests and the resulting transition. In this respect, the fact that the demand for Mubarak's immediate resignation originated from Cairo's Tahrir Square rather than from the Obama administration is a positive development.

Many of the opposition groups, representing a broad spectrum of opinion - including a traditional liberal party, the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood, and the Facebook activists of the April 6 Youth Movement - have indicated that they might support an interim government, possibly one led by the Nobel Peace Prize winner Mohamed ElBaradei.

But, in order to choose a leader, these groups must coalesce into a coherent force. Great civil-society protest movements - such as those in Egypt and Tunisia - can overthrow a dictatorship, but a true democracy requires parties, negotiations, election rules, and agreement on constitutional changes. In most successful transitions, the first step toward forging the unity required to create an interim government is taken when the diverse groups begin to meet more often, develop common strategies, and issue collective statements.

Regardless of who leads it, there are some things an interim government should not do. Judging by the transitions that we have studied, a successful democratic outcome stands the best chance if the interim government does not succumb to the temptation to extend its mandate or write a new constitution itself. The interim government's key political task should be to organize free and fair elections, making only those constitutional changes needed to conduct them. Writing a new constitution is best left to the incoming, popularly elected parliament.

Most activists and commentators are now asking who will or should become the next president. But why assume that a presidential political system, headed by a powerful unitary executive, will be instituted? Of the eight post-communist countries in the European Union, not one chose such a system. All of them established some form of parliamentary system, in which the government is directly accountable to the legislature and the president's powers are limited -- and often largely ceremonial.

That was a wise decision. A presidential election at a moment of great uncertainty, and in the absence of experienced democratic parties or broadly accepted leaders, is filled with danger.

To elect a president is to commit to one person, generally for at least four years. But, because the country's political parties are so young, so numerous, and so inexperienced, it is very uncertain that any person elected today in Egypt would have the same support in even a year. For example, if there are many candidates in a first round of a presidential election, it is conceivable that neither of the two candidates in the second-round run-off will have won more than 20% in the first round. The winner would thus assume all the burdens of leadership with the support of only a small minority of the electorate.

It is also possible that a new president turns out to be incompetent, or is in a permanent minority position and unable to pass legislation. In this way, many new democracies fall rapidly into "super-presidentialism" with plebiscitary qualities.

Fortunately, some Egyptian democratic activists and theorists are already debating the parliamentary alternative. In that case, Egypt's first free and fair election could create a constituent assembly that would immediately provide a democratic base for the government, as well as a means to amend or re-write the constitution.

At that point, the constituent assembly and government could decide whether to switch to a presidential form of government or establish a parliamentary system on a permanent basis. Under a parliamentary system, any future democratic government would gain invaluable flexibility, for two major reasons.

First, unlike presidentialism, a parliamentary system can give rise to multiparty ruling coalitions. Second, unlike a president, who, however incompetent or unpopular, remains in power for a fixed term, the head of government in a parliamentary system can be removed at any time by a vote of no confidence, clearing the way for a new, majority-backed government - or, failing that, fresh elections.

Some democratic nationalists in Egypt are defending parliamentarianism with an important new argument: a contentious, pluralist, probably multiparty coalition government would be harder for the United States to dominate than a lone "super-president" like Mubarak.

Perhaps most importantly, a parliamentary system could address the huge task of creating democratic and effective political parties better than presidentialism would. Criticizing Mubarak as a "pharaoh" makes for great political rhetoric, but for democracy truly to work in Egypt, it will need to do more than subject the president, and the presidential system, to meaningful elections; it will need a new system altogether.


source:
theatlantic

The Muslim Brotherhood's Strategy in Egypt


Some Americans fear that Egypt in 2011 could repeat Iran in 1979, when a small group of religious fanatics hijacked a revolution. They see another popular uprising overtaking a much-hated, U.S.-backed dictator. They know that the strongest opposition group is the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist movement that is unfriendly to the United States (In my years of interviewing Brotherhood leaders, I've almost never heard one say anything friendly about the U.S., which they regard with open and conspiratorial hostility.) And they worry that the dictator's impending fall will invite another Islamist takeover, which could undermine U.S. interests in the Middle East for decades to come.

Ironically, nobody understands these fears better than the Muslim Brotherhood itself. The Egyptian Islamist organization knows that if it does anything that even remotely appears as though it is trying to take charge of the opposition, it will become the global face of Egypt's popular revolt - subjecting both the revolt generally and the group specifically to the scrutiny of an international community that doesn't want to see a Brotherhood-ruled Egypt. So for the moment, its leaders say that they will neither run a presidential candidate nor participate in any transitional government. Their coyness is likely to continue until a political transition is consolidated.

This has been the Brotherhood's operating style for nearly a month. When Egyptian activists first began planning discussions for the fateful January 25th protests following the Tunisian uprising, Brotherhood leader Essam el-Erian hinted to me that the group would stay on the sidelines, observing that the Mubarak regime uses "the Muslim Brotherhood as a bogeyman to frighten the people and the Western countries." Even after the protests gained traction, Brotherhood leaders continued to downplay their involvement, claiming that Muslim Brothers were participating merely "as independent Egyptians" rather than as members of an Islamist organization. Since joining an ad hoc coalition of opposition groups involved with the protesters, members of the organization have refused to take a leading role.

"This is a revolution for all Egyptians -- it's not ours," el-Erian said on Monday. "The revolution was raised by the people."

In recent days, the Muslim Brotherhood has worked assiduously to avoid too much attention by following other groups' lead. On Sunday, Brotherhood representatives joined a coalition of approximately 30 opposition leaders and intellectuals who met with Vice-President Omar Suleiman to discuss a transition. But, on Monday, the Muslim Brotherhood announced that it had withdrawn from the talks, joining with other organizations in demanding that Hosni Mubarak leave office before any future meetings are held.

"The basis of negotiations was not there," said Brotherhood official Mohamed Morsi, who attended the meeting with Suleiman. "Our basic position is with the people: that [the] president should step down. This is our bottom line, because it is the people's bottom line."

To further assimilate itself into the popular revolt, the Brotherhood has released a set of demands mirroring those of liberal opposition groups. These include abolishing the emergency law, dissolving both parliamentary bodies, holding new elections under judicial supervision, releasing detainees and political prisoners, investigating the regime's violence against demonstrators, and forming a transitional government. To avoid becoming a lightning rod for attacks, the Brotherhood's leaders have said that they will not participate in this transitional government.

"We want to keep an eye [on things]," said Morsi. "We want to be a part of the social movement and social activities, but do not want to be a part of the government at least for this period, which can be for many years."

El-Erian even suggested that, were Egypt to hold a new round of parliamentary elections, the Muslim Brotherhood wouldn't even nominate enough candidates to gain to gain a majority. "In the last parliamentary elections, we named about 160 candidates for 554 seats. We are for gradual, peaceful change," he said.

For the moment, the Muslim Brotherhood's lax, backseat role has added to Egyptian liberal leaders' confidence. "I don't think they can be a leader of the opposition," says Ghad party leader Shadi Taha. "Looking at the political playground, there might be some support for the Muslim Brotherhood, but it can't be more than 15 percent."

Yet in a country where few people have any experience voting, a tightly organized political movement stands to mobilize voters more effectively than the looser, liberal organizations now leading the demonstrations. And therein lies the true genius of the Muslim Brotherhood's strategy: It knows that it can win in the long run, if it can emerge relatively unscathed over the short run.

__________________
It's Not Over 'til I Win

Comparing the GDP of China's Provinces to Countries
How massive is China's economy? Take for example the province of Inner Mongolia, which is the size of Chile in terms of economic output. I've been obsessed with Inner Mongolia ever since a visit to a rare earth high-tech zone there last November (and having been elbowed out of a doughnut shop on Sunday morning as Inner Mongolians were buying up the entire store of donuts it seemed). But the purpose of the comparison is that after having written on China becoming a $5.8 trillion economy, I thought it might be interesting to compare provincial economies to countries to see how many country-sized economies are in China. Californians, for example, probably bask in the glory of the fact that they live in the 8th or 9th largest economy in the world and can simultaneously produce a Lindsay Lohan and a Steve Jobs.

I happened to come across a Chinese report that compiled 2010 growth rates and GDP figures for individual Chinese provinces. (This exercise may also be a partial and limited answer to my fellow guest blogger Edward Goldstick's dispatch on China's 12th five-year plan, a topic on which I've written extensively in my day job.) So using World Bank GDP numbers for various countries, which were only up to 2009 unfortunately, I did a quick comparison (confession: I did not tally up the GDPs to see if they totaled $5.8 trillion).

In order from largest GDP to smallest:

1. Guangdong: 12.2% growth, $689 billion

2. Jiangsu: 13.5% growth, $620 billion = Turkey: $614 billion

3. Shandong: 12.5% growth, $597 billion = Indonesia: $540 billion

4. Zhejiang: 11.8% growth, $411 billion = Sweden: $406 billion

5. Henan: 12% growth, $333 billion = Greece: $329 billion

6. Hebei: 12.2% growth, $306 billion = Denmark: $309 billion

7. Liaoning: 13% growth, $265 billion = Thailand: $263 billion

8. Sichuan: 15.1% growth, $256 billion

9. Shanghai: 9.9% growth, $255.6 billion

10. Hunan: 14.5% growth, $241 billion = Finland: $238 billion

11. Hubei: 14.8% growth, $239 billion = Colombia: $234 billion

12. Fujian: 13.8% growth, $209 billion = Ireland: $227 billion

13. Beijing: 10.2% growth, $208.7 billion

14. Anhui: 14.5% growth, $185.8 billion = Egypt: $188 billion

15. Inner Mongolia: 15% growth, $176 billion = Chile: $163 billion

16. Shaanxi: 14.5% growth, $151.8 billion

17. Heilongjiang: 12.5% growth, $150 billion

18. Guangxi: 14.2% growth, $144 billion

19. Jiangxi: 14% growth, $143 billion

20. Tianjin: 17.4% growth, $138 billion = Algeria: $140 billion

21. Shanxi: 13.9% growth, $137.7 billion

22. Jilin: 13.7% growth, $130 billion = Hungary: $129 billion

23. Chongqing: 17.1% growth, $119.5 billion = Kazakhstan: $115 billion

24. Yunnan: 12.3% growth, $109.4 billion

25. Xinjiang: 10.6% growth, $82.1 billion

26. Guizhou: 12.8% growth, $69.6 billion

27. Gansu: 11.5% growth, $62 billion = Libya: $62 billion

28. Hainan: 15.8% growth, $31.1 billion = Uruguay: $31.5 billion

29. Ningxia: 13.4% growth, $24.9 billion = Kenya: $29 billion

30. Qinghai: 15.3% growth, $20.5 billion = Turkmenistan: $20 billion

31. Tibet: 12.3% growth, $7.7 billion = Papua New Guinea: $7.9 billion

These are of course rough equivalents. And for some provinces, I didn't see a close enough proximate GDP. I know, I know, the figures are also far from a comprehensive look at economic performance, as measurement of per capita welfare, quality of growth, social welfare and so on are not reflected.

But the intention in juxtaposing provinces with countries is to help visualize how China is composed of--based on total output anyway--literally developed, middle income, and poor developing countries, from Sweden to Turkmenistan. It also highlights the regional disparity that you often hear Chinese officials talk about--for example, the wealthiest province (Guangdong) is roughly 10 times richer than the poorest (Tibet).The second point is to note how growth is shifting into interior China, as Qinghai and Ningxia, two of the poorest provinces in China, are growing incredibly at 13-15%. Meanwhile, Shanghai, for all its glitz and glam, was the only one that had a "paltry" single-digit growth rate. (Amy Chua would've given Shanghai a D- for economic performance.)

The last point is also related to the 12th five-year plan, billed as China's "economic rebalancing act". But it is not just a rebalancing from a production and export-intensive model to a more consumption-based economy. It is also meant to be a rebalancing of political and economic power beyond the coast to the "continent" if you will. Some of these dynamics have begun naturally, but the financial crisis brought a sense of urgency in further developing the interior. Judging by some of the growth targets individual provinces have set, the interior provinces are clearly more ambitious in their growth prospects as they play catch-up to the coastal behemoths. If nothing else, I think this means more doughnut shops in Inner Mongolia.

source
theatlantic

__________________
It's Not Over 'til I Win

Why There's No Turning Back in the Middle East
by Fareed Zakaria

The year of the revolutions began in January, in a small country of little importance. Then the protests spread to the region's largest and most important state, toppling a regime that had seemed firmly entrenched. The effect was far-reaching. The air was filled with talk of liberty and freedom. Street protests cropped up everywhere, challenging the rule of autocrats and monarchs, who watched from their palaces with fear.

That could be a description of events in Tunisia and Egypt as those countries' peaceful revolutions have inspired and galvanized people across the Middle East. In fact, it refers to popular uprisings 162 years earlier that began in Sicily and France. The revolutions of 1848, as they were called, were remarkably similar in mood to what is happening right now in the Middle East. (They were dubbed the springtime of peoples by historians at the time.) The backdrop then, as now, was a recession and rising food prices. The monarchies were old and sclerotic. The young were in the forefront.

Except that the story didn't end so well. The protesters gained power but then splintered, fought one another and weakened themselves. The military stayed loyal to the old order and cracked down on protests. The monarchs waited things out, and within a few years, the old regimes had reconstituted themselves. "History reached its turning point, and failed to turn," wrote the British historian A.J.P. Taylor.

Will history fail to turn in the Middle East? Will these protests in Yemen, Bahrain, Jordan and beyond peter out, and in a few years, will we look back at 2011 and realize that very little actually changed? It's certainly possible, but there are two fundamental reasons the tensions that have been let loose in the Middle East over the past few weeks are unlikely to disappear, and they encompass two of the most powerful forces changing the world today: youth and technology.

The central, underlying feature of the Middle East's crisis is a massive youth bulge. About 60% of the region's population is under 30. These millions of young people have aspirations that need to be fulfilled, and the regimes in place right now show little ability to do so. The protesters' demands have been dismissed by the regimes as being for Islamic fundamentalism or a product of Western interference. But plainly these are homegrown protests that have often made the West uneasy as they have shaken up old alliances. And what the protesters want in the first place is to be treated as citizens, not subjects. In a recent survey of Middle Eastern youth, the No. 1 wish of the young in nine countries was to live in a free country, although, to be sure, jobs and the desire to live in well-run, modern societies ranked very high as well.

Young people are not always a source of violence. The West experienced a demographic bulge — the famous baby boom in the decades after World War II — that is known mainly for fueling economic growth. China and India, likewise, have a large cohort of young workers, and that adds to those countries' economic strength. But without economic growth, job opportunities and a sense of dignity, too many young people — especially young men — can make for mass discontent. That is what has happened in the Middle East, where the scale of the youth bulge is extreme — perhaps the largest in the world right now. From 1970 to 2007, 80% of all outbreaks of conflict occurred in countries where 60% or more of the population was younger than 30. And even places where the baby boom produced growth are not without problems. The peak years of the West's bulge came in the late 1960s, a period associated with youth rebellions and mass protests.

Journalists, politicians and scholars have all noted the Middle East's youth problem. But the region's governments have done little to address it — youth unemployment remains staggeringly high, by some measures close to 25%. The oil boom has certainly helped the Gulf countries pay off their people in various ways, but more than half of those who live in the Middle East are in lands that do not produce oil. Moreover, oil has proved a curse in the rich countries, where the economies have little to offer other than extracting hydrocarbons, where armies of foreigners do all the work and where regimes continue to offer their people a basic bargain: we will subsidize you as long as you accept our rule. Rattled by recent developments, Kuwait and Bahrain both decided to give all of their citizens bonuses this year ($3,000 in Kuwait, $2,700 in Bahrain).

Those payments are a reminder that in the Middle East, there are two modes of control: mass repression and mass bribery. Perhaps the latter, used in the Gulf states, will prove more effective — though in Bahrain, the regime faces specific challenges, with a Sunni minority ruling over a Shi'ite majority. The broader predicament facing both systems, however, is a population that is increasingly aware, informed and connected. It's too simple to say that what happened in Tunisia and Egypt happened because of Facebook. But technology — satellite television, computers, mobile phones and the Internet — has played a powerful role in informing, educating and connecting people in the region. Such advances empower individuals and disempower the state. In the old days, information technology favored those in power, because it was one to many. That's why revolutionaries tried to take over radio stations in the 1930s — so they could broadcast information to the masses. Today's technologies are all many to many, networks in which everyone is connected but no one is in control. That's bad for anyone trying to suppress information.

Of course, the state can fight back. The Egyptian government managed to shut down Egyptians' access to the Internet for five days. The Iranian regime closed down cell-phone service at the height of the green movement's protests in 2009. But think of the costs of such moves. Can banks run when the Internet is down? Can commerce expand when cell phones are demobilized? Syria has only now opened access to Facebook, but its basic approach remains to keep the world tightly at bay — which is a major obstacle to economic growth and to tackling that vital problem of youth unemployment. North Korea can stay stable as long as it stays utterly stagnant. (And that stability is for the short term anyway.) For regimes that need or want to respond to the aspirations of their people, openness becomes an economic and political necessity.

The modernizing imperative — societies need to embrace more openness to make progress — is why I am allowing myself to be optimistic about the progress of the youth revolutions. It's easy to be disappointed when looking at the Middle East's sad recent history. And yet something in the region feels as if it is changing. Warren Buffett once said that when anyone tells him, "This time it's different," he reaches for his wallet because he fears he's going to be swindled. Well, I have a feeling that this time in the Middle East, it's different. But I have my hand on my wallet anyway.


source:
Timesmagazine

__________________
It's Not Over 'til I Win

Pakistan Delays Ruling on Jailed American
By JANE PERLEZ


Pakistan — A provincial court on Thursday gave the Pakistani government three weeks to decide whether the American official in custody for killing two Pakistanis has diplomatic immunity, a delay that is likely to intensify a standoff with the United States, the nation’s biggest donor and an ally in the fight against terrorism.

The decision came a day after a whirlwind visit by Senator John Kerry to try to find a quick resolution to the case, which has severely damaged relations between the countries and exposed the weakness of the pro-American government headed by President Asif Ali Zardari.

The public furor in Pakistan has revolved around why Raymond A. Davis, 36, arrested with a loaded Glock handgun and other security gear, was driving alone in an impoverished area of Lahore not usually frequented by diplomats. After Mr. Davis killed two motorcyclists who he said were trying to rob him, an official American car that tried to rescue him ran over another motorcyclist, who later died. That car fled the scene.

In an argument before the court in Lahore, the advocate general of Punjab Province, Khawaja Haris, said the authorities had filed a “double murder case” against Mr. Davis.

On the matter of diplomatic immunity, which the Obama administration insists on, the lawyer pointed to conflicting statements by the Americans on the status of Mr. Davis.

On Jan. 27, the day of the shooting, the United States Consulate in Lahore issued a statement saying Mr. Davis was an employee of the consulate and the holder of a diplomatic passport.

Later, the American Embassy in Islamabad said Mr. Davis, a former Special Forces soldier, worked at the embassy and was employed as a “technical and administrative” official.

The application sent to the Pakistani Foreign Ministry in late 2009 for Mr. Davis’s posting to Pakistan stated that he would work as a “technical and administrative” official at the embassy.

The distinctions could have a bearing on the outcome, since the Vienna Conventions, the international protocols under which diplomatic immunity is regulated, have different standards of immunity for officials employed at embassies and at consulates.

The Obama administration insists that Mr. Davis’s status as a “technical and administrative” official, a phrase used in the 1961 Vienna Convention, grants him immunity from prosecution. The administration has repeatedly said that Mr. Davis is being held illegally and must be released.

President Obama, speaking at a news conference this week, referred to Mr. Davis as “our diplomat.”

Officials assigned to consulates generally enjoy less immunity from prosecution in the host countries, according to lawyers who specialize in diplomatic law.

The judge in Lahore, Chief Justice Ijaz Ahmad Chaudhry, ordered the Foreign Ministry to present its findings on Mr. Davis’s immunity in three weeks, further frustrating the Obama administration’s effort to win his speedy release.

In a statement after the court proceedings, the American ambassador, Cameron Munter, said the United States was disappointed that the Pakistani government had not certified that Mr. Davis had diplomatic immunity.

To press Pakistan, the Obama administration has postponed a meeting scheduled for later this month in Washington where officials from Pakistan, Afghanistan and the United States were to discuss the war in Afghanistan.

It has also warned Pakistan that a planned state visit by Mr. Zardari next month would be in jeopardy if the case was not resolved, and Congress has threatened to cut military assistance.

The argument by Mr. Haris before the court echoed the hard line taken by former Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi. Mr. Qureshi lost his job in a cabinet reshuffle last week because he said he refused to issue the “blanket immunity” for Mr. Davis demanded by the United States, and favored by President Zardari and his close advisers.

Senator Kerry, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the sponsor of a $7.5 billion aid package for Pakistan, left Pakistan on Wednesday night after meeting with top leaders, including President Zardari. He was confident, he said, that the Davis case would be resolved in the “next few days.”

Mr. Kerry met with Mr. Qureshi and the leader of the main opposition party, Nawaz Sharif, the most powerful politician in Punjab. After those meetings, Mr. Qureshi and Mr. Sharif did little to help the Americans to win Mr. Davis’s release, suggesting that the courts should decide the case.

Mr. Qureshi, who had refused to declare Mr. Davis a diplomat entitled to “blanket immunity,” denied at a news conference that he was influenced by the Pakistani military in his decision.

Mr. Sharif criticized the United States for not handing over the people in the car who tried to rescue Mr. Davis, saying that Pakistani officials had written five letters to the consulate in Lahore demanding to know their whereabouts. The consulate had not replied, he said.

Mr. Davis is being held at the central jail in Lahore, where American officials say he is sleeping on a foam mat on a concrete floor without access to a cellphone, the Internet or television.

Video showing Mr. Davis declining to answer questions while in custody has been shown on the television channel Express News.

Apparently leaked from law enforcement authorities supervising Mr. Davis’s custody, the video shows Mr. Davis dressed in a blue jersey, impatiently getting up from a chair and indicating that he would not cooperate.

After the High Court hearing on Thursday, Mr. Davis appeared in a video link from the Lahore jail for a hearing in a lower court to extend his remand for 14 more days on a separate charge involving his carrying the Glock pistol. The authorities charge that Mr. Davis was armed illegally.

source:
nytimes

__________________
It's Not Over 'til I Win

CIA drones may be avoiding Pakistani civilians
By Ken Dilanian, Los Angeles Times
February 22, 2011

chance to kill a powerful militant was reportedly passed up last year because women and children were nearby, reflecting a possible increase in concern over such casualtiesThe CIA passed up a chance last year to kill Sirajuddin Haqqani, the head of an anti-American insurgent network in Pakistan that is closely linked to Al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban, when it chose not to fire a missile at him from a Predator drone because women and children were nearby, U.S. and Pakistani officials say.

The incident was one of at least three occasions in the last six months when a militant was identified on video and a shot was available, but U.S. officials decided not to fire in order to avoid civilian casualties, said a senior Pakistani official familiar with the drone program.

Killing civilians in drone attacks on insurgents in Pakistan's tribal regions has generated a powerful anti-American backlash across the country. The anger has been a major public relations problem for both the Obama administration and the government of Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari, who subscribe to a delicate arrangement under which Pakistani authorities help with intelligence information for the strikes but officially deny involvement.

The Pakistani official, who spoke on condition he not be named, said allowing high-value targets to escape reflected a decision by the U.S. since August to use greater caution in the drone strikes. A strike Aug. 22 destroyed a militant hide-out in North Waziristan, killing 13 members of the Afghan Taliban but also four women and three children who were living among them, according to Pakistani intelligence officials.

The U.S. officials said there had been no policy change and that there always have been occasions when the CIA decided not to fire at a target in the midst of civilians. Those officials would confirm only the Haqqani incident. But they cited two other occasions in the last year when missiles that had already been fired from drones were diverted off target to avoid killing civilians. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were discussing a classified program.

Another factor driving the change, according to a former CIA official, is that the U.S. can afford to forgo an opportunity to kill a senior militant because intelligence and technology improvements to drone operations give the CIA confidence it will get the chance for a clearer shot.

In the past, if the agency passed up an opportunity to strike, the worry was, "Will we ever see that person again. Is this it?" according to the former CIA official. That is less of a concern now, he said.

Members of Congress who received classified briefings on the drone program are satisfied with the efforts made to avoid killing civilians, even if it means passing up opportunities to strike high-value targets, according to congressional sources.

One of the U.S. officials also asserted that no civilian has been killed in more than 75 strikes in Pakistan's tribal areas since the Aug. 22 strike, suggesting that the CIA, which runs the drone program in Pakistan, has been more judicious in its attacks. And despite a substantial increase in drone strikes in recent months, senior Pakistani officials said complaints about civilian deaths have been scant.

Both the U.S. and Pakistani governments have an interest in getting out a message that they are taking care to avoid civilian deaths. Independent groups that monitor media reports to track U.S. strikes in Pakistan said they cannot confirm the U.S. statistics.

But the New America Foundation, which researches the drone program, estimates that as few as zero and as many as 18 civilians have been killed by U.S. drones since the August hit. Overall, the level of noncombatant deaths dropped from 25% of the total in prior years to an estimated 6% in 2010, according to calculations by the foundation's Katherine Tiedemann.

The report concerning Sirajuddin Haqqani suggests that sensitivity about civilian casualties has increased. When a CIA missile took out another Taliban leader, Baitullah Mehsud, in 2009, it also reportedly killed his wife and other family members.

Haqqani is a top-priority CIA target who leads an insurgent network that operates in North Waziristan. He is believed to be responsible for cross-border attacks in Afghanistan, and U.S. officials think the Haqqani network helped plan the 2009 suicide bombing at an Afghan base that killed seven CIA officers.

In an April interview, Haqqani admitted planning the January 14, 2008, attack against the Serena Hotel in Kabul that killed six people, including an American citizen. He also admitted to having planned an April 2008 assassination attempt on Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The State Department, which is offering a $5-million reward for information about his location, says he "has coordinated and participated in cross-border attacks against U.S. and coalition forces in Afghanistan."

The U.S. is required to take steps to avoid killing civilians under the international legal principle of proportionality, but there is no clear standard governing every situation. CIA Director Leon Panetta and his designee have authority to approve the strikes, U.S. officials say.

There have been roughly 180 drone strikes in Pakistan since President Obama took office, more than four times the number that occurred during the eight years of the Bush administration, according to the New America Foundation.

The CIA does not comment on the drone program. U.S. officials say that by the CIA's count, a total of 30 civilians have been killed since the program was expanded in July 2008, including the wives and children of militants. Officials say that tally is based on video and images of each attack and its aftermath, along with other intelligence.

Independent analysts, while lacking access to the CIA's data, claim the number is much higher. The New America Foundation estimates that between 277 and 435 noncombatants have died in drone strikes since 2004, out of 1,374 to 2,189 total deaths.

Christopher Rogers, a human rights lawyer who has interviewed relatives of those killed in drone strikes in Pakistan, said he counted 30 civilian casualties after interviewing witnesses to just nine strikes that occurred before August.

U.S. officials contest those numbers, arguing that interviews are not a reliable indicator because relatives of the dead often refuse to acknowledge the suspects were involved with militant groups.

Rogers doubts the U.S. claim of zero noncombatant deaths since August.

"The reality is that all these casualty reports are incredibly dubious," he said. "It's not like someone can go out and interview all these people and attest to what happened. The onus is on the United States to make much more of a credible demonstration that the casualties are that low."

Former CIA officer Bruce Riedel, who was a close advisor to Obama on his Pakistan strategy, said the drone videos don't always offer a clear picture of casualties. A few Al Qaeda figures believed killed in drone attacks have later turned up alive, he noted.

"Since you can't be 100% sure about the hard target that you're trying to kill, I'm not so confident in anyone's expertise on the soft targets," said Riedel, author of the just-published "Deadly Embrace: Pakistan, America and the Future of the Global Jihad." "You can only see so much from 20,000 feet


source:
LAtimes

__________________
It's Not Over 'til I Win

Women's groups say putting the shelters under strict government control would have a catastrophic effect on their ability to protect the abused. The government accuses the shelters of mismanaging donated foreign money One is a barely pubescent girl, forced to wed a much older man to pay a family debt. Another is a scarred and bruised mother of four, so traumatized by her husband's beatings that she trembles whenever anyone speaks to her. A third is a spirited young woman marked for death by her brothers and father when she tried to run away with the man she wanted to marry.

All found sanctuary at a shelter in the Afghan capital run by a privately funded women's group. But this fragile haven and others like it are threatened by a plan, laid out publicly Tuesday for the first time by the administration of President Hamid Karzai, to bring all such facilities under strict government control.

Women's groups and their supporters say making the shelters answerable to the state in every aspect of their day-to-day operations would have a catastrophic effect on their ability to protect women and girls fleeing forced marriage or abuse, and put rape victims at risk of being killed by relatives for the sake of family "honor."

Activists fear that the takeover plan is part of a larger effort by the Karzai government to solidify its shaky political standing by wooing deeply conservative religious and tribal figures opposed to a broad spectrum of women's rights.

The government is also trying to lure the Taliban to the bargaining table, leaving many women to fear that the limited freedoms they have achieved since the movement was overthrown nearly a decade ago are more tenuous than ever.

"This campaign is meant to try to appease the Taliban; it is a goodwill gesture toward them," said Manizha Naderi of the organization Women for Afghan Women, which pioneered the shelter movement and runs group homes in four cities, including Kabul. "For that reason, it's very, very dangerous."

Some of the plan's provisions appear almost guaranteed to ensure that women will not seek help, including a demand that they submit to intrusive medical examinations meant to establish whether they are virgins. Activists also believe government control over the shelters would make it much easier for families to use political influence or bribery to reclaim runaway girls and women, exposing them to retribution perhaps worse than what they fled.

As it is, shelter providers say, only a tiny fraction of women in desperate need of refuge have the luck, will and wherewithal to find their way to one of about a dozen safe houses nationwide, which are mainly in urban centers. Fear keeps most imprisoned at home.

I would never have had the courage to run if there had not been somewhere to run to," said Fawzia, a thin, careworn woman from a village in eastern Afghanistan. Her husband and in-laws turned her into a virtual domestic slave, starved and beaten, after she failed to bear children and he took a second, younger wife. A sympathetic teacher helped her make her way to the capital.

The shelter dispute comes as the Karzai government is aggressively seeking to channel foreign aid money away from private organizations and directly into the hands of his administration. Western governments have acknowledged the need for greater accountability in disbursing such funds, but there is very little international appetite for ceding total financial control to corruption-plagued ministries.

Money does appear to be a decisive factor. At a news conference Tuesday, Husn Banu Ghazanfar, the acting minister for women's affairs and a Karzai appointee, accused the shelters of waste and mismanagement. She portrayed the government drive as an effort to ensure that money earmarked to help abused women, most from outside donors and foreign governments, is spent fairly and efficiently.

"I think those shelters are probably more concerned for their finances than for women," she said, citing what she claimed were expenditures of hundreds of thousands of dollars by some shelters to care for only a few clients. Ghazanfar said the plan would be implemented soon, though she did not provide a timetable.

Over the last five years, as the shelters have expanded into more areas of Afghanistan, they have been the objects of virulent suspicions in a profoundly traditional society. Particularly in rural Pashtun areas, rumors are rife that these group homes — which generally provide women with vocational training and literacy classes, together with medical treatment and legal advice — are little more than houses of prostitution.

Shelter providers try to allay those accusations by building relationships with the police and serving as go-betweens if abused women wish to return home. Many women do return to be with their children, but they want guarantees from tribal or community leaders that they will not be battered or killed.

Nongovernmental groups running the shelters say they are willing to submit to a reasonable degree of government monitoring, as long as they retain a measure of autonomy.

When the proposal's broad outlines became known this month, Afghan and foreign rights activists, including groups such as New York-based Human Rights Watch and several United Nations agencies, began banding together to try to halt its implementation. But outside organizations are keenly aware that they have to tread carefully to avoid allowing the government to depict their campaign as foreign meddling, a theme frequently invoked by Karzai and his senior aides.

Some activists believe the campaign to curtail the shelters' activities gained impetus from the case of Bibi Aisha, a former child bride whose nose and ears were cut off by her Taliban husband and his cohorts when she attempted to defy him. After her disfigured but compellingly clear-eyed visage appeared on the cover of Time magazine last year, she was taken to the United States for medical treatment.

The government was mortified by the case, insisting that it was not representative of women's lot in Afghanistan. Before her departure, Aisha had been given refuge at the Women for Afghan Women shelter in Kabul.

"Why is there no discussion about the abuses these women are fleeing from?" said Rachel Reid, Afghanistan researcher for Human Rights Watch. "It's easier for them to have a debate about foreign influence than about the pattern of abuse itself."

Fawzia, who fled her abusive home, said that until her opportunity to escape she had been ready to seek refuge in death.

"There is such a thing as a life that cannot be lived," she said. "I was living that life."

source:
LAtimes

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It's Not Over 'til I Win

The ruling Pakistan People's Party says it will unveil a new, smaller Cabinet within a few days in response to pressure from those who say its size is an impediment to economic reforms.
Pakistan's ruling party Friday authorized a sweeping overhaul of the country's Cabinet that probably will mean a marked reduction in the number of ministers, a response to critics who have called the bloated government's size an impediment to economic reform.

International lenders and opposition leaders have been keeping up pressure on the ruling Pakistan People's Party to slash the size of Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani's Cabinet, a bulky roster of 52 ministers and advisors.

World lending groups such as the International Monetary Fund provide billions of dollars in loans that help keep the country's fragile economy from collapsing, but they are now demanding a tax overhaul and spending cuts in return for their financial assistance.

The government's lax performance in providing relief to millions of people devastated by floods last year has further eroded the ruling party's popularity, giving opposition leaders newfound leverage to push for major changes.

The ruling party's executive committee, chaired by President Asif Ali Zardari, met in Islamabad, the capital, and gave Gilani the go-ahead to dissolve the Cabinet and form a smaller version after consulting with allied parties.

Party leaders did not say how large the new Cabinet would be, but they have talked of initially eliminating 10 ministries and cutting eight more in the summer.

Federal ministers formally submitted their resignations Friday, party general secretary Jahangir Badar said, but they will stay on until Gilani announces the formation of the new Cabinet, probably within the next couple of days.

The Cabinet's size is a symptom of the ruling party's diminishing popularity, which has forced party leaders to cobble together a coalition government with the help of rival political groups. As payback for their participation, those parties demanded Cabinet seats.

Other demands by international lending institutions have yet to be met. The government has been urged to generate new tax revenue through measures that, though unpopular, would signal Pakistan's willingness to help itself. However, a massive wave of opposition to a proposal for a sales tax and an increase in fuel prices prompted Gilani to rescind those initiatives.

Lahore political analyst Hasan Askari Rizvi called the party's announcement "a small step, but in the right direction."

"Ultimately, the IMF would like new taxation to be imposed," Rizvi said. "But the government thinks if it can make these kinds of gestures, perhaps they will get support from other political parties for the general sales tax. It shows the government is serious about reducing expenditures."

Party leaders still face the difficult task of keeping coalition parties happy by ensuring that they have enough representation on a smaller Cabinet.

"How will the coalition partners be satisfied with a lesser amount of seats available for them?" Rizvi said. "This will be a big challenge for the PPP."

Source:
LAtimes

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It's Not Over 'til I Win

India's lack of a border with Afghanistan, giving it no road access except via Pakistan, and the attacks against its missions and aid workers have blunted New Delhi's enthusiasm and effectiveness Indian leaders hope visiting Afghan President Hamid Karzai this week will emphasize the safeguarding of mutual interests between the two countries based on historical and cultural links as talks cover the U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan expected to begin this summer.

New Delhi has pledged $1.3 billion in reconstruction aid to the violence-racked nation since 2001, making it Afghanistan's fifth-largest donor. It has built roads and hospitals, maintained a generous visa policy and educated many of the country's top leaders, including Karzai, who was scheduled to arrive Wednesday for a two-day visit.

From India's perspective there's a significant factor impeding its bid to expand its influence: Pakistan.

Even as Washington encourages India to take a larger regional role, the Pakistani government in Islamabad remains deeply wary of Indian reconstruction projects, viewing them as fronts for espionage and trouble-making. Pakistani leaders still remember India's use of Afghanistan to help Baluch separatists in Pakistan in the 1970s.

In addition to meeting with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President Pratibha Patil, Karzai is to give the keynote speech at a conference on sustainable economic, political and social development.

But India's lack of a shared border with Afghanistan, giving it no road access except through Pakistan, and the growing number of suicide attacks against its missions and aid workers have blunted New Delhi's enthusiasm and effectiveness.

"The way we look at it, our presence is largely economic and largely a manifestation of soft power," said G. Parthasarathy, a former ambassador to Pakistan. "You can't get around Pakistan."

Analysts said India doesn't expect the United States to fully withdraw by 2014, which should make any tilt toward extremism in Afghanistan less pronounced.

The influence of Taliban militants could be contained by Afghanistan's neighbors, some said. Russia is wary of illegal drugs entering its territory and could well support the Northern Alliance against the Taliban in the north. And Iran is wary of Taliban influence on its border, checking the movement's advance in the west.

India's major interests in Afghanistan are strategic, ensuring that terrorists don't wash up on its shores, and economic, especially access to energy needed to fuel its red-hot economy.

Indian officials hope to hear this week how Karzai sees national reconciliation playing out, what role he expects the Taliban to play and on what terms, analysts said.

"India has spent so much on reconstruction, it wants to know that its investment is safeguarded," said C. Raja Mohan, a security analyst and columnist with the Indian Express newspaper.

India also has expressed interest in two pipeline projects, one of which is a $7.6-billion project to carry natural gas from Turkmenistan to the Indian town of Fazilka on the border with Pakistan, about 230 miles northwest of New Delhi.

Given the geography, however, both conduits would have to run through Pakistan, leaving India's energy security vulnerable to a neighbor it has fought three wars with since independence in 1947.

"Both pipelines have a 'P' in the middle for Pakistan," said D. Suba Chandran, an analyst with the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies in New Delhi. "We like to say that Afghanistan is the gateway to Central Asia, but if you can read a map, Pakistan is the gateway."

U.S. diplomatic cables written in 2007 and recently released by WikiLeaks outline various ways India could expand its soft power in Afghanistan, including police and election training, food aid, sports and the spread of Bollywood.

But Bollywood films are a tool that must be handled carefully, some said, given the danger that, despite the productions' popularity, Islamists could resent the movies' dancing and merrymaking.

"We play our cultural thing very carefully," Parthasarathy said. "If, through cable and DVD, this gets people to treat women better, though, that's a plus."



source:
LAtimes

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It's Not Over 'til I Win

Libya Crisis Thrusts U.S. Africa Command Into Leadership Role
By ERIC SCHMITT
Published: March 22, 2011


WASHINGTON — When the United States Africa Command was created four years ago, it was the military’s first “smart power” command. It has no assigned troops and no headquarters in Africa itself, and one of its two top deputies is a seasoned American diplomat.

Indeed, the command, known as Africom, is intended largely to train and assist the armed forces of 53 African nations and to work with the State Department and other American agencies to strengthen social, political and economic programs in the region, including improving H.I.V. awareness in African militaries and removing land mines.

Now the young, untested command and its new boss, Gen. Carter F. Ham, find themselves at their headquarters in Stuttgart, Germany, setting aside public diplomacy talks and other civilian-military duties to lead the initial phase of a complex, multinational shooting war with Libya.

“Are they up to the task?” said Kenneth J. Menkhaus, an Africa specialist at Davidson College in North Carolina. “So far, I’d say yes. Down the road, though, if it gets messier, it’ll test the capacity of Africom. This is certainly a baptism by fire.”

The command has faced difficulties in its first few years. Initial statements about its mission and scope of activity alarmed some African leaders and State Department officials, who feared the Pentagon was trying to militarize diplomacy and development on the continent. These concerns led the command to set up its headquarters in Germany.

Congressional critics have warned that the command is understaffed and poorly resourced for challenges that include countering fighters with an affiliate of Al Qaeda in North Africa, Islamic extremists in Somalia, drug traffickers in West Africa and armed rebels in Congo. Other Congressional officials cast doubt on the command’s ability to gauge progress in its programs.

“Africom is generally not measuring long-term effects of activities,” concluded a report issued last July by the Government Accountability Office, an investigative arm of Congress. “Without assessing activities, Africom lacks information to evaluate their effectiveness, make informed future planning decisions and allocate resources.”

Military officials say General Ham’s arrival three weeks ago to replace Gen. William E. Ward, who retired, will inject new dynamism into the command and its 1,500-member headquarters staff. More than 1,000 other troops are conducting training, security assistance or other temporary duties in Africa at any given time.

General Ham, 59, a native of Cleveland, is one of the Army’s stars, having risen from private to four-star commander in a 38-year career. He has commanded troops in northern Iraq, overseen military operations at the Pentagon’s Joint Staff and helped lead reviews into the Defense Department’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy and the fatal shootings at Fort Hood, Tex.

The son of a Navy PT boat officer in World War II, General Ham enlisted in the Army in 1973 as a paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne Division. After earning his officer commission, he served as an adviser to a Saudi Arabian National Guard brigade, commanded the Army’s storied First Infantry Division and, until his current assignment, led all Army forces in Europe, when he worked closely with many of the same European allies now engaged in the Libya operation.

“He’s inclusive and a great team builder,” said Lt. Gen. Mark P. Hertling, who earlier this month succeeded General Ham in the Army’s European command. “He’s not only a great soldier who studies his profession, he’s the kind of normal guy you can drink a beer with.”

Perhaps General Ham’s most wrenching tour was commanding American forces in northern Iraq as the insurgency was strengthening. On Dec. 21, 2004, a suicide bomber killed 22 people, including 18 Americans, in a dining hall at a military base in Mosul. General Ham arrived on the scene shortly after the explosion.

When he returned to Fort Lewis, Wash., a few months later, he sought help for post-traumatic stress, received counseling from a chaplain and later publicly discussed his treatment. “You need somebody to assure you that it’s not abnormal,” General Ham told USA Today. “It’s not abnormal to have difficulty sleeping. It’s not abnormal to be jumpy at loud sounds.”

General Ham’s willingness to speak openly about his personal combat stress sent shock waves through a service in which seeking help has often been seen as a sign of weakness.

That plain-spoken attitude has earned plaudits from top Defense Department officials.

“During our ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ review, he was our conscience and our center of gravity,” said Jeh C. Johnson, the Pentagon’s general counsel and co-author with General Ham of the department’s report on the effects of allowing openly gay men and women to serve in the military. “I always made sure never to get out ahead of him.”

For the time being, General Ham will oversee the American side of the Libya operations, briefing President Obama and his top security aides from Stuttgart, as he did on Sunday, and providing broad guidance and direction to the mission’s tactical commander, Adm. Samuel J. Locklear III, who is in the Mediterranean aboard a command ship, the Mount Whitney.

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said on Sunday that the United States would turn control of the Libya military operation over to a coalition — probably led either by the French and British or by NATO — “in a matter of days.” But the American military would continue to fly missions.

General Ham, in an e-mail message on Sunday, said plans for the change in command were already under way. “It’s fairly complex to do that while simultaneously conducting operations,” he said. “But we’ll figure it out.”

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It's Not Over 'til I Win