International Relations Today- Book-1 by Dr. Abdul Ruff Colachal Jnu

International Relations Today-1 - Dr. Abdul Ruff Colachal

Chapters

Chapter-1: Trump’s shapeless foreign policy! Chapter-2: Turkey’s Referendum: Defeat of global anti-Islamists! Chapter-3: Russian annexation of Crimea is final! Chapter-4 : Factional politics in India: DMK, BJP to cash in the ruling AIADMK split in Tamil Nadu! Chapter-5: Indian politics: Is ruling AIADMK in Tamil Nadu is a party of bluffers? Chapter-6: USA, Russia in talks over “safe zone” in Syria! Chapter-7: Contours of Russo-France relations! Chapter-8: India on fascist path: Hindutva criminal operations in Gandhian India! Chapter-9: India promotes bribery in polls: On cancellation of RK Nagar by poll in Tamil Nadu! Chapter-10: West needs to respect rights of Muslim women! Chapter-11: Chinese President meets Trump on April 6-7

Chapter-12:

Middle East: When will there be a regime change in Syria?

Chapter-13:

India: AIADMK crisis: Fragile unity move!

Chapter-14: Indian sports: Bogus IPL records for Padma/President’s awards Chapter-15: Syria’s Aleppo under siege: USA lets Russia claim diplomatic advantage!

Chapter-16: Enough crossfire: Indo-Pakistan exchange gunfire in Uri border!

Chapter-1: Trump’s shapeless foreign policy! -Dr. Abdul Ruff ______

US President Donald Trump is in the initial stage of his presidency, only trying fix his role in the comity of nations and in intentional politics where America always managed to play the lead role in whatever manner.

President Donald Trump has years of foreign policy decisions to go before he can comprehensively restore US prestige or make USA great. There exists not enough space to enumerate the ways Obama weakened American power and made the world a distinctly more dangerous place by his own attacks on Afghanistan, Libya, Pakistan and indirectly Syria. Genocides, destructions and destabilization were the hall mark of Bush-Obama foreign policy. President Trump’s supporters claim that his decision to strike Syria was a strong and swift declaration of American values and the president’s rationale was refreshingly simple and clear. Last month the nascent Trump government chose to forego the now absurd “red line” but spoke through the US military, responding with a missile strike on Syria a mere two days after Assad’s latest chemical attack on civilians. Weak legacy When Trump took over the White House he in fact inherited a weak America which is clearly diminishing of its standing in the world owing to several reasons, mainly the Russian challenge, Iranian outmaneuvering ability and North Korean capacity to pursue its nuclear goals.

Syria, Russia and Iran remains the major thrust of concerns for the US strategists and the powerful Neocon elements, dominated by hard core Jews who control US foreign policy beyond West Asia.

Syrian leader Assad and has survived albeit with a great deal of destruction, genocides 2

and destabilization thanks only to the open support extended by the Kremlin- a close military ally of Iran, the self proclaimed Shiite leader in West Asia that has taken the responsibility of protecting the Shiite regimes against the will of Sunni leader Saudi Arabia which still wants to see Persia also gets destabilized, possibly as the end process that began with the invasion and destabilization of an Islamizing Afghanistan.

Russian back up had made a fast falling Assad energetic and strong, bold. A year after President Barack Obama issued Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime a “red line” on the use of chemical weapons, Assad manifestly crossed the line with a chemical attack that killed more than 1,400 civilians. Rather than acting decisively on his pledge, Obama first dithered and then demurred to Congress for approval of a strike on Syria. Of course, the strike never materialized, and Assad’s brutality went unchallenged and unpunished for years.

While the European Union faced its existential crisis with the Brexit, and NATO appeared confused about its own reasons for existence, Russian strongman Vladimir Putin continued to exert Moscow’s influence over weaker neighbors. Latest appointment of an Armenian Armed Forces General, Yuri Khachaturov, as head of the Collective Security Treaty Organization, commonly known as “Putin’s NATO” illustrated the degree of the Kremlin’s sway over its neighbors. A former Soviet republic, Armenia is filled with Russian military bases and weapons, and its external borders are guarded by the Russian security officers. Khachaturov’s appointment proves that, even in the Moscow-dominated world of its Eurasian satellites, Armenia stands out as an ultraloyal and dependent Russian vassal.

Russia last November strategically placed its nuclear-capable Iskander ballistic missiles in its exclave of Kaliningrad, right next to America’s NATO Baltic allies, and announced plans to do the same in its annexed territory of Crimea—essentially threatening the entire Black Sea region. In addition to areas Russia controls directly, Moscow placed the Iskander in two of its regional proxies and satellites: Armenia and Syria. Apparently for Russia, the difference between the territories it formally deems its own, and the failed states it effectively controls, is very symbolic.

These are a clear effort by Russia to deny military advantage to NATO forces and to 3

assert geographic dominance. The first major test for President Trump came when Moscow-backed Assad carried out April’s chemical attack, defying the former Obama red line. Trump responded in force. Possibly Russia-Iran-Syria trio had not foreseen that.

Iran is now one of the biggest oil exporters to South Korea and has steadily increased its exports since the lifting of sanctions associated with its nuclear program in January 2016. Iran became the second largest oil exporter to South Korea in the first three months of 2017, delivering a record 18.54 million barrels. South Korea will be under pressure to import more oil and gas from the US, having ramped up Iranian imports in recent months to the displeasure of Washington. The USA has sent the first batch of its heavy armaments to the Kurdish People’s Protection Units or YPG. Speaking to Sputnik Turkiye, former Turkish Ambassador to the US Faruk Logoglu reacted to the delivery, calling it a "diplomatic slap in the face of Turkey." The armament and armed vehicles were sent by land from the Iraqi Kurdistan and then sent to Rojava autonomous region in northern Syria, he said. It was further sent to Kobani, a city in the Aleppo Governorate and the Tell Abyad District within the Raqqa Governorate. This weaponry, the source said, will be used in the ongoing offensive to liberate Raqqa from Daesh Support for Ukraine government Meanwhile, a bipartisan group of US senators on May 8 sent a letter to President Donald Trump encouraging him to prioritize meeting with President Petro Poroshenko of Ukraine before meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin at the G-20 conference in July. Identifying the importance of engaging longstanding American allies as a priority for the foreign policy agenda of the new administration, the letter also recommends increased support for institutions and European governments that help preserve the international order. “As your Administration continues to formulate policies to promote American national security and foreign policy interests, we are writing to strongly encourage you to engage with our traditional allies and prioritize meeting with foreign leaders representing countries with whom we share historical ties, democratic values, and mutual interests,” wrote the senators. “Meeting with democratically elected representatives from Ukraine would send a strong signal that the United States continues to prioritize our relationship with longstanding allies, and

will continue our commitments to support Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity in the face of ongoing aggression.”

A meeting in Washington, D.C., between President Trump and Ukraine’s President, they say, would be a critical sign of support for peace in the region, as US support for Ukraine now is imperative to its survival. Russia’s unrelenting hybrid warfare in Ukraine is destabilizing the international world order. The massive build-up of Russian troops along Ukraine’s eastern border and recent escalating attacks in the eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk are continuously threatening Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty. The USA must take definitive action to help stabilize the transnational, trans-Atlantic security framework, which clearly serves our national interests as Americans. Without US support and a commitment to peace, the crisis in Ukraine is only likely to escalate,” they noted. They argued that, “As the bastion of democracy in the Free World, the United States must take the lead in promoting international norms and consolidating geo-political stability,” and they urged Trump “to affirm the United States’ commitment to Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.” They cited security concerns that should be highlighted by the USA.

Trump to meet Putin Recently, Russia's top diplomat Sergei Lavrov met US President Donald Trump and praised his government as problem solvers, just as the White House drew criticism over the firing of the FBI director who was leading a probe into Moscow's alleged interference in US politics. The talks with Foreign Minister were the highest-level public contact between Trump and the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin since the Republican took office on January 20. While not unprecedented, it is a rare privilege for a foreign minister to be received by a US president for a bilateral meeting in the White House.

A meeting between Putin and Trump is likely to happen under the auspices of the G20 summit in Hamburg in Germany in July and that it was important that their meeting brought tangible results.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov raised the issue of the compounds during a 5

Washington visit. Former US president Barack Obama ordered the expulsion of the 35 Russians in late December and imposed sanctions on two Russian intelligence agencies over what he said was their involvement in hacking political groups in the November 8 US presidential election. Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the time he would not retaliate immediately and would wait until at least US President-elect Donald Trump took office on January 20 before deciding what action to take.

Russia retaliates against the USA for the Obama government's expulsion of 35 Russian diplomats it said were spies. Moscow is also waiting for the return of two diplomatic compounds seized in the USA during the same espionage scandal, Yuri Ushakov, a Kremlin foreign policy aide, said. "We are waiting for the return of Russian diplomatic property illegally impounded before the New Year by the previous US authorities," Ushakov told a news briefing. "We decided not to respond immediately to this escapade, but no-one has yet abolished the principle of reciprocity in diplomacy ... Our patience is not without limits," he said, saying Russian retaliation could not be ruled out. Observation Americans voted for Trump mainly because they wanted to punish Obama-Mrs. Clinton for their mishandling of the world, especially their crimes in West Asia.

Speculations were ripe about a possible collaboration between USA and Russia in Syria under Trump presidency. But the US attack on Syria put to end such speculative exercises.

Trump apparently is confused and he is confusing the world as well. He si trying to do exactly his predecessors Bush and Obama have done. Possibly the notorious Neocons with their regime change agenda in Arab world continue to mislead the new US president as well. In a stunning development, Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, whose agency is investigating alleged Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election and the possibility Trump associates may have colluded with Moscow.

Trump has not formed any clear cut idea about how he would handle Israel and free Palestinians from the Zionist fascist clutches and their children from Israel’s military bombs supplied by USA. One is not sure if what he said about solving the Kashmir issue would be a sincere intent or just rhetoric to get maximum money from a badly stressed India through Indian corporate lords as service charges.

Trump should show the world that America will not blur its red lines. Flying in the face of concerns about his “support for Putin”, the president showed, by striking Syria, that he is willing to stand up to Russia. _____________________________

Chapter-2: Turkey’s Referendum: Defeat of global anti-Islamists! -Dr. Abdul Ruff ______

In a befitting reply to global anti-Islamic propaganda machine against Islamic government in Turkey that sought to defeat the Turkey referendum to make the Presidency as well as nation strong, President Erdogan has won the referendum with a massive popular mandate.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has claimed victory in the vote, which the opposition says looks set to grant him sweeping new powers but that is exactly necessary for the government to defend the nation from enemies within and outside, jointly rying to destabilize Turkey.

This is the first time in Turkish history that the Turkish people have cast their votes on such an important constitutional change. Today, for the first time, the will of the people has shown through this referendum and this is the first time in our history and very important, Erdogan said voters abroad were a big part of the success."We would like other countries and institutions to show respect to the decision of the nation."

Prime Minister Binali Yildirim, who led the Yes campaign alongside Erdogan, said: "This referendum once again has proven the level of maturity and the improvement of Turkish democracy to the rest of the world. We are all first-class citizens of our country and we are all equal." He addressed supporters from the balcony at the Justice and Development Party (AKP) headquarters in Ankara. "Our people made their decision and our people said yes to the presidential government system in this country and this nation will never face any guardianship, this nation will never face any external intervention and we will not give in to any threats. And we have shown this once again as a nation." Referendum President Erdogan has argued that creating a presidential system would bring "stability and confidence" to Turkey, state-run media Anadolu reported. "Let's make consolidation in this great historic reform and put in place the foundation stones of a strong, leading and prosperous Turkey with unity, solidarity and integrity," he said. He and his senior ministers have argued that a stronger government is needed to deal with the spate of recent terror attacks.

Currently, the President's role is supposed to be largely ceremonial, but Erdogan has already broken with tradition and kept himself as the face of Turkey's leadership.

The 18-article constitutional reform package has been dubbed the "power bill," and would effectively consolidate the authority of three legislative bodies into one executive branch, with the President as its head. The President would be given the authority to appoint ministers and judges without parliament's approval, design a state budget and dissolve parliament.

With the Turkish people having voted yes, the country will get rid of all the checks and balances that keep the government in line. Under Presidential powers Parliament will become totally ineffective, just rubber stamping Erdogan's policies. There will be no prime minister -- all the power will be in Erdogan's hands." Shifting Turkey away from a parliamentary republic to a strong, self defensive presidential one, is at the heart of the proposals, but the vote has also become a plebiscite on Erdogan and his footprint on the country. Global anti-Islamism

Unfortunately, US led war on terror has become a terror war on Islam and Islamic world, targeting Islamist AKP government in Turkey as anti-Islamic tirade including in global media, led by USA and EU focused on Erdogan’s Islamist government.

Western world claims the whole sale custodians of democracy and rule of law and work against Islamic world always finding faults with Islamic nations as their joint policy and Sept-11 hoax them a handle to target Islam at will.

A strong Turkey under Islamic party AKP Is not what the anti-Islamic world, including Israel, wants and in fact it is eager to see entire Islamic world a continuation of Pakistani plight.

The cruel anti-Islamic world, ill focused on Islamist government in European Turkey, spread all sorts of filthy rumors against Islamist Turkey, thereby seeking to destabilize Turkey and fail the referendum the nation is undergoing.

Erdogan’s referendum won a historic victory against all anti-Islamic campaigns of global media.

After the failed coup Extraordinary changes came to Turkey in July 2016, after a failed military coup prompted a purge that reached just about every institution in public life. According to Turkish state media, 249 people were killed in the coup attempt, and had it been successful, Turkey may have been plunged into civil war.

Although the coup aimed to kill or topple Erdogan and destabilize Turkey and eventually remove Islamist ideas, the President himself declared the attempt a "gift from god" to defend the country’s freedom. His government subsequently imposed a state of emergency giving him unprecedented powers; this has been extended several times. The government has detained tens of thousands of Erdogan's political opponents, as well as journalists and civil society groups and removed more than 100,000 people from their jobs, including teachers and security officers who secretly work against the government.

Among those imprisoned were the leaders of the main pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party, as the government continues to stamp out Kurdish opposition. 9

The purge also targeted anyone with links to Fethullah Gulen, Erdogan's friendturned-rival, who lives in the United States in exile.

In fact, anti-government protests began a couple of years back. The Turkish people had already seen a strong response from the government, when a 2013 peaceful sit-in over plans to demolish the Gezi Park in central Istanbul turned into a nationwide protest movement against Erdogan, who was then prime minister. At least five protestors and a police officer were killed in clashes, and thousands were injured, according to Human Rights Watch. Erdogan eventually admitted police had used excessive force in the protests.

The opposition and outside powers used the protest to intensify their tirade against the government. Gulen became a safe tool in their hands to engineer coup and terror attacks.

Turkey has also been changed by a series of terror attacks, which some see as a failure by the government to manage long-standing tensions with Kurdish groups and to deal with the Syria conflict on its doorstep.

Almost all recent attacks in Turkey have been blamed on either ISIS or the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). The USA and other countries have long called on Turkey to seal its border with Syria, as ISIS appears to have used Turkey as thoroughfare to smuggle people and resources in and out of Syria. Turkey has beefed up its security and launched an anti-ISIS military campaign in Syria, but the attacks have already taken a toll on the country. Tourism in Turkey is in shambles as it is one of the biggest industries, but now all the hotels are empty. This change was felt profoundly in Istanbul, particularly since the New Year's terror attack, in which dozens were killed. There used to be a thriving urban nightlife, but not now. It's no longer the cheerful happy city it once was, a few Turks and many non-Muslims feel. Germany got into a diplomatic spat with Turkey just before the referendum, when it refused to let President Erdogan lead political rallies on German soil. About 1.4m Turks living in Germany were eligible to vote. Just ahead of the final results, German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said: "We'd be well advised to keep calm and to proceed in a level-headed way."

The Council of Europe, a pan-European human rights body of which Turkey is a member, said in a statement that officials should consider the next steps "carefully" 10

given how close the result was. "It is of utmost importance to secure the independence of the judiciary in line with the principle of rule of law enshrined in the European Convention on Human Rights." The council is a distinct entity and is not a branch of the European Union.

The EU Commission said: "In view of the close referendum result and the farreaching implications of the constitutional amendments, we also call on the Turkish authorities to seek the broadest possible national consensus in their implementation."

A divisive campaign ended in a contested result. President Erdogan declared victory by a narrow margin and called on every side to respect it. But the opposition has not conceded, claiming voting irregularities. It's clouded the legitimacy of the mandate the president now feels he's been given, to concentrate political power in his hands.

Erdogan the hero!

Turkey's President Erdogan is today Turkish hero who has steered his country through a period of extraordinary change. Erdogan has transformed Turkey's democracy based on Islamic teachings. President Erdogan has proved that his party ideology remains supreme in the hearts of people.

Erdogan clearly has charismatic aspects -- the people who love him love him so much, and those few who hate him, they hate him intensely. The country's economic rise has been meteoric, lifting millions of people out of poverty, but it's also suffered a stream of deadly terror attacks and a failed military coup last year, which prompted a clampdown on civil liberties. Erdogan has essentially ruled Turkey for more than 13 years -- he rose to power as prime minister in 2003 and stayed in that position until he was elected president in 2014. Turkey today is seen pursuing pro-common people agenda. Many of Erdogan's most loyal supporters come from Turkey's rising middle class, whose lives have transformed in the country's economic boom.

The ruling AKP led government increased earnings of common people of Turkey and 11

for this President Erdogan should be given credit. The average person's income has risen from $3,800 in 2003, when Erdogan became prime minister, to around $10,000 in 2017, according to data from the World Bank. This means the number of people living below the poverty line dropped from 23% of the population to less than 2% in that time. "Now the middle class has a different lifestyle. If you take today a couple in their 30s with two kids, and compare them with another couple 10 years ago, they live a different life," said Marc Pierini, a visiting scholar at Carnegie Europe, who served as EU ambassador to Turkey from 2006 to 2011.

When Erdogan became prime minister, his government had adopted the wave of reforms from its predecessors and "got their act together," bringing infrastructure and services to the regions. The government also made credit more easily available to the middle class. Today's couple has an apartment -- of course with a mortgage. They have a car -- of course with credit. They go to shopping centers and they travel. They can take a domestic airline that didn't exist until 2008.

Until around 2012, Erdogan had been a champion of women’s rights—he rose to power in Turkey advancing women’s rights—and as prime minister he pushed through laws on child custody, divorce, and protections against violence that many women's groups applauded.

Elimination of violence against women is apriority in Turkey. Erdogan pursued that policy vigorously, he even replaced ministry of women with the broad based ministry of family and social justice and declared that men and women weren’t equal. In 2016, Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) amended the penal code to make it possible for men who rape girls under 18 to marry their victims, thereby making the sex offenders under check. Some women activists want to ensure that women are seen not merely as in mere family settings, wives and mothers and within their traditional gender roles. They want to see the women as machines and fighters in streets and source of instability. The impact on women is extraordinary—something world has seen firsthand in NATO wars in Iraq, Syria, Libya and Afghanistan. Women and girls there often feared even walking on the streets. Foreign forces use the local women as relaxation stuff along with liquor and s cigars, during the terror wars in Islamic world. Turkey in 2017 is a vastly different country to a decade ago and the Turkish people will vote in a referendum on a new constitution that could hand Erdogan unprecedented powers, cementing his position for years to come. 12

President Erdogan’s enhanced powers Despite the negative European responses to the referendum and its popular vote, Turks have voted for the referendum and welcomed the victory as their own.

Erdogan’s supporters view the referendum as a necessary response to the chaos in Turkey. They say the proposed constitutional changes would give the President the tools needed to quell Turkey’s many crises. But. Erdogan’s critics insist that he is trying to take advantage of the turmoil to shroud a major power grab. They say that granting enormous new executive powers to the presidency, when the current office holder has already shown authoritarian tendencies, might sound the death knell for Turkish democracy.

No one questions that Turkey is grappling with a long string of troubles. To reassert control after the failed coup last year, Mr. Erdogan created an administrative vacuum. Many of the purged are accused of association with the movement led by Fethullah Gulen, a reclusive Muslim cleric in self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania, who Mr. Erdogan says orchestrated the July 15 uprising. But some are dissidents from secular, leftist or Kurdish backgrounds. More than 120 of them are journalists, according to Amnesty International.

The economy in post coup Turkey is now struggling. Many young Turks are out of work. And beyond Turkey’s southern border, Erdogan has dwindling influence on shaping the outcome of the Syrian civil war, should it finally be settled. Turkey has its own internal battles, too. The Islamic State and Kurdish nationalists are waging separate terrorist campaigns on Turkish soil. Adding to this mess, Erdogan has a toxic relationship with Europe.

President Erdogan hoped the win of the referendum would be the crowning moment of his career. But it's left Turkey profoundly polarized, at risk of becoming another chronically unstable part of the Middle East. Observation: Future of Turkey For most of the last century, Turkey has been the go-to example of an Islamic country that doubles as a secular democracy, where women enjoy vast freedoms unlike in many Middle Eastern countries. Both Islam and democracy thrived in the country under the Islamist government.

The Erdogan government has raised the diplomatic and economic profile of Turkey and would like to see a much more prosperous nation in Europe. His domestic and foreign polices have moved the EU to hurry up for deal with Turkey over its membership, notwithstanding opposition by a few members like Germany. Turkey applied to become a member of the European Union in 1987. Negotiations only began in 2005 and talks have since hit a wall. Turkish officials, fed up with fake negotiations by EU, have expressed their ire to the adamant EU over an array of issues -- from refugees to migration rights. And Turkey is showing signs it no longer cares to join the EU union.

Turkey is strong source of support for Global Islam and Arab world and Iran. What's clear is its role as a bridge between the West and the Islamic east is changing. Modern Turkey was built on a foundation of political secularism, but in the past decade, the influence of Islam has crept into Turkish political discourse and policy. As a result, Turks now appear to be turning away from the essentially anti-Islamic West. People generally dislike the westerners and their hatred for Islam and Turkey. Polls show the 'Yes' vote, which would grant Erdogan sweeping new powers, stands very high despite anti-Islamic and Anti-Erdogan media rhetoric. Empowered Erdogan presidency is going to make Turkey as strong as former Ottoman Empire. ___________________

Chapter-3: Russian annexation of Crimea is final! -Dr. Abdul Ruff

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Crimea was an integral part of Russia for centuries and is historically, culturally and linguistically Russian. Just like some European nations continue to see European Turkey as being a part of Asia mainly because of its Islamic religion; they now view Crimea as being a part to Ukraine just because it became a part of the Soviet nation as a part of Ukrainian Republic but now it is a East European nation. Soviet President Khrushchev, who belonged to Ukraine, had gifted Crimea from Russian Republic to Ukrainian Republic as a part of territorial rearrangement. 14

Angry over Ukrainian support for USA and it move away from Moscow, Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 and made it an integral part of Russia once again. Even if Ukraine changes its anti-Russia stand, Crimea would remains with Russia henceforth. Clearly, if Purim’s statements are of any indication, Russia is not going to give Crimea to Ukraine any time in future. As such, all calls for Russia to leave Crimea are useless and as pointless. Continued occupation of many Arab nations as well as Afghanistan and Pakistan by the USA and anti-Islamic allies, does not offer any chance for forcing Russia as well. Meanwhile, French Presidential candidate Francois Fillon warned that Russia was “unstable” and “should be handled with care.” “Can we lift sanctions against Russia without progress in Crimea?” he said. “We have to respect two important yet contradictory principles: respect for sovereign borders and the right to selfdetermination. No one doubts that Crimea has been historically, culturally and linguistically Russia, and pointless to keep demanding that Russia leaves Crimea: it's never going to happen.” Fillion had been seen as a forerunner in the French elections until February this year, when French police began to investigate claims that he had deliberately squandered public money by hiring his wife in a nonexistent role as a “parliamentary assistant.” He's recently made a comeback in the polls, reaching third place. The first round of the French presidential elections takes place this Sunday. Russia remains strong notwithstanding all economic sanctions by USA and EU, and its other allies. Putin said he would stress Superpower status in Presidential Campaign next year. Restoring Moscow's global influence will be a dominant theme of the 2018 election. There are obviously no signs of Putin asking the military to leave Crimea for Ukraine and EU to take it away.

2018 Presidency poll

In 2016, Donald Trump rode a wave of popular discontent to the White House on the promise that he would “make America great again.” As Russia’s presidential election, scheduled for March 2018 draws nearer, President Vladimir Putin may try a similar tactic — by contending that he has already restored Russia’s greatness. Since annexing Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014, Russia has increasingly asserted its role on the global stage. Following annexation of Crimea, the Kremlin has also ignited a separatist movement in eastern Ukraine and supported the unrecognized “people’s republics” that emerged there. In 2015, Russia entered the longstanding Syrian civil war in support of embattled Syrian President Bashar Assad. Trump’s electoral victory and the demise of the Western consensus against Russia’s violation of international law has also been a major coup for the Kremlin.

These events have all catapulted Putin to the position of a powerful broker in the international arena and fulfilled the country’s longstanding desire for international influence. They signify that, Russia is once again a global player on par with the USA—much like the USSR was thirty years ago.

Russia’s military prowess

Earlier this month, it emerged that Russia had deployed a 22-member special forces unit to a base in western Egypt, near the Libyan border. Russia’s goal is likely to support Khalifa Haftar, a renegade Libyan National Army general who currently controls most of the country’s east and poses a serious challenge to the UN-backed government in Tripoli. The general made two high-profile visits to Moscow in 2016, and signed a series of undisclosed agreements with the Russian military in January. But it is significant because it undermines UN efforts to stabilize the north African country. The deployment shows that Russia is thinking “not just about its continued presence in Syria, but in the Greater Middle East,” says Alexei Malashenko, a regional analyst at the Dialogue of Civilizations foundation. Recently, Russia has also increased its role in Afghanistan. In February, the Kremlin organized an Afghanistan peace conference in Moscow that brought together representatives from Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, China, and Iran. Notably absent were the United States and other NATO coalition members. Russia has also advocated for including the Taliban in any solution to the conflict in Afghanistan, presenting the Islamist militants as a bulwark against the Islamic State (IS). In February, Gen. John Nicholson, commander of U.S. military operations in the country, alleged that Russia had increased covert and overt support for the Taliban to undermine the USA and NATO in Afghanistan.

Russia has sincere concerns about conflict spillover from Afghanistan into Central Asia, says Malashenko. But it is also using the IS and Taliban presence in Afghanistan to assert the role of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), a Russia-led military alliance of post-Soviet states in the region. On March 20, David McAllister, chair of the European Parliament Committee on Foreign Affairs, accused Russia of deliberately destabilizing Serbia in order to prevent the Balkan country from joining the EU. He has also alleged that Russia supports nationalist leaders throughout the Balkans. In Montenegro, two Russian intelligence officers stand accused of masterminding a failed coup on election day in October 2016 to prevent the Balkan nation from joining NATO. Last month, a Montenegrin special prosecutor stated that “Russian state bodies were involved on a certain level.”

Any move that destabilizes the Balkans would send a strong message to the West: Russia is a critical regional powerbroker. Europe could serve as another staging ground for restored Russian influence. As political uncertainty grows in the EU, Russia is reasserting its influence in the Balkans. Earlier this month, when EU foreign affairs representative Federica Mogherini spoke in the Serbian parliament, a group of pro-Russia parliamentarians met her with chants of “Serbia! Russia! We don’t need the EU!”

Observation

The sanctions, imposed by USA and EU on Russia against the annexation Crimea, have not yielded any fruits. It is mainly because of economic position of Moscow. The major sources of economy include arms and oil. Unless weak countries like Pakistan or Afghanistan, Russia cannot be bullied by sanctions or threat of terror attacks the powerful Kremlin. Threats of USA are not going to weaken Russia in any manner. And there is no reason for the Kremlin to leave Crimea. So far, there is no consensus in the Kremlin on whether to boost tension in Serbia. Cooler heads understand it may be riskier than involvement in Syria. Meanwhile, decision makers must take into account the public mood. Last year, polls repeatedly showed that Russians are tired of war. Armed conflicts are increasingly seen as an irrational waste of resources, and human losses—first in Ukraine, then in Syria—as something Russia doesn’t need. The Russian public sees the country’s newly achieved superpower status as a source of international respect, but Russians are more eager for this status to be used for dialogue, than for confrontation. The challenge for the Russian leadership will be to avoid backsliding into real conflicts that might undermine stability, something Russians hold dear. Putin seems to understand this. He is too cautious to attempt a full-scale restoration of Soviet grandeur. Besides Syria and Ukraine, it’s either isolated local episodes, or just talk So far, there is no clear indication that the Kremlin has decided on a central idea for Putin’s electoral platform. One of the challenges for the Kremlin will be addressing economic stagnation and declining living standards that will likely persist in Russia for a few more years. The other will be getting voters to the polls. But nostalgia for Soviet greatness could still drive electoral mobilization. Recent debates over holding the election on the fourth anniversary of the Crimean annexation reflect an appeal to that nostalgia. 17

Restoring Russia’s superpower status was the purpose of Putin’s third term. Russia’s global influence will be a key part of the campaign, but the nostalgia card has already been played. EU cannot expect Putin to explain why Russians need global influence and what they get from it. Russia’s quest for global influence won’t end in the near future. The upcoming presidential election will be utterly predictable, lacking real competition. As a result, Putin will likely spend 2017 demonstrating Russia’s global greatness to spur enthusiasm and drive Russians to the polls. This does not mean that Russia will rush to war, however. . But it does mean the Kremlin must project an image of strength abroad. The idea is to show influence. Putin will need to make headlines, assert Russia’s global presence and demonstrate that it is returning its spheres of influence. ______________________

Chapter-4: Factional politics in India: DMK, BJP to cash in the ruling AIADMK split in Tamil Nadu! -Dr. Abdul Ruff ________

Factional politics in India has its own disadvantages and maybe a few advantages too. But generally people suffer due to factionalism in parties.

Factional politics within the ruling AIADMK in Tamil Nadu is becoming murkier and dirtier day by day and any onlooker would feel the party is on the verge of total collapse, giving rise to an imminent government replacement by the opposition DMK.

After the death of former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa in December 2016, the AIADMK has essentially fractured into two. The chief of the party and close aide of the former Chief Minister, Sasikala tried to get the Chief Ministership from Panneerselvam before her conviction in a corruption case. However, before her incarceration, Sasikala appointed Edapadi Palaniswami as (EPS) the Chief Minister Sasikala was promoting her relatives and close peole in the party and government, including Dinakaran whom she made her deputy in the party. He went to jail for bribing for getting the party symbol for his faction. 18

After the trust vote in the Tamil Nadu assembly in February, which was won by the faction led by E Palaniswami, what followed was chaos in the House with the DMK alleging that the trust vote was rigged. The DMK leader MK Stalin moved the High Court for a new trust vote and this demand was dismissed. An investigative report by Times Now found that money was paid to sway votes. The money was paid in the resort where the MLAs were kept by the Sasikala camp. The news outlet along with Moon TV conducted sting operations on two AIADMK MLAs. At a meeting organized in Thiruverkadu in Chennai's suburbs, Panneerselvam said, "Wherever we went, people say there is no need for merger. They are people of Tamil Nadu, particularly women, students, youth, people who are neutral, even the media. The political churn witnessed by ¬Tamil Nadu since Jayalalitha’s death in December 2016 has now thrown up a new political offering—a third faction of the AIADMK led by Dhinakaran, deputy general secretary and Sasikala’s nephew. Dhinakaran wants to take complete control of the party machinery and manage the government through remote control. He claims to have the support of 40 MLAs. In an interview to the same newspaper, a party member Madhusudanan of OPS faction said, “The war between Edappadi Palanisamy and Dhinakaran is a drama. They are staging this drama to weaken our faction. It is a well laid out plan and this drama is an outcome of that. But they fail to realize about the reality that they will themselves get eliminated in this process.” In the precarious equilibrium brought about by Dhinakaran’s re-entry into the scene, EPS is happy with the status quo; OPS remains a passive onlooker. With a little help from the Centre, which would only be keen to put its foot down ahead of the presidential election, EPS and OPS can sweep the differences under the carpet and stay steady. Palaniswami has been able to keep his ministers in line. Both factions of the AIADMK are under compulsion to merge. Unity moves continue without any direction. The never ending saga has taken another turn, when O Panneerselvam (OPS), the leader of the rebel camp in the AIADMK dissolved the seven member committee he had set up to work out modalities for merger of the two rival factions within the party. The tug of war in Tamil Nadu politics could become an all out ‘political drama’ during the time of the Presidential elections. With leaders from Edappadi Palanisamy camp like K T Rajendra Balaji declaring that there was nothing wrong in supporting the BJP, the 19

camp seems to have already made up its mind. There's more and more muck coming out against their alleged thuggery during the Jaya rule, which incidentally also dents the latter's legacy, and a number of their illegally procured assets are being confiscated by the government based on the trial court order in the disproportionate assets case. The BJP is looking to exploit the vacuum created by Jaya's absence, and matinee idol and forever-political-debutant Rajinikanth seems to be preparing the path for them. For the BJP, a weak and splintered AIADMK is necessary for it to find its foot in the door. If the factions of the AIADMK come together, it would squeeze out the BJP from whatever little space it has gained in the last few months. Tamil Nadu state governor cannot dismiss the Palanisamy led government simply because it has got the number- a simple majority on its own in the assembly. Moreover no one can say that the government is not functioning or it is corrupt. So far the TN government is not facing any such serious issues. The usual corruption is prevalent as Indian system allows that in a tacit manner.

Of course, the government is not fully legitimate as Sasikala has indeed captured the party and government and put in place a proxy government under Palanisamy.

As it appears the Palanisamy leadership does not want to quit or hand over power to Jayalithaaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s favorite and former CM O. Panneerselvam and it can wait for the next election at least in RK Nagar constituency in the state capital which had elected Jayalithaa twice to decide their future course. May be O. Panneerselvam team also looks forwards to the judgment of RK Nagar to chart out its next move.

Meanwhile, both factions are fighting in the media to showcase their importance among the people of the state, engaged in mudsling activities in order to make claims as the real AIADMK and for criticizing one another.

EPS and OPS factions are also fighting to regain the party symbol- Two Leaves to claim as the real party eligible to rule the state. 20

As the factional politics within the ruling AIADMk continues unabated without any sincere effort for credible patch up by making compromises as followers of MGR-Jaya, two parties are expected to reap the benefits - DMK and BJP. DMK has ruled the state alternatively alongside the AIADMK while the BJP which has no real influence in the state but has won seats to assembly and parliament seats from the state by aligning with Dravidian parties DMK or AIADMk alternatively. But in the last Assembly poll, Jayalithaa refused to have any truck with BJP while DMK formed a strong profitable alliance with Congress party. BJP, like many other state parties like PMK, DMDK, and MDMK etc could not win even one seat to Tamil Nadu assembly. This exposed the real position of BJP in the state.

Jayalithaa and her AIADMK returned to power for second term for the first time in years. CM Jayalalithaa’s sudden death under mysterious circumstances has caused serious existential crisis for the party which her friend Sasikala exploited to become the General Secretary of the party but her ambition to be the CM of the state could not be materialized as the court sent her to jail for her serious corruption operations from the Poes Garden residence of Jayalalithaa. She hurriedly arranged for the swearing in ceremony at the Madras University campus but Governor refused to attend the function as the Supreme Court judgment was forthcoming in days and it sure that she would be punished. Sasikala, knowing the judgment beforehand, still wanted to be the CM at least for a few days so that she could enjoy the special privileges in the jail as Jayalalithaa did. It should be mentioned here that during her life time, Jayalalithaa had never given her “friend” Sasikala any position in the party or government as she was busy making wealth and money by illegal means.

Already the DMK working president and former Deputy CM MK Stalin has hinted that his party would soon replace the AIADMK at the Madras Fort and provide a clean government. A week after TTV Dhinakaran made it clear that he will fight for his position in AIADMK, it is unclear where the party goes from here. Speaking to India Today, a minister named Jayakumar, a finance minister said, “We are in for a merger because that's what lakhs of cadres of the AIADMK want. We want a united party that can work together to carry forward Amma's legacy.”

Panneerselvam held a press conference at his residence in which he said, â&#x20AC;&#x153;MLAs in our group will be meeting at 9am on June 14. We will discuss issues, especially those in which people have been affected, and raise it in the assembly seeking an answer from the government. We will not fail in our responsibility to the people." Unless the AIADMK factions also think along these lines, they must quickly come together forgetting their enmity as Sasikala era is deemed to be over now.

They could think of unity measures to rule the state as people had voted for the party and Jayalalithaa. A way forward is cultivation of mutual understanding between the factions and they must behave as one party to face the new challenges.

As for as government and party are concerned , of course, a man with popular acceptance should be chosen as CM and OPS could help improve the credibility of the party, while Palanisamy could be made the General secretary of the party as he has shown rare courage in getting the Sasikala banners removed from the party head quarters.

Other issues like ministers and other importance positions in the party and government could be sorted out in due course. A partyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s General meeting needs to be convened to discuss the issues and find solutions.

Tamils have given mandate to the AIADMk for quarreling and creating uncertainty. . Uncertainty is harmful for the ruling party and state.

Only a united party and government can fulfill the poll pledges given to the people and also to get from the federal government the state's legitimate requirements. Time is indeed running out for AIADMK.

Chapter-5: Indian politics: Is ruling AIADMK in Tamil Nadu is a party of

bluffers?

-Dr. Abdul Ruff _____ _

Yes, clearly the ruling party tells lies and tries to fool the public and the O. Panneerselvamâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s faction. OPS was the acting CM and Treasurer of the party during the life time of AIADMK supremo Jayalalithaa. Whatever the Sasikala faction said before has been proven false now. Public views the party as a group of selfish leaders and who tell lies to stay in power by talking about unity. It is like cricket matches where the rains are created by the secret forces very close to mafia lords to spoil the chances of the teams that they want to defeat.

In fact, Indian politics is largely being conducted as part of cricket matches with suitable pitches for batboys to shine and bowlers are bought to offer big scores.

Ruling AIADMK party is eager to get the party symbol to win polls and is eager to use the OPS faction to achieve that. Otherwise, all unity talk is false. The ruling party does not want the OPS faction at all. Once the party wins the party symbol, Sasikala would be back to lead the party.

Both party factions are seen becoming weaker than before, though the OPS faction is much better than the ruling faction. The government is facing a serious existential crisis as some MLAs have taken deviation from the ruling Palanisamy faction. Now efforts of the party are to somehow continue to rule the state, notwithstanding the split.

Meanwhile Dinakaran, who was jailed for his corrupt effort to buy the party symbol from the Election Commission, has been released on bail from the famous Tihar jail 23

and he has met the Sasikala in Bangalore jail and say he needs 60 days to bring the factions together. Sasikala appointed Dinakaran, her nephew, as her deputy before she went to jail to serve a four-year sentence for corruption.

The Tamil Nadu Cabinet on April 18 had revolted against Dinakaran and decided to keep him and his family out of the party and government. Dinakaran, who was recently released on bail after being in jail for a month in the Election Commission bribery case, had kicked up a fresh row on his role in the party when he said he would "continue party work" since he had said in April that he was keeping away from party affairs.

Dinakaran was sidelined by the party as it attempted a reunion with a rebel faction led by former Tamil Nadu chief minister O. Panneerselvam or OPS, whose main condition for a merger was that Sasikala and her family be kept away from the party and the government. Dinakaran and his aide Mallikarjuna were arrested in April by the Delhi crime branch police. The duo was charged with attempting to bribe election commission officials in the AIADMK symbol row to gain a favourable verdict. A Delhi court on June 01 granted bail to Dinakaran and his aide Mallikarjun over allegedly bribing the Election Commission officials for the party's two leaves symbol. The Tis Hazari court granted bail to the duo on personal bond of Rs. five lakh, however, they were asked to surrender their passports. Ousted All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) deputy general secretary TTV Dinakaran on Monday reached without passport Bengaluru's Parappana Agrahara jail to meet party leader and General Secretary V.K. Sasikala who was jailed in February in a Disproportionate Assets (DA) case. Tamil Nadu Finance Minister and senior AIADMK (Amma) leader D Jayakumar today said party deputy general secretary T T V Dinakaran should stick to his stand of keeping away from party affairs. Reacting to Dinakaran's assertion that he will continue party work, Jayakumar said it was the party's unanimous view to hold on to its stand of having no dealings with Dinakaran, party general secretary V K Sasikala and their associates. Jayakumar said top party functionaries and ministers started deliberations following Dinakaran's assertion on June 3 that he will continue party work. "We are firm, and we are clear," the minister told reporters here. "We have no truck with him, we are not dependent on him." He said Dinakaran, Sasikala or their associates were not "in the 24

background." " Dinakaran should stick to his stand that he will keep away from party," he said. After Tamil Nadu Ministers said on April 18 that they were dumping the top duo, Dinakaran had said he was stepping aside in deference to their wish. "We are leading Amma's government without anybody being in the background there is no doubt about it," he said. Sasikala, whom the Jayalalithaa did not entrust any party or government post, has split and spoilt the party as she was getting ready to take over the positions of Jayalithaaboth CM and General Secretary and loot the resources of the state. However, she could not become the CM of the state as she was sent to jail.

A prominent AIADMK leader said the ruling party is not obliged to tell the truth to the public or take the OPS faction into confidence in whatever the government and party do. The party leaders in the media take the public for granted by telling that they are the government fulfilling the â&#x20AC;&#x153;Jayalithaa dreamsâ&#x20AC;?.

The self appointment of General Secretary by Sasikala chinnamma is in the Election Commission and the court which is unnecessarily delaying the matter. Once the issue is settled there is clear cut possible for the factions to come together.

Sasikala and her loyal relative Dinakaran who is now facing corruption charges sought to bring together the factions by offering ministerial berths to a couple of MLAs, including OPS. They do not want OP to become CM once again because all their theatrics were meant to deny the CM post to him. Hence OPS becoming the CM again goes against their secret plan, intentions and actions.

The ruling party leaders are frauds as they fooled the public by saying that they have removed both Sasikala and Dinakaran from the party and the posts they hold.

While Dinakaran wants to return to party activities as Deputy Secretary, the ruling party 25

leader Jayakumar has asked Dinakaran to stay away from the party for the sake of party and its unity. Dinakaran threatens to enter the party head quarters to prove that he is above the government.

Meanwhile, BJP continues its efforts to rope in the troubled AIADMK to form a profitable alliance in Tamil Nadu and stage a comeback in Tamil Nadu politics, secret talks seemingly are underway, secretly, between AIADMK and BJP. BJP seems to have caught hold of a few TV commentator to promote BJP-AIADMK alliance.

Meanwhile Dinakaran and Sasikala to split the ruling party and have achieved that objective as a about dozen MLAs meet separately and also meet the CM Palanisamy on some secret issues.

Meanwhile some ministers in Palanisamy government blamed both Sasikala and Dinakaran for the untimely death of Jayalithaa. Meanwhile Tamil Nadu is not getting proper attention of the federal government after jaya’s death. The 14th Finance Commission has, once again, shortchanged Tamil Nadu by allocating it a bare minimum of funds. Fears of a renewed attempt to impose Hindi upon the country have led to vociferous opposition by the DMK, but a conspicuous silence on the part of the ruling party. Subsequent shows of power from the Centre, such as Union minister Venkaiah Naidu's unprecedented threat to cut funds after inspecting records at the secretariat at Fort St George, have only added to the fear that the Palaniswamy government, in its desperation to stay in power until 2021, has bowed to the demands of Delhi.

Meanwhile, it’s happened yet again. As Jayalithaa’s death has created a void, hoping to fill the void, Rajinikanth, the veteran actor with almost as many monikers as movies, has once again threatened to take the plunge and formally join Tamil politics. To take on Jayalalithaa, as Rajinikanth did in 1996 when he famously declared that if she won "even God couldn't save Tamil Nadu", was an especially precarious position for an actor to take, given her control over the Tamil film industry, and her ruthlessness in dealing with political enemies, perceived or otherwise. 26

And to take on Karunanidhi would mean dealing with a politician who has left an indelible mark on Tamil Nadu and with the last surviving link to the Justice Party and the ideals of Periyar's Dravidian movement. Their absence has resulted in the speculation that Tamil politics is about to see a shift; that there is a potential for a new leader or party outside of the two Dravidian majors to win over the electorate.

Rajni might want to use his Tamil films to become the ruler. AIADMK founder MG Ramachandran captured the hearts and minds of the general public on screen, playing roles that solidified his reputation as a man of the people which complemented his political rhetoric. Jayalalithaa was equally well-known as an actress, while DMK chief Karunanidhi first made his name as a remarkable screenwriter and poet.

Bur Rajinikanth taking the plunge would be a highly regressive step for Tamil Nadu's already stagnant political system. The state, since the 1970s, has witnessed the dominance of slavish cults of personality, especially under Jayalalithaa who took a leaf out of her mentor's book and transformed herself into "Amma" (mother in Tamil) following her disastrous defeat in the 1996 Assembly elections.

The vast changes that Tamil politics has seen in the months following the death of sixtime chief minister J Jayalalithaa may have influenced him to think along this line. There were claimants to the throne of Poes Garden come and fail in their attempts to seize control of the state: First Sasikala, the shadowy confidante with connections, mostly unsavory, across Tamil Nadu, then her nephew, TTV Dinakaran.

Both of their gambits failed, with Sasikala in prison, and Dinakaran recently out on bail. In their quest to seize power, the Mannargudi mafia ended up destabilising the Tamil Nadu government. Its ruling party, the AIADMK, is now split in twain. One faction is led by three-time interim chief minister O Panneerselvam, who is currently recovering from his own failed attempt at seizing power. The other faction is led by Edappadi K Palaniswamy, and while his government is secure in terms of seats in the Legislative Assembly, it is weak when it comes to dealing with the Narendra Modi government.

Meanwhile, the Tamil Nadu Assembly will meet for its next session on June 14. The session is likely to witness the debate on grants for various departments. The state government is also likely to move the Tamil Nadu Goods and Services Tax Bill, 2017, draft for which has already been approved by the state cabinet. Finance Minister D Jayakumar had last week said the government will “very soon” introduce the bill in the Assembly for consideration and passage. The government’s announcement on convening of the state assembly comes amid persistent demand from main opposition party DMK in this regard to debate the grants for various departments.

The ruling faction though talks about unity they don’t want OPS to emerge as the CM because they would lose their self importance. They just say want talks with OPS just to fool the public. . Their claim is that they have 120 MLAs and won’t allow OPS with a 12 MLAs to rule the state.

Unity of factions may not happen as long as Sasikala and Dinakaran leave the party by resignations or their removal by the courts. The OPS faction doesn’t trust the ruling faction; nor does it trust what they say. CM Palanisamy should offer his post to OPS as an initial effort to bring about the real, genuine and credible unity n the party. _____________________

Chapter-6: USA, Russia in talks over “safe zone” in Syria! -Dr. Abdul Ruff _____

None can predict as to how long the dirty war in Syria sponsored by foreign powers led by USA and Russia would go on and how many more thousands of Syrians would be slaughter there. US-Israel terror duo must be seriously considering escalation of war to weaken Iran.

Americans, focusing on its advantages, may not be interested in ending the war. Yet, apparently, there are talks going on behind the scenes over the increased fighting in Syria between USA and British Special Ops troops and the militant 28

proxies they have been using to control as much of the Syrian-Jordanian-Iraqi border as possible.

An agreement to set up the safe zones in Syria came into effect more than a week ago, at midnight May 6. . Russia, Turkey, and Iran, the guarantors of the initiative, who authorized the memo creating the safe zones during Syria talks in Kazakhstan’s capital, Astana on May 4, have to complete the final geographic division of the four areas within a month.

According to the memorandum, the preparation of the maps of the de-escalation areas and security zones should be completed by June 4, 2017. By the same date, the Guarantors should separate the armed opposition groups from the terrorist groups DAESH/ISIL/Islamic State, al-Nusra Front and all other individuals, groups, undertakings and entities associated with Al-Qaeda or DAESH/ISIL//Islamic State. The zones are located in the Idlib Governorate and parts of neighboring Latakia, Aleppo and Hama provinces; in the northern part of Homs province; in the Damascus neighborhood of Eastern Ghouta, and in parts of southern Deraa and Quneitra provinces bordering Jordan.

Meanwhile, by May 22, Russia, Turkey, and Iran, the guarantors of the Syrian ceasefire, have to complete the final geographic division of the four safe zones in Syria, also referred to as “de-escalation zones”. Sputnik has delved into the details of the suggested plan and its difference from the similar initiatives of the USA and Turkey.

The plan suggests that within the lines of the de-escalation areas hostilities between the conflicting parties the government of the Syrian Arab Republic and the armed opposition groups will join the ceasefire regime with the use of any kinds of weapons, including aerial assets, should be ceased.

Checkpoints and observation posts are to be positioned along the de-escalation lines within the safe zones, according to the document. They will provide free movement of unarmed civilians and humanitarian access to the areas, under guarantor states’ control. Russian delegation head at Astana talks and Special Presidential Representative for Syria Alexander Lavrentyev said that Russia was ready to send its observers to the safe zones in Syria and did not rule out other countries taking part in monitoring de-escalation. Chief of the Russian General Staff’s Main Operational Directorate Col. Gen. Sergei Rudskoy said that the work of checkpoints and observation posts will be under control of Russia, Turkey and Iran. Under mutual agreement of the three countries, they can draw in units of other countries. 29

The memorandum stated that the creation of the de-escalation areas and security zones is a temporary measure, the duration of which will initially be 6 months and will be automatically extended on the basis of consensus of the Guarantors.

The steps outlined in the Astana agreement for the “de-escalation zones” in Syria are not clear but it is clearly spelled out that the attacks on ISIS and al-Nusra will continue. But al-Nusra is not waiting for any clarification, having already announced it would be confiscating the ammo depots of the opposition groups in Idlib and arresting their leaders to preempt them going over to the SAA. This might start up new infighting among the anti-Damascus groups, as al-Nusra has said it will attack any group that supports the ceasefire. Missing so far is how they plan to deal with the membership roulette game the “jihadis” and officially designated terrorists have been playing by flowing their members back and forth as needed to suit their combat and political tactical needs.

Thus by May 22, the working group of the representatives of the guarantor states has to define the areas within the above safe zones which are still under control of “terrorists” and exclude them from the ceasefire agreement. So far, it is only known for certain that Eastern Ghouta municipality of Qaboun, in the neighborhood of Damascus, which is still controlled by al-Nusra and from where they are shelling on the dwelling areas of Damascus, will be excluded from this safe zone.

While Israel is making efforts to further complicate the crisis in Syria, both USA and Europe now think along Moscow way that Assad must stay for the “stabilization” of Syria as they are under the impression that once Assad is killed or driven out of Syria, Syria would, like Afghanistan, become totally disoriented although Syria is already destabilized with many war fronts inside.

The US Coalition does not want the Syrian people to have anti-terrorism partners unless it approves, and they are using the Russians to get this deal done, similar to their wanting Assad out.. USA wants the situation would eventually assure a weak and more easily destabilized Syria even after any kind of a “settlement” which it can manipulate further. . One of the reasons for this development for talks, therefore, is only to block the Damascus-Baghdad highway from being the critical link for the Syrian coalition for logistical support from both Iran and Iraq Including blocking military hardware and troops – in effect, imposing a situation that would benefit the foreign forces, as the USA has not won the war even after 5 long years. Sources in Syria say that many are wary of what the Americans and Russians might do, as one can assume that Moscow does presumably not want to be involved permanently at the current level of combat for years and years. The US Coalition obviously does not want to submit Assad’s future to the Syrian people, as he would 30

win devastatingly, which would show that he ruled his own people only by military oppression.

Peace after ceasefire will by no means be an easy feat to accomplish, as there are many enemies of peace still on the battlefield and in the capitals of the world. But at this stage of the game, maintaining momentum toward peace has to be visible to increase the hope and interest in a political settlement

Of course, USA does not want the crisis in Syria to end because that could lead to Mideast peace as well.

USA cannot win war in Syria but can hope to win the talks. When the peace talks began that the US Coalition would string the process along, looking for openings to win in the talks what they could not on the battlefield and that is exactly what is rolling out here.

USA and Europe slapped sanctions on Iran in order to weaken that country. The Western claims of Iran having a secret nuclear weapons program were a complete hoax, done partially to justify the Iranian sanctions to cripple its economy, and also for the deployment of a US anti-missile screen in Eastern Europe.

Unfortunately, the western media has never mentioned this exposure of the Iranian nuclear threat hoax as one of the key accomplishments of the nuclear deal. That shows they fear public focus on the nasty deed, because it could focus closer public attention in the future. The public might look for a replay scam the Syrian threat is, or the new Iranian threat because it is Syria’s ally. Iran has done way more to fight terrorism in Syria that the USA has – another item about which Western media seems selectively blind.

What is at stake is countries like the USA and Israel, who have aggressive secret intentions and fascist mindset, to paint their selected targets as aggressors, so their own aggression can be cloaked in the often-used robe of being “defensive measures” and “counter terror” measures. .Both want to make Arab world destabilized even while looting their resources in arms deals. .

Syria’s President Bashar Assad has recently said that he believes that the internationally agreed de-escalation zones are a real opportunity to finally achieve peace in his war-torn country, saying, all previous initiatives have failed due to 31

some states hindering peace by pursuing own political goals. The “foremost” aim of the de-escalation or safe zones is to protect peaceful civilians, but Assad said they also provide armed militants with an opening “to enter into a truce with the government.” “This is a chance for a person with weapons in hand to pause to think. In other words, if they lay down arms, amnesty would follow,” the Syrian president said.

The agreement between Moscow, Tehran and Ankara presumes the cessation of airstrikes in Syria. However the US State Department has said the US military won’t join this moratorium. Israel seems to have a similar position on the issue. Recently the Israeli authorities informed Moscow that Israel will strike on Syrian territory “in case of necessity.” The Saudi authorities however have fully supported the document signed in Astana. They probably did not like Trump’s idea to pay for the safe zones in Syria and rushed to support the alternative project.

Back in January, US President Donald Trump promised to “do safe zones in Syria” for refugees fleeing violence in the war-torn country. He was then expected to sign a draft order to the Pentagon and the State Department to produce a plan to provide safe areas in Syria and in the surrounding region in which Syrian nationals displaced from their homeland can await firm settlement, such as repatriation or potential third-country resettlement. On the campaign trail, Trump gave no details as to how he might go about creating such havens, except to say that he would ask Gulf states to help pay. In February, the US leader reiterated that the Gulf States should pay for these safe zones. “We do owe $20 trillion. Okay. So we’re going to have the Gulf States pay for those safe zones. They’ve got nothing, but money,” he then said.

The Turkish government had long pressed Obama, without success, for creation of a no-fly zone in Syria on its border with Turkey. US military officials had long warned that the creation of no-fly zones inside Syria would require a large number of additional resources beyond the fight against Islamic State (Daesh).

It should be noted however that the idea of the safe zones in Syria is not new. It was earlier voiced by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. However Ankara’s major tasks initially were not the settlement of the Syrian conflict but the setup of control over the border territories and control the Kurds. With this very purpose it launched its Operation Euphrates Shield in August 2016, planning to squeeze Kurdish units out of northern Syrian territories. This task however has been fulfilled only partially.

Hence the main difference of the document signed by Russia, Iran and Turkey in 32

Astana is that it is aimed at a complex settlement of the situation in Syria. Washington’s effort was aimed at tacking only one problem — the refugee influx into Europe and the USA. The USA is now studying the terms of the memorandum. US Secretary of Defense James Mattis has recently questioned the Russiansponsored plan saying that it “poses many unanswered questions, including whether it would be effective.” “The devil is always in the details, right? So we have to look at the details, see if we can work them out, see if we think they’re going to be effective,” the Pentagon head told journalists.

With a fluid situation in Arab world after Qatar was ousted by Saudi Led Arab world blaming it on behalf of USA for “sponsoring terrorism”, there is no possibility Syria would be safe in the near future.

Aiming at a dangerous Sunni-Shiite war in the long run that would further slash Islamic populations and faith, President Donald Trump, whose son in law is a Jew, declared that the action taken by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Bahrain was “hard but necessary.” He denounced Qatar for having been a “funder of terrorism at a very high level”. Trump’s remarks make clear that following Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia last month, during which he sought to form a Sunni bloc to confront Iran, Riyadh felt emboldened to strengthen its regional position under the pretext of combating terrorism.

Qatar has long attempted to maintain a somewhat more independent foreign policy, including through economic ties and joint exploration of energy resources with Iran and through its support for groups like the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas. This stance has infuriated Riyadh. Until Riyadh broke diplomatic ties, Qatar was also part of the coalition conducting the brutal war in Yemen that has killed tens of thousands of civilians over the past two years.

In Syria, the USA has over recent weeks with air strikes effectively begun to partition the country. The USA has justified these attacks on the grounds that the pro-government forces have allegedly violated a “deconfliction zone” proclaimed unilaterally by Washington in Syria’s south near the borders with Jordan and Iraq.

Of course, the whole idea of US-Israel duo is to create a weak Arab world and sustain that. _______________

Chapter-7: Contours of Russo-France relations! -Dr. Abdul Ruff _____

Anti- Islamic and anti-Russian mindset of the West is all well known. While Europe hates Islam more than what the USA does, both USA and Europe hate Russia for reasons known to the world. Like Islam which as the final religion of the universe is seen by anti-Islamic forces and nations as a serious threat to their own religions, Russia is also viewed as a threat to global capitalism and imperialism in which the western powers trade in, thereby forcing the world surrender to their joint military will. Though Russia is also somewhat anti-Islam and no more a communist or socialist nation, the West still is suspicious of its actions and very carefully monitors its moves and jointly works for future wars with Russia for global domination.

The western powers aim at weakening the Russian power and strangle Islam and remove Islamic faith from the face of the earth so that colonialism, capitalism, fascism, Zionism and imperialism could stay permanent global fixtures. Russian attitude towards France is positive as Russia views European civilization rather pensively. However, French view of Russia is not quite encouraging. In a 2013 BBC World Service poll, 25% of French people viewed Russia's influence positively, with 63% expressing a negative view, while 49% of Russians viewed French influence positively, with 10% expressing a negative view. Russian relations with France need, therefore, to be seen as a part of the hate politics of the western powers of which France is one. Generally, France is known for its neutrality in world affairs and regional conflicts except in case where USA dominates the regions. Even during the height of Cold War, France did not pick a side between the USSR and the USA and we had good economical and diplomatic relationships. The relationship like between France and Russia has been normal without any serious direct conflicts on any matter but its close ties with USA always stood between them, at times harming even their normal relations. Putinâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Visit Newly elected French President Emmanuel Macron and Russian President Vladimir Putin met in Paris on May 29, 2017 in an unscheduled meeting of the latter to France in which the former chose to lecture Putin on issues like Ukraine, Chechnya, Syria, and Russian interference in the French electoral campaign. 34

Obviously, the Russian strong man could not digest the “smart” act of Emmanuel Macron during their first ever meeting as presidents. Such a behavior by a host president toward a foreign dignitary is unusual in international politics and it hurt the egoist Putin who later in an interview bombarded the French novice unable to comprehend the niceties in international relations.

Emmanuel Macron just expressed his displeasure and anger for Putin for his support for his opponent candidate in the French presidency poll which he won in a highly surprising manner.

Just before that Emmanuel Macron and Vladimir Putin had a pleasant walk in the Gallery of Battles at the Versailles Palace as they arrived for a joint press conference following their meeting in Versailles, near Paris.

Putin strongly defended his right to welcome Marine Le Pen in the Kremlin during the presidential race. Putin met the newly-elected Macron during a trip to see the official opening of a new exhibition dedicated to Russian ruler Peter the Great. The exhibition, “Peter the Great: a Tsar in France,” will run in the Great Trianon Palace in Versailles until the end of September. The special event celebrates the 300th anniversary of Peter's first visit to France and the start of full diplomatic relations between the two states.

A few hours after his return from Versailles, Vladimir Putin chose to give an interview to the right-wing newspaper Le Figaro. With hardly veiled resentment, he took issue with his host, newly elected French President Emmanuel Macron, and rebuffed him on the major points of contention that came out during their May 29 press conference: Syria, Ukraine, and interference in the French electoral campaign. In Versailles, Putin listened sternly to Macron’s moral lesson about Ukraine and human rights in Chechnya, said little, and looked impatient to leave. Now, he played the deciding match—without the contender, on his own terms, and at the new Russian Orthodox center he had belatedly opened on the banks of the Seine. Vladimir Putin’s methods are well-known to seasoned Russia observers abroad. He is stubborn, denies even established facts—like Damascus’s use of chemical weapons against civilians. He angrily dismisses foreign leaders’ positions on the Ukrainian conflict. And he speaks insincerely about the Russian state media’s smear campaign against Macron and the supposed hacking of his movement’s website and emails. 35

The new French president is learning the hard way what it costs to have a “very frank and direct” exchange with the master of the Kremlin. The Russian president has spent seventeen years at the helm. Macron, meanwhile, is taking his first steps in international power politics and probably misread his guest’s reasons and expectations for this meeting. Putin was seeking honor and respect, recognition of his stature as dean of the “concert of nations,” and also a benign French response to his aggressive military policies for “restoring legal order and peace” in Syria and Ukraine. An experienced Putin was not looking for a frank, honest discussion on issues of war and peace. And he certainly did not expect Macron to open the press conference with strong criticisms of state violence against gay men in Chechnya and to hint that he, Putin, should fix this. Vladimir Putin did not come to Versailles to negotiate a way out of the Syrian tragedy or finding solutions to world issues. He came to drag Macron into his political logic, in which the global struggle against terrorism predominates, no matter what. To Moscow, the most offensive part of the failed show was that the Russian authorities had worked hard to obtain this invitation from the Elysée Palace. They wanted Macron to repair the humiliation of October 2016, when François Hollande advised Vladimir Putin against visiting Paris to inaugurate the new Russian Orthodox center. At the time, the Russian military was helping Bashar Assad’s army in their brutal assault on Aleppo. The Kremlin’s preference for armed conflict over negotiation has a deeply corrosive effect on its relationship with France, despite a “centuries-long friendship.” Trust is gone. In France, Italy, Germany, Greece and Romania, the capitalist media lords see a clear link between Russia’s military participation in the war and refugees crossing European borders. Even the most pernicious fake news and propaganda cannot whitewash the glaring facts: True, Russia’s use of military force creates more insecurity and does not help us fight back against terrorists in all cities. But Americans want that to crate alarm about so-called “Islamic terrorism”. Retrospect Russo-European relations have been strained for quite some time due mainly to the sanctions imposed, along with its boss USA, on Kremlin for its annexation of Crimea. France and entire Europe considers the Crimea annexation illegal while Moscow has only taken back its territory from Ukraine. Neither USA nor Europe could do anything against Russia’s bold takeover of Crimea expect criticizing Putin.

France–Russia relations date back to early modern period, with sporadic contact even earlier, when both countries were ruled by absolute monarchies, the Kingdom of France (843–1792) and the Tsardom of Russia (1547–1721). Following Russia's victory over Sweden in the Great Northern War, the foundation of Saint Petersburg as the new capital in 1712, and declaration of an empire in 1721, Russia became a major force in European affairs for the first time.

France–Russia diplomatic ties go back at least to 1702 when France had an ambassador (Jean-Casimir Baluze) in Moscow. Following Russia's victory over Sweden in the Great Northern War, the foundation of Saint Petersburg as the new capital in 1712, and declaration of an empire in 1721, Russia became a major force in European affairs for the first time. The geographical separation between the two countries meant that their spheres of influence rarely overlapped, but both were crucial states in the European balance of power.

After the French Revolution, Russia became a center of reactionary antagonism against the revolution, and when Russia had a successful October revolution in 1917 France opposed that. Napoleon Bonaparte (later Emperor Napoleon I) came to power in 1799, Russia remained hostile. The establishment of a French-backed Polish state, the Duchy of Warsaw in 1807 threatened Russia and caused tensions that led to the French invasion of Russia in 1812. This was major defeat for France and a turning point in the Napoleonic Wars, leading to Bonaparte's removal.

Imperial Russia's foreign policy was hostile to republican France in the 19th century and very pro-German. Germany, Austria and Russia-had as its stated purpose the preservation of the monarchical order in Europe against the France of the Third Republic. After the defeat in the Franco-German war of 1870-71, French elites worked hard to keep France diplomatically isolated. France's challenges to Russia's influence led France to participate in the Crimean War, which saw French troops invade the Crimean peninsula. Imperial Russia's foreign policy was hostile to republican France in the 19th century and very pro-German. Rejected by Germany, Russia cautiously began a policy of rapprochement with France starting in 1891 while the French for their part were very interested in the Russian offers of an alliance. In August 1891, France and Russia signed a "consultative pact" where both nations agreed to consult each other if another power were to threaten the peace of Europe.] In 1893-94, French and Russian diplomats negotiated a defensive alliance meant to counter the growing power of Germany. The alliance was intended to deter Germany from going to war by presenting the Reich with the threat of a two-front war; neither France nor Russia could hope to defeat Germany on their own, but their combined power might, which in turn was meant to deter Berlin from going to war with either Paris or St. Petersburg.

Russia played a complex role in the Napoleonic wars. At the Vienna Congress of 1814-15, Russia played a major diplomatic role as a leader of the conservative, anti-revolutionary forces. Russia was again hostile when the Revolutions of 1848 broke out across Europe, bringing Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte (later Emperor Napoleon III) to power in France.

Under the terms of the Franco-Russian alliance of 1894 if Germany attacked France, then Russia would attack Germany or its close ally and if Germany or its close ally like Italy attacked Russia, France would attack Germany. After France was humiliated by Britain in the Fashoda Incident of 1898, the French wanted the alliance to become an anti-British alliance. In 1899, the Franco-Russian alliance was amended to deal with any power threatening the "equilibrium of forces in Europe" instead of just the "general peace" as before, and in 1900 the alliance was again amended to name Great Britain as explicitly the power that threatening the "equilibrium of forces in Europe". To that end, it was agreed that if Britain should attack France, then Russia would invade India and the French provided a loan so that the Russians could start the construction of a railroad from Orenburg to Tashkent. Tashkent in its turn would be the base from which the Russians would invade Afghanistan as the prelude to invading India. Despite their alliance, both Russia and France pursued their own interests.

In 1908-09 during the Bosnia crisis, France declined to support Russia. Japan later fought Russia in the Russo-Japanese war. France remained neutral in this conflict. At the time, Nicholas seriously considered abrogating the alliance with France, and was only stopped by the lack of an alternative. In 1911 during the Second Moroccan Crisis, the Russians paid the French back for their lack of support in the Bosnia crisis by refusing to support France when Germany threatened war against the French over Morocco Further linking France and Russia together was a common economic interests. Russia wished to industrialize, but lacked the capital to do so while the French were more than prepared to lend the necessary money to finance Russia's industrialization. By 1913, French investors had put 12 billion francs into Russian assets, making the French easily the largest investors in the Russian empire. The industrialization of the Russian Empire was largely the result of a massive influx of French capital into Russia.

During World War I, France was allied with Great Britain and the Russian Empire. The alliance between the three countries formed the Triple Entente. However, after the communist Bolsheviks seized control of the Russian government in 1917, Russia left the war.

Soviet era

France's bilateral relations with the Soviet Union have experienced dramatic ups and downs due to Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, and France's alliance in the NATO. Previous Soviet premier Mikhail Gorbachev made a visit to France in October 1985 in order to fix the strains in the Franco-Soviet relations. Nevertheless, France's bilateral activities continued with NATO, which furthermore strained the bilateral relations between France and the Soviet Union. After the breakup of the USSR, bilateral relations between France and Russia were initially warm. On February 7, 1992 France signed a bilateral treaty, recognizing Russia as a successor of the USSR.

One of the major news has been the sale of Mistral class amphibious assault ships to Russia. The deal which was signed at 2010, is the first major arms deal between Russia and the Western world since World War II. The deal has been criticized for neglecting the security interests of Poland, the Baltic States, Ukraine, and Georgia. Before Syrian Civil War, Franco-Russian relations were generally improving. Ever since the financial crisis took hold, European powers have been forced to court emerging markets more and Moscow meanwhile wanted to diversify its own economy.

Era of terrorism, reactivated by USA and NATO following the Sept-11 hoax perpetrated to destabilize oil rich Arab world and totally destroy Afghanistan brought Russia and France together alongside USA. François Hollande and Vladimir Putin agreed on ordering their respective armed forces to "cooperate" with one another in the fight against the terrorist organization. The French President has called upon the international community to bring "together of all those who can realistically fight against this terrorist army in a large and unique coalition."[16] The French-Russian bombing cooperation is considered to be an "unprecedented" move, given that France is a member of NATO. Seeking closer ties between Russia and Europe alongside USA, a Russian newspaper recalled that "WWII had forced the Western World and the Soviet Union to overcome their ideological differences", wondering whether ISIS would be the "new Hitler". According to French counterintelligence sources in 2010, Russian espionage operations against France have reached levels not seen since the 1980s.

Like in other western countries, the increasingly fanatic corporatist media continues to create illusions about the “dangerous” Russian boar and terrorize the people on “monstrous” Russia. Since (Jewish) President of France Sarkozy and his open "Atlantist" foreign policy, it has become more complicated, and Russia is more and 39

more seen as an enemy more than an ally. The whole Ukrainian situation and the refusal to sell the French made Mistral boats to Russia are a good example of that. There is in the French media network (TVs, radios, newspapers) an almost systematic propaganda against Russia, so most of the French people are highly misinformed on the matter. Observation

Notwithstanding the visible cooperation and coordination between them in Syria and elsewhere, the West-Russian conflict is real. The deliberate smear campaign by western media against Russia is real. Russia through Putin is taking an opportunity to make a comeback on the European stage, after the G7 summit in Sicily held without him. For the new French president Emmanuel Macron, Versailles was an eye-opening experience. He say a calm and iron like leader in his guest from Moscow. Vladimir Putin cannot be seduced, lectured or talked into a rational, “fully inclusive” (Macron’s words) multilateral diplomatic negotiation. There is no bait that he is willing to take.

Putin wants to talk with Western leaders on his own terms—and those terms alone. He has shown he is not willing to compromise in order to restore a broken partnership with Europe. For Macron, the path forward is clear—the further strengthening of the EU and Franco-German tandem and of Europe’s political, economic and military unity. Given the current unpredictability of US policies and its shaky commitment to NATO, European states will likely close ranks. In this renewed strategy of common security and foreign policy, France might play a leading role. And Putin, seeking genuine ties with Europe, may have given to the world one more incentive to ensure ideas of narrow national interest do not get in the way of a unified European position toward the Russian leadership. Recent history has shown that France or any other European country for that matter is incapable of making its foreign policy choices on its own and all of them have to take cognizance of what Washington wants from them in order advance its own so-called national interest at global level.

History reveals the Russo-France relations can never be stable, unless, of course, world order changes entirely. There is no chance for any open conflict between Russia and France, however. Russo-France ties, meanwhile, have to adapt themselves to the existing reality and US directives from time to time!

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Chapter-8- India on fascist path: Hindutva criminal operations in Gandhian India! (Story of Indian fanaticism, secularism and Muslims) -Dr. Abdul Ruff Colachal ----------

Indian Hindutva looks very close to criminal Zionism of Israel that brutally occupies Palestine, and unless the trend is checked legally, it could harm the nations and entire world. If PM Modi is really opposed to Hindus murdering Muslims in cow's name, why canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t he initiate legal action against Hindutva fanatics, who eye Hindu vote banks, and end such crimes against humanity? Why? India is often in the news for crimes against women and, according to government statistics, a rape is reported every 15 minutes. More incidents remain unreported. Even reported cases go on for years in the courts before the guilty are punished, if at all, whereas when a cow is slaughtered or a Muslim caries beef, Hindu extremist groups immediately go and kill or beat up whoever they suspect of cow slaughter or they bluff in order to kill Muslims for Hindu votes.

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Zionism influences Hindutva

There is a saying across the world that â&#x20AC;&#x153;if you name who is your thick friend others would know who areâ&#x20AC;? and as an emerging thick friend of fascist fanatic Israel, India cannot be entirely different. Both are fanatically pursuing colonialist policies to terrorize the masses of their colonies - Palestine and Kashmir, respectively. RSS-BJP duo takes counsel from Israel. That PM Modi who represents entire Indian secular nation decided to visit Israel- a criminal state in Mideast â&#x20AC;&#x201C; without going to Palestine revels what the RSS-BJP is all about. Modern India for which leaders of the nation after the independence laid secular and democratic foundation, is fast moving towards a fascist Hindutva format to catch up with Zionist Israel, among cruelest fanatic dispensations. Funnily the BJP led government of Narendra Modi deliberately plays double roles in the promoting Hindutva establishment by maintaining a total silence over the communal atrocities on Muslims and other oppressed sections of the nation. Guided by RSS, the BJP government of Modi takes revenge on Muslims to gain the sympathy and votes of majority Hindus. They believe if they get a major chunk of Hindutva votes, BJP and other Hindutva outfits can easily win the polls and they need to depend on Muslims or secular or democratic sections of India for winning polls. Moreover, they know Congress and other so-called secular parties have no real sympathy of Muslims and these parties get Muslim votes on the strength of their fear for Hindu communal elements targeting Muslims. Right from the day of Indian independence in 1947 Muslims are being targeted by the criminal minded Hindus and politicians for Hindu votes but in recent years the phenomenon of anti-Muslimism has obnoxiously increased the risk for Muslims with state promoting Hindutva mentality against the fundamentals of a secular democracy. These Hindu criminal do not attack any Muslim criminals or frauds that they deliberately promote to terrorize Muslim community but only sincere and god abiding Muslims are the Hindutva victims. Today, the Hindutva parties very dangerously use issues like Muslims, patriotism of Muslims, Pakistan, mosque etc for getting Hindu votes and to come to power with Hindu votes. Today, Indian political scene has reached a level where any Muslim could be killed straight away by Hindu criminal elements just by blaming for eating beef or buying a goat or cow. The ruling BJP and their media lords consider it an act of crime graver than killing a human or bombing the Parliament or a state assembly with Israeli cluster bombs. Had PM Modi declared, as he assumed power as Indian executive chief in 2014, punitive measures for those Hindus who kill any Muslim for fulfilling their sadistic 42

pleasures, or anyone from other minority communities that would have sent a clear message to India and Hindutva criminal elements in BJP to care for legal system of India. But true to his past Hindutva credentials as CM of Gujarat state - in consideration of which he was made the PM candidate by BJP – Modi did not say word of warning or punishment to Hindu criminals. He wanted to save the Hindu criminals who destroyed the Historic Babri Mosque by appointing Hindutva minded judges. Modi now feels sad that his Hindutva guys are kiting Muslims in place animals in his country. On June 29 Modi told a gathering in his home state Gujarat that killing people in the name of cow protection was "not in keeping with the principles of India's founding father, Mahatma Gandhi". "As a society, there is no place for violence," Modi said, adding that "no person has the right to take the law in his or her own hands". Bur those criminals who have taken law into their own dirty hands are free to operate in the country now. The Modi statement in itself is indeed a positive development in Indian Hindutva criminal politics. This is significant because the former ruling outfit Congress party which owns wholesale Muslim banks has never expressed sympathy with Muslims or criticized the Hindutva elements for attacking Muslims and never said a word of appreciation for Muslim contribution to Indian development and growth. In fact it always insults Muslims. Congress party promotes and wants Hindus rule entire India both at the centre and states and ensured that no Muslim emerges as a contender for CM in any state even in Kerala where Muslims are more than 30 percent at par with Hindus and Christians. BJP made a Muslim president of India. But the then President APAJ Abdul Kalam was hated by the Congress party and began sideling Muslim leaders in the party, except those who can only be used as successful votebank managers to garner Muslims as votebank material. There cannot be two opinions that Indian PM Narendra Modi is a “proud” Hindu and a Hindutva fanatic but as PM Modi cannot openly propagate his Hindutva moorings or openly ask Hindus to attack and kill Muslims. He lets his “people” do that and he protects them as his prime duty as Indian PM. But he is doing everything indirectly to promote Hindutva and make Muslims the target of Hindutva criminal elements. Of course, a basic RSS champion, Modi is not a democrat or secularist. Modi came to the national scene only after his government killed Muslims just as a revenge to appease the RSSBJP/VHP zealots. Beef- a tasty, healthy meat! 43

Modi became Indian PM in 2014 not to promote Muslim interests in India or abroad. Like his predecessors from Congress party, Modi also promotes millionaires’ interests inland and abroad. Hindutva parliament gives him the necessary support to do whatever he wants and he tours the world and creates problems for the people. PM Modi takes along with all top corporate lords in his foreign tours. Hardcore Hindutva leaders want Modi to advance their interests and he has so far done that religiously. . In recent months, the innocent looking and humble cow has become India's most polarising animal as Hindutva parties, upon their success in using the antiMuslimism and hatred for Islam for promoting Hindu vote bank, have accelerated their Hindutva gimmicks to increase their Hindu vote share. The BJP insists that the animal is holy and should be protected. Cow slaughter is banned in several states, stringent punishment has been introduced for offenders and parliament is considering a bill to bring in the death penalty for the crime. Beef is global meat consumed by people belonging to all religions and cow meet is also consumed by Indians and foreigners who like the taste of that animal meat. While vegetarian people don’t eat meat all, beef is a major and cheap meat consumed by most Indians, including Hindus. Hindus world over eat beef as their favorite dish in varieties and enjoy life. Also, the BJP vote bank promoters do not think beef is bad but in order to generate fear and hatred among Hindu voters toward Muslims, ask the party carders and other pro-RSS people to kill those Muslims in India who eat beef, though their target is Muslims and low caste Hindus and Christians, others. A few politically charged fanatic Hindus, whose Hindutva imagination is boosted by Hindu god characters in movies, and brainwashed by Hindutva activists and Muslim haters, propagate the domestic animal cow as a “sacred animal” and cow slaughter is banned in several states by BJP governments. Muslim slaughter ri snot banned anywhere in India because Hindutva criminal mended people want to kill Muslims to feel themselves elated. Modi, who came to the national scene by targeting Muslims in his Gujarat state, knows the Hindu communal elements want to destroy peace in the country. Like Jews, they promote violence culture in India. They have taken law, judges and judiciary into their own hands and want the judges deliver judgment according toothier “notes” sent to the government. After demolishing historic Babri mosque like jungle beasts do, they say they won’t accept court judgment on the destruction of Muslim property and place of Islamic worship. Since Muslims are a minority and directly controlled by Hindu government and Hindu network, BJP thinks they can do anything to them. Gradually the RSS-BJP, a large fanatic family targeting Muslims and Islam, question the very existence of 44

Muslims in India, questioning their patriotism, cricketism, food habits, etc and threaten them with sedition laws. The TV media lords pronounce sedition and death sentences of those Muslims who eat beef. That is food terrorism policy of RSS-BJP.

Beef lynching targeting Muslims: Indians protest RSS and its political outfits and some sections of other Hindu parties like Congress and SP, etc and their media mouth pieces target Muslims for their blood and flesh. The governments support that Hindutva ideology as the basis for Hindustan. Muslims have been converted into not just vote stuff but also the Hindutva objects to target. RSS-BJP hardcore leaders keep trying new tricks to trap Hindus and harm Muslims. Under Narendra Modi's Hindu nationalist BJP, the cow has become a polarising animal and religious divisions are widening. Restrictions on the sale and slaughter of cows are fanning confusion and vigilantism. Critics of the government say that ever since the Hindutva BJP came to power in 2014, RSS/BJP Hindutva forces began implementing the hidden agenda. Its cow protection vigilantes have carried out numerous attacks on Muslims and Dalits, for whom beef is a staple. Hindus and Christians also enjoy beef in different flavors. They have also criticised Modi for not doing enough to condemn the attacks. Nearly a dozen people have been killed in these attacks. Targets are often picked based on rumours and Muslims have been attacked for even transporting cows for milk. Ever since the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party came to power in the summer of 2014, vigilante cow protection groups have been emboldened and there have been numerous attacks on Muslims and Dalits, for whom beef is a staple. Nearly a dozen people have been killed in these attacks over the past two years. Targets are often picked based on unsubstantiated rumours and Muslims have been attacked for even transporting cows for milk. Possibly RSS believes Muslims should be slaughtered instead of animals. In India Cow slaughter is banned in several Indian states that are now under spell of extremist Hindutva moorings, and those found violating the law can be jailed for up to 10 years. Parliament under the control of Hindutva forces is also considering a bill to bring in the death penalty for the crime. On 26 June 2017 a 15-year-old Muslim boy, returning home from Eid shopping with his three brothers, was killed in a brutal assault by a mob of about 20 men on a 45

train in the north Indian state of Haryana. Police say that the reason for Junaid Khan's murder - in which his three siblings were also injured by the knife-wielding mob - was mainly because of a row over seat space on the train. But a man arrested for being part of the mob said on TV that he was goaded into it by others because Muslims ate beef. Shaqir, one of the surviving brothers, told reporters in the hospital that the attackers "flung our skull caps, pulled my brother's beard, slapped us, and taunted us about eating beef". Nearly a dozen people â&#x20AC;&#x201C;Muslims- have been killed in the past two years in the name of the cow. Two years ago, a mob killed farm worker Mohammed Akhlaq over "rumours" that his family had stored and eaten beef. Protests under the banner #NotInMyName are being organised in 16 Indian cities, including Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Lucknow and Allahabad as well as in London on Wednesday. Gatherings are also planned for later in the week in Toronto, Boston and Karachi. The protest at Delhi's Jantar Mantar monument was expected to be the biggest. Targets are often picked based on unsubstantiated rumours and Muslims have been attacked for even transporting cows for milk. Ghosh, who is from the eastern city of Kolkata (formerly Calcutta), says he became aware of "this dangerous mix of religion and vote bank politics" only after he moved to Delhi a few years ago and that "this project is a silent form of protest that can make an impact". So earlier this month, during a visit to New York, he bought the cow mask from a party shop and, on his return, began shooting for the series, taking pictures of women in front of tourist hotspots and government buildings, on the streets and in the privacy of their homes, on a boat and in a train, because "women are vulnerable everywhere". " I started the project from Delhi since the capital city is the hub of everything politics, religion, even most debates start here. "I took the first photo in front of the iconic India Gate, one of the most visited tourist places in India. Then I photographed a model in front of the presidential palace, another on a boat in the Hooghly River in Kolkata with the Howrah Bridge as the backdrop." Protests are taking place across India against rising attacks on Muslims and Dalits (formerly untouchables) by vigilante cow protection groups. About 2,000 people turned out in Delhi. Protests were also being held in 15 other cities as well as in London, protest organizer Saba Dewan said. The campaign, #NotInMyName, started with a Facebook post she wrote after a Muslim teenager was killed last week. The protests come amid reports that a Muslim dairy farmer in Jharkhand state was assaulted and his house was set on fire after the carcass of a cow was found at his door on Tuesday afternoon. The protest organizers have alleged that the family of Junaid Khan, the 16-year-old Muslim boy brutally killed by a Hindu mob on a train last week, had not been able to attend because they were intimidated by the authorities. 46

Crowds gathered at Jantar Mantar, a historical Delhi monument and popular venue for protests. Many of the 2,000 present held posters and banners saying #NotInMyName. Others wondered if it is so easy to divide Indians on the basis of religion. On the stage, poets recited verses, and musicians sang songs of protest. Organiser Saba Dewan demanded that Indian citizens be protected, saying the right to life is non-negotiable. One young woman told me the murders were not how she wished to remember her country. A photography project which shows women wearing a cow mask and asks the politically explosive question - whether women are less important than cattle in India - has gone viral in the country and earned its 23-year-old photographer the ire of Hindu nationalist trolls."I am perturbed by the fact that in my country, cows are considered more important than a woman, that it takes much longer for a woman who is raped or assaulted to get justice than for a cow which many Hindus consider a sacred animal," Delhi-based photographer Sujatro Ghosh told the BBC. The project is "his way of protesting" against the growing influence of the vigilante cow protection groups that have become emboldened since the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, came to power in the summer of 2014. "I've been concerned over the Dadri lynching [when a Muslim man was killed by a Hindu mob over rumours that he consumed and stored beef] and other similar religious attacks on Muslims by cow vigilantes," Ghosh said. The documentary filmmaker said she was "shattered" when she heard about last Thursday's attack on 16-year-old Junaid Khan, who was killed by a mob of about 20 men on a train in the northern state of Haryana while returning home from Eid shopping in Delhi. Her anguished Facebook post has managed to galvanize a large number of Indians, with thousands pledging to participate in the protests. "The protest is against this systematic violence against Muslims and Dalits that is going on in our country at the moment," Ms Dewan said. "Junaid's killing was a shattering moment for me, and also for a lot of other people. I started crying when I heard about his murder. "We've always been saying we should protest, but there's been no leadership. So we decided to do this ourselves. How long can you keep waiting till the cows come home?" she added.

Two weeks ago when he launched the project on Instagram, the response was "all positive. It went viral within the first week." But after the Indian press covered it and put out their stories on Facebook and Twitter, the backlash began. "Some wrote comments threatening me. On Twitter people started trolling me, some said I, along with my models, should be taken to Delhi's Jama Masjid mosque and slaughtered like a cow and that our meat should be fed to a woman journalist and a woman writer the nationalists despise. They said they wanted to see my mother 47

weep over my body." Some people also contacted the Delhi police, "accusing me of trying to instigate riots and asking them to arrest me".

The threats, however, have failed to scare him. Positive fallout of the project going viral has been that he's got loads of messages from women from across the globe saying they too want to be a part of this campaign. So the cow, he says, will keep travelling. Ghosh is not surprised by the vitriol and admits that his work is an "indirect comment" on the BJP. "I'm making a political statement because it's a political topic, but if we go deeper into the things, then we see that Hindu supremacy was always there, it has just come out in the open with this government in the past two years."

Hindutva lynching Like Capitalism and imperialism, fascism and its varied tendencies are an option for the regimes. India is one those modern states that have opted for fascism in palace of humanism.

Some rulers pretend they oppose these trends but in fact they indirectly promote provoke them in order to stay in power. Modiâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s perpetual silence on all anti-Muslim and anti-human operations of the party and its mother RSS gave the impression that he guides them from behind. True, the Prime Minister in a tough message against mob lynching and killing in the name of the cow said such actions were not acceptable and warned that no one has the right to take law into his hands. This is not the first time that Modi has commented on the cow vigilante groups. He had made similar comments earlier last August, but, interestingly, mob lynching of Muslims accused of eating beef or killing cattle have continued. In a tough message against cow vigilantism and mob lynching, Narendra Modi said killing people on pretext of protecting cows is not acceptable and warned that no one has the right to take law into his hands. His statement on gau rakshaks: Words not enough, strict action required, says Opposition. Prime Minister Narendra Modi finally broke his silence on the killing of people in the name of gau bhakti (cow worship). Condemning the attacks, he said, "This is not something Mahatma Gandhi would approve." His statement elicited some strong reactions from all quarters. But RSS-BJP has not given up their anti-Islam and essentially anti-democracy and anti-humanity criminal policies Just hours after PM Modi gave a strong statement against cow vigilantes, a Muslim Alimuddin alias Asgar Ansari accused of carrying beef was lynched to death in BJP48

ruled Jharkhand's Ramgarh district. IANS quoting police sources said, Ansari was carrying the "banned” meat in a Maruti van and was apprehended by a Hindutva mob belonging to BJP which attacked him brutally lke wild beasts. His van was set on fire. According to reports, police personnel rescued Alimuddin from the murderous mob and rushed him to the hospital. But he couldn't be saved. According to police, it is a case of 'pre-meditated murder' and people involved in beef trade plotted to kill him. The killers have been identified. as per police. This is second such incidence of cow related violence in Jharkhand in a week. A Muslim was beaten up in Jharkhand after a dead cow was reportedly found outside his house. The incident took place in Beria Hatiatand village in Deori area of Giridih district, nearly 200 km from Ranchi. A Hindutva criminal mob also set the house of Usman Ansari on fire after they spotted the carcass of a cow. The victim has been injured and undergoing treatment. His condition is stable. On June 29, 2017, Mamata Banerjee and Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi also emphasized the need for action. West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee, who could be the Opposition’s prime ministerial candidate for PM for the next elections, said, "Condemn killings in the name of gau raksha, just words are not enough. Modi is trying to subvert democracy. The killings must stop now."We condemn killings taking place in the name of gau raksha. This must stop now. Just words not enough Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi criticised Narendra Modi’s speech over cow vigilantes, saying that the statement was ‘too little too late’. Gandhi wrote, “Too little too late. Words mean nothing when actions outdo them.” The prime minister must reaffirm that he believes in the founding values of the Indian state." Mahatma Gandhi's grandson Gopalkrishna Gandhi, in a sarcasm-laced remark, said the "presence of Gandhiji's living spirit in Sabarmati Ashram" must have affected Modi. "What he has said is absolutely right, but it should be followed by very strong action on the ground. All the perpetrators (of hate crimes) have to be caught and prosecuted and the public's confidence in (law and order) has to be revived," Gandhi told IANS. Hollow rhetoric without substance

Rashtriya Janata Dal spokesperson Manoj Jha said Modi's words sound hollow. "He had made such delayed statements about the Rohith Vemula suicide and the Una incident (thrashing of Dalits) too. Did it stop? In fact, all sound and no substance in terms of action have emboldened such vigilante groups. What this nation urgently requires is a robust legislation against mob lynchings," Jha said. Protests were held in several cities across India under the banner of "#NotInMyName" to protest against the mob lynching. Manisha Kayande of Shiv 49

Sena said Modi's statement has come late but is welcomed. She has said that though Modi had made a similar statement earlier, there is a need for strict action now. "Modi gave a clear message to his own people... Since the BJP government has come to the Centre, all this is happening. Who are they to kill in the name in the name of cow protection? We know who is provoking them and which party is behind them," Kayande said. Girish Karnad, a 79-year-old playwright and film director said Modi should instead be talking to the people within the BJP who have made life difficult for cattle traders. "Whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s the point of the prime minister preaching to us?" Karnad asked. "He should be preaching to his party men, to those who have created this problem in the first place." Asaduddin Owaisi, chief of All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen, said that the prime minister's words won't have desired action. Gau rakhshaks get direct support from BJP, Sangh." D Raja, CPI national secretary said that the prime minister has broken his silence after long. PM statement is mere lip service as there has been slip between cup & lip: Asaduddin Owaisi Will any fundamental change in Modi mind possible?

Possibly PM Modi uttered these words as one of his favored monologues called â&#x20AC;&#x153;man ki batâ&#x20AC;? while addressing a public meeting to mark the centenary of the Mahatma Gandhi's Sabarmati ashram in Ahmadabad, Modi said indulging in violence in the name of "gau bhakti" goes fully against the ideals of the Father of the Nation. Voicing his concern on the spate of incidents of lynching and violence over cows' protection, the prime minister said nothing would be achieved from such acts. "Today, I want to express my sadness and my pain, when I am here at the Sabarmati ashram," he said. "This is a country which has the tradition of giving food to ants, street dogs, fish, a country where Mahatma Gandhi taught us lessons of non-violence. What has happened to us?" Modi asked. "If a patient dies due to an unsuccessful operation, relatives burn down hospitals and beat up doctors. Accident is an accident. When people die or are injured in the accidents, a group of people come together and burn vehicles," he said, pointing out the prevalent trend among the people of taking law into their hands, and the mob violence. "Nobody would have practiced cow protection and cow worship more than Mahatma Gandhi and (his follower) Vinoba Bhave. They showed us the way how to protect cow. The country will have to adopt their way," the prime minister said. The comments come just days after a Muslim teenager was brutally killed on a train by a group of Hindu men. He did not ask the concerned departments to book the Hindutva criminals. Soon thousands of Indians took part in protests against rising attacks on Muslims and Dalits (formerly untouchables) by vigilante groups. Similar protests under the banner #NotInMyName were held in several Indian cities, including Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Lucknow and Allahabad, as well as

in London. Gatherings are also planned for later in the week in Chennai city as well as in Toronto in Canada, Boston in the US, and Karachi in Pakistan. Modi just expressed his opinion that killing people in the name of cow protection was "not in keeping with the principles of India's founding father, Mahatma Gandhi". "As a society, there is no place for violence," Modi said, adding that "no person has the right to take the law in his or her own hands". Bur those criminals who have taken law into their own dirty hands are free to operate in the country now. However, it is indeed significant that for the first time in his life and career, Modi says something fundamentally against the RSS ideology by criticizing the Hindus who target Muslims in the name of cow and beef to garner Hindu votes. Since Congress and other so called â&#x20AC;&#x153;secularâ&#x20AC;? parties like SP, JRD, BSP, etc are also proHindu and anti-Muslim parties that steal Muslim votes and betray them. These Hindu parties pretend to be sympathizing with Muslims just for their votes and they are essentially anti-Islam. All these political parties and their leaders have betrayed Muslims; hit them both from behind and from the front. They see Muslims in India are powerless and hapless. In a tough message against cow vigilantism and mob lynching, Narendra Modi said killing people on pretext of protecting cows is not acceptable and warned that no one has the right to take law into his hands. His statement on gau rakshaks: Words not enough, strict action required, says Opposition. Prime Minister Narendra Modi finally broke his silence on the killing of people in the name of gau bhakti (cow worship). Condemning the attacks, he said, "This is not something Mahatma Gandhi would approve." His statement elicited some strong reactions from all quarters.

Failure of India's political imagination: Beef lynching Beef is a staple and cheap meat for Muslims, Christians and millions of low-caste Dalits (formerly untouchables) who have been at the receiving end of the violence perpetrated by the cow vigilante groups. PM Modi must take action against those Hindutva criminals who kill Muslims or others only to get more Hindu votes. Ruing that the "state has been complicit in murders in the cow's name", Gandhi hoped that Modi's statement should be the beginning of a change. Janata Dal-United (JD-U) spokesman KC Tyagi said he does not see any substance in Modi's remarks. "I don't think the prime minister's socalled warning to cow vigilantes has any meaning. The prime minister has spoken on cow vigilantism earlier too, but it has had little impact on the ground.In fact, every time he issues such advisory to gau rakshaks (cow vigilantes), the incidents of violence in the name of cow go up," Tyagi told IANS.

What officers in the city of Malegaon in Maharashtra, one of India's most populous states, are doing in an attempt to enforce its new beef ban. "We are keeping the photographs for verification purposes only," one policeman said. “If someone alleges that some illegal activity has taken place and if the owner has a photo, it will be easy to establish the truth." I'm not sure that's right. How do you match a steak with a photo of a cow? To be fair, this is a tough law to enforce. You'd pretty much have to catch the newly criminalized butchers with their hands in a cow carcass - literally "red-handed" - to be certain of conviction. That's because, without DNA analysis or a very refined palate, it is hard to tell the difference between beef and buffalo meat. Criminalized Hindus don’t want any proof in order to kill Muslims. Photographs are morphed too. Unfortunately for India's buffaloes, they aren't regarded as close enough to God to deserve protection. Buffalo is banned in just one of the country's 29 states. Beef, meanwhile, is already banned in most of Hindutva-BJP minded northern and western India, and there are partial bans in most of the rest of the country. There is an economic issue in tightening the laws. The Hindu majority - 80% of the country’s 1.2 billion people - regards cows as divine; the 180 million-strong Muslim minority sees them as a tasty meal. Many Muslims see the extension of the beef ban as evidence of an assault on one of the key principles on which independent India was founded - secularism. Vigilante cow protection groups, operating with impunity, have killed people for transporting cattle. Muslim men have been lynched by Hindu mobs, mostly in BJPruled states, for allegedly storing beef and, in one case, for helping an mixed-faith couple elope. Many are wondering whether India is hurtling towards a "mobocracy" under Modi’s watch. They also question the prime minister's silence over the killings. There is a sense of a rapid breakdown of law and order when it comes to protecting minorities. The police at the railway station in BJP-ruled Haryana failed to save the teenager. The local police station chief told The Times of India newspaper that they could not rescue the boy because of the criminal crowd. "Such things happen. Whenever there is a riot or fight such things happen and people say some communal things but we can't do anything," he said.

The ultra fanatic chief minister of BJP-ruled Rajasthan, where 55-year-old dairy farmer Pehlu Khan was lynched in April, offered condolences over his "demise" 52

without mentioning the fact that he had been murdered. A BJP lawmaker said he had "no regret" over the killing because Khan was a "cow-smuggler". The spate of mob murders is earning a bad name both for Hinduism and Modi's government. "India is slipping beyond the pale. It is unfathomable that the ancient Hindu horror at the taking of life, any life - the very same doctrine of ahimsa, or non-violence, that governed the beliefs of men like Mahatma Gandhi and the Rev Dr Martin Luther King Jr - should in our time be used as a justification for murder," noted author Aatish Taseer, writing in The New York Times. The Economist magazine has suggested that under Modi debate about communal relations has "atrophied". To be sure, hate crimes are not new to India. The crisis of violence is not unique to the country either - many point to the US, where there are high rates of gun crime. And mob lynching is also not new to India. Hundreds of people - more than 630between 1982 and 1984 alone - were murdered by mobs during the threedecade-long Communist rule in West Bengal. The reckless vigilantism was blamed in part on political oppression and appalling law and order. Interestingly, there was little public outrage. On the day of Junaid Khan's killing, a Muslim police officer was beaten to death by a Muslim mob outside the main mosque in Srinagar, the summer capital of Indianadministered Kashmir. Earlier this month a Muslim activist was allegedly murdered by overzealous government officials after he objected to them taking pictures of women defecating in the open. India has a shambolic record when it comes to religious violence. It ranks fourth worst in the world for religious intolerance, according to a recent Pew Research Centre analysis. Women are routinely branded as witches and lynched to death for property in large parts of the country. There are also high rates of domestic violence. But the problem with Modi's government, say many, is that it is seen as ineffective - or unwilling - to rein in the thuggish Hindu mobs. It is, in the words of sociologist Shiv Visvanathan, a "politics of insecurity and anxiety" which is leading to anarchy even as the "state watches lynching as a spectacle". Many wonder whether India is staring into a dangerous abyss when a government with a majority led by a powerful leader refuses to condemn hate crimes and a vast number of citizens stay silent or appear to privately support it. A lawyer tweeted that he had "family elders supporting [the lynching]. Took me great self-control to avoid anger". Why is there a lack of outrage outside a handful of journalists, teachers and activists? Have most Indians become inured to violence and intolerance? On Wednesday, countrywide protests are being planned against such "targeted" murders. 53

What many Indians who choose to remain silent do not realize is that small-scale and large-scale violence are intimately connected. The perpetuation of hate crimes can easily lead to wider violence. "Every act of violence that you tolerate without protest, brings it a step closer to your doorstep. It is because small violence is tolerated that big violence is rendered possible," writes Sudipta Kaviraj from Columbia University. It is a warning India ignores again and again.

Modi governmentâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s food fascism

The BJPâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s tallest party leader and PM Modi has repeatedly reasserted his commitment to secularism yet the party has supported the clampdown on beef in Maharashtra. That's why while the idea of cow mug shots may be amusing, the beef ban is deadly serious.

A lawmaker from India's southern state of Kerala has announced that he is returning to eating meat, beef inclusive, fish and eggs after practicing vegetarianism for nearly two decades. There's nothing unusual about a lapsed vegetarian but VT Balram said his decision was prompted by the federal Hindu nationalist BJP government's attempt to seize the people's right to eat what they wanted. "I have been living without eating meat, fish or eggs since 1998. But now the time has come break it and uphold the right politics of food assertively," Balram said, while posting a video of him eating beef with friends and fellow party workers. The BJP believes that cows should be protected, because they are considered holy by India's majority Hindu population. Some 18 Indian states have already banned slaughter of cattle. But millions of Indians, including Dalits (formerly untouchables), Muslims and Christians, consume beef. And it's another matter, say many, that there's no outrage against the routine selling of male calves by Hindu farmers and pastoralists to middlemen for slaughter as the animals are of little use - bullocks have been phased out by tractors in much of rural India, and villagers need to rear only the occasional bull. The government, then run by Akhilesh Yadav, appeared to buy peace on the cheap. Yadav flew out Akhlaq's family to the state capital, Lucknow, upped compensation for the family for the third time since the incident and assured them justice and security. The Aam Aadmi Party's Arvind Kejriwal's foray into the village, again nearly a week after the incident, accused the police of trying to stop him from entering the village and then, and attacked other parties for "indulging in vote bank politics". Been there, heard that. The state appears to have withered away under Akhilesh Yadav rule; and incidents of religious clashes and crime are on the rise. 54

The opposition parties have done no better. Rahul Gandhi, the heir-apparent of the enfeebled 129-year-old Congress party, visited Akhlaq's family nearly a week after the incident. He put out half-a-dozen anodyne tweets, saying "touched by the desire of the villagers to maintain harmony" and that this "spirit will help the country through tough times". It was almost if this "politics of naivetĂŠ and adolescence", Gandhi's politics, had abdicated from its responsibility of shoring up bipartisan secular support against the poison of communalism, and left it to the people to fend for themselves. This is all India's Grand Old Party could manage. Cow a polarising animal Ironically, the cow has become a polarising animal. Two years ago, a mob attacked a man and killed him over "rumours" that his family ate beef. Vigilante cow protection groups, operating with impunity, have killed people for transporting cattle. More recently, the chief of BJP's powerful ideological fountainhead Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (National Volunteers' Organisation) has called for a countrywide ban on the slaughter of cows. And this week, a senior judge said the cow should be declared a national animal and people who slaughter cows should be sentenced to life in prison. Many say this is all contributing to effectively killing India's thriving buffalo meat trade.

Earlier this week, several Indian states opposed the federal government's decision to ban the sale of cattle for slaughter at livestock markets. The government said the order was aimed at preventing uncontrolled and unregulated animal trade. But the ban, say many, could end up hurting some $4bn (ÂŁ3.11bn) in annual beef exports and millions of jobs. There are some 190 million cattle in India, and tens of millions "go out of the system" - die or need to be slaughtered - every year. How will poor farmers sell their animals? So, as lawyer Gautam Bhatia says, the new rules are "perceived as imposing an indirect beef ban". He believes the government will find it difficult to defend them if they are challenged in the court - one state court, responding to a petition that they violate the right of a person to chose what he eats, has already put the ban on hold. The badly-drafted rules, Mr Bhatia says, are "an opportunity for citizens and courts to think once again whether the prescription of food choices is consistent with a Constitution that promises economic and social liberty to all".

Critics have been calling the beef ban an example of "dietary profiling" and "food fascism". Others say it smacks of cultural imperialism, and is a brazen attack on 55

India's secularism and constitutional values. Don't laugh, but there could be a conspiracy to turn India vegetarian, screamed a recent headline. Many believe that the BJP, under Narendra Modi, appears to be completely out of depth with India's widely diverse food practices which have always been distinguished by religion, region, caste, class, age and gender.

Indians now eat more meat, including beef - cow and buffalo meat - than ever. Consumption of beef grew up 14% in cities, and 35% in villages, according to government data analyzed by IndiaSpend, a non-profit data journalism initiative. Beef is the preferred meat in north-eastern states like Nagaland and Meghalaya. According to National Sample Survey data, 42% Indians describe themselves as vegetarians who don't eat eggs, fish or meat; another baseline government survey showed 71% of Indians over the age of 15 are non-vegetarian.

Governments have tried to impose food bans and choices around the world, mostly using health and environment concerns and hygiene concerns. In the US, for example, groups have rallied against subsidised vegetables, outlawing large sodas, promotion of organic food and taxing fat. Bangkok is banning street food to clean up streets and enforce hygiene standards. India has done the same in the past. Crops like BT brinjal have been stalled by the government and industrially manufactured food like Maggi noodles banned temporarily amid claims they contained dangerously high levels of lead. Scarcity has also led to bans - a ban of milk sweets in the 1970s in Delhi was justified because milk used to be in short supply. To the extent that this ban on cattle slaughter justifies itself by speaking of 'unfit and infected cattle', it seems to invoke public health, but then stops short by not banning the sale of goats, sheep and chicken as well," sociologist Amita Baviskar told me. "In fact, the public health argument leads logically to a move towards better regulation like stricter checking of animals for disease, more hygienic slaughter and storage of meat rather than a flat-out ban." Clearly, the ban appears to be working already.

Observation: Donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t convert Bharat Mata a criminal pl Those who claim domestic animal cow to be their god do not keep the cows in their bed rooms or in prayer room alongside the god photos, because they cannot stand the horrible smell and dirt. Those who kill Muslims in the name of Bharat Mata indeed insult India and military that uses the phrase to make the solders work for the salary they receive. In fact, these Hindutva people should join military and police forces to work for the nation free of cost. 56

That would make a difference to their claim to be patriots that they often use to insult Muslims being unpatriotic claim. India, now controlled by right wing Hindutva nationalist party, has been, since it came to power in 2014, pushing for a Hindutva state just like its Zionist ally Israel has already embarked upon a extremist Jewish state in Israel. While PM Modi keeps silence on the crucial issues and Hindu-Muslim conflict over lynching of Muslims over beef, the BJP and other Hindutva extreme factions keep attacking Muslims and speak ill of Islam.

The Hindutva criminal elements are sure that BJP and other Hindu parties can service in state assemblies sand parliament only if Muslims, Kashmiris, are brutally targeted and Pakistan is shown as enemy number one of India and Hindus. Indian core media just obey the Hindutva leaders for business cum Hindutva reasons. The meat-eating habits of Indians have been changing rapidly in the last couple of decades and the chicken, once regarded as a "dirty bird" eating all sorts of things on their ways, is now the most popular meat. Long queues are there in the evening in front of places that serve chicken and roti, etc. Also, there is a greater polarization taking place between red states (meat-eating) and white states (chicken eating). Within the white states, meat-eaters will have to skulk about, looking over their shoulder as they bite into a beef kebab". Rich alone can afford highly costly mutton. Beef is significantly cheaper than chicken and fish and is part of the staple diet for many Muslims, tribal people and dalits - the low caste Indians who used to be called untouchables. It is also the basis of a vast industry which employs or contributes to the employment of millions of people. But, as with so much conflict in the world, the real reason the ban is such a sensitive issue here is religion. RSS-BJP duo continues to discover new themes to target Muslims. Selling red meat, even goat meat, in BJP-ruled states is dangerous now and injurious to one's health. Who would want to risk the wrath of the vigilantes?

Mohammad Akhlaq, an ironsmith, was killed in his village in Dadri in Uttar Pradesh, barely 50km (31 miles) from the Indian capital. His 22-year-old son Danish was seriously injured in the attack. Another son, Mohammad Sartaj, who works as a technician with the Indian Air Force, survived the attack because he does not live in the village.

What does the aftermath of the lynching of a 50-year-old Muslim man by a criminal Hindu mob over rumours that his family had been consuming beef say about political imagination in India? 57

Lynching a person merely on suspicion that he or she may have eaten beef is aa serious crime, the antithesis of all that India stands for and all that Hinduism preaches", almost implying that lynching a person. Sedition law should be slapped those echo kill humans for eating beef because they violate Indian Constitution that protects minority rights. Hindutva criminals that seek to control even judiciary, argue that any Indian living in India who has consumed beef should be killed by Hindus and law and their beef crime does not deserve to be condoned. The main problem with India is the regime supports everything that the Hindutva criminals do. Secularism in India means something a little different from elsewhere. It doesn't mean the state stays out of religion; here it means the state is committed to supporting different religions equally. Hindutva people are antidemocracy and anti-secularism because they are anti-Muslim. They are responsible for partition of India and murder of father of Nation. Cruelly, they are still active to destroy the unity of nation and people. India's secularism was a response to Hindutva maneuverings and horrors of the partition when millions of people were murdered as Hindus and Muslims fled their homes. The country's first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, argued equal treatment was a reasonable concession to the millions of Muslims who'd decided to risk all by staying in India. But India is now governed by a Hindu nationalist party, the BJP. It sees India as a Hindu nation. India's triumph has been in forging a nation in which Hindus and Muslims can live happily together. But RSS is opposed to peace. The fear is that the beef ban is part of a state process that is gradually undermining not just the compromises of genuine nation that made that possible but insulted the Constitution of India which guarantees protection of minorities and their belongings in this country, which is indeed is a serious Sedition case for life imprisonment. When Hindus violate Constitution their own by employing Muslims- they should be punished. . The reaction to Dadri indeed points to a larger failure of India's political imagination cutting across national and regional political spectrum. India's democracy - a gift which has kept the diverse country together - appears to be all about winning elections alone by hook and crook. Every party sees every issue as a political opportunity. There is this obsession with electoral politics alone. Electoral democracy has actually become anti-democracy. Electoral politics has become obscene in India. This is the view of many critics.

The fact that Akhlaq's last call for help was to a Hindu friend before the mob descended on his house, and that a number of Hindu families in the village moved 58

many of their Muslim neighbours to safety also offer hope. This proves that India's armed forces remain resolutely secular and most of its people - despite the fact that many in Akhlaq's village showed no remorse after the incident - remain plural, notwithstanding media menace. But the greedy Hindutva politicians know how to poison the minds of people of all walks of life in single stroke of rhetoric.

The poverty of political imagination did not end with Modi's silence and media articles from Hindutva cynics. High caste Mahesh Sharma, federal culture minister and local MP, visited the dead man's family, and said that the "murder took place as a reaction to that incident", alluding to rumours of cow slaughter in the area. Sharma reminded reporters that there was a teenage girl - Akhlaq's daughter - in the home, and nobody had touched her, as if India's women should be eternally grateful for such small mercies. Hindutva criminals have taken law into their own hands. And, BJP party lawmaker Sangeet Som, visited the victim's village and stoked religious tensions by saying Hindus were capable of giving a "befitting reply" if innocent members of the community were "framed" for the murder. No Hindutva guy should be punished under law!!!

BJP and likeminded Hindu communal parties thrive in India because of lack of honesty and sincerity on the part of political class, ably supported by executive and judiciary. Media lords try to fish in troubled waters and make maximum profits. . India, clearly, needs to fix its dysfunctional democracy. On the one hand it needs more but credible democracy, but the idea of democracy cannot begin and end with elections alone. Until that happens, lives like Mohammad Akhlaq's will continue to be lost because of, say, the politics of food. Will India's corrupt and anti-Muslim parties please stand up? One wonders in which direction the Hindu leaders led by Hindutva BJP and soft Hindutva Congress and other so-called â&#x20AC;&#x153;secularâ&#x20AC;? parties along with their Muslims vote bank managers take India?

Post-script

A week into the horrific incident in his backyard, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, usually so active on social media, has maintained a studied silence. He has 59

expressed his "gratitude to American people" for their hospitality during his recent trip to the USA, feels indebted to the Jewish pork with which he was offered sumptuous dinners in Israel; he greeted a cabinet colleague and a governor on their birthdays, offered his condolences on the death of a singer's son and congratulated a billiards champion on his prolific twitter feed. Not a word on Akhlaq. Modi's soundlessness on Dadri, is the "silence of indifference which becomes obscene, because it denies dignity to the victim". Modi is not a BJP leader alone, he is now PM of entire India.

Later on July 16, speaking at a BJP meeting in New Delhi, PM Narendra Modi said cow vigilantism should not be given political or communal color. Modi speaks out against lynching in the name of cow protection again, asks states to take strict action So, a big statement has come from the big boss, PM Narendra Modi again amid ongoing controversies over cow vigilantism in various regions of the country. PM Narendra Modi asked all the states to take strict action against those violating law in name of cow protection. “The cow vigilantism should not be given political or communal color; the nation doesn’t benefit from it, said Modi at the meet. Also, PM Modi said that the “belief” that cow is like ‘mother’ but this should not let people take law in their own hands.

Those who worship cow do not let the animal stay in their bed rooms but let stay in dirty places behind the house. Briefing the media after all party meet, Union Minister Ananth Kumar said, “PM said that strict action will be taken against such people (gau rakshak violence). According to news agency ANI, PM Modi also asked various parties and states to take action against corrupt leaders. PM Modi has asked all parties and states to cooperate in the probe against corrupt leaders.

But how sincere he is in his rhetoric remains to be seen!

. Will the RSS and BJP sanyasis let Modi have his final say over Hindutva criminal operations in democratic and secular India?

Earlier, a day ahead of the start of the Monsoon session of Parliament, the CPI (M) said it would raise the issue of cow vigilantism in the House and demand the passage of the Women’s Reservation Bill. CPI (M) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury told reporters here there were 16 bills listed by the government in what was perhaps going to be the shortest Monsoon session.

Modi became famous in BJP and RSS because of his Hindutva actions. He never opened his mouth so far even his so-called “man ki baat” – regular twitter feature about his thoughts,

and only now he opened his mind. This is indeed a fantastic

monologue by India’s Hindutva leader cum PM.

But how sincere is he about what he says? Will he take action against the Hindutva criminal elements that do all this in order to force Hindus to vote for BJP and likeminded Hindutva parties?

That is the trillion dollar question!

_____________ Chapter-9: India promotes bribery in polls: On cancellation of RK Nagar by poll in Tamil Nadu!

When the Election Commission decided on April 09 to cancel the vote at RK Nagar constituency on account of serious claims cash for votes, there were mixed reactions from the politicians and people at large, a good number of them supporting the 61

move as an evil but a necessity to check the evil practice of distributing money for votes. The decision was taken on the advice of Income Tax department that railed many politicians in Tamil Nadu. The Central Board of Direct Taxes submitted a report to the Election Commission, stating that the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam camp led by VK Sasikala had set aside at least Rs 89 crore to distribute as cash to voters of the RK Assembly constituency, earlier represented by former Chief Minister J Jayalithaa, who died on December 5. On Friday, the Income Tax officials raided several properties belonging to Tamil Nadu Health Minister C Vijayabaskar, his close associates and other AIADMK leaders of the Sasikala camp and allegedly found documents suggesting that about Rs 89 crore had been distributed for votes. More than Rs 5 crore in cash was also recovered from properties of Vijayabaskar and his aides. Speculation was rife that the bye-poll may be cancelled over the allegations Open mini-vans belonging to the Sasikala faction continued to hurtle down the main roads of RK Nagar, with politicians wearing white shirts and cowboy hats waving at the crowd. TTV Dhinakaran, Sasikala’s nephew, is her faction’s candidate from the seat.

Autorickshaws with loudspeakers blared praises of Deepa Jayakumar, Jayalalithaa’s niece, whose MGR Amma Deepa Peravai party is fighting its debut election from this constituency. She is keen to make her presence felt in the state. Deepa Jayakumar’s party and O Panneerselvam’s faction – which has floated E Madhusudhanan as a candidate – declared themselves innocent of any malpractice. “All parties are giving out cash except us,” said the party workers. Many political leaders blamed the Modi government and BJP working against the peaceful atmosphere in the state and the cancellation of poll is cited being one. BJP leaders have rejected all such allegations. If the Election would also fix the culprits and punish them as per the laws of the land, that would be a milestone in cleansing Indian poll and politics in general. The poll would be held only after “the vitiating effect created by the distribution of money and gift items to lure the electors gets removed with the passage of time, and the atmosphere in the constituency becomes conducive to the holding of free and fair election

On April 09 Sunday, campaigns for the bye-polls in North Chennai’s RK Nagar constituency were high in volume and vibrancy. Even though word had spread that the elections may not be held on the scheduled date of April 12 over allegations of a cash-for-votes scandal, the contesting parties showed no signs of slowing down their campaigns. Members of Sasikala’s faction presented conspiracy theories about the corruption charge against them. A party worker from the IT wing of Sasikala’s camp, denied that cash had been distributed for votes. Other party workers too said that money might have been given to poorer voters who had been campaigning alongside them, just as a gesture of kindness. “Every party gives money to the people in the constituency, not just ours.” “Modi has interfered with this news now because he knows we have a good chance of winning, he said. “That is why he wants the election to get cancelled.”“His main game here is to divide the AIADMK, which has happened,” he added. “He wants the BJP to take over in Tamil Nadu using the help of O Panneerselvam. Modi is the one who plotted everything.” “DMK members wore our party hats and went around distributing money in the locality,” said K Varalakshmi, a party member. “This has been captured by media and our faction is being blamed.”

Voters not surprised The possibility of the election being cancelled over the cash-for-votes allegations came as no surprise to voters. Last year, elections in Thanjavur and Aravakurichi constituencies had been cancelled in the run up to the Tamil Nadu Assembly elections after it was found that both the AIADMK and the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam were bribing voters. “Only money speaks here,” said G Vadivelu resignedly, as the carpenter chipped away at a wooden block at his shop. “Nobody here will tell you that they will not take money.” Vadivelu said that though he had not received any money, he had heard that Sasikala’s camp had planned to give out Rs 4,000 to voters, while the DMK had decided on Rs 2,000 per head. “People don’t feel guilty of taking money from these parties,” he said. “They might not accept it if it were someone’s hard-earned money or even government money. But they know all this is black money from corrupt practices by the party, so they are willing to accept it.” Many voters said that they would accept money if it is offered to them, but vote for the party of their choice. S Chandrakumaran, an auto-rickshaw driver, said he and his 63

friends had decided to accept money from Dhinakaran’s party but vote for Madhusudhanan. But some voters said they are disillusioned with the parties and are considering choosing the NOTA – none of the above – option on voting day. “It is better if the election is cancelled because the money has made its way to most houses,” said U Murugan, a hardware store owner. “People are not valuing this as an opportunity to exercise their democratic right or a way to make their country better. People do not rule here, only money does.”

______________ Chapter-10: West needs to respect rights of Muslim women! -Dr. Abdul Ruff _________

It is a crude joke that the media lords in the West consider Islam and Muslims as a serious threat to their existence while the governments place awful restrictions on the life patters of Muslims in their countries, infringing upon their basic religious rights. Even their courts have fiend the Islamic women for wearing protective veil around their face or while of body so that street evil eyes do not enjoy too much. The western world appears to be seeking all these to promote exhibitionism as the fundamental right of women. They try to silence the Muslim voice. The imagined civilizational war by Islam is unfortunate but the western media lords deliberately maintain the trend to make majority populations hate insult and injure minority Muslims. That awkward posture suits the governments to shore up majority support for the governments pursuing anti-people policies to promote the interests of corporate lords that finance the capitalism, neo-colonialism and imperialism. Wars thus never end.

Those Muslims who seriously practice Islamic faith, uphold Islamic values and follow Islamic practices are known as Islamic Muslims. Others are not Islamic Muslims but just name sake Muslims or political who could be misused by the anti-Islamic forces, politicians and media. The life of Islamic Muslims is not easy at all in the modern world, however, as they are under continuous surveillance, attack and their faith and practices are manhandled by anti-Islamic governments, media and allies, including anti-Islamic Muslims. Muslims, therefore, have to very cautious, careful. While anti-Islamic nations terrorize Muslims with terror goods the Muslims who practice Islamic way of life are being terrorized by denying them basic religious rights. The trend is devastatingly very acute in so-called western democracies where Islamic women face state restrictions of serious nature with regard to religious practices. It is most unfortunate as western countries, claiming to be democracies, speak very high of women rights and unnecessarily shed crocodile tears about the poor fate of Muslim women and Islam not treating well the women folk. The powerful anti-Islamic forces both in the west and east that operate against humanity globally impose their terms on Muslims. Islam and its elders are unable to satisfactorily defend Islamic faith. Denial of basic rights Sept-i1 hoax gave the enemies of Islam enough stuff to spread Islamophobia and target Muslims, their resources, especially in energy rich Arab world. Already millions of Muslims have been slaughtered by these anti-Islamic forces led by Americans and Europeans in Islamic world on fake pretexts.

Most Muslims world over, targeted by Islamophobia and terror forces of fascism, do not wish to hide their faith and other Islamic identity but anti-Islamic regimes do not appreciate that as they Islamic faith being against their own regions. For quite some time now, the Western governments and media networks shamelessly continue to target Islam and forcing the Islamic women to give up Islamic practices. Islamic women are being denied the right to practice life in Islamic way and forced to imbibe uncultured semi-dress patterns of life making exhibitionist trends their way of daily life.

Excessive dosage of anti-Islamism from the side of the regimes has harmed the 65

genuine interests of global Muslims, especially the women who are eager to live according to Islamic faith. Western powers try to control Muslims by restricting their religious practices.

Consequently, Islam, Muslims and Islamic faith are under siege and attack for years.

Following Sept. 11, 2001 hoax, engineered in USA to gain legitimacy to invade an Islamizing Afghanistan by blaming it for the Sept- hoax and, destabilizing the nation of brave Afghans, and invade Iraq to kill a brave President of Iraq Saddam Hussein for his anti-American stance and hi efforts to protect Arab oil to flow into USA and EU freely. USA achieved its objectives- Afghanistan has been destabilized and President Saddam Hussein was assassinated in a cold blooded manner. Not just that. USA and NATO destabilized many Arab nations, killing Libyan President Col. Qaddafi.

In doing so, the western governments and media lords derive dirty sadistic pleasures and care a damn about the rights of minority religions.

There could be some women who are under state-private surveillance throughout who seeks favors form the Christian governments and officals, might go out without wearing hijab. But the media make this a big show to force all Islamic women to walk in the street without minimum cloth on them, showcasing their body in ways that please the perverts.

It has become a practice for the governments and media outlets scorn Islamic practices and try to link the practices with terrorism, thereby terrorize those who practice Islamic way of life. The governments are keen to make as many Muslims as possible the anti-Islamic people to aid the Islamophobic elements.

Most Islamic women have has worn a headscarf, both as an expression of her traditional Muslim faith and her commitment to its requirements for public modesty. They wear it throughout their years as professionals like doctors in cities. In Colorado, Dr. Elmadhun, for instance, proudly wears hijab as the chief surgical resident at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, a top trauma center and affiliate of Harvard Medical School. But media outlets resent the Islamic practice as â&#x20AC;&#x153;uncivilizedâ&#x20AC;?.

Dr. Elmadhun was wearing it on April 15, 2013, when her husband texted her. A bomb had exploded near him at the finish line of the Boston Marathon. That day marked a turning point, however. Though she had been acutely aware of the fact that her headscarf made her stand out, Elmadhun says, she always felt confident and strong wearing hijab, both as a Muslim and as an American who felt, in a deeply personal way, her country’s promise of liberty and religious freedom – even after the difficult days following Sept. 11, 2001.

Instead of second glances, she became the object of America’s angry stares. Instead of folks assuming she’s from another country, or expressing surprise she speaks without an accent, they began to openly associate her with the Tsarnaev brothers, who perpetrated the Boston bombings, or other Muslim extremists. American media lords and their state bosses are so cool- they plant terror moles and coolly blame their terror attacks on Islam and terrorize global Muslims. Very cool anti-Islamic guys. Interestingly, these are highly educated with backing of intelligence wings. Drone attack on Islam

The US drone war routinely kills thousands of noncombatants in Syria and Iraq, most recently this week, when “at least 36 civilians, including 20 children, in a village in eastern Syria” were killed. “Do Americans notice? Of course not! The US government has conducted war by remote-controlled drones since 2001 in a variety of places, including Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia, and Pakistan. Do Americans have a clue what it must be like to live under the drone threat? You know the answer is no. But many Muslims do, and many others can sympathize,” he continued.

Obama has claimed that the drone war kills few noncombatants, but this is rejected by many authoritative sources, including a team of NYU and Stanford law students who found that “CIA-operated drones were nowhere near as discriminating toward noncombatants as the agency’s leaders have claimed.”It’s the US foreign-policy makers, whose daily atrocities make targets of Americans at home.

It is also true that Islam has, since its founding around 1,400 years ago through the Holy Prophet SAS, been continually under attack by all anti-Islam forces, led by Jewish-Christian varieties to destroy Islam and kill Muslims and the trend continues even today. They resent any counter move by Islamic nations. Today, the failed anti-Islamic forces led by NATO and Israel-India twins, and they defend themselves by saying that Muslims are waging a “jihad” war against all other people in an attempt to spread that religion by force. 67

No religion can survive for centuries if it grows by forceful conversions. Other religions are shaky that notwithstanding all their joint operations against Islam and Muslims, Islam has survived to stay forever, though some Muslims have been weaned away for Islamic faith and spread the word of anti-Islamism Anti-Islamic jihad has spread by violent conquests through the Islamic world, especially energy rich West Asia following regions in chronological order: Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Tunisia, Egypt the Middle East, North Africa, and the Near East. Faith vs. hatred

It’s a theology that is shared by some Orthodox Jewish women, who often wear wigs to cover their heads in public. In some Orthodox Christian, Roman Catholic, and Protestant traditions, too, women are sometimes required to cover their heads in places of worship – a practice common in the USA just decades ago. “It would be a tragedy to us here in the USA if Muslims felt like they had to hide their faith, if Muslim women felt like they had to take off their hijabs, or Sikh men their turbans, or anyone who felt they could not identify who they are in public,” says Imam Omar Suleiman, president of the Yaqeen Institute for Islamic Research in Irving, Texas. “So I think that it’s important that we collectively challenge these attacks on people that are identifiably Muslim,” he continues. “It’s important for us to challenge all of that, and to stand tall and firm, because at the end of the day, bigotry is not something that can be reasoned with. And bigotry should not force us to change the way we live our lives Islamic way.”

Such incidents led Aguilera, the daughter of a former professional boxer, to organize a self-defense class for women who wear hijab. She and her colleagues expected 50 or so women to respond for a class scheduled after the election. Posted on Facebook by her sponsor, New York’s Muslim Community Network, the self-defense class got about 2,700 people expressing interest in a class accommodating 40.

For Elmadhun, wearing hijab for most of her life was “a positive and powerful message, allowing me to recognize that I am not just what I appear to be, but I’m a human being who should be valued for who I am and what I have to offer.” And though she does feel relieved in many ways, and feels safer with her son outside, “I’m also sad that I was driven to this,” she says. “I’m sad about what it means about our religious freedoms in general in our country, I’m sad that I had to give it up. I was kind of forced into this. It wasn’t really a choice.”

The class includes a time for women to share their experiences and fears and 68

discuss how to respond, both physically and emotionally. “Our knowledge about how to manage that fear is very vital,” says Aguilera. “Eventually these are going to take a toll, because once you start denying who you are, that takes a toll on your personality, and that’s not healthy.”

The attack on the Christmas market in Berlin that killed 12 brings more unease as Muslims are the target of angry officals. . Both women say that anytime a Muslim terror attack occurs, they feel they are being held personally responsible for actions occurring hundreds, if not thousands, of miles away – and which they emphatically deny represents the religion they hold dear. “Last year, after the Paris attacks, it was like every time something like that happens, there’s the aftermath, and people who have nothing to do with it, we have to take the heat for that,” says Aguilera. “And the first people targeted, the most vulnerable, are Muslim women.”

At the same time, however, many advocates have been frustrated by recent fabrications. In November, police discovered a student at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette lied about having her hijab ripped off. And in New York, a young woman who lied to police and the media, alleging that two white Trump supporters attacked her on the subway, was arrested and charged with filing a false report. In the young woman’s court appearance, she was uncovered, and her head had been shaved.

What do “Barack Obama and Donald Trump have in common?”—and then answered the question by saying that “Among other things, they have—or pretend to have— no clue why some Muslims hate us.” Most of the world's major religions are made up of multiple sects or denominations, and Islam is no different. Islam's two major sects are the Sunnis and the Shiites, and the division and interplay between the two is a major factor in the geopolitics of the Middle East.

Donald Trump’s call for a ban on Muslim immigration to the US “until the country’s representatives can figure out what’s going on,” is little more than a deliberate cop out by almost all the “mainstream” political figures as to the real cause of the “clash of civilizations.”

The real dual reasons for the conflict—which even Trump dares not broach—is the inherent nature of Islam and its adherents, and the ubiquitous Israel/Jewish lobby which serves to incite the entire Islamic world against the West.

The CIA’s subversion of Iranian democracy in 1953, the US government’s systematic support of compliant autocratic and corrupt Arab monarchies and 69

dictatorships, its empowering of Iraqi Shi’ite Muslims, and its “unconditional backing of Israel’s brutal anti-Palestinian policies.” US ‘experts’ dare not mention Israel, and, of course, in an omission similar to the one of which he accuses Trump, he also pretends not to know why the US government “unconditionally” backs Israel —or at the very least, just ignores it completely.

In the ten years prior to the September 11 attacks, the George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton administrations bombed Iraq while maintaining an embargo, especially on equipment for the water and sanitation infrastructure the US Air Force had destroyed during the Gulf War.

Half a million Iraqi children died as a result, something which the then Secretary of State, Jewish Madeleine Albright, said on TV was “worth it” just to get at Saddam Hussein for his mere anti-Americanism stance

Democracy means anti-Islamism, Islamophobia, hatred for Islam and Muslims? Many western people who hate Islam oppose the Muslim women covering their head by wearing hijab. A court in Europe even stipulated Muslim women from not wearing hijab or any other cover over the face. “Over the last several years, the trend has been growing, causing unease, feeling uncomfortable Elmadhun a female Muslim surgeon living in USA, world’s highly democracy, says. “And that is something that’s new.... I was feeling less and less welcome in my own community, and more and more like there was a target on my back.”

And so, like a number of Muslim women, Elmadhun made the wrenching personal decision to stop wearing her headscarf. “You feel fear, its human nature,” says Mariana Aguilera, who converted to Islam 10 years ago and now runs The Demureist, a Brooklyn-based website that celebrates conservative lifestyles and fashion, especially for Muslim women wearing hijab. “But this is more than about our fear,” says Ms. Aguilera, who has decided to keep wearing her headscarf, despite receiving verbal threats this month. “There’s a reason why we have this religious freedom in our country, and if we don’t do something – this climate is destroying our values, and that’s dangerous.”

Elmadhun and Aguilera point to 2015, when armed protesters were marching in front of mosques and candidate Donald Trump was calling for a ban on all Muslims entering the country. That year, hate crimes against Muslims were becoming more and more common – up 67 percent, according to the FBI. That also was the year Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was convicted and sentenced to death for the Boston Marathon bombings. During the trial, Elmadhun says she was walking her son in a stroller in

Brookline when a man stopped his car, got out, and yelled, “Go back to your expletive country, you expletive terrorist!”

American officals crate ugly scenes to insult Muslims. Earlier this month, a man at Grand Central Terminal in New York pushed a New York City transit worker down a staircase, yelling “You’re a terrorist, go back to your own country!” In Brooklyn, another man threatened an off-duty police officer with his pit bull, also telling her and her son to “go back to your country.” On the steps of a municipal court in New Jersey, too, a man spit in the face of an advocate with the Muslim American Society’s Immigrant Justice Center, after she testified in a domestic violence case, according to the Religious News Service.

Indeed, if Muslim women wearing hijab across the country have been feeling especially vulnerable during the current political climate in which few can recall such open hostility, for many of them harassment and violence has also cut to the core of their faith – a chill on their freedom to remain true to their visible acts of worship and what they see as a theology of modesty.

President elect Trump’s anti-Islamic rhetoric essentially to w woo the Christian votes in the presidency, caused problems for Muslims, including the women. However, Trump revised his anti-Islamic thoughts.

Islam means peace

Ideology behind targeting Muslims for blood and insult is to unite the majority nation by dividing and punishing the hapless minority Muslims. The state and media lords justify attacks on minorities by legitimizing the situations created by antiminority miscreant.

Anti-Islamic nations consider the existence of Muslims and Islam a serious threat to their own religions and they encourage the media lords and fanatic majority sections. They fail to gauge a simple fact that even after 1400 years, Islam could not replace Christianity and there is no possibility now that the weakened Islam or terrorized Muslims could do it any time in future as well. . Islam is one of the world's great religions. Islam has brought comfort and peace of 71

mind to countless millions of men and women. It has given dignity and meaning to drab and impoverished lives. It has taught people of different races to live in brotherhood and people of different creeds to live side by side in reasonable tolerance. It inspired a great civilization in which others besides Muslims lived creative and useful lives and which, by its achievement, enriched the whole world. As a religion of peace and tranquility Islam never inspired in its followers any mood of hatred and violence. And when Islam was under attack, Muslims may have resorted to retaliatory measures angering the enemy of Islam but never preach violence or terrorism. And people from other faiths and non-faith have embraced Islam on the strength of Islam and what it stands for. A lot of propaganda - as a perfect mischief to fool and mislead the world - is being circulated by the antiIslamic forces and media that people have come to Islam forcefully. If so that were the case, they should have renounced Islam but that never happened, but on the contrary, they strengthened Islamic faith. Also, notwithstanding the strenuous efforts by other religious leaders to wean away Muslims to their side, Muslims have remained steadfast faithful. However, politics have converted some Muslims into unfaithful to the religion.

US led NATO terror war have complicated the life of Muslims and their faith. It is our misfortune that, though most of the Muslim world is now going through such a traumatic period, instead of compassion, hatred is directed against Islam. Fear for anti-Islamic governments and media forces cannot force Muslims change their religion because their faith is unshakable. .

Muslims share certain basic cultural and moral, social and political, beliefs and aspirations but there is an imposing Western presence and influence -- cultural, economic, and diplomatic -- in Muslim nations, some of which are Western allies. Certainly nowhere in the Muslim world, in the Middle East or elsewhere, has American policy suffered disasters or encountered problems comparable to those in Southeast Asia or Central America. American position is weak in Islamic world, however. Target of Islam and Muslims resulted in hatred from Muslims and the surge of hatred that distresses, alarms, and above all baffles Americans. Pakistanis who were pro-Americans are now anti-Americans because NATO operations destabilized the nation, killed thousands.

The idea that God has enemies, and needs human help in order to identify and dispose of them, is a little difficult to assimilate. The Zoroastrian devil, unlike the Christian or Muslim or Jewish devil, is not one of God's creatures performing some of God's more mysterious tasks but an independent power, a supreme force of evil engaged in a cosmic struggle against God. Muslims have to view their misfortune as being one of these. The Holy Quran is of course strictly monotheistic, and recognizes one God, one universal power only. There is a struggle in human hearts between good and evil, between God's commandments and the tempter, but this is seen as a struggle ordained by God, with its outcome preordained by God, serving 72

as a test of mankind. since God is in principle the sovereign, the supreme head of the Islamic state -- and the Prophet and, after the Prophet, the caliphs are his vicegerents -- then God as sovereign commands the army. The army is God's army and the enemy is God's enemy. The duty of God's soldiers is to dispatch God's enemies as quickly as possible to the place where God will chastise them. The struggle of good and evil very soon acquired political and even military dimensions. The ISIS is supposed to fight for God on these lines.

The leaders of a widespread and widening religious revival in Islam sought out and identified the enemies of God as their enemies and vice versa. Anti-Islamic media nuts call the Muslim believers who wear Islamic dress and caps as Mullahs, as a degrading human dignity. Now in place of using the term mullahs, Muslims are called the terrorists.

War is not an option for Islam but only in retaliation for attacks on Islam and Muslims - and not a voluntary policy, Repeated attacks on Muslims and Islam breed the radicals among Muslims.. Planned attacks on Muslims have led to a situation that the faith of Islam has been undermined and the law of Islam has been abrogated.

The advent of Islam in the seventh century has continued virtually to the present day. For a long time now there has been a rising tide of rebellion against the Western Paramountcy, and a desire to reassert Muslim values and restore Muslim greatness. Since anti-Islamic nations and forces are stronger, naturally the Muslims have to suffer successive stages of defeat. The first was his loss of domination in the world, to the advancing power of Russia and the West. As Arab world was quietly advancing its economy and security, the West enacted the Sept-11 to invade and destabilize Afghanistan and energy rich Arab nations. Then the undermining of his authority in Muslim nations by coups and west sponsored antiIslamic movements, and through an invasion of foreign ideas and laws and ways of life and sometimes even foreign rulers or settlers, and the enfranchisement of native non-Muslim elements.

The Second World War, the oil industry, and postwar developments brought many Americans to the Islamic lands; increasing numbers of Muslims also came to America. Cinema and later television brought the American way of life that contradicted Islamic faith and way of life. The Islamic faith and practices, as a result, got weakened.

At first the Muslim response to Western civilization was one of admiration and emulation -- an immense respect for the achievements of the West, and a desire to 73

imitate and adopt them. This desire arose from a keen and growing awareness of the weakness, poverty, and backwardness of the Islamic world as compared with the advancing West. Muslim writers observed and described the wealth and power of the West, its science and technology, its manufactures, and its forms of government. Several generations of reformers and modernizers tried to adapt these and introduce them to their own countries, in the hope that they would thereby be able to achieve equality with the West and perhaps restore their lost superiority. But now the West expects Islamic anions to disown Islam.

In our own time of state terror operations targeting Islam and Muslims, this mood of admiration and emulation has, among many Muslims, given way to one of hostility and rejection. In part this mood is surely due to a feeling of humiliation -a growing awareness, among the heirs of an old, proud, and long dominant civilization, of having been overtaken, overborne, and overwhelmed by those whom they regarded as their inferiors. Islamic faith gets eroded.

All infidels are not enemies of Islam as many Muslims are not faithful. But those who target Islam and Muslims are indeed the enemies of Islam. Like every other civilization known to human history, the Muslim world in its heyday saw itself as the center of truth and enlightenment, surrounded by infidel barbarians, polytheists and idolaters whom it would in due course enlighten and civilize patiently.

Though most Muslim countries promote capitalism and fund NATO fascist operations in Islamic world, the western imperialist world hates Islam. West now denies secularism and democracy for Muslims. Destructions, genocides and destabilizations have become order in Arab Mideast.

How far anti-Islamic attempts to go on in Europe and USA?

Muslims are in minority in USA and Europe, except in Turkey. Muslims are in minority in India and Israel. So, these anti-Islamic majority communities in the West and Indo-Israel do exactly with Muslims what pleases themselves- even against their own Constitutional guarantees for the minority communities. That is shameful. In order to hide their ugly sides of fanaticism and racism, they always insult Islam, target and inure Muslims. European target of Islamic women and forcing them to shed the Islamic practices like regular prayers and wearing veil, etc, and imbibe degraded western culture is shameful to humanity, 74

Efforts are afoot form the anti-Islamic forces to reduce Islamic populations and deny them even minimum rights, let alone Islamic practices. The enemies of Islam say Islam in Spain and the Ottoman Turk Empire (Turkey) were defeated and driven out after centuries of war and resistance by Europe. That is exactly anti-Islamic, Zionistic, Hindutva forces in India say how “cleverly” they destroyed Islamic Mosque Babri Mosque by way of defeating Islam. They want to destroy Islam and Muslim nations if they don’t promote Christianity. For the time being they have been operating along with Judaism and Israel to defeat Islam. Once Islam is routed fully, the Christian militaries would raze down Israel in a matte rof hours. A entirely Christian empire would be established without any other religions surviving to challenge ti prowess

Unless it not disproved the stated views are real and going to happen.

The chief objectives of anti- Islamic jihad include slashing the Islamic populations to promote rise in Christianity, loot the energy and other valuable resources from Islamic world, forcefully convert as many Muslims and nations into Christianity. The leaders of both Judaism and Christianity believe arrival of Islam cut into their conversion operations globally as Islam became very popular and a religion of the poor.

When Spain was finally liberated in 1492 from the last of the Moors, the Jews were expelled from that country along with the Moors—and large numbers fled to Istanbul, the Ottoman capital. It was only with the advent of Zionism—when the Jews demanded Palestine as a homeland—that the Muslim-Jewish alliance against Europe finally fell apart.

In summary then, the real reason why Muslims hate the West can therefore be traced to two factors: the long-standing order to jihad contained within Islam, and the Jewish lobby’s control of US and Western foreign policy which incites Muslims across the world through its unconditional support of Zionist atrocities in Israel. These are the reasons which Trump, the mainstream politicians, and far leftists like Richman, all ignore, either unconsciously because they really are ignorant, or, even worse, consciously because they do not want to admit the true nature of the threat facing the West.

Islam is not against secularism and modernism but they cannot be allowed to overrun the faith, cannot derail Islamic values. The so-called Islamic fundamentalism has given an aim and a form to the otherwise formless resentment and anger of the Muslim masses at the forces that have devalued their traditional 75

values and loyalties and, in the final analysis, robbed them of their beliefs, their aspirations, their dignity, and to an increasing extent even their nations and livelihood, peace prosperity.

Pseudo secularism and ultra modernism are not healthy trends. There has been a dangerous trend world over to a new phenomenon of the seizure of Mosques in the name of an imagined clash of civilizations. The Babri Mosque in India by state sponsored Hindu criminal elements and the Great Mosque in Mecca stand as examples.

It should by now be clear that we are facing a movement far transcending the level of issues and policies and the governments that pursue them. It is crucially important that we on our side should not be provoked into an equally historic but also equally irrational reaction against the rival, weak or strong. .

It should by now be clear that we are facing a mood and a movement far transcending the level of issues and policies and the governments that pursue them.

No Muslim today is safe, no Muslim feels free to live even in Muslims nations because of anti-Islamic regimes and their faithful media controlling the freedoms of Muslims.

Muslims are under severe surveillance systems. UN should debate the issue of Islamophobia and anti-Islamic conflictual situations and wars elaborately and undertake punitive measures against the arrogant antiIslamic nations and parties. Meanwhile, USA and Europe, the leaders of cultural and civilizational standards should behave as truly democratic and civilized, treat the fellow Muslims as humans; respect their religion, faith, practices. __________________

Chapter-11: Chinese President meets Trump on April 6-7 -Dr. Abdul Ruff 76

________

Ever since Trump assumed office at White House, rumors have been spinning about possible meeting between Presidents of America and China even before Trump would be able to meet his favourite leader Russian president Putin. But Trump gave preference to Israeli leaders ahead of both for a face to face meeting soon.

Letter writing US President Donald Trump wrote recently to his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping the first contact the two leaders have had since Xi sent a congratulatory note for the inauguration. According to the White House, Trump sent a letter to President Xi wishing him a prosperous Year of the Rooster and saying he looks forward to developing "a constructive relationship that benefits both the United States and China," press secretary Sean Spicer said. The two leaders have yet to speak by phone. Beijing had previously said that preparatory work for the meeting was underway. But it had not yet confirmed the trip, despite western media reports on a scheduled meeting and an announcement by the Finnish government that Xi would make a brief stop in Finland on April 5. There is a new twist in the program. Confirming recurring rumors from the past month, overnight both China's Foreign Ministry and the White House confirmed that China's president Xi Jinping will meet with President Trump at Mar-a-Lago in Florida on April 6-7. It will be Xi's first meeting with Trump, a little over a month after Trump used the same venue to meet with Japan's PM Abe, and comes at a time when the two sides face pressing issues, ranging from North Korea and the South China Sea to trade disputes. Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lu Kang, who made the announcement at a daily news briefing, did not give any more details of the meeting agenda, but spoke of the need to see the big picture while fostering mutual interests in trade relations. "The market dictates that interests between our two countries are structured so that you will always have me and I will always have you," Lu said. "Both sides should work together to make the cake of mutual interest bigger and not simply seek fairer distribution," he said in response to a question about trade frictions. The summit follows a series of other recent U.S.-China meetings and conversations aimed at mending ties after strong criticism of China by Trump during his election campaign. Rex Tillerson ended a trip to Asia this month in Beijing, agreeing to work together with China on North Korea and stressing Trump's desire to enhance understanding.

Foreign trade criticism

In expanding trade across the globe, including in Africa, the Chinese government plays a heavy hand in structuring its economy, moves that Trump and others have argued put US companies and manufacturers at a disadvantage against their Chinese counterparts. Trump's attempts to change that reality come on top of years of attempts by previous administrations.

President Trump and his years-long rhetorical crusade against Chinese foreign trade abuses is finally colliding with the reality of face-to-face negotiation. The real estate businessman is staring down his first major opportunity to make headway on his campaign pledge to level the terms of the US-China trade relationship as he meets for the first time with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday. While Trump's longstanding rhetoric on the trading relationship will hang over the meeting, the encounter also comes as Trump nears three months in office having done little to make good on his bold promise to fundamentally alter the trading relationship. While Trump has focused the brunt of his rhetoric on simply reversing the United States' $347 billion trade deficit with China, experts say an improved trading relationship will rest not on China simply changing that top-line number, but fundamentally altering the role it plays in its economy.

Florida opportunity The series of meetings at Trump's opulent south Florida residence, Mar-a-Lago, an opportunity to "set a framework for discussion" of the trading relationship and begin the process of urging China to change policies that have led to "an uneven playing field for US companies." One official stressed that they did not view the meeting as an opportunity to "resolve any particular issue." Former US officials and experts on China and international trade said they were heartened to see that Trump had not made good on some of his boldest campaign pledges -- like imposing double-digit tariffs on Chinese imports or labeling China a currency manipulator. experts also warned that Trump may be enticed by a Chinese public relations coup with little long-term value aimed at Trump's eagerness for clear-cut "wins," like a series of quick, pre-packaged Chinese announcements of investments in the US, or headline-worthy purchases of high-profile US products. Rather than a willingness to make fundamental changes to their economies, experts said the Chinese were more likely to come bearing political enticements, like promises of investments in manufacturing plants. Trump and his advisers have thus far signaled they will aim for more than just window dressing changes with the Chinese trade. The USA would look to "reduce 78

the systemic trade and investment barriers that they've created. Trump will now need to push Xi to reduce the Chinese government's heavy-handed regulation of its economy to lower the barriers of access to its economy for US companies, said David Dollar, a China expert at the Brookings Institution. Dollar and other experts said top targets for the US efforts to level the playing field will also include addressing China's abuse of US intellectual property, high tariffs on certain goods and stricter labor standards that make Chinese manufacturer's more competitive.

Deliberate error? Most economists and China experts have argued that Trump's move to withdraw the USA from the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement will only serve to embolden China. The trade deal, spearheaded by the Obama government, would have represented a clear statement of US influence in a region China has sought to dominate and would have raised labor and environmental standards in the region -- putting Chinese manufacturers on a more level playing field should China choose to join the agreement, as it was likely to do. Amid Trump's tough talk on curbing Chinese trade abuses and reversing the US' trade deficit with China in favor of boosting US manufacturing, Trump has yet to telegraph what he is prepared to offer China in return. Trump had previously been criticized by some Chinese commentators for not recording a Lunar New Year message, although his daughter and granddaughter did attend a celebration at the Chinese embassy in Washington. Since his election, Trump has challenged Beijing over a range of issues -- slamming its military build-up in the South China Sea, its currency and trade policies and, perhaps most controversially, upending decades of diplomatic protocol by questioning a longstanding US policy towards Taiwan. "We highly commend President Trump for expressing festival greetings to President Xi Jinping and the Chinese people," Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Lu Kang said.

Politics plus America keeps pressuring Beijing on North Korean efforts for nukes that threaten neighboring South Korea, a loyal ally of NATO and USA, and Among the most pressing recent issues, China has been irritated at being repeatedly told by Washington to rein in North Korea's nuclear and missile programs and by the US decision to base an advanced missile defense system in South Korea. Beijing also remains suspicious of US intentions towards self-ruled Taiwan, which China claims as its own.

Ahead of the first meeting between US President Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, North Korea fired a ballistic missile off the coast of the Korean Peninsula. The missile -- which fell into the Sea of Japan, also known as the East Sea, on Wednesday morning -- is one of several the country has test-fired in recent months. Even before the missile test, North Korea's nuclear program was expected to be an important talking point between Xi and Trump. The USA has been pushing China to put pressure on North Korea to stop its nuclear program and missile testing, but Trump said on Sunday the United States would be prepared to act alone to stop North Korea. The test elicited a terse response from the US State Department, unlike the standard diplomatic condemnations that usually follow Pyongyang's missile tests. The primary concern surrounding North Korea's weapons program is that Pyongyang could eventually equip long-range missiles with a nuclear warhead. North Korea has conducted five nuclear tests -- including two last year -- but experts said the country still hasn't developed nuclear warheads that can be mounted onto missiles. Both US and South Korean officials said the projectile was a KN-15 medium-range ballistic missile- from a site in the vicinity of Sinpo, South Hamgyong province, a South Korean Defense Ministry official said. It flew a distance of around 60 kilometers (37 miles) and flew as high as 189 kilometers (117 miles), South Korean officials said. The North Koreans use Sinpo shipyard for their submarine activity, and US satellites have observed increased activity there in recent days. Solid fuel is like an explosive jelly, less corrosive than liquid fuel, and it can be more easily stored in the rocket's fuel tank than the liquid alternative, which requires specially lined tanks. Of course, trade will be a dominant topic. Trump has repeatedly accused China of unfair trade policies, criticized its island-building in the strategic South China Sea, and accused it of doing too little to constrain North Korea, although with the "Goldman" block silencing Peter Navarro in recent months, Trump has significantly moderated his tone. With an uptick in tests, North Korea may have significantly advanced its missile technology and increased the size of its arsenal. USA cannot do anything now, nor would it be able use China to end or threaten Chinese efforts.

Kremlin and Great Wall

Relations between Russia and China have improved considerably in the wake of Moscow's annexation of Crimea and the international sanctions that followed. In 2014, the two countries signed a landmark $400 billion gas deal, as well as numerous other trade and energy agreements. In September last year, Chinese and Russian naval forces conducted joint exercises in the South China Sea, where China's aggressive territorial claims have hurt relations with regional neighbors. 80

Beijing, a major global investor, has invested $40 billion in a Silk Road Fund to back OBOR, and it was the primary reason for the establishment of the $50 billion China-backed AIIB development bank. Though some critics have suggested the plan could harm Sino-Russian ties, as it expands Beijing's influence well into Moscow's backyard, a 2015 report by 16 Russian academics said OBOR could complement Russia's own Eurasian Economic Union, and improve ties between the two countries. "Driven by strengthening personal ties between Putin and Xi, the breadth and depth of China-Russia relations have spilled over into multiple spheres of governmental and institutional policymaking," according to Bob Savic, a senior research fellow at London Metropolitan University's Global Policy Institute.

Kremlin watch Meanwhile, setting the stage for a just as critical summit, Russian President Vladimir Putin said last week that he was ready to meet US president Trump at an Arctic summit in Finland. The Russian president made this remark responding to his Finnish counterpart, who said he would be happy to receive Russian and US presidents in Finland. “I believe Finland suits this purpose well, and Helsinki is a very convenient platform to organize an event like this,” Putin said, when asked if he thought a meeting between him and Trump was possible in Finland. Finnish President Sauli Niinisto said earlier that his country would “certainly be very happy to have the opportunity to hold such a summit.” A meeting with Trump could any case take place in the framework of the G20 summit set to take place in July, according to Putin. The summit is set to take place at Finlandia Hall in Helsinki on September 18-20, 2017, according to the event’s official website. As Trump reached out to Beijing, it was confirmed that Russian President Vladimir Putin would meet with Xi in May on the sidelines of a major economic summit, according to Russian state media.

Preliminary observation

Global media are focused on the meeting between Trump and Xi as a major event of intentional importance.

Clearly, President Trump appears to favor Russia over China: he made a point of criticizing Chinese economic policy during the campaign and has also questioned US policy orthodoxy on the matter of Taiwan. Conversely, Xi has emerged as an unlikely champion of globalization (though his rhetoric abroad often contradicts actions at home) and a potential new leader on tackling climate change.

So it is unclear whether Trump, who made criticism of expansive trade deals a key part of his platform and personally withdrew the US from President Barack Obama's Trans-Pacific Partnership, would choose to attend the OBOR conference even if he was invited. It is also unclear whether Trump will join the pair at the "One Belt, One Road" (OBOR) forum -- Xi's landmark scheme to pump billions of dollars into infrastructure and other projects across Asia, Africa and Europe. However, many in China wanted a meeting between Trump and Xi as soon as possible, with some suggestion that Trump could be invited to the May multilateral meeting. Essentially USA and China are anti-Islamic nations with hidden agendas and the hatred for Islam as global phenomenon could be motivating factor in slashing hatred or fear between them. Observers, especially in the West, watch keenly the meeting in Florida between two giant global leaders with veto back up and any positive outcome could help improve intentional relations.

________

Chapter-12: Middle East: When will there be a regime change in Syria? -Dr. Abdul Ruff _____

Anyone who follows the crisis in Middle East and role USA-Russia-Israel trio plays in destabilizing the region , would say the talks of rĂŠgime change in Syria is a big joke.

Syria's six-year civil war has claimed the lives of at least 500,000, according to

a United Nations estimate released a year ago. More than 5 million Syrians have fled the country and more than 6 million more have been displaced internally, according to UN agencies.

The United States launched a military strike Thursday on a Syrian government airbase in response to a chemical weapons attack that killed dozens of civilians earlier in the week. On President Donald Trump's orders, US warships launched 59 Tomahawk cruise missiles at the airbase that was home to the warplanes

that carried out the chemical attacks, US officials said. Six people were killed in the airstrike, according to a televised statement by the Syrian's Armed Forces

General Command. Russia condemned the strike as an "act of aggression," and Assad's office Friday called it "a disgraceful act" that "can only be described as short-sighted." Trump said “There can be no dispute that Syria used banned chemical weapons, violated its obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention and ignored the urging of the UN Security Council. Years of

previous attempts at changing Assad's behavior have all failed and failed very dramatically."

The decision to attack was a direct reaction to the Syrian regime’s gas attack that claimed 85 lives, including about two dozen children. Images of the Syrians who suffocated to death seemed to shock President Trump, who spoke of the

“beautiful little babies” killed in the attack, which he described as “an affront to humanity.”

The US began launching airstrikes in Syria in September 2014 under President Barack Obama as part of its coalition campaign against ISIS, but has only

targeted the terrorist group and not Syrian government forces. He argued that the US should remain laser-focused on defeating ISIS and vowed to try and partner with Russia, which has heartily backed Assad's regime, in order to defeat ISIS and bring the conflict to an end.

Briefing reporters, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said that the strike did not represent a "change in our policy or our posture in Syria," even though it

marked the first time the US had decided to take military action against the Syrian government. 83

Targets

An initial battle damage assessment from the strike was that 58 of the 59 missiles "severely degraded or destroyed" their intended target. The official

cautioned that this is just the earliest assessment using radar and more robust assessments using satellites and other surveillance is still pending.

The attack targeted aircraft, aircraft shelters, petroleum and logistical storage,

ammunition supply bunkers, air defense systems, and "the things that make the airfield operate," Pentagon spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis told reporters. The

missiles were launched from warships in the Eastern Mediterranean. "Initial indications are that this strike has severely damaged or destroyed Syrian

aircraft and support infrastructure and equipment at Shayrat Airfield, reducing the Syrian government's ability to deliver chemical weapons," the Pentagon, a close ally of Israel, said in a statement.

Trump went even further, telling reporters that “something should happen” to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad because of his responsibility for the attack. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, meanwhile, said Assad would have “no role” governing Syria in the future and that “steps are underway” for a US-led

international push to remove him. US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said in March that “our priority is no longer to sit there and focus on

getting Assad out.” Or take Tillerson himself, who said in late March that “the longer-term status of President Assad will be decided by the Syrian people.” All of that has changed — rapidly. The president who campaigned on an “America

first” platform of keeping the US out of conflicts that don’t directly impact core

US national security interests has now intervened in Syria’s intractable civil war. And the president who was silent just days ago about Assad’s future is now clearly saying the “dictator” needs to go.

USA justifies all its terror actions. Trump said Assad’s “heinous actions” were a

“consequence of the past administration's weakness and irresolution. President Obama said in 2012 that he would establish a 'red line' against the use of chemical weapons and then did nothing.” In a couple of days, Trump was

singing a different tune. He said Assad’s gas attack “had a big impact on me,” and that “it’s very possible … that my attitude toward Syria and Assad has changed.”

For good measure, the secretary of state directed Russia to "consider carefully" its continued support for Assad's government. Trump and his aides know

Russia is not going to change its policies in order to appease Washington. G-7 doesn’t favor ignoring Russia Meanwhile, on April 11, G-7 foreign ministers ruled out military solution on Syria. Foreign ministers from the Group of Seven (G7), which comprises the

U.S., Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Japan and Canada, discussed the crisis with representatives from the European Union and several Middle Eastern countries. Germany and Italy stressed Tuesday the need for a political solution in Syria, where the U.S. has intervened with missile strikes in response to a chemical

weapons attack on civilians. “We do not believe that the military solution is the right one,” said Italian Foreign Minister Angelino Alfano, who hosted the talks

also involving ministers from Saudi Arabia, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Jordan.

The ministers, meeting in the Tuscan town of Lucca, agreed that “Russia must not be isolated and, on the contrary, must insofar as possible be involved in the political transition process in Syria,” Alfano added. While the White House said Monday the U.S. was ready to repeat strikes against Syrian targets to prevent the use of chemical weapons, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson focused on

diplomacy in talks with partners, Germany said. “Tillerson explicitly said they

are seeking a non-violent, non-military way,” German Foreign Minister Sigmar 85

Gabriel told reporters, praising his U.S. counterpart for taking “a very realistic

and clear stance.” The USA bombing of Syrian airfield on April 7 in response to the attack in the city of Khan Sheikhoun has confounded expectations that

Donald Trump would be an isolationist president, and soured his relations with Russia. Russian shield The strikes represented not only an escalation of the US role in Syria, but could have a ripple effect on the US' relations with the Syrian regime's powerful backer, Russia.

Russians were present at the base the US struck, a US defense official said, though the role of those Russians was not immediately known.

Russia, a staunch ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, has condemned US actions as reckless and counterproductive. Iran, another main backer of the

regime in Damascus, has expressed similar concerns. The G7 was attempting to put up a united front on Syria ahead of Tillerson’s Wednesday visit to Moscow. Calls Britain made on Monday to threaten Syria and Russia with further

sanctions did not seem to make headway. Nevertheless, Gabriel urged Moscow to reconsider its support for al-Assad. “I believe that it is almost inconceivable that Russia wants to stand on the side of such a murderous regime as that of Bashar al-Assad for the long haul,” he said. North Korea’s illegal nuclear

programme and the US decision to send warships to the Korean peninsula, ongoing conflicts in Ukraine and Libya, the threat from terrorism and migration were also on the agenda. The Lucca talks were also laying the ground for next month’s G7 summit in Taormina, Sicily, the first to be attended by Trump.

Trump’s decision to bomb the Assad regime because of its use of chemical

weapons is new. This isn’t the Trump of the recent past. Yet Trump fashions himself a tough guy, one willing to go where his predecessor would not. So far, this means sending US cruise missiles into Syria. This isn’t the America-first

stance of Trump’s campaign; it’s the start of something new and uncharted,

one that could potentially escalate to a broader US war against Assad. This is a momentous moment for the United States and Syria. And we have no idea, as of right now, where the super power rivalry drama will lead.

Tillerson confirmed that the US military contacted their Russian counterparts about the attack ahead of time, in accordance with deconfliction policies

between the US and Russia over military activities in Syria. Russia was given a one-hour notice, according to a senior US official.

Russian President Vladimir Putin described the US airstrikes on Syria as "an act of aggression against a sovereign state" that "dealt a serious blow to Russia-US relations," according to a Kremlin statement. Russia said it believed Syria had

destroyed all of its chemical weapons and the US strikes were based on a "farfetched pretext."

US leaders try to justify the Sept-11 hoax and the terror wars Lawmakers in the USA cautioned the President against unilaterally starting a

war without first consulting Congress. A pair of defense hawks -- Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham -- who have frequently been critical of Trump, roundly praised his decision. . “United States will no longer stand idly by as

Assad, aided and abetted by Putin's Russia, slaughters innocent Syrians with chemical weapons and barrel bombs," McCain and Graham said in a joint

statement. Sen. Rand Paul called on Trump to consult on Congress. "While we all condemn the atrocities in Syria, the United States was not attacked," Paul

said. "The President needs congressional authorization for military action as

required by the Constitution, and I call on him to come to Congress for a proper debate."

Those views appeared steeped in his longstanding criticism of the Iraq War,

which he called a "stupid" decision, lamenting the billions of dollars funneled

toward that war effort instead of on domestic programs, like infrastructure spending.

The Obama regime concluded that Syria had violated the "red line" Obama had set a year earlier in discussing the use of chemical weapons, but ultimately

decided against military action against Syria in favor of a Russian-brokered deal to extricate the country's chemical weapons stockpile.

Trump at the time said the US should "stay the hell out of Syria" and urged Obama on Twitter to "not attack Syria" in the wake of the 2013 chemical attack. Trump repeatedly criticized Obama during his presidential campaign for not acting on his "red line" threat, but the real estate mogul also argued against deepening the US' military involvement in Syria, particularly as it related to Assad.

Observation After Russian invasion ostensibly to protect the president Assad and his regime, now USA has also attacked Syria with a contradictory purpose of removing Assad. On Apr 6, 2017, USA, one of the “largest” so-called electoral

democracies, intentionally bombed a Syrian regime target for the first time since the country’s civil war began in 2011. So far, it has been a limited cruise

missile strike targeting one Syrian airbase, causing an as-yet-unknown number of casualties. Like his predecessors, Trump never opened his dirty mouth to denounce the Zionist crimes in Palestine, killing even children. But he, like Netanyahu, talks

about Assad’s crimes and justifies the crimes. "When you kill innocent children, innocent babies, babies, little babies, with a chemical gas that is so lethal,

people were shocked to hear what gas it was, that crosses many, many lines, beyond a red line." Tillerson — without saying so explicitly — implied that the administration would for now basically maintain Obama’s Syria policy, which

was predicated on Assad eventually relinquishing power after internationally led diplomatic talks.

Trump's decision marked a dramatic shift in his position on whether the US should take military action against the Syrian President's regime -- which Trump opposed during his campaign for president -- and came after the

President was visibly and publicly moved by the images of this week's chemical weapons attack. It represents a substantial escalation of the US military

campaign in the region, and could be interpreted by the Syrian government as an act of war.

American palms are socked in Arab and Afghan blood and there is no reason to believe that like Israelis, who intermittently attack Palestinians for their meat, blood and lands, or Indian military that kill Kashmiri Muslims for their blood and meat and lands for military-cum Hindu religious promotional purposes,

Americans would ever stop attacks on Muslims for their meat and blood. Known its double speaks in order to confuse the world on what it really intents to do, Trump had said he was not interested in wars or attacking any soverign

nations. Till March end, Americans were telling the world that they were not did not interest in regime change in Syria nor would they force Assad to retire or quit the nation. But in April his military attacked Syria. Trump's decision to launch the strikes, the most significant military action of his young presidency, came nearly four years after the US first concluded that Syrian forces had used chemical weapons in Syria.

While Trump rejected the isolationist label some placed on him during the

campaign, he made clear that his preference was for limiting the US footprint around the world and refocusing US foreign policy around core national security interests.

Neither Russia nor USA has entered Syria neither to end the west sponsored terror war in that Arab nation nor to bring peace to Mideast.

On the contrary!. None of “interested” parties, USA or Russia or Assad is eager to let Syrians live in peace. Israel is eager to see the region remains tensed. What will they get if West Asia is peaceful? _________________

Chapter-13: India: AIADMK crisis: Fragile unity move! (Panneerselvam toughens stance on merger as noose around Dinakaran tightens) -Dr. Abdul Ruff

Even as the AIADMK merger efforts are in full swing some Sasikala-Dinakaran backers oppose the merger move and as before find faults with former CM O. Panneerselvam not supporting their jailed small-amma (Chinnamma) to assume power as Tamil Nadu CM and control Jayalithaa’s assets. .

Dinakaran, the nephew of jailed AIADMK general secretary VK Sasikala, is facing a revolt by an influential section of the party led by Palaniswamy and a host of ministers, who declared the ouster of the once powerful aunt-nephew duo, and extended a hand of friendship to the Panneerselvam camp.

The influential section of Ministers revolted against Dinakaran and decided to keep AIADMK general secretary VK Sasikala and him out of the party. According to 'Jaya Plus' Tamil TV channel, Dinakaran said a "good decision" will be taken in the 90

interest of the party. Party sources indicated that he was expected to appear at the Economic Offences court in Chennai on a case against him for alleged violation of FERA regulations. However, he skipped the court hearing citing the death of a relative. The court accepted his plea and scheduled the next hearing on 24th April.

Lok Sabha Deputy Speaker and AIADMK leader M Thambidurai also called on Tamil Nadu Governor C Vidyasagar Rao, in an apparent effort to merge the two factions of AIADMK. Tamil Nadu Finance and Fisheries Minister D Jayakumar also met Rao. While the efforts for the merger are in full-swing, O Panneerselvam camp toughened their stand demanding Sasikala's resignation and calling for a CBI probe into Jayalalithaa's death. On Wednesday, isolated in his party, AIADMK deputy general secretary TTV Dinakaran threw in the towel and "stepped aside" to pave the way for a merger of rival factions led by Tamil Nadu chief minister EK Palaniswamy and his predecessor O Panneerselvam. Dinakaran, who had on Wednesday convened a meeting of the MLAs backing him, called it off at the last moment, apparently because his supporters were outnumbered by those arrayed against him. Senior ministers including D Jayakumar and KA Sengottaiyan, who chairs the AIADMK presidium and had hitherto sided with Dinakaran, had questioned the beleaguered leader's locus standi to convene a meeting of legislators and the party's district secretaries. Seeking to avoid any confrontation, Dinakaran said he had "stepped aside" last night itself "in the interest of the party". "I myself would have announced it (of keeping away from the party) if they had told me about their decision," he said, referring to last night's revolt.

Though the Palaniswamy and Panneerselvam camps have shown inclination for the merger of the two factions, there have not been any direct talks between them so far. Although the ministers under the CM Palanisamy took a bold decision to oust Sasikala and Dinakaran from the AIADMK, they have not made any further move to let these shrewd Mannargudi elements claim any association with the ruling party. Apparently, the move to oust Sasikala was essentially to get the party symbol Twoleaves back from the election commission and as such the OPS faction does not think the ruling MLAs are really sincere about unity of the party people to secure the government. Hence they demand the ruling faction to secure resignation letters from the Sasikala, Dinakaran and entire family now controlling the party and government. In other words, the party should be freed from the Sasikala control mechanisms now or in future. Otherwise unity move would be farce and wonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t work. . Meanwhile, a Delhi police team came to Chennai to conduct enquiries about Dinakaranâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s involvement in bribing someone in Delhi to get back the party symbol. He has also been asked to appear before the Crime Branch of Delhi Police on Saturday in a case of alleged bribery to EC officials for retrieving the party's 'two leaves' symbol. On Wednesday night, the Delhi Police had served summons to him in the case. He has been directed to report to the Delhi police for investigation immediately but he has asked for 3 days. As a beleaguered AIADMK leader and Sasikalaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s nephew TTV Dinakaran, asserting that all party MLAs stood behind him, said none in the party were against him.

Dinakaran, who is facing trouble on multiple fronts, including from the Delhi police which has booked him for allegedly trying to bribe an Election Commission official to clinch the 'Two-Leaves' symbol of the party, frozen by the poll panel, for his faction, also said he had no issues with the rival camps merging together. He, 92

however, claimed the rebellion against him was out of "fear". "They (ministers) might have done this (revolt) due to some fear. Maybe there was some dissatisfaction against me. But I don't know," he told reporters. He was apparently referring to the possible angst in the party following income tax raids at Health Minister C Vijayabaskar's premises ahead of the assembly bypoll to the RK Nagar seat which was countermanded following allegations of bribing and inducement of voters. Dinakaran was the party's nominee for the election. " When they make such sudden announcement there must be some fear," he said, adding, the revolt was a decision made in a "hurry". Dinakaran, however, made it clear that since it was Sasikala who had appointed him to the post, he would decide on the next course of action only after meeting her. He wondered why there was the question of his resignation when he had already "stepped aside". Meanwhile, Panneerselvam, a staunch loyalist of the late Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa, described the revolt against the Sasikala family as the "first success" of his "dharma yuddh" (holy war). Panneerselvam said he had launched the "dharma yuddh" with the help of his supporters, including MPs and MLAs, in an effort to ensure that the AIADMK did not go into hands of Sasikala's family. Panneerselvam had filled-in for Jayalalithaa as Chief Minister thrice in the past, twice when she had to go to jail in corruption cases and once when she was on her death bed. He had claimed he was coerced to step down by Sasikala after Jayalalithaa's death. Dinakaran, against whom the Delhi police has issued a lookout notice for allegedly trying to bribe an Election Commission official, said he had no intention to fight with people who are like his "brothers." "I will never go against the AIADMK," he said.

He, however, insisted the appointment of Sasikala and himself to the top party posts was made with the "consent" of others and that none was "bypassed". He indicated Sasikala has not yet been apprised of the developments. "How can someone inside the jail be informed," he asked. When asked if he was being "targeted" by way of Income Tax raids on Health Minister C Vijayabaskar and countermanding of the 12 April RK Nagar bypoll, he responded with a terse "maybe." Putting up a brave face, he said he will tackle the situation. "They can maximum put me behind bars. If that is my destiny, I will face it and come out," he added. A powerful section of the ruling AIADMK (Amma) had last night risen in revolt against Sasikala-Dinakaran leadership, and said they had resolved to "delink" the party and the government from them. The surprise development had come on a day when Panneerselvam made the merger talks between the two camps contingent upon the ruling AIADMK faction ejecting Sasikala and Dinakaran, who is standing-in for his jailed aunt. AIADMK leader and state Finance Minister D Jayakumar on announced that Sasikala and Dinakaran would be 'delinked' from the party. A day after the ouster of VK Sasikala and her nephew Dinakaran from the AIADMK, O Panneerselvam said that it was a first victory of their faction. Addressing the media, Panneerselvam said, "This is our faction's first victory that Sasikala and her family have been ousted from the party. Both factions will talk to fulfill the aspirations of lakhs of party workers." Meanwhile, Dinakaran has said that he has no problem with the possible merger of AIADMK factions if it benefits the party. He also added that the revolt against him could have been due to some fears. "I have stepped aside in the interest of the party, so the question of resigning doesn't arise." However, he added that he would 94

have to consult with Sasikala on resigning as she had appointed him as the Deputy General Secretary of the party. Dinakaran has called for a meeting of MLAs and District Secretaries at the party's headquarter in Royapettah in Chennai. However, AIADMK leader M. Thambidurai has called for unity in the party, saying that if all leaders would come together, then it would strengthen the party. "It's not a sudden development, it's going on for a long time. We have to come together and have to be united. We need to unite this party so that Amma's ideology may move forward," he said. Pannerselvam is the only leader the AIADMK leader Jayalithaa trusted and that explains why the party people and Tamils in general approve of candidature of Pannerselvam to be the CM and party supremo to lead the party, government and state to success. People view Palanisamy as the proxy of Sasikala and her chief agent in the government, although he is a changing man today to throw Sasikala and her nephew out of AIADMK. Divisions in the AIADMK are real. Both factions must stop criticizing one another and try to be members of one party. Sasikala has done the harm to the party and government of Jayalithaa by her political mischief and now the factions must take steps to mend ways so that party is not gone sooner than later. Meanwhile, with the political fiasco in Tamil Nadu getting murkier by the day, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) hit out at the ruling AIADMK saying that its leaders are making a mockery of every authority that exists. AIADMK should be united as quickly as possible to serve the people. Even as AIADMK politics in Tamil Nadu making twists, the Supreme Court has pronounced its verdict and the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is sitting pretty. But not many know that it was the countryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s premiere agency itself which had dropped the criminal conspiracy charge under section 120-B of the IPC against

Advani and others while submitting a supplementary charge sheet in May 2003 before Rae Bareli Special CBI Court. _____

Chapter-14: Indian sports: Bogus IPL records for Padma/President’s awards

In cricket all records and rankings are bogus. IPL it is worst as the run rate should be above 8 runs per ver minimum and individual batboy should be given maximum 4s and 6s so that they get 50s and 100 within the stipulated 29 overs. In IPL the most important teams should be Mumbai Indians team of Sachin so all teams should help that poor team according to the specifications of BCCI On April 20, Punjab team faced great Mumbai team sn the formula was to let Mumbai win and come to the top of the points table. But unfortunately, Punjab made about 200 runs with Amla getting 100 runs as his record. But the Punjab bowlers have been pressured by BCCI to let Mumbai win by huge runs in 4s and 6s and the process is on. They want to belittle the Amla’s 100. That is it. So nasty!

Chapter-15: Syria’s Aleppo under siege: USA lets Russia claim diplomatic advantage! -Dr. Abdul Ruff ______

Conflicts in West Asia resembling a new World War launched by Bushdom fascist regime exclusively on Islam to ensure energy security by enacting Sept-11 hoax and invading an Islamizing Afghanistan in extension of the illegal Iraqi war, are now focused on Syria where many foreign powers, led by USA one the one hand and Russia on the other, are targeting Muslims in Sunni nation ruled by a Shiite Assad who apparently wants to rule the nation of Syrians forever.

Syria has been under siege for years since the onset of Arab Spring and both the government and the Opposition forces keep claiming victories off and on but the war continues, killing and mutilating Syrians. 96

Bush Junior has made the US government a blood thirsty war machine fully engaged invasions, destabilization, destructions, genocides. US generals have demonstrated an impressive aptitude for moving pieces around on a dauntingly complex military chessboard in Islamic world. Brigades, battle groups, and squadrons shuttle in and out of various war zones, responding to the needs of the moment. The lesser theaters of conflict, largely overlooked by the American public, that in recent years have engaged the attention of US forces, a list that would include conflicts in Libya, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen. This engagement in wars have made Islamic world insecure. Saudi Arabia and Iran have been spared so far essentially for strategic reasons. The two principal conflicts of the post-9/11 era: the Afghanistan War, now in its 16th year, and the Iraq War, launched in 2003 and (after a brief hiatus) once more grinding on. Wars have helped USA control entire world.

Syria seems to have slipped out of US control and fallen into Russian orbit. Five years since the conflict began, more than 250,000 Syrians have been killed in the fighting, and almost 11 million Syrians - half the country's prewar population - have been displaced from their homes. In 2011, what became known as the "Arab Spring" revolts toppled Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. That March, peaceful protests erupted in Syria as well, after 15 boys were detained and tortured for having written graffiti in support of the Arab Spring.

The Syrian government, led by President Bashar al-Assad, determined to stay in power at any cost, responded to the protests by killing hundreds of demonstrators and imprisoning many more. In July 2011, defectors from the military announced the formation of the Free Syrian Army, a rebel group aiming to overthrow the government, and Syria began to slide into civil war. Initially, lack of freedoms and economic woes fuelled resentment of the Syrian government, and public anger was inflamed by the harsh crackdown on protesters. Successful uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt energized and gave hope to Syrian pro-democracy activists. Many Islamist movements were also strongly opposed to the Assadâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s' rule.

Assad control of Aleppo city parts

Reports suggest that Syrian government forces have captured a key part of eastern Aleppo, splitting rebel-held territory. Both state TV and the monitoring group, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said that the district of Sakhour had fallen to the Syrian army.

The Syrian army and their allies launched a major offensive to retake control of Aleppo in September. Thousands of civilians have fled rebel-held eastern Aleppo districts after a weekend of heavy fighting. Hundreds of families have also been displaced within the besieged area. Russia says its air force is active in other parts of the country, but not operating over Aleppo. While it is very difficult to find out exactly what is happening in besieged eastern Aleppo, several key districts appear to have fallen to the government, leaving very little, if any, of the northern part of the rebel-held enclave still under the rebels' control.

There were 250,000 people in need of assistance in eastern Aleppo, 100,000 of them children. The situation on the ground in eastern Aleppo is almost beyond the imagination of those of us who are not there. State TV quoted a Syrian military source as saying that government forces "are continuing their advance in eastern neighborhoods of Aleppo". The US led opposition had lost more than third of the area it controlled in Aleppo city during the recent advance. The east of Aleppo has been held by rebel factions opposed to President Bashar al-Assad for the past four years. In the past year, Syrian troops have broken the deadlock with the help of Iranian-backed militias and Russian air strikes. Things have turned out very differently.

Meanwhile, Russia has rejected US calls to halt bombing eastern Aleppo. Western observers have been generally impressed by Russia's deployment in Syria, mainly reflecting a sense of disbelief that they proved to be capable of planning, executing and sustaining such a complex operation and dealing with the logistical issues involved in supplying forces at great distance from Russia.

As reports coming in, the Assad government currently controls the capital, Damascus, parts of southern Syria, portions of Aleppo and Deir Az Zor, much of the area near the Syrian-Lebanese border, and the northwestern coastal region. Rebel groups, ISIL, and Kurdish forces control the rest of the country.

Rebel groups continue to jockey against one another for power, and frequently fight each other. The Free Syrian Army has weakened as the war has progressed, while explicitly Islamist groups, such as the al-Nusra Front, which has pledged allegiance to al-Qaeda, and the Saudi-backed Islamic Front have gained in strength. Syria under threat In March 1971, Hafez al-Assad, an Alawite, declared himself President, a position that he held until his death in 2000. Since 1970, the secular Syrian Regional Branch 98

has remained the dominant political authority in what had been a one-party state until the first multi-party election to the People's Council of Syria was held in 2012. On 31 January 1973, Assad implemented the new Constitution which led to a national crisis. Unlike previous constitutions, this one did not require that the President of Syria must be a Muslim, leading to fierce demonstrations in Hama, Homs and Aleppo organized by the Muslim Brotherhood and the ulema. They labeled Assad as the "enemy of Allah" and called for a jihad against his rule Robert D. Kaplan has compared Assad's coming to power to "an untouchable becoming maharajah in India or a Jew becoming tsar in Russiaâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;an unprecedented development, shocking the Sunni majority population which had monopolized power for so many centuries." The regime survived a series of armed revolts by Sunni Islamists, mainly members of the Muslim Brotherhood, from 1976 until 1982.

In 2000, Bashar al-Assad took over as President of Syria upon Hafez al-Assad's death. He initially inspired hopes for democratic reforms. A Damascus Spring of social and political debate took place between July 2000 and August 2001The Damascus Spring largely ended in August 2001 with the arrest and imprisonment of ten leading activists who had called for democratic elections and a campaign of civil disobedience In the opinion of his critics, Bashar Assad had failed to deliver on promised reforms.

The Assad government opposed the US invasion and occupation of Iraq. The Bush administration then began to destabilize the regime by increasing sectarian tensions, showcasing and publicizing Syrian repression of Kurdish and Sunni groups, and financing political dissidents. Assad also opposed the Qatar-Turkey pipeline in 2009. A classified 2013 report by a joint U.S. army and intelligence group concluded that the overthrow of Assad would have drastic consequences, as the opposition supported by the Obama regime was dominated by jihadist elements.

Syria is now a major war theater where foreign forces are busy killing Muslims and destroying the nation.

In the history of Syria â&#x20AC;&#x201C; a Sunni nation- many events contributed to its gradual weakening. In the recent past, a severe drought plagued Syria from 2007-10, spurring as many as 1.5 million people to migrate from the countryside into cities, which exacerbated poverty and social unrest. Although the initial protests were mostly non-sectarian, armed conflict led to the emergence of starker sectarian divisions.

In 1982, Bashar al-Assad's father, Hafez, a Shiite, ordered a military crackdown on the Sunni led Muslim Brotherhood in Hama, which killed between 10,000-40,000 people and flattened much of the city.

Recently, even global warming has been claimed to have played a role in sparking the 2011 uprising.

Although most Syrians are Sunni Muslims, Syria's security establishment has long been dominated by members of the Alawite sect, of which Assad is a member. Having left with no alternatives, no polls Sunnis and minority religious groups tend to support the Assad government, while the overwhelming majority of opposition fighters are Sunni Muslims.

The sectarian split is reflected among regional actors' stances as well. The governments of majority-Shia Iran and Iraq support Assad, as does Lebanon-based Hezbollah; while Sunni-majority states including Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and others staunchly support the rebels.

Foreign backing and open intervention have played a large role in Syria's civil war. An international coalition led by the USA has bombed targets of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as IS and ISIS and there could be more to be invented by CIA and Pentagon) group since 2014.

In 2013, ISIL emerged in northern and eastern Syria after overrunning large portions of Iraq. Meanwhile, Kurdish groups in northern Syria are seeking self-rule in areas under their control. This has alarmed Turkey's government, which fears its large native Kurdish population may grow more restive and demand greater autonomy as a result. In response to attacks within Turkey, the Turkish government has bombed Kurdish targets in Syria. Kurdish groups have also clashed with al-Nusra Front and ISIL.

It appears USA and Russia had informally decided to take opposite sides in Syrian War Theater. In September 2015, Russia launched a bombing campaign against what it referred to as "terrorist groups" in Syria, which included ISIL as well as rebel groups backed by Western states. In October 2015, the USA scrapped its controversial program to train Syrian rebels, after it was revealed that it had spent $500m but only trained 60 fighters.

100

Russia has also deployed military advisers to shore up Assad's defences. Several Arab states, along with Turkey, have provided weapons and materiel to rebel groups in Syria. Many of those fighting come from outside of Syria. Lebanese members of Hezbollah are fighting on the side of Assad, as are Iranian and Afghan fighter.

Although the USA has stated its opposition to the Assad government, it has hesitated to involve itself deeply in the conflict, even after the Assad government allegedly used chemical weapons in 2013, which US President Barack Obama had previously referred to as a "red line" that would prompt intervention. Fluid situation and enter Russia Syrian war is a multi-sided armed conflict in Syria in which international interventions have taken place. The war grew out of the unrest of the 2011 Arab Spring and escalated to armed conflict after President Bashar al-Assad's government violently repressed protests calling for his removal. The war is being fought by several factions: the Syrian Government and its various supporters, a loose alliance of Sunni Arab rebel groups (including the Free Syrian Army), the Syrian Democratic Forces, Salafi jihadist groups (including al-Nusra Front) who often co-operate with the Sunni rebels, and the ISIL. The factions receive substantial support from foreign actors, leading many to label the conflict a proxy war waged by both regional and global powers.

As Assad government was facing rout at the crushing attacks of US led Opposition forces, Russia came to the rescue of Assad and his rule. Russian forces, enjoying a free hand in Syria, have been operating in support of the government of President Bashar al-Assad in Syria for a year. Their impact has been significant. When they arrived, there were fears that government forces were close to collapse. This position has largely been reversed. It is the Syrian government - while still fragile that is now on the offensive with a brutal bid to recapture the whole of the city of Aleppo. Initially seen by US analysts through the prism of recent Western military involvements in the region, many pundits were quick to dismiss the Russian effort as likely to fail. The Russian military, it was said, was not up to expeditionary warfare. Russia would quickly find itself bogged down in a Syrian quagmire.

Russia carries out its first air strikes on 30 September 2015 and Syria says it requested intervention to help in "the fight against terrorism". On 10 November 2015 the Syrian army, aided by Russian strikes, lifts two-year-long siege by IS on the key Kuwairis airbase in eastern Aleppo province, marking its first victory against IS since the Russian intervention.

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Obviously, on instruction from Washington, Turkey shot down on 24 November a Russian Su-24 fighter jet near the Turkish-Syrian border; Benefiting from Russian support, the Syrian army makes territorial gains in various parts of Syria December 2015 - January 2016 and declares Latakia province rebel-free. Syrian army 24 March 2016 backed by Russian strikes inflicts a major symbolic and strategic defeat on IS, recapturing the historic city of Palmyra. In September 2016, Russia acknowledges providing air cover to the Syrian troops in their bid to seize control of Aleppo city. Russian goal Russia, of course, has had a strategic relationship with Syria going back to Soviet days. It has long maintained a small naval base on the Syrian coast and has close ties with the Syrian military, being its principal arms supplier. Syria had become Moscow's last toe-hold of influence in the region. It was the fear of this relationship unraveling that prompted President Vladimir Putin to act.

While it is Russian air power that has been the main focus of news reporting on the Russian intervention, it is as much the intensified training and re-equipping of the Syrian army that has also been a crucial factor in helping to turn around President Assad's fortunes.

Russian and Syrian military goals are not identical. While the Syrian government insists it still wants to recapture all the territory it has lost, Moscow's approach is very different. Unlike Syria and Iran, Russia has no interest in fighting for territory. In defending Assad, Moscow had sought to steadily destroy the moderate Syrian opposition on the battlefield, leaving only jihadist forces in play, and lock the USA into a political framework of negotiations that would serve beyond its current Democratic shelf-life. In both respects, Russia has been successful. Ultimately, the Russian goal is to lock in gains for Syria via ceasefires, while slow-rolling the negotiations to the point that true opposition to the Syrian regime expires on the battlefield, leaving no viable alternatives for the West in this conflict by 2017. Russia's intervention, however, does not seek to minimize losses.

The Russian air force has deployed some of its most modern aircraft to Syria, though the same cannot be said for the munitions they employ. The Russian air campaign overall has relied upon the use of "dumb bombs" of various types, a major distinction with modern Western air campaigns, where almost all of the munitions used are precision-guided. Russian Special Forces and artillery have been engaged on the ground. Long-range missile strikes have been conducted from Russian warships and submarines. Even Russia's only aircraft carrier is now on its way to the region. 102

The Syria operation has also provided an invaluable opportunity for Russian generals to try out their forces in operational conditions, as well as offering something of a "shop-window" for some of Russia's latest military technology. Russian military sees this as an opportunity to test new or modern systems; experiment with network-centric warfare capability; and to present evidence of the success of military modernisation." This helps Moscow to showcase its new combat systems for West Asia and elsewhere. .

Syria has become a kind of sampler of Russian military capabilities. Israel could be disappointed.

Russia's air campaign: Key moments

30 September 2015 - Russia carries out its first air strikes. Syria says it requested intervention to help in "the fight against terrorism". 10 November 2015 - The Syrian army, aided by Russian strikes, lifts two-year-long siege by IS on the key Kuwairis airbase in eastern Aleppo province, marking its first victory against IS since the Russian intervention. 24 November - Turkey shoots down a Russian Su-24 fighter jet near the TurkishSyrian border December 2015 - January 2016 - Benefiting from Russian support, the Syrian army makes territorial gains in various parts of Syria and declares Latakia province rebelfree 24 March 2016 - Syrian army backed by Russian strikes inflicts a major symbolic and strategic defeat on IS, recapturing the historic city of Palmyra September 2016 - Russia acknowledges providing air cover to the Syrian troops in their bid to seize control of Aleppo city. Diplomatic advantage

The diplomatic consequences of the Russian intervention have also been a plus for Moscow. Its active military role in the WA region has reshaped its relationships with Israel, Iran and Turkey. Indeed, Israel and Russia have developed a significant level of â&#x20AC;&#x153;understandingâ&#x20AC;?. Israeli air operations against the Lebanese Shia militant group Hezbollah, for example, have not been hindered by Russian control of significant parts of Syrian air space.

Attacks on Arab Muslims by any nation are good enough for Tel Aviv seeking to weaken entire Arab world. Russian attacks in Syria are welcome in Israel Relations between Moscow and Tehran (Syria's only other significant ally) have 103

developed, and even the enmity between Moscow and Ankara has been diminished, with both countries realising they have to accommodate - at least to an extent - the other's regional aims. Arabs are slowly shedding the Americophobia.

It is US-Russia relations that have been most profoundly influenced by Moscow's intervention in Syria. At one level, Syria can be added to Ukraine as a dossier where the USA and Russia are failing to find common ground. But Russia's military role ensured that the Assad leadership was not going to be removed from the chessboard. This made Washington revise its own approach and pursue what has largely proved an illusory effort, to develop some kind of partnership with Russia.

The indiscriminate nature of the Russian and Syrian air campaigns - exemplified by the current struggle over Aleppo - has certainly not won Russia many friends in the West, however. Russia has been accused by several governments of barbarity and potentially committing war crimes. According to the UK-based monitoring group the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, over 4,000 civilians have been killed in one year of Russian strikes. Russian casualties in Syria are difficult to estimate. Helicopters have certainly been shot down, and several members of Russia's Special Forces are known to have been killed in combat.

Western public opinion seems largely unmoved by the struggle; perhaps to an extent a reflection of war weariness in the wake of the campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq. And there has been a good level of confusion. Many in the West, sceptical about their own governments' records, seem unwilling to get excited about what Russia is up to.

The importance of information operations was most clearly illustrated by the extraordinary concert mounted in the ruins of Palmyra after its recapture from socalled Islamic State (IS) by Syrian forces.

The Kremlin has skillfully managed how the Russian public sees this intervention. Given the woeful state of the economy, Russian leaders have always been concerned that Syria would come to be viewed as an undue burden, though victory in Syria would make Russians happy. Specialists interpret the Kremlin's decision in March to announce a significant reduction of its air power in Syria as an attempt "to cash-out the political gains at home and recast the war in the public's mind". Western expectations of political peril for President Putin have, so far, simply not been realized. Rather than a prolonged campaign, Russia's combat operations have become the new normal. Those expecting Russian support behind Vladimir Putin to collapse, either over Ukraine, or Syria, or the economy, have thus far been proven 104

wrong. The Kremlin is demonstrably more adept at securing public approval, or apathy, than commonly acknowledged in the West.

But the overall level of casualties appears to have been limited, and news of combat deaths (like those among Russian forces in eastern Ukraine) is restricted another reason why there has been no domestic backlash against the Syrian adventure. By its own standards, Russia's intervention in Syria has been a success on several levels. The real question is whether this situation can last. Put it another way, is there any clear exit strategy for Russia that might enable it to bank its gains and end its losses?

Russia's strategic goals are vague. The exit strategy, if there is one appears rooted in strengthening the fighting power of the Syrian army and securing some longterm political settlement that demonstrates Russia has returned as a great power. The "strategic impact" of Russia's intervention still remains in doubt. "Such gains are readily lost and can prove illusory," an expert says. The Syrian army remains a shambles, Iran is attached to Assad, while Russia is more interested in the grander game with the USA. And without a political settlement to secure them, these accomplishments can vaporize, as Russian patience and resources become exhausted. Russian leadership knows that this could take years and would rather cut a deal while possessing the military advantage with USA. . Aleppo was once a place of culture and commerce, with a jewel of an old city that was on Enescoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s list of world heritage sites. Now, the five-year civil war that rages in Syria has left much of it destroyed and divided roughly in two, with President Bashar al-Assad's forces controlling the west and the rebels the east. A month ago, government forces re-imposed a siege on the east, and launched an all-out assault to take full control of the city, accompanied by an intense and sustained aerial bombardment.

Activists say the offensive has left hundreds of civilians dead, but the government and its ally Russia have denied targeting them and blamed rebel fighters for operating in residential areas. But what about the 275,000 people who are trapped there? Where are they getting their food from? Do they have enough water and medicine?

In August, the UN Children's Fund (Unicef) estimated that 35,000 people were internally displaced inside eastern Aleppo, some of whom were in official shelters run in abandoned buildings, others staying with family or friends, and still others sleeping outdoors in parks and streets. Not many will have been able to leave since 105

then - and it is likely that the number of people not sleeping in their own homes has gone up. And even those who are still at home know they are not safe. People are saying there is no safe place to go. There may be many who are staying in places that they don't consider being adequate but they're staying anyway.

Nearly half the people who live in besieged Aleppo are under the age of 18. Many of their schools have closed or moved. Some of the buildings have been bombed, while others are being used as shelters for displaced people, or fighters in the conflict are using them for military purposes. It might be difficult to imagine any child going back to school when bombs are falling. People are buying water from wells and privately-owned water tankers, and carrying it home in buckets. Many have reported that it tastes bad, and there is no guarantee that it is free of disease. It is hard to say whether anyone has died of hunger in the siege because with aid agencies unable to get inside, they cannot accurately diagnose the level of malnutrition. Many doctors have fled the city as refugees or been killed in the fighting, and there are just 30 doctors remaining in eastern Aleppo. Using the UN's estimate for the number of people trapped there - 275,000 - that means there is roughly one doctor for every 9,100 people. This in a place that is being bombed every day - at least 376 people were killed and 1,266 wounded in the first two weeks of the latest government's assault, according to the UN. The places where doctors work have been repeatedly targeted by government and Russian air strikes, activists and charities say. The UN says six hospitals are still operating, although they are only partially functional. Two hospitals have been almost totally destroyed in the past two weeks, and three doctors and two nurses killed. The few remaining hospitals are collapsing under a flow of hundreds of wounded lying in agony on the floors of wards and corridors. It has long maintained a small naval base on the Syrian coast and has close ties with the Syrian military, being its principal arms supplier. Syria had become Moscow's last toe-hold of influence in the region. It was the fear of this relationship unraveling that prompted President Vladimir Putin to act.

Russian forces have been operating in support of the government of President 106

Bashar al-Assad in Syria for a year. Their impact has been significant. When they arrived, there were fears that government forces were close to collapse. This position has largely been reversed. It is the Syrian government - while still fragile that is now on the offensive with a brutal bid to recapture the whole of the city of Aleppo.

Initially seen by US analysts through the prism of recent Western military involvements in the region, many pundits were quick to dismiss the Russian effort as likely to fail. The Russian military, it was said, was not up to expeditionary warfare. Russia would quickly find itself bogged down in a Syrian quagmire. Things have turned out very differently.

Roger McDermott, senior fellow in Eurasian studies at the Jamestown Foundation and a long-time watcher of the Russian military - says: Western observers have been generally impressed by Russia's deployment in Syria, mainly reflecting a sense of disbelief that they proved to be capable of planning, executing and sustaining such a complex operation and dealing with the logistical issues involved in supplying forces at great distance from Russia.

But what exactly were Russia's goals in intervening in the first place? Russia, of course, has had a strategic relationship with Syria going back to Soviet days. Observation USA created all problems in Syria but now Russia has all diplomatic advantages to win a powerful point over its nuclear rival America. The siege is pushing people towards starvation and serfdom.

The Syrian war is creating profound effects far beyond the country's borders. Lebanon, Turkey, and Jordan are hosting large and growing numbers of Syrian refugees, many of whom have attempted to journey onwards to Europe in search of better conditions.

Several rounds of peace talks have failed to stop the fighting. Although a ceasefire announced in February 2016 has limited fighting in some parts of Syria, recent government air strikes in Aleppo have prompted uncertainty about the ceasefire's future. But with much of the country in ruins , millions of Syrians having fled abroad, and a population deeply traumatized by war, one thing is certain: Rebuilding Syria after the war ends will be a lengthy, extremely difficult process.

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Syrian war has killed thousands, produced innumerable refugees. As Syriaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s war reaches another grim milestone, refugees fleeing the 5-year conflict face greater hurdles to finding safety while international solidarity with its victims is failing to match and reflect the scale and seriousness of the humanitarian tragedy. UNHCR provides basic and necessary humanitarian aid for Syrian refugees and helps the most vulnerable refugees with urgently needed relief - including water, food, medicine, blankets and warm clothes, household items, diapers and hygiene supplies, and jerry cans. By its own standards, Russia's intervention in Syria has been a success on several levels. The real question is whether this situation can last. Put it another way, is there any clear exit strategy for Russia that might enable it to bank its gains and end its losses? Russia's strategic goals are vague. The exit strategy, if there is one appears rooted in strengthening the fighting power of the Syrian army and securing some longterm political settlement that demonstrates Russia has returned as a great power. The strategic impact of Russia's intervention still remains in doubt. Such gains are readily lost and can prove illusory. The Syrian army remains a shambles; Iran is attached to Assad, while Russia is more interested in the grander game with the USA. And without a political settlement to secure them, these accomplishments can vaporize, as Russian patience and resources become exhausted. Russian leadership knows that this could take years and would rather cut a deal while possessing the military advantage. The USA was compelled not just to deal with Russia as a diplomatic equal but also to shift its own stance towards the Assad government to one - that for all the obfuscation - falls well short of its long-time insistence that President Assad had to go, as the essential pre-condition for any negotiated settlement. Not many powers like Israel are happy that the USA has not invaded Iran to equalize its destruction efforts in Iraq- both Shiite dominated Muslim nations in West Asia. Neither the end of war in Syria nor peace in West Asia is the major concern of USA or Russia, or UNSC. __________

Chapter-16: Enough crossfire: Indo-Pakistan exchange gunfire in Uri border! 108

--Dr. Abdul Ruff

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India and USA keep asking Pakistan doing “enough” on crossterror issue. A ceasefire violation was reported at the India-Pakistan border in the Uri sector of Kashmir’s Baramulla district on Tuesday. The Indian Army confirmed that small arms fire was being exchanged with the Pakistani Army at the Line of Control in Lacchipora and Mahiyan Boniyar. The exchange of fire was continuing an hour after it started. “Pakistani troopers resorted to heavy gunfire with small and automatic fire arms from across the Line of Control. No damage was caused to Indian posts,” a defence source said. “The fire was returned with equal calibre weapons.” Union home minister Rajnath Singh called up the director general of the Border Security Force to give them a “free hand” to retaliate to the provocation, TV reports said. Pakistan is often accused of firing at Indian posts to give cover to infiltrators. The firing violates the 2003 ceasefire agreement between India and Pakistan along the international boundary and the LoC — the de facto border that divides Jammu and Kashmir between the two neighbours. The border skirmish came as New Delhi and Islamabad are locked in a bitter diplomatic war of words following the Uri terror attack, in which heavily armed militants, believed to be of Pakistan-based terrorist outfit Jaish-e-Mohammad, stormed an army base in Uri, killing 18 soldiers and injuring 22. Pakistan has denied the allegations even as India claimed to have clinching evidence to support its claims. The Indian Army has claimed to have recovered arms, ammunition, and food and medicine packets with Pakistani markings during combing operations at the military base in Uri. India also claimed that the four militants who were gunned down during the gun fight that lasted about two-and-a-half hours were foreigners.

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Amid the Indian elite’s clamour for dispensing with “strategic restraint” and delivering a harsh, demonstrable blow to Pakistan after the Uri attack, some voices can now be heard, not least from elements within the Indian military, urging New Delhi to thoroughly deliberate over its battle plan before proceeding Six days after India’s government, without so much as even a cursory investigation, held Pakistan responsible for a terrorist attack on the Uri military base in the disputed Kashmir region that killed 18 Indian soldiers, New Delhi continues to be gripped by war fever. From the political establishment, military, and corporate media has come a clamour for India to “punish” Pakistan. The media has enthusiastically reported that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is conferring with the military and intelligence chiefs about possible air and cruise missile strikes. Cross-border raids and the assassination of those responsible for the Uri attacks through covert action are also said to be under consideration. On September 20, India charged that Pakistani troops had unleashed a cross-border artillery barrage, violating the shaky ceasefire across the Line of Control (LoC) that divides Indian- and Pakistani-held Kashmir. By late afternoon, New Delhi was boasting it had killed 10 armed militants whom it said had recently infiltrated the LoC near Uri. Such reports, and indeed all the claims and counter-claims of the Indian and Pakistani governments and their militaries should be viewed critically. India’s military has a long and well-documented history of fake encounter killings in Kashmir; just as Pakistan’s military-intelligence apparatus has a proven record of using Islamist terrorists to pursue its reactionary strategic conflict with India and to manipulate, communalize, and suppress the popular opposition of the Kashmiri people to the Indian state. Amid the Indian elite’s clamour for dispensing with “strategic restraint” and delivering a harsh, demonstrable blow to Pakistan, some voices can now be heard, not least from elements within the Indian military, urging New Delhi to thoroughly deliberate over its battle plan before proceeding.

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Far from being advocates of peace, those counseling caution are merely making the obvious, albeit chilling, point that a military strike on Pakistan could quickly spiral into an all-out war and with a nuclear-armed adversary. An adversary, moreover, that has publicly stated the massive strategic imbalance between it and India has compelled it to deploy “battlefield,” or tactical nuclear weapons, and signaled that they will be used if Indian forces launch or, in the midst of a war, mass for an invasion of Pakistan. “We will avenge the killings of our soldiers,” an unnamed top military commander told the Indian Express. “But we will do so based on cold-blooded professional military assessment, and a timeline of our own choosing, not one dictated by political imperative or the prime-time news cycle.” On September 20, the Express and other influential Indian dailies reported that senior military commanders had told the government a “swift” strike on Pakistan may not be “feasible” because Pakistan has mobilised forces near the LoC in readiness and because Indian forces are not yet positioned to thwart the inevitable Pakistani counter-strike. Such reports could well be disinformation. In the run-up to the May 2014 election that brought him to power, Modi pilloried the previous Congress Party-led government for its supposed “appeasement” of Pakistan. Leaders of his Hindu supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its ideological ally, the RSS, have been leading the outcry for swift and decisive action against Pakistan. But insofar as there is truth to the claim, India has decided not to immediately take the most incendiary actions—a high-profile cross-border attack or airplane and missile strikes—pressure from Washington is undoubtedly also a motivating factor. Washington has deplored the Uri attack and reaffirmed its partnership with India. But it has not joined New Delhi in labelling Pakistan responsible for Sunday’s assault. In summarising the outcome of US Secretary of State John Kerry’s Monday meeting with Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, a State Department spokesman said that Kerry had insisted on the need for India and Pakistan to work together to reduce tensions. He added that Kerry had praised Pakistan’s contribution to the fight against “terrorism,” while repeating the US’s standard call for Pakistan to do more to stop its territory from being used as a “safe haven” by terrorists. With the aim of harnessing India to its drive to strategically isolate, encircle, and prepare for war with China, the US under George W Bush and 111

now Obama has forged a “global strategic partnership” with India and lavished it with strategic favours, including access to the Pentagon’s most advanced technology. Pakistan has warned in ever more shrill language that the Indo-US alliance has overturned the balance of power in South Asia, emboldening India and triggering a weapons and nuclear arms race. But all to no avail. The strategists of US imperialism view India as the crucial south-western pillar of a quadrilateral anti-China alliance, involving its principal Asian-Pacific allies, Japan and Australia. However, Washington, in keeping with the imperialist patron-client character of its relationship with India and to the consternation of the Indian elite, has repeatedly shown that it is not ready to cede New Delhi a “free hand” in dealing with Pakistan. US strategists are well aware that the Indo-Pakistani conflict could rapidly escalate to war with potentially incalculable consequences for the people of South Asia, and more importantly, from their view, US hegemony over Eurasia. Even heightened tensions between New Delhi and Islamabad cut across the US war in Afghanistan, which remains almost wholly dependent on Pakistan for logistical support. However, none of this should be interpreted to mean that South Asia is anything but teetering on the precipice of war. The rival ruling elites of India and Pakistan are primed to dangerously escalate their confrontation in the coming days and weeks. Moreover, the US’s reckless drive for global hegemony, which has already blown up the Middle East and brought the world closer to a clash of the great powers than any time since the World War II, has now sucked South Asia into the maelstrom of imperialist violence and war—adding a highly combustible explosive charge to all the region’s conflicts, most importantly those between India and Pakistan and India and China. Even the more “measured” steps India will reportedly take, should it deem an immediate strike on Pakistan too hazardous, would dramatically escalate tensions and propel India and Pakistan toward a clash. The difference between the two options is at most that between lighting a long or a short fuse to war. According to the press reports, the “measured” steps include– — Sustained (i.e. weeks or months) of artillery barrages across the LoC to make the Pakistani military “bleed.” 112

— Small cross-border raids into Pakistan to kill Kashmiri insurgents and Pakistani troops, but that will be publicly touted as encounters on Indian soil. (According to an article in September 20 edition of Indian Express, the Indian military used this tactic during the undeclared 1999 Kargil War, seizing and executing seven Pakistani soldiers.) — Expanding India’s military-strategic involvement in Afghanistan, with the aim of countering Pakistan’s influence and placing pressure on it from the north and west. (Pakistan has repeatedly charged that India’s intelligence agency, RAW, is already using Afghanistan to provide support to both nationalist insurgents in Balochistan and to the Pakistan Taliban.) — Intensifying India’s recently-launched strategic offensive to leverage the Balochistan issue, that is the Balochi nationalist opposition to the Pakistani state in its resource rich, western-most province. Rattled by the mass protests in Kashmir—protests the BJP government has dismissed as the product of nothing more than the machinations of “Pakistani “terrorists”—Modi last month launched a major strategic turn, announcing that henceforth India will denounce Islamabad’s brutal repression in Balochistan at the UN and other international forums. So as to underscore the implicit threat of Indian support for Pakistan’s dismemberment, New Delhi has also indicated that it intends to give more “political space” to the Balochi separatists in India. This strategy would appear to be the brainchild of Modi’s national security adviser, Ajit Doval, who in advocating a more aggressive policy against Pakistan in a February 2014 speech declared: “You do one more Mumbai (a reference to the 2008 Mumbai terror attack), and you lose Balochistan.” While directed first and foremost against Islamabad, India’s new Balochistan policy also targets Beijing. In response to India’s burgeoning strategic partnership with the US, China has moved over the past year and a half to enhance its longstanding “all weather friendship” with Pakistan. China is investing $46bn in Pakistan to build a transit and pipeline corridor stretching from western China to the Arabian Sea Port of Gwadar, in southwestern Balochistan. India virulently opposes the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) because it provides a desperately needed shot in the arm to Pakistan’s economy. But it is also well aware that the CPEC has major strategic implications for China. Were the CPEC to be completed, it would enable Beijing to partially counter US plans to impose an economic

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blockade on China in the event of a war or war crisis by seizing Indian Ocean and South China Sea “chokepoints.” While Washington may today seek to dampen India-Pakistan tensions because they cut across its own predatory designs, its drive to make India a “frontline” state in its anti-China military-strategic offensive is a hugely destabilising factor and is whetting New Delhi’s own reactionary great power ambitions. The logic of the US’s actions is to polarize the region, dramatically raising the likelihood that a war between India and Pakistan would draw in other great powers, starting with the US and China. __________________

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