Was the U.S.-India relationship oversold?US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will visit Kolkata on May 7 where she is expected to meet West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. While it is yet to be finalised, this meeting will assume significance in the light of Mamata’s opposition to FDI in retail. The US is keen to enter the retail sector in India through the FDI route.
No visa for Narendra Modi, reiterates US
NEW DELHI: Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi may have recently appeared on the cover of Time magazine's Asia edition, but the US says there is no change in its policy to not grant him a visa.
"Our position on the visa issue hasn't changed at all," state department spokesperson Victoria Nuland told reporters at her daily news conference in Washington on Wednesday. She was responding to questions on the letter written by Congressman Joe Walsh to secretary of state Hillary Clinton, that the US government reverse its 2005 decision not to issue US visa to Modi.
The letter by Walsh was written about a fortnight ago. "If we do respond, it'll be along familiar lines," Nuland said. The Indian American Muslim community demanded, in a statement, that the state department should not change its 2005 policy on Modi's visa. He was first denied visa in 2005, three years after the Gujarat riots.
For Modi's political rivals, the US stand gives fresh fuel to attack him over the 2002 riots, which have haunted the BJP leader ever since. While Congress refrained from commenting on the US policy and asked Modi to reflect on it, BJP said it was for the US to ponder over its approach towards an elected chief minister.
"I am sure that they (US) look at everything they want to look at... Not for us to comment on US policy but it is a matter of serious concern that there is this kind of serious question mark on the personality of somebody who leads a major state in our country," law minister Salman Khurshid said replying to questions on the US stand. "It is sad but we have that. I hope that the person concerned will reflect upon this and think about it and think about why the world thinks so poorly of him," he said.
BJP said Modi had not applied for a US visa. "Its up to the US administration to see that while extremists, despots, dictators can get safe haven in the US, a chief minister who has won thrice cannot," BJP's chief spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad said. The US had said that it could not issue him a diplomatic visa because of its Immigration and Nationality Act which states that any foreign government official responsible for serious violation of religious freedom is ineligible for a visa.
Notice how the Cheenis and Uncle were so willing to help Pakis until we first a) weaponised in 1989 and b) post pokhran and restart of Agni missile series.Sushupti wrote:US Knew Of Pak's Screwdriver Nukes, Kept Quiet
Memos that are scheduled to be released on Thursday reveal that Pakistan was lying about its nuclear program in the 1980s, and was in fact seeking nuclear weapons. The US halted assistance to Pakistan in 1990 after concluding that the country was developing nuclear weapons.
http://india.nydailynews.com/newsarticl ... d-on-nukes
Remind me of the last time US refused visa to a government official from Pakistan or China on the basis of violating religious freedom.Manu wrote:The US had said that it could not issue him a diplomatic visa because of its Immigration and Nationality Act which states that any foreign government official responsible for serious violation of religious freedom is ineligible for a visa.
2 I can think of immediately,rkirankr wrote:One newbie kind of question: Aren't there any fissures in the US which can be exploited to keep them busy in their own country?
This might explain the following: -(Reuters) - U.S. companies are poised to sign defense deals totaling $8 billion with India, U.S. Ambassador Nancy Powell said on Friday at her first public speech since arriving in New Delhi this month.
Powell did not specify which companies she was talking about or when the deals would be signed, but embassy officials said she was referring to negotiations that include about a dozen Apache helicopters along with engines for Indian jets.
"We are poised to sign an additional $8 billion in direct commercial and foreign military sales," Powell said. "As we share more common equipment, our bilateral defense ties will become stronger."
...
U.S. companies including Boeing Co, Lockheed Martin Corp and Raytheon Co are some of the contractors looking to grab a share of India's planned military spending.
Industrial conglomerate Honeywell International Inc. is offering engines for the Indian Airforce's Jaguar fighter aircraft.
Powell said improving bilateral trade and investment was her main objective as ambassador, mentioning U.S. concerns about tariff and non-tariff barriers and a new retroactive tax law as obstacles in the relationship.
Add Saudis to the list.ManishH wrote:Remind me of the last time US refused visa to a government official from Pakistan or China on the basis of violating religious freedom.
Friday, 27 April 2012 14:50
Hoping to get a bigger slice in the pie of massive Indian defence modernisation efforts, the US has said the level of its willingness to share defence technologies with India has never been higher than it is now.
"The level of our willingness to share technology with India has never been higher," Andrew Shapiro, Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs, said.
The US bid for Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) -- which had failed -- demonstrated its willingness to transfer some of these technologies, he said.
In a wide ranging-interview to a group of Indian journalists, Shapiro, who last week held the first India-US PolMil dialogue in six years, said the US is willing to share best of its technologies with India and that the India-US defence sale and purchase is not a buyer-seller relationship.
The US is interested in providing India with the best technology it has, he said.
In the last 10 years the defence trade between the two countries has increased from virtually nil to USD 8 billion.
"Next decade, sky is the limit. We think, we have the best defence products in the world. India is interested in modernising its military across all the services.
"We think we have competitive technology and defence articles that would be able to serve their needs for each of their services," Shapiro said, but hesitated to put a number on the figures.
"From India any company that apply for licences are denied for less than one per cent of the time. That is comparable to our closest partners around the world," he said, adding the figures are that of last year.
Further, the processing time has decreased from 30-40 days on an average to just 17 days, he added.
"We are willing to sell defence articles to India and the refusal rate is very very low," he said. "We demonstrated our willingness to share high technology items. But there still have some shibboleths to work through the Indian system of working with the US and their willingness to work with our system," Shapiro said.
One of the bottlenecks that "I am willing to overcome is the idea that our foreign military sale (FMS), which is our government to government sale can't be used in a competitive bidding contest.
"Our FMS bids include life cycle cost and maintenance costs... So it comes in a little higher than others. By law, we cannot make profit on FMS sales. So it's corruption proof. You are getting the best price," he said.Shapiro hoped that America's Apache helicopters would beselected in India's attack helicopters competition.
During his trip to New Delhi, the two countries, he said, had discussions on a number of bilateral, regional and global issues, including Afghanistan, Pakistan, China, and piracy.
Officials of the two countries talked about bilateral trade.
During the New Delhi meeting, he said, the two countries talked about how they would like to transfer technologies. The US would like that its technologies are secure.
"We talked about their desire for co-production and co-assembly agreements," he said, adding that they have a number of proposals for the potential projects that the two countries can do together.
Without specifically mentioning them, he hoped that India and the US would soon be able to reach agreements that would be helpful to both countries.
"Ballistic missile defence issue was not something that was discussed in detail during the dialogue," he said in response to a question.
The US official said the two countries are building a robust relationship based on shared security interests.
Since the signing of a bilateral defence framework agreement in 2005, the defence relationship has become a major pillar of the strategic partnership.
Now India holds more than 50 annual military exercises with the United States, more than any other country, which includes some of the sophisticated exercises. "Both military find those exercises tremendously productive," Shapiro said.
Responding to a question, he said there are no US special forces in India. On Iran, he said the US is encouraged by the fact that India is seeking alternative sources of energy.
Replying to another question, he denied reports that the US is seeking India's help in using Iranian route to get its equipment's from Afghanistan as it begins the process of withdrawal.
"That would be news to me," he said.
On China, he said both the countries are not trying to characterise the Communist nation as a threat.
Most of it as good as useless because it always has strings attached.
How about we start with AEGIS for IN and take forward from there.
There is little long term thinking. Although, SDREs generally pout that their vedic system goads one to think of consequences for seven generations of any action/s they undertake, the practicality of polity disallows more than 1 to 2 election cycles. It will be pursued ruthlessly.nvishal wrote: Post agni-V test, china had correctly pointed out about how india acquires most of its defense needs from outside and it was a direct contradiction to indias aspirations to becoming a super power.
India needs to bankroll its own defense and r&d industry rather than bankrolling some foreign company(like rafale ithayadi).
First, the US kills indias nuclear development in lieu of electricity generation.
Then, it wants to kill its aspiring defense industry by undercutting
India needs to think long term.
If not for steadfast support of expat Gujju community, NaMo would have been crucified in the US media. Making it to TIME is the result of hard work of many Gujjus and spending top dollar to bring the result. A lot of money has been invested in "Brand Modi" by them, it is only a matter of time before the law of averages will bear fruit. India had to bear lot of insults because of sleepy PM, Steel knee PM, and now limp dcik PM. It is time for a change.abhischekcc wrote: 7. The fact that the US is so dead set against NAMO shows how much they are willing to do to hurt Hindu interests.
Funny, how allocations to DRDO, MMRCA, domestic Artillery, Domestic rifles, Pinaka etc takes years. But US Purchases get done in a jiffy.Roperia wrote:U.S., India to sign $8 billion defense deals: envoy
This might explain the following: -(Reuters) - U.S. companies are poised to sign defense deals totaling $8 billion with India, U.S. Ambassador Nancy Powell said on Friday at her first public speech since arriving in New Delhi this month.
Powell did not specify which companies she was talking about or when the deals would be signed, but embassy officials said she was referring to negotiations that include about a dozen Apache helicopters along with engines for Indian jets.
"We are poised to sign an additional $8 billion in direct commercial and foreign military sales," Powell said. "As we share more common equipment, our bilateral defense ties will become stronger."
...
U.S. companies including Boeing Co, Lockheed Martin Corp and Raytheon Co are some of the contractors looking to grab a share of India's planned military spending.
Industrial conglomerate Honeywell International Inc. is offering engines for the Indian Airforce's Jaguar fighter aircraft.
Powell said improving bilateral trade and investment was her main objective as ambassador, mentioning U.S. concerns about tariff and non-tariff barriers and a new retroactive tax law as obstacles in the relationship.
- The speculated trip of US Secretary of Defence, Leon Panetta, in June,
- The bilateral Defence Policy Dialogue in New Delhi held on February 21, co-chaired by Defence Secretary Shashi Kant Sharma and US Acting Under Secretary of Defence for Policy Jim Miller.
- Political-military dialogue co-chaired by Joint Secretary (Americas) in the Ministry of External Affairs, Ashraf Javed and US Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs, Andrew Shapiro a couple of weeks back.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here are exact costs of the contracts
$1.4 billion for direct commercial sale of 22 AH-64Ds. (US government details AH-64D bid for Indian air force contract)
$1.2 billion for 6 more Lockheed Martin C-130J tactical transports. DSCA notifies US Congress of possible India C-130J deal
$647 million for 145 M777 155mm Light-Weight Towed Howitzers (India – M777 155mm Light-Weight Towed Howitzers)
$2 billion for roughly 250 new engines for the Jaguar Upgrade (India to Settle for a Single Vendor for Jaguar Upgrade)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
That's roughly $5.25 billion, what is the rest of $2.75 billion?
Jarita wrote:The Narendra Modi refusal might be more due to the EJ agenda than anything else
In a move that could help the government trim its burgeoning health care costs, the Food and Drug Administration may soon permit Americans to obtain some drugs used to treat conditions such as high blood pressure and diabetes without obtaining a prescription.The FDA says over-the-counter distribution would let patients get drugs for many common conditions without the time and expense of visiting a doctor, but medical providers call the change medically unsound and note that it also may mean that insurance no longer will pay for the drugs.“The problem is medicine is just not that simple,” said Dr. Matthew Mintz, an internist at George Washington University Hospital. “You can’t just follow rules and weigh all the pros and cons. It needs to be individualized.”
Under the changes that the agency is considering, patients could diagnose their ailments by answering questions online or at a pharmacy kiosk in order to buy current prescription-only drugs for conditions such as high cholesterol, certain infections, migraine headaches, asthma or allergies.By removing the prescription requirement from popular drugs, the Obama administration could ease financial pressures on the overburdened Medicare system by paying for fewer doctor visits and possibly opening the door to make seniors pay a larger share of the cost of their medications.
The change could have mixed results for non-Medicare patients. Although they may not have to visit a doctor as often, they could have to dish out more money for medications because most insurance companies don’t cover over-the-counter drugs.“We would expect that out-of-pocket costs for insured individuals, including those covered by Medicare, would be increased for drugs that are switched from prescription to OTC status,” said Dr. Sandra Adamson Fryhofer, who testified last month on behalf of the American Medical Association in an FDA-held public hearing.Pharmacists and doctors have lined up on opposite sides of the issue. Often trying to combat a public perception that downplays their medical training, pharmacists embrace the notion that they should be able to dole out medication for patients’ chronic conditions without making them go through a doctor.“We think it’s a great development for everybody — for pharmacists, for patients and the whole health care system,” said Brian Gallagher, a lobbyist for the American Pharmacists Association. “The way we look at it is there are a lot of people out there with chronic conditions that are undertreated and this would enable the pharmacists to redirect these undertreated people back into the health care system.”
- Air force request to join exercise with American navy turned down
SUJAN DUTTA
Ships of the Indian and US navies during the Malabar exercise in the Bay of Bengal. (PTI)
New Delhi, April 28: The Centre recently turned down an air force request to participate in the war games with the US navy in the Bay of Bengal that concluded last week.
The seven-day Malabar 2012 exercise involved the American and Indian navies.
The Centre’s move followed a quiet policy decision in the defence ministry to scale down — but not stop — the friendly military engagements with the US armed forces, which have gathered pace and increased in complexity over the past decade.
The defence ministry is wary of the “hype” that the US builds around joint military exercises with India.
Among the most important of the war games that the Indian and US forces conduct is the Malabar series involving the two navies. An air force component is integral to the exercises because the US deploys a carrier battle group.
The Malabar exercise in 2007 in the Bay of Bengal involved the armed forces of five countries and was easily the largest international war games that India has hosted. The exercise involved three aircraft carriers and the Indian Air Force (IAF).
That drill irritated the Chinese so much that Beijing asked New Delhi if it was forging a military alliance against it.
For this year’s Malabar exercise, based out of Chennai, the US deployed the Carrier Strike Group-1 with the Nimitz-class carrier USS Carl Vinson in the lead. The US also deployed a Los Angeles-class nuclear submarine.
When the IAF asked to be part of the exercise, the ministry turned down the request. While it was reworking its proposal, air headquarters communicated its desire to naval headquarters.
The navy was of the view that involving the air force would require a change in the “Con Ops” (concept of operations).
The air force wanted to deploy its Shamsher (Jaguar) fighter-bombers that are assigned to the maritime strike role. The IAF’s Maritime Air Operations are headquartered in its southern command.
After the navy told the IAF that it was too late to change the “Con Ops”, the air force wanted a separate exercise with the US navy, the second-largest air force in the world. The USS Carl Vinson alone carries 85 aircraft in its hangars and flight deck.
The highlight of the seven-day Malabar 2012 in the absence of complex maritime-aerial drills was the refuelling in high sea of the USS Carl Vinson by the Indian Navy’s new Italy-built feeder vessel, the INS Shakti. India also deployed the INS Satpura, the indigenously built stealth frigate commissioned earlier this year.
The Carrier Strike Group-1 included, apart from the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson, the Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser USS Bunker Hill and the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Halsey (DDG 97).
It also deployed the Military Sealift Command fast combat support ship, the USNS Bridge. The Indian assets included the frigate INS Satpura, destroyers INS Ranvir and INS Ranvijay (D55), and the corvette INS Kulish along with the replenishment oiler INS Shakti.
The exercise took place in approximately 450 nautical miles of sea and air space. The INS Satpura led one group and the USS Bunker Hill another.
If the Japanese and/or the Nazis
conquer India, they will capture
the raw material arsenal of Asia, a
storehouse of economic and industrial resources. The deposits of
high-grade iron ore are second only
to those of the United States.
India produces one-third of the
world’s manganese, and has huge
reserves of coal and aluminumbearing bauxite. She is the second
largest supplier of oil seeds, vital
for war production, and ranks next
to the United States as a grower
of cotton.
And then promptly goes back to his India baiting ways while doing an equal=equal between India and the Islamic Republic of Pakistan:‘Peace in region only when US aligns with India’
……………. Peace can only be won when everybody has a seat at the table, power is dispersed and we align ourselves with democratic India. ………………
Zee News
Pen friends: Rohrabacher writes letter to Gilani, calls Pakistan a 'failed state'
Warns that aid for Pakist¬an will dry up once the US leaves Afghan¬istan.
By Huma Imtiaz
Published: May 3, 2012
………………………. In his letter, Rep. Rohrabacher says that until Pakistan’s government and military deny ethnic groups in the country their right to self-determination, the country’s future will “remain bleak and marred by political violence”. He added that he has long held India to the same standard as well. …………………………
Express Tribune
Until the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the American view of radical Islam and its many discontents was shaped more by the Middle East than South Asia. The U.S. has long been at odds with the raging Ayatollah in Iran, the murderous truck bomber in Lebanon and the masked Palestinian "freedom fighter." Only over the past decade has the geographical footprint of this scourge expanded in the popular imagination to include Afghanistan and Pakistan.In this sense, the Navy SEALs raid on Osama bin Laden's home in Pakistan, a year ago, marked the culmination of a widely shared intellectual journey. Its milestones include the war against the Taliban, the capture or killing of dozens of al Qaeda leaders in Pakistani safe houses, and the tracing of some of the world's most prominent terrorist acts—including the 2005 London bombings and the 2008 Mumbai attacks—to Karachi, Islamabad and the badlands straddling Pakistan and Afghanistan.Even so, our recently updated understanding of radical Islam tends to halt at Pakistan's border with India. Despite India's 150-million-strong Muslim population, its status as the birthplace of Islamist thought in South Asia, and a clutch of jihadist groups operating on its territory, the country figures only tangentially in the best-known books on the subject. It is this lack that the London-based journalist and historian Dilip Hiro seeks to address in "Apocalyptic Realm: Jihadists in South Asia." The jacket announces it as the "first complete history of Islamist terrorism in South Asia."Mr. Hiro attempts to make a fist of these disparate stories. His purpose: "to show that the interrelated jihadist movements in Afghanistan and Pakistan have infected India, and that they pose a serious threat to the Pakistani state." In a familiar refrain, he blames the U.S. for its role in nurturing the anti-Soviet jihad in Afghanistan in the 1980s, which he sees as the genesis of today's problems, and for a ham-handed campaign in Afghanistan since 2001 that has only made matters worse. He argues that, thanks in part to the poor economic and social condition of India's Muslim community, the "cycle of violence" between "Muslims and Hindus in India is yet to run its course."Independent India's brush with radical Islam is more recent. Though the country has experienced periodic Hindu-Muslim riots since the 1947 Partition, Islamic terrorism was virtually unknown to Indians before erupting in Kashmir in the late 1980s and spreading to the rest of the country. For this, Mr. Hiro blames not only the ISI but also the rise of Hindu nationalism and New Delhi's heavy-handed rule in Kashmir.
Mr. Hiro ought to be commended for attempting to bring a regional lens to a subject too often written about in narrower terms. Nobody can seriously disagree with his assertion that instability in Afghanistan and Pakistan is bound to spill over into India. Nonetheless, "Apocalyptic Realm" falls short. Mr. Hiro spends too much time retelling events—at times month by month—and too little analyzing their import. He also fails to connect the dots between the Middle Eastern and South Asian strains of the ideology, represented not only by bin Laden but also by, among others, Ayman Al-Zawahiri, the man who now leads al Qaeda. The intellectual cross-fertilization between Sayyid Qutb (1906-66), chief ideologue of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, and Abul Ala Maududi (1903-79), founder of South Asia's Jamaat-e-Islami, goes unnoticed, though between them the two organizations have spawned most of the world's Sunni jihadist offshoots.It is hard to know precisely what threat is posed by the collection of violent incidents that Mr. Hiro surveys. One lesson of recent years has been that the West if it does not view this conflict as a war of ideas, risks returning to the complacency of the 1990s that led up to 9/11. But one thing is certain: In South Asia, neither Islamism as an ideology nor jihadism as a tactic has run its course.
U.S. trump card in the Afghan endgame
M.K. Bhadrakumar - January 9, 2012
The Afghan endgame has got off to an exciting start. The great reconciliation with the Taliban is all set to begin. Through sustained diplomatic efforts, Washington has gained acceptance — in the domestic opinion in the United States as well as internationally — of the idea that durable peace in Afghanistan can be reached only through an inclusive settlement involving the reconciliation of the Taliban. No one today (including the visceral critics of the Taliban in the Indian establishment) would demur about the idea of reconciling the Taliban that seemed so bizarre as recently as in January 2010, when it was first introduced at the London peace conference. In fact, no Indian official any longer quibbles over the subtle difference between ‘reintegration' and ‘reconciliation' in the diplomatic idiom.
‘Taliban not our enemy'
At any rate, it is crystal clear that the Obama administration intends to press ahead with the idea — and even speed up its realisation — no matter what others think about it. If Vice-President Joseph Biden is to be taken on his word, Washington has unceremoniously dumped the pre-conditions it underlined at the London conference. To quote Mr. Biden, the Taliban “ per se is not our [U.S.'] enemy.” Clearly, the strategic ambiguity over the ultimate destiny of the Taliban in mainstream Afghan political life has been conclusively cleared and the U.S. is open about its willingness — nay, keenness — to accommodate the Taliban in the power structure. So, the tantalising part of the U.S. strategy now narrows down to the ‘great game.' Put differently, what the U.S.' ‘hidden agenda' could be with regard to the western military presence in the region beyond 2014, which is the timeline set for the drawdown of the U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Here, too, the strategic ambiguity is being incrementally removed with a steady, calibrated spate of statements coyly suggesting Washington's determination to retain a permanent military presence, including combat troops, for itself and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation. What 2012 will unfold is the high drama of bringing the Taliban in from the cold and getting it to accept the idea of a long-term U.S. military presence in Afghanistan, which it has so far opposed.
This is where Qatar comes in.The Obama administration places trust in the skill Qatar displayed in Libya (and, to an extent, in Egypt) in finessing seemingly intractable Islamist groups by making them susceptible to the way of all flesh. The western accounts claim Qatar spent $450 million on Libya. Thanks to the charming Qatari ally, the U.S. has been able to catapult itself to the ‘right side of history' in the Middle East alongside the Islamists on the surge. The Obama administration is optimistic about bringing the Taliban to Doha and exposing it to the magical Qatari ways of relaxing even Islamists with a stubbornly religious outlook. There could be other countries in the region such as Turkey or Saudi Arabia that may be ‘Islamic' but they do not possess the special skills that Qatar seems to have. All said, therefore, it stands to reason that the head of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence, Ahmed Shuja Pasha, travelled to Doha recently to make an on-the-spot assessment of the prospects of Qatar doing a ‘Libya' on the Taliban.
Thus, in the run-up to the New Year, the Obama administration began signalling that it was raring to go. Carefully planted media ‘leaks' began to appear, speculating on the appreciable progress of the U.S.' initial contacts with the Taliban so far and underscoring the high efficacy of buttressing the positive impulses of this sub-soil intercourse with some open display of confidence-building measures (CBMs), aimed at enticing the Taliban leaders to sit across the table with American officials in a formal setting in Qatar. Thanks to the latest ‘leak' on New Year's Eve, we now know that the Obama administration is considering the transfer to Afghan custody a senior Taliban official, Mullah Mohammed Fazl, detained at the Guantanamo Bay. The ‘leak' maintains that his release (transfer to Qatar) is by way of acceding to a request by the Kabul set-up. Now, Fazl is big-time Taliban — actually, one of the most experienced Taliban commanders and one of Mullah Omar's closest associates right from the infancy of the movement in the early 1990s. He went on to serve as deputy defence minister and chief of the Afghan militia.
Fazl's ‘homecoming'
Conceivably, nothing would convince Omar of American goodwill more than Fazl's ‘homecoming'. But herein hangs a tale. Fazl also happens to be linked to some of the bloodiest pages in the Taliban saga. According to reports reaching Tashkent, when the Taliban under the ISI's astute guidance and backing moved into the Amu Darya region, thousands of Shi'ite Hazaras, including women and children, were killed in ethnic cleansing in the August-September of 1998 and left to rot on the streets of Mazar-i-Sharif to be eaten by wild dogs. Reliable accounts put the figure at over 5000 killed. Indeed, Fazl (and Taliban governor of Mazar-i-Sharif, Mullah Manon Niazi if he is alive) would have a great deal to explain as war criminal — as also his role in the execution of eight Iranian diplomats who were assigned to northern Afghanistan.
Again, Fazl resurfaced in a pivotal role in strange circumstances during the surrender of the Taliban in Kunduz and Mazar-i-Sharif in November 2001. Most certainly, he mediated between the U.S. Special Forces and the al-Qaeda's ‘foreign fighters' who were taken prisoner in Kunduz. The then leader of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Juma Namangani, was an associate of Fazl. Fazl was a key figure in the execution of the grand design of the Taliban and the al-Qaeda (and its affiliates such as IMU) toward Central Asia and Russia's North Caucasus region. At the very least, he was Mullah Omar's ‘point person' at the operational level with the al-Qaeda, and he probably had one foot inside the al-Qaeda camp. Suffice to say, Fazl is not exactly the human face of political Islam in Afghanistan.
However, the Obama administration will be resorting to a masterstroke if it brings Fazl out from his 2x1 metre underground cell in Guantanamo Bay where he has been interned for a decade. Mr. Pasha's visit to Qatar to confer with the U.S. Central Command officials suggests that the ISI would like to take a rain check. After all, Fazl was a darling of the ISI and his ‘homecoming' ought to be a delightful event. Conceivably, it can even be transformed as Washington's ‘olive branch' to Rawalpindi. Fazl is today America's man too, after the intense bonding in Guantanamo Bay. But there is uncertainty when someone like Fazl is introduced into the game at extra time. For instance, the Haqqani clan may not easily give way to him. Of course, all this is predicated on Qatar ensuring that Fazl's metamorphosis as a reasonable Islamist politician is complete.
Terrific equation with the ISI
What is the game plan? First and foremost, Fazl does have the credentials to bring Mullah Omar on board for launching formal peace talks. Rather, the initial contacts between the U.S. and the Taliban can be expected to move on to a qualitatively new level if he is around. Second, Fazl is a familiar face to the Taliban militia and it would be inclined to emulate his farewell to arms. Third, he is one of the finest products of Pakistan's madrassas and he enjoyed terrific equations with the ISI. (Declassified U.S. State Department documents cite him as a key figure in the Taliban's capture of Kabul in 1996.) His bonding with the Islamist forces in Pakistan and the ISI can be useful channels of communication to persuade Islamabad to cooperate with the U.S.-led peace talks or, at the very least, refrain from undercutting. Fourth, Fazl evokes hostile sentiments from the Hazaras but not so much from the Tajiks (Ahmed Shah Massoud negotiated prisoner exchanges with him) or the Uzbekis (he worked with the U.S. Special Forces in November 2001 while in Rashid Dostum's custody in Qala-i-Jangi.) Fazl's appearance can throw the erstwhile Northern Alliance groups into disarray.
But Fazl is a trump card for the U.S. on two other templates. One, he is an antidote to Iran's influence in Afghanistan and can create imbalance in the delicate Iran-Pakistan equations. Tehran cannot easily forgive him for his war crimes. Two, Fazl used to be the Taliban's interface with the Jihadi Internationale and he is just the partner Washington might need in the great game if the ‘Arab Spring' were to appear in Central Asia holding prospects of regime change and the rise of ‘Islamic democracies' in the steppes. Of course, Fazl can always be counted upon to persuade the Taliban not to make such a terrible issue of the U.S. plans to establish military bases in Afghanistan.
Have friends who dealt with him directly. A very slithery and greedy guy you expect from a politician.arun wrote:The need for India to be cautiously circumspect in dealing with the US reiterated.
India-baiter, US legislator Dana Rohrabacher, pushes for an alliance with India:
‘Peace in region only when US aligns with India’
……………. Peace can only be won when everybody has a seat at the table, power is dispersed and we align ourselves with democratic India. ………………
The Galleon Group hedge fund wasn't alone in piling into Goldman Sachs Group Inc. GS -2.28%stock hours before the bank announced a $5 billion investment from Warren Buffett's firm at the height of the financial crisis, trading records show. The last-minute purchases by Galleon founder Raj Rajaratnam on that day, Sept. 23, 2008, are expected to be a focus of the insider-trading trial of former Goldman director Rajat Gupta, who is accused of leaking news of the still-secret investment to Mr. Rajaratnam in a phone call just before the market closed. But a quick run-up in Goldman stock that preceded Galleon's orders by several minutes—suggesting that others may have had early notice of the blockbuster Buffett investment—could also emerge as a key point in the defense of Mr. Gupta as his lawyers point to other possible leaks, people familiar with the case say.
It isn't unusual for stocks to spike in volume or price at the end of the day, and during those weeks of financial uncertainty, Goldman's stock surged and sank with even greater severity on other occasions. Mr. Gupta's criminal trial for securities fraud and conspiracy is scheduled to begin May 21 and expected to last about three weeks. Mr. Gupta has pleaded not guilty. His lawyer, Gary Naftalis, declined to comment for this article but previously has called the accusations "totally baseless." The Manhattan U.S. attorney's office also declined to comment.Federal prosecutors in Manhattan have taken note of the spike in trading in Goldman, which began as the firm's board concluded a special meeting to approve the deal that afternoon, according to people familiar with the matter. Galleon traders also noticed the climbing stock, conversations recorded on government wiretaps show. "Someone had this before us, someone, whatever went on, something happened," Galleon trader Ian Horowitz told Mr. Rajaratnam in a phone call the next morning, caught on tape by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. "I got a call, right, saying something good's gonna happen," interrupted Mr. Rajaratnam, who was convicted of insider trading last year partly based on the Goldman trading. He is now serving an 11-year sentence.Mr. Gupta disconnected from the board call at 3:54 p.m. and called Mr. Rajaratnam 16 seconds later, according to phone records. Starting at 3:57 p.m., Mr. Rajaratnam ordered 350,000 shares of Goldman; he obtained 217,200, according to records from his trial.
But Goldman's price and volume had already started moving higher around the time the board call was concluding, an analysis of the stock's trading shows. It had been hovering around $118 or $119 a share between 3:40 p.m. and 3:52 p.m., with an average of 50,500 shares changing hands each minute, according to price data obtained from Telvent DTN, an information-services firm.In the five minutes before Mr. Rajaratnam bought, from 3:52 p.m. through 3:56 p.m., Goldman's price rose 2.9% to more than $123, and 503,000 shares were traded, or an average of about 100,500 a minute.
How about the fact that there are Anglo-Saxon/European kabilas in many parts of the world too? Infact European colonialism is their kabila project on the new-world. We need our own kabila to migrate and compete with these.ramana wrote: So dont be too hard and rigid about the permanance of any power. Only the kabila survives.
Note the 1965 Immigration Act is what opened up the borders for Indian immigration. The 3M strong community is really an economic gypsy kabila in US. It might be uprooted and driven out. Be ready for change all the time.
