with Dr. A.K. Enamul Haque PhD

Some things are just hard to picture.  Over the last few weeks I have watched the events in Bangkok unfold and wondered about my friend.  I’ve never been to Bangkok Thailand.  However, my friend Enamul is in Bangkok often.  He goes there for meetings on a regular basis as it is only about a 120 minute plane ride from Dhaka.  So with him there at the height of the violence in Bangkok over the last few weeks, my concern was heightened.  I couldn’t picture him among the violent streetscapes, which are pictured on television.

It just so happened that I found myself with time on my hands during this period.  So I watched my computer light up on several days with Dr. Haque on the other end of a Skype call.  We make a habit of chatting when he is in a foreign capital as usually the Internet connection is quite good and Skype works quite well.  So I answered his calls, my first question was how was he doing and did he know what was going on in Bangkok?

He answered in the style that he always answers, there is no problem where he is and that it is in Bangkok city.  There is no trouble here.  Enamul was at the Asian Institute of Technology 30 kilometres outside of the city of Bangkok.  When I talked to him he almost was seemingly unaware of the violence that was going on in the city.  However, on the other side of the world we watched together a BBC news report on the violence in the city.  I think everybody at this end was quite relieved to know that Enamul was safe.  I’m sure that his family back in Bangladesh was wondering about the same thing.

Of course I asked him at that time what some of the Thai people were thinking about the “redshirt demonstrators”?   He told me that he did not have a lot of contact with the regular Thai people and the ones that he did have didn’t say too much.  He said it was almost a cultural thing as in many Asian people don’t like to describe some of the chaos that is going on in their home country.  He was at a conference, which was mainly put on by foreigners.  So his exposure to the political violence in Bangkok thankfully was minimal.

That was the good news.  However, the daily images from the television showed a much more violent story.  Thailand in the West has an almost idyllic reputation.  When people think of Thailand, they think of the beaches Phunket, the gentle nature of the people and of course I’m sure there are many people who think about the food.  Needless to say, increasingly that image of Thailand is changing as the country has shown an increasing tendency for instability over the last few years because of protest, a weak democracy and corruption.  The latest manifestation of the “red shirt” rebellion in downtown Bangkok was one of the bloodiest stains on that country’s reputation.   Increasingly, peaceful and tranquil Thailand is losing that reputation.

Some might argue that the political instability centers squarely in Bangkok and not in the surrounding countryside other than the north and northwest of the country.  I will let Dr. Haque handle that one.  Bangkok is one of those exotic places on the world stage that demands press coverage.  So when the yellow shirts took over the Bangkok airport and the red shirts staged a rebellion in downtown, it surely grabs the world’s attention.  It surely is a unique Thai situation because shirt collar has never been a distinction on political factions around the world, at least to what I could remember.

Protest comes in many forms and the Thai example is truly unique for that part of the world.  I know in Canada I have actually led protests on Parliament Hill, the seat of the Canadian government.  I have done that with 10,000 protesters in front of me.  However, I can remember very clearly the extent of cooperation between protesters, police and even the government, which we were protesting.  It was truly a Canadian example of how we do things here.  Unfortunately, what took place in Thailand over the last few weeks has become increasingly common of how they do things there too.  Or maybe I should say to be fair in Bangkok.

The challenge I suppose in many ways is to spread the wealth between Bangkok and other parts of the country.  Enamul will surely be back in Bangkok many more times.  It’s not a second home for him but he is there often so he should provide a very unique look into what happened over the last few weeks.

Bangkok Violence – the other side of the story
Dr. A.K. Enamul Haque  PhD

Before landing in Bangkok I was aware that the city was in trouble.  Its main business district is out of reach for visitors and the tension between governments and the Red Shirts was reaching a point of no return.  My mother, brothers and sisters, of course, my family members (wife and son) were all very tense because of this.  However, organizers of the course (where I was teaching) told us that it is no problem in their part of the city.  Luckily, it was not my first trip and so I knew that I could avoid the downtown area by using the freeways and could reach the Asian Institute of Technology without trouble.  I was not tense at all.

As I arrived in Bangkok, things seemed to be quite normal for me.  Taxi drivers were there; buses were there to take visitors.  People were at the airport to receive visitors and I did not see any tension in their faces either.   The following day, we visited a local retail market (weekend market) and things were normal too.  Two/three days later, the BBC told us that Thai military is zooming in and a possible crackdown is imminent.  Since I could not speak Thai, Thai channels are off limits for me.

At the conference center, people are busy as usual but we decided to talk.  Most of them are not like us, and they were not ready to talk about their political situation in front of foreigners! Luckily, one of the organizers was staying in the center for a month and she had developed a good working relationship with a few Thai girls at the center.  She was telling me that most of them do not like “Red Shirts”. On the other hand, she also told me that the “Taxi drivers” are with the “Red Shirts”.

You could see the colors in Bangkok about liking and disliking.  White color people were not interested in red shirt (they are happy with the current government) but the blue color people seems to be more sympathetic to them.   The BBC had been telling the same except that they were terming it as more of rural vs. urban divide.  Whatever, may be the case, the silence of the local Bangkok people, the indifference of the general public in Bangkok towards the movement must have frustrated the Red Shirt leaders and the boosted the moral of the government and the Army who later on decided to take on the Red Shirts.

Meanwhile, the local media seemed to be divided too. “The Bangkok Post” seemed to me was favoring the government while “the Nation” was sympathetic to the Red Shirts. You all know the story.  However, what struck me is this, before the day Red Shirt leaders decided to surrender they had a meeting with their followers.  In all calmness they requested their followers to go home – it was a no win situation and they cannot win against an organized force.  They informed them that they can go home freely (without being harassed by the army or police) and that in turn they [the leaders] decided to surrender to the police and face the consequences.  Many of the followers cried and said that they too are ready for the same consequences but the leaders told them not to do so.  Instead they insisted that they should take advantage of the negotiation and go home but remain organized and that the fight is not over yet.  At least 15 other provinces were also involved in this revolt but it was less reported in our media.

The next day amidst the chaos in Bangkok, one picture caught me totally unprepared – a solo Red Shirt worker, a lady, was sitting on a chair in the middle of the podium where the Red Shirts were with a red flag in her hand.  She decided not to go home.

I can see two things out of this chaos and sad events in Bangkok – a) the quality of leadership – who were negotiating a hassle free exit of their followers at the price of their own arrest, and b) the divide between the white and blue color people in their social, cultural and political thinking.

Hopefully, these two groups can come into a common platform and keep the Thai economy alive and competitive.

With Philip Shaw M.Sc.
The recent wave of controversy over wearing of veils by Muslim women in Europe is quite interesting to me.  I am not sure what they are talking about!  There are a few terms used in Muslim world to refer to women’s dress codes.  These are: Hijab, Burqah, Niqab, Jilbab, Chador, Burqini, etc.  Each one of them is considered as a dress for Muslim women and they are not same.  There are a variety of dresses the women wear in various parts of the Muslim world.  Given these varieties of dresses, I am not sure as of today which one is creating all the controversy?  So far my knowledge goes, the controversy started in France when a French white Muslim women wearing burqini entered in a public swimming pool and when she was asked by the pool staff to wear “proper” swim-suit.
Later on several individuals picked up the issue including the Sarkozy government who is now considering a ban on the veil.  The problem is I am not sure which one is the veil?  Which one are they trying to ban?  Ireland has, I believe, recently banned face veil – niqab in public places.  Switzerland has recently banned construction of minaret in Muslim mosques.
All these measures are clearly a sign of restlessness in the western society which I thought have had risen above the values of the past centuries.  I remember, at Guelph, the Muslim students used to gather at the Chapel on Fridays to perform Jummah prayer.  I remember writing this to home and explaining the greatness of western values – the tolerance, whereas in Muslim world religious leaders often talk about tolerance as a great virtue but the society is yet to adopt it in all spheres of their life.
Now the banning of dresses not fit to a society is not uncommon.  India has banned wearing the bikini in public places, many western societies have banned topless dresses for women in public places, and many Muslim societies have banned wearing of western dresses in public places.  All these are in the name of protecting the culture and values of each of the society.  Rarely it was used against any specific religious groups in any country.  This time it is an exception.
Many other cultures in the world also use covering of dresses by women not to speak of the dresses of the Nuns in catholic churches. No country has ever banned this – even in a Muslim country.  Mind it, I am not saying “Islamic dress” to any of the above dresses.  To me the dress is always cultural and people used their cultural values to ensure that it also fits within the religious codes.  In fact, if you look at the Muslim dresses of even men and women around the world, you will find a significant difference among them.  In Bangladesh, for example, you will find a variety of dresses for women.  In fact, the dress my wife chooses to wear is not the same my sister-in-law prefers to wear or my mother prefers to wear.   None of us ever are bothered about it neither we wanted anyone to explain the differences.  Last week, a High Court bench in Dhaka ordered that women are free to choose their dresses and none shall be forced to wear any specific dress (of course, they did not mean that women in Bangladesh are now allowed to wear a bikini in public!).  They were referring to a case related to wearing of burqah in a public place.
The French interpretation for imposition of the ban is to promote French values and culture in France.  I am not sure what does it mean.  Little that I know about culture I understand that it is dynamic – ever changing and always is moving forward.  It cannot be dictated by politicians and by courts.  The more politicians and courts gets involved in it, it is likely to become messy.  It cannot be held constant by laws either.  The Taliban failed, and of course, the French government will fail too.  Hopefully, you all understand the synonyms between the Taliban’s policy on dress code and the current debate in western world about dress codes.  I end this with the following picture of a billboard, which shows how Muslim men and women should dress up in public places during Taliban era.  Have a look at it and then think through the debate on dresses in the West and a new French billboard in Paris!

In the West, It’s About the Perception of Equality
By Philip Shaw M.Sc.

I am unique among my friends and colleagues here in Canada.  I am a farmer in southwestern Ontario Canada.  There is dirt firmly embedded underneath my fingernails.  My days are spent on country roads bereft any population.  Some days are spent without even uttering a word simply because I don’t see anybody.  For most Canadian farmers that is somewhat typical.  Most of our friends are people in our immediate area or our province.

I’m different in a lot of ways just because of my professional obligations as an agricultural economist and writer.  However one thing that separates me from many Canadians is my friendship with many Muslims around the world.  It just so happens that I know a lot of Muslim women in Bangladesh and other places.  So when I see the debate about Muslim women wearing the veil in Western society sometimes I cringe.  If people in Western society would spend time with Muslim women, they might find out how strong they are both in stature and with their opinions.

Enamul openly questions why the veil is so reviled in some Western societies.  I can understand where he is coming from because of his environment.  Women surround him in his family as well as his students.  They are all fashion conscious and dress in the typical styles within the country.  However, when it comes to the veil in Western society it’s not about any of that.  The big problem with women wearing the veil in Western society is about the western values of equality when it comes to women.  In short, men on women equate the veil on Muslim women in Western society with abuse.  It is a symbol so uncommon that the use of the veil can only be construed as a symbol of inequality among the sexes.

In Western society I’m being charitable with that.  In Canada I am embarrassed as a Canadian because the province of Quebec recently enacted a law to ban Muslim women from receiving or delivering public services while wearing a niqab.  Our Prime Minister and the opposition leaders of Canada had joined in supporting that ban.  As a Canadian I’m embarrassed because in this country everybody is welcome to live as they want based on our charter of rights and freedoms.

It must also be said that Western societies xenophobic fixation on women with the veil is based on prejudice.  In Canada it is that way but is not as bad as it is in France, Australia and other places. When you take into account the overt prejudices against Muslims in Western society post-9/11, the veil has become more of a symbol of oppression.  In many ways it brings out the very worst stereotypes about the treatment of Muslim women in places like rural Pakistan and rural Afghanistan.

In other words, there is no room for Muslim women wearing the veil in countries where sexual orientation is wide open and women’s liberation has more to do with sexual choice and sexual freedom is the norm.  I don’t believe that.  However, the entrenched feminist Western styled “women’s agenda” which has been part of liberal culture for over 50 years in countries like the United States, Canada and those of Western Europe never took into account Muslim women wearing the niqab.   When these women show up in western grocery stores or other places, they are targets for abuse and it is not right.

In Western society there is a common buzz phrase in business which says “sex sells”.   What this has meant over the last 50 years in Western society is female exploitation as in more sex and more skin sells more products.  There are millions of examples in our Western cultural discourse.  I face them all the time.  It has become normal.  At the same time when I travel in Muslim lands, it’s not there or at least it’s not public.  It is what it is.

So the mixing of the veil in Western culture has been toxic.  It is certainly exasperated by daily media feeds out of places like Afghanistan or any other Muslim country where all we see are men on the streets. This has been exasperated by sensational examples of Muslim girls who would have tried to break free of their cultural norms being abused by their own families in some Western societies.  There is nothing right about it.

So you can see by both our commentaries the differences between our societies when it comes to Muslim women wearing the veil.  On one side of the divide it is a cultural and fashion statement and on the other it is a symbol of inequality and abuse.  Can the two sides coexist in Western culture and society?  I think so, however, coming together across that divide will be very difficult.

With Dr. A.K. Enamul Haque Ph.D

In Canada last month we were all focused on the Vancouver Olympics. It’s natural for Canadians to be watching winter sports at this time of year.  However one of my favorite pastimes every two years is watching the opening ceremonies of the winter and Summer Olympics.  I like to watch because I enjoy seeing the people of the world getting together in one place all at the same time.  For whatever reason, I’ve always felt that was a very good thing.

Interestingly enough my focus is always on the athletes from Asia.  With Asia being one of the most dynamic places on earth both with population and increased economic activity, I’m always watching for the countries from Asia to take their place on the medal stand.  Regrettably, other than China, I think the cultural differences in sport don’t lend themselves to Asian athletes.  What other reason could we explain the Indian team showing up in Vancouver and not having any uniforms for the opening ceremonies? I hope that a certain point that cultural chasm between Asia and the Olympic movement gets some attention.

Of course China does not take a back seat to anybody at the Olympic games, having won the most medals at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.  They have a smaller contingent in Vancouver and they do not expect to win the medal count, but it’s pretty obvious in a few years they might be taking their place in the Winter Olympics too.

In many ways, China’s ascendance to large Olympic dreams mirrors the whole Asian region.  We have all had and some of us have experienced the economic explosion “on the other side of the world “.  China’s economic growth rates have continually been in the double digits with only a few hiccups over the last 10 years.  What this means of course is increased wealth per capita, increased trade and at the end of the day increased influence in the world.  When I have traveled into East Asia and Australia, China is like the big brother in the neighborhood.  Everybody is either trying to trade with them or keep them happy in some other way.

I read one study where the Chinese economy will reach $123 trillion in 2040.  By that time the per capita income in China will be higher than many major countries in Western Europe.  The thrust of the study had to do with the differing standards of living.  It was pointed out that Western society was resting on their laurels and Asian society works harder and had a brighter future.

Sitting here in Canada and traveling across the United States, it’s somewhat difficult to truly fathom what all this means.  For instance as many of you know I give presentations across Canada on grain markets.  There are some fundamental economic benchmarks that I’ve always believed in.  Many of them have to do with the perceived wealth of Western society now and in the future.  So when you see the statistics regarding China and the influence that will give them, increasingly in 2010 that is making me pause.  What’s this mean for the world in the next 5 to 10 years and how can we thrive within that?

The short answer is everything should be turning up roses.  For instance doesn’t increased wealth in the world mean everybody’s doing better?  The point being it is not as simple as that as old prejudices combined with scarce economic resources and ethnic tensions always seem to get in the way.  China and much of South Asia surely has its share of that.  So simply stating that China and Asia are going to increasingly be the world’s leading power center does not necessarily ring true.

However, when this simple Canadian rides through the streets of Asia in a place like Bangladesh I cannot see how it can be avoided.   In other words, when I look at Bangladesh’s youth, work ethic and population and extrapolate that across Asia, I can only see good economic things.  I see at a certain point that these Asian nations take a leading role in world economic affairs and at some point in the future maybe my grandchildren or great-grandchildren here in Canada will take direction from there.

At the present time the Western world continues to deal with global economic recession.  Our American friends have particular troubles, as their government spending has been so high there is much conjecture on how they will pay it all back.  Our Chinese friends hold much of that debt in Asia.  I believe we will learn much from how the Chinese and Americans work out this problem in the next few years.  There are a myriad of options, not necessarily friendly to each side.  Nobody likes the specter of disappearing money.

The challenge will be to coexist peacefully as our world changes.  I see it as a fundamental shift of world power.  However, I don’t think everybody sees it that way especially on this side of the world.  So sure, that my friends, maybe a problem.  I just hope it doesn’t get too messy.

Changing world, Asia and its challenges
A.K. Enamul Haque PhD

As the Winter Olympics was lifted in Canada, my wife, my son and I were glued to the TV screen to watch the opening ceremony from Canada.  With full enthusiasm I was showing it to them because it is being held in Canada where I spent about 6 years of my life.  In few minutes time, my son asked me a question to which I did not have a full answer.  The question was “When Bangladesh would be able to participate in Winter Olympic?” I told him, unless we are able to deal with poverty, I don’t think we should even think of participating in it.  It is still a club where rich nations can only afford to play.

I agree with Phil that Asia is changing rapidly.  With China growing, Asian economies are also integrating in terms of trade and investment. In 2003, the Wharton Business School published a book called “the Chinese Century”.  I have been teaching this book in my class on international business.

The book narrates how this century is likely to be the Chinese century.  However, I see the rise of Asia as a result of the consequences of the failures of the economic super powers. What we see today is a sequel of a drama.

Asia was an economic superpower until the nineteenth century.  In 1820, India and China produced more than 50% of the world’s GDP.  These two countries were at the center of attraction for all. At that time, all voyages were coming to Asia. Many European countries floated companies like the East India Company to trade with India only.  However, it has all changed since then.

Asia was colonized by Europe and it gradually lost its economic power.  Europe emerged as the new center of the universe in terms of economic activities. By 1920, Europe reached its peak. The economic growth of Europe also led to migration of people and migration of capital. But by the 1940s Europe lost its power to the USA.  How? Europeans got themselves into trouble when they initiated the wars- one in 1919 and other one in 1939. The war eroded their economic power.

By the end of the WWII, the USA emerged as a new center of economic power.  The free world began to assemble around USA.  Many now believe that its economic power is also coming to an end. Unfortunately this is also due to several wars.  This time, however, the wars are fought far away from its own territory – in the Middle East.

The current prediction is that by 2050, China and India will be the center of all economic activities in the world. However, I still think that this is far from true.  The fundamental challenge of Asian nations is not religious extremism, not freedom of speech, not capitalism, not socialism, not democracy; the challenge is how to deal with its huge scale of poverty.  Unless and until they can successfully deal with poverty Asian economies will not be able to stand on their feet. Unfortunately, except China others including India seemed to be less worried about it.

With Philip Shaw M.Sc

Happy New Year!  We have just finished 2009.  At the beginning of the year President Obama came into power after a massive electoral victory and all of us in the world thought that we have been able to wipe out the ghost of the 9/11.  Good-bye terrorism and good-bye a deceitful America!  The Delta Air flight Airbus 253 from Amsterdam to Detroit, which was approaching Detroit on the 25th of December 2009 led us to think that it is not true yet.  A Nigerian named Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab who was trying to ignite an explosive was tackled by some brave passengers and was later arrested and charged for terrorism.  The year thus ended in a big zero with a fear around the world, once again, that air travel is not yet safe.

As I was talking to Phil over skype last week, he was telling me that the flight path was right above Dresden as the plane was approaching the Detroit airport.  The event was a chilling reminder to air travelers around the world that traveling is far from safe despite the number of security measures that were adopted to make it safe for us.

I myself travel a lot around the globe.  My experience of seeing the various kinds of security measures being followed in different airports often confused me and I like many others also thought many a times that some of the security measures are simply too much.  They are counter-productive as terrorists might be able to sneak into an airplane no matter how smart we are and how many different measures we take to secure our flights.

India, our neighbor, has been under terrorist threats from various quarters.  Unlike global terrorism, it has threats from within who are not definitely religious groups. Almost all Indian airlines take special measures while on board and it includes hand checking all your hand baggage while entering the plane.  This is after two rounds of scanning and two rounds of body scanning.  Often it creates unnecessary delays while boarding but Indian travelers have adopted it quite nicely.  Rarely, have I seen them complaining about it.

Sri Lanka, has been under terrorist threats from the Tamils for many years.  They also adopted a very similar checking while boarding except that they do not hand-check the body and luggage while entering the plane but they hand check all of your baggage at the entry of the airport premises and later while entering into the security zone.  In fact, security threats are still so great in Sri Lanka that in my last visit, our vehicle was stopped nearly half a kilometer outside the terminal and we were asked to board in an exclusive airport bus to get inside the terminal.

Nepal was under terrorist threat for many years as the Maoists were threatening the political stability of the country at that time.  Security measures were also up in Katmandu.  In my last visit with my family, we checked in on time for a flight to Dhaka from Katmandu and decided to enter into the security clearing area to board.  Unfortunately, our flight was delayed for 5 hours and to my surprise I realized that I couldn’t even go back to the food zone to fetch food for my son.  What was the reason?  The security clearance zone is the last stop for boarding and you cannot come back.  I realized that I made a mistake of going into the zone before seeing the plane landed.  I learned my lesson for that day!

Bangkok Thailand, a relatively peaceful country but they have threats of terrorism from their southern zone.  The security system in Bangkok is mostly machine-dependent but you will find that traveling will be quite confusing if you wear suits or overcoats or even have belts on your waist.  Of course, shoes must be without any metal parts.  If not, you have to take your shoes off while crossing the security clearance and pass the shoes through the scanner.  At the same time, they are particularly careful when you carry liquid stuff like water bottle, gels etc.  In most cases, you have to leave them in a box forever.  I’ve seen many people leaving these items behind while boarding in planes.

The Dubai airport has a funny system, which I still do not understand.  You will be screened while boarding in and also screened again while going out of the plane.  My confusion is that we have been out of a plane and still have to go through security clearance to travel from one gate to other gate?  Yes, that’s Dubai.  Of course, you have to do – walk slowly in a queue with shoes, belts and coats in your hand too!

Traveling to Europe is OK but if you are catching a flight to USA, the gates are different in most of the airports I have traveled so far.  This is also true within South Asia if you are boarding in a flight to India.  And yet, Umar was able to take explosives inside and was able to ignite it while on board!  Unbelievable to me!  Shall I trust it?  I am not yet sure about it.   Was it done to start a new “war on terrorism”?  Was it done to ensure that “America’s war against the Muslims continue or to change Obama’s mindset?”  Was it done to make Israel a good trusted friend of the USA again!  I genuinely hope that it is not.  Why am I questioning these?  The reason is that I know that all passengers traveling to the USA go through special gates from Europe.  The scanning process, the security clearance, etc., all are different.  Yet we have to believe that he possessed his explosives from Yemen and was able to pass through all security gates around the world!  I have a hard time to swallow it.  Let us hope that we get a clear picture about it this time.  I don’t want to see a smoking gun pointed towards Yemen like what happened only few years ago in Iraq.

Being On a Watch List: My Travels Through Air Security
By Philip Shaw M.Sc.

I like to tell everybody that I have traveled around the world.  In 2003, I managed to fly around the world by mistake.  I had planned on visiting Bangladesh by going east through Amsterdam and Singapore and back the same way.  On arrival at the Sarnia airport, I found out that my flight was canceled to New York City.  So the airline attendant somehow found a way for me to go west around the world to Bangladesh and I came back on my original flight going west again, completely encircling the globe.  My brother told me it would be much more impressive if I had done it in a leaky old boat like Magellan.

I agree.  I cannot imagine how Magellan floated around the world in a leaky old boat.  If memory serves me correct he didn’t.  Something tells me he was killed on the other side of the world and his men made it back to Spain.  I don’t know, but it was an impressive feat.

Just think if  Magellan could imagine air travel and air security.  It’s a nonstarter.  What was different about my trip in 2003 was it was my first trip to Asia after 9/11.  As I traveled around the world I was asked to take off my shoes and security was obviously so much stricter than it was before 9/11.

The one airport I remember very clearly from 2003 was getting on a 747 in Singapore.  I was boarding a flight from Singapore to Newark New Jersey.  So I was thinking that security would be very tight.  It was.  A very tough lady who was standing in front of the passport control interviewed everybody who was getting on that plane.  She was tough as nails, sending people down and bringing people back up and asking very direct questions.  I went through no problem.  However I remember getting on that plane thinking there’s nobody getting past her.

Fast-forward to 2009.  Your loyal scribe found himself back on a plane going to the other side of the world to visit my friend Enamel.  This time I did not fly through the United States, completely bypassing them flying from Toronto to Dubai and then on to Bangladesh.  Security was tight again and in fact this time after I went through passport control and was about to board the plane I was met by four security officers from Canada customs with a guard dog asking me questions about how much money I had.  It was one of the most bizarre things I’ve ever seen at a Canadian airport.  Needless to say they passed this poor farmer off and into the plane.

Of course it is all about traveling in 2010.  The air traveling public has become used to it and flying is no longer seen as some type of exotic thing.  In fact in North America if you have any flight less than two hours, I think a lot of people think about driving.  Flying has just become too much of a hassle.

The last time I flew in the United States I was asked for extra security identification and had to answer some questions before I got on the plane.  This happened twice to me.  The second time I calmly asked why.  The employee of the airline told me that I was on a “watch list”.  I must’ve looked horrified because without flinching she told me don’t worry about it, a lot of people are!

That is something I don’t wear as a badge of honor.  In fact as a Canadian how do I get off the US watch list?  I don’t know, write Barack Obama?  It just goes to show that in 2010, “ridiculous” has come into vogue with regard to air security.  I’m on a watch list and so was Umar, except he gets on a plane without luggage on a one-way ticket paid in cash and tries to blow it up.  None of this is making sense anymore.

I can remember the day when there was no airport security.  People asked to ride in the cockpit and many got their wish.  People walked through airports like they were supermarkets.  Even I have boarded a plane from Launceston Tasmania to Melbourne Australia without a security check.  Back in 1984 they had none.

Of course we are not going back to those days.  However, we are surely going into something different in North America with increased security and maybe even racial profiling.  Enamul didn’t mention that.  He has in fact been profiled in a Canadian airport in the past.

What’s the challenge?  I think we all know, keeping those terrorists off the planes and maintaining some type of normalcy regarding air security.  Yes, it is a challenge and if the events over Dresden on Christmas Day mean anything, it’s that we still have a long way to go.

By Philip Shaw M.Sc.

With Dr. A.K. Enamul Haque Ph.D

Sometimes things come along the change everything.  You can call it “climate gate “.  What I’m talking about is evidence that scientists at the Hadley climatic research unit at Britain’s University of East Anglia had tampered with scientific evidence to manufacture a “hockey stick “graph showing a dramatic warming trend in the late 20th century.  It is referred to as “climate gate “.

It came to light when a hacker or somebody in the scientific community expose thousands of e-mails and data from a climatic research unit and put them on the Internet.  Those e-mails show the private admissions of doubt and the uneven scientific foundation in global warming theory. In essence it is the smoking gun for those climate change critics who believe the idea of climate change is all hot air.  With the Copenhagen global warming conference starting this week, “climate gate” is surely making things interesting.

This came to my attention from a local farmer in southwestern Ontario who is an avid listener and reader of all things American.  For instance he listens to a lot of shortwave American radio where right-wing idealists constantly spout their views about everything un-American.  Global warming has certainly been one of those targets.

Of course I had never heard of “climate gate “but.  So I did what every good researcher does when he doesn’t know something.  I googled it and if you’ve never heard of it I would expect that you do the same thing.  Needless to say you will learn more than you ever wanted to about problems with global warming science.

Needless to say, “climate gate “caught wind in the Western media earlier this month.  For instance one of the lead commentators on the CBC national news referred to the problems at East Anglia has a tremendous black mark against the science of global warming.  It is one thing to be interested in an idea and to study it profusely but it is another to manufacture something to keep the “global warming “revolution going.  “Climategate” is all news pointed toward the billions of dollars going toward maintaining “climate fraud “.

I think the inclination is for all of us to treat “climategate” as some type of aberration.  For instance it would be a lot easier if it hadn’t happened but still it tells us something about society.  That is once something gets so big it starts rolling like a snowball and when people are making money with it sometimes it’s very hard to expose for what it really is.  It is like a self-fulfilling prophecy and nobody wants to hear about it not being real.  In the case of the scientists at East Anglia, it looks like you there was no room to hear the contrary argument.

If you really wanted to be a deep cynic, maybe it was just bad science or even worse lazy bad scientists.  I don’t know because I am an agricultural economist by trade. I just know when I made research findings; they always have to be backed up with statistical significance.  I never invented data which wasn’t there.  If I did it would discredit everything that came after.

I’ll say this.  As a Canadian journalist there is really no room for me to talk about global warming in any sense other than it is a terrible environmental hazard.  If I wrote anything else in this country it would be seen as buffoonish and not credible.  Whither Arctic ice cap melting it has become fashionable in 2009 to take almost any global warming theory as gospel.  So when the leading Canadian commentator on the subject talked about “climate gate” the other night in the news it was like a total reboot on global warming for Canadian society.

Critics of global warming have always mused about what the world was doing 789 years ago.  In other words the thought was that how can we measure global warming if we didn’t have records from hundreds of years ago.  The thinking was that maybe the present global warming was all about cycles and natural ups and downs in the global climate.  My feeling was the deep ice core samples taken on the Greenland ice sheet rendered those musings mute as they showed a warming over time.
This has all happened at a time when the world gathered at Copenhagen to work out another global warming protocol.  We’ll see what happens.  Part of this big solution will surely boil down to domestic politics within each individual country as well as the bigger more industrialized nations.  “Climategate” will surely muddy those waters and make the politics that much harder in many of those nations.  Did it have the effect of derailing Copenhagen?  I dunno.  However, it certainly turned a large part of the population against a greener world.

Urbanites vs Ruralites – the Climate Dilemma

A.K. Enamul Haque PhD

The Copenhagen climate discussion just finished with an agreement which is nonbinding to any of the participating countries. Towards the end it seemed like there would be no agreement and it was not until when President Obama extended his hands to the leaders of the world to reach an agreement. It is not yet fully clear what the leaders had finally signed but it is evident from the deliberations later that many were not very unhappy with the result.

To many Bangladeshi farmers the discussion in Copenhagen meant almost nothing to them in terms of what they are going to achieve at the end.  They are not concerned as much as the other agencies are for global warming [because they are not fully aware of it yet].  On their behalf the NGOs did the pushing to find an agreement. Yet I could not fully appreciate it.  Yes, it might have been a technique used to forge a deal but it might not deliver what we like to have in the agreement. Furthermore, I am not sure whether we at all expected a deal in Copenhagen.  To me, the world is not ready for a deal yet. We need a lot of mutual understanding, not just the science part of it but also we need more understanding on the human part of it.  Who gains, who loses, at whose costs?  These are important questions and must be clearly answered to achieve the best agreement.

What is true is that “climate change” is real from the science point of view but it is difficult to separate “climate change” phenomenon from other competing phenomenon like globalization, development and economic integration.  The IPCC report of 1995 predicted a rise of world temperature between 1 and 3.5 degree Celsius by 2010. We understand that not a lot has been done yet to combat climate change because the largest polluter – the USA – did not sign it yet. Consequently, there must have been a rise in world temperature as predicted earlier.  I assume that we can now say with our weather data that the world is warmer than before.  Al Gore showed it few years ago in his movie. So, if we agree the world is now warmer than before, the next logical step is not to ask who is responsible or irresponsible but what to do next? I guess, many would answer that we – the humankind – must do “something” to reduce the continuation of it.  It will have disastrous impacts on many countries who have been trying hard to feed its population.  I am not sure whether we have an agreement on this yet?

Last week in my class, a few students raised this issue to me.  They expected an answer.  I was not sure whether I could give a perfect answer to them.  So I described to them something which they were familiar with and told them to learn from it.  Let me describe this here for all of you.

The use of renewable energy is no longer a slogan it has become reality. Last week, my university, the United International University organized an International Conference on Developments in Renewable Energy Technologies.  A few of my students attended it.  They were there to learn about the solar energy as it is being propagated in remote rural areas to replace their kerosene dependence of the households. Our PM did mention it proudly in her speech at the Copenhagen conference.  She specifically mentioned how successfully Bangladesh was and how effectively they had embraced the alternative energies like solar and that 600,000 households in rural Bangladesh are connected to it now.

I told them that most of these 600,000 households are located in remote regions of the country where they did not grid electricity connections to hookup for electricity.  So these households paid a “huge” amount of money [relative to their income] to replace kerosene fuel for lighting. They did it by borrowing the capital from NGOs in Bangladesh at an interest rate of at least 20%. Moreover, the annualized cost of the using solar energy is more than 12 times that of electricity. They did it not because of their love for reduction of GHG emission; they did it because alternative fuel has become costly to them. They borrowed money at an interest rate which we the urbanites could never think of. After describing this, I asked the following question to my students: Would not it have been better if we had asked the urbanites to switch to solar energy for lighting and release excess electricity for the poor at 1/12th of the price? Would not it have been more equitable for us to borrow the capital at most at 15% rate of interest from Banks and install these technologies in our homes?

I end my discussion today with a note that if we replace the urbanites with the richer nations and rural people as the affected nations who are likely to absorb the impact of climate change, we see the same answer. To me, the poor and the affected people of the world will finally absorb the impacts of climate change before others would wake up, leave the discussion table, and do something real for them.

with Philip Shaw M.Sc.
The fifteenth Conference of Parties (COP15) of UNFCCC will be held in Copenhagen from 7-9 December 2009.  Ahead of this conference the media, the NGOs, the UN organizations, the donor organizations, the Environmentalists are quite upbeat.  Their enthusiasm, the festivity and the overall mood of the conference indicate that something has to be resolved at the conference.  If you are still not clear about what has to be resolved there, I must say, I am also one of you.
The Kyoto Protocol on carbon emission is due to expire by 2012 and if the world needs to continue with the progress that has been achieved so far (I have doubts about it!) it must be replaced with another protocol or convention so that we, the people, can take effective measures to halt the onset of climate change. The road map was drawn in Bali and the objective is to ensure a new carbon order in the world.
Three weeks ago the Asian Development Bank in Dhaka hosted a meeting to discuss in detail how Bangladesh could “earn” millions of dollars by reducing emission of GHG and then converting them into a “credit” for the industrialized countries.  The following week USAID sponsored another meeting where the “policy makers” of Bangladesh were “informed” about the opportunities they were missing by not engaging into “carbon trading”.  These were part of the Kyoto protocol deal where developing countries as well as some developed countries could use their natural advantage to “store” carbon or “save” carbon and then trade them against the quota set under the Kyoto protocol.
Both events were quite informative and I was impressed with it and the opportunities, which we have already missed.  However, what was not clear to me was that the program was going to be expired in another three years and so it will be very difficult for Bangladesh to engage in a meaningful trade on it.  The reasons were also clear to me, we do not have as smart a people as India or China who benefitted from this and it is only natural that a least developed country like us will always fall behind versus countries who are more advanced when these type of protocols are drafted.
My problem is that in the discussion on climate change, Bangladesh’s name appears quite often – not as a big polluter, but as a possible victim of the circumstances. The problem, which is being addressed in Copenhagen, may not reduce the effect on Bangladesh at all but it is supposed to provide the courage to the millions of people who are likely to suffer from what is now a foregone conclusion.  The emphasis on climate change discussion should not be around who had done it in the past and who is doing it now rather it should be around what to do if human beings are going to suffer.  I understand that when the industrialized world was emitting GHGs, the science was not fully developed to predict its impact and so it was done without any ill motive.  At the same time, countries like India and China, who are named as new “big” polluters are actually being accused because of its size and not because of what they are doing.   Per capita emission in both of these countries are far lower than others and yet it looks like a cat and mouse game to me when Europe and America are conveniently drawing a line between them to pressurize these countries to “do more”.
At the same time, the industrialized countries have adopted a very strategic plan to lure poor countries to do more for emission reduction (using carbon trade) then reducing it by themselves in their own countries.   A simple theory of convenience!
Let me explain the problem that is going to happen in Bangladesh due to climate change.  First, the extreme events like cyclone, heavy downpours, and drought will affect the poorest of all because their houses are not protected.  How many of them?  40% of the people of Bangladesh (out of 150 million) cannot afford more than two meals a day and we expect them to take the sufferings.  Second, farming in Bangladesh, unlike in Canada, is done by the poorest of all, who lack education, training and also capital to adapt and switch crops.   For example, while fishing (aquaculture) is eight times more profitable than rice farming on the same plot of land, most of the rice farmers remained engaged in rice.  Why? Because they do not have any knowledge about fish farming and they cannot easily acquire it because they cannot read and write.  Third, industries (95% of them are small and medium sized) are currently operating within the protection of many flood control embankments.  Due to climate change, these flood control structures will become vulnerable and many may collapse.  Most of these industries cannot recover from any big threat like embankment failure or waterlogging.   Fourthly, salinity rise in the coastal belts of Bangladesh will make water a very scarce commodity.  Cost of water will be high and so many poorer families will be compelled to use highly saline water while others are likely to switch to bottled water. You can imagine the vulnerability of the poor people. I have not finished yet.  The biggest threat is what is known as sea level rise and I have not discussed it.  Even without this, the social consequence of short-term impact of climate change could totally devastate Bangladesh.  As such, what should be our priority?  Trying to find out how to sell carbon credits?  Or to take measures to ensure that millions of people can protect their health, assets and livelihood from the short-term impacts of climate change?  I have not seen donor agencies taking priority in these as much as they are taking keen interest to “buying” carbon credits from Bangladesh.  Hopefully, everyone would understand my pain.

Global Warming:  The Canadian Arctic Versus the Bangladeshi Sundarbans
By Philip Shaw M.Sc.
Where I live in Canada it is very close to the American border.  For instance, I think when Enamul came to Canada he could have never imagined traveling to the United States as often as he did.  Living and working here means I listen and am bombarded with American media every day.

That’s significant for me because our American friends have been the last to get on the global warming bandwagon.  For the longest time, President George Bush didn’t accept the conventional wisdom that the world might be warming.  President Obama has changed that paradigm, but the belief that global warming is some liberal, far left conspiracy to make Americans poorer still lives in the United States.  I hear it almost everyday on specific media outlets coming out of the United States.

As a Canadian that’s a bit hard to take.  Every Canadian grows up learning about the North West passage through the Arctic Archipelago.  Specifically, we learned how the Northwest Passage is “ours” and anybody who questioned that was wrong.  Despite such prejudice, every Canadian knows there is a problem in the Arctic.  The ice is melting, remote Canadian communities in the Arctic are documenting that, and our fabled “north west” passage is getting more and more visitors from foreign countries.  In Canada, if you don’t believe in global warming, you just have to look north.  Our country is changing and for some Canadians it is apocalyptic.

I find myself typical among westerners.  Global warming is an issue, but I have no problem with my fridge fully stocked with food and my three automobiles lined up beside my barn with my four tractors and combine.  Meanwhile, my Bangladeshi colleagues, many of who live on two meals a day, do everything by hand and don’t generate a sliver of carbon.  So who’s the problem and what should be done about it?

I found Enamul’s explanations about the current global warming debate in Bangladesh to be quite telling.  For instance, 40% of 150 million people exist on two meals a day and will have to endure more suffering because of global warming.  Of coarse Enamul was talking about this in the context of Bangladesh being able to earn credits in the global greenhouse gas game.  It doesn’t make much sense to be engaging in a “war of credits” when we should be looking at alleviating the short-term suffering of the vast majority of poor people who are going to take the brunt of global warming.

I have visited Bangladesh four times.  In 2003 I took a trip to the Sundarban mangrove forest, the largest mangrove forest in the world.  It spans the southern regions of Bangladesh and parts of India and of course is the home of the Royal Bengal Tiger.  It is one of the most delicate ecosystems in the world and is being threatened because of the increased salinity in the water of that region.  Plant life is changing and of course the Royal Bengal Tiger is retreating inland and the millions of people who live there are at risk.  Seeing that firsthand gave me a real appreciation for how global warming is affecting people’s lives in the Third World.

Compare that with the problems that we are having in the Canadian Arctic and it would seem that we’re talking about two very different concerns regarding global warming.  There is an old joke in Canadian farm country that sometimes it’s so cold out there, we could use a little bit of global warming.  Make no mistake, despite the evidence of global warming in the Canadian Arctic melting much of the snow and ice, it’s still very cold up there.  As Canadians we are concerned because that’s our territory up there and we are concerned because increased international commerce might affect our sovereignty over the region.  In our iPod throwaway society I think our concerns here are much more “corporate “then some of my Bangladeshi friends who I met in the Sundarban Forest.

So Enamul asks when musing about Bangladesh, what should be our priority?  Trying to find out how to sell carbon credits?  Or to take measures to ensure that millions of people can protect their health, assets and livelihood from the short-term impacts of climate change?”  Interesting comments for sure.  While we debate “carbon credits “at big conferences people’s lives especially in the developing world are being sideswiped and taking short-term practical action might make much more sense than big global agreements nobody is going to keep.

So when the world gets to Copenhagen in December, we’ll see what happens.  Already western leaders are lowering expectations.  Passing the buck looks to be in the cards.  However, Enamul, yes, I do feel your pain.  For the people doing the suffering, global warming is real.  Finding tangible, practical solutions to help them in the short term needs to be the priority.

With Dr. A.K. Enamul Haque

One of my preoccupations is international tourism.  I have always been kind of fascinated with overland routes to specific destinations. One such overland travel route, which I would consider fascinating, is driving from Europe to Bangladesh.  In fact when I was in Australia I would often see travel literature of people who liked to travel overland from Australia to London England.  It would truly be an adventure.

Of course I will never get to take such a route unless my adventurous colleague Dr. Enamul Haque decides he’s up for it.  I wouldn’t hold your breath.  I think both Enamul and I like the overland route, which takes an airplane to Dubai.  That way we get to miss international hotspots like Afghanistan.

In many ways we have visited Afghanistan several times before in this column.  It is one of the most tortured countries outside of Africa.  It’s a place where seemingly civilizations have fought over for many years.  In 2009 Afghanistan continues to be in the crosshairs of global media focus.  Lately of course that focus has been on the discredited Afghan presidential election.

In the West there is a certain sterilization to the Afghan question.  For many of us here in the developed world, “thinking Western” seems so easy and of course many of us feel why can’t our Afghan friends think the same. Some of this of course is translated into the annals of power within our respective countries.  That’s only a small reason why we find the North Atlantic Treaty Organization hunkered down far from the North Atlantic where it was born.  The Afghan presidential election is also a result of Western good intentions clearly missing their mark.

It’s a real problem. If you believe that NATO is in Afghanistan to keep Al Qaeda from having a safe refuge to attack the West that is one thing.  However if you believe the West is there to set up some democratic government for the good of all Afghans, then the election results of 2009 are an indictment on the whole process.  Even though the idea of elections is about inclusiveness and democracy the 2009 Afghan election was wracked with corruption and fraud.

Election day violence was rife all across the country.  Of course the Taliban boycotted the election.  According to Afghan government officials there were about 73 incidents of violence that took place over 15 different provinces on Election Day.  However that figure could surely be much higher and who knows what it really is.  When you have discredited candidates running and the notion that the UN might favor a person like Hamid Karzai over everybody else it doesn’t seem very fair.

It makes the Afghanistan soup that much murkier.  However, is it realistic to expect a rogue rebel group like the Taliban to engage the vestiges of democracy?  I think it’s almost laughable, but the West had to do something to bring Al Qaeda to bay.  It is one thing to attack Afghanistan after the terrible terrorist attacks in New York in 2001 and eight years later finding yourself there and wondering what to do.  The 2009 Afghan election didn’t solve anything.

I can almost hear my esteemed colleague Dr. Haque yelling at me.  I am sure he would be saying something about foreign intervention into someone else’s country.  I know what he means; we had actually discussed this in a previous article about four or five months ago.  Democracy is one thing but leaving out the Taliban in the Afghan question is like playing baseball without the bat.  There will be no peace and no security until the Afghan people work out their own problems.  Of course the difficulty is nothing will come easy and there surely will be a lot more loss of life, women would be disfranchised and history would take its course.  In the Western world there is no stomach for that, at least outside the African continent.

I cannot see things coming together in Afghanistan.  That country was carved together by the British and an argument could be made it should have never happened.  In fact you can see the divisions cut along ethnic lines in the discredited election results.  Needless to say it’s pretty obvious the whole western world is redefining their take on Afghanistan.  For many it looks like the Afghanistan end game will be never-ending.

Clearly, there are some decisions to make in Western capitals.  The Afghan election was the latest setback in Western strategy for Afghanistan.  Pres. Barack Obama is surely reconsidering his next move.  For the West remaking Afghanistan hasn’t turned out the way it was envisioned and I tend to believe it never will be.  Thinking “western” doesn’t work for everybody.

The Future of Afghanistan
A.K. Enamul Haque PhD

Phil and I had discussed Afghanistan in several of our writings.  He was rightly pointed out that I would question the presence of US troops in Afghanistan.  Several times in the past Phil mentioned that the reason for the US to intervene in Afghanistan was 911.  My question is, is it so true?  I cannot agree with him on this.  In my last writing on Afghanistan I had shown that during the Cold War the Soviet invasion into Afghanistan led to US intervention into this country.

What I liked in Phil’s writing this time is that he has also convinced himself that Western-style democracy may not work well in many of the countries in the east.  Afghanistan is just an example where it is in trouble.  Recent news out of Afghanistan tells us that there will be a run-off election for the Presidency.  Reporters from Afghanistan are also saying that it is going to be a big joke as the Afghan people are not used to voting twice to elect one president.  So it is likely that many may not turn out in the polling stations. If this happens then the NATO mission in Afghanistan is in big trouble too.

The problem of NATO and Western forces in Afghanistan is how to leave this country in a safe hand.  The process they have chosen to do so is to introduce a Western-style democracy with an elected president as its head.  What they have forgotten is that the social mosaic of Afghan people is quite different.  Afghanistan is still a feudal society.  According to one statistics, only 18.7% men and 2.8% women are literate in this country.  This too varies by region and by economic status.

They are not used to secret ballots or voting and so it will be hard for them to think of voting in private and not telling it in public.  As a result, the essence of secret ballot, one of the pillars of Western democracy, does not exist in Afghan society.  Afghan people still today divides into tribes and groups. This needs to be changed to ensure a greater social welfare for them.  However, it cannot be done by force or by law, it has to come from within the Afghan society.

Other countries need to help them to make a good choice through effective persuasion, and increasing their level of awareness against the feudal system.  That is why I think that some type of social intervention is necessary.  However, this intervention must remain respectful to the values and culture of Afghan society.

I thought President Obama would be brave enough to acknowledge the weakness of the current Western strategy in Afghanistan and would alter the path of Western intervention.  In our last writing on Afghanistan I had mentioned that the war is heading east.  Over the past few months we have seen increasing Taleban attacks in Pakistan.  It seems to me that Pakistan is already in deep trouble and my hunch is that over the next few years it will cross the Pakistan border and enter into India.  This is not desirable from any point of view and I hope the leadership in the West will understand the difficulty of continuing such a war for decades in a country like Afghanistan.  I do hope that the gesture of goodwill will be back in our mind.”

The Truth is not always “out there”!

A.K. Enamul Haque, PhD

With Philip Shaw M.Sc

The release of Abdulbaset Ali Al Megrahi from the Scottish Jail on August 20, 2009 on “compassionate grounds” has created an uproar in the US and in the western media for the past few weeks.  Bangladeshi media was, however, silent on this.  Explaining the release the Scottish justice secretary Kenny MacAskill said, “He is a dying man, he is terminally ill, …my decision is that he returns home to die.”   In his statement Mr. MacAskill was very much diplomatic and was not referring to the issues related to a possible “miscarriage of justice” and probably putting an innocent man into the jail for a crime that he might not have committed at all.
The US government including Mrs. Hillary Clinton, a Harvard lawyer, was quick to condemn the event and requested to Scottish government not to release him.  However, the fact was that within an hour of the Press release by Mr. MacAskill, a Libyan plane was ready to take Al Megrahi out of the UK. It happened very quickly and only a handful of people were there who booed at him while he was taken out of the prison to the plane.  Clearly, the Libyan government was well informed about it and a plane was waiting for him.  In Tripoli Gaddafi’s son gave him a heroic welcome and he was then put into a government house equipped with a live TV-link with Scotland prison office, who will continue to monitor him.  This was a condition of release.
The reactions from the victims are quite different.  Families of the victims of Pan Am 103 flight (where 270 persons were killed) from the US did not endorse it at all while many in the UK did not oppose so vehemently.  The reasons are, the UK victims were following the debate over the “miscarriage of justice” and were not fully convinced that Abdulbaset Ali Al Megrahi was the killer.  Remember the events since 1988?  After the incident, many stories came out about the possible killer or killer group.  Of them, there were theories that Iran was behind it, that Mossad was behind it, that Hizbollah was behind it, that CIA was behind it and so on.  It was after a so-called thorough investigation by the FBI and UK investigating teams, two possible suspects were zoomed in, they were AbdelBaset Ali Al Megrahi and al Amin Khalifa Fhimah.  In 1991, the British authorities indicted them.  The Libyan government opposed it but the British and US government stood firm behind their investigating teams.  Libya was put under sanctions from the US, UK and also from the EU.  Billion of dollars of Libyan assets were frozen.  In the end, Nelson Mandela intervened and persuaded Libyan leader Gaddafi to hand over the suspects for a trial under Scottish law in a neutral land in 1999.  Two Scottish judges completed the long trial and one of the suspects was acquitted.   Al Megrahi was sentenced to 27 years of jail to be served in Scotland.  The Libyan leader also was forced to accept a deal to compensate the families of victims (10 million dollar each) in order to release its frozen assets from US.
Al Megrahi always maintained that he was innocent.  His appeal was rejected in Scotland and a final review is now under process.  Many distinguished lawyers in Scotland now think that Al Megrahi would be not found guilty beyond reasonable doubts and so he might be a fall guy, imprisoned to contain the whims of the “great nations of the UK and US. There were two major witnesses against him.  First Mr. Gauci, a shop retailer in Malta, who identified Al Megrahi as the person who bought the clothes found in the debris in Lockerbie.  It was believed to be from the suitcase carrying the bomb.  The next witness was Mr. Ulrich Lampert from Switzerland, who identified that a broken circuit board found in the debris, which was originally sold by him to Libyan government. So, Al Megrahi, a Libyan Security Officer could have smuggled the bomb into the plane while it was taken off from Malta.  The verdict was that the Station Manager of the airport was innocent and Al Megrahi was found guilty.
In an affidavit sworn in Switzerland in July 2007 (available on the website www.lockerbie.ch) Lumpert now states that the fragment produced in court was in fact part of a non-operational demonstration circuit board that he himself had removed from the premises of MEBO, the company producing the board, and had handed over to a Lockerbie investigator on 22 June 1989 (six months AFTER the destruction of Pan Am 103).  Furthermore, Mr. Gauci, the other key witness, was interviewed more than 17 times by different investigators and now it appears that his testimonies during those investigations are inconsistent and so he could not be a reliable witness for the case.
There are many other stories surrounding the event too.  For example, Tony Blair was pivotal in signing a prison exchange agreement with Libya so that Al Megrahi could be transferred under Libyan custody.  That two of the Scottish banks are now in deep financial trouble and Libya is willing to support them out of the crisis and so the deal was struck.  That the UK is interested to invest in Libya and so it was important for them to come out clean from the event, that the key witness Mr. Gauci received a 2 million dollar bribe from CIA to testify against Al Megrahi, and so on.  Whatever may be the true cause for the release of Al Megrahi, I must say that I am impressed with the Scottish justice system, which is now considering a full review of the case and probably to clarify the matter that the investigation was not thorough.  It now appears to me that the 3 million dollar “trial” in the Netherlands was a fiasco too. The trial judge refused to hear some of the key submissions from the defense lawyers during the trial too.
Having said this, it now finally coming to two possible conclusions: a) the FBI and the UK investigating team behaved the same way as the CIA did to create “fake” evidences to convict two innocent persons in order to appease their governments to politically punish Gaddafi, so the true culprits could never be found, and b) that the same two agencies are now hatching a second plan targeting Iran or the Palestinians in order to sabotage a possible reconciliation effort by President Obama.  Finally, I must congratulate Mr. MacAskill; the Scottish justice secretary to take such a bold step in order upheld the Scottish principle of justice, whatever that may be.

Libya Now Versus Libya Then: So Much Has Changed.
By Philip Shaw M.Sc.
I find it hard to believe the conspiracy theory in which Enamul mentions in his piece this month.  In the West the Al Megrahi release is a cut and dry mistake, especially in North America.  Of course we will never know for sure exactly what happened but I for one took the evidence against Al Megrahi as gospel.  The destruction of the Pan Am flight over Lockerbie Scotland was one of the worst atrocities of the 1980s.

It is hard to categorize how different things are now with regard to Libya and the West versus the way they were then.  Back in the 1980s Libya was looked at as a pariah state, which supported terrorism at almost every level.  Also too, it was an aggressor against some in sub-Saharan Africa such as a country of Chad.  Almost everything that Libya touched at that time when viewed through an American lens was not good.  When the Pan Am airline went down over Scotland Libya would surely be a prime suspect.

You might say and you might feel that was a long time ago.  It surely was.  It just so happens that both Enamul and I had a very good friend at the time who was from Libya and was studying with us at the University of Guelph in Guelph Ontario.  To make a long story short I would call this Libyan friend of mine the “Magic Man “because of his love for the Los Angeles Lakers.  Needless to say over a period of months and years that we spent together I would often debate with him the politics and geopolitics of Libya in the 1980s.

It’s probably a good idea to preface all my remarks by saying I have a deep respect for my colleagues on the other side of the world who see the world differently than me.  Certainly that is the raison d’être of this column as Enamul sees things from the developing world and I see them 12 miles from the United States.  That is exactly how my Libyan friend saw things at the time.  I would question him extensively about Libya’s role in the world and how it seemed to me to be a troublemaker but he would often retort back to me about some of the other troublemakers in the neighborhood such as Israel.  Needless to say we were good friends and still to this day I hear from the “Magic Man “from Libya.

Sometimes it’s easy to talk about international terrorism and geopolitical moves like they we are on some type a chessboard.  However, I remember very clearly in April of 1986 when the United States bombed Libya the reaction of my friend “the Magic Man “.  While I think some in the halls of academia felt that the American action might be justified my friend was beside himself for obvious reasons.  The Americans were bombing his homeland and I’m sure he was very concerned about friends and family.   That raid in 1986 certainly painted his view of the Americans.

Fast-forward to 2009 and we have a totally different world. Libya is now a friend of the West with Col. Qaddafi actually visiting Italy and American and British firms fighting over investing in Libyan oilfields.  So when Al Megrahi was freed from the Scottish jail on compassionate reasons and was welcomed back to Tripoli in what looked like a hero’s welcome it brought back many memories of a bad time.  The optics are what the optics are it was too bad for everybody involved.

I take issue with my friend Enamul on many of his points regarding the Al Megrahi release. Certainly I am not an authority on who did what but I was clearly in the camp that he was guilty.  Releasing him on compassionate grounds was humanitarian but the reception in Tripoli waxed salt in some still present wounds.  Mistakes were made and that certainly was one of them, it just goes to show sometimes that you cannot put the cat back in the bag after it’s been released.

In Canada we have had our own terrorist problems.  For instance, in the late 1960s French-Canadian terrorists killed a British envoy and blew up bombs across Québec.  At the present time some of these individuals live peacefully in Québec and some have even run in past federal elections.  That should serve as an example of how dicey it can get when people in the West criticize the release of “terrorists “in other lands.  Sometimes it is what it is and sometimes it’s in the eye of the beholder.

The Al Megrahi affair will certainly fade into history.  If you believe Enamul someday we will find out who actually took down Pan Am 103.  I believe it was Al Megrahi.  Looking in the rearview mirror sometimes we have the habit of twisting and rationalizing history.  Nobody can pick the pieces up that fell over Lockerbie and put them back together again.  It was tragic to say the least.  The challenge now is to get everybody to move on.

By Philip Shaw M.Sc.

With Dr. A.K. Enamul Haque Ph.D

There are few world leaders like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.  At least I could say that with some degree of certainty and Western circles.  I’ve said it seemingly 1000 times in this column that the leader of Iran cannot be taken seriously in the West because of his Anti-Semitism and his public notions about the Holocaust.  However I know in the rest of the world he is not quite seen the same way.  Needless to say after the last presidential election in Iran, that country will never be the same.

I have never been to Iran and I must admit the American hostages, who were captured in 1979, and its present-day President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad shape many of my views regarding Iran.  However I learned many years ago under the tutelage of Dr. Haque that the world isn’t quite the way I see it.   Iran has a burgeoning population and a rich history, which sometimes is characterized the wrong way in Western circles.  Reaching out for some understanding between the two cultures seemingly would be good for everybody in 2009.

President Obama certainly gave the world a glimpse of a new outreach toward Iran earlier this year. In his inaugural address Mr. Obama talked about a “new era of responsibility “, where a clenched fist could be turned into an outstretched hand.  I know he was talking about many things that day and drawing several analogies but it was pretty clear some of it was meant for the Islamic Republic of Iran.  As the Obama era dawned I was hoping for an opening between the Western world and Iran.

That speech was made when Dr. Haque and I were on the small Bangladeshi island of St. Martin’s.  So I only got to see snippets of it after-the-fact.  A few days later I flew into Dubai and I couldn’t get over my proximity to Iran.  I saw several airliners headed toward Tehran.  A few hours later the aircraft that I was in flying back to Toronto flew over Tehran. It was a beautiful sight.  As I looked down from 35,000 feet I can only wonder if the people under those snowcapped mountains north of Tehran would be able to join the greater global community.

We all know what happened next.  The morning after the June 12 presidential election the Islamic Republic news agency, Iran’s official news agency, announced that with 66% of the votes counted Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had won the election.  The runner up Mir-Hossein Mousavi had received 33% of the votes cast.  A world away in Ontario Canada I was quite surprised.  However nothing could have prepared me for the violence, which erupted in Tehran and other cities in Iran.  Through a period of weeks and still to this day, supporters of the opposition and boosters of more openness in Iranian society have been protesting the election result as a fraud.  For ordinary Iranians it is a tragedy.  Who knows what it means for our greater world, especially in a world in south-central Asia.

For the people of Iran it is turned into a very messy situation.   You could make an argument that the divisions are between those who want to hang onto power by violence and those possibly younger people who want the rule of law, human rights and greater personal freedoms to be sustained.  This in turn would lead to an end to Iran’s long-time international isolation.   Adding to that chorus over the last few days have been conservative Iranians who have joined with some others from the Iranian political culture calling for justice.  With nearly 30 people killed during the political violence, it is certainly put a black mark on the present Iranian political leadership.

It surely also complicated the reproach to Iran from President Barack Obama.  How is he supposed to react now after many people have been killed and arrested?  The bottom line is change is likely to come very slowly in Iran as historically there has always been a combination of ruling clerics and politicians who rule the country.  Also too, US meddling in the past still paints the water in that part of the world.  Obama needs to tread carefully over the next few weeks and months with Iran not to add legitimacy to the people who have done the killing.

My colleague Enamul will certainly have a different view of this; we have debated many times the Iran question.  Looking ahead to the future in the short-term looks rocky as one side is pitted against the other with compromise in short supply.  Is there an honest broker that can help get it done and bring peace to the streets of Tehran again?  I don’t know.  Simply put the status quo is dangerous.  The winds of change might he starting to blow.

Winds of Change in Iran, is it coming?
A.K. Enamul Haque PhD.

Like Phil and many others, I also was quite curious about Iran. There are few things that even the people opposing the Islamic rule in Iran agreed in the past – a free and fair election.  Somehow the Iranian election authority maintained a posture that they were capable of holding a free and fair election.  It was indeed the strength of the Iranian government after the fall of Shah in 1979. To me, it was because of this, the Iranian government, despite being opposed by the West was still respected in the East.  We in the East, understand the grudge, the bitterness, the feeling of resentment of the West when the Shah of Iran fell into the hand of Imam Khomeni.  Khomeni humiliated and embarrassed the US government through his “April Fool” movement when his “Islamic Revolution” succeeded to oust the Shah of Iran on the 1st of April 1979.

The story afterwards, is well recorded in the history book but the maturity of new regime was evident when Khomenei decided not to take over the power himself. New Iranian leadership developed a complex rule for governing the country (diagram below/ source:Wikipedia).  As a result, successive Iranian governments could be formed through peaceful elections – that includes winning of the election by Ahmedinejad in 2005.

Frankly speaking, I think, this election is a blow to this image of Iran.  Many individuals like me are not going to be happy to learn that the election was rigged in favor of the incumbent President.

It shows the inherent weakness of the government to face their own citizens.  The Iranian government is, of course, quick to blame the West [as usual] for this and I believe that there is some truth to it too.  But the fact is that many Iranians came onto the street opposing the election result and it is a moral blow to the Iranian leaders.  Only history will say who did what to make this happen but for now the Government of Iran is on the defensive side – trying to defend “killing” of its citizens by its own security forces!

Assuming that the Iranian version of the chaos is true, that is, the US government orchestrated the whole trouble, the response by the Iranian government is obviously immature.  It shows the unpreparedness of the Iranian government to deal with the crisis, their inability to predict a political crisis and their failure to keep a brave face against their critics.

President Ahmedinejad might have forgotten that while challenging a super power like the US, the only strength they had was their moral power – where they were able to prove to the world that they too can hold free and fair elections and can change political power through peaceful means.  The Iranian leadership must work hard to establish that they still have the moral superiority in order to regain the support from the people in the East.

Can Sri Lanka win over poverty? Let us all help.
By Dr. A.K. Enamul Haque Ph.D

With Philip Shaw M.Sc.
On the 27th June 2009, I landed at the Bandarnayake International Airport in Colombo.  It was about noon, and for the first time I landed in Colombo in broad daylight.  I looked around – a beautiful airport with greenery all around.  The airport is relatively new – possibly built within the past 5-6 years – very clean, neatly organized with signs to direct visitors to the immigration counters.  Just before the immigration desk, I saw a thermal camera, taking the temperature of our body (to check if anyone had flu or flu like syndrome).  I was impressed!
At the meeting point, I saw a taxi driver waiting with a signboard with my name printed on it.  This is Sri Lanka, where the literacy rate is above 90% and it was possible for the organizer to simply give my name and asked them to pick me up from the airport, something very difficult to arrange in any other Asian country.  We started moving to the Club Hotel Dolphin where SANDEE is supposed to organize the biannual research and training workshop for researchers.
As we were moving, I started the conversation with the driver – here is Sri Lanka, English is OK and most people can speak to you at ease in English.   How is the business (for taxi drivers)? He replied to me that it is not good.  I was surprised!  Sri Lanka has just won a 30-year-old war with Tamils, who are only about 10% of the population!  He corrected me pretty quickly. It was great thing for Sri Lanka but tourists have not come back yet.  Clearly, he was happy with the fact that the civil war is over but he was referring to the fact that tourists are still hesitant to come and so his business is down!  Recession I guess
I asked his name, he was Faruk.  I could quickly guess that he is a Muslim and in Sri Lanka about 8% of the population are Muslims.  On inquiry I also found out that he did not like the Tamil’s war because to him, they are very few (but quite large in some of the north and eastern provinces) and so there is no logical point for them to fight the war.  He considered them to be “terrorists” who were trying to destroy the country.
However, on my way I also realized the security is not down yet.  Every few kilometers there were police and also army barricades or checks points.  But people seemed to be happy to continue to work.  Faruk had never been to a Tamil place yet and he cannot think that he will need to go there very soon.
Over the next one week I had tried to gauge the opinion about the victory against LTTE by the Sri Lankan Army.  It was clear that most people are happy with it.  However, it was also clear that they want a solution to the problem.  This is to me the beauty of Sri Lankans.  They were jubilant but not celebrating it.   With an educated citizenry Sri Lanka seemed to be much more mature in terms of dealing with it.  They are positive and want to recognize that Tamils like other minority groups in Sri Lanka need some protection and some autonomy to run their own affairs in provinces where they are majority and Sri Lanka is for all, not just for Sinhalese who are 74 percent of the population.
At the club Dolphin Hotel, I also realized that tourists are everywhere.  Never before I had seen this hotel so full!  Tourists are coming to Sri Lanka.  Most of them are from Europe – Germans, Austrians and also British.  Sri Lanka needs them to rebuild its economy and to fight poverty.  With a much higher rate of literacy, I strongly believe that Sri Lanka will be one of first few countries in South Asia, which can win over poverty very soon.  However, it needs support both at home and abroad.  I hope all peace loving country extend their hand and help them win this curse of the 21st century.

Putting It In the Rear View Mirror: In Sri Lanka It Seems Over
By Philip Shaw M.Sc.

I found Enamul’s account of his time in Sri Lanka to be truly fascinating.  In fact we communicated with each other while he was in Sri Lanka.  I reminded him that I wanted him to collect as much information as he could regarding the recent civil war.  He assured me that he was doing.

This is the one great advantage Enamul has over myself. I like to think of myself as quite a world traveler.  However, when it comes to business travel and frequency of travel my friend Enamul seems to fly all the time.  I don’t know how many times East West has been written in Bangkok, Beijing or Colombo?  I’m sure it’s been more than once in any one of those cities. Seeing and hearing about Sri Lanka’s civil war from somebody on the ground there was truly fascinating.

I also thought it interesting that Enamul tied the end of the Civil War in Sri Lanka to that country’s fight against poverty.  I had no idea that the literacy rate in Sri Lanka was 90%.  For those of you that don’t know that’s fairly high for South Asia and the example Enamul gave you about being picked up at the airport with somebody holding a sign is very telling.  Having been to South Asia many times that would be a stretch in the Dhaka airport.  Eliminating poverty in South Asia is usually job one of any government.  Some Western academics refer to South Asia in general as a poverty theme park. That description I have always found quite distasteful.

The difference in Sri Lanka seems to be tourism.  For instance you don’t hear much about tourism in places like Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Bhutan.  Sure, you hear a lot about tourism in India but that is a very big place and the tourist’s dollars can get buried underneath many other things.  In Sri Lanka like Nepal, tourism would be a major source of foreign exchange and employment.  Emamul’s driver Faruk was certainly hurting by the lack of tourist dollars coming back to Sri Lanka since the end of the Civil War.

The difficult part for Sri Lanka will be putting the pieces all back together from the Civil War. My buddy Enamul has the same, “it’s all based on history “.  That was the answer he gave me to almost every question I would ask him regarding why some nationalities didn’t like other nationalities or why some groups didn’t like other groups.  He would always go on to explain that something happened in history that nobody forgot.  In other words I paraphrased it to me your grandfather didn’t like my grandfather and it goes on and on.  Sri Lanka will surely have that problem.  For instance you cannot expect to have the grievances of the world’s Tamils to simply go away because the war is over.

In last month’s East West Enamul referred to the way Canada embraces Québec separatist within our federal parliament.  He has made that analogy more than once that he thinks it’s a wonderful quality of being Canadian that we can actually do that.  He made that analogy hoping I believe that our Sri Lankan friends might be able to do the same thing. I don’t know if that is possible but I would remind my friend Enamul that it is not the easiest thing for Canadians to do either.

In Canada three ethnic groups plot at war over this country, the French, English and native Canadians. However, that war was 300 years ago this year and still there is antagonism in Québec over what happened.  This summer a reenactment of the famous English conquest of Quebec had to be canceled because of radical Quebec separatists threatening to disrupt the reenactment. So still waters run deep even after 300 years.

So in Sri Lanka it’s been about six weeks since the fighting stopped. I can imagine that people in Colombo are happy but not necessarily jubilant. On the other hand people in Jaffna in the Northeast might not feel the same way.  The point being it will be hard for Sri Lanka to put this in the rearview mirror. It’s still very raw to many people.  Despite Faruk’s hope for the future from my vantage point here, I’m not so sure. Sometimes it’s hard to put things back together again.   For Sri Lanka’s sake and is people, I hope they get there.