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China enters the Year of the Dragon, signifying divine bliss, fortune and dynamism. Source: paknationalists.com China basked in festivity on Sunday as red lanterns and firecrackers ushered in the Year of the Dragon, a legendary animal of the Chinese zodiac considered the sign of divine bless with fortune and dynamism. When the bells chimed heralding the start of the Chinese lunar New Year on January 23, Zhu Shiming and Xiao Xiao prayed for a "Dragon Baby" to join their family in the following 12 months. The couple in the northern port city of Tianjin tied the knot last May and now hope to join the exclusive club of new parents in the Year of the Dragon, when Chinese population experts are expecting a baby boom. Despite the lack of statistics, a baby boom in the Year of the Dragon has become something of a sure thing as lots of young couples reportedly prepare to have a baby like Zhu and his wife, leading to the surge of charges for maternity nanny services in cities like Tianjin and Beijing.A large number of Chinese proverbs and phrases include references to the dragon, and "wang-zi-cheng-long" may interpret how important a Dragon Baby might mean to a family. The idiom means "hoping that the child will become a dragon," and with the hopes that the child will have as much success, money and be as powerful as the mythological mascot. Year of Hope amid Global Downturn Chinese people use 12 animal signs in a mathematical cycle for their zodiac system, each for a year. The previous Year of the Dragon was 2000, which ushered in the new millennium. In the first decade of the 21st century, China witnessed breathtaking, non-stop fast track development that catapulted the country to number two in the world's economic league table. However, amid global downturns since the financial crisis in 2008, China has to find a way out for sustained growth while it tries to cool down an overheated economy in an effort to rein in inflation. China's economy grew 8.9 percent year-on-year last quarter, below the 9-percent mark for the first time since mid-2009. Full-year growth of the gross domestic product slowed to 9.2 percent in 2011 from 10.4 percent in the previous year. he annual growth was well above the government's expectation of eight percent, and the slowdown can be attributed mostly to the government's macro-control levers. However, some businesses, especially small enterprises, have felt the bite of the slowdown. A construction project contractor in Tianjin, Yang Tingjiu, is hoping the Year of the Dragon will bring him more business opportunities after he endured two years of business slump. The man also saw his investment in stocks shrink over the past years, and is wishing for a rally of the stock market after the Year of the Dragon has begun. Chinese stocks have suffered continuous drops over the past years, with the key benchmark index at the Shanghai exchange down from the peak 6,000-plus points in October 2007 to just more than 2,200 points nowadays. As a token of good luck, the Year of the Dragon is considered especially crucial for China's development in the next ten years amid prophesies of an economic "hardlanding," a plunge in annual growth to 5 percent or less, as has been defined by some economists. In his speech addressed at a gathering to celebrate the Spring Festival, or the Chinese lunar new year, Premier Wen Jiabao said on Saturday that China has made a good start to the 12th Five-Year Plan (2011-2015) at a time of an austere and complicated international economic situation, but "We are going to face bigger challenges in the new year." Wen said the government will maintain stable prices and steady, rapid economic development, accelerate the transformation of development patterns and adjust the economic structure in a bid to enhance sustainable development. "We have the will, determination, courage and ability to overcome any difficulties," Wen said. More Than Economic Concerns On the eve of the Spring Festival, President Hu Jintao visited grassroots urban and rural areas in Beijing, extending greetings to the people. Hu went to the small village Tianxianyu near the Great Wall in Beijing's northern mountainous area, where he joined villagers asking about their livelihood and watching a dragon dance to welcome the New Year. In a similar action that is regarded as the central authorities' concern for the people, Premier Wen went to an oilfield in northwestern Gansu Province on Saturday. Festivity also surrounded Wukan, a village in the southern province of Guangdong which came into international spotlight for protests that lasted more than three months against illegal land requisition and corruptions in village financing and elections. The turbulence since September receded at the end of last year after a senior provincial official vowed, in a rare high-profile dialogue with protesters, to address the villagers' complaints and launch a probe. Zhu Mingguo, vice secretary of the Guangdong Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China, said that most of the villagers' appeals and complaints were reasonable. Provincial investigators later announced that there were violations in the village's land requisition and the village committee election in February 2011 was invalid. Now people in Wukan said their New Year wish is a smooth village committee election slated after the Spring Festival holidays. "We hope the new committee can solve the land problems soon and completely," said a villager, Zhang Yi. Wukan has been taken as an example about how the government should respond to the public's concerns and outcries as some places in the country are troubled by protests over land requisitions, pollution concerns and other problems amid rapid urbanization and industrialization. Actually, social stability has been on the government's top agenda as it endeavors to let all the people share the fruit of the country's economic development. At a provincial legislators' session earlier this month, Wang Yang, Guangdong's Party chief, warned that the biggest challenge faced by Guangdong is not economic but social problems. Premier Wen also underscored the improvement of people's livelihoods, democracy, equity and justice in his speech at Saturday's gathering. [Read the full report online on the website of People’s Daily Online].

In a major development, the United States declared that Taliban is not an enemy of US, a move by Obama administration aimed at reconcile with the proscribed outfit that ruled Afghanistan before 9/11. [is he nuts?] “Look, the Taliban per se is not our enemy. That’s critical,” US Vice-President Joe Biden said in an interview to the Newsweek magazine. “There is not a single statement that the (US) President has ever made in any of our policy assertions that the Taliban is our enemy because it threatens US interests,” he told the magazine. If, in fact, the Taliban is able to collapse the existing government, which is cooperating with us in keeping the bad guys from being able to do damage to us, then that becomes a problem for us. So there’s a dual track here, Biden added. “One, continue to keep the pressure on al-Qaida and continue to diminish them. Two, put the government in a position where they can be strong enough that they can negotiate with and not be overthrown by the Taliban,” he said. “And at the same time try to get the Taliban to move in the direction to see to it that they, through reconciliation, commit not to be engaged with al-Qaida or any other organization that they would harbor to do damage to us and our allies,” Biden said. White House press secretary Jay Carney, supporting Biden’s statement, said the Vice-President does not regret having said this.“We didn’t invade Afghanistan. We did not send US military personnel into Afghanistan because the Taliban were in power. They had been in power. We went into Afghanistan because al-Qaida had launched an attack against the US from Afghanistan,” he said. by By Katrina Jones source: http://pakistanideology.com Nawaz

Forty million women killed, buried alive, abandoned, or married off at young age to old men. And if they are not killed, entire villages force their girls into prostitution. This the place where 50,000 unborn girls are aborted every month, where thousands of little girls are either buried alive or abandoned. A place where the female ratio is lowest in the world. A place with the highest number of underage girls married to older men, and the highest number of female infanticide: the practice of burying new born baby girls alive. Around 40 million women have been aborted, murdered or abandoned in this one nation since 1980. This is India. Home to the biggest genocide against women on the planet.And it continues as we speak. “It’s the obliteration of a whole class, race, of human beings. It’s half the population of India,” said women’s rights activist Ruchira Gupta of Apne Aap Women Worldwide. If a baby girl survives abortion or being buried alive in India, she is forced into prostitution. It is a crime in India to use an ultrasound to determine the sex of a child and it is also illegal to perform an abortion based on gender, but the laws are rarely enforced. The Indian government has the resources to spend on stopping this massive ill-treatment of women but it prefers to spend billions on weapons. India is on a quest for superpower status and is spending its resources on the military. It has already spent $2 billion in Afghanistan to contain Pakistan, and billions more to counter China. But can the Indian government really stop this mistreatment of Indian women? It can. The Indian government had $264 billion in its savings account in 2009. This figure has jumped to $307 billion in the first week of December 2011. So India basically has a rich government that refuses to share wealth with India’s poor, who happen to be largest single block of poverty anywhere in the world. Two women, one India and the other American, brought this silent genocide to world’s attention this month. Gita Aravamudan is the author of the book, ‘Disappearing Daughters’. And Mindy McReady is a journalist working for ABC television in the United States. Together they have produced a compelling documentary, titled, ‘India’s Deadly Secret: Why an estimated 40 million girls have gone missing in India?’ Sadly, the Indian police and judiciary are corrupt and their silence can be bought. Even worse, the policemen and the judges are, after all, Indian men who don’t see much wrong in getting rid of female babies. “The very people who have to implement the law — the police and the judiciary — also believe that having too many girls is a burden on the family,” Gupta said. “They never implement the laws because they believe in the same thing, and sometimes actually do the same thing.” The real issue here is Hinduism, the majority Indian religion. It attaches a very low status to women, and thousands of years of practice has entrenched the anti-girl bias in Indian psyche. Today, there are thousands of Indian villages that push their girls into prostitution, if they survive abortion and infanticide.In September 2011, Catholic Online wrote in a report quoting an Indian charity that “Young girls are pushed into the sex business by their own fathers and brothers, who see nothing wrong with it. They claim it is a tradition that has been passed down through generations. Under the devdasi (“servant of God”) culture, girls were dedicated to a life of sex work in the name of religion.” MUST SEE See the full documentary on ABC’s website at this link: http://bitly.com/tHVRHI?r=bb See Part 1 of the documentary on YouTube at this link: http://bitly.com/sh8bJ1?r=bb Part 2: http://bitly.com/vVwrfz?r=bb Read the article on ABC’s website: Forced Abortions of Female Babies In India at this link http://bitly.com/spue08?r=bb How To Help India’s Disappearing Daughters? See http://bitly.com/uHtNIr?r=bb Read India’s Villages Still Force Young Girls Into Prostitution at this link http://bitly.com/s4CkAV?r=bb SPECIAL REPORT | PakNationalists.com Source: http://www.pakistanideology.com Nawaz

The US government should transfer Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) command of aerial drone strikes to the armed forces and clarify its legal rationale for targeted killings, Human Rights Watch said today in a letter to President Barack Obama and in a questions and answers document. A dramatic increase in the use of CIA drone strikes underscores the need for the US to demonstrate that the CIA adheres to international legal requirements for accountability, Human Rights Watch said. “CIA drone strikes have become an almost daily occurrence around the world, but little is known about who is killed and under what circumstances,” said James Ross, legal and policy director at Human Rights Watch. “So long as the US resists public accountability for CIA drone strikes, the agency should not be conducting targeted killings.” In the decade since the September 11, 2001 attacks, the Bush and Obama administrations have engaged in a campaign of “targeted killings” – deliberate, lethal attacks aimed at specific individuals under the color of law. Estimates of the number of deaths of alleged al Qaeda members, other armed group members, and civilians from US targeted killings range from several hundred to more than two thousand. Most of these attacks are believed to have occurred in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Somalia, and Yemen using unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, armed with missiles and laser-guided bombs. The lawfulness of a targeted killing hinges in part on the applicable international law, which is determined by the context in which the attack takes place, Human Rights Watch said. The laws of war permit attacks during situations of armed conflict only against valid military targets. Attacks causing disproportionate loss of civilian life or property are prohibited. During law enforcement situations, international human rights law permits the use of lethal force only when absolutely necessary to save human life. Individuals cannot be targeted with lethal force merely because of past unlawful behavior, but only for imminent or other grave threats to life when arrest is not reasonably possible. The CIA’s increasing role in targeted killings using drones in Pakistan and other countries with no transparency or demonstrated accountability raises grave concerns about the lawfulness of the attacks, Human Rights Watch said. While the laws of war do not prohibit intelligence agencies from participating in combat operations, states are obligated to investigate credible allegations of war crimes and provide redress for victims of unlawful attacks. The US government’s refusal to acknowledge the CIA’s role in targeted killings or to provide information on strikes where there have been credible allegations of laws-of-war violations leaves little basis for determining whether the US is meeting its international legal obligations. “Unsupported claims by administration officials that all US agencies involved in targeted killings are complying with international law are wholly inadequate,” Ross said. “By failing to adopt policies and practices that demonstrate compliance with international law, the US raises doubts among its allies about the lawfulness of its actions and creates a dangerous model for abusive governments.” Since the US has not demonstrated a readiness to hold the CIA to international legal requirements, the use of drones for attacks should be exclusively within the command responsibility of the US armed forces, Human Rights Watch said. The military has more transparent procedures for investigating possible wrongdoing, although it too needs to make clear that it is conducting attacks in accordance with international legal requirements. Ending the CIA’s command of targeted killing operations would be consistent with the recommendations of the independent 9/11 Commission, which in 2004 specifically urged that “[l]ead responsibility for directing and executing paramilitary operations, whether clandestine or covert, should shift to the Defense Department.” In November, former director of national intelligence Dennis Blair called for military control over the armed drone program, noting that the armed forces have an open set of procedures, while CIA operations require secrecy, which is not sustainable over the long term: “If something has been going for a long period of time, somebody else ought to do it, not intelligence agencies." Human Rights Watch also called upon the US government to clarify fully and publicly its legal rationale for conducting targeted killings and the legal limits on such strikes. The US should explain why it believes that specific attacks are in conformity with international law and make information public, including video footage, on how particular attacks comply with those standards. To ensure compliance with international law, the United States should conduct investigations of all targeted killings where there is credible evidence of wrongdoing, provide compensation to all victims of unlawful strikes, and discipline or prosecute as appropriate those responsible for conducting or ordering illegal attacks. The Obama administration, through public statements by senior officials, has provided an outline of its legal justification for using force against al Qaeda and associated organizations. However, the administration has yet to clearly explain where it draws the line between lawful and unlawful targeted killings, Human Rights Watch said. In asserting that targeted attacks on alleged anti-US militants anywhere in the world are lawful, the US undermines the international rules it helped craft over the past half-century. This sets a dangerous precedent for abusive regimes around the globe to conduct drone attacks or other strikes against anyone labeled a terrorist or militant, and undercuts the ability of the US to criticize such attacks.About 40 other countries currently possess basic drone technology, and the number is expected to expand significantly in coming years. These drones are primarily used for surveillance. China, France, Germany, India, Iran, Israel, Italy, Russia, Turkey, and the United Kingdom either have or are currently seeking drones with attack capability. Follow Human Rights Watch on Twitter: www.twitter.com/hrw http://www.huffingtonpost.com/human-rights-watch/us-end-cia-drone-attacks_b_1159144.html Source: http://www.pakistanideology.com Nawaz

The route from Karachi to Kabul was the best way to get supplies to U.S. troops in Afghanistan, and the main artery for a Pashtun trucking empire—until Pakistan shut it down. Like a broker tracking the dips and spikes of a volatile but lucrative stock, Mohammad Shakir Afridi has kept a close eye on U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan since the first Americans landed in the country 10 years ago. As president of the Khyber Transport Assn., one of the largest associations of truck owners in Pakistan, Afridi’s biggest contract involves moving military equipment for American and coalition forces through Pakistan to military bases in Afghanistan. The slightest policy shift in Washington can carry major consequences for Afridi and his business. Sitting on a rooftop in a leafy residential block in Peshawar, the largest city in northwest Pakistan, Afridi slaps the morning paper on the floor beside his mat. “Twenty-four of our boys in one go,” he spits out. A front page photograph shows a field full of coffins draped in Pakistani flags. The soldiers were killed on Nov. 26 when U.S. helicopters and jet fighters from Afghanistan fired on military outposts on the Pakistani side of the border. The relationship between Pakistan and the U.S., which has been rocky for years, hit a new low. While the U.S. military promised to investigate and the NATO chief regretted the “tragic, unintended” incident, the Pakistani Prime Minister said there would be “no more business as usual” with the U.S. Pakistan demanded the U.S. vacate an airbase it was using in the South and choked off all U.S. and coalition military supplies traveling through the country. Afridi learned of the American attack before the Pakistan military or government had issued any statement; one of his truck drivers called to tell him the border was closed. Afridi was later given orders from the military to halt trucks near the border, and to direct all others to the southern port city of Karachi. He quickly obliged. “It’s serious this time,” Afridi says. “They’ll make the Americans sweat.” U.S. and Allied forces in Afghanistan get the bulk of their supplies in two ways. The first is the Northern Distribution Network, a web through Central and Eastern Europe and Central Asia that crosses through at least 16 countries, using a combination of roads, railway, air, and water to move supplies in from the north. The chain can be complex and circuitous. One path through the network, for example, might involve military cargo that arrives by sea in Istanbul. From there it travels the width of Turkey on truck and crosses the northern border into Poti, Georgia. In Georgia the equipment goes by rail to Baku in Azerbaijan, where it’s loaded onto a ship bound for the Kazakh Port of Aktau, across the Caspian Sea. Then it’s put on trucks for the 1,000-mile ride through Kazakhstan, then a train through Kyrgyzstan and, finally, into Afghanistan. The second passage to Afghanistan, known as Pakistani Lines of Communication, begins at the port of Karachi and continues on one of two land routes, north toward the logistical hub at Bagram Airfield or west toward Kandahar. It has always been the primary option for American forces: It’s the shortest and cheapest, requires only one border crossing, and minimal time on the road inside Afghanistan. Nearly 60,000 trucks drive more than 1,200 miles through the length of Pakistan every year carrying supplies and fuel. According to varying figures provided by U.S. and NATO forces, 40 percent to 60 percent of all military supplies used by coalition forces in Afghanistan come through Pakistan. Afridi doesn’t cut the figure of a man playing a key role in the U.S.’s long war in Afghanistan. The 46-year-old Pashtun is from the Khyber Agency, one of the seven Pakistani tribal sectors along the border with Afghanistan. He has a neatly trimmed salt and pepper beard and prefers to drape his rotund figure in a plain white shalwar kameez and a black vest. When he’s not too preoccupied, he wears a disarming smile. The only thing that makes him stand out from the legions of similarly dressed men on the streets of Peshawar are his dark tinted glasses and a cell phone that never stops ringing. this article published in Businessweek.com Source: http://www.pakistanideology.com Nawaz

A noted South Asia defence analyst who spent six years in Pakistan as Australia's military attache has condemned as "unpardonable" Nato's attack on border posts in Mohmand in which 24 Pakistani soldiers were killed. "The US assault is unpardonable," wrote Cloughley in Counter Punch, a bi-weekly American newsletter. "It was one of the only too frequent Cowboy Yippee Shoots, as we used to call them in Vietnam when I served there in the Australian army. Some things don’t change," said Cloughley, who contributes regularly to Jane's weekly said. Cloughley, who now lives in France, said he was in Mohmand three weeks ago, visiting 77 Brigade, "whose officers and soldiers were slaughtered by US aircraft, and I know exactly where Pakistan’s border posts are located. And so do American forces, because they have been informed of the precise coordinates of them all." "Nobody can deny that the posts are well inside Pakistan," he wrote. "Those killed in the US attack on Pakistan included Captain Usman, whose six-month-old daughter will never see him again, and Major Mujahid who was to be married shortly. Well done, you gallant warriors of the skies. May you never sleep contented." After giving various versions of the incident, Cloughley, who believes there is no military solution to the conflict in Afghanistan, commented, "The 'sacrifices that America is making' in Afghanistan, in what is ludicrously called ‘Operation Enduring Freedom’, are entirely self-inflicted. But Pakistan’s sacrifices are inflicted by America, which is losing yet another war and again blames another country for its failure. Just like it did in the disasters in Vietnam and Somalia and Iraq. "In the past 50 years, what nation has trusted America and come out of the deal with dignity, honour and prosperity? Pakistan is far from a perfect country. Its government is corrupt and appallingly inefficient. But it could do without Washington’s imperial insolence. At the moment Islamabad is desperate to find some means of registering the country’s contempt and loathing for the United States, and there are very few options available to it. But it could reflect on what Washington’s retaliation would have been if Pakistani aircraft had gone on a yippee shoot and killed 24 American soldiers inside Afghanistan." Source: http://www.pakistanideology.com Nawaz

The US media is now reporting that the Pakistani government has ordered the U.S. to “vacate” an air base used for suspected drone attacks, in retaliation for a NATO strike that allegedly killed two-dozen Pakistani soldiers. NATO attacked the Pakistani post at 2 am in the morning while the 40 soldiers were asleep 1.5 miles from the Afghan border in the Baizai area of Mohmand. Pakistani soldiers were engaged with the TTP which has safe havens in Afghanistan. Several dozen (28) were murdered in the cold of the night, which included two officers, and more than a dozen were injured. Pakistan has protested and halted NATO supplies. The last time the supplies were halted for about ten days, ISAF and NATO ran out of food rations and toilet paper. This time around, the stoppage will be longer. The nonsense about a Northern supply route is as bogus as a three Dollar bill. Pakistani troops retaliated “Pakistani troops effectively responded immediately in self-defense to NATO/ISAF’s aggression with all available weapons.” NATO has admitted responsibility. “Close air support was called in, in the development of the tactical situation, and it is what highly likely caused the Pakistan casualties.” Brigadier General Carsten Jacobson, spokesman for the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) It seemed an unprovoked attack on Pakistani soldiers. “The latest attack by NATO forces on our post will have serious repercussions as they without any reasons attacked on our post and killed soldiers asleep.” Night raids by NATO are also very unpopular in Afghanistan. The Loya Jirga recently condemned it and Karzai has been very vocal about it. Its as if this is exactly what Husein Haqqani wanted. The US military to beat up on the Pakistani Army. The president, prime minister and the government of Pakistan strongly condemn the attacks which were totally unacceptable, constituted a grave infringement of Pakistan’s sovereignty, were violative of international law and a serious transgression of the oft conveyed red lines and could have serious repercussions on Pakistan-US/Nato/Isaf cooperation.” Pakistani spokesman. The commander of NATO-led forces in Afghanistan, General John R. Allen, said he had offered his condolences to the family of any Pakistani soldiers who “may have been killed or injured” during an “incident” on the border. . The U.S. embassy in Islamabad also offered condolences. “I regret the loss of life of any Pakistani servicemen, and pledge that the United States will work closely with Pakistan to investigate this incident,” ambassador Cameron Munter said in a statement. What is ironic is the fact that this attack came on the heels of high level meetings between NATO and Pakistani commanders”After the recent meetings between Pakistan and ISAF/NATO forces to build confidence and trust, these kind of attacks should not have taken place,” a senior military source told Reuters. Pakistan has halted NATO supply trucks and fuel tankers bound for Afghanistan,ostensibly for their own protection and because of the security situation. Trucks were stopped at Jamrud town in the Khyber tribal region near the city of Peshawar hours after the raid “We have halted the supplies and some 40 tankers and trucks have been returned from the check post in Jamrud,” Mutahir Zeb, a senior government official, told Reuters. The border crossing at Chaman in Baluchistan was also closed. General Kayani has threatened an “effective response” and retaliation. Analysts believe that the halting of NATO supplies is the first step in Pakistani retaliation for the unprovoked NATO attack believed to have been instigated by Washington. Pakistani military officials do not buy the line that this was a tactical mistake. Brussels is every aware of the sensitive nature of the cross-border raids. The civilian, military and civic society is infuriated and backing down will be difficult right now. Some analysts are pointing out the Hillary Clinton‘s explicit warning to Pakistan to resolve this situation within “days, weeks”. “We intend to push the Pakistanis very hard as to what they are willing and able to do with us and the international community to remove the safe havens and the continuing threats across the border to Afghanistan.” Hillary Clinton. Could this escalation be a link in the grand plan to resolve Pakistan before the next general elections in the US. Beaten to a pulp by the Pakistani Army the TTP terrorists are limping back to the negotiating table. Washington is however frustrated that Pakistan has not pressured the Afghan Taliban into submitting to US demands. After the fiasco of the Istanbul conference which was a colossal failure because the Americans insisted on the presence of India (which is not an immediate neighbor of Afghanistan) at the conference. This spells failure to the next link in peace the Bonn Conference scheduled for December 2 is now a non-starter. With the NATO attack, and US rhetoric against Pakistan, it seems that the US lead peace process is dead. The folks in Khyber, the Hindu Kush and the Pamir are biding time, waiting for the countdown when an exhausted Obama Administration, overburdended with debt will come to a hasty withdrawal from West Asia. Obama’s Afghanistan strategy is a failure. Its Pakistan strategy is in shambles. The US economy shows no sign of recovery. The Republicans are chomping at the bits. The war is in stalemate. A Talib victory is inevitable Imran Khan, Chairman of Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf (PTI) strongly condemned the unprovoked NATO attack on Salala Check Post in the Momand Agency and “Time has come for the government to pull out of this inhuman conflict and initiate a purposeful dialogue to bring peace to the country and the region.” Using diplomatic language Reuters reports that “There is possibility of attacks on NATO supplies passing through the volatile Khyber tribal region, therefore we sent them back toward Peshawar to remain safe.” he said. A similar incident on Sept 30, 2009, which killed two Pakistani troops, led to the closure of one of NATO’s supply routes through Pakistan for 10 days. This led to a severe shortage of goods and supplies. Soldiers began running out of bullets, and NATO had to put its soldiers on half-rations. In the initial days of the stoppage of supplies, NATO kept on saying that there was no affect on anyone and that the Norhter supply routes will fill in the shortages. In actuality it didn’t happen and the stoppage hurt the fighting which came to a virtual halt. Soldiers cannot fight without food. In that case NATO apologized for that incident. American-Pakistani relations are at a new nadir with Republican candidates full of bluster against the ally that has lost 35,000 innocent citizens and about 70000 Pakistani soldiers. There is no appreciation for the loss of life–only charges of “do more”. Things began to unravel when the CIA operative with an anger problem killed two Pakistanis in borad daylight, and then over ran another one who was an innocent bystander. The CIA cowboy used his Brock gun to shoot several bullets into the injured guys who were writhing in pain on the road. This caused a huge furore in Pakistan and Raymond Davis was tried and convicted of the crime. However blood money was paid and he was released. The day after the release the CIA killed 300 pro-Pakistani tribals who had gathered to resolve a domestic dispute. There are news reports that Pakistan is taking the drone attacks issue to the UN. There are many in Pakistan who want to take this to the UNSC. Most analysts dont think of this as a permanent breach, unless either party over-reacts. The halt in supplies will hurt the US where it matters, in the gut and in the stomach. [published in Rupeenews.com] Source: http://www.pakistanideology.com Nawaz

US allegations against Pakistan Government, military and the ISI appear to be based on psychological campaign using technique of Psy Ops, in which information is given forcing the target audience to respond or engage in desired activities. In fact, these machinations and allegations have enabled the Pakistani nation to get united, and gird up its loins to meet the challenges. American administration should understand that denouncing Pakistan government, denigrating Pak Army and accusing ISI of supporting terrorists could prove detrimental to fight against terrorism and undermine the efforts to bring peace in Afghanistan. Since the endgame in Afghanistan is approaching, the US wants to position India in Afghanistan with a strategic advantage to encircle Pakistan and contain China. But in view of strategic partnership with Afghanistan, if India agrees to send troops in Afghanistan, Afghans in general and Pakhtuns in particular would not tolerate them. The question is when 150,000 American and NATO forces with all the latest gadgetry and arsenal at their disposal could not win the war, how could a contingent of Indian army rein in Taliban and other insurgent groups. The fact of the matter is that stability in Afghanistan will remain a distant possibility till all the stake holders, including Pakhtuns and Taliban, are brought on board. At the same time concerns of regional states like Pakistan, Iran and China also need to be addressed rather than displaying arrogance or show of power. No doubt it is in the interest of Pakistan to improve her relations with Afghanistan. However, America should let the peace process go forward in line with the declaration of Istanbul Regional Conference to bring peace and stability in Afghanistan. But India is raising alarm of China’s presence in the region, and has stepped up propaganda alleging that elements of Chinese Red Army are present in Azad Jammu and Kashmir areas posing a direct threat to Indian security. It is unfortunate that one TV anchor/analyst commented that Chinese Deputy Prime Minister’s visit to Pakistan was not to express solidarity with Pakistan during period of crisis (in the wake of US accusations) but to issue a warning to Pakistan for training the terrorists who create trouble in Xingjian Province of China. Anyhow, India continues to raise the bogey of threat from, what it calls Pakistan-China nexus. In July 2010, the Defence Ministry in its annual report stated its concerns over Beijing’s possible use of Jammu and Kashmir to increase its connectivity with Pakistan. “The possibility of (China) enhancing connectivity with Pakistan through the territory of Jammu and Kashmir will have direct military implications for India,” the report said. Stressing the need to remain vigilant, India’s defence minister A.K. Antony, however, hoped that China will reciprocate the initiatives aimed at mutual trust-building. India had reportedly sensed new threat perceptions and aired its concerns on a road connecting China and Pakistan through Karakoram. Almost three decades ago, when the road was laid, India made a formal protest. Subsequently, the issue was put on the backburner till 2009, but it again cropped up in 2010, and with a view to appeasing the US, Indian government has unleashed propaganda about Pakistan-China nexus. According to Mathew Rosenberg’s report in Wall Street Journal, US held secret meetings with Afghan Taliban (Haqqani Network), and one was held a month before the September 13 attack on US embassy in Kabul. America is displaying double standards. On the one hand US holds Haqqani group responsible for violence in Afghanistan and accuses ISI of supporting the group, while on the other US is making behind the scene efforts to negotiate with Taliban, including Haqqani group. Siraj Haqqani, son of Jalaluddin Haqqani, in a BBC interview, had categorically denied taking orders from ISI, adding Americans were in touch with him to persuade him to enter into talks with Afghan Government. The problem is that America wants Pakistan to go all out to help America win the war in Afghanistan, but at the same time CIA along with Indian RAW is trying to create conditions in Karachi, Balochistan and FATA that could destabilize Pakistan. There are reports that US agents have connections with Pakistani Taliban who launch attacks inside Pakistan. Such acts of sabotage and terrorism are arguably sponsored by the CIA and India.After Professor Rabbani was killed by a suicide bomber, Afghan Defence Minister General Abdur Rahimullah Yusufzai Wardik in a statement had said that the attack was planned in Quetta and that suicide bomber, Ismatullah, was a Pakistani from the border town of Chaman. Afghanistan’s Interior Minister went a step further and alleged that ISI was involved in the conspiracy to assassinate Rabbani. The Indian intent is obvious from the fact that it wants to keep the focus entirely spotted on Pakistan to demonise it as a state, denigrate its agencies and its military, to project it as a state sponsoring terrorism globally, to isolate it internationally with a view to reaping a big harvest of consequent gains. But this path is fraught with dangers because the escalation of tensions and the war between the two nuclear states is not an option. It is therefore in the best interest of both India and Pakistan to resolve all outstanding issues and resume composite dialogue process in real earnest, as it has been established that Pakistan as a state was not involved in any of terrorist acts in India. Indian leadership has to bear in mind that there are more contradictions between the states and the center in India, and there are separatist movements in at least a dozen states. And once the course of disintegration is set rolling, India is much more vulnerable to disintegration than Pakistan. A lot of books have been written in India and in the West, and a brief survey of the shelves of any bookshop will among others show books on India such as “The Corrupt Society”, “Foul play: Chronicles of Corruption 1947-97” and so on. That point besides, Pakistan should expose Indian RAW’s thuggish activities in FATA, Karachi and Balochistan. Pakistan’s foreign office should abandon the habit of being on the defensive and always responding to India’s allegations. It should stop playing on the back foot and play on the front foot to expose India’s machinations and artifices to destabilize Pakistan. Since the US and Indian interests converge in the region, it is almost certain that the propaganda blitz against Pakistan has the wink from the former. Pakistani politicians, foreign office and media have not been able to counter that propaganda. There are indeed patriots in Pakistani media, but there is no dearth of the sold-out journalists and palmed off analysts who propagate the views expressed by the US and hostile international media. by Mohammad Jamil (The Frontier Post) Source: http://www.pakistanideology.com

The “Atlantic” magazine, in its article with the same title as above carried in the December 2011 issue has attacked Pakistan and its nuclear program tooth and nail. However, the authors of the article, Jeffrey Goldberg and Marc Ambinder, who claim to have put in six months of research, have apparently never set foot in Pakistan and concocted their fabrication from the comfort of their arm chairs. The leader of the Strategic Plans Division (SPD), the custodians of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal and the secretariat of neither the Nuclear Command Authority, nor its mid-ranking officers have ever heard the names of these scribes, let alone talking to them. It was rather surprising, since the SPD is fairly transparent in interacting with both the national and international media. The fictional scenario of the Pakistan Army Chief calling up Lieutenant General Khalid Kidwai (Retd.), the Director General of SPD in the aftermath of the May 02 attack on Abbottabad to eliminate Osama, perhaps is meant to lend credence to the 10,000 words fairy tale conjured with malicious intent and malign Pakistan and its nuclear assets. The tirade is so full of holes and self contradiction that it is surprising how a journal of the repute of “Atlantic” lent space to it, unless it too is part of a more sinister and macabre propaganda. It commences with the preamble that Pakistan is an “unstable and violent country located at the epicenter of global jihadism”. That much is correct although we need not go into the discussion that the violence and instability has been caused by the US itself, by interfering in Pakistan’s domestic politics and its involvement in the war on terror at the behest of the US. In the same article, the authors respectfully acknowledge the professionalism of the Pakistan Army as well as the SPD, even quoting erudite scholars, yet they contradict themselves by claiming the SPD transports nuclear warheads in public transports. What could be more ridiculous than that? They claim that the SPD tries to hide the warheads from USA and not the terrorists. If that were true, the US would by now have taken action towards it or the terrorists stolen a nuke or two. Although it is extremely amateurish to imagine that a ragtag militia would be able to put together a sophisticated nuclear device and explode it by simply pilfering a warhead. To provide essence to the flavor of bigotry and deceit, the authors take the instance of the attacks on a bus carrying PAF personnel at Sargodha, another at a naval installation at Karachi and at the gates of Pakistan’s Ordnance Factory at Wah as targeting nuclear installations. Since neither the authors and for that matter, the CIA or State Department know the location of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal what to say of the number of warheads it possesses, (the authors quote General James Jones, former National Security Adviser to Obama as expressing no knowledge of the location of Pakistan’s nukes) it is preposterous to imply that the frequent attacks by the terrorist organizations on Pakistan’s armed forces personnel as retaliation for the successful operations by Pakistan Army to eradicate terrorism, as attacks on nuclear installations. The authors have even taken pains to publish a map indicating the supposed locations of Pakistan’s nuclear warheads. It must be relief for the custodians of the nukes to see how widely off mark they appear to be. In fact if the Abbottabad incident left any aftereffects, it must have been to analyze, augment security procedures and plug the gaps that were exposed in its aftermath. One swallow does not make a summer; hence the detractors of Pakistan’s nukes should give up the Walter Mittyish scenario being presented of nabbing and grabbing Pakistan’s nukes and failing that, maligning their custodians. In fact the authors have presented a factual comment about the US being “the ally from hell” and in the words of the authors, “with a friend like this, who needs enemies?” by S.M Hali (Opinion-Maker) Source: http://www.pakistanideology.com Nawaz

Black Libyans by the racist para-militaries who now rule Libya. Bodies of black men hanging from highways. Bound and tortured bodies of Africans dumped along the roadsides. Am I talking about Libya or Louisiana? And all under the approving eye of the first Black President of the USA. The lynching of Africans in Libya has been so bad that African leaders across the continent have been forced to raise their voices in protest. When the President of Nigeria, the USA’s unofficial enforcer in West Africa leads an African wide outcry against the lynching of his citizens in Libya one would assume that it was heard in the Obama White House. With the murder or expulsion of most of Libya’s African migrant population well on its way came the massacre and ethnic cleansing of tens of thousands of Black Libyans. And all the while Barack Obama and his band of criminal cohorts in the western capitals and television news channels strung together words like “pro-democracy”, “freedom fighters” and “liberation” to describe the orgy of looting and lynching being carried out. When Black Libyans took up arms to defend their families and homes from the Libyan lynch mobs they found themselves the beneficiaries of “pro-democracy” high explosives, delivered from on high by a freedom loving NATO air force. Bombed from on high, lynched on the ground, the only choice is flee for your lives and that is what hundreds of thousands of Black Libyan have been forced to do. And all under the approving eye of the first Black President in the White House. Should we be surprised at such serpentine behavior by the first Black President? Isn’t this the guy who raised over $500 million to help him buy the White House, with $300 million of that from Wall Street? Isn’t this the guy who surrounded himself before his election with the very worst criminals from the Clinton White house such as Anthony Lake, Susan Rice, Gayle Smith and Eric Holder? But isn’t Barack Obama supposed to know what it’s like to be a black man in America? Didn’t he used to attend a militant black church where the minister preached the Lord’s damnation upon the racist and genocidal rulers of the USA? The brutal truth is that, like the shepherd’s dog taken as a pup from its mother to suckle at the tit of a sheep, Barack Hussein Obama spent those most critical teenage years being the only black kid in a school of thousands (Note; this writer attended the same school as Barack Obama, Punahou, some half a dozen years before him). Punahou is one of the most elite schools in the USA, founded in Hawaii by Yankee missionaries who so famously brought the bible and took the Hawaiians land. Today Punahou’s alumni include names that adorn the headquarters of multinational corporations like Dole Foods. Barack Obama discovered what the white man wanted to hear from a black boy at an early age and apparently never forgot it. From Punahou eventually to Harvard, Obama learned what the elite needed to hear if you wanted to get ahead even if it meant black is white, up is down and wrong is right. So today we have the spectacle of a son of an African, the first Black President in the White house, broadcasting his approval for all the world to see that Libya or Louisiana, if lynching Africans is what it takes, God Bless the USA…and no where else. Thomas C. Mountain is the only independent western journalist in the Horn of Africa, living and reporting from Eritrea since 2006. He can be contacted at thomascmountain at yahoo dot com. Source: www.pakistanideology.com Nawaz