These last couple weeks I have been watching numerous movies on British politics. Coincidence or calculations? Yesterday night, it was Tinker, Tailor, Sailor, Spy, the night before Page Eight (which by the way is one of my favorite spy movies), tonight most likely the Iron Lady. Prior to this triple hat, I did see the Queen, The Special Relationship, Ghost Writer, the King Speech and the Deal among many others. So I cannot help myself thinking: why has Britain always shape imagination? Is there such thing as a British myth? And, what kind of power will Britain be in the 21st century?

All these movies – and I am missing a lot of them – prove that Britain’s soft power – or the power of attraction as defined by Joseph Nye – is more than ever alive and powerful. British cinema and music, such as Coldplay, are still doing very well and truly influence the artistic world to a certain extent. But has British soft power been an overall success? Not really, British soft power is also progressively eroding with the considerable cuts of the British diplomatic services, one of the most powerful in the world, by almost 20 percent. The Foreign & Commonwealth Office (FCO), diplomatic corps, has seen a reduction of its staff from 4,300 to 3,900, which will affect the influence of Britain in less relevant and strategic regions as well as the gathering of information. Furthermore, many radio programs of the BBC have already been cancelled. These moves will undeniably hurt British soft power in the long run. Looking at the domestic politics of Britain, the economic crisis has been pretty violent and led to the appointment of Mr. Cameron, a conservative, to Downing Street. Mr. Cameron’s job and approach have been to cut public programs in order to lower the overall budget deficit, an obsession among conservatives. The budget cuts have been considerable across the board, even the military did not escape it.

Talking of the military, defender of hard power, critics have claimed that defense budget cuts have been made without a clear overall strategy. Many believe that these defense cuts will affect the type of power Britain will be in the 21st century. Some have argued that the defense cuts of “the annual $58 billion Ministry of Defense budget might have to be cut by almost a quarter.” The Franco-British treaty of 2010 illustrates the new approach of cooperation in the very opaque world of military and defense. A year later, France and Britain sought to protect Libyan civilians from their leader Colonel Qaddafi. Both European military powerhouses knew that without NATO they would not be able to act and sustain their military strategies without the intervention of the US. Even though the mission was described as a success and a possible template for future missions, it did show that France and Britain cannot finance military operations at regional and international scales. Furthermore, these defense cuts have sent a wrong message across the pond. The American fear that it could affect the role of Britain in the Afghan counter-insurgency. Britain is the second largest force in Afghanistan after the US. Former US Secretary of Defense, Mr. Gates, expressed his concerns back in June 2011 about the large defense cuts taking place in Europe and their impacts on the relevance of NATO. Robert Gates declared that “If current trends in the decline of European defense capabilities are not halted and reversed, future U.S. political leaders — those for whom the Cold War was not the formative experience that it was for me — may not consider the return on America’s investment in NATO worth the cost.” Following the cuts, Defense Minister, Liam Fox declared in order to reassure his American counterpart, “We would be able to maintain a moderate deployable force for a considerable length of time, if required,” Mr. Fox added. “Maybe not exactly at the level we have now, but at still a respectable and useful level.” This remains to be seen.

So is Britain a Great Power? I would answer yes and no. No, Britain has never fully recovered from the crisis of 1929. At the time, Britain was a hegemon with overwhelming military, financial and economic power. The famous say “the sun never sets on the British Empire” illustrated the power and influence of the British empire around the globe as well as its exceptional nature. Since then, Britain has remained a very relevant power in the world thanks to its strategic positioning on many issues; historical heritage; membership of the EU and NATO; and its ‘special relationship.’ Multilateral institutions, such as the EU, NATO, the UN, the IMF, G-20, wherein Britain holds powerful seat and/or important shares can allow Britain to remain influential in the high sphere of politics and international security.

However, British power is undeniably declining as illustrated by the domestic turmoil such as the 2011 summer riots, the problem of radicalization among the communities of immigrants, and the erosion of the welfare state. Domestic signs as well as revision of ambition downwards are clear symbol of the decline of British power. The dispute with European counterparts on the protection of the British financial sector, the famous City, which has contributed to maintaining the world status of Britain, is considerable. The shift of power of the financial system will progressively move to Asia and impact the financial power of Britain. Following the election, Mr. Cameron declared in an interview:
What does it mean to be British in the 21st century? This is still a great country. Being British is being part of a successful multi-racial country that has traditional beliefs in liberty, supporting the underdog, and having a role that punches above our weight in the world. All those things still matter. We’re going to have a tough time for a couple of years. We’ll come through it, and we’ll be even stronger.

The decline of a great power of such preeminent power has already started and has had a considerable effect on the moral of the country. Let’s face it, movies will always be around in order to remind us how powerful Britain used to be.

By Carlos Harrison for The Huffington Post

It’s been a troubled – some might say, tragic – 10 years for the detention camps at the Guantánamo Naval Base in Cuba. And as they slouch into their 11th year on January 11, there’s no end in sight.

“We say to ourselves, in sort of gallows humor: Guantánamo will close when the last detainee there dies of natural causes,” Jeremy Varon, an organizer with Witness Against Torture, told the Huffington Post on Wednesday.

Franz Kafka himself would have been hard-pressed to concoct a more bewildering and brutal contradictory reality. Allegations over the years have included sexual humiliation, waterboarding, and the use of dogs to scare detainees. Released detainees reported being locked in in sensory deprivation cells, beaten repeatedly, and forced to race while wearing leg shackles. If they fell, they were punished.

If it sounds like Abu Ghraib, it should. The U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee found that intelligence teams transported the “aggressive” interrogation techniques perfected at Guantánamo to Afghanistan and Iraq.

The link between Cuba and the war zones, the New York Times reported, was Maj. Gen. Geoffrey D. Miller, then the head of detention operations at Guantánamo. At his insistence, the Times wrote, the Defense Department sent training teams on 90-day tours in Iraq, showing the soldiers there the techniques utilized on the island. The timing, Amnesty International points out, happened to coincide with when the worst abuses occurred at Abu Ghraib.

Thanks to reports like those, the detention camps have become an international symbol of what democracy and justice are not. They’ve been plagued by suicide attempts by desperate detainees and condemned by the United Nations, human rights groups, even former U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, who called for the immediate closing of the camps in 2006.
“The value of holding prisoners there was unclear, but the price we were paying around the world for doing so was obvious,” Powell said.

The camps were created in 2002 as a deliberately “extraterritorial” place to extract information from captives in the “War on Terror.” By putting them at Guantanamo, the United States, meant to be beyond the jurisdiction of both the Geneva Conventions and U.S. courts.

That didn’t put them outside the range of public opinion. The camps sparked outrage on day one. Pictures flew around the world of shackled and handcuffed detainees on their knees on the ground with black hoods over their heads and mittens on their hands.

The indignation grew as the first 20 captives went into wire cages at Camp X-Ray, described by critics as “kennels.” Soon, though, the detainees were transferred to permanent cells, and Camp X-Ray was closed.

But the human rights complaints continued, even from some of America’s closest allies.
In 2006, speaking on BBC radio, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said:

“I am absolutely clear that the U.S. has no intention of maintaining a Gulag in Guantanamo Bay. They want to see the situation resolved and they would like it other than it is. However, that is the situation that they have.”

In all 779 detainees have been held in the camps. Eight have died there, including six suicides. One man died of colon cancer, another after an apparent heart attack.

And, in the 10 years since it opened, only six detainees have been convicted of war crimes.
The last 171 still there are caught at the conflicting conjunction where bureaucracy, politics, and military regulations collide – offering little chance, at least for the foreseeable future, of gaining their release.

Forty-six are classified as “indefinite detainees,” held without charges, but considered too dangerous to be released; 89 are eligible for release or transfer but in perpetual custody because there is no place to send them. Five more have been convicted of war crimes; and six face trial – perhaps this year – for the 9/11 attacks and the October 2000 U.S.S. Cole bombing.
That makes Guantanamo, as Carol Rosenberg of the Miami Herald described it in a piece for Foreign Affairs, “arguably the most expensive prison camp on earth, with a staff of 1,850 U.S. troops and civilians managing a compound that contains 171 captives, at a cost of $800,000 a year per detainee.”

But even the budget conscious Congress resists closing the base. In fact, it has used its spending oversight powers to thwart the president’s efforts to do just that. It has used that authority to prevent the trial of detainees on U.S. soil and to block the purchase of a dedicated prison facility in Illinois to house transferred detainees.
And no one wants to risk having a released captive later become involved in an act of terrorism or insurgency, which happened with at least one-fourth of the 500 detainees set free under President George W. Bush.

So, the captives remain in Guantanamo. Until when no one knows.
As Marc Thiessen, a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, told CNN:

“We have the right to continue to hold them as long as al Qaeda is at war with us.”

Having the right, though, doesn’t make it right, said Geneve Mantri, government relations director for national security, Amnesty International.

Speaking to The Huffington Post on Wednesday, he said the 89 cleared for release by both the Bush administration and a review ordered by President Obama, “represent little or no threat.”

“This has always been sold as a question of the worst of the worst and the reality is that a large number of the people that have been picked up, I hate to say it are in the insignificant and rather pathetically sad story category,” he said.

“There is a minority of people (in the camps) that no one doubts are truly dangerous. That minority of people should be placed in front of a US court. Because we have the most efficient system, the fastest and cheapest and best system for looking at all the evidence. You produce it all in a court of law. Have a real defense — an internationally recognized defense. And then put them away forever.”

Filed under: Afghanistan, Democracy, Freedoms, Hate Crime, homegrown terror, Middle East, Pakistan, Pakistani Taliban, President Obama, United States Tagged: Civil Rights, Constitutional Rights, Cuba, GITMO, Guantanamo, Guantanamo Bay, Gulag, Human rights, NDAA, President Obama, United Nations

By Aisling Byrne
Asia Times Online

"War with Iran is already here," wrote a leading Israeli commentator recently, describing "the combination of covert warfare and international pressure" being applied to Iran.

Although not mentioned, the "strategic prize" of the first stage of this war on Iran is Syria; the first campaign in a much wider sectarian power-bid. "Other than the collapse of the Islamic Republic itself," Saudi King Abdullah was reported to have said last summer, "nothing would weaken Iran more than losing Syria." [1]

By December, senior United States officials were explicit about their regime change agenda for Syria: Tom Donilon, the US National Security Adviser, explained that the "end of the [President Bashar al-]Assad regime would constitute Iran’s greatest setback in the region yet – a strategic blow that will further shift the balance of power in the region against Iran."

Shortly before, a key official in terms of operationalizing this policy, Under Secretary of State for the Near East Jeffrey Feltman, had stated at a congressional hearing that the US would "relentlessly pursue our two-track strategy of supporting the opposition and diplomatically and financially strangling the [Syrian] regime until that outcome is achieved". [2]

What we are seeing in Syria is a deliberate and calculated campaign to bring down the Assad government so as to replace it with a regime "more compatible" with US interests in the region.

The blueprint for this project is essentially a report produced by the neo-conservative Brookings Institute for regime change in Iran in 2009. The report – "Which Path to Persia?" [3] – continues to be the generic strategic approach for US-led regime change in the region.

A rereading of it, together with the more recent "Towards a Post-Assad Syria" [4] (which adopts the same language and perspective, but focuses on Syria, and was recently produced by two US neo-conservative think-tanks) illustrates how developments in Syria have been shaped according to the step-by-step approach detailed in the "Paths to Persia" report with the same key objective: regime change.

The authors of these reports include, among others, John Hannah and Martin Indyk, both former senior neo-conservative officials from the George W Bush/Dick Cheney administration, and both advocates for regime change in Syria. [5] Not for the first time are we seeing a close alliance between US/British neo-cons with Islamists (including, reports show [6], some with links to al-Qaeda) working together to bring about regime change in an "enemy" state.

Arguably, the most important component in this struggle for the "strategic prize" has been the deliberate construction of a largely false narrative that pits unarmed democracy demonstrators being killed in their hundreds and thousands as they protest peacefully against an oppressive, violent regime, a "killing machine" [7] led by the "monster" [8] Assad.

Whereas in Libya, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) claimed it had "no confirmed reports of civilian casualties" because, as the New York Times wrote recently, "the alliance had created its own definition for ‘confirmed’: only a death that NATO itself investigated and corroborated could be called confirmed".

"But because the alliance declined to investigate allegations," the Times wrote, "its casualty tally by definition could not budge – from zero". [9]

In Syria, we see the exact opposite: the majority of Western mainstream media outlets, along with the media of the US’s allies in the region, particularly al-Jazeera and the Saudi-owned al-Arabiya TV channels, are effectively collaborating with the "regime change" narrative and agenda with a near-complete lack of questioning or investigation of statistics and information put out by organizations and media outlets that are either funded or owned by the US/European/Gulf alliance – the very same countries instigating the regime change project in the first place.

Claims of "massacres", "campaigns of rape targeting women and girls in predominantly Sunni towns" [10] "torture" and even "child-rape" [11] are reported by the international press based largely on two sources – the British-based Syrian Observatory of Human Rights and the Local Co-ordination Committees (LCCs) – with minimal additional checking or verification.

Hiding behind the rubric – "we are not able to verify these statistics" – the lack of integrity in reporting by the Western mainstream media has been starkly apparent since the onset of events in Syria. A decade after the Iraq war, it would seem that no lessons from 2003 – from the demonization of Saddam Hussein and his purported weapons of mass destruction – have been learnt.

Of the three main sources for all data on numbers of protesters killed and numbers of people attending demonstrations – the pillars of the narrative – all are part of the "regime change" alliance.

The Syrian Observatory of Human Rights, in particular, is reportedly funded through a Dubai-based fund with pooled (and therefore deniable) Western-Gulf money (Saudi Arabia alone has, according to Elliot Abrams [12] allocated US$130 billion to "palliate the masses" of the Arab Spring).

What appears to be a nondescript British-based organization, the Observatory has been pivotal in sustaining the narrative of the mass killing of thousands of peaceful protesters using inflated figures, "facts", and often exaggerated claims of "massacres" and even recently "genocide".

Although it claims to be based in its director’s house [13], the Observatory has been described as the "front office" of a large media propaganda set-up run by the Syrian opposition and its backers. The Russian Foreign Ministry [14] stated starkly:

The agenda of the [Syrian] transitional council [is] composed in London by the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights … It is also there where pictures of ‘horror’ in Syria are made to stir up hatred towards Assad’s regime.

The Observatory is not legally registered either as a company or charity in the United Kingdom, but operates informally; it has no office, no staff and its director is reportedly awash with funding.

It receives its information, it says, from a network of "activists" inside Syria; its English-language website is a single page with al-Jazeera instead hosting a minute-by-minute live blog page for it since the outset of protests. [15]

The second, the LCCs, are a more overt part of the opposition’s media infrastructure, and their figures and reporting is similarly encompassed only [16] within the context of this main narrative: in an analysis of their daily reports, I couldn’t find a single reference to any armed insurgents being killed: reported deaths are of "martyrs", "defector soldiers", people killed in "peaceful demonstrations" and similar descriptions.

The third is al-Jazeera, whose biased role in "reporting" the Awakenings has been well documented. Described by one seasoned media analyst [17] as the "sophisticated mouthpiece of the state of Qatar and its ambitious emir", al-Jazeera is integral to Qatar’s "foreign-policy aspirations".

Al-Jazeera has, and continues, [18] to provide technical support, equipment, hosting and "credibility" to Syrian opposition activists and organizations. Reports show that as early as March 2011, al-Jazeera was providing messaging and technical support to exiled Syrian opposition activists [19] , who even by January 2010 were co-ordinating their messaging activities from Doha.

Nearly 10 months on, however, and despite the daily international media onslaught, the project isn’t exactly going to plan: a YouGov poll commissioned by the Qatar Foundation [20] showed last week that 55% of Syrians do not want Assad to resign and 68% of Syrians disapprove of the Arab League sanctions imposed on their country.

According to the poll, Assad’s support has effectively increased since the onset of current events – 46% of Syrians felt Assad was a "good" president for Syria prior to current events in the country – something that certainly doesn’t fit with the false narrative being peddled.

As if trumpeting the success of their own propaganda campaign, the poll summary concludes:

The majority of Arabs believe Syria’s President Basher al-Assad should resign in the wake of the regime’s brutal treatment of protesters … 81% of Arabs [want] President Assad to step down. They believe Syria would be better off if free democratic elections were held under the supervision of a transitional government. [21]

One is left wondering who exactly is Assad accountable to – the Syrian people or the Arab public? A blurring of lines that might perhaps be useful as two main Syrian opposition groups have just announced [22] that while they are against foreign military intervention, they do not consider "Arab intervention" to be foreign.

Unsurprisingly, not a single mainstream major newspaper or news outlet reported the YouGov poll results – it doesn’t fit their narrative.

In the UK, the volunteer-run Muslim News [23] was the only newspaper to report the findings; yet only two weeks before in the immediate aftermath of the suicide explosions in Damascus, both the Guardian [24], like other outlets, within hours of the explosions were publishing sensational, unsubstantiated reports from bloggers, including one who was "sure that some of the bodies … were those of demonstrators".

"They have planted bodies before," he said; "they took dead people from Dera’a [in the south] and showed the media bodies in Jisr al-Shughour [near the Turkish border.]"

Recent reports have cast serious doubt on the accuracy of the false narrative peddled daily by the mainstream international press, in particular information put out by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the LCCs.

In December, the mainstream US intelligence group Stratfor cautioned:

Most of the [Syrian] opposition’s more serious claims have turned out to be grossly exaggerated or simply untrue … revealing more about the opposition’s weaknesses than the level of instability inside the Syrian regime. [25]

Throughout the nine-month uprising, Stratfor has advised caution on accuracy of the mainstream narrative on Syria: in September it commented that "with two sides to every war … the war of perceptions in Syria is no exception". [26]

Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and LCC reports, "like those from the regime, should be viewed with skepticism", argues Stratfor; "the opposition understands that it needs external support, specifically financial support, if it is to be a more robust movement than it is now. To that end, it has every reason to present the facts on the ground in a way that makes the case for foreign backing."

As Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov observed: "It is clear that the purpose is to provoke a humanitarian catastrophe, to get a pretext to demand external interference into this conflict." [27] Similarly, in mid-December, American Conservative reported:

CIA [Central Intelligence Agency] analysts are skeptical regarding the march to war. The frequently cited United Nations report that more than 3,500 civilians have been killed by Assad’s soldiers is based largely on rebel sources and is uncorroborated. The Agency has refused to sign off on the claims.

Likewise, accounts of mass defections from the Syrian army and pitched battles between deserters and loyal soldiers appear to be a fabrication, with few defections being confirmed independently. Syrian government claims that it is being assaulted by rebels who are armed, trained and financed by foreign governments are more true than false. [28]

As recently as November, the Free Syria Army implied their numbers would be larger, but, as they explained to one analyst, they are "advising sympathizers to delay their defection" until regional conditions improve. [29]

A guide to regime change

In relation to Syria, section three of the "Paths to Persia" report is particularly relevant – it is essentially a step-by-step guide detailing options for instigating and supporting a popular uprising, inspiring an insurgency and/or instigating a coup. The report comes complete with a "Pros and Cons" section:

An insurgency is often easier to instigate and support from abroad … Insurgencies are famously cheap to support … covert support to an insurgency would provide the United States with "plausibility deniability" … [with less] diplomatic and political backlash … than if the United States were to mount a direct military action … Once the regime suffers some major setback [this] provides an opportunity to act.

Military action, the report argues, would only be taken once other options had been tried and shown to have failed as the "international community" would then conclude of any attack that the government "brought it on themselves" by refusing a very good deal.

Key aspects for instigating a popular uprising and building a "full-fledged insurgency" are evident in relation to developments in Syria.

These include:

>> "Funding and helping organize domestic rivals of the regime" including using "unhappy" ethnic groups;

>> "Building the capacity of ‘effective oppositions’ with whom to work" in order to "create an alternative leadership to seize power";

>> Provision of equipment and covert backing to groups, including arms – either directly or indirectly, as well as "fax machines … Internet access, funds" (on Iran the report noted that the "CIA could take care of most of the supplies and training for these groups, as it has for decades all over the world");

>> Training and facilitation of messaging by opposition activists;

>> Constructing a narrative "with the support of US-backed media outlets could highlight regime shortcomings and make otherwise obscure critics more prominent" – "having the regime discredited among key ‘opinion shapers’ is critical to its collapse";

>> The creation of a large funding budget to fund a wide array of civil-society-led initiatives (a so-called "$75 million fund" created under former US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice-funded civil society groups, including "a handful of Beltway-based think-tanks and institutions [which] announced new Iran desks)" [30];

>> The need for an adjacent land corridor in a neighboring country "to help develop an infrastructure to support operations".

"Beyond this," continues the report, "US economic pressure (and perhaps military pressure as well) can discredit the regime, making the population hungry for a rival leadership."

The US and its allies, particularly Britain [31] and France, have funded and helped "shape" the opposition from the outset – building both on attempts started by the US in 2006 to construct a unified front against the Assad government, and the perceived "success" of the Libyan Transitional National Council model. [32]

Despite months of attempts – predominately by the West – at cajoling the various groups into a unified, proficient opposition movement, they remain "a diverse group, representing the country’s ideological, sectarian and generational divides".

"There neither has been nor is [there] now any natural tendency towards unity between these groups, since they belong to totally different ideological backgrounds and have antagonistic political views," one analyst concluded. [33]

At a recent meeting with the British foreign secretary, the different groups would not even meet with William Hague together, instead meeting him separately. [34]

Nevertheless, despite a lack of cohesion, internal credibility and legitimacy, the opposition, predominately under the umbrella of the Syrian National Council (SNC), is being groomed for office. This includes capacity-building, as confirmed by the former Syrian ambassador to the US, Rafiq Juajati, now part of the opposition.

At a closed briefing in Washington DC in mid-December 2011, he confirmed that the US State Department and the SWP-German Institute for International and Security Affairs (a think-tank that provides foreign policy analysis to the German government) were funding a project that is managed by the US Institute for Peace and SWP, working in partnership with the SNC, to prepare the SNC for the takeover and running of Syria.

In a recent interview, SNC leader Burhan Ghaliyoun disclosed (so as to "speed up the process" of Assad’s fall) [35] the credentials expected of him: "There will be no special relationship with Iran," he said. "Breaking the exceptional relationship means breaking the strategic, military alliance," adding that "after the fall of the Syrian regime, [Hezbollah] won’t be the same." [36]

Described in Slate magazine [37] as the "most liberal and Western-friendly of the Arab Spring uprisings", Syrian opposition groups sound as compliant as their Libyan counterparts prior to the demise of Muammar Gaddafi, whom the New York Times described as "secular-minded professionals – lawyers, academics, businesspeople – who talk about democracy, transparency, human rights and the rule of law" [38]; that was, until reality transitioned to former leader of the Libyan Islamist Fighting Group Abdulhakim Belhaj and his jihadi colleagues.

The import of weapons, equipment, manpower (predominantly from Libya) [39] and training by governments and other groups linked to the US, NATO and their regional allies began in April-May 2011, [40] according to various reports [41], and is co-ordinated out of the US air force base at Incirlik in southern Turkey. From Incirlik, an information warfare division also directs communications to Syria via the Free Syria Army. This covert support continues, as American Conservative reported in mid-December:

Unmarked NATO warplanes are arriving at Turkish military bases close to Iskenderum on the Syrian border, delivering weapons … as well as volunteers from the Libyan Transitional National Council … Iskenderum is also the seat of the Free Syrian Army, the armed wing of the Syrian National Council. French and British special forces trainers are on the ground, assisting the Syrian rebels while the CIA and US Spec Ops are providing communications equipment and intelligence to assist the rebel cause, enabling the fighters to avoid concentrations of Syrian soldiers. [42]

The Washington Post exposed in April 2011 that recent WikiLeaks showed that the US State Department had been giving millions of dollars to various Syrian exile groups (including the Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated Movement for Justice and Development in London) and individuals since 2006 via its "Middle East Partnership Initiative" administered by a US foundation, the Democracy Council. [43]

Leaked WikiLeak cables confirmed that well into 2010, this funding was continuing, a trend that not only continues today but which has expanded in light of the shift to the "soft power" option aimed at regime change in Syria.

As this neo-con-led call for regime change in Syria gains strength within the US administration, [44] so too has this policy been institutionalized among leading US foreign policy think-tanks, many of whom have "Syria desks" or "Syria working groups" which collaborate closely with Syrian opposition groups and individuals (for example USIP [45] and the Foundation for the Defense of Democracy) [46] and which have published a range of policy documents making the case for regime change.

In the UK, the similarly neo-con Henry Jackson Society (which "supports the maintenance of a strong military, by the United States, the countries of the European Union and other democratic powers, armed with expeditionary capabilities with a global reach" and which believes that "only modern liberal democratic states are truly legitimate") is similarly pushing the agenda for regime change in Syria [47].

This is in partnership with Syrian opposition figures including Ausama Monajed, [48] a former leader of the Syrian exile group, the Movement for Justice & Development, linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, which was funded by the US State Department from 2006, as we know from WikiLeaks.

Monajed, a member of the SNC, currently directs a public relations firm [49] recently established in London and incidentally was the first to use the term "genocide" in relation to events in Syria in a recent SNC press release. [50]

Since the outset, significant pressure has been brought to bear on Turkey to establish a "humanitarian corridor" along its southern border with Syria. The main aim of this, as the "Paths to Persia" report outlines, is to provide a base from which the externally-backed insurgency can be launched and based.

The objective of this "humanitarian corridor" is about as humanitarian as the four-week NATO bombing of Sirte when NATO exercised its "responsibility to protect" mandate, as approved by the UN Security Council.

All this is not to say that there isn’t a genuine popular demand for change in Syria against the repressive security-dominated infrastructure that dominates every aspect of people’s lives, nor that gross human-rights violations have not been committed, both by the Syrian security forces, armed opposition insurgents, as well as mysterious third force characters operating since the onset of the crisis in Syria, including insurgents, [51] mostly jihadis from neighboring Iraq and Lebanon, as well as more recently Libya, among others.

Such abuses are inevitable in low-intensity conflict. Leading critics [52] of this US-France-UK-Gulf-led regime change project have, from the outset, called for full accountability and punishment for any security or other official "however senior", found to have committed any human-rights abuses.

Ibrahim al-Amine writes that some in the regime have conceded "that the security remedy was damaging in many cases and regions [and] that the response to the popular protests was mistaken … it would have been possible to contain the situation via clear and firm practical measures – such as arresting those responsible for torturing children in Deraa". And it argues that the demand for political pluralism and an end to the all-encompassing repression is both vital and urgent. [53]

But what may have began as popular protests, initially focused on local issues and incidents (including the case of the torture of young boys in Dera’a by security forces) were rapidly hijacked by this wider strategic project for regime change. Five years ago, I worked in northern Syria with the United Nations managing a large community development project.

After evening community meetings, it wasn’t uncommon to find the mukhabarat (military intelligence) waiting for us to vacate the room so they could scan flipcharts posted on the walls. That almost every aspect of people’s daily lives was regulated by a sclerotic dysfunctional Ba’ath party/security bureaucracy, devoid of any ideology apart from the inevitable corruption and nepotism that comes with authoritarian power, was apparent in every feature of people’s lives.

Tuesday, December 20 was reportedly the "deadliest day of the nine-month [Syrian] uprising "with the "organized massacre" of a "mass defection" of army deserters widely reported by the international press in Idlib, northern Syria. Claiming that areas of Syria were now "exposed to large-scale genocide", the SNC lamented the "250 fallen heroes during a 48-hour period", citing figures provided by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. [54] Quoting the same source, the Guardian reported that the Syrian army was:

… hunt[ing] down deserters after troops … killed close to 150 men who had fled their base". A picture has emerged … of a mass defection … that went badly wrong … with loyalist forces positioned to mow down large numbers of defectors as they fled a military base. Those who managed to escape were later hunted down in hideouts in nearby mountains, multiple sources have reported. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights estimated that 100 deserters were besieged, then killed or wounded. Regular troops allegedly also hunted down residents who had given shelter to the deserters. [55]

The Guardian’s live blog-quoted AVAAZ, the citizen political advocacy/public relations group, which "claimed 269 people had been killed in the clashes", and cited AVAAZ’s precise breakdown of casualties: "163 armed revolutionaries, 97 government troops and 9 civilians". [56] They noted that AVAAZ "provided nothing to corroborate the claim".

The Washington Post reported only that they had spoken to "an activist with the rights group AVAAZ [who] said he had spoken to local activists and medical groups who put the death toll in that area Tuesday at 269". [57]

A day after initial reports of the massacre of fleeing deserters, however, the story had changed. On December 23, the Telegraph reported:

At first they were said to be army deserters attempting to break into Turkey to join the FSA [Free Syrian Army], but they are now said to be unarmed civilians and activists attempting to escape the army’s attempts to bring the province back under control. They were surrounded by troops and tanks and gunned down until there were no survivors, according to reports. [58]

The New York Times had, on December 21, reported that the "massacre", citing the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights, was of "unarmed civilians and activists, with no armed military defectors among them, the rights groups said".

It quoted the head of the Observatory who described it as "an organized massacre" and said his account corroborated a Kfar Owaid witness’ account: "The security forces had lists of names of those who organized massive anti-regime protests … the troops then opened fire with tanks, rockets and heavy machine guns [and], bombs filled with nails to increase the number of casualties. [59]

The LA Times quoted an activist it had spoken to via satellite connection who, from his position "sheltering in the woods" commented: "The word ‘massacre’ seems like too small a word to describe what happened." Meanwhile, the Syrian government reported that on December 19 and 20, it had killed "tens" of members of "armed terrorist gangs" in both Homs and Idlib, and had arrested many wanted individuals. [60]

The truth of these two "deadly" days will probably never be known – the figures cited above (between 10-163 armed insurgents, 9-111 unarmed civilians and 0-97 government forces) differ so significantly in both numbers reported killed and who they were, that the "truth" is impossible to establish.

In relation to an earlier purported "massacre" in Homs, a Stratfor investigation found "no signs of a massacre", concluding that "opposition forces have an interest in portraying an impending massacre, hoping to mimic the conditions that propelled a foreign military intervention in Libya". [61]

Nevertheless, the "massacre" of December 19-20 in Idlib was reported as fact, and was etched into the narrative of Assad’s "killing machine".

Both the recent UN Human Rights Commissioner’s report and a recent data blog report [62] on reported deaths in "Syria’s bloody uprising" by the Guardian (published December 13) – two examples of attempts to establish the truth about numbers killed in the Syrian conflict – rely almost exclusively on opposition-provided data: interviews with 233 alleged "army defectors" in the case of the UN report, and on reports from the Syrian Human Rights Observatory, the LCCs and al-Jazeera in the case of the Guardian’s data blog.

The Guardian reports a total of 1,414.5 people (sic) killed – including 144 Syrian security personnel – between January and November 21, 2011. Based solely on press reports, the report contains a number of basic inaccuracies (eg sources not matching numbers killed with places cited in original sources): their total includes 23 Syrians killed by the Israeli army in June on the Golan Heights; 25 people reported "wounded" are included in total figures for those killed, as are many people reported shot.

The report makes no reference to any killings of armed insurgents during the entire 10-month period – all victims are "protesters", "civilians" or "people" – apart from the 144 security personnel.

Seventy percent of the report’s data sources are from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the LCCs and "activists"; 38% of press reports are from al-Jazeera, 3% from Amnesty International and 1.5% from official Syrian sources.

In response to the UN Commissioner’s report, Syria’s ambassador to the UN commented: "How could defectors give positive testimonies on the Syrian government? Of course they will give negative testimonies against the Syrian government. They are defectors."

In the effort to inflate figures of casualties, the public relations-activist group AVAAZ has consistently outstripped even the UN. AVAAZ has publicly stated it is involved in "smuggling activists … out of the country", running "secret safe houses to shelter … top activists from regime thugs" and that one "AVAAZ citizen journalist" "discover[ed] a mass grave". [63]

It states proudly that the BBC and CNN have said that AVAAZ data amounts to some 30% of their news coverage of Syria. The Guardian reported AVAAZ’s latest claim to have "evidence" of killings of some 6,200 people (including security forces and including 400 children), claiming 617 of whom died under torture [64] – their justification to have verified each single death with confirmation by three people, "including a relative and a cleric who handled the body" is improbable in the extreme.

The killing of one brigadier-general and his children in April last year in Homs illustrates how near impossible it is, particularly during sectarian conflict, to verify even one killing – in this case, a man and his children:

The general, believed to be Abdu Tallawi, was killed with his children and nephew while passing through an agitated neighborhood. There are two accounts of what happened to him and his family, and they differ about the victim’s sect.

Regime loyalists say that he was killed by takfiris – hardline Islamists who accuse other Muslims of apostasy – because he belonged to the Alawite sect. The protesters insist that he is a member of the Tallawi family from Homs and that he was killed by security forces to accuse the opposition and destroy their reputation. Some even claim that he was shot because he refused to fire at protesters.

The third account is ignored due to the extreme polarization of opinions in the city [Homs]. The brigadier-general was killed because he was in a military vehicle, even though he had his kids with him. Whoever killed him was not concerned with his sect but with directing a blow to the regime, thus provoking an even harsher crackdown, which, in turn, would drag the protest movement into a cycle of violence with the state. [65]

By Ghazala Akbar:

Sonia Gandhi once imperiously remarked that the Indians need not bother going to war with Pakistan anymore, the invasion of Indian TV was enough. She had a point. For a while, the murderous machinations and dynastic power- struggles of Indian soaps had people hooked.  Not anymore. Indian soaps are passé. The gripping political drama unfolding daily on our TV screens is a serious challenge not just to Bollywood but Hollywood too. Over the past year, every genre has been represented: tragedy, high comedy, farce, buffoonery, drama, action, war, murder, spy thrillers, musical extravaganzas and a bit of soft porn too.

Such is the quality of live political theatre that I cannot remember the last time I watched a film on television. Who needs expensive blockbusters from across the border to feed our fantasies? Why would anyone go channel surfacing — when our rulers, allies, security forces, politicians, cricketers and celebrities provide non – stop 24/7 entertainment? Who needs a burger when we can all have steak at home!

2011 began tragically with murder most foul — the death of the Punjab Governor, Salmaan Taseer, heroically championing the cause of a poor Christian woman, sentenced for blasphemy. If that wasn’t maudlin enough, what followed was a worse tear- jerker. Clerics — usually in surplus in Pakistan suddenly became scarce – too scared to lead the funeral prayers for the slain Governor.

The final dénouement in the sorry tale was the odious spectacle of the self- confessed smiling assassin showered with rose petals by Lawyers — the very same that had marched up and down Constitution Avenue in support of the Rule of Law. Thankfully, a judge had the courage of his convictions to sentence the killer. The long-awaited decision of the Appeal Court is another story.

February brought us an international spy thriller complete with a car chase, shootings and carnage in the streets of Lahore. Footage of the arrest and interrogation of Raymond Davis by the ‘Keystone Cops’ of the Punjab Police went viral. Intriguingly, a miniature camera located between the suspect’s feet activated the filming. A support car coming to his ‘rescue’ also ran over a couple of bystanders adding to the body count. And just who was this trigger – happy, gun – toting suspect? A ‘diplomat’ allegedly fleeing armed motor- cycled muggers at a busy intersection in Lahore who just had to shoot in self- defence. Naturally.

No less a personage than the US President vouched for his credentials. And since we are a hospitable, law- abiding people who honour diplomatic immunity, we bent over backwards to find ways to absolve him of guilt. Shariah law ironically came to the rescue. A clause was invoked and Davis ‘forgiven’ after the payment of blood money to the victims’ families– but– not before another sad twist : the young wife of one of the ‘alleged robbers’ overcome with grief, ended her own life. End of story.

The ides of March claimed yet another fatality. Poor Shahbaz Bhatti, the outspoken Minister for Minority Affairs was gunned down for having the temerity to remind the Majority about the rights of Minorities! The brave man should have read George Orwell and learnt not to speak out of turn. In the State of Pakistan, all men are created equal but some are more equal!

Riveting as these episodes were, they were a mere trailer for May Day’s mega blockbuster: the Death of Osama Bin Laden. Without our censor’s knowledge, this film played to packed houses globally. Audacious US Navy seals  swooping down in helicopters, shooting their way to bag and bin the world’s most wanted terrorist in his ‘luxury pad’, was an instant hit worldwide.

Our US allies in the War on Terror, didn’t think it worth their while to give us a role to play. Not even as an extra. While champagne corks popped at the White House in an orgy of self- congratulation, we had to eat humble pie and suffer the additional agony of our picturesque garrison town continually mispronounced as A – BBOT- A- BAD! Surely, the BBC ought to have known better!

As if things were not bad enough when another scary episode sent us cringing for cover. Masked terrorists disguised in ‘Star Wars’ attire sneaked into a naval airbase in the heart of Karachi. Only the bravery of our security forces foiled their evil intent after a tense gun – battle lasting several hours. Reassuringly all through the crisis, the Minister of the Interior provided a running commentary soothing shattered nerves.

Soon after, another jolt shook our equanimity: the mysterious murder of a journalist, Salim Shahzad. Nudged gently but firmly not to poke his nose in sensitive matters relating to state or non – state actors, he did not take the hint. Neither did the unfortunate Wali Babar in Karachi. After too many questions about ‘target killings’ the TV Reporter became a target himself –confirming our prime position as a dangerous place for journalists.

In July, the citizens of Karachi decided to steal the show with a gory episode of their own: the killing fields of Karachi. More mayhem, more body bags and even more confused incoherence from the Interior Ministry were the main themes of this sordid drama. Not to be outdone, trigger- happy Rangers started their own sideshow. A petty thief, pleading for mercy was shot at point blank range, in full view of the camera in a public park.

Meanwhile in the badlands of Baluchistan, some unlucky Chechen men and women were mistakenly ‘taken out’ as terrorists by the Constabulary. In other areas, members of the minority Hazaras and ‘dissidents’ were being systematically decimated. Exactly who was killing who and why is of little consequence in this perplexing plot. In Khyber- Pakhtoonwa, the Taliban regularly reminded us of their explosive presence. Drones continued to strike ‘terror’ in South Waziristan adding to a continuous supply of new recruits to their cause.

The festival of Eid released Pandora’s Box, a brilliant, virtuoso, unrestrained performance by the former Home Minister of Sindh. His remarkable presentation received extremely high TV ratings – the dramatic use of the Holy Book as prop was an unforgettable highlight of the two- hour soliloquy. Several weeks later, a London production house came out with a four – hour epic. A vintage rendition of a golden oldie rang the curtain down on this superlative show that ran to packed houses nationwide.

Not shy of being in the spotlight, the perpetual drama queens, our star cricketers entered the limelight with a courtroom drama of their own.  Sadly, their coached appearances at Southwark Crown Court, UK were as unconvincing as their play-acting during the Oval Test in England last year. The show flopped miserably with Messrs. Butt, Asif and Amir reduced from fallen heroes to zeroes.

Come September, Admirable Mike Mullen took us all by surprise with his own version of ‘Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.’ Mullen’s muddled story – line brazenly accused our security services of sponsoring a network of non – state actors and re-writing a counter script for the end – game in Afghanistan. It backfired. In a remarkable show of unity, the civilian government, raucous TV Anchors, politicians, ghairat brigades and the public booed and hissed in unison. Flying in to soothe ruffled feathers, Mrs. Clinton was publicly but politely accused of acting like a nit-picking Mother-in-law.

Mullen’s story however would not go away. It sprung back with a vicious new twist at the end of October. A rejuvenated and revamped Khan tweaked the tail of the Lions in Lahore with a spectacular televised musical extravaganza. Not only did fans dance in the aisles, his revelations rocked the boat, setting the scene for yet another blockbuster: Memo gate. A 007 wannabe got star- billing in this US- Pakistan joint production. Our Ambassador to the US has a dubious supporting role.

As we grappled with at the turns and twists of this complex saga, a brief exposition of Ms Veena Malik provided us with a moment of light relief. Then all hell broke loose. NATO helicopter in an incident of ‘friendly fire’ picked off our soldiers at the Afghan border, martyring 28 and wounding countless others. With friends like these, who needs enemies!

All this flak was too much for the beleaguered President who suddenly took to his bed. His unidentified ailment and dash to Dubai fuelled yet another mystery: the curious case of the missing President. Was his illness genuine, a reaction to the strain of the on-going Memo gate saga or something entirely unrelated? Who knows! Anyhow, it was short and sweet with a happy ending when the President returned to Islamabad with his customary grin. Who will have the last laugh is a moot question.

Finally, as the holiday season approached we settled in front of the box in anticipation of yet another extravaganza. (The Information Minister’s impromptu crying act on the morning of the holiday was a dampener but did not deter us from making merry). Billed as the greatest show on earth, the Tehreek- i- Insaaf spectacle promised to be like no other. For weeks, we had watched in bemused incredulity as self- proclaimed rebels and all the King’s men of yesteryears, shaved, showered and applied fresh make-up in preparation for supporting roles to the Rising Star, the man of the moment, Imran Khan.

Could he walk where angels fear to tread? Would the cast of thousands rally to his call? On the founder’s birthday, in the city of lights, by the dramatic setting of the Quaid’s Mazar, the Hero finally took centre stage. Amidst a glow and a roar, He came. They saw. He conquered.  Move over Shahrukh, Saif, Salman and Amir. We have the real thing, our very own King Khan.

Come December 27, we remembered Shaheed Mohartama Benazir and other fallen comrades. The cameras panned towards the dusty plains of Ghari Khuda Bukhsh and the graveyard of the martyrs in the towering tomb of the Bhuttos. There was pathos, passion, poetry and the evolving script of a new work- in – progress: the son also rises.

And so we come to The End. As we usher in the New Year, book your seats early for the next episode of Pakistan: 2012. It is still a working title and your guess is as good as mine. Will it be Great Expectations, Gone with the Wind or the Night of the Generals? Whatever we choose to call it, you can be sure it will be a sensational international box- office hit!  As Larry King used to say on CNN, Don’t go away!

As you may noticed in tweets and emails newsletters, the short URL of any product page on Amazon.com has a standard format that looks something like amzn.to/XYZ.

The path portion of Amazon short URLs is made of random digits and alphabets but if you wish, you can also use a more memorable string as a short URL. Here’s how:

Go to bit.ly and sign-in using your Facebook or Twitter account. Next paste any Amazon URL into the text box and hit the Shorten button.

Bitly will generate an amzn.to URL with a random suffix but you use the “Customize” option (see video) to set any other string as the suffix for that short URL. For instance, I reserved the following two URLs for my eBook that I published last week.

1. amzn.to/MyKindleBook
2. amzn.to/MostUsefulWebsites

These URL suffixes (or keywords) are shared across the bitly ecosystem so if someone has reserved a particular keyword with another website that also uses bitly (like nyti.ms or 4sq.com), it won’t be available for your Amazon Short URL.

One more thing. All products listed on Amazon are assigned a unique ASIN code (it is listed in the item’s description) and you can just add this code to amzn.com to quickly create a short URL. Here’s an example – amzn.com/B006R4RN3U.

The same technique may be extended to other websites that are configured to work with bit.ly – these Facebook (on.fb.me), BBC (bbc.in), The Wall Street Journal (on.wsj.com), The New York Post (nypo.st) and others.

Video: Customize Amazon Short URLs

www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOfPmXQt22I

This story, Creating Custom Short URLs for Amazon, was originally published at Digital Inspiration on 03/01/2012 under Amazon, Internet.

As Reported By The BBC

A doctor who testified that Pakistani security forces had killed a group of unarmed foreigners has himself been shot dead.

Dr Baqir Shah was gunned down in the city of Quetta.

He had contradicted police reports earlier this year which suggested the five victims had been suicide bombers.

Dr Shah was in his car when gunmen pulled up alongside him and sprayed the vehicle with bullets.

He died soon afterwards in hospital.
It was Dr Shah who, back in May, carried out the autopsies in a controversial case.

Two men and three women of Russian and Tajik origin died at a checkpoint just outside Quetta, in the province of Balochistan.

One of the women had been heavily pregnant, but police insisted they had all been militants and that they had been carrying explosives.

Police said that they died as they detonated a bomb.

They said at the time of the attack they had hand grenades and bombs strapped to their bodies.

The BBC’s Aleem Maqbool in Islamabad says that Dr Shah’s autopsy corroborated what many witnesses said – that they had in fact died after being shot many times at a distance by the security forces. Witnesses also said they had been unarmed.

Hours after he filed his testimony, Dr Shah was dragged out of a restaurant and beaten by a group of unidentified men. He later complained that while he was supposed to receive protection, he never got it.

Filed under: Pakistan Tagged: Dr Baqir Shah, Pakistan, Pakistani, Quetta

Photo: Express/Shaheryar Popalzai

This past Sunday was Christmas Day, PML-N leader Nawaz Sharif‘s birthday, and the 135th birth anniversary of Mohammed Ali Jinnah, the father of Pakistan.

This past Sunday was also Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (“Movement for Justice”)’s much-anticipated political rally in Karachi. For those of us not physically at the Minar-e-Quaid (Jinnah’s Mausoleum), the PTI jalsa was cause to gather at friends’ houses, tweet feverishly, and offer sideline commentary to no one in particular. Or maybe that was just me.

By this time, you have undoubtedly read a flurry of news coverage on said jalsa. But for those who haven’t, here is the rundown. PTI leader Imran Khan – the oft-labeled “cricketer-turned-politician” – has gained much political traction and popularity in the last year, after launching his political party officially in 1996. Fahad Desmukh, in his radio piece for PRI’s The World, noted,

The PTI attracted mostly urban educated professionals, but failed to get a mainstream following. In fact, in the 2002 parliamentary elections, Imran Khan was the only candidate from his party to win a seat…But now Khan has managed to mobilize enough young urban professionals to become a rising political force. In the past, this demographic shunned politics as a dishonorable activity. But young people are coming out now out of frustration with the current leadership.

Last month, PTI’s jalsa in Lahore garnered between 100,000 to 200,000 supporters – one of the largest political rallies in the country. This past Sunday, thousands of people came out on the streets of Karachi. Although PTI estimated the number at 500,000, news agencies report that the number in attendance was closer to 100,000, still making it one of the largest rallies in Karachi in recent years. Mutahir Ahmed, a professor at the University of Karachi, told Dawn, “He is riding a wave of popular politics right now. There is a lot of frustration among ordinary people, as well as political workers right now, which he is cashing on.”

In an article for the Express Tribune entitled, “Imran Khan Wins Hearts & Minds at Karachi Rally,” Shaheryar Mirza and Saad Hasan interviewed one rally attendee, who said, “I don’t know why but Imran Khan gives me hope. I want change, security and a better future for my children.”

Ah, the psychological underpinnings of hope and change. We saw it work with the Obama 2008 presidential campaign, and leveraged again by Afghanistan’s Abdullah Abdullah during his recent presidential run.  It’s the promise of something different. And though it may just be semantics, words like hope and change induce positive associations with absolute ideals of happiness, progress, and prosperity.  For a fatigued and frustrated Pakistani populace, that is a fuzzy but welcome option.

I don’t claim to be an expert on our political system (I actually don’t claim to be an expert on anything), but I have been fascinated with the perceived rise of PTI & Imran Khan in recent months. Here are a few observations both on the lead-up to the December 25th jalsa, the rally itself, and subsequent reactions post-rally.

1. PTI Snakes on a Plane: You have to give it to Tehreek-e-Insaf. They know how to market their vision to urban masses & millennials alike. Prior to the Dec 25th jalsa, the party generated buzz by launching a telemarketing scheme akin to Snakes on a Plane (if you received a phone call from Samuel L. Jackson telling you about those mother**** snakes on the mother**** plane, then you know what I’m talkin’ about). Many Karachiites received a 30-second phone call from Imran Khan inviting them to the rally. Although the call was pre-recorded, many almost believed they were receiving a personal call from the man himself. Insert swoons here. The strategy is a reflection on the party’s overarching marketing approach – the use of choice words (hope, change & the like), leveraging social media, telemarketing all enforce a broader theme: Imran Khan & PTI offer something new, something approachable, something hip, something different from the status quo.
2. Imran Khan Cricket Hero, Imran Khan Politican = Same, Same: I don’t think I’ve ever heard so many cricket analogies. Oh my goodness. In a BBC interview prior to the jalsa he noted, “It’s like playing a World Cup final…this could be a defining moment in Pakistan.” In the lead-up to the rally, Imran reportedly called PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif a club cricketer “flexing muscles with a Test cricketer.” The list goes on. And while I think cricket & “tsunami” references could form its own drinking (coke! hee!) game, the analogies further raise positive associations of Imran circa 1992 World Cup. Imran the politician + Imran cricket hero = Imran heroic politician.
   
3. Rally like it’s a Britney Spears Concert: When the band-formerly-known-as-Junoon’s lead singer Salman Ahmed started singing Junoon songs, all I could think was, Wow he sounds just like Ali Azmat! And then I realized he was lip-synching. It was, in fact, Ali Azmat. Such a Britney move, dude. In their post on the rally, Cafe Pyala noted, “With more ‘heavyweights’ joining, PTI youth may have to live with the fact that the music has died with the Lahore jalsa.”
   
4. PTI – Stragglers Welcome: Ahsan over at Five Rupees had a great post on the politicians who have crossed over from their own parties to join PTI, and what it all means: “…when the potential for success for [insert party here] ticket goes down, and PTI’s chances of success go up, we’re more likely to see politicians from [insert party here] to leave for the PTI,” though this may not be the case for MQM or Jamaat-e-Islami (JI). The new additions to PTI are relative heavyweights, including Javed Hashmi from PML-N & Shah Mehmood Qureshi from PPP. Before watching the jalsa, I thought they were sure to help PTI’s clout. But then I watched SMQ talking like a wannabe Shakespeare (community) theater actor about nuclear policy during the rally, and am now grumpy and undecided.
5. Insecurity is the Best Form of Flattery: You can tell other political parties (namely the PPP & PML-N) are beginning to feel threatened when they start resorting to petty mudslinging and banding together. PM Gilani, who reportedly also made a statement that Zardari was actually younger than Imran, also told media outlets, “Those people who are talking of revolution – are there any new people among the revolutionaries or are they mostly those who wanted to bring revolution along with Musharraf?” Curiously absent from those critiques – the MQM. Curious indeed.

(Express Image) Gilani: Bhai, your plugs may need some sprucing up. Look who we're up against. Nawaz: Curse those gorgeous locks of hair. Curses!

Don’t get me wrong. I’ve been impressed with the perceived meteoric rise of Imran & his party. His speech, especially in comparison with the other speeches at the jalsa, was powerful & hit all the right notes – from wishing Pakistani Christians a Merry Christmas to addressing the Balochistan issue. And though the PTI Manifesto can and should be a better representation of how PTI aims to do much of what they promise (including, ahem, ending corruption in 90 days! Eee!), I do think Imran has steadily moved away from the days where he stood against everything and for nothing. Does that mean I still have my reservations? Hell yes. Does he really have the establishment on his side and what ramifications will that hold? What does an Islamic Welfare State mean in reality? What does all of this mean in reality?

Every political leader in our country has set out to prove that they can undertake the ideals laid out in Jinnah’s vision. Every leader makes vague promises, tugs on our heart strings that this time, dear citizens, they will be different. The difference with Imran is that he is an option we have not tried before.

Does that merit my vote? I’m still undecided, but at least his campaign has spurred me to vote. You should too.

Other blog posts/related pieces you should read:

A Reluctant Mind – Pedaling Obscurantism (esp. on the female dress issue)

Obama Says Do More – The PTI Rally in Karachi or Democracy is Alive & Well in Pakistan But Not Really

Dawn – Cowasjee’s Open Letter to Imran Khan (from 1996)

Filed under: Op-Eds

بسم اللہ الرحمن الرحیم
یہ کچھ دن پہلے لکھا اور چند خدشات کی وجہ سے شائع نہیں کیا تھا۔ دراصل یہ سب ایک تحریر”موجودہ دور میں اردو زبان“ کے جواب میں لکھا تھا۔ میں کچھ دن انتظار کرتا رہا کہ شاید کسی کی اُس تحریر پر نظر پڑھ جائے اور کوئی بات کرے اور پھر یونہی ہوا۔ دوستوں کی نظر پڑ گئی اور انہوں نے کافی تسلی بخش جواب دے دیئے ہیں۔ خیر میں نے یہ تحریر فیس بک پر ”اصل مفکروں“ کے ایک صفحہ پر پڑھی تھی۔ یہ تحریر ایک اچھی کوشش ہے۔ گو کہ میں ذاتی طور پر لکھاری کی کئی باتوں سے اتفاق کرتا ہوں جیسے کہ اردو کے معاملے میں حکومت کی نالائقی لیکن تحریر میں کئی باتیں ایسی ہیں جو میرے خیال میں تھوڑی وضاحت طلب ہیں۔ لگتا ہے لکھاری کو کچھ باتوں کا علم نہیں تھا جبھی وہ کئی جگہوں پر غلطی کر گئے اور ساتھ ساتھ اردو کمپیوٹنگ کی تاریخ میں کافی کچھ چھوڑ گئے۔ ٹھیک ہے، فی الحال کمپیوٹر پر اردوزیادہ پذیرائی حاصل نہیں کر پائی اور ابھی کئی مسائل کا حل ہونا باقی ہے لیکن مسائل کی نشاندہی کرتے ہوئے اس بات کا خاص خیال رکھنا چاہئے کہ آپ کی باتیں لوگوں میں حوصلہ پیدا کریں نہ کہ مایوسی تاکہ جو مسائل ہیں ان کا حل کرنے کے لئے کئی لوگ آگے بڑھیں۔ مزید جو پہلے کام کر چکے ہیں یا کام کر رہے ہیں ان کی حوصلہ افزائی ہونی چاہئے نہ کہ ان کو دیوار سے لگایا جائے۔

خیر جتنا کچھ میرے علم میں ہے اس کے مطابق جواب اور وضاحت کر دیتا ہوں۔ ”موجودہ دور میں اردو زبان“ والی تحریر کی باتیں نیلے رنگ میں درج ہیں اور ساتھ میری طرف سے کچھ وضاحت پیش خدمت ہے۔

ابھی تک ونڈوز اردو زبان میں دستیاب نہیں ہے۔
کوئی بھی کمپنی، کوئی بھی چیز منافع کمانے کے لئے بناتی ہے۔ اگر ونڈوز اردو زبان میں موجود نہیں تو اس میں مائیکروسافٹ کا کوئی قصور نہیں کیونکہ وہ تب ہی ونڈوز اردو میں بنائیں گے، جب اردو والے خود ایسی چیز خریدنا پسند فرمائیں گے۔ یہاں حال ایسا ہے کہ چوری کی ونڈوز تیس چالیس روپے میں حاصل کی جاتی ہے اور پھر اس چوری شدہ ونڈوز کو استعمال کرتے ہوئے مذہب کی تبلیغ کی جاتی ہے۔ آج پاکستانی جو ونڈوز استعمال کر رہے ہیں وہ اصلی ونڈوز پر منتقل ہونے کی مائیکروسافٹ کو گارنٹی دیں اور اردو ونڈوز کا کہیں تو پھر دیکھیں مائیکروسافٹ ونڈوز اردو میں بناتی ہے یا نہیں۔ اور تو اور مائیکروسافٹ خود کسی اچھے پاکستانی ادارے کو پیسے دے کر انگریزی کا اردو میں بہتر سے بہتر ترجمہ کروا لے گی۔

ٹوٹی پھوٹی سی اردو آپ آفس یا ایکسپلورر میں دیکھ سکتے ہیں جو کہ ایسے لکھی گئی ہوتی ہے کہ پڑھتے ہوئے سر میں درد ہوتا ہے۔
پتہ نہیں یہ کس ”اردو“ کی بات کر رہے ہیں۔ ہماری اردو نہ تو ٹوٹی پھوٹی ہوتی ہے اور نہ ہی ہمیں پڑھتے ہوئے سر میں درد ہوتا ہے، بلکہ ہماری اردو مکمل نستعلیق رسم الخط میں ہے اور ہمیں پڑھتے ہوئے خوشی ہوتی ہے۔

پہلے مرحلے میں فاسٹ فاؤنڈیشن کے CRULP کو بھی کچھ گرانٹ دی گئی جس نے اردو فونٹس اور کی بورڈ وغیرہ پر کچھ کام کیا ہے۔ (فاسٹ کے لیے پاکستانی قوم ہمیشہ آغا حسن عابدی اور بی سی سی آئی کی مشکور رہے گی کہ اکیلے اس ادارے نے پاکستان میں کمپیوٹر کی ترقی کے لیے جتنا کام کیا ہے، باقی سب نے مل کر بھی نہیں کیا ہو گا۔)
اس میں کوئی شک نہیں کرلپ نے اردو کے لئے کام کیا ہے اور میں ذاتی طور پر خود اس ادارے کا مشکور ہوں۔ لیکن شاید آپ بھول رہے ہیں کہ کرلپ کے فانٹس سے پہلے بھی یونیکوڈ فانٹس بن چکے تھے اور کرلپ کا اردو کیبورڈ لے آؤٹ، مائیکروسافٹ کیبورڈ لے آؤٹ کریئٹر ریلیز ہونے کے بعد بنا۔ مائیکروسافٹ کیبورڈ لے آؤٹ کریئٹر سے لے آؤٹ بنانا کوئی ”راکٹ سائنس“ نہیں بلکہ یہ بچوں کا کھیل ہے۔ آپ بات کرتے ہیں کہ کرلپ نے پاکستان میں کمپیوٹر (اردو) کی ترقی کے لئے جتنا کام کیا ہے، باقی سب نے مل کر بھی نہیں کیا ہوگا، تو حضرت عرض ہے کہ ہم کرلپ کے مشکور ہیں لیکن یہاں آپ غلطی کر گئے ہیں۔ شاید آپ نے اردو محفل، القلم، شاکرالقادری، نبیل نقوی، زکریا اجمل اور امجد علوی وغیرہ وغیرہ کا نام نہیں سنا۔ کرلپ نے تو پھر بھی گرانٹ لے کر دو چار فانٹ بنائے لیکن یہاں تو لوگ گرانٹ نہیں بلکہ الٹا اپنی جیب سے خرچ کر کے، اپنا قیمتی وقت اردو کی خدمت میں لگا کر اردو فانٹس سرور تک بنائے بیٹھے ہیں جہاں آپ کو رنگا رنگ یونیکوڈ اردو فانٹس ملیں گے۔ ٹھیک ہے کرلپ نے کام کیا ہے لیکن یہ بات میں پورے وثوق کے ساتھ کہہ سکتا ہوں کہ کرلپ کا کام باقی اردو کے لئے کام کرنے کے مقابلے میں کچھ بھی نہیں۔ شاید کئی دوستوں کو میری اس بات پر حیرانگی ہو لیکن دوستو! باقی لوگوں کو چھوڑو صرف کبھی اردو محفل کے کام پر نظر ڈالیے گا تو خود اندازہ ہو جائے گا کہ چند لوگ، ایک گرانٹ لے کر کام کرنے والے ادارے کی نسبت کیا کیا کر چکے ہیں اور کیا کر رہے ہیں۔ لوگ مانیں یا نہ مانیں لیکن یہ اردو بلاگنگ، اردو فورمز اور زیادہ تر اردو ویب سائیٹ اور باقی سب کچھ جہاں آج کھڑا ہے اس سب کے پیچھے بالواسطہ یا بلا واسطہ اردو محفل ہی ہے۔ آپ کو بتاتا چلوں کہ بندہ ناچیز (م بلال م) بھی آج تک جو کچھ کر سکا ہے اس کا زیادہ حصہ اردو محفل کی ہی بدولت ہے۔ بھائی لوگو! آخر تحقیقی مباحثے بھی کوئی چیز ہیں۔ اردو کمپیوٹنگ پر ایسی تحقیق اور باتیں ہمیں سوائے اردو محفل کے کسی ادارے کے پاس نہیں ملتیں۔ یونیکوڈ اردو کے بے شمار مسائل کے حل اردو محفل نے ہی دریافت کیے۔ ڈیٹابیس سے لے کر اردو ویب بیج بنانے، وی بلیٹن، پی ایچ پی بی بی، جملہ، دروپل، ورڈپریس اور کئی چیزوں کی اردو میں تحقیق، تراجم، انسٹال کرنے کا طریقہ اردو میں اور پھر مدد اردو محفل ہی نے دی اور ابھی تک دے رہی ہے۔ اردو محفل کے مزید کارنامے بتانے شروع کیے تو عام تحریر نہیں بلکہ پوری کتاب لکھنی پڑ جائے گی۔ خلاصہ یہ کہ میری نظر میں فی الحال اردو محفل کا کوئی ثانی نہیں۔

انڈیا نے تقریباً 1982 میں ہندی زبانوں کو کمپیوٹر پر استعمال کرنے کے لیے ایک اچھا سٹینڈرڈ بنا لیا تھا۔ ہم نے رو پیٹ کر 2000 کے بھی کافی بعد ایسا کیا۔ لیکن اردو کیونکہ کمپیوٹر پر ایک یتیم زبان ہے، اس لیے اس کوبھی کوئی نہیں پوچھتا۔
محترم مجھے اس بات کی سمجھ نہیں آئی کہ آپ ”اچھا سٹینڈرڈ“ کس چیز کو کہہ رہے ہیں؟ مجھے انڈیا کا تو پتہ نہیں لیکن اردو کا نوری نستعلیق فانٹ بھی تقریباً 1980ء کے آس پاس تیار ہو چکا تھا۔ 1982ء تک سات آٹھ ایسے پبلشنگ ادارے وجود میں آ چکے تھے جو نوری نستعلیق میں کتابت کرتے تھے۔ باقی بھائی جان ہمارے ہاں جب سے کمپیوٹر عام انسان تک پہنچا ہے تب سے لوگ کمپیوٹر پر اردو وقت کے حساب سے ”اچھے سٹینڈرڈ“ پر لکھ رہے ہیں۔ کم از کم میں تو 2000ء سے ہی اردو میں ہی ای میل کرتا آ رہا ہوں۔ ٹھیک ہے وقت کے ساتھ ساتھ ٹیکنالوجی تبدیل ہوتی آئی ہے لیکن اس کا مطلب یہ تو نہیں ہم اردو کو کمپیوٹر پر ایک یتیم زبان کہیں۔ اردو کمپیوٹر پر یتیم نہیں ں ں ں ں۔۔۔ بلکہ یتیم ہماری سوچ ہے۔ اردو کو اگر کوئی پوچھتا نہیں تو اس کی وجہ اردو کی یتیمی نہیں بلکہ ہماری ذہنی غلامی ہے۔ شاید حالات کو کوسنا ہماری عادت بن چکی ہے۔ بھائی صاحب اگر اردو آج پیچھے ہے تو اس کے ذمہ دار بھی ہم ہیں۔ اردو کو یتیم کہنے سے پہلے اتنا تو سوچ لیتے کہ آج اس کے وارث ہم ہیں۔ جب ہم ہی کسی قابل نہیں تو اس میں اردو کا کیا قصور؟

بے قدری کی انتہا تو دیکھیں کہ اردو میں ڈیسک ٹاپ پبلشنگ کا تقریباً واحد سافٹ وئیر، ان پیج، ایک بھارتی سافٹ وئیر ہے۔
جناب آپ کی اطلاع کے لئے عرض ہے کہ نوری نستعلیق فانٹ پاکستان میں ہی بنا تھا لیکن مزید پروگرامنگ کا کام پاکستان میں ممکن نہ ہو سکا تو پھر ہندوستان کے لوگوں نے اس پر مزید کام کر کے سافٹ ویئر تیار کیا۔ مجھے سمجھ نہیں آتی، اردو کے معاملے میں اتنی تنگ نظری کیوں۔ جس مشین پر آپ یہ تحریر پڑھ رہے ہیں وہ پاکستان نے تو نہیں بنائی بلکہ وہ بھی غیر ملکی ہی ہے۔ مجھے بھی آپ کی طرح ہندوستانیوں سے بے شمار نظریاتی اختلاف ہو سکتے ہیں، لیکن اس میں اردو کو کیوں گھسیڑ رہے ہو۔ ٹھیک ہے اردو پاکستان کی قومی زبان ہے لیکن اردو ہندوستان میں بھی بولی جاتی ہے اور یہ ان کی بھی زبان ہے، اس لئے اردو میری یا آپ کی جاگیر نہیں بلکہ یہ ہر اس انسان کی زبان ہے جو اسے پسند کرتا ہے۔
باقی آپ کو بتاتا چلوں کہ اب اردو والے انپیج کے محتاج نہیں۔ اب اردو میں ڈیسک ٹاپ پبلشنگ کئی اور سافٹ ویئر کے ذریعے ہو سکتی ہے البتہ ہم دوسری طرف نہ دیکھیں تو یہ علیحدہ بات ہے۔

سن 2010 میں جاکر حکومت (اور) لوگوں نے ونڈوز وسٹا اور سیون میں موجود اردو لکھنے کی سپورٹ اور فونٹس کی وجہ سے اردو بلاگز میں زیادہ دلچسپی دکھانی شروع کی۔ اسے سے پہلے کوئی بھی اردو ویب سائٹ دیکھنے کے لیے اس پر موجود فونٹ کو ڈاونلوڈ کرنا پڑتا تھا۔ بی بی سی اردو پہلی مقبول اردو ویب سائٹ بنی۔
حضرت زیادہ نہیں تو تھوڑی سی تحقیق کر لیتے۔ ایک طرف آپ کہہ رہے ہیں کہ 2010ء میں اردو لکھنے کی سپورٹ اور فانٹس کی وجہ سے اردو بلاگز میں دلچسپی دکھانی شروع کی، تو دوسری طرف کہتے ہیں کہ بی بی سی اردو پہلی مقبول اردو ویب سائیٹ بنی۔ کیا آپ جانتے ہیں کہ بی بی سی اردو کی ویب سائیٹ تو 2002ء میں شروع ہوئی تھی۔ یوں 2010ء والی بات سمجھ نہیں آتی۔
خیر آپ کو بتاتا چلو کہ 2010ء میں نہیں بلکہ بہت پہلے ہی ونڈوز ایکس پی میں اردو لکھنے اور فانٹس کی مکمل سہولت موجود تھی اور اردو ویب سائیٹ دیکھنے کے لئے کسی فانٹ کی ضرورت نہیں پڑتی تھی۔ اگر آپ کی مراد نستعلیق فانٹ ہے تو بھائی جان نستعلیق فانٹ تو وسٹا اور سیون میں بھی موجود نہیں، پھر آپ یہ سہرا وسٹا اور سیون کے سر کیوں سجا رہے ہیں؟ بلکہ یہ سہرا ونڈوز 8 کے سر سجائیے گا کیونکہ اس میں نستعلیق فانٹ آ رہا ہے۔۔۔ باقی اگر بات اردو بلاگنگ کی کی جائے تو عرض ہے کہ 2008ء سے تو میں بھی بلاگنگ کر رہا ہوں جبکہ کہا جاتا ہے کہ 2002ء میں عمیر سلام پہلا اردو بلاگر تھا۔ 2004ء سے تو اپنے خاور کھوکھر صاحب بھی بلاگنگ کر رہے ہیں۔ 2005ء میں اردو محفل (پہلی یونیکوڈ اردو فورم) کیا بنی پھر تو جیسے اردو بلاگنگ میں انقلاب آ گیا۔ آپ کو بتاتا چلوں کہ 2005ء میں ہی اردو سیارہ پہلا اردو بلاگ ایگریگیٹر بھی وجود میں آ چکا تھا۔ بھائی جی یہ کوئی قبل مسیح کی باتیں تو نہیں جو آپ تاریخ میں اتنی بڑی غلطیاں شامل کر رہے ہیں۔

انٹرنیٹ پر دنیا کی پہلی پانچ مقبول ترین زبانوں میں سے ایک کا ہندی چہرہ تو نظر آتا ہے، اردو نہیں۔ گوگل اور وکی پیڈیا جیسی سائٹس پر اردو ایک دو سال پہلے تک موجود نہیں تھی حالانکہ ایسی زبانیں موجود تھیں جنہیں ایک دو کروڑ سے بھی کم لوگ بولتے تھے۔ اب ورڈ میں اردو مل جاتی ہے، لیکن اردو ڈکشنری کے بغیر۔
ویسے تحریر میں یہاں تک پہنچنے تک میرے دماغ کی بتیاں بجنے لگ پڑیں تھیں کہ یہ بھائی صاحب آخر لکھ کیا رہے ہیں۔ خیر پانچ مقبول ترین زبانوں میں اگر اردو چہرہ نظر نہیں آتا تو اس کی سیدھی سی وجہ یہ ہے کہ ان چہروں کی تعداد کم ہے جو انٹرنیٹ پر اردو لکھنے کو فوقیت دیتے ہوں۔ گوگل پر ایک دو سال پہلے تک اردو نہیں تھی اگر اس سے مراد تلاش کے نتائج میں اردو کا کہہ رہے ہیں تو پھر عرض ہے کہ جس دن انٹرنیٹ پر یونیکوڈ اردو لکھی جانی شروع ہوئی اسی دن گوگل کی تلاش میں اردو شامل ہو گئی تھی۔ مزید آپ وکی پیڈیا پر اردو ایک دو سال پہلے تک موجود نہیں تھی کا کہتے ہو جبکہ ایسا نہیں تھا۔ اگر آپ قریب ترین ہوتے پھر بھی کوئی بات ہوتی لیکن آپ تو بہت فرق ڈال گئے۔ جناب وکی پیڈیا پر اردو 2004ء سے موجود ہے۔
ورڈ میں ڈکشنری سے مراد اگر یہ ہے کہ غلط الفاظ کی نشاندہی ورڈ خودبخود کر دے تو عرض ہے کہ ورڈ میں اردو ڈکشنری ”موجود“ ہے۔

باقی رہی بات معیاری اردو کی سند کے لئے اور دیگر الفاظ کے تراجم کے لئے ادارہ ہونا چاہئے تو میں اس بات پر آپ سے مکمل اتفاق کرتا ہوں۔ اب اصطلاحات کا ترجمہ کیا اور کس طرح ہونا چاہئے اس پر میں کچھ نہیں کہہ سکتا کیونکہ میں لسانیات کا ماہر نہیں اور یہ کام تو ماہرین کا ہے۔ بھائی صاحب آپ کی تحریر کے جواب میں میری اس تحریر کو اگر آپ پڑھیں تو برائے مہربانی غصہ نہ کیجئے گا۔ دراصل میں نے آپ کی تحریر میں جو غلطیاں دیکھیں سوچا ان کی نشاندہی کر دوں تاکہ لوگوں تک حقائق پہنچیں۔ یقیناً آپ اور میں ایک ہی کشتی کے سوار ہیں۔ آپ نے بھی اردو کی بہتری کے لئے تحریر لکھی ہے لیکن مجھے محسوس ہوا کہ جہاں جہاں غلطیاں ہیں ان کی مجھے نشاندہی ضرور کرنی چاہئے، سو کر دی۔ باقی اگر میں کسی جگہ غلطی پر ہوں تو امید کرتا ہوں کہ آپ اچھے انداز میں میری اصلاح ضرور کریں گے۔ آخری بات یہ کہ کمپیوٹر اور انٹرنیٹ پر اردو لکھنا اور پڑھنا کوئی مشکل نہیں بلکہ یہ بالکل انگریزی یا دیگر زبانوں کی طرح ہی ہے۔ عام صارفین کے لئے کمپیوٹر اور انٹرنیٹ پر اردو لکھنے اور پڑھنے کی مکمل سہولت موجود ہے، اس لئے بہتر یہ ہے کہ لوگوں کو اردو لکھنے کی طرف قائل کرو، نہ کہ مسائل کا انبار سنا کر لوگوں میں مایوسی پیدا کرو۔ ٹھیک ہے چند ایک مسائل کا حل ہونا ابھی باقی ہے لیکن اب اتنے بھی مسائل نہیں جن کا آپ نے ذکر کر دیا ہے، ویسے اگر کہیں مسئلہ ہے تو وہ ہماری سوچ کا ہے جو ہم اردو لکھنا پسند ہی نہیں کرتے۔ اس لئے لوگوں کے حوصلے بڑھاؤ اور اردو لکھنے اور پڑھنے کی طرف قائل کرو۔۔۔

Riot police officers standing on duty in the western Kazakh city of Aktau following the deadly riots. Tretyakov / Reuters

Recent riots in Zhanaozen and Shetpe in the Mangystau province in western Kazakhstan have resulted in at least 16 deaths and over 100 injured. This information is according to the Kazakh authorities although unverified eye witness accounts and human rights groups put the death toll at more than 50. The number of those wounded in the clashes is most likely much higher than reported.

The violence that took place between the police and protesting oil workers and their sympathizers last week is the most bloodshed the country has seen since its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. Ironically (or intentionally) these events coincided with the 20th anniversary festivities held across Kazakhstan to mark the occasion that included the unveiling of a replica of Paris’s Arc de Triomphe in the capital of Astana.

The violence started on Friday, December 16. Since last May, disgruntled oil workers were occupying the central square in Zhanaozen, a nondescript industrial city of some 90,000 residents in western Mangystau province, citing disputes over wages and job losses. Some of the thousands of initial strikers were dismissed, prompting many of their colleagues to return to work.

The New York Times writes that the protesters shifted their focus to political demands including the right to form independence parties. “In response, the authorities announced plans to hold a state-sponsored New Year’s holiday party for children on the site, apparently in a ruse aimed at providing an excuse to clear out the workers. In an online video said to be shot at the scene, protesters are shown pushing past police lines to dismantle a stage for the party, then overturning a tree decorated for the holiday. It also showed police officers firing into the air.”

The Moscow Times reports a slight variation on the theme: “fired oil workers and sympathetic citizens stormed a stage erected for an Independence Day party and smashed sound equipment in central Zhanaozen. They later set fire to the city hall, the headquarters of a local oil company, a hotel and dozens of other buildings, including trade centers and houses, burned cars and buses and plundered ATMs.”

Police opened fire and according to the officials 14 protesters were killed in the clashes in Zhanaozen alone. An article from the Telegraph has a short video of the storming of the stage.

The following day the unrest spread to the neighborhood village of Shetpe, 60 miles north of Zhanaozen, where a crowd blocked a train coming from the port of Aktau. According to the authorities, one person was killed and 12 were wounded.

On Sunday morning, December 18, about 500 protesters gathered near the main square in Aktau facing a large force of riot police.

The city is the capital of the Mangystau region and is one of Kazakhstan’s most important oil producing centers. Aktau is a key transportation hub for the Northern Distribution Network, which provides transit of non-lethal supplies for U.S. troops in Afghanistan. It has a population of around 180,000 people and is home to hundreds of Western expats.

The government declared a state of emergency in Zhanaozen with a 20 day curfew in effect and a ban on public gatherings until January 5, 2012. President Nursultan Nazarbayev was quick to dismiss the clashes as provocations by the “hooligans.”

After clashes in Zhanaozen, protests erupted in Shetpe. (c) The New York Times

Protests in pictures from the BBC.

From the Economist on the Kazakh clashes.

The Jamestown Foundation Blog has a good overview of the recent violence and events in Kazakhstan.

Amateur video of the clashes making rounds on the internet:

There are numerous values attached to each link that is generated to and from your website. Some links (such as quality link backs) can bring incoming visitors and help increase your search engine page rank. On the contrary, too many outgoing links can result in reducing the search engine value of your website. One of the most important aspects of website optimization and SEO, includes proper knowledge of link building. Obviously you can avoid the hassle if you already have a good SEO service provider like href="http://www.digitalmoz.com/">DigitalMoz, which is a well know company that provides href="http://www.digitalmoz.com/">SEO Philippines and other countries.

Following is an overview of the five things that you should know about link building, to optimize your website.

Get Indexed More Quickly

To get your website, particularly blog to be indexed quickly, you can put a link on a popular website. The search engine bots are likely to crawl that website often and they might see your link and travel through it to your website. While getting quality link backs from established websites in the short run can be difficult, you can post your website links on websites like YouTube . However, it is advised that you do not spam your link but rather post it on e.g. your own YouTube channel. Other ways of getting your website linked with an established website can be to write guest posts on other blogs (and link to your website), leave your link to questions in online forums (the link should lead to relevant content), etc.

class="aligncenter" style="padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; border: 0px;" src="http://aliwaqas.info/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/get-indexed-fast.jpg" alt="get-indexed-fast" width="500" height="333" border="0" />

No Follow Tags

No follow tag can be applied to links and entire pages on your website to command the search bots to not to follow certain link(s). This ensures that specific links e.g. outgoing links, do not count for anything SEO related.  While there is some skepticism as to how much attention bots pay to the no follow tags, Bing and Google both claim to value the no follow tags.

class="aligncenter" style="padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; border: 0px;" src="http://aliwaqas.info/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/SayNotoNoFollow.gif" alt="SayNotoNoFollow" width="421" height="283" border="0" />

Reciprocal Link Building

While it is always a good idea to link to reliable sources, you are far more likely to get reciprocal link backs from websites who are more similar to your website’s content. For example, you are unlikely to get a reciprocal link if you link to the BBC website, than linking to a fellow blogger. While the potential websites providing you with courtesy link backs may be your competitors, they are still likely to link to your blog, if and when you link to them. This is because your link backs will provide them with fresh visitors and is likely to increase their ad revenue, and vice versa.

class="aligncenter" style="padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; border: 0px;" src="http://aliwaqas.info/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/SEO-Link-Building.jpg" alt="SEO-Link-Building" width="300" height="300" border="0" />

Link Priority

If two separate links on a webpage of your website link to the same page, then Google only uses the first (that appears in the code) of the  two links. This means that it is not wise to repeatedly link to a specific page from a single webpage. Furthermore, if you require doing so, make sure that the first link has a relevant keyword hyperlinked with it. However, you can use two or more links on a single webpage, to link to separate webpages on your website.

class="aligncenter" style="padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px; border: 0px;" src="http://aliwaqas.info/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/1st-link-priority.jpg" alt="1st-link-priority" width="300" height="300" border="0" />

Use Search Engine Marketing

Search Engine Marketing companies can help your website acquire good search engine visibility, which often results in quality link backs. This is because websites appearing in the initial pages of search queries also get linked by websites that benefit from their content. You can always acquire the help of DigitalMoz href="http://www.digitalmoz.com/services/sem-philippines/">Search Engine Marketing Philippines, which is a company of expert professionals that can optimize your website and help you get quality backlinks by enhancing the search engine value of your website. For more information, visit href="http://www.digitalmoz.com/services/sem-philippines/">DigitalMoz website.