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I have broken bread with Condoleezza Rice, if not exactly on the same table as hers, then at least under the same roof on one of the higher floors of the State Department building on 23rd and C Streets, which since 9/11 has assumed the appearance of the American ambassador’s residence in Baghdad’s Green Zone. There are concrete boulders that are impregnable enough to block an armoured invasion by Osama bin Laden’s motorised cavalry. Argus-eyed guards stand everywhere and give all passers-by the look-over.

Every time I find myself in that vicinity, I get this illogical but vivid feeling that I may be questioned and then asked to “please come with us” for what in police parlance is known as “further questioning”. So far, it has not happened but since I am a believer in being safe rather than sorry, I have rationed my forays into that part of town.

October 25 was however different. Since only the Faithful were invited to the Secretary of State’s “Iftar dinner” (an absurd expression since there is no such thing as an Iftar breakfast or an Iftar lunch), it was unlikely that any of us would be paid more than cursory attention by the boys with guns in their holsters. Of the 140 invited, about a 100 turned up, including what journalists there are in this town with Muslim names.

Not being invited, therefore, could be seen as a mark of distinction, which is what I told my friend Nayyar Zaidi, though he did not seem to think so. I await his next column in the only newspaper in the world whose name is the antonym of peace because obviously, there must have been a grand conspiracy at work in the drawing up of the guest list.

The oddest thing about the evening was a so-called imam, wearing the kind of cap old Parsis used to don, intoning the azan in a flat, off-beat, jarring voice before Iftar, after which half the crowd marched behind him to an adjacent room to offer Maghrib prayers. I am no authority in these matters but isn’t it the fast that is ended first? So overawed were the sheepish guests that nobody pointed that out. This strange man then got on the rostrum and read out a 12 minute-long prayer that appeared to have been written at the Department of Homeland Security.

Ms Rice, dressed in a becoming grey outfit, entered the room at some point and took the table on which sat a number of gentlemen whom the Department obviously considers people of influence in the Muslim community. Dr Akbar Ahmed was on that table, which I thought was something of a comedown because he has appeared more than once on the Oprah Winfrey show.

Were Ms Rice and Ms Winfrey to get into a who-is-better-known competition, the TV star whose magazine invariably has her as the cover girl month after month, would beat the Secretary of State by several lengths. A young friend who is active on more fronts these days than I can count on the fingers of one hand was on Ms Rice’s table and appears to have engaged her in conversation a good deal of the time.

He later told some of us that Ms Rice, when asked what the United States would do when our General was no longer on the scene, replied that he was taking very good care of his security. There is no doubt left in my mind now that the General is immortal. She graciously promised more assistance to Pakistan (“We are doing more.”) but wondered why there were no Chinese choppers flying over Pakistan. I leave the Chinese to deal with that one.

Another gentleman on Ms Rice’s table was the head of the largest and most ultra conservative Muslim outfit in America at whose annual do, were a prize of $10 million on offer for each non-hijab “Muslima” spotted, there would be no winners. I asked what the leader of the Faithful — beard but no moustache — had said to the lady and was told, “Precious little”, which was just as well.

So the State Department has done its good deed of the year and I am sure earned heaps of sawab, though the crowd of which Ms Rice is so integral a part is made up mostly of born-again evangelical Christians who feel that except for them the rest of the earth’s denizens are lost both here and in the hereafter. Ms Rice said a few nice words about overcoming “our differences” and turning our backs on hatred. She said justice should prevail and human beings should not be seen as enemies but as partners.

This brought a wan smile to some lips because this stirring message of goodwill for all and peace on earth is somewhat hard to reconcile with the invasion of Iraq, a sovereign state, which may have been cruelly and undemocratically ruled, but a sovereign state it was nevertheless.

Ms Rice was one of the great drumbeaters of invading Iraq and she it was who once painted a chilling vision of a nuclear-armed Saddam Hussein doling out death and destruction. Being the closest of President Bush’s aides and friends, she it was who, along with Dick Cheney (a name out of detective fiction) and Shaukat “Shortcut” Aziz’s bosom buddy, Paul Wolfowitz, led this country into a war that has cost hundreds of thousands of lives, including those of 2,000 young Americans.

There can be little doubt that the Bush doctrine of ‘Democracy through Invasion’ found its most ardent supporter in Ms Rice, who, if you please, plays the piano beautifully, wanted to be a ballet dancer and speaks Russian. What more can one ask for!

In the end, most of those invited, all sitting at separate round tables, expected that Ms Rice would walk around to greet her guests but she did no such thing. Perhaps, she needs to learn a lesson from the Chinese, who always do that, Chinese choppers or no Chinese choppers.

Khalid Hasan is Daily Times’ US-based correspondent

No matter what arguments the Bush administration offers the world for the continued internment of over 500 men at the US naval base of Guantanamo, it will not be able to justify what is has done and what it continues to defend in the face of universal criticism.

I was there, along with five other journalists, for four days in October and whereas we were treated with the greatest courtesy by those in charge of the five camps that are collectively known as Camp Delta, it was a most disturbing experience for all of us. It is not that the 505 inmates of these camps are deliberately mistreated or ill-fed or not cared for medically; it is just that they should not be there in the first place.

I think Amnesty International said it best when it observed in one of its reports: “Hypocrisy, an overarching war mentality and a disregard for basic human rights’ principles and international legal obligations continue to mark the USA’s ‘war on terror.’ Serious human rights violations are the inevitable result. The detention camp at the US Naval Base in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba has become a symbol of the US administration’s refusal to put human rights and the rule of law at the heart of its response to the atrocities of 11 September, 2001. Hundreds of people of around 35 different nationalities remain held in effect in a legal black hole, many without access to any court, legal counsel or family visits.” Amnesty said it is more urgent than ever that the US government bring the Guantanamo Bay detention camp and any other facilities it is operating outside the US into full compliance with international law and standards. The only alternative is to close them down.

Almost all the inmates were either captured or handed over by bounty hunters in Afghanistan or Pakistan. Not all of them are, or can even be, Al Qaeda. They are young, the average age being 34 years. The youngest inmate is just 20 and was only 17 when he was brought in. Guantanamo itself is controversial and so is the entire US presence there, although it has been an American naval base since 1903. The 45 square mile area with a population of just over 8,000 serves as the site of Camp Delta and the US naval base. It is part of mainland Cuba but despite the fact that Cuba considers the American presence an occupation of its sovereign territory, the US will never restore it to Havana. For over 40 years, Cuba has not accepted the token annual lease payment that the US makes, but it cannot regain its integral part. The original lease deed says that the lease can be terminated through either abandonment or by mutual agreement. The US is not going to abandon Guantanamo, nor will there be a mutual agreement whereby it vacates the base. So there you have it. Tails Washington wins, heads Havana loses.

Before there was Camp Delta, there was the notorious Camp X that now lies abandoned, home to snakes, iguanas, fire ants and wild growth. It remained in existence for only three months in 2002 when the men were first brought in, but it has come to symbolise the horror that concentration camp-like establishments are. I have seldom seen a more haunted, forlorn place than this abandoned camp with its metallic cage-like cells. There was neither water in there nor any other facilities; the heat and humidity must have been intense. Many of the pictures of its inmates in their dread orange overalls, burnt into people’s memories, were taken at this camp.

Camp Delta, as I wrote above, is actually five camps, four of them located in a cluster inside the same fence, while the fifth one – called Camp Five – lies some distance away. Camp One has a capacity of 400 and contains 31 per cent of the detainees; followed by Camp Two (9 per cent), Camp Three (10 per cent), Camp Four (34 per cent) and Camp Five (16 per cent). The most “cooperative” of the detainees are kept in Camp Four and are allowed a kind of community living. They and the inmates of Camp Five wear white, while those in the other three camps wear orange, the colour that has come to be universally associated with Guantanamo. Outside each camp, there is a large sign that says under the name of the camp: “Honour bound to defend freedom.” It reminded me of the words written at the entrance to every German concentration camp: Arbeit macht frei (Work brings freedom). And can there be anything more Orwellian than that the main watchtower in Camp Four is called “Liberty Tower”?

We were permitted to attend an administrative hearing at which the detainee, a Russian-speaking young man from Kazakhstan, refused to answer questions but was allowed to make a statement at the end. He said: “I have been here for four years and all the (relevant) documents are with the authorities. In the past, I had never met any American but had been hearing that the United States was a democracy. I did not know which language they spoke. I had heard that America is a fair country and it fights those who are unfair to their people or harm their interests. I have been here for four years and I have not seen any signs of democracy. I wonder if it is all a lie. The US government was an example for other countries and helpful to people who had no rights. I am from Kazakhstan which has nothing against America. I have never killed anybody; therefore, how can America be against me and harm me? Maybe America is angry because a lot of its citizens were killed in 9/11. I was not involved. It is very sad what happened. They were children and fathers. I also have a father and a mother.”

We were not allowed to meet the prisoners on the grounds that this would constitute a violation of the Geneva Conventions. The selectivity with which the United States applies international law has become its own condemnation. Human Rights Watch, in a letter to President Bush in July this year, wrote: “Access has been granted to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), but under their rules of confidentiality, the ICRC does not discuss their concerns publicly. Media and congressional delegations who visit Guantanamo are not allowed to interview detainees, nor inspect the different detention camps. Attorneys for the detainees have strict limits on their visits, such as having their client meetings monitored and their interview notes classified. UN human rights special experts and rapporteurs who have sought access to Guantanamo have waited more than a year but have still not received permission from your administration.”

The war on terrorism is an endless war, and so, it seems, is the detention of those 505 men.

The Punjab chief minister, the lesser luminary of the Gujrat dynasty, is no longer in town, as I write this on a bright day of what can only be the remaining few of a lingering summer. He came, some say en famille, stayed with the estimable Dr Mubashar Choudry, who mends hearts both in Washington and Lahore and is privy to the inner recesses of many VIP chests in Pakistan. Every single stent in several important hearts stays in place because it was inserted there by the able-fingered Dr Choudry.

The Punjab chief minister came to Washington, not to raise funds for the victims of the earthquake, as his public relations managers would have us believe, but to have a good American look taken at his heart which underwent minor repairs some months ago in Lahore. Well, one should always look at the bright side of things.

No matter what some say, the people of the gallant province of the Punjab should find it reassuring that their beloved chief minister not only has a heart but one that beats for them in Washington as much as it does in Lahore. It will beat even more rhythmically now that it has been pronounced in good working order by American mechanics from the very same town where the slayer-to-be of big bad Osama lives (that is when he’s not in Crawford hacking bush).

The chief minister showed no interest in meeting the four or five journalists who live in Washington and write for Pakistani newspapers. And one can understand why. Every single day that he spent in Washington coincided with the release of a Lahore-datelined press note highlighting his great fund-raising efforts in America on behalf of Pakistan’s earthquake victims. In a way it was just as well: at least none of us would have to face a people’s court at some date in the future for filing baseless reports from Washington about the chief minister.

However, even chief ministers need to shop and thus there should be no raised eyebrows, as there are, about Seigneur Elahi having been found shopping at Tyson’s Corner, the prime shopping centre in the greater Washington area. They are all there: from Saks Fifth Avenue to Nordstrom to Neiman Marcus to Lord & Taylor. All that the heart desires can be picked up here — for a price though.

I recall that when Farooq Leghari, then president, (Benazir gave him the apt name of Farooq ul Haq) came to America to attend his son’s graduation, he called it a “working visit”. What Chaudhry Pervez Elahi has christened his visit, one is not sure. Maybe it was also a “working visit”.

And why not? Wasn’t he the star attraction at a “Fund Raising Iftar Dinner” on October 13 at Dr Choudry’s sprawling residence — Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain also stayed there for several weeks last year — where a couple of hundred well-heeled Pakistanis came but all that was pledged — normally only five to six out of ten pledges get honoured — was $50,000, which is like a similar event in Lahore yielding Rs 50,000. A celebratory press release extolling the great effort made by the chief minister to generate funds for earthquake victims was issued in Lahore the next day.

Why the chief minister did not meet the local akhbarwalas is understandable. These people ask too many questions, some of them downright insolent, so it is best to keep away from them. In any case, in Pakistan’s social pecking order, akhbarwalas figure pretty low. Did the chief minister pay for his trip — he was earlier in London in connection with a family wedding — or was this honour placed on the shoulders of the Punjabi taxpayer, I leave others to investigate?

As if that were not enough, a 15-member delegation was all set to arrive last week in New York to attend the UN General Assembly. In the end, it stayed home. And the credit for keeping these jaunty lawmakers tethered to the post must go to Pakistan’s permanent mission to the United Nations and its admirable head, Munir Akram, who advised the Foreign Office that at a time like this, it would be found inappropriate for as many as 15 men and women from Pakistan to be seen at the UN. I should add that the General Assembly debate ended on Friday.

We can’t be seeking assistance with one hand and spending what we have with the other on inessential travel. This delegation that never came was to have stayed a month, to be followed by another. Is there someone in Islamabad — our immaculate foreign minister for one — who can stop the second wave of holidaymakers from taking that New York-bound flight?

But I am not optimistic, because as I write this, I am told that three parliamentary delegations have already landed in Geneva, Hague and Brussels. The speaker of the National Assembly is also in Geneva. He arrived a full 10 days before his conference is due to start. Will someone out there please raise a point of order against him?

Khalid Hasan is Daily Times’ US-based correspondent

Painter extraordinaire, crusading litigant, egotist without equal and defender of lost causes at home and abroad, yes, that’s right, you have come to the right address, it is Sir Geoff – or to give him his full name as it appears on his visiting card, Barrister Mohammed J Iqbal Jafree of Slarpore, MA (Illinois), LLM (Harvard), PhD, Dlitt, FRSA, PC, advocate Supreme Court of Pakistan plus admitted to 51 other Jurisdictions and former Assistant Attorney General (USA).

Sir Geoff, as I prefer to call him in the interest of brevity, prices his paintings at Rs 786,000 each. His fee as counsel is also the same. If he is not in a generous mood, he may raise it to Rs 786,000,000. It all depends. I once appeared as a defence witness in his favour at a civil court in Lahore. The suit filed by Sir Geoff was against two lawyers who had called him names or some such. He tells me that he won the case and received financial and spiritual satisfaction. My hope that he would share some of the satisfaction falling in the first category with his sole defence witness has not materialised, although he has promised me a plot of land around Kala Shah Kaku. If he thinks I am going to have a mailing address that says Kala Shah Kaku, he needs to go fly a kite.

Sir Geoff does not suffer fools and he has no time for, to quote his celebrated description, keera makoras – the creepy crawly types from among his fellow human beings. Whenever Sir Geoff files a writ – generally pro bono publico – he mails me a copy. What he has never mailed, except once, are the judgments. I have always wondered what happens to those writs that he files in and out of season at the rate of two or three a day. I suspect there is a secret underground chamber in the Lahore High Court where all of Sir Geoff’s writs are piled up, waiting to be heard. Sir Geoff is a believer in the classic adage that there are no synonyms in the English language and hence his writ petitions are laced with colourful adjectives directed at Their Honourable Lordships. It is amazing that he has so far not been charged with contempt of court. That would be the day because Sir Geoff would rather go to jail than say, “I place myself at Your Lordship’s mercy.”

Sir Geoff says he is the greatestlivingartist of the world. I write this as one word because Sir Geoff says it in one single breath. Sir Herbert Read said of him that he had entered a unique destiny of his own and Queen Brenda, otherwise known as Elizabeth II, is stated (by Sir Geoff) to have called him the “Arts Council of Great Britain.” He also claims to have matched wits with Marcel Duchamps and created art in front of the National Gallery, London, by a rather unconventional method that I would rather not go into. Currently, Sir Geoff is in some kind of a scuffle with the Tate Gallery, London, which Sir Geoff charges has damaged several dozen of his works. Sir Geoff has long entries in most Who’s Whos, but I should add that those included are held responsible for what they list by way of their achievements. Sir Geoff’s claims, which I once checked because he was threatening to sue me in Vienna, London, New York and Lahore because of something I had written, turned out to be valid for the most part. He did not, in the end, sue and we remain friends. The moral of this tale is that it is not prudent to cross the Meister Writ Petitioner of Pakistan.

Sir Geoff, who has yet to gift me one of his $786,000 (or is it rupees?) paintings, has recently written a letter to President Pervez Musharraf, of which he has sent me a copy. It is vintage Geoffrey. He begins: “Dear President Musharraf, AA (which I suppose means Assalaam-aul-Alaikum), you should answer letters. The Queen, the Lord High Chancellor answer all letters although they receive more than you and have less staff than you, except you have never appointed anyone upon merit, so your staff efficiency is low. No need to be paranoid about Hidden Hands and funded NGOs.” Attached to Sir Geoff’s letter is copy of a writ over a gang rape that, he says, has been lutcking (sounds better than hanging) in the Lahore High Court for 10 years.

Sir Geoff is a concerned citizen and reminds the General that he has written to him before to facilitate the visa of Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times (he of the poison-darted Shazia rape columns) so that Nick can see “justice in our courts” and hear a man (namely Sir Geoff), to hear whom people used to travel across long distances in the United States. Sir Geoff wants to know who advised Gen Musharraf to have a visa denied to Kristof or to put Mukhtar Mai on the exit control list. Sir Geoff adds: “You were wrongly advised. Even God changes His orders and hears prayers.” He reminds the General that he had written to him six yeas ago to sell his plot in Westridge, Rawalpindi so that his holdings would come in line with the laid-down limit. “A government servant,” wrote Sir Geoff, “cannot have more than one wife, one car, one plot/house and one servant. You are no exception.” He adds by way of cautionary advice that “lest you jump to conclusions that I am being supported by any NGO or foreign funds, the answer is no. This letterhead that you see is from halal income. No chips on my shoulders, no plots in my closet, no closets in fact. I understand that so that your link with the world at large is not totally lost.”

Sir Geoff next asks the President to appoint him an ad hoc judge of the Supreme Court without a salary for a year “to show the world that world class judgments can emanate from Pakistan yet.” He also wants it noted that “our PM has invested nothing in Pakistan yet.” He further requests Gen Musharraf to “please return the enclosure to me after perusal to save me expenses on postage and Xeroxing.” He also wants to know when Gen Musharraf will start making appointments on merit as the constitution under which he took his oath mandates that he do that. A copy of his letter to the General is endorsed to Kristof and me. Kristof will remain where he is, at the New York Times , but as for me, that means yet another entry in my dossier maintained by the dutiful ISI since 1977. I am sorry to increase the Agency’s workload but what is an extra entry between old friends! As for Sir Geoff, I say: “Keep on truckin’and filin’ them writs.”

“You are all set now”, is generally what you are told at US airports after you have been put through the ringer, as it were, in an effort to ascertain if you are carrying explosives, sharp knives, firearms or any device that can put the safety of other passengers at risk.

It is not only foreigners, especially those with a Muslim name or some linkage to a Muslim country who are special objects of interest but American Americans also who have to go through the same humiliating routine. However, their treatment tends to be softer and their questioning less interrogative.

Every time I have landed back at a US port of entry since 2001, I have had to undergo the indignity of being taken to a separate area earmarked for those whose credentials require additional verification, asked questions both enervating and comical and given the most thorough physical going-over. Once when boarding a flight from Toronto to Washington, I had to have my baggage searched so often that I myself began to wonder if I was actually carrying contraband stuff.

Shakespeare may have thought there is nothing in a name, but how could the Bard have known what the world would become 400 years later. It is a fact that if you have a name like mine, you are not going to just sail through US immigration and customs: you’re going to be stopped baby.

Shoes have now to be taken off in all cases, placed in an open-mouthed plastic container and pushed through the X-raying machine. Belts have to be unbelted which can be tough and sometimes comical if all that is holding up your trousers is your belt. Anything metallic, including keys, has to be disgorged from your pockets and put through electronic scrutiny. Cameras, computers, handbags, jackets, topcoats, all have to pass the test and be declared harmless.

So ridiculous have some of these procedures become that more than once I have seen toddlers being made to take off their shoes. Maybe one of the Homeland Security manuals contains warnings about potential four-year old hijackers.

I recall Maj Gen Rashid Qureshi, then General Pervez Musharraf’s press secretary and chief of military public relations, being made to take off everything except his trousers and shirt — he was travelling with his boss who apparently was spared the treatment. Rashid declared afterwards in the lobby of New York’s dumpy Hotel Roosevelt, “I will never come to America again.”

His prayer was obviously heard because not only has he not come to America since; he no longer is what he then was, though he remains a general holding a somewhat less exciting job than the one he held with such aplomb in those heady days. Gen Orakzai, at the time corps commander at Peshawar, and travelling to the US at the invitation of the commander of Centcom, was so traumatised by what he was made to undergo first at London by his American airline and then on arrival in New York, from where he wanted to catch a connecting flight to Tampa, that he vowed never to return to the United States. His prayer too was heard and he has not been here since.

Recently when writer and online joiner of lonely hearts, Mustansar Hussain Tarar, arrived in New York, it took the immigration people a few minutes before realising that his name was Tarar not Terror. “What do you do?” he was asked. “I am a writer”, he replied, and so it said on his passport.

“Do you know President Pervez Musharraf?” came the next question. The suave, unflappable MHT replied, “Yes, he knows me.” He was let in without further ado.

My friend Mamood Shaam, the Jang group editor, who uses the email name of “Bullcart”, came to New York last month to report Gen Musharraf’s visit. After his return home, he wrote a poem in Urdu that deserves to be shared, though in my English translation unfortunately, and not in the crisp Urdu in which it is written. The poem which has an English title is called ‘Access to Information’.

Place all you carry on the floor
Cameras, bags, wallets and your brain
For our expert dogs to sniff
Empty your pockets please of all they contain
No metal should be touching your body
And your heart should be free of negative thoughts
Stand in one line, single-file, all of you
Put your feelings to sleep
A hand-held machine will go over you
It will ferret out any traces of self-respect you might still have
And any camouflaged sense of honour
But wait! what was that sound? A watch or what?
Turn around, raise your arms again
Is that your good sense that we smell?
And, yes, take off those shoes
Step on the bare floor where your honour lies
In our presence, you’ve to stand barefoot
Are there odd ideas in your head?
Well, next time you come, leave all that behind
Your feelings are best left back where you come from
Failing which, the hand-held machine’ll spring to life
And disgorge all that our hidden files contain
“You are all set now, sir.”

Khalid Hasan is Daily Times’ US-based correspondent

Next time you pick up a phone – or pull one out of your pocket – and before you open your mouth, know that what is going to leave your lips, and those of the person at the other end who could well be somebody else’s wife, Big Brother is listening to. What Big Brother will make of the average conversation that takes place between two Pakistanis, it is hard to say, since a good bit of it is devoted to saying catty things about someone they both know, which admittedly has little intelligence value unless the scandal involves the big boys who run us from the wilderness called Islamabad.

But this is not a subject one can treat with levity: it is serious business. Every phone call made, every fax message sent, every e-mail clicked away is monitored. That means some of the world’s major powers remain extremely well-informed about what is being said around the globe. You, therefore, have to ask yourself why in that case some of the decisions they take are so short-sighted. The answer is that information alone does not constitute wisdom. What country could be better informed than the United States, which has still taken one disastrous decision after another and has not been able to correctly interpret the trillions upon trillions of pieces of information and raw intelligence it picks up through state-of-the-art equipment and facilities, both earth and satellite-based.

Despite its vast and all pervasive intelligence capabilities, the US has repeatedly been taken by surprise. Both the first Indian nuclear test in 1974 and the second one in 1998 came as rude shocks to Washington. The World Trade Centre attacks were not foreseen and reports that clearly indicated that something most sinister was in the works were either misread or misinterpreted or simply ignored. So there may be something to the old saying that it is not the gun so much that matters but the man behind the gun. Countries like Israel with a fraction of Washington’s resources – though some of the intelligence gathered by the Americans is shared with Tel Aviv – make the most impressive use of their capabilities, despite limitations.

However, the ultimate conspiracy theory turns out to be true. The United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand have been listening to the world for the last 57 years. Everyone spies on everyone. A marvelous new book – Chatter: dispatches from the secret world of global eavesdropping by Patrick Radden Keefe, who is 29 years old and finishing law school at Yale, provides a stunning look into this most mysterious world. If it has a moral, it is this: every time you think you are speaking off the record or in strict privacy, you really are not. Someone, something, somewhere is registering every single syllable, every rise and fall of your voice, every click of your keyboard. And, brother, make no mistake that it is so.

According to Keefe, while the United States has less than 5,000 spies beavering away in different parts of the world today, it has about 30,000 eavesdroppers. Every three hours, National Security Agency (NSA) satellites pick up enough information to fill the Library of Congress. Another investigator, Patrick S Poole, writes that “in the greatest surveillance effort ever established, the NSA has created a global spy system, codename ECHELON, which captures and analyses virtually every phone call, fax, e-mail and telex message sent anywhere in the world.” Poole explains that the ECHELON system is fairly simple in design. It positions intercept stations all over the world to capture all satellite, microwave, cellular and fiber-optic communications traffic, and then process this information through the massive computer capabilities of the NSA, including advanced voice recognition and optical character recognition (OCR) programmes, and look for code words or phrases (known as ‘Dictionary’) that will prompt the computers to flag the message for recording and transcribing for future analysis. Intelligence analysts at each of the respective “listening stations” maintain separate keyword lists so that they can analyse any conversation or document flagged by the system, which is then forwarded to the respective intelligence agency headquarters that requested the intercept.

In September 2001, the European Parliament published a 194-page report on ECHELON, confirming that it exists, something no sponsoring government has ever done. The report admitted that the existence of Echelon could be proved only by gathering together as many clues as possible so that it remained the only possible explanation. The report said that since it was investigating an extremely secretive spying mechanism run by some of the most secretive and powerful organisations in the world, that was the only method it could have used: namely establishing the existence of the network through a process of elimination. The report used three basic routes to gathering the clues together: the first being physical evidence provided by all the listening stations dotted about the globe; the second being unclassified documents and other bits of information from the military, NSA and other bodies that run the system; and third, the testimony of investigative journalists and former employees of security services.

Between the fall of the Berlin Wall and the summer of 2004 when the 9/11 Commission released its report, there were 16 federal studies in the United States, many of which called for major structural reforms in the intelligence apparatus. And that brings me to Pakistan. If I am not mistaken, the only time a serious attempt was made to do a stocktaking of the intelligence establishment was in 1969 soon after Gen Yahya Khan took over from Ayub Khan, in the process denying the people of Pakistan yet another chance at having the country return to civilian control and representative rule. The committee was headed by a senior military officer – Brig Muhammad Omar if I am not mistaken – and included the brilliant Brig Muhammad Usman, an officer and a gentleman worth his weight in gold who sadly is no longer among us. My friend Zafar Iqbal Rathore, then in the Intelligence Bureau and by any count one of the best-read men in Pakistan, then as now, was also involved with the written side of the report. While I never saw the report, I understand it contained some most sensible recommendations. However, the Yahya regime was overtaken by events and nothing came of the good work done by these men.

If there has been another such effort since, I am not aware of it. Or maybe it has been a secret one, which would be something of a joke. Meanwhile, every time I read another asinine statement by retired Gen Hamid Gul “Himmler,” or the Gen Javed “Mad Mullah” Nasir, I begin to understand a little more clearly why what has happened to our country has happened to it. Over the years, of course, the intelligence establishment, spearheaded by the “Aabpara Boys” has become a law unto itself and is a state within a state. That being a given, all we can do is to tighten our seat belts and wait for the belly landing of the airship that is carrying us.

This rape-to-riches story is become like Banquo’s ghost: it just won’t go away. There are certain situations in the news and public relations business when clarifications or damage control exercises end up achieving the opposite result from the one intended. The unfortunate words that left General Pervez Musharraf’s lips about rape having become for women a means of gaining a visa for the West, continue to haunt him and since he also happens to be the president of our benighted country, the country itself.

At the same time, I must point out that the Washington Post editorial last week castigating the General was written in language that one has seldom seen being used against anyone by that newspaper, least of all a head of state. Even the notorious Slobodan Milasovich has been referred to in politer language than that chosen for the General.

A lot of people have pointed out that by attacking General Musharraf with those intemperate words, the Post did not cover itself with glory. What irked the newspaper was the Pakistani leader’s assertion in New York that he had been “misquoted”. In other words, the newspaper felt that it had been called a liar. It promptly returned the compliment, lacing it up, for good measure, with several broadsides at the General and Pakistan.

I have a theory on why General Musharraf said that he had been “misquoted”. Since he speaks far too much and far too frequently, he does not — and cannot — measure or judge the significance and impact of his words. Earlier, he had said that the rape-to-riches formulation was not his. In his mind, being held responsible for those words amounted to being “misquoted” since he thought he was only quoting someone else’s words. This “fine distinction” was lost on everyone, as it should have been, including the Washington Post.

It appears that the newspaper is not going to let go, as evidenced by the appearance on October 6 of an open letter to General Musharraf printed on the op-ed page from one Yasmeen Hassan, who is said to be a lawyer, author of the first study of domestic violence in Pakistan and a UN employee.

She was present at the women’s meeting organised by the prime minister’s heavy-handed, freewheeling adviser on women, Ms Nilofar Bakhtiar (whose husband, by the way, presented General Musharraf with a copy of a Quran written in Hazrat Ali’s own hand. Will someone please ask him where he got hold of it since no one had ever heard of such a manuscript before?).

The women’s meeting was ill-conceived, ill-organised and ill-omened. I am told that Ms Bakhtiar was keen to hold it as she feared that Dr Shazia Khalid was going to arrive in New York and thunder around the city denouncing her. What someone should have told the redoubtable lady adviser — an un-elected appointee in an avowedly parliamentary government — was that Shazia and her husband cannot leave England because the moment they do so, their application for political asylum will lapse.

But to return to the open letter to the President, Ms Hassan makes a number of telling points. She writes, “You exhorted us not to air Pakistan’s dirty laundry abroad… You threatened the women’s rights activists among us who are involved in international campaigns about violence against women in Pakistan and called us unpatriotic… you seem to want to cleanse the reputation of Pakistan without addressing the real issue: violence against women and the failure of the legal system to hold the perpetrators of this violence responsible… Pakistan has not only systematically failed to implement and enforce laws to protect women from violence, but the system that is in place re-victimises victims of violence rather than delivering justice. The Hudood Ordinance requires a confession or the testimony of witnesses other than the victim to secure a conviction for rape, and rape victims can find themselves being punished for fornication if rape is not proved. You acknowledged the deficiencies in the system while talking about your stance in Mukhtar Mai’s case… You said legal reform was pointless because the personnel in the police and other agencies responsible for law enforcement were of a certain ‘mind-set’ that would have to be changed before effective reform could take place. President Musharraf, the ‘mind-set’ of the people of Pakistan did not stop you from committing Pakistan’s resources to hunting down Al Qaeda supporters in Pakistan at the request of the United States. Do the demands of the women of your own country not match the demands of a superpower? Isn’t the fight against sexual terrorism that potentially affects approximately half of your own population at least as important as the fight against international terrorism on foreign soil?”

Ms Hassan ends her letter, which one hopes General Musharraf will read, on a ringing note, “If you do not want your dirty laundry aired abroad, please take urgent measures to wash it at home by repealing the Hudood Ordinance, reforming legislation on rape, enacting laws on domestic violence, effectively implementing laws on violence against women, and creating other systems and mechanisms that ensure women access to justice, rehabilitation and protection.”

Khalid Hasan is Daily Times’ US-based correspondent

My dream of hitting it rich one day has come true. No, it is not a mile-long commercial plot in Lahore’s Defence nor going 50:50 with that legendary developer known in Lahore as Zapata Zameen. It so happens that I have won the Spanish Sweepstake Lottery. Apart from that, millions of dollars are soon going to pour into my bank account from Nigeria, Liberia, Ghana and certain other countries whose names I am not at liberty to mention.

I won the Spanish Lottery without lifting my little finger, which is nice for someone who has never won at cards or been lucky at games of chance. My “winning notification,” all very hush hush, came to me through a discreet email. I almost fell out of my chair. The mail had come to me from the International Promotion/Prize Award Dept of the Spanish Sweepstake Lottery, Calle Granvia 32N 1C Madrid. My winning ticket carried Reference No. IHDSGP/67-ILGI0409/49, Batch PSSG/15/056/WRCS dated 29 September 2005.

“Dear Winner,” said the communication, titled Winning Notification (what else!). “We happily announce to you the draw of the Spanish Sweepstake Lottery International programs held in Madrid, Spain. Your e-mail address attached to ticket number: 632005600545-182 with Serial number 2388/02 drew the lucky numbers: 41-6-76-13-45-8, which subsequently won you the lottery in the 3rd category. You have therefore been approved to claim a total sum of 500,000,00 Euros (Five Hundred Thousand Euros) in cash credited to file IDC/906044308/03.”

The winning notification went on to inform me that once I established contact, the process to facilitate the release of my funds would start cranking. I was chosen randomly from the World Wide Web site through a computer draw system involving over 100,000 companies. Then came the serious part: “For security reasons, you are advised to keep your winning information confidential till your claim is processed and your money remitted to you in whatever manner you deem fit to claim your prize.” I was asked to call Mr James Wright at a certain phone number and to indicate to which account the money should be sent.

As I was getting ready to claim my millions, another message flashed across my computer screen. Talk of lucky days. This one was from a Muslim lady by the name of Mrs Zahara Arzu Mustafa of Iraq. Her husband Dr Ahmad Arzu Mustafa, who worked with Shell Petroleum Company for 12 years, I was told, had died after a brief illness (probably because he sneezed more than once). The 8-year marriage, alas, produced no child and after Arzu’s death, Zahara decided not to get hitched again. But now she was in need of immediate help. According to her, Arzu had deposited $32.5 million with an “International Diplomatic service firm” in Malaysia, so that the money could be invested in an Islamic foundation. Misfortune never comes alone because the war in Iraq destroyed “all the property and the asset of my husband” and she herself is “undergoing a serious sickness that resulted to be stroke and cancer problem.” She attempted to “treat myself with every medical expert but there is no improvement.” She has been told that she is not going to last beyond three months because of her “cancer problems.” That is why she has decided donate her money to a “mosque, Islamic school authority or better Muslim individual that will utilise this money the way I instruct.” She wants “this fund to be disbursing to orphanages, widows promoting the work of Almighty Allah, neediest and to promote work of almighty Allah in your country.”

The pious lady who doesn’t have long to live because of “cancer problems” writes: “The Koran made us to understand that blessed is the hand that gives. I took this decision because I don’t have any child that will inherit this money and my husband relatives are unbelievers. I don’t want my husband hard earned money to be misused by unbelievers because I know he will be rejoicing in the blossom ( blossom? ) of Allah if this fund spends to promote the work of almighty Allah. I don’t want a situation where this money will be used in an ungodly manner. Hence the reason for taking this bold decision. I am not afraid of death hence I know where I am going. I know that I am going to be in the heaven.” I was instructed not to phone but to write and she would instruct the Malaysian company and her husband’s lawyer to furnish me with more details on how to receive the cash.

She ends her e-mail on a heartbreaking note: “I want you and the Muslim to always pray for me because in almighty Allah I put my hope. My happiness is that I lived a life of a worthy Muslim. Whosoever that wants to serve Allah must serve him in spirit and truth. Please always be prayerful all through your life. And reply me through my alternative e-mail address as delay in your reply will give me room in sourcing for another faith member for this same purpose. Please assure me that you will act accordingly as I stated here in. As I am disabled and can not be able to move around and do much due to am presently very ill, I will really appreciate it for you to contact me through my e-mail address as the internet is my only mean of communicating. Or through the help of nurse here who is so kind to assist me in the hospital and taking care of me.”

One thing is quite clear. If she survives her “cancer problems,” she would need some lessons in English.

As I was about to write to Sister Zahara, I received another message from Kwuessi Sam, personal assistant to former President Charles Taylor of Liberia, now living in exile in Nigeria but under restrictions. The problem was that he has deposited $18 million with a security company in Ghana but the only way the money could get out of Ghana was to have it sent to me for safe deposit till Sam could slip out of Nigeria and pick up the cash, leaving me with an agreed percentage. I was assured that “there is absolutely no risk to you because nobody knows of the existence of this fund.” I was further told that I should phone Sam or e-mail him so that the matter could proceed further, since “time is very essential in this deal; I am waiting to hear from you.”

Just can’t believe my luck. The old saying that when God gives, money comes crashing through your roof is true. Wow!

Gen Musharraf should have apologised and admitted that his remarks were callous and in bad taste. He would have looked much taller than he does now. … With the lady who questioned him sharply, he should have been calm, keeping his voice down. But what did he do? He kept declaring, “If you shout, I can shout louder”

Gen Musharraf is gone but the story that he left behind refuses to go away. Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times fired off another column castigating Pakistan for its treatment of women and taking Gen Musharrf to task for his comments on rape as the road to women’s enrichment. The unfortunate incident at the women’s meeting organised by Ms Nilofar Bakhtiar, at which half the invitees were unable to get in, saw a slanging match between Gen Musharraf and one Ms Qureshi who had asked him aggressively to apologise. That incident has become the stick with which the Pakistani military leader is going to be struck for a long time to come.

While most people believe that what Gen Musharraf narrated did not reflect his own views, no one can stop marvelling at the lack of discretion he showed. Gen Musharraf’s defence was that he had heard someone else make the rape-for-profit remark, and all he had done was repeat those words. This did not wash and it should not have washed. It is like telling someone, “I don’t say it but I have heard it said there that there is a question mark over the legitimacy of your birth.” Obviously, the man to whom this is said will pick up the first thing he can get his hands at and throw it at the person who said he was merely reporting what he had heard and those were not his own views. Repetition of libel is libel, and everyone knows that.

Gen Musharraf, it is true, has done a great deal for women, but all the good that he has done, it is sad to say, is all but gone with that single indiscreet and unfeeling remark. We should, however, be honest enough to recognise that we Pakistanis often talk like that. Gen Musharraf may have heard the rape-for-riches remark in Islamabad. I have heard it and heard it more than once in Washington and New York, and every time from my own dear countrymen. We tongue lash those who cannot defend themselves and we are given to saying the most nasty things about innocent people, always behind their back, never in their face. Let us have the decency to admit that we are two-faced. I have seen people saying the most flattering things about a person who is demonised the moment he leaves the room. This is the national character. We are backbiters because we do not have the courage to say out front what really is in our hearts. Ours is a culture of flattery and flattery seems to have worked for those who practise it.

Once many years ago on a Sunday morning as some of us sat in the now-closed Shezan Continental in Lahore sipping tea and gossiping, there was a particular person who kept announcing every five minutes that he was leaving, but leave he wouldn’t. Finally, in exasperation, someone asked him why he simply did not get up and leave. “I don’t want to leave because I know that the moment my back is turned, you are going to talk against me.” He was reassured that no such thing could ever happen, but the moment he left, he was taken apart by those left behind.

Gen Musharraf, instead of saying that he was merely reporting what he had heard, should have apologised and admitted that his remarks were callous and in bad taste. He would have looked much taller than he does now. He should do it even now. With the lady who questioned him in New York sharply, he should have been calm, keeping his voice down. But what did he do? He kept declaring at meeting after meeting, “If you shout, I can shout louder.” Heads of state and government, even if they have come riding a tank and not through popular acclaim, should not shout, no matter what the provocation. They represent in their persons the dignity of their state and under no circumstances, should they compromise that dignity. When they do that, as the General did in New York, they undermine the dignity of the state and the people in whose name they speak.

Gen Musharraf must also learn another lesson. He is far too prolix. He must ration his words. There is no need for him to speak three times a day and to go on and on, as he loves to do. The fewer words he speaks, the more attention will be paid to what he says. He must come to learn that less is more. The old Chinese proverb about speech being silver and silence being gold is actually true, he needs to learn. He also does not seem to realise that every word that leaves his lips will be noted carefully and analysed. We live in a world where everything is happening in real time. What he says in the remotest village in the interior of Balochistan is around the world within moments. There is no such thing any more as a local audience. The audience is worldwide. The General must control his natural impetuousness. Perhaps as the late Hameed Naseem used to say, he should count up to ten if something that has been said to him in public angers or irritates him, before he opens his mouth.

Khalid Hasan is Daily Times’ US-based correspondent

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