Link to "Rashed Rahman: Fragments of a life of struggle – Ep-10" the tenth of a series of 13 episodes on YouTube of my interviews by my son Dr Taimur Rahman on my life and political struggles: https://www.youtu.be/LnJB4YHmAvk
Rashed Rahman
Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)
Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook)
Link to "Rashed Rahman: Fragments of a life of struggle – Ep-09" the ninth of a series of 13 episodes on YouTube of my interviews by my son Dr Taimur Rahman on my life and political struggles: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fv25-qOUWpE
Rashed Rahman
Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)
Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook)
US-led west’s real agenda in Ukraine crisis
Rashed Rahman
The latest news barrage in the Ukraine crisis suggests both elements of possible war and hopeful signs of peace. Russia has extended its military drills in Belarus, which borders both Ukraine and Russia, beyond the original close on February 20, 2022 in reaction to the flare-up of hostilities in the eastern Ukrainian breakaway region of Donbas and the US-led west’s unrelenting propaganda regarding an imminent Russian invasion while dismissing Russia’s denial of any such intention.
While Europe teeters on the brink of an unthinkable conflict, the doors to diplomacy and a mutually acceptable political solution have not been shut. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, while continuing to parrot the ‘imminent invasion’ rhetoric, says the diplomatic option is still on the table. French President and current European Union (EU) Chairman Emmanuelle Macron in a telephone talk with Russian President Vladimir Putin on February 20, 2022 has reflected Europe’s stakes in the crisis by stating the EU still seeks a diplomatic solution. Europe was on the brink of receiving gas from Russia through the Nord Stream Gas Pipeline. The US sees this as making Europe more reliant on Russia’s goodwill, if not gradually falling under Moscow’s sway. Washington is apprehensive of losing ground in Europe to Moscow.
The interesting fact is that ever since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, giving birth to 15 independent states, the US and NATO have incrementally encroached on East European countries formerly in the Soviet bloc (e.g. Poland, etc.), and even countries that were once part of the Soviet Union (e.g. Georgia, Ukraine, etc.). In what has pejoratively been dubbed ‘NATO-creep’, this has effectively destroyed the ‘buffer zone’ between Russia and the west in Eastern Europe, partly at least by weaponising regime change through the so-called ‘colour revolutions’ in Eastern Europe (other examples of such weaponisation being the ‘Arab Spring’ and the unsuccessful campaign against a left-wing government in Venezuela). In Ukraine this phenomenon arrived in 2014, when a pro-Moscow government was overthrown by street protests backed by the west and replaced by the present Ukrainian incumbents. This outcome triggered the recovery of Russian-populated Crimea by Russia, a reversal of the ‘gift’ to Ukraine in 1954 by Khrushchev when the Soviet Union was still extant. Crimea represents the critical Russian access to the Black Sea, the only warm water sea available to Russia. The events in Ukraine in 2014 also triggered a breakaway movement in the Donbas, an eastern area of Ukraine bordering Russia, which clearly stated its aspiration to join Russia instead. The Donbas region is historically the heart of Russian civilisation, culture and development as a people.
Despite the hysteria being whipped up for weeks now by the west and its media regarding an imminent Russian invasion, the lack of critical and objective reportage is a sad reflection of the much-vaunted ‘independent’ western media seen toeing the line of its governments. Putin has gambled military exercises on Russian soil and in Belarus, both adjoining the Ukrainian border, will finally act as a wake up call to the US-led west regarding its blatant violation of the (informal) assurances to post-Soviet Russia that the west and NATO would not expand into Eastern Europe, threatening thereby Russia’s security. Although the new Cold War ignited by Washington sees China as the greater threat to its global hegemony (the so-called ‘unipolar world) in the long run (both economically and eventually militarily), in the present context it is Russia that possesses the military might to match the US, despite not being as economically powerful as rising China. This new Cold War for the preservation of the US’s weakening global hegemony (because of economic factors as well as the relatively muted contradictions between Washington and its European allies) threatens European and world peace in a modern version of the Thucydides trap (i.e. the inherent conflict between an older, declining power and a new, rising one, with the peculiarity in place of Russia being an old, vanquished power that is reviving). Washington’s new Cold War policies have been instrumental in bringing Russia and China closer.
If we cleave through the western propaganda barrage below the surface and through to the heart of the matter, Moscow is playing its brinkmanship cards to shake awake a US-led west that has ignored, and continues blithely to ignore, Russia’s very real concerns about an expanding NATO presence on or near its borders. In passing, it may not be out of place to question the retention of NATO as a military alliance long after the purpose for its creation, the ideological, political and military contention with the Soviet Union, has passed into history more than 30 years ago. The US-led west’s regional anti-communist military alliances, CENTO and SEATO (both of which Pakistan was once a part), have long ago disintegrated after being overtaken by events. NATO’s retention despite the Soviet Union and Eastern European communism’s collapse can only be read as the desire to retain the military arm of a global hegemony drive.
If diplomacy is to have a chance to avoid a war, the US-led west and NATO will have to adhere, and in turn persuade Ukraine to adhere to the Minsk Agreement that stops short of the Donbas’ separation, offering instead regional autonomy. Washington and the EU will also have to address Moscow’s concerns regarding the European security structure that has emerged due to NATO-creep and not mutual agreement in favour of a consensual security architecture that does not disadvantage the still militarily formidable Russia.
rashed-rahman.blogspot.com
Link to "Rashed Rahman: Fragments of a life of struggle – Ep-08" the eighth of a series of 13 episodes on YouTube of my interviews by my son Dr Taimur Rahman on my life and political struggles: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fv25-qOUWpE
Rashed Rahman
Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)
Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook)
Link to "Rashed Rahman: Fragments of a life of struggle – Ep-07" the seventh of a series of 13 episodes on YouTube of my interviews by my son Dr Taimur Rahman on my life and political struggles: https://youtu.be/ekTjTfCvK38
Rashed Rahman
Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)
Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook)
Lynching season
Rashed Rahman
A mentally challenged middle-aged man in Tulamba, a Khanewal village, is the latest victim of mob vigilantism on allegations of blasphemy. His brother revealed that the victim, Mushtaq Rajput, had mental health problems for the past 17-18 years. He had been living with another brother in Karachi until January 2022 and had returned to the village recently. He also remained hospitalised for years but could not recover. His wife divorced him on these grounds despite the couple sharing three children. On February 12, 2022, he went to buy cigarettes but did not return until evening, the brother said. The family later learnt of his death on allegations of blasphemy, despite the area residents being aware of his mental health issues.
The facts of the incident as reported appear to be that Mohammad Ramzan, the complainant in the blasphemy case police claim was registered on February 13, 2022, a day after the lynching, said two men, Azhar Abbas and Mukhtiar Hussain, rushed to Shah Muqeem mosque on seeing smoke being emitted and discovered an unidentified person setting fire to the Holy Quran. A crowd gathered and demanded action against the alleged blasphemer. The police team that rushed to the spot and took the accused into custody could not protect him from the hundreds of people gathered there. They snatched him from the police, clubbed and stoned him before tying him to a tree and stoning him to death despite his cries of innocence. The paltry police contingent remained passive onlookers throughout this danse macabre. As usual, heavy police reinforcements requested arrived too late to prevent the tragedy. The victim’s brother revealed his body was missing some fingers, suggesting the grisly thought that they were cut off after he died (Cf. allegations of genital mutilation in the Sialkot lynching).
Prime Minister Imran Khan fulminated ‘zero tolerance’ for such mob vigilantism and directed the authorities (presumably the Punjab government of his ‘Wasim Akram’) to take action against the policemen who ‘failed in their duty’. The result is that the police claims to have conducted 120 raids, netting 85 suspects, including 15 ‘main’ suspects. It also claims to have registered an FIR for alleged blasphemy (against the dead victim?) under Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) Section 295-B and another related to the lynching under various PPC Sections and the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997.
A day after this Khanewal atrocity, on February 13, 2022, a similar incident occurred in Faisalabad’s Tandlianwala area. A violent mob attacked and injured a Shia man for allegedly burning pages of the Holy Quran. In this instance however, police mercifully rescued him from the mob and shifted him to some unknown location for safety. The few details available suggest a vigilante mob carrying clubs, bricks and other hard objects surrounded the accused’s house and attacked him. Fortunately, not only was he rescued and spirited away, the police also transported his family to another area to keep them out of harm’s way.
Lest anyone be deluded into thinking these are stray incidents, a reminder may be in order. On November 21, 2022, a police station was vandalised and set on fire in an unsuccessful attempt to wrest a blasphemy accused from police custody by a violent mob in Charsadda area, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. On December 3, 2021, a Sri Lankan factory manager was beaten and burnt to death allegedly for blasphemy in Sialkot, Punjab. Now the Mian Channu, Khanewal, and Faisalabad incidents coming close on the heels of the Sialkot brutality indicate all is not well in our society. This chain of incidents suggests the chickens of Ziaul Haq’s tweaking the blasphemy laws are coming home to roost, fuelled by the climate of religious fanaticism that has society in its unrelenting grip ever since.
The usual condemnatory fulminations from ministers and others have been trotted out, but some modicum of deeper wisdom can be found in the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan’s (HRCP’s) statement that the ruthlessness with which the mob in Khanewal lynched its hapless victim, including wresting him away from police custody, illustrates all too well that the (business of) allegations of blasphemy have long gone beyond (simply) a law and order problem. HRCP says it is no longer enough to simply reiterate the government’s (non-visible) ‘zero tolerance’ claim when its own minister brushed aside a similar incident as a case of ‘high emotions’ (implying some justification for barbarity?). HRCP goes on to point out that the state has consistently (at least since 1977) pandered to political and religious groups that have never had any qualms about encouraging religious fanaticism. It notes with grave concern the seeming uptick in mob vigilantism and warns that if the government (state?) does not push back against fanaticism on all fronts, ordinary citizens (victims of blasphemy accusations in particular) will continue to pay the (high) price.
Since Ziaul Haq’s many ‘blessings’ left behind long after he met his Maker, the religious fanatics have increasingly held sway over the public space. Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer fell victim to just such a fanatic (who was his bodyguard!) for standing up for a Christian woman, Asia Bibi, falsely accused of blasphemy. Many other such crimes can be mentioned in this regard. The record of atrocities is long and growing. Perhaps it is time to return to the blasphemy laws to enquire whether they are in consonance with the Quran, Sunnah, and example of the Prophet (PBUH). Perish the thought of course that our law enforcement and justice system is up to the task of punishing vigilantes and ensuring true justice prevails. State and society will have to come together to objectively critique the fallout in practice of making the blasphemy laws more stringent, including the death penalty, leading arguably to vigilante mobs, often riled up by local clerics, to take the law into their own hands, an indictment in action of our justice system, in which so little hope still resides.
rashed-rahman.blogspot.com
The February 2022 issue of Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) is out. Link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com
Contents:
1. Rashed Rahman: The National Question in Marxism – VII.
2. Zahra Shah: Book Review of Manan A Asif's The Loss of Hindustan: The Invention of India.
3. Dr Charles Amjad-Ali: The Historical and Contemporary State of Minorities in Pakistan.
Rashed Rahman
Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)
Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook)
Link to "Rashed Rahman: Fragments of a life of struggle – Ep-06" the sixth of a series of 13 episodes on YouTube of my interviews by my son Dr Taimur Rahman on my life and political struggles: https://youtube.com/watch?v=38deEojzZdw
Rashed Rahman
Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)
Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook)
My column as written.
Security insecure
Rashed Rahman
Even a casual glance at the instances of attacks on the security forces in the country would indicate that a significant uptick in such incidents has occurred of late. Take for example the five soldiers killed and four wounded in a terrorist attack from across the Afghan border on the Angoor Tangi check post in Kurram tribal district on the night of February 6-7, 2022. From 8:00 pm onwards, there was a three-hour battle. That indicates the attackers came in strength, although even this did not allow them to succeed in repeated attempts to damage or uproot the border fence. The Pakistani authorities have once again called on the Afghan Taliban government in Kabul to ensure Afghan soil is not used for such attacks. But the Afghan Taliban government bald facedly continues to deny the firing came from their side.
What this indicates is that the Afghan Taliban’s assurances regarding the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) that has enjoyed safe havens on Afghan soil with the help of their Afghan Taliban brothers mean nothing. When Pakistan earlier pressed the Afghan Taliban government to take action against the TTP, they facilitated instead a ceasefire and negotiations. These came to naught since the core demand of the TTP for a sharia-based system (according to their interpretation) meant undoing the Constitution and the democratic (however flawed) political system that emanates from it. Since this extreme demand was completely unacceptable, the talks broke down and TTP attacks resurfaced.
One cannot ignore the fact that there has been a sharp increase in attacks by the TTP, both cross-border and in-country, since the Afghan Taliban takeover last year. The Afghan Taliban, despite having enjoyed Pakistani ‘hospitality’ and support during the 10-year war against the occupying US forces, have refused to unequivocally recognize the Durand Line as the international border. Instances of attempts by the Afghan Taliban to demolish the border fence were downplayed by the Pakistani authorities until recently as localised incidents. Now, after the latest TTP attacks, the Pakistani authorities are reportedly becoming impatient with their erstwhile Afghan Taliban proxies regarding their inability to halt such attacks and their denials of their origin from Afghan soil.
Down south, the Balochistan nationalist insurgency front has also heated up. On January 28, 2022, the insurgents attacked a Frontier Corps (FC) post in Kech and killed 10 troops. On February 2, 2022, two simultaneous attacks on FC camps were carried out in Panjgur and Nushki. Reports in our media of the casualties seem to rely wholly on ISPR handouts, rather than any independent reporting (which in any case is ‘forbidden’ in Balochistan). These handouts speak of some 20 insurgents killed, with not more than 13 soldiers dead and half a dozen wounded. However, these statistics fly in the face of the fact that the Majeed Brigade of the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) attacked in strength (approximately 50 strong), managed to break into the Nushki camp and hold security personnel and their families hostage. This standoff lasted five days and nights. The BLA has claimed 170 soldiers killed, other sources say 100 dead. Even allowing for the usual exaggeration, any discounted number would still be alarming, indicating perhaps a new stage of the nationalist insurgency.
Since 9/11, all over the world and in Pakistan, all non-state movements of insurgency have been lumped into the terrorist basket (including, ironically, the Kashmir struggle). While this may be a convenient one-size-fits-all description, it runs the risk of losing the thread of nuance and difference in disparate situations, which then inevitably gravitates towards the same approach: repression. The distinction between religious fanatical terrorist movements and politically motivated nationalist and similar insurgencies is lost in the process. And with it a differentiated, more nuanced approach.
Interestingly, despite the recent TTP attacks after the ceasefire and talks broke down, Federal Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid insists that the door to negotiations with the TTP cannot be closed. With due respect, would it be out of place then to ask the worthy minister whether the door to negotiations with the Baloch nationalist insurgency cannot be opened? Between the extremes of separation and the state’s heavy-handed repression (including the epidemic of enforced disappearances) lies considerable middle ground on which talks could conceivably be based. The fifth Baloch nationalist insurgency since Independence has veered more and more towards separation because successive governments since its outbreak in 2002 have opted for the knout rather than the negotiating table. Unlike the TTP and others of their ilk, the Baloch nationalist insurgents are not religious fanatics who cannot be reasoned with.
The policy of repression alone has stoked the fires of the nationalist insurgency that began in embryonic form in 2002 after a new generation finally tired of the demonstrated futility of pursuing their long standing grievances and demand for rights within the system during the 25 years between the end of the fourth nationalist insurgency in 1977 and the start of the fifth in 2002. Along the way, the brutal killing of Nawab Akbar Bugti in 2006 further widened the insurgency to include, for the first time, a section of the Bugti tribe. The growth of the middle class in Balochistan yielded nationalists such as Allah Nazar, a doctor tortured in custody, who became a guerrilla leader after release. Today, the appeal of the guerrillas is spreading through the length and breadth of Balochistan.
The almost clichéd, knee-jerk response of the security establishment to pin the (entire?) blame on the ubiquitous ‘foreign hand’, does little else except further muddy the waters and thinking. Even if such involvement exists, dousing the fire in one’s own home seems the wisest course to deny any such ‘mischief makers’ the troubled waters to fish in.
But such a turn, dealing with terrorism as irreconcilable and therefore not open to a negotiated political solution, and with the Baloch nationalist insurgency as a long standing political problem requiring negotiations, possible give-and-take and a political solution, would require a rethink in the security establishment of which there are so far few if any signs.
rashed-rahman.blogspot.com
And as published by the paper.
Security insecure
Rashed Rahman
Even a casual glance at the instances of attacks on the security forces in the country would indicate that a significant uptick in such incidents has occurred of late. Take for example the five soldiers killed and four wounded in a terrorist attack from across the Afghan border on the Angoor Tangi check post in Kurram tribal district on the night of February 6-7, 2022. From 8:00 pm onwards, there was a three-hour battle. That indicates the attackers came in strength, although even this did not allow them to succeed in repeated attempts to damage or uproot the border fence. The Pakistani authorities have once again called on the Afghan Taliban government in Kabul to ensure Afghan soil is not used for such attacks. But the Afghan Taliban government bald facedly continues to deny the firing came from their side.
What this indicates is that the Afghan Taliban’s assurances regarding the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) that has enjoyed safe havens on Afghan soil with the help of their Afghan Taliban brothers mean nothing. When Pakistan earlier pressed the Afghan Taliban government to take action against the TTP, they facilitated instead a ceasefire and negotiations. These came to naught since the core demand of the TTP for a sharia-based system (according to their interpretation) meant undoing the Constitution and the democratic (however flawed) political system that emanates from it. Since this extreme demand was completely unacceptable, the talks broke down and TTP attacks resurfaced.
One cannot ignore the fact that there has been a sharp increase in attacks by the TTP, both cross-border and in-country, since the Afghan Taliban takeover last year. The Afghan Taliban, despite having enjoyed Pakistani ‘hospitality’ and support during the 10-year war against the occupying US forces, have refused to unequivocally recognize the Durand Line as the international border. Instances of attempts by the Afghan Taliban to demolish the border fence were downplayed by the Pakistani authorities until recently as localised incidents. Now, after the latest TTP attacks, the Pakistani authorities are reportedly becoming impatient with their erstwhile Afghan Taliban proxies regarding their inability to halt such attacks and their denials of their origin from Afghan soil.
Down south, the Balochistan nationalist insurgency front has also heated up. Since 9/11, all over the world and in Pakistan, all non-state movements of insurgency have been lumped into the terrorist basket (including, ironically, the Kashmir struggle). While this may be a convenient one-size-fits-all description, it runs the risk of losing the thread of nuance and difference in disparate situations, which then inevitably gravitates towards the same approach: repression. The distinction between religious fanatical terrorist movements and politically motivated nationalist and similar insurgencies is lost in the process. And with it a differentiated, more nuanced approach.
Interestingly, despite the recent TTP attacks after the ceasefire and talks broke down, Federal Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid insists that the door to negotiations with the TTP cannot be closed. With due respect, would it be out of place then to ask the worthy minister whether the door to negotiations with the Baloch nationalist insurgency cannot be opened? Between the extremes of separation and the state’s heavy-handed repression (including the epidemic of enforced disappearances) lies considerable middle ground on which talks could conceivably be based. The fifth Baloch nationalist insurgency since Independence has veered more and more towards separation because successive governments since its outbreak in 2002 have opted for the knout rather than the negotiating table. Unlike the TTP and others of their ilk, the Baloch nationalist insurgents are not religious fanatics who cannot be reasoned with.
The policy of repression alone has stoked the fires of the nationalist insurgency that began in embryonic form in 2002 after a new generation finally tired of the demonstrated futility of pursuing their long standing grievances and demand for rights within the system during the 25 years between the end of the fourth nationalist insurgency in 1977 and the start of the fifth in 2002. Along the way, the brutal killing of Nawab Akbar Bugti in 2006 further widened the insurgency to include, for the first time, a section of the Bugti tribe. The growth of the middle class in Balochistan yielded nationalists such as Allah Nazar, a doctor tortured in custody, who became a guerrilla leader after release. Today, the appeal of the guerrillas is spreading through the length and breadth of Balochistan.
The almost clichéd, knee-jerk response of the security establishment to pin the (entire?) blame on the ubiquitous ‘foreign hand’, does little else except further muddy the waters and thinking. Even if such involvement exists, dousing the fire in one’s own home seems the wisest course to deny any such ‘mischief makers’ the troubled waters to fish in.
But such a turn, dealing with terrorism as irreconcilable and therefore not open to a negotiated political solution, and with the Baloch nationalist insurgency as a long standing political problem requiring negotiations, possible give-and-take and a political solution, would require a rethink in the security establishment of which there are so far few if any signs.
rashed-rahman.blogspot.com
Link to "Rashed Rahman: Fragments of a life of struggle – Ep-05" the fifth of a series of 13 episodes on YouTube of my interviews by my son Dr Taimur Rahman on my life and political struggles: https://youtu.be/EOSdC5AymZw
Rashed Rahman
Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)
Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook)
The February 2022 issue of Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) is out. Link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com
Contents:
1. Rashed Rahman: The National Question in Marxism – VII.
2. Zahra Shah: Book Review of Manan A Asif's The Loss of Hindustan: The Invention of India.
3. Dr Charles Amjad-Ali: The Historical and Contemporary State of Minorities in Pakistan.
Rashed Rahman
Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)
Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook)
Link to "Rashed Rahman: Fragments of a life of struggle – Ep-04" the fourth of a series of 13 episodes on YouTube of my interviews by my son Dr Taimur Rahman on my life and political struggles: https://youtu.be/DFIOaaFmQI8
Rashed Rahman
Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)
Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook)
Link to "Rashed Rahman: Fragments of a life of struggle – Ep-03" the third of a series of 13 episodes on YouTube of my interviews by my son Dr Taimur Rahman on my life and political struggles: https://youtu.be/U3aH0Jz7pJM
Rashed Rahman
Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)
Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook)
‘Punishing’ Russia
Rashed Rahman
The US-led west and Russia have been at loggerheads over Ukraine since 2014. Of late, the former has used escalating rhetoric and military deployments and weapons supplies to Eastern European countries (some former parts of the Soviet Union) in response to what it says are Russian plans to invade Ukraine. The west’s argument is based on the military exercises Russia has been conducting on its own soil across the Ukrainian border. The US Congress is discussing a sanctions bill to ‘crush’ Russia’s economy. The UK, always a loyal follower of the US, is preparing its own sanctions package, described by British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss as a move that would leave Russia with ‘nowhere to hide’. Although talks and a diplomatic solution to the crisis are still hoped for, the situation is arguably the tensest since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, when Ukraine and other ex-Soviet countries declared their independence.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov says Russia wants good, equal, mutually respectful relations with the US but does not want to remain in a position where Russia’s security is infringed daily. Citing the NATO encroachment near its border, often referred to as ‘NATO-creep’, Russia has demanded that NATO not admit new members, especially Ukraine, the US refrain from establishing new military bases in ex-Soviet countries, and NATO forces deployed to Eastern European and ex-Soviet countries that joined the western alliance after the Cold War ended be pulled back. Lavrov pointed out that NATO’s line of ‘defence’ continues moving eastward, has come very close to Ukraine, which he asserted, was not ready to join NATO.
The crisis has produced a flurry of diplomatic activity amongst the western allies and with Russia. Not all the European allies are as gung-ho about pillorying Russia as the US and UK because they are on the verge of completing the gas pipeline from Russia that will allay their energy shortages. Germany is quoted as the main sceptic in this regard. Ukraine is resorting to mixed messaging, with its President Volodymyr Zelensky calling on the west to avoid stirring ‘panic’ in the face of the alleged Russian troops buildup while his Foreign Minister, Dmytro Kuleba, says it is important to remain ‘firm’ in talks with Moscow.
How have things reached such a pass? After all, the world expected after the Soviet Union’s collapse and the end of the Cold War that the west and Russia no longer would be at loggerheads. Russia had taken the turn from socialism (howsoever flawed) to capitalism. After the disastrous years under Boris Yeltsin, Vladimir Putin has succeeded in putting Russia back on its feet. In fact, astute observers argued that since the US, as the leader of the western alliance, exhibited more and more of the characteristics of a Colossus with feet of clay, a reference to the dominant military might but faltering political and economic perception of the US, the world was witnessing a tectonic shift of power from the west to a newly restored alliance between recovered Russia and a China rising after embracing capitalism. To the naïve and uninformed, it seemed that since all three of these major global centres of power were wedded to capitalism, their mutual relations would be friendly and smooth from now on.
However, history teaches that conflicts between established powers and new, rising (or restored) powers are the pattern in mankind’s past. Add to this version of the Thucydides trap the inherent competition between major capitalist powers that led to two world wars in the 20thcentury and you have the strange spectacle of China’s rise through an embrace of capitalism and Putin’s restoration of Russia’s pre-eminent position evoking, as time went by, the kind of hostility that we thought had been buried with the end of the Cold War. Since military conflict between the contending parties is now overshadowed by the presence on both sides of nuclear weapons, the ‘rivalry’ or competition is fought out through proxies or indirectly.
In this general context, Ukraine’s crisis is a case of Russia’s angst at the US-led west reneging on its promises and commitments to refrain from NATO’s eastward expansion after the Soviet collapse. Instead, ‘NATO-creep’ has been at work ever since, which essentially rests on including Eastern European and ex-Soviet countries in the military alliance that seems an anomaly after the end of the Cold War, while western intelligence services indulge in subversive activities in those countries (dubbed the ‘colour’ revolutions) to wean them away from Russian influence and attach them to western aims. These aims are essentially to prevent the centres of global power in Russia and China from competing with the dominant US-led west. This western hegemony is sought in political, economic and strategic terms.
The Ukraine crisis dates from 2013-14, when a ‘popular’ protest movement against pro-Moscow leader Viktor Yanukovych’s decision to resist an agreement that would bring Ukraine into the European Union’s orbit resulted in his ouster and the installation of the present pro-western regime. Two immediate consequences followed. One, Russia, that had ceded Crimea to Ukraine in 1954 (Khrushchev), invaded and occupied it, later holding a referendum confirming the largely Russian population of Crimea endorsed the move. Of course the west rejected the referendum for having been held under the shadow of the occupying Russians’ guns. Crimea’s strategic importance to Russia lies in its providing access to warm water seas. Two, the Russian populated eastern Ukrainian areas of Donetsk and Luhansk (known as the Donbas), allegedly with backing from Russia, declared their ‘independence’. Conflict has been simmering ever since between the current pro-western Ukrainian government and the Donbas self-proclaimed republics. It has so far taken a toll of 14,000 people killed, with regular breaches of the ceasefire under Russian-Ukrainian agreements signed in Minsk in 2014 and 2015.
‘NATO-creep’ is the inherent logic of aggressive capitalism and imperialism, even against competing rival capitalist powers like Russia (and China). The result is the world being treated to the spectacle of what has been dubbed a new Cold War. The world needs peace and development, tackling the planet’s ecological crisis, providing a better future for humanity as a whole. If capitalist imperialism is allowed to hold sway once again, humanity stands threatened.
rashed-rahman.blogspot.com
