NNPC/Shell SNEPCo Undergraduate Scholarship for Nigerian Students 2016/2017

Brief description: The Shell Nigeria Exploration Production Company (SNEPCo) in collaboration with NNPC announces its National Merit University Scholarship for Undergraduate Nigerian Students for the 2016/2017 academic session.

Examination/Assessment Date: 20th August, 2016

Application Deadline: 10th August, 2016

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: Nigeria

To be taken at (country): Nigeria

Eligible Fields of Study: Petroleum Engineering, Materials/Corrosion Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Mining Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Instrumentation Engineering, Civil Engineering, Medicine, Pharmacy Physics/Applied Physics, Agricultural Science, Geophysics, Geosciences/Geology, Mathematics/Applied Mathematics and Medical Laboratory Technology.

About the Award: The NNPC/SNEPCo scholarship is provided to promote academic excellence and improve the skills of young Nigerians. It provides yearly grant to the successful applicants from their second year to the completion of their degree programme. The scholarship is managed by SNEPCo on behalf of itself, its co-venture partners and the NNPC

Type: Undergraduate degree

Eligibility: 

• Candidates must be citizens of Nigeria.
• Candidates must not be a beneficiary of any other scholarship (National or International).
• Candidates must currently be in their second year of full-time study in a Nigerian University accredited by the National Universities Commission (NUC)\
• Candidates must have a minimum CGPA of 3.0 in a 5-grade system

Number of Awardees: Several

Value of Scholarship: Full scholarship

Duration of Scholarship: Duration of undergraduate course

How to Apply:  The mode of application is online. Candidates are advised to visit this LINK TO APPLY

• Candidates should have a valid email account for easy communication.
• Applications are accompanied with the following:
  • A recent passport-sized photograph of the applicant in JPEG format, and not more than 200kilobytes;
  • University or JAMB (UTME or D/E) Admission Letter; Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examinations (UTME) Scores;
  • ‘O’ Level Result(s); and ‘A’ Level /OND /NCE Result(s) are applicable.
  • Letter of Identification from State of origin indicating applicant’s local government of origin.
  • Candidates are to upload their 100 level results.

Application Procedure: Interested candidates are advised to adhere strictly to these instructions before and while applying:

• Each document submitted online must not exceed 200KB and the image format must be in JPEG.
• Beware of fraudulent websites when applying for the NNPC/SNEPCo scholarship online. Such websites may ask you to make some payments in the course of the application. These are completely faux sites which should be avoided. NNPC/SNEPCo scholarship application is FREE.
• SNEPCo will not accept email applications.
• It is important to visit the official website for detailed information and to access the online application portal.
• SNEPCo is committed to providing scholarship opportunities that are not associated with application fees.
• SNEPCo DOES NOT ASSIGN ‘Representatives’/’ Agents’ to assist applicants’ process applications.
• Any candidate found to have presented false documents will be disqualified or withdrawn at any level of the scholarship.
• Only short listed candidates will be invited for a computer based tests in selected centers nationwide.

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Shell Nigeria Exploration Production Company (SNEPCo)

Important Notes: For more information or clarification on the NNPC/SNEPCo National University Scholarship, please send an email to SNEPCO Social Performance SNEPCO-UIO/G/NRS (SNEPCO-Social-Performance@shell.com)

The Propaganda War With Putin

Renee Parsons

If it had not already been apparent, the net effect of the DNC email hack has been to kick open the door to a deep American antagonism towards Russian President Vladimir Putin.

In what has become an old fashioned American pile-on, President Barack Obama, Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, the Democratic Party and what seems the entire political establishment as well as the MSM, have united to undermine Putin as if to prime the American public for war with Russia.

War is, after all, more successful when the people have been thoroughly programmed. For instance, for a war-weary American public ‘we are bombing civilians out of a humanitarian necessity’ may work well. If necessary, a little hysteria wouldn’t hurt but most of all, a necessary requirement is to efficiently tutor the public consciousness to despise the adversary. In this case, Clinton has identified Putin as the adversary and that he is one evil reincarnation of Adolf Hitler.

Among media outlets, Politico, once considered a ‘liberal’ magazine ran “Inside’s Putin’s Information War” whose author has found a lucrative book deal on the subject and yes, this is the same Politico that requested DNC permission to publish re the Sanders/Clinton primary. The Times of London joined the effort to demonize Putin with several anti Russian articles over the weekend including “Putin’s Information War” which ran on July 30^th followed by “Inside Putin’s Info War on America’ in the Wall Street Journal on July 31^st.   Keep your eyes peeled as the “Putin Info War” concept is sure to catch on.

As part of the effort to synchronize public antipathy to an appropriately belligerent level, the Associated Press recently published an article for wide distribution entitled “Clinton v. Putin: Russian television shows what Kremlin thinks of her.” Perhaps the AP presumed to rouse the American public in defense of Hillary Clinton.

The first paragraph began with the admission that Clinton’s entire acceptance speech had been broadcast live on nationwide television in Russia.   If anyone yearns for the day when a Putin speech will be broadcast across American television, forgetaboutit. A good guess is that the intellectually-lazy American public including many liberals who have forgotten how to think, would not make the effort to inform themselves of world events.

Thereafter, the AP article followed with a series of assertions that dazzled the reader with its irony such as:

“Viewers were told that Clinton sees Russia as an enemy and cannot be trusted” and “the Democratic convention was portrayed as proof that American democracy is a sham.” The story added that Channel One introduced Clinton “as a politician who puts herself above the law, who is ready to win at any cost and who is ready to change her principles depending on the political situation.”

If the AP reporter wrote with the intention that the American public would rise up en masse and demand satisfaction; how unfair of those Russkies to write like that about our Gal Hill – that reporter was dead wrong.

What the reporter did not mention was that a significant number of Americans, including some of those who plan to hold their collective noses while voting for Clinton in sheer terror of Trump, agree with those quotes. What the reporter did not mention was that the Sanders and Trump campaigns have been largely based on those sentiments giving Clinton an unexpected run for the money which explains why she has had to pull out all the stops to beat Trump, a candidate who, by any standard, should have been a piece of cake.

Giving a wink and a nod to the MSM, Clinton formalized her accusations on Sunday Fox News that ‘Russian intelligence” was responsible for the DNC hacking and linked her opponent Donald Trump to Vladimir Putin.

Using the DNC hack issue as an opportunity to further hammer on Putin, Clinton asserted during the Fox interview that ‘we KNOW that Russian intelligence services hacked into the DNC and we KNOW that they arranged for a lot of those emails to be released and we KNOW that Donald Trump has shown a very troubling willingness to back up Putin, to support Putin.”

A good follow up by an engaged journalist might have been what does Clinton know, how does she know it and when did she know it? If the proof exists, why the reluctance to provide specifics to the American public – but that might require initiative, transparency and some candor? While challenging Trump on his commitment to the Constitution (who clearly could use an Intro 101 class), wasn’t Clinton trained, as an attorney, to understand that evidence comes before the accusation?

This is not the first time that Clinton has personally attacked Putin. In March, 2014 before a University of California audience, she said he was “thin-skinned,” was trying to “re-sovietize Europe while threatening instability and the peace of Europe.” In citing ‘Russian aggression,” she is smart enough to know the difference between protecting ethnic Russians who have centuries of deep cultural roots in Ukraine and Crimea as compared to Hitler’s invasions of eastern Europe.

An impartial observer can only assume Clinton has knowingly skewed the chronology of events in the Ukraine which began with the US-initiated overthrow of a democratically elected President on February 22, 2014; followed by an overwhelming vote on March 16^th by Crimean citizens to reunite with Russia which was then followed by the legal annexation of the Crimean peninsula to Russia on March 18^th.   What is so difficult to understand?

Thanks to Clinton’s repetitive disinformation campaign, accusations of ‘Russian aggression’ are now widespread; repeated without regard to the evidence throughout the mainstream media and by Members of Congress, many of whom choose to remain uninformed.

Back to the Fox interview, she could not resist adding, with mock indignation, that “I think laying out the facts raises serious issues about Russian interference in our elections, in our democracy.” And as if the rest of us were asleep at the wheel and could not distinguish fact from fiction, she further added that “For Trump to both encourage that and to praise Putin despite what appears to be a deliberate effort to try to affect the election I think raises national security issues.”

Does she not see that ‘interference in our elections, in our democracy’ is exactly what the DNC did to the Bernie Sanders campaign?

And has no bright eyed, eager beaver staff person yet pointed out to Clinton that if Russia and Putin had been intent on disrupting the American presidential election, why wouldn’t they have gone after Clinton’s ‘classified’ State Department emails on her personal server that were subject to an FBI investigation and with the potential of criminal charges? Then again, an educated assumption might be that Russian intelligence does have those emails in their possession. Now there’s a real national security issue.

In her eagerness to further aggravate US – Russian relations, apparently Clinton is not only unfamiliar with the State Department’s Foreign Service Protocol for the Modern Diplomat guidelines for rules and process of diplomatic protocol (or perhaps it does not apply to her), but appears she did not receive the memo from the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) James Clapper.

Responding to the DNC-Russian furor in a more blasé and introspective manner than might be expected, Clapper stepped in as a calm voice of reason stating that he was ‘somewhat taken aback by the hyperventilation on this” and that the US was in “reactionary mode” regarding cyber-attacks. Clapper further indicated he was ‘not ready’ to identify Russia as the hacker “I don’t think we are quite ready yet to make a call on attribution.”

Interestingly, Clapper commented that “cyber warfare is not ‘terribly different than what went on during the Cold War” suggesting that it is ‘just a different modality.” He further suggested that the American people ‘need to accept’ and ‘become more resilient’ since cyber threats are a major long term challenge. Americans should ‘not be quite so excitable when we have yet another instance.”  Hmm…wonder to whom he was referring.

In other words, we spy on them, they spy on us – all’s fair in love and war and that there is a certain level of honor among (cyber) thieves.

$400 Million: The Partial Price of Peace?

Thomas L. Knapp

When the US government sends $400 million in cash, stacked on pallets, to Iran on the same day the Iranian government releases four imprisoned Americans, it looks an awful lot like ransom.

On the other hand, when the US government decides to keep $400 million sent to it by the Iranian government pursuant to an arms deal  for 35 years without ever shipping the arms, it looks an awful lot like stealing.

And when the US government reaches a settlement to finally pay back that money with interest, it looks an awful lot like  justice.

Yes, the simultaneity of payment and release looks pretty damning on both ends.

On the other hand, it seems very understandable from both ends.

The Iranians have had good reason to distrust the US government for more than 60 years, ever since the US overthrew their elected government and saddled them with a US-approved dictator, then stole their money when they overthrew that dictator. As often as the US has screwed them, why would they trust the US to repay them absent some kind of leverage?

President Obama, on the other hand, wanted to secure the return of those prisoners, and he seems to genuinely want to improve US relations with Iran after more than three decades of cold (and sometimes not so cold) war.  Coughing up cash that the US owed to Iran anyway probably looked like a good way to make progress on both of those fronts.

Yeah, I guess it looks kind of bad. But you know, I don’t have any heartburn over it. And I find it hard to give much credence to Republican temper tantrums over the whole thing.

I don’t recall Republicans complaining about the Iranians timing their release of hostages from the US embassy in Tehran to coincide with the inauguration of a Republican president (some people even believe that that Republican’s running mate negotiated a secret deal with the Iranians to stretch the matter and create that coincidence).

I do recall Republicans defending that same president when he was discovered to have traded arms to — not to merely have returned money to, but to have intentionally armed — Iran in return for assistance in achieving the release of American hostages held in Lebanon by Iran’s Hezbollah allies.

It seems to me that all is well here, election year partisan bluster notwithstanding. Peace gets messy now and again, but it beats the alternative.

The Critical Link Between Poverty and Health

Cesar Chelala

Concern for the health of the poor is one of the critical issues in development. Poverty cannot be defined solely in terms of low or no income. Lack of access to health services, safe water, adequate nutrition, and education are also essential components of poverty. Poverty and health are closely linked. Poverty is one of the most influential factors in ill health, and ill health can lead to poverty.

Poverty drains family savings. In addition, poor people are more exposed to several risks (poor sanitation, unhealthy food, violence, drug abuse and natural disasters) and less prepared to cope with them.

More than 1.5 billion people in the world –most of them children- live in extreme poverty, and 80 percent of them live in developing countries. Poor people have little or no access to qualified health services and education, and do not participate in decisions critical to their day-to-day lives. UNICEF statistics show that 22,000 children die each day because of poverty.

People with low income are at greater risk of illness and disability. They are also less informed about the benefits of healthy lifestyles, and have less access to quality health care. It is estimated that one third of deaths worldwide –some 18 million people a year or 50,000 a day- are due to poverty-related causes.

Those who live in extreme poverty are five times more likely to die before age five, and two and a half time times more likely to die between 15 and 59 than those in higher income groups. The same dramatic differences can be found with respect to maternal mortality levels and the incidence of preventable diseases.

The impact of poverty on health is largely mediated by nutrition and is expressed throughout the life span. Those living in poverty and suffering from malnutrition have an increased propensity to a host of diseases, a lower learning capacity, and an increased exposure and vulnerability to environmental risks. It is estimated that 165 million children worldwide suffer from malnutrition.

However, nutrition and health are only moderately responsive to mere economic growth. Increased income alone cannot guarantee better nutrition and health because of the impact of other factors, notably education, environmental hygiene and access to health care services, which cannot necessarily be obtained with increased income in developing countries.

Education is one f the most powerful weapons to fight against poverty and its effects.
Experiences in several countries have shown the power of education to increase the nutritional levels and the health status of the poor. In that regard, girls’ education is one of the most effective investments countries can make toward development and better health. Those countries that have the greatest gender disparities in access to education, like Afghanistan, India, Ethiopia and Yemen are also among the poorest countries in the world.

In urban India, for example, it has been found that the mortality rate among the children of educated women is almost half than that of children of uneducated women. In the Philippines, primary education among mothers has reduced the risks of child mortality by half, and secondary education has reduced that risk by a factor of three.

Several strategies can be used to improve the access of mothers and children to educational opportunities as a way of improving their health status and overcome poverty. At the national level governments -particularly in developing countries- have to establish education as a priority, and provide necessary resources and support.

At the international level, lending institutions have to increase the number of debt-reduction plans for those countries willing to provide resources for basic education, particularly in rural areas and at the community level. Since an important goal is to reduce economic inequity to improve the health status of populations, education can provide substantial benefits to people of all ages.

UK Parliament Endorses Terracidal Nuclear Terrorism

Gideon Polya

The UK Parliament recently overwhelmingly supported renewal of the Trident nuclear weapons system, with a psychopathic  new UK PM Theresa May declaring her preparedness to kill vast numbers of people with nuclear weapons. Total nuclear disarmament can and should happen. On the eve of the 71st anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, decent people around the world must declare a peaceful war on nuclear terrorist supporters and countries  by Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) that are most likely to be  effective when applied to small nuclear powers like the UK , France, North Korea and Apartheid Israel.

In July 2016 the UK Parliament had a 5 hour debate over the renewal of Trident, the UK’s submarine-borne nuclear weapons system that with other national nuclear arsenals threatens Humanity with annihilation.  The UK Parliament (647 members) shamefully and disgustingly voted in favour of Trident renewal by a majority of 355, with virtually all of the 330 Conservative Party MPs and about 140 Labour MPs – more  than half of Labour MPs – voting for prospective mass murder, including Labour Party leadership challengers Angela Eagle and Owen Smith. Some 41 Labour MPs squibbed this key existential moral issue by being absent or abstaining, the cowardly abstainers including shadow defence secretary, Clive Lewis, and the shadow foreign affairs secretary, Emily Thornberry.

Trident renewal was opposed by all 54 Scottish National Party MPs, the 8 Liberal Democrats and a mere 47  Labour MPs, most notably Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn who has been resolutely  opposed to nuclear terrorism and who told the House of Commons:  “What is the threat we are facing that one million people’s deaths would actually deter? … I make it clear today I would not take a decision that kills millions of innocent people. I do not believe the threat of mass murder is a legitimate way to deal with international relations.”

In stark contrast, after the Scottish National Party MP George Kerevan asked of PM Theresa May: “Is she personally prepared to authorise a nuclear strike that can kill a hundred thousand innocent men, women and children?”, UK PM  Theresa May replied: “Yes. And I have to say to the honourable gentleman the whole point of a deterrent is that our enemies need to know that we would be prepared to use it, unlike some suggestions that we could have a deterrent but not actually be willing to use it, which seem to come from the Labour party frontbench.”

We are approaching that time of year when we commemorate the evil and war criminal American atomic bombing of Hiroshima on 6 August 1945 (up to 150,000 Japanese civilians killed and over 20,000 military killed) and of Nagasaki on 9 August 1945 (up to 80,000 Japanese civilians killed), atrocities for which US presidents up to Barack Obama refuse to apologize. The fundamental  reasons for these successive mass murder atrocities seem to have been (a) an obscene proof of principle of nuclear annihilation in war, and (b) an  American desire to threaten the newly victorious  Soviet Union that had overwhelmingly borne most of the burden of defeating Nazi Germany, with up to 27 million Soviet citizens dying in WW2 as compared to 600,000 French, 450,000 British, and 420,000 Americans.

The Soviet Union, the UK and France went on to acquire a nuclear deterrent after WW2. China, which had lost 40 million people under Japanese Occupation in 1937-1945, subsequently acquired nuclear weapons. India provided 2 million men to the Allied armies in WW2  but suffered the man-made 1942-1945 Bengali Holocaust (Bengal Famine) in which 6-7 million Indians were deliberately starved to death by the British with Australian complicity;  post-independence  India and Pakistan also eventually acquired nuclear deterrents. With genocidal fanaticism  paradoxically assertedly justified by the WW2 Jewish Holocaust (5-6 million Jews killed and part of the wider WW2 European Holocaust in which over 30 million Slavs, Jews and Gypsies were killed),  Apartheid Israel  also acquired nuclear weapons with American help.  North Korea, in which an estimated 28% of the population was killed by US bombing in the 1950-1953 Korean War, has also acquired nuclear weapons.

The upper  estimates of stored  nuclear weapons  are as follows: US (7,315), Russia (8,000), Apartheid Israel (400), France (300), UK (250), China (250), Pakistan (120), India (100), and North Korea (less than 10). India , Pakistan and North Korea have not ratified the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Nuclear exchanges have almost occurred accidentally several times in the last half century and in several instances have only  been averted by the sane actions of particular  courageous and humane individuals e.g. Commander Vasili Alexandrovich Arkhipov (1962) and Lieutenant Colonel Stanislav Yevgrafovich Petrov (1983). A nuclear exchange would wipe out most of Humanity (current population about 7.5 billion) , successively through the initial instantaneous destruction of cities, subsequent deaths from burns and  radiation sickness from radioactive fallout, and  finally  through a “Nuclear Winter” decimating agriculture, photosynthesis and photosynthate-based life in general. In contrast, as of March  2016,  127 countries have signed up to support the UN Humanitarian Pledge for the banning of nuclear weapons.

Sea-girt Britain was last successfully invaded about 1,000 years ago in 1066 (an invasion associated with the genocidal Norman subjugation of  the English Saxons),  and since then successfully saw off threats  by the Spanish Armada, Napoleonic France and Nazi Germany. The only conceivable European threat to the UK, and hence a target for UK nuclear terrorism,  is US- and NATO-threatened Russia, a distant country which has never sought to invade Britain (what for ?) but which has been repeatedly invaded by Britain. However there are many Developing  Countries that  are potential targets for British nuclear terrorism. Indeed over the last millennium Britain has invaded 193 countries including  nearly all but a few of the present-day UN-recognized or de facto countries of the world. Most of these British invasions in the Americas, Africa, Asia, Europe,  Australasia and the Pacific were variously  associated with genocidal atrocities.

In the 21st century, nuclear terrorist Britain has continued invading other countries as a US lackey. The UK is presently  involved in its Sixth Iraq War and Third Syrian War in a century; is involved in a continuing  Iraqi Genocide and Afghan Genocide (post-invasion deaths from violence or imposed deprivation totalling 2.7 million and 5.5 million, respectively);  as part of the France-UK-US (FUKUS) Coalition helped devastate Libya, formerly the most prosperous country in Africa; and presently has armed forces in the war-torn African nations of Somalia and South Sudan. The genocidally racist and violent  British Establishment just cannot help itself.

It gets worse.  Each year 17 million people die avoidably from deprivation in the Developing World on Spaceship Earth with the first World, including the UK, in charge of the flight deck. Globally, 1.5 billion people have died avoidably from deprivation since 1950.  It is estimated that 1.8 billion Indians died avoidably from deprivation under brutal British domination in the period 1757-1947. 1950-2005 avoidable deaths in countries occupied by the British  in the post-WW2 era have totalled 727 million.

What can decent people do in the face of British nuclear terrorism and indeed nuclear terrorism by other nuclear weapons –possessing states? In relation to the horrifying threat of mass extinction of Humanity and most of the Biosphere from nuclear weapons one can be more specific about the targets of Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) that obviously should apply to all nuclear weapons-possessing countries and nuclear weapons supporters:

1.  “Small” nuclear powers like the UK, France, Apartheid Israel and North Korea are most likely to be pressured successfully by carrot or stick and should be particularly   subject to Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) as were successfully applied to  Apartheid South Africa and are currently being applied against nuclear terrorist, racist Zionist (RZ)-run, genocidally racist, democracy-by-genocide Apartheid Israel.
2. Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) should also be applied against the numerous countries that (a) host US bases, (b) host US nuclear weapons, (c) host  nuclear-armed warships, (d) host nuclear terrorism-related communications facilities or (e) otherwise support US nuclear terrorism. Thus  when a US nuclear-armed warship is in an Australian port,  Australia is effectively hosting US nuclear weapons  and making Australia a nuclear target,  in addition to  hosting a US Marine base in Darwin, hosting nuclear-armed warships in general, diplomatically opposing a Nuclear Weapons Ban,  and hosting  joint US-Australian  nuclear terrorism-related communications facilities such as that at Pine Gap in Central Australia.
3. Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) should also be applied against all those nuclear terrorism-supporting countries that refuse to join the present 127 decent nations who support a Nuclear Weapons Ban.

Armed Struggle Is Not Terrorism

Abdul Majid Zargar

The more I read or listen to the debates & discourses on Indian media, both print & electronic, the more I am bemused at the ignorance or deliberate attempt to ignore the fundamental question of Kashmir dispute. That question is simply a political one created by an international promise of right of self determination to people of J&K upon partition of British India in two domains India & Pakistan. The two successor states have duly accepted to implement this promise in letter & sprit.

Indian Writers or debaters, with few honorable exceptions, would simply like to skip  or  reduce this question to terrorism which  reared its head after Nineties around the same time when Kashmiris started their armed struggle. It provided a god send opportunity to these Indians to juxtapose the two and present the struggle to world as an act of Islamic terrorism.

In October 1947, Maharaja of Kashmir  signed an instrument of accession with India to thwart what India calls a ‘Tribal raid to annex Kashmir’ and Pakistan an indigenous initiative supported by tribal Muslims  to liberate Kashmir from the tyrant Mahraja’s rule  under which a  genocide of  Muslims was in progress in Jammu. Incidentally Mahraja had signed a Stand-still agreement with Pakistan few months earlier. Looked in this background the accession, (whose authenticity is also under challenge) gave India only a limited claim and not a perpetual  right to be in Kashmir.

When the matter went to UN at the instance of India, it resolved to hold a plebiscite in Kashmir to know the will of people as to which of the two domains they want to join. Both the two Countries accepted this decision but India, after first adopting dilly-dallying tactics, finally reneged on the promise on a flimsy ground of Pakistan having joined Anglo-American military alliances CEATO & CENTO

So since 1947, Kashmiris have been waging a peaceful resistance to Indian occupation and when these means failed, the people started an armed struggle. To crush this struggle, Indian army used its massive fire-power to such an extent  that all Indian military operations are in reality the collective punishment of whole districts, towns and cities. Targeted killing of  young men, rape of women & enforced disappearances  has been the hallmark of its policy & strategy to subdue a whole population. Crimes against humanity  have been so grave that human beings have even been burnt in live infernos prompting reputed TIME magazine to say PERHAPS THERE IS A SPECIAL CORNER IN HELL RESERVED FOR INDIAN SOLDIERS——(re: TIME magazine on Sopore Massacre of 6th Jannuary 1993). A small coterie of collaborators & agents has been  propelled to paint the occupation with a democratic brush mainly to mislead the international community.

India is taking advantage of a global anti-terrorism atmosphere by juxtaposing  Kashmir issue with terrorism aided and abetted by Pakistan.  As stated earlier an armed struggle was started by Kashmiris in 1990 but a peaceful transition was also made in 2008. So two peaceful struggles from 1947 to 1990 & from 2008 till now have not yielded any fruitful dividend for people of Kashmir and there are now strong indications that its youth  may again be driven to guns out of a sense of hopelessness & desperation. Burhan Wani’s rise & martyrdom  is an indication of that situation.

In this background it is extremely important to know whether an armed struggle to evict an occupier amounts to terrorism. The answer is provided in United Nations General Assembly (UNGA)  resolution No. 3314 passed in 1974.The said resolution while adopting the definition of word  ‘Aggression’,  forbids states and coalitions of states from “any military occupation, however temporary.” It also prohibits bombardments, blockades, or forced annexations of any lands. The Definition warns that no consideration of whatever nature, whether political, economic, military or otherwise, justifies aggression. The definition also treats acts of aggression as crimes against peace. Interestingly, however, the Definition provides an exception for the right to armed struggle. It states: “Nothing in this definition of aggression could in any way prejudice the right to self- determination, freedom and independence of peoples forcibly deprived of that right, particularly peoples under colonial and racist regimes or other forms of alien domination: nor the right of these peoples to STRUGGLE to that end and to seek and receive support.” Although the text mentions “struggle” and not “armed struggle,” the context in which it is used amply makes it clear that it includes    both forms of struggles. Even logic yields such an interpretation. Since the Definition lists unlawful uses of force, the exception must refer to the lawful use of force. Accordingly, the people under occupation and alien domination may resort to armed struggle in pursuit of freedom and independence. They may also seek and receive arms and other support from external sources.

The  above law of armed struggle as pronounced by UN was further reinforced and all doubts set at rest when UNGA passed yet another historic resolution No. A/RES/37/43 passed on 3rd  December 1982 which justifies use of armed struggle by people for liberation of their land from foreign occupation. The said resolution is reproduced below:

“This House reaffirms the legitimacy of the struggle of peoples for independence, territorial integrity, national unity and liberation from colonial and foreign domination and foreign occupation by all available means, including ARMED STRUGGLE”.

Some  developments regarding global terrorism particularly the 9/11 event may have muddled the right to armed struggle. Few members of  international  think tanks   opine the law of armed struggle has been overtaken by the necessity to fight global terrorism. This argument has no merit, whatsoever  on two grounds. First that despite these developments & opinions, international law has not yet repudiated the right to armed struggle and two   various international organizations and institutions reaffirm the right of self-determination against colonial and occupying  regimes every year with right of armed struggle intact.

Is Democracy Consistent With Islam?

Nauman Sadiq

Some people are under the impression that democracy and Islam are incompatible. But I don’t see any contradiction between democracy and Islam, as such. Though, I admit, that there is some friction between Islam and liberalism. When we say that there is a contradiction between Islam and democracy, we make a category mistake which is a serious logical fallacy.

There is a fundamental difference between democracy and liberalism. Democracy falls in the category of politics and governance while liberalism falls in the category of culture. We must be precise about the definitions of the terms that we employ in political science.

Democracy is simply a representative political system that ensures representation, accountability and the right of the electorate to vote governments in and to vote governments out. In this sense when we use the term democracy we mean a multi-party representative political system that confers legitimacy upon a government which comes to power through an election process which is a contest between more than one political parties in order to ensure that it is voluntary. Thus democracy is nothing more than a multi-party representative political system.

Some normative scientists, however, get carried away in their enthusiasm and ascribe meanings to technical terminology that are quite subjective and fallacious. Some will use the adjective liberal to describe the essence of democracy as liberal democracy while others will arbitrarily call it informed or enlightened democracy. In my opinion, the only correct adjective that can be used to describe the essence of democracy is representative democracy.

After settling on the theoretical aspect, let us now apply these concepts to the reality of the practical world, especially the phenomena of the nascent democratic movements of the Arab Spring. It’s a fact that the ground realities of the Arab and Islamic World fall well short of the ideal liberal democratic model of the developed Western World. However, there is a lot to be optimistic about. When the Arab Spring revolutions erupted in Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain and Yemen, and before the Arab Spring turned into an abysmal winter in Libya and Syria, some of the utopian dreamers were not too hopeful about the outcome of those movements.

Unlike the socialist revolutions of ‘60s and ‘70s, when the visionaries of yore used to have a magic wand of bringing about a fundamental structural change that would have culminated into equitable distribution of wealth overnight, the neoliberal movements of present times are merely a step in the right direction that will usher the Arab and the Islamic World into an era of relative peace and progress.

The Arab Spring movements have not been led by Gamal Abdel Nassers, Zulfikar Ali Bhuttos, Jawahar Lal Nehrus and other such charismatic messiahs that the utopian thinkers are so fond of. But these revolutions have been the grassroots movements of a society in transition from an abject stagnant state towards a dynamic and representative future.

Let us be clear about one thing first and foremost: the Tunisian moderate Islamist political party, Ennahda, and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt would have followed the same old economic model of Ben Ali and Hosni Mubarak. It’s a growth-based neoliberal model as opposed to an equality-based socialist model. It’s a fact that the developing Third World economies with large populations and meager resources cannot be compared to the democratic socialist countries of Scandinavia.

A question arises that what would have the Arab Spring movements accomplished if the resultant democratic governments would have followed the same old neoliberal and growth-centered economic policies? It should be kept in mind that democracy is not the best of systems because it is the most efficient system of governance. Top-down autocracies are much more efficient than democracies.

But democracy is a representative political system. It brings about a grassroots social change. Enfranchisement, representation, transparency, accountability, checks and balances, rule of law and the consequent institution-building, nation-building and consistent long term policies are the fruits of representative democracy.

Immanuel Kant sagaciously posited that moral autonomy produces moral responsibility and social maturity. This social axiom can also be applied to politics and governance. Political autonomy and self-governance engender political responsibility and social maturity. A top-down political system is dependent on the artificial external force that keeps it going. The moment that external force is removed, the society reverts back to its previous state and the system collapses. But a grassroots and bottom-up political system evolves naturally and intrinsically.

We must not expect from the Arab Spring movements to produce results immediately. Bear in mind that the evolution of Western culture and politics happened over a course of many centuries. Moreover, the Arab revolutions of ‘60s and ‘70s only mobilized the elite classes. Some working classes might have been involved, but the tone and tenor of those revolutions was elitist and that’s the reason why those revolutions failed to produce the desired outcome. The Arab Spring movements, by contrast, mobilized the urban middle class of the Arab societies in the age of electronic media and information technology.

In the nutshell, if the Arab Spring movements have not been about the radical redistribution of wealth, or about creating a liberal utopia in the Middle East overnight, what was the objective of those movements then? Let me try to explain the aims of the Arab Spring movements by way of an allegory. Democracy is like a school and people are like children. We only have two choices: one, to keep the people under paternalistic dictatorships; two, to admit them in the school of representative democracy and let them experience democracy as a lived reality rather than some stale and sterile theory. The first option will only produce half-witted cretins, but the second option will give birth to an educated human resource that doesn’t just consumes resources but also creates new resources.

Finally, I would like to clarify that the militant phenomena in Libya and Syria has been distinct and separate from the political and democratic phenomena of the Arab Spring movements as in Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain and Yemen. A question arises that when political movements for enfranchisement turn violent, do their objectives cease to be legitimate? No they don’t, but from a pacifist standpoint we ought to make a distinction between political movements, to which we should lend our moral support; and the militant phenomena which should be discouraged.

In civil law a distinction is generally drawn between the lawful and unlawful assembly. It is the inalienable right of the people to peacefully assemble to press their demands for political reform. But the moment such protests become militarized and violent, they cease to be lawful. Expecting from the heavily armed militants as in Libya and Syria, who have been described by the Western mainstream media as “moderate rebels,” to bring about political reform and positive social change is not only naïve but bordering on insanity.

In the latter case the only prudent course for the international community is to pressurize both sides: the militants and the regimes, to show restraint and avoid using force; the political right of peaceful demonstrations for political and social reforms is always a given. The demonstrators must have our political and moral support but beyond that any militarization and so-called “liberal interventionism” for ulterior motives in an opportunistic manner is only likely to further exacerbate the conflict.

The Islamic State in Bangladesh

Angshuman Choudhury

The assessment in the first part of this analysis leads to the assumption that the Dhaka attack was a manifestation of a new, hybridised terror dynamic in Bangladesh that involves at least some degree of international involvement, in this case the Islamic State (IS). This part of the analysis provides a framework analysis of two possible scenarios or types of IS diffusion in Bangladesh. 

Both models are based on a new prototype of Islamist terrorism that is a cross-fertilisation of local and global jihadist networks, working together in a mutually beneficial arrangement.

Type I: Returnee Networks 

Under the first type, IS-trained returnees run autonomous sleeper cells in Bangladesh, which propagandise, radicalise, and recruit under direct or indirect supervision from IS’ central command in Syria/Iraq. This model assumes the relative ease for returnees in slipping back into their homeland without raising suspicion – a belief reasserted by several close IS observers. The native cells procure arms from local and regional cross-border channels, in connivance with like-minded subcontinental groups. For recruitment and tactical support, they rely on existing domestic outfits like Jama’at ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) and al Qaeda affiliated Ansar ul-Islam, which have ready-to-use pools of cadres and functional networks for logistical support. 

In this model, JMB takes organisational lead, given its highest strike capacity and organisational strength amongst all, in addition to its pledged allegiance to the IS. The cells regularly receive inputs, supervision, advice, and funds from the IS in Syria/Iraq and/or its extended networks in the region. This is a self-perpetuating model, wherein returnees routinely maintain a steady stream of local emigrants to Syria/Iraq. 

The IS cells execute the attacks in a customised style, tailor-made for the local demographic profile while maintaining a bare minimum of tactical sophistication. The usage of assault rifles, IEDs, and suicide-style raid tactics, while taking care not to kill Muslims, could be attributed to this model. The Kishoreganj Eid attack was largely un-customised, but remained unclaimed (a signature IS tactic for Muslim societies). 

This type is closer to al-Hanif’s narrative presented in Dabiq (the IS propoganda magazine), and implies that the IS orchestrated the Dhaka and Kishoreganj attacks. 

Type II: Regrouped/Affiliated Networks

The second type comprises of a regrouped set of purely domestic groups like JMB, Ansar, and Hizb ul-Tahrir, pledging allegiance to the caliphate to restore their own credibility. All three groups have shown at least some degree of localised organisational influence in the last two years. This prototype is characterised by a franchise terror module, wherein various domestic groups reorient themselves into a single operational network that draws ideological legitimacy from the IS. Given JMB’s reported allegiance to the IS, this regrouping is initiated and led by JMB, although other entities have fairly equal tactical and ideological control. This is notwithstanding the fact that the domestic groups have critical ideological and tactical differences within themselves. 

This means that the IS command structures – central or extended – have no direct control over the operational aspects of terror attacks in Bangladesh, although lateral assistance is highly probable. IS-trained returnees from Syria/Iraq are automatically absorbed into these networks, bringing conventional IS tactics to the local domain. Furthermore, some advisory collaboration with the IS’ regional cells to choose the right offensive tactics, locating the funding sources, and arranging mobilisation networks cannot be ruled out. Such an arrangement of affiliation serves to ensure the globalisation of local jihad, while providing the larger group a springboard for expansion and international media attention. 

This type is closer to the government’s narrative, and denotes that the IS inspired the Dhaka attack.

This prototype explains the fusion of local and transnational elements in the Dhaka and Kishoreganj attacks, including the mixof sophisticated and crude weapons. It partially explains the target filtering method in Gulshan, which could be due to the prevalence of Ansar’s al Qaeda-based tactics. Most crucially, it could explain Ansar’s warning tweet before the attack. 

Limits of these Models

There are certain critical indicators in the Gulshan attack that neither of the models explains convincingly. 

First, it is hard to conclude why the attackers chose to selectively execute only non-Muslims. It could fit into both types. Within Type I, it could be attributed to IS’ newly-emerging customised offensive design, in which it slightly modifies its terror tactics according to the local demographic context. Within Type II, it could be attributed to the operational and tactical control exercised by al Qaeda affiliate Ansar. In either case, local support is the deciding factor.

Second, the above models are insufficient in explaining the elite recruit pool. While it is closer to Type I (secondary involvement of JMB), it could easily fit into Type II, wherein a radicalised wolf-pack joins local cells. Early this year, Bangladeshi intelligence agencies warned of the formation of JMB sleeper cells with “highly educated members and technology experts” in the north of the country.

Hence, although at this point it cannot be affirmatively concluded if IS networks are operational in Bangladesh, this analysis evinces that a lateral, if not direct, engagement of the group in Bangladesh is a strong possibility. The indications are telling enough for the government to draw out a more holistic counter-terrorist design that does not blatantly overlook international influence and/or active engagement.

Brexit: Quo Vadis the European Deterrent?

Marie Pavageau

Despite the fact that the majority of London and Scotland wanted to remain in the European Union (EU), Brexit is now a fait accompli. Perhaps one of the most important long-term consequences of this will be the impact of Brexit on European security and defence. Specifically, what does this mean for the dynamics of the NATO-EU overlap and what does it hold in store for the two nuclear deterrents – the British Trident replacement and the FrenchForce De Frappe - both of which have been described in recent times as anachronistic?

As early as 1963, when Britain applied to the European Economic Community, then French President Charles de Gaulle described Britain as an American Trojan horse in Europe. Agreements such as Franco-British nuclear cooperation (2010 Lancaster Treaties) and bilateral ones are likely to survive Brexit, even if having the UK out will probably mean a new direction for the EU. Furthermore, being the only nuclear power in Europe will probably mean a French leadership in terms of defence in Europe. Generally speaking, the Brexit will result in a split between two visions for Europe and by extension two different orientations on its foreign policy: an Anglo-Saxon camp predominantly anti-Russian, and a more-tempered camp led by France and Germany on the Russian problem.

Anglo-Saxon Camp: Reinforcing NATO
As a way to compensate for lost clout and its place in the defence of Europe, is it highly probable that the UK will try to get closer to the US by reinvesting in NATO. Effectively intensifying their presence and commitment to NATO instead of the EU will be the obvious path for the UK to ensure the preservation of its geopolitical interests and agenda in the region. This surge in commitment will in all likelihood produce a stronger NATO and will reinforce the Anglo-Saxon influence in the Atlantic Alliance. Why? The maths is simple. By leaving the EU, the UK would presumably have more money to spend in the alliance, more manpower and most importantly more motivation to do so. 

The real problem though comes about because of renewed demands for Scottish independence in the wake of Brexit. What does this mean for the British deterrent? Bruno Tertrais, a French nuclear expert, offers three options in the case of Scottish independence: the most credible according to him would be moving the submarines bases to bases in elsewhere in the UK; negotiating the creation of an enclave in Scotland but probably against the will of the locals; or moving the submarines to a foreign ally, for example to the US or even to France. Regardless of the option chosen, the result would be extremely costly for the UK in having to reinvest heavily in new support infrastructure.

A French leadership in the Defence of Europe
On the other side though France becomes a virtual paramount power within the EU. With a highly effective power projection force and considerable overseas engagement, the Frenchforce de frappe will in effect be the only organic EU nuclear shield. The question then is how does this reconcile with previous French statements that support France's traditional policy of strategic autonomy? France for example is on record stating that the French UNSC veto will never become an EU UNSC veto. Similarly, the French nuclear doctrine focuses almost exclusively on the protection of French interests, not EU or allied interests. However now France has no peer in the EU – be it conventional or nuclear. This may in itself force a leadership role on to France however reluctant the country may be to assume that role, in much the same way as Germany has been entrusted with the economic leadership of the EU by the better performing northern states.

The Russia Question
What will determine the future path and possibly divergence of EU defence and NATO defence will be their responses to Russia. It is commonly said that the nuclear force is the UK’s and France’s “insurance policy” against potential aggressors – the only candidate at present being Russia. Brexit essentially re-shapes Europe’s relations with Russia since the EU will be losing one of its biggest anti-Russian voices, the UK. For that reason, Brexit will decisively alter Europe’s relations with Russia. While both arsenals are aimed primarily at Russia, the French tend to view Russia more as partner. NATO on the other hand will see a decisive shift in more hawkish voices on Russia being strengthened. This is largely due to the fact that the only countries that spend over 2 per cent of their GDP on defence as required by NATO are the countries that border and have the most to fear from Russia, in addition to the UK and US.

Consequently, it is safe to assume that the biggest impact of Brexit in security terms will be the divergence within Europe itself of an anti-Russia bloc focusing its energies on NATO and a more tempered bloc that may for the first time be able to lay the seeds of European defence.

Hardship grows in Alberta as oil industry contracts

Janet Browning

A sharp decline in oil industry activity since the summer of 2014 has led to rising unemployment and poverty in Alberta, a province that until recently was called “the economic engine” of Canada.

During 2015, Alberta’s unemployment rate grew from 4.7 percent to 7.0 and now sits at 7.8 percent, significantly higher than the seasonally adjusted Canadian average of 6.9 percent. This is the first time in over two decades that Alberta’s jobless rate has been above the Canadian average.

In 2015, the Alberta Government received notice of 116 group terminations from employers planning to lay off 50 or more workers at a single location. A total of 17,579 workers were let go, about 78 percent of them in the oil and gas sector. Nearly 52,000 people in Edmonton and 60,000 in Calgary were looking for work in December 2015. This is in a province with a population of just 4 million.

Todd Hirsch, chief economist at ATB Financial, a local bank owned by the province, noted in his quarterly newsletter, The Owl, that Alberta’s resource sector lost nearly 21,000 highly paid positions in 2015. Manufacturing jobs were also down 5.3 percent, while construction employment fell 2.7 percent. Just in December, the accommodation and food sector lost 11,500 jobs, as the economic slump led broad sections of the population to curtail their spending.

From 1996 to 2014, Alberta was the go-to destination for Canadians seeking employment. Many Atlantic Canadians worked part of the year on oil-industry extraction and construction projects and this went a long way toward sustaining their families down East throughout the year. Now, this income is gone, causing many laid-off workers to leave the province. According to the Bank of Canada’s Monetary Policy Report, net inter-provincial migration to Alberta in the third quarter of 2015 was at its lowest since 2010.

The recent federal budget included C$405 million this fiscal year for an “enhanced” Employment Insurance (EI) Benefit Program for 12 hard-hit areas across Canada. This means laid-off workers in parts of northern and southern Alberta can draw extended EI benefits. But Liberal prime minister Justin Trudeau did not see fit to include Edmonton, where EI claims have risen by 91 percent since January 2015 and the New Democratic Party (NDP) provincial government gets much of its support. Excluding Edmonton-area workers from this relief has caused many of them to return to the long-depressed Maritime Provinces, where they are at least eligible for extended benefits.

The job losses are contributing to rising poverty and food insecurity. Mike Kluttig of the United Way charity noted, “Food bank use is up 60 per cent. We know that there has been a spike in distress line calls, a spike in the suicide rate.”

Bankruptcy filings are up across Alberta as laid-off workers exhaust severance packages. Freida Richer, a licensed insolvency trustee with Grant Thornton Accountant’s Edmonton office told the Metro in January, “Last year we started to see that uptick in the number of filings and certainly in the number of phone calls we have been getting. The tone of my discussions with people now, certainly, year to date, is that there’s a little bit more desperation in the air and frustration because they are running out of money and they are ending up having to default on payments.”

Statistics Canada reported in March that Canadians ended 2015 with a record-high debt burden, with the ratio of household credit-market debt to disposable income, the key measure of the debt load, rising to 165.4 percent in the final quarter. In 2015, Canadian household debt rose 4.9 percent, the fastest pace in four years, to a record of C$1.92 trillion, including a 6.3 percent surge in mortgage debt. Disposable income, meanwhile, grew by a modest 3.0 percent.

As a result of the contraction in the oil industry and attendant job losses, housing prices in Fort McMurray and Grand Prairie dropped by 20 percent in the months preceding last May’s wildfire disaster.

Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) reports that mortgage arrears of three months or more reached 0.34 percent in Alberta in 2015, higher than the Canadian average of 0.28 percent. It also found that in Edmonton, unsold new homes rose by 70 percent in 2015 and that housing starts are down by 50 percent this year.

Hardest hit have been working class families who have they lost their homes. Over the past year, Alberta’s emergency shelters have had to turn 16,000 homeless away. Between April 2015 and 2016, 11,000 people were housed in 36 emergency shelters, 13 second-stage, and two seniors’ shelters operated by the Alberta Council of Womens’ Shelters.

While there are few reliable figures available on the numbers of homeless people sleeping “rough,” other related indicators of worsening social conditions are truly shocking.

There has been a staggering rise in suicide deaths, and this under conditions where even before the economic downturn, Alberta had among the highest suicide rates in Canada, with more Albertans dying from suicide than car crashes. In the first 6 months of 2015, the most recent period for which figures are available, suicides were up by 30 percent. There were an average of 500 to 550 deaths per year in the past, but in 2015 there were 327 suicide deaths in the first 6 months.

With mental health facilities overburdened and facing further budget squeezes, Alberta Health Services has installed emergency public call boxes on the Edmonton High Level Bridge as a stop gap measure. The City, for its part, has just finished installation of a suicide barrier.

The City of Edmonton’s response to more homelessness in the downtown core has been to hire more police officers. For example, the City recently announced it had hired 40 more officers to patrol the Central McDougall and McCauley neighborhoods, which host numerous homeless shelters and are within a five-minute walk of the posh new Ice District being constructed around a new arena for the privately owned Edmonton Oilers Hockey Team.

There is no long-term plan to build affordable social housing, which would reduce the increasing number of homeless resulting from the gentrification of the Ice District, let alone any concrete plan to end homelessness. The Edmonton City Council constantly pleads lack of funds, saying it cannot afford to build affordable housing on its own. Yet the City is largely financing the building of the C$500 million Rogers Arena for the Oilers hockey team, which is owned by Daryl Katz, Canada’s 12th richest billionaire and the proprietor of the Rexall drug-store chain.

Police and peace officers in Alberta harass the homeless, issuing thousands of tickets for petty offenses such as jaywalking, trespassing, drinking open liquor in public, public intoxication, having an unlicensed dog, and fare-jumping on public transit. Frequently, they are jailed for such minor offenses, ending up with arrest records that impede their chances of finding jobs. In some cases, this can be a factor in causing their lives to spiral to the point where suicide looks like the only option. According to Alberta Justice, in 2014-2015, about 2,000 people were incarcerated for non-payment of fines for such offenses, for an average of 2.8 days each.

The NDP government of Rachel Notley has broken its election promise to implement a $15-per-hour minimum wage. In March, it froze the pay of all provincial government workers, even as they are being forced to do more work due to cuts in staffing levels. Alberta Union of Public Employees (AUPE) figures indicate that the average annual salary for its members was C$56,750 in 2015 for direct government employees, C$42,275 for employees of boards and commissions, C$41,853 for those in the education sector, and just C$30,877 for Alberta Health Services unionized staff.