TSS with Zaid Hamid and Shireen Mazari

Mazari vs. Patterson: Clarifications By Jang Group, Shireen Mazari & PakNationalists

A AHMEDQURAISHI.COM Report
Edited by Khalid Ashraf
Monday, 7 September 2009.
WWW.AHMEDQURAISHI.COM

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—The Editorial Board of the Jang Group issued a clarification published today, Sept. 7, reacting to a written complaint by US Ambassador to Pakistan Anne W. Patterson that resulted in knocking Dr. Mazari's regular column off the pages of the newspaper for one day last Wednesday, Sept. 3.

The newspaper published the regular column a day later, on Thursday Sept. 4, after back and forth with Dr. Mazari.

The clarification in The News also indirectly referred to a report published at PakNationalists/AhmedQuraishi.com and carried by several websites where the US ambassador's letter to the newspaper was described as 'private'. The paper says it was not 'private'.
It is unfortunate that a letter by the US ambassador, which was not printed or made public and as such can be legitimately misconstrued as an attempt at undue pressure by an envoy of a foreign government, has resulted in a misunderstanding between the esteemed columnist and the respected newspaper, ending a long relationship that goes back almost a decade.
The two- The News International and Dr. Mazari – are especially remembered for the bold decision taken last year by The News, one of Pakistan's largest English-language newspapers, to publish an exclusive report, written by Dr. Mazari, which prevented the Bush administration from quietly appointing an anti-Pakistan US army general as a defense attaché in Islamabad.
The ending of this relationship [Dr. Mazari joins The Nation as editor, columnist and television host as of tonight] must have engendered many smiles at the US embassy in Islamabad. There is a history between Dr. Mazari, a renowned defense expert, and the US mission here. In 2006, the US ambassador at the time reportedly approached Pakistan's Foreign Secretary to request that Dr. Mazari, who was heading a think tank financed by the Pakistan Foreign Office, be asked to stop writing columns critical of US policy in Afghanistan. Mr. Khokhar, according to Dr. Mazari, resisted the pressure. But last year, Dr. Mazari was unceremoniously removed from her post in one of the first few decisions taken by the new elected government. Mr. Husain Haqqani, Pakistan's envoy to Washington and one of America's most vocal Pakistani apologists, personally supervised the move.
The following is the clarification as published in The News International today, followed by the reply sent by Dr. Mazari to the newspaper [also received by us], and then a reply from PakNationalists, written by Ahmed Quraishi.

Clarification by The News
A press conference of Dr. Shireen Mazari was reported in the newspapers of Thursday (September 3) in which it was indicated that The News International had been pressurised by the US Embassy into dropping her article, although it appeared in the same day’s issue. Some websites have also alleged that the US ambassador has written a ‘private’ letter to the Jang Group pressuring that Dr. Mazari’s article be dropped. We are surprised that someone as familiar with the Jang Group’s editorial policy as Dr. Mazari — an official turned politician and Information Secretary/ Spokesperson of the Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf — should level such unfounded allegations. The facts of the matter are as follows: * The US ambassador had sent a letter to the Jang Group complaining that in her article published in The News the week before, Dr. Shireen Mazari had levelled certain incorrect allegations that had endangered the life of a US citizen. * In accordance with our policy, and accepted international norms, we referred the complaint to Dr. Shireen Mazari — for her feedback and comments. * While this complaint was being investigated, Dr. Mazari sent another article on Tuesday (September 1), which was to be published the next day — that is on Wednesday. In this article she had again levelled certain allegations, which were also without attribution. Since certain contentions in the previous article had been refuted and were under investigation and she had not produced any evidence or reliable reference to prove the same (nor has she been able to do so till date), we reverted to Dr. Mazari and asked if she could substantiate these allegations. The concerned editor also informed her that her article had been referred to the concerned department to make sure that it was not libellous. As it happens, on receiving supporting comments from her, as well as advice from the concerned editor, the article was published the very next day — that is on Thursday. * It is normal for embassies, political parties and other affected people and institutions to complain against perceived bias and the letter from the US ambassador was in the same vein. She neither asked us in the above letter nor any time in the past to drop articles by Dr. Mazari or by any other contributor holding similar views and writing for many years in The News. The ambassador also did not desire that the letter be kept confidential. While we take all complaints seriously, we allow them to exert no pressure on us or influence editorial policy or decisions. Therefore, at no point did anyone from the management or editorial staff of The News suggest to Dr. Mazari that this, or future, articles by her would not be published. * We not only publish articles by some of the most respected columnists in the country, but as a matter of policy, give space to people holding strong and diverse opinions. Since years some of the fiercest criticism of US policies has been voiced on the pages of The News. We are sorry that she chose to go public with accusations that have no basis in fact. — Editorial Board.

Dr. Mazari's Response
This is the response sent by Dr. Mazari to The News in response to the clarification [as received by us]:
With reference to my press conference on Wednesday, 2 September, I was clearly premature in assuming the newspaper would succumb to US pressure given its past stance on such occasions. So on that count I stand corrected by the paper’s clarification published on 7th September and appreciate the fact that I have not been victimised for my critical stance on US policies.
However, the thrust of my press conference was on multiple efforts by the US embassy to intervene in the media and I had cited my own earlier cases. Now The News has substantiated my position on this issue.
I am glad that The News has referred to US ambassador’s letter in which certain objections were made to one of my columns. My point is that she levelled a serious allegation against me – that of endangering the life of an American citizen. What proof does she have of that from my columns? Did I incite anyone to kill an American? Did I print pictures of the citizen in question? On what grounds did she come to this conclusion? Did The News editorial team ask her for substantiation of what is a serious charge? After all I was asked for so many “proofs”! Here was a foreign emissary levelling a serious allegation against a Pakistani citizen and where was the proof? My columns discuss issues and do not include any form of incitement.
The normal practice that one has seen in newspapers is for embassies to have their objections published which then allows the writer to respond to the allegations. It is strange that the US ambassador chose not to have her objections to my column published so that I could have directly responded to these.
Finally, I simply want to correct one error in The News’s clarification – I was never an “official” – otherwise I would not have been able to write a regular column. I was an academic for 16 years before I headed a research think tank as a researcher/technocrat.
I am presuming again that The News will, in its policy of fair play and equal access to all, publish this response and my appreciation once again of the paper’s ability to withstand all manner of pressures.

Shireen M. Mazari


PakNationalists Comment

Ahmed Quraishi comments:

1. The issue in question is not The News. The issue in question is a letter sent by US ambassador Anne Patterson to a Pakistani newspaper accusing a Pakistani columnist of endangering the life of a US citizen. Since Ms. Patterson provides no proof and does not seek to publish her letter, as is the custom when you dispute a published report, there is a possibility she is intimidating a known critic of US policy into submission.

2. The accepted practice is for politicians or ambassadors to send a letter that is published and then the concerned writer gets a chance to respond or apologize if he or she is wrong. This never happened. Dr. Mazari never saw a copy of the ambassador's letter or was provided proof from her writings that she was endangering the life of a US citizen.

3. US ambassador's serious accusation to Dr. Mazari of threatening a US citizen's life was taken at face value, without supporting evidence, and Dr. Mazari was asked to provide evidence for her opinions that she shapes based on circumstantial and/or factual evidence, which is what all established analysts do.

4. Nowhere in her articles did Dr. Mazari call for violence against any US citizen.

5. The US citizen in question was mentioned in several news mediums before Dr. Mazari referred to him. The US embassy never reacted in public or private to those stories, which were both in print and on television. This is why it is inexplicable why Dr. Mazari was singled out by the US ambassador, beyond the fact that Dr. Mazari is a fierce critic of US policy.

6. Several newspapers published the statements of a retired Pakistani intelligence officer accusing United States of engineering the assassination of Gen. Zia ul Haq. Did any newspaper ask him for evidence before publishing the story, which, according to the US ambassador's logic, endangers the lives of all US diplomats here since it implicates them in the murder of a former Pakistani president and almost the entire leadership of the Pakistan armed forces? It is strange, then, for the US ambassador to demand that Dr. Mazari provide evidence for her opinions and analysis.

7. The US media outlets have spread false alarm worldwide over the past two years by saying Pakistan's nuclear weapons risked falling in wrong hands. Did any one of these US news organizations provide evidence?

8. Dr. Mazari went public on the undue pressure by the US ambassador. She did not accuse the newspaper of anything, nor would it have been appropriate to do so in the first place. If anyone should be issuing clarifications, it is the US embassy because the US ambassador has failed to justify how Dr. Mazari endangered the life of a US citizen.

9. The core question here is this: Why should the US ambassador in Pakistan get away with accusing a Pakistani columnist of endangering the lives of Americans and the columnist gets a rough treatment where she is asked to produce evidence for her analysis? How do we know that Dr. Mazari is not being attacked by the US ambassador for her opinions critical of US policy?

There is no question that The News did not succumb to any pressure. The biggest evidence on this is Mr. Holbrooke's undiplomatic statement against the Geo television in June [See here].

But it is also true that the US ambassador did inadvertently get a special treatment when she got to accuse Dr. Mazari without evidence and without having her letter published for Pakistanis to see and question the veracity of her position and the position of the accused journalist, as is the custom when someone disputes a newspaper article.

In a country reeling under excessive US meddling in domestic affairs, we certainly did not need this reminder of where things stand.

India’s Arihant — upping the psychological ante

By : Dr.Shireen Mazari [ Defence Analyst , PTI Spokesperson]


Coming back to the Indian nuclear powered submarine – it should be pointed out that we do not yet know how it will perform once its reactor goes critical. Will it actually have the speed and capability – given that it has been built with Soviet/Russian technology and the fate of many Soviet/Russian subs lies at the bottom of the seas – taking a heavy toll of human life and reflecting the limitations of Soviet weapon systems?

While Pakistan’s decision makers squabble over whether to go ahead and implement the 2008 decision of buying German submarines or alter course and seek more French subs instead, India has put its prototype nuclear powered submarine, INS Arihant, into the waters. Incidentally, those in Pakistan who have been ranting for years over the use of Islamic warrior names for our missiles seem absurdly mute in commenting on India’s aggressive usage of Hindu mythology warrior names not only for its missiles but now also for its nuclear-powered submarine. Of course, the reality is that the nuclear reactor of this submarine will not go critical till 2012, so at the moment Arihant is more of a symbolic reflection of where India is headed in terms of its nuclear arsenal. Nevertheless, the development has signalled the nuclearisation of the Indian Ocean by a littoral state – since nuclear weapons have been present in this Ocean through the military presence of the external nuclear powers, especially the US.

That is one major reason why the US, France and UK always opposed the UN General Assembly’s efforts to make the Indian Ocean a weapon-free “zone of peace” – as reflected in the first UN GA Resolution of 16 December 1971(2832:XXVI). Ironically, along with the Soviet Union, India was a major force behind this Non-Aligned Movement-supported UN resolution. But then this has been the hallmark of Indian security policy: seeking time through multilateral diplomatic moves while it builds its military capability. In contrast to the Indian position on the Indian Ocean as a Zone of Peace resolution, the US, France and the UK always voted against this idea and in 1989 they chose to withdraw from the 44 member UN committee on this issue that had been set up in 1972. The US in fact demanded that the committee be eliminated so as to reduce UN spending and we know how this whole issue simply died for lack of visible progress. Now that India has also moved towards nuclear militarisation of the Indian Ocean, it will be difficult to see any revival of the zone of peace proposal for this region in the future. With the launching of the Arihant, India has moved still further away from being a proponent of nuclear disarmament to being a projector of nuclear force. Strategic rationality makes it incumbent on Pakistan to seek to restore the nuclear balance for the future.

However, this should not be a major issue for us even in financial terms, as long as the lure of commissions does not distort or destroy our strategic interests. We already have conventional submarines including the Agosta-type which are not only capable of carrying nuclear warheads, but can be upgraded to being fitted with air-independent propulsion technology (AIP) specifically designed to allow conventional subs to remain submerged for longer periods. That is the main advantage of nuclear-powered submarines, along with the speed element – they do not need to surface like conventional subs that need to surface after short periods of being submerged and therefore become vulnerable. AIP technology is specifically designed for conventional subs and the Germans have been in the forefront of this technological development, although the Agostas can also be upgraded.

It is unfortunate that Pakistan’s purchase of subs has been delayed apparently over the commissions lure, because now the international community will make it harder for this country to acquire these subs. Have we learnt no lessons from what happened to Pakistan in 1974 after the Indian nuclear test? India tested and Pakistan was penalised! The Canadians withdrew from KANUPP despite IAEA safeguards and a legal agreement. There is nothing to suggest that things will be different this time round – given how Hillary Clinton practically blessed Indian militarisation with a new defence pact. Besides Pakistan’s pathetic record of asserting legal agreements with its allies makes us easy victims of foreign pressure and diktat – remember the replacement of F-16s with wheat and soya beans? Not only did we lose our money, but before the US finally retracted on the deal, we were made to pay parking charges for these F-16s also! But we always forget US abuse and present ourselves for more of the same whenever the occasion arises!

Coming back to the Indian nuclear powered submarine – it should be pointed out that we do not yet know how it will perform once its reactor goes critical. Will it actually have the speed and capability – given that it has been built with Soviet/Russian technology and the fate of many Soviet/Russian subs lies at the bottom of the seas – taking a heavy toll of human life and reflecting the limitations of Soviet weapon systems? A major disadvantage of nuclear-powered subs is that they are noisier because they have to keep the reactor powered on all the time so if conventional subs can acquire longer submergeable capability through AIP technology – although it will still not be the same as a nuclear-driven sub – the imbalance can be offset to some extent.

Sea-launched nuclear missiles are central to second strike capability which acts as a stabiliser in the context of nuclear strategy since it reduces the imperatives for first strike. In this context, although Pakistan has not officially made any declarations regarding the development of this capability, it is now fairly well-established that we are already on the way to ensuring this second strike capability. It is also now recognised that we have had more success with missile development than India – probably because we have kept our missile ranges and types limited and focused more on developing solid fuelled delivery systems (which, again, are more stable) and reducing circular error probabilities. India, on the other hand, chose to have a wide-ranging missile programme including seeking the development of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). While we have stabilised our cruise missile as well as moved towards the beginnings of sea-launched ballistic missiles, from all accounts, India has not been too successful in both these fields – especially with the Sagarika (which is to be its sea-launched missile) in surface tests. So if India is to gain any advantage from its nuclear-powered submarine, assuming it will perform as expected once its reactor goes critical, it will have to work more on its delivery systems.

For Pakistan while there is no need to go into panic mode, we will have to stop sacrificing good deals simply because of the greed over commissions. The fact that a French inquiry has hinted at commissions lying at the root of the death of the French engineers in Karachi should be a sobering moment for any leadership. But the brazenness with which our successive decision-makers have been proceeding, with scant regard for propriety and wastage of limited national resources, shows that no lessons have been learnt – nor is there any desire to learn from even recent history.

Worse still, our rulers are full of bombast but are unwilling to take proactive concrete actions. Take the case of Balochistan. Political leaders of all shades have been repeating ad nauseum the need for political healing and economic investment in that province but why have the first steps in that direction not been taken beyond publication of reports and statements? Why is the leadership so hesitant to declare a general amnesty for all Baloch political figures and the release of all political prisoners? When we can talk to militants (and we should if they are our own people prepared to accept the writ of the state) and be allied to the Americans who continue to kill our people through drone attacks, why are we so unwilling to begin the healing process with the Baloch people and their leaders? Why are we allowing our detractors to provide support for the dissidents instead of taking the punch out of their dissidence by granting them a one-time amnesty if they accept the writ of the state? How can we rise to external military challenges posed by countries like India and the US when we are unable to deal with our own people? Our weakness lies within ourselves reflecting a psychological confidence deficit which makes the rulers aggressive and non-accommodative with the nation and timorous before external players.

The Indians and Americans are exploiting this well which is why the Indian’s are making grandiose statements about a submarine that has yet to show how it performs!


The writer is a defence analyst. Email: callstr@hotmail.com


Note : Also watch this Times of India video clip on India's JUNK weapons system

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/videoshow/4835093.cms