Vol 13, No.08 August 2013

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ARTICLES

THE TPP - BE CAUTIOUS!

.THE BODHGAYA SACRILEGE BY CHANDRA MUZAFFAR.................................P2

.COMMERCIAL COLONISATION OF AFRICA: THE NEW

WILD WEST (PART I)BY GRAHAM PEEBLES..........................................P 10

STATEMENTS

.BRITISH AID FOR MYANMAR ETHNIC CLEANSING

BY MAUNG ZARNI................................................P 6

.EGYPT: WHAT NOW?BY CHANDRA MUZAFFAR......................................P 3

.MODERATE “SHAMI” ISLAM VS WAHHABISM: SHIEKH

MOHAMAD SAEED RAMADAN AL BOUTI FINALLY PAYS FOR

HIS ANTI- SALAFISM STANCES

BY SYRIA TRIBUNE...............................................P 9

By Chandra Muzaffar

The proponents of the Trans PacificPartnership argue that the TPP

would bring huge benefits to Malaysia“with as much as US $ 40 billion (RM128.4 billion) in annual export gainsand US $ 25 billion in annual incomegains by 2025.” Small and mediumenterprises (SMEs) in particular willreap a bonanza. The TPP, it is said,will also “give Malaysia preferentialaccess to a US $ 15 trillion economy,which means access to the US $ 500billion in US government tenders.”

As against these projections, there areissues of tremendous significancepertaining to the TPP that have beenraised by a variety of citizen groups inalmost all the 12 countries (Australia,Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia,Mexico, New Zealand, Peru,Singapore, United States and Vietnam)that are currently part of the negotiationprocess. These issues have emergedas a result of leaks since no officiallysanctioned draft has been placed beforethe public. The negotiations — the 18th

round of which will commence in Kota

Kinabalu( Malaysia) on the 15th of July2013 — are shrouded in secrecythough representatives of majorcorporations such as Monsanto,Walmart, Bank of America, JP Morgan,Cargill, Exxon-Mobil, and Chevron,among others, it is alleged, have hadfull access to the draft and have been“suggesting amendments.”

One of the issues that has caused graveconcern is a set of rules in the TPPwhich apparently would empowerforeign corporations to bypassdomestic laws and courts and challengegovernment policies and regulationsaimed at protecting the public interestvia tribunals linked to the World Bank

and the UN. If this is true, it would bean affront to national sovereignty.The TPP also prohibits governmentsand central banks from imposing capitalcontrols or banning risky financialproducts. Central banks would havediminished capacity to regulate theentry and exit of speculative capital.Countries that are part of the TPP wouldbe compelled to create an even moreconducive environment for casinocapitalism. Given Malaysia’s relativesuccess in developing regulatorymechanisms during and after the 1998Asian financial crisis, this aspect of theTPP would be particularly galling.

The adverse impact of this trade pactupon national sovereignty and theeconomic well-being of countries suchas Malaysia is underscored by yetanother provision which questions ourprocurement policies. Apart fromseeking to rectify economic imbalances,government procurement policies havealso attempted to expedite technologytransfers to local industries, enhanceexport capabilities and curb foreign

.THE CONVICTION OF BRADLEY MANNING

BY BARRY GREY..................................................P 4

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L E A D A R T I C L E

exchange outflows. These are goals thatdo not conform to TPP objectives.

The TPP also allows pharmaceuticalcorporations to increase the price ofmedicines and to limit consumer accessto cheaper generic drugs. Monopolypatents would be better protected andthe purchase of generic drugs wouldbe made more difficult. At the sametime, by designating a whole spectrumof policies, regulations and practicesas “trade barriers” the proposedagreement undermines some of thepeople oriented measures associated withdifferent TPP countries. For instance, theTPP, it is alleged, upbraids the Malaysiangovernment for “requiring that slaughterplants maintain dedicated halal facilitiesand ensure segregated transportation forhalal and non-halal products.”

While some of the provisions of theTPP may be set aside at the behest ofindividual countries, it is obvious thatthe US which is the driving forcebehind the pact is determined to use itas its vehicle to strengthen itseconomic position in the Pacific regionin the face of the rise of China. Itexplains why China itself —economically the most dynamic nationin the region — has not been invited tojoin the TPP. This is why it would benaïve to view the TPP as a mereeconomic and trade arrangement. Itsunderlying motive is clearly political.It is a critical weapon in the US arsenalfor curbing and containing theemergence of a power which has thepotential of shaping the future of theentire Pacific in the decades to come.

The US will not allow this to happen.

It knows that in order to remain as theworld’s sole superpower it has toensure that it is at the helm of that oneregion with the greatest economicviability and vitality. The US already has320,000 troops in the Pacific region.That is the military arm of Pacific Power.The TPP is designed to secure theeconomic dimension of Pacific Power.

As a nation committed to harmoniousrelations among states, Malaysia shouldbe extra cautious about participating inany venture by any power, be it theUnited States or China, to enhance itshegemony over the Pacific — a regionwhose very name signifies peace.

6 July, 2013Dr. Chandra Muzaffar is thePresident of International Movementfor a Just World (JUST).

STATEMENTTHE BODHGAYA SACRILEGE

10 days after a series of blasts at thefamous Bodhgaya temple complex inBihar, India, the National InvestigationAgency (NIA) has yet to come up withany lead on who was responsible forthe dastardly deed. All that it hasproduced so far is a sketch of a personmoving suspiciously in the area beforethe 7th July incident.

Indian authorities should expediteinvestigations and nail down the culpritor culprits in the shortest possible time.As long as their identity is not known

and the motives for the heinous act arenot established clearly, rumours andsuspicions will continue to gaincurrency. They will poison relationsbetween Buddhists and people of otherfaiths not only in India but also in otherparts of the world.

All places of worship should beprotected and respected. This is whyin 2002 the International Movement fora Just World (JUST) launched aworldwide campaign to protect allplaces of worship. A Convention was

drafted for this purpose. Though anumber of prominent personalities suchas Nobel Peace Laureates, DesmondTutu and Mairead Maguire, andrenowned faith based organisationsfrom all major traditions, endorsed theConvention its impact was limited.

As a place of worship and sacred site,the Bodhgaya temple that houses theholy bodhi tree under which theBuddha attained enlightenment, and themassive Mahabodhi statue of theBuddha, has an exalted status in

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Buddhism. It is highly revered byBuddhists all over the world. UNESCOhad named it as a World Heritage sitein 2002.

It is a shame that whenever the sanctityof a place of worship or a sacred site

is violated, not many organisations orpersonalities from other religiousbackgrounds openly condemn thesacrilege. Most of the time, we appearto be concerned with only our owncommunity and its symbols andinstitutions. This is an attitude thatshould change.

To paraphrase the illustrious 13th

century Muslim poet-philosopher,Shaikh Saadi, it is only when we feelfor the suffering of the other that wecan call ourselves human.

Chandra Muzaffar17 July, 2013

EGYPT: WHAT NOW?

ARTICLES

By Chandra Muzaffar

In the wake of the military coup of July3rd 2013, the question that is on the lipsof many people is what is going tohappen now in Egypt? How will thesituation evolve? What is the future ofthe 80 million people who live in thatancient land?

It would be hazardous to try to predictthe future, given the uncertainties thatbefuddle the present. There is howeverone possible scenario that one hopeswill not be the fate of Egypt. Egyptshould not become another Algeria. Amilitary coup against the IslamicSalvation Front which had won the firstround of a democratic election in 1991in that country led eventually to an orgyof violence that lasted almost 10 yearsand left 100,000 people dead.

To avoid such a horrendouscatastrophe, the military shouldexercise maximum restraint in dealingwith supporters of deposed PresidentMorsi just as the protesters shouldrefrain from resorting to violence in

whatever form. The 55 mainly Morsisupporters killed outside theRepublican Guard Headquarters inCairo at dawn on July 8th by militarypersonnel is the sort of incident — ifit recurs in the future — that willtrigger mass, perhaps uncontrollableviolence.

If the situation does not descend intosuch violence, the current militarybacked leadership may be able toimplement its road map: a referendumon amendments to the presentConstitution, followed by aParliamentary Election in about sixmonths and then a Presidential Election.Apart from ensuring that the outcomeof the referendum is in its favour, themilitary would be keen on gainingcontrol of the legislature and installingits own candidate as President.

For the military to achieve its post-couppolitical agenda there is a vitalprerequisite. It has to deliver on theeconomy. If within the next six to ninemonths, it shows that it is capable ofproviding jobs, checking the cost ofliving, ensuring a regular supply of waterand energy to various parts of Cairo, andmeeting some of the demands foraffordable housing, it would gain adegree of credibility and win theconfidence of a segment of the citizenry.

But even if there is some economic

improvement and a measure of politicalstability, it is quite conceivable that thefundamental challenges facing theEgyptian people will remain. Since themilitary will retain real power, anyattempt at creating democraticstructures of governance would bemerely cosmetic. It will continue toprotect its almost 40% stake in theEgyptian economy which in itself is animpediment to economic reform. At thesame time, the military can also beexpected to pursue the type of cronycapitalism which characterised theMubarak regime and which bredmassive corruption.

The military will remain as committedas ever to preserving, and perhapseven strengthening, its close ties toboth Saudi Arabia and Israel. Indeed,it has been argued by some analyststhat it was Morsi’s opposition to adam project which Saudi Arabia andIsrael favoured that was the last strawthat broke the camel’s back. Theproject seeks to divert the waters ofthe Nile to Israel. A month before hisouster, Morsi had apparently declaredthat, “We have very serious measuresto protect every drop of Nile water.”It is reported that the dam is nowscheduled for completion in 2017.

As critical as its relationship to thesecountries are the military’s deep ties

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with Washington. It is well-known thatit receives an annual US aid packageof 1.5 billion dollars. The US has merelysuspended but not cancelled (which iswhat it should have done) its shipmentof four F-16 fighter planes to theEgyptian military. In fact, by refusingto describe Morsi’s overthrow as acoup, the Obama Administration issending a clear message to the post-coup leadership— whose pivotalfigure, General Abdul-Fattah el-Sisi, isclose to Washington and Riyadh— thatit is on the side of the military, itslongstanding, most trusted ally inEgypt.

If this is the possible scenario in theevent of a military backed leadershipperching itself in power after electionsnext year, how would Morsi’s Ikhwan-ul-Muslimin, the Muslim Brotherhood,address domestic and externalchallenges on the off chance that itemerges victorious in the polls? TheIkhwan, there’s no need to emphasise,has to adopt a different approach, evendisplay an altogether differentmindset, if it is to transform Egyptiansociety. To start with, it has to be morestrategic in dealing with the military. A

head-on collision with the latter willnot serve the interests of Ikhwan orthe nation. Perhaps, the Ikhwan shouldtake a leaf from the book of TurkishPrime Minister, Recep Erdogan, onhow he succeeded to emasculate thepowerful military over a decade.

Part of the strategy should be a totallyinclusive approach to politics andsociety. Inclusiveness does not merelymean offering important positions toliberal and left leaders which is whatMorsi tried to do. It means listeningand responding to all sections ofsociety, and not just confining one’sinteraction to Ikhwan’s constituency.Absorbing the values and attitudes ofdiverse elements in society wouldinvariably demand that certain aspectsof one’s dogma be set aside. It waspartly because Morsi and the Freedomand Justice Party established byIkhwan was not able to transcenddogma that they alienated segments ofthe female population and the artisticcommunity.

Perhaps it was also because of itsattachment to dogma, that it failed toprioritise the economic woes of thepeople. Its emphasis was upon

securing an IMF loan and obtaining aidfrom wealthy neighbours such as Qatarand Saudi Arabia. It was not able tofocus upon the implementation of itsAn-Nahda (Renaissance) economicprogramme, partly because of thepolitical environment.

There was also a great deal ofinconsistency in Ikhwan’s foreignpolicy. On the one hand, it offeredmoral support to Hamas; on the otherhand, it closed down an undergroundtunnel to Gaza presumably at the behestof Israel. Initially, Morsi sought toreach out to Iran. Shortly before hisouster, he ordered the closure of theSyrian Embassy in Cairo in a bid toplease the sponsors of the Syrian rebelsin the region such as Qatar, Saudi Arabiaand Turkey and their Western patrons.In both its foreign and domestic andpolicies, the Ikhwan appeared to lack aclear, coherent vision which could betranslated into specific policies.

If this is the situation vis-a-vis themilitary, on the one hand, and theIkhwan, on the other, what hope isthere for the Egyptian people?

22 July, 2013

THE CONVICTION OF BRADLEY MANNING: A TRAVESTY OF JUSTICEBy Barry Grey

The guilty verdict handed downTuesday in the court-martial of whistle-blower Bradley Manning is a travestyof justice. The judge, Col. Denise Lind,found the 25-year-old Army privateguilty of 19 of the 21 counts lodgedagainst him, including five countsunder the 1917 Espionage Act.

Manning faces a prison term of up to136 years in the sentencing phase ofthe trial that begins today at FortMeade, Maryland.

Manning‘s acquittal on the charge of“aiding the enemy,” which carries a

potential death sentence, reflects theawareness of the military and theObama administration of the broadpopular opposition to the proceedingsagainst the young soldier. At the sametime, it underscores the fraudulent

character of the entire trial.

The prosecution denounced Manningas a “traitor” and charged him withaiding Al Qaeda and carrying outespionage even though there were noallegations that he handed overinformation to any foreign governmentor terrorist organization. Instead, in asinister and unprecedented attempt tomake the revealing of governmentsecrets potentially a capital crime andundermine First Amendment guaranteesof speech and press freedom, thegovernment argued that any leaking of

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classified information constitutedespionage because the informationcould be accessed by those deemed tobe enemies.

As the government well knows, the“enemy” for whose benefit Manningcourageously exposed proof of USwar crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan,was the American people.

Manning’s conviction, particularly onespionage charges, establishes areactionary precedent that will be usedagainst whistle-blowers and journalistsin the future.

Of all the revelations made byWikiLeaks on the basis of materialsupplied by Manning, the one that mostinfuriated Obama and the military wasthe video posted on YouTube in April2010 showing the wanton and cold-blooded killing of unarmed civilians andreporters in Baghdad by an Americanhelicopter gunship. That incidentgraphically summed up the criminalnature of the war.

The US ruling elite was all the morefrightened that the broad opposition tothe wars in Iraq and Afghanistan wasfinding expression among a section ofrank-and-file soldiers.

The response of the Obamaadministration was to imprisonManning for more than three yearsbefore any charges were laid, keepinghim for much of that period in solitaryconfinement and subjecting him tocruel and abusive conditions that werecondemned by human rightsorganizations around the world astantamount to torture.

The trial itself was a legal farce. It was ashow trial aimed at intimidating popularopposition to the wars and furthersubordinating an already cowed press.

It is largely because of the cowardice ofthe official media and its complicity incovering up government lies and crimesthat individuals such as Manning andNational Security Agency whistle-blowerEdward Snowden have been compelledto sacrifice their freedom and jeopardizetheir lives to get the truth out to thepublic.

Manning’s court-martial, in the finalanalysis, arises from Washington’slaunching of an illegal war ofaggression against Iraq and the attemptof the government to conceal all of thecrimes—torture at Abu Ghraib andother US prisons, the destruction ofFallujah and other Iraqi cities, theincitement of a sectarian civil war—that arose from that war.

Because the wars in Iraq andAfghanistan were criminal enterprises,based on lies, none of the allegationsagainst Manning, who sought toexpose the criminal character of thosewars, has any legal or moral substance.

Under the principles established by theNuremberg Tribunal, which tried andconvicted Nazi leaders after World WarII, it should be Obama and other topUS civilian and military leaders whoare standing in the dock, rather thanManning. The chief prosecutor atNuremberg, Supreme Court JusticeRobert Jackson, insisted that thecentral crime committed by thedefendants, and the source of all othercrimes, was the preparation and

waging of wars of aggression.

The Obama administration is guilty ofthis crime not only in Iraq andAfghanistan, but also in Libya andSyria, and it is preparing further andeven bloodier wars against regimesdeemed to be obstacles to thegeostrategic and financial interests ofthe American ruling class, includingIran and China.

In April of 2011, while Manning waslanguishing in prison, Obama said ofthe Army private: “We are a nation oflaws. We don’t let individuals makedecisions about how the law operates.He broke the law.”

Not only did this statement from thechief executive make a mockery of anyclaim to due process in the Manningcase, it came from a president who hasbeen caught shredding the USConstitution and the democratic rightsguaranteed in its Bill of Rights. It is wellknown that Obama is presiding over amassive and illegal spying operationagainst the American people andmillions more around the world, thathe oversees a program of droneassassinations, including of Americancitizens, and sanctions the use of force-feeding and other forms of tortureagainst detainees at Guantanamo andother US gulags.

The American president is engaged inthe erection of the framework of apolice state within the United States.The vindictive prosecution of BradleyManning and the international with-huntagainst Edward Snowden andWikiLeaks founder Julian Assange arebound up with the preparations forrepression on a mass scale againstsocial and political opposition.

31 July, 2013Barry Grey is a regular contributor toWorld Socialist Web Site.Source: wsws.org

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By Maung ZarniBRITISH AID FOR MYANMAR ETHNIC CLEANSING

Britain, the largest donor country andformer colonizer of Myanmar, iseffectively aiding and abetting theunfolding “ethnic cleansing” of MuslimRohingya by helping to finance thecountry’s controversial 2014 nationalcensus.

Ex-general and head of Myanmar’squasi-civilian government Thein Seinmade an official visit to Britain thisweek, during which his hostsannounced a new 30 million-pound(US$45.6 million) developmentassistance package and resumption ofarms sales. One third of that amountis earmarked to bankroll the formercolony’s census, “which is essential tomake sure support is getting to thosewho need it more”, according to anofficial British government statement.

Because Thein Sein’s government isforcing the Rohingya people to registeras “Bengali”, a continuation of adecades-old policy of stripping theRohingya of both their citizenship andethnic identity, Britain’s financialsupport for this process is troubling.The coming census will no doubt beused to reinforce this racist policy andpractice of forcibly registering the self-referenced Rohingya and erasing thefact that the Rohingya as an ethnicnationality group ever existed inMyanmar.

During a question and answer sessionfollowing his beautifully written, liberalsounding speech at the Royal Instituteof International Affairs, or ChathamHouse, Thein Sein was emphatic abouthis government’s policy towards theestimated 800,000 to one millionRohingya whose cultural, economicand historical roots can be found onboth sides of the once East Bengal andformer Arakan State.

He stated that “to use the termRohingya, in our ethnic history we donot have the term Rohingya”. Thisofficial denial and the racist policies thatperpetuate the marginalization of theRohingya is tantamount to ethnocide,a blatant erasure of a verifiable fact thata distinct ethnic community, with allits typical sociological fluidity, existsin Myanmar.

Gregory Stanton of George MasonUniversity, who is president ofGenocide Watch and a world renownedscholar in genocide studies, sees inMyanmar’s mistreatment of theRohingya a Nazi-like “us versus them”classification in which the dominantgroup and its political state dish outdiscrimination, mistreatment andeventually “final solutions”.

In his influential essay entitled “TheEight Stages of Genocide”, Stantonwrites: “We treat different categoriesof people differently. Racial and ethnicclassifications may be defined byabsurdly detailed laws - the NaziNuremberg laws, the “one (Africanblood) drop” laws of segregation inAmerica, or apartheid racialclassification laws in South Africa.”

Classification is universal across allcultures and political systems.However, when it is carried out in amilitaristic state with a deeply

Islamophobic “Buddhist” society suchas the present-day Myanmar, there isonly a short jump between thedeliberate act of mis-classifying theRohingya as “illegal Bengali” or“Bengalis” and being dehumanized as“viruses”, “ogres” or the local languageequivalent of “niggers”. The next stageis mass violence with state impunityagainst a given dehumanized community.

That is precisely what has happenedto the Rohingyas of western Myanmarsince 1978. In February that year, theBurma Socialist Programme Party-ledgovernment, a one-party, one-mandictatorship under General Ne Win,launched the country’s first large-scaleethnic cleansing operation. Known asthe Na-Ga-Min, or King of the Snakes,operation, inter-ministerial and inter-agency units from police, customs,immigration, army, navy, intelligence,civil administration and the homeministry’s religious affairs departmentwere mobilized against the Rohingya.

Even the government’s conservativeestimate put the number of Rohingyawho fled to neighboring, newlyindependent Bangladesh at 150,000;other independent sources put thefigure much higher. Since then theRohingya have been living in securitygrids where virtually every aspect oftheir lives is severely restricted andmonitored as a matter of policy.

A cursory glance at doctor-patientratios, adult illiteracy and mortality ratesamong children under five speaksvolume about the policy-induced direconditions under which the Rohingyaare forced to live. The doctor-patientratio for the Rohingya in northernRakhine State is 1:83,000, adultilliteracy is over 90%, and the mortalityrate for under-five children is twice as

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high as Myanmar’s already very highnational average.

No longer able to endure decades ofmyriad forms of sexual violence,summary execution, forced labor,extortions, and other means of abuse,many Rohingya families - includingwomen, children and the elderly - haveattempted to flee the country, willinglyrisking their lives in rickety boats onthe Andaman Sea and facing anuncertain future as stateless people incountries as varied as Canada,Australia, Thailand, Malaysia andneighboring Bangladesh.

Unconscionable policyEthnocide may sound like esotericacademic jargon but its consequencesare grave and of growing internationalconcern. A policy of ethnocide sets theideological and social-psychologicalstage for an otherwise peaceful peopleto carry out unspeakable andunconscionable atrocities against thosewhom they have been trained toconsider an existential threat.

The military-controlled state inMyanmar - now headed by ex-generalThein Sein and his quasi-civiliangovernment in Naypyidaw - has bothpaved the way for and carried outethnic cleansing of the Rohingya.Ethnocide of the Rohingya hasempowered the racist, ultra-nationalistsamong the local Buddhist Rakhine,national leaders and Buddhist societyat large to dehumanize the Rohingya.

The fact that Thein Sein feltcomfortable enough to repeat hisgovernment’s ethnocidal stance on theRohingya at the prestigious ChathamHouse should ring alarm bells amongthe British public. His speech spokevolumes about the extent to whichMyanmar’s former colonial master hasbecome officially complicit in the

atrocities against the Rohingya,London’s expressed “human rightsconcerns” notwithstanding.

Apparently designed to hit Britain’ssubliminal colonial guilt, Thein Seinframed the Rohingya as a problemwhich the former British colonyinherited from the Raj upon achievingindependence in 1948. In Thein Sein’swords: “During the colonialadministration there was a migrationof economic migrants from othercountries into the Rakhine State(formerly known as Arakan) to workon the lands... So they grew their cropsand then they did the harvest and thenthey went back home. But later on theydecided to settle in the region. Duringthe colonial administration there were50,000 Muslims in that region... Nowwe have 800,000 Muslim populationin the region. That of course caused alot of tension.”

Colonial-era statistics have provenmore often than not unreliable and theracial conceptualizations andclassifications on which thesedemographic data rest were often fullof racist and pseudo-scientificmethodologies that were part and parcelof colonial rule. In 1824, the year ofthe British annexation of the Arakan,itself a pre-British feudal colony thatwas depopulated by both Buddhists andMuslims by repressive militaryconquest, around one-third of thepopulation of Arakan was Muslim,according to colonial records.

Today, out of the estimated threemillion who live in Rakhine State,around a third are Muslim. This ishardly a demographic threat to the localRakhines and certainly not a nationalthreat to the predominantly Buddhistcountry of 50-plus million people.Beyond the numbers’ games, there areother people-centered - as opposed tonation state-centric - perspectives that

are far more convincing and far closerto Arakan’s historical realities than isThein Sein’s dubious explanation.

In a public seminar on the Rohingyaheld at Columbia University inSeptember last year, Amartya Sen, theworld renowned Bengali philosopherand economist and Harvard Universityprofessor, perceptively observed: “TheRohingya did not come to Burma. ButBurma came to the Rohingya.”

Like other borderland ethno-culturalcommunities, the Rohingya as a peoplecan be found on both sides of theborders of modern nation states,namely the former Burma, which since1989 has been known as Myanmar, andformer East Pakistan, which since1971 has been known as Bangladesh.The boundaries of once boundary-lessfeudal kingdoms, many characterizedby fluctuating territorial control andadministrative powers, were abruptlylocked and divided into post-colonialnation states.

In fact, there is nothing strange orpersecution-worthy about numerousethno-cultural and linguisticcommunities being split and scatteredacross these manufactured borders asnation states emerged out of wars,conflicts and other processes ofexploitation. Even in the case ofMyanmar, there are other groups suchas the Chin, Kachin, Karenni, Mon,Shan, Tai, and, yes, even the BuddhistRakhine, who also belong to differentneighboring nation states. Notably,none of these communities are facingethnocide or genocide by Thailand,Laos, Bangladesh, India or China.

Twisted historyThe truth is that the Rohingya werenot always denied their existence bythe Myanmar state. In contrast to TheinSein’s ethnocidal perspective, and inspite of the contemporary debates as

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continued from page 7to whether the Rohingya are historicalor ancestral “children of the land”, foursuccessive Myanmar governments -the parliamentary democracygovernment of prime minister U Nu(1948-58), the caretaker governmentof General Ne Win (1958-60), theUnion Government of premier U Nu(1960-62) and General Ne Win’s earlymilitary government, namely theRevolutionary Council (1962-74) - hadall officially recognized the Rohingyaas a distinct ethno-cultural community.

The Rohingya had their own nationalethnic language program based at thestate’s sole national broadcastingservice (Burma Broadcasting Service,or BBS) alongside other national ethniclanguage programs such as Shan,Lahu, Bama and others. The officialsocial studies textbooks described themas Myanmar’s Rohingya ethnicnationality and placed them on theethnic map of the country.

The household lists and nationalidentification cards bore the word“Rohingya” for those who self-identified as such. All cabinet officesof these aforementioned governmentsused the word “Rohingya” in theirofficial dispatches and records, whilesenior military generals in the ministryof defense addressed the Rohingyacommunity and its religious leaders as‘esteemed Rohingya leaders’ in theformer’s public remarks and speeches.The government’s official BurmeseEncyclopedia (published in 1964, twoyears after the military governmentcame to power) had a specific sectionon the Rohingyas of northern districtsof the country.

Since the first genocidal operationagainst the Rohingya in February 1978,successive military leaderships havebeen relentless in their drive to cleansewestern Myanmar of the ethnic groupwhom they now derisively and officially

insist on calling “Bengali” - both fromstate discourse and from the land.Ethnocide began under Ne Win’swhimsical dictatorship, which wassteeped in nationalist and anti-colonialideologies that justified draconianpolicies towards the Rohingya. As aresult, Myanmar now has an apartheidsystem for the Rohingya, who havesurvived various waves of ethniccleansing since 1978.

Instead of confronting Thein Sein overhis past and present role in the ethnocideand ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya,the British government instead gave 10million pounds for his government’s2014 census, a project that will almostsurely drive the final nail into the coffinof the Rohingyas’ existence inMyanmar.

This also puts Britain’s plan to involvethe British Ministry of Defense intraining Myanmar’s armed forces in theareas of human rights and civil-militaryrelations in a new light. For while Britishofficials talk of human rights andaccountability in military classrooms,they will simultaneously be financing acensus that will be used to facilitateethnic cleansing with British tax-payers’money.

For those familiar with Britain’sinternational trajectory, its decision tohelp fund Myanmar’s ethnocidalcensus, which in turn will be technicallyassisted by the United NationsPopulation Fund, should not come as asurprise. Nor should the Britishgovernment’s decision to reward TheinSein with the export of made-in-UKarms worth $5 million. Foreign Officespin-masters will, one can be sure, soonbe justifying this questionable arms dealas one to help end the country’s ethnicconflicts.

On July 19, 1947, made-in-Englandbullets killed independence hero AungSan and a group of the country’s co-

founders in a British-assisted butlocally carried out assassination. AungSan, a staunch anti-imperialistnationalist, was then seen as anobstacle to the unfettered pursuit ofBritain’s post-colonial, post-WorldWar II commercial and strategicinterests in Myanmar.

Sixty years on, the resumption ofexport of made-in-UK arms to TheinSein’s military-backed, genocidalregime sends an ominous signal tothose ethnic and religious minoritieswho may not be as open to Britishofficial and corporate interests as theethnic Burman military generals andtheir cronies.

In pursuit of its own hidden and not-so-hidden strategic and corporateinterests, Britain is simply repeatingthe old colonial policy of ethnic divideand exploit. In the days of the BritishRaj of the 19th and early 20thcenturies, the British pursued theirimperialist aims and interests throughthe use of the country’s non-Buddhistethnic minorities along the country’sborderlands, then referred to as the“frontier peoples”.

In 2013, Britain’s new design inMyanmar is about pursuing Britishinterests through the dominant“Buddhist” generals and theirrepressive state while looking theother way when their colonial eraethnic instruments, namely the frontieror borderland ethnic peoples of theRohingya, Karen, Kachin, and othersare being further marginalized,militarily overwhelmed or ethnicallycleansed.

19 July, 2013Muang Zarni is a Burmese dissidentblogger and a Visiting Fellow at theCivil Society and Human SecurityResearch Unit at the London Schoolof Economics.Source: www.atimes.org

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By Syria Tribune

MODERATE “SHAMI” ISLAM VS WAHHABISM: SHIEKH MOHAMAD SAEED

RAMADAN AL BOUTI FINALLY PAYS FOR HIS ANTI- SALAFISM STANCES

The suicide explosion that took the lifeof Sheikh Mohamad Saeed RamadanAl Bouti among 42 others in Damascusyesterday (21 March 2013) is not aSyrian crisis incident. This eventcommemorates a struggle that has beengoing for the past 35 years for Al Boutiin person and the past one and a halfmillennia for Islam itself.

A research long overdue, much likethe explosion itselfBefore I start this short journey inancient and recent Islamic history, Iwould like to emphasize that I am asecular researcher. I spent 7 years inSudan under the rule of the IslamicFront (now called the NationalCongress of Sudan). The SudaneseIslamic Front is one of the differentfaces of political Islam that conqueredthe Arab World during the second halfof the 20th Century. The mother of allthese political Islam movements is theone and only Muslim Brotherhood,who ruled of Egypt explicitly untilrecently, and a few other countriesunder different names.

This research is long overdue; speciallyfrom a person who considers himselfan expert in Islamic movements in theMiddle East and North Africa. Thebloody events in Damascus yesterdaypushed me to write this article, but thisis just step one in a series of articles onthis important issue.

As for the explosion in Damascusyesterday, it is also long overdue. AlBouti has been the sworn enemy ofSalafism and Muslim Brotherhoodmilitia since the early 80s of the pastcentury. Read on to know why.

Historical rootsThe term Salafism appeared for the first

time in the 13th century in theteachings of the controversial Islamicscholar Ibn Taymiyyah. IbnTaymiyyah called upon Muslims to goback to the way their great ancestors(in Arabic: Al Salaf Al Saleh, hence theterm Salafism) used to understandIslam. What he wanted was to rid Islamof what he called foreign influence onIslam, which was the natural order ofhistory, given the interaction betweenMuslims and the wide variety of culturesin areas conquered by the Islamic state.Ibn Taymiyyah is the God Father of theconcept of Islamic Sharia rule, and themost prominent scholar whose teachingsinfluenced political Islam movements.

In the 18th century, Mohamad bin AbdAl Wahhab, the creator of modernSalafism, Wahhabism (after him),restructured Salafism in light of modernlife, and established what will later be theruling doctrine for all political Islammovements. The turning point inWahhabism was the alliance with IbnSaud, the founder of the Saudi dynastystill ruling the Kingdom of Saudi Arabiauntil today.

Meanwhile in DamascusDamascus has always been a meltingpot where various cultures anddoctrines mixed to form a uniquedamascene form of Islam. It is worthmentioning that Ibn Taymiyyah wasjailed several times in Damascus.

Damascus Islamic scholars at that timedid not agree with his extreme views,and they kept confronting him till hedied in jail.

The damascene version of Islam wasclosely linked to Sufism, a mysticalmethod that focuses on the spiritualaspects of the religion rather than thepolitical ones. Damascus still has thetomb of Mohey El Din Ibn Arabi, oneof the most prominent Sufi scholars inhistory, and the founder of the AkbariSufi method. Unlike Ibn Taymiyyah andAbdul Wahhab, Ibn Arabi was aphilosopher and researcher, not a salafifollower.

Damascus is also linked to the Ashaarimethod, a follower of which is IbnRushd, one of the most prominentphilosophers in the history ofhumankind.

So damascene or “Shami” Islam ishistorically different of that of Salafismand Wahhabism. This could help thereader understand the conflict betweenAl Bouti and Salafi scholars. Al Bouti wasnot happy about the Muslim Brotherhoodinfluence on the International Union ofMuslim Scholars, headed by Aljazeera’sspokesperson, Sheikh Yusuf Al Qaradawi,so he established the Union of ShamLand Scholars.

Al Bouti vs the MuslimBrotherhoodIn the late 70s and early 80s of thepast century, the Muslim Brotherhoodattempted toppling the Baath regimeand late President Hafiz Al Assad. Asconfessed by their leader Riyad AlShakfeh on the BBC, they usedterrorism in their attempt. They werealso backed by regional and

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COMMERCIAL COLONISATION OF AFRICA: THE NEW WILD WEST (PART I)By Graham Peebles

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international powers, from SaddamHussein to the BBC itself back then.They used the media to portray theevents as a peaceful uprising (muchlike 2011), and a recently released CIAdocument revealed that the numbersof causalities in those events wasextremely exaggerated.

Mohamad Saeed Ramadan Al Bouti, backthen a young Muslim scholar, took theother side. The Brotherhood accused AlBouti of taking the side of the regime forbeneficial purposes, but he explainedseveral times that the disagreement withthe Brotherhood was on the doctrineitself, not on politics.

Since then. Al Bouti became the icon ofShami Islam. He was given all the supportby the Syrian regime to spread his versionof moderate and fraternal Islam, to theextent that he used to appear on thenational TV confronting secularresearchers, like the televised debate withDr. Tayeb Tizini in 1990. He also engagedin several debates with secular Syrianresearcher Nabeel Fayyad. Thosedebates took the form of a book for abook, where Fayyad would write a book

criticizing Islam, give it to Al Bouti inperson, then Al Bouti would write a bookin answer to that book*.

Therefore, Al Bouti was an example of amoderate scholar, who acceptedcriticism, and answered discussion withmore discussion. He is known for nevercalling anyone infidel, and never claimingthe right to judge people’s rights of lifeand freedom. This does not go well withthe Salafi doctrine that calls forpurification of Muslim society by gettingrid of all infidels. Infidels here referringnot only to non-Muslims, but also to anywho disagrees with Salafism.

The Syrian “Revolution”: Amovement supported by SalafischolarsSince the events started in Syria, Salafischolars played an important role in callingfor people to revolt. They played on thesectarian string, and incited people tosupport the “revolution” with money andweapons. The most important Salafiroles came from Al Qaradawi, who hasa carte blanche on Aljazeera, and a SyrianShiekh named Adnan Al Arour. Both AQaradawi and Al Arour attacked Al Boutiseveral times.

On March 21st, coinciding withNowruz day, a national Kurdishholiday, Sheikh Mohamad SaeedRamadan Al Bouti (of Kurdish origin)was assassinated in his mosque, with42 of his students. His death wascelebrated by many revolutionary pagesMoreover, They are now threateningAl Bouti’s son, Tawfeek.

To us in Syria Tribune, this is not anincident related to the Syrian crisis only.This commemorates a long strugglebetween Al Bouti and the Wahhabischolars, and between the damasceneversion of moderate Islam andextremism.

* Fayyad wrote his book “Hiwarat”(Dialogues) in answer to Al Bouti’sbook “Hazihi Moshkilatohom” (Theseare Their Problems). On his Facebookpage, Fayyad testified that he took thebook to Al Bouti before publishing it,but Al Bouti refused to read it before itwas published, so it would not looklike censorship.

22 March, 2013Source: www.syria-tribune.com

Dancing to the tune of their corporatebenefactors, governments of the rulingG8 countries are enacting complexagriculture agreements delivering largetracts of prime cut African soil into theportfolios of their multinationalbedmates.

Desperate for foreign investment,countries throughout Africa are at themercy of their new colonial masters –national and international agrochemicalcorporations, fighting for land, waterand control of the world’s foodsupplies. Driven overwhelmingly by

self-interest and profit, the current cropof ‘investors’ differ little from theircolonial ancestors. The means may havechanged, but the aim – to rape andpillage, no matter the sincere sounding

rhetoric, remains more or less thesame.

Regarded by her northern guides asagriculturally underperforming, Sub-Saharan Africa is seen as The AfricanCentre for Biosafety (ACB), as a “newfrontier”, a place to “make profits, withan eye on land, food and biofuels inparticular”. Africa, then, is the newWild West; smallholder farmers andindigenous people are the nativesIndians, the multi nationals and theirdemocratically elected representatives

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– or salesmen - the settlers.

Various initiatives offering what is,indisputably much needed ‘supportand investment’ are flowing north tosouth. Key amongst these is The NewAlliance for Food Security andNutrition in Africa (NAFSNA),designed by the governments of theeight richest economies, for some ofthe poorest countries in the world. TheNew Alliance was born out of the G8summit in May 2012 at Camp Davidand, according to, War on Want(WoW), “has been modelled on the‘new vision’ of private investment inagriculture developed by managementconsultants McKinsey in conjunctionwith the ABCD group of leading graintraders (ADM, Bunge, Cargill and LouisDreyfus) and other multinationalagribusiness companies.” It has beenwritten in honourable terms to sitcomfortably within the Africa Union’sComprehensive African AgriculturalDevelopment Programme (CAADP),bestowing an aura of internationalcredibility.

The New Alliance… in land and seedappropriation

At first glance, The New Alliance, withits altruistically-gilded aims, appears tobe a worthy development. Whoamongst us could argue with theintention as reported by the UnitedNations (UN), to “achieve sustainedand inclusive agricultural growth andraise 50 million people out of povertyover the next 10 years”. The means toachieving this noble quest however, areskewed, ignoring the rights and needsof small-holder farmers and the wishesof local people – who are not consultedduring the heady negotiations withgovernment officials local and national,and the multi zillion $ corporations whoare swarming to buy their ancestralland. Alliance contracts and deals-donefavour wealthy investors, revealing the

underlying, unjust G8 initiativesobjective, to “open up Africanagriculture to multinationalagribusiness companies by means ofnational ‘cooperation frameworks’between African governments, donorsand private sector investors”.

Poverty reduction (the principal statedaim of the Alliance), will be achievedwe are told, not by rational methodsof sharing and re-distribution, but byUSAID “aligning the commitments ofAfrica’s leadership to drive effectivecountry plans and policies for foodsecurity”. ‘Plans and policies’, draftedno doubt in the hallowed meetingrooms of those driving the ‘NewAlliance’: the G8 governments andtheir cohorts including The World Bankand, pulling the policy strings, theagriculture companies sitting behindthem, nestling alongside thepharmaceutical giants and the armsindustry magnates. With Africangovernments anxious to eat at the headtable, or at least be invited into thecocktail chamber they have little choicebut to sign up to such unbalanced‘plans and policies’.

To date, nine African countries (froma continent of 54 nation states), havecommitted to The New Alliance. Firstto sign up were, Tanzania, Ghana andthe West’s favoured ally in the region,Ethiopia – where wide ranging humanrights violations, including forceddisplacement and rapes havereportedly accompanied land sales,and where over 250,000 people inGambella have been forced into theOrwellian sounding ‘VillagizationProgrammes’. Then came BurkinaFaso, Mozambique and Cote d’Ivoire,followed by Benin, Malawi, andNigeria. It is an agreement drippingwith strings that promise to entanglethe innocent and uninformed. After“wide-ranging consultations on landand farming”, with officials frompotential partner countries, the results

of which were “ignored in theagreements with the G8”, deals“between African governments andprivate companies were facilitated bythe World Economic Forum”, behind,The Guardian reportS, “firmly closeddoors.”

Conditional to investment promised byThe New Alliance, African leaders,USAID tell us are ‘committed’ –‘forced’ may be a better word - “torefine [government] policies in orderto improve investment opportunities”.In plain English, African countries arerequired to change their trade andagriculture laws to include ending thefree distribution of seeds, relax the taxsystem and national export controls andopen the doors for profit repatriation(allowing the money as well as thecrops to be exported). In Mozambique,as elsewhere across the continent, localfarmers have been evicted from theirland under land sales agreements, andThe Guardian (10/06/2013) reports, “isnow obliged to write new lawspromoting what its agreement calls“partnerships” of this kind”. A pollutedterm, disguising the real relationshipbetween African governments and themulti-national ‘investors’, which is closerto master and maid than equalcollaborators.

27 June, 2013

Part II of this article will be publishedin the September 2013 issue of theJUST Commentary.Graham Peebles is Director of TheCreate Trust, www.thecreatetrust.org,A UK registered charity. Runningeducation and social developmentprogrammes, supporting fundamentalSocial change and the human rights ofindividuals in acute need.Source: countercurrents.org

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