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Sunday,
June 3, 2001, Chandigarh, India  
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 “SO many foreigners!” exclaim visitors to this green and pleasant — aside from mad cows and countryside plagues— land. Kosovans, Chinese, representatives from every district of the subcontinent, Afghan tribesmen, Brazilians, East Asians seem to throng every street corner in what looks like an open-door immigration policy. “And we had such trouble getting a visa,” add the visitors.
Finance Minister of
Malaysia quits USA may not lift sanctions against Pak |
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Celibacy the rule in orbit
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Ferozepore man Green Party candidate “SO many foreigners!” exclaim visitors to this green and pleasant — aside from mad cows and countryside plagues— land. Kosovans, Chinese, representatives from every district of the subcontinent, Afghan tribesmen, Brazilians, East Asians seem to throng every street corner in what looks like an open-door immigration policy. “And we had such trouble getting a visa,” add the visitors. The recent riots in Manchester, National Fronters assaulting pregnant Bangladeshi women, William Hague promising rationalisation of asylum seekers are these responses inevitable in view of daily reports that thousands of third-world immigrants are smuggling themselves into Britain gobbling down scarce resources and claiming political asylum when their real motive is economic ambition? Mr Pritam Singh, Green Party candidate for East Oxford, lecturer, founder member of the International Journal of Punjab Studies, activist in the Anti-Nazi League, is a man of passionate convictions. “Why shouldn’t people want to improve their lives? Our future is a multi-cultural society because that is the reality today. Demographic changes in western Europe mean a desperate shortage of skilled workers, hospital staff, IT personnel, even English teachers. A headteacher in London told me that she had to fill two teaching posts for English with a Bangladeshi and a South African as there were no qualified native applicants. Governments everywhere will have to recognise that if capital is universally mobile, then labour must be as well. After all, a hundred years ago there were no visas — history is full of migrations. And look how much immigrants contribute to this society. They come in the prime of life and they make a net contribution by working longer hours and under demanding conditions...” Three days of ugly street rioting in Manchester has left everyone in a state of shock. How would Mr Pritam act if the scenes were repeated in Oxford? His solution would be to get people to talk, even if the dialogue were angry and confrontational. “Dialogue is the best way to settle problems. The situation now is very different from a few years ago. Young Asians are feeling aggrieved for their parents’ sake. They are a lot more confident than the older generation and are not willing to put up with being ignored or patronised. There is also a lot of bitterness because of the high unemployment and lack of opportunities up north. The police needs to be closely monitored. They are not always as quick to defend Asians against attacks.” A Jat Sikh from Ferozepore district, Mr Pritam has been staying in Oxford since the late eighties. Open-faced, unassuming and innocent of the politician’s camouflaged agenda, he is in the happy position of saying what he believes. “Of course I’m not going to win this time. But perhaps the election after this...I’m convinced the Green Party will be mainstream in less than 20 years. Look at Germany. Who would have thought the Green-supported Socialist candidate would win Paris a few months ago?” The English Greens are the oldest established green party in Europe. They have representation in the House of Lords, three elected members of the Greater London Assembly, some of the most interesting candidates, but no leader and their budget is a tiny £40,000 compared to the Tory and Labour £ 15 million. Their case looks pretty hopeless but Mr Pritam thinks that when proportional representation comes (as it’s bound to one of these days) things will look up. At one time he was a Maoist (during his student days at Panjab University, when in 1971 he was jailed and tortured) then he turned Trotskyite at JNU. But these days he is a lecturer of economics and environment studies at Oxford Brookes University. Politically he describes himself as a socialist green. He loves his job and is popular with his students. Mr Pritam has not felt marginalised even when occasional pangs of not truly belonging to England hit him. “It’s the way I speak,” he says with disarming candour. He feels his Punjabi consonants catch him out and it is his consciousness of such a minor idiosyncracy that reveals an endearing vulnerability and transparency. “Now my daughter Tanya sounds like a native and she doesn’t look particularly Indian so people react in a different way to her. But I can honestly say that I feel at home in this place. We Asians are such a big community here. Visiting you is like going to a friend’s house in Chandigarh. Especially since I became involved in the Green Party, I feel that I have really struck roots. I would never been invited to run for Parliament in India — I wouldn’t have had the connections or the money. But here, even a university lecturer can contest an election. The main political parties, Labour or Conservative, didn’t interest me because they have nothing radical to say. But Green is the politics of the future. So many protocols need to be agreed internationally and globally, the environment, nuclear power and weapons, child labour. We have to think globally and act locally”. Public apathy has been cited as the main reason for the sluggish response to the political process. Has he got a magic formula for getting people interested and involved? He things that the public is fed up with politicians and their distancing from day to day reality but believes that everyone can be made to hook into the political process at different levels — some with local concerns, like the floods this last winter or traffic congestion in central Oxford, others on larger issues such as nuclear power and human rights. The Green Party is committed to encouraging organic farming and banning GM crops, to investing in public transport and discouraging private car use. How “green” is Pritam himself “I use my car reluctantly but I’ve started cycling up that steep hill to the university campus. At home we eat almost exclusively organically grown produce and I recycle all my papers, bottles and cans.” How does his party intend to confront the multinational giants whose globalisation of trade and economics are responsible for most of the world’s environmental degradation? “By supporting local shops and businesses, providing subsidies and other types of support in order to increase their competitiveness and try impose environment and labour standards on large companies.” |
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Finance Minister of Malaysia quits Kuala Lumpur, June 2 Mr Mahathir Mohammad said he received Mr Zainuddin’s resignation letter yesterday and that he had accepted the resignation. He said Mr Zainuddin did not give any reasons for resigning. “Previously, he said he wanted to resign but I asked him to go on holiday and think about it”, he added. It is not yet known who will replace Mr Zainuddin or when the Prime Minister would be expected to announce a new finance minister. Mr Zainuddin, a wealthy businessman and long-time ally of Mr Mahathir Mohammad, went on a two-month holiday in April citing “tiredness”. His long vacation sparked rumours of a rift with the 75-year-old Premier due to alleged misunderstandings over several recent government financial bail-outs of companies linked to Mr Zainuddin. However, Mr Zainuddin, had frequently spoken of his desire to quit the government once Malaysia’s economy had turned around from the 1997-1998 Asian financial crisis. Mr Zainuddin, who served as Mahathir’s Finance Minister in the mid-1980s, was appointed Finance Minister after the premier sacked Deputy Premier and Finance Minister Anwar Ibrahim in 1998, during the height of the Asian financial crisis, which sent the country into its worst-ever recession.
DPA |
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USA may not lift sanctions against Pak Washington, June 2 Senior US officials said while the military sanctions imposed on India in the aftermath of 1998 nuclear tests would go in a few months, similar measures on Pakistan, which conducted nuclear tests shortly after India did, would remain in place for a longer period. The newspaper quoted the official as saying, “We have banned the term even-handed (between India and Pakistan). We plan to look at the merits of our relationship with Delhi and Islamabad on a separate basis.” Washington looks likely to retain a range of economic sanctions on Pakistan that existed before the nuclear tests. The official did not pin any hope on the meeting between Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and Pakistan’s military ruler Pervez Musharraf on the Kashmir issue, saying that bilateral talks had failed in the past. It was widely speculated in the congressional circles that the official quoted by the newspaper was US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage. The official told the British newspaper that the USA was concerned that Pakistan-based Islamic groups still conducted operations across the Line of Control in Kashmir. Pakistan also had close ties with the Taliban regime that provided safe haven to Saudi Islamic militant leader Osama bin Laden. “In pursuing these two objectives of playing host to Kashmiri separatist groups and supporting the Taliban, Pakistan has relied as instruments of policy on groups that commit acts of terrorism both within the region and beyond,” he said, adding that these groups also want to transform Pakistan society. There was also increasing doubt in Washington about Islamabad’s ability to prevent the proliferation of nuclear technology given its shaky economic state. The Pakistan government insisted that it was ignored or rebuffed at Washington’s peril. “If we are to solve the problems in the region, whether it is narcotics or terrorism, Pakistan has to be part of the solution,” its ambassador in USA Maleeha Lodhi said.
UNI |
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‘Dennis the Menace’ creator dead Los Angeles, June 2 Ketcham, who had been battling cancer, died of a heart attack on Thursday night, his spokeswoman Linda Dozoretz said yesterday. His creation became one of the world’s most popular comic strips and Dennis became a tow-haired, freckle-faced symbol of mischievous youth. The boy, who was forever five years old, turned 50 on March 12. In an anniversary interview Ketcham recalled how an editor warned him, shortly after he started, that he might soon be looking for work. “I don’t see how it can last,” the editor said, adding that “there’s only so much you can say about a 5-year-old kid.” The strip is carried in more than 1,000 newspapers in 48 countries and in 19 different languages. There have been movies based on it and a successful TV series starring Jay North. Besides, more than 50 million “Dennis the Menace” books have been sold. The Seattle-born Ketcham called his autobiography “The Merchant of Dennis.” He presided over the day-to-day activities of the strip, working with two artists, Marcus Hamilton and Ronald Ferdinand, via fax and phone in spite of poor health. Ms Dozoretz, said the strip would continue to be drawn by the two artists Ketcham worked with for so many years. A University of Washington dropout, he worked as an animator for Walter Lantz, creator of “Woody Woodpecker,” and for Walt Disney, where he helped draw “Pinocchio”, “Bambi” and “Fantasia.” He joined the navy and after World War II drew for the best magazines of the day.
Reuters |
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Wahid appoints
new deputy police chief Jakarta, June 2 Police chief General Bimantoro rejected yesterday an order from the embattled Wahid to resign, saying Parliament must agree first. General Bimantoro had previously urged Mr Wahid not to declare a state of emergency in a bid to ward off impeachment. The battle over the police chief coincides with Mr Wahid’s sudden decision yesterday to sack six ministers, including the Chief Security Minister, who had also opposed the Muslim cleric’s plan to declare a state of emergency.
Reuters |
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4 escape, 200 still captive Lamitan, (Philippines), June 2 But at least four Filipinos kidnapped by the guerrillas last Sunday from an island resort managed to escape in the confusion. There was no confirmed news on the whereabouts of the other 16 kidnapped at the time, who include three Americans, but they are also believed to be trapped in the hospital in the town of Lamitan on the Basilan island.
Reuters |
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Celibacy the rule in orbit Moscow, June 2 “Absolutely not, even though there has been a lot of chit-chat about this,” Talgat Musabayev told Rossiiskaya Gazeta yesterday. Moreover, an official ban has been placed on any cosmic liaisons out of moral and ethical grounds.
DPA |
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