Kashmir riots rage

Violent protests in Kashmir threaten India-Pakistan peace process

Riots sparked by a controversial land-transfer deal have widened to become pro-independence rallies.

by Jonathan Adams
Christian Science Monitor, August 14, 2008

Escalating unrest in Indian-controlled Kashmir threatens to derail a peace process between India and Pakistan that has extended over more than four years.

Riots, sparked by a land-transfer dispute, have also cast a shadow over local elections planned for this fall that were seen as a possible turning point toward greater stability.

Reports differed on the number of casualties from the violence. Bloomberg put the death toll at 27, after police on Tuesday fired on and killed 11 protesters who had defied a curfew.

Authorities cracked down on demonstrators a day after more than 50,000 took to the streets.... India's government accused its nuclear-armed neighbor of interference after Pakistan's Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi condemned what he described as "excessive and unwarranted use of force."

"The situation is tense," police official Kailash Kumar said. "The army has been called out and they are patrolling the streets."

The BBC explained that the current unrest began in May, when the state government in Indian Kashmir – also called Jammu and Kashmir State – decided to transfer some land to a Hindu trust that runs the Amarnath shrine, which is frequented by Hindu pilgrims. That deal sparked protests by the state's Muslim majority, which fears losing land rights.

The protests in the valley only subsided when the government dropped the plans - but that in turn triggered equally large protests in the Jammu region in the south of the state, where the majority Hindu population was outraged.

Now it is no exaggeration to say that the state could be heading towards a communal meltdown.

Angry Hindu extremists blocked roads between the Muslim-majority Kashmir Valley in the north and the Hindu-dominated area around Jammu City in the south. That led to mass protests this week by Muslims, who said the blockade was preventing their fruit farmers from getting their produce to markets in the south. Agence France-Presse quoted observers saying that the unrest reflected a failure to increase basic security and economic conditions for Kashmiris.

They hope the massive protests will force New Delhi to admit it has not won "hearts and minds" in its part of the disputed Himalayan territory – despite claims it has – and accept the root causes of the conflict must be addressed.

"The protests are the manifestation of an anger that the peace process doesn't seem to have achieved anything," said Noor Ahmed Baba, a political science professor in Indian Kashmir's main university.

An editorial in the Indian daily newspaper The Hindu pointed out that the unrest had cast doubt on local elections planned for this fall in the Indian-controlled state.

Less than two months ago, politicians ... were discussing strategies for winning elections to the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly, which are scheduled to be held in October. But poor political judgment — and an apparently catatonic administration — precipitated a crisis, which have made even the prospect of an election appear somewhat surreal.

The Pakistani daily Dawn published an editorial stating that the unrest was "threatening a wider conflagration" and has undone progress in revitalizing the region.

Indeed violence was on the decline, tourists had returned to the Kashmir valley and there was hope that the elections would be a turning point for stability in the region. But those gains have quickly evaporated and the Muslim protests, some of the largest seen in two decades, have widened to become pro-independence rallies.

The unrest in Kashmir comes on the heels of bombings in Indian cities that had already heightened India-Pakistan tensions. The Christian Science Monitor reported that the July 26 bombings in the western Indian city of Ahmedabad killed 45. Those attacks came a day after bombings in Bangalore and in the wake of May bombings in Jaipur that killed 60.

Security analysts suspect that Pakistan and Bangladesh-based Islamic militant groups were behind those attacks. Indian officials routinely claim that such groups are backed by the Pakistani government, but Pakistan denies this.

Tensions between the two nations also escalated last month over a series of skirmishes along the India-Pakistan border in Kashmir. The repeated exchange of fire was seen by both sides as a violation of a five-year-old cease-fire and sparked a mutual blame game, reported Reuters.

Both India and Pakistan claim the entire state of Kashmir, but control only part of the territory. The two nuclear powers have repeatedly come to blows over the region, most recently between 2001 and 2003, when tensions nearly led to all-out war.

A cease-fire in 2003 began a peace process that included talks and increased transport links across the so-called Line of Control separating Indian- and Pakistani-controlled areas of Kashmir. But analysts say New Delhi and Islamabad cling to irreconcilable claims that make a permanent solution of the territorial dispute unlikely anytime soon.

The International Crisis Group said in its latest report on Kashmir in 2006 that Muslim unrest within Indian-controlled Kashmir was fueled by frustration with the slow pace of the peace process and by the strong Indian security presence.

Observers in Srinagar and Jammu [Muslim-majority and Hindu-majority cities in Indian Kashmir] blame militancy on Pakistan but also warn that frustrated and alienated young Kashmiris, regardless of political affiliation, could join militants unless New Delhi changes its approach.

They attribute Kashmiri alienation to the overwhelming presence of Indian security forces, which, they say, create a sense of humiliation and loss of dignity and feed local perceptions that India is a colonial state.

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Eating China's treasures

Exterior of Silks Palace restaurant, Taipei, Taiwan

A Palette for the Palate

A restaurant near Taipei's National Palace Museum serves works of art that are more than metaphorical.

Jonathan Adams
NEWSWEEK magazine, Aug 2, 2008

Imagine if the greatest works from the Chinese imperial collection of art became ... edible.

That's the basic concept behind the new Silks Palace restaurant in Taipei. It opened in late June next to the National Palace Museum, which holds what is widely regarded as the world's finest collection of traditional Chinese art. The museum's prized sculpture, ceramics and artifacts come from the imperial collection of Beijing's Forbidden City, the best of which the Kuomintang took with them to Taiwan when the communists drove them off the mainland in 1949.

Silks Palace pays homage to that collection, but with a decidedly contemporary twist. Taiwan's Formosa International Hotels Corp. won the bid to run the government-owned restaurant until at least 2030, with a concept designed by Taiwan's Yao Ren-shi and Japan's Yukie Hashimoto. Then Formosa's army of chefs let their imaginations run wild. The result is a $14.8 million epicure's delight whose design and dishes offer a whimsical take on famous Chinese art and artifacts.

The exterior of the five-floor building is a boldly modern counterpoint to the imperial-style museum next door. It is covered in glass with a webbed pattern meant to evoke the cracks in Song-dynasty-era (A.D. 960–1279) ceramics. At night, the building is illuminated like a futuristic Chinese lantern. Interior designer Hashimoto continues the cracked-ceramics theme, and gives Chinese artifacts a hip but restrained twist.

Four glass-enclosed pillars inspired by the Tsung tubes used in Neolithic-era Chinese religious rituals extend the height of the two-story atrium. The first floor features an à la carte dining area with soft illumination from lamps shaped like Tsung-chou bells of the late Western Chou period (about 1100–771 B.C.). The 10 VIP rooms on the second floor are named after Chinese artists, and decorated with backlit paper prints of classic works from the museum collection. A banquet area on the third floor features sci-fi chandeliers with crystal bulbs illuminated by LEDs.

The cuisine is mostly Cantonese style, with flavors from other Chinese regions. Diners can order à la carte, or choose from wildly creative set menus inspired by the museum collection.

Three signature dishes imitate the most famous of the museum's masterpieces—two of which are actually renditions of food. A small, poached bok choy with mustard is presented to look exactly like the famed "Jadeite Cabbage With Insects," a piece of carved jade that was the dowry of a Qing-dynasty concubine. On the plate, a tiny shrimp takes the place of the carefully sculpted katydid on the original. A lovingly marinated chunk of pork mimics another masterpiece, the museum's carved agate imitation pork slice, "Meat-Shaped Stone."

And a tiered rack with a sampling of desserts—one of the restaurant's best-selling items—is inspired by a Qing-era emperor's curio box.

There are plenty of other delights. The goose comes in a wrap with a single swipe of Peking duck sauce, representing a broad stroke from Chinese calligraphy. The museum's take on the classic Fujian stew "Buddha Jumps Over the Wall" comes in a white bowl shaped like a classic three-legged "ding" cauldron from the Warring States period (about 475–221 B.C.). And the chefs carve a larger ding from ice to hold the fruit course at the end.

Even the serving plates—which evoke ancient Chinese coins from the collection—are an inspired nod to China's heritage. It gives a whole new meaning to the concept of a museum restaurant.

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US delays Taiwan arms sales

F-16 Fighting Falcons

Delay in U.S. arms sale to Taiwan stirs concerns

Taiwanese officials maintain the postponement is motivated by a US desire to secure China's cooperation in tackling North Korea and Iran.

By Jonathan Adams
Christian Science Monitor, July 24, 2008

A delay in the approval of an $11 billion arms sale to Taiwan has fueled concerns about the United States' commitment to help defend the island from Chinese attack. Speculation on the reasons for the freeze has mounted in the absence of a clear explanation from the US government. Taiwanese officials believe the sale has been postponed so that the US can secure China's cooperation and that it may yet go through after the Olympics.

At issue is a package of arms, including Patriot antimissile systems and attack helicopters, that was offered to Taiwan by the Bush administration in 2001 as part of the president's pledge to do "whatever it takes" to defend Taiwan.

Taiwan's legislature approved the purchase of the weapons after a long delay last December. But the Bush administration has yet to notify Congress of the sale – a necessary formality before the weapon systems can be released.

The US is also ignoring Taiwan's request for more than 60 F-16 fighter jets to boost its air power.

But the Taiwanese government continues to urge the US to move forward, and some pro-Taiwan commentators have criticized the Bush administration for shirking obligations to the island.

China sees self-governing Taiwan as part of its territory and has threatened force to back up its claim. Beijing has long pressed the US to phase out arms sales to Taiwan, but the US government is bound by law to make defensive arms available to the island.

Reuters reported last week that the top US military commander in the Pacific, Adm. Timothy Keating, confirmed the current freeze on major arms sales to the island. He noted that improved cross-strait relations had sharply reduced the potential for conflict.

U.S. decision-makers "have reconciled Taiwan's current military posture, China's current military posture and strategy that indicates there is no pressing, compelling need for at this moment arms sales to Taiwan of the systems that we're talking about," the Hawaii-based commander said at the Heritage Foundation in Washington....

"I'm more comfortable today ... than I was 15 months ago, that my belief is well founded that it is very, very, very unlikely that there will be conflict across the strait," Keating said.

But other current and former US officials appeared to contradict Keating's remarks. Asked whether US policy on arms sales to Taiwan had changed, a State Department spokesman said, "The short answer is no," according to the transcript of a US State Department daily press briefing. The spokesman continued:

"Let me reiterate for you what our policy is. The Administration faithfully implements the Taiwan Relations Act, under which the United States makes available items necessary for Taiwan to maintain a sufficient defense."

Speaking in Taipei on Wednesday, Paul Wolfowitz, former deputy defense secretary in the Bush administration and current chairman of the board of the US-Taiwan Business Council, said that he thought President Bush was committed to selling arms to Taiwan and would do so before he left office, according to the Associated Press.

Patriot anti-missile battery in action

But The Wall Street Journal reported that the US could be delaying the sales until after the Olympic Games.

Some analysts say Mr. Bush may only be delaying the sale until after he travels to China next month for the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics. "The best chance [for the sales] is right after the Olympics," said Randall Schriver, a former senior Asia official at the State Department under Mr. Bush.

US foot-dragging on arms sales to the island comes amid a thaw in Taiwan-China relations under Taiwan's new, China-friendly president, Ma Ying-jeou. The Christian Science Monitor reported last month that since Mr. Ma took power on May 20, the two sides have moved rapidly to expand cross-strait links.

But Ma said that Taiwan still needs US help to defend itself against China, despite recently improved cross-strait relations, the Associated Press reports. He called recently for the US to remove the freeze.

The Financial Times cited top Taiwanese national security officials as saying that Taiwan was dropping its push for F-16s for now in order to focus on getting the other weapon systems approved. The report adds that Taipei officials believe the delay is motivated by the US's attempt to secure China's cooperation.

Taipei officials said they believed that the US had temporarily put off arms sales in order to secure Beijing's co-operation in tackling trouble in Iran and North Korea....

Taipei is concerned that Washington may have created a precedent that could prove difficult to reverse, since the communist-ruled mainland has long demanded the US phase out its arms sales to the island.

Pro-Taiwan commentators in the US have blasted the Bush administration for being soft on China. Writing in the Fort Worth Star Telegram, the Heritage Foundation's John Tkacik and the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy's Gary Schmitt said the US was shirking its obligation to defend Taiwan's democracy against the Chinese threat.

Such an approach will only fuel Beijing's own ambitions and sense of entitlement when it comes to Taiwan and, equally important, do nothing to reassure our democratic allies in the region that we have a balanced but firm approach when it comes to a rising China.

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Cold War replay

U.S., Russia revert to cold-war rhetoric over missile-defense plan

Russia says that the proposed US defense shield in Poland and the Czech Republic, an initial agreement for which was inked this week, is targeting Russia, not rogue states.

By Jonathan Adams
Christian Science Monitor, July 09, 2008

A war of words erupted this week between the United States and Russia over a controversial US plan to deploy a missile-defense shield in the Czech Republic and Poland. The plan has already strained US-Russia relations and encountered resistance from some in Europe.

The verbal spat between the US and Russia came after US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Tuesday inked an initial agreement on missile-defense deployment with the Czech government in Prague, as reported by the Associated Press.

According to Reuters, Russia's Foreign Ministry responded to the news in a statement: "If the real deployment of an American strategic missile defense shield begins close to our borders, then we will be forced to react not with diplomatic methods, but with military-technical methods."

In reaction to that statement, the US criticized Russia for its "bellicose rhetoric," which it said was meant to intimidate the European partners of the US into backing out of the defense plan, according to the BBC. The report goes on to clarify Russia's statement.

The BBC's Adam Brookes in Washington cites Russia's ambassador to the UN as suggesting that the phrase "military-technical means" does not mean military action, but more likely a change in Russia's strategic posture, perhaps by redeploying its own missiles.

The US has ambitious plans for a missile-defense system that would include advanced radar facilities in the Czech Republic and 10 interceptor missile sites in Poland. The US insists the shield is designed to protect against attacks from "rogue states" in the Middle East, such as Iran.

A graphic made available by Agence France-Presse maps the US missile shield as well as proposed deployments.

But Russia has strongly protested, saying the deployment of the US shield would threaten its security by blunting the capabilities of its own missile force.

Reuters adds that the US and Russia have discussed possible ways to address Moscow's worries, but that Tuesday's US-Czech deal is perceived as a step backward by Russia's Foreign Ministry.

Proposals under discussion had included stationing Russian military officers at the shield sites and providing real-time video monitoring of activity at those sites.

"Even those half-hearted promises relating to confidence-building and monitoring measures which our American partners gave us have been in effect cancelled out by them," Interfax quoted the ministry source as saying.

The Christian Science Monitor reported earlier this year that NATO governments are unanimous in backing the US missile-shield plan, though they remain deeply divided on other issues.

"There is a threat ... and allied security must be indivisible in the fact of it," read the statement on missile defense.

Public opinion in Eastern Europe is another story, however. The Czech opposition strongly opposes the plan. Writing in the Post Global section of The Washington Post website, Dana Kuchtova, the first vice chair of the Czech Green Party, says that some 70 percent of the Czech public opposes the plan to host an advanced radar facility. Ms. Kuchtova says similar percentages of Poles oppose participating in the missile-shield project. She adds that Russia is the real target of the missile shield, not Iran and North Korea, which are "at best hypothetical threats to Europe."

Though ex-satellite states hardly have a warm spot in their hearts for Russia, few Czechs appreciate being used as launching ground for a Cold War revival. And with Russia's vast oil and gas supplies, it is not in the Czechs' interest, nor in the interest of any European nation for that matter, to become Moscow's enemy.

CNN reported that before leaving for Europe this week, Ms. Rice tried but failed to reach a deal with the Polish foreign minister on deploying interceptors in Poland.

The sticking point in talks with Poland, according to the Associated Press, is that the US has not offered enough defense aid. Poland wants more protection for the proposed interceptor sites, which could themselves make Poland a target for attack. Specifically, Poland wants US antimissile defenses, including a Patriot missile battery, to be deployed alongside the 10 interceptor missile sites.

"The fundamental issue that must be resolved is in what way the American installations are going to be protected from an eventual missile attack, and in what way Poland is going to be protected from an eventual ballistic missile attack," Defense Minister Bogdan Klich said on TVN24 television.

He said the proposed U.S. system would only protect Poland from long-range ballistic missiles, leaving the country vulnerable to short and medium-range missiles.

In an opinion piece for the International Herald Tribune last year, Michael O'Hanlon, a security expert at the Brookings Institution in Washington, argued that it would be best to postpone the controversial shield rather than push it through over Russia's objections.

[The defense shield] is in principle a worthy idea, but the benefits in the short term are not worth the worsening of relations with Russia that it has already engendered.

Rather than push the idea now, when the threat of long-range missiles from the Middle East is hardly acute, it would be better to allow a new American president and a new Russian president ... to reconsider the subject in 2009 or 2010.

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Where are the protests?

The Key to Cross-Strait Détente

by Jonathan Adams
Far Eastern Economic Review, Posted July 6, 2007

Given the dramatic extent of the KMT’s current opening to China under Taiwan’s new President Ma Ying-jeou, you might expect Taiwan’s scrappy pro-independence party to take to the streets in protest.

After all, the Ma government’s measures look like a unificationist’s to-do list. These include: cross-Strait weekend charter flights, which began on July 4; an expansion of Chinese tourists allowed in to 3,000 per day (that’s one million per year); renminbi-Taiwan dollar exchange in Taiwan; a relaxation of restrictions on China-bound investment by Taiwan firms; a relaxation on restrictions on Chinese investment in Taiwanese banks, funds and real estate; a welcome to Xinhua and People’s Daily reporters banned from Taiwan by the previous DPP government; and a welcome mat for mainland pop stars and performers, previously tightly restricted.

All this amounts to a dramatic step toward normalization of economic and cultural relations.

Many believe, of course, that’s also the first step toward Beijing’s long-term goal: political unification.

But rather than strongly oppose all of this, the DPP is laying low. It’s raising quibbles (Mr. Ma’s giving up too much too soon at the negotiating table) while agreeing in principle with the normalization process.

In fact, in some cases the DPP is actually complaining the new links don’t go far enough. The DPP mayor of Kaohsiung has griped that too few cross-Strait charter flights will be coming to her city. And party headquarters is peeved that the flights deal doesn’t yet include cross-Strait cargo flights, something high on Taiwan businesses’ wish list.

The DPP’s stance suggests two points worth raising:

First, it’s evidence of the broad consensus in Taiwan supporting closer economic links—but not political unification—with the mainland. Despite the supposed polarization between the independence-leaning DPP and unification-leaning KMT, moderates in both parties are in fundamental agreement on this direction.

That consensus isn’t recent. In fact, it has been apparent since the DPP’s Chen Shui-bian took power in 2000. Far from being a protectionist hardliner determined to throttle business opportunities, Mr. Chen actually began a process of economic normalization with the mainland that Mr. Ma is only continuing.

Cross-Strait trade and investment boomed dramatically under Mr. Chen, and his government in 2001 launched the “three mini-links” between Taiwan’s Kinmen and Matsu islands and the mainland as a first step toward broader transport links. And the Chen government spent years negotiating a deal on cross-Strait charter flights and tourists—the deal Beijing only inked when Mr. Ma came into office.

In his heart of hearts, Mr. Chen may indeed cherish the long-term goal of independence and Mr. Ma of unification—only they know for sure. But as a matter of official government policy, their stands are identical: No independence, no unification, preserve the political status quo, but expand cross-Strait economic ties.

The only difference between the two governments is on the pace and scope of normalization—Mr. Ma is willing to move more quickly (the DPP says too quickly) on a raft of issues. But a more significant difference is Beijing’s attitude.

That brings us to the second point. Despite the similarity in Messrs. Chen and Ma’s official policy positions, from Beijing’s standpoint there are large symbolic differences. Exhibit A is Ma’s embrace of the “1992 Consensus”—a flimsy formula, never written down or formalized, to agree on “one China” while fudging its meaning. Mr. Chen’s DPP rejects that formula as a downgrade of Taiwan’s sovereignty.

Exhibit B is Mr. Ma’s stress on Taiwan’s essential “Chinese-ness”—such as his description of Taiwan and China as parts of the “zhonghua minzu” (the Chinese peoples or nation). Mr. Chen never rejected that cultural link outright, but instead stressed Taiwan’s distinct culture and history in order to bolster a budding sense of Taiwan identity and pride.

To China, Mr. Ma’s shift in emphasis is critical. It suggests cross-Strait solidarity rather than separation. Here, Beijing and the KMT are allied in a culture war against the DPP—one waged through language and symbols—about what it means to be Taiwanese.

That, and not any dramatic policy shift by Mr. Ma’s government, is why cross-Strait economic relations are advancing so quickly under a KMT government.

But this, of course, could put China in a very difficult position in the future. What happens when the DPP inevitably retakes power in four, eight or 12 years? Presumably, it will continue to back economic normalization, while rejecting the “1992 consensus” and downplaying cultural and historical cross-Strait ties.

Will Beijing call back its tourists, withdraw its investment, and cancel the cross-Strait flights?

China is responding to the symbols and language used by specific politicians and parties in Taiwan, rather than engaging the official policy produced by Taiwan’s democratic government. For now, that’s producing results acceptable to all parties.

But as the basis for long-term cross-Strait stability, it’s a shaky foundation indeed.

Mr. Adams is a freelance journalist in Taiwan.

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DPP supporter actively protests former KMT chairman Lien Chan's 2005 trip to China