from The Human Impact:
Sri Lanka’s war-traumatised at risk as aid group leaves?
It was with a heavy heart I read the press release this morning.
A desperately needed aid programme run by the charity Medecins Sans Frontiers (MSF) – in English, Doctors without Borders – in Sri Lanka's war-torn north has shut down after only 18 months of operation.
I had visited the project last September and I must say what MSF was giving was no ordinary aid.
It was not distributing food to survivors of the Indian Ocean island's almost three-decade long conflict. Nor was it reconstructing the shelled and bullet-ridden homes, schools and hospitals of Kilinochchi district.
It was not even helping war-hit populations with new skills to help them get jobs after their businesses were destroyed and their farms filled with landmines during fighting between separatist Tamil Tiger fighters and government forces.
India no angel in dangerous neighbourhood
By Annie Banerji
Perhaps the finger-pointing at neighbouring Pakistan and the talk of Afghan militancy destabilising the region that New Delhi so often rolls out should be reconsidered. The neighbourhood may well be dangerous, but India is no model pupil.
According to the 2011 Global Peace Index, an initiative of the Institute of Economics and Peace, which evaluates 153 countries based on the level of ongoing conflict, safety and security and militarisation, India is the world’s 135th most peaceful country, falling seven positions from last year.
Kashmir seeks extradition of accused army soldier
A former Indian soldier, accused of killing a Kashmiri human rights lawyer, has been arrested in the United States on charges of domestic violence.
Major Avtar Singh fled the country in the 1990s after he was accused of kidnapping and brutally killing Jaleel Andrabi, a Kashmiri lawyer and human rights activist.
Andrabi’s decomposed body was found 15 years ago in a river. The killing sparked off massive protests and led to a probe by authorities.
Should forces responsible for over 100 killings be praised for restraint?
India’s Prime Minister praised the work of security forces in disputed Kashmir on Tuesday, in a show of support for troops that killed over 100 separatist protesters last year that risks angering those that resent India’s large military presence in the state.
The remarks represent a seal of approval for security forces that are cited by many Kashmiris as an element of the violence, rather than the preventers of it, and come as a team of interlocutors enters its fifth month of talks in the troubled region, and almost two months after Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram said that a political solution to the troubles was likely to emerge “in the next few months.”
Kashmir calms down, but peace still distant
Winter has come to Kashmir, a scenic valley deep in the Himalayas, cooling tensions in the disputed region after months of violent anti-India demonstrations.
At least 110 people have been killed since June. Dozens were wounded, mostly by police bullets, during the protests – the biggest since a revolt against Indian rule broke out in 1989.
A separatist strike, curfew and security lock-down, that dragged on for over four months and closed much of the region, have ebbed away and the streets across Kashmir are abuzz with activity again.
Is Kashmir’s protest leader gaining popularity?
Separatist militancy has waned over the years in Kashmir, but now a radicalised young generation which has grown up in over two decades of violence and strife is driving the massive anti-India demonstrations across the disputed region.
Who is leading months of freedom demonstrations in Kashmir, a fresh unarmed uprising that is proving a huge political challenge for the Indian government?
Syed Ali Shah Geelani, the 80-year-old hardline Kashmiri politician who is hated by India and backed by Pakistan, has emerged as the leading face of the present separatist campaign in the region.
India offers fresh peace talks to Kashmir
New Delhi has expressed its willingness to hold talks with ”any group” from Kashmir where protests against Indian rule have mounted in recent weeks and government forces have killed at least 65 people, mostly stone-throwing protesters.
The civilian deaths have fuelled anger in the disputed Himalayan region where anti-India sentiments run deep though militant violence has gone down.
“We hope to restart the dialogue process. We will talk to any group, any political party which is willing to talk to us,” Home Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram said.
Is New Delhi working on Kashmir solution?
At least 64 people have been killed across Kashmir during anti-India demonstrations, one of the worst outbreaks of unrest since a separatist revolt against New Delhi broke out in 1989.
Frequent curfews, security lockdown and separatist strikes have kept the Muslim-majority Kashmir valley on the boil, shutting down much of the region for the past two and a half months.
New Delhi has been criticised for failing to respond to violence that has wounded hundreds, closed down schools and colleges also.
Manipur blockade highlights India’s northeast dilemma
An entire state held to ransom for the past three months. And a central government that seems helpless to stop it.
Naga groups on Tuesday said they were extending for another 25 days their blockade of the two highways linking landlocked Manipur to the rest of the country.
This follows almost consecutive 20 days and 69 days of similar blockades, leaving the northeast state surviving on army-escorted supplies for the past three months.
In Kashmir, India now struggles with “children of conflict”
Kashmir has been seething since early June. Life across the Muslim-majority valley has been completely disrupted by curfews and protest strikes since some of the biggest anti-India demonstrations in two years erupted a month ago.
Seventeen people, mostly teenage protesters, have been killed by security forces in near daily pro-freedom demonstrations fuelling anger across the disputed Himalayan region.
India blames Pakistan-based militants for the ongoing Kashmir protests but Kashmiris say the protests are spontaneous.
