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	It takes Two Hands to Clap by Ahmed Rashid Yale Center for the Study of Globalization Afghanistan   Published: 6 October 2005   Afghanistan will require both domestic and international action for any hope of rebuilding . (YaleGlobal)   Lahore: On October 3, a crowd of a least 5000 Afghanis gathered in Kabul to protest the murder of a prominent parliamentary candidate and demanded the resignation of powerful warlord General Atta Mohammed, a provincial governor. Just a few days earlier, Interior Minister Ali Ahmad Jalali, one of President Hamid Karzai''s closest aides – highly respected for his honesty and desire for radical reforms – resigned, in what his friends say is a mood of "anger and frustration."   Karzai faces challenges both from the Afghan people and from elites within his own government. Clearly, though Afghanistan''s parliamentary elections have concluded, the hard part is yet to come. At least 1200 people have been killed this year in Taliban-related violence, and the presidential and parliamentary elections cost the international community nearly US$300 million. Both the international community and the Karzai administration now face the challenges of building stable, functioning state machinery and infrastructure, while fighting off a Taliban insurgency, warlordism, drug trafficking, and corruption.   Little of this agenda has been accomplished in the four years following the defeat of the Taliban. And now the two components essential to success – the Western alliance (the US-led coalition, NATO, and international aid donors) and the Karzai government – appear to be faltering even as a resurgent Taliban escalate their offensive.   Two days after the September 18 elections for a new parliament and 34 provincial councils, Karzai proudly told reporters that Afghanistan, "now has a constitution, a president, a parliament, and a nation fully participating in its destiny." However, he has failed to ensure that the political architecture, constructed at enormous loss of life and expense, matches reforms on the ground.   The low voter turnout showed growing public disillusionment with the government and the slow pace of reforms. Compared to the 70 percent of votes cast in the presidential elections a year ago, only 53 percent turned out for the parliamentary elections. In Kabul, the most politicized city in the nation, the turnout was only 36 percent.   Meanwhile, the Taliban insurgency demonstrated its staying power by an unusual and devastating urban attack, when on September 28, a suicide bomber killed nine Afghan soldiers and wounded 36 outside a military training center in Kabul. Afghans, including Karzai, are deeply frustrated that the Taliban leadership continues to live and operate from Pakistan.   The current situation differs drastically from the hopes and visions for Afghanistan a year ago. After the presidential elections, Karzai promised to use the coming 12 months to carry out a vigorous reform agenda that would change Afghanistan from the bottom up. Instead, through his actions – and more importantly, inaction – he has wasted the past year.   Despite the support of the US embassy and the United Nations, Karzai abandoned the reform agenda in favor of maintaining the status quo and his own power. Afghanistan has never had a strong central government, and only now has Karzai managed to extend the government''s writ to provinces beyond the center. Still, an enormous amount of crucial legislation (to encourage local and foreign investment, set up state institutions, establish a modern judiciary, and so on) has not been carried out.   Encouraged by their leader''s pledge to enforce accountability for the massive human rights violations committed by warlords over the past 25 years, Afghans expected that he would continue a vigorous campaign against them. Instead, warlords have only been reshuffled among top cabinet or provincial jobs. Not a single drug baron – many of whom are well-known warlords, cabinet ministers, and commanders – has been outed or convicted.   And the initial election results indicate that the warlords and their supporters will dominate the future parliament. They will block every reform agenda Karzai may want to make and demand he retire progressives in the cabinet and install their own nominees. Instead of spurring on development goals and reconstruction, the parliament will likely become a major hinderance for both.   Further, Karzai''s refusal to allow a party political system to flourish before the elections – a hallmark of any serious democracy – will also allow individual warlords to exert unnecessary influence. An indecisive man at the best of times, Karzai is unlikely to either control or confront the new parliament. Karzai believes that political parties were responsible for destroying Afghanistan in the past and that he can control parliament through one-on-one meetings with representatives.   While things look bleak within Afghanistan, Western countries are showing signs of wanting to back off just when they are needed the most. "The need for the international community to have a commitment here and patience is absolutely essential," said Lt. Gen. Karl Eikenberry, the head of US forces in Afghanistan.   The United States, however, may be decreasing its commitment. US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld indicated his desire to see up to a quarter of the 18,000-strong US forces out of Afghanistan by next spring, to be replaced by NATO troops. Further, battered by the insurgency in Iraq, the hurricane in Louisiana, and historically low poll ratings, President George W. Bush is desperate to show the American people a success story in the war against terrorism and also bring some troops home from somewhere.   Plans call for the US-led coalition fighting the Taliban and the separate NATO-led peace-keeping force to merge in the spring of 2006. But major NATO countries, including France, Spain, and Germany, are resisting the merger or refusing to take part in counter-insurgency fighting. Other European members are refusing to commit more troops to Afghanistan – even in a peace-keeping mode.   The international donor community is faltering in its commitment to provide sufficient aid for reconstructing the country so that a self-sustaining economy can emerge. Western donors have committed on average about US$2.5 billion every year for the past four years for reconstruction, but less than half that money has actually been disbursed. Four years on, not a single new dam, power station, or major water system has been built. Afghanistan remains the third poorest country in the world.   Though Western donors are also financing the training of an Afghan army, police, justice system, and bureaucracy, the process is too slow and funds are inadequate. Jean Arnault, the UN s envoy to Afghanistan says the Afghan people "were exasperated" over the inability of the bureaucracy and the judiciary to function as it should.   Karzai faced bigger problems in 2001, but had always sided with the public''s desire for change, reform, and an end to past abuses. Now, after four years and little change in their lives, people are becoming frustrated. Karzai seems to be acting against the people''s wishes by retaining warlords, refusing to allow parties, or carrying out accountability. However, he still has the time to rediscover his vision for the nation.   Afghanistan''s political system will not succeed without steady and substantial assistance from the international community over the long term. Ultimately, only a renewed Western commitment – not a withdrawal – will give the Afghans the confidence to tackle their monumental problems. It will continue to take two hands to clap in order to rebuild Afghanistan.   (Ahmed Rashid is the author of "Taliban" and "Jihad" and is a correspondent for The Daily Telegraph for Pakistan, Central Asia and Afghanistan).
	Farewell to Freedom by AAP / The Age & agencies Australia   October 28, 2005   New Anti-Terror law threatens human rights". (AAP)   The Australian Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC) says human rights are not protected under the federal government"s anti-terrorism bill.   Commission president John von Doussa, QC, has stressed the need to stop and consider the practical implications of the bill, and the context in which it will operate, before it is passed as law.   "What concerns me most about the current version of the anti-terrorism bill is what happens after a person is first detained or served with a control order and their liberty is restricted," Mr von Doussa said in a statement. "International human rights law requires that a person who is detained must have the right to challenge this detention in a court without delay," he said.   He said review before the court needed to include: consideration of whether the order is based on a correct understanding of the facts; whether the detention is fair; whether it is reasonably necessary in the circumstances; and whether it is proportionate to the goal of protecting national security. "The current form of the bill simply fails to meet these basic guarantees".   He was also concerned that people wrongly detained may not have the opportunity to contest their detention on the basis that authorities got it wrong. "All they can do is seek judicial review before the federal court or high court...a form of review that is very limited and confined to technical legal grounds.   "In my view, the absence of the right to adequate review is the major human rights weakness in the current draft of the legislation."   "On top of this, the current bill would place significant restrictions on a detained person"s ability to contact other people. He said all that a detained person"s family or employer would receive is a fax stating that they were safe but unable to be contacted at the moment. "What would one"s spouse or employer think if a message like this was received?"   He has acknowledged that the government could and should make tougher security laws in a time of heightened concern about terrorism. But he said: "We need to debate the bill with these practical considerations in mind and require the time to do so."   A former chief justice of the Australian High Court has joined two former prime ministers, Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser, in expressing concerns about the new counter-terrorism laws.   "Laws impairing rights and freedoms cannot be justified unless they are shown to be needed to target an identifiable, present danger to the community," former chief justice Sir Gerard Brennan said in a statement yesterday.   "A legislature should not attempt to bring in such laws until the community has had an opportunity to examine their terms and decide on their purpose and effect." Another former chief justice, Sir Anthony Mason, said recently that adequate time must be allowed for debate.   Yesterday Mr Whitlam said the proposals would allow for Australians to be "interned" and then face criminal charges if they spoke to their families or employers about their detention. He accused the Federal Government of using fear as an election winner and lamented the fact that Labor had not joined in opposing the proposed laws.   Last week Mr Fraser said the laws should be opposed because the secretive process to introduce them was seriously flawed. Yesterday Elizabeth Evatt, former chief justice of the Family Court, said she was stunned that the Government would contemplate the proposals for preventive detention and control orders.   Oct 2005   Anti-terrorist laws are undermining the foundations of our democracy, writes Alastair Nicholson. (The Age)   Our liberties and our democracy are under a more serious threat than that posed by terrorists as a direct result of the reaction of our leaders, the media and, in turn, the public, to that threat.   We have experienced a complete failure of political leadership on both sides of politics that has led to a lemming-like rush by the two major political parties to outdo each other in proposing more and more extreme legislation directed at combating a threat of terrorism in this country.   In the name of security, in circumstances reminiscent of the works of Joseph Heller and George Orwell, the public is prevented from knowing the evidentiary basis that justifies such powers. This is the case with new legislation and also, as US activist Scott Parkin discovered, where the powers are applied to an individual.   Absent the death penalty and the official approval of torture, loss of individual liberty is the most extreme sanction that can be inflicted by the state on our autonomy and integrity. Historically, our legal systems and institutions reflected this fact and the concept of the "liberty of the subject" is one of the cherished doctrines of the common law. Indeed, the capricious use of detention often lay at the heart of popular portrayals of totalitarian regimes in contradistinction to ours. Now, in a society where democratic virtues are hailed as the foundation of our personal freedoms, we seem to have come to accept the legitimacy of the extended use of incarceration, one that could have perilous, ever-increasing application.   I do not for a moment suggest that we do not need ASIO or other intelligence-gathering organisations, nor do I suggest that they should not be properly empowered to carry out their functions. The important question is what is a proper empowerment. It is simply not good enough for the Government to assert the need for a power without justifying it as the Federal Government and the Premiers seek to do.   The present powers conferred on ASIO are extensive and represent a considerable invasion of civil liberties. The fact that they have apparently been exercised sparingly to date, while commendable, is no answer. The fact is that police powers of this type are always open to the possibility of abuse..   The checks and balances that it is suggested should be included are laughable. The present ASIO legislation in relation to terrorism had a sunset clause of three years and yet the premiers apparently regarded it as something of a victory that they obtained agreement to a 10-year sunset clause in relation to the new legislation.   The provision for judicial review is no more than window-dressing. It is a meaningless safeguard because the judge or magistrate concerned has no way of testing what is produced by the authorities. Any judge who has had experience of authorising telephone tapping or the use of listening devices can testify that this is no safeguard and that the judge is little more than a rubber stamp.   It is for this reason that most federal judges now refuse to have any part in authorising such applications. The proposed legislation will provide nothing better and the provision for judicial review is included largely to create a false impression of due process.   The second problem about this sort of legislation is that it is likely to lead to a situation where Government and its agencies will use it for other and improper purposes, including its own political ends. Alternatively, those responsible for its administration will bungle its use in such a way that it will have the effect of blighting people"s lives in the same way as the Department of Immigration has done to many of the asylum seekers under its charge.   Contrary to the misnomer "the war on terror", this is not a war and the threat to Australia is much less than it was in the Second World War or even the Cold War. Nevertheless, the history of the surrender of liberties in times of war is not an attractive one. In Australia during the Second World War, extensive powers were granted to the attorney-general to detain and intern people suspected of affinities with the enemy. Most of the exercise of such powers later proved to be unnecessary.   There has been a failure of leadership on all sides of politics in relation to these changes and this has been coupled with a failure by ordinary members of Parliament generally to discharge their responsibilities to the Australian people.   The Government under the leadership of this Prime Minister has embodied a true neo-conservative approach to Government modelled on the worst possible examples of this approach in the US. But the Opposition is not without blame in this saga and bears much of the responsibility for the introduction of the destructive immigration policy that this country has pursued since the early 1990s. Nevertheless, this Government has pursued it with messianic vigour to the point where many thinking Australians, myself included, have felt ashamed of their country.   The Howard Government"s fear agenda has been allowed to flourish as the Labor Party has sat back like the little kid at school who gets sand kicked in his face and who is too frightened to upset the big boys.   The Labor Party I know would have fought tooth and nail against Australia"s involvement in Iraq without UN sanctions. They would have protected Australia from terrorism by simply not being party to an illegal war. Their voices would have been loud and would have clearly defined what they stood for. The Labor Party I know would have countered Howard"s fear agenda with one of peace.   This climate of fear is Howard"s creation and instead of counteracting it with an alternative, forceful, intelligent debate, the Labor Party blindly accepts it and helps promote it.   The reality is that we have witnessed a complete and abject failure by Australia"s politicians to provide much-needed leadership to this country and they have sacrificed our freedoms in the process.   Driven by fear and the need to act, we run the risk of a series of overreactions in our response to terrorism. This is the very dynamic that terrorists rely upon. What they cannot achieve by military might, they seek to achieve by stimulating our fears. Indeed, it is by our own actions that we are likely to isolate and ostracise members of our community who might then become targets for terrorist recruitment. It is also by our own actions that we travel further from our ideal of what a democratic and open society based upon the rule of law should be.   (Alastair Nicholson, QC, is an honorary professorial fellow in the criminology department at Melbourne University and former chief justice of the Family Court of Australia).
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