Pakistani journalists shout slogans during a demonstration in Islamabad, Nov. 10.

After the breaking-up of the PPP meeting in Rawalpindi, the line seems to be once again drawn between General Pervez Musharraf and the opposition political spectrum, with calls for an All Parties Conference (APC) from the Mutahidda Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) and from Benazir Bhutto under the umbrella of the Alliance for Restoration of Democracy (ARD).
The London APC, which later became All Parties Democratic Movement (APDM) and was unable to attract the PPP and unwisely allowed the JUIF to plough its own political furrow, will not likely be repeated this time. So is this the end of General Musharraf’s divide and rule policy if he doesn’t announce an end to the Emergency and a date for the elections immediately? If he doesn’t, the country could once again head for a grand confrontation with no one in the field to fight on behalf of General Musharraf but the ruling PML.
The PPP wants the General to leave his military post before November 15. But while he has pledged to hold the 2008 general elections in February he has not said much about when he will leave his military rank. Before the Provisional Constitutional Order (PCO) put an end to the case at the Supreme Court, he was committed to leaving his “dual office“ upon getting sworn in as president for another five-year term on November 15.
But now he doesn’t want to repeat his undertaking because he doesn’t know when the new Supreme Court, with its judges sworn in under his PCO, will decide the matter of his re-election.
Of course, there will be problems with the validity of any verdict by the new Supreme Court.
The new chief justice has to set up an 11-member bench to hear the petitions filed against General Musharraf’s re-election. But under the law, once a bench has been disrupted the case has to be heard all over again.
However, once the new bench has been put together, maybe in a week’s time, it will need the petitioners to argue their case. But the main opposition lawyer of the case, Mr Aitzaz Ahsan, is behind bars, unable to come to the court.
Additionally, the petitioner Justice (Retd) Wajihuddin Ahmad, says he is no longer interested in pursuing his petition before a new court that he does not recognise as legally constituted.
So all these issues have to be sorted out and overcome.
General Musharraf’s attorney general, Malik Qayyum, thinks that his retirement from the army could take a while longer than the deadline accepted by him earlier.
The case has to be heard de novo and there is no telling when it will reach its conclusion. Add to that the boycott of the Court by the lawyers and we have a very uncertain situation emerging. General Musharraf’s external supporters, in particular the United States, now say he must doff his uniform before November 15 if he wants to retain their support.
It is significant that the US Consul General in Lahore has actually said that General Musharraf must quit the army chief’s position before November 15.
Until now US officials had merely said that he must remove uniform as soon as possible without giving any cut-off date.
Is this an ominous sign that his foreign benefactors are thinking of ditching him?
Another demand pending before him is to lift the Emergency.
If he doesn’t do it quickly, this is bound to become more strident. So far he has been responding to “conditions“ imposed on him only half-heartedly, but as time passes more demands are going to surface.
They will surface because the facts on the ground will be changing rapidly as his domestic support dwindles. The media too will have to be restored to their earlier freedom.
And the financial damage done to the TV channels will not have endeared the General to them.
The lawyers have proved that they can take to the warpath and will not be cowed down. They had earlier wished to keep their campaign non-political; now they are asking the political parties to join them.
Indeed, the big demand that has just been voiced by the PPP could become a battle-cry: the restoration of the old Court of Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry.
But that is linked to the PCO. Without overthrowing the PCO, the old Chief Justice of Pakistan cannot come back. So we could get into another deadlock that might wreck the proposed elections by posing an all or nothing confrontation.
The numbers were once with President Musharraf.
DAILYTIMES.CO.PK

Georgian special police forces use tear gas to disperse opposition protesters in front of the parliament building in Tbilisi, Nov. 7.

Georgia’s current political mess started with allegations of cronyism and abuse of power at the highest level. It continued with demonstrations, mostly peaceful but with some violence. They were broken up by a police action involving a lot more.
Then the authorities said they were battling an alleged Kremlin-backed putsch.
Now a state of emergency has enabled the authorities to black out opposition radio and television stations (and in some cases smash their equipment).
Public meetings have been banned. That has given all sides a chance to shout “provokatsiya“, a Russian word with no direct translation, much used in the ex-communist world.
Literally, it means a “provocation“, but with elements of “stunt“ and “dirty trick“.
The upshot is that Mikheil Saakashvili, the strong-headed pro-Western president who triumphed in the 2003 “rose revolution“, seems to have let himself be provoked to the point of near disaster.
He has handed a propaganda gift to his Russian adversaries, severely dented his self-proclaimed credentials as a democrat, and dismayed his friends abroad.
On Thursday November 8th Mr Saakashvili tried to defuse some of the tension by calling hasty presidential elections for January 5th.
Mr Saakashvili and his allies in government already have a strong electoral mandate.
Big demonstrations do not necessarily trump that. The country’s economic, regulatory and military reforms have been by any standard a stunning success.
And the opposition is in large part incoherent and hysterical, and may well be financed or even organised by outside forces that wish the country ill.
Today Georgia publicly accused Badri Patarkatsishvili, a tycoon who co-owns Imedi, an opposition television and radio station, with Rupert Murdoch, of trying to stage a coup (how Mr Patarkatsishvili, who is exiled from Russia, would fit in with the alleged Kremlin involvement is not clear).
But other aspects are troubling. The presidency’s strong powers make it particularly important that decision-making is based on the best available advice and is exercised with scrupulous clarity and care. Mr Saakashvili’s impulsive temperament, coupled in some cases with a blind eye to his friends’ flaws, have created a worrying impression of both cronyism and a liking for a brusque, even bullying, style.
He is keener on building a functioning state than building a democracy. His heroes are not the likes of Thomas Jefferson, but Kemal Ataturk.
Economic reform alone is not a recipe for happiness. Georgia’s stunning GDP growth (perhaps over 10% by the end of the year, despite Russian trade sanctions) is great news for the well-educated urban middle classes. It has yet to mean as much for the ill-educated, elderly and rural population.
But they have votes too: making them feeling wanted, needed and listened-to requires a patient and inclusive style of government that has been lacking in Georgia.
Similarly, a huge increase in defence spending and a lot of well-directed western military aid does not on its own make Georgia a prime candidate to join NATO, desirable though that might be for other reasons.
The latest over-reaction came despite a direct warning during a recent visit from NATO’s secretary-general, Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, of the need for more transparency, accountability and legality.
Now NATO has been forced publicly to condemn the Georgian authorities.
The paradox is that it used to be on foreign policy, particularly relations with Russia, that Georgia risked embarrassing its allies. “Misha, when you talk like that, your allies dive for cover“ was the message conveyed forcefully by his western friends of his belligerent tone.
That brought a sharp change of tack a year ago, after the expulsion from Georgia of several Russians accused of spying had raised the temperature again.
Two subsequent Russian raids on Georgian territory, one by helicopter gunships, the other with an abortive missile attack, brought an admirably measured and moderate reaction.
Georgia’s western friends are struggling to pull off the same trick with “Misha’s“ domestic policy.
But the election called by Mr Saakashvili is not what his allies were urging: indeed, it looks like a “provokatsiya“.
A landslide is not necessarily a mandate: as Mr Saakashvili would readily agree when talking about Russia, democracy is not what happens at elections, but what happens in between them.
ECONOMIST.COM

The Ethiopians in Somalia have discovered to their cost the same harsh reality confronting the Americans in Iraq: it is easy for a well-equipped and trained army to defeat in short order an inferior enemy. What follows, however, is frustration and humiliation as that enemy regroups and begins a guerrilla war against the occupying power.
Regular troops may be able to score isolated victories against insurgents but since the timing of attacks is generally of the insurgents’ choosing, it is hard, if not impossible, to strike a decisive blow against them.
This feeds the frustration of occupying troops which then turns to anger when their own casualties are subjected to degrading treatment by the insurgents.
The mutilation of the corpse of an Ethiopian soldier which was then dragged through the streets of Mogadishu by Union of Islamic Courts supporters was an all too successful provocation.
Ethiopian tank and mortar fire, allegedly aimed at insurgent positions, caused carnage among civilians, bringing to at least 60 the death toll since renewed violence gripped the city.
Both the Ethiopians along with the rudimentary Somalia government forces they support and the insurgents are accused of appalling behavior by Human Rights Watch which has called for all the perpetrators to be brought to justice.
There is presently little chance of that happening. Somalia is returning to chaos and no one, least of all the country’s government, seems to know what to do about it.
The answer is nonetheless clear. The Ethiopians, like the Americans in Iraq, thought they came as liberators.
In fact, they quickly became part of the problem they had allegedly come to solve. This is even truer in this particular case since Ethiopia originally said that its troops would leave in a fortnight.
That promised departure long ago faded into the past and now the continued presence of Ethiopian soldiers on Somali soil causes offense to even moderate Somalis who would themselves have nothing to do with the Union of Islamic Courts.
Given the historic rivalries between the two countries, Ethiopia’s continued military deployment in Somalia is a provocation rather than a way to peace.
The response of its soldiers to the appalling treatment of the fallen in no way wins Somali hearts and minds. It ought instead to draw a line under Ethiopia’s intervention.
Whatever Addis Ababa’s friends in Washington may think, now is surely the time to leave.
Some political leverage might be possible if Ethiopia’s withdrawal were tied to a peace conference at which all parties, the rival warlords and the Union of Islamic Courts were present.
Past efforts to find agreements do not bode well for any deal, but in the final analysis, this conflict is a Somali affair.
The country’s neighbors, including Ethiopia, have no legitimate role except supportiveness. Somalia must in the end succeed--or perhaps fail--on its own terms. Outside interference cannot help and indeed has been a major cause of the present chaotic conflict.
ARABNEWS.COM

Western Europe’s small democracies have, on the whole, been exceptionally fortunate. Freer and richer than almost anywhere else in the world, countries such as Holland, Belgium and Switzerland would seem to have little to worry about.
This is why the world normally hears less about them than about Afghanistan or Kosovo.
Yet all three have been much in the news of late--and not for happy reasons.
The most successful political force in Switzerland today is Christoph Blocher’s Swiss People’s Party.
Vlaams Belang, the Flemish nationalist party, may not be the biggest party in Belgium, but it has done well in local elections.
Like the Swiss People’s Party, Vlaams Belang feeds on popular resentment of immigrants of the European Union, and, of course, of the French-speaking Walloons, from whom the Flemish nationalists would like a divorce. This last sentiment is posing a serious threat to Belgium’s survival.
Although the Dutch government is still managed mostly by mainstream, steady-as-you-go Christian Democrats, right-wing populism is growing.
The new Proud of the Netherlands Movement, led by Rita Verdonk, the former minister of integration, promotes a somewhat more respectable version of this hard line.
These parties and movements share a sense that native-born citizens have been let down by liberal political elites, who seem unable or unwilling to stem the tide of immigration, crime and militancy, as well as the erosion of national sovereignty by EU bureaucracy and global capitalism.
Such fears are by no means confined to Europe’s small countries. Nicolas Sarkozy’s election in France has at least something to do with similar feelings.
But anxieties about being swamped by foreigners and dominated by outside powers are more acute in smaller countries, whose political elites seem particularly impotent.
The Dutch case is the most surprising, because, unlike Belgium, the Netherlands has no significant tradition of right-wing populism.
Nor does it share Switzerland’s insularity. On the contrary, the Dutch pride themselves on their openness and hospitality to foreigners.
The case of Somalia-born Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the bestselling author of Infidel, best illustrates both the popular resentments and the relative openness that mark contemporary Dutch society.
Much criticism and even abuse has been heaped on the Dutch for the way her adopted country has treated her.
Commentators in the US and elsewhere have accused the Dutch of “unacceptable cowardice.“
The way the Dutch government handled the affair was not elegant, to say the least. But I’m not sure how many governments do pay for the protection of private citizens who live permanently abroad. The US doesn’t pay to protect its citizens who are under threat even at home.
It is true that the Dutch, proud and comfortable inside their narrow borders, have, like the Swiss, often viewed the outside world with a degree of smugness. And for this they are now being punished. That, too, is the natural fate of being a lucky little country in Western Europe.
Ian Buruma
DAILYSTAR.CO.LB