a importância de identificar o inimigo

 (publicado originalmente no Observador)

Os nomes das guerras costumam remeter para o sítio onde se combate, e aqueles que participam na guerra costumavam ser aqueles que estão no terreno e lutam nos campos de batalha. No entanto, tem havido guerras com outros tipos de nomes. Em 1945 George Orwell cunhou o nome “guerra fria” para descrever o tipo de relação que os EUA teriam com os países vizinhos por serem o único país com a bomba atómica. Como sabemos, a URSS e outros Estados rapidamente ganharam a sua capacidade nuclear e o mundo evoluiu para uma situação de tensão entre dois blocos concorrentes que recebeu precisamente esse nome – Guerra Fria – até à queda do Muro de Berlim e consequente esboroar do bloco soviético. Também o Presidente Lyndon Johnson chamou em 1964 às suas políticas públicas de “Guerra contra a Pobreza” (War on Poverty), George W. Bush declarou a “Guerra contra o Terrorismo” (Global War on Terrorism) em 2001 e, mais recentemente, temos ouvido vários líderes políticos a falar duma “Guerra contra a Pandemia”.

O problema destas denominações é que o inimigo se torna invisível, difuso, desfocado, múltiplo. Não se sabe bem quem é, ou sequer se é. Não é um inimigo palpável e com rosto. A alternativa não é arranjar um inimigo qualquer para dar sentido à nossa guerra, nem devemos atirar ao lado como alguém que diz que é preciso matar o homem branco, ou outros ainda para quem o grande problema são os ciganos. Esses bodes expiatórios servem para guerras que não são as nossas e, uma vez derrotados, o nosso problema persiste. Foi com simples distracções que nos entretivemos e, entretanto, não só perdemos tempo como eventualmente sacrificámos a paz de inocentes.

Muitas vezes, o politicamente correcto é simplesmente o correcto. Outras vezes, o politicamente correcto limita-nos a capacidade de identificar certeiramente aquilo e aqueles que combatemos. Voltemos a um problema nacional. A guerra no Afeganistão, também nossa porque envolveu 4500 militares portugueses — dois mortos em serviço — no âmbito da NATO, fez parte da Guerra contra o Terrorismo declarada pelos EUA cinco dias depois de sofrer os ataques de 11 de Setembro de 2001. Os atentados de 2001 e dos anos próximos tiveram um autor, a Al-Qaeda, e uma ideologia: o radicalismo islamista.

É claro que seria injusto culpar todo o Islão por causa duma franja minoritária e oportunista que apoia o terrorismo contra o Ocidente e o seu modo de vida. A maioria dos muçulmanos são tão pacíficos e normais como nós. No entanto, não podemos ignorar que os terroristas da Al-Qaeda, do ISIS, do Hezbollah e outros agem invocando motivos religiosos. Aqui, por complexos compreensíveis relacionados com o politicamente correcto, houve um esforço concertado para não relacionar aquela religião e os seus crentes com as ideias de radicalismo, terrorismo e violência. A meu ver, fizemos mal. Seria do nosso interesse e do interesse da maioria dos muçulmanos que tivéssemos juntado esforços para sinalizar os grupos, os líderes políticos e religiosos, as mesquitas e madraças que albergam as seitas ditas islâmicas mas que distorcem o Islão e instrumentalizam a fé dos homens e o nome de Deus para semear a violência e cometer crimes contra a humanidade.

Para além do mau nome que estes radicais dão ao Islão, a maior quantidade de mortos vítimas de atentados terroristas são… muçulmanos. Em vez de identificarmos o inimigo do terrorismo islamista e de o combatermos, cedemos primeiro ao politicamente correcto e depois cedemos também ao medo – sobretudo após os ataques a embaixadas dinamarquesas em 2005/6 por causa de caricaturas no Jyllands-Posten e o massacre do Charlie Hebdo em 2015.

Quando não identificamos o inimigo numa guerra, ele ganha uma vantagem desnecessária. Em sociedades democráticas como as nossas, os líderes têm contas a prestar para se manterem no poder e para continuarem a actuar. Quando a guerra é contra um inimigo vago e sem cara, quando após 20 anos já não sabemos o que fazemos numas montanhas longínquas e porque é que isso é tão importante para a nossa segurança e modo de vida, então a retirada é fatal e o sabor da derrota é amargo. Como já não compreendemos aquela guerra, ela torna-se aparentemente inútil e cara.

Queremos crer que os talibãs de hoje são melhores, mais moderados e humanistas que os de há 20 anos – mas as imagens e relatos mostram-nos o contrário. A Al-Qaeda continua, a Bin Laden sucedeu Al-Zawahiri e surgiu também um ISIS que semeia o terror até em Moçambique. Podemos pensar que ao sairmos do Afeganistão a guerra acabou, no entanto, o radicalismo islamista persiste como inimigo violento, perigoso e próximo. Devemos seguir a nossa vida sem a mudar, mas, se formos confrontados novamente com este inimigo, só ganhamos em identificá-lo melhor.

Bangladesh condemns extremists while others keep coming to South Asia

International Crimes Tribunal of Dhaka

Yesterday, one of the worse criminals of the XXI century was condemned to life imprisonment. His name is Delwar Hossain Sayedee, he is 74 years old and he was one of the leaders of the extremist party Jamaat-e-Islami in Bangladesh. During the Liberation War of Bangladesh in 1971, he committed brutal crimes against humanity. Being now accused of at least 20 crimes, the case went to Supreme Court and there he was proven guilty of:

•     torture a leader of the Awami League, Mr Nurul Islam, and arson attack on his house;
•     killing one and torching house in the village of Chitholia;
•     killing one and torching 25 houses in the village of Umedpur;
•     abduction and rape of 3 sisters of Parerhat Bazar;
•     forcing 100 to 150 Hindus to convert to Islam in Parerhat and other villages.

Delwar Hossain Sayedee, a Razakar

Besides that, he was accused of many other crimes, as killing more 65 people, raping countless Hindu girls (many in Pakistani army camps), and torching civil houses in at least 17 other villages. Those charges lacked evidences for the judges. Mr Sayedee was known as “Delu Razakar”. Razakars, as Al-Badr’s and Al-Shams were paramilitary militias organized by the Pakistan Army to fight the freedom fighters in Bangladesh in 1971. These paramilitary forces, together with Pakistan Army, committed one of the biggest genocides of history, killing 3 million people (specially Hindus, other religious minorities, moderate Mulsims, Awami League party supporters and country intellectuals), provoking an exodus of 10 million refugees and the displacement of 30 million people million, and raping more than 200 thousand Bangladeshi women, from whom thousands of war babies were born. Genocidal mass rape was part of the military strategy and must be seen in this context: as General Tikka Khan (also known as the “Butcher of Bengal”) openly said "I will reduce this majority to a minority".

Mr Sayedee is not the first person to be condemned for crimes against humanity, for example Mr Abdul Quader Molla faced death sentence and was hanged to death on the 12^th of December 2013. Next judicial case to be solved must be Azharul Islam’s, who was an Al-Badr commander and is charged “with two acts of genocide that left more than 1,200 people dead. The 61-year-old Jamaat assistant secretary general was also charged with torture, looting, arson, abduction, rape, mass killing and conspiracy to kill unarmed civilians in Rangpur”, reports the Daily Star.

Beautiful poster from 1971, saying that Hindus,
Christians, Buddhists and Muslims, all are Bengali

But now it is fair to ask: if those crimes were committed in 1971, why they are being judged only now? The problem was that during many years the Jamaat-e-Islami party was influential enough to prevent his criminal members to be judged. Only in 2009 – 38 years after the liberation war – the International Crimes Tribunal was set up, being supported by the Awami League government and large sectors of Bangladeshi society, many of them young people who were born after 1971, who gathered in huge numbers in the Shahbag area in Dhaka calling for justice. The Shahbag Movement was one of the biggest protests in History of moderate Muslims in a country with a Muslim majority. Although all the political parties tried to take credits for these manifestations, it is now clearer that the Shahbag Movement was spontaneously born within the civil society, in a non-partisan way.

However, we must not believe that Jamaat-e-Islami and other extremist groups are weak in Bangladesh. On the contrary, these parties are richer than others, being very well financed from abroad with donors in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar… Also, in the case of Jamaat, they are self-financed through key businesses they control in Bangladesh, such as banks, hospitals, universities, madrasas, charities and others. In fact, Jamaat-e-Islami called for hartal (strike) yesterday and Sunday, in order to protest the condemnation of Mr Sayedee. Yesterday, some clashes between Islami Chhatra Shibir (Jamaat-e-Islami’s youth political wing) and the police were registered.

 

Al-Zawahiri announced in September 2014 a new Al-Qaeda chapter in South Asia

Al-Qaeda in South Asia

Justice is being made and Bangladesh is putting an end to impunity, which was undermining rule of law. This is good news. We just have to hope that when other party comes to power no amnesty must be given to such criminals. But while Bangladesh is putting its terrorists into jail, others are coming to South Asia. Al-Qaeda’s leader, Mr Al-Zawahiri, announced this month that Al-Qaeda is opening a new chapter in South Asia. Besides Al-Qaeda’s support of the Taliban in Afghanistan, experts admit that India will be the first priority for this terrorist network and Myanmar and Bangladesh are probably the following targets.

India’s Prime-Minister Mr Narendra Modi, told CNN today that Al-Qaeda will fail in India. He said “If anyone thinks Indian Muslims will dance to their tune, they are delusional. Indian Muslims will not want anything bad for India”. As Indian elections were won by the Hindu-Nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), many political analysts feared that discrimination laws and practices would flourish in the country, marginalizing minorities and stablishing 1^st and 2^nd class citizens. But those fears were not materialized so far and we must give this government the benefit of the doubt and Mr Modi first steps in government seamed good. For example, after visiting neighbouring countries, Mr Modi chose Japan as the first country to visit, where he signed with Japan’s Prime Minister Mr Shinzo Abe the Tokyo Declaration for India, to foster Indo-Japanese cooperation in domains as important as Defence, Maritime Security, Cyber Security, Economic and Technologic Partnership.

 

Tokio: Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi with Shinzo Abe, Prime Minister of Japan

Even if Indian Muslims are a minority (around 14,6%), India is also the 3^rd country in the world with more Muslims (177 million), next to Indonesia (204 million) and Pakistan (178 million). Most of the Muslims in India are known as being quite moderate. But one of the most significant clashes between Muslims and Hindus happened during the tragic 2002 Gujarat riots, when Mr Modi was Gujarat’s Chief Minister. The challenge is simple in theory and hard but possible in practice. If Muslims in India feel they are being unfairly treated, they may become easy targets for jihadi recruiters. But if Mr Modi choses the right words and his government choses the right actions to integrate Muslim communities in India, he will succeed.

Most of Indian Muslims are proud Indian, they want democracy and a pacific secular State. We should resist the prejudice of seeing in each Muslim a potential terrorist. That is simply not fair. But we must also recognize evidences, and reality is that Al-Qaeda terrorists are coming to fight and bomb in South Asia. Al-Qaeda, as ISIS and other Islamic terrorist associations, uses a misinterpretation of Islam for political purposes. South Asian politicians understand that their best allies against Islamic terrorist groups are moderate Muslims themselves. They are the ones who ultimately will expose this fraud and reject this foreign, far-away, backwards ideology of fear. And India concretely has a long experience of both defending against terrorist groups as Lashkar-e-Taiba, Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and other ISI (Pakistan Secret Services) supported groups, as well of preventing communist attacks by the Naxalite guerrilla groups. With Al-Qaeda opening a new chapter in South Asia, the free world should support India in its fight against terrorism.

 

Dhaka: Shahbag protests in 2013, supporting the condemnation of 1971 war criminals

To sum up

While extremists are finally being put in jail in Bangladesh, others are coming to South Asia. Terrorism never sleeps and this is our wake-up call: those who love freedom and liberty should be vigilant and don’t let these extremists gain ground anywhere.

como estava o Bangladesh em Novembro de 2013

O artigo em baixo foi inicialmente publicado na revista Think South Asia nº11, número de Dezembro, disponível aqui: http://sadf.eu/home/2013/12/15/think-south-asia-11/. Entretanto as eleições deram-se no dia 5 de Janeiro, com o boicote do principal partido da oposição (BNP), que apelou à não-participação nas eleições. O partido do governo (Awami League) ganhou assim as eleições, elegendo dois terços dos deputados. Os extremistas do Jamaat-e-Islami, aliados eleitorais do BNP, preferiram influenciar as eleições através do terror, provocando mais de 20 mortes no dia das eleições e continuando os atentados até hoje, principalmente perseguindo as minorias religiosas (em especial os hindus, os cristãos e os budistas) e muçulmanos moderados. No fundo, os alvos do costume.

The Situation in Bangladesh – November/December 2013

I could have been killed last time I was in Dhaka. Anyone could. In fact, around 30 innocent people died in street bombings and shootings during the 3^rd week of November 2013.

The streets of Dhaka are filled with orange and black posters from Hizb ut-Tahrir. The main purpose of this poster is to call the Military to take over power in Bangladesh and establish "Khilafat" (the caliphate). This pan-Islamic political organisation has been legally banned in Bangladesh since 2009, yet they continue to spend fortunes in promoting extremism through propaganda and schemes to take over the elected powers, evident for example in 2011.

In their most recent press release, Hizb ut-Tahrir states that during the last  strike 25 people were killed, concluding that "Democracy = Death to People". Of course what they do not understand is that democracy is not responsible for  causing these deaths: extremism is. With their hate speeches and incite to violence, Hizb ut-Tharir and other powerful extremist organisations like Jamaat-e-Islami are contributing to the confrontational climate in Bangladesh' society and therefore putting this country on the verge of violent situations where religious and ethnic minorities are always the first ones to suffer. Many people on the street timidly share the opinion that the current strike is not helping in restoring  peace and order, which this troubles country needs so desperately.

Hizb ut-Tharir cannot win elections, but their posters help us understand how violent the climate in Bangladesh is right now. Bangladesh has two major parties, the Awami League in power and the Bangladesh National Party (BNP) in the opposition. Both are considered to be relatively moderate, the Awami League on the left, BNP on the right. The problem will be the alliances they are forging for the upcoming  elections. BNP has a coalition agreement with Jamaat-e-Islami for next elections, and although Jamaat-e-Islami has been barred by the courts from partaking in elections, its influence is and will still be enormous. By financing part of BNP’s campaign, Jamaat-e-Islami will be able to push their extreme Islamist agenda, hurting religious minorities and setting their war criminals free. In 1971 many Jamaat-e-Islami leaders engaged in the tremendous genocide in Bangladesh, where during 9 months of terror 3 million people were killed and around 4 hundred thousand women were raped. The International Crimes Tribunal is trying to end 40 years of impunity by providing fair trials for these war criminals. If Jamaat-e-Islami comes to power with the help of another party, nobody doubts that they will try to end this important Court of Justice.

Just to add another concern, the very active extremist outlet Hefazat-e-Islam is another group to be concerned about. It is politically and financially backed by Jamaat-e-Islami. They are actively producing bombs and violence in order to achieve their 13 points, quote:

1. Restore the phrase ‘Complete faith and trust in the Almighty Allah’ in the constitution and repeal all the laws contrary to the Quran and Sunnah.

2. Pass a law in parliament keeping a provision of the maximum punishment of death sentence to prevent defaming Allah, the Islamic prophet Muhammad and Islam and smear campaigns against Muslims.

3. Take measures for stringent punishment against self-declared atheists and bloggers, led the so-called Shahbagh movement, and anti-Islamists who made derogatory remarks against Muhammad.

4. Stop infiltration of all alien-culture, including shamelessness in the name of individual’s freedom of expression, ant-social activities, adultery, free mixing of male and female and candle lighting.

5. Make Islamic education mandatory from primary to higher secondary levels canceling the anti-Islamic women policy and anti-religion education policy.

6. Officially declare Qadianis (Ahmadiyyas) as non-Muslim and stop their propaganda and all conspiratorial ill-moves.

7. Stop setting up sculptures at intersections, schools, colleges and universities across the country.

8. Lift restriction on saying payers in all mosques across the country, including Baitul Mukarram National Mosque, without any hassle and remove obstacles to carrying out religious activities.

9. Stop evil efforts to spread hatred in the mind of young generation regarding Islam through the misrepresentation of religious dresses and cultures in the media.

10. Stop anti-Islam activities by NGOs across the country, including in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, and evil attempts of Christian missionaries for conversion.

11. Stop attacks, mass killing, oppression and indiscriminate shooting on Alem-Ulama, devout followers of Muhammad and towhidi janata (revolutionary people).

12. Stop threatening teachers and students of Qawmi madrasas, Islamic scholars, imams and khatibs and conspiracies against them.

13. Free immediately all the arrested Islamic scholars, madrasa students and towhidi janata and withdraw all false cases filed against them, compensate the victims and bring the assailants to justice.

There are many other groups promoting extremism in Bangladesh and sadly this is the kind of discourse we  find ourselves confronted with in Bangladesh nowadays. The country is in an extremely sensitive pre-electoral situation. Despite the impressive reports we receive every day in our countries, none of them are completely able to picture how  tense the climate really is. People are afraid. The Police and the Military are on the streets. National strikes are being organized by the opposition parties. In the streets of Dhaka small bombs and explosives like “cocktail molotovs” are being dropped. Different neighborhoods of the city are being affected and from while to while we can hear gun shots in places that used to be safe and secure. Many countries with embassies or relevant information in Bangladesh are advising their nationals not to visit Bangladesh right now.

In 2012 I was in Bangladesh for 11 days and last November it was my 2^nd time there. I noticed that many things changed. There is some new infrastructure and many roads and buildings are being built. There is some real progress being made. I first thought that the lack of the usually omnipresent traffic jams were the consequence of the existence of new roads, but that was not its main cause: due to an opposition-called 84 hour “hartal” (strike), many services stopped completely.

Another thing I saw was an overwhelming presence of Police and the Military on the streets, mainly in the intersections between main roads and secondary streets. This strategic placement is to avoid attacks in the main roads of groups coming from narrower streets to drop explosives and cause more casualties. I was travelling by car and within the small distance from the airport to my hotel, Police forces stopped and frisked the car twice. But as they saw that I was a foreigner, they quickly let us go. The respect for foreigners is part of this culture. Each and every road intersection is filled with police forces in groups of 5 to 10 people, all visible carrying machine guns.

On the 1^st day, after I left my luggage in the Hotel I went by rickshaw to visit the Holy Rosary Church, which is a beautiful catholic temple. You probably know that Dhaka is known for being the city of rickshaws, with around 4 hundred thousand cycle-rickshaws driving around every day. Nowadays rickshaw is the safest means of transport in Dhaka because it is the only which allows us to jump and run at any time. Some buses, CNG’s and cars were attacked during the last days. So I went through Tejgaon, where the Prime-Minister’s office is, and 10 minutes after we heard an explosion noise and gun shots nearby. The security guard of the church told me to come inside the Church gates and then locked the entrance. After a while, everything was back to “normal”.

People are afraid and tense; we can see that in almost everybody’s eyes. The Bangladeshis are worried about what may happen in the course of the next days, before and during and after elections. In 2012 I told all my friends that I never saw a city with so much life and movement as Dhaka. Many times I even complained that I could not sleep with so much honking in the street, 24 hours per day in a non-stop mode. And trust me, I am a heavy sleeper. But last November I could not see one single person in this main avenue at night. Nobody dares to be out there in this megacity of 15 million people which used to be one of those that never sleeps. It seems that fear is reigning in Dhaka.

The people in Bangladesh, more than ever, need  our international support in advancing and stabilizing   their legal institutions and democracy. People want peaceful elections, the International Crimes Tribunal to keep providing Justice and honoring the memories of the genocide victims. The economy is growing at a 6% to 7% rate every year. Extremism exists, extremism is well financed, and extremism could damage all these and other achievements. As the Canadian MPs Joe Daniel and Russ Hiebert said in a recent pre-election observation mission report, “the role and participation of Jamaat-e-Islami in national politics requires close scrutiny by authorities as this organization has created deep concerns about the protection of the rights of women, minorities and others. The BNP in particular must also reflect on the possible role that Jamaat may be playing in its party and work to distance itself from this extremist organization”.

It would surely be a setback for Human Rights and Minority Rights in Bangladesh if extremism of any kind came back to power again. Regardless of who wins the next elections, we must hope that Bangladesh finds the peaceful conditions required in order to prosper and keep elevating their standard of living in the years to come.

extremist propaganda inciting to violence in Bangladesh

Hizb ut-Tahrir poster inciting to violence in Dhaka, Bangladesh

The streets of Dhaka are filled with orange and black posters from Hizb ut-Tahrir. The main purpose of this poster is to call Military to take the power in Bangladesh and establish "Khilafat" (the caliphate). This pan-Islamic political organisation is legally banned in Bangladesh since 2009, yet they continue to spend fortunes in promoting extremism throughout propaganda and schemes to take over the elected powers, as it occurred for example in 2011.

In their most recent press release, Hizb ut-Tahrir states that during current strike 25 people were killed and then they conclude that "Democracy = Death to People". Of course what they do not understand is that democracy is not causing these deaths: extremism is. With their hate speeches and incite to violence, Hizb ut-Tharir and other powerful extremist organisations like Jamaat-e-Islami are contributing to the confrontational climate in Bangladesh' society and therefore putting this country on the verge of violent situations where religious and ethnic minorities are always the first to suffer. Many people on the street timidly share the opinion that current strike is not helping normality and peace to come back to this country. Bangladeshi people needs now more than ever our international support to their legal institutions and democracy.

This is all for today.

António Vieira da Cruz

SADF reporting from Bangladesh

Dhaka, the 12th of November 2013

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