Americans launch Ramadan offensive of another kind
By Muhammad Rafique

ISLAMABAD - Wendy Chamberlin, the trim, always elegantly dressed American ambassador to Pakistan, has vowed to fast during the remainder of the holy month of Ramadan, which began last Friday.

This apparently is a form of damage control after the "Ugly Americans" in Washington rebuffed Pakistan's President General Pervez Musharraf's repeated requests to suspend or at least scale down the bombings in neighboring Afghanistan during Ramadan.

This week Chamberlin, a Christian, invited top bureaucrats, Muslim envoys and selected media persons to an iftar dinner at her residence - the meal that marks the end to the daily dawn-to-dusk fast observed by Muslims during Ramadan - and told the charmed audience in a speech that she will keep the fast herself. Earlier, an embassy spokesman said that Chamberlain wanted to understand better what Muslims experience during Ramadan.

Chamberlin said that she was genuinely impressed by the spirit of Ramadan, a sort of self-denial, and she wanted to show sympathy with the deprived and distressed people of Afghanistan, as well as the poor people of Pakistan.

On display on the occasion at her elegant residence in the diplomatic enclave in Islamabad were paintings by Americans showing Muslims praying and reading the holy Koran, and framed verses from the Koran. Many of the Western woman guests wore traditional Pakistani dress, especially the shalwar (trousers) and kameez (shirt).

The Saudi Arabian ambassador to Pakistan was also invited to the party. Islamabad and Riyadh had insisted on a pause in the bombing raids during Ramadan but the US turned it down, citing operational reasons.

American officials have told Asia Times Online that Chamberlin is one of the most wanted people these days at iftar dinners as socialites and lobbyists try to outdo each other in attracting high-profile guests. For his part, Musharraf is holding separate dinners for Muslim and non-Muslim envoys, senior military officials and the top bureaucracy.

Chamberlin's public relations exercise may or may not have gone well with the general public, especially the clergy, but it received a big play in the media. However, unlike some of the previous overbearing American ambassadors to Pakistan, who were often referred to as "viceroys" by the press, Chamberlin is a model of decorum. "She has been friendly, outgoing and has mixed with people in disregard of the security alerts that have come to be associated with living and working in this part of the world," said one Asian diplomat.

Chamberlin has been vocally supportive of Musharraf. Following his decision to close down the Taliban consulate in Karachi earlier in the month, she said that the move put him in a stronger position to deal with possible challenges to his regime from anti-American protesters angry at his decision to cooperate with the US. This week the general went even further by closing the last consular office of the Afghan militia - located in Quetta in southwest Pakistan. This leaves only the embassy in Islamabad open, but on Monday the Pakistan government said for the first time that it no longer has any relations with its "old allies", the Taliban, whom it helped put into power in 1996.

Chamberlin's Ramadan gesture in part was apparently designed to counter negative reports about racially motivated attacks on some Pakistanis in the US, resulting in at least two deaths, and moves by the US government to introduce racial profiling of immigrants with dark complexions, and even possible trial by military tribunals - something that has been the hallmark of Pakistani military regimes, and for which Washington in the past roundly condemned Islamabad in calling for the restoration of democracy.

Musharraf, who seized power in a bloodless military coup in 1999, has pledged to hold elections next year. But there has been not such talk of this, however, since September 11 when Pakistan gave its support to the the US-led war against the Taliban in Afghanistan and the hunt for Osama bin Laden.

President George W Bush signed an executive order last week allowing military trials of non-citizens who are members of the Al-Qaeda terrorist network or who are charged with aiding or committing acts of terrorism, or harboring terrorists. Such tribunals could be held in secret and could require a lower burden of proof for the government than a normal criminal proceeding. Civilians have not been subject to such trials since World War II.

"I need to have that extraordinary option at my fingertips," Bush said. "I ought to be able to have that option available should we ever bring one of these Al-Qaeda members in alive. It's our national interests, it's our national security interests that we have a military tribunal available. It is in the interests of the safety of potential jurors that we have a military tribunal."

An article in the Wall Street Journal commented, "The order is tantamount to a suspension of habeas corpus and would not pass constitutional muster. The Bush executive order takes a perilous step toward eviscerating the time-honored doctrine of the separation of powers, a centerpiece of our constitution. The president and his secretary of defense - if not this administration, then a successor with fewer constitutional scruples - can run roughshod over the Bill of Rights."

And a newspaper in Pakistan editorialized, "More effective would have been some sane advice given to panicked policy makers not to turn America, the so-called bastion of freedom and liberty, into another banana republic with summary military courts, secret trials hush-hush excecutions and the virtual goodbye to free speech, free movement and a free life without any big brother watching. The Statue of Liberty must be feeling grossly uncomfortable these days."

In June, the US strongly condemned Musharraf's decision to declare himself president and said that US sanctions would remain until Pakistan moved toward democracy. All the sanctions have since been lifted. After the decision in June, a State Department spokesman said it, "severely undermines Pakistan's constitutional order and casts Pakistan as a country ruled by decree rather than by democratic process".

In Washington, meanwhile, Bush hosted the first-ever iftar dinner at the White House on Monday, with envoys from more than 50 Muslim countries as guests. Commenting in the state dining room, the president said,"This evening, we gather in a spirit of peace and cooperation. I appreciate your support of our objectives in the campaign against terrorism. Tonight that campaign continues in Afghanistan, so that the people of Afghanistan will soon know peace. The terrorists have no home in any faith. Evil has no holy days."

((c)2001 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd