Friday, August 07, 2009
DON’T SEEK FOREIGN SOLUTIONS TO SECURITY : V. Balachandra - COVERT Fortnightly, New Delhi
Police & State | V. Balachandran
DON'T SEEK FOREIGN SOLUTIONS TO SECURITY
First we mess up with our internal security by ignoring standard operating procedures, and then we rush to foreign countries to learn how to handle it. The Maharashtra Government is sending a delegation to Israel to learn counter-terror methodology. There is nothing wrong in learning what we do not know, but we have seen similar visits earlier. In May 1996, Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Gopinath Munde visited Israeli counter-terrorism schools and was "impressed" with their efficiency; in June 2000, Deputy Prime Minister L.K. Advani led a police and intelligence delegation to Israel. Israel has not changed its methodology, so, did we undertake any meaningful internal security reforms after those visits?
Indian and Israeli situations are incomparable. Israel is less than 5% of India's area and population. It is surrounded by threatening neighbours 640 times its size. Survival, security is Israel's topmost priority. Politics, even at the cost of security, is our priority. Otherwise, the Maharashtra Cabinet would not have decided to relegate the 26/11 enquiry report into the dark labyrinths of "secrecy" on, what the media described as, "political grounds". Even the Prime Minister and the Home Minister, who told Parliament that the "Pradhan Committee" was enquiring into 26/11, had nothing to say when the Maharashtra Government did not let its police improve intelligence and counter-terrorist methodology by perusing the 26/11 report.
The Israeli police is fiercely independent. It questioned serving PMs Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert for alleged corruption. Deep politicisation of the Indian police affects its professionalism. Israel, being a small country with better infrastructure, marshals its entire counter-terrorist forces, including defence commandos, in minutes. We are very sloppy in anticipating any such crisis or trying to learn after the event. US Department of Homeland Security prepared protection plans in April 2008 anticipating seaborne attacks from 17 million small boats. Their waterfront police systems conducted dry runs of their schemes in December 2008 after Mumbai 26/11 to improve their methodology. The police in India did nothing, until prodded by Home Minister Chidambaram.
Israel treats terrorism like war. It uses all methods, including the demolition of suspected terrorist homes and aerial strafing, to crush terrorism. Our political system does not permit such high-handed measures. In 2008, Israel suffered 1,750 rocket and 1,528 mortar attacks from Palestinian areas. Israel killed 782 Palestinians in West Bank and Gaza in preventive or retaliatory measures, including 315 in airstrikes. Yet, it suffered ten serious suicide attacks in 2008 that killed 27 civilians. It is not able to overcome terrorism, but tries to keep it under control as a survival strategy. A reason for its success is heavy investment in intelligence coordination, which we have neglected. Israeli counter-intelligence has achieved very close coordination among Shin Bet [internal intelligence], Mossad [external intelligence] and Aman [military intelligence] after the 1973 Yom Kippur War. We failed to do this even after the 2001 Kargil report on intelligence reforms. Even now we have not set up an efficient national counter-terrorist intelligence integration centre. We are satisfied with purchasing gadgets and weapons. Gen. Meir Dagan, who occupied a senior position in Israeli counter-terrorist operations, said, "Investments in intelligence are invisible, whereas increased security is visible and often wasteful."
THIS HAS BEEN the UK's experience as well. The May 2009 issue of BBC's science magazine Focus quotes a senior London Metropolitan Police officer saying that the CCTV system in England, the largest in the world, is an "utter fiasco" as the cameras are not able to identify images clearly. It took hundreds of hours and hundreds of staff to scan through more than 90,000 CCTV tapes to identify the Mercedes used in the June 2007 Haymarket bombing. The Maharashtra Home Minister has declared that Mumbai will purchase 400 CCTV cameras, and in two years the number will go up to 4,000-5,000. Are we satisfied that this is the latest technology keeping in mind the British experience? It was only on 8 April 2009 that a leading national daily accused the Mumbai police of selecting outdated weapons without field trials [¼]
V. Balachandran, a former Special Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat, was part of the two-member "High Level Committee" appointed by the Government of Maharashtra to enquire into 26/11
Thursday, August 06, 2009
In Raleigh, Muslims View FBI with Fear, Mistrust
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Tuesday, August 04, 2009
CHILLING CONFESSION - By (Ms.) Rana Ayyub - Tehelka Magazine
Chilling Confession 'WE WERE TOLD THAT BOYS HAD COME FROM OUTSIDE. THEY WERE NOT LIKE US. THEY WORE JEANS AND T-SHIRTS. I KNEW ABOUT THE BOMBS... I BACKED OUT BECAUSE THEY WERE NOT KEEPING THEIR PROMISE. INSTEAD OF TARGETTING THE VHP, THEY WERE PLANTING BOMBS IN CROWDED PLACES TO KILL INNOCENTS'  The Gujarat Police took quick credit for arresting the masterminds behind the July 2008 blasts in Ahmedabad. RANA AYYUB tracks the police's star witness to find he has been tortured into falsely implicating the 'masterminds'. An exclusive report HE HAS a name, but lets just call him 'Witness'. He had a life too — like yours and mine — till 26 July 2008, when serial blasts shook Ahmedabad. Between 6.45 and 7.55 that evening, 16 bombs exploded in various parts of the city, including in a hospital where the injured were being rushed to. As the death toll reached 56, Witness had only one thought – he could have been responsible for the bloodletting, the mayhem, the death of innocents. He almost was. Witness was in on the plot. He knew bicycles were being bought. He knew low-intensity explosive devices were being assembled. He knew they would be concealed in tiffin boxes and the boxes placed in the bicycles. But Witness withdrew at the last minute — barely 24 hours before 6.45 in the evening — when he learnt that the target areas had changed. As the plot was being hatched in meetings Witness attended before July 26, he was given to believe that RSS and Bajrang Dal offices would be targeted. But the script changed. Witness withdrew when he realised that innocent people in crowded places would be slaughtered. The Gujarat Police was quick to blame the blasts on the Indian Mujahideen (IM), the same group held responsible for the blasts in Jaipur on 13 May 2008. But when different states paraded different faces, all proclaiming their catches as the IM's mastermind, TEHELKA started an investigation that led it to Witness.
The testimony of Witness is important — and credible — for several reasons. First and foremost, because he indicts himself, openly admitting he was part of the plot till the last moment. This gives his words credence. His words gain even more credence because he has given more or less the same narrative to the Gujarat Police. The narrative changes at one crucial place – when he reels off the names of the men behind the Gujarat blasts. But wait. Witness has told TEHELKA that he was physically tortured by the police into naming innocents, that he could not bear the physical and mental torture he was subjected to. They were not responsible for the serial bombings, he swears. I, TEHELKA's special correspondent, landed up at his house in Juhapura, accompanied by the wife and daughter of an accused in the case. Witness' sister opens the door. Her brother is not home, she says. As I speak to her, a male voice asks from inside, "Who's there?" When she does not answer, a man comes to the door. He is around 22, dressed in kurta and jeans, just like any college student. The lady with me says, "He is the one." Yes, this is the Gujarat police's star witness. The police arrested people on the basis of Witness' statements. The police said its claim that the Gujarat blasts was the work of the Indian Mujahideen, a reincarnation of the Student's Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) was proven by Witness' statements. It is on the basis of Witness' statement that the police have named the masterminds in the case – Mufti Abu Bashar and Sajid Mansuri. At first, Witness is unwilling to talk. He is preparing for exams, he says. He sees the lady accompanying me and asks her what she is doing with me. I have smuggled myself in, wearing a head scarf, trying to pass off as one of them. He lifts up the lady's child in his arms and allows us in, looking around to see if we have been spotted. After keeping in him detention for twelve days and beating the confession out of him, the police now keep an eye on their 'approver'.
Witness bursts into tears when I ask him questions. "Don't make me narrate everything again. My family and I have gone through hell all because of me. It was all a big mistake," he says between sobs. His mother, an ailing lady in her late 50s enters. She wants to know if we too are from the police. "How many questions do you want to ask him? He has told you everything he knows. Now leave him alone!" she says. Witness ushers her out and bolts the door. "I wouldn't be talking had it not been for this girl," he says, gesturing at the girl now sleeping snugly in her mother's arms. "Her father is innocent, ma'am. They are all innocent. If what I say to you can do anything, then please get them freed. They are in jail for no fault of theirs." Witness was detained days after the blasts in Ahmedabad took place in July last year. He was part of the plot until he learnt the targets included hospitals and not those responsible for the 2002 Gujarat riots. Until he learnt that they were not going to kill the 'Bajrangis' or those who had admitted to having slit open the stomachs of pregnant women during the riots.
THEY (THE conspirators) had told us that they wanted to avenge the atrocities committed against Muslims but what they were doing would also kill Muslims," says Witness. Although he was never told who the top bosses were, he carried out the orders of his fellow plotters. Witness also reveals troubling truths – he denies ever being a part of SIMI. He denies the involvement of SIMI in the plot and says he knows the Indian Mujahideen only as a phrase seen in newspapers. Witness says he was tortured into implicating the men he met during Friday prayers. "The police forced me to name those they had arrested." Our long conversation was occasionally interrupted by his mother's knocks on the door. She was both scared and curious but Witness wanted to talk. He wanted to unburden himself and reveal everything; all in the hope that it would help free those innocent people languishing in jail.
The words came in a torrent and he spoke, initially without much prodding. "My friend Alamzeb Afridi [absconding, involved along with Witness in the blasts] introduced me to Yakub bhai [earlier detained, now a witness], Arif Kagzi, Yunus Mansuri and Sajid Mansuri [all accused in the July 2008 Ahmedabad blasts and all ex-SIMI members who spoke to TEHELKA in Sabarmati jail]. They told me that they used to be SIMI members. I knew Alamzeb from college. We used to meet in the evenings for religious discourses. We would discuss the Quran and often attended various programs at Yaqub bhai's place. These guys would only teach us about the hadees[the Prophet's statements and actions] and would tell us about the life of the Prophet. I was told that after SIMI was banned, they would hold educational programmes to explain the true meaning of Islam to youngsters who were disillusioned. People like Abdul Subhan Qureishi [one of the masterminds of the plot, now absconding] and Safdar Nagori [General Secretary, SIMI] used to come there. I was told that Subhan worked with Wipro and that he had been absconding ever since his name came up connection with the July 2006 Mumbai train blasts. He said that he was not involved in the blasts. He said that the group hated the hardliners and wanted to work against the propaganda put out by the VHP and the RSS. This was in 2007. In the meetings we were told how Muslims were being tortured in Afghanistan, America and Palestine. Subhan Qureishi used to tell us that these were the real people who were against Islam. Of all the people who attended, Abu Bashar Siddiqui was perhaps the most reserved of all. He had tremendous knowledge about the Quran and the hadees and used to speak about the true essence of Islam. Those meetings were not conspiracy sessions. In them, no one ever spoke about the plot. Subhan used to bring Abu Bashar Siddiqui for the religious gatherings and it was very clear that he did not discuss anything else with him. There was an annual meeting of SIMI every year. In 2007, it took place in Indore. They just wanted the ban on SIMI to be lifted. It was there that Safdar Nagori and others were arrested. Subhan and Qayamuddin Kapadia [recently arrested, named by Witness as being involved in the blasts] were also to reach there but they said they had missed their train. They returned to Ahmedabad two weeks later. Alamzeb, Mujeeb [another ex-SIMI member, now in jail], Tauseef [a localite accused in the case, now in jail] and I had continued to meet after namaz.
After the Indore arrests of SIMI cadres, Subhan Qureishi met Mujeeb, Alamzeb, and me and told us that we had to do something to avenge the Gujarat riots. Subhan first approached the SIMI guys. They told him outright that they did not wish to be a part of anything and that they were struggling to lead a normal life as had been tortured enough by the Gujarat police for being SIMI members. These people could not even carry on their normal jobs. Qayamuddin was also absconding then as the police was after him. The first time Subhan and Qayamuddin met us was at a shop at the Dani Limda area in Ahmedabad. We were told not to involve the SIMI people and also to take in new people with no records. Arif and the others told Subhan not to do anything destructive. SUBHAN THEN gave us Rs 3,000 to enrol in some physical fitness courses like swimming. We did that for a month. Only the three of us — Mujeeb, Alamzeb and me — knew about it. Qayamuddin was our leader. We were asked to stay away from SIMI members, as they would have stopped us. We did not meet any SIMI member. Subhan and Qayamuddin had tried to gauge who could do the task and had told just the three of us. Qayamuddin got a CD just a month before the blasts. The CD was shown to Mufti Abu Bashar as he was the only one who could understand Arabic. A few days afterwards, Qayamuddin came to us and told us that some boys had come from outside who were well trained and who wanted to do something. None of us knew them. Nobody knew them. We were only given orders. When Qayamuddin mentioned bombs, I said that the original plan was to attack the VHP headquarters and not kill common people. He retorted that even if we didn't help them, the boys from outside would set off the bombs. He said they wouldn't wait for us and told us that if we helped them, they would be able to place the explosives at the right places and would be able to take revenge against the right people.
We then agreed to the plan. Qayamuddin then gave us Rs 5,000 and asked us to buy 10 cycles. At that time my exams were on. Alamzeb bought six bicycles and gave me three. I parked them at places where no one would touch them and Alamzeb parked his cycles too. Later, Qayamuddin called us. We asked him about the bombs and how many casualties they would cause. Initially, they said the bombs would be kept in buses and we were asked to identify the right buses. We then confronted them, saying that people in buses were not our targets. We said we should set off the bombs in places were Hindus dominate and where it is difficult for Muslims even to enter. The places they had chosen were areas like Paldi, which also had a large number of Muslims. The targets were then changed to areas like Maninagar and Satellite. Qayamuddin later took me with him and showed me places like Naroda [one of the worst hit during the Gujarat 2002 riots] and told me that these were the places were we needed to plant the bombs. I was told to just look at the areas. After we came back from Naroda, we met Mujeeb who was waiting for us near the Vadodara express highway. Qayamuddin then told me that I did not appreciate what we were doing and that I was too busy with college. I retorted that that was because they were not keeping their promise to attack the VHP. I told them I did not want to be a part of the plan.
Did you know Sadiq Israr Ahmed? [in custody with the Mumbai police, named as one of the IM masterminds and accused in the Ahmedabad blasts. Recently cleared by a Mumbai court of involvement in the 2006 Mumbai train blasts] Was he ever a part of the plan? Did any of you go to Pakistan or any other country? After I said I wouldn't be a part of the plot, I was removed from the group. It was only on the morning of the blasts when Alamzeb came in to get the cycles that I felt something was about to happen. I told him where the bicycles were parked and then went to college. It was only after I returned that I realised that the blasts had taken place. After the blasts, the group avoided me. Even when they met me they asked me not to discuss the plot. The only fault of Zahid Sheikh [a friend of Witness arrested by the police and accused in the case. Also accused of attending terror camps in Ahmedabad] and others who have been arrested is that someone told him that the blasts were done by this group. I met Alamzeb five days after the blasts and asked him about the boys from outside. Were they like us – kurta-pyjama clad and bearded? Alamzeb replied that on the contrary, they didn't look like us. They were welleducated, wore jeans and T-shirts and smoked a lot.
Did you know their identity? You have been named a witness in the case. Your statement says that those named in the chargesheet including Arif, Tauseef, Zahid and the others played an active part in the blasts. Why did you say that? Did they torture you mentally or physically? Are those named in the chargesheet involved?
Do you see the role of a SIMI insider? Did you know about the Indian Mujahideen? But you were still a part of the plot. Why did you join it? You were a part of the plot till almost a day before the blasts and you have been let off. But others who don't even know about the blasts are in jail. Why did this happen?
How can you be so sure that the others were not involved? What about Abu Bashar? Did the Gujarat Police ever lure you? When was the last time you met Subhan Qureishi?
Unknown to the police, Witness has given us a full account in which he also damns himself. We also spoke to police officers without letting them know that we had had a long meeting with their star witness. The police maintain that they have a strong case. Says Joint Commissioner of Police Abhay Chudasama who is in charge of the case, "Even a child would know how important a witness would be in this case. And we do believe that whatever statements we have got from them and from the accused corroborate the evidence and will be enough to strengthen our case and nail the accused". When asked specifically why the alleged mastermind in the case would keep changing and asked about Abu Bashar Siddiqui, Sajid Mansuri and Yunus Mansuri [whose involvement in the case Witness has denied], Chudasama maintained that they were the key conspirators. While Chudasama was not as forthcoming when it came to the status of the witnesses, Ashish Bhatia, IG, Law and Order, who was the Joint Commissioner of Police in charge of the investigations maintained that some people who had backed out of committing the blasts were made witnesses and that their confessions would be crucial. When asked if the statements were voluntary, Bhatia said that all the statements were voluntary and in case the witnesses retracted their statements — even though they were recorded before a magistrate and therefore couldn't be retracted —the Police would have the right to file a case against them. When asked if the witnesses had been tortured, both Chudasama and Bhatia replied that the matter was sub judice. One year into the blasts, the trial is still to begin. Perhaps in the case of the Ahmedabad blasts there may not be no such thing called justice. WRITER'S EMAIL | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Lieberman affair / Human error sank Israel's most careful politician- By Gidi Weitz - HAARETZ
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| Lieberman affair / Human error sank Israel's most careful politician | |||||
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How did this happen to Avigdor Lieberman, perhaps the most careful man in the history of Israeli politics - to reach the point where the police are recommending that serious charges be brought against him? Human error is to blame. A group of documents that Lieberman forgot at a certain office reached the attorney general and eventually led to the unequivocal police recommendation. Since 1996, when he was tapped as director general of the Prime Minister's Office, Lieberman has been under police investigation on many issues. All ended with nothing. He was suspected of receiving bribes from businessman David Appel, of scheming to have Roni Bar-On become attorney general, of fraud involving the Israel Broadcast Authority, and much more. Lieberman managed to emerge from all these cases without a scratch, and no less important, with a constant increase in the number of seats in parliament for his party, Yisrael Beiteinu. During his years as a serial suspect, Lieberman adopted near-paranoid behavior. He changed his phone numbers at a dizzying rate and removed the battery from his cellphones during private meetings. Lieberman also liked to discuss with friends claims of close ties with the police. Occasionally, when he would meet a close friend, Lieberman would whisper: "I have information that they [the police] are on to you. Watch out. Don't talk on your cellphone."
In 1999, when Lieberman ran for the Knesset for the first time, I traveled with him in northern Israel. Lieberman, who stepped down from the PMO in 1997 and turned to private, international business, gave the impression of being a nouveau riche. He smoked cigars, had a lavish office in Jerusalem and drove a new Volvo with a new, extra-quiet driver by the name of Igor Schneider. At the time, the police were conducting a secret investigation against him. They suspected, among other things, that he as involved with underworld figures from the former Soviet Union. During our trip to the north, Lieberman was constantly on the phone, in Russian and Hebrew. After every call he would turn to me and say: "This was a deputy head of investigations, and I know everything that is going on in there." Later he told me that he always knew what kind of investigation was being carried out against him and that he had a number of sources in the police who leaked him information. Several months later Lieberman once more surprised everyone when he managed to enter parliament with four seats. Two years later, he was national infrastructure minister in Ariel Sharon's government. In parallel to his political rise, and according to the thick volume the fraud squad sent over to Attorney General Menachem Mazuz, Lieberman continued his business activities, which are believed to have paid him handsome dividends. What started the snowball that led to the police recommendation to indict was a group of documents sent to Lieberman's attorney from Cyprus in late 2001. These documents were forgotten by him at a certain office. Human error proved to be decisive. In 2006 the documents found their way to the office of Mazuz, who ordered the police to begin yet another investigation against Lieberman. The documents, in English, listed private accounts held by Lieberman, as well as commercial accounts handled at the Cyprus Popular Bank. The documents showed data on Lieberman from 2001, when he was an MK and national infrastructure minister in Sharon's government. The documents had been sent from a Cypriot attorney's office to Lieberman's attorney, Yoav Many, and showed the movement of $500,000 from MCG Holdings to Mountain View Assets. The latter is a company held by a Lieberman associate, Michael Chernoy. Another story that Haaretz broke in August 2001 involved the transfer of $650,000 from an Austrian company to a Cypriot firm that police believe Lieberman controls. The firm, Trasimeno, was originally set up by Lieberman in 1998 for wood trading. Schneider was found to have regularly handled funds from the Trasimeno account; another person who drew thousands of dollars was Gershon Trastman, a close friend of Lieberman from the settlement of Nokdim. The police also suspect that Lieberman had been involved in a number of businesses during his tenure in government; in addition to the wood business, he was involved in foodstuffs and minerals. "This is an octopus," one of the investigators said in describing Lieberman's activities. "We did not believe we would get this far in this investigation." If he is indicted, Lieberman will pass on his portfolio to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or National Infrastructure Minister Uzi Landau, but will not step down from government. He has also reiterated with confidence that "nothing will come of this, either." But police investigators are unusually confident that this time the minister will find it hard to extricate himself from the evidence against him. Related articles: | |||||
Monday, August 03, 2009
Fwd: Fw: HINDUISM
From: Farrukh Abidi <farrukhabidi@yahoo.com>
Date: Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 4:13 PM
Subject: Fw: HINDUISM
--- On Mon, 12/3/07, Ahumanb wrote:
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