Many apologies for the continued delay in the final publication. The good news is that the final proofs and indexing are completed and so the book should be ready soon.
Thursday, 28 March 2013
Friday, 19 October 2012
Malala Yousufzai and Noor-Syed – Who is responsible?
The neglect of the Pakistan government and military towards its own people allows groups like TTP to operate, yet the same military and government will cynically exploit their violent actions while American drones fly overhead.
Recently the tragic story of the shooting of the 14 year old Malala Yousufzai by two armed men has dominated the media in Pakistan and elsewhere. Malala, who was well known as a campaigner for the education of young females, survived the shooting and is currently in hospital. The Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan called media from an undisclosed location to accept the responsibility of the attack, apparently due to Malala’s anti-Taliban activism and spreading of “secular” thoughts among her peers.
Noor-Syed is another young Pakistani girl who suffered an attack – though in her case she was killed by an American drone strike back in 2009. Her story was not covered by any of the media, and wider knowledge of her death only came to light as a result of the publication in 2011 of pictures by Noor Behram, a 39 year old photographer from the North Waziristan Agency (NWA) who has been documenting civilian victims of CIA drones since 2007.
Read full article at New Civilisation and Foreign Policy Journal
Thursday, 11 October 2012
Freedom of Speech - a Universal Value?
Freedom of speech is the concept that one should be able to express themselves, whatever opinion they may hold. It has never existed as an absolute, and generally the various Western philosophers and thinkers who developed the concept never considered it to be unrestricted – rather most have accepted that there have to be limits upon expression, in order to protect society. Every society has red-lines – limits upon what constitutes lawful expression – and these depend upon the values of that society, contradicting the idea of a universal absolute freedom of speech.
In the West, these limits sometimes depend upon the political considerations and historical context – for example, holocaust denial is criminalised in Germany is understood in the context of the role of Nazi Germany in the holocaust, and the fear that permitting holocaust denial would encourage or allow for far-right ideas to gain legitimacy in the society again. Another example is the French Senate bill criminalising the denial of any genocide recognised by French law, generally considered to be targeting at Turkey with respect to the manner of identification of the conflict in Armenia in 1916. In the UK – for all practical purposes it has been recently shown that denigrating soldiers is considered unlawful, with the conviction for “grossly offensive communications” applied to someone who wrote British soldiers in Afghanistan should die and go to hell. In her ruling upon the case, Judge Goodwin stated that while the law was not there to stop legitimate political opinions being strongly voiced, the test was whether what was written was “beyond the pale of what’s tolerable in our society”.
Read the full article at There is Power in the Blog
(The article is also published on New Civilisation, Eurasia Review and elsewhere online)
In the West, these limits sometimes depend upon the political considerations and historical context – for example, holocaust denial is criminalised in Germany is understood in the context of the role of Nazi Germany in the holocaust, and the fear that permitting holocaust denial would encourage or allow for far-right ideas to gain legitimacy in the society again. Another example is the French Senate bill criminalising the denial of any genocide recognised by French law, generally considered to be targeting at Turkey with respect to the manner of identification of the conflict in Armenia in 1916. In the UK – for all practical purposes it has been recently shown that denigrating soldiers is considered unlawful, with the conviction for “grossly offensive communications” applied to someone who wrote British soldiers in Afghanistan should die and go to hell. In her ruling upon the case, Judge Goodwin stated that while the law was not there to stop legitimate political opinions being strongly voiced, the test was whether what was written was “beyond the pale of what’s tolerable in our society”.
Read the full article at There is Power in the Blog
(The article is also published on New Civilisation, Eurasia Review and elsewhere online)
Saturday, 29 September 2012
Dr. Reza Pankhurst on Foreign Policy Journal: Charlie Hebdo and French Government Islamophobia
After the reaction to the anti-Islam film “The Innocence of Muslims”, it was only a matter of time before the next deliberate provocation added fuel to the fire. The French magazine Charlie Hebdo duly obliged, last week publishing cartoons mocking the Prophet Mohammad on September 19 in what was considered by many Muslims worldwide as a further gratuitous affront to Islam. The magazine has previously engaged in incitement, when last year it printed offensive cartoons ridiculing Islam while then announcing that its edition would be guest-edited by the Prophet Mohammad, leading to its office being firebombed in November 2011.
In this instance, the French government responded quickly, understanding that in the context of protests against foreign embassies across the World French interests abroad could be threatened. A number of French embassies across the Middle East were duly closed over the last weekend, and the French Prime Minister also expressed his “disapproval of any excess”, while stating that “the freedom of speech makes up one of the fundamental principles of [the French] republic”. This response echoed the position of American Secretary of State Hillary Clinton when she expressed her personal disapproval of the anti-Islam film that has caused the initial wave of protests, while confirming the right for it to be made, published and promoted in the United States.
Thursday, 27 September 2012
Dr. Reza Pankhurst Op-Ed on Eurasia Review - The Egyptian Government Prepares For War
The Egyptian government, led by President Mohammad Morsi, is currently preparing for war.
While a few (naïve) analysts may have assumed that the first war declared would be against Israel, given the Muslim Brotherhood’s apparent support for its offshoot Hamas and the goal of the complete liberation of Palestine, the initial sounds from Morsi’s government have been supportive of the Camp David agreement (rejected by the majority of Egyptians). The most prominent exchanges between the two governments included Morsi’s hope to put the peace process back on track. In further interviews, Morsi was keen to state his commitment to all international peace treaties signed by Egypt, highlighting that post-revolutionary foreign policy with respect to Israel was less about what the Egyptian public demanded and more about maintaining Mubarak era policies and appeasing the West.
Read the full article at Eurasia Review
While a few (naïve) analysts may have assumed that the first war declared would be against Israel, given the Muslim Brotherhood’s apparent support for its offshoot Hamas and the goal of the complete liberation of Palestine, the initial sounds from Morsi’s government have been supportive of the Camp David agreement (rejected by the majority of Egyptians). The most prominent exchanges between the two governments included Morsi’s hope to put the peace process back on track. In further interviews, Morsi was keen to state his commitment to all international peace treaties signed by Egypt, highlighting that post-revolutionary foreign policy with respect to Israel was less about what the Egyptian public demanded and more about maintaining Mubarak era policies and appeasing the West.
Read the full article at Eurasia Review
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