Pakistan: fanatics for polio

There are only two countries in the world where polio is still endemic – Afghanistan and Pakistan. In Pakistan, Muslim extremists are helping it to go on killing and paralysing children by murdering vaccination workers.

In the latest attack this week, at least 15 people were killed by a suicide bomber at an inoculation centre at Quetta in Balochistan. It happened just as medics and the security staff who are needed to protect them had reported for duty before going out on their rounds. Another 20 people were injured.

There were more than 300 cases of polio in Pakistan in 2014, the highest number since 1999, following a series of attacks by extremists. Last year, energetic efforts by the security forces enabled the vaccine teams to penetrate what had previously been no-go areas, and the number of cases fell to 50.

The fanatics claim immunisation is a Western plot to sterilise Pakistani children. As a result of the latest bombing, the vaccination programme in Balochistan has been suspended. (See also my posts of 24 February, 3 March, and 10 December, 2014.)

Europe's migrant crisis - facts and numbers

Last month, more than 218,000 migrants reached Europe by sea according to the United Nations – about the same as the number for the whole of 2014. More than 10,000 arrived in Greece alone on a single day. So far this year, nearly 3,500 are estimated to have died trying to get to Europe.

The vast majority have come via Turkey to Greece. This has replaced the route to Italy via Libya which used to be more popular. The highest number come from Syria – about 53 per cent, with Afghanistan next – 18 per cent.

The United Nations has been heavily critical of Europe’s response, but the organisation’s own predictions for the number of migrants expected have been gross underestimates. It forecast 700,000 for the whole year, but at the end of October with two months still to go, that figure had already been exceeded by 44,000.

Normally the numbers fall during the winter months, but that may not happen this year as the people traffickers seem to be offering bad weather discounts. The fact that some of the Islamic fanatics who carried out the mass murders in Paris apparently slipped into Europe as ‘refugees’ has heightened alarm.

Pakistan and Nigeria - Islamists against health and education

Another deadly attack on health workers trying to fight polio in Pakistan (see also my blog of Feb 24). At least 11 people were killed by a roadside bomb in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province near the Afghan border.

No group has claimed responsibility, but the Taliban oppose polio vaccination, which is claimed to be part of a Western plot to sterilise Muslims. Pakistan is now one of only 3 countries where polio remains endemic (Afghanistan and Nigeria are the others). Indeed it is on the increase.

Meanwhile in Nigeria, the Islamist extremist group, Boko Haram, whose name apparently means ‘western education is forbidden’, have murdered 40 schoolchildren aged 11 to 18 in the town of Buni Yadi in the north-eastern state of Yobe.

A teacher said the assailants locked the victims in buildings then set fire to them. Those who managed to escape by climbing out of windows had their throats slit. Boko Haram is estimated to have murdered more than 300 civilians during the past month.

* Article on my new book Flood: Nature and Culture from the Camden New Journal - http://www.camdenreview.com/reviews/books/flood-nature-and-culture-by-john-withington

Polio - a tale of two countries

India became officially free of polio last month. It is now three years since its last case was recorded. The health minister praised the efforts of more than two million vaccinators who had made this possible.

India had launched its anti-polio campaign in 1995. An important role was played by religious leaders who gave reassurance to people who were suspicious about the immunisations. The country now hopes to eradicate measles by 2020.

Over the border in Pakistan, it is a different story. Along with Afghanistan and Nigeria, it is one of the last three countries in the world where the disease is still endemic. Indeed, it is on the increase. The practice of murdering vaccination workers does not help.

Last month, three were killed in Karachi, as were six policemen on their way to guard the teams. Those who oppose the immunisation programme claim it is a Western plot to sterilise Muslims. Now India is worried that the disease my re-enter the country from Pakistan.

Deadly tunnel

The Americans have been repairing the Salang tunnel in Afghanistan. Nearly two miles long and 11,000 feet up in the Hindu Kush mountains, it was an engineering wonder when it was built by the Soviet Union in the 1960’s. Now it has a leaky roof, a rutted surface, and failing ventilation and lighting.  

On November 3, 1982, the tunnel was the scene of one of the world’s deadliest ever road accidents – assuming that it was an accident.

The official Soviet version is that two military convoys collided, causing a traffic jam in which 64 Soviet soldiers and 112 Afghan people were poisoned by carbon monoxide.  Unofficial reports speak of a fuel tanker blowing up, perhaps as a result of an attack by Afghan guerrillas.

It is said that this resulted in a deadly chain reaction of explosions, while the Russians sealed off both ends of the tunnel, trapping hundreds of people inside. In this unofficial version, 700 Soviet troops and 2,000 Afghans may have died.

Britain's 20 Worst Military Disasters 12 - Afghanistan

The British government had no quarrel with the people of Afghanistan, but was worried about the presence of influential foreigners.   It decided to get rid of the existing government, and impose one it liked.   Then it compiled a dodgy dossier to drum up support for a war.

Any of this sound familiar?   It was what happened in Afghanistan in 1839, when the foreigners were Russians, not al-Qaeda.   At first, everything went swimmingly.    The popular ruler, Dost Mohammed, was replaced by Amir Shah Shuja-ul-Mulk, who the Afghans had thrown out 30 years before, whose main interest was his enormous harem, and who dismissed his new subjects as ‘dogs’.

After the Brits had been in control for a couple of years, the Afghans rose up, and in January 1842, the occupiers said that as they were there only for the benefit of the Afghan people, if the Afghan people did not want them, then they would leave.

There followed the most disastrous retreat in the history of the British army.    Around 16,000 British soldiers, Indian sepoys and assorted camp followers began the 90 mile journey to Jalalabad.   At every pass, they were ambushed by Afghan tribesmen, while cold, hunger and exhaustion gnawed at them.     A week later, just one solitary army surgeon reached Jalalabad.

Dost Mohammed once again became ruler and proved himself a true friend of the British Empire until his death in 1863.   But he always remained baffled by the invasion, once telling a British visitor:  ‘I cannot understand why the rulers of so great an empire should have come to deprive me of my poor and barren country.’

Labour and the USA - no change

Even the Labour party must by now realise that one reason why it suffered one of its heaviest ever defeats in May’s general election was its nauseating subservience to the United States. But apparently not. Indeed, Labour’s “justice spokesman” in the Scottish Parliament, Richard Baker, seems to be propounding the view that we are nothing more than a province of America.

The Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill had refused a summons from American senators to cross the Atlantic and be berated like a naughty schoolboy over his decision to release Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, the man convicted – many believe wrongly – of the Lockerbie bombing. (See my blogs of 27 July, 16 and 22 Aug, and 19 Sept, 2009 and 17 July, 2010.)

Mr Baker was incensed. When America hands out an instruction, he thinks we Brits should jump to it. Fortunately, Mr MacAskill seems to have a better understanding of where his duty lies. "I am elected by the Scottish people, I am accountable to the Scottish parliament,” he said. If only Labour politicians could get their heads around this, they might not dragoon us into disastrous American adventures, like Iraq.

How about a counter-invitation to the American senators? Why don’t they go to Afghanistan and stand in for some of the British soldiers currently risking life and limb there to save the US from embarrassment?

Mudslides

Last week it was an avalanche in Pakistan, the week before another in Afghanistan (see my blog of Feb 18). Now heavy rains have brought floods and mudslides to the delightful holiday island of Madeira.

At least 40 people have been killed as tons of mud and stone were washed into the capital Funchal and other towns. The rescue effort has been hampered by the number of roads that have been blocked.

The deadliest mudslide ever was probably the one that hit Venezuela’s coastal strip in December 1999, after 36 inches of rain fell in just a few days. An estimated 30,000 people died – many of them inhabitants of the shanty towns that clung precariously to the ridges around the capital Caracas. (see also my blog of Oct 10, 2009).

Belated thanks to the Bernstein Crisis Management Blog for its welcome to my (then) new blog almost one year ago! http://bernsteincrisismanagement.blogspot.com/2009/01/dont-let-your-crisis-become-disaster.html

Thanks also to the Jersey Journal for its article on Disaster! – my new US book:-
http://www.nj.com/hobokennow/index.ssf/2010/02/hoboken_docks_fire_of_1900_fea.html

Avalanches

At least 38 people have been killed by an avalanche that buried a village in the remote Kohistan district in north-west Pakistan. Avalanches are common in the area, and heavy snow over the last fortnight has increased the danger.

Earlier this month, a series of avalanches struck the approach to the Salang tunnel in Afghanistan, burying more than two miles of road and killing at least 172 people. The Salang tunnel was the scene of a disastrous road crash in 1982 which cost the lives of up to 2,000 people. For more details, see A Disastrous History of the World.

The deadliest natural avalanche ever was probably the one that buried the town of Plurs in Switzerland in 1618, killing more than 2,400, but during World War One in the Tyrol, the Italian and Austrian armies each deliberately set off avalanches with explosives, and during one period of 48 hours, 10,000 soldiers were killed.

I mentioned in my blog of Feb 6 that my world disasters book has now been published in the United States as Disaster! My thanks to The Southern in Illinois which has written articles on the book:-

http://www.thesouthern.com/news/local/article_70ddf2ee-1ab6-11df-a631-001cc4c03286.html
http://www.thesouthern.com/news/local/article_6014bbfe-1a4e-11df-b826-001cc4c03286.html

Sombre October

The bloodbaths in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan go on. More than 90 people – most of them women and children - were killed today by a huge car bomb at a busy market in Peshawar. The Taliban have denied responsibility but many believe it is part of their campaign of retaliation against the Pakistan government’s assault on their strongholds in South Waziristan.

This is the third major bombing in Peshawar this month, and brings to more than 150 the number killed there. Across the country in October, a series of attacks has caused nearly 300 deaths.

Iraq too has been having a dreadful time. A militant group linked to al-Qaeda says it planted the two car bombs that killed more than 150 people in Baghdad on Sunday. It was the deadliest attack in the country for more than three years.

Meanwhile, in Afghanistan, at least five UN workers have died in an attack on a guesthouse in Kabul. The Taliban said it was part of a campaign to disrupt next week’s second-round presidential election. Earlier this month, a suicide bombing at the Indian embassy killed 17.

Afghanistan and Iraq - continuing carnage

As the sabre-rattling directed at Iran grows louder and louder, reminders arrive from both Iraq and Afghanistan about how big a mess we still have to clear up in those places.

A series of bombs across Iraq in the last two days have killed at least 13 people, including seven near a police station in the northern city of Ramadi. Last month saw 393 civilian deaths in the country – the highest total for more than a year.

Meanwhile, in southern Afghanistan, at least 30 people lost their lives when a bus hit a landmine as it travelled from Nimroz to Kandahar City. A UN report said that last month was the worst of the year for civilian deaths in Afghanistan too. Up to the end of August, 1,500 had been killed so far this year – an increase of more than 350 on the same period in 2008.

See also my blog of Sept 2.

Afghanistan v Iraq + Great Fire

In the grim competition to establish which is the greater disaster area, Afghanistan today forged briefly ahead of Iraq, as at least 23 people were killed by a suicide bomb at a mosque in Mehtar Lam, east of Kabul. Just a week ago, a massive truck bomb in Kandahar killed more than 40 in the biggest attack in a year.

Last year, Afghanistan looked for a time as though it might grab the title, ending with 436 people killed in suicide bombs – just 27 fewer than the total for Iraq (see my blog of March 28th). Now, though, Iraq is once again establishing its unenviable lead, with 393 civilians killed during last month alone.

Whoever wins the grim contest, our experience of both countries is likely to reinforce the old saying – “invade in haste, repent at leisure.”

In the early hours of this day…343 years ago, the Great Fire of London broke out in Pudding Lane, just north of London Bridge. Roused from his bed, the Lord Mayor took a quick look at the blaze, declared: “a woman might piss it out,” and went back to sleep. Five days later it had devastated 436 acres of the City – more than the Blitz managed. (For the full story, see The Disastrous History of London.) How wise Sam Goldwyn was when he advised: “never make forecasts, especially about the future.”

The Nigerian Taliban

Just as Foreign Secretary David Miliband urges the Afghan government to start talking to the Taliban, the so-called “Nigerian Taliban” has started to wreak havoc in West Africa.

The Muslim fundamentalist Boko Haram sect (its name means "Western education is a sin") is alleged to have shot and stabbed civilians at random in the north of the country, as well as attacking police stations and government buildings. The military has retaliated by shelling the compound of the sect’s leader.

The government has tried to evacuate civilians, but many are still in harm’s way, and up to 150 people are said to have been killed in the last four days. The group wants to see Sharia law imposed right across Nigeria, instead of just in the Muslim north as it is at present, even though half the population is Christian.

Boko Haram is not thought to have any direct links with the Afghan Taliban, and some say the nickname was invented by its opponents to try to ridicule the group.

Terrorism

After the death of 15 British soldiers in 10 days in Afghanistan, Gordon Brown and his Labour colleagues have again been banging the “War on Terror” drum. How instructive last night, then, to watch the thought-provoking Terror! Robespierre and the French Revolution on BBC-2.

It was the Reign of Terror of Robespierre and his henchmen that gave us the word “terrorism” – “the systematic use of violence to create a general climate of fear in a population and thereby to bring about a particular political objective”. (Encyclopaedia Britannica).

However, governments of all colours have managed to obscure an important fact. The most dreadful acts of “terrorism” are almost invariably perpetrated by them, rather than the rebel groups to whom the term is normally applied. Hardly surprising as governments usually command far more powerful weapons.

So we are constantly told that 9/11 was the world’s worst terrorist outrage – killing nearly 3,000 people, but, of course, it does not compare with, say, the USAF’s bombing of Tokyo in 1945 that killed perhaps 140,000, nor with Hitler’s mass murder campaign that accounted for perhaps 20 million, or Stalin’s cruelties that killed up to 30m, or Mao’s – maybe 70 million. Robespierre’s terror, incidentally, saw off about 55,000.

As a few of those around him raised the odd timorous voice to express half-hearted misgivings about the ever-more intrusive and paranoid regime he had created, Robespierre retorted: “innocence never fears public scrutiny.” Or as Labour tends to put it when critics object to its National Identity Register or its project to snoop on all our emails etc, etc – “if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear.”

Suicide bombs

It is now feared that up to 70 people may have been killed by yesterday’s suicide bomb at a mosque in Pakistan’s Khyber region about 20 miles from the Afghan border. The blast went off just as Friday prayers were beginning and completely destroyed the building. No one has claimed responsibility for the attack, and some believe it may be part of a power struggle between rival tribal militias. Similar enmities may have been behind another suicide bombing on Thursday that killed at least ten people in a restaurant in South Waziristan.

Last year Pakistan overtook Iraq as the world’s worst country for suicide bombings. In the first eight months of 2008, more than 471 people were killed in 28 suicide attacks, compared with 463 people in Iraq and 436 in Afghanistan.

We tend to think of suicide bombings as a new tactic, and certainly the US-British attack on Iraq gave them an enormous boost, but actually they go back at least as far as the 17th century when Dutch soldiers trying to conquer Taiwan would use gunpowder to blow up themselves and the enemy.

If you count fuel-filled aeroplanes as bombs, then the deadliest ever suicide attack remains 9/11, which killed nearly 3,000 people in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania. Of attacks using more conventional explosives, the deadliest happened on August 14, 2007 when four suicide bombers killed up to 800 members of the obscure pre-Islamic Yazidi sect in Iraq.