Selected Articles from Various News Paper: Civil Services Mentor Magazine April + May 2014

SELECTED ARTICLES FROM VARIOUS NEWSPAPERS & JOURNALS

(April + May 2014)

Telangana birth-pangs

By getting a resolution rejecting the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Bill for creating Telangana passed by the State Assembly just before the deadline set by President Pranab Mukherjee to consider the Bill ended on Thursday, Chief Minister N. Kiran Kumar Reddy did what little he could to protect what he saw as his political constituency: those standing for a united Andhra Pradesh in the Rayalaseema and Coastal Andhra regions. Neither the delay nor the ultimate rejection of the Telangana Bill by the Assembly will have any bearing on the creation of the new State if the Centre stands firm on its decision on Telangana. The Chief Minister, in raising legal and technical objections to the Bill, might have managed to convey the opposition of large sections of the people in Seemandhra to the division of Andhra Pradesh, but the manner in which the proceedings of the House were conducted from the day the Bill was introduced till the day it was rejected reflects badly on his government and the democratic traditions of the legislature. Speaker Nadendla Manohar, who too is politically opposed to Telangana, put the Chief Minister’s contentious resolution to a voice vote amid noisy scenes, and declared the motion carried in a matter of two minutes. It was obvious from the regional representation in the House that those opposed to the Bill constituted a majority. The Bill presented a chance to address the concerns raised by the proposal to bifurcate Andhra Pradesh. Instead, the time was used for political posturing and the reiteration of known positions by both sides. Pro- Telangana members, on their part, did not press for a division amid the din, perhaps because they did not want to expose their lack of numbers. The voice vote was, in effect, the only mode of expression of the views of the legislature.

Now that the onus is on the Centre to shepherd the Bill through Parliament, the Congress must eschew any temptation to use this issue as part of any electoral strategy before the Lok Sabha polls. With the national leadership of the party backing the creation of Telangana, and the State unit divided on geographical lines, making this a campaign issue is anyway fraught with risks. No political consensus on the Bill is possible at this late stage, but the Centre can bring in amendments to the Bill to incorporate the concerns of other parties and representatives of Rayalaseema and Coastal Andhra. As the support of the Bharatiya Janata Party is necessary in the Rajya Sabha, the Congress will have to keep the Bill open for amendments. The State legislature was robbed of a free, reasoned debate on the issue, but hopefully Parliament will consider all aspects of the Bill before bringing Telangana into being.

Keeping people and tigers safe

As conservation of wild species becomes more successful, higher levels of human-wildlife conflict are being reported in many parts of the country. The outcome of such encounters is a distressing number of human lives lost, and the tragic elimination of the wild creatures involved in the attacks. The ‘man-eating tiger’ incident in Dodabetta in the Nilgiris, which ended in the gunning down of the cat, brings to the fore the dilemma of ensuring a safe distance between wild animals and people. Evidently, there are no easy answers to this question, not just in India but in several other countries that have well-protected wildlife.

Two strategies often adopted to prevent conflict rely on modification of human and animal behaviour. Farmers are encouraged to switch to cash crops to avoid attracting elephants, while forest departments provide access
to water within protected areas to stop animals from moving out. Wild creatures in turn learn to avoid places rendered inaccessible through trench-digging and building of fences. Yet, these are by no means fail-safe interventions. It is necessary to identify areas for intensive protection, and encourage forest-dwelling communities to move out — of course, with sufficient attention devoted to their rehabilitation at a new location.

Removal of problem animals often becomes unavoidable if there are human casualties and there is a prospect of more people being killed. It would appear ironic, but conservation advice in such circumstances is usually to swiftly eliminate the lone animal, such as the Dodabetta tiger, rather than attempt slow capture and risk negative public attitudes to tigers as a whole. Unfortunately, it is not easy to identify the individual tiger or leopard, and the conflict may continue even after one animal is shot dead. In Chikmagalur district, for instance, 17 leopards had to be shot in 1995 before the problem of attacks on people stopped. Research evidence supports a strategy that relies on ‘spatial separation’ of people and animals as a more rewarding means of conflict reduction. If isolated villages and free ranging cattle are moved out of the small land area that makes up India’s protected forests, the risk of an encounter with fierce creatures can be brought down. The problem today is that successfully managed national parks and sanctuaries are witnessing a rise in tiger and leopard numbers, leading to the dispersal of old and injured animals towards habitations on the periphery and even beyond. Future conservation strategies would have to rely on well-administered wildlife sanctuaries, and equally on a voluntary resettlement programme for forest communities.

‘U.S. spied on 2009 climate summit’

The U.S. government spied on delegates at the high-profile UN climate summit in Copenhagen, Denmark, in 2009, a document obtained by some media houses via whistleblower Edward Snowden has revealed.
The talks were spied on to get critical prior information on the host country and others’ negotiating positions even as U.S. President Barack Obama flew in to sign a deal with them.

The summit saw the coming together of more than 90 heads of state and delegates from more than 180 countries to hammer out a binding global deal on climate change, but the talks collapsed. A political agreement, The Copenhagen Accord, worked out by the U.S., taking the lead to negotiate with four other BASIC countries — Brazil, India, China and South Africa — could not be adopted by consensus as a UN agreement. The document, an internal U.S. National Security Agency text, reads: “Analysts here at NSA, as well as our Second Party partners, will continue to provide policymakers with unique, timely, and valuable insights into key countries’ preparations and goals for the conference, as well as deliberations within countries on climate change policies and negotiating strategies.”

It goes on to record, “A late November report detailed China’s efforts to coordinate its position with India and ensure that the two leaders of the developing world are working towards the same outcome. Another report provided advance details of the Danish proposal and their efforts to launch a “rescue plan” to save COP-15.” The Danish hosts prepared an alternative agreement that they intended to float at the annual summit. This after talks for a new deal floundered through the year under immense global scrutiny and civil society pressure to stitch up an ‘ambitious climate deal’. An early sketch of the elements of this draft was floated by Denmark in a round of informal meetings — referred to in the climate negotiations jargon as the pre-COP — some weeks before the summit, but delegates were not allowed to take back copies of the documents. Delegates from the select countries did take notes as time permitted. The media reported on these elements days before the summit got off the ground.

But the NSA document reveals that the U.S. administration had got early access to the entire document which helped it keep ahead of other countries at the negotiations during the fortnight of talks. The NSA document,
authored days ahead of the talks, said, “While the outcome of the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference remains uncertain, signals intelligence will undoubtedly play a significant role in keeping our negotiators as well- nformed as possible throughout the 2-week event.”

For days the rumours of the ‘Danish document’ floated at the Copenhagen talks, with many countries expressing anger and anguish at the opaque and covert operations of the hosts along with geopoliticallypowerful countries. The climate talks are meant to be driven by consensus and transparency, but mistrust brewed fast and led to the ultimate crash of the negotiations in 2009. This despite the U.S. being able to stitch together a non-binding political agreement with a very low ambition — something that suited its interests. Over subsequent years, the U.S. got many elements of the political deal embedded in the UN climate negotiations while the distrust got embedded in the talks trenchantly.

No South China Sea air zone, China assures ASEAN countries

China has rejected reports suggesting it was planning to set up an air defence zone over the disputed South China Sea, saying it was “yet to feel any air security threat” from its Southeast Asian neighbours. In November, China established its first Air Defence Identification Zone (ADIZ) over parts of the East China Sea, amid an increasingly tense stand-off with Japan over the disputed Diaoyu/Senkaku islands. An ADIZ is a defined area in international airspace within which countries monitor and track aircraft heading towards their territory.

The setting up of the ADIZ heightened tensions with Japan, as it overlapped with Japan’s zone and included the disputed islands. China at the time defended the move, pointing out that Japan had established its own ADIZ in 1969. After a Japanese newspaper reported last week that China was considering setting up a second such zone over the South China Sea – a move that would be certain to worry the half a dozen or so countries that have competing claims over the sea’s waters and islands – the Chinese Foreign Ministry was quick to deny the report, and also, at the same time, accuse Tokyo of attempting to fan tensions. “In a general view, the Chinese side has yet to feel any air security threat from the ASEAN countries and is optimistic about its relations with the neighbouring countries and the general situation in the South China Sea region”, Foreign Ministry spokes person Hong Lei said in a statement.

He blamed “right-wing forces of Japan” for “repeatedly clamor[ing]” about the alleged plan of China to set up ADIZ over the South China Sea”. “We sternly warned these forces not to mislead public opinions with rumors and play up tensions for their own selfish benefit,” he said.

China-Japan relations have soured over the past year over the disputed islands, and issues relating to wartime history and the Japanese occupation of China during the Second World War. China was especially angered by a visit by the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to the controversial Yasukuni war shrine - a memorial for Japanese who died during the war that also enshrines 14 Class- A war criminals – which was the first by a Japanese leader in seven years. The rising tensions with Japan have coincided with an apparent diplomatic outreach by China to other Asian countries, ostensibly aimed at attempting to isolate Tokyo. China’s ties have warmed with South Korea, which was also angered by Mr. Abe’s Yasukuni visit.

Last year, both President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang visited ASEAN countries. A year after Chinese vessels had run-ins with ships from both Vietnam and the Philippines near contested South China Sea islands, tensions with both countries have subsided. China recently signed an agreement for joint exploration with Vietnam.

Mr. Hong said China and ASEAN countries were “working together to implement the declaration on the conduct of parties in the South China Sea in a comprehensive and effective way to safeguard peace and stability in the region”. He also hit out at the Japanese media report about the ADIZ as being “of ulterior motive and simply aimed to shift international attention from and cover up the plot to change Japan’s pacifist constitution and expand its military power.”

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