US President Donald Trump appears to have trumped his legion of critics at home and abroad with the deal North Korean President Kim Jong-un to de-escalate tensions on the highly charged Korean peninsula. It would appear that President Kim has agreed to stop his country’s development of nuclear weapons as a first step towards abolishing them altogether, the process to be subjected to close verifiable scrutiny. President Trump, for his part, agreed to stop military drills with South Korea. The American and North Korean leaders got on well during their talks in Singapore, which is cause for hope and no more, knowing President Trump’s penchant for sudden mood swings. But it is some blessing that the US President has forsaken his initial incendiary language to blow away North Korea ‘with fire and brimstone,’ and possibly worse.
In these troubled times small mercies are occasions for celebration. Two lessons will be learned from the Korean experience. The first and overriding lesson is that nuclear weapons in the state locker is a form of life insurance. Libya’s Muamer Gadaffi gave up his country’s nuclear weapon development, only for Libya to be attacked by Britain, France and the US, and his regime destroyed. He himself was brutally murdered to cackling acclaim of the vile Hillary Clinton, Secretary of State in the Obama Administration. Warring parties today battle for control of Libya, the point from which dispossessed humanity from Sub Saharan Africa and the Greater Middle East take to the waters of the Mediterranean in a bid to reach European havens. Libya now has a functioning slave markets for trafficking in black African cargo, a numbing tragedy for which the Nobel Peace laureate Barack Obama bears prime responsibility.
It is thus understandable why President Kim gave to initial rage when the US Vice President Mike Pence and National Security Advisor John Bolton referred to a possible Korean settlement built on a likeness to the Libyan settlement. Mr Kim didn’t take kindly to being disposed of the Gadaffi way! That said, the leading feature of the Korean situation was the determination of the leaders of North and South Korea to heal their cold war neurosis and join hands in an enduring peace with the beckoning dream of a united Korea. The South Korean leadership in the early days of the crisis felt they were losing control of their sovereignty with the US and North Korea seemingly the two maintain protagonists. A second Korean war, they believed, correctly, would leave the entire peninsula a ruined desolation, just as it did after the first conflict of 1950-53. The nightmare galvanized both Koreas to come together in defence of their common heritage.
The lotus-eyed in India look to the two Koreas and the once two Germanys as an inspirational model for a hallucinatory Indo-Pakistan accord. This is utter twaddle, a fallacy as the rulers of Pakistan from the Partition of the subcontinent, if not before it, denied any shared cultural experience with infidel India, which is why they created through blood and gore Pakistan – ‘the Land of the Pure’ - in the first place. It’s time to get real and eschew the march of folly. The Indo-Pakistan confrontation will not end until the messianic delusions of Pakistan’s rulers and the country’s political class are abandoned. That is unlikely to happen anytime soon. Time is not on their side.
Korean developments are best viewed from a Korean perspective, as was the case with German unification. Period.
Much claimed Korea settlement by President Trump may prove to be on weaker foundations. It is more like a wish list without any detailed step by step agreement and the time frame. North Korean President, like his father is well known for changing goal posts and renegading on promises. Both South Korea and Japan appear to have been let down.
UK policy confusion worse confounded
British policy, from immigration to Brexit, is hobbled by confusion and uncertainty. For instance, its loosening of ironclad controls for skilled Indians entering the country is welcome. Changes in in the tier 2 visas open up opportunities for Indian professionals. Indian doctors and nurses have been exempted from the annual cap of 27,700 visas to plug the crippling shortages of skilled shortages in the National Health Service.
Indian industry has reacted positively to these changes. ‘Coming in the wake of a long-standing demand from Indian professionals, the news is a welcome development,’ said Rashesh Shah, President of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry.
Vinous Ali, head of policy at Tech UK, added his voice of welcome. ‘The tech sector in the UK is going from strength to strength,’ he said. Matthew Fell, Chief Policy Director at the Confederation of British Industry called on the government to remove all shortage categories from the cap. Good sense has prevailed.
The government’s desire to ease the movements of capital across borders inevitably entails recognition of a like movement of labour. This does not, of course, include unskilled labour, or labour in areas where there is a plentiful local supply. The issue of demand and supply should surely be regulated by market forces, which, allegedly, has long been a mantra of Conservative Party philosophy. It has taken more time than it should to get back to basics.
Easing the entry of professionals into the country has almost perversely been accompanied by restrictions on Indian students. For long British university vice chancellors have pointed out to the authorities that the presence Indian students have been a boon to higher educational institutions in the country. It was not only that they contributed to university coffers, but that they made valuable contributions to their intellectual life. The stubborn resistance of the Home Office has drawn severe criticism from Lord Kiran Billimoria as an act of ‘hostility.’ Indian students have been placed under the ‘risk’ category, while many from non-Commonwealth countries are perceived to be risk-free.
It is not that Indian students simply walk in with applications in hand. There are mountains of paperwork to endure. Shrimoyee Chakraborty,28, who came from Mumbai to Manchester University in 2010 on a tier 4 student visa to do an MSc in global business analysis, explains: ‘It was tough to apply. There’s a ton of paperwork. It is ridiculous….because so many Indians pay four of five times the fee that a UK citizen does.’ Nishanath Kilim, 28, from Andhra Pradesh, who spent 40,000 pounds in 2014, complains, ‘The UK, for a long time, has given preferential treatment to China and other Asian countries,’ to which the Home Office countered: ‘We welcome Indian students. We issue more visas to students from India than any other country except China and the US.’
Finally, Britain’s industry chief has warned of post-Brexit ‘extinction.’ Paul Dreschler, Director of the Confederation of British Industry in an interview with the BBC was highly critical of the government’s approach of Brexit: more ideology and politics than business sense. Maybe. Brexit was the country’s democratic choice. He reproached Government for its lack of clarity on the future direction of Britain’s relations with Europe. His comment came days after Jaguar Land Rover’s decision to shift production of its Discovery model to Slovakia as part of JLR’s long-term manufacturing strategy. The message to Government and Parliament is loud and clear.
Cricketing lesson for Afghans
Afghanistan’s cricketers, reared mostly on the one-day format including the Twenty/20 Indian Premier League (IPL) were understandably out of their depth in the more demanding requirements of five-day Test cricket - the ultimate demonstration of skill and character. The Afghan side, hopelessly under-prepared were thus blown away by India at Bangaluru in two days of the five-day Test match, their first such encounter. Rashid Khan and his colleagues have abundant talent; but this harnessed to the requirements of the five-day game.. The Afghans had, prior to the Test match against India, played three warm up Twenty/20 games in which they disposed of Bangladesh. Perhaps this led to complacency – and disaster.
However, the India-based Afghan team will have opportunities galore to learn the game for the next level. The BCCI could help by allowing Afghanistan to participate in India’s domestic four-day Ranji Trophy, which includes top Indian sides. Cricket, however, has taken hold in war-torn Afghanistan, and this truly is a cause for celebration.
