Lessons from Track Two

As India embarks upon a new peace initiative with Pakistan, the experience of an Israeli professor who has led various experiments in Track ...

As India embarks upon a new peace initiative with Pakistan, the experience of an Israeli professor who has led various experiments in Track Two or 8216;Citizens Diplomacy8217; worldwide might be instructive. Edy Kaufman, a professor at Hebrew University and in the US, spoke about his experiments in Peru-Ecuador, Lesotho as well as in Jerusalem, over the weekend in the capital. He pointed out that even during the worst periods of the 8216;intifadah,8217; when governments from both sides treated the other as sworn enemies, various groups such as academics, always kept in touch.

At a particularly illuminating workshop on 8216;8216;Jerusalem,8217;8217; Kaufman found the Palestinian-Israeli participants discovering differing meanings to the holy sites, indicating that solutions had to be perceived equally radically. For example, if a horizontal rather than a vertical line were to be drawn across the holy structures, it was possible to give the Palestinians owndership to the first floor where the Al-Aqsa mosque stands, while the Israelis could get the ground floor they consider sacred.

Few spoke about India-PakistanTrack Two initiatives or their distinct inability to survive. The Neemrana group 8212; funded initially by USIS and Ford Foundation 8212; is an exception, with a meeting in December. One month later, of course, the PM goes to Pakistan.

The science of meditation

The Dalai Lama, resident in Dharamsala, India, for the last 44 years, is no stranger to visa refusals by nations abroad, even as the relationships of these countries wax and wane with China. In September, for example, the Dalai Lama was denied a visa by Russia to visit the Buddhist-majority Republic of Kalmykia, with Moscow admitting they were doing so in deference to Chinese sentiments. Considering the Tibetan leader was allowed to visit in 1993 during the Yeltsin era, Putin8217;s position seems somewhat strange.

Still, the Dalai Lama began a 12-day visit to Japan this week, to address his growing constituency of Shinto Buddhists. And just like he did in the US some weeks ago, he participated in a 8216;mind and science8217; dialogue with Nobel physics laureate Masatoshi Koshiba and DNA specialist Kazuo Murakami8230; Increasingly, scientists worldwide are finding that meditation has permanent and positive effects on neurotransmitters in the brain.

Mahathir8217;s Midas touch

Dialling 8216;M for Malaysia8217; in the early 90s, then Foreign Secretary Muchkund Dubey once asked Dr Mahathir Mohamad, why he had not included India in a grouping of East Asian economies he had begun with some fanfare. After all, reasoned Dubey, how could there be any Asian movement without India in it? But he had obviously not reckoned with the Malaysian leader, who, firmly tongue in cheek, answered : 8216;8216;This grouping is only for dynamic economies.

Twenty years after he took his first bow on the third world stage of Kuala Lumpur, Mahathir has transformed his nation into a first world miracle. He retired last week, but not before taking KL8217;s GDP from 12 billion in 1980 to 210 billion. His work ethic has clearly rubbed off on his Cabinet. At the Pravasi Bharati celebrations in January,Works minister Samy Velu, of Indian origin like Mahathir whose mother hailed from Kerala, was busy lobbying Indian politicians for Malaysian companies. As he won promises to build the capitals of Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand, nostalgia forMother India clearly meant big bucks 8212; for Malaysia.

Diplomatic quiz

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The city is awhirl with speculation over a possible extension for Foreign Secretary Kanwal Sibal as well as an ambassadorship to the US, when Lalit Mansingh, the current incumbent, returns by the end of March. Only three things, however, are certain so far : Mansingh has won a Rajya Sabha ticket from the Biju Janata Dal from Orissa, the Foreign Office has sent back the 8216;agre8217;ment8217; for David Mulford as the new US ambassador to India, while Rakesh Sood, India8217;s ambassador of disarmament in Geneva is going as the number two man in Washington.