The Role of the Civil Society in Prevention of Conflict in South Asia

Regional meeting organized by the Regional Centre for Strategic Studies(RCSS) in cooperation with Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) and supported by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)

11-13 September 2004, Kathmandu

• to define civil society, its role and scope for partnership and a modality to work with the United Nations
• to understand the nature of conflicts- i.e. the national nature of conflicts rather than regional,
• to explore a multifaceted approach in understanding and resolution of conflicts,
• to develop early warning systems,
• to find out the linkages between NGOs and human security and
• strategies of capacity building for conflict prevention through trainings and the like.

In his address, Dev Raj Dahal, the FES representative, tried to look into the complexities of finding out a common point between the social interest of the civil society and the security interest of the state saying that the success of civil society organizations depended on trying to navigate through these complexities.

UNDP resident representative Matthew Kahane for his part said that organization of citizens has become vital for social change in these past 20 years or so. He cited examples of the peaceful breakaway of Baltic states from the erstwhile Soviet Union and the banning of andmines as proof of the power of organization. Kahane said that he hoped the meeting would discuss the issue of organization of citizens, including trans-national citizens and also the psychological support necessary for the civil society if they want to be effective in countries like Nepal.

Catherine Barnes tried to give shape to the discussion by providing the first course. She defined civil society saying that it is a network of relationships between the state, the market and the private family life of individuals which has manifested into a whole different sets of organisations in the cultural, religious and social spheres. These same interests could go against each other producing conflict and also could be used reduce the level of conflict, she said. The civil society can also mediate between the state and the citizens or monitor corporate interests and the like. She grouped the organizations into those

• that focus on policy and structural changes-e.g. the banning of landmines. There are networks which could provide an alternative to militarism and offer peace. The anti-war movement is an example.
• that include women and other groups that could address conflicts as they are the ones most affected.
• and the third group has to do with de-escalation of conflicts from the structural level. Structural prevention talks about the ongoing efforts of civil societies like fostering tolerance etc.
  

Regarding the regional need of South Asia, Barnes said that systems to foresee crises beforehand need to be developed. The people know in advance when conflicts are going to occur which needs to be included into the early warning systems analysis. She also pointed to conflict prevention strategies that could be adopted for peace: promoting peace building-zones of peace, peace rallies, networks etc. and Track II dialogue and other behind the scenes pressure for peace.

S. Basu provided the highlights of the Secretary general's eminent persons' group's report, the trigger of a whole lot of activities in trying to understand the civil society, saying that it was a bold proposal for the transformation of the UN. The report assumes that an increase in civil society activitism is people's desire to shift to participatory democracy, that intergovernmental process- for example the UN- is very important and global policy networks will develop because of civil society pressure. The recommendation of the report was that the UN should involve multi-level partnerships-civil society, govt, etc.
Basu said that the practical outcomes of the recommendations were that:

• Many have said that the general assembly should be the one to execute policy.
• The Resident Representative of the UN has been more empowered.
• It proposes to create a fund to build the capacity of the civil society in developing countries.
  

Therefore, Basu thought that the issues that need to be discussed should include the report's assumption that civil society organisations are self-forming and self governing. But it may not necessarily be true for networks, he said. He also said that there has been a tremendous gap is in partnership between local, regional and international civil society organisations for conflict prevention. For example, in Sudan local civil society organisations had given the warning of a looming catastrophe but the international ones did not heed.

Norbert Ropers put the meeting into perspective by saying that the action agenda that was expected at the end of the meeting should also reflect the strategies of the regional civil society to cope with conflict prevention as the initiation of the dialogue on the subject was also motivated by the desire of the Europeans to understanding of the areas that required funding in the future. Making his presentation, Ropers asked the discussants to focus their inputs into three categories-the definition of civil society, the clustering of activities being focused and the actors.

He said that many of the conflicts are closely connected with modernization as it undermines the traditional society. The social capital available is therefore not enough to sustain peace building activities. The modern civil society is cosmopolitan in nature and funded by international sources. The existing social fabric is not much affected by this new movement of civil society. Hence, he said, the challenge is to ensure that it has something to contribute to this social capital that is on the wane.

Secondly, systemizing or clustering of activities of the civil society. Galtung differentiates conflict settlement, management and resolution. Civil society used to come in areas of peace building, but today they are being challenged to contribute in all these areas. In 1990, the Americans put together something called multi-track diplomacy (Track I and Track II). Civil society has been concentrating majority of its activities in promoting the establishment of NGOs in crisis zones and helping them to build capacity. Organised civil societies were set up in these crisis zones, but was still inadequate to help the social capital. We are stuck with this situation, Ropers said, because the donors have been imposing their perception of focussed areas.
Norbert Ropers pointed at the following gaps are requiring discussion:

• Real politik paradigm talks about maximising power. But civil society talks about positional bargaining for greater participation. Ways to impact on the real politik needs to be discussed.
• The linear diagnosis and the non-linear reality. Have we really developed the concept to guide us in the future?
• Have we done our utmost to make participation a reality by ourselves following it within civil society organizations?
• Do we have enough skills, and concepts to guide us through the handling of intra-party conflicts.
• The gap between civil society actors among themselves is another area of discussion.
• Partnership is sought among organisations and networks, but how is the situation within the organisation? Have we found the appropriate methods to address the conflict?
• The gap that exists with respect to demonstrating with results and outputs. The measurement of the outputs at the macro-level needs to be replicable.

The discussion sessions that followed had been divided into country presentations and floor discussions. Although most of the presentations were limited to relating the experiences of the civil society organization that the presenter represented, some did try to touch upon the larger philosophical context by trying to define the terminologies and discuss the burning social questions of the day. The first presentations were made by Sri Lanka, followed by Pakistan, then India, Nepal and finally Bangladesh spread over two days. Each day's discussions were wrapped up with a summing up by Catherine Barnes.

SRI LANKA

Presenters
Kumar Rupesinghe
Shanthi Sachithanandam
Ariyaratne
S. Balakrishnan
Fr. A. I. Bernard
Chairman of the session: Ranabir Samaddar

The first presentation was made by Kumar Rupesinghe on the experience of Sri Lanka on the early warning system that had been developed. He began by defining:

• 'Conflict' as the clash between missions and values
• 'Human security' as the freedom to live without fear
• 'Early warning' as the ability to provide timely information to prevent conflict

Rupesinghe gave an account of the early warning system developed in Sri Lanka where 20 field officers had been stationed to gather information for indicators developed in the country itself. There is also the ability to intervene based on the information available, he said. Daily newspapers are monitored and reports are brought out periodically. Since one intervention cannot help in a protracted conflict, many interventions are necessary, he said.

He said that when the conflict between Tamils and Muslims in the east had threatened the peace process, the violence was stopped after an agreement was reached with the LTTE. The peace indicators have moved up once again. But again, there is an intra-LTTE conflict that is threatening peace -conflict with the pro-Karuna faction.

Rupesinghe described the three strategies of intervention in Sri Lanka-village level, regional level and national level. His recommendation was to expand the early warning system developed in Sri Lanka, with cooperation from the region, to include the whole of South Asia.

Shanthi Sachithanandam related her experiences in working with women in the grassroots which ultimately led her to empower them by making them participate in Sri Lanka's politics. Her experience was that without political power organizations alone would not be able to sustain their activities. Her definition of: Civil society was that it was a group of people aiming to change the common issues that affect them. Conflict as a confrontation between the state and a section of the citizenry for power.
The questions she posed at the end of the presentation for discussion were:

• We tend to romanticize the grassroots. But is it the best target group? Will it be able to provide leadership to the civil society? It might be better to work on the radicalized urban group.
• Can foreign funded NGOs contribute to fulfill local needs like mobilization campaigns?
• Activism is not something that is expressed in big crises, but an everyday behaviour.

Ariyaratne gave an account of Sri Lanka's Displacement Problem. For him, funded organisations do not necessarily instill confidence in the people that they have chosen to serve and that they are non- partisan. But the civil society, on the other hand, is not a military organization, nor the public. He said that they assume shape when they are juxtaposed by certain situations as it occupies the political space and the non-state space. Unlike NGOs, the civil society can contribute by addressing the root causes of the conflict, he said.

Sri Lanka has the biggest internally displaced people in South Asia with 800,000 displaced people at the turn of the century as against 500,000 people in India, he said. About 75,000 Lankan refugees are languishing in Tamil Nadu camps. In fact some of the Rajiv Gandhi assassins were from those camps, he said.

To explain the hardships of displaced persons, Ariyaratne described the situation of the displaced Sri Lankan Muslims who were happily embraced by a province. As time went by the Muslims found that the empathy was wearing thin. They can vote for their representatives from their original constituencies but that the elections are a sham because they do not even know the candidates they are voting. It has been 20 years since they left home.

Ariyaratne stressed the need for civil society to develop links to assist the displaced persons.

FLOOR

Paula Banerjee: The question of land in conflict. How do you deal with land that has already been given to some one else, but the displaced person comes back?
Is it enough for us to say that women could not be active enough at the grassroots and the movement fizzled out? What is the agenda that rendered them so?
The Indian IDP figure is much larger than you showed.

Kamal Mitra Chinoy: Have you put forward some form of solution to the conflict? Is the solution related with state policy or also civil society?
Given the funding of Northern NGOs, do you think we can dowithout it?

Shamsul Bari: The UNHCR deals more with IDPs today than refugees. Funded NGOs are probably not part of the civil society. We also said NGOs are organised. We again said unorganised civil society is not civil society. This gives us some understanding of civil society. How do we organise social capital in such a state.

Rita Thapa: Could you expand a bit on NGOization?

Aniz Haroon: Are we totally rejecting the role of political parties by not including it in the civil society. In Pakistan, during military rule, political parties were not active and civil society organisations were non-existent. In my country, depoliticization of NGOs has weakened the civil society. In a way we are minimizing the role of the political activist who does not wait for funds to deal with issues.

Vasu: The UN does consider parliamentarians as part of the civil society.
Early warning was timely ten years ago. Now it is early action. Early warning has come a long way. How did you organise the system in Lanka. Is there any lessons learnt from South Asia in the movement from early warning to early action?

Kumar's reply

Conflicts have been centered around the land question. In Sri Lanka, the Muslims were evicted from their agricultural land in the north and have been living in camps for the last 20 years. The Tamils too have the land problem. By law, if a person occupies a land for ten years, that is his land. When the original owner wants to come back the security situation does not allow him. We have recommended a council to deal with the land question, including experts who have dealt with the issue in other conflicts.

Regarding our contribution to policy, we are involved in feeding Track II issues to Track I. This is not easy. For example, for constructive engagement, the voice raised at Track III level need to go up to Track I.

There are three generations of early warning systems. First, it was the Jewish genocide. A lot of information was available before the genocide took place, but could not be prevented. Second, the Rwandan genocide, which too came far too late. The system has not helped in African conflicts even with information available. The second generation of early warning calls for the local people themselves to develop new tools to address the problem themselves.

Lastly, the NGO-bashing that is going on is making me unhappy. You need resources to run NGOs but that should not make them bad just because of that. But there are NGO leaders who retain their positions for life, unlike parliamentarians who are voted off and on. But I do agree that NGOs may be an obstacle to relationships at the village level.

Shanthi's reply

With regard to whether we have the legitimacy to lead such action that we are engaged in, our agenda was to have activism but we were unable to translate the activism into action. We work in a highly militarized society. The LTTE is very militaristic. Our work is political and we feel it is time that we take up the political space more eagerly.
Reporting to the donor, and being accountable to them, depoliticizes NGOs.

Ariyaratne's reply

Only organised civil society can make a dent in conflict resolution, not the village society, although it may be more wholesome.

Chairperson's remarks: Land is a crucial issue. The Bhutanese state immediately colonised the southern land from where the Nepalese were driven out. It was resettled by northern Bhutanese. The Israelis, the Filipinos and others have all done the resettlement successfully. Strangely, no UN or other organisation has come forth to take up the issue and international law does not take this problem into account. Experience is not lacking in this regard. Are the states ready to mend their ways?

Sri Lankan presentations continue…

S. Balakrishnan described the history of NGOs in Sri Lanka saying that in the late 70s, they came to take up the space that was vacated by the Left forces which allied themselves with Sinhala chauvinistic forces and started acting communal. He said that his organisation began then, in a situation where people would easily submit to the political parties' will. We had to face the wrath of both the government and the Tamils who were using us to weaken the democratic structure, he said. By the early 90s, the civil society organisations were able to convince the southern population that war would only bring death and destruction. Balakrishnan said that after 1995, the civil society had to safeguard its legitimacy as the political leaders were swallowing them up. The conflicting parties want to maintain a divide while the civil society needs to work to overcome the divide. The peace constituency is being expanded at the moment but faces the challenge of being more visible, he said, adding, the challenge of the civil society is to maintain a silence of the guns until an agreement is reached. He concluded by saying that a very inclusive civil movement is needed to garner a compromise between the perceived past, the present and the future.

Fr. A. I. Bernard's presentation centered on the difficulties faced by the church during the height of the crisis in Jaffna: Jaffna was completely isolated in 1996, from the mainland and the rest of the world. All kinds of human rights violations were taking place. LTTE had retreated and only the military remained. We had to deal with the violence that was going on. It was not certain that you returned home if you went out outside curfew hours as the military was also doing the civil administration. We tried to organise periodic meeting with the military authority. Issues like narrow barbed wire lanes at the checkpoints, body searching of women and reduction of curfew hours were initially discussed. This reduced tensions between the two sides. Since outsiders were not allowed in, we smuggled out letters through occasional visitors of the diplomatic community. Issues of disappearances and human rights violations were taken up by the outside world and the government had to ease the situation somewhat.
Some of the lessons learnt by Fr. Bernard:

• Maintain dialogue, even with the military. But talks that will not result in practical dividends to the people will not help.
• Secondly if talks resolve problems, guns will not have to be resorted to.
• Initially, the Tamil cause was not a separate state, just inclusiveness. A Tamil leader lost elections badly in the sixties when he campaigned for a separate state. Also the means adopted was to be Ahimsa, which was later taken to be a weakness and then violence was resorted to.
• Track 1.5 of the Bergoff Foundation were helpful for us.
• Civil societies across ethnic lines need to be continued regardless of what happens at the Track I level.
• Capacity building, non-formal and formal education, training programmes for potential leaders from the grassroots need to be continued.

FLOOR

A.F Matthew: You did not tackle the question of nationality. India too stands for a united Sri Lanka. But we should resolve the nationality issues.

Asha Hans: NGOs are afraid of losing their funding, at the same time governments have been hounding out NGOs that are not working on real issues. Like the NGOs, the urban elites too are afraid of losing their positions. Grassroots organisations are the only effective means to work.

Kamal Mitra Chinoy:How much has Indian role of training and supporting Sri Lanka got to do with the Tamil issue?

Balakrishnan's reply
Indian stance gave the wrong impression to the Tamils who thought that the Indians would intervene to help them just as they did in Bangladesh if thing got out of hand. India is still part of the problem. If you can transform it into part of the solution, the conflict would be over. There are three points here. First, India has been a failed mediator. It has had to retreat humiliatingly from Lanka. Second, the Pravakaran factor, LTTE being the major cause of defeat of the Indian agenda. Third, would India would allow Sri Lanka to find its own model of power sharing?
Regarding NGO funding, money should not be the determining factor of your work.

Fr. Bernard's reply
In 1985 and 86, India was talking in favour of the Tamil cause. India does not want to wipe out LTTE, only keep it weak.

Asha Hans: We need to strengthen the peace constituency at a time when nobody appears to be bother about it.

PAKISTAN

Presenters
S. Haroon Ahmed
Anis Haroon
Atta ur Rahman
Naveen Qayyum
Francisco d'Sa
Chairman: Kumar Rupesinghe

S. Haroon Ahmed looked into the psychological dimension of a conflict area. He describes his experience in working to promote the positive aspects in a conflict climate, particulary in the Pakistan-India conflict. He said that people to people relations and emotions can transcend government policy as shown by the people to people friendliness during the cricket match in spite of the fact that Pakistan lost. He said that the civil society can foster this dimension to mitigate an environment of conflict. He was critical of the funding strategies of NGOs. He said that NGOs have a bad name not because only of the funding per se, but because of the funding of the wrong agenda. Dr. Ahmed also pointed to the need for the media to play a more positive role during conflict.

Anis Haroon focused on the space needed for the civil society agenda, which she said had been constrained by state structures. She blamed Pakistani military structure for not providing the civil society the space to work. In contrast, she said that the religious organisations have all the space they want because during Gen Zia ul Haq rule he decided to promote religious parties for their support, as he had no backing of other parties. This has given them the power to make laws resulting in Talibanisation of the society. And, women are the sufferers from all this she said.
She thought that more discussion was needed on

• the nature of the state in S. Asia,
• globalisation of violent religious extremism,
• and the role of people in NGO movement

In his presentation, Atta ur Rahman described the situation of Pakistan's civil society saying that there is no organisation in Pakistan to address peace issues and prevent conflict. Pakistan has a very small peace constituency and this needs to be activated and made bigger was his contention.

Naveen Qayyum said that women are the sufferers of conflicts and at the same time they have initiated or prevented conflicts. They have taken peace initiatives even in the India-Pakistan cross-border conflicts. She talked about peace that could be constructive and that which comes from forced silence as well.
Her experience was that

• Discovery and possibilities of peace process, further collaboration, women's experience and issues should be involved in negotiations,
• Conflict prevention needs to be researched in its regional, national and global dimensions.

Francisco d'Sa categorized conflict into destructive conflict that saps energy and constructive conflict that opens up new possibilities. He talked about how Pakistani society was forced to cope with the waves of refugees from Afghanistan each time conflict intensified in Afghanistan- right from the communist takeover to the Taliban takeover. D'Sa also said that the rise of religious extremism in Pakistan was not only leading religious extremists to impose their will on the people through law, but also conflicts between religious sects had been troubling the society. His explanation of international linkages of conflict ended saying, "We need to have a common standing among South Asians regarding looming wars, like one which may befall on Syria or Iran or even Pakistan".

Amjad's presentation focused mainly on the Kashmir conflict where he said that politicization of the problem had not only prevented meeting between Kashmiris on either side of the conflict but that it had affected others working for peace there. Training of civil society workers in Washington showed that the trainees were a changed lot as they were thinking out of the box, he said. If we keep the political issue aside, and allow Kashmiris to meet with each other, a lot of problems would solve at the level of the Kashmiris themselves. He also said that Kashmiris need to be involved in any dialogue between Pakistan and India.

Chairman's remarks: Pakistan or Sri Lanka do appear to have the organisations, but they do not appear to be working for peace in a cooperative manner. Globalisation and terrorism, were also discussed. It seems like it was the civil society that first initiated inter-Kashmiri people's meeting, but here again, it looks like it was the outsiders who took the initiative.

FLOOR

Bishnu Upreti: India and Pakistan are spending huge amounts of resources in arms depriving the development sector.

Paula Banerjee: Did 9/11 contribute to strengthenning of the khaki-mullah nexus? Is there any dialogue planned with Jehadi women?

Anees' reply
Definitely, 9/11 has strengthened the khaki outfit as everyone can be apprehended without any reasons. The Iraq war has given a boost to religious fundamentalism, leading to many religious parties winning parliamentarian seats.
Jehadi women are controlled by their men and hardly have any say in the party structure. Dialogue with them has not been very fruitful.

Nasrulla's reply
Pakistan follows India in raising the defense budget and has no independent decision on its own.

Atta's reply
Interactions have softened the stance of religious parties.

Shamsul Bari:The lack of civil society in Pakistan was evident during the Bangladeshi crisis.

Matthew: Terminologies need to be used cautiously. We talk about Islamic terror, but hardly about imperialism perpetrated by the church. It was not absence of civil society that led to the failure of the Oslo peace process, but Israel's intransigence.
Why become so obsessive about September 11?

Kamal: We never talk of Christian terrorists when we discuss the IRA. There is some hegemonisation of history here, especially when we refer to the fight against terrorism as a post 9/11 scenario. The attacks to justify the deaths of the 3,000 on September 11 have killed far more people.

Haroon Ahmed's reply
Radio and TV channels have come up that freely air discussions on the atrocities that went on in the war leading to the creation of Bangladesh. Similarly, other forums are discussing the issues more openly today.

Naveen Qayyum's reply
We have been exposing the military atrocities that went on in Bangladesh then, and the media have been playing some positive role in this regard.

Shanthi Sachithanandam: Should civil society organisations be knocking the doors of the UN, regional or national bodies by forming regional networks to get stronger? Multi-track diplomacy should help.

Anees Haroon's reply
Multi-track diplomacy has been tried but in a unipolar world, it is hegemonism that wins.

At the end of the day's discussion, Catherine Barnes tried to wade through the points raised during the discussions and presentations and divided them into different groups and subgroups to give a perspective to the meeting. The floor was opened again for final comments on the format of the discussions she developed. She said:

The tones of the commentators showed today that they were analytical. I grouped them into clusters
1. Dynamics and definitions of peace and conflict
Constructive and destructive conflict
Just peace and active peace
Human security
Absence of fear as against militarisatic understanding
Social dimension of conflict
Family violence
Conflicts within states
Regional context was provided
Also domestic conflicts extending to the regional dimension
Global dimension of conflict e.g. the US war on terror

2. Nature of the State and the exercise of political power
Exercise of power at heart of conflict
Progressive forces finding their space constrained including space for civil society
State-sponsored violence and how it shapes the dynamics of violence

3. Nature of civil societies
Meaning, roles and dynamics of civil society
-Self organising element in civil society
-Mobilizing to effect change in one's life
-Militarization constricts the ability to self-organise while it also provokes one to self organise
Ethnic dimension pushing conflicts into violence
Role of NGOs in particular
-Historical context where traditional civil societies may have been undermined
-Depoliticizing and projectizing issues because of funding imperatives
-But there was also caution against NGO-bashing
-NGOs as buffer between liberalization and consumers
-Ethics of engagement of NGOs- who are they accountable to? Are they democratic in their practices? Are they generating trust?

4. Multiple levels of the work of civil society
Activity based, peace movements, people-to-people linkages

5. Role of outsiders
The role of UN
Regional organisations like SAARC

6. Resources
Information sharing and developing it as a source of power
Multiadvocacy networks
Technical infrastructure to be able to make things work, technical skills and knowledge
Funding
Self reflection and evaluation

7. Other issues
Role of women appeared cross-cutting across all issues
Role of educators
Role of community based organisations
Role of the media
Role of competititon for land leading to political dimensions at times.
Reconciliation and peace
Specific issues that came up was on Kashmir

FLOOR

Shamsul: UN Secretary General talks about NGOs, but we talk of civil society.

Vasu: It had been clear from early on that NGOs were doing tremendously much in conflict areas, but when the work progressed, we found that there was a definitional problem here. At one point there was also an opinion about whether to include even businesses as part of the civil society. In fact, the UN has within itself intra-organisational differences in definitions. The definitional domain is a fluid one and still remains unresolved.

Sridhar Khatri: This definitional conundrum is going to be there for a while and we have to accept it as it is, at least for some time to come.

Shamshul: My question is whether there is a conflict between civil society and NGOs or would it not matter anyway?

Ranabir: Yes we need to understand why the phrase 'civil society' has come up in recent days. There are things we would like the phrase to encompass while we may not like some of what it already does. Therefore, civil society cannot solely mean NGOs. Most of what UN does on South Asia does not reach the concerned. To find the UN trying to define what Hegel had done way back in history is quite strange anyway.

Paula Banerjee: No matter how we define the term, we will have to include the jihadi groups of Pakistan. We will have to deal with such groups no matter what the decision.

Kabir: The history of civilization is not just formulating and drafting projects and papers.

Kamal: Civil society includes a large extent of the organised groups of society. Parliamentarians have been included because they are representing the civil society. Because of their dual role, their other role as an organ of the state is not part of the civil society.

Shanthi: Catherine's summary has made things clearer. What if we divide all the issues that we discussed into
Analysis
-Conflict and peace, state and discourse on terrorism
Strategies
-Peace building
and
Areas
-Land, human security, IDPs and women

Dr. Haroon Ahmed: The following points too need to be included
Demilitarization,
Kashmir,
intolerance and
good governance

Hiranya Lal Shrestha: The focus should be on dialogue

Ranabir: How important is it to go into the definitional quagmire? I suggest, let us not do it, especially in the context of South Asia.

Anees Haroon: NGOs operate only when there is funding. But there are movements that function without funding. I think all of them are part of the civil society.

Shanthi: There are large NGOs that are visible and co-opted by large international organisations. There are also those that are small and which work without funding.

Catherine: The first meeting of this global partnership agreed to discuss the issue but not to define it. There were dangers of making the definition too tight or getting paralysed by the need to define the term.

Shamshul: My question was whether we are discussing only NGOs or a civil society that does not include it?

Balkrishnan: I have read a definition which is broad enough and goes something like this: A domain of social organisations formed between the family and the state based on voluntarism.

Sridhar Khatri: I think we can take this concern at the drafting of the statement.

Norbert: The whole exercise is to raise resources and to legitimise their programmes by the actors. This exercise is only a way to get access to the UN.

Sridhar: I think this process also involves linking up with other organisations to benefit from the work they have done e.g. on human security.

Kumar: I think we have missed out 'globalization of religious intolerance, fundamentalism, ethnic cleansing'. Globalisation is fostering these tendencies in all societies. Are the tools, being bandied about, adequate to deal with these issues. In Sri Lanka, 2,000 NGO leaders have been killed in the past. The order of the capitalist project or the democracy project is not working. How do we deal with it?

Anisuzaman: We talked of 'prevention' in the morning.

Rita: The conflict in Nepal and its escalation has taken place in the globalization context. Also the aid machinery needs to be put into perspective while talking of conflict in Nepal. Another is the gender perspective. Resolution 1325 was put forward one and a half years ago. We all know the flaws that exist there.

Matthew: Which aspect of globalization are you talking of? Mobility of labour, current account of nations, cultural globalization? Marketing was not discussed, e.g. eradication of the public transport from the US at the behest of Detroit. Branding, mass culture etc.

Kamal: I think the Analysis part should be divided into two- the second being the peace movement of the civil society. Also, militarism which has percolated into the civil society.

Shanthi: Can globalization cover loss of identity and cultural degradation?

Catharine: It may be better to have accompanying documents that explain all this. But the guiding principles need not be that detailed.

INDIA

Presenters
P. Agrawal
Paula Banerjee
Keseli Chisi
AF Matthew
Ranabir Samaddar
Kamal Mitra Chinoy
Asha Hans
Anirban Roy
Sukum Nanda
Gina
Chairman: Prof. Anisuzzaman

The presentation by Prof. P. Agarwal centered on the question of violence per se. He said that there is not only ambiguity in the definition of civil society but there is ambiguity also in the perception of violence. And this is not good. There needs to be some thinking on the question of violence, even though puritanism in the extreme form may not be good while seeking an end to violence.

Agrawal said that in India, violence has been meticulously organised over the years. There is no organized violence that has not been planned, ever. Institutionalized conflict mechanisms or peace mechanisms need to be explained in their conceptual forms. Every individual makes some moral choice and follows it, he said.

In Babri masjid, even women took part and so was the case in Gujarat. Agrawal said that although women sympathize with women victims of violence, they have been seen to be as violent or more in one context or the other.

Some individuals have been actively involved in peacemaking as some are in peace breaking. There has been a systematic effort to destroying peace all around the world. Since all organised violence has a political context and is not done without planning, peace too can be brought about in a forced manner. Hence peace can either be a 'silent peace' brought about through force or a 'vibrant peace' that prevails after a space for dialogue and conflict resolution is provided.

Movement from political democracy to social democracy has been interfered with by instilling fear and constructing fear. For example, perpetrating ideas like Hindus of India will be turned into a minority by Muslims.
The points he made were:

• Interconnectivity of conflict
• Ambiguity of perception of violence
• Silent peace and vibrant peace
• No violence is an spontaneous episode but planned

Paula Banerjee dwelt on the success stories of the northeast Indian women in making peace- the women's way of making peace. She said that usually peace movements are issue based- they are not usually long-term, especially after the issue goes away, e.g. cases of disappearances. Even if they regroup later, it is not long-term. In the northeast, there are examples of women working in a protracted conflict situation. She gave the example of the Naga Mothers group that was originally formed in 1984 for health services purposes. In the 80s they changed roles to participate in the larger domain of politics, electoral politics, she said. In 1994, a violent conflict erupted and this group of women intervened demanding 'no more blood'. They take the position of 'the mother of the community'. They believe in their cause and they know it is political negotiations that can bring change in the society, she said. They have been talking of distribution of land and demanding equity. These women also sat for negotiating for the ceasefire.

Banerjee also gave examples of other groups that were formed to protest against violence by taking torches. Another group took off their clothes in front of the Assam Rifles to protest military violence, she said.

Kesheli Chisi, herself from the Naga community, made the situation of the Northeast Indian woemen's movement clearer in her presentation. The Naga Mothers were formed in 1984 to resolve the larger political problem of the Naga people. Since 1994, they have been fighting against all forms of violence, she said. The Naga Mothers met different national brothers [underground people fighting for self-determination in the northeast of India], networked with other Naga organisations and churches, she said. She also listed the participation of her group ion different regional and international conference to make the voice of the Nagas heard. We want peace to prevail in our homeland, Chisi said.

AF Matthew: I think that when talking of human rights you need to talk of the whole and not in parts. Theory and practice should also go together.
It took about six years for Nazi Germany to exterminate about five million people, but it took only about seven months for the Rwandan genocide to take place. So we have not been able to change the world for the better by much.
Regarding truth and reconciliation commissions, the law is kept outside the peace framework. And this is dangerous. Secondly, the media- one of the crucial foundation-laying tools has been the media in genocides. But it was the last sector to be privatized by states. For example, NBC hardly reports on anti-war issues as military hardware makers are found to own it. But there are also those who have been documenting the violence that have taken place in different conflict areas or about day-to-day violence through photographs and films. The media have been able to marketize conflict icons in their branding, like Saddam condoms, and also to drum up support for their agenda- in fighting epidemics or creating a war environment.

Ranabir Samaddar: How political can we be? What are our political tasks? How do we influence government or policy? Should we be a partner with the state?

The primary task of the peace community is to bring in moral opposition to violence. Therefore, it should not be our concern whether we influence government or not. It is they who should change sides if it suits them. We should rather play the role of the opposition. Government attitude to us should in no way change our direction of work.

Secondly, since conflict is always there in society, people either learn something from it or it destroys the fabric of society. If we look at how women or children behave and adjust in conflict situations, we can understand a lot, as it provides education opportunities. They cope with conflict without anyone's help.

Third, dialogue. Five years ago it was a group that asked both the People's War Group and the Andhra government to initiate dialogue. Nobody took it seriously then. Today, when dialogue has actually started, that group has started to command respect. But dialogue is a contentious process and can be as tricky as engaging in war itself. In fact, war is at times much easier than holding talks.

Lastly, adversaries need to ultimately resort to dialogue. And, the peace constituency will have to realize that the demand for justice has a legitimacy in a conflict situation. A minimal justice system will have to be devised to resolve any conflict. The five principles of minimal justice:

• Recognise that injustice has been done by the state
• The compensation you are devising-moral, financial or whatever sort of compensation
• Guarantee of effecting the changes promised during dialogue
• Who is the custodian of the process of guarantee?
• Will this process of justice be final or do we keep innovating?

FLOOR

Saleem: When people talk of genocide, they talk of Rwanda or the Balkans. Bangladesh which had generated the largest number of refugees along with three million people killed is never mentioned.

Shanthi: When we are talking of good and bad violence, are we trying to legitimizing the state's violence? As long as there is the military, there will always be violence. Talking about non-violence while the state is armed to the teeth is legitimising their monopoly over violence.

Anwar: Peace under duress cannot be peace under international definition. Victors calling their imposition of order in other countries 'peace treaties' is one such. Could Agrawal talk of just peace and unjust peace as well?

Bishnu Upreti: We have been against human rights abuses and violence as there are reasons behind that. We do have to criticise the government at some point in time.

Naveen: How did the media react to the Naga women's peace movement?

Kumar: We are discussing violence today-- something bigger than preventing an armed conflict, our seminar theme. Are we talking of violence or conflict as they are two different things?
About Gujarat, was it known beforehand that such a thing was planned? How early was it known? What action was taken to prevent it?
You talked of peaceful co-existence in South Asia. Can you give the best example to be followed?

Norbert: There is difference between violence and armed conflict and this should be addressed in the action agenda.
For a proper approach to transitional justice you need to organise minimal justice. Also, the reconciliation approach is a Christian approach, how will you deal with it? How will you include the impact of the media in the action agenda?

Sri Lankan questioner: Can we take up legal provisions that justify military action like emergency regulations?
Can the media be channelled to promoting peace?

Balakrishnan: Enemy, armament, belief that power can be maintained through violence, a people ready to tolerate violence and the media-these five elements are said to be needed for violence to take place.
Also, we do need to deal with the past in promoting peace.

Sridhar Khatri: Because we did not agree on a common definition of conflict, various ideas were floated for discussion and the topics that we have today are related with that. We will have to be more specific for the action agenda. Also while devising the action agenda we will also have to define the type of conflict we are addressing.

Agarwal's reply: Even if we confine ourselves only to armed conflict we need to understand the ideology of violence. Second, I don't think everyone was in a position to predict the violence in Gujarat. But the human rights workers and the RSS knew that Gujarat was being used as their laboratory and that violence would erupt, but they did not know exactly when.
I don't know the best example for peaceful coexistence, that is why I talk of vibrant peace and silent peace.
Finally, I am not trying to justify the violence inherent in the state, but a difference has to be made between what is principle and that which it practices.

Paula's reply: Issues of disappearance, violence against women, and other forms of structural violence need to be addressed if we are talking of conflict prevention.
The media did not give much coverage to the Naga women's movement. In fact, they even mistakenly portrayed it as an insurgency. The local media is a different story, however.
Regarding the powers of the state, we need to address the powers that security forces have been given in border areas which is much more worse than in conflict situations.

Matthew's reply: We do need to ideologise contexts but there are problems while doing so with cases of Stalinism and Nazism.
The media have been used successfully in building peace and other areas like literacy programmes. In Gujarat, the vernacular took up the rabid Hindutwa line, fueled by their circulation. But there are also positive cases. The media is only an appendage rather than something that stands on its own.

Ranabir's reply: We define our agenda our way, the UN does it in a more technocratic manner. Therefore, the concept of violence always gets interjected. This may be good in its own way.
We need to look at the pre-conflict and conflict situations.
I do not take peace and reconciliation as purely a Christian matter. Anthropology is testimony to that.

The second part of the Indian session began with Kamal Mitra Chinoy's projection of national interest as one of the main reasons for violence. National chauvinism needs to be taken up seriously to resolve regional conflicts like Kashmir, he said.
Globalization is just another aspect of the projection of national interest by the superpowers. Even students are made read textbooks that hails this. There is nothing liberal about the neo-liberal doctrine. What kind of 'reform' is reduction in public sector investment or laying-off of workers?
Violence needs to be discussed as it is central to conflict. It is justified as self-defence by state actors and non-state actors provide an ideological justification.

Asha Hans' presentation dealt with patriarchy in the society. She said that it is entrenched at every level and section of society. It is not only a 'men' problem but cuts across gender. And, in an effort to change we do not have the courage to overhaul the system. When we are serious, we only make minor changes so that the system is not put in jeopardy. The masculinist discourse leaves out women and such indoctrination works also on women.
We have found patriarchy in Bosnia and Sri Lanka in the systematic rape that was committed and other like incidents. W are also working on human security, a concept that was not discovered by Amartya Sen but by a few women a long time ago. The media too is involved in it as much as anyone else in promoting patriarchy.
Our action plan is- representation of women in all bodies, not only in peace. They need to be there in monitoring. Some kind of tribunal needs to be developed for South Asian crimes and a gender component included in it, she said.

Anirban Roy said that the northeast Indian states are geopolitically important as four countries border them. It could be an anthropologist's delight, because of the so many tribes there. But, so is it with the number of insurgent groups. It is a hazard to work in the region for media persons. Newspapers have been intimidated to do the bidding of the armed groups. Similar pressure is borne by journalists from the army's side.
Journalists of the Northeast have formed a group in New Delhi recently. Journalists have also helped broker ceasefires. They can be helpful in defusing tension, Roy said.

Sukum Nanda said that the northeastern state of India, namely Manipur, has been witnessing a long term low intensity conflict, and a warlike situation prevails.
People have been demanding a repeal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act as it has been responsible for gross violation of human rights by the security forces.
Civil society, like the women's group, have been working against injustice, ever since the British rule. The civil society has the responsibility for paving the way for dialogue to resolve the conflict.

Gina, a Naga woman who has worked with the Mother's Group said that the Naga custom gives women a peace role. Women married to other communities also play the mediating role between the two communities. Even the cultural dances symbolize peace, she said.
Taking off the sarong is an expression of disgust or dissatisfaction, she explained regarding the form of protest that the Naga women had resorted to against the military, and something an earlier speaker had mentioned. She said that it was not 'going naked' as was made to be believed by the media. Our women's organization, the Mothers Group, is representative of all women, she said. We are for peace and if that can be achieved through dialogue we are for it, but if justice is not served there will be no peace, Gina asserted.

FLOOR

Amjad: We need to make a distinction between South Asia and other regions.
There is also a need to discuss how inhuman laws contributes to conflict, and how the media helped in a similar fashion.
The cost of conflict borne by people also need to be assessed. What impact did it have on development?

Devraj: There are three sources of violence-one is embedded in knowledge itself, in the sectoral or disciplined knowledge. The second is embedded in constitutional and social systems. And, the third is in politics that is articulated to exclude minorities. Can the civil society transform these sources of violence?

Atta: You mentioned that churches have not been able to broker peace. What is the attitude of the church towards women's groups in Manipur?

Norbert: What is the contribution of South Asia to the West European search for paradigms? Is it the same as that of the Europeans who are looking at how they can fund the civil society organisations?

Kumar: I see the United States and India developing a strategic partnership. I also see Sri Lanka developing a military partnership with India at a time when peace talks are going on.
Would Asha elaborate on the tribunals in the Balkans?

Naveen: Sensitization of journalists on gender issues has not helped much. How will sensitization on conflict help?

Saleem: There is also a document that blames the bordering countries for inciting conflict in the northeast Indian states. What about Bangladesh' role?

Kamal's reply
We follow WTO and other global rules, but not the international human rights laws. Indian federalism is a quasi federalism. It is much more centralized than is made out to believe.
There should be paradigms- an extremely flexible one in the case of South Asia. What is cosmopolitan for Europeans is not so for South Asia.
The Rainbow Coalition is important for South Asia as the region is very diverse. If not, it will not include the diversity of the population.

Asha's reply
On the South Asian tribunal, we could help national tribunals set up and after the hearings we could help a South Asian one emerge. But would women come forward? Manipur shows that it can be done.

Anirban's reply
The media has been highlighting the role of peace, the cost of conflict and the like.
Churches have hardly brokered peace in the last two years. Insurgents reject any involvement of the church in the political cause. Church groups are also patriarchial and chauvinistic.
Journalists in NE India are the lowest paid professionals. Very few efforts are made to train those journalists.
The insurgents have been using the territory of Bhutan, Bangladesh and Myanmar for training and other uses. India has pointed out 199 camps in Bangladesh, so Bangladesh is involved.

Gina's reply
Church leadership is only for men, so we have a long way to go. Only one lady reverend is there so far, but she is not allowed to do much any way.

Kheseli Chisi's reply
Naga mothers are not a very subdued lot. We can be very aggressive when we want to.
Regarding Anirban's fears, I am concerned over maltreatment of journalists, but there are many who have been reporting falsehood.

At the end of the session, just like the First Day, Catherine Barnes grouped the points raised throughout the Second Day into:
Human rights and Justice and impunity
Paradigms and discourses
Woemn and vulnerable groups
National security
Coalition building, networks
Drug trafickking
Legislation and Minority rights
Regional dynmics
Education
Religion,
Early warning, early action and dialogue

NEPAL

Presenters
Bishnu Upreti
Thakur Dhakal
Hiranya Lal Shrestha
Indira Rana
Rita Thapa
Jagdish Dahal
Kanak Dixit
Anjana Shakya
Chairperson: Anees Haroon

The first presentation was made by Bishnu Upreti. He gave an account of the work that Nepalese civil society was involved in. He said that the civil society in this country has been generating different options to resolve the conflict in the country-by providing roadmaps, impact assessment, analysis and the like. They have also been collecting data on small arms. Human rights issues have been highlighted by the civil societies. Some like the Nagarik Awaj have been working at the local level, but it is still in an incipient phase. There are those working to raise issues of violence, peace education, building the peace constituency and carrying out humanitarian activities. Very few activities have been initiated to address the concerns of the victims of the conflict, he said and added that some have been involved in fact-finding missions in partnership with the National Human Rights Commission.

The government has been trying to undermine the civil society at times, and there is tension between the security forces and civil society, especially when the issue of human rights crops up, he said. Upreti said that Maoists have, on the other hand, used civil society work when it benefits them. Similarly, political parties seem to look at the civil society as a competitor at times and have been criticising it for being funded by foreigner, he said.

Thakur Dhakal said that networking, informal dialogue have been initiated at the local level by civil society organizations with both the government and the Maoist rebels. He was of the opinion that since these community level interventions will not be able to effect pressure for dialogue between the conflicting parties, they need to organise their activities to including larger organisations like trade unions. The space of the civil society is being gradually narrowed by the conflict. Dhakal said that relevant data and information needs to be collected.

In the development versus peace building debate, the conflicting parties are not interested in development at the moment. The government has its law and order problem, which supercedes its development priority.
Dhakal also said that the international community needs to be mobilized for peace, peace spoilers identified and dealt with.
Conflict is inherent in development but it needs to be mainstreamed, he said.

Hiranya Lal Shrestha dwelt on the external dimension of the conflict in Nepal between the state and the Maoists. He described the Maoist People's War afflicting the country for the past eight years as one akin to a civil war like situation. The state gets logistical and arms support from India, UK and the USA, he said. The Maoists too have their support from the RIM, COMPOSA (a South Asian Maoist group) and People's War Group and other insurgent groups in India who help them by supplying arms. Both the conflicting parties receive support from outside to fuel the conflict. The civil society on the other hand lacks that cross-border assistance, he said. With cross-border linkages of civil society organizations, it would be possible for them to monitor the activities of the Maoists and the government in other countries also. This would enable us to find out whether groups from outside are going according to the Geneva conventions or not and pressure them to do so if they are not. This would help reduce casualties among the unarmed population, he said, since sixty per cent of the women killed are raped before the killing. Supply of arms overtly and covertly would also be reduced with such cross-border linkages, Shrestha said.

Indira Rana said that the majority of victims re civilians, women and children in any conflict. Conflict also needs to be kept in the larger context of poverty. Gender injustice in armed conflict needs to be addressed. Nepali women will have to form a caucus to address women in conflict, she said. During the government-Maoist dialogue, not enough homework was done, not one woman was included in the peace process, she said.
She suggested that the civil society form its own peace secretariat, just as the government had done. Livelihood issues of the war widows, victims of war, the children need to be taken up, she said. Her suggestions:

• Gender justice is needed by setting up measures to settle grievances.
• All parties in the armed conflict need to be trained on gender issues
• Consider rape as a war crime
• Domestic violence and women trafficking
• Woman headed households, war widows, children and other victims of the conflict
• Seek help of the media

Corruption, mal governance and political instability have been the main reasons for the crisis situation in Nepal, she said.

Rita Thapa explained the problems of exclusion exist in Nepal, saying that it is an extremely diverse country. She related her own work experience about building the peace constituency in her presentation.
Conflict victims we have tried to rehabilitate have recovered from their bad experiences very rapidly and they are playing the role of peace ambassadors in other organizations, she said.

FLOOR

Kumar: Is the peace movement independent of the Maoists and the government in Nepal? How interested are donors in building peace?

Anjana Shakya: I approached so many donors for research on the peace movement, but the donors did not want to hear another word on research as they had had too many research reports already. No wonder, that the Maoists did not want any NGOs in the 1990s.

Rita's reply
Indeed, we do not have the support needed for the needy. Actionaid could only do so much and my personal efforts have yielded a bit.

Shanthi: The Maoists want to overthrow the feudal state. Like in all conflict situations, what could be the win-win situation for Nepal?

Paula: The state is as much a party to the conflict, but Dhakal talks of partnership with the state!

Hiranya Lal's reply
The win-win situation would be for the King to call a political conference including all parties, then a national government formed to hold an election that can both act as the constituent assembly and the parliament.
In our context, peace building should accompany development.

Dhakal's reply
One of the weaknesses of the programme I am affiliated with is that we are not being able to create a peace movement.
Regarding partnership with the government, I don't see much harm in building capacity of the government where it lacks it.

Chirinjibi: The work NGOs and political parties could do regarding the neo-liberal hegemony, could make them a part of the civil society, otherwise they could be chalked out of the civil society definition. If political parties do not contest for power but work to reform the society, they can be part of the civil society, otherwise not.

Norbert: How do you assess how these NGOs are working together regarding the conflict in Nepal?

Kamal: I can't see why India should give arms to Nepal even if it was following human rights norms. War always robs human rights.

Bishnu Upreti's reply
The donors have their own agenda and is not helpful for a resolution of the problems. You just heard why they have denied funds in necessary areas.
I have always highlighted the Indian state's role in my books. There is support for Maoists in India through territorial uses and the like. The US is rather direct in its approach and is dealing with the problem in a more understanding manner.
There are good donors as well, especially the Scandanavian countries.

Kanak: In Nepal some organisations are overwhelmed with cash from donors, while others do not have the needed cash. Organisations have sprouted around donor programmes.
In Nepal, all violence has been programmed. Even the Maoists emerged when democracy was being experimented.
Nepal was hit by the influx of democracy, market forces and NGOs all at once in 1990. There was a lot of money that could not be handled, leading to the crisis.

The Nepalese presentations continued with Jagdish Dahal describing the experience of INSEC, a rights organization working in Nepal. We have found that empowering people with skills and education can also push the rebels too to work to help the people instead of destroying their infrastructure. His suggestions were:

• Training is needed to empower the people.
• The culture of silence can be broken through education.
• Media can play a constructive role in building peace.

Kanak Dixit related the history of the Nepalese media, particularly after 1990. He explained the hurdles facing the media saying that the journalist may be highly motivated but has very little social science background and other professional qualities to do his job properly.
The media initially romanticized the Maoist movement. When the emergency was declared, a flip-flop was evident as they had been declared terrorists by the state.

They yet to take up the militarization of the country going on now, he said. In the absence of scholars, the mediapersons have had to take up their roles as well. Overall, the media is not doing as it should be doing, but doing much better than other sectors, he said. The success is owed to the Nepali language as everyone understands Nepali.

The army was arrogant at the beginning but are seeking to study media courses at the moment. The Maoists do influence reporting but not totally, Dixit said..

Anjana Shakya said that human rights activists have been able to prevent some abuses, relieve some victims of abuse and the like in Nepal. The power circle in the country are dominated by the higher castes like Bahun and Chhetris and have been perpetrating conflict rather than mitigating it. The heterogeniety of Nepal has not been taken seriously by the people and it is hard to change the attitude. Marginalisation is there for the larger section of the people and discrimination huge, let alone gender discrimination.

FLOOR

Ranabir: All presses work with some form of self-censorship. How do you consider the self-censorship regarding the Crown?

Shobha Gautam: India is a close neighbor of Nepal. When Nepal wants to buy arms from China and others, India takes up the issue, but again India has committed itself to help Nepal with a large cache of arms.
Kailali district has been the main transit-point for weapons. Maoists loot guns from the police and the people. Illegal trafickking and smuggling of arms have been promoted by Maoists.
At the moment, women in the southern borders in the east are being raped by Indians coming from the other side of the border. Even the Maoists, who usually say they work against such elements in the society, have not take action against them as they happened to be arms smugglers who provide them with arms.

Saleem: Kanak did not mention the number of journalists killed by Maoists.

Kanak's reply
About a dozen journalists have been killed, half by the Maoists and half by the army. But there are many more killed in toto. The pressure on the Maoists is great as they have come out saying that they are for a free press.
Regarding reporting on the Crown. The King's activities and his projected persona have damaged him in the last two years. Things are changing. The credit for this goes to the political parties.

BANGLADESH

Presenters
Anisuzzaman
Shamshul Bari
Saleem Samad
Nurul Kabir
Anwar Hossain
Farooq Faisal
Chairperson: Rita Thapa

Anisuzzaman made his presentation on the conflict in Bangldesh. He said that when the Chakma rebellion began with identity demands it was a shock to Bangladeshi homogeneity. The Chakma took up arms, took refuge in India, and people were thus displaced. A peace accord was signed in 1996 but was opposed by the people who settled there in the land of the hill people. The problem was compounded by the fact that the hill people did not have documents to prove the ownership of their land.

On the government part, secularism had initially been adopted as a fundamental core of the constitution. Later when martial law dropped secularism, Islam was adopted as state religion. Communal riots took place after the Mabri Masjid was demolished. The largest massacre occurred in 2001, during elections. Hindus were being intimidated, but unlike in the past, it was happening in rural areas.
He also touched on inter-Muslim conflict saying that it was the civil society that prevented attacks on Ahmedia Muslims aided by diplomats.

Shamshul Bari related his own experience to say that mediating conflict in Bangladesh is difficult because of the polarization of the society along party lines. He suggested that building social capital through trust would bring in results. The waning social capital in the past years can be brought back with the help of the civil society, he said.

Saleem Samad dwelt on political violence brought about by the proliferation of small arms in Bangladesh. He said that the proliferation of small arms started with the 1971 war when thousands of Mukti Bahini youths started fighting the Pakistanis.

Another civil unrest that arose because of the same arms was suppressed by Zia ur Rahman brutally. There was a students' movement that went out of control.

The Chittagong Hill Tracts brought another arms proliferation. Political parties have been blamed for patronizing and protecting those who are armed. Now, the henchmen of political parties have turned professional and switch sides at the behest of power lobbies. Politics in Bangladesh today is criminalised and violent.

Nurul Kabir focused his attention to the international developments that were having an impact in the region. Although terrorism existed much before than that, conflict in this region started to escalate here too after 9/11. Religion too has a role here as terminologies like 'Islamic' terror have religious tenors in them. US President Bush had cited a 'higher authority' in attacking Iraq and calls Osama bin Laden the 'evil one'. Both are Biblical terms. The Guardian has recently warned that Iran, another Muslim country, may get the Iraqi treatment.

The announcement of the war on terror brought the Hindu fundamentalists of India, the Christian fundamentalists and Jews together. The result was that the Indian political establishment started on the path of a hegemon. And, he said that the American support to the governments in South Asia was going to escalate the local conflicts.
Regarding the media, individuals in the media will have to come out of their national chauvinistic mantle, Kabir said.

Anwar Hossain said that the civil society's role in preventing conflict starts from the grassroots as the seeds lie there. There should not be any debate on the stances of which political party is right as history should be allowed to judge that. Religion has got a role to play in both peace or conflict. Handled well, it could lead to a dialogue of civilizations or, poorly, a clash of civilizations.

Farooq Faisal said that civil society is not new to South Asia. We do not need western money to define what it is. Also, the Ku Klux Klan or the madrassas are all civil societies, so let us not think that civil societies only promote peace, he said.
There is need to define terrorism also. They could be freedom fighters or something else too. If non violence works, who would take the violent path?

Regarding Canada, it only has a business interest in South Asia or even a diaspora interest as there is a huge South Asian community there. There are organisations that work for the interests of the South Asians at the policy level.

FLOOR

Paula Banerjee: What is the current situation of women in Bangladesh regarding the rising intolerance? Why was the space for hill women taken away? Not only small arms, but also big arms affect women.

Dr. Haroon: The student movement you mention National Students Federation was not Bangladeshi but a East Pakistani one.

Kamal: What is the contribution of civil society to rest of South Asia, apart from Bangladesh.

Hiranya Lal Shrestha: Do you take Bengali nationalism or Bangladeshi nationalism as the nationalism you are trying to discuss. Do you have Maoists in Bangladesh?

Kumar: The consequences of a hegemonic power tying up with regional powers has not been discussed properly as it could be enormous. Tie it up with neo-liberalism and the picture becomes worse. Again tie it up with the lack of funds for peace issues for NGOs, then the civil society's role too appears helpless. What should be the role of the civil society in this situation?

Babita Basnet: What kind of problems do journalists face in Bangladesh.

Anisuzzaman's reply
Religious extremists have not been able to impair the activities of civil societies. Bangladeshis should be able to unite and not be divided politically. Otherwise, South Asian civil societies may not be able to help much.
Before, it was Bengali nationalism, but when Zia ur Rehman replaced it with Bangladeshi nationalism he did not pay heed to the problems of the minorities.

Bari's reply
BRAC is the largest NGO in the world and we have it in our country. But it is more like a government than a civil society organisation. Can such NGOs play the role we are talking of here? Polarization of NGOs is so deep that they cannot be separated from their political leanings.

Anwar' reply
We need to have a deep look into the situation of civil society organisations while charting a roadmap for them. Historically, between the seventh century to 12th century it was the formation of a civil society that helped a chaotic Bengal to have order.

Nurul Kabir's reply
Talking of gender, we have had women prime ministers, but we still do not seem to be resolving women's issues. Shekh Hasina's government drafted a law on women but could not complete it while in power.
Bangladesh has had no social movement in the past 25 years. Many people say that it is because of the NGO movement. Many even term the NGOs an 'evil society'.

Saleem's reply
We do not have the Maoists, but we did have a group who called themselves so-called leftists. They have already been killed or have surrendered. Some of them function under certain parliamentarians and use their networks in the rural areas.
Journalists have been killed in Bangladesh, but by sitting parliamentarians.
Regarding the students' movement, the documents call the group the NSF, the national students federation, who threaten voters.

Farooq's reply
Bangladesh needs reconciliation between the deep divisions in the society.

Anwar's reply
Nationalism is not resolved overnight.

The day ended with Catherine Barnes forming a group to draft the action agenda the next day. Two representatives from each participating county had been involved in the drafting process.

The day began with the drafting committee sitting down to draft the action agenda which was then brought for discussion at the plenary.

Sridhar Khatri: We have extracted the structural issues from the points that Catherine developed. Please contribute to the final text. Five sections were identified within the guiding principles we identified earlier.

Paula: We wanted the preamble to express that it was the civil society that had prepared it and the gender issue needed to be included.

Mathew: The document is comprehensive and it is sensitive to gender issues, but caste, class and religion have been left out.

Balakrishnan: We could mention the exclusion issue this way- exclusion of ethnic and religious minorities.

Nusrul: When you read the 'stratification' it gives a positive connotation, even while it is not. Also there are varying opinions regarding the 'war on terror'

Sridhar Khatri: We are also drafting the action agenda for the international community. W..Europe has clearly come out with what they will be doing -funding, recognition and strategising the issues.

Shanthi: In the second para of the preamble, instead of saying 'growing inability of government to deal with' we could say 'the ever decreasing space for citizens to take part in governance'.
Ranabir's section talks about violence. It should come to the Preamble as violence is what leads to armed conflict. These issues have not come after 9/11. We could also introduce ourselves in the preamble.

Kumar: The issue of violence is critical. But prevention does not deal with structural violence. And we do want to deal with the whole concept of violence.
The two points that came was- fragmentation of the civil society, the other was international support (should we seek a consistent funding instead of being project orientated?).

Bari: We wanted to lay down the foundation in the preamble. It is just an introduction.

Asha: The preamble should have both the positive and the negative, otherwise it would just be an introduction.

Ranabir: Let us deal with the conceptual part in the preamble but the actions or agenda in the later sections.

Norbert: There is a struggle with the US led discourse which strengthens national security and which is expanding. Some Europeans wanted to change while the US would want to go back.

Balakrishnan: I would also like majoritarianist to be added to masculinist and statist descriptions provided.