BENAZIR ENTERS THE RING

Pakistan faces Frankenstein of its own creation

AMM Shahabuddin

As they say, "what must be, must be." So the tragedy that killed some 140 innocent people and wounded hundreds in Karachi the other day when suicide-bombers attacked Benazir Bhutto's home-coming reception parade turning the Karachi streets into an "abattoir" (to quote a foreign correspondent), was neither unexpected nor unpredictable. 'Even the unexpected always happens, so goes the adage. It was most awe-some, but unfortunately was taken very lightly by Benazir's security forces.
   Long before her landing in Pakistan, Benazir was forewarned by the al-Qaeda-linked Talibans about the coming attack. Thus, judged from all circumstantial evidences, the devastating storm was already on its way to strike hard. But the forecast was rather ignored. So the storm that hit Karachi devastated the image of Pakistan as a moderate secular Muslim state, often repeated by its present leadership these days which was boldly outlined by Pakistan's creator M.A. Jinnah some sixty years back. In his unequivocal declaration at the opening session of Pakistan's first National Assembly (Karachi in 1947), Jinnah asserted that "Muslims would cease to be Muslims, not in the religions sense, but as citizens of the state." But during the last six decades Pakistan had witnessed many ups and downs, bringing new changes, both desirable and undesirable. The newly emerged forces had given an indecent burial to what Jinnah had declared and what shape he wanted to give Pakistan. So what began with a bright morning, under Jinnah's leadership, had now ended in dark cloud in which the bewildered Pakistan nation is groping to find an exit passage to reach their goal. But the wrong side had gone too far, and it is now difficult to put it on the right track.
   In fact, with the untimely death of Jinnah, his ideal of a model democratic moderate Muslim state had also vanished, giving rise to a new breed of religious fanaticism, and radicalism, showing their ugly faces, particularly during the regime of military dictator Gen. Zia-ul-Haq.
   Meanwhile, the people of East Pakistan, now Bangladesh, being in majority in the Parliament with its 56 per cent of total population, was feeling the heat of continues Army rule, dominated by Army Generals mainly from Punjab which had a plan to turn East Pakistan as their permanent colony. When the Bengali freedom fighters raised their voice, they became an eye-sore of the Punjabi war-lords who jumped on them like hungry wolves to crush them. But it back-fried. Nothing could stop the freedom movement of the people of East Pakistan. And the occupation forces from Punjab had to flee with whatever they had on them. And that was perhaps the beginning of Pakistan's disaster that had gradually assumed a greater role as manifested in Karachi recently. Perhaps more are in the offing.
   
   Rise of Fanaticism
   But how Pakistan gradually slipped into the hands of the so-called fundamentalists and fanatics is a long history, beginning with the army rule introduced by field Marshal Ayub Khan, peaking during the reign of Gen. Zia-ul-Haq who had, in fact, created the Frankenstein of Talibans to please his US backers to stabilise his regime. The Frankenstein now threatens the very existence of Pakistan. It had fulfilled the mission of those both within and without Pakistan who wanted to see the end of its existence as a nuclear power in the region.
   The death of Jinnah within a year of Pakistan's establishment at a health resort in the Frontier province was followed by another tragic death when Pakistan's first Prime Minister, Liaqut Ali Khan, who was shot while addressing a public meeting in Rawalpindi. The assailant was subsequently shot dead by a security man standing nearby, as if to obliterate any witness. Those two top leaders were known to be the most liberal ones. It was, so to speak, was an open secret at the time as to which group of leaders were behind it. And the tragic Karachi disaster had shown how far the 'cancer' had spread.
   
   Benazir's reaction
   However, rather surprisingly, Benazir Bhutto, in her prompt reaction to the tragic incident on her home-coming reception parade, alleged that she had "no doubt" that "members of Zia-regime were responsible" for the attack. How could she forget about the al-Qaeda-linked most powerful Talibans who had already spread their network from Afghanistan to northern Pakistan. Undoubtedly, she had a grudge against Gen. Zia-ul-Haq who removed her father Z A Bhutto from Premiership in 1977 and then hanged him in 1979. After removing Bhutto, Gen. Zia had endeared him to Washington. Thereafter began a new chapter in Pakistan's history, with a bigger role for Zia to launch his US-inspired Talibanisation programme through thousands of Madrassas (Islamic schools), spread over the northern areas of Pakistan, for which billions of dollars poured in from the US.
   The well-trained 'Talibans' (students), mostly Pathans (or, Pashtuns), were the mainstay that carried the struggle to free Afghanistan from the then Soviet forces. They forced Soviet forces to retreat from Afghanistan, leaving the country in the hands of the Talibans. This created a new headache for the Americans as only wanted to remove one 'thorn' by another and did not bargain for this. The US Administration was literally thrown from the frying pan into the fire! These US-trained Talibans had their hey-days to run their rollercoaster over Afghanistan to turn it into an Islamic state to be governed under the Islamic 'Sharia' (rules). And Gen. Zia became another headache for them as he was moving too close with the Talibans in Afghanistan. Ultimately, the inevitable happened. 'What must be must be.' Gen. Zia met his 'mysterious' death in a plane crash on a domestic flight from Lahore to Karachi. Gen. Zia is dead but the seeds he had sown while in power under the guidance of US advisers, now appears to be in full bloom. As you sow, so you reap. The Pakistanis are now reaping the 'fruits' which majority of them do not like.
   But the newly harvested 'crops' are showing their teeth and claws. Karachi proved to be a masterly woven field the other day where they showed their muscle-power to both Benazir and her supposedly new political partner Gen. Musharraf. Thus Z. A Bhutto had to give his life, literally in the hands of US-trained 'Islamist' leader Gen. Zia as he was going too far with the pro-Chinese socialist bloc. But, ironically, Gen. Zia too had to give his life because of his all-out support to Afghan Talibans following the ouster of occupying Soviet forces. Gen. Musharraf is now the latest to join the grand parade' of the Army Generals in Pakistan's politics. But he is now feeling shaky.
   (The article was written before the declaration of emergency and suspension of constitution in Pakistan by General Mosharraf.)
   The writer is a retired UN official.

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A new view of cancer

Dr. Joseph Marcola

German New Medicine (GNM), developed by Dr. Ryke Geerd Hamer, M.D., operates under the premise that every disease, including cancer, originates from an unexpected shock experience.
   The discovery came after Dr. Hamer, the former head internist in the oncology clinic at the University of Munich, Germany, lost his son in an unexpected tragedy, then developed testicular cancer. The diagnosis led him to study the connection between stressful events and disease by investigating the histories of his cancer patients.
   He found that, like himself, every one of his patients had gone through a very stressful episode prior to developing cancer, and, upon investigating other diseases found that every disease is controlled from its own specific area in the brain and linked to a very particular, identifiable, "conflict shock."
   GNM is based of five biological laws that apply scientifically to each and every case of disease. They include:
   #1: Every disease is caused by a conflict shock that catches an individual completely off guard.
   #2: Provided there is a resolution of the conflict, every disease proceeds in two phases, a conflict-active phase and a healing phase.
   #3: Ties the findings of the first two laws into the context of embryology and the evolution of man. It illustrates the biological correlation between the psyche, the brain, and the organ from an evolutionary point of view.
   #4: Addresses the role of microbes in the context of evolution and in relation to the three germ layers from which our organs originate. Microbes are indispensable to your survival.
   #5: Every so-called disease has to be understood as a "meaningful special biological program of nature" created to solve an unexpected biological conflict.
   Further, Dr. Hamer believes that a person cannot die of cancer in and of itself.
   If someone dies during the conflict-active phase of disease, he says, it's because of energy loss, weight loss, sleep deprivation, and emotional and mental exhaustion. The stress of receiving a cancer diagnosis, or being given a negative prognosis, is often enough to deprive a person of their life-force. Conventional cancer treatments only accelerate the downward spiral.
   If a patient has not undergone any conventional treatments such as chemotherapy or radiotherapy, GNM has a success rate of 95 percent to 98 percent.
   While trying to publicize his findings, Dr. Hamer has been persecuted and harassed by German and French authorities. He is now living in exile in Spain where he is continuing his fight for official recognition of GNM.
   I have long maintained that your emotional state plays a role in nearly every physical disease-from heart disease, to depression, to arthritis and cancer.
   Even the conservative Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) states that 85 percent of all diseases have an emotional element. And I believe the actual percentage is much higher.
   It is not surprising that Dr. Hamer has been persecuted for trying to publicize his GNM findings that solving an emotional conflict is the first step to healing disease. Most all new theories, particularly those that go against recommending drugs, surgeries, and conventional treatments, go through this. It makes complete intuitive sense that the stress of receiving a negative prognosis-"You have six months to live"-would be enough to make a person give up hope entirely.
   And, of course, once your mind gives up hope, your physical body will follow.
   Fortunately for you, the converse also holds true.
   If you tend to focus on pain, misery and grief, you will tend to experience and attract more of that into your life. Alternatively, if you keep your focus on what you want to experience and put some energy into healthy lifestyle choices, your body really doesn't have much of a choice. Before you know it you will start to feel much better.
   Quite simply, it's one of the most amazing and remarkable transformations that you could possibly imagine.
   If allowing your body to heal itself by resolving your emotional conflicts is as intriguing to you as it is to me, please do read through the PDF file above. It's a fascinating read!
   Also, remember that you can get a better handle on your emotions and pain, including the stress from unexpected tragedies, by learning the Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT), my most highly recommended energy psychology tool.
   One of my other favorite strategies is to focus on W. Clement Stone's strategy. He was the most financially successful student of Napoleon Hill and was a billionaire in Chicago. He died at 100 years old a few years ago. He was fond of taking the position of an "inverse paranoid". He firmly believed that most of the negative events that occur in your life can be viewed from the perspective of life trying to teach you something that will ultimately improve you.
   Sounds like a simple and perhaps naive approach, but it has powerful potential to transform many of the negative consequences that some of life's events will throw at you.

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