Another ominous sub-plot in the struggle for Iraq's oil—and a step closer to the brink for a region that has thus far managed to avoid complete embroilment in Iraq's civil war. From AP via the Assyrian International News Agency (AINA), Feb. 21:

ANKARA -- Turkey's prime minister on Tuesday urged one of Iraq's two vice presidents to delay a referendum on the future of Kirkuk, fearing Iraqi Kurdish groups could seize control of the northern, oil-rich city.

We strongly suspect that the front-page Feb. 19 story in the New York Times—based entirely on anonymous "studies" and quotes from anonymous "officials"—purporting huge hydrocarbon deposits in Iraq's Sunni center ("Iraqi Sunni Lands Show New Oil and Gas Promise" by James Glanz) is a ploy to convince Sunnis they have a secure future in a unified Iraq, and thereby chill out the "insurgents" (as the media flatteringly call them). True, your average "insurgent" probably doesn't read the New York Times, but Iraqi legislators do, and it is hoped that if they can strike a deal that gives the Sunni center a share of the oil wealth the grassroots wil be mollified. As the Times notes: "The question of where the oil reserves are concentrated is taking on still more importance as it appears that negotiators are close to agreement on a long-debated oil law that would regulate how Iraqi and international oil companies would be allowed to develop Iraq’s fields." (IHT Feb. 19)

Despite a long activist campaign against India's controversial Sardar Sarovar dam project on the Narmada River, authorities have just announced the project's completion. From Planet Ark World Environment News, Feb. 1:

AHMEDABAD - India completed construction of a highly ambitious and controversial dam on Sunday, nearly two decades after it launched the project environmental groups say will destroy the lives of hundreds of thousands.

The Feb. 18 fire bombing that killed 68 mostly Pakistani passengers and destroyed two coaches on the Samjhauta Express about an hour after the train left New Delhi was an obvious attack on one of the most visible symbols of the India-Pakistan peace process. The India-Pakistan train link was suspended after the 2001 attack on the Indian parliament that India blamed on Pakistan and which nearly led to war. But a peace process has ensued, and the train service reopened in 2004. (AP Feb. 20) Now both governments say the new attack will not disrupt the peace process. "We will not allow elements which want to sabotage the ongoing peace process and succeed in their nefarious designs," Pakistan's ruling Gen. Pervez Musharraf said in a statement. There is even talk of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visiting Islamabad soon, a trip that was put on indefinite hold after Mumbai train blasts of last July killed close to 200 people and injured more than 300. But there is an ominous side to this "peace process"—both Delhi and Islamabad are, of course, emphasizing anti-terrorist cooperation, which could mean a more perfect police state in both countries. An India-Pakistan anti-terror panel set up last year is scheduled to hold its first meeting next month in Islamabad, with a focus on stepped-up intelligence sharing. (Asia Times, Feb. 21)

Thailand was shaken by a string of simultaneous terror blasts on the Christian New Year, and now again on the Chinese New Year. The Jan. 1 blasts in Bangkok are still murky, but the Feb. 17 blasts in the heavily Muslim south are claimed to be the work of Islamic militants. Few are making the connection, but could the date have been chosen because it marked the opening of the Year of the Pig—an animal thought to be propitious in Chinese astrology, but haram for Muslims? Interestingly, authorities in China have actually banned images of the pig from state television during the festivities, in the name of cultural sensitivity—a move that Alt.Muslim dismisses as "Throwing a (Pig) Bone to China's Muslims," a patronizing gesture aimed at underming the Muslim Uighur insurgency in China's far west. In Thailand, some arrests have been made, but little real information seems available. How devout could these supposed Muslim militants be if they "boosted their courage with narcotics and cough syrup"—which is just as haram as swine for the orthodox? From AP, Feb. 20:

We have noted repteated claims and denials that veterans of the feared Guatemalan counter-insurgency troops known as the Kaibiles are active in Chiapas and collaborating with Mexico's narco-mafias. But these Kaibiles, caught in the new Chiapas immigration sweeps, seem to have fallen on hard times. From El Universal, Jan. 25, our translation:

Mexican President Felipe Calderón announced Feb. 18 that he is dispatching some 3,300 army troops and federal police to combat narco-traffickers in Tamaulipas and Nuevo Leon, two states that border Texas. Nuevo Leon capital Monterrey and the Tamaulipas border town of Nuevo Laredo, both plagued by drug violence in recent months, are especially targeted, Defense Secretary Guillermo Galvan said. Soldiers have already set up roadside checkpoints in and around Monterrey to search vehicles for weapons and drugs. Since taking office Dec. 1, Calderón has already ordered 24,000 troops and federal police into Tijuana, Acapulco and Michoacan state in response to narco-violence that claimed over 2,000 lives last year. (San Antonio Express, Feb. 19)

The evangelical Journal Chretién features a commentary Feb. 12 on religious violence in Mexico's conflicted southern state of Chiapas which is rife with dangerous distortions, and smacks of a propaganda job against the Zapatista rebels. Although writer Aloys Evina begins by boasting of his "many years as a reporter," his garbled report reveals either deep ignorance or willful denial of the realities of Chiapas. The implausible account concerns a supposed Zapatista "lynch-mob" attack on a Maya evangelical preacher.