South-East Asian dimensions

The echoes of the U.S. campaign are being felt to varying degrees across the countries of South-East Asia.

AMERICA'S search for a new frontier in the ongoing globalised "war against terrorism'' has cast a spell in several countries along the Asiatic Rim of the Pacific Ocean. The major powers of this region, such as China and Japan, have found it a challenge to comprehend the sense of urgency that U.S. President George W. Bush has shown in demanding that the United Nations Security Council act quickly to "disarm'' Iraq of its suspected capabilities to make and deploy weapons of mass destruction.

At another level, a few South-East Asian states have begun to come to terms with the emerging reality that their own backyards might have been hospitable, all along a timeline in the past and the present, to native "terrorists'' and their international friends and patrons. An undercurrent of new political awareness, but not exactly a uniform pattern of anti-terror ferment, is sweeping across these countries.

While much political confusion marks Bush's campaign against Iraq and its leader Saddam Hussein at this juncture, the general impression in the Asia Pacific region tallies with the one that U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell has outlined. Powell tends to portray the current American agenda of "regime change in Iraq'' as an extended aspect of Bush's near-evangelical pursuit (some say, a pseudo-evangelical pursuit) of a global "war on terror''. It is against this background that China and Japan have been trying to fine-tune their own strategies to the American wavelength of anti-terror "hegemonism'' or at least anti-terror "leadership''.

As the only full-fledged Asian country with the status of a permanent member of the Security Council, China occupies an unrivalled position in the region on matters that might be just might be decided by, or in the name of, the Security Council. Russia, a Eurasian power in geographical rather than geopolitical terms, is not always privy to the highly diffused power politics among the countries on East Asia's seaboard. However, if China has yet interacted vigorously with Russia in recent months on a number of international issues, including the U.S.' "anti-terror agenda'', the reason is not far to seek. Both Moscow and Beijing belong to the select club of veto powers at the U.N. China has been speaking about its generally positive experience of exchanging ideas and coordinating policy preferences with the U.S. in the larger arena of enunciating anti-terror principles.

A high point in this upward graph of "consultations'' was reached when the U.S. recently decided to designate an anti-Chinese government outfit as a foreign terrorist organisation for the purposes of American laws. The East Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM), a small but definitive separatist group that operates in China's Xinjiang province, has been ostracised by the U.S. in a manner that certainly has pleased Beijing. Following China's own presentation of the facts of the case and with the U.S.' no-objection diplomacy, the Security Council, too, placed the ETIM on a terror-list. This list is of relevance to a committee that monitors U.N.-mandated sanctions that were imposed on the Taliban and its symbiotic patron, Al Qaeda, in the context of the latter's suspected role in the bombing of two American embassies in 1998.

It is against this background that China expressed, in mid-September, its willingness to play "an active and constructive role'' to resolve the international crisis that was sparked by Bush's declaration of intent to "disarm'' Iraq. The objective, according to China, was to seek a "political solution'', as against a Rambo-style military offensive, and do so "within the framework of the United Nations''.

China amplified its position even as the debate intensified in the corridors of the U.N. on whether or not a new Security Council resolution would be necessary to ensure Saddam Hussein's full compliance with the organisation's earlier mandate of inspecting and defusing Iraq's (suspected) programme of making weapons of mass destruction. Beijing said that "reciprocity and mutual benefit'' would mark Sino-American cooperation on anti-terror matters across the spectrum of the stated concerns of the U.S. The obvious question here was whether China should "reciprocate'' America's action as regards the ETIM and support the U.S.' move to "disarm'' Iraq at this point.

However, Beijing is not really known to seek to appease the U.S. on issues of vital interest to China, and would not deviate from its line on the resolution of the Iraq crisis within the U.N. framework. The position, in effect, reflected the criticality of China's veto power, and the U.S. kept this aspect in mind, at least until the beginning of the final full week in September. As viewed from China, the current Iraq crisis reflected the power politics within the U.S. and certainly beyond the spectrum of anti-terror concerns and the common international denominators in this respect. While this explained the limits to China's "reciprocity'' towards the U.S., Beijing appeared to hint that its notion of "mutual benefit'' as regards Washington would depend on how Bush might, in the final analysis, explain his move to "disarm'' Iraq.

Beijing, according to authoritative Chinese sources, "is not a hegemonistic power''. While this might, in the end, determine China's veto-related stance on the Iraq issue, Beijing is not dependent solely on America's goodwill in matters concerning the ETIM. China's own anti-terror web of regional alliances, which involves Russia and some Central Asian republics, is no less important than the U.S.' gesture on the ETIM question.

Above all, Beijing is eager to take measures, in conjunction with such friends and allies as it might make, to address the growing U.S. strategic presence in China's immediate neighbourhood without stepping on the U.S.' toes to the extent possible. Maybe a diplomatic ballet, but not a Pavlovian exercise.

JAPAN'S dilemma over the latest American urgency to unseat Saddam Hussein has much to do with realities of a different kind. As an ailing economic superpower and as a nation with no veto power in the U.N., Japan is also mindful of its strategic dependence on the U.S. However, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi is no less aware of the need to stay on the right side of the U.S. without arousing the suspicions of his critics at home that he might feel tempted to downplay his country's MacArthur-era Constitution and strike an America-friendly posture at crunch time.

However, even as international concerns mounted over America's ideas for a final game plan to "disarm'' Iraq, Japan clarified that it would not like its non-combat logistical support to be utilised for any direct U.S. military offensive against the Saddam Hussein regime. Japan has been lending non-lethal logistical support to the U.S. in its ongoing "anti-terror'' operations in the Afghan theatre. This followed a specific legal enactment to overcome the ban in Japan's pacifist Constitution on any kind of military role outside the realm of self-defence within Japanese territorial limits.

Not directly related to the international debate on Iraq is the latest flurry of anti-terror activities in some key South-East Asian countries. However, the Iraq context, especially when defined as a subtle aspect of the global anti-terror agenda, has certainly added to the `mystique' of the new law-enforcement drive in countries ranging from Indonesia and Malaysia to the Philippines and Singapore. Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim-majority state with a historical tradition of generally secular politics, now faces new ground realities. A relatively small but well organised section of Indonesian society has been mobilised in recent years for Islam-based politics.

It is in this context that leading Muslim organisations, such as Nadhdlatul Ulama and Muhammadiya, have raised their voices against official Jakarta's suspected tendency to play second fiddle to the U.S. and arrest and deport alleged terrorists with an Islamic background and a presumptive link with Al Qaeda. The growing protest is related to the circumstances in which Omar Al-Faruq, variously described as an "Arab'' and even an "Indonesian'' in a technical sense, was recently arrested by the Indonesian authorities and sent to the U.S. for interrogation and "incarceration''. Megawati Sukarnoputri's administration not only defended its actions but also managed to stay on top of the gathering domestic storm until at least the final week in September.

In neighbouring Malaysia, where Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammad has made common strategic cause with the U.S. on anti-terror issues, the government sought to take action against religious radicals without stirring a hornet's nest.

The story in the Philippines is of an altogether different dimension. As a predominantly Roman Catholic nation with an increasingly virulent movement of "Isalmic separatism'' and "communist insurgency'' in some parts, the Philippines has openly collaborated with the U.S. in the "war on terror''. For some time now, domestic and international critics of the Filipino government have portrayed it as Uncle Sam's Man Friday in a situation that has little resemblance to Robinson Crusoe's existential dilemma. With the U.S. and the Philippines staying the course in the "anti-terror'' arena, Singapore's new revelations about region-wide terrorist plots acquires topicality and urgency.

The Singapore Ministry of Home Affairs has publicised the details of its recent arrest of 21 terror-suspects. The city-state, which unravelled last December a suspected plot to bomb the U.S. embassy and other installations, has prepared a document based on investigations following the arrest of 21 persons in August. Of the 21 persons, 18 are detained under the Internal Security Act and the others placed under restrictions. The 18 include a few of "Indian'' and "Pakistani'' origin, and the common religious affiliation of all the detainees is of particular concern to the South-East Asian region.

Three aspects of the Singapore findings merit attention: 1. The suspected plot of the detainees and their collaborators to create, over a period of time, a pan-Islamic state in the region, with Indonesia as also Malaysia and the southern Philippines forming the initial nucleus; 2. The alleged plans to foment inter-religious strife in Singapore and Malaysia; and 3. The apparent design to sow distrust between Singapore and Malaysia. These findings have a resonance beyond the South-East Asian region.