Hot Spots Hotter after Sept. 11 Terrorist Attacks

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, September 13, 2002

Hot Spots Hotter after Sept. 11 Terrorist Attacks

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From Afghanistan to Kashmir, from Palestine to Iraq, major hot spots in the world have grown more turbulent in 2002 after the unprecedented terrorist attacks on NewYork and Washington on Sept. 11 last year.

Afghanistan, which had been in turmoil since the 1970s, became the focus of the world after US troops, with significant support from the Northern Alliance of Afghanistan, staged large-scale military operations against the Taliban regime and al- Qaeda network.

Despite the collapse of the Taliban and the disintegration of al-Qaeda, Afghanistan is still far from tranquil. A transitional government led by Hamid Karzai was established in June following aLoya Jirga meeting attended by delegates from different parts of the country.

The remnants of the Taliban and al-Qaeda hatched a series of terrorist attacks on government leaders and foreign agencies in Kabul and other places in Afghanistan.

On Sept. 5, Karzai survived an assassination attempt when the assassin, dressing in a security uniform, fired on his car as he left the governor's palace in Kandahar.

On July 6, Afghan Vice-President and Minister of Public Works Haji Abdul Qadeer was assassinated in front of the Ministry of Public Works building in Kabul. Explosions erupted one after another in the country and the US-led allied troops found themselves suffering rising casualties.

The year 2002 has also witnessed a worsening of the long-standing Kashmir dispute between India and Pakistan, which had in the past led the two sides into two large-scale wars and numerous clashes.

After the Sept.11 attacks, India labeled the violence in Kashmir as terrorist acts. It accused Pakistan of backing "cross-border terrorism" after Pakistanis launched raids on the Indian Parliament in New Delhi last December and on its military camps in May. It sent more soldiers to its border areas, closing air space, roads and railways connecting Pakistan and expelled Pakistani diplomats.

Pakistan, which pledged to fight terrorism in all forms, reaffirmed moral and diplomatic backing for "freedom fighters" in Kashmir.

As a result, clashes broke out frequently in the border area and the two countries were, for a time, on the brink of a full-fledged war.

In the Middle East, Israel has tried to exploit the global war on terrorism by calling the Palestinians' struggle against Israelioccupation "terrorism" and its military actions in the West Bank and Gaza Strip "fight against terrorism."

The Israeli government accused the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) of being an "entity supporting terrorism" early this year and severed ties with its president Yasser Arafat later.Pursuing a policy of "targeted killing," Israel launched large-scale military actions in Palestinian cities and confined Arafat in his Ramallah compound for dozens of days.

The harsh intrusion of Israeli troops provoked suicide bombers from such radical Palestinian groups as Hamas and Jihad to launch bloody attacks on Israeli civilians.

Both Israeli military actions and suicide bombings by Palestinian extremists drew widespread condemnation from the international community.

Iraq, another major hot spot in the world since the 1991 Gulf War, has been in the spotlight since US President George Bush branded it as part of the "Axis of Evil" earlier this year.

Bush has reiterated time and again that to topple the Iraqi regime is the policy of his administration and he accused the country of developing weapons of mass destruction.

Currently, the tension over Iraq is mounting as the United States is mustering international support for launching a war against Iraq.

The Sept.11 attacks on the United States have made a significant impact on major hot spots in the past year. Nevertheless, parties involved in the conflicts do not want to seetheir countries plunged into a large-scale and sustained war.

After mediation by leaders of big countries between the two sides, India and Pakistan were brought back from the brink of war.

In the Middle East, the United States, the Arab League and the European Union have respectively put forward peace plans to cool tension between Israel and Palestine and bring the two sides back to the negotiating table. As a result, bloody conflicts have reduced in the past months.

As for Iraq, the international community has expressed fierce opposition against possible US attacks on the sovereign state. Many countries believe that the Iraqi issue should be settled on the basis of relevant UN resolutions.

Overall, peace and development remain the mainstream of the times.

Source: Xinhua News Agency

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