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341. Human Rights and International Investment Law: Investment Protection as Human Right?

Author:
Nicolas Klein
Publication Date:
06-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
The Goettingen Journal of International Law
Institution:
The Goettingen Journal of International Law
Abstract:
Legal research conceptualized the relationship between International Investment Law (IIL) and International Human Rights Law (IHRL) until recently rather as opposing fields of law with colliding policy interests as well as contradictory rules and regulations. However, lately a new approach is gaining increasing support in the academic community: Investment protection could be understood as being part of human rights law. Such a conclusion may be perceived as highly controversial, however, from a conceptual perspective IIL and IHRL share more common ground than differences. This article will argue, first, that certain material standards of IIL can be conceptualized to be human rights-like guarantees of a minimum standard of protection and second, that such an understanding does not lead to a neoliberal proliferation of economic rights but, to the contrary, may serve as an important conceptual tool to prevent overly extensive interpretations of investment treaties and to balance economic rights with other human rights in case of norm conflict. After all, IIL could prove to be not more, but also not less, than “One Out of a Crowd” of all other fundamental human rights.
Topic:
Economics, Human Rights, and International Law
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Germany, and Guinea

342. India in Afghanistan: A Rising Power or a Hesitant Power?

Author:
Harsh Pant
Publication Date:
04-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for International Peace and Security Studies
Abstract:
Indian diplomacy faced a major setback at the Afghanistan Conference in London in January 2010, where Indian concerns were summarily ignored. In one stroke, Pakistan rendered New Delhi irrelevant in the evolving security dynamic in Afghanistan. When Indian External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna underscored the folly of making a distinction “between good Taliban and bad Taliban,” he was completely out of sync with the larger mood at the conference. Days before this much-hyped conference, senior U.S. military commanders were suggesting that peace talks with the Taliban may be imminent and that Taliban members might even be invited to join the government in Kabul. The West had made up its mind that it was not a question of if, but when and how to exit from Afghanistan, which seemed to be becoming a quagmire for the leaders in Washington and London.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, Terrorism, War, Power Politics, and Counterinsurgency
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Afghanistan, United States, Washington, India, Taliban, London, and New Delhi

343. The PTI and Pakistan's Changing Political Landscape

Author:
Stephanie Flamenbaum
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
United States Institute of Peace
Abstract:
As the Pakistani electoral cycle gears up for an election, the country's traditional political stakeholders face a change in the tenor of political discourse and a more robust electoral field due to the recent rise in popular support for the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), or Pakistan Movement for Justice, helmed by cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan.
Topic:
Democratization, Islam, and Politics
Political Geography:
Pakistan and South Asia

344. Moving Forward with the Legal Empowerment of Women in Pakistan

Author:
Anita M. Weiss
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United States Institute of Peace
Abstract:
The history of laws affecting women's rights and empowerment in Pakistan involves a com¬plex pattern of advances and setbacks, with the state's efforts to articulate a definition of women's rights complicated by the need to balance divergent views on the place of women in Pakistani society. After General Pervez Musharraf's 1999 coup, a number of factors, including international perceptions of Pakistan, brought women's rights, greatly curtailed by General Zia-ul-Haq's Islamization project, to the fore. Most critical among the changes to women's rights dur¬ing this period was the 2006 revision to the Hudood Laws, resulting in the Protection of Women Act. The incumbent Pakistan People's Party government has passed several important pieces of legislation continuing the progress for women's empowerment made under Musharraf. These new laws focus on sexual harassment at the workplace, antiwomen practices, and acid throwing. Additionally, the National Commission on the Status of Women has recently achieved elevated status. Despite these advancements, new legislation is needed to address ongoing challenges such as women's ability to control inherited land and human trafficking. If the Pakistani state is to make lasting improvements on these and other challenges facing the legal status of Pakistani women, it must find solutions that will not only benefit women in the country but create consensus among Pakistanis on the best and most achievable way to prioritize global rights for women while adhering to Islamic precepts.
Topic:
Gender Issues, Human Rights, Islam, Poverty, and Law
Political Geography:
Pakistan and Asia

345. What It Will Take to Secure Afghanistan

Author:
Max Boot
Publication Date:
06-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
Afghanistan is approaching a major inflection point in its long and turbulent history. In 2014 most of the foreign military forces are due to pull out. With them will go the bulk of foreign financing that has accounted for almost all of the state's budget. Twenty fourteen is also the year that Afghanistan is due to hold presidential elections. Hamid Karzai, the only president the country has known since the fall of the Taliban, has said he will not seek another term in office. Thus Afghanistan is likely to have a new president to lead it into a new era. This era will be shaped by many factors, principally decisions made by Afghans themselves, but the United States has the ability to affect the outcome if it makes a sustained commitment to maintain security, improve the political process, and reduce Pakistani interference so as to build on the tenuous gains achieved by the U.S. troop surge since 2010.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Foreign Policy, Democratization, Islam, Terrorism, War, and Counterinsurgency
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Afghanistan, United States, and Taliban

346. Aid and Conflict in Pakistan

Publication Date:
06-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
International, particularly U.S., military and civilian aid has failed to improve Pakistan's performance against jihadi groups operating on its soil or to help stabilise its nascent democracy. Lopsided focus on security aid after the 11 September 2001 attacks has not delivered counterterrorism dividends, but entrenched the military's control over state institutions and policy, delaying reforms and aggravating Pakistani public perceptions that the U.S. is only interested in investing in a security client. Almost two-thirds of U.S. funding since 2002 ($15.8 billion) has been security-related, double the $7.8 billion of economic aid. Under an elected government, and with civilian aid levels at their highest in decades, the U.S. and other donors can still play a major part in improving service delivery, supporting key reforms and strengthening a fragile political transition vital to internal and regional stability. Re-orientation of funding from military security purposes to long-term democracy and capacity building support is the best way to guarantee the West's and Pakistan's longterm interests in a dangerous region. But aid policies must be better targeted, designed and executed.
Topic:
Democratization, Terrorism, Foreign Aid, and Counterinsurgency
Political Geography:
Pakistan, United States, and South Asia

347. Recalibrating U.S. — Pakistan Relations

Author:
Haider Ali Hussein Mullick
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
The Washington Quarterly
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
Afghanistan is America's longest war. Thousands of U.S. troops and those from nearly 50 other countries have fought in Afghanistan against Taliban and al-Qaeda forces, but it was in nuclear-armed Pakistan where Osama bin Laden was killed, Khalid Sheikh Mohammad (the mastermind of 9/11) was captured, and Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Omar as well as the heads of the virulent Haqqani network reside. Pakistan's duplicity is a fact, yet it is often excessively characterized as a function of the India—Pakistan rivalry. Pakistani generals do fear India, but they have also recognized the threat from domestic insurgents. The height of this concern was reached in 2009, when the Pakistani Taliban were 60 miles from the country's capital and jeopardized U.S. as well as Pakistani goals in the region: interdicting al-Qaeda, protecting Pakistani nuclear weapons, and stabilizing (and in Pakistan's case, an anti-India) Afghanistan. At that point, Pakistani troops, unlike past attempts, fought back and prevailed against the insurgents. It can be done.
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Afghanistan, America, and India

348. Horsemen of the apocalypse? Jihadist strategy and nuclear instability in South Asia

Author:
Andrew Phillips
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Politics
Institution:
Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:
Since 9/11, counter-terrorism officials have fretted over the possibility of jihadist terrorists obtaining and deploying a nuclear weapon. Although acknowledging that such anxieties are well grounded, I offer here a reconceptualisation of the jihadist terrorist nuclear threat that focuses alternatively upon the remote but real possibility that jihadist terrorists may seek to advance their goals by trying to provoke an Indo–Pakistani nuclear confrontation. Such a confrontation would serve jihadist goals by aggravating religious polarisation on the sub-continent while dramatically weakening the Pakistani state. The system-destabilising consequences of such a catastrophe would likely also offer the jihadists their best opportunity to revive their faltering movement, which otherwise appears fated to terminal decline. In the light of this assessment, I argue that a higher priority must be accorded towards strengthening Indo–Pakistani crisis stability and advancing regional reconciliation if the risk of a jihadist-provoked nuclear exchange is to be minimised.
Political Geography:
Pakistan, South Asia, and India

349. Religious Movements, Militancy, and Conflict in South Asia: cases from india, pakistan, and afghanistan

Author:
Robert D. Lamb, Liora Danan, Joy Aoun, Sadika Hameed, Kathryn Mixon, and Denise St. Peter
Publication Date:
07-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
The top headlines of the past year have made increasingly clear to U.S. government officials the central—but complicated—roles that religion plays in many of the most strategically important engagements of the United States.
Topic:
Political Violence, Peace Studies, and Religion
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Afghanistan, United States, South Asia, and India

350. Religion and Militancy in Pakistan and Afghanistan

Author:
Mariam Mufti
Publication Date:
06-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
The importance of studying the rise of Islamic radicalism in Afghanistan and Pakistan cannot be overemphasized. First, both Afghanistan and Pakistan have experienced serious threats from radical Islamic groups. In Afghanistan, coalition forces led by the United States were successful in overthrowing the Taliban regime after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, but since then there has been a resurgence in violence that is being perpetrated by a combination of the Taliban who have regrouped, the Haqqani Network (HQN) and Hizb-e-Islami (HiG). Foreign groups such as al Qaeda are also implicated in the violence. In Pakistan, most of the militant activity has occurred in the frontier region between Afghanistan and Pakistan, known as the FATA. But other parts of Pakistan, especially Punjab, have also been subject to bomb attacks. These attacks have not only targeted Pakistanis but also foreigners, including U.S. government facilities.
Topic:
Political Violence, Islam, Religion, Armed Struggle, and Counterinsurgency
Political Geography:
Pakistan and Afghanistan