Push in by BSF

Throughout the last few weeks, we have been reading the grave situation of abuse by our neighbouring nation's own citizens into Bangladesh. There have been claims by India that these people are Bangladeshi and in turn, we are finding them to be Bangla speaking, Indian nationals gathered from all over India. While this tug of war is continuing, where push in attempts have become a daily ritual by the BSF and a cat-and-mouse game between the border guards. It amazes me that Bangladesh Foreign Ministry and our regular national dailies have not taken any step to gather information from these people and present the secular views of the Indian government to the world. These people have become refugees in their own country and this issue needs to be addressed by our government. The world should have the opportunity to see the injustice of the current Indian government to its own people and minority. To this day, our Foreign Ministry has not gathered a

diplomatic team of international countries and UN members to these sites and meet these people!

Perhaps it could become a hot political subject by the current BJP politburo as a platform for its reelection campaign. If our diplomats were a little bit far sighted, they would look into political strategies around the world where the subject of threats against a nation have always become a good re-election policy. Throughout the history of democracy, this example could be cited from numerous nations.

Thus I would like to ask the Foreign Ministry and our political parties if they honestly believe that this problem will subside on its own.

Riyadh Hossain, Austin, USA * * *

I want to thank Mr. Masud Karim for his letter "Push-in and HR violation". Not only the human rights activists, but also the news agencies have some allergy regarding the issue. But when it comes to presence of al-Qaeda network in Bangladesh etc they seem to be very much interested, though there is no concrete

evidence behind those.

May be the ill-fated people gathered for push-in are too inferior to be regarded as "human" by these human rights activists and the members of the "civil" society.

Joy, Dhaka

INS requirements and diplomatic reciprocity

Many Bangladeshis are writing letters to The Daily Star complaining about Bangladesh's inclusion on the INS list and how Bangladesh should call for "diplomatic reciprocity." If any of these Bangladeshis had done any research on the experiences the Westerners have in entering Bangladesh, I doubt that they would be complaining about requirements for Bangladeshis entering the US.

Most of all they would not be asking for diplomatic reciprocity, unless they want to be stared at, cheated with all sorts of strange fees, harassed for "bakshish" by the customs "officers," and discriminated against because of skin

colour. Have any of these letter writers (who have complained about the INS requirements) ever consulted an American on the difficulties he/she has faced upon entering this country? And have we forgotten September 11 already? If September 11 had occurred in our backyard, wouldn't we want to prevent it from happening again in some other shape or form?

The US has a right to track visitors coming into its borders; that is the only purpose of the INS requirements and the US has told you this over and over.

Ali, Dhaka

Welcome, human clone

Controversies, whether human cloning will be good for the mankind or not, have been going on for years. But things are quite different now. The cloning controversy has moved a step forward -- a human clone has come into being at last. It is a turning point for the civilisation, yet the scientists are not so sure about its future.

Throughout the history of civilisa-

tion every major turn raised ideological debates in its earlier stage. The case is identical regarding human cloning as well. Some people regard human cloning as an inhuman attempt. They show many reasons to justify this standpoint. A human child is brought up by its parents whose sincerity is unquestionable. And it's not only human beings, but other animal raise their babies with great care too. Then again, everyone knows how difficult it is to rear an orphan child. So, will not the human-cloned child be deprived of motherly affection and fatherly care? Will not life be a burden on the very being? Why should we impose such load upon him? These questions interrupted the development of human cloning but could not stop the endeavour. At last man's thirst to experience the unknown and unseen win over all difficulties.

We must act with an open mind and welcome the new venture. Being frightened and suspicious of cloning would not help. So we thank the bravery of the scientists and welcome the first cloned human being to earth.

Sonad Singha, Gaibandha

3D game in Bangladesh

A few days ago I went to the BCS Computer Show and met a group of young programmers who developed the 'First 3D game in Bangladesh' called 'Dhaka Racing' and marketed it completely with their own financial support. They have developed this game on the roads of Dhaka and I found very enthusiastic crowd gathered around in their Stall No. 18. I also went to their website

(www.dhakaracing.com) and learnt about their progress.

I must confess that I am not a serious gamer, however, I congratulate these programmers for their initiatives to develop and market a game in Bangladesh. Remember that they run the risk of piracy of the game.

We must highlight their initiative and encourage these youngsters. Shaikh M Habib, Shamoly, Dhaka Is war inevitable?

Mixed messages from the Bush administration notwithstanding, war seems inevitable. Why else this unremitting preparations, this massive build up of forces and armour, this barely concealed indifference to counsels of wisdom and public protests urging peaceful means? Why disarming Iraq has become the single most pressing agenda for the US while Palestine burns?

We have heard eloquent rhetoric by Mr. Bush and Mr. Blair; how they are out to make the world a safer place, how they wish to guard freedom, democracy and human rights. Do we need to destroy Iraq or is Iraq such a singular threat? These two champions are bent upon preemption. Yet their logic of war fails to convince. From a clinical point of view, their prescription is radical surgery on mere presumption without evidence of cancer. And what these two champions do when they have evidence? They pronounce negotiation, appeasement, or at best take recourse to the Security Council to debate what is unilateral agenda laced with threat

they are afraid to follow through. This is clear in the case of North Korea which managed to give these two a dose of their own medicine by demanding a written nonaggression treaty before they sit down to negotiate not in the Security Council but with the US which they rightly recognise as the only party to the dispute. You can get away with these bullies if you are equally dangerous as they are. And who is seeking to make the Korean divide permanent but hastily applauded the reunification of Germany?

All this sounds hollow in spite of the rhetoric in speech after speech. The Millennium Goal asked for mere 10 billion dollars and what the US managed to pledge is merely 200 million dollars to fund modest goals of reducing poverty, AIDS and Malaria. That is a fraction of the cost of a single stealth bomber that it is willing and able to deploy by the dozens to rain destruction and death.

Hussain, Dhaka