Dignity And Privacy

Malala Yousufzai, the girl who was shot by Taliban on her way to school, addresses a thousand students from one hundred countries at an especially convened youth assembly at the UN in New York - it is her 16th birthday and this day has now been declared "Malala Day". The fight for girls' education got a face through her testimony. She rightly points out, that girls and boys, that every child deserves a decent education, as boys schools are not spared from attacks by extremists. How to expect a man to understand the importance of a girl's education if he himself was denied one?


The report of the Abbottabad Commission, investigating the circumstances of the Osama bin Laden raid, has been leaked to Al Jazeera and surprises by the frank and open conclusion, that failures on all levels led to the American intervention.

May and June have seen a surge in violent attacks and casualties through the country with more than 600 people being killed per month. The murder of thirteen mountaineers, ten of them foreigners, at Nanga Parbat adds a new chilling dimension. The beautiful mountain area of the north having been the last resort for tourism.

The extremists don't seem to make a difference between political parties that wish to promote dialogue and those who don't. There seems to be a shift in the policy of the new governing party. PM Sharif answered the question by a journalist, whether he was seeking Chinese help in getting American drone attacks stopped: "We have to help ourselves if we want to stop American drones". He convenes an all parties conference on terrorism at the end of July in order to develop a strategy to terminate the existential threats by extremism in the country, the cause of drone strikes in the first place. Disrupting the links of terrorists in Pakistan from groups operating from outside the country allegedly being on top of the agenda. 'Brotherly' countries, including Saudi Arabia and Iran would be asked to clamp down on financiers of sectarian and terrorist networks operating in Pakistan.

The Cyber Law Society of Pakistan invites for a seminar at the District Court of Islamabad, which is housed for the last thirty years in buildings meant for shops in a market area, awaiting to move in a permanent new structure to be built. Courtrooms in small shops then, a fan to fight the heat, if lucky, a copy machine being operated by a clerk in the open, but again, lawyers, judges in impeccable suits and with remarkable endurance.

Cyber security emerges as today's burning topic - in Pakistan as in other countries alike - and as the President of the Islamabad Bar Association points out, violation of privacy is considered a serious attack on the dignity of a human being and protected in several passages in the Koran, as well as by Pakistani law. This is not just theory here in Pakistan - as I can only confirm how little one knows about the private life of people in public life and how difficult it is to even find out if they are married, let alone know anything about their wives or husbands. All guests at a recent dinner table were guessing about the family life of the two brothers that hold the political power in this country upon my questioning, only bits and pieces emerge, contributed by all present and some surprise even the knowledgeable ones! Whatever people know, it would not appear in the press, journalists respect privacy and prefer exposing professional failure instead. Corruption is one of the dominant topics these days.

The General Secretary of the Cyber Law Society is a woman and a group of female attorneys is attending the seminar, being part of 350 female lawyers among 4000 lawyers and they assure me, that their professional advice and representation at court is sought after by men and women alike. Even following a full time professional career, they have two, three or four children, their education and upbringing shared with their extended families, no shortage of support. I am quickly included in their discussion and their group and awarded with the certificate for attending the seminar at the end!

The last of the Agamohicans stay behind in very, very quiet Isloo, where shopkeepers are sitting on chairs, their heads laying on the table, asleep, enduring the long hours of a Ramadan day without food, without water.
We morph into the four Musketeers in collecting all remaining energy, beating the heat, the humidity, the blues, the added restrictions in movement (yeah, we can still visit each other!), and Agasue prepares her garden for a day of sports and lean cuisine for us! That means, petanque on the lush grass, that turns out to be tricky due to undetectable irregularities under the thick grass carpet, but we compete against each other with highly combative spirit, measuring the distances of the silver balls in millimeters. Bending, lifting and carrying the balls, dragging the feet along the eight meter long playfield - we might hire caddies next time to do that job, and watch from the pool which team is going to win for us ...

As calories seem to be burnt at another rate in this climate, we are offered a so declared "lean bite" by the hostess, a chocolate chili cake with lychee ice cream, covered in very light caramel syrup:

Diplomats are a highly adaptable cast of the human race - by profession! - always excited about meeting new cultures, exploring unknown territories and developments, absorb and adapt with ease and panache. They also master brilliantly the technical and social challenge of operating a small communication device at dinner tables, a still life of three gentlemen, that the lady at the table had undisturbed time to ban on photos. It is encouraging to see that the traditional protocol (at the start of my career as a "trailing spouse" I was advised to arrive at a new posting wearing "chapeau, gants, collants", no matter the climate I might encounter...) - obviously does not freeze in time, as besides Ambassadors three actual and former chiefs of protocol were present at the dinner… with their mobiles...