A Bit More Detail

• CityLab looks at how, facing the impending closing of a General Motors plant that brutally displaced and mostly destroyed the (mostly) Detroit neighbourhood of Poletown, there is question about what to do with this space. Can Poletown live again?


• Taylor Lambert at Sprawl Calgary writes about how Calgary is learning to adopt Indigenous names for its growing communities and roads, and more, how Calgary is learning to do so respectfully.


• Guardian Cities notes the extreme sensitivity of the binational conurbations straddling the US-Mexico border in the Californias to the possibility of border closures.


• Guardian Cities notes how people in Kathmandu, struggling to rebuild their homes after the 2015 earthquake, are now facing terrible levels of debt.


• The Guardian reports on a remarkable rave/art party held in Chernobyl not far at all from the ruined reactor.

South Asian integration remains a distant dream as some member countries like Nepal resent India’s big brotherly dominance in the region. They perceive that they have no stakes in India’s rise as an economic power. Ensuring unrestricted market access perhaps would have made a big difference in this regard. Their resentment has only deepened as this hasn’t happened. Instead they have registered growing trade deficits with India! The on-going travails of the Himalayan kingdom vis-a-vis India exemplify the problematic nature of integration in a region that accounts for 44 per cent of the world’s poor and one-fourth of its’ population.

Nepal appealed to the UN to take “effective steps” to help remove an “economic blockade” imposed on it by India. According to SD Muni, Professor Emeritus at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, this situation is reminiscent of what happened in 1989 when King Birendra’s decision to import anti-aircraft guns from China and his refusal to reform the Panchayat system in the face of a democratic movement precipitated tensions in bilateral relations. India closed down the special entry points for trade and transit, resulting in a severe shortage of essential supplies. Twenty-six years later, Indian trucks have been stopped from entering Nepal.

This blockade similarly has resulted in a shortage of fuel, food and medicines in the Himalayan Kingdom. Supplies of vaccines and antibiotics in particular are believed to be critically low. UNICEF has warned that this will put more than three million infants at risk of death or disease as winter has set in. More than 200,000 families affected by earthquakes earlier in the year are still living in temporary shelters at higher altitudes. The risks of hypothermia, malnutrition and shortages of medicines will disproportionately affect children. As if all this weren’t bad enough, fuel shortages are resulting in illegal felling of forests.

Nepal’s non-inclusive constitution is the proximate cause of this development disaster-in-the-making. The blockade is being spearheaded by ethnic communities who make up 40 per cent of the population like the Madhesis and Tharus from the southern plains or the Terai These minorities have strong historic links with India and are protesting that the recently promulgated constitution marginalizes them. They have stopped goods from India entering the country by trucks since September. India of course formally denies that it has anything to do with the blockade but it is concerned that the constitution discriminates against these minorities.

As Nepal shares a 1,088 mile open border with it, India is concerned that the violent agitation over the constitution will spill over into its country. The bulk of the Himalayan Kingdom’s trade is with India, including a total dependence on fuel. It is also a beneficiary of special trading trade concessions and Indian aid. Nepali soldiers in the Indian army constitute one of its leading infantry formations — the Gurkha Regiment. Nepali nationals freely cross the border and work in India. Normally, such interdependence should occasion closer bilateral ties and integration. Unfortunately, this hasn’t happened till now.

[Som] Subedi is one of almost 76,000 Bhutanese refugees who have come to the U.S. since 2008. He’s now a naturalized American citizen, who helps Bhutanese refugees adjust from life in a refugee camp to life in Portland, Ore.

Suicide is not usually associated with Bhutan, a tiny Himalayan nation of legendary beauty that measures its success in gross national happiness. But Subedi and the other Bhutanese refugees are not technically Bhutanese, according to the country’s government. Known as Lhotsampas, their ancestors migrated to Bhutan from Nepal in the 17th century. And in the 1990s, more than 100,000 of them – one-sixth of the country’s population – were trucked out of Bhutan as part of its “one-nation-one people” policy, effectively an exercise in ethnic cleansing. They’re now one of America’s fastest-growing refugee populations.

They’re also committing suicide at a rate higher than any other refugee group in America, according to a 2012 report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. For every 100,000 Bhutanese refugees, 24.4 commit suicide, almost double the rate of 12.4 for the general population. Twenty-one percent of Bhutanese in America are also depressed, nearly three times the national rate. According to the Wall Street Journal, since November 2013, there have been seven known cases of Bhutanese refugees taking their own lives.

“It’s an epidemic,” Subedi said.

The suicide rate in the camps in Nepal is similar to the rate among resettled Bhutanese in America, according to the CDC. But Subedi believes the promise of the American dream is part of what’s killing his people. Many are excited to leave the Nepalese camps, where a generation of children have been born and raised in legal limbo with “no hope,” “no future” and “no identity,” said Subedi. But he said many Bhutanese refugees arrive in America believing there’s “money in the streets,” and instead end up isolated, unemployed and in debt.

Every day, almost 1,500 Nepalis join the long queues at Kathmandu’s airport to follow their dreams of a job abroad, typically in the Gulf or Malaysia. Over 525,000 Nepalis were issued permits to work overseas in 2013-14, well over double the number issued just five years ago.

According to an Open Society Foundations report on migrant workers, Nepal now sends the most workers abroad per capita of any country in Asia.

And for many, migration works. Official remittances account for over 29 percent of Nepal’s total GDP, and have increased by 400 percent between 2003 and 2011. At the arrivals gate of Kathmandu’s airport, dozens of migrants arrive off each flight balancing bulging bags and flat-screen TVs on their trolleys.

But wait till they have left, and another set of trolleys emerge from the terminal carrying a very different load — coffins bearing the bodies of migrant workers, like Umesh Pasman. Every day, three or four are flown back to grieving families in Nepal. In 2013, at least 185 Nepalis died in Qatar alone.

[. . .]

It usually begins with an introduction to a local recruitment broker, or agent. Typically, "the individual agent [is] someone personally known to the migrant worker... Consequently, migrant workers have great trust in their agents to look after their interests," said the Open Society Foundations report.

In the public lexicon, the narrative of the Naxalites being a grassroots reaction to decades of economic neglect has become an unchallenged truism. It is true that in the tribal areas of states like Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh, poverty is so desperate that joining the Naxalite factions is often the only way out. There are no other alternatives to make a livelihood.

Many argue that the answer lies in investment and infrastructural development on a massive scale, which will create jobs, bring economic advancement and draw the tribal areas closer to the union.

As Aaradhana Jhunjhunwala, the Kolkata-based writer, once pointed out, it is not simply underdevelopment and economic backwardness that lies at the heart of people’s distress. It lies in the deficiency of efficient and democratic governance. Why have Naxalites had the most success in tribal districts over the last decade? It is not accidental. There are clear correlations between areas of tribal habitation and sub-standard levels of socio-economic conditions. The helplessness of tribals in their own matters makes them perfect breeding grounds for revolutionary ideology.

[. . .]

As part of their strategic and tactical approach, the Naxalites have consistently presented themselves as a better alternative by taking up battles on tribal issues and drawing up pro-tribal governance policies.

As the historian Ramachandra Guha has argued, “what the Naxalites have going for them is their lifestyle – they can live with, and more crucially, live like the poor peasant and tribal, eating the same food, wearing the same clothes, eschewing the comforts and seductions of the city. In this readiness to identify with the oppressed, they are in stark contrast to the bureaucrat, the politician and the police officer.”

In May 2007 Canada agreed to take in 5,000 refugees who had been living in camps in eastern Nepal since the early 1990s. Last year, more than 40 of them arrived on Prince Edward Island. Another 35 are expected this year.

Madan Kumar Giri and seven members of his family were the first Bhutanese refugees to arrive more than three years ago. They've applied for Canadian citizenship. Giri sends photos and videos back to the refugee camps in Nepal, in the hopes of attracting people to P.E.I.

"We would like to increase the number of Bhutanese immigrants here on the Island, so at least we would have a small Bhutanese community," he said.

The size of the community matters to Citizenship and Immigration Canada as well. Creating a sustainable community for immigrants is a central part of its planning.

"That is a contributing factor and certainly makes it easier for that particular group to settle into the province," said Jon Stone, director of communication for Citizenship and Immigration Canada in the Atlantic Region.

As Canada continues to work towards its commitment of settling 5,000 refugees, more are expected on the Island in 2011.

• Centauri Dreams has two posts that particularly interested me, the first one regarding the use of masers to propel interstellar probes at substantial fraction of light speed, the other one speculating how the moons of extrasolar planets could be detected.


• Daniel Drezner reports on how the Argentine government plans to pay its future bills by nationalizing private pensions.


• Inkless Wells links to a Ross Douthat article suggesting that American Republicans should model themselves on the model of Stephen Harper's Conservatives in order to recover.


• Joe. My. God reports about the frankly unsurprising news that Jörg Haider, Austrian neo-fascist famous for fighting against Slovenes in his native Carinthia and scorning immigrants, had a long-time male lover.


• Norman Geras wonders if the concepts of "immortality" and "not dying" are really the same.


• Spacing Toronto links to a notice of upcoming changes to the Dufferin TTC station and suggests that the Toronto Reference Library should be renamed after urban theorist Jane Jacobs.


• Strange Maps links to one map of the Kingdom of Araucanian-Patagonia and another of Liechtenstein's very complex collection of communes.


• Wis(s)e Words features a news story explaining how, if the Nepalese royal family doesn't pay its bills, the new government will cut them off.

On Sunday, after a seven-hour discussion ended months of bickering over the monarchy issue between the two major constituents of the seven-party alliance -- the centrist Nepali Congress party and the CPN (M) -- the death knell for the beleaguered monarchy, led by the hugely unpopular king Gyanendra Shah, was sounded.

The CPN(M), which led a decade-long armed struggle against the monarchy, before laying down arms under a November 2006 peace accord and joining an interim government, had threatened to disrupt elections to constituent assembly if the country was not declared a republic first.

For the Maoists, who as part of the peace accord had agreed to confine some 30,000 of their fighters in United Nations supervised camps, the main concern was that pro-monarchy forces could still undermine the elections and move to reverse the hard fought gains of the armed struggle.

But the Maoists relented after other parties -- chief among them the Nepali Congress -- refused to declare the country a republic before an elected assembly convened. As per the 23-point deal agreed to by the parties, Nepal will become a federal democratic republic after the first meeting of the constituent assembly, elections to which are to be held in mid-April. The parties have agreed to announce a date soon.

[. . .]

Nepal's monarchy has not recovered from a tragic massacre in the royal palace in June 2001. A majority of people do not believe the verdict of a government-appointed probe that the then heir to the throne, Gyanendra's nephew, killed nine members of his family before shooting himself.

Gyanendra, who succeeded to the throne after the massacre, dismissed the elected government in February 2005 after charging it with failure to end the Maoist insurgency and ruled as an autocratic monarch for 14 months.

But faced with mass demonstrations, Gyanendra was compelled to restore parliament in April 2006. Once his title as head of the army was removed his authority was severely crippled.

With even the top officers of the Nepal army now saying, both in private as well as public, that they would accept the verdict of the elected constituent assembly, it is truly the end of the road for the ‘world’s last Hindu kingdom’.

Bhutanese began voting on Monday to elect members to a new upper house of parliament for the first time, a step towards democracy after a century of absolute monarchy.

The tiny Himalayan kingdom has been preparing for democracy since former monarch, King Jigme Singye Wangchuck, decided to hand power to an elected government, even as many of his citizens said they were quite happy with the way things were.

Monday's vote is only the first step. More important polls are expected to take place in February and March with elections to the lower house, when newly formed political parties will be able to take part.

Queues of voters formed in the town of Deothang as the polls opened at 8 a.m. (0200 GMT), all dressed, as is compulsory, in traditional Bhutanese costume -- gowns for the men, long dresses for the women, some of whom were carrying babies.

"I pressed the button on the computer and I'm very happy to cast my vote," said Sonam Wangda, a 35-year-old farmer, one of the country's 312,817 registered voters. He was referring to the electronic voting machines being used.

The country has temporarily closed its borders as authorities fear Nepal's former Maoist rebels could cause trouble in support of ethnic Nepalis living in Bhutan, who complain of discrimination.

Tens of thousands of ethnic Nepalis fled Bhutan or were expelled in 1991 for protesting against discrimination and demanding democracy.

The tiny Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan is being praised across the world because its king is abdicating the throne in favour of democracy. But on the flip side, the issue concerning the fate of the 100,000 Bhutanese refugees in neighbouring Nepal, thrown out of Bhutan in 1991, remains unresolved. The refugees are Nepali-speaking Bhutanese. They were driven out of Bhutan because they protested the passage of a law in the 1980s that arbitrarily cancelled their citizenship. Accounting for as much as a sixth of the Bhutanese population, most of them, living in the south of the country, fled from Bhutan to Nepal in 1990. They have been living in refugee camps in Nepal since then, desiring to get back home.

Bhutan, also known as Druk Yul or the Dragon Kingdom, is surrounded by India and Tibet. The country is witnessing a transition from absolute monarchy to multi-party democracy on account of the Dragon King, Jigme Singye Wangchuk abdicating the throne and not because of any popular uprising. Earlier, his main accomplishment (that was visible to the outside world) was his Gross National Happiness standard-of-living index but in December last, after setting in motion the transition to democracy, he abdicated the throne in favour of his eldest son, the Oxford-educated Crown Prince, Jigme Khesar Namgyal Wangchuk.

The benefit of happiness, however, does not seem to have percolated through the Hindu Bhutanese. "Some 108,000 Bhutanese refugees have been registered by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees," says Suhas Chakma, the director of the Asian Centre for Human Rights (ACHR), a New Delhi based rights body. Following a visit to the refugee camps in Nepal last month, Chakma reiterated his demand that Bhutan be held accountable for settlement of the exiles.

[. . .]

The Nepal government has raised the issue with the Bhutanese authorities in 15 rounds of talks; but it has failed to persuade Thimphu to allow the refugees to return to Bhutan. Not a single refugee has returned to Bhutan.