Naeem's Blog

3/7 UPDATE: Fisk is reporting that America is attempting to supply the Libyan rebels with anti-tank rockets and ground-to-air missiles.

I am extremely intrigued by this news-item revealing the capture of covert MI6 officers by anti-Qaddafi forces near Benghazi.

The official UK government line states that the ‘diplomatic team’ experienced some ‘difficulties’ in their attempt to reach out to the Libyan opposition.

Uhmmm...Sure.

Care to explain what the group’s contact on the ground, another MI6 officer named Tom, was doing ‘working as an administrator’ for the PAST 5 MONTHS on the farm where they were caught?

It's quite plausible that the UK would send some undercover forces to secretly help the Libyan opposition. But did they play a greater role in the lead-up to the recent rebellion, seeing as they had some sort of clandestine presence for the past 5 months?

This leads a wider question on the overall role of the outside forces (read: West) in what is commonly perceived as a purely populist uprising throughout the Middle East.

BTW, this incident reminds me of the 2005 incident in Iraq where UK forces raided a local police station to free two British undercover agents, arrested for planting a car bomb.

Quite a bumbling lot, these MI6 lads.

I must admit that I was (naively?) shocked to read this recent article stating the enormously high divorce rate. I had heard about divorce skyrocketing in recent times, but I never imagined it was this high.

Without getting into any deep socio-psycho analysis of the Saudi landscape, I can say that it actually isn't very surprising.

The two genders live in completely separate universes, intermixing only in forbidden encounters or after marriage. For the most part, they have created lives devoid of the other. The males go out for nightly coffee sessions and weekend desert forays while the females busy themselves at the malls and salons, if and when they are allowed out.

In and of itself, the mere separation of activities by gender in the pre-marital years does not lead to a failed marriage.

But when these activities persist after marriage, with the husband and wife insisting on the continuation of their pre-marital lifestyle, the bonds of marriage are never afforded a rich soil wherein the roots can flourish and strengthen.

In my own experience, it’s not uncommon to see young married men going out with the guys almost every night, while the wives are at home tending to the young children.

And then there is the trend of many young Saudi women having lofty expectations that their male counterparts simply cannot fulfill. From the need for a villa to a housemaid and a driver to an expense account beyond the fiscal capacity of the husband, Saudi women can be very costly to maintain.

Also, the education disparity between the genders must also be considered. While many Saudi women are completing their degrees and even continuing onto graduate school (after all, they have not much else to do), many Saudi men struggle to finish college, busying themselves with questionable business ventures as well as social misadventures.

Finally, other more seedy variables, such as homosexuality and pornography, are surely playing an unwelcome role in the divorce phenomenon.

All in all, it’s a very sad situation, with the next generation of Saudis (ie. the children) being the biggest losers.

Here is an excellent article detailing the multiple layers of complexity that make up the American-Pakistani relationship.

Once you read this piece, you'll have a much better understanding of the different layers of deceit that pollute that region's politics.

And the writer finishes his article with a nice bang, calling out America's new policy of hiring private contractors who are beyond the accountability reach of the US Government.