The war on Afghanistan to drive out the Taliban was morally defensible as the UN Security Council had established that terrorists may be considered as agents of the state that harbours them and has made it illegal for states to sponsor or shelter them. Taliban refusal to hand over Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaida network to the international community for trial and punishment rendered the Taliban and Afghanistan liable to international military action. Odious nature of the Taliban regime had acquired barbaric perfection and was contrary to all civilised norms, and perhaps most importantly the Taliban had given a convoluted expression to Islam, quintessentially a religion of peace and brotherhood. Therefore the global pantheon unhesitatingly agreed on US, NATO and allied military intervention to totally demolish the Taliban politico-religious construct. World conscience did not suffer any pangs of contrition for the pulverisation of Afghanistan.

Going back into history the allied participation in the Second World War was unquestionably moral given the hunger of Nazism and Fascism for occupation of other countries and the unspeakable atrocities meted out to the conquered people and particularly to the Jews. Decolonisation of the colonial empires was a logical follow up of the Second World War. After all if the allied powers could put their men, women and money in harms way to save others (and themselves) from the Nazis and the Fascists' devouring hunger, then clearly any moral ground for the colonial powers to hang on to their colonies, occupied by force in the first instance, in the pretext of carrying the "white man's burden" to civilize the uncivilized people of the colonies, did not hold water.

It must also be recognised that only moral pressure did not force the colonialists to give freedom to the colonies. In many cases the colonial powers entered into an agreement to grant freedom after the Second World War was won in exchange for the support of the colonies to the war efforts. Equally indigenous leaders of the colonies well versed in the western precepts of democracy, civil and political rights, expressed the unquenchable thirst of the colonized for freedom, sometimes expressed through armed struggle( e.g. in India or Mau Mau in Kenya) but more often through non- violent political movement.

Be it as it may the decision of the colonial powers to grant freedom to the colonies was backed by moral principles. But the onset of the cold war instigated the western powers to support dictators in many parts of the world as bulwark and sentinel in the west's fight against communism. Until the fall of the Berlin Wall and the consequent collapse of the Soviet empire, western powers as a matter of policy propped up brutal regimes like those of Mobutu in Zaire, Pinochet in Chile and Ayub Khan in Pakistan and many others. These were expedient policies devoid of any moral fibre.

Contrary to expectations the end of the cold war has not necessarily seen the end of western support to military dictators. Sporadic assault on dictatorship has been dictated more by self- interest than by western obeisance to the god of democracy. Military intervention in Panama to oust General Noriega and to reinstall President Aristides in Haiti, for example, were not solely to free the oppressed people from the clutches of dictators as Noriega was a drug peddler and scores of Haitians were crowding the American shores for refuge which the US was reluctant to provide.

Albeit the west has encouraged the developing world to embrace democratic values because of the conclusion reached by the west that tolerance of "democratic exceptions" does not further western interests in the long run because closed political systems and stagnant economies result in frustration of the enslaved people and these places become breeding ground for terrorists. Indigenous insurrections may result in failing and failed states with the government controlling a portion of the states' territory or with several competing governments exercising authority in their respective areas of control. Unlike Afghanistan of the Taliban it is assumed that terrorist activities are carried out in these cases against the wishes of the government "in power". UNSC resolution 748(1992) enjoins all states " to refrain from instigating, assisting, or participating in terrorist acts in another state or acquiescing in organised activities within its territory directed towards the commission of such acts".

In the Chechen case would military intervention, in remote parts of Georgia where Chechens have taken up abode from where they undertake terrorist activities while these areas being outside the control of the Georgian authorities, be legal? Repeated use of preemptive actions resorted to by various US Presidents (Cuban missile crisis and Iraq war for example) would make it difficult for the US to oppose Russian military intervention in Chechnya. Such acts of preemption now articulated in the Bush Security Strategy document of November last year stretches the definition of self-defence beyond the limit of the elasticity of the concept. Besides, the use of force in the absence of imminent and discernible threat can only be resorted to by one militarily too strong against one militarily weak as in the case of Anglo-US war on Iraq without global consent. Tomas Valasek of the Center for Defense Information opines that legitimacy is a more ethereal concept than simply seeking UN approval -- it roughly translates into securing a broad international approval for use of force, involving others in the decision, and justifying it under the law of war. Asymmetric balance of power between the interventionist and the state which is being intervened is essential to limit the extent of conflagration. If the two parties are equally or evenly balanced militarily then unilateral intervention (as in the case of Iraq) would further endanger international peace and security because the state intervened could cause immense damage to the interventionist state raising the cost of intervention to unacceptable level. This could perhaps be one of the reasons behind Indian reticence to intervene in Pak occupied Kashmir despite being persistently victimised by cross border terrorism from across the line of control in Kashmir.

Another related issue is humanitarian intervention. The UN charter provides that "no other state and no international organisation may scrutinise what is happening inside a state except with the full consent of the territorial state". But recent world history is replete with examples of humanitarian intervention. In 1971 Indian intervention was dictated partly by humanitarian consideration as a result of genocidal attacks on unarmed Bengalis by the Pakistani occupation army which forced millions of Bengalis to flee from then East Pakistan to the neighboring states of India.

More recently NATO forces intervened in Kosovo to protect the ethnic Albanians from the Serb security forces. In recent days the western powers are pressing the Burmese military junta to free dissident leader Aung San Suu Kyi from detention and have imposed strict sanctions on assets abroad of the junta and their supporters as well as on trade with and investment in Burma. US Secretary of State Colin Powell characterised the military rulers as "the thugs who run the Burmese government" and warned that the action of the military rulers would not be allowed to "stand as the last word on the matter". Clearly the Anglo-US, EU and Japanese ( albeit less strident) response, however welcome these may be to a large part of the international community, can be termed as diplomatic and economic intervention in Burma's internal affairs contrary to article 2(7) of the UN Charter. Yet such intervention can be justified if the decades old war waged by the military junta against the civilian population is seen as state terrorism where victims are the Burmese people. Besides, if one were to consider the influx of refugees from Burma into Thailand and Bangladesh then the war against the Burmese people can be given an external dimension.

Anglo-US military intervention in Iraq has been justified by supporters of interventionists on the grounds of UNSC's inability to face up to the challenge posed by Saddam Hussein. Lately one sees a growing demand by some quarters for UN reforms. British FCO Minister Bill Rammell addressing UN Modernising seminar in London last month emphasised on the need for UN reforms to face up to the challenges before the international community. He called for examination of "principles under which we intervene to tackle global threats more widely" just like the ongoing discussions of the principles under which some countries intervene in states on humanitarian grounds. One may recall that during the inter war years terrorism increasingly referred to oppressive measures imposed by various totalitarian regimes like those in Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy or Stalinist Russia. More recently military dictatorships in South America and Mugabe regime in Zimbabwe have been open to charges of using terrorism as a tool of the state. If the argument that such regimes practice terrorism on their own people is accepted then intervention to remove oppressive regimes from power thus denying them the ability to wage war on their own people becomes a valid instrument in maintaining international peace and security.

Problem arises when interventionists themselves do not uniformly follow the principles because of self interest. While the western powers encouraged the African Union and the Organization of American States to pledge themselves to upholding uninterrupted practice of democracy, the west for example continues to shower Pak President General Musharraf with political and economic support while sizeable part of Pakistani people are pressing the General to shed his uniform. General Musharraf has become the blue eyed boy of the west because of Pakistan's position as a front line state in the war against terrorism. India's persistent complaint that Pakistan is the epicentre of terrorism in South Asia has completely fallen on deaf ears of the western powers.

The argument proffered, for example by Singapore's Lee Kwan Yew that Asia is more comfortable with communitarian values where the interest of the society takes precedence over the interest of the individual as opposed to western values of putting more emphasis on politico-social rights of the individual has not received universal support. It has been contended that cultural differences as an argument for systematic denial of basic civil and political rights as well as economic, social and cultural rights cannot withstand critical scrutiny. Nobel laureate Amartya Sen argues that rights have intrinsic value and most obviously people have the right not to be killed in the process of exercising their civil rights. Besides he found no correlation or causal connection between authoritarianism and economic success. It is therefore necessary for the delinquent states to acknowledge the changing definition of sovereignty and territorial integrity so that states become responsible members of the global village.

It is equally necessary for those who have issued themselves imprimatur to change the map of the world that they not be inconstant in pursuit of their principles and have an immaculate set of values which they would practice without meandering away from the principled path on the pretext of serving immediate national interest.

Kazi Anwarul Masud is a former Secretary and Ambassador.