WHILE President George Bush is relentlessly pursuing his war of vengeance against terrorists with ferocious bombings in Afghanistan, killing hundreds of innocent civilian Afghans in the process, Guyana continues to suffer from acts of political terrorism in settlement of disputes.

The latest such act, as reported by the media, occurred last week at Better Hope sugar estate with manifestations of the lawlessness that had characterised the politically-instigated post-election disturbances earlier in the year with blocking of public roads, beating and robbing of innocent people and generally fomenting a reign of terror.

Perhaps the Better Hope squatters were also inspired by the subsequent lawlessness at Albion on the Corentyne when an armed crowd stormed the police station to protest failure to respond effectively to a wave of criminal violence and robberies.

Last week's incident at Better Hope, where some 70 squatters damaged canefield beds and seized a bulldozer at cutlass point in their angry bid for consideration of land for housing, forced the Guyana Sugar Corporation to summon the intervention of the police to restore order.

This phenomenon of lawlessness must be unequivocally denounced by all political parties and civil society before it becomes the norm for resolving disputes. Any local version of political terrorism must be effectively opposed to secure a better future based on the rule of law.

Even those whose signatures were all over the post-March election violent disturbances, in and out of Georgetown, would know the danger in permitting this terroristic, lawless behaviour to become part of the nation's political culture.

And those, like the Working People's Alliance, who have been commendably raising voices, small as they may be, against the continuation of America's bombings of Afghanistan in pursuit of Osama bin Laden and the al Queda militant backers of the Taliban regime in Kabul, also know how to decry this brand of reckless, lawless behaviour.

LOCAL PROTESTS
Except for Guyana, I am unaware of any public protest or party political statements that have raised questions about the cycle of retaliation, with the most sophisticated military hardware by the world's sole superpower, that is resulting in awesome collateral damages on civilian population in the war against terrorists located in Afghanistan.

It would seem as if parties, governments and civic organisations in the region have become so intimidated by President Bush's war cry of "if you are not with us you are with the terrorists", that they are conveniently forgetting that even a Muslim or Christian terrorist is entitled to due process in a court of law or before an international tribunal.

That's why the symbolic protest mounted by the WPA with placards bearing slogans like "Stop war now, invest in caring, not killing" and "Eye for an eye makes the whole world blind", does make a difference to the silence in our part of the Caribbean.

That's why it was also encouraging to know that President Bharrat Jagdeo and the governing People's Progressive Party (PPP) while unequivocally denouncing the criminal terrorist strikes against the U.S. on September 11, have expressed "deep concern" over the negative impact of the waves of air strikes on the civilian population and even humanitarian organisations in Afghanistan.

The PPP has well said that "in the fight against terrorism, it must be emphasised that Muslims and Islam are not on trial".

As this column was being written, there was the report of representatives of local Muslim organisations arranging meetings to discuss their own objections to the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan, a Muslim nation, and the implications for Muslims and Islam, without giving any encouragement to terrorism.

AN AMERICAN VIEW
Others, in and out of the region, have been seeking to make a connection between America's war on terrorism in Afghanistan and the cycle of revenge killings between Israelis and Palestinians at a time when Ariel Sharon's reoccupation of Palestinian territory is being ruthlessly enforced under the guise of attacking terrorists allegedly being sheltered by Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority.

Mark Danner, writer for 'The New Yorker' has some relevant observations in his own article in the October 16 edition of 'The New York Times' on "The Battlefield In the American Mind".

He said, for instance: "Alongside the triumphant cold war narrative we have shaped for ourselves, one can easily trace another story, one of bluster and flight and uneasy forgetting (such as):

"The Bay of Pigs debacle (in Cuba) of 1961; the panicked retreat from Saigon in 1975; the humiliation at the hands of the Iranian 'students' in 1979; the wholesale flight from Beirut after the American Embassy and Marine barracks bombings in 1983; the abandonment of Mogadishu, Somalia, after the death of 18 American servicemen in 1993 -- this last an event that led not only to the retreat of the 'USS Harlan County' from Haiti, but to the American refusal to act to halt the Rwandan genocide the following year..."

Danner thinks that America had "no choice but to respond militarily" for the infamy of September 1l.

"Yet", he said, "with each air strike, it condemns itself more vividly to the role that its enemies have chosen for it -- the violent, blundering superpower dominating the gulf, its fragile allies cowering in its shadow."

CARICOM'S PERSPECTIVE
And what of the thinking on terrorism by the Caribbean Community, the grouping of 15 members, including provisional member Haiti?

Meeting in The Bahamas exactly one month after the terrorist strikes on the World Trade Center and The Pentagon, CARICOM leaders issued a 'Declaration on International Terrorism' that roundly denounced the September 11 attacks on the U.S. and asserted:

"No political cause or national grievance could ever justify these reprehensible attacks on a nation and on unsuspecting civilians".

CARICOM recognised that terrorism is a global problem requiring "a concerted and resolute global response". It has reaffirmed commitment to work with the international community in a "multifaceted front against terrorism".

Appropriately, the Declaration on terrorism also stressed the community's "deeply entrenched respect for the rule of law, human rights and democratic values" as well as its reaffirmation of respect for "pluralism and ethnic, religious and cultural diversity within our societies" (read that to mean respect also for Muslims and their Islamic faith).

And for the benefit of the terroristic and lawless-inclined among us in this and other Caribbean states, the declaration's concluding paragraph is quite relevant:

"We, the Heads of Government are determined to preserve for the enjoyment of all, a Caribbean which is peaceful, law abiding, economically dynamic and politically stable, safe and secure for citizens, visitors and business persons alike..."