Is nothing sacred?

[cooran]

O.K. ~ there's the World Financial Crisis. there's the War in Iraq and Afghanistan. there's Climate Change.

But now, the unthinkable has happened.

Sri Lankan Test Cricketers attacked in Lahore - many injured
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7920260.stm

The world as we know it will never be the same again.

metta
Chris

[Ben]

Its disgraceful.
We live in a wicked world.

[retrofuturist]

Greetings Chris,

It's disgraceful... especially sad because the Sri Lankan cricket team are full of lovely, polite and sporting young men.

Indirectly, Pakistan cricket is going to be a victim too... they could hardly get anyone to tour Pakistan as it was. Now nobody will go there.

Metta,
Retro.

[cooran]

Hello Ben, Paul, all,

I think many in my congregation at Dhammagiri will be shocked - at least half of them are from Sri Lanka - many of them with parents and siblings still there. Hardly a month passes without one or more of them returning to Sri Lanka to visit relatives or attend weddings etc.

But ... this raises the query as to whether playing in India is safe as well? If terrorists are going to target sporting teams to drive wedges between countries .... who is safe?

They may have made a very wrong move ~ with the way Cricket is honoured in those countries ....

metta
Chris

[nathan]

who is safe?

metta
Chris

Well, no one is. Samsara. This is the world. A butchershop floor. A bloody battlefield. All that arises also ceases. A mound of bones at the bottom of a dark well. Human life is unfortunate in many ways but not without the blessing of human awareness which has so much potential. Apart from that, frequently uncertain. We can deny or defy that we all live in the same world together but we clearly do in any case.

I think the Dali Lama is correct. Ghandhi was. So many. The peace is won through peace. This is the law of it. The Dhamma.

The best thing the free and peaceful nations of the world could do is turn away from obsession with shocking episodic violence and the escalation of mass violence and give attention to rescuing and providing sanctuary to the vast numbers of peaceful peoples who are oppressed and killed by a relative few all over the world.

Forget going only to fight the few, go also to rescue the many from the few.

Capture and defend the prize not just murder the opposition. That is the purpose of war is it not? What do we value most then if not life? What have we won if we don't, only more death. I prefer to think about the potential human beings have within them for a winnable war against wars of all kinds. The peaceful can be rallied to actively implement the appropriate strategies to nurture the desired conditions for more peace. This can grow just as naturally into ever greater peace as readily as promoting the conditions for war will foster the escalation of war. The peaceful have to take a stand more dangerous than the violent do. The peaceful make many sacrifices already. We also need to become better team players on the whole peace side of this war against war. We could have the home field advantage with this solidarity and overwhelming force of numbers very likely as well.

The wicked kill where they will. All others need only escape this. We could rescue the mass scale victims or else we are continuing on as we have, spectators to an ongoing massive and horrific violent loss of human life undertaken at extremely high cost to all of us with little return on our investments. The few who die in some spectacular way are no less of a loss as people but in terms of producing a better outcome our resources are woefully wasted and misspent on imposing even more military rule over more disparate and divided peoples. The military are best suited to rescuing peoples from violence and containing the violent in the most expedient manners. There will always be things that cannot reasonably be expected and the level of security expected by a very few is out of keeping with the lack of security granted to many. We have the power to act in as forcefully constructive ways as we can act in forcefully destructive ways. If approached in a balanced way the violent would be contained more naturally to themselves by removing the non-violent from their dominions. In such a way all peaceful and well intentioned people would all increasingly have a chance for life and freedom and those who renounce life and freedom can be progressively isolated in such places as remain to contain them.

If those peoples of a warlike spirit were brought to live in the company of those who share their faith, each to face that faith in the lands they now rule by majority, this would resolve the interfaith conditions for domestic religious conflicts in nations which seek to strongly define themselves on that basis. If there are concerns about territories lost, taken or abandoned of groups of peoples they can then take this up diplomatically within the context of a more mutually tolerant and supportive atmosphere in the places where they can have greater stability and security along with some more equivalent lawful rights. If multilateral international transfers or exchanges of militantly combatant populations were mutually agreeable concerning minority ethnic and religious groups then states would be enabled to lawfully insist that these peoples go wherever they need to go to best begin to live in peace with their neighbors. Peoples could be given fair hearings. If efforts were made to rescue the peoples who are peaceful and accepting of greater rights and responsibilities, rescued and protected peoples could be lawfully granted basic protections and rights in many suitable places apart from war zones and countries with high levels of ongoing conflict. Any who cannot escape ongoing violence could be viewed as potentially either a combatant or a captive and the identity would be more apparent to trained military personnel if there are only the two types of people to attempt to identify in a violent region instead of prosecuting wars in large mixed settlements of combatants and non-combatants. The peaceful peoples could be given forewarning of coming engagements in large scale hostilities in their region and sufficient opportunity to evacuate. Otherwise this is simply terrorism on a large scale and there is no big difference in terms of military action, it is simply war and killing of either a few or of many.

The administration of these kinds of mutual accommodations could be determined by international agreements and multi-lateral legislation. There are states that are multi ethnic and multi faith supportive and tolerant and these states can be looked to for leadership and mediation in keeping with the domestic harmony they can demonstrate. I think we should call upon free and peaceful nations to provide increasingly open sanctuary to the peaceful and freedom respecting and thereby to protect these people from any violence in the war torn countries they are or will be trapped within. This can wisely be done by free and peaceful nations in keeping with the needs for ongoing domestic harmony and security.

metta and upekkha

[retrofuturist]

Greetings,

Sri Lanka attack: the death of cricket in Pakistan?http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,25135162-5006003,00.html

Extract:

Now what?

The attacks leave international cricket on the verge of collapse. Cricket in the sub-continent is gone. No more.

Now, who will want to go to the sub-continent, where Kalashnikovs lay in wait? The future of India's rich IPL, for which some Australians have already committed to play, with many of the world's best players, is now under heavy threat.

This comes after England returned home briefly last year when terrorists attacked the Taj Mahal Hotel - a hotel frequently used by Australian cricketers - in Mumbai. There were indications that the same group was behind the Mumbai attacks, when 10 gunmen killed 179 people, mostly foreigners.

"I want to say it's the same pattern, the same terrorists who attacked Mumbai," Salman Taseer, Governor of central Punjab province said. "The kind of weaponry, the kind of arms they had, the way they attacked ... they were not common citizens, they were obviously trained."

Fallout

The International Cricket Council cast doubt on Pakistan's hopes of remaining a co-host of the 2011 World Cup, saying the attacks had changed the global landscape of the game.

While vowing not to make a "knee-jerk" reaction to the deadly attacks on Sri Lanka's cricket team in Lahore, ICC chief executive Haroon Lorgat warned that it will be difficult to persuade cricketers to play in Pakistan.

Metta,
Retro.

[David N. Snyder]

Terrible news. Pakistan is sure going down-hill at the speed of light. The assassination of Bhutto, Taliban take the Swat valley, and now this attack on the Sri Lankan team . . .

Hard to imagine the Dhamma once flourished there . . .

[pink_trike]

These are interesting times. We haven't seen anything yet. No, nothing is sacred in these times of:

[nathan]

Self purification and self renunciation are naturally, more preternaturally and most preternaturally Sacred in relation to all else. This is the only sacred path to sanctuary.

[Tex]

Apparently this would have been worse without some courageous and quick-witted action by one of the drivers:

LAHORE, Pakistan (CNN) -- His job was to drive the bus. But Meher Mohammad Khalil is now being hailed as a lifesaver.

On Wednesday, Meher Mohammad Khalil went back to the place where gunmen attacked his bus.

When gunmen jumped out of bushes and began spraying bullets at the bus carrying the Sri Lankan cricket team Tuesday, Khalil quickly sized up his options and got everyone to safety.

"First I thought there were some firecrackers going off. Then, when I saw the elite force cars in front of me taking fire, I immediately lost my voice," Khalil told CNN on Wednesday.

"At that time, the other elite car that was with us gave me cover, and then, when I saw he was giving me cover, my courage and my patience returned.

"I decided to take the vehicle from there, and one way or another, even if I had to drive over someone, I would take this bus and escape."

Khalil returned to the scene of the attack in the Pakistani city of Lahore on Wednesday to honor those who were killed and to place flowers in their memory.

One of the dead was Zafar Khan, a friend and fellow bus driver who had been in a vehicle behind Khalil.

"My eyes filled with tears that these were people that I was eating with and who died in doing their duty."

Khalil had been part of a convoy heading to Gaddafi Stadium, where the Sri Lankan cricket team was to continue a match against Pakistan.

Six police officers were killed, in addition to Khalil's friend Khan who was driving a bus with the match umpires. See where the attack happened

The Sri Lankan cricketers praised Khalil's quick thinking and action, saying he saved their lives. Six team members were injured by broken glass and shrapnel.

Team captain Mahela Jayawardene wrote on his Web site of Khalil: "He probably saved our lives, showing remarkable bravery in the face of direct gunfire to keep the bus moving."

Crowds mobbed Khalil as he paid his respects at the place where his life changed in an instant.

"He is a hero, a real hero, a real man of the people," a man in the crowd said.

Private donors in Lahore have rewarded Khalil with 300,000 rupees (more than $3,000) -- a small fortune for a Pakistani bus driver.

Today, Khalil says all he can feel is pain of the loss of life. And he called on the attackers to recognize that their victims are humans just like them, with mothers and sisters.

"For God's sake, please stop this terrorism and let this nation breathe a sigh of relief," he said.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/0 ... index.html