More than 30,000 residents have had to flee the loess plateau as a result of

HOW good is the news that India and Pakistan are prepared to talk to each other and, eventually, to sign a treaty banning nuclear-weapons testing? Anyone who thinks this thaw will melt down South Asia's small stockpiles of nuclear weapons or unfreeze the two countries' positions on Jammu & Kashmir, an Indian region part of which Pakistan covets, will be disappointed. Nevertheless, there may be more modest grounds for hope.

With their recent announcements at the UN General Assembly, the Indian and Pakistani prime ministers narrowed the gap with the United States, which imposed sanctions on both countries after they tested nuclear weapons earlier this year. Signing the Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) is one American demand. Atal Behari Vajpayee, India's prime minister, and Nawaz Sharif, his Pakistani counterpart, now say they will do so before September 1999, when signatory countries meet to discuss how to put the treaty into effect. Both governments also recently softened their opposition to talks on a treaty banning production of fissile material used to make nuclear weapons.

Yet neither has promised to refrain from testing missiles or arming them with nuclear warheads, another American demand. Their most encouraging commitment is simply to talk, on trade, drugs, terrorism and other “confidence-building measures”, after the bellicose exchanges that followed their nuclear tit-for-tat.

The Indians insist that tensions with Pakistan are no more likely to provoke nuclear war than did the half-century cold war between America and the Soviet Union, and that they can be trusted with nuclear weapons. The analogy is worringly wide of the mark. Alaska was not Kashmir: it did not harbour a sometimes mistreated minority, nor did the Sovet Union lay claim to it. Russian-backed guerrillas did not massacre American civilians. The two superpowers fought only proxy wars. Pakistan and India have fought three wars since independence in 1947 and their troops routinely shell each other across the “line of control” that divides Kashmir (see map). Where America and the Soviet Union had elaborate safeguards against the sort of miscalculation that could trigger a nuclear exchange, Indian and Pakistani procedures are rudimentary and often ignored. According to a recent paper by the Stimson Centre, a Washington-based think-tank, the two armies use their hotline “perfunctorily” and evade requirements to notify the other side of large troop movements.

Talking broadly

The talks, set to start on October 15th, will cover a broad agenda, as India had wanted, taking in everything from cross-border shelling and deployment of missiles to trade in energy and a proposed bus service from Delhi to Lahore. But Kashmir, which Pakistan regards as the main issue worth discussing, will also be on the agenda. It should be remembered, however, that a previous series of talks between India and Pakistan broke down in 1997 with little to show in the way of progress.

Much depends on whether the two countries' leaders can keep politics from polluting diplomacy. The omens are not encouraging. Mr Vajpayee's government is a shaky coalition of a dozen parties, which can be rallied only by chest-thumping on highly charged issues like Kashmir. The ruling Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party is itself split over how quickly to proceed with economic reforms. This is not a good time for concessions.

Mr Sharif is in worse trouble. Sanctions have hit Pakistan hard and the country is struggling to repay its foreign debt. Pakistan should be eager to scramble back into the West's good graces, if only to open the way for an IMF-led bail-out that would save the country from outright default. But events are pushing the other way. The American attack on terrorist bases in Taliban-led Afghanistan, an ally of Pakistan, the threat of war between Afghanistan and Iran, and growing hardship within Pakistan are hardening opinion against America and its demands. And Mr Sharif, a moderate compared with Islamic fundamentalists and some of the military men who might seek to replace him, also faces allegations of corruption, which he denies; even so, he may now find it more politic to provoke than to placate India.

Even under the best conditions, Kashmir will take decades to sort out. No Pakistani politician will dare suggest that the country's claim to India's only Muslim-majority state is anything less than total. With somewhat less conviction, India demands the return of that part of Kashmir now controlled by Pakistan. Some Indian diplomats say privately that the only solution lies in turning the current line of control into a permanent border. But when the country's chief negotiator on nuclear issues with America hinted at such a settlement recently, he was roundly criticised and obliged to retreat. When it comes to Kashmir, India and Pakistan seem to agree only on rejecting the idea of independence, a demand of some Kashmiri activists.

Nor will talks lead to nuclear disarmament. Both countries refuse to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which would in effect oblige them to scrap their nuclear arsenals. The established nuclear powers are thus in the awkward position of refusing India and Pakistan entry to their club, while admitting that their weapons will not disappear. America is reluctant to withdraw sanctions, for fear of encouraging others, including Iraq or Iran, to build the bomb. Yet America knows that sanctions cannot continue forever.

On September 29th congressional leaders agreed to give President Bill Clinton authority to waive some sanctions for one year. That does not mean they will end quickly. America will insist on progress towards regional peace, on help in stopping further proliferation and on the signing of the CTBT, even though it does nothing to deprive countries of nuclear weapons, once they have tested them. America may be preparing to grit its teeth and admit two new members to the nuclear club.

Will they conform to the club's rules or blow it up? That depends on whether their leaders can avoid using Kashmir as a bargaining chip in domestic politics—and nuclear threats as a lever in Kashmir.

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AP

NEVER before have the quiet, tree-lined roads around the courthouse in Petaling Jaya, a suburb of Kuala Lumpur, seen anything like this: scores of police lorries, a few water cannon, armed personnel, a helicopter hovering overhead and an unprecedented traffic jam. The cause of the disruption, on September 30th, was the second court appearance in two days by Anwar Ibrahim. Mr Anwar was sacked last month as Malaysia's deputy prime minister, arrested a few days later, and has now been charged on five counts of sodomy, and five of abusing his power while in office to block investigations of his crimes.

The day before, on Mr Anwar's first public sighting since his arrest on September 20th, he had displayed his bruised arms and sported a black eye. Mahathir Mohamad, Malaysia's prime minister, who was once Mr Anwar's mentor but is now his main accuser, suggested the wounds were self-inflicted or provoked. Mr Anwar told his lawyers he had been beaten senseless by the police who arrested him. A doctor who later examined him supported this claim. However Mr Anwar met his injuries, Dr Mahathir has sent a powerful message by allowing him to appear in court in this state: that he really does not mind if the outside world is outraged; still less if his own people are scared.

Many Malaysians had already been angered by the treatment meted out to Mr Anwar: the relentless press coverage of his alleged crimes—adultery, corruption and treason, as well as sodomy and abuse of power—is seen as an abuse of Dr Mahathir's grip on the mass media. The charges levelled in court did not seem to justify the build-up. And Mr Anwar's injuries evinced even more public sympathy. Nor were Dr Mahathir's accusations made more plausible by reports that two men, who had pleaded guilty to homosexual relations with Mr Anwar, had decided to recant and appeal against their jail sentences.

Even before the shocking spectacle of Mr Anwar in court, Dr Mahathir had managed to forge unlikely unity among his opponents. Two new coalitions have been launched grouping opposition parties and non-governmental organisations, to take up the rallying cry Mr Anwar had adopted in the brief interlude between high office and the interrogation cell: reformasi, or reform. That was the theme of the protests which, in May, brought down President Suharto of Indonesia. Dr Mahathir has accused Mr Anwar of plotting a similar uprising to topple him after 17 years in office.

Mr Anwar, and several of his supporters, have been arrested under the Internal Security Act (ISA), a draconian piece of anti-terrorist legislation introduced by the British when their then colonial possession was under threat from a communist insurrection in the 1950s. Repeal of the ISA, under which 106 people were locked up in 1987, and which should have become redundant in 1989, when the last communists surrendered, is a demand that brings together many strands of Malaysia's splintered opposition.

Dr Mahathir's opponents see some ground for optimism in all this. They see a movement gathering strength that is not bound by the traditional shackles of Malaysian politics. Parties are organised on racial lines, and the political system reflects the numerical advantage of the Muslim Malay population over other groups, notably the Chinese, who still own much of the country's wealth, and the Indians. The opposition is also heartened that the campaign for reformasi has not petered out with Mr Anwar's arrest. Indeed, it seems to be spreading beyond Kuala Lumpur. Hundreds of protesters have now been detained, and not just in the capital.

The prime minister faces something of a crisis of credibility. The usual foreign suspects—such as America and Australia—have lined up to express concern about the way Mr Anwar is being treated. But even Indonesia's president, B.J. Habibie, telephoned Dr Mahathir when he sacked his deputy, and urged him, in an oblique way, to behave decently. At home, Mr Anwar has roots deep in Dr Mahathir's own party, which dominates the ruling coalition, and especially among Muslim groups. He is no pushover.

Just a few weeks ago, Dr Mahathir seemed poised to call a general election. He still may. Or the resentment his treatment of Mr Anwar has provoked may give him pause. Either way, his hope is that economic success will make voters forget the political thuggery. The stringent capital controls he is now imposing have given Malaysia a respite from the hammering of international markets. But the country is still in the throes of a sharp economic contraction—GDP shrank 4.8% in the first half of the year—and even with the loose monetary and fiscal policies allowed by exchange controls, any short-term boost may simply be storing up trouble for the future.

In the cafés of Petaling Jaya, where they moan about the commotion and the traffic jams brought by this undignified political tussle, the economy is the crucial issue. Dr Mahathir is still in an unassailable position in his party, and hence as prime minister. The movement Mr Anwar inspired is leaderless and disorganised. But the prime minister's heavy-handedness has alienated many former supporters. He needs to show economic results quickly to head off further discontent, but in the present regional and global climate may end up with a black eye of his own.

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AP

AT LAST the Chinese and the Taiwanese are to talk again. Jaw, jaw, in Winston Churchill's phrase, now seems to be preferred to war, war, which the two sides came close to in 1996. Previous talks were called off in mid-1995. Since then so many hopes have been dashed for a resumption of talks that, now they are about to happen, nobody is getting too excited.

The new, and possibly exciting, feature of the five days of discussions due to start on October 14th is that they will be at a higher level than in the past. Koo Chen-fu, Taiwan's top negotiator with China, will meet not only his Chinese counterpart, Wang Daohan, but also Qian Qichen, a Chinese deputy prime minister, and President Jiang Zemin. What will they discuss? China wanted to talk about reunification, but Taiwan has refused to deal with this topic formally. As a result, the meetings are not to be called “talks” but “meetings providing opportunities for discussion”.

This downgrading may have advantages. The informality may encourage plain speaking, so that China's leaders can hear directly about the constraints on the government imposed by Taiwan's democratic system. Mr Jiang needs to grasp just how unpopular the idea of reunification is in Taiwan, to understand how China's own actions have contributed to this, and to realise that advocacy of rapid reunification would be suicide for any serious Taiwanese political party.

China may be prepared at last to face Taiwanese realities. Mr Koo's trip and his proposed meeting with the president are themselves encouraging. At the beginning of the year such a meeting seemed out of the question; China demanded Taiwan's virtual surrender as a condition for restarting talks. Since then there have been signs of new thinking about Taiwan's decade of democratic change. A national conference in China on Taiwanese affairs in May was followed by meetings of a group in the Communist Party's Central Committee that deals with this “rebel province”. Reports from Hong Kong claim that at these meetings military action against Taiwan was ruled out. It would provoke foreign intervention, destroy China's economic progress over the past 20 years and make the country an international pariah for decades. However, it seems that China will not publicly renounce the possible use of force.

Given that Taiwan cannot be forced, can it be wooed? The Hong Kong reports suggest that, if China turned to wooing, Taiwan would have to be treated as an equal. In any talks, priority should be given to some kind of peace settlement.

In Taiwan, though, these alluring ideas are being treated with scepticism. China's long-held objective, speedy reunification, has not changed, say most Taiwanese. Those in charge of Taiwan's policy see no easing of what they consider China's imperious and bullying attitude and its attacks on Taiwan's international stature. If this is wooing, they say, then China has much to learn about courtship. China's invitation to Mr Koo is seen as a result of American pressure to ease tensions, and Taiwan's own tough stance.

Such dismissive talk may, however, be a screen to mask Taiwan's deeper worries. Could China's new friendliness towards Taiwan be a result of a sudden surge of confidence in Beijing? China's leaders have long thought that American encouragement propelled Taiwanese separatism. Bill Clinton's public denial of support for Taiwan's independence during his trip to China in June seems to have persuaded the Chinese that this is not so. The logic is that the rest of the world will follow Mr Clinton's lead and decline to suport Taiwanese ambitions of self-determination. If so, then China's economic and military clout will force Taiwan back into the fold. This is a logic that an increasing number of Taiwanese are themselves starting to accept.

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TWO months after sponsoring a general election to settle Cambodia's political stalemate, foreign governments are still no closer to achieving their main ambition, which is to leave Cambodia alone and let its contesting parties get on with running the country. Earlier this week there had been some hope that they might do so. The three main political parties had appeared to come up with a rough compromise, and this was followed by talks on September 29th between the parties' senior ministers. Optimists hoped this would eventually clear the way for the formation of a coalition government. Meanwhile, observers from the European Union, one of the main sponsors of the July 26th election, were putting the last touches to their final report, due to be released on October 2nd, as they too prepared to leave.

Foreign governments will not escape so easily. At the September 29th meeting, Mr Hun Sen's government agreed to submit a request for a recount to the national election committee. On the same day the International Republican Institute, an American group that monitors elections, issued a report which said the election was “among the worst” it had seen. Two days later Sam Rainsy, Cambodia's former finance minister and the head of one of the two opposition parties, left for America to testify before a Senate subcommittee.

Mr Rainsy complains that the international overseers have been too quick to give their approval to the results of the election, which he says was botched in several ways. Besides questioning the count and claiming that voters were intimidated, he refuses to accept the formula used to allocate seats in Cambodia's National Assembly. That formula was changed without notice just before the election, which Hun Sen's Cambodian People's Party (CPP) won by gaining 41% of the vote.

Even a recount might not amount to much, because Mr Hun Sen controls the country and the armed forces. Since the election, more than 200 opposition supporters have disappeared or been killed. Mr Rainsy hopes America will back him by cutting off non-humanitarian aid and continuing to stop Cambodia taking its seat in the United Nations.

While Mr Rainsy seeks foreign help, his ally, Prince Norodom Ranariddh, faces increasing temptations to abandon him. Although Prince Ranariddh has also complained about the elections, his royalist party is being courted by the CPP. Mr Hun Sen desperately wants to form a government that is accepted by the outside world so that Cambodia can take up membership of the regional club, the Association of South-East Asian Nations, and regain its seat at the UN. His party does not have the two-thirds majority required to form a government on its own. By handing over some ministries, Mr Hun Sen hopes to lure the prince's party into a coalition.

Whatever his feelings towards Mr Hun Sen, it would be hard for Prince Ranariddh to refuse a generous allotment of ministerial posts. His party's MPs are anxious to assume the power which they fought so hard to win. But Prince Ranariddh is also facing heavy pressure from his party's voters, thousands of whom stood up to Mr Hun Sen's soldiers in violent street demonstrations last month designed to get Mr Hun Sen to step down. If the prince now forms a government with Mr Hun Sen, many will feel betrayed.

With foreign support, Prince Ranariddh may continue to hold out for a bigger role in government, in the hope that Mr Hun Sen will make further concessions. But he faces an uphill battle. Most other countries are now content simply to keep dishing out aid. They do not much care who forms a government in Cambodia, so long as it is reasonably stable.

Despite the election flaws, many Cambodian voters appear to agree. Although some were no doubt frightened into voting for the CPP by personal threats, many others simply concluded that opting for the party with the guns was the best way of keeping the peace. That may not say much for Mr Hun Sen's brand of dictatorship. But it does suggest that a cleaner election process might not have made much difference. As one aid worker put it, without a hint of irony: “These elections were important—just thank God he won.”

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AP

THE employees who lit candles and prayed for deliverance as Philippine Airlines was given its last rites are wrong if they believe the expected resurrection of the national flag-carrier is a miracle. But there is a miraculous quality to the way Joseph Estrada, the country's new president, used the affair to transform himself from a demon into an angel in the eyes of many ordinary Filipinos.

Mr Estrada was smiling angelically as the airline's owner, Lucio Tan, shook hands with Alex Barrientos, the president of the company's main trade union, when they struck a deal on September 28th that could allow the carrier to start flying again. The only obstacle remaining is the need for union members to ratify the deal. Their alternative is to lose their jobs. Yet the outcome could have been very different.

Mr Tan, a local tycoon, has controlled the debt-ridden loss-making airline since 1995. He carried out his threat to close it on September 23rd, when the unions failed to agree to a ten-year suspension of collective bargaining in return for shares in the company and seats on the board. Mr Estrada had pressed both sides to keep talking, but the unions accused him of taking the side of management and supporting a rich businessman against oppressed workers. Mr Estrada, a former tough-guy film star, took office in June after portraying himself in the preceding election campaign as a champion of the underdog.

Mr Estrada further angered the unions by refusing to use government money to rescue the airline. Many saw its collapse as not just the demise of a national institution (it claims to be Asia's first airline), but also the loss of a vital form of transport. The Philippine archipelago is made up of more than 7,000 islands and the national airline dominated about half the domestic air-travel market. When it stopped flying, thousands of passengers were left clamouring for seats on the country's smaller airlines, and provincial businessmen were desperate to get cargo out.

Once again, Mr Estrada's opponents criticised him for blustering and blundering. His apparent inaction in the face of Asia's economic turmoil, claim his rivals, shows he is not up to the job of president. Although the Philippines has not been hit as hard as some of its neighbours, the country is nevertheless close to recession. Mr Estrada's oft-repeated excuse for not taking action is that the government does not have the money to do the things he would like it to do. In the case of the bust airline, a lack of cash probably served him well.

The turning-point came when Mr Estrada called in Hong Kong's Cathay Pacific to help out. Only five days after Philippine Airlines stopped flying, Cathay Pacific began operating on some of its domestic routes. Although this inflamed nationalist sentiment, it pushed the national carrier's management and employees back to the negotiating table. The unions then agreed to almost the same deal they had rejected a week earlier. Some domestic services may resume in about a week, though international ones may take longer to restart. However, foreigners are being invited to invest in the airline, and Cathay Pacific and America's Northwest Airlines are among those interested.

All this means Mr Estrada now appears as the saviour of the airline. His reputation for crisis management has also been boosted. And his concern for ordinary people has been demonstrated by his role in helping to save not just the jobs of several thousand of the airline's employees, but also of lots of others who depend on it for their livelihoods—from the porters at airports to the fishermen whose valuable tuna catch has to be flown out to customers.

Mr Estrada did all this without giving in to pressure to abandon the free-market principles that he says he espouses. He resisted calls to use emergency powers to take over the running of the airline, used no government money and made a tempestuous union face reality. The affair has provided Mr Estrada with a much-needed fillip. Before he was elected, the president hit back at critics who said he could not handle the job: “They are underestimating me. So I'll give them the surprise of their lives.” The deft way he turned the airline dispute to his advantage was certainly that.

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AP

“NEVER underestimate us Singaporeans,” a correspondent to the local Straits Times recently warned Malaysia's prime minister, Mahathir Mohamad. “We will shed blood to defend our country's honour.” Stirring stuff. But have relations between the island-city of Singapore and the Malaysian hinterland really reached such a bellicose point? With new bones of contention being unearthed every week, the 3m Singaporeans are now constantly being reminded that their wealth and security are fragile. But not that fragile.

Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore's senior minister, has seen it all before. “It's one way for us to get it out of the system,” he said this week, “doing a war dance, plumed feathers and so on.” He conceded there was a danger of “an accidental clash of plumage” but deemed it unlikely because Singapore takes things “calmly and quietly, calculating the odds”.

Mr Lee contributed to the squabble by publishing on September 16th—his 75th birthday—the first volume of his memoirs*. It raised hackles across the border with an account of Singapore's expulsion in 1965 from a short-lived federation with Malaysia. Some Malaysians thought it reopened old racial wounds between the Chinese, who predominate in Singapore, and the Malay majority in Malaysia.

Earlier this month Malaysia closed its air-space to the Singaporean air force and said Singapore needed clearance before its ships entered Malaysian waters for search and rescue missions. These are minor inconveniences, but they symbolise just how poor relations have become.

Ever since 1996, when Mr Lee said reunification with Malaysia would be possible only if it pursued more “meritocratic” policies, there has been a series of tiffs. The latest arises from the chaos caused in Singapore's financial markets by Malaysia's abrupt imposition of capital controls this month.

For Dr Mahathir, tapping the antagonism many Malaysians feel towards Singapore has been a useful distraction from the sharp economic downturn and political turmoil at home. But he also seems genuinely to resent Singapore for not doing more for his sickly economy, or—worse—for trying to undermine it by encouraging capital flight. But despite Dr Mahathir's tirades, many Singaporeans hope he will win his political battles. His sacked deputy, Anwar Ibrahim, once an Islamic youth leader and later a spokesman for liberal reform, is distrusted on both counts. Dr Mahathir offers stability.

Singaporean officials say they have nothing to gain from Malaysia's troubles. Singapore has avoided the banking excesses, bad investments and policy uncertainty that have added to its neighbours' woes. But, as a regional entrepot, it too is facing a slide into recession and needs a recovery in East Asia. Singapore also suffers a sense of deep strategic anxiety. It is a dot on the map, surrounded by Malaysia and giant Indonesia. It even has to rely on Malaysia for much of its water supply—another source of tension.

Ironically, Mr Lee's comments in 1996, like his memoirs, were prompted in part by the feeling that young Singaporeans had forgotten how independence was “thrust upon them”, and was still vulnerable. Many will have learned that lesson from the rising temperature. Those Malaysians who accuse their neighbours of being superior and smug would welcome a change in attitude. But Singapore still has one of the highest standards of living in Asia, and its streets are still free of litter, crime and political protest. Its government may feel that, even more than usual, it has much to be smug about.

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EPA

THE main event was well advertised, but the warm-up act almost stole the show. After sacking Anwar Ibrahim on September 2nd as his deputy prime minister and finance minister, it was only a matter of time before Mahathir Mohamad finished off his once-anointed successor with an arrest warrant. While Mr Anwar went around the country denying accusations of treason and sodomy (a crime in Malaysia), the police arrested some of his associates. At the conclusion of the Commonwealth Games, this year being held in Malaysia, Dr Mahathir's show of strength was expected to end with a convincing finale. But few had expected the unprecedented level of popular support Mr Anwar attracted.

At rally after rally, Mr Anwar, an articulate intellectual, proved that he could also be a fiery public speaker as he denounced the heavy-handed tactics being used against him. His defiant tour ended on September 20th when more than 30,000 people swarmed into the centre of Kuala Lumpur to hear him speak. After peppering Dr Mahathir's regime with accusations of corruption, economic mismanagement and abuse of power, Mr Anwar was hoisted on to the crowd's shoulders and swept into Merdeka (Independence) Square, while Britain's Queen Elizabeth, in town for the conclusion of the games, sang hymns in an adjacent church. From there the protesters marched to the headquarters of the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), Dr Mahathir's party, and then on to Mr Anwar's house. Having seen enough, Dr Mahathir dropped the curtain.

In the event, his arrest later that night was hardly anti-climactic. The police donned black masks and, armed with submachineguns, broke through Mr Anwar's unlocked front door in the middle of a press conference. They took him away and later announced he was being held under the Internal Security Act (ISA), a remnant of British colonial rule which allows trouble-makers to be held without explanation. After chasing off another demonstration with tear-gas and water cannon, the police arrested dozens more protesters. By mid-week they were holding 12 of Mr Anwar's closest allies under the ISA. Dr Mahathir said on television that, since two of Mr Anwar's friends had been charged with sodomy with him, it seemed only fair that Mr Anwar should also be charged. This was followed by a clampdown on anti-government protests and a ban on supporters going to Mr Anwar's home.

All this has left Malaysians wondering what will happen next. Given the dominance of UMNO over Malaysian politics, and the banishing of Dr Mahathir's rivals, his grip on power looks firmer than ever. He directly controls the police. The local media have long been brought to heel. The independence of the courts is widely questioned. And although the Malaysian economy has been rocked by Asia's financial troubles, Dr Mahathir is doing his best to postpone the effects until after the next election, which he is likely to call later this year or early in 1999.

It is hard to see anyone mounting a strong challenge in that election. On September 23rd, the police said Mr Anwar would be brought to trial within a week. If he is convicted, that would prevent him from standing. Mr Anwar has, however, passed the banner to his wife, Wan Azizah Wan Ismail. She has impressed many as a potential leader. In Asia it is something of a tradition for wives and daughters to take up the campaigns of husbands or fathers persecuted by political rivals. Yet after accusing the government of plotting to inject her husband with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, she has also been questioned by police and threatened with arrest.

The bigger threat to Dr Mahathir may not be a direct challenge from Mr Anwar at all, but the prospect that opposition groups will gather enough votes to strip away some seats from his ruling coalition, the Barisan Nasional, of which UMNO is the dominant party. The Barisan Nasional's consistent two-thirds majorities in Parliament have not only allowed it to alter the Malaysian constitution at will, but have also come to be seen as a measure of the coalition's viability. If that majority were eroded, Dr Mahathir's leadership of UMNO would be much more shaky.

Could that happen? If there is enough outrage over Mr Anwar's arrest and trial, voters could surprise the prime minister, despite UMNO's huge campaign coffers and strong political base. In two recent by-elections, the party has lost seats to both Malay and non-Malay opposition parties. And the supporters chanting for Reformasi at Mr Anwar's rallies appear to have been drawn from across the political spectrum.

Eventually it may be the economy that does more damage to Dr Mahathir. The capital controls he has put in place could spare Malaysia the worst of the adjustment pains from Asia's economic downturn, for the moment. But it is increasingly clear that the purpose of those controls is not only to stabilise the currency, but also to ignore the danger signals from the regional slump. In the past month Dr Mahathir has not only fixed the exchange rate, but has also taken several measures to pump up the economy. Banks have been allowed to change the definition of non-performing loans, thus creating an illusion of sound balance-sheets. The central bank has injected more liquidity into the economy and has instructed private banks to do the same, issuing quotas of 8% credit growth for the year.

These measures will help Malaysians feel better, for now. But when the effects of even more excess credit eventually kick in, the pain will be all the more severe. Indeed, Malaysia may end up in much deeper trouble than some of its South-East Asian neighbours. For instance, Thailand, which at the beginning of the region's current troubles had much greater problems, now looks like recovering faster. This could do more to undermine Dr Mahathir. By mid-week, Merdeka Square was back to normal, the protesters having lost their appetite for conflict. But looming over it stood a pair of silent protests: the towering offices of Hongkong Bank and Citibank, two of the powerful foreign banks at which Dr Mahathir has so gleefully thumbed his nose. In the end, it may be protests by bankers and investors that prove more lasting—and more damaging to Dr Mahathir—than those led by Mr Anwar.

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THE floods, a cynic might say, came just in time. The fight to control the waters that officials say killed 3,000 people this summer has helped divert attention from the government's dismal struggle in other areas—its difficulty in pursuing reform and in finding economic growth. The People's Liberation Army, too often associated with smuggling and corruption until the heroic soldiers did battle with the floodwaters, is now refulgent with pride. The dyke-savers have been acclaimed as proletarian heroes. Already, President Jiang Zemin has beatified several “martyrs of the flood-fights”. One has been immortalised as a statue.

Even as the waters recede, they will remain useful for the government. Official rumblings suggest that the flooding might soon be blamed for the government's failure to reach the 8% growth in 1998 that has been promised ad nauseam all year. This would be disingenuous. It is now apparent that flood damage, though serious, is not as extensive as the government claims, particularly in the oil-producing regions of the north-east. China's grain harvest is likely to be no less than last year's. Meanwhile, government spending in flood-stricken areas may actually raise growth.

But this is a story not only for cynics. In some state-controlled newspapers a remarkably frank debate has erupted about the man-made contributions to the causes of the floods, particularly the admittedly ancient question of overcrowding on the flood-plains, as well as deforestation on the middle and upper reaches of the mighty Yangzi River and its tributaries. Denuded slopes and soil erosion help explain why, even when the summer rainfall has not been spectacularly high, the volume of water barrelling down the Yangzi has risen during the 1990s. A government ban on logging is a welcome first step, even if in places it will at first be disregarded.

One effect of the debate is that people are starting to take the water shortage in the north equally seriously. Floods notwithstanding, the Chinese have available, per person, only about a fifth of the world average supply of water. In the vast northern and north-western regions of Inner Mongolia, Shanxi, Shaanxi and Gansu provinces, that falls to just 4-5% of the world average. “There is no doubt in my mind”, says Juergen Voegele, of the World Bank, “that China's water shortage is the key problem, greater than the floods.”

A visit to Taiyuan, the grimy capital of Shanxi, a sulphurous province of coal mines, brings the point home. The aquifers there have all but run dry. Water charges are among the highest in China. Water is turned on for at most three hours a day, and those living above the third floor can expect none at all. Water consumption per person (industry included) is only 20 litres—just over five American gallons—a day.

Local officials say that the shortage of water restricts the kind of businesses they can attract. Clean power production and coal-washing are constrained. Another World Bank official says bluntly that, if nothing is done about water, Taiyuan's industrial production will have to fall by 85%.

A few years ago the provincial government considered moving 2m of Taiyuan's inhabitants several dozen kilometres closer to water, in effect, rebuilding the city. That plan has been shelved in favour of a project on an imperial scale, indeed China's third largest. A massive dam is being built near the town of Pianguan, across a canyon where the Yellow River cuts through the Loess plateau in Shanxi's north-east, along the border with Inner Mongolia. From there, water will be pumped, through several hundred kilometres of underground tunnels and down existing river courses, to Taiyuan, to Datong in the north-east and to the smaller city of Shouzhou in between. The Wanjiazhai project, costing $2.2 billion ($400m of it World Bank money), might allow these cities' current annual consumption of water to rise by 1.2 billion cubic metres.

The plan to suck water out of the Yellow River has brought grumblings from two downstream provinces, Shandong and Hebei. Zheng Yousan, party secretary in charge of the diversion project and an irrepressible booster, counters that these provinces have long benefited from Shanxi's inability to draw off its allocated share. Yet the problem remains. Officials are talking enthusiastically about reforesting the land beside the upper Yellow River, to help regularise the flow. A project to dwarf all others is being mooted that would divert Yangzi water to various reaches of the Yellow River. Part of the scheme would involve building tunnels and covered water courses over several hundred kilometres of high, inhospitable terrain in Qinghai province. To the outsider, the whole project sounds hare-brained. But the Chinese accomplished something similar when building the 2,000-kilometre Grand Canal during the Sui dynasty, 1,300 years ago.

The residents of Taiyuan, by Chinese standards at least, are adequately off. That cannot be said for most of the 70m or so rural residents of the Loess plateau, an area the size of France that spans several north-western provinces and autonomous regions. The Loess soil, fine and silty, is fertile enough, and deep. But rainfall amounts to only 20-55 centimetres (8-22 inches) a year. And when it does fall, it often washes away the soil and crops planted on the steep slopes. The erosion—over 1 billion tonnes of soil washed away each year—gives the Yellow River its name. Meanwhile, the high Gobi desert rolls down in sandy billows, swallowing more of the plateau each year. More than half of the region's population barely subsists, scraping together less than $50 a year.

Yet the plateau is experiencing a remarkable transformation. The denuded hills were once covered in thick, mixed forest. Officials say that in the 13th century, a time of Mongol invasions, Chinese armies cut down the woods the better to see what, with political correctness, are now called “invading ethnic minorities”. But the more recent depredations of peasant farmers and Mao-era collectivisation are also much to blame.

Under a programme led by Mr Voegele, who, it is clear, is something of a folk hero on the plateau, reforestation has begun on a vast scale. Though the scheme is barely four years old, plantations of pine trees in many parts stretch as far as the eye can see. In time, it is hoped deciduous woodland will seed between the pines. Management of the forests is contracted out to local farmers, who at first are responsible for keeping sheep and goats out, but who will later be able to use the forest for timber and fodder.

Lower down, the more fertile hills are terraced and planted with cereal crops. Small earth dams stop water and soil running away. By such methods, nine-tenths of the water, and nearly all the soil, is retained.

A staggering 150,000 hectares (370,000 acres) of plateau have been rehabilitated in the past four years, including 45,000 hectares of terraces. A second project of equal size is now being considered. The World Bank has put in a mere $150m in soft loans, with another $100m found locally.

Farmers proudly display their loan contracts, which guarantee land-use rights for up to 100 years. A soil conservationist predicts that the afforestation will eventually lead to higher rainfall. “Master the mountains and conserve the waters,” shouts a giant slogan on a replanted mountainside. “Change heaven and revive the earth.” The earth, says a woman farmer in her village far from the metalled road to Pianguan, has certainly been revived. “But”, she reminds visitors from the cities, “we still eat bitterness up here.”

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WHEN he called Australia's general election for October 3rd, John Howard, the prime minister, was banking on public boredom working in his favour. Australians usually place politics well below sport in their order of priorities, and the campaign has coincided with a series of big sporting events which promised that voters' attention would be fixed on contests between athletes rather than politicians.

But Australians seem to be taking the election seriously enough, and their interest is not working to the benefit of Mr Howard's conservative coalition. A Newspoll opinion survey published two weeks before voting day showed the opposition Labor Party, led by Kim Beazley, with 52%, against 48% for the ruling Liberal-National parties, taking into account the distribution of votes from minor parties under Australia's preferential system. This would be enough to unseat the government, which has a majority of 42 in Parliament. Those who predicted at the outset that Mr Howard's lot would be returned with a reduced majority have fallen silent.

Mr Howard has staked his re-election on a plan to reform Australia's tax system. Its centrepiece is an unpopular new consumption tax of 10% on almost all goods and services, including food. When he launched his campaign in Sydney on September 20th, Mr Howard called on voters to “ask what is good for Australia, not what is good for you or me.” It is a risky request.

Mr Beazley told a rally of party faithful at his launch in Brisbane three days later that the election was a contest between “a vision for a nation and a plan for a tax”. He promised to spend almost A$8 billion ($4.7 billion) on schools, universities, hospitals and job schemes, and to reduce unemployment from 8.3% to 5% by 2004. This too could be risky, as there is no guarantee that Australia's economy, heavily dependent on volatile markets in Asia, can sustain enough growth to meet such targets.

A loser in the campaign seems to be Pauline Hanson, a populist independent renowned for her attacks on Asian immigration, multi-culturalism and welfare spending on aborigines. In the Newspoll survey, support for her party, One Nation, had fallen to 6% from 10% in August. Electoral pundits predict that Mrs Hanson will lose her own seat in Queensland now that all candidates standing against her have agreed to place her last in the preferential voting order. But no one is writing off Mrs Hanson's impact altogether. Her main support lies in rural Australia, where towns are dying and people have complained of being abandoned by the main parties. Now both Mr Howard and Mr Beazley are competing with each other in promises to breathe new life into country centres.

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Reuters

FOR a regime contemptuous of foreign views, Mynamar's ruling junta is surprisingly beholden to an international calendar. The UN's General Assembly, for example, which opened on September 21st, is a big annual event. Usually, the assembly passes a resolution critical of the junta. To avoid making the censure worse, the generals restrain themselves. This may explain their surprisingly reticent reaction to the latest affront from their leading opponent, Aung San Suu Kyi, and her National League for Democracy (NLD).

On September 16th, Miss Suu Kyi and her colleagues announced that they had formed a committee to represent the parliament elected in 1990, but never allowed to meet, because the NLD had won over 80% of the seats. This was the party's fulfilment of a pledge to convene parliament if there were no progress towards a negotiated settlement by August 21st. Doing anything more was hard. By this week nearly 900 NLD members—including most of the NLD's surviving members of parliament still in the country—were in detention.

The junta's mouthpieces had threatened to outlaw the NLD if it went ahead with its plan. Columnists had also called for Miss Suu Kyi (who, as they often remind their readers, is married to a Briton), to be deported and for her closest lieutenant, Tin Oo, to be arrested. But, in the event, government spokesmen preferred to play down the latest crime, contenting themselves with scoffing at the committee's effrontery, and reassuring the world that soldiers would not be distracted from the serious business of government.

Certainly, the junta could do without further foreign criticism. Its stubborn refusal to talk to Miss Suu Kyi is earning it resentment even from its neighbours, who had hoped that admitting Myanmar to their regional club, the Association of South-East Asian Nations, last year, might encourage better behaviour. And a report last month from the International Labour Organisation, a UN body, concluded that, despite the junta's frequent denials, the use of forced labour in the country is “widespread and systematic”, and implemented with “a total disregard for the human dignity, safety and health and basic needs of the people”.

But the generals have troubles enough at home. Fierce repression has enforced an uneasy calm after student demonstrations in August, despite occasional small-scale protests. In the tea shops, the word of choice for the present mood is “explosive”. Even more worryingly, all may not be well in the army. At the Thai border, defectors tell of unhappiness in the ranks over pay and even food; this year many army units became responsible for growing their own rice.

There are also reports that several senior officers have been arrested, after responding to an appeal by Miss Suu Kyi broadcast by foreign radio stations. It reminded them that the army belongs to the people, not the other way around. The last time the people of Myanmar tried to shake off military rule—ten years ago—thousands of people were slaughtered. The junta's biggest worry may not be the text of a UN resolution, but whether, next time, its soldiers would shoot to kill.

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Which economic group was the early beneficiaries of the Communist revolution in China?

Which weather condition occurs during East Asia's winter monsoon quizlet?

Which of the following groups constituted the Chinese Communist Party's most important base of support?

Which of the following is the best characterization of the pattern of human settlement in Southeast Asia?