Tattoo of a Terrorist

(VIEWER DISCRETION ADVISED)

At the bottom is a photograph (taken and released by Reuters) of the body of one of the terrorists involved in the failed terrorist attack on Peshawar Airbase in Pakistan on 15 December 2012, credit for which was immediately claimed by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) (notably before the photo was released). He was killed by Pakistani security forces in a firefight after being encircled during a search operation on 16 December 2012 in the vicinity of the Peshawar Airbase.

Religious Muslims (which the TTP claims to be) consider tattoos and the artistic depiction of the human and animal form to be un-Islamic. Yet this terrorist not only has tattoos, but tattoos depicting a satanic skull with multiple horns and a hand with long fingernails. The skull, let alone a satanic one, is a very un-Islamic art form and not one in vogue in predominantly Muslim countries like Pakistan. It goes without saying that tattoos are rare in Pakistan even among liberal Westernized Pakistanis, let alone religious ones. This begs the question: does this back, covered with satanic symbols, belong to an ideologically-driven religious Muslim fighting a Jihad?

A few years ago, a similar photograph was released by Pakistani authorities (now widely available on the Internet and too explicit to be reproduced on this blog) showing the naked body of a dead terrorist who was killed while fighting the Pakistan Army in Swat Valley. He had long hair and a long beard that made him look like a religious Muslim (or someone belonging Pakistan's tribal areas) but was, strangely, uncircumcised (circumcision is a mandatory religious obligation for all Muslim males before they reach puberty). A DNA test carried on his body by Pakistani intelligence revealed that he was a Gurkha, who are Hindus from the mid-western, eastern Nepal and the Gorkhaland region of India. Both the Indian and British armies enlist Gurkhas in elite fighting units in their respective armies.

Viewers may draw their own conclusions as to who these terrorists actually are; what their real objectives are; who their handlers are; and which ultimate beneficiaries/controllers are directing these terrorist attacks on Pakistan's high value defence assets through them. For those unaware, Peshawar Airbase houses two fighter squadrons of the Pakistan Air Force (PAF), including the first operationalized squadron of the PAF's JF-17 Thunder multi-role fighters, which, apparently, were the targets of the terrorists (see also this article).

Photo credit: Khuram Parvez/Reuters

Most Favoured Nation Status to India catastrophic for Pakistani Agriculture

Dr. Mohammad Tariq Bucha

The government has planned to grant the Most Favoured Nation (MFN) status to India by the end of 2012. The farmers believe that such a basic shift in trade policy would require a significant amount of research and confidence of important stakeholders before working out specific modalities of liberalising trade relations with India.

Moreover, any such opening should occur in a phased and strategic manner to ensure that Pakistan’s agricultural and food security is not compromised. However, it is strange that the government is pursuing a reckless path to hasty trade liberalisation with India without consulting the farmers’ community.

Islamabad is currently maintaining a ‘negative list’ of over 1,000 items prohibited for import into Pakistan, but there is not a single agricultural item on this list. If approved by the federal cabinet by December 31, 2012, the ‘negative list’ will be replaced with a time-bound ‘sensitive list’ of about 100 goods with all other goods carrying 5 percent maximum tariff. The ‘sensitive list’ is likely to include only those items already on the ‘negative list’. Since there are no agricultural items on this list, this economically reckless oversight must be redressed.

The Pakistani farmers - small, medium and large - are of the opinion that a sudden liberalisation of trade with India, which ignores their legitimate interests and excludes agricultural goods from both the ‘negative’ and ‘sensitive’ lists, will prove to be suicidal for agriculture and ultimately the nation’s economy. It is in the interest of the government to give attention and support in the following context:

Pakistan must pursue a fair trade policy, rather than a hastily negotiated one-sided free trade regime with India. Agriculture should be forthwith removed from the ambit of this ill-planned trade regime.

India provides roughly $66 billion per annual subsidies to its agricultural sector. Pakistan’s entire GDP is roughly about $210 billion, and giving heavy subsidies to any sector will not be possible in the foreseeable future. Thus, agricultural goods must benefit from the protection of ‘negative’ and sensitive’ lists as well as technical regulations.

In India, a bag of urea sells for Rs 610; whereas in Pakistan, it is Rs 1,800 per bag. High Speed Diesel, a critical agriculture input, in India is priced at Rs 85 per litre against Rs 115 per litre in Pakistan. India also provides significant subsidies on indirect inputs such as electricity and seeds, both of which are almost free in India; whereas its rates in Pakistan have become extremely unaffordable. Pakistan also levies GST at 16 percent on all agriculture inputs, which are tax exempt in India. India’s average duty rate for agricultural goods is as high as 34 percent; whereas Pakistan’s average duty rate is half, i.e. as low as17 percent. Thus, India not only provides very large subsidies to help its farmers, but also erects high tariff barriers so that they are protected from competition, including agricultural exports from Pakistan. India maintains a minimum price support programme on 25 agricultural crops; whereas Pakistan has just one such agricultural crop, i.e wheat. Thus, the protection given by New Delhi to its agri-sector is significantly greater than Pakistan.

Even though India granted the MFN status to Pakistan in 1996, the balance of trade has heavily favoured it because it also imposed non-tariff and tariff barriers to deny access to Pakistani goods. Thus, Pakistan’s exports to India could not increase beyond $332 million since 1996-97; while on the other hand, even without being granted the MFN status, Indian exports to Pakistan have increased manifold, i.e. from $158 million to $2.0 billion during the same period. The ratio that was 80:20 in India’s favour now stands increased to 85:15. What more has been planned for Pakistan, is quite clear. Therefore, any knee-jerk and reckless opening of trade that does not protect our agriculture will favour India, even more to the detriment of the Pakistani economy.

In its negotiations with its Indian counterpart, the Pakistani team must insist that India lowers its tariffs on agricultural goods from Pakistan, which it can do bilaterally with respect to Pakistan, as per WTO rules.

Additionally, India has a myriad number of non-tariff barriers, which it imposes on goods that try and get access to the Indian market, particularly for agricultural goods. Before Pakistan grants the MFN status to India, it must demand that it remove most of its non-tariff barriers, which serve protectionist purposes.

High Indian subsidies and protectionist tariffs for agricultural goods would prevent Pakistani agricultural goods to be exported to India. We must include necessary agricultural goods in the current ‘negative’ and the planned ‘sensitive’ lists. If the agriculture sector is discriminated against by our own government in such a manner and not given the same protection given to industrial goods, it will force farmers to convert land to non-agricultural use leading to the closure of factories and shrinking markets. It will cause a total collapse of Pakistan’s economy with grave threat to its food security, thereby our sovereignty.

Liberalising trade with India through the Wagah route will inundate our smaller and more fragile markets. Farmers firmly believe that Pakistan and India should both benefit from a resumption of bilateral trade relations, but they support phased and measured trade liberalisation. But the cardinal principle that ‘mutually-beneficial bilateral trade must be fair in order to be truly free trade’ should not be ignored, which is enshrined in the WTO principles as well.

Any such change in policy must be transparent and be made in consultation with Pakistani farmers through different farming organisations, which are the major and important stakeholders of the agricultural sector in the country. Without a trade policy that affords protection to agriculture, granting the MFN status to India will be catastrophic for the tens of millions of people whose livelihood is based on agriculture. As is shown in the chart, India provides minimum support prices to 25 agricultural produce by an annual subsidy of $66 billion also.

The leaders in Islamabad need to wake up and not give away Pakistan’s food security and sovereignty just to please few vested interests. They must also take swift action to avert a situation that will lead to the devastation of our agriculture and economy.

The writer is the President of Farmers Associates Pakistan (FAP). E-mail: buchatariq@gmail.com

This article was published in 'The Nation' newspaper on 7 December 2012

Remembering Bhagat Singh, Forgetting Aurangzeb

It is regrettable, if not shameful, that not a single road in Lahore is named after the sixth Mughal Emperor, Abul Muzaffar Muhi-ud-Din Muhammad Aurangzeb (1618-1707), the man who gave Lahore (and possibly the land that is now Pakistan) its greatest, grandest and most beautiful architectural treasure, the Badshahi Mosque.

A historical opportunity to correct this omission was presented to the City District Government Lahore recently when it formed the “Dilkash Lahore Committee” to rename major roads, bridges and intersections in Lahore. However, it is regrettable that, on the recommendation of the Committee, 26 roads, bridges and intersections in Lahore have recently been renamed after important personalities of Pakistan and British India, yet not a single one of them has been renamed after Aurangzeb.

This seemingly blatant omission can only point towards the historical myopia of the members of the Committee that was constituted for this purpose. One can only hope that such omission was not deliberate but rather due to an oversight, reckless as it may be.

Those who were entrusted with the task of renaming of Lahore’s roads, bridges and intersections had a moral, historical and legal obligation to (i) take into account all considerations that ought to have been taken into account; (ii) exercise their discretion reasonably and; (ii) represent the aspirations of the majority of the residents of Lahore and not their own personal desires, biases, agendas and vested interests, if any.

Furthermore, giving the authority to decide the names of Lahore’s major roads, bridges and intersections to a select committee comprising only a handful of Lahore’s residents (without any public survey, poll or referendum) is tantamount to empowering a tiny fraction of Lahore’s residents (who may represent a particular viewpoint) with the right to decide for the vast majority of the city’s residents, who may hold a different viewpoint. Such exercise of discretion is arbitrary, unreasonable, discriminatory, unfair and non-judicious. There should be written and legally-binding guidelines for naming and renaming of public roads in Pakistan. If there aren’t any, there ought to be. If there are, then it should be examined if these are being complied with.

It may be pertinent to mention that the most expensive and prestigious road in New Delhi, the capital of India, is called “Aurangzeb Road,” i.e. after the Mughal Emperor. Indeed, one British newspaper called it “India’s richest road.” The Times of India referred to it as the road “paved with gold.” Such is its prominence. This is notwithstanding the fact that Emperor Aurangzeb is not very popular amongst a large section of the majority Hindu population of India (mostly due to demonization, historical misinterpretation and myths built up by communal, bigoted and revisionist Hindutva historians). Yet it goes to the credit of New Delhi's municipal authorities that they had the courage to accept and recognize historical realities and felt the need to honour and remember Emperor Aurangzeb by naming (and keeping) one of the major roads in their capital in his memory.

If New Delhi, in the Hindu-majority secular Republic of India, can honour Aurangzeb, so can Lahore, in the Muslim-majority Islamic Republic of Pakistan. If the City District Government Lahore can bend backwards to rename a chowk as Bhagat Singh Chowk (many residents of the Shadman locality have protested against renaming of Shadman Chowk as Bhagat Singh Chowk and some have even challenged the same in the Lahore High Court), then it can certainly find a major road in Lahore to rename after Aurangzeb.

A Silent Invasion

Asif Ezdi

In his appearance last Monday before the Supreme Court, Raja Pervaiz Ashraf sought some more time to deliberate on the issue of writing a letter to the Swiss authorities and assured the court that he would do his best to deal with it. “Mujh par vishvas karen” (trust me), the Prime Minister said, using an opaque Hindi word meaning trust, confidence, belief.

Raja’s use of Hindi in addressing the court was striking as well as jarring, given the fact that there are perfectly suitable Urdu words with the same meaning, not only those of Arabic origin – like yaqin and i’timad – but also indigenous ones like bharosa. Vishvas, on the contrary, is not one of the hundreds of thousands of words that are common to Urdu and Hindi, but has been given currency in India as a result of a campaign by Hindu nationalists to popularise or coin “authentic” local substitutes for “foreign” terms.

Raja’s choice of Hindi vocabulary would hardly merit comment, were it not for the fact that it is symptomatic of a creeping cultural penetration of Pakistan by our eastern neighbour, to which the government seems to be completely oblivious. This silent invasion is taking place mainly through the opening of Pakistan to cheap Bollywood movies, the airing of Indian TV’s entertainment programmes by our cable operators, the free availability of pirated DVDs and videos of Indian films on the local market and, most insidious of all, the home screening of popular children’s programmes, especially cartoons, dubbed in Hindi.

Young impressionable minds are the most vulnerable to this onslaught. But they are not the only ones. Raja hardly belongs to that category and even at his age he seems to have subconsciously imbibed Hindi vocabulary simply by watching too many of the Bollywood thrillers.

Most of these oeuvres offer little more than a standard fare of love triangles, scheming villains, melodramatic dialogue, “wet sari scenes and lots and lots of singing and dancing in alpine meadows” (Washington Post). and are devoid of any artistic or cultural merit. If someone chooses third-rate entertainment, it is of course a matter of individual choice. Where the state comes in is when the national interest or the fabric of society is threatened. From this point of view, there are three reasons why imports from Bollywood should be a matter of public concern.

First, these movies provide a generous serving of what a recent Associated Press story on Bollywood described delicately as “swelling songs, innervating rain storms, and jiggly dances” which transgress the bounds of decency and good decorum. The titillating scenes which are their main attraction promote vulgarity and obscenity, as the Supreme Court has remarked on a petition by concerned citizens. Because of lack of action by the government, the Supreme Court has now taken the matter in its hands. Although the airing of “obscene” material is prohibited, there is no definition of this term under the law. The court has asked Pemra to consult all interested parties to determine what amounts to “obscenity.” The case is still pending, but in the absence of a commitment by the government judicial action will not be enough.

Second, Indian movies increasingly portray such errant behaviour as steamy love affairs, promiscuity and marital infidelity as normal and acceptable. This tends to promote a culture of permissiveness in the society at large and should be a matter of concern to the state. Even Afghanistan, India’s strategic partner and one of the biggest foreign markets for Bollywood films, has had to draw a line, and in 2008 the government was forced by pressure from the parliament and the Shura-e-Ulema to order local television networks to stop broadcasting five Indian soap operas because they were not in keeping with “Afghan religion and culture.”

When the Musharraf regime lifted the ban on the import of Indian movies in February 2008, it gave the assurance that “religious and cultural norms and values” of the country would be protected. But this commitment has not been fulfilled. Since most Pakistani viewers watch pirated (and therefore uncensored) Indian movies at home, there is no way to ban unwanted films or to excise undesirable material, other than by penalising their illegal sale in the country. But this has never been done. The truth is that the government has an unwritten policy not to enforce its declared policy to ban Bollywood movies which are offensive to our values and culture.

Third, the home screening of pirated Indian films brings Indian culture and language right into our living rooms across all barriers of law and policy. As a result, our distinct way of life, values and language, which we have successfully preserved through the centuries in an alien and hostile environment, are being challenged as never before. Children and young people are particularly susceptible.

Typically, the government does not have any policy to counter this threat. It is perhaps not even alive to its existence. But it is not the government alone which has been remiss. The civil society, which is quick to take up causes dear to the West, and the political parties, have been remarkably silent on the challenges posed by the easy availability of uncensored Indian movies and the airing of Indian TV programmes. Besides, the media, especially private TV channels, has contributed to the problem by idolising Indian film stars and giving extensive coverage to gossip about their lives.

The cultural onslaught that Pakistan is facing from its larger neighbour is not unique. In several European countries, France in particular, there is resistance against the large share of Hollywood in the movie market and against the adoption of English words in the local language. Jack Lang, who served as French Culture Minister under Mitterrand, warned two decades ago of the dangers of the “Coca Colonisation of the minds.” The effort to purge the French language of foreign words is even older. The French Academy was set up in 1635 as an official authority to protect the purity of the French language. It has now been tasked to coin French words in place of English terms which have crept into French. France also has laws to limit the use of English on TV and to impose translations of English slogans in advertising. Unofficial academic or civil society organisations to guard against the mingling of English words in the national language exist in Germany, Russia and Spain. In China as well, some linguists have been objecting to the mushrooming of English loanword in Chinese.

The ban on Indian movies was imposed in 1965 and lifted in 2008. Today, there are good reasons for reinstating it. The Supreme Court has taken up the issue of combating vulgarity and obscenity, the main source of which is Bollywood. In addition, the ban is needed to preserve our cultural values and to protect our language from disfigurement.

But a prohibition on the screening of Indian movies in our cinemas will not be enough. The government would also have to enforce a complete ban on the import, production and sale of DVDs and videos of Indian movies and of films and children’s programmes of other countries which have been dubbed in Hindi.

Besides, to fill the gap created by a ban on Indian films, the government should provide financial support for the dubbing of quality foreign-produced movies, educational films and children’s programmes in our own languages. There is a precedent. In France, the government provides huge subsidies to dubbing firms. Also, the National Language Authority, like the French Academy, should be given the task of popularising and, if necessary, coining Urdu words to substitute foreign terms that have crept into our language.

This is neither a difficult nor an overly ambitious agenda for the government. All that is needed is the necessary political will.

The writer is a former member of the Pakistan Foreign Service. E-mail: asifezdi@yahoo.com

This article was published in 'The News International' newspaper on 3 September 2012

Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan: An Instrument of 4th Generation Warfare against Pakistan

The attack on the Pakistan Air Force's PAF Minhas airbase at Kamra on 16 August 2012 is part of the same pattern of terrorist attacks on Pakistani military installations and assets as the one carried out against the Pakistan Navy's PNS Mehran naval base in Karachi on 22 May 2011.

It is useful to look at the commonalities between the PNS Mehran and PAF Minhas attacks:

(i) Both were against Pakistan's military bases.

(ii) Both targeted Pakistan's high-value military assets: (a) the PNS Mehran attack targeting the Pakistan Navy's P-3C Orion Maritime Surveillance and Anti-Submarine/Shipping aircraft and (b) the PAF Kamra attack targeting the Pakistan Air Force's IL-78MP Air-to-Air Refuellers and Saab 2000 Airborne Early Warning & Control (AEW&C) aircraft.

(iii) The modus operandi of the terrorists in both attacks was similar: involving terrorists on foot, armed with automatic weapons, rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) and suicide vests.

(iv) Credit for both attacks was claimed by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).

The difference is that, in the case PNS Mehran, there was a failure of security and the terrorists succeeded in their objectives, whereas in the case of PAF Minhas, the attack was successfully thwarted and the terrorists failed in their objectives. Seemingly, the objectives of every TTP terrorist attack are twofold: to (a) erode Pakistan's capability to effectively defend itself by inflicting losses to military personnel and equipment and (b) discredit Pakistan internationally by demonstrating that Pakistan can neither prevent nor defend itself from such attacks.

This begs the question as to why the TTP, or any other domestic terrorist organization for that matter, would want to destroy those Pakistani military assets that are not being employed in the so-called "War on Terror" and that are not being used against the TTP or any other terrorist organization? The Pakistani weapon systems that have posed one of the greatest threats to the TTP in their mountain hideouts in the tribal areas have been the Pakistan Army Aviation's Cobra AH-1 helicopter gunships, which are based near Kamra at Ghazi for anti-TTP operations. Why would the TTP walk past the Cobra gunships that have pounded them relentlessly and target those aircraft that pose no threat and have done no damage to them? Maritime surveillance aircraft, anti-submarine/shipping aircraft, air-to-air refuellers and AEW&C aircraft pose no threat to the TTP or any other terrorist organization. If Pakistan is deprived of these aircraft, it would make no difference to the TTP or any other terrorist organization because they are not being used against them. From a terrorist's standpoint, therefore, targeting these military assets does not erode Pakistan's ability to fight against them. So why would the TTP then target them?

The answer is simple: TTP is not a domestic terrorist organization with a religious or political agenda but a veritable arm of a foreign intelligence agency that has long-term strategic designs against the Pakistani state. TTP is an instrument of a foreign power's policy of conducting asymetrical warfare against Pakistan, also known as "Fourth Generation Warfare" or "4GW." What makes TTP even more potent is that whilst it was created by one foreign intelligence agency, it is now being used by other foreign intelligence agencies with the same agenda. Thus, the TTP is engaged in a proxy war against Pakistan at the behest of foreign powers.

The faces and footsoldiers of TTP may be Pakistani (in many instances they have also been foreign), but the planners, financers, suppliers and trainers are not. It may be that the TTP footsoldiers who carry out terror attacks across Pakistan may not even be aware of the identity of their ultimate controllers and beneficiaries. They may even think that they are carrying out some religious Jihad when, in fact, all they are doing is serving the interests of foreign non-Muslim powers and inflicting harm on the world's only nuclear-armed Muslim country. This is not too far-fetched. Victor Ostrovsky, the former agent of the Israeli intelligence agency, Mossad, in his 1990 book, By Way of Deception: The Making and Unmaking of a Mossad Officer, revealed that, at any given time, the people who knew they were working for Mossad was only a small fraction of the actual number who were working for Mossad, all unaware of their actual employer.

Neutralizing Pakistan's maritime surveillance and anti-submarine/shipping capability can only benefit a state actor with a navy and naval designs against Pakistan. Similarly, neutralizing Pakistan's air-to-air refuelling and airborne early warning and radar jamming capabilities can only benefit a state actor with an air force and aerial designs against Pakistan. Neither of the two can benefit a terrorist organization engaged in urban terrorism and guerrilla warfare in mountainous terrain. Needless to say, terrorist organizations such as the TTP neither have naval or air power, so what threat are they neutralizing by targeting the naval and air power of Pakistan?

Attacking Pakistan's strategic installations also serves another purpose. One that is part of the objective to neutralize Pakistan's nuclear capability, which is the objective of more than one foreign power. By exposing gaps in Pakistan's security apparatus, those who wish to seek Pakistan's nuclear disarmament can argue that if Pakistani's military installations are vulnerable to terrorist penetration, then how vulnerable are its nuclear installations? Therefore, each terrorist attack on a military base in Pakistan builds the case against Pakistan and feeds the narrative and propaganda against Pakistan's nuclear capability. Of course, to anyone even vaguely familiar with the multiple and redundant layers of security and safeguards surrounding Pakistan's nuclear weapons and strategic installations, the idea of terrorists gaining access to nuclear weapons or even nuclear installations seems farfetched, if not ludicrous. But who is to educate foreign domestic public opinion when the airwaves are dominated by Western-controlled media, which toe the line of Western political, military and corporate interests.

Another factor that lends credence to the view that TTP is directly controlled by a foreign intelligence agency is the fact that these audacious attacks on defended military installations cannot be undertaken by a bunch of ragtag domestic terrorists. It takes finances, resources, weapons, ordinance, equipment, training and intelligence gathering to undertake terrorist attacks of the scale mounted on PNS Mehran and PAF Minhas. Only the intelligence agency of a state actor can sponsor and provide the finances, weapons, logistics, intelligence and training for such ambitious and audacious terrorist acts against the military installations of a nuclear power.

The lesson for Pakistan here is not to be complacent and be prepared at all times for such attacks against military and strategic installations. The enemies of Pakistan will continue to plan and attempt such attacks in future. PAF Minhas was not the last of them. Pakistan's needs to bolster the defences around all its military and strategic installations and improve intelligence with a view to pre-empting such terrorist attacks. When on the ground, all military aircraft should be parked in hardened aircraft shelters and reinforced hangars. Wide buffer zones with multiple and redundant security systems should surround all military installations, especially air bases.

Whenever a crime is committed, every good detective worth his salt needs to ask and seek an answer to one question: Who is the ultimate beneficiary of this crime? In the case of PNS Mehran and PAF Minhas, we must ask the question: Who is the ultimate beneficiary of the erosion of Pakistan's strategic military capability? Who stands to gain most from the destruction of Pakistan's P-3C Orion maritime surveillance and anti-submarine warfare aircraft, the IL-78MP air-to-air refuellers and the Saab 2000 AEW&C aircraft? The answer will lead us to the real culprits.

Founder of Pakistan

Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah:

“Few individuals significantly alter the course of history. Fewer still modify the map of the world. Hardly anyone can be credited with creating a nation-state. Mohammad Ali Jinnah did all three.”

(Stanley Wolpert, Jinnah of Pakistan)

Jinnah's prediction of the collapse of Western banking in 1948

The founder of Pakistan, Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah, predicted the collapse of the Western banking system on 1 July 1948 in his speech on the occasion of the inauguration of the State Bank of Pakistan at Karachi:

"The economic system of the West has created almost insoluble problems for humanity and to many of us it appears that only a miracle can save it from disaster that is not facing the world. It has failed to do justice between man and man and to eradicate friction from the international field. On the contrary, it was largely responsible for the two world wars in the last half century. The Western world, in spite of its advantages, of mechanization and industrial efficiency is today in a worse mess than ever before in history. The adoption of Western economic theory and practice will not help us in achieving our goal of creating a happy and contended people. We must work our destiny in our own way and present to the world an economic system based on true Islamic concept of equality of manhood and social justice. We will thereby be fulfilling our mission as Muslims and giving to humanity the message of peace which alone can save it and secure the welfare, happiness and prosperity of mankind."

Source: http://www.sbp.org.pk/about/history/h_moments.htm