The Tragicomedy of Errors: China, British Imperialism, and the Opium Wars

Julia Lovell finds something funny in the Opium Wars

Great Britain has many reasons to feel great about itself. Its empire was the largest in history and covered over a fifth of the world's population. It had more colonies than any other European power. It came, it saw, it divided, and it conquered.

It raped and it reaped, it slaughtered millions of people, massacred entire populations, and caused civil wars with impunity. Racism was its state policy. It sucked the life out of its colonies and reduced them to what we now call third-world nations. It drew and redrew boundaries and created whole new countries randomly on a whim. Most conflicts in the world today can be traced back to British Imperialism: the Kashmir issue, the Sino-Indian border dispute, Tibet, Palestine, Northern Ireland, Cyprus, Sudan - the list goes on. 

Yes - Great Britain can be proud. It had the largest empire in the world. It had managed to keep its European competitors in check. There was no known threat to its global dominion. It seemed that Great Britain was destined to rule the world.

Akmal Shaikh, Britain’s Double Standards, and Lessons for India

 The execution of a Britain in China for Drug Smuggling raises some interesting questions

Recently the news was atwitter with the execution in China of Akmal Shaikh, a "mentally ill" Briton. He was caught at Urumqi airport carrying 4 kilograms of heroin into China. His family (surprise surprise!) said that he was mentally ill. And then human rights groups, that are always more than ready to jump in on denouncing China, picked it up.

Much has been written about this story, with some citing it as yet another example of China's "increased confidence" and "muscle flexing"; and the more paranoid even saying that "the Chinese government didn’t need to know" that he was mentally ill, and only used Akmal Shaikh as a scapegoat to "keep the memory of those outrages (the Opium Wars) afresh". That particular article even goes on to say that it arrested four more drug smugglers "to show that it had no regrets"! Since China has sentenced one drug smuggler to death, the author thought it should stop arresting others.