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Russia Bolivia ink helicopter deal
Forrest Hylton: There used to be a recognition of US spheres of influence - all that is over.
Russia and Bolivia strengthened their ties this week. With Moscow concluding a deal with La Paz to purchase five Russian civil defence helicopters. The deal also forms part of a strategy of Latin American integration, sidelining the United States, as countries like Venezuela, Brazil, and Argentina among others, attempt to re assert control over their own progress. Forrest Hylton states that "there used to be a recognition of spheres of influence all that is over."
Forrest Hylton is the the author of Evil Hour in Colombia (Verso, 2006), and with Sinclair Thomson, co-author of Revolutionary Horizons: Past and Present in Bolivian Politics (Verso, 2007). He is a regular contributor to New Left Review and NACLA Report on the Americas. Forrest Hylton: There used to be a recognition of US spheres of influence - all that is over. ... more -
Strategic voting in Canada
Barry Kay: Without splitting the left-of-centre vote, Conservatives could not form the government.
With the Canadian election approaching, incumbent Prime Minister Stephen Harper appears destined to remain in power, with the only question remaining being: How much power will he attain? Senior Editor Paul Jay sat down with Barry Kay, who's own seat distribution forecast at http://www.wlu.ca/lispop shows Harper's Conservative Party just two seats away from forming a majority government. This despite the fact that the vast majority of Canadians support parties that campaign to the political left of Harper's policies. Barry explains both the reasons for this phenomenon in Canadian politics, and the sort of strategy which would be required to ensure an electoral outcome more reflective of the Canadian populace.
Dr. Barry Kay is a Professor of Political Science at Wilfrid Laurier University. His research focuses on the topics of elections and public opinion. He is a past member of the Canadian National Election Study team, and recent publications pertain to electoral systems, public opinion polling, and the impact of single-issue interest groups. He has developed a model for projecting parliamentary seat distributions from popular vote or opinion polls, which is updated regularly and can be found at www.wlu.ca/lispop. He is also a political analyst with Global Television, for their national election coverage. Barry Kay: Without splitting the left-of-centre vote, Conservatives could not form the government. ... more -
Humiliation and child abuse at Israeli checkpoints strip-searching children
Israeli officials have been regularly strip-searching children for decades, some of them American citizens.
While organizations that focus on Israel-Palestine have long been aware that Israeli border officials regularly strip search men and women, If Americans Knew appears to be the first organization that has specifically investigated the policy of strip searching women. In the course of its investigation, If Americans Knew was astonished to learn that Israeli officials have also been strip searching young girls as young as seven and below.
According to interviews with women in the United States, Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, Israeli border officials periodically force Christian and Muslim females of all ages to remove their clothing and submit to searches. In some cases the children are then "felt" by Israeli officials.
Sometimes mothers and children are strip-searched together, at other times little girls are taken from their parents and strip-searched alone. Women are required to remove sanitary napkins, sometimes with small daughters at their side. Sometimes women are strip searched in the presence of their young sons.
All report deep feelings of humiliation. Many describe weeping at the degradation they felt.
"I remember crying and pleading with my mother," Gaza journalist Laila El-Haddad recalls of an experience when she was 12-years-old, hoping that her mother could convince the Israeli official to allow her to keep her undershirt on. But parents are unable to shield their children, El-Haddad and others report.
"They had machine guns," El-Haddad explains. "We just had to submit." El-Haddad, who holds a Masters degree in Public Policy from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, believes that the intention of the strip searches is to humiliate Palestinians so that they won't return to Palestine.
Oregon attorney Hala Gores remembers being strip-searched at the age of 10. Her family, Palestinian Christians from Nazareth, were leaving Israel because of Israeli discrimination against Christians. Gores has never returned to her family's ancestral home in Nazareth, she says, in part because she does not want to repeat the experience of having no control over what is done to her.
The Israeli policy appears to target only Christian and Muslim children, and is equally applied to those with Israeli citizenship and citizenship in other countries, including native-born Americans. There are no reports of Jewish children being strip-searched.
New Jersey stand-up comedian Maysoon Zayid describes being strip-searched at Ben Gurion Airport when she was "seven, eight, nine years old" on family trips to visit her parents' original home in Palestine. On her most recent trip in July 2006, Maysoon, an American citizen, had her sanitary pad taken by officials in Ben Gurion Airport. When the search was completed, she says, the Israeli official in charge, Inbal Sharon, then refused to return her pad or allow her to get another.
Zayid, who has cerebral palsy and was sitting in a wheelchair, was then forced to bleed publicly for hours while she waited for her flight.
-----------------more Israeli child abuse at link
This is probably one of the sickest articles I've read on the human rights violations by Israeli government..... Israeli officials have been regularly strip-searching children for decades, some of them American citizens. ... more -
Peaceful coexistence of different communities in Switzerland can be model for Leba...
Switzerland talks to all to help Lebanese reconciliation.The peaceful coexistence of different communities in Switzerland could be a model for Lebanon, the Lebanese social affairs minister believes.
Mario Aoun made the comment in the context of the three-day visit to Lebanon of Swiss President Pascal Couchepin, which ended on Sunday.
Couchepin told his Lebanese counterpart, Michel Sleimane, that Switzerland supports Lebanon in its efforts to achieve national reconciliation and was ready to give assistance if requested.
Sleimane came to office just over four months ago after a lengthy period of tension between the parliamentary majority and the opposition, and now presides a government of national unity tasked with creating the conditions for greater stability.
Among the major players represented in this government is Hezbollah, regarded by the US as a terrorist organisation.
But for the Swiss embassy in Beirut contacts with the group form part of its normal diplomatic work.
"We are in regular contact with their members of parliament or their ministers in the context of various dossiers we are dealing with," Swiss ambassador François Barras told swissinfo. "We have no problem with this since the party is one of the political forces in Lebanon."
In any case, Switzerland does not share the US evaluation.
"Our country does not regard Hezbollah as a terrorist group," Swiss chargé d'affaires Carine Carey explained to swissinfo. "Unlike al-Qaida, for example, there is no UN resolution to this effect. In this case Switzerland follows no recommendations other than those coming from the United Nations."
Dual role
Sheikh Naim Kassem, the deputy head of Hezbollah, and one of its founders, told swissinfo about the group's aims and policies.
For him, there is no contradiction between being a resistance movement and a political party.
"We have to differentiate between the two main lines of our action, namely resistance to Israel and our political work," he told swissinfo.
"Our resistance made it possible to liberate southern Lebanon in 2000 and we drove the enemy back in 2006. But we have never used our weapons to further our policies."
Kassem described the military action launched by Hezbollah in Beirut and its suburbs last May as "an isolated incident". He accused the pro-government Future Movement of bringing armed men into Beirut to provoke clashes, in order to use this as a pretext to call for general disarmament.
"We decided on a preventative operation," he explained.
No Islamic state
Many of Hezbollah's enemies in Lebanon accuse it of having a hidden agenda, namely to establish an Islamic state in the country – something Kassem categorically rejects.
When it comes to relations with Israel, Kassem is intransigent.
---------more at link-----------------this proves that progress can be made if communication is opened up. Just because one country says their political organization is a terrorist, doesn't mean that they are, in fact terrorists. It seems like putting that tag on anything will instantly make people hate or dislike that country/person/organization. If you want to get down to brass tacks....The Israeli intelligence community are terrorists, having carried out many missions to blow up vehicles, assassinate people and cause harm to certain societies. If it sounds like a duck, walks like a duck it IS a duck! Israel can, in fact, change their ways and seriously start to build a true peace with Palestine. But they need to get rid of their selfish, greedy infrastructure of a government that is making this world a more dangerous place to live. We of the world will not take it any more and let Israel take, take and take for themselves. We all need to live on this planet, not just Israel Switzerland talks to all to help Lebanese reconciliation.The peaceful coexistence of different communities in Switzerland could be a m... more -
Georgia's Saakashvili: freedom fighter or rights abuser?
An influential group of Georgian opposition leaders has mounted a blistering political campaign against U.S.-backed President Mikheil Saakashvili, accusing his government of running an autocratic regime that tramples human rights and stifles democracy.
The timing could embarrass the Bush administration, which is pressing NATO members to approve an action plan for Georgia — a key step toward full membership — at the organization's meeting in December.
The claims by many in the opposition, some of which have been affirmed by a top Georgian human-rights official, go to the heart of Washington's rationale for backing Saakashvili as a democratic force in a region where Russia is trying to re-establish dominance.
Saakashvili had widespread support even among the opposition immediately after the August war with Russia, but the country's domestic problems were quick to resurface, said Salome Zurabishvili, who previously served as foreign minister under Saakashvili.
"The balance has shifted," she said. "The main problem for Georgia is a lack of democracy."
Zurabishvili, like other opposition leaders, emphasized that she's pro-Western and doesn't support Russia, which seized two Georgian rebel enclaves and marched its forces within 25 miles of Tbilisi during the invasion.
"I think the big confusion in the American policy . . . is to confuse support for a country and its democracy with the support for a small group of people," Zurabishvili said of Saakashvili, a U.S.-educated lawyer, and his allies.
The U.S. Embassy in Tbilisi, which monitors the government's human rights record, had no comment for this story.
Other opposition members, especially those in parliament, strike a softer tone.
"Of course we disagree about a lot of things with the president's party, but we agree about" the need to maintain cooperation with Saakashvili after the war with Russia, said Gia Tortladze, an opposition member in parliament.
Saakashvili has said repeatedly that he's committed to building a democratic state. He told the U.N. General Assembly last month that his government is launching "expanded democratic initiatives" that include greater independence for the parliament and judiciary, greater funding for opposition parties and a series of legal reforms including jury trials and lifetime judicial appointments. It will amount to a "Second Rose Revolution," he said, referring to the 2003 movement that ousted pro-Russian leadership.
His opponents are unconvinced, however.
While Georgians have more freedoms today than they did under Soviet rule, Saakashvili's critics say that in the years since the Rose Revolution, he's dramatically consolidated state power under his office, taken control of national television and demonized his opponents.
"He is building an authoritarian regime here," said Levan Gachechiladze, an opposition candidate for president earlier this year who finished second with about 25 percent of the vote. "The West closed its eyes because they were not ready . . . to change their so-called democratic star."
Saakashvili's unchecked centralization of power, people such as Gachechiladze maintain, allowed the president to launch an ill-advised military strike against the separatist region of North Ossetia in August. That move led to a five-day war with Russia that ended in crushing defeat.
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More at link. An influential group of Georgian opposition leaders has mounted a blistering political campaign against U.S.-backed President Mikheil ... more -
What do the Taliban want in Pakistan?
Dr. Tariq Amin-Khan: Taliban seek to gain popular support by inciting Pakistani military. Part 4
The US military has increased the frequency of drone attacks inside Pakistani territory, resulting in high numbers of civilian casualties. Furthermore, they have been accused of conducting special operation missions within Pakistan, the Pakistani military even stating that they fired warning shots at a US helicopter found flying inside the border. The US denies this claim. Dr. Amin-Khan discusses how neither the US nor the Pakistani government can hope for success in defeating the Taliban through military action alone.
Tariq Amin-Khan is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Politics and Public Administration at Ryerson University. In addition to a PhD in Social and Political Thought from York University in Toronto, he holds a Master’s degree in South Asian Studies from the University of Toronto, and a Bachelor of Law from the University of Karachi in Pakistan. The title of his doctoral thesis is Theorizing the Post-Colonial State in the Era of Capitalist Globalism.
See Part 1 at: http://current.com/items/89339338_pakistan_on_the_brink
See Part 2 at: http://current.com/items/89351852_is_pakistan_s_zardari...
See Part 3 at: http://current.com/items/89361227_global_meltdown_pakis... Dr. Tariq Amin-Khan: Taliban seek to gain popular support by inciting Pakistani military. Part 4 ... more -
Reports Link Karzai’s Brother to Heroin Trade
(Photo: Ahmed Wali Karzai, President Hamid Karzai’s brother, in 2001. Both say accusations of drug trafficking are politically motivated.)
When Afghan security forces found an enormous cache of heroin hidden beneath concrete blocks in a tractor-trailer outside Kandahar in 2004, the local Afghan commander quickly impounded the truck and notified his boss.
Before long, the commander, Habibullah Jan, received a telephone call from Ahmed Wali Karzai, the brother of President Hamid Karzai, asking him to release the vehicle and the drugs, Mr. Jan later told American investigators, according to notes from the debriefing obtained by The New York Times. He said he complied after getting a phone call from an aide to President Karzai directing him to release the truck.
Two years later, American and Afghan counternarcotics forces stopped another truck, this time near Kabul, finding more than 110 pounds of heroin. Soon after the seizure, United States investigators told other American officials that they had discovered links between the drug shipment and a bodyguard believed to be an intermediary for Ahmed Wali Karzai, according to a participant in the briefing.
The assertions about the involvement of the president’s brother in the incidents were never investigated, according to American and Afghan officials, even though allegations that he has benefited from narcotics trafficking have circulated widely in Afghanistan.
Both President Karzai and Ahmed Wali Karzai, now the chief of the Kandahar Provincial Council, the governing body for the region that includes Afghanistan’s second largest city, dismiss the allegations as politically motivated attacks by longtime foes.
“I am not a drug dealer, I never was and I never will be,” the president’s brother said in a recent phone interview. “I am a victim of vicious politics.”
But the assertions about him have deeply worried top American officials in Kabul and in Washington. The United States officials fear that perceptions that the Afghan president might be protecting his brother are damaging his credibility and undermining efforts by the United States to buttress his government, which has been under siege from rivals and a Taliban insurgency fueled by drug money, several senior Bush administration officials said. Their concerns have intensified as American troops have been deployed tto the country in growing numbers.
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More at link - it might require registration (which is free).
I lived in Afghanistan for a while in 1971-1972. Already then, the CIA was deeply involved in drug trafficking - opium (at the time, there was not much heroin there, the labs being situated in Pakistan) and hashish, and active in rooting-out and eliminating competition by either killing the people involved if they were Afghans, or having them jailed by paying the already very corrupt Afghan police to arrest and throw them in jail if they were foreigners (so as not to draw unwanted attraction to its shenaningans by killing them). I used to visit two young women in the Kabul prison - a Belgian woman and a French woman - who had fallen victim to the CIA's denunciation. The Afghan government was, at that time, not at all concerned about Europeans and Americans buying hashish and opium and taking it out of the country. After all, it was business, it brought much foreign currency to the country. The CIA hated the amateur competition, though, especially as it brought the street-prices down in Europe and the USA.
I reckon that, today, the CIA regards the Taliban as competition in the drug business... it is, after all, a multi-billion dollar business. (Photo: Ahmed Wali Karzai, President Hamid Karzai’s brother, in 2001. Both say accusations of drug trafficking are politically motivat... more -
South Ossetia car bomb blast kills 7
By Charles Clover
A powerful car bomb exploded yesterday near a military base used by Russian peacekeeping troops in Tskhinvali, the capital of the breakaway region of South Ossetia, killing at least seven and injuring three, writes Charles Clover in Moscow.
It was the worst act of violence since the end of the war in mid-August, and threatened a fragile peace accord in which Russia has pledged to withdraw its troops from positions in central Georgia and back to South Ossetia and Abkhazia by October 10. Russian officials said they were still investigating the blast. Some feared it could be used to justify any delay in the withdrawal.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008 By Charles Clover ... more -
Obama, France, and Race
Négritude is an ideology of black pride conceived in Paris during the 1920s and 30s. There is a resurgence of this philosophy and a new black consciousness in France, sparked by Barack Obama's nomination as the Democratic candidate for president of the United States. Race is still a taboo topic in France. So while Obama's nomination seems to transcend race, and AMerica is talking about a post-race society, the French are looking to open up conversation and policies that highlight racial differences.
We will take an in depth look at this new emerging culture and philosophy, and the debate between those who argue for an equal society and those who want to promote the communautaristique ideal to locate ethnic groups with specific needs and problems. Négritude is an ideology of black pride conceived in Paris during the 1920s and 30s. There is a resurgence of this philosophy and a ... more -
Are Canadians mostly progressive or conservative?
Murray Dobbin: The right has convinced Canadians that their values will never become public policy.
As Canadians prepare to go to the polls on October 14th. The question of a majority conservative government continues to play in the minds of voters. Prime Minister Stephen Harper stated last week that Canadians have grown more accepting of conservative ideas. Journalist and Author Murray Dobbin does not agree.
Murray Dobbin, Vancouver based, has been a journalist, broadcaster, author and social activist for over thirty five years. A board member and researcher with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, he has written five studies for the centre including an expose of charter schools and ten myths about the Canadian tax system. He has been a columnist for the Financial Post and Winnipeg Free Press, contributes to the Globe and Mail and other Canadian dailies and now writes a column for the Vancouver on-line paper The Tyee. He has written five books, three of them critical profiles of Canadian politicians. His latest book, Paul Martin: CEO for Canada? exposes Martin’s corporate agenda for the country. Murray Dobbin: The right has convinced Canadians that their values will never become public policy. ... more -
New head of ISI; Karzai calls for Taliban talks
Eric Margolis: Political stability is unattainable in Afghanistan without dialog with the Taliban.
As the ongoing conflict in Pakistan and Afghanistan continue with coalition forces taking a beating, Eric Margolis believes that "there will never be stability in Afghanistan until the largest ethnic group is brought into the political process."
Eric Margolis is a journalist born in New York City and holding degrees from Georgetown the University of Geneva, and New York University. During the Vietnam War he served as a US Army infantryman. Margolis is the author of War at the Top of the World –- The Struggle for Afghanistan and Asia is a syndicated columnist and broadcaster whose articles have appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The International Herald Tribune, Mainichi Shimbun and US Naval Institute Proceedings. Margolis is an expert of military affairs, a former instructor in strategy and tactics in the US Army, and a member of the International Institute of Strategic Studies and the Institute of Regional Studies in Islamabad, Pakistan. Eric Margolis' books have been published in the US, Canada, Britain, and India. He often appears and contributes to national and international news items for outlets such as CNN, ABC,CBC and Voice of America to the Wall Street Journal and Maninichi-Tokyo. He broadcasts regularly on foreign affairs for Canadian TV (TV Ontario and CBC), radio, and has appeared on ABC, CBS, CNN, and PBS. Eric Margolis: Political stability is unattainable in Afghanistan without dialog with the Taliban. ... more -
Global meltdown: Pakistan and the Taliban
Tariq Kahn: Pakistan on the brink - the economic crisis. Part 3
Tariq Amin-Khan is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Politics and Public Administration at Ryerson University. In addition to a PhD in Social and Political Thought from York University in Toronto, he holds a Master’s degree in South Asian Studies from the University of Toronto, and a Bachelor of Law from the University of Karachi in Pakistan. The title of his doctoral thesis is Theorizing the Post-Colonial State in the Era of Capitalist Globalism.
See Part 1 at: http://current.com/items/89339338_pakistan_on_the_brink
See Part 2 at: http://current.com/items/89351852_is_pakistan_s_zardari...
See Part 4 at: http://current.com/items/89373446_what_do_the_taliban_w... Tariq Kahn: Pakistan on the brink - the economic crisis. Part 3 ... more -
Gurkhas finally win their own battle of Britain
With their battle cry of Ayo Gorkhali (Forward Gurkhas), former soldiers from Nepal celebrated on the steps of the High Court yesterday after winning their battle to stay in the country they risked their lives to serve.
The Government had decided that 2,000 Gurkha soldiers who retired before July 1997 did not have the necessary “strong ties to the UK” to allow entry. Yesterday a High Court judge ruled that the Gurkhas had been treated unlawfully, and found that the immigration policy denying them visas was irrational and misleading.
Mr Justice Blake said the restrictions needed “urgent revisiting” and set the Home Office a deadline of three months to review the situation.It is now hoped that the ruling for the test case of five Gurkhas and a widow will clear the way for more than 2,000 veterans whose visa claims were rejected to finally settle in Britain.
Wearing a traditional Gurkha yellow sash, Martin Howe, the solicitor representing their case, said: “This is a victory that restores honour and dignity to deserving soldiers who faithfully served in Her Majesty’s Armed Forces. It is a victory for common sense, a victory for fairness, and a victory for the British sense of what is ‘right’.” Seven Gurkhas denied entry as a result of the policy have died while awaiting this decision, he added.
More than 200,000 soldiers from Nepal have fought alongside the British forces for 200 years, serving in the two world wars, Iraq and Afghanistan, and have won 13 Victoria crosses.
However, unlike the majority of foreign soldiers in the British Army, who have the right to settle here after four years of service anywhere in the world, the Gurkhas do not share the same rights. In what has now been declared an unlawful immigration policy, only those who retired after July 1997, when their base was moved from Hong Kong to England, could automatically stay in Britain. The rest were told they must apply individually for permission to stay, and would be refused and deported if they failed to demonstrate “strong ties” to Britain.
During the hearing, lawyers representing the Home Office argued that “having a Victoria Cross is not necessarily a strong tie bringing the entry application within the policy”. The judgment brings veterans one step closer to retirement in Britain.
Lending her voice to the Gurkha cause was Joanna Lumley, the actress, who vowed to petition Downing Street until the policy was reviewed. Miss Lumley’s father, Major James Lumley, fought with the Gurkhas in Burma during the Second World War.
None of the six test case claimants was in court. Gurkhas who were in Britain as asylum seekers had awaited the ruling with trepidation as they feared deportation.
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Read the whole article at link. With their battle cry of Ayo Gorkhali (Forward Gurkhas), former soldiers from Nepal celebrated on the steps of the High Court yesterda... more -
Russian nuclear bomber flies undetected to within 20 miles of Hull
A Russian nuclear stealth bomber was able to fly within 90 seconds of the British coast without being picked up by radar, it was revealed today.
The supersonic ‘Blackjack’ jet flew completely undetected to within just 20 miles from Hull in one of the worst breaches of British security since the end of the Cold War.
RAF radar eventually picked up the plane, but the only two pairs of fighter jets used for air alerts were on other duties.
The embarrassing breach late last year has called into question Britain's defence capabilities after four jet squadrons were cut from the RAF’s budget four years ago.
One senior RAF pilot told The Sun: ‘The Russians made us look helpless. It was a disaster - it basically gave the Russians the green light to fly wherever they want.’
The supersonic jet had taken off from Engel's Air Base near Saratov on Russia's Volga delta.
The Ministry of Defence confirmed the incursion took place but said it had a ‘multi-layered’ approach to deterring enemy aircraft.
A spokesman said in a statement: ‘We are satisfied we have the flexibility to launch as many aircraft as the situation requires.’
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1064713/Russian...
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This is a clear warning to the EU with regard to their accepting US anti-missile missile bases in Poland and the Ukraine. Better go the diplomatic way and mend fences with Russia rather than continue in the present Bush-driven aggressive and threatening paradigm. A Russian nuclear stealth bomber was able to fly within 90 seconds of the British coast without being picked up by radar, it was revea... more -
Olmert says Israel must withdraw from West Bank for peace
Israel's prime minister, who has a few weeks left in office, says that to achieve lasting peace, the nation has to cede most of the West Bank and half of Jerusalem to Palestinians.
Israel will have to give up "almost all" of the West Bank areas it occupies and accept the division of Jerusalem in order to take advantage of a rapidly closing window of opportunity for peace with the Arabs, outgoing Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said in an interview published Monday.
"The decision we are going to have to make is a decision we have been refusing for 40 years to look at open-eyed," the Israeli leader told the Yediot Aharonot newspaper. "The time has come to say these things. The time has come to put them on the table."
Olmert has resigned from the premiership because of a host of corruption investigations. But he remains in a caretaker position while Tzipi Livni, his successor as head of the ruling Kadima party, works to assemble a new government.
His interview with the prominent Israeli daily amounted to both a challenge to beliefs held as central to the Jewish state and a personal mea culpa. Though fresh rounds of talks with the Palestinian Authority and Syria were launched under his watch, Olmert acknowledged some of the positions he was advocating in the interview -- such as the division of Jerusalem -- were things he opposed during most of his 35-year political career.
"I am the first who wanted to enforce Israeli sovereignty on the entire city," said Olmert, a former mayor of Jerusalem, noting that he opposed the 1978 Camp David accords between Israel and Egypt. "For a large portion of these years, I was unwilling to look at the reality in all its depth."
It is unclear what impact Olmert's statements will have, since he is most likely in the final weeks of his administration.
But it offered a telling portrait of Israeli political life and the constraints facing prime ministers who must constantly hedge their views on land-for-peace deals and especially on Jerusalem in order to maintain their governing coalitions.
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More at link.
It seems to me that, now that he has nothing left to lose, he is finally speaking his mind rather than speak his party's mind. Israel's prime minister, who has a few weeks left in office, says that to achieve lasting peace, the nation has to cede most of t... more -
Is Pakistan's new president up to the job?
Asif Ali Zardari was best known as the husband of Benazir Bhutto, a highflying businessman with a taste for fine living, polo and, his critics allege, bribes. Asif Ali Zardari was best known as the husband of Benazir Bhutto, a highflying businessman with a taste for fine living, polo and, his... more
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Is Pakistan's Zardari creating new dictatorship?
Tariq Kahn: Pakistan's President Zardari is not rescinding legal framework of dictatorship. Part 2
Tariq Amin-Khan is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Politics and Public Administration at Ryerson University. In addition to a PhD in Social and Political Thought from York University in Toronto, he holds a Master’s degree in South Asian Studies from the University of Toronto, and a Bachelor of Law from the University of Karachi in Pakistan. The title of his doctoral thesis is Theorizing the Post-Colonial State in the Era of Capitalist Globalism.
See Part 1 at: http://current.com/items/89339338_pakistan_on_the_brink
See Part 3 at: http://current.com/items/89361227_global_meltdown_pakis...
See Part 4 at: http://current.com/items/89373446_what_do_the_taliban_w... Tariq Kahn: Pakistan's President Zardari is not rescinding legal framework of dictatorship. Part 2 ... more -
How the US presidential debate played overseas
Barack Obama's tough talk scared Pakistanis and the Russians. But Afghans applauded. Iranians and Iraqis shrugged.
Pakistani political scientist Hasan Askari Rizvi is of two minds about Friday night’s presidential debate in the United States.On one hand, he flinches at Barack Obama’s swashbuckling comments about taking out Al Qaeda leaders on Pakistani soil – with or without Pakistan’s consent. No policy could make him more unpopular in Pakistan, Mr. Rizvi says.
Then again, Rizvi acknowledges, he cannot rid himself of the idea that, despite his nuanced arguments Friday, Republican John McCain will be “George Bush III.”
In the countries for which Friday night’s debate perhaps held the most relevance – Pakistan, Afghanistan, Russia, Iran, and Iraq – the clear desire is for fresh ideas from US leaders. While this has generally led to more sympathy for Mr. Obama, Friday’s debate did little to project this image in several regions central to US foreign policy.
“The debate [in Pakistan] is how much policy is going to change,” say Rizvi. “Many are concerned by Obama’s tough talking.”
Indeed, the debate in many ways represented a reversal of expectations. “The line John McCain took was quite reasonable,” says Rasul Baksh Rais, a political scientist at the Lahore University of Management Sciences, who teaches a class in American politics. “Extending the war into Pakistan has really aroused Pakistanis and made them much more interested in this race,” he says.
The same is true in Afghanistan, but for the opposite reasons. Many Afghans see one of the main sources of their problems as being across the border in Pakistan, where Al Qaeda and the Taliban find refuge from the coalition forces in Afghanistan.
“[President] Bush said that after 9/11, he would smoke the terrorists out of their caves. But we know now that the terrorists aren’t living in caves, they are living in luxury villas in Pakistan,” says Haroun Mir, director of the Afghanistan Center for Research and Policy Studies in Kabul.
Right or wrong, this widespread perception in Afghanistan has led many people to favor Obama’s tough talking. His comments Friday played well.
“He said that he will help Afghanistan fight terrorism,” says Fazel Qazizada, a former political science student at Kabul University.
But he adds, “In the end, we think that Obama and McCain are not radically different from each other. We see some hope from the election campaigns and debates that they represent a new direction in American policy, but ultimately we will need to wait and see.”
This caution is apparent throughout the region. Among Pakistan’s highly educated, English-speaking classes – those most aware of the debate – there was an understanding that the event played to Americans, not the world.
“The candidates have to play to the gallery,” says Professor Rais.
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Click on the link for the complete article. Barack Obama's tough talk scared Pakistanis and the Russians. But Afghans applauded. Iranians and Iraqis shrugged. ... more -
US war resister is granted stay of deportation
Canadian judge rules against deportation of outspoken anti-Iraq war resister.
Iraq War Resister Jeremy Hinzman won a stay of deportation this week as a judge refused to allow Canada to send him back to the United States to face prosecution for desertion. Hinzman is one of numerous war resisters currently in Canada. Despite the Canadian parliament passing a non binding resolution on June 3rd calling for resisters to be allowed to stay in Canada permanently as conscientious objectors, the Canada Border Services Agency continues to routinely effect deportation orders of US war resisters. Ottawa based immigration lawyer Yaver Hameed believes that "the contradiction between the non binding parliamentary motion that allows war resisters to stay in Canada versus the Canada Border Services effecting deportation orders to war resisters reveals a lack of commitment to our basic democratic values."
Yavar Hameed is a lawyer whose practice focuses on the protection and advocacy of human rights and civil liberties in the following areas: Administrative Law, Immigration and Refugee Law and general civil litigation. Yavar is a sessional lecturer in the Department of Laws at Carleton University, a member of La Ligue des droits et libertes, l’Association des juristes de l’expression francaise de l’Ontario (AJEFO), Lawyers Against the War (LAW) and the World Social Forum (WSF) movement. Canadian judge rules against deportation of outspoken anti-Iraq war resister. ... more -
Latin American leaders support Morales at UN
Forrest Hylton: Latin America is leading world in multipolar forms of regional diplomacy.
Visiting the UN this week Bolivian President Evo Morales stated that mediation by UNASUR, The Union of South American Nations, is having a positive effect in a political crisis between his central government and eastern provinces demanding greater autonomy. Journalist and author Forrest Hylton believes that "Latin America is leading the world in multipolar forms of regional diplomacy."
Forrest Hylton is the the author of Evil Hour in Colombia (Verso, 2006), and with Sinclair Thomson, co-author of Revolutionary Horizons: Past and Present in Bolivian Politics (Verso, 2007). He is a regular contributor to New Left Review and NACLA Report on the Americas. Forrest Hylton: Latin America is leading world in multipolar forms of regional diplomacy. ... more
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