“In light of the grave situation in Iraq”, Pope Francis has appointed Cardinal Fernando Filoni, Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, as his personal envoy to express his “spiritual closeness to the people who suffer and to bring them the solidarity of the Church”, says a statement released by the Vatican.

In another statement on the Iraqi crisis, released by the Congregation for the Oriental Churches, its president Cardinal Leonardo Sandri, thanked the Holy Father for his “attentive closeness” to the more than 100,000 Christians who fled from their homes, churches and villages in the biblical plain of Ninive overnight and are now traveling, many on foot, to Erbil and other Kurdish cities, “in impossible conditions in search of refuge” and face “the increasingly uncertain possibility of survival”.

Cardinal Sandri also expressed his hope “that the civil world, public authorities and international organizations” not hesitate to provide “the necessary humanitarian interventions” and “stop, especially in Iraq and Syria, the painful and profoundly unjust exodus of Christians from the land they have inhabited for two thousand years”.

In constant contact with the Chaldean Patriarch Louis Raphael I Sako, the pontifical representation in Baghdad and local Bishops, the Cardinal, on behalf of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches, urged “the authorities and those who are sensitive to the plight of Christians in the East” to do “with great urgency” whatever is “essential to alleviate their suffering. Deprived of water, food and every other type of necessity, especially children, the elderly and the sick, are in the most unbearable tribulation”.

“It is feared”, he said, “that there will be a catastrophic epilogue if we do not put an end to the marked general insecurity fueled by the indifference of many, which has been repeatedly denounced”.

The post Pope Francis Sends Envoy Cardinal Filoni To Iraq appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The premiere episode of “Black Jesus” aired last night on the Cartoon Network.

We have long taken the position that portraying Jesus as black is fine with the Catholic League, and indeed we find it silly that anyone would object. The Jesus character in this show is a mixed bag: He is irreverent, and can be downright crude, but he also has many redeeming qualities.

The Jesus character parks illegally, curses, smokes pot, drinks, and hits on women. At one point he is depicted as the get-away driver for a drug deal gone wrong; he is eventually robbed and gets busted. But he is also forgiving, kind, respectful, and condemns violence. No one questions his divinity, and even an atheist detective who interviews him after his arrest appears to sense that there is more to this man than what first appears.

If the goal is to lure young people to take a closer look at Jesus, the Son of God, that is noble (the show airs at 11:00 p.m). But if so, it is not a good sociological sign: Must we debase Jesus to make him real? It will be interesting to see how the show develops, and how the audience reacts to the Jesus message, however twisted his delivery.

The post Hip Black Jesus TV Show Airs – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Hasan Selim Ozertem

Political uncertainty in Iraq has the potential to adversely affect the country’s territorial integrity and its energy sector. Resultant of the political vacuum, the biggest risk facing Iraq’s expected oil production is the possibility of a delay in much needed decisions regarding the investment for the upcoming period.

After the invasion of Mosul by the Islamic State (formally known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria-ISIS), scenarios related to the division of Iraq came to the agenda once again. Presently, the most tangible scenario that could prevent such disintegration of the Iraqi state can be seen in the formation of a triadic entity consisting of Sunni, Shia and Kurdish regions incorporated in a lax federal system. Before ISIS’s assault on Mosul, this formulation was also endorsed by American Vice-President Joe Biden in 2006. However, for the establishment of such an entity it is necessary to restore the political balance which shifted after June 11 and for different groups to reach a consensus on a common roadmap.

Dominated by a chaotic atmosphere, it is still unclear what will result from the country’s efforts to form a government. While Sunni Arabs and the Kurds have uttered on multiple occasions that they do not look positively on a formula in which Nouri al-Maliki will remain the President, they bring about political obstruction by not participating in the work of the parliament. Maliki is insistent on refusing to take a step back in this process. In the meanwhile, he harshly accuses the Kurdish Regional Government of hosting ISIS and Ba’ath forces. Nonetheless, with the Kurds withdrawing their delegates from Baghdad they show a more unreserved attitude regarding their independence in the upcoming period. While Mesut Barzani, the President of the Iraqi Kurdish Regional Government, claimed to be preparing for two referenda regarding the status of Kirkuk and national independence in his speech to the members of parliament at the beginning of July in Erbil, he does not refrain from emphasizing that it is too late to withdraw from Kirkuk.

The Kurdish Peshmerga forces have gained limited control of certain regions like Mosul, Diyala and Tuzhurmatu which were cleared by the central governments’ forces in the process of pursuing ISIS’s movement to Baghdad from the north-west of the country. This development raises two issue. The first issue is that since becoming the primary armed force in their controlled regions, the Kurds are expanding the areas under their control and thus they now have to create a line of defense that is beyond their capacity. The second prominent issue is that even though the Kurds would prefer to remain under the Iraqi flag, the question remains whether they will revert to their old borders and how the energy resources within their newly controlled borders will be used. These two issues are important for both the country’s security dynamics and the political economy of the energy sector in the near future.

Ensuring Security in Iraq

Considering the operations carried out by forces loyal to the Iraqi central government, it is seen that they cannot robustly move on the North. The increase in violent clashes while facing off against resistance in Salahuddin and Diyala show that certain coordination problems have emerged. To illustrate, it is stated that while one civilian lost his life in the July 6 air strike on Tuzhurmatu, 6 Peshmerga died in a helicopter attack on June 14. Meanwhile in Baghdad, news continue to flow in about the new execution teams whose associations still remain murky and the severe weakening of security standards there.

From time to time, the Iraqi security forces, which are supported by American military advisors, try to create a line of defense in coordination with the Peshmerga in order to defend their existing positions, while on the other hand trying to repel ISIS through ground operations. In this environment, with minorities being severely affected, the demographic map of the region has been drawn anew through the mobilization of peoples in and out of ISIS-controlled regions. While 200 Turkmens lost their lives in Ninova and Kirkuk during the clashes, more than the 200,000 others have left their homes to seek refuge in more secure regions.

The Political Economy of Energy in Iraq

Although oil wells are of secondary importance to ISIS, in terms of energy, it is seen that Iraq’s largest oil refinery, Baiji, was located within an ISIS-controlled region. While ISIS has succeeded in gaining control of certain regions in the northern part of Iraq, this does not pose risks to the more important energy resources of the southern provinces. According to the International Energy Agency, the oil exports from the Persian Gulf that had declined to 2.42 million barrels per day in June, will rise to 2.6 million barrels in July. Particularly, it is stated that the investments in the BatıKurna-2 and Mecnun fields in Basra contributed to the expected increase of production capacity.

According to Ben Lando, the Bureau Chief of the Iraq Oil Report, it is possible to export 200,000 barrels per day from the fields controlled by the Kurdish Region. Yet, it has been stated that the Kurds have a total production capacity of 360,000 barrels. In addition, the Kurds, which have already captured two more oil fields in the region around Kirkuk as of July 11, have the potential to increasingly execute oil shipments.

It is argued that the motivation of Kurds who are quite determined to control the Kirkuk oil fields could be broken when faced with the risk of sabotage and damage to the infrastructure of the fields by the Central Government rather than ISIS. In an analysis by the Economist Intelligence Unit, it is pointed out that the motivation behind Baghdad’s inclination towards such an act would be to prevent a possible disposition that leans towards Kurdish independence. But recent march of Islamic State militants in the north shows that it is not possible to ignore the threat posed by the extremists to Erbil.

On the other hand, by trying to control a large geographical space, the Kurds are faced with a serious fuel shortage. The Kurdish Regional Government, which must consider the needs of its security forces in addition to the civil consumption in provinces such as Mosul and Kirkuk, are contemplating how to meet the increasing demand. That the shipment from the Beyci refinery was stopped makes this problem all the more pronounced. With the lines of traffic in front of gas stations throughout Erbil reminding us of the 1973 oil crisis, the Erbil government needs to import more oil due to its limited refining capacity. While Taner Yıldız, the Turkish Minister of Energy, says in his statements on the subject that Turkey is ready to do all that it can in this regard, he emphasizes the importance of logistical cooperation for traffic at the Habur Border Gate.

Besides all this, it is seen that ISIS, which controls some oil wells and energy infrastructure in Syria and Iraq, has turned into an actor that should not be ignored when it comes to oil trafficking. It is claimed that ISIS has a daily million dollar income as a result of this trafficking as it performs oil shipments to the Kurdish region and to Turkey’s border cities across the Syrian border.

ISIS moving farther into the country and the resulting power vacuum it leaves behind in central and northwest Iraq stands as the greatest threats to the continuance of Iraqi unity. In order to resolve the security problems that have been experienced up until now in the country, first and foremost, the establishment of a functioning political structure is required. Despite the Sunni Arab Salim al-Juburi being elected as President of the Council of Representatives in mid-July, the fact that a government which will ensure the unitary action of different groups has yet to be established negatively affects the success of the struggle. This uncertainty poses the risk of dashing the positive expectations that Iraq could provide a 40-45 percent increase in the world’s oil production in the near future. It has been stated that based on the available investment in infrastructure, a production capacity of 3-4 million barrels could soon be achieved in Iraq. However, considering the present risks, it is argued that the estimated 450 billion dollars in additional investment that it would take to augment the country’s capacity to reach an 8-10 million barrel production capacity is now under threat of becoming unrealistic. In this regard, ensuring the country’s territorial integrity is important both for the political future of the country and for the international oil markets.

This article was first published in Analist Monthly Journal, on August 2014.

The post Iraq’s Political Uncertainty, Security Crisis And Energy Markets – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Benjamin Witte-Lebhar

Recent wrangling over tax reform has put a sudden damper on Michelle Bachelet’s red-hot return to power and offered an early glimpse of what may prove to be the biggest political challenge of her presidency: transforming her broad electoral alliance — the New Majority (Nueva Mayoría) — into a viable governing coalition.

Upon taking office in March, the center-left leader put her proverbial pedal to the metal as she raced to make good on a campaign pledge to carry out “50 measures in 100 days.” By June 18, the self-imposed deadline, Bachelet had ticked off all but a few of those items – 91 percent, by her own calculations – mostly in the form of legislative proposals. Among other things, the new government has submitted bills to revamp the tax code, overhaul the education system, create several new ministries (including a long-promised Ministry of Indigenous Affairs) and introduce a public option to complement Chile’s otherwise privatized system of pensions.

Bachelet, who previously served as president from 2006-2010, has also made trips to the United States, Argentina and Brazil, responded to not one but two natural disasters – an 8.0-magnitude earthquake in northern Chile followed less than two weeks later by a devastating firestorm in the historic port city of Valparaíso – and decided once and for all to bury the highly controversial HidroAysén project, a multi-billion-dollar hydroelectric complex slated for two of Chilean Patagonia’s largest and most pristine rivers.

“Politics needs to get its prestige back, and you do that by honoring the commitments you have made. It is really important to recover people’s trust in our democratic institutions,” Bachelet, 62, told the Spanish daily El País last June.

Empowering the right?

More recently, however, the government’s soaring start has run into some serious political turbulence — largely of its own making. On July 8, Finance Minister Alberto Arenas provoked a flood of intra-coalition complaints when he announced a series of changes to Bachelet’s high-profile tax reform proposal.

One of the so-called “pillars” of Bachelet’s policy agenda, the legislation was designed to boost government coffers to the tune of US$8.2 billion annually and thus provide the funds needed to finance the sweeping education reforms she also hopes to implement. The bill made its way through the lower house of Congress in May but still needs approval from the Senate.

The bill originally proposed a radical shift in the country’s corporate tax structure whereby large companies, rather than pay taxes only on the profits they withdraw, would be obligated to pay a percentage on their overall earnings.

In its updated form, the legislation allows corporations to choose: they can either stick with the old system, but pay a higher percentage on their declared profits, or start paying taxes on total income, but with certain deductions allowed. Also missing from the watered down version of the bill are a series of new powers the government had hoped to give the Servicio de Impuestos Internos, Chile’s tax collection agency, as a way to crack down on tax evasion.

The changes are the result of an agreement with members of the Senate’s five-person Finance Committee, which is headed by Sen. Ricardo Lagos Weber, a cabinet official during Bachelet’s first term. The committee also contains members of the opposition Alianza coalition, which pushed for concessions on behalf of its business community constituents, but does not include representatives from the New Majority’s left-wing flank.

Lagos Weber and Arenas defended the deal they struck with the right-wing Alianza and insist that the “heart” of the reform — namely an increase in corporate taxes and the elimination of an institutionalized tax loophole known as the Fondo de Utilidades Tributarias (FUT) — is still intact. “We’ve reached an historic agreement,” Arenas told reporters. “We’ve managed to move forward on the most complex and profound tax reform in the last 30 years.”

A number of Bachelet’s New Majority allies, however, are up in arms, accusing the government of unnecessarily kowtowing to pressure from the right and from business interests, and of consciously excluding left groups such as the Communist Party (PC) from the decision making process. They also complain that the tax deal empowers the Alianza, which took a mayor political hit in last year’s presidential and congressional elections, and sets a disappointing precedent regarding Bachelet’s other reform proposals, particularly her education bill, which the right will no doubt want to water down as well.

“Things will be done differently”

Perhaps the biggest problem, the deal’s New Majority critics warn, is that it raises serious questions about the viability of the coalition itself. Until recently, Chile’s center-left called itself the Concertación. The four-party grouping, forged in the waning days of the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship (1973-90), won four straight presidencies (1990-2010) before finally succumbing to the Alianza in the 2010 election. As an opposition group it fared poorly and was eclipsed — at least in terms of popularity — by student protestors and other social movements that became increasingly active during the Sebastián Piñera presidency (2010-2014).

With that in mind, Bachelet opted during her reelection campaign to expand the Concertación leftwards and incorporate the PC and other progressive but previously marginalized factions. Those groups agreed to back her candidacy in hopes she would make good on promises to pursue deep structural reforms, particularly to Chile’s education system, which has been widely criticized for being both inconsistent, as far as quality is concerned, and in some cases prohibitively expensive, most notably at the university level.

Bachelet tried to cement those new relationships further still by giving the PC its first cabinet minister since 1973, when Pinochet toppled Chile’s then left-aligned president, Salvador Allende (1970-1973), naming Claudia Pascual Grau, a communist leader, as minister of the Servicio Nacional de la Mujer (SERNAM), the Ministry of Women, and Víctor Osorio of the Citizen Left (IC) party as head of the National Heritage Ministry. Observers have reason to wonder, however, just how much power and influence Bachelet and other old-guard concertacionistas are really willing to concede to their new coalition partners. Perhaps not much, judging by the government’s handling of the tax reform bill.

For now at least, the PC and IC are still willing to give Bachelet the benefit of the doubt. But as her government prepares for its next big policy push, it may want to tread a bit more carefully. Patience may be a virtue, but it also tends to have an expiration date. “There are ways in which we’ve been harmed by this,” Guillermo Teillier, the PC’s party president, said following a meeting on July 14 with Minister Arenas. “The understanding we have with the minister is that from here on out, things will be done differently.”

The post Chile: Governing Coalition Tested By Tax Bill Accord appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Nigeria’s President Goodluck Jonathan declared a state of emergency in the country on Friday over the Ebola outbreak in Africa’s most populous country, Reuters reported Friday.

The president also approved 1.9 billion naira ($11.6 million) of emergency funds to contain the outbreak, according to the news agency.

Nigeria is the third country after Liberia and Sierra Leone to declare the state of emergency due to the deadly virus.

Nigeria was the latest country to be affected by the virus and has claimed seven cases of Ebola, brought in by a man who fell sick on arrival from Liberia. Two people in Nigeria have died.

The total death toll in the worst Ebola outbreak in history and the first to occur in West Africa reached 961 people on August 6, Reuters cited the World Health Organization on Friday. The number of the infected people rose to 1,779, according to WHO.

The organization issued a statement on Friday acknowledging that the virus outbreak is an emergency situation of international importance.

The virus has killed four people in Guinea, where the outbreak originated, 12 in Sierra Leone and 12 in Liberia.

There is no licensed treatment or vaccine for the Ebola virus, which has a case fatality rate of up to 90 percent. Medical workers use rehydration fluid and antibiotics to fight infections. Some groups have called for new drugs to be rolled out in Africa after two US aid workers infected with the virus responded positively to an experimental treatment known as Zmapp.

The post Nigeria Declares State Of Emergency Over Ebola Outbreak appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Cheryl Pellerin

U.S. air operations in Iraq reflect a commitment to relieving the humanitarian issue in northern Iraq’s Kurdistan region and to protecting American personnel, Pentagon Press Secretary Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby said today.

Kirby discussed the situation in Iraq with Chris Cuomo on the CNN program “New Day.” The admiral is in New Delhi with Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel.

Two U.S. F/A-18 aircraft dropped 500-pound laser-guided bombs on a mobile artillery piece near the regional capital of Irbil today. The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant was using this artillery to shell Kurdish forces defending Erbil where U.S. personnel are located, Kirby said in a statement earlier today. Yesterday, U.S. aircraft dropped food and water to thousands of people seeking refuge on Mount Sinjar to escape ISIL fighters.

“We’re committed to two things,” Kirby told Cuomo. “One is trying to relieve the humanitarian issue there on Mount Sinjar, and of course being prepared and ready to conduct airstrikes to protect American personnel … in Irbil and potentially even in and around Baghdad.”

The airstrikes also will try to help Iraqi security forces, the admiral added, “as they go after the ISIL threat inside their country, to their people [and] to their sovereignty. Ultimately, this is an Iraqi fight.”

Kirby noted that ISIL’s progress in Iraq has been swift and that the terrorist group is well-led and well-resourced. But the larger picture is mixed, he said.

“We have seen them strengthened there in the north, and that’s what led to the humanitarian disaster on Mount Sinjar — this exodus of these people,” he said. “But toward the south and in and around Baghdad, we continue to see Iraqi security forces stiffen their resistance. They’re being assisted by Shia militia.”

Throughout the country, Kirby said, the fight is not uniform.

On the humanitarian emergency for the Yezidis on Mount Sinjar, the problem is one for the international community to help in solving, the admiral said. “The international community has … responded with some humanitarian assistance, the government of Iraq provided some humanitarian assistance, [and] we’re chipping in to that effort as well,” he added.

Kirby said President Barack Obama was clear in his remarks last night that the world must attend to the behavior of the ISIL terrorists.

“These ISIL terrorists are simply brutes,” the admiral said. “They’re thugs. They’re murderers. They have no regard for human life or human dignity. And it’s not just Christians or the Yezidis they’re threatening.

“We do believe they pose a threat not just to Iraq, but to the region, and they do have aspirational desires to threaten western targets, to include the United States and American citizens,” he continued. “There’s no question about that. … And our focus is helping the Iraqis deal with this threat inside their country and in the broader region.”

The U.S. military focus on the region has intensified over many weeks, he said, with an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf, increased intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance activity over Iraq, assessment teams on the ground, advisors working in joint operation centers in Baghdad and Irbil, and now conducting air operations.

“The United States is not just standing by idly,” Kirby said. “We are working very hard on this. There is a sense of purpose and urgency here. But … this is ultimately an issue the Iraqi government has got to come to grips with and solve, and the Iraqi security forces have got to continue to step up against this threat.”

A critical step toward the ability of Iraq to secure its own country is the creation of a unity government in Iraq, the admiral added — “a politically inclusive process to look after their own people and provide the kind of structure and stability Iraq needs to prevent the growth of these kinds of extremist groups.”

The United States has expedited military assistance to the Iraqi government, most critically in the form of Hellfire missiles, Kirby said, adding that thousands of the missiles are on the way.

“They’ve been used with good effect and the Iraqi government continues to need those,” he said. “We’re working with the Iraqi government on that, and that does include conversations and discussions with the Kurds and the [armed Kurdish fighters known as] Peshmerga up in the north. We’re continuing to evaluate those kinds of requests.”

The post Pentagon Spokesman Explains Objectives Of Iraq Operations appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel met in New Delhi today with top leaders in India’s new government to discuss deepening the cooperation between the world’s largest democracy and the world’s oldest democracy.

In statements summarizing Hagel’s meetings with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, Pentagon Press Secretary Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby said Hagel and the Indian leaders discussed the importance of continuing robust defense cooperation, particularly in terms of co-development and co-production, and through military education and training exchanges.

Modi’s forward-looking agenda for his summit with President Barack Obama in the fall was part of Hagel’s discussion with Modi, Kirby said, as well as new ways for the United States and India to deepen strategic ties while addressing a range of global issues.

“Topics covered in the discussion included Iraq, Afghanistan, the threat of terrorism in the Middle East, as well as security issues in the areas comprised by the Indian and Pacific oceans,” the press secretary said.

Hagel’s meeting with Swaraj was the first conversation between the two leaders, Kirby noted.

“Secretary Hagel expressed his strong desire to strengthen and deepen the relationship, especially in the defense sector,” he said. “The two leaders discussed strategic geopolitical issues, to include Iraq, Afghanistan and increasing cooperation in the Indian Ocean and Pacific regions.”

Hagel and Swaraj reaffirmed their commitment to strong bilateral relations, and both expressed the desire for a robust and energetic summit between Obama and Modi in the fall.

The post Hagel, Modi Discuss Deepening Cooperation appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Rape is a crime but not one merely of passion. It’s a weapon used to subjugate, to perpetrate hate, to force submission, to prove a point, to avenge, even satiate the need for retribution, however misplaced. For obvious reasons and in sharp contrast to most other crimes as or more grievous, rape evokes very strong responses. In that, lies the paradox of the social treatment of the offence. There are parameters which need to be fulfilled; parameters that are at direct variance with each other.

Consider this: while on the one hand, there’s an overwhelming view to treat rape on par with any other crime and, concurrently, free the ‘victim’ from social ostracism; on the other, the impassioned enrage towards the ‘accused’ in the media, overwhelming pressure on investigating authorities and a collective cry to hang the accused almost infers a near conclusive guilt. The two, at variance, deter the progress of logical processes and place hurdles in the way of legal resolution.

Laws are created and modified to meet social needs. In that, it would be a given to understand that no law is absolute in itself. Lawmakers constantly attempt to tweak the law to address real-time needs which change almost constantly. The Delhi gang-rape and the outrage that ensued was a trigger to tweak the law to meet inadequacies that had to be addressed. Following them being addressed, it must be realised that the new law once again remained open to change that needed to follow in the passage of time and dynamic realms of social behavior and it wasn’t absolute either.

Change In Law Was Needed

The reactions that followed Delhi gang-rape were warranted in that they triggered a change in the law – a defined shift in onus where the involvement of juveniles in rape was concerned; more severe punishment in cases of acid-attacks; an enhanced punishment for rape compounded with other offences like murder and others.

That said, as is the wont, certain areas were ignored in the process. Real-time situations cannot be simulated to aid parliamentary processes and need to actually happen before law-makers wake to a socio-legal need and…legislate!

Only recently, the Anti Corruption Bureau invoked the Prevention of Corruption Act; laid charges of extortion, threat and blackmail on two Mumbai policemen following a real estate agent’s complaint that they were helping three men blackmail and extort Rs 50 lakh from him. The complainant, a young estate agent alleged in his police complaint that when he met one of them at a police station recently, he was told that a 20-year-old woman had filed a gang-rape complaint against him and began to summon him.

In what is alleged to be a fake application, the policeman told the complainant the victim had given an application stating that the complainant had spiked her drink and she had been gang-raped by three to four persons, including the complainant. This application was marked as sent to the chief minister, the home minister and the Mumbai police commissioner while in reality, it had not even reached Khar police station’s senior inspector. Apparently, investigators learnt that the accused had fabricated the application to frighten the complainant.

In another case which exposes the need for change in the present-day law, a 17-and-a-half year old girl and a 27-year-old boy fell in love and planned to convince their families to get them married. However, before they could do so, the girl discovered she was pregnant. After her grandparents, with whom she had been living since her parents’ death, learnt of her pregnancy, they forced an abortion.

Since she was a minor, the hospital, as prescribed under the law, reported the case to the police and the boy was booked under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 (POCSOA). Following an immediate arrest, the boy had to spend five-and-a-half months in jail before being released on bail in October.

Now, under the law according to POCSOA, the age of consent has been increased from 16 years to 18 years and it criminalises every sexual act involving minors, even if it is with her “consent”.

After his release in October, the boy married the girl. However, the case against him continued till the Vasai Sessions Court finally acquitted him. But, if the Court had gone strictly by Section 4 of POCSOA the boy would be proved guilty, and could have been sentenced to seven years rigorous imprisonment.

Lately, the Supreme Court, while hearing a case filed by a former airline cabin crew member against a top banker, expressed concerns over the recent increase in cases where women had filed complaints of rape against their male partners after their relationship went sour, mostly accusing them of sexual exploitation with the promise of marriage.

Where is it held that if you had a relationship for two years, it becomes rape when it failed?” asked the Supreme Court bench while hearing the case where the complainant had alleged that the accused had taken advantage of her for two years and then refused to marry her. The accused was already married and the complainant knew it.

Following reforms in rape law, Mumbai’s police stations have witnessed a surge in the number of rape complaints, with more and more women coming forward to lodge criminal protests; the most worrying being ‘technical rapes’, which stem from failed relationships. According to police, these are cases where a consensual sexual relationship later turns into a complaint of rape against the man. Officers claim around 80 per cent of rape cases registered with them are ‘technical’ in nature though procuring exact figures was impossible.

There is a definite need to address the law on rape in a sound comprehensive manner through legislative deliberations and after taking precedents from across the world into consideration. Issues such as preventing the identification of an accused – particularly of rape considering the stigma that comes attached – by the police and the media, need to be addressed.

Glasgow Police Display Sensitivity

In this context, it’s pertinent to note the sensitive and exemplary manner in which Glasgow Police authorities made statements regarding the two Indian officials who were arrested in Glasgow during the 2014 Commonwealth Games tournament before being let off after the separate charges against them were dropped for lack of evidence.

A spokeswoman for Police Scotland had said, “On Saturday, August 2, a 49-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of assault in Glasgow city centre and a 45-year-old man was held for alleged assault in west Glasgow…Both men are expected to appear at Glasgow Sheriff’s Court on Monday.” The police didn’t identify either of the accused. Back in India, the police would have gleefully revealed the identity of the accused and posed with him – head covered by a cloth – for publication across the nation. In the absence of a law preventing this, sections of the police and media will continue to act in ways outrightly insensitive and in violation of right to privacy.

Being Emotional About Rape Won’t Work

Introducing a battery of laws to curb the rate of rapes or other crimes isn’t actually effectual. It only creates an illusion of safety besides fetching votes for the legislating party. What we need to do is to tweak the law on rape as others with far-sighted vision, sensitivity and thoroughly researched deductions. Once that is done, we also need to be ready to undertake an impartial appraisal of whatever we legislate, when needed and…apply the change. Getting overtly emotional about rape instead of being logical will only land us with an entirely new set of problems and fail to address the real issue…that of deterrence!

The post India’s Newest Rape Law Needs To Be Tweaked – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

(EurActiv) — The May 2014 EU election saw the lowest voter turnout on record, according to updated figures discretely released by the European Parliament during the summer holiday period for EU institutions.

The updated numbers, published on the Parliament website, show that turnout struggled to reach 42.54% in 2014, well below the 43.1% initially announced.

Diplomatic pencils will be being snapped in despair at the lowest public enthusiasm for an EU poll since 1979, when elections were first held.

The tweaked figures will also come as an embarrassment for EU officials who had hailed the results of the 2014 poll for finally reversing a trend of declining voter engagement with EU polls.

The Parliament in particular ran its entire campaign on an assumption that the economic crisis would boost voter turnout, with the slogan “This time it’s different”.

It was, but not in the way that lawmakers expected.

Jaume Duch Guillot, the Parliament spokesperson, said on election night that the EU had witnessed “a historical moment because for the first time since 1979, the long term trend of declining turnout has been reversed”.

Turnout is seen as a litmus for the EU Parliament’s democratic legitimacy by many but it has fallen steadily, from 62% in 1979 to 43% in the 2009 election.

Worryingly for europhiles, the new low will call into in question the legislative credibility of the European Parliament. Guy Verhofstadt, the lead candidate for the liberals and a convinced federalist had initially hailed the marginally-higher turnout estimate, saying the new Parliament “will be more representative than the previous one”.

The actual result will also cast doubt on the experiment of having lead candidates – or ‘Spitzenkandidaten’ – campaigning for the major European political families.

When the first result was estimated, Simon Hix, a professor of politics at the London School of Economics (LSE) said that it proved “the validity of the experiment to personalise the campaigns and focus them on European issues”.

A Parliament spokesperson quoted by the EUobserver news website said the change in turnout numbers was due to differences in estimated and final results for Spain and Italy.

Still, the spokesperson put on a brave face: “When you look at the final result and the figure that was estimated at the end of May – those two figures are very close. The final figure, which is a little bit lower than in 2009, confirms that the big descending tendency of previous years has been stopped,” the spokesperson told EUobserver.

Turnout did in fact rise in some countries, notably Greece where the sovereign debt crisis and austerity measures imposed by the EU/IMF bailout drove the population to vote en masse. The presence of populist parties with activist bases – particularly the far-left Syriza which won the vote they had billed as a referendum on the bail-out deal – may also have helped turnout there to climb from 52.61% in 2009 to 59.97% in 2014.

The numbers in other bail-out countries decreased:

• In Spain, turnout reached 43.1%, lower than the 44.87% recorded in 2009.
• In Portugal, turnout fell to 33.67%, down from 36.77 in 2009.
• Ireland saw the biggest drop, to 52.44%, down from 58.64% in 2009.

The post Last EU Election Had Lowest-Ever Turnout appeared first on Eurasia Review.

ArcelorMittal is currently mining and shipping 5 million tonnes of iron ore a year in Liberia from its operations in Yekepa and Buchanan (described as phase 1).

The company is also working on an expansion project (described as phase 2) that will see shipments rise to 15 million tonnes of iron ore with first production planned by the end of 2015.

“Due to the evolving situation of the current Ebola virus outbreak in West Africa, contractors working on the phase 2 expansion project have declared force majeure and are moving people out of the country. We are currently assessing the potential impact on the project schedule,” ArcelorMittal said Friday.

ArcelorMittal said it remains fully committed to Liberia and the intention is to re-start full construction of the phase 2 project at the earliest opportunity. In the meantime, employees are working to secure equipment and carrying out other critical activities related to logistics, engineering and procurement, ArcelorMittal said.

According to ArcelorMittal, Phase 1 operations continue as normal at this time and to date have not been affected by the situation in Liberia.

Bill Scotting, chief executive of ArcelorMittal Mining, said, “Clearly the priority for Liberia and other affected countries right now is to contain and ultimately stop this current outbreak of Ebola. We are providing full support to the government in this regard and taking every precaution to protect all of our employees on the ground in Liberia. ArcelorMittal has made a long-term commitment to Liberia and we will maintain this commitment. While the recent developments are very concerning, at present we believe that the emergency procedures and other measures developed and currently in place at all ArcelorMittal sites in Liberia make it possible to continue our phase 1 operations.”

Since the outbreak of Ebola in Liberia, ArcelorMittal said it has taken every precaution to protect its employees and operations, including providing thermoflash scanners to test for fever in all employees and visitors to all ArcelorMittal Liberia locations, distributing 500 full sets of personal protective equipment (PPE) to ArcelorMittal Liberia hospitals and other hospitals and clinics in Nimba, Buchanan and Monrovia, and providing training to healthcare workers and employees.

ArcelorMittal said that Ebola awareness sessions were conducted by a leading Ebola prevention and control expert, and an infectious disease nurse has been brought in who serves as ArcelorMittal Liberia’s in-house expert and is working closely with the ArcelorMittal hospital teams. The company is also in regular contact with ISOS and Liberia’s Ministry of Health, ArcelorMittal said.

The post ArcelorMittal Issues Statement On Operations In Liberia And Ebola appeared first on Eurasia Review.

TEL AVIV has no metro. It has been discussed for decades. Successive mayors have promised it. Alas, still no metro.

When the Israeli army entered the Gaza strip and found there an astounding system of underground tunnels, an idea made the rounds: Why not invite Hamas to build the Tel Aviv metro? They have the expertise, the technology, the planners, the manpower.

But this war is no joke. It is a terrible tragedy.

AFTER 29 DAYS of fighting (until now), who has won?

It is, of course, much too early to draw final conclusions. The ceasefire has blown up. It will take months and years to sum up all the consequences. But Israeli popular wisdom has already drawn its own conclusions: it is a draw.

This conclusion, by itself, is a kind of miracle. For an entire month, Israeli citizens have been bombarded by a barrage of propaganda. Daily, hourly, they were subject to an endless stream of brainwashing.

The political and military leaders dictated a picture of victory. Tanks and troop carriers coming out of the Gaza Strip have been ordered to fly large flags. All photos of troops leaving the Strip showed happily smiling soldiers. (In my imagination I see the troops training for the exit, with the sergeant-major shouting: “You there, Private Cohen, correct your smile!”)

According to the official line, our glorious army has achieved all its goals. Mission accomplished. Hamas has been beaten. As one of the tame “military correspondents” put it: “Hamas is crawling on all fours to the ceasefire!”

It is therefore a great surprise that in the first poll after the fighting, 51% of the Israeli Jewish public responded that the war has ended in a draw. Only 36% answered that we have won, while 6% believe that it ended in a victory for Hamas.

WHEN A guerrilla organization with at most 10,000 fighters achieves a draw with one of the mightiest armies in the world, equipped with the most ultra-modern weapons, that is by itself a kind of victory.

Hamas has not only shown a lot of courage during the fighting, but also surprising ingenuity in preparing for this campaign. It is still standing upright.

The Israeli army, on the other hand, has shown very little imagination. It was quite unprepared for the maze of tunnels. The vastly successful “Iron Dome” anti-rocket defense was invented by civilians and installed eight years ago by a civilian Minister of Defense against the express wishes of the army. Without this defense, the war would have looked very different.

Indeed, as a commentator dared to write, the army has become a heavy, cumbersome, conservative machine. It followed its established routine, without employing special forces. Its doctrine was, in essence, to pound the civilian population into submission, causing as much killing and destruction as possible, so as to deter the “resistance” as much and as long as possible. In Israel, the terrible pictures of death and destruction did not evoke compassion. On the contrary. People were proud of it.

In the end, both sides were thoroughly exhausted. Yet in the Cairo ceasefire negotiations, Hamas did not surrender.

For the Israeli leadership, the only alternative to retreat was the conquest of the entire Gaza Strip. This would have enabled it to exterminate Hamas physically and dismantle its infrastructure. But the army strenuously objected and convinced the political leadership, too. An estimated thousand Israeli soldiers would have been killed, the entire Strip would have been turned into ruins.

32 years ago, the Begin-Sharon duo was faced with the same dilemma. The conquest of Western Beirut would have cost an estimated 800 Israeli soldiers. Like the Netanyahu-Ya’alon duo now, they decided against it.

Israeli society has no stomach for so many casualties. And the international outcry against the civilian carnage in Gaza would have been too much.

So now Netanyahu is doing what he had sworn never-ever to do: he is conducting negotiations with the “despicable terrorist organization” – Hamas.

THERE IS a mental illness called paranoia vera. Its main symptom: the patient takes a crazy assumption (the earth is flat, Kennedy was killed by extraterrestrials, the Jews rule the world) and builds an entire logical system around it. The more logical the system is, the sicker is the patient.

Israel’s current paranoia concerns Hamas. The assumption is that Hamas is an evil jihadist terrorist organization, bent on the annihilation of Israel. As one journalist put it this week: “a gang of psychopaths”.

The entire policy of Israel is based on this assumption. So was the war.

You can’t talk with Hamas. You can’t make peace with it. You must annihilate it.

This demonic picture has no connection with the real world.

I don’t like Hamas. I don’t like religious parties in general – not in Israel, not in the Arab world, not anywhere. I would never vote for one.

But Hamas is an integral part of Palestinian society. In the last internationally supervised Palestinian election it won a majority. True, it took power in the Gaza strip by force, but only after winning a clear electoral majority in the Strip, too.

Hamas is not “jihadist”‘ in the sense of al-Qaeda or ISIS. It is not fighting for a world-wide Caliphate. It is a Palestinian party, totally devoted to the Palestinian cause. It calls itself “the resistance’. It did not impose religious law (the “sharia”) on the population.

Ah, but what about the Hamas Charter, which demands the destruction of the State of Israel and contains virulent anti-Semitic statements?

For me, this is frustratingly deja vu. The PLO had a Charter that also called for the destruction of Israel. It was paraded around endlessly in Israeli propaganda. A respected professor and former army intelligence chief, Yehoshafat Harkabi, spoke for years about nothing else. Only after the signing of the Oslo agreement between Israel and the PLO were the relevant clauses of this document formally struck out, in the presence of President Bill Clinton.

Because of religious restrictions, Hamas itself cannot sign a peace agreement. But, like religious people everywhere (especially Jews and Christians), it has found ways around God’s commandments. The founder of Hamas, the paralyzed Sheik Ahmad Yassin (who wrote the Charter and was assassinated by Israel) proposed a 30-year Hudna. A Hudna is a truce sanctified by Allah, which can be renewed until the Last Judgment.

Gush Shalom, the Israeli peace organization to which I belong, first demanded eight years ago that our government start talking with Hamas. We ourselves had a series of friendly discussions with several Hamas leaders. The current official line of Hamas is that if Mahmoud Abbas succeeds in signing a peace agreement with Israel, Hamas will accept it – provided it is ratified by a referendum.

Unfortunately, there is very little hope that Israel will be cured of this paranoia soon.

ASSUMING THAT this war will soon be over, what will remain?

The war hysteria that submerged Israel during this war has brought with it an odious wave of fascism. Lynch mobs have hunted Arabs in Jerusalem, Journalists like Gideon Levy need bodyguards, university professors who dared to advocate peace were censored (justifying a world-wide academic boycott), artists who voiced mild dissent were dismissed.

Some people believe that this is a milestone in the decay of Israeli democracy. I still hope that the evil wave will recede. But something will surely remain. Fascism has been sanctioned in the mainstream discourse.

One symptom of fascism is the “knife in the back” legend. Adolf Hitler used it all the way to power. Our glorious army was on the verge of victory, when a cabal of (Jewish) politicians stuck a knife in its back. One can already hear this now in Israel. The brave soldiers could have conquered all of the Gaza strip, if Netanyahu and his stooges – the Defense Minister and the Chief of Staff – had not given the order for an ignominious retreat.

At the moment, Netanyahu is at the height of his popularity. An overwhelming 77% of the Jewish citizens polled approve of his conduct of the war. But this can change overnight. The criticism voiced now in whispers, even in his own government, may break into the open.

In the end, Netanyahu may be devoured by the very same super-patriotic flames that he has stoked.

The awful pictures of devastation and death coming out of Gaza have made a profound impression abroad. They cannot be simply erased. Anti-Israeli sentiment will remain, some of it tinged with outright anti-Semitism. Israel’s (false) claim of being “the nation-state of the Jewish people” and the almost total identification of Diaspora Jews with Israel will inevitably lead to blaming all Jews for Israel’s misdeeds.

The impact on Arabs is far worse. For every child killed, for every home destroyed, new “terrorists” will surely grow up.

THERE MIGHT have been some positive results too.

This war has created temporarily an unlikely coalition of Israel, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the Palestinian Authority.

Two months ago, Abbas was the punch bag of Netanyahu. Now he is the pet of Netanyahu and Israeli public opinion. At the same time, paradoxically, Abbas and Hamas have also been drawn closer together.

This could be a unique opportunity to start a serious peace process, in the wake of the solution of the Gaza Strip problems.

If…

The post Metro Gaza – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Time’s up, or so planet earth seems to be telling humanity. Extreme weather conditions around the globe, including rising temperatures, droughts, crop failures, melting sea ice, rising sea levels, disappearing glaciers and the loss of plant and animal species all point in only one direction. The tipping point towards the sixth great extinction is taking place right now.

It is clear that these problems are all human made. Rising carbon dioxide levels caused by fossil fuel emissions are creating a series of catastrophes in ecosystems around the world. The processes are clear to anyone who pays attention.

Two large craters, one more than 200 feet in diameter, were recently discovered in the remote Yamal peninsula of northern Russia. In an extreme case of irony, Yamal is said to mean “end of the world” in the local Nenets language. Scientists have concluded that the holes were formed when a mixture of salt, water and natural methane gas exploded underground. They theorize that rising temperatures made the permafrost unstable and released methane, the key ingredient in the explosions. A temperature rise of only two degrees centigrade is enough to make permafrost thaw and begin a chain of terrible events.

All of the bad news is relevant as the United Nations prepares to host a Climate Summit on September 23, 2014 in New York. Past climate conferences haven’t provided much in the way of relief, as the United States and other industrialized nations subverted the 2009 Copenhagen climate accords. The supposedly environmentalist president Barack Obama and his European cohorts forced an agreement that allowed a two degrees increase in temperature. This seemingly small amount will kill humans and other species and brought the giant holes to Siberia and now more dangerously, methane from the sea. Climatologist Jason Box recently made this pithy comment on Twitter. “If even a small fraction of Arctic sea floor carbon is released to the atmosphere, we’re f’d.”

As the situation is dire, so must the solutions be truly radical. The free for all of capitalism is deadly in so many ways as financial collapse, exploitation and wars bring misery to millions of people. Money is the problem and not individual decision making. We may feel useful when recycling trash or driving hybrid vehicles but these are bandages when the world needs major surgery. “Green capitalism” is doomed because capitalism can’t be green. The imperative to maximize profits is in direct conflict with environmental and human sustainability. The profit motive must be eliminated in favor of managed economies that limit growth, fairly distribute resources, regulate the polluting industries and activities, and end the gross inequalities of this gilded age.

Money is the elephant in the climate change room. Corporations are beholden to no one but themselves, only claiming to be like human beings when they really want to get their way with governments and citizens around the world. “Corporate personhood” is a one way street and everything from income inequality to planetary destruction is the proof.

Recently residents of Toledo, Ohio and southeast Michigan literally had no water to drink for three days. A combination of sewage, live stock manure, and fertilizer run-off create algae blooms which spread more rapidly because of rising temperatures. If the amount of algae grows enough it contaminates drinking water from lake Erie. The causes of this recurring problem are well known but the obvious solution of regulating the businesses responsible for the problems doesn’t happen and the inaction is a direct result of corporate power flexing political muscle. The Fertilizer Institute is the industry lobby which makes sure that neither federal nor local regulators restrict the use of fertilizers which deprived 500,000 people of drinkable water. Acquiescence to corporate interest makes life itself untenable.

Unfortunately, the elites will not suffer in the collapse as much as the rest of us will. Poor Detroit residents live with the threat of a privatization plan which begins with the loss of access to water, while golf courses and publicly financed stadiums owe the city $30 million in unpaid water bills without facing any loss of this resource. On the very same day that struggling people were forced to accept pension cuts, the wealthy owners of the Detroit Red Wings hockey team unveiled plans for a publicly financed stadium and said nothing about paying the overdue water bill at Joe Louis arena.

The 1% will make the rest of us suffer slowly before suffering at all themselves. They will still get plenty of water, or energy, or land or whatever the rest of us lack. The end will not come as Hollywood tells us, with a sudden cataclysm. It is moving surely but slowly enough to keep some people safe while others suffer.

The People’s Climate March scheduled to take place on September 21 in New York cannot be just a feel good precursor to the United Nations meeting. It must have as part of its agenda a critique of the world financial system. The criminals who must be exposed aren’t just in New York and London either. India and China poison the air and their citizens in a mad dash to catch up with the other industrial polluters of the world.

There are many villains in this story but there is only one important point. Maintaining the status quo means the end of life on the planet. The 1% will limit their exposure for a time but eventually the end will come for them too.

The post Climate Change: Point Of No Return – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Although, based on the news media, it is difficult to believe that Homo Sapiens have become biologically gentler, an apparent reduction in testosterone about 50-60,000 years ago, lead to human personalities becoming gentler and human faces becoming more feminine, according to a study based on measurements of more than 1,400 ancient and modern skulls.

This led people to have gentler personalities and to great advances in art and tool making.

The new study, published in the August 2014 issue of the journal Current Anthropology, found that human skulls changed in ways that indicate a lowering of testosterone levels at around the same time that culture was blossoming.

The study’s lead author Robert Cieri said: The modern human behaviors of technological innovation, making art and rapid cultural exchange probably came at the same time that we developed a more cooperative temperament resulting from having a little less testosterone in action

Heavy brows were out, rounder heads were in, and those changes can be traced directly to testosterone levels acting on the skeleton, according to Duke University anthropologist Steven Churchill, who supervised Cieri’s work.

What the bones do not reveal, according to a report in The Telegraph 8/3/14, is whether humans had less testosterone in circulation, or fewer receptors for the hormone.

In a study of Siberian foxes, animals that were less wary and less aggressive toward humans took on a different, more juvenile appearance and behavior after several generations of selective breeding.

Dr Hare of Duke University, who also studies differences between our closest living ape relatives, aggressive chimpanzees and mellow bonobos, said chimps and bonobos develop differently, and they respond to “social stress” differently.

Chimpanzee males experience a strong rise in testosterone during puberty, but bonobos do not. When stressed, the bonobos don’t produce more testosterone, as chimps do, but they do produce more cortisol, the stress hormone. Thus their social interactions are profoundly different; and their faces are different, too.

Cieri compared the brow ridge, facial shape and interior volume of 13 modern human skulls older than 80,000 years, 41 skulls from 10,000 to 38,000 years ago, and a global sample of 1,367 twentieth century skulls from 30 different ethnic populations.

The trend that emerged was toward a reduction in the brow ridge and a shortening of the upper face, traits which generally reflect a reduction in the action of testosterone.

There are a lot of theories about why, after 150,000 years of Homo Sapiens (HS) existence, humans suddenly leapt forward in religious activities and technology. Around 40-70,000 years ago, there is widespread evidence of bone and antler tools, heat-treated and flaked flint, projectile weapons, grindstones, fishing and birding
equipment, and ritual burials with grave goods.

A significant increase in religious activities in the many millennia prior to that time may have lead to increased numbers of people who were able to live together in a band or clan without splitting apart. Small groups that lack a religious incest taboo will be plagued by the ills of inbreeding; therefore groups with a religious taboo on incest that leads to exogamy in mating will be selected for.

As ancestor worship strengthens kinship ties over more and more generations, it also expands kinship ties over more nomadic bands creating extensive clans and tribes. These clans and tribes can gather periodically at a special place to exchange future mates. They also started exchanging i.e. trading for desirable objects not found in
their usual local. Seashells, obsidian, red ocher and other materials have been found in campsites and graves more than 100-200 miles away from their closest source.

The stronger the attraction of a special place, the greater the effort that distant clans will make to attend, so gathering spots that are turned into sacred sites of pilgrimage through special seasonal rites will enrich human communities. There are scholars who think that HS advanced trade networks helped them out compete Homo Neanderthals in Europe (studies of Neanderthal DNA have shown that they were a distinct species not ancestral to HS).

The need for all the clans to show up about the same time leads to fixed seasonal holy days and a religious calendar. The need to mark time for pilgrimage festivals led people to study the cycle of the moon and the movement of the constellations and thus move some of the spirit powers into the sky.

Pilgrimage festivals still have major economic impact and serve in most religions as great sources of religious experience and solidarity.

In small groups moral values can be based on utilitarian principles like do to others as you want them to do to you, or what goes around comes around. But in larger more complex societies with diverse classes and castes it may be more effective to root ethics in transcendent terms since there are not enough repeat interactions between individuals to validate utilitarian morality.

As tribes became larger and villages grew, a judge who rewarded good people and punished evil people helped the community to instill its norms in its members. With the exception of a sociopath, the intelligent minds of HS also have a conscious, self-evaluating, purpose driven aspect that needs to be satisfied because groups with a higher percentage of these kinds of minds were more stable and more effective. Guilt arises from many activities and needs to be atoned for. Self-discipline provides many advantages for an individual’s survival and success.

Most people, and all societies, need the structure of rules, community and divine discipline to maintain self-control. Hunters needed to kill animals, yet they obviously felt ambivalent about it because almost all human societies have rules either about offering some of the kill to the spirit of the animal killed, or a taboo on killing or eating certain animals.

There are much fewer rules relating to eating plants. Spilling blood intentionally is fraught with spiritual ambivalence and tension that needs to be dealt with.

Sex is also never simply a natural act for HS. The mind is always involved. It is not just chance that the first thing HS becomes self-aware of in the Garden of Eden is the shame of being naked. HS is the only living species that thinks it must clothe itself. Evidence of textiles from more than 24,000 years ago has been found in the cold climates of ice age Europe.

However, the origins of clothing in Africa are the not the result of ice age climate but the result of concepts of modesty. Self-aware intelligent minds became moral minds, which became modest minds.

Recent DNA studies of body lice that must lay their eggs in clothing, show that these lice evolved from pubic lice that adapted to clothing that covered the pubic area. This genetic adaptation took place 60-100,000 years ago. Thus, HS have been clothing themselves for at least 60-70,000 years. Long before rules about property became important, religious rules of probity were important.

The authors of the study quoted above argue that living together and cooperating put a premium on agreeableness and lowered aggression, which in turn, led to an apparent reduction in testosterone that changed faces and created more cultural exchange.

I maintain that religious developments helped make that whole transition possible and effective; by enabling larger and larger bands of humans to live and co-operate together, which created more cultural and technology exchange.

Religion is the glue of pre-state tribal societies for weal or for woe.

The post How Did Homo Sapiens Become Gentler? – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Obamacare’s most significant effect is an expansion in the number of people dependent on Medicaid, the joint state-federal welfare program for low-income people. Kaiser Health News points out that this expansion is threatening the existence of free clinics. Some clinics are signing up for Medicaid, while others are closing:

“We used to say … ‘wouldn’t it be great if we no longer had uninsured and we could close our doors and go out of business,’” said Michelle Goldman, CEO at the Eastern Panhandle Care Clinic in Ranson, W.Va., which is one of the free clinics now also taking Medicaid. “But the truth is we like the work we do and enjoy helping this population and believe we still have a lot to offer them.”

While a few free health clinics have shut their doors in Arkansas and Washington, most expansion-state non-profit free clinics are reassessing their business strategies. Medicaid offers the potential to give their patients better access to specialists, diagnostic testing and hospital care, and that’s created a sense of unease for operators of the clinics that for decades have played a key role in the nation’s health-care safety net.

“These changes have caused some real disruption in the free clinic sector trying to anticipate what it means for patients who continue to need our services, and how we can sustain ourselves,” said Marty Hiller, senior consultant with Echo, a consulting firm that works with free clinics. “It’s been a tremendous upheaval.”

The nation’s loosely organized network of free clinics have come a long way since the 1970s when most were made up of volunteer doctors and nurses working a day or two a week in church basements. Today, about 1,200 free clinics serve about 6 million patients, according to the National Association of Free and Charitable Clinics. Their increasingly modern facilities look much like private medical offices that serve patients with insurance. They often use electronic medical records, pay administrative staffs and nurse practitioners, and run their own pharmacies.

Unlike the nation’s community health centers, which receive billions in federal funding and are a key part of the health law’s push to expand access to health care, free clinics have traditionally relied on private donations, and state and local assistance. Community health centers, which also treat poor patients, charge patients above the poverty level on a sliding fee scale and are paid a higher Medicaid fee than private physicians.

The assertion that Medicaid dependency increases patients’ access appears unfounded: Medicaid patients have terrible access to physicians. It does not appear that access to care has changed for these patients—at least in the short term. However, the change in cash flow means that the clinics are now more accountable to the federal government than private donors and local government. That will likely increase the bureaucratic burden and decrease quality of care in the long term.

The post Obamacare Threatens Free Clinics – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Andy Dabilis

The apprehension of a notorious terrorist after a gun battle in the middle of a popular tourist spot in Athens is being hailed by authorities – who are now on alert against signs that the group may try to retaliate.

Nikos Maziotis, who, with his wife Panayiota Roupa were released from a pre-trial detention two years ago and vanished, engaged in a shootout with a squad of police in the Monastiraki flea market shopping area on July 16th as tourists fled.

There was a 1 million euro bounty for information leading to their arrests. Greek officials were eager to get him into custody, particularly after another terrorist, Christodoulos Xeros, walked away from a holiday furlough in January.

Maziotis is the mastermind of Revolutionary Struggle, a group active between 2003 and 2009 and known for firing a rocket-propelled grenade into the US Embassy and bombing the Athens Stock Exchange. Neither of those attacks caused injuries.

Authorities had said he was also believed behind a car bombing outside a main branch of the Bank of Greece in Athens in April, just ahead of a visit to Greece from German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Maziotis was hospitalised with a shoulder wound before being taken to a high-security prison in Athens and then transferred to another in the country’s second-largest city, Thessaloniki.

Maziotis refused to speak with a prosecutor other than to state his occupation was “Revolutionary.” He reportedly told a magistrate who came to see him that “the members of Revolutionary Struggle do not have to answer for anything. It is others who should answer for the social genocide that is being carried out in the country.”

Two days after his capture, police, hunting for accomplices in bank robberies they said he carried out, found an apartment hideout in a northern Athens neighborhood. Roupla is still at large.

The adventure gripped Greeks, but polices sources who weren’t named told the newspaper Kathimerini they believe he had been planning a terrorist attack this summer and feared his group could be planning an attack in revenge for his arrest.

Efi Lambropoulou, a professor of criminology at Panteion University in Athens, said she didn’t think Revolutionary Struggle would strike again soon.

“Revenge for what? For the situation of the country? If they wanted revenge they could do something else, not robberies,” she told SETimes.

The group blames the government, bankers and international lenders propping up the economy with bailouts for attached austerity measures that they blame for record unemployment and deep poverty.

Despite the arrest, Lambropoulou said counter-terrorism police still have their work cut out. “The new terrorism is a very complex issue, dangerous and with many faces,” she said.

Police in May linked Maziotis to six armed robberies believed to have netted him and his accomplices around 15 million euros in cash to finance their violent agenda.

He was charged with attempted murder and armed robbery. Public Order Minister Vassilis Kikilias said the arrest was “an important success” that would have “multiple benefits for Greek society.”

Ioannis Michaletos, a terrorism specialist at the Athens-based Institute for Security & Defence Analysis, told SETimes: “Maziotis was foremost a symbolic personality that could mobile recruitment for the cause of the terrorist networks. Certainly his arrest will cause a slowdown in this process.”

But he too had a caveat. “He was co-operating with criminal figures of the Greek underworld and if they aren’t arrested his group will remain active,” he said.

Evidence of the danger Maziotis poses remains. Police detained a man after the arrest and said he was linked to the terrorist, and found bulletproof vests in his house.

Police said Maziotis was working with a dangerous criminal, Vassilis Palaiocostas, who escaped by helicopter from a high-security prison five years ago.

Maziotis disdained working with other terrorists, including Xeros, who went on the Internet after he vanished and then posted a video promising a return to violence.

Michaletos though said the arrest hasn’t stopped terrorism or Revolutionary Struggle. “His comrades for the time being will try to hide any evidence and ‘go under’ for a while.”

But, he added: “Once they feel safe they will certainly strike. That’s what experience has showed so far.”

The post Police In Greece On Alert After Terrorist’s Capture appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Imrane Binoual

News about a Moroccan national who leads an Islamic State (ISIS) brigade in Syria is raising talk about Islamist jihadists in northern Morocco.

Mohamed Hamdouch, a 28-year-old jihadist who is also a member of the Islamic council of the organisation, appeared in a video cutting off the heads of five people.

Before fighting in Syria, he ran a clothing business in Fnideq and was recruiting jihadists from the area.

A fortnight ago, Moroccan security services also arrested a French jihadist in Tangier for seeking to recruit fighters and send them to organisations loyal to al-Qaeda.

Analysts say that northern Morocco has become a fertile breeding ground for radicalisation.

According to Human Rights Defence Association Chairman Lahbib Haji, the region is more conservative than elsewhere in Morocco.

“Furthermore, they are permanently in contact with Moroccans who have settled in Europe. That makes it easier to recruit them,” the Tetouan barrister said.

The cells recruit members from underprivileged areas, he noted.

Mediterranean Strategic Analysis and Intelligence Company head Mountacir Zian puts forward other factors to explain the phenomenon.

“The northern region has been neglected, if not completely forgotten, since independence,” he said.

“What also sets the north apart from the interior of the kingdom is the lack of zawiyas, (brotherhoods), which are centres for spirituality,” Zian said.

The zawiya enables “religion to be separated from politics,” he added. “It is a place for debate, where people can devote themselves to all the spiritual practices. But that’s completely lacking in the north,” Zian explained.

Writer Abbassi Mustapha tells Magharebia: “For a long time we’ve been drawing people’s attention to the existence of international fundamentalism in the northern region,” he said.

Now, women, old and young, “are being radicalised and setting off for jihad to join their husbands”, he commented.

He noted the ties between extremists and street crime.

“The facts show that radicals have always had connections with this easy money,” he explained. “It’s this money that allows them to set up cells. In fact, the jihadists who have been arrested have links with drug trafficking, car theft and all kinds of illegal activity.”

“This is why the north has become fertile ground for the development of jihadist cells, particularly in Fnideq, Martil, Tetouan, Laarache and Tangier, to a lesser degree,” he told Magharebia.

“The majority of these work in smuggling, have a history of drug trafficking, or are street vendors with connections to smuggling,” the journalist said.

This pattern is now taking on an international dimension, he concluded.

The post Radicalism Takes Root In Northern Morocco appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Kanchi Gupta

As the Islamic State (IS) is rapidly gaining territorial and political control over key territories, oil fields and refineries in Iraq and Syria, domestic, regional and international stakeholders are calling for the resignation of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to pave the way for a political resolution to the crisis. Maliki, whose political bloc won the 2014 parliamentary elections by a small margin, asserted his will to stay in power by stating that calls for the formation of a national salvation government “represent a coup against the constitution” and seek to “eliminate the democratic experience”.

Despite his refusal to step down, the parliament elected Sunni Islamist Salim al-Jubouri as the new speaker on July 14, 2014. By Iraqi custom, the speaker is Sunni, the President is Kurdish and the Prime Minister is Shia-Arab.

Prime Minister Maliki has been accused of partisan politics which have played into the hands of Sunni insurgent groups like the IS. His consolidation of power has compromised the legitimacy of Iraq’s political, security and economic institutions. Iraq’s Deputy Prime Minister, Saleh al-Mutlaq contended in 2011 that Maliki’s “dictatorial power” will lead to a civil war and divide the country. Maliki’s key backer, the US, too is conceding that his divisive policies have contributed to the current crisis.

Nouri al-Maliki was born in 1950 in the village of Janaga in the Karbala province of Iraq. He is believed to have been inspired by his grandfather who represented the Shia clergy in the 1920 armed uprising against the British occupation of Iraq. Maliki joined the ‘underground’ Shia Islamist Dawa Party in the 1970s after the Arab countries’ loss to Israel in 1967. Following a crackdown on party members by Saddam Hussein’s forces, he escaped to Syria in October 1979.

The execution of Ayatollah Baqir al-Sadr – one of the founders of the Dawa party — the suppression of Shia uprisings in southern Iraq, the massacre of almost seventy of his relatives and the destruction of Shia villages and shrines radicalised Maliki. He helped set up guerrilla cells in Iraq and facilitated suicide attacks and assassinations targeted at Hussein’s regime. He helped integrate Dawa members across the region from Iran to Lebanon and also oversaw the military training camp in Iran from 1981 onward.

Iran’s efforts to co-opt the Dawa as a proxy in its war with Iraq splintered the party and Maliki was further disillusioned by growing ties between Damascus and Iraq in the 1990s. Thus, following the US-led invasion of Iraq that toppled Saddam Hussein, Maliki moved back to his hometown in April 2003. He served as board member of the de-Baathification committee and spokesman for a coalition of Shia parties (United Iraqi Alliance) before being short-listed for the Prime Ministerial post by former US Ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad.

Maliki assumed the office of the Prime Minister in mid-2006, in an environment of civil war wherein Shia militias were engaged in a sectarian battle with Sunni insurgent forces, including the al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI). Maliki secured political power by bypassing parliamentary oversight to fill up military and political institutions with Shia loyalists and removed potential rivals from power.

He circumvented the defence and interior ministries by creating institutions like Office of the Commander in Chief, which centralised his control over security forces, the intelligence apparatus, elite security units like the Baghdad Brigade and other counter-insurgency bodies. Post the elections in 2010, he used the delay in forming the new government to appoint himself minister of interior and defence as well as the national security advisor. Following opposition from other political blocs he relinquished the posts, while retaining control over their functions.

Marisa Sullivan of the Institute of War Studies writes, Maliki’s “desire to centralise and maintain power…stems more from political paranoia, distrust and fear than from strong ideological impulses”. However, his internal policies have polarised Iraqi society along sectarian lines as counter-insurgency strategies targeted Sunni and Kurdish Iraqis.

A prime example is the marginalisation of Sunni Awakening Councils Militia (or Sons of Iraq), a paramilitary force cultivated by the US to fight insurgent groups like the AQI. Maliki, initially unreceptive to the idea of arming Sunni fighters, conceded to US pressure and also promised them a role in state-building thereafter. However, many of these fighters were later removed from the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) and arrested, pushing them towards radicalisation.

Maliki has been accused of politicising the security forces by awarding senior military positions to Shia loyalists, earning the ISF the label of “Maliki’s militia”.

Consequently, thousands of Kurdish troops defected from the ISF in 2013, requesting to join the Kurdish peshmerga. Tensions with the Kurds intensified after counter-insurgency operations were expanded into disputed areas of Kirkuk, Diyala and Salah ad-Din, which are under the jurisdiction of the Kurdish Regional Government. KRG President, Massoud Barzani called this an “unconstitutional step…against the Kurdish people, the political process (and) co-existence”.

Maliki used de-Baathification to target not only Sunni opponents but also rival Shia leaders like Muqtada al-Sadr. In 2008, he led a security operation against Sadr’s Iranian-backed Mahdi Army in Basra. Maliki also targeted the leadership of the secular al-Iraqiyya bloc to whom his State of Law Coalition lost by a few percentage points in the 2010 parliamentary elections. Despite the electoral loss, Maliki formed the government with the support of Iran, the US as well as the KRG.

The bloc was established by Ayad Allawi, former interim Prime Minister, who was a political threat to Maliki after he secured the support of Shia clerics for the Prime Minister’s post in 2010. Maliki ordered the arrest of Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi, also of the Iraqiyya bloc, on charges of terrorism in 2011.

Large-scale detention of Sunnis as well as excessive control over anti-corruption bodies, the judiciary and the security forces have led to deterioration in the security situation and provided a significant recruitment base to the Islamic State and other insurgent groups. Even the relative stability of 2007 and 2008, for which Maliki’s supporters have sought credit, was a direct result of the success of the “Awakening” initiative.

Maliki, thus, faces challenges to his power not only from receding American support but also from political rivals like the Sadrists and the al-Iraqiyya bloc, and the rise of Sunni insurgent groups like the Islamic State. It is also being reported that Iraq’s highest Shia authority, Grand Ayatollah Sistani has communicated his opposition to renewing Maliki’s term. However, despite losing support of his core backers, Maliki is holding on to his bid for the third term owing to his marginal electoral success.

(The writer is a Junior Fellow at Observer Research Foundation, Delhi)

The post The Iraq Crisis And PM Nouri Al-Maliki – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

(Bosnia and Herzegovina post-mortem)

In the land of gray and endless maimed bodies of people that call themselves humans, one word thinly resounding within the pulse of deserted desires-Strategy! Klaić’s Dictionary[1] of foreign words (edition 1951) describes Strategy as a science, which explores and develops within the correlate connection, political, economic and especially war elements of preparing and waging the war!

Nineteen years later, with its featureless announces the continuation of daffodils of the better prediction and as such it just poured even more fuel to the fire for those who wants to warm themselves over the ashes of my beloved Bosnia and Herzegovina (Republic of Srpska and Federation of BiH). And why, my dear Professor, we need a new war? Say it, just say it, my never forgotten schoolboy, ringing in my ears the words of an old man with, at the same time an old and remarkable beauty, name, but also the sleeping name – Alter Ego.

Because here there is not even one Strategy for any field of human creation and life and without it we are doomed to slowly die out. Yes, dying out. Earlier (ah, the good old days), we made ​​movies about it making even the “Magpie strategy”[2], and today…

Let me, please, give the possibility to elaborate on the following theme: Education of the local youth. No, I do not want to lament over the already said and written, about the three headed, national mania overloaded Dragon, but I just want to, my dear Professor, in methodological way to outline, that HOW it would be nice if we have the Strategy of the educational process and at the same time not to awake Frankenstein monster created in the Dayton laboratories and to trick it in a very scientific way.

Quoted that word-HOW! Here you go – Let’s start with the Council of Ministers, the ruler above the rulers, and we request that the entity governments (and even those from lower levels) the following:

Information / Poll as the product results from the analysis of all companies and their needs for personnel in the next five years.

Are we asking too much? Yes, from their point of view. Because, then on the light of the son will finally surfaced complete information on the operations of each company and we would not have what we have today: unpaid taxes and not carried out duties towards the state. Not even talk about other things. HOW nice it would be coming out of the school and go directly to work. And not in Bureau of Employment or in order for a visa to a country that uses all the successful mind(s) from this area.

The Strategy of the educational process would do just that:

a) Construction of the country on healthy roots with oriented needs towards the common good,

b) Staying of the indispensable – educated personnel in the region,

c) Assumptions of market oriented economy,

d) The educational process unencumbered with surplus of knowledge and a lack of personnel.

Yes, a new war encapsulated with Strategy. The war of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Republic of Srpska and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina), is human worthy.

And unquestionably naive as though many years I have been, my dear Professor, I still believe that we have the strength for it.

You’re right, my student: unquestionably naive.
Surely, I have to write down the words.
Notes:
[1] Adolf Bratoljub Klaić was born on 27.8.1909 in Bizovac (Croatia) and died in Zagreb, 2.3.1983 (Croatia, Yugoslavia) – created one of the most popular Dictionaries of foreign words in former Yugoslavia and current Croatia “DICTIONARY OF FOREIGN WORDS”, 1951.
[2] The movie “The magpie strategy“, directore Zlatko Lavanic; writer of the script Emir Kusturica, 1987 (Sarajevo, Bosni and Herzegovina, Yugoslavia): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0094055/

The post Bosnia And Herzegovina And XXI Century: We Need A New War – Essay appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Martin Murphy

Hong Kong is now the most politically polarized it’s been since its return to China in 1997. That discord was on full display last month when hundreds of thousands took to the streets in a mostly peaceful protest at the annual July 1 handover anniversary march.

The ubiquitous banners, placards, and booths along the three-mile route showcased Hong Kongers’ perennial complaints—including a widening income gap, unaffordable housing, and creeping mainland Chinese influence. Yet one theme, as if embodying all of the city’s ills, seemed to unify the marchers: the long-held demand for genuine universal suffrage in Hong Kong’s next chief executive election in 2017.

Currently, Hong Kong’s top official is chosen by a pro-Beijing “election committee.” But many residents have grown tired of this undemocratic system and are now stepping up demands to be able to elect their leader directly.

If denied, Hong Kong could face another decade of political paralysis, poor governance, and sharpened tensions with the mainland.

Who Holds the Reins?

The majority of Hong Kongers have long expressed a desire for genuine universal suffrage—the right to both vote and stand for election—as called for in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. China has acknowledged these aspirations, but has sought to water them down over the years.

The 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration on the return of Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty established that “The chief executive will be appointed by the Central People’s Government on the basis of the results of elections or consultations to be held locally.” Hong Kong’s Basic Law, its “mini-constitution,” states that “The ultimate aim is the selection of the Chief Executive by universal suffrage,” but specifies that it be “upon nomination by a broadly representative nominating committee in accordance with democratic procedures.” In 2007, the Standing Committee of the National Peoples Congress reaffirmed the Basic Law and provided a timetable of 2017 for the first such election.

This contradiction between requiring a “nominating committee” and allowing “democratic procedures” is at the heart of  Hong Kong’s current political reform debate.

While Beijing and pro-democracy advocates are generally agreed that Hong Kongers will have the right to vote in a general election, Beijing continues to insist that under the Basic Law, the right to nominate candidates continues to reside with a nominating committee. Populated mostly with pro-Beijing members, its further institutionalization under a new electoral system would ensure that no undesirable or “unpatriotic” candidates make it past the starting gate and onto the ballot. Of the current 1,200 members, only 689 picked the current chief executive in a city of 7 million, earning him the derisive nickname “689.”

As part of Hong Kong’s preparations for the 2017 election, the government recently concluded a five-month public consultation that elicited some 124,000 comments. Its summary document, released on July 15, was blasted by Hong Kong’s pro-democracy “pan-democrats” and academics for being “unscientific and lacking credibility” when it asserted that the “mainstream” of Hong Kong society supported the current nominating committee system. The government report also failed to mention how many supported popular nomination, the annual July 1 march, or the “Occupy Central” movement.

If, as expected, the government’s official reform proposal does not allow for public nomination of candidates, pro-democracy “Occupy Central” activists plan to take to the streets and blockade the city’s main business district with 10,000 protestors. The movement, led by Hong Kong University professor Benny Tai, has said it will wait for the government’s proposal, due out before the end of the year. But plans are already afoot for some form of civil disobedience as early as August.

“Occupy Central” organizers held their own preparations at the end of June, with a citywide referendum on a number of proposals for changing Hong Kong’s electoral system. Expecting some 200,000 votes, the movement saw a nearly 800,000-vote turnout—about a quarter of the electorate—with most supporting public nomination. In the eyes of organizers, it sent another strong message to Beijing that the Hong Kong people are fed up with their current undemocratic system.

That Beijing issued a white paper just days before, asserting its “comprehensive jurisdiction” over Hong Kong and calling Hong Kongers “lopsided and confused,” only helped swell the numbers. Beijing also reminded Hong Kongers that the next chief executive needed to be “patriotic” and “love China.” It was another case of Beijing shooting itself in the foot when it came to managing Hong Kong affairs.

Backlash from Beijing

If pro-democracy proponents had thought that momentum was building on their side, Beijing and its powerful supporters in Hong Kong wasted no time in pushing back on various fronts with attacks that have continued fast and furious.

In one opinion piece, China’s state-run Global Times called the referendum “an illegal farce,” and in another accused the United States of advocating “separatism” in Hong Kong. A former Xinhua News Agency official referred to the exercise as meaningless and questioned whether those who voted knew what it was all about. His comments came a day after a former deputy from the State Council’s Hong Kong and Macau Affairs office said the referendum was unrepresentative, unlawful, and not legally binding.

In Hong Kong itself, where the tone was slightly muted, governing authorities pledged to listen to the people’s views, but highlighted that any political reform would have to be consistent with the Basic Law—i.e., no public nomination. And a new group, The Alliance for Peace and Democracy, whose individual members are not necessarily opposed to universal suffrage, is currently conducting its own referendum against “Occupy Central,” in which it hopes to show that Hong Kong’s “silent majority” is against the movement.

But the opponents of “Occupy Central” and universal suffrage were not content to just issue statements. During the 10-day referendum, the movement’s servers became targets of some of the largest and most sophisticated global cyberattacks in history. What angered many Hong Kongers were not so much the attacks themselves, as they were expected, but that the government voiced little concern and has yet to investigate the matter.

Thrown into this mix is a range of less ideological voices—some support universal suffrage but oppose “Occupy Central,” while others ask Hong Kongers to temporarily set aside calls for public nomination for “the greater good.” Several proposals to make the nominating committee more democratic with a larger and broader membership have also been tabled, and could form part of the government’s final reform proposal package.

An Explosive Moment

Hong Kong is now entering an explosive environment, and the weeks and months ahead will be critical.

Pan-democratic lawmakers in the legislative assembly likely have enough votes to defeat any undemocratic political reform bill that comes before it. Hong Kong’s democratic road would then face an uncertain future and, as a leading politician recently said, the city would become “ungovernable.”

But there’s more at stake than just universal suffrage. Many here fear that Hong Kong is already losing its way of life and the many freedoms it enjoys—including the freedom of speech, freedom to protest, and rule of law.

Optimists say Hong Kong and Beijing have reached the precipice before without tumbling over. There’s still a chance that one side could compromise again. But this time is looking different. That’s because Beijing’s leaders are losing patience with Hong Kong, and many Hong Kongers have simply grown tired of fake democracy.

Washington on the Sidelines

Over the past several years, America’s low-key approach toward Hong Kong’s democratic development has resulted in little more than occasional statements in support of universal suffrage. These are usually met with retorts from Beijing accusing the United States of meddling in China’s internal affairs.

Since 1992, U.S. policy toward democratization in Hong Kong has been driven by the United States-Hong Kong Policy Act. The law enabled the United States to treat Hong Kong, even after its 1997 return to China, as “fully autonomous from the People’s Republic of China with respect to economic and trade matters,” including allowing continued exports to Hong Kong of sensitive technologies.

But the Act also contemplated a future when Hong Kong might no longer be “sufficiently autonomous” to justify continued preferential treatment under U.S. law. In such an eventuality, the U.S. president could terminate Hong Kong’s special status “until it regained sufficient autonomy,” meaning it would be treated just like any other Chinese city under U.S. law.

While most Hong Kongers and their supporters in the United States still hold out hope for the success of “one country, two systems” and the preservation of Hong Kong’s autonomy, events on the ground now bear closer watching.

As initially written, the Act required the State Department to send an annual report to Congress on the state of Hong Kong’s autonomy and its democratic development. That requirement lapsed in 2007. Now would be an excellent time to bring it back.

Born in Hong Kong, Martin Murphy is a former U.S. diplomat and was head of the Economic-Political Section at the U.S. Consulate in Hong Kong from 2009-12. He can be found at www.hongkongreporting.com. 

The post Hong Kong’s Simmering Revolt Against Fake Democracy – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

CODEPINK asks: “Why does our President want to take sides and get involved in a civil war? The US is not the target of ISIS, but if we become involved, we will be.”

A lot of Americans these days, some of whom regard themselves as impeccable humanitarians, have formed the conviction that when it comes to the Middle East (or pretty much anywhere else in the world), intervention by the United States — especially military intervention — can do nothing but harm.

President Obama’s concerns about the Iraqi humanitarian crisis and the safety of US personnel can be solved without dropping bombs. Helping the besieged civilians in Iraq should be an orchestrated international effort, not carried out just by the US — the country that unleashed the sectarian turmoil in the first place. (CODEPINK)

Tens of thousands of Iraqis fled from ISIS, taking refuge on a mountain top where they have no food, water, or shelter. How long could anyone survive in these conditions when daytime temperatures often exceed 100F?

By the time CODEPINK’s wished for international effort could be orchestrated, thousands of those in need of help would be dead.

Channel 4 News spoke to a Yazidi refugee, Barakat al-Issa, who is trapped in the Sinjar mountains: “the situation is very tragic, more than 100 thousand people are trapped in the mountains here, in need of water and food.”

The Americans and Turkish have carried out air drops of aid, but the effort was not sufficient said Mr al-Issa: “They are saying that planes are dropping aid, but this aid is only getting to some 5 per cent of the people who are trapped here, because of the mountainous terrain.”

“People are waiting here for international forces to intervene, in the hope that this will become a safe haven for aid to be delivered.”

“Most of the people here are civilians and they hope a peacekeeping force will come from Iraq or Nato.”

He accused the Islamic State militants of kidnapping at least 500 Yazidi women, whose fate remains unknown, and said that dozens of families had been murdered in the south of the Sinjar mountains as they tried to flee. He also repeated allegations that militants had been seen executing women and children.

To advocate neutrality in this conflict seems indicative of either being willfully deluded about the nature of ISIS or the result of simply not paying attention to what has been happening in Syria and Iraq over the last two years.

ISIS, or the Islamic State as it now prefers to be known, is utterly uncompromising. These men have chosen to fight a war that they will either win or lose — don’t expect them to ever send a delegation of negotiators to Geneva or start talking about how they want to live peacefully side by side with anyone. Coexistence is not part of their vocabulary.

Anyone in CODEPINK who is averse to taking sides should watch the video below — or at least as much of it as they can stomach — to witness how these jihadists whose passion for killing has no limit choose to portray themselves.

Some of the latest military action in Iraq appears to already by paying off but the situation remains dire, as Rudaw reports:

Local officials said today that 10,000 Yezidis who were stranded on Mount Shingal for one week were rescued and settled in the town of Zakho.

Medical teams and aid organizations in Zakho have rushed in to assist the rescued families, said Rudaw reporter.

Ashti Kocher, Zakho’s security chief said that Kurdish armed forces have opened a safe corridor for the Yezidis at Mount Shingal.

“We have also cleared about 30 kilometers of the ISIL forces in order to open a road for those families,” said Kocher, who currently leads a Peshmerga unit at Sinune village near Shingal.

Kocher said that the rescued civilians were transported to the Kurdistan Region through Rojava (Syrian Kurdistan) which is under the control of Kurdish forces known as the Peoples Protection Units (YPG).

Barakat Issa, Rudaw reporter on Mount Shingal said that the number of Yezidis stranded on the mountain is higher than initially reported. He said that nearly 100,000 people are hiding on the mountain.

Issa said that in the past few days 60 children and elderly have [died] … of hunger and thirst while there is fear that Islamic militants controlling the town of Shingal and other villages have massacred hundreds of others.

Stephen Walt proposes a course of inaction for the U.S. in the Middle East on the grounds that U.S. intervention never has its desired effects, but he adds this caveat:

[T]his argument would not preclude limited U.S. action for purely humanitarian purposes — such as humanitarian airdrops for the beleaguered religious minorities now threatened with starvation in Iraq. That’s not “deep engagement”; that’s merely trying to help people threatened with imminent death. But I would not send U.S. forces — including drones or aircraft — out to win a battle that the Iraqi government or the Kurds cannot win for themselves.

So the anti-interventionist “humanitarian” perspective is this — if I understand it correctly: we should try to make sure the Yazidi do not starve to death on the mountaintop. If, however, they manage to come back down only later to be slaughtered by ISIS, that’s their problem.

The post Iraq: Send Them Parasols? – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.