Quantcast
Channel: Eurasia Review
Viewing all 73339 articles
Browse latest View live

Egypt: Jail Terms For Prominent Activists Extended

0
0

An Egyptian court sentenced leading political activist and blogger Ahmed Douma to three years in prison for “insulting court judges,” an Anadolu news agency correspondent who attended the session reported on Tuesday.

Douma was also ordered to pay a fine of 10,000 Egyptian Pound (roughly $1400) after the court convicted him of “insulting” the judges during another court session for a the trial in which he is facing an array of violence-related charges.

Douma – who was allowed to step out of the defendant’s dock to defend himself – accused the judges of “threatening” his attorneys by taking “illegal disciplinary measures” against them.

According to Reuters, Douma accused Judge Mohammed Nagi Shehata during Tuesday’s hearing of posting comments on Facebook criticizing Egypt’s opposition.

The judge slammed the accusation as “an insult” to the judicial system.

Douma and 268 others are accused of staging “riots” outside central Cairo’s cabinet headquarters and assaulting policemen during a sit-in back in December 2011 against a decision by Egypt’s then-ruling military council to appoint as prime minister Kamal al-Ganzouri, who had served in this position under ousted autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

Around 15 people were killed and hundreds injured during clashes between the Egyptian forces and protesters that day.

In April, an Egyptian court upheld three-year prison sentences for Douma and two other prominent activists, including the founder of the April 6 movement, Ahmed Maher, for violating a controversial law restricting protests.

April 6 movement, banned since April this year, also took part of mass protests against Islamist then-president Mohammed Mursi, who was toppled by the army in July. However, the group turned on the military-installed regime when authorities violently cracked down on dissidents.

Three leading members of April 6 – Ahmed Maher, Mohammed Adel and Ahmed Douma – were sentenced to three years in prison in December 2013 on charges that included protesting illegally. Their appeals were rejected in April.

Maher, Douma and Adel were charged with organizing an unauthorized and violent protest in November, days after the passage of the law.

The Protest Law (107 of 2013) “allows security forces to use firearms against peaceful protestors” if they do not have an authorization.

In late October, President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi approved a military decree, similar to Mubarak’s martial law, to expand military power under the title of “ensuring stability,” that categorizes state institutions as military facilities and considers attacks against these facilities as a crime against the armed forces.

Ending martial law throughout the country, which gives the authorities wide-ranging policing powers, was one of the demands of the popular uprisings, but the decrees eroded hopes among liberals that Egypt’s second uprising would finish the job begun with Mubarak’s ouster in 2011.

The sentencing of the three secular activists in December last year, part of a broad coalition of groups that supported Mursi’s ouster, raised concerns at the time of a return to Mubarak-era practices.

Last week, an Egyptian court dismissed charges against Mubarak for ordering security forces to kill protesters during the 2011 uprising.

That verdict, and others handed down to Mubarak-era figures, has led some to conclude that the old regime that existed before either revolution is back all but in name.

Authorities banned association to the Muslim Brotherhood following Mursi’s ouster and launched a heavy crackdown on its members, leaving at least 1,400 dead and 15,000 jailed, including hundreds sentenced to death for allegedly taking part in deadly riots in August 2013.

Egypt was brought in November in front of the UN’s top human rights body for a litany of rights abuses, including its crackdown, mass arrests and unfair trials targeting mainly Mursi supporters, journalists and activists, described as “unprecedented in recent history.”

Besides the heavy crackdown on Muslim Brotherhood supporters, many of the leading secular activists behind the 2011 uprising have also found themselves on the wrong side of the new political leadership, getting locked up for taking part in peaceful demonstrations following the recent ban on unlicensed protests.

Original article

The post Egypt: Jail Terms For Prominent Activists Extended appeared first on Eurasia Review.


Israeli Discourse About Palestinians: When Media Do Not Mediate – Analysis

0
0

The media has an important role to play in reducing violence, particularly if committed to peace, through a less simplistic or even propagandistic coverage. Analyzing coverage of the 2008-09 and other Israeli military operations against the Gaza Strip highlights the key arguments employed for defending the alleged necessity of war, or for the protection of so-called ‘national interests’.

By Moara Crivelente

Abstract

The mass media have a deeply important role in conflict situations or their resolution; they can determine the rise on violent episodes and on distrust, or the other way around. Mass media are also fundamental in determining people’s perceptions about the conflict or their engagement and confidence in a peace process. If frustrated, actors might return to violence to draw back attention, especially when they feel forgotten or that their cause is being neglected. The media coverage of conflicts and the discourse promoted by political actors when addressing the public are extensively analyzed by various authors. Examples are Professors Xavier Giró, Teun van Dijk, Gadi Wolfsfeld and Johan Galtung, who advocates for an engagement in ‘peace journalism’.

The key arguments – reinvented, though with little novelty, after the 9/11 attacks in the USA – employed for defending the alleged necessity of war, or for the protection of so-called ‘national interests’, are also analyzed. Examples of these arguments are centered on the dichotomies ‘civilized’ and ‘barbarian’, ‘legitimate’ and ‘terrorist’, ‘peace’ and ‘security’. They are applied extensively in the Israeli official discourse transmitted through the media; both are deeply nationalist and dedicate to forging an identity in a context of constant violence. These conditions are very similar in different contexts, such as the role of official ‘advertiser’ that major and commercial mass media end up playing especially during war.

The paper addresses these issues to approach the role that media should play in reducing violence, particularly if committed to peace, through a less simplistic or even propagandistic coverage. This paper used some of the methods available for the measurement of violence discourses, analyzing the coverage of the 2008-09 and other Israeli military operations against the Gaza Strip.

1) Media Analysis in Conflict Coverage

On 27 December 2008, the Israeli Government launched the ‘Operation Cast Lead’, a military offensive led by the Army, named ‘Israel Defense Forces’ (IDF), against the Gaza Strip. It lasted three weeks, and it was poorly covered, in terms of complexity, by the traditional media from all over the world. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a constant, in a superficial or simplistic form, in the international media. Although global attention is certainly an important factor sparking some form and sporadic negotiations, in this case the perpetuation of a peace process is frustrating not only for the victims and the actors directly involved, but also for the audience. Besides the ‘Operation Cast Lead’, which sets the main point of analysis, this paper also looks at other military offensives against the Gaza Strip and the West Bank as well as other circumstances of escalation and the problematic conduction of a innocuous ‘peace process’. The evaluation points at a pattern of distorted or simplistic media coverage and official discourses that contribute to fuel tensions.

Furthermore, the frustration of expectations in an armed and ongoing conflict has serious consequences; it determines the rise on violent episodes and on distrust both between the political actors and in the negotiation process as a whole. Through mass media, the frustration and the distrust are heightened: the initial intense coverage – either positive or negative for the conflict’s resolution – and the gradual fading on attention are also fundamental in determining people’s reactions or engagement, and their confidence in the process. If frustrated, actors might return to violence to draw back media attention to their causes, which they feel could be forgotten.

Examples of studies that take these issues into account are the project Measuring Peace in the Media, which consisted in an analysis carried out by the Institute for Economics & Peace and Media Tenor; and the Israeli media observatory Keshev, which has important works on the national media coverage of Israeli wars. Keshev’s methodology suggestion and many insights its researches gave to this analysis were incorporated or adapted to the works’ aims and theoretical ponder. The analysis is centered only on two important Israeli newspapers’ electronic versions, aiming to analyze the media’s justification of violence and the reproduction of official discourses for that purpose, choosing ‘Cast Lead’ as the main event analyzed, when around 1,400 Palestinians and 67 Israelis died and the Gaza Strip was devastated, an event repeated at least twice in the following five years.

The Yedieot Ahronot’s electronic and translated version Ynet News, and Haaretz were the papers chosen due to their influence, but also for the different approach each has towards the conflict – from critical perspectives to the defense of stances linked to the justification of the war. Still, they represent the media that people directly indirectly involved in the conflict read, and Yediot is the most read paper in Israel, while Haaretz is the oldest, with an editorial line tending to be somewhat critical, though many of the ‘war mode’ narratives were found to prevail in their coverage.

2) Discourse analysis

The media coverage of conflicts and the discourse promoted by political actors when addressing the public through mass media are analyzed extensively by various authors. Examples are Professors Xavier Giró, Antoni Castel, Teun van Dijk, Ross Howard, Gadi Wolfsfeld and, in a wider aspect, Professor Johan Galtung, who advocates for the necessity of media and journalists to engage in a positive peace journalism.[1] More specifically pointing at an ideological frame for conveying political discourse, in conflict situations, Professor Giró builds his argument on nationalism and Professor van Dijk sets a theory of an ‘ideological square’, in which actors try to legitimize their actions by maximizing their own virtues and victories and minimizing the other’s, and by minimizing their own losses and wrong-doings, while maximizing the other’s.[2] The construction of national identities through political and mass media discourses is an observation that correlates with the evaluation of the role that the same mass media could play on conflict transformation and peace building.

‘Cast Lead’ brought the UN to respond to the international outcry against the military operation by sending a fact finding mission, under the auspices of the UN Human Rights Council. It was headed by the South African and Jewish judge Richard Goldstone and it resulted in a report that concluded: war crimes and possible crimes against humanity were committed.[3] It is also an example of how important a role the media could have played by turning the event into a news frame for the search for accountability of the Israeli Government, and its failure to respond to the task, mostly for its overall simplistic and ethnocentric coverage. Still, the event was inserted on a time when the Government was lacking support and with elections being planned for a near future, which has fundamental consequences for the political leaders’ positions and their stances in front of the public. The reactions to the UN Human Rights Council were extremely negative and refuted every aspect of the fact finding mission and its conclusions, resorting to the very persecution of Jude Goldstone personally.[4]

On a wider range, conflict resolution and negotiation processes are directly influenced by the media coverage of the peace efforts as well as of the escalation of violence, either generally or in isolated events. Although real negotiations are usually undertaken inside closed doors, political leaders and mediators also use the media to transmit messages, either positive or negative to the overall process. More importantly, it has been argued that the media provide the only channel for communication and negotiation between rival actors during crises, or when diplomatic channels are severed, in what was labeled as media diplomacy.[5] This is another reason why media observers have stressed the importance of journalists having in mind their responsibility towards peace.

However, when the coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian question is made by mass or conventional media in general, not only it misrepresents and simplifies the causes of the conflict, but it also furthers disagreements by fueling nationalist sentiments, basically set against the other and based in narratives that insist in portraying this as a religious matter. This sort of oversimplification and the mobilization in that direction postpone the resolution of the conflict mostly by expanding insecurity and enmity, conditions under which the Israelis and the Palestinians have seen themselves for many decades now.

Transmitting ideological and propaganda discourses through mass media is nothing new. Since the beginning of the 20th century the film industry plays on inflaming nationalist sentiments, to legitimize the war effort – and expenditure. With newspapers, nowadays, it is clearly not different. Professor Teun van Dijk dedicates one of his articles to clarifying the notion of manipulation, which is employed by the specialist in linguistics Noam Chomsky in his writings about propaganda and by various theorists who use the Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) in their work.[6]

The manipulation of identities and, more specifically, of nationalist sentiments, their escalation and instrumentalization for political purposes are observations very persistent within critical studies. Applying CDA, it is analyzed by authors like Noam Chomsky, van Dijk and Professor Xavier Giró, among many others. Giró argues for the fundamental – though not exclusive – role of the media on the construction of the social reality, ‘particularly when it is conflictive.’[7] On the media’s linkage with mental models, he affirms that ‘if the mental representation we have about the conflicts was co-constructed by the media, it is not difficult to infer that the media – and particularly daily newspapers – co-construct collective identities.’[8]

CDA is crucial in this paper to complete – in a complex and critical way – the ‘framing studies’, present in the suggestions made by Professor Gadi Wolfsfeld, from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He develops his analysis on the Israeli media by pointing out four general and problematic values, on which the news production is based: immediacy, drama, simplicity and ethnocentrism.[9]  The last is defined by Wolfsfeld as a cultural barrier that in the case of the Israeli media, as in many others, exists in a strong relationship with sensationalism. He goes further in affirming, when analyzing the media coverage of peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian National Authority (PNA), that the ‘Hebrew news media are constructed for Jewish Israelis and are inherently ethnocentric in orientation.’[10] It enables the discourse to be centered on the ‘journalistic defense mechanisms’, favoring a perspective in which ‘we are the victims’ and ‘they are the guilty’, which is different from what he observed when analyzing Northern Ireland’s media addressing all the parties to the conflict, and not only one side.[11]

After describing its response and methods as part of Israel’s reaction against Hamas’ attacks, and as legal under international law – even before concluding investigations on specific situations –, the IDF published its findings for an overall investigation, led exclusively by military colonels. Maintaining the legal vocabulary for the justification of its operation, the IDF concludes that ‘the investigations showed that throughout the fighting in Gaza, the IDF operated in accordance with international law’ and that ‘these unfortunate incidents [the destruction of civilian infrastructure and the death of civilians] were unavoidable and occur in all combat situations, in particular of the type which Hamas forced on the IDF, by choosing to fight from within the civilian population.’[12] In regard to proportionality, the IDF argues that according to international customary law and to principles of IHL, a defender does not have to ‘limit itself to actions that simply repel an attack’ and that ‘a state may use defensive measures necessary to avert ongoing attacks or preserve security against further similar attacks.’[13] It concludes the section of the right to self-defense arguing for the use of force.

The hypotheses confirmed

The paper’s analysis centered on the evaluation of the use of names, context, familiar sources, images and other instruments, or, on the other hand, official sources, graphics, statistics, less images, and less prominence given to the information in the story – by leaving it to the end of the articles, as put by members of the Israeli media monitor Keshev – for instance, and the use of words and adjectives that would de-legitimize victims as such or that would justify their suffering – such as terrorists and Hamas operatives – so the culpability is taken off ‘our’ shoulders and put on the other’s, as also suggested by Professor Giró. Still, the prominence of official and military sources, as put by Wolfsfeld, in detriment of political activists, critics, other specialists, not to mention citizens and witnesses was also observed by this paper as a ‘journalistic defense mechanism’.[14]

For the use of the principles of International Law to legitimate the war, or ‘lawfare’, as put by the US’ General Charles Dunlap, the analysis centered not only on the actual rules in international covenants and other UN instruments, but also on the norms that could invoke such laws, such as the definition, before-hand, of ‘legitimate military targets’, by tying places and persons to Hamas’ activities, even in the case of schools, mosques, hospitals, TV stations, government buildings and many other civilian infrastructure. By identifying international law language in the discourses reproduced by the news stories analyzed and the dismissal of the possibility of war crimes being committed – through the omission and even distortion of facts and of the very international law norms – the analysis can shed some light on the hypotheses suggested. Still on the same path, the refusal of conveying diplomatic alternatives to the escalation of violence and the exclusion of Hamas as a negotiating partner was deeply observed.

The general news stories chosen follow the general pattern, introduced in the beginning of this work, of over-simplification. One example is reducing the variety of actors involved in the conflict to ‘Israel against Hamas’. They rarely mention other smaller groups, other voices contrary to the violence, political activists and think-tanks, mediators or even the UN itself, saved the events in which the UN compound was hit, or when the Palestinian death toll passed 1000, when the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon condemned the violence.

The first hypothesis set for this papers was that the Israeli media manipulate facts and distort actions, either in favor of the Israeli investment in violence, or against Hamas’ and other activists’ mobilization. This hypothesis was confirmed, given a variety of facts and contexts that were almost completely omitted or even distorted in the Ynet and Haaretz’s news stories analyzed. Still, the dominance of official sources was a general norm in both newspapers’ articles in the samples. These sources have completely monopolized the explanation of events and actions, leaving virtually no space for other actors’ explanations.

For instance, when conveying the alleged causes for the escalation of violence, there is virtually no mention to Hamas’ position towards the previous cease-fire, brokered by Egypt. The group’s position is based on the accusations that Israel had broken it first, by invading the Strip; the Israeli Government had admitted it, saying the goal was to destroy tunnels supposedly aimed at smuggling weapons and kidnapping soldiers. The articles limit their stories to the reproduction of Israeli official explanations, which are reduced to a zero-sum game that could only end with a weakened and de-legitimized Hamas. The group is again framed as a terrorist organization, an ‘illegitimate entity’, despite the fact that it is a political party elected for the Government by Gaza’s citizens.

In the case of Palestinian sources, who are virtually absent from Ynet and poorly mentioned in Haaretz, when they occur they are limited to the category of ‘Palestinian sources’, ‘Palestinian officials’, ‘Palestinian medical sources’ and, very rarely, to ‘Hamas’ operatives’, who are only quoted when giving threatening declarations. There is almost no mention to names or political positions, for example, and for the witnesses rarely cited, too, no name or political context is given in the news stories analyzed, and they are quite often relinquished to the end of the article. It enables the de-legitimization of Hamas and other political groups and individuals as primary actors and as actual negotiating partners, since no political voice is given to them.

The second hypothesis affirmed that the official discourse, reproduced by the Israeli media, is based solely on facts and International Law norms that help de-legitimize Hamas and other political activists in Gaza as such and legitimize the Israeli Government’s use of violence. It was confirmed both in the previous describing and in the whole analysis in general. For instance, framing the targets counted in the news stories throughout the wave coverage according to the IHL notion of ‘legitimate military target’ is constant, even if this specific expression is absent of the texts. The principle is constantly stretched to make fit homes, schools, mosques, TV stations, parliament buildings, among other civilian infrastructure and people.

The third hypothesis was also confirmed, since the analysis could verify that besides the manipulation of IHL principles, the ‘justification’ of violence by the official discourse and by the media is made through the ‘journalistic defense mechanisms’ and the ‘ideological square’. For starters, Hamas’ claims are completely absent in the articles analyzed and in its journalists’ perspectives when explaining Israel’s motivations for war. Ynet goes further by not refraining from frequently using the terms ‘terrorism’, ‘terror’, ‘terrorist’. Again, according to an ‘ideological square’, as suggested by van Dijk, and to Wolfsfeld’s ‘journalistic defense mechanisms’, the other’s wrongdoings are exposed at length and ours’ are treated with euphemisms, if treated at all; our victimhood is heightened through adjectives – ‘peaceful’ and ‘innocent civilians’ – and theirs’ is treated as consequence, as their own responsibility – which rests ‘on Hamas’ shoulders’.

Still, by establishing that all Hamas’ members and even their families are terrorists, since they are considered to be aides, it is possible to estimate acceptable numbers for the ‘casualties’ classification, within the international troubling standards – even if the numbers themselves are ephemerons, undefined. No questioning is made in that regard by the articles examined; they follow the pattern when using the mechanisms that can set that base, such as the constant use of ‘terrorist’ as an adjective for Hamas and by saying that the civilian ‘casualties’ were their responsibility. It completes the extensive use of the JDM and the ideological square. Furthermore, the ‘victims frame’, as suggested by Professor Wolfsfeld, is widely employed; when referring to their own victims and suffering, names and context are extensively used and even repeated; when referring to Palestinian victims and damage, numbers, instead of names or classifications, in most cases – civilians or combatants? –, and little context is given for the deaths.

One of the many examples of that and of the diminution of IHL relevance, when it is not supportive of Israel, can be given in the Haaretz article, published on December 28, 2008, entitled ‘Gaza residents breach Egypt border; Israel bombs 40 smuggling tunnels’. It tells the story of the breach in Egypt’s borders by ‘Gaza residents’, who should in fact be called refugees. This kind of recourse is used in the majority of the articles analyzed in this paper, as in the case of a strike in Cast Lead’s first aerial strikes against the police academy, in which 99 policemen graduating and 9 members in the ceremony were killed. Under IHL, the attacks can be considered war crimes if the UN Fact-finding Mission’s report is considered, because it concludes that there was no evidence that the policemen were taking part in any violent activities against Israel and, therefore, could not be considered ‘legitimate military targets’.[15]

The results to this paper’s analysis could be partly framed by a set of suggestions regarding the political environment and its relation with a media environment. The cycle formed by the changing political environment, which influences the media environment and that, again, influences the political environment – the politics-media-politics cycle, suggested by Wolfsfeld – and the control that the government has over events; the ability that the government has in mobilizing political consensus over certain issues, such as war; and the nature of news – based on simplistic and ethnocentric perspectives – enable governments to mobilize media in support of wars much easier than to mobilize them in support of peace options.[16] This paper’s analysis has not only confirmed the hypotheses suggested, it has also reaffirmed previous claims that the media do not engage in peace efforts that frequently even though there are alternatives. For starters: making an honest effort to give more complexity and diversity of voices to conflict analysis in news stories; refraining from accepting dependency on official sources and setting aside ethnocentric approaches to a situation that is shared by many; avoiding simplifications such as a religious narrative to a deeply political conflict – a simplification that only serves to mobilize people for more violence – and the normalization, through discourse, of brutal power relations and asymmetries that perpetuate conflict, prevents accountability and maintain status quo, as seen for the past six decades.

Moara Crivelente is a political scientist currently studying the Communication of International Armed and Social Conflicts. Her main academic interests are peace studies, peace communication, community-based conflict transformation and local resistance.

Footnotes

1) Johan Galtung, ‘High road, Low road: Charting the course for peace journalism’, Track Two, vol.7, n.4 (December 1998).

2) See: Xavier Giró, ‘Enfoques analíticos críticos sobre el discurso de la cobertura informativa de conflictos’, eds. Tiziano Telleschi, Eduardo Andrés Sandoval Ferrero, Espacio y tiempo en la Globalización: Una visión de la transparencia en la información (Culiacán, México: Comisión Estatal para el Acceso a la Información Pública del Estado de Sinaloa, 2007); and Teun Van Dijk, ‘Discourse and manipulation’, in Discourse and Society, vol. 17 (2) (London: Sage Publications, 2006), 359-383.

3) UN Human Rights Council, Human Rights in Palestine and other UN Occupied Arab Territories: Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza conflict, (A/HRC/12/48, 15 September 2009).

4) ‘Barak: Goldstone report “false, distorted and irresponsible”’, in Haaretz, (28 January 2010). Viewed March 10, 2012.

5) Eytan Gilboa, ‘Media diplomacy in the Arab-Israeli Conflict’, in ed. Eytan Gilboa, Media and Conflict: Framing issues, Making policy, shaping opinions. (Ardsley, New York: Transnational Publishers, 2002), 193-211.

6) According to Ruth Wodak, CDA ‘aims to investigate critically social inequality as it is expressed, signaled, constituted, legitimized and so on by language use (or in discourse).’ See: Ruth Wodak, ‘What CDA is about: A summary of its history, important concepts and its developments, in eds. Ruth Wodak and Micahel Meyer, Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis (London: Sage Publications, 2001), 2.

7) Xavier Giró, ‘Periódicos y construcciones nacionales’, in ZER, Nº 12, (May 2012), 79-97.

8) Ibid, 81.

9) Gadi Wolfsfeld, Media and the path to peace (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004).

10) Ibid, 135.

11) Journalistic defense mechanisms include, for instance, syntactical or lexical tools to diminish the other’s suffering and heightening emotionalism when telling one’s own suffering, such as the prominence of graphics, statistics and military sources, in the first case, or images, sounds, names and familiar contexts, in the second. See: Gadi Wolfsfeld, The news media and peace processes: The Middle East and Northern Ireland (United States Institute of Peace and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2001).

12) Israeli Defence Forces, Conclusions of Investigations into Central Claims and Issues in the Operation Cast Lead, Part 1, (22 April 2009). Viewed 22 May 2012.

13) IDF Military-Strategic Information Section, Operation Cast Lead, 25.

14) Wolfsfeld, The news media and peace processes.

15) UN Human Rights Council, Human Rights in Palestine and other UN Occupied Arab Territories.

16) Wolfsfeld, Media and the path to peace.

References

Al-Qassam Brigades, Statements, January 2009. Viewed 22 May 2012.

Amanpour, Christianne, interviewed by Chris Lewis, for Investigating Power. (New York, January 9, 2008).

Amnesty International, Israel/Gaza. Operation ‘Cast Lead’: 22 Days of Death and Destruction, MDE 15/015/2009.

Arab Peace Initiative. Viewed 20 May 2012.

Arestizábel, Pamela Urrutia; ‘Conflicto palestino-israelí: ¿Más proceso que paz?’ in Quaderns de Construcció de Pau 23 (Barcelona: Escuela de Cultura de Paz, September 2011).

‘Barak: Goldstone report “false, distorted and irresponsible”’, in Haaretz, (28 January 2010). Viewed 10 March 2012.

Beaudoin, Christopher E.; and Thornson, Esther, ‘Spiral of violence? Conflict and conflict resolution in International News’, in ed. Eytan Gilboa, Media and Conflict: Framing issues, Making policy, shaping opinions. (Ardsley, New York: Transnational Publishers, 2002).

Breaking the Silence, Soldiers’ testimonies from Operation Cast Lead, Gaza 2009, (Jerusalem, June 2009). Viewed 20 May 2012.

Britain and Israel Communications Research Centre, BICOM Briefing: Israel’s unity Government. Viewed 14 May 2012.

B’Tselem – The Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, One Million and a Half People Imprisoned (27 December 2009). Viewed 22 May 2012.

Castel, Antoni, ‘La Guerra de la informació mediocre i controlada’, in Annals del Periodisme Català – Periodisme de Guerra (Barcelona, 1991).

Collier, Paul, and Anke Hoeffler, Greed and Grievance in Civil War (Oxford: Centre for the Study of African Economies, 2002). Viewed 20 February 2011.

Collins, J.; Glover, R., Collateral Language: A User’s to America’s New War, eds. J. Collins y R. Glover. (New York: New York University Press, 2002).

De la Torre, Blanca, ‘Israel: informació de guerra “pret à porter”’, in Annals del Periodisme Català – Periodisme de Guerra (Barcelona, 1991).

Deutsch, Morton; ‘Constructive Conflict Resolution: Principles, Training, and Research’, in The Handbook of Interethnic Coexistence, ed. Eugene Weiner (New York: Continuum Publishing, 1998), 199-216.

Diamond, L.; and J. McDonald, Multi-track Diplomacy: A Systems Approach to Peace. 3rd Edition. (West Hartford, CT: Kumarian Press, 1996).

Donahue, W.A.; ‘Managing equivocality and relational paradox in the Oslo Peace negotiations’ in Journal of Language and Social Psychology 17, 1998, 72-96.

Donahue, W. A.; and Gregory D. Boobler, ‘Relational Ripeness in the Olso I and Oslo II Israeli-Palestinian Negotiations’, in Media and conflict: Framing issues, making policies and shaping opinions, ed. Eytan Gilboa (Ardsley, NY: Transnational Publishers, 2002).

Escuela de Cultura de Paz, Cronología de los conflictos armados: Israel – Palestina. Viewed 14 May 2012.

Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Network, Al Mezan condemns the Israeli increasing indictments of Gazans as ‘Unlawful Combatants’, 18 November 2009. Viewed 20 May 2012.

Fisas, Vicenç, Cultura de Paz y Gestión de Conflictos. (Barcelona: Icaria Editorial y Unesco, 1999).

__; Anuario de Procesos de Paz 2012 (Barcelona: Icaria, 2012), 161.

Fowler, Roger Bob Hodge, Gunther Kress and Anthony Trew, Language and Control (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1979).

Galtung, Johan, ‘High road, Low road: Charting the course for peace journalism’, Track Two, vol.7, n.4 (December 1998).

Galtung, Johan, ‘Violence, Peace and Peace Research’, in Journal of Peace Research 6 (3), 1969, 167-191.

__, Violence, War and Their Impact: On Visible and Invisible Effects of Violence. (Polylog: Forum for Intercultural Philosophy, 2004).

Gilboa, Eytan, ‘Media diplomacy in the Arab-Israeli Conflict’, in ed. Eytan Gilboa, Media and Conflict: Framing issues, Making policy, shaping opinions. (Ardsley, New York: Transnational Publishers, 2002), 193-211.

Giró, Xavier, ‘Enfoques analíticos críticos sobre el discurso de la cobertura informativa de conflictos’, eds. Tiziano Telleschi, Eduardo Andrés Sandoval Ferrero, Espacio y tiempo en la Globalización: Una visión de la transparencia en la información (Culiacán, México: Comisión Estatal para el Acceso a la Información Pública del Estado de Sinaloa, 2007).

__, ‘Periódicos y construcciones nacionales’, in ZER, Nº 12, (May 2012), 79-97.

Ha’aretz, ‘Analysis: IDF plans to use disproportionate use of force in next war’, in Ha’aretz (05 October 2008). Viewed 25 May 2012.

Hass, Amira; Crónicas de Ramallah (Barcelona: Galaxia Gutenber, 2005).

__, interviewed by Moara Crivelente. Ramallah, West Bank (Palestinian Occupied Territories), 23 June 2012.

IDF Military-Strategic Information Section, Operation Cast Lead: IDF limiting harm to civilians, 14 January 2009.

IDF Military Advocate General, The Operation in Gaza – 27 December 2008-18 January 2009: Factual and Legal Aspects. Viewed 24 May 2012.

Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, Implementing the Lull Arrangement (2008). Viewed 20 May 2012.

International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Times of War (Fourth Geneva Convention), 12 August 1949, 75 UNTS 287. Viewed 30 May 2012.

International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflict, 8 June 1977. Viewed 20 August 2012.

International Crisis Group, ‘End the War in Gaza’, in Middle East Briefing 26 (2009). Viewed 24 May 2012.

Israeli Defence Forces, Conclusions of Investigations into Central Claims and Issues in the Operation Cast Lead, Part 1, (22 April 2009). Viewed 22 May 2012.

Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, IDF Operation in Gaza: Cast Lead – updates, January 17, 2009. Viewed 14 May 2012.

Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, One month of Calm Along the Israel-Gaza Border (27 July 2008). Viewed 20 May 2012.

Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, The Operation in Gaza – Factual and Legal Aspects (2009). Viewed 24 May 2012.

Kaldor, Mary, New and Old Wars: Organized violence in a Global Era (Oxford: Polity Press, 1999).

Kasher, Asa; ‘Operation Cast Lead and Just War Theory’, in Azure Online, Summer 5769, N 37 (2009), 43-75.

Keshev, Keshev’s Research Methodology. Viewed 30 May 2012.

Lederach, Jhon P.; Building Peace: Sustainable Reconciliation in Divided Societies (Washington, DC: U.S. Institute of Peace Press, 1997).

Lund, Michael S.  Preventing violent conflicts: A strategy for Preventive Diplomacy, (Washington, DC: U.S. Institute of Peace Press, 1996).

Malone, Sandra; Georgios Terzis and Ozsel Beleli, ‘Using Media for Conflict Transformation: The Common Ground Experience’, in Berghof Handbook for Conflict Transformation (Berlin: Berghof Research Center for Constructive Conflict Management, March 2002).

Mamdani, Mahmoud, ‘The politics of naming: Genocide, Civil War, Insurgency’, in London Review of Books, Vol. 29 Nº 5 (8 March 2007). Viewed 20 February 2010.

Ocampo, Luis Moreno, interviewed by Al-Arabiya News Agency, April 3, 2012. Viewed 14 May 2012.

OCHA, The Humanitarian Monitor, No. 30, October 2008. Viewed 20 June 2012.

Palestinian Academic Society for the Studies of International Affairs, Government and Administration, December 2011. Viewed 30 June 2012.

__; Israeli Occupation Policies, December 2011. Viewed 30 June 2012.

Philo, Greg; and Mike Barry, More Bad News from Israel (Glasgow: Pluto Press, 2011)

Reporting the World, ‘Israel and Palestine: Are we getting the Story?’, in Freedom Forum, March 21, 2001, London.

Richmond, Oliver P.; ‘Liberal peace transitions: a rethink is urgent’, in Open Democracy, November 19, 2009. Viewed 20 February 2011.

Shenhar, Daniel; ‘Israel’s Military Campaign in Gaza and the Israeli Election Campaign – Two Campaigns in One?’, in Opinion CIDOB, nº 21 (Barcelona: Centro de Estudios y Documentación Internacionales de Barcelona,  13 January 2009). Viewed 22 May 2012.

Sherman, Martin; ‘Proportionality and Hypocrisy’, in Ynet, 19 January 2009. Viewed 30 May 2012.

Siegman, Henry; ‘Sin Hamás no hay solución para Gaza’, in El País, February 8, 2008.  Viewed 20 May 2012.

Spencer, Graham, The Media and Peace: From Vietnam to the ‘war on terror’ (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005).

The State of Israel, The Operation in Gaza: 27 December 2008-18 January 2009-Factual and Legal Aspects, July 2009. Viewed 30 May 2012.

UN, A performance-based road map to a permanent two-State solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, 2002.  Viewed 20 May 2012.

UN General Assembly, Follow-up to the report of the United Nations Fact-Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict (II), A/64/L.48, 23 February 2010.

UN Human Rights Council, Human Rights in Palestine and other UN Occupied Arab Territories: Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza conflict, (A/HRC/12/48, 15 September 2009).

UN Watch, UN: We still consider Gaza an ‘Occupied Territory’, 27 January 2012. Viewed 20 August 2012.

United Nations, The Closure of the Gaza Strip: The Economic and Humanitarian Consequences (2007). Viewed 25 May 2012.

Van Dijk, Teun, ‘Discourse and manipulation’, in Discourse and Society, vol. 17 (2) (London: Sage Publications, 2006), 359-383.

__, Ideology: A multidisciplinary approach (London: Sage Publications, 1998)

__, ‘The socio-psychological side of CDA’, in eds. Ruth Wodak and Micahel Meyer, Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis (London: Sage Publications, 2001).

Weerakkody, Niranjala, Research Methods For Media and Communication (Sydney: Oxford University Press, 2009).

Weizman, Eyal; ‘Lawfare in Gaza: Legislative Attack’, in Open Democracy (1st March 2009). Viewed 25 May 2012.

Wodak, Ruth, ‘What CDA is about: A summary of its history, important concepts and its developments, in eds. Ruth Wodak and Micahel Meyer, Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis (London: Sage Publications, 2001).

Wolfsfeld, Gadi, Media and the path to peace (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004).

__, The news media and peace processes: The Middle East and Northern Ireland (United States Institute of Peace and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2001).

__, ‘The news media and peace processes: The Middle East and Northern Ireland’ in Peace Works No. 37 (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace, 2001).

__, ‘The political contest model’, in ed. Simon Cottle, News, Public Relations and Power (London: Sage Publications, 2003), 81-96.

Wolfsfeld, Gadi; Paul Frosh and Maurice T. Awabdy, Covering death in conflicts: Coverage of the Second Intifada on Israeli and Palestinian Television (Jerusalem: The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2007).

Wolfsfeld, Gadi; and Tamir Sheafer, ‘Competing Actors and the Construction of Political News: The Contest Over Waves in Israel’, in Political Communication, 23: 333-354 (Routledge: London, 2006), 334.

Zartman, I. W. ; and J. Z. Rubin, ‘Symmetry and asymmetry in negotiation’, in eds. I. W. Zartman and J. Z. Rubin, Power and negotiation (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2000), 271-293.

The post Israeli Discourse About Palestinians: When Media Do Not Mediate – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

India: Botched-Up Operations Again – Analysis

0
0

By Jayshree Sengupta

Quacks masquerading as doctors can be found everywhere in India. The recent botching up of eye surgeries in Ghuman, Batala, Punjab, is a case in point. So many people have lost their eyesight and yet public outrage would be short-lived and subdued in a few days. The victims, mostly poor, will have little recourse to justice and only paltry sums will be handed out to them as compensation. They have lost their sight, the greatest gift of all, and nothing can compensate for such a huge loss. Various committees will in the meanwhile continue with the probe.

In various hospitals and clinics all over India such botch-ups and wrong operations are an everyday affair. In the US ‘malpractice’ is a big offence and doctors are scared stiff of huge damages they may have to pay if malpractice suits are brought against them. In India, suing doctors is still not common and it costs money and time as well. More importantly, what the Batala incident highlights is the government’s laxity in implementing any regulations or standards for the private sector’s healthcare units. The government’s surveillance of private hospitals in India is weak in terms of quality, reliability and cost. How could this eye camp in Ghuman go about performing eye operations without any permission from the authorities? It is not about the instruments being dirty but the whole process of running such camps reflects lack of control by the state government. It also reveals the general lack of access to public hospitals for simple eye surgeries.

The health sector in India has been in great distress for a long time. Huge big-ticket reforms are needed in hospitals by all the state governments and the Central government. First of all India spends the least amount on health as a proportion of GDP (1.1 per cent) as compared to the other members of BRICS. Public hospitals are crowded and highly congested and hence only the poor who cannot afford to go to private hospitals queue up there the whole night or at least from the early hours to get to see a specialist. Public hospitals are, however, accessible to VIPs who hog doctors’ and specialists’ time and hospitals’ resources. They jump queues and are admitted to VIP wards immediately on arrival.

It is the lack of access to quality hospitals which forces people from low-income strata to seek free healthcare wherever it is available. In Delhi a renowned eye surgeon charges over one lakh rupees for a cataract surgery and lens implant. How many people even in the middle class can afford such high costs? In China, where the health sector was in a similar state as in India today, healthcare reforms were vigorously carried out from 2005 and it was given top priority. Today China has guaranteed healthcare for 95 per cent of the population through a health insurance cover. In India only 10 per cent people are insured for health.

Healthcare in rural areas in India is specially poor and primary health centres (PHCs), except for a few states, are under-performers and are poorly equipped with medicines, instruments, doctors and nurses. Basic healthcare has to be improved if we want a healthy India. Deprived of local healthcare, the rural population flocks to bigger hospitals in towns and cities and adds to the congestion and neglect.

In healthcare, one of the main rudimentary elements is health education which is lacking in India. Hygiene and cleanliness are very important as is emphasised by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and if basic habits like washing hands before eating are inculcated in the people, a lot of diseases could be prevented. It has been found in a survey that only 53 per cent of the people wash their hands after defecation and only 38 per cent before eating.

Since India faces multiple challenges in healthcare in the next decade, the government has to encourage the private sector. In any case the private sector has been mushrooming but the quality of treatment has to be monitored. Healthcare has become a money-making machine and the poor are scared to approach private hospitals. The doctors like in China are given to over medication and prescribe unnecessary antibiotics and imaging procedures. As a result, the patient has to bear a heavy monetary burden which makes him avoid seeking medical help. The ‘out-of-pocket’ expenditure in India for patients is among the highest in the world at 70 per cent. It is only 30 per cent in China.

In 2005 the government started the National Rural Health Mission and in parallel several state governments have been systematically and independently building a government-sponsored health insurance scheme to cover the costs of secondary and tertiary hospital care for the poor. The RHM has brought about an improvement in the immunisation programme and in bringing more women to hospitals for deliveries. Yet it has not been able to take care of all the health problems of the low-income population in rural areas. As a result they have to go for treatment to the private sector. Around 39 million people become poor every year due to debts incurred for medical treatment.

Huge amounts (between 39 and 42 per cent) remain unspent and unutilised under the RHM. These funds could be used in the training of medical staff as there is a big need for paramedical staff and trained nurses.

There is a scarcity of properly trained doctors and nurses in rural areas. Doctors who qualify after years of study and having invested a huge amount of money in their education, want to practice in cities and towns and many try immediately to go abroad. India is indirectly subsidising the health care system of Western countries, especially the US and the UK, by training at the public expense doctors, who then happily migrate Westwards to greener pastures.

On the whole, healthcare deserves the topmost priority of the nation and there will have to be better compliance to standards by the private healthcare industry and more widespread accreditation programme for private hospitals to prevent botch-ups.

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

Courtesy: The Tribune, December 9, 2014

The post India: Botched-Up Operations Again – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Greece: PM Decides To Hold Snap Elections Dec 17

0
0

(EurActiv) — In a sudden move and under pressure from international lenders, Greek PM Antonis Samaras decided yesterday to hold elections on 17 December, with a new wave of political instability expected to hit the country. EurActiv Greece reports.

Normally the presidential election should be held in March, but the coalition government of centre-right New Democracy and centre-left Pan-Hellenic Socialist Movement (Pasok) decided to accelerate the procedure for political reasons.

The negotiations with the troika for its last assessment have reached a deadlock, despite the fact that Greece now has the highest primary surplus in the euro area after Germany, according to Eurostat.

Early on Monday (8 December) the Greek parliament approved the first balanced budget in decades. The same day, Eurozone finance ministers agreed to extend Greece’s bailout programme by two months, in an attempt by international lenders and the Greek government to buy time. Further budget cuts will have to be decided after the end of the bailout, scheduled for the end of this year.

The government attributed the sudden decision for presidential election to the main opposition Syriza’s alleged efforts to provoke political instability with the negotiations with the Troika- IMF, European Commission, European Central Bank.

“The government cannot accept this open undermining. This political uncertainty must end immediately,” said government spokesperson, Sofia Voultepsi.

According to latest figures, leftist Syriza is steadily leading all the polls, and it would be in its interests to hold snap general elections.

Fragile balance

The balance in the Greek parliament makes the election of a new president quite complicated.

According to the Greek Constitution, the first two voting procedures require 200 votes in the 300-seat parliament for the election of a new president.

As 200 votes seem quite difficult to gather taking into account the current balance of political forces, in the third and final voting procedure 180 votes are needed. In case the presidential candidate does not receive 180 votes, the parliament is dismantled and snap general elections are called.

Currently, the coalition government is supported by a total of 155 MPs. There are 24 independent MPs, who are considered as key factor for the final result of the election. Up until now, they have not shown any coherent stance on crucial issues.

The right-wing party “Independent Greeks” has 12 MPs but its leader, former New Democracy MP Panos Kammenos, has categorically stated that his party would not consent to the election of a new president.

The former junior coalition partner, Democratic Left, currently has 10 MPs, and its stance on the issue is unpredictable.

Leftist main opposition Syriza (71 MPs) which has been calling for early general elections for months now, believes that the government cannot find 180 votes for the election of a new president.

Communists and neo-Nazi Golden Dawn have 12 and 16 MPs respectively, and it is unlikely that they will support any candidate for president.

New tough measures?

According to analysts in Athens, the Greek government decided to accelerate the presidential election because the negotiations with the Troika were stuck, and new austerity measures would be needed after the end of the bailout at the end of the year.

Opposition Syriza has promised to give an end to the austerity-driven policy if it wins the elections, provoking uncertainty to international lenders.

Syriza MEP Giorgos Katrougkalos recently told EurActiv Greece that international lenders will attempt to impose “economic suffocation” on Greece.

“I am afraid that when Syriza is in government, they will try to impose a peculiar political and economic suffocation in Greece , aiming at proving that there is no alternative policy to the neoliberal one,” he said.

International lenders believe that Greece has not made yet crucial structural reforms, such as the opening of some closed professions, and reached privatisation targets.

In an interview with EurActiv Greece, centre-right New Democracy MEP Giorgos Kyrtsos, shared a similar view.

“Despite being a government MEP, let me say that Greece does not fully implement the memorandum,” he had stated, referring to the scheduled dismissals in the public sector that never took place.

The post Greece: PM Decides To Hold Snap Elections Dec 17 appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The Rise Of German Imperialism And The Phony ‘Russian Threat’– OpEd

0
0

The principle Nazi ideological prop that secured massive financial and political support from Germany’s leading industrialists was the Communist and Soviet threat. The main Nazi military drive, absorbing two-thirds of its best troops, was directed eastward at conquering and destroying Russia.

The ‘Russian Threat’ justified Nazi Germany’s conquest and occupation of the Ukraine, the Balkans, Eastern Europe and the Baltic states, with the aid of a substantial proportion of local Nazi collaborators.

After Germany’s defeat , division and disarmament, and with the extension of Soviet power, the US reinstated the Nazi industrial and banking giants, officials and intelligence operatives.At first they were engaged in rebuilding their domestic economy and consolidating political power, in collaboration with the US military occupation forces.

By the late 1960’s Germany regained economic primacy in Europe and was at the forefront of European ‘integration’, in association with France and England. It soon came to dominate the principle decision – making institutions of the European Union(EU). The EU served as Germany’s instrument for conquest by stealth. Year by year, through ‘aid’ and low interest loans,the EU facilitated German capitalist’s market penetration and financial expansion,through out south and central Europe. Germany set the agenda for Western Europe, gaining economic dominance while benefiting from US subversion and encirclement of Eastern Europe, Russia and the Baltic and Balkan states.

Germany’s Great Leap Forward: The Annexation of East Germany and the Demise of the USSR

Germany’s projection of power on a world scale would never have occurred if it had not annexed East Germany. Despite the West German claims of beneficence and ‘aid’ to the East, the Bonn regime secured several million skilled engineers, workers and technicians, the takeover of factories, productive farms and, most important, the Eastern European and Russian markets for industrial goods, worth billions of dollars. Germany was transformed from an emerging influential EU partner, into the most dynamic expansionist power in Europe, especially in the former Warsaw Pact economies.

The annexation of East Germany and the overthrow of the Communist governments in the East allowed German capitalists to dominate markets in the former Eastern bloc .As the major trading partner, it seized control of major industrial enterprises via corrupt privatizations decreed by the newly installed pro-capitalist client regimes. As the Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Bulgarian, the Baltic States “privatized” and “de-nationalized” strategic economic, trade, media and social service sectors, ‘unified’ Germany was able to resume a privileged place. As Russia fell into the hands of gangsters, emerging oligarchs and political proxies of western capitalists, its entire industrial infrastructure was decimated and Russia was converted into a giant raw-material export region.

Germany converted its trade relations with Russia from one between equals into a ‘colonial’ pattern: Germany exported high value industrial products and imported gas, oil and raw materials from Russia.

German power expanded exponentially, with the annexation of the “other Germany”, the restoration of capitalism in Eastern Europe and the ascendancy of client regimes eager and willing to submit to a German dominated European Union and a US directed NATO military command.

German political-economic expansion via ‘popular uprisings’, controlled by local political clients, was soon accompanied by a US led military offensive – sparked by separatist movements. Germany intervened in Yugoslavia, aiding and abetting separatists in Slovenia and Croatia .It backed the US-NATO bombing of Serbia and supported the far-right, self-styled Kosovo Liberation Army ( KLA),engaged in a terrorist war in Kosovo . Belgrade was defeated and regime change led to a neo-liberal client state. The US built the largest military base in Europe in Kosovo. Montenegro and Macedonia became EU satellites.

While NATO expanded and enhanced the US military presence up to Russia’s borders, Germany became the continent’s pre-eminent economic power.

Germany and the New World Order

While President Bush and Clinton were heralding a “new world order”, based on unipolar military supremacy, Germany advanced its new imperial order by exercising its political and economic levers. Each of the two power centers, Germany and the US, shared the common quest of rapidly incorporating the new capitalist regimes into their regional organizations –the European Union (EU) and NATO– and extending their reach globally. Given the reactionary origins and trajectory into vassalage of the Eastern, Baltic and Balkan regimes, and given their political fears of a popular reaction to the loss of employment, welfare and independence resulting from their implementation of savage neoliberal “shock policies”, the client rulers immediately “applied” for membership as subordinate members of the EU and NATO, trading sovereignty, markets and national ownership of the means of production for economic handouts and the ‘free’ movement of labor, an escape valve for the millions of newly unemployed workers. German and English capital got millions of skilled immigrant workers at below labor market wages, and unimpeded access to markets and resources. The US secured NATO military bases, and recruited military forces for its Middle East and South Asian imperial wars.

US-German military and economic dominance in Europe was premised on retaining Russia as a weak quasi vassal state, and on the continued economic growth of their economies beyond the initial pillage of the ex-communist economies.

For the US, uncontested military supremacy throughout Europe was the springboard for near-time imperial expansion in the Middle East, South Asia, Africa and Latin America. NATO was ‘internationalized’ into an offensive global military alliance: first in Somalia, Afghanistan then Iraq, Libya, Syria and the Ukraine.

The Rise of Russia, The Islamic Resistance and the New Cold War

During the ‘decade of infamy’ (1991-2000) extreme privatization measures by the client rulers in Russia on behalf of EU and US investors and gangster oligarchs, added up to vast pillage of the entire economy, public treasury and national patrimony. The image and reality of a giant prostrate vassal state unable to pursue an independent foreign policy, and incapable of providing the minimum semblance of a modern functioning economy and maintaining the rule of law, became the defining view of Russia by the EU and the USA. Post-communist Russia, a failed state by any measure, was dubbed a “liberal democracy” by every western capitalist politician and so it was repeated by all their mass media acolytes.

The fortuitous rise of Vladimir Putin and the gradual replacement of some of the most egregious ‘sell-out’ neo-liberal officials, and most important, the reconstruction of the Russian state with a proper budget and functioning national institutions, was immediately perceived as a threat to US military supremacy and German economic expansion. Russia’s transition from Western vassalage to regaining its status as a sovereign independent state set in motion, an aggressive counter-offensive by the US-EU. They financed a neo-liberal-oligarchy backed political opposition in an attempt to restore Russia to vassalage via street demonstrations and elections .Their efforts to oust Putin and re-establish Western vassal state failed. What worked in 19991 with Yeltsin’s power grab against Gorbachev was ineffective against Putin. The vast majority of Russians did not want a return to the decade of infamy.

In the beginning of the new century, Putin and his team set new ground-rules, in which oligarchs could retain their illicit wealth and conglomerates, providing they didn’t use their economic levers to seize state power. Secondly, Putin revived and restored the scientific technical, military, industrial and cultural institutions and centralized trade and investment decisions within a wide circle of public and private decision makers not beholden to Western policymakers. Thirdly, he began to assess and rectify the breakdown of Russian security agencies particularly with regard to the threats emanating from Western sponsored ‘separatist’ movements in the Caucuses, especially, in Chechnya, and the onset of US backed ‘color revolutions’ in the Ukraine and Georgia.

At first, Putin optimistically assumed that, Russia being a capitalist state, and without any competing ideology, the normalization and stabilization of the Russian state would be welcomed by the US and the EU. He even envisioned that they would accept Russia as an economic, political, and even NATO partner. Putin even made overtures to join and co-operate with NATO and the EU. The West did not try to dissuade Putin of his illusions .In fact they encouraged him, even as they escalated their backing for Putin’s internal opposition and prepared a series of imperial wars and sanctions in the Middle East, targeting traditional Russian allies in Iraq, Syria and Libya.

As the ‘internal’ subversive strategy failed to dislodge President Putin, and the Russian state prevailed over the neo-vassals, the demonization of Putin became constant and shrill. The West moved decisively to an ‘outsider strategy’, to isolate, encircle and undermine the Russian state by undermining allies, and trading partners

US and Germany Confront Russia: Manufacturing the “Russian Threat”

Russia was enticed to support US and NATO wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya in exchange for the promise of deeper integration into Western markets. The US and EU accepted Russian co-operation, including military supply routes and bases, for their invasion and occupation of Afghanistan. The NATO powers secured Russian support of sanctions against Iran. They exploited Russia’s naïve support of a “no fly zone” over Libya to launch a full scale aerial war. The US financed so-called “color revolutions” in Georgia and the Ukraine overt, a dress rehearsal for the putsch in 2014 Each violent seizure of power allowed NATO to impose anti-Russian rulers eager and willing to serve as vassal states to Germany and the US.

Germany spearheaded the European imperial advance in the Balkans and Moldavia, countries with strong economic ties to Russia. High German officials “visited” the Balkans to bolster their ties with vassal regimes in Slovenia, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Croatia. Under German direction, the European Union ordered the vassal Bulgarian regime of Boyko “the booby” Borisov to block the passage of Russian owned South Stream pipeline to Serbia, Hungary, Slovenia and beyond. The Bulgarian state lost $400 million in annual revenue . . . Germany and the US bankrolled pro-NATO and EU client politicians in Moldavia – securing the election of Iurie Leanca as Prime Minister. As a result of Leanca’s slavish pursuit of EU vassalage, Moldavia lost $150 million in exports to Russia. Leanca’s pro-EU policies go counter to the views of most Moldavians – 57% see Russia as the country’s most important economic partner. Nearly 40% of the Moldavian working age population works in Russia and 25% of the Moldavians’ $8 billion GDP is accounted for by overseas remittances.

German and the US empire-builders steamroll over dissenting voices in Hungary, Serbia and Slovenia, as well as Moldova and Bulgaria, who’s economy and population suffer from the impositions of the blockade of the Russian gas and oil pipeline. But Germany’s, all out economic warfare against Russia takes precedent over the interests of its vassal states: its theirs to sacrifice for the ‘Greater Good’ of the emerging German economic empire and the US – NATO military encirclement of Russia. The extremely crude dictates of German imperial interests articulated through the EU, and the willingness of Balkan and Baltic regimes to sacrifice fundamental economic interests, are the best indicators of the emerging German empire in Europe.

Parallel to Germany’s rabid anti-Russian economic campaign, the US via NATO is engaged in a vast military build-up along the length and breadth of Russia’s frontier. The US stooge, NATO Chief Jens Stoltenberg, boasts that over the current year, NATO has increased 5-fold the warplanes and bombers patrolling Russian maritime and land frontiers, carried out military exercises every two days and vastly increased the number of war ships in the Baltic and Black Sea.

Conclusion

What is absolutely clear is that the US and Germany want to return Russia to the vassalage status of the 1990’s. They do not want ‘normal relations’. From the moment Putin moved to restore the Russian state and economy, the Western powers have engaged in a series of political and military interventions, eliminating Russian allies, trading partners and independent states.

The emergent of extremist, visceral anti-Russian regimes in Poland, Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania served as the forward shield for NATO advancement and German economic encroachment. Hitler’s ‘dream’ of realizing the conquest of the East via unilateral military conquest has now under Prime Minister Merkel taken the form of conquest by stealth in Northern and Central Europe , by economic blackmail in the Balkans ,and by violent putsches in the Ukraine and Georgia.

The German economic ruling class is divided between the dominant pro-US sector that is willing to sacrifice lucrative trade with Russia today in hopes of dominating and pillaging the entire economy in a post-Putin Russia (dominated by ‘reborn Yeltsin clones’); and a minority industrial sector, which wants to end sanctions and return to normal economic relations with Russia.

Germany is fearful that its client rulers in the East, especially in the Balkans are vulnerable to a popular upheaval due to the economic sacrifices they impose on the population. Hence, Germany is wholly in favor of the new NATO rapid deployment force, ostensibly designed to counter a non-existent “Russian threat” but in reality to prop up faltering vassal regimes.

The ‘Russian Threat’, the ideology driving the US and German offensive throughout Europe and the Caucuses, is a replay of the same doctrine which Hitler used to secure support from domestic industrial bankers, conservatives and right wing overseas collaborators among extremists in Ukraine, Hungary, Rumania and Bulgaria.

The US-EU seizure of power via vassal political clients backed by corrupt oligarchs and Nazi street fighters in Ukraine detonated the current crisis. Ukraine power grab posed a top security threat to the very existence of Russia as an independent state. After the Kiev take-over, NATO moved its stooge regime in Kiev forward to militarily eliminate the independent regions in the Southeast and seize the Crimea .thus totally eliminating Russia’s strategic position in the Black Sea.
Russia the victim of the NATO power grab was labelled the “aggressor”. The entire officialdom and mass media echoed the Big Lie.
Two decades of US NATO military advances on Russia’s borders and German-EU economic expansion into Russian markets were obfuscated. Ukraine is the most important strategic military platform from which the US-NATO can launch an attack on the Russian heartland and the single largest market for Germany since the annexation of East Germany

The US and Germany see the Ukraine conquest as of extreme value in itself but also as the key to launching an all-out offensive to strangle Russia’s economy via sanctions and dumping oil and to militarily threaten Russia. The strategic goal is to reduce the Russian population to poverty and to re-activate the quasi-moribund opposition to overthrow the Putin government and return Russia to permanent vassalage.
The US and German imperial elite, looking beyond Russia, believe that if they control Russia, they can encircle ,isolate and attack China from the West as well as the East.

Wild-eyed fanatics they are not. But as rabid proponents of a permanent war to end Russia’s presence in Europe and to undermine China’s emergence as a world power, they are willing to go to the brink of a nuclear war.

The ideological centerpiece of US-German imperial expansion and conquest in Europe and the Caucuses is the “Russian Threat”. It is the touchstone defining adversaries and allies. Countries that do not uphold sanctions are targeted. The mass media repeat the lie. The “Russian Threat” has become the war cry for cringing vassals – the phony justification for imposing frightful sacrifices to serve their imperial ‘padrones’ in Berlin and Washington – fearing the rebellion of the ‘sacrificed’ population. No doubt, under siege, Russia will be forced to make sacrifices. The oligarchs will flee westward; the liberals will crawl under their beds. But just as the Soviets turned the tide of war in Stalingrad, the Russian people, past the first two years of a bootstrap operation will survive, thrive and become once again a beacon of hope to all people looking to get from under the tyranny of US-NATO militarism and German-EU economic dictates.

The post The Rise Of German Imperialism And The Phony ‘Russian Threat’ – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Kosovo: Parliament Approves New Government

0
0

By Nektar Zogjani

Former Pristina mayor Isa Mustafa became Kosovo’s new prime minister, while former PM Hashim Thaci took the posts of deputy prime minister and foreign minister.

After six months of political deadlock and wrangling between the major parties, the Kosovo parliament appointed Mustafa, the chairman of the Democratic League of Kosovo, LDK, as the new prime minister on Tuesday.

In line with the LDK’s governing coalition agreement with the Democratic Party of Kosovo, PDK, the former PM and leader of the PDK, Hashim Thaci, was appointed as the new deputy prime minister and the foreign minister.

Mustafa’s new government, which got the votes of 73 out of 120 deputies in Kosovo parliament, will have 21 ministers, two more than the last cabinet.

While the last cabinet had two deputy prime ministers, the new one will have three – Hashim Thaci, the first Deputy Prime Minister, Kujtim Shala, from the LDK and Branimir Stojanovic, from the Serbian List.

Mustafa’s cabinet will also have one more minister without portfolio, as Edita Tahiri was assigned a ministry without portfolio and leadership of the dialogue with Serbia.

The deputy chairman of the PDK, Kadri Veseli, was elected as the Assembly’s speaker, with 71 votes in favour.

Mustafa’s election as premier was made possible after his party on Monday signed the power-sharing agreement with the PDK, which came first in the June elections.

In 2016, after current President Atifete Jahjaga’s mandate is over, Thaci will replace her, the agreement says.

According to the deal, the two parties will also share out the other ministerial posts.

Addressing MPs in parliament, Mustafa vowed that his main goal would be effective, responsible and competent governance “which will strengthen the trust of citizens and [our] international friends” in Kosovo.

“We are committed to building a state that offers equal rights and opportunities for all its citizens, and a state that tackles organised crime, corruption and any form of extremism,” he said.

“We are also aware of the need to work more for economic development and citizens’ well-being,” he added.

The election of a new administration was a matter of urgency as Kosovo needs to approve a budget for 2015.

The budget review is supposed to take place in the middle of each year, but could not be done because parliament was not functioning due to the political stalemate.

Before reaching their agreement, the PDK and an opposition coalition bloc led by the LDK fought over which party had the right chose the speaker of the assembly. This in turn delayed the establishment of other central institutions.

The opposition coalition agreed after the elections that Mustafa would be the speaker of parliament, with the promise of the presidency once Jahjaga leaves office in 2016.

But a ruling by the Constitutional Court in August wrecked that deal, annulling Mustafa’s election and confirming that the PDK, as the largest single party
in parliament, had a right to the post.

In the aftermath of the court ruling, which effectively allowed PDK to stall the formation of a government indefinitely, the post-election coalition failed to reach a new power-sharing agreement.

Finally the PDK and LDK reached their deal which paved the way for a new government to be established.

The post Kosovo: Parliament Approves New Government appeared first on Eurasia Review.

EU Welcomes Formation Of New Government In Kosovo

0
0

The EU has welcomed the formation of a new government in Kosovo, with Isa Mustafa, the former Pristina mayor, becoming that country’s new prime minister.

“We welcome the formation of a new government in Kosovo and look forward to working with the new authorities in Pristina. Today’s constitutive session of the Assembly and election of the government ends the political deadlock that prevented progress in Kosovo following the general elections of 8 June 2014,” Federica Mogherini, the High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy/Vice-President of the Commission, and Johannes Hahn, Commissioner for European Neighbourhood Policy and Enlargement negotiations, said in a statement.

Federica Mogherini said, “I am looking forward to working with the new government on Kosovo’s EU path as well as to the resumption of the high-level dialogue for the normalisation of relations between Pristina and Belgrade in the near future. Comprehensive normalisation is an ambition we share with both sides. The work must continue urgently, both through the full implementation of agreements already reached as well as by tackling new issues that still need to be addressed.”

Mogherini added, “I am ready to personally engage in order to make further progress in the normalization of relations. It is also important that the new government continues cooperation with EULEX in the implementation of its revised mandate, including by proceeding with the necessary amendments of the legal framework, which will allow for the setting up of the Specialist Court.”

Nevertheless, Johannes Hahn noted, “It is essential that Kosovo’s new government gets to work on the many challenges it faces. Alongside with the resumption of the dialogue, the new government has to also resume its European reform agenda.”

Hahn added that there is also a lot of ground to cover to catch-up on preparations for the implementation of the Stabilisation and Association Agreement that was initialed on 25 July.

“The European Commission is ready to support these efforts,” Hahn said,

The post EU Welcomes Formation Of New Government In Kosovo appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Maldives And The Islamic State – Analysis

0
0

By Dr. S. Chandrasekharan

Since September this year, former President Nasheed has been repeatedly pointing out that “Radical Islam” is getting very strong in Maldives. He made another significant observation recently that the strength of radical Islamists is increasing in the military and the Police. This should be of concern not only to Maldives, but also two of its neighboring countries- India and Sri Lanka.

Nasheed had also estimated that of the 200 Maldivians who have joined the war in Syria, many are ex military men and that at least four Maldivians had died in fighting. It is now officially announced that a fifth Maldivian had also died in the war so far.

The figures could be higher as no one is sure as to how many Maldivians have actually left for the war front. While the Security establishment in Maldives admits that only seven persons are currently fighting in foreign civil wars, the James Town Foundation in its Terrorism Monitor Volume 12 of November 21, 2014 has said that about 100 Maldivians are believed to have joined the Syrian conflict and that most of them have actually joined up with Al Qaeda’s official affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra.

Nasheed blamed an influx of Saudi funds for the conservative turn of the Maldivian society as also the failure of the government in not taking any measures against the sympathy shown to the ISIS within Maldives.

In an interview to UK’s Independent Newspaper in October, Nasheed alleged that the Radical Islam is getting “very, very strong” and had again pointed its significant strength in the military and the Police.

On September 5 a protest march of a few hundred took place in Male with the participants carrying the ISIS flags and calling for the implementation of Islamic Shariah in the Maldives. The placards they carried said:

  • We want the laws of the Quran, not the green book. ( Green book refers to the present constitution that has a green cover).
  • Islam will eradicate secularism.
  • No democracy- We want just Islam
  • Shariah will dominate the world.

Just a few days before the rally, the Foreign Minister Dunya condemned the ISIS for committing crimes against innocent civilians. Earlier the Minister for Islamic Affairs had also condemned the ISIS and declared that the ISIS will not be allowed to operate in the Maldives.

Yet the demonstrations took place.

It was surprising that President Yameen had also not publicly commented on the presence of Maldivians in the Syrian War. More surprising that as recently as in September he said that his government is unaware of Maldivians fighting abroad. His Police as of September 16 was only willing to admit that about 24 Maldivians in Maldives are associated with foreign terrorist groups!

It was only when a query was raised by former Police Commissioner of Jumhooree party Abdulla Riyaz in the Majlis that the Home Minister Umar Naseer was forced to make a statement in the Majlis on the war in Syria and the participation of Maldivians. He was only willing to admit that “more than seven Maldivians are currently fighting in foreign civil wars.”

In addition, the Home Minister in his response made the following points.

  • The Police have been monitoring persons with extremist religious views. Persons attempting to leave abroad with the intention of joining civil wars have been stopped with court orders. He had suggested that the “evidentiary standard should be lowered for terrorism cases. ( We need to remind him that Maldives has so far been misusing the terrorism laws. For example those who had alleged to have indulged in violence in Adu in the after math of the alleged coup in toppling Nasheed have been charged under terrorism laws.)
  • Some Maldivians have been brought back to the country with the help of foreign agencies. Police is also working with the Islamic Ministry to provide religious counselling. ( This does not include those already participating in the fighting where the Minister has indicated his helplessness in getting them back.))
  • A Strategic Action Plan is being implemented to combat religious extremism and this involved prevention of radical views in public schools. ( No one knows the actual details of the action plan. But what is important to see is that the Saudi funds that flow generously are not misused for spreading radical Islam.)
  • In an effort to prevent recruitment in the country his government has banned independent prayer congregations across the country.
  • He claimed that the number of Maldivians in foreign wars would be proportionately much lower than that of large European nations. ( This is no solace as Maldives is a hundred percent Sunni country with a total population of 3,41, 256 according to last census! While there is no independent confirmation of the number, even a figure of over 100 is large enough for a small country like Maldives. Only last month it was known that a jihadist group called Bilad al Sham (BASM) is running a media forum of Maldivians in Syria to publicise the activities and heroics of Maldivian Jihadists in Syria.)

It is time that the government of Maldives takes the statements of former President Nasheed seriously. In a gathering of his party members recently on 25 November, he made an alarming statement that the government of his country “is on the edge of being toppled and that foreign terrorist organisations and domestic institutions are carrying out this task swiftly and together.”

While such an eventuality is not imminent, the government could take the following steps.

  • Firstly, the Government will have to realise that they have a problem of radical Islam in the island. The IS is an idea and an inspiration for the radicals. If this is not understood or pushed under the carpet, no amount of legislation or action will ever help.
  • The use of Saudi funds for spreading radical Islam needs to be regulated.
  • The terrorism laws should be used only for terrorist acts and not for law and order situations. Otherwise the courts are also not likely to take the real terrorist acts seriously.
  • Of late, the activities of criminal gangs have increased and nexus if any between the gangs and the security forces should be probed ad prevented. Incidents of use of drugs by some members of security forces has also come to light.
  • Serious crime cases like the kidnapping of the well known Minivan Journalist Ahmed Rilwan some 4 months ago should be investigated. Rilwan is yet to be traced and it does not speak well of the law and order machinery in the island.
  • Visits of radical preachers need to be regulated. Although rules exist, there appears to be a reluctance to enforce the laws.
  • Above all the government’s security agencies could tie up with agencies of neighboring countries who are also seized with the same problem.

The post Maldives And The Islamic State – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.


Haze Pollution And Peatlands: Can ASEAN Finally Breathe Easy? – Analysis

0
0

President Jokowi’s visit to Riau Province recently and his comments on fires and smoke haze have raised hopes across the region. But the mere act of blocking canals on peatlands is, but one, of many interrelated and multifaceted issues he has to tackle.

By Raman Letchumanan

The people of ASEAN have been enduring choking haze – primarily smoke from wild fires – for the past two decades. Despite numerous efforts, promises, and actions, the haze pollution has only gotten worse. However, the publicity surrounding newly-elected Indonesian President Joko Widodo’s recent visit to Riau Province, where most of the transboundary haze originates, hopefully points to a change for the better.

The President said: “For the past 17 years, forest fires are due to the practice of negligence and complacency. This is simply just an issue of whether we want to or not, whether we intend to or not … to solve the problem.” But if it was that simple, why were his predecessors not able to pull it off?

Understanding complexity of the problem: Peatlands

To better understand the complexity of the problem, one needs to appreciate the primary source of the haze, the root causes, and the multiple actors and vested interests that collide and collude to make simple solutions complex and intractable. To be fair fires and haze are not uniquely Indonesian, but occur throughout the region where forests and peatlands occur.

Unfortunately for Indonesia, because of its large extent of forest and peatlands, the unfavourable wind direction brings the haze over and discomfits its neighbours. But the people of Indonesia are the ones who suffer the most from the haze and it is in Indonesia’s interest to solve it.

Peatlands are the least understood, unrecognised, and the first to be exploited among all of the natural ecosystems. But it is the most damaging as far as fires and haze are concerned. Peatlands contribute about 90% of the haze, therefore reducing peatland fires will substantially reduce or even eliminate transboundary haze pollution. The ASEAN region has about 25 million hectares of tropical peatlands, about 60% of the world total.

Peatlands are unique wetland ecosystems which are formed over thousands of years consisting of partly decomposed vegetation which is primarily carbon, and can only remain in its stable state if sufficient water is present. Lowering of the water level will expose and turn the peatsoil into tinder.

Peatlands are often seen as swamps, waste land and inhabitable. Large areas are exploited for plantations, agro-forestry and cash crops. Invariably, the first intervention on virgin peatland is to drain the water through deep canals (which also transport valuable timber) to plant other non-native species of commercial value. This is akin to draining blood from the body. It permanently destroys and kills the peatland ecosystem and its unique biodiversity, and creates the perfect condition for recurrent fires and choking smoke haze thereafter.

Canal blocking: Poking fingers in the dyke?

Actually, there are well established sustainable methods of farming and managing peatlands. But as Singapore’s Minister in charge of the environment Dr. Vivian Balakrishnan succinctly put it: The reason companies take shortcuts, burn forests, drain peatlands is simply because the economics favour such behaviours. This, of course, applies not only to companies, but all those operating on peatlands.

President Jokowi’s visit to Riau included a personal demonstration of canal blocking to a crowd of local people. Canal blocking is done to rewet the peatlands to make them less prone to fires. But what comes to mind is who built the canals in the first place. The abandoned maze of well-planned deep canals suggest that they must have been the work of deep-pocket investors carried out with heavy machinery. But no one was made responsible to block the canals after they had left.

Most times, it is the locals who are directly affected risking their lives building rudimentary makeshift canal blocks. If only the local authorities and the companies could help out and do this on a systematic and regular basis.

Peatlands: Victim of conflict and vested interests

Large concessionaires have well–managed system of canals within their concessions. Experts estimate a water level of 40-60 cm below ground level is needed for maximum productivity of crops and maintaining the ecological integrity of peatlands. Companies looking at quick short-term gains are just keen to destroy the peatland ecosystem with a single cropping cycle, and then look for new fertile areas to plant.

Strangely, there are protests against the Indonesian moratorium against opening new peatland areas, and the regulation on maintaining water level, when these regulations are only helping the companies to get better value out of their existing concessions. Most importantly, the footprint of a peatland ecosystem covers a much larger area in terms of its hydrological (water) system. Systemic water management can only take place at this landscape level, not individuals blocking canals or even large plantations managing water within their concessions.

In any case, the biggest challenge in managing water, or the acute lack of it, is during the dry season. This is when the water level drops significantly and there would not be enough water even to fill the canals, let alone to put out fires on peatlands as they occur. This is the primary reason for the severe episodes of haze pollution in the region, and it should be clear why during these times everyone points the finger at each other.

All in all, even the seemingly simple task of blocking canals raises many systemic issues that can only be resolved through sustained political leadership and government stewardship working closely with all stakeholders.

Peatlands: The ecosystem approach

It is refreshing to hear President Jokowi frequently mention the ecosystem approach and his concern for widespread monoculture – dependence on a single species of commercial value – during the visit. Being trained in forestry, he knows what he is talking about, and that his symbolic act of canal blocking is not going to solve the problem.

As a former furniture businessman, he perfectly understands the importance of sustainable natural resource management and its huge contribution to the economy and employment. Already he has merged the forestry and environment ministries to provide better coordination among environment and natural resources-related policies and implementation.

While the people of ASEAN may have to hold their breath a while longer, things are moving in the right direction in Indonesia as far as addressing forest fires and smoke haze is concerned.

* This is the first in a series on the issue of haze pollution in ASEAN.

Raman Letchumanan is a Senior Fellow with the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University. The views expressed here are strictly his own. Dr Raman was the person-in-charge of fire and haze issues at the ASEAN Secretariat for 14 years, and prior to that in the Malaysian Government.

The post Haze Pollution And Peatlands: Can ASEAN Finally Breathe Easy? – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Iranian Oil Giant Seeking Billions In Foreign Investment

0
0

The National Iranian Oil Company says it will attend a London conference with the goal of attracting $40 billion of investment in 40 oil industry projects The conference is reportedly set for two days in March of 2015.

IRNA reports that the Deputy Director of Consolidated Planning for the National Iranian Oil Company, Moshtagh Gohari, said on Monday December 8 that most of the projects are linked to the Southern Pars Fields.

The London conference was first planned for the fall of 2014, but with the lack of concrete progress in the nuclear negotiations between Iran and the 5+1, officials at the National Iranian Oil Company felt it was wise to postpone.

In November, the nuclear negotiating parties extended their deadline for reaching a final agreement by another eight months to July 2015.

Iranian officials also indicate that they will provide new forms of partnership at the conference, which would see the Iran’s oil company delegate all responsibility for exploration, development and production activities.

The post Iranian Oil Giant Seeking Billions In Foreign Investment appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Oregon Scientists Prepare For Another Wave Of Tsunami Debris, Possible Invasives

0
0

Scientists monitoring incoming tsunami debris were taken aback last spring when some 30 fishing vessels from Japan washed ashore along the Pacific Northwest coast – many of them covered in living organisms indigenous to Asia.

Incidence of wayward skiffs and other tsunami debris subsequently declined sharply over the summer because of seasonal shifts in the winds. Now, those winds and currents have returned to their winter-spring pattern and scientists are expecting more items to wash ashore – even though it is nearing four years since a massive earthquake and tsunami shook Japan.

Blue mussels have been found on literally every boat that has washed ashore and some 200 different species overall have been documented on tsunami debris, according to John Chapman, an Oregon State University marine invasive species specialist at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center.

“The crustaceans and bivalves are of particular concern because they could introduce new diseases, and compete with, displace or otherwise affect our oyster or mussel populations,” Chapman noted.

Just last week, a tote with numerous mussels washed up at Seal Rock – a sign that debris will still be arriving over the next few months. Of particular concern are boats and large objects that wash ashore carrying a variety of living organisms – including some new species that were not aboard the now-infamous dock that landed on Agate Beach near Newport, Ore., in June of 2012.

“We continue to find new organisms that we have never seen before,” Chapman said. “There isn’t as much diversity aboard the Japanese fishing vessels as there was on the dock, but each new species that we haven’t seen before is a cause for concern.

“No one can predict if these new species may gain a foothold in Northwest waters – and what impacts that may have,” he added.

Chapman and OSU colleague Jessica Miller have examined roughly a dozen boats that have washed ashore from the southern Oregon coast to the central Washington coast. Most of them were similar in style – long, narrow skiffs up to 30 feet in length, with no motors. As they drift from Asia to the West Coast of North America, they pick up a variety of organisms along the way.

“We’ve been surprised at the tenacity of some of these coastal Asian organisms that are arriving on the tsunami debris because the middle of the ocean isn’t the most biologically productive place for coastal species,” Miller said.

Among some of the species the Oregon State biologists have encountered over the past year are bat stars, which are sea stars that look like they have bat wings; striped knifejaw, fish that were found alive in at least one boat; and numerous small crustaceans.

Teams of scientists from around the North Pacific region, including Chapman and Miller, have identified more than 165 species that were aboard the original dock, and another 40-50 species that were found on other debris items, including boats. The rate of incoming debris should be slowing, the researchers say, but the arrival of so many boats last spring suggests that the threat is not over.

Invasive marine species are a problem on the West Coast, where they usually are introduced via ballast water from ships. OSU’s Chapman is well aware of the issue; for several years he has studied a parasitic isopod called Griffen’s isopod that was introduced from Asia. Griffen’s isopod infests mud shrimp in estuaries from California to Vancouver Island and is decimating their populations.

The OSU researchers are working with other scientists on the West Coast, who are attempting to genetically identify all of the species arriving on tsunami debris using genomic sampling – work led by Jon Geller of Moss Landing Marine Laboratory. Geller and his students also are collecting samples of marine life in Northwest coastal and estuary communities to look for evidence that non-native species may have established.

“We’re also doing a lot of old-fashioned looking,” Chapman said. “But new species can be difficult to identify if you aren’t searching for them directly in the first place. So we’ve identified three species that are particularly abundant in Asia, appear highly suited for invading the open coast, and would be readily apparent to searchers looking in the right place.”

These species include a hydroid, Eutima; a fly, Telmatogeton; and an amphipod crustacean, Caprella cristibrachium.

The post Oregon Scientists Prepare For Another Wave Of Tsunami Debris, Possible Invasives appeared first on Eurasia Review.

South Africa Says State Visit To China ‘A Success’

0
0

The Republic of China has agreed to increase short-term skills development programs for South Africa to reduce the skills gap.

“China will gradually increase the training opportunities for South Africa and will provide training for 2 000 South Africans from the year 2015 through to 2020,” Minister of International Relations and Cooperation Maite Nkoana-Mashabane said on Tuesday.

Speaking at a media briefing about President Jacob Zuma’s recent State visit to China, Minister Nkoana-Mashabane declared the visit a success.

She briefed the media on the many agreements signed by the two countries.

“As part of the industrialization process, China agreed to South Africa’s request to assist in the creation of black industrialists who will participate in the mainstream economy,” Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane said.

She said China had committed to support South Africa’s industrialization agenda by agreeing to assist in the development of Science and Technology and Industrial Parks, as well as key areas such as the Ocean Economy.

South Africa’s ocean economy has the potential to contribute up to R177 billion to the GDP and create just over one million jobs by 2033.

“China has committed to support the establishment of Railway Parks in South Africa, which is linked to the localization of railway carriage manufacturing processes to facilitate Inward Buying Missions into South Africa starting early in 2015,” Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane said.

Chinese companies will also be encouraged to invest in the Special Economic Zones.

During the State visit, the two governments adopted the China-South Africa Five- to Ten-Year Framework on Cooperation with the objective of furthering and entrenching the implementation of agreements since the conclusion of the Beijing Declaration in 2010.

Other agreements signed during the visit were the agreement on Minutes to Further Improve Economic Cooperation in Trade and Investment, an Action Plan on Agriculture Cooperation between the Republic of South Africa and the People’s Republic of China (2014-2016).

Other agreements include the Protocol of Phytosanitary Requirements (the control of plant diseases) for the Export of Maize from South Africa to China, Protocol of Phytosanitary Requirements for the Export of Apple Fruit from South Africa to China and the Protocol of Phytosanitary Requirements for the Export of Dates from China to South Africa.

“In terms of these protocols or agreements, China has agreed to expedite ​market access negotiations for the export of South African ​fresh produce to China, for example maize and apple fruit,” Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane said.

She said the countries also concluded agreements and MoUs on collaboration in human resource and capacity development, and soliciting support for South Africa’s industrial planning to improve beneficiation and value addition with respect to raw materials.

The post South Africa Says State Visit To China ‘A Success’ appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Wyden: Senate Report Shows CIA Torture Didn’t Work

0
0

U.S. Senator Ron Wyden, D-Ore., responded Tuesday to the release of the Senate Intelligence Committee report on torture by the Central Intelligence Agency saying that the report shows torture not only didn’t work, but that the nation should never torture again.

Wyden pushed to launch the investigation in 2009, and played a critical role in ensuring the report came to light, despite a campaign to delay its release and obscure critical details. Along with Chairman Dianne Feinstein and others on the committee, Wyden succeeded in reversing a number of unnecessary redactions that did nothing to protect intelligence assets.

“Following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, a small number of CIA officials decided to listen to the advice of outside contractors who told them that the way to quickly get important information from captured terrorist suspects was by using coercive interrogation techniques that had been developed and used by communist dictatorships during the Cold War, despite years of evidence that torture is not effective,” Wyden said.

“In fact,” Wyden said, “these techniques were not effective. While I understand this is a dangerous world and am grateful to the rank-and-file intelligence professionals that keep our country safe, the facts show that torture did nothing to protect America from foreign threats.”

According to Wyden, “The current CIA leadership has been alarmingly resistant to acknowledging the full scope of the mistakes and misrepresentations that surrounded this program for so many years. I hope this report is the catalyst CIA leaders need to acknowledge that torture did not work and close this disgraceful chapter in our country’s history.”

The post Wyden: Senate Report Shows CIA Torture Didn’t Work appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Hagel Visits Baghdad To Thank Troops

0
0

US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel arrived in Baghdad on Tuesday to visit with and thank US troops for their contributions to the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.

In a statement announcing Hagel’s arrival in the Iraqi capital, Pentagon Press Secretary Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby said the secretary will receive operational updates from Army Lt. Gen. James L. Terry, commander, Combined Joint Task Force — Operation Inherent Resolve.

Hagel also will meet with key Iraqi leaders, including President Fuad Masum, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi and Defense Minister Khalid al-Ubaidi, the admiral said.

Visits Slated With U.S., Australian Troops

In addition, Kirby said, Hagel will speak to U.S. and Australian personnel providing security assistance in Baghdad, and he will visit the joint operations center there.

“The secretary looks forward to gaining first-hand knowledge of coalition progress against the threat ISIL poses to the region, and to ensuring our troops — and the personnel of our Iraqi and coalition partners — understand how grateful he is for their service and professionalism,” Kirby said.

The post Hagel Visits Baghdad To Thank Troops appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Promise Shown In Drug Against Antibiotic-Resistant ‘Superbugs’

0
0

A treatment pioneered at the University of Pittsburgh Center for Vaccine Research (CVR) is far more effective than traditional antibiotics at inhibiting the growth of drug-resistant bacteria, including so-called “superbugs” resistant to almost all existing antibiotics, which plague hospitals and nursing homes.

The findings, announced online in the journal Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy and funded by the National Institutes of Health, provide a needed boost to the field of antibiotic development, which has been limited in the last four decades and outpaced by the rise of drug-resistant bacterial strains.

“Very few, if any, medical discoveries have had a larger impact on modern medicine than the discovery and development of antibiotics,” said senior author Ronald C. Montelaro, Ph.D., professor and co-director of Pitt’s CVR. “However, the success of these medical achievements is being threatened due to increasing frequency of antibiotic resistance. It is critical that we move forward with development of new defenses against the drug-resistant bacteria that threaten the lives of our most vulnerable patients.”

Each year in the U.S., at least 2 million people are infected with drug-resistant bacteria, and at least 23,000 die as a direct result of these infections, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

On the tail end of HIV surface protein, there is a sequence of amino acids that the virus uses to “punch into” and infect cells. Dr. Montelaro and his colleagues developed a synthetic and more efficient version of this sequence – called engineered cationic antimicrobial peptides, or “eCAPs”–that can be chemically synthesized in a laboratory setting.

The team tested the two leading eCAPs against a natural antimicrobial peptide (LL37) and a standard antibiotic (colistin), the latter being used as a last-resort antibiotic against multidrug resistant bacterial infections. The scientists performed the tests in a laboratory setting using 100 different bacterial strains isolated from the lungs of pediatric cystic fibrosis patients of Seattle Children’s Hospital and 42 bacterial strains isolated from hospitalized adult patients at UPMC.

The natural human antimicrobial peptide LL37 and the colistin drug each inhibited growth of about 50 percent of the clinical isolates, indicating a high level of bacterial resistance to these drugs. In marked contrast, the two eCAPS inhibited growth in about 90 percent of the test bacterial strains.

“We were very impressed with the performance of the eCAPs when compared with some of the best existing drugs, including a natural antimicrobial peptide made by Mother Nature and an antibiotic of last resort,” said Dr. Montelaro. “However, we still needed to know how long the eCAPs would be effective before the bacteria develop resistance.”

The team challenged a highly infectious and pathogenic bacterium called Pseudomonas aeruginosa – which flourishes in medical equipment, such as catheters, and causes inflammation, sepsis and organ failure – with both the traditional drugs and eCAPs in the lab.

The bacterium developed resistance to the traditional drugs in as little as three days. In contrast, it took 25 to 30 days for the same bacterium to develop resistance to the eCAPs. In addition, the eCAPs worked just as effectively at killing Pseudomonas aeruginosa after it became resistant to the traditional drugs.

“We plan to continue developing the eCAPs in the lab and in animal models, with the intention of creating the least-toxic and most effective version possible so we can move them to clinical trials and help patients who have exhausted existing antibiotic options,” said Dr. Montelaro.

The post Promise Shown In Drug Against Antibiotic-Resistant ‘Superbugs’ appeared first on Eurasia Review.


E-Cigarettes Appear To Be Less Addictive Than Cigarettes

0
0

E-cigarettes appear to be less addictive than cigarettes for former smokers and this could help improve understanding of how various nicotine delivery devices lead to dependence, according to researchers.

“We found that e-cigarettes appear to be less addictive than tobacco cigarettes in a large sample of long-term users,” said Jonathan Foulds, professor of public health sciences and psychiatry, Penn State College of Medicine.

The popularity of e-cigarettes, which typically deliver nicotine, propylene glycol, glycerin and flavorings through inhaled vapor, has increased in the past five years. There are currently more than 400 brands of “e-cigs” available. E-cigs contain far fewer cancer-causing and other toxic substances than cigarettes, however their long-term effects on health and nicotine dependence are unknown.

To study e-cigarette dependence, the researchers developed an online survey, including questions designed to assess previous dependence on cigarettes and almost identical questions to assess current dependence on e-cigs. More than 3,500 current users of e-cigs who were ex-cigarette smokers completed the Penn State Cigarette Dependence Index and the Penn State Electronic Cigarette Dependence Index.

Higher nicotine concentration in e-cig liquid, as well as use of advanced second-generation e-cigs, which deliver nicotine more efficiently than earlier “cigalikes,” predicted dependence. Consumers who had used e-cigs longer also appeared to be more addicted.

“However, people with all the characteristics of a more dependent e-cig user still had a lower e-cig dependence score than their cigarette dependence score,” Foulds said. “We think this is because they’re getting less nicotine from the e-cigs than they were getting from cigarettes.”

Although many regular users on e-cigarettes are trying to quit smoking, the Food and Drug Administration has not approved them for this use, and they cannot be marketed as a smoking cessation product.

“This is a new class of products that’s not yet regulated,” Foulds said. “It has the potential to do good and help a lot of people quit, but it also has the potential to do harm. Continuing to smoke and use e-cigarettes may not reduce health risks. Kids who have never smoked might begin nicotine addiction with e-cigs. There’s a need for a better understanding of these products.

“We don’t have long-term health data of e-cig use yet, but any common sense analysis says that e-cigs are much less toxic. And our paper shows that they appear to be much less addictive, as well. So in both measures they seem to have advantages when you’re concerned about health.”

The findings, which are published in Nicotine & Tobacco Research, also have implications for developing e-cigs for smoking cessation.

“We might actually need e-cigarettes that are better at delivering nicotine because that’s what’s more likely to help people quit,” Foulds said.

Previous research shows that nicotine replacement efficacy correlates with higher nicotine dose and faster delivery speed.

The new index used in the study is more modern than the most widely used dependence survey, the Fagerstrom Test for Nicotine Dependence. That scale was developed 25 years ago and does not reflect modern use of tobacco and nicotine products.

“People smoke fewer cigarettes today but are still clearly addicted, and the old scale — while still reasonably effective — was not designed to measure that,” Foulds said.

The new questionnaire also allows for cross-comparisons between different nicotine and tobacco products. “Not only are e-cigs a booming industry, but new tobacco products are set to enter the market soon,” Foulds said. “Our questionnaire is designed to compare dependence across different products simply by substituting the different product name into the questionnaire in place of cigarettes.”

The post E-Cigarettes Appear To Be Less Addictive Than Cigarettes appeared first on Eurasia Review.

US Senators Push EPA For Stronger Carbon Pollution Reductions In Clean Power Plan

0
0

Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley and Senator Brian Schatz (D-HI) led eleven Senators in calling on the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to strengthen its proposed Clean Power Plan to achieve even greater reductions of carbon pollution.

In the first major congressional call to further strengthen the plan from its existing targets, the Senators emphasized that it is essential for the plan to hit the target levels of emissions reductions necessary to avoid the most harmful effects of climate change.

Merkley and Schatz were joined by Senators Ben Cardin (D-MD), Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Ed Markey (D-MA), Cory Booker (D-NJ), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA).

In a letter to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, the Senators wrote: “The Clean Power Plan will be the single most significant step this country has ever taken to tackle greenhouse gas emissions in the power sector, so it is essential that it be done right. For the Clean Power Plan to be a success, it must achieve the level of emissions reductions that the science calls for to avoid the most dangerous impacts of climate change.”

The Senators emphasized that current technology and market conditions make it possible to deploy renewable energy more aggressively to cut carbon pollution even further from the first draft of the Clean Power Plan. In a detailed appendix to the letter, the Senators laid out specific areas within the proposal where the draft rule can be strengthened.

The post US Senators Push EPA For Stronger Carbon Pollution Reductions In Clean Power Plan appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Congress Reaches Deal On $1.1 Trillion Spending Bill Ahead Of Deadline

0
0

U.S. Congressional leaders have reached an agreement on a $1.1tn spending bill ahead of a looming Thursday, Dec 11 evening deadline.

A consensus would prevent a government shutdown and fund the federal government until September 2015.

The bill was agreed by congressional leaders and is expected to be passed by Congress this week. There are disagreements over immigration-related funds requested by President Barack Obama. But additional cash requested to bolster U.S. border security, issued by Obama through a controversial executive action last month, remains in the balance.

Republicans – who gained control of both chambers of Congress in November’s pivotal mid-term elections – may put spending for the Department of Homeland Security, responsible for immigration oversight, on a shorter timeframe until conservatives formally take the reins next month.

The package must be approved before a spending deadline on Thursday.

The bill is expected to include funding requested by Obama to fight the spread of Ebola in West Africa.

The post Congress Reaches Deal On $1.1 Trillion Spending Bill Ahead Of Deadline appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Italian Historian Claims Mona Lisa Was Chinese, And Was Da Vinci’s Mother

0
0

An Italian historian’s theory that Mona Lisa might be a Chinese slave and Leonardo da Vinci’s mother — making the 15th-century polymath half-Chinese — sent online commentators into a frenzy.

Angelo Paratico, a Hong Kong-based historian and novelist from Italy, told the South China Morning Post: “On the back of Mona Lisa, there is a Chinese landscape and even her face looks Chinese.”

Chinese web users expressed astonishment and disbelief Wednesday, posting dozens of parodies of the painting, with faces from Chinese comedians to British actor Rowan Atkinson grafted over her delicate features.

Little is known about Caterina, the mother of the artist, writer, mathematician and inventor, and the identity of the sitter for the portrait hanging in Paris’ Louvre museum has long been a matter of debate.

Paratico, who is finishing a book entitled Leonardo da Vinci: a Chinese scholar lost in Renaissance Italy, cited Austrian neurologist Sigmund Freud’s 1910 assumption that the painting was inspired by the artist’s mother.

“One wealthy client of Leonardo’s father had a slave called Caterina. After 1452, Leonardo’s date of birth, she disappeared from the documents,” he told the paper.

The evidence for a Chinese connection appears to be slight, with Paratico saying he was sure “up to a point” that da Vinci’s mother was from the Orient. “To make her an oriental Chinese, we need to use a deductive method,” he added.

Many posters on China’s Twitter-like Sina Weibo were incredulous.

“I’m so sad that you thought I’m a foreigner!” wrote one, with an image of a frowning Mona Lisa holding two rolls of toilet paper and blowing her nose. “I’d rather be from wherever I am loved.”

Another user replaced her features with unlikely faces ranging from Chinese male comedian Zhao Benshan to British actor Rowan Atkinson, to a grimacing robot holding a Mona Lisa mask.

The topic had been viewed more than four million times and triggered 160,000 postings by midday Wednesday.
“I now understand why her smile looks so mysterious and concealed — it’s typically Chinese,” said another poster.

The post Italian Historian Claims Mona Lisa Was Chinese, And Was Da Vinci’s Mother appeared first on Eurasia Review.

UN Counter-Terrorism Task Force To Strengthen Cooperation With INTERPOL

0
0

Enhancing coordination between UN agencies and the world’s largest police organization to combat the threat of terrorism and foreign fighters was the focus of the recent 4th UN Counter-Terrorism Implementation Task Force (CTITF) Retreat.

The need to adopt a proactive approach in identifying current and future threats, as well as to bring together all relevant expertise to the front line in the fight against terrorism, was one of the main recommendations of the meeting.

In addition to 34 UN agencies with expertise across the spectrum of counter-terrorism, peacekeeping, political and legal affairs, human rights, cyber security, CBRNE (Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear and Explosives) security, public communication and emergency management, the meeting included INTERPOL’s Counter-Terrorism, Maritime Security and Public Safety directorate.

“The current non-state actors based threat resulting from the potential use by terrorist groups of CBRNE materials represents a major security concern to the critical infrastructure of all countries,” said Jeffrey Muller, Assistant Director at INTERPOL’s CBRNE unit which chairs the UN Working Group on the Protection of Critical Infrastructure, Vulnerable Targets, Internet and Tourism Security.

“Working multilaterally with its UN partners, INTERPOL, through its global tools and services has a fundamental role to play in raising awareness and improving the level of preparedness to better prevent and respond to various risks threatening global safety and security,” added Mr Muller.

The UN CTITF retreat followed the recent briefing to the UN Security Council by INTERPOL Secretary General Jürgen Stock in which he emphasized the inherent role of international policing in shaping and reinforcing sustainable security worldwide.

In September, the UN Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 2178 (2014) which recognized INTERPOL’s efforts against the threat posed by foreign terrorist fighters, including through global law enforcement information sharing and procedures to track stolen, forged identity papers and travel documents.

The post UN Counter-Terrorism Task Force To Strengthen Cooperation With INTERPOL appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Viewing all 73339 articles
Browse latest View live




Latest Images