In Washington’s coming budget battles, sacred cows like the tax deductions for home mortgage interest and charitable donations are likely to be on the table along with potential cuts to Social Security and Medicare.

But no one on Capitol Hill believes Wall Street’s beloved carried-interest tax loophole will be touched.

Don’t blame the newly elected Republican Congress.

Democrats didn’t repeal the loophole when they ran both houses of Congress from January 2009 to January 2011. And the reason they didn’t has a direct bearing on the future of the party.

First, let me explain why this loophole is the most flagrant of all giveaways to the super-rich.

Carried interest allows hedge-fund and private-equity managers, as well as many venture capitalists and partners in real estate investment trusts, to treat their take of the profits as capital gains — taxed at maximum rate of 23.8 percent instead of the 39.6 percent maximum applied to ordinary income.

It’s a pure scam. They get the tax break even though they invest other peoples’ money rather than risk their own.

The loophole has no economic justification. As one private-equity manager told me recently, “I can’t defend it. No one can.”

It’s worth about $11 billion a year — more than enough to extend unemployment benefits to every one of America’s nearly 3 million long-term unemployed.

The hedge-fund, private-equity, and other fund managers who receive this $11 billion are some of the richest people in America. Forbes lists 46 billionaires who have derived most of their wealth from managing hedge funds. Mitt Romney used the carried-interest loophole to help limit his effective tax rate in 2011 to 13.9 percent.

So why didn’t Democrats close it when they ran Congress?

Actually, in 2010 House Democrats finally squeaked through a tax plan that did close the carried-interest loophole, but the Democratically-controlled Senate wouldn’t go along.

Senator Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), one of those who argued against closing it, said the U.S. “shouldn’t do anything” to “make it easier for capital and ideas to flow to London or anywhere else.” As if Wall Street needed an $11 billion annual bribe to stay put.

To find the real reason Democrats didn’t close the loophole, follow the money. Wall Street is one of the Democratic party’s biggest contributors.

The Street donated $49.1 million to Democrats in 2010, according to the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics. Hedge-fund managers alone accounted for $5.88 million of the total. Schumer and a few other influential Democrats were among the industry’s major beneficiaries.

Wall Street has continued to be generous to Democrats (as well as to Republicans).

The Democrats’ unwillingness to close the carried-interest loophole when they could also goes some way to explaining why, almost six years after Wall Street’s near meltdown, the Obama administration has done so little to rein in the Street.

Wall Street’s biggest banks are far bigger now than they were then, yet they still have no a credible plan for winding down their operations if they get into trouble.

The Dodd-Frank Act, designed to prevent another Wall Street failure, has been watered down so much it’s slush. There’s been no move to resurrect the Glass-Steagall Act separating investment banking from commercial banking.

Not a not a single Wall Street executive has been prosecuted for his involvement in the frauds that caused the mess.

Wall Street was the fourth-largest contributor to Barack Obama’s presidential campaign in 2008, and is already gearing up for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 run.

Hedge-fund and private-equity managers are donating generously to Priorities USA Action, a super PAC dedicated to getting her elected.

The hedge fund Renaissance Technologies has contributed $4 million to date. D.E. Shaw, another fund, has donated over $1 million. Khosla Ventures and Soros Fund Management have donated $1 million each.

Many Wall Street financiers have donated $25,000 (intended to be the maximum contribution) to the Ready for Hillary superPAC.

Robert Wolf, the former president of UBS’ investment bank who now has his own advisory boutique, told “Politico” that six in ten Wall Street types are Democrats, and that “when and if she decides to run, [Hillary Clinton is] going to have an incredible support foundation from Wall Street.”

Just because a candidate takes Wall Street money doesn’t mean he or she is beholden to the Street.

But the reason Democrats have pulled their punches with the financial sector for years is because it’s hard to punch the hand that feeds you.

This must stop. America can’t tackle widening inequality without confronting the power and privilege lying behind it.

If the Democratic party doesn’t lead the charge, who will?

The post Wall Street’s Democrats – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

With Americans spending billions of dollars each year on nutritional supplements, researchers have analyzed popular eye vitamins to determine whether their formulations and claims are consistent with scientific findings. They determined that some of the top-selling products do not contain identical ingredient dosages to eye vitamin formulas proven effective in clinical trials.

In addition, the study found that claims made on the products’ promotional materials lack scientific evidence. The results of their study were published online in Ophthalmology, the journal of the American Academy of Ophthalmology.

The leading cause of blindness among older adults in the United States is age-related macular degeneration (AMD). This is the deterioration of the eye’s macula, which is the central part of the retina that enables the eye to see fine details clearly. Recommended treatment for AMD at certain stages of the disease includes nutritional supplements.

The landmark Age-Related Eye Disease Study (AREDS) found in 2001 that a specific formula of nutritional supplements containing high doses of antioxidants and zinc could slow the worsening of AMD in those who have intermediate AMD and those with advanced AMD in only one eye. A follow-up study that concluded in 2011, AREDS2, determined that the formula was still effective if one ingredient, beta-carotene (a form of vitamin A), was replaced with related nutrients, lutein and zeaxanthin. Beta-carotene was substituted in AREDS2 due to its link to increased risk of lung cancer in smokers. The two studies prompted a surge in sales of eye supplements which are marketed as containing the AREDS or AREDS2 formulas.

To test whether the products are consistent with the studies’ findings, researchers compared the ingredients in top-selling brands to the exact formulas proven effective by AREDS and AREDS2. The researchers – based at Yale-New Haven Hospital-Waterbury Hospital, Penn State College of Medicine, Providence VA Medical Center and Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University – identified the five top-selling brands based on market research collected from June 2011 to June 2012, and analyzed the brands’ 11 products.

They found that, while all of the products studied contained the ingredients from the AREDS or AREDS2 formulas:

• Only four of the products had equivalent doses of AREDS or AREDS2 ingredients
• Another four of the products contained lower doses of all the AREDS or AREDS2 ingredients

Four of the products also included additional vitamins, minerals and herbal extracts that are not part of the AREDS or AREDS2 formulas

In addition, while all 11 of the products’ promotional materials contained claims that the supplements “support,” “protect,” “help” or “promote” vision and eye health, none had statements specifying that nutritional supplements have only been proven effective in people with specific stages of AMD. There were also no statements clarifying that currently there is not sufficient evidence to support the routine use of nutritional supplements for primary prevention of eye diseases such as AMD and cataracts..

“With so many vitamins out there claiming to support eye health, it’s very easy for patients to be misled into buying supplements that may not bring about the desired results,” said first author Jennifer J. Yong, M.D. “Our findings underscore the importance of ophthalmologists educating patients that they should only take the proven combination of nutrients and doses for AMD according to guidelines established by AREDS and AREDS2. It’s also crucial that physicians remind patients that, at this time, vitamins have yet to be proven clinically effective in preventing the onset of eye diseases such as cataracts and AMD.”

The post Top-Selling Eye Vitamins Found Not To Match Scientific Evidence appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Mohammed Fahad Al-Harthi

The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Summit taking place in Doha, Qatar, is one of the most crucial in its 33-year history, coming as it does in the wake of unprecedented tension and upheaval in the region.

The summit is important for the critical topics on the agenda, but also because it is the start of a new phase of Gulf solidarity. In an important step that is likely to have far-reaching consequences, the Gulf countries have decided to bury the hatchet and work toward common goals.

The next stage is unity. The Gulf states have many enemies envious of their oil wealth. There are entities and states in the region eagerly looking to exploit chinks in the GCC’s armor.

To their credit, the leaders here have realized that they share a common destiny, and that history would judge those harshly who decide to go it alone. There would be a heavy price paid for grandstanding and posturing at this critical juncture.

The GCC members had last month overcome arguably their most divisive period. It was Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah, known as one of the world’s most respected elder statesmen and unifying leaders, who managed to smooth relations with Qatar at an extraordinary GCC meeting in Riyadh.

This resulted in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain sending their ambassadors back to Doha. Another important development was the visit to Doha of Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, the ruler of Abu Dhabi.

Having achieved this, there is now space and opportunity to look at other challenges, which include joint security and defense measures.

Only a unified and secure GCC can play a powerful role in the international arena.

The world is in flux: The US has shifted its priorities toward the Pacific area; Russia and China are increasingly flexing their muscles regionally and on the global stage; there are worries over Iran’s nuclear ambitions; and Turkey is increasingly expanding its influence in the region.

In addition, the Arab world as a whole is fragmented, which has left the Gulf in a vulnerable position. Under these circumstances, the Gulf states have no option but to stand together on the political, economic and military fronts.

Within this context, a unified military leadership structure would lead to a joint defense system to assure security in the GCC, serve the unity project, send a reassuring message to citizens, and a warning to those who dare interfere.

The changes in the Arab world over the past three years have again highlighted the dangers posed by power-hungry extremist groups, particularly in influencing the uneducated, young and gullible. These groups have harnessed the power of the Internet to spark religious differences and sectarian wars that threaten the stability of communities and countries.

This is clearly not a time for overzealous national fervor. Those who are opposed to the GCC unity initiative because it might impact on national sovereignty, should study the example of the European Union, which despite its flaws have achieved a working system for disparate states.

There were inevitable sacrifices of some sovereignty for the common good in the EU, based on a great deal of political maturity. It involved making tough decisions that would ultimately benefit the group. It is this same level of understanding that is currently being displayed by GCC leaders.

There is undoubtedly a move in the GCC to make the difficult transition to real unity that would benefit, protect and empower it in the region and the world. The Doha summit marks this historic turning point.

The post GCC’s Historic Turning Point – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The onslaught of super typhoon Hagupit has once again raised fears of massive destruction and high casualties in the Philippines. Being prepared helps mitigate the impact of destructive typhoons.

By Mely Caballero-Anthony and Julius Cesar Imperial Trajano

For the communities in central Philippines, a repeat of 2013’s onslaught of super typhoon Haiyan (locally known as Yolanda) raised, once again, fears of devastation and loss of lives with the arrival of Typhoon Hagupit.

The strongest typhoon to hit the country this year, Hagupit barrelled through central Philippines, where thousands were killed by super typhoon Haiyan last year. At less than 200 kilometres per hour (kph), though far weaker than Haiyan which had a strength of more than 300 kph, slow-moving Hagupit was projected to hammer cities, towns and impoverished coastal communities, which were still recovering from the devastation wrought by Haiyan.
Devastation redux

The region experienced heavy rain and intense winds, but few injuries and little damage had been reported so far. At least 27 people have been reported killed, according to the Red Cross, although exact casualty figures are likely to rise as more deaths are uncovered. Still, it did not appear to have wreaked devastation on the same scale as last year’s deadly Haiyan.

During the onslaught of Haiyan last year, tsunami-like storm surges flattened what used to be vibrant towns and communities, killed or left missing close to 8,000 people, and displaced as many as four million. In Tacloban City, which was the ground zero for Haiyan, the city’s response to another disaster was again tested. And this time, the city suffered no casualties after Hagupit made landfall, thanks to early massive forced evacuation of 49,000 inhabitants.

Local governments in Samar and Leyte provinces declared their typhoon preparedness a “success” as there were no massive casualties during the onslaught of Hagupit. In terms of economic cost, while the damage to infrastructure and agriculture is yet to be assessed by the government, it is unlikely that Hagupit will be as destructive as Haiyan which caused approximately US$700 million worth of damage to infrastructure and agriculture. It obliterated more than half a million homes and destroyed the local communities’ sources of agriculturally based livelihood.

Preparedness matters

After the 2013 ‘fiasco’, the Philippine government pulled out all stops to prepare for imminent typhoon. Hagupit was seen as the ultimate test of President Benigno Aquino’s post-Haiyan disaster preparedness mechanism – a year after his administration was criticised for its messy response to Haiyan’s devastation. President Aquino himself, in a pre-Hagupit disaster meeting, pressured his cabinet ministers to ensure minimum casualties. By initial accounts, his administration seems to have passed the test.

Prior to Hagupit’s onslaught, the Philippines implemented one of its largest-ever peacetime evacuations. More than one million people have been evacuated and placed in 81 evacuation centres. Some private properties, including hotels and even houses of local politicians, were likewise opened to host evacuees. The government’s disaster response equipment, emergency workers and relief aid items were also prepositioned to ensure prompt post-typhoon relief assistance.

Another post-Haiyan innovative measure of the government was the regular issuance, through mainstream and social media, of storm surge warnings, which were used by local governments to identify disaster-prone communities and kept affected residents informed. Also, local governments – as first responders – seem to be more prepared in protecting their communities, through enforced evacuation.

During Haiyan last year, affected local governments were virtually incapacitated to immediately respond to the needs of their communities and uphold peace and order. But this time, local police and military personnel were strategically deployed to prevent looting, a common occurrence in the aftermath of Haiyan as desperate residents received no relief supplies.

Disaster-relief initiatives from the international community also appear to be more coordinated and, evidently, less political. It must be noted that in the course of massive international relief efforts last year, China was heavily criticised for its delayed and paltry contribution to the relief efforts due to, arguably, its lingering territorial disputes with the Philippines in the South China Sea.

This time, China is among the first 11 countries to pledge relief and rehabilitation assistance, along with the United States, Japan, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and the Philippines’ ASEAN neighbours Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and Brunei.

Lessons learnt: Regional response

Indeed, one important lesson in this episode is that a regional disaster mechanism can now be easily activated to complement the relief assistance of the international community. A six-man ASEAN Emergency Rapid Assessment Team (ERAT), which included four Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) officers, was deployed prior to the onslaught of Hagupit.

The team comes under the ASEAN Coordinating Centre for Humanitarian Assistance (AHA). Its critical function is to provide rapid assessment and determine the critical resources – such as tents, medical kits, and sanitation facilities – required for the areas affected by the typhoon. ERAT helps ASEAN and the international community identify what needs to be delivered to affected communities.

Working with the AHA, Singapore has also deployed its Swift Emergency Evaluation Deployment (SEED) team, a nationally-organised needs assessment team to assist the Philippines in getting a comprehensive analysis of the situation in the affected areas and enhance information-sharing. This helps facilitate decision-making by armed forces, for instance, by directing them to affected areas most in need of disaster assistance.

Engaging local communities

Another key takeaway in the aftermath of Hagupit is the importance of getting communities involved to boost community resilience. While both local and national governments prepared themselves to protect communities, the people had already inculcated the habit of cooperating with authorities in the massive evacuation efforts.

Local governments credited the cooperation of communities to ensure quick and orderly evacuation which undeniably saved thousands of lives. People are also now more informed of the possible deadly consequences of Hagupit should they refuse to heed authorities.

Indeed, natural disasters are now regarded as a major security threat affecting communities regionally. Powerful typhoons such as Haiyan and Hagupit are no longer just one-off events, but yearly occurrences due to worsening climate change. As this kind of disasters affect millions of lives irrespective of political boundaries, it is essential to assist communities to be more disaster-resilient, primarily through coordinated efforts of national and multilateral actors.

Mely Caballero-Anthony and Julius Cesar I. Trajano are respectively Head and Senior Analyst with the Centre for Non-Traditional Security (NTS) Studies at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University.

The post Lessons Of Two Disasters: Building Resilience From Within – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Dabiq is the name of ISIS’ new recruiting magazine because this village is the place where the Muslim and Christian armies will “in the end of days”, face each other; and the Crusaders will be destroyed.

Dabiq is a small town in northern Syria, close to the border with Turkey, with only a few thousand inhabitants.

Like Judaism and Christianity, Islam has a powerful eschatological strain. It anticipates the end to the world as we know it; a final historical confrontation between good and evil; after which human life will be transformed.

And according to one Hadith, the place where this apocalypse will happen is Dabiq. This is a parallel to the Jewish/Christian location of Armageddon-Har Megiddo in the southern part of Israel’s Galilee.

Of course, ISIS is selective in its use of Hadith. For instance, other Ahadith have it that Jesus, will return to a place east of Damascus and will join forces with the Islamic messiah, the Mahdi, in a battle against the false messiah, the one eyed Dajjal, (Armilos in Jewish tradition).

After the death of both the Dajjal and the Mahdi, the Muslim Jesus will rule the Earth. This Hadith is less useful to ISIS, though its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, looks to some observers to be trying to style himself as the Mahdi. Most important, the Hadith say that these events will come to pass when Islam itself is threatened by its own corrupt fanatics.

As ibn Babuya writes in Thawab ul-A’mal, “The Apostle of God said:

“There will come a time for my people when there will remain nothing of the Qur’an except its outward form, and nothing of Islam except its name, and they will call themselves by this name even though they are the people furthest from it.

“The mosques will be full of people but they will be empty of right guidance. The religious leaders (Fuqaha) of that day will be the most evil religious leaders under the heavens; sedition and dissension will go out from them and to them will it return.”

Secularists believe that these apocalyptic visions of the future are absurd, although many secularists themselves fervently believe that run away genetic modification of food; and/or extreme climate change; is going to doom all of human civilization in the next generation.

The basic difference between the pessimistic, humanist secularists and the religious optimists is that those who believe in the God of Abraham also believe that God’s inspiration guarantees that the spiritual forces of good will overcome all the world’s evils at the end of days; and justice, peace and religious pluralism will prevail. Or as Prophet Micah envisions it: (4:1-5)

In the end of days the mountain of the Lord’s Temple will be established as the highest mountain; it will be exalted above the hills, and peoples will stream to it. Many (not all) nations will come and say, ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the Temple of the God of Jacob. who will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths.’

Torah will go out from Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. God will judge between many (not all) peoples and will settle disputes among powerful nations far and wide. They will beat their swords into ploughs, and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war any more.

Everyone will sit under their own vine and under their own fig-tree, and no one will make them afraid, for the Lord Almighty has spoken. All the nations will walk in the name of their gods, and we (Jews) will walk in the name of the Lord our God for ever and ever.

Thus, the Bible and the Qur’an’s final judgement is the self-destruction of violent, hate filled terrorism and narrow ‘my way or death’ philosophy; and the victory of kindness love and religious pluralism.

The post ISIS’ Dabiq And The Bible’s Armageddon – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Nick Cunningham

New oil projects are being scrapped in Norway amid falling production and low oil prices.

Long held up as the model for managing oil abundance, Norway has painstakingly sought to prevent the problems that occur with other natural resource-based economies, such as corruption, slow economic growth, currency appreciation, and subsequently, deindustrialization.

Since 1990, Norway has diverted much of its oil earnings to a sovereign wealth fund, which has become the world’s largest. The money, reaching $890 billion as of June 2014, amounts to $178,000 for every Norwegian citizen. The sovereign wealth fund helps Norway avoid some of the problems associated with the “resource curse” by investing capital abroad. But more importantly, the money is set aside to be saved and invested to help the country plan for the eventual decline of oil production, with the intention of transitioning to a more diversified economy that can take oil’s place.

The early cracks in Norway’s petrol-based economy are beginning to show, perhaps quicker than many predicted.

Energy analysts have explored in detail how the ongoing decline in oil prices – down 40 percent since June – might affect oil exporting countries like Russia, Iran, Venezuela, and other OPEC members. But even Norway, the model for using natural resources to build a modern wealthy economy, is not immune to the price fall.

Statoil, the mostly government-owned oil company, has seen its share price cut in half since July 2014. It is idling several offshore rigs as oil prices drop. Three rigs – the COSL Pioneer, Scarabeo 5, and Songa Trym – will be suspended until the middle of 2015 because of lower profitability. “These measures are necessary due to the overcapacity of rigs compared to the assignments we are prioritising. This situation is unfortunate, and we are doing what we can to minimise the extent of the suspensions,” Statoil procurement head Jon Arnt Jacobsen said in a statement.

To make matters worse, costs of developing new fields have been steadily rising. “The boom is probably over. But we’re not looking at a steep decline in investment or production,” Norway’s oil minister Tord Lien told Reuters in May 2014. “The costs are rising too high and too fast. The Norwegian costs have risen a little bit more than elsewhere.” Since those comments, oil prices have tumbled. Norway may in fact see a steep decline in investment.

Lower oil prices could force more than $150 billion worth of investments to be put on hold worldwide, according to an assessment by Norwegian firm Rystad Energy. Statoil is deferring a decision on investing $5.74 billion in the Snorre field, an offshore oil project in the Norwegian Sea. Also, Statoil’s Johan Castberg field, an estimated $16-$19 billion oil field in the Barents Sea, will be tabled for the time being. These costly projects won’t generate a sufficient return given today’s prices.

But the oil price decline is only accelerating a trend that is already underway. Even with high oil prices Norway was facing a tougher future due to years of waning oil production. Since 2001, Norway’s oil production has fallen by almost half, from around 3.5 million barrels per day down to about 1.8 or 1.9 million bpd in 2014.

The decline in investment is already pinching the labor market. Around 10,000 Norwegian oil workers have been laid off as the industry pares back spending, accounting for 10 percent of the sector’s total workforce, the Wall Street Journal reports. Oil workers are threatening to strike unless the government steps in to stem further losses.

And the way forward is murky. Despite its best efforts, Norway’s economy is overwhelmingly dependent on oil, which accounts for more than half of the country’s exports. Other export industries have struggled to develop as costs are too high – a classic symptom felt in countries suffering from the resource curse.

But resuscitating the sector may be difficult. With such a high cost environment, it doesn’t make sense for many companies in Norway to invest in new projects. Spending could drop by another 18 percent next year as project economics look poor.

Conversely, without investment, new production will not materialize in the coming years, leading to further deterioration for the sector as existing fields age and decline.

To be sure, Norway has its almost $1 trillion sovereign wealth fund to fall back on, so it is not as if its citizenry will be thrust into poverty anytime soon. Still, Norway may need to begin building a post-oil economy sooner than it thought.

Source: http://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Norways-Oil-Decline-Accelerating.html

The post Norway’s Oil Decline Accelerating – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Tuva Julie Engebrethsen Smith

The EU-India bilateral partnership dates back to the 1960s, but it was at the 5th India-EU Summit at The Hague in 2004, that the relationship was upgraded to a ‘Strategic Partnership’, further enhancing ties. It is a relationship built on mutual cooperation anchored within economic agreements.

A recent study by the Europe India Chamber of Commerce (EICC) and the European Business and Technology Centre (EBTC) reveals that EU firms have emerged into becoming the largest inbound investors in India. The report further states that EU enterprises have invested $198 billion over a period of ten years, and have provided 1.5 million Indians with direct employment.

Since being elected as the 15th Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi’s eagerness to strengthen regional and international business partnerships, and improve India’s reputation as an economic and political power-state has awakened excitement in the EU. It has sparked fire in the European optimism to improve the EU-India partnership. However, does the Modi-government have the capability or willingness to embark upon existing challenges vis-à-vis the bilateral?

Modi-fications

It is certain that the EU wants to contribute to the injection of new life into India’s economy, but one crucial step remains to be implemented for the EU-India partnership to fully flourish: the consensus on the Free Trade Agreement (FTA). Negotiations over the FTA have been ongoing without an outcome since 2007. The former Secretary General of NATO, Javier Solana, argues that concluding the FTA is crucial for a stronger EU-India partnership that, in the longer run, will help easing existing investment and trade disagreements, while simultaneously strengthen EU-India economic and business relations. Consensus on the FTA will benefit India with access to a duty-free European market while offering benefits within production, welfare, and productivity. According to the Observer Research Foundation, India’s welfare gains will temporarily show a 0.3 per cent economic growth, which, in the longer run will increase up to 1.6 per cent.

According to the European Commission´s Trade and Investment Barriers report published earlier this year, hopes are high on foreign direct investment (FDI) limits concerning defence manufacturing, which the Indian government has said it might raise from 26 per cent up to 49 per cent. The report further underlines positive investment improvement as European firms have already applied and gotten their licenses approved in single-brand retail. However, expectations persist among European firms on the approval of multi-brand retail license.

There is optimism in the energy sector as well. According to the EICC and EBTC report, EU enterprises have already spent $118 billion on 2,566 Greenfield projects (projects not constrained by prior work: new factories, airports, etc.). With Modi’s focus on bringing more renewable energy technology into the country, especially on solar and wind energy, an EU-India strategic partnership does not seem short-sighted.

In Europe, renewable energy is creating jobs. Henriette Faergemann, counsellor, Environment, Climate and Energy, EU Delegation to India, speaking of employment generation, argues that green energy is that sector “which decreases resource use and greenhouse gas emissions while creating business, growth and development,” and will surface as economically prosperous. Thus, having 12 million competitive English-speaking Indian youth entering the job market every year and the EU’s innovative energy research, a EU-Indian collaboration in high-tech areas is set to complement each other.

Along the lines of a business and growth-oriented Modi and his approach to opening up the Indian market to foreign trade and investment, Arnaldo Abruzzini, Secretary General, Eurochambres, is optimistic on a final FTA coming into place. It will allow for the growing Indian companies and workforce to discover what the EU has to offer, while simultaneously giving Europe access to a young, prospective market with an opportunity to further bolster its expertise and trade. After all, EU firms are India´s largest investors in FDI.

The European Maritime Security Strategy is optimistic that EU´s pre-existing maritime security cooperation with India will flourish with Modi as the Indian prime minister. On the bilateral level, the Konkan series between the Indian Navy and the Royal Navy of Britain is a success story, and similar exercises will hopefully continue to thrive, as well as other passage exercises between the European and Indian Navies. It is important to encourage capacity-building in smaller countries in the Indian Ocean in order to strengthen regional emergency preparedness and capacity to resist maritime threats, like piracy, illegal arms trafficking and terrorism, among others. Reinforcing the EU-India maritime security partnership is mutually beneficial, as the EU wants to secure its commercial shipping, while India looks for strategic equities and improved maritime power.

As regards political security, as a key strategic goal, India hopes for a more stable and peaceful environment in its neighbourhood, according to Rahul Roy-Chaudhury, senior fellow, International Institute for Strategic Studies. Modi has only been in office for a few months. However, his recent visits to Asia-Pacific countries, outreach to BRICS countries, and his social calls upon SAARC countries demonstrate dialogue and political willingness within the Modi-government.

Nevertheless, with the “Modi-fications” in play, Europe is given the opportunity to bargain new deals with a new government.

Tuva Julie Engebrethsen Smith
Research Intern (IPCS)
E-mail: tuva.engebrethsen@gmail.com

The post EU-India: Modi And Expectations Of Change – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The US Senate Intelligence Committee’s report summary on the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) detention and interrogation program is a powerful denunciation of the agency’s extensive and systematic use of torture, Human Rights Watch said today. The 525-page partially redacted summary, released on December 9, 2014, is part of a 6,700-page classified report that the committee has still not indicated it plans to release.

The summary documents numerous misrepresentations the CIA made about the program’s effectiveness and demonstrates US officials’ knowledge that it was illegal. It underscores the need for the US government to promptly release the full report, bolster oversight of the CIA, and investigate and appropriately prosecute the senior officials responsible for the torture program, Human Rights Watch said.

“The Senate report should not be relegated to a shelf or hard drive but be the basis for criminal investigations on the use of torture by US officials,” said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “The failure of the Obama administration to hold those responsible for torture to account risks leaving torture as a policy option when the next inevitable security threat strikes.”

Nature and Scope of the Abuses

The summary concludes that CIA abuses were far more brutal, systematic, and widespread than previously reported; that many of the CIA’s interrogation techniques went beyond even those authorized by the Justice Department; and that the CIA began using the techniques long before they had obtained authorization for them.

The summary describes many previously reported facts about the CIA torture program, including the agency’s use of painful stress positions, forced standing, extended sleep deprivation, extensive bright light and loud noise exposure, waterboarding, and throwing detainees against walls or closing them into coffins.

It also contains new details showing that CIA torture was even more brutal than previously thought. The agency used painful restraints, imposed punitive “anal feeding” or “anal rehydration,” and forced detainees with broken leg bones to stand shackled against walls. The tactics took a heavy toll on the detainees, especially when combined with sleep deprivation and isolation and used over long periods. One detainee is described as “clearly a broken man,” another “on the verge of a complete breakdown.”

The summary also provides evidence corroborating many details contained in prior Human Rights Watch reporting about CIA abuses. As just one example, Human Rights Watch reported in 2012 on the CIA’s use of waterboarding and similar water torture against detainees, directly contradicting the CIA’s claim that it had waterboarded only three detainees. As noted in footnote 623 of the summary, Human Rights Watch reported in 2012 that detainee Mohammed Shoroeiya (who also went by the names Abd al-Karim or al-Shara’iya) provided detailed and credible testimony that he was waterboarded repeatedly during interrogations at a CIA detention site in Afghanistan. The summary corroborates that Shoroeiya was rendered into CIA hands in 2003 and notes that CIA documents include a photograph of a wooden waterboarding device surrounded by water buckets at the detention site where Shoroeiya was held. The summary also notes that in an interview, the CIA was unable to explain the presence of the waterboarding device at that site.

Human Rights Watch also reported on the case of Khalid al-Sharif (who also went by the name of “Abu Hazim”), who described being subjected to a form of water torture very similar to waterboarding while in CIA detention in Afghanistan. The summary describes, at pages 107-108, the testimony of a CIA linguist who in 2003 apparently reported this abuse to the CIA inspector general, who in turn referred it in 2004 to the US Attorney’s office for the Eastern District of Virginia as a possible criminal violation. It is unclear what, if anything, happened to the referral, but the inspector general’s report dismissed the linguist’s allegation by concluding there was no corroborating evidence. Sharif, like several other CIA detainees, has pointed out that no US official ever sought to interview him about the abuse he endured while in CIA custody.

CIA Knew the Techniques Were Illegal

The report reveals new evidence that the CIA was well aware of the illegality of the techniques it was employing. On page 33, the summary notes that senior lawyers at the CIA internally circulated a draft letter to Attorney General John Ashcroft dated July 8, 2002, expressly acknowledging that the interrogation tactics that came to be known as “enhanced interrogation techniques” violated the US Torture Statute. The draft – it is unclear if it was ever sent – requested that the Justice Department provide the CIA with “a formal declination of prosecution, in advance.” That is, the CIA sought a promise from the Justice Department never to prosecute –or immunity.

This document contradicts previous CIA officials’ claims that they did not know whether the tactics were legal and that they relied on guidance from Justice Department legal counsel in good faith. Instead, the document makes clear that senior CIA officials knew their tactics were illegal, and were trying to create some form of legal cover for those actions. When their efforts to obtain an advance declination failed, they sought and procured another form of cover through a series of legal memos – the so-called “Torture Memos” – drafted by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel and the White House counsel beginning in August 2002, which purported to authorize the techniques.

Various current and former CIA officials have tried to justify the use of abusive practices against detainees by relying on these memos. The new evidence that the CIA knew about the illegality of the techniques undercuts any claim by senior CIA officials that they were simply relying in good faith on legal guidance, Human Rights Watch said.

Moreover, the memos were not an honest assessment of the law proscribing torture as well as cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment but a twisted effort to justify the unjustifiable. It has been a major failing of justice that the lawyers who provided legal cover for this torture program, becoming accomplices in its illegality, have not faced disciplinary or criminal consequences, Human Rights Watch said.

“It’s now clear that senior CIA officials knew from the beginning that the techniques they were using were illegal,” Roth said. “It is the height of cynicism for the CIA to continue appealing to the ‘Torture Memos’ as if it relied in good faith on their legal rationalizations.”

CIA Obstruction of Oversight

The summary shows the lengths to which the CIA went to cover up its crimes and obstruct the democratic process, including by making false claims to the Justice Department, White House, and Congress about the scope, nature, successes, and necessity of the program. At the same time, the summary shows senior White House officials knew from the start that the program was illegal, and that the administration kept even members of its own senior National Security Council and Defense Department team in the dark about the program.

At the direction of the White House, the summary states, the secretaries of state and defense, both principals on the National Security Council, were not briefed on program specifics until September 2003. The report describes a CIA email from 2003 stating that “[Secretary of State Colin] Powell would blow his stack if he were to be briefed on what’s been going on.”

The Senate Intelligence Committee initiated the study in 2009 after reports that the CIA had destroyed 92 videotapes of CIA interrogations of terrorism suspects. Despite the committee’s oversight role, no committee members, other than the then-chairman and vice-chairman, were briefed about the program, which began in 2002, until September 2006, hours before President George W. Bush disclosed the program to the public.

CIA efforts to evade oversight apparently did not end there. In March 2014, Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Dianne Feinstein reported that the CIA had spied on committee staff computers as they were conducting their oversight investigation. The CIA inspector general referred the matter to the Justice Department for prosecution, but the Justice Department declined. CIA Director John Brennan, who had repeatedly dismissed allegations of CIA wrongdoing, apologized on July 31 after an internal CIA investigation found that the agency had monitored committee staff computers.

“The CIA has tried to cover up its torture program by systematically obstructing oversight and sending false messages to the public,” Roth said. “Congress and the president should seize this opportunity to bolster oversight of the CIA and bring it under the rule of law.”

The Need for Accountability

On his second full day in office in January 2009, President Barack Obama signed an executive order closing the CIA’s secret detention facilities and ending the use of “enhanced interrogation techniques” – a euphemism for torture and other cruel or inhuman treatment. Although torture and other ill-treatment of people in custody violates US and international law, not a single US official responsible for creating or carrying out the program has been brought to justice.

“It’s unconscionable that President Obama refuses to allow prosecution of a single person who authorized, implemented, or covered up the torture,” Roth said.

Although the names of countries that cooperated with the US program were redacted in the summary, substantial evidence exists that the CIA sent prisoners to at least eight countries, including Afghanistan, Poland, Romania, Lithuania, Thailand, Morocco, Jordan, and Egypt.

The United States has often pressed other governments to prosecute serious human rights violations committed by their own officials. Besides sending a signal that the US will not tolerate detainee abuse at home, credible and fair prosecutions of US torture are crucial to US credibility on accountability abroad.

In 2009, the Justice Department initiated an investigation, led by Special Prosecutor John Durham, which it portrayed as a serious criminal inquiry into abuses against detainees in CIA custody. However, the investigation looked into only abuses that went beyond the interrogation techniques that the Justice Department had authorized, even though President Obama has acknowledged that some of the authorized techniques constituted torture.

Durham looked into 101 cases of CIA abuse, including the cases of two detainees who died in CIA custody. However, the Justice Department closed the investigation on August 2012 without bringing any criminal charges. In addition, it appears that the US never interviewed for the investigation many former CIA detainees who reportedly suffered some of the worst abuses in CIA custody. The US government has refused to answer questions as to whether any former CIA detainees were interviewed at all for the Durham investigation. The failure to conduct such interviews raises serious questions about US compliance with its obligations to conduct a full and fair inquiry under the Convention against Torture into potential violations, Human Rights Watch said.

“The Senate report summary should be the beginning, not the end, of the process to bring to justice those who committed torture in the name of the American people,” Roth said. “Real presidential leadership will be needed to ensure the next steps are taken.”

The post US Senate Report Slams CIA Torture, Lies, Says HRW appeared first on Eurasia Review.

By Mehmet Hecan

The Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK) announced the country’s economic growth rate for the third quarter of 2014, which grew by 1.7% during the third quarter, a rate far lower than that previously predicted by economists, who estimated that the economy would grow by 2.5-3%.

This is Turkey’s lowest quarterly growth rate recorded in two years. The Turkish economy grew by 4.2% during the same quarter last year. Despite this record low, TUIK updated its growth forecasts from 2.1 to 2.2% and from 4.7 to 4.8% for the first and second quarters of 2015 respectively.

To explain this record low economic growth rate, economists point to the agricultural and industrial sectors. According to them, the 4.9% contraction in agricultural production considerably exacerbated overall economic performance, while industrial production did not sufficiently contribute to economic growth. According to TUIK, the finance and insurance sectors grew by 5.2%, but the growth rate in the industrial sector remained at 2.2%.

One glaring positive change witnessed in the third quarter was foreign trade. Whereas Turkey’s exports grew by 8%, it imports decreased by 1.8%. Nonetheless, this figure demonstrates a chronic dilemma of the Turkish economy: It suffers from a large current account deficit at around 5% of its GDP, and this current account deficit generally decreases when its economy slows, due to the weight of imports in the economy.

On a yearly basis, the Turkish economy grew by 2.2% and 4.1% in 2012 and 2013 respectively. Although it was estimated that Turkey’s economy would grow by 4% in 2014, the estimated economic growth rate was downgraded from 4% to 3.3% in early October 2014. Turkey targets a 4% growth rate in 2015, however, the IMF forecasts a 3% growth rate for the Turkish economy next year.

The post Turkey: Economy Slows In Third Quarter – Analysis appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will head to Rome on Monday for an urgent meeting with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, the Israeli press, quoting senior government officials, has reported.

According to Haaretz, the meeting is aimed at coordinating the two country’s policies ahead of a UN Security Council vote scheduled two weeks from now on a Palestinian proposal to demand an end to Israel’s decades-long occupation of the West Bank by the end of 2016.

The Palestinian draft resolution will seek to apply a “two-state solution,” providing the Palestinians with an independent state within pre-1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital.

For the draft resolution to pass, nine council members must endorse it – provided it is not vetoed by a permanent member.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas had initially set the end of November as the submission date for the draft resolution. But Palestinian officials opted to wait until permanent council members returned from Iran nuclear talks, which wrapped up in Vienna late last month.

According to Haaretz, a senior Israeli official said Kerry had initiated the meeting in Rome, adding that talks were expected to last for a few hours.

The official said the top U.S. diplomat wanted to hear Netanyahu’s position on the Palestinian draft and a “more complicated” European version, which would also set a two-year deadline for reaching a permanent agreement.

Washington, which hopes to maintain its Arab allies in its coalition against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militant group, hopes to avoid using its veto to torpedo the draft resolution.

Palestinian-Israeli peace talks ground to halt in April after Israel failed to honor an earlier promise to release a number of Palestinian prisoners.

Original article

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A Palestinian National Authority (PA) minister was killed today in clashes between demonstrators and Israeli soldiers in a West Bank village, reports MISNA.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas condemned the incident as “a brutal crime.

Settlement Minister Ziad Abu Ein died after being hit in the chest and inhaling tear gas by Israeli soldiers who were dispersing a protest near Ramallah, according to MISNA.

Violence has escalated over the past weeks in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The French parliament in November was the latest European legislative body to vote for the recognition of the Palestinian State,

The post Palestinian Minister Killed By Israeli Soldiers In West Bank Clash appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Major emerging economies should push forward with policies to address high energy intensity and corrosive energy subsidies, and to encourage wider investment, according to the World Economic Forum’s Global Energy Architecture Performance Index Report 2015, which is released Wednesday.

The annual index, designed to help countries address challenges and identify opportunities across their energy systems, benchmarks the energy architecture of 125 countries based on their ability to provide energy access across three dimensions of the energy triangle – affordability, environmental sustainability, and security and access.

This year’s report focuses on energy reforms in major emerging economies, drawing on examples from Brazil, China, Colombia, India, Indonesia and Nigeria. The report, written in collaboration with Accenture, is being launched today in Mexico, highlighting the significance of the country’s far-reaching energy reforms in transforming its energy sector.

“2014 has been a turbulent year for the energy sector – geopolitical uncertainties, slowing economic growth and the drop in oil prices are affecting energy systems around the world,” said Roberto Bocca, Senior Director, Head of Energy Industries, World Economic Forum. “In this context, effective energy reforms are more important than ever to drive economic competitiveness, particularly in major emerging economies – these nations face some of the greatest challenges across the energy triangle.”

The shortlist of top performers – led by Switzerland (1st), Norway (2nd) and France (3rd) – demonstrates that there is no single pathway to a more affordable, sustainable and secure energy system, but that a balanced approach to energy policy across the three dimensions of the energy triangle pays off. All top 10 countries are European and/or OECD countries, with the exception of Colombia (9th).

Major global economies tend to perform less well on the index as their transitions take longer to unfold, due to the complexity of their energy systems. Of these economies, a number are examined in the report. The impact of the Energiewende in Germany (19th) clearly highlights the risks and benefits associated with the energy transition. In the US (37th), the surge in shale gas production is having a profound impact on national competitiveness and climate policy.

Of the major emerging economies, India (95th) needs to address the growing gap between domestic demand and production, to limit further increases in energy import bills in coming years. China (89th) has taken resolute action to tackle air pollution and meet future energy needs, sparking a renewable energy transition, but much more work remains to control emissions. As growth slows, this will be increasingly difficult.

Energy Reform in Major Emerging Economies: New Models for Sustained Growth

Reforming state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in major emerging economies, which together account for nearly half of global energy consumption and carbon emissions, will help create effective regulatory frameworks, investment signals and public engagement. This will in turn drive the global energy transition, according to the report.

“Energy reforms will typically take years to implement, so strong institutional and regulatory frameworks that transcend shorter political cycles are critical,” said Arthur Hanna, Senior Managing Director, Accenture Strategy, Energy, and a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on The Future of Oil and Gas. “In the long term, the prize of effective energy reforms in major emerging economies is great, both for the individual nations concerned, and for addressing affordability, sustainability and security challenges across the global energy system.”

The report explores three areas for reforming governments to consider based on lessons learned from other emerging economies:

• Enacting sound policies in solid institutions: Nations with responsive policy frameworks and governance structures will be better placed to manage change and create competitive energy architectures. Effective reforms will require modernizing and reforming SOEs to increase their effectiveness and ability to adapt to fast-changing conditions.
• Signalling market readiness: Effective investment signals are required to attract the levels of capital needed to build more efficient energy systems. This includes rebalancing the risk and reward ratio for investors, and demonstrating visible leadership commitment to reforms. In Colombia, amendments made to the fiscal regime more than a decade ago helped change the incentives for oil and gas investors. These have had impressive results for the oil and gas sector, including increased flows of foreign direct investment.
• Mastering public engagement: The complexity of the energy sector and its central role in the wider economy means that serious reform will involve negotiation and interplay between numerous interlocking interests. Progress can appear slow-paced, but this should not be a barrier to serious reform. Engagement with stakeholders across the energy value chain will be essential to sustain momentum for reforms. China’s swift response to public pressure on air quality, which included a range of measures at local and national levels, demonstrates how effective the interplay among different parties can be.

Ultimately, there is no universally applicable formula for energy reform, and difficult choices and trade-offs will therefore need to be made at a country level in order to advance the energy transition globally, the report said.

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Former Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski has acknowledged his country let the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) run a secret prison on its territory following 9/11, BBC News reports.

However Kwasniewski, who previously denied that Poland hosted a secret CIA prison, insisted he had not known about the harsh treatment used by the CIA interrogators.

A U.S. Senate report into the CIA’s activities did not name the countries that hosted the prisons. But the European Court of Human Rights ruled in July that Poland had allowed the CIA to torture two al Qaeda suspects at a secret detention centre in 2002 and 2003, when Mr Kwasniewski was president.

In an interview following the publication of the U.S. Senate report, Kwasniewski said Poland had agreed to strengthen intelligence co-operation with the U.S. following the September 11 attacks on New York and the Pentagon.

He said the Americans had been very secretive about the way they conducted their activities, which aroused suspicions among Polish officials.

“Poland took steps to end the activity at this site and the activity was stopped at some point,” Kwasniewski told Radio TOK FM in Warsaw.

He said he had been unaware of the methods the CIA had used. “These methods which are repulsive, which I do not accept, which are not justifiable, did not bring anything good. And that is the real catastrophe of the US, that is the real catastrophe of the CIA, that is the real catastrophe of George Bush.”

Prosecutors opened an investigation into the claims in 2008, three years after Kwasniewski left office. The investigation continues and has yet to publish any findings.

The CIA has defended its actions in the years after the 9/11 attacks on the US, saying they saved lives.

The post Poland: Ex-President Admits CIA Ran Secret Prison In Country appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Contrary to current scientific knowledge, there’s no atmospheric lead pollution in the Alberta province’s oil sands region, according to research from the University of Alberta.

William Shotyk, a soil and water scientist who specializes in heavy metal pollution, examined sphagnum moss from 21 separate peat bogs in three locations around the oil sands area, near open pit mines and processing facilities.

After measuring the heavy metal content in the moss samples in his ultra-clean lab at the University of Alberta, Shotyk, based in the Faculty of Agricultural, Life and Environmental Sciences and his team compared them to moss samples of the same species in two areas in rural Germany that have the lowest concentrations of heavy metals in the country. What they found is that the Alberta mosses actually had lower concentrations of lead and other heavy metals.

“I found the lowest lead levels I’ve ever seen in moss,” said Shotyk, who researched heavy metal pollution through moss in peat bogs for more than two decades in Europe before becoming the Bocock Chair in Agriculture and Environment at the University of Alberta.

The findings were recently published in the journal Environmental Science and Technology.

He said that in addition to lower concentrations of lead, he and his team also found lower concentrations of silver, cadmium, nickel, antimony and thallium, similar concentrations of molybdenum, and greater concentrations of barium, thorium and vanadium. The elevated concentrations of barium and thorium reflect the abundance of dust particles in the air whereas the vanadium concentrations are due to its abundance in the bitumen.

Moss is often used to measure heavy metal deposits in Europe and North America because it’s an excellent indicator, Shotyk noted. “Whatever is in the air is in the moss.”

The post Study Finds No Lead Pollution In Alberta Region Oil Sands appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The Ebola virus travels from person to person through direct contact with infected body fluids. But how long can the virus survive on glass surfaces or countertops? How long can it live in wastewater when liquid wastes from a patient end up in the sewage system? In an article published Dec. 9 in the journal Environmental Science & Technology Letters, Kyle Bibby of the University of Pittsburgh reviews the latest research to find answers to these questions.

Bibby and his co-investigators didn’t find many answers.

“The World Health Organization has been saying you can put (human waste) in pit latrines or ordinary sanitary sewers and that the virus then dies,” said Bibby, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering in Pitt’s Swanson School of Engineering. “But the literature lacks evidence that it does. They may be right, but the evidence isn’t there.”

Bibby and colleagues from Pitt and Drexel University explain that knowing how long the deadly pathogen survives on surfaces, in water, or in liquid droplets is critical to developing effective disinfection practices to prevent the spread of the disease.

Currently, the World Health Organization guidelines recommend to hospitals and health clinics that liquid wastes from patients be flushed down the toilet or disposed of in a latrine. However, Ebola research labs that use patients’ liquid waste are supposed to disinfect the waste before it enters the sewage system. Bibby’s team set out to determine what research can and can’t tell us about these practices.

The researchers scoured scientific papers for data on how long the virus can live in the environment. They found a dearth of published studies on the matter. That means no one knows for sure whether the virus can survive on a surface and cause infection or how long it remains active in water, wastewater, or sludge. The team concluded that Ebola’s persistence outside the body needs more careful investigation.

To that end, Bibby recently won a $110,000 National Science Foundation grant to explore the issue. His team will identify surrogate viruses that are physiologically similar to Ebola and study their survival rates in water and wastewater. The findings of this study will inform water treatment and waste-handling procedures in a timely manner while research on the Ebola virus is still being conducted.

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BG Group said Wednesday it has agreed to sell its wholly-owned subsidiary QCLNG Pipeline Pty Ltd to APA Group, Australia’s largest gas infrastructure business, for approximately US$5.0 billion.

QCLNG Pipeline Pty Ltd owns a 543 kilometer, large-diameter underground pipeline network linking BG Group’s natural gas fields in southern Queensland to a two-train liquefied natural gas (LNG) export facility at Gladstone on Australia’s east coast. The sale of this non-core infrastructure is consistent with BG Group’s strategy of actively managing its global asset portfolio.

The pipeline was constructed between 2011 and 2014 and has a current book value of US$1.6 billion. Tariffs payable on the pipeline are set to provide a fixed rate of return on the asset base with the primary tariff components escalating annually with US inflation indices. For the year ended 31 December 2016, the pipeline tariff is expected to deliver to APA Group EBITDA of approximately US$390 million.

The sale is conditional on the start of commercial LNG deliveries (post commissioning) from the QCLNG export facility at Gladstone and on partner consent. BG Group and its partners have firm capacity rights in the pipeline for 20 years, with options to extend.

On completion, expected in the first half of 2015, the transaction is expected to result in a post-tax profit of approximately US$2.7 billion. The profit on disposal will be partly offset by a post-tax impairment of BG Group’s remaining QCLNG assets, expected to be around US$2 billion, following categorization of QCLNG Pipeline Pty Ltd as held for sale in the fourth quarter of 2014.

The Group expects the sale proceeds will be used to reduce net debt and to fund future growth investment.

Andrew Gould, interim Executive Chairman of BG Group, said, “We are pleased to have entered into an agreement for the sale of this high-quality infrastructure with a bidder the calibre of APA Group.”

According to Gould, “The sale of the QCLNG pipeline is in line with our strategy to focus on BG Group’s core areas of oil and gas exploration and production and LNG. The timing reflects QCLNG’s advanced stage of development; we are now on the verge of delivering the world’s first large-scale project using natural gas from coal seams as a feedstock for LNG.”

BG Group is reviewing its reference conditions, long-term price assumptions and business plans in light of recent movements in commodity prices, particularly oil. Any impact of changes to these assumptions on the carrying value of assets within the Group’s portfolio will be reflected in the 2014 fourth quarter results.

The post BG Group To Sell Australian Pipeline For $5 Billion appeared first on Eurasia Review.

ON MONDAY, the 19th Knesset voted to dissolve itself, less than two years after its election. For many of its members it was a sad day, a kind of political hara-kiri. They have no chance of re-election. Some of them are so forgettable, that I do not recognize their names or faces.

The day after, a political bomb exploded on the TV news. Channel 10 – slightly more liberal than the two others – published the results of a quick public opinion poll by a respected pollster.

They were amazing.

THE FIRST result was that the Labor Party, after its union with Tzipi Livni’s “the Movement”, will be the largest party in the next Knesset.

Israelis gasped. What? Labor? A party seen by many as clinically dead?

Of course, this is only the first of hundreds of polls to come before election day, March 17 2015. Yet the results had their impact. (Two other polls since then confirmed its findings.)

A second result was that Likud, in second place, would get exactly the same number of seats whether led by Binyamin Netanyahu or by his putative challenger, Gideon Sa’ar, an unglamorous party functionary (and a former employee of mine). As Interior Minister, he excelled mainly in persecuting African asylum-seekers. (At the last moment, Sa’ar gave up his challenge to Netanyahu.)

Is it possible? Netanyahu the Great, the “King Bibi” of Time magazine, no longer a vote magnet?

Ya’ir Lapid, the hero of the last elections, shrunk to half his size. Like the gourd in the Book of Jonah, “which came up in a night and perished in a night”.

But the real sensation of the poll was something else: though Netanyahu still headed the list of preferred candidates for Prime Minister, Yitzhak Herzog, the leader of Labor, came so close as to make no difference.

Only a month ago, such a result would have appeared a hilarious hoax. At that time, Netanyahu had an unassailable lead, towering over all the dwarfs around. Conventional wisdom had it that “there is no one else”.

Now there is. Herzog! Herzog?

HERZOG IS the German word for duke. Yitzhak, commonly called Buji (that’s what his mother called him when he was small), is indeed of aristocratic origin.

His grandfather, Yitzhak Herzog (after whom he was named, according to the Jewish tradition), was the Chief Rabbi of Ireland. He had such a good reputation that he was called in the 30s to become the Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Palestine. He was considered (comparatively) liberal.

His son, Chaim, studied in England, excelled as a boxer and joined the British army in World War II. He was serving as an intelligence officer in Egypt when he met Susan Ambash, the daughter of a rich local Jewish family.

The two Ambash girls were sent on Saturdays to the synagogue to fetch Jewish officers and bring them home for the Shabbat meal. On one Shabbat they caught two – one Chaim Herzog and one Aubrey (Abba) Eban. They married them.

In the 1948 war, Chaim Herzog joined the new Israeli Army as an intelligence officer, eventually becoming a general and chief of army intelligence. On leaving the army he founded what became the largest and richest law firm in the country.

But his real days of glory came on the eve of the Six-day War. For three weeks, Israel fell victim to an attack of acute anxiety. Some spoke of the coming Second Holocaust. During that period, General Herzog had a daily program on the radio and succeeded in soothing the public mind with his sober, sensible analysis, neither belittling nor exaggerating the danger ahead.

The people rewarded him with the presidency of the state. In this post, he was more British than Israeli. An example: at a time when I was boycotted by all the heads of the establishment, I was surprised by an invitation to a private dinner with him at the presidential residence. We had a pleasant talk, without any particular subject. He just wanted to get to know me.

I used the opportunity to plead for his intervention in the security arrangements at Ben Gurion airport, where Arab citizens were (and are) routinely singled out and searched in a humiliating manner. (He promised, but nothing much came of it.)

By the way, I had a similar dinner with his brother, Ya’acov, then the Director General of the Prime Minister’s office. Of the two brothers, Ya’acov was considered the outstanding intellect. Then as now I was preaching the two-state solution, which at the time was totally rejected in Israel and around the world. Over dinner, Ya’acov said he would like to hear my arguments for this solution and cross-examined me – again, a more British than Israeli attitude. Senior Israeli officials do not talk with people of the radical opposition.

YITZHAK HERZOG also served in army intelligence before he was appointed cabinet secretary. Joining the Labor party, like his father, he became a member of the Knesset and minister in several minor ministries.

Slightly built, blue eyed, with a fair complexion, Herzog (54) looks more British than Israeli. He speaks softly, expresses himself in a moderate way and has no enemies. He is the very opposite of the typical Israeli politician.

He surprised everybody when he beat one of these for the chairmanship of the Labor Party. Sheli Yachimovitch is strident, outspoken and belligerent, a resolute socialist who does not hesitate to tread on people’s toes. She antagonized too many colleagues and was voted out. Buji became leader of the party and automatically “Leader of the Opposition”, a title and status accorded by law to the chief of the largest opposition party.

(One of the little jokes of politics: Herzog was about to lose his title and the perks associated with it when Netanyahu dismissed Lapid, whose Knesset faction is larger than Labor. Since the Knesset dissolved itself, Lapid does not inherit the title.)

ASSUMING THE party leadership, Herzog lost no time in declaring himself a candidate for prime minister. This was generally met with a tolerant smile.

Now, for the first time, this seems just possible. Not likely, by any means. But the impossible has become possible. The unthinkable, thinkable.

This in itself is a revolution.

During the last years, Israeli media have been obsessed with the idea that “Israel is moving to the right”. That Netanyahu, bad as he is, is preferable to those who will inevitably succeed him – outright fascists, warmongers, Arab-eaters.

It was almost fashionable to declare that the Left is finished, dead, deceased. Among commentators, it has become de rigeur, especially among leftists, to heap scorn on the Left and the remaining leftists. Poor guys (and gals, of course). Can’t see what’s going on. Harbor illusions. Whistling in the gathering darkness.

And suddenly there is a chance – a remote chance, but a chance nevertheless – for the Left to regain power.

WHY? WHAT has happened?

The easiest explanation is that people just got fed up with “Bibi”. Netanyahu is a person it is easy to get fed up with. In fact, it has happened to him before. His wife, Sarah’le, who is universally disliked, does not help.

But, I believe, it goes much deeper. The poll shows that the Likud will not fare better with another chief candidate. Has the Likud lost its touch?

Two factors have contributed to this:

First, Moshe Kahlon. A former typical Likud stalwart, popular among his peers, he suddenly left his party. No reason given.

As Minister of Communications, a very minor ministry, Kahlon had become immensely popular. He took on the tycoons of the mobile phone industry, broke their monopoly, instituted competition and cut prices by half. Since it is difficult to imagine a young Israeli – male or female – without a mobile phone stuck to their ear, he became a hero.

Now Kahlon, two months younger than Herzog, has announced that he is creating a new party. It is to be called “Kulanu” (“We All”). Though it still has no candidates, it already emerges in the poll with 10 seats – mostly supported by former Likud voters.

This is hugely significant, for several reasons. First, the basic electorate of Likud consists of oriental Jews, though Menachem Begin, Netanyahu and most of their colleagues were and are Ashkenazi. Kahlon is as oriental as you get: His parents came from Tripoli in Libya, they have seven children, Moshe grew up in a poor immigrant township.

Breaking the Likud hold on the oriental community is extremely important. Especially as Kahlon cites Begin as the leader who gave up the entire Sinai peninsula for peace with Egypt. His “moderate Likud” could change the entire balance between Right and Center-Left in the next Knesset. And that, after all, is what counts.

The second reason : Bennett’s extreme right-wing religious-nationalist (some say fascist) “Jewish Home” party is gaining strength – also gaining votes from Likud. Naftali Bennett, smooth, amiable, with the smallest kippah on earth on his head, is appealing to secular voters too.

Traditionally, the Orthodox parties hold the key. Since they care neither for Left or Right and are beholden to no one but themselves, they can choose.

For a long time, they were the allies of Labor. For the last few decades, they were automatic allies of the Right. After the last elections, Netanyahu dropped them for the ultra-secular Lapid. Now they are ready for revenge. Since Herzog is the grandson of a chief Rabbi, he is kosher.

HERZOG WON his first success of the current campaign by forming a common list with Tzipi Livni. It is now up to him to keep up the momentum and make alliances with – possibly – Lapid, Kahlon and Meretz. If successful in the elections, he must stretch out his hands to the Orthodox and the Arabs.

Last week I sketched out this vision. This week it has advanced by a small but significant step towards realization.

Can the duke become king? Well, that’s what the history books tell us.

The post Netanyahu No Longer A Vote Magnet – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

The 528 page Senate Intelligence Committee report on C.I.A. torture may come as a shock to many, but would not have surprised the late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-NY). In 1991 and again in 1995, fed up with his dealings with this agency, he introduced a bill for its abolition. Too much secrecy that amounted to a blanket institutionalized cover-up, too much bad or inadequate information leading to blunders, tragedies and failures to anticipate events like the collapse of the Soviet Union. Moynihan believed that secret government breeds disaster and shreds democratic societies.

Despite the bill not being put to a vote, Senator Moynihan’s criticisms proved justified after 9/11 when the C.I.A. became more imperial, more secretive, more violently operational and more of a “government within a government”—a phrase used by Senator Daniel Inouye (D-HI) during the Iran/Contra scandal under President Reagan.

Outwardly, the C.I.A. claims its “enhanced interrogation methods” (aka torture) have blocked plots and saved lives. Asked to document these claims, the agency automatically hides behind its secret curtain. When a federal agency claims what it is doing is legal and constitutional, it better back this up beyond general assertions of secret legal memos from the Justice Department and knowledge and approval from the war criminals (e.g. invasion of Iraq) President George W. Bush and the generic prevaricator, Vice President Dick Cheney.

The C.I.A.’s bureaucratic environment assured this kind of searing and specific criticism. The Senate Intelligence Committee’s report, delivered by its chairperson, Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA) after a five year investigation revealed torture, cover-ups, lying and a failure to achieve its objectives.

With a very ample, multi-billion dollar, secret budget, near zero independent Congressional oversight, and the omnipresent sheen of protecting “national security”, the C.I.A. can never answer the old Latin question, “Quis custodiet ipsos custodies?” or, “who will guard the guards themselves?” No rule of law or externally independent monitoring can contain this rogue agency driven by internal conviction and righteousness.

During the Bush years, the C.I.A.’s unbridled forays were commonly marked by dictatorial secret wars, secret prisons, secret courts, secret evidence, secret law, and dragnet illegal surveillance.

In addition, there were no criminal or civil prosecutions of any culpable bureaucrats either by the Bush or Obama administrations—with one exception. The only person prosecuted, under Obama no less, was the truly patriotic John Kiriakou—a well-regarded C.I.A. interrogation specialist who accurately blew the whistle on illegal C.I.A. torture. He is serving a 30 month jail term—having copped a plea on a minor, questionable charge to spare his wife and five children from an even longer, financially breaking ordeal defending himself from vengeful prosecutors with endless budgets.

To prevent the Senate Intelligence Committee from finally redeeming its history of passivity and complicity exhibited by its “look the other way” tradition, the C.I.A. tried to obstruct the Committee staff in numerous ways. They blocked the staff from proper access to documents, leaked false information to the press, hacked into the Committee’s computers, and even urged the Justice Department to criminally prosecute the Senate’s valiant investigators. When all that failed, the C.I.A. delayed and delayed the issuance of the report, while it pored over its contents and secured so many redactions that readers would wonder what else they could possibly be hiding. (See for yourself: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/12/09/world/cia-torture-report-document.html.)

Well, how about 6,000 more pages of the Committee’s work product, kept secret by C.I.A.’s demands, describing in stomach-wrenching detail the various forms of torture and their uselessness, especially compared to other friendlier methods, described by former C.I.A. interrogators such as Ali Soufan.

All of this “spook business” creates a tightknit brotherhood of self-reinforcing admiration that belies or suppresses significant dissent inside spy agencies. Indeed, as the New York Times just reported, “[i]n January 2003, 10 months into the Central Intelligence Agency’s secret prison program, the agency’s chief of interrogations sent an email to colleagues saying that the relentlessly brutal treatment of prisoners was a train wreck ‘waiting to happen and I intend to get the hell off the train before it happens.’ He said he had told his bosses he had “serious reservations” about the program and no longer wanted to be associated with it ‘in any way.’”

No wonder one of the Times headlines summed up the Intelligence Committee’s work with these words: “Senate Report Depicts Broken Agency That Was Wedded to Failed Approach.”

So broken, that the C.I.A. contracted out torture to two psychologists who promptly formed a company that received $81 million in taxpayer money. To add to what one C.I.A. official quoted in the report called “useless intelligence.”

The bigger story in this sordid mess is that there will be no prosecution against the top government officials responsible, starting with Bush and Cheney. Senator Mark Udall (D-CO) framed this accountability issue on the Senate floor: “Director [John] Brennan and the CIA today are continuing to willfully provide inaccurate information and misrepresent the efficacy of torture. In other words the C.I.A. is lying.” He urged the president to purge the agency leadership, including Mr. Brennan. “There can be no cover-up. If there is no moral leadership from the White House helping the public understand that the C.I.A.’s torture program wasn’t necessary and didn’t save lives or disrupt terrorist plots, then what’s to stop the next White House and C.I.A. director from supporting torture?”, he concluded.

The response from the White House was President Obama expressing “complete confidence” in C.I.A. Director John Brennan, and Mr. Brennan calling all his subordinates “patriots.” The circle has closed once again.

An even larger consequence from the increasing disclosures of how Bush/Cheney and Obama have responded in their “War on Terror” comes from the millions of innocent children, women and men who were killed, injured or sickened, millions more refugees in Iraq and Afghanistan, the loss of American life and limb, and the trillions of dollars in public funds that could have been used to rebuild America’s crucial infrastructure to save lives and provide needed facilities and jobs.

The criminal gang that struck on 9/11 had no second strike capability. Bush’s gigantic over-reaction, blowing apart whole countries and societies year after year, has only enormously spread the Al-Qaeda forces into a dozen countries through affiliates and offshoots such as ISIS.

Fighting stateless terrorism with massive state terrorism and torture that strengthens the former creates a deadly boomerang. It destroys our priorities, mutes the waging of peace and corrodes our democracy with its purported rule of law. It also obscures the history of the West intervening violently in the East’s backyard for a century, carving up its colonies, backing local, brutal dictatorships with U.S. arms, money and diplomatic cover.

The Senate Intelligence Committee’s first step should arouse Congress to its constitutional duties and stop the destruction of the separation of powers by an overweening White House executive. Certainly the Left-Right in the Congress should agree on that principle. It helps if we the people, who pay the price, give them constant nudges in that direction.

The post Ralph Nader: Senate Report Condemns Government Torture Abroad – OpEd appeared first on Eurasia Review.

Google has begun imaging Sri Lanka for its ‘Street View’ service to create new views of the country to share with the world.

The service provides 360 degree views and navigation of streets as if the viewer was walking down the road and can be accessed on Google Maps by using the ‘pegman’ icon.

Google Asia Pacific Director of Public Policy Ann Lavin, who had flown down to Colombo, said that the benefits of Street View to a destination couldn’t be overstated.

Lavin said the service provides safety of mind to both locals and tourists by being able to recognize places and routes prior to physical visits and provide exposure to local businesses. In Sri Lanka, three cars will begin their journeys shortly from Jaffna, Matara and Arugam Bay.

Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority Director General D.S. Jayaweera said this will allow more people to discover Sri Lanka and at the same time, allow people in Sri Lanka to explore new parts of their country online.

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Communication networks are evolving to keep pace with increasing consumer needs and business demands. We’ve already experienced the progressive jumps from 1G to 4G wireless networks and 5G is looming in the not-too-distant future.

But 5G is much more than 4G plus 1. In the manner of an evolutionary leap, 5G technologies and ICT networks bring the global competition for technological leadership to a whole new level. This is a truly wireless environment that will realize the promise of near-instantaneous, zero-distance online connectivity at any time, from anywhere and from almost any device or terminal.

Scaling wireless networks to keep pace with the ever-increasing mobile traffic is increasingly challenging. There are today 6 billion mobile subscriptions and 200 million smart phones are sold every quarter.

The use of network and bandwidth resources has grown beyond expectations and scientists have already begun to design the innovative network architectures that are to enable the 5G vision by the year 2020: 1,000-fold gains in capacity, 7 trillion wireless devices serving over 7 billion people, and a individual user data rates on the order of 10 Gb/s combined with extremely low latency and response times.

In this context, IMDEA Networks Institute launches and coordinates a pioneering research project on integrated technologies for the management and operation of 5G networks: TIGRE5-CM.

The aim of the TIGRE5-CM project is to design an architecture for future generation mobile networks based on the emerging Software Defined Networking (SDN) paradigm, which simplifies the deployment, configuration and management of the network while integrating the latest technologies, both in the access network (reaching the end-user’s terminal) and in the core network.

Through a combination of the state of the art in wireless technologies with the SDN architecture paradigm, TIGRE5-CM aims to make the jump from specific-purpose networking equipment to virtualization-based SDN. As the use of SDN spans different architectural layers, they are turned into truly programmable resources, thus creating networks that are flexible, scalable, adaptable and easily upgraded to integrate new functionalities.

The expected outcome of the TIGRE5-CM project is a high performance integrated architecture, with a control plane and a data plane that support a flexible, agile and cost-effective network, which is also configurable and programmable, robust and interoperable. The use of open source hardware and software will facilitate vendor implementation as well as future improvements that go beyond the project’s end date.

The TIGRE5-CM team

The Madrid-based research groups working on the TIGRE5-CM project are the WNG group from IMDEA Networks (Dr. Joerg Widmer is the Principal Investigator and Project Coordinator), the WNL Group and the ADSCOM Group from University Carlos III of Madrid and the GIST group from the University of Alcalá. With this project IMDEA Networks strengthens its leadership role in 5G technologies and ICT networks. The research institute is directly involved in the evolution of 5G through its roles as board member of the 5G Infrastructure Association in Europe, the European Technology Platform (ETP) NetWorld2020 and the Public-Private Partnership “5G PPP”.

The post Re-Imagining The Network appeared first on Eurasia Review.