de Souza's Daily Digest

2004-12-15T15:30:00.000Z

Death by dinner

Nicholas Kristoff is bang on the money once again, this time over Russia. The New York Times columnist was writing about Darfur while others were jumping on the Iraq bandwagon. He's now again filling in the gaps that others are leaving behind, noting the little reported fact that the pro-reform, pro-democracy, pro-West candidate in Georgia's disputed presidential election, Viktor Yushchenko, dined with the Ukranian Secret Service the night before he was poisoned.

Coincidence? More worrying is that the SBU, as it is called, has close connections to the Russian security services, which are at the whim and fancy of Russia's increasingly authoritarian leader, Vladamir Putin. Alarmist conspiracy theory it may seem, until the facts are considered. First, Swiss doctors have indeed confirmed that Yushchenko was poisoned. Second, Russia's secret service has previous when it comes to assassinations. As Kristoff points out, two Russian secret agents recently murdered a former president of Chechnya in Qatar by blowing up his car as he left a mosque. Nice.

"The bottom line is that the West has been suckered by Mr. Putin. He is not a sober version of Boris Yeltsin. Rather, he's a Russified Pinochet or Franco. He is not guiding Russia toward free-market democracy, but into fascism... If those brave Ukrainians can stand up to Mr. Putin [by voting for Yushchenko], so can we."

2004-11-17T16:30:00.002Z

Strange Stories

Humanitarian crisis in Darfur; the election of a right-wing president, who despite what the naïve optimists write, will not moderate his policies at home or abroad over the next four years; environmental catastrophe looming for Indonesian rain forests and the ozone layer... It all seems a bit glum at the moment.

So, as is the tradition at DDD, here is some much-needed, light-hearted relief. The Miami Herald in conjunction with Associated Press, brings you Weird News:

A world toilet summit has begun in China. Smells funny, don't it?

Fans of eBay can bid for half of a 10-year-old grilled cheese sandwich that its owner says bears the image of the Virgin Mary.

The Convicts Cookbook will soon go on sale in all good book stores, courtesy of inmates doing time at Washington State Penitentiary - "Cell Block Fudge or Jail Mix, anyone?"

2004-11-09T13:06:00.000Z

Invade Sudan?

Four more wars, is how a good friend of mine and Kerry supporter described Bush's victory last week. Will it be Syria, North Korea, Iran? Any of these could be targets for a newly invigorated, right-wing administration. Sudan should be on that list, too. Even scholars at Bush's favourite think tank, the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), are calling for greater involvement:

"As Americans gathered peaceably to vote on Tuesday [2 November], Sudanese soldiers and police were storming the Al Jeer Sureaf refugee camp in the western province of Darfur, beating and tear-gassing its 5,000 inhabitants, burning their makeshift shelters and forcing at least 250 families into trucks for forced relocation. Al Jeer Sureaf is Sudan's Srebrenica — the Bosnian town and U.N. "safe haven" made infamous in July 1995 when Serb militias overran Dutch peacekeepers and slaughtered 7,000 Muslim refugees."

The scholars continue: "Just as the Clinton administration could no longer credibly claim in the aftermath of this massacre that its policies for the former Yugoslavia were working, Tuesday's attack in Darfur likewise marks a turning point for the Bush administration's Sudan strategy. In both cases, U.S. policymakers attempted to outsource responsibility for stopping a genocide to the U.N. and ill-equipped regional allies. And in both cases, the results were disastrous."

Why has the international community largely failed to call what is happening in Dafur by its proper name - genocide? It would then be obliged to intervene by law, perhaps? The EU particularly, is conspicous by it silence, happy to take the moral high ground (some of its members at any rate) over Iraq, but unwilling to say much about a conflict where it really needs to take action. Or maybe the duty to intervene that a "genocide" definition would eschew could expose the likes of Germany and France to ridicule. It is quite clear they are not capable, militarily at least, of changing things on the ground.

So it falls on the US to do something, anything, to prevent further bloodshed. While the Republican right is not known for its humanitarian works, it is known for its political shrewdness. Engaging in Sudan could win it friends and allies, something the US desperately needs. This does not necessarily have to entail a huge ground assault - the mere threat of force could have the desired effect on the slippery Sudansese authorities. Other interventions in Africa, such as the British experience in Sierra Leone, have not required thousands of troops.

Sudan could allow the Bush administration to throw off its tarnished image of a bunch of cowboys riding roughshod over human rights, and show to the world it cares about the oppressed and is willing to fight for a higher cause than oil.

Strategically, involvement in Sudan would be more justified than Iraq. "As one of seven countries on the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism, Sudan has courted nearly every rogue regime and hosted almost every significant terrorist organization in the region," writes the AEI's Thomas Donnelly and Vance Serchuk. "Sudan provided a base for Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda during the 1990s, while Hamas and Hezbollah continue to operate in Sudan to this day. When the U.S. retook the Iraqi city of Samarra from insurgents this fall, the Iraqi defence minister reported that 18 of the 24 foreign fighters captured there were Sudanese."

The political, humanitarian and strategic case for greater involvement in Sudan grows stronger by the day. Bush's friends at the AEI recognise this - will he?

2004-11-04T16:34:00.000Z

Reaching out to the base

Don't worry, optimists say. Reagan built nuclear missiles in his first term then ended the cold war in his second. Perhaps Bush will discover multilateralism as Reagan did. Then again, Reagan had to. He was faced with a hostile Congress controlled by Democrats, baying for blood over the Iran Contra affair. Bush finds himself in different waters. Republicans now control all three branches of government - the legislature, the executive, and most alarmingly, the judiciary, his appointments to which can shape public policy for a generation.

As for multilateralism, the early signs aren't good. Take the comments of Myron Ebell, the president's adviser on climate change. Appearing on this morning's Today Programme, he portrayed proponents of Kyoto as "alarmist" and accused the EU of having a hidden agenda when it came to environmental law, which is, he declared, designed to "hamper the competitiveness of US companies". So much for cooperation on issues of common concern.

"It is deeply disturbing and worrying that one of the first acts of the Bush administration, following the election, is to deny climate change and portray it as a European conspiracy, " retorted Liberal Democrat spokesman Norman Baker. Perhaps Kerry's running mate John Edwards best sums things up: "We can be disappointed, but we cannot walk away, for this battle has just begun." Ebell's comments highlight this fact.

2004-11-04T16:19:00.000Z

Rove was right

So was DDD, well partly. George Bush won the popular vote and the presidency (see previous post for DDD's prediction and click here for a quick guide to the US electoral process). Karl Rove's strategy for this election was perfect, contrary to what DDD had first thought. The president's chief of staff targeted four million evangelical Christians who, he claimed, did not vote for Bush last time. Many doubted these people existed. Bush's margin of victory over Kerry: nearly four million votes. Perhaps they did exist, after all.

2004-11-02T17:25:00.000Z

My prediction

A Kerry victory, though Bush may win the popular vote. Now that would be poetic, wouldn't it?

2004-10-26T11:27:00.000+01:00

Past offences

Should juries be given a defendant's previous criminal history to help them decide whether the accused is guilty? The police and victims groups have always said yes. Well, they would, wouldn't they? Now the UK government has weighed in on their side.

There can be nothing more gut-wrenching for a victim of a crime to see the perpetrator walk free. When the police have painstakingly put together a case and know what the jury does not know, that the defendant has previous, that the person accused of child abuse has a molested innocents before. There can be few things as frustrating.

"On too many occasions, my colleagues have watched the devastation and anger on the faces of victims and the astonishment of juries as a whole catalogue of relevant previous convictions are read out at the end of a trial as the defendant walks free." Rod Dalley, Police Federation

Yet there can be nothing more damaging for an innocent man being sent to prison for a crime he did not commit. Giving juries information on a defendant's criminal past will prejudice a trial before it has ended an increase the likelihood miscariages of justice.

It will allow perception to cast a shadow over fact, certainty to replace reasonable doubt. It presumes people will never turn over a new leaf. More worryingly, it encourages police to round up the usual suspects, safe in the knowledge that if their case is flawed, the juries can fill in the gaps with a brief glance at the defendant's record.

"A jury should consider each offence on its individual evidential merits - moving the legal goal posts to make convictions easier is not to improve the standard of justice." Mark Leech, founder of ex-prisoners charity Unlock

2004-10-25T11:23:00.000+01:00

A Kerry landslide?

My old boss Lance Knobel has stuck his neck out and predicted that John Kerry will not only win next week, but win decisively. There are a few good reasons to suspect this. The polls have grossly underestimated voting intentions of new voters and young people, since few polling companies call mobile phones. An increasing number of young people do not have fixed phone lines. Given that young people tend to vote for left-leaning parties, Kerry's tie in the polls with Bush could be underestimating his true support.

There is little doubt that Americans who have registered to vote, who didn't do so in 2000, are overwhelmingly anti-Bush. They are registering in large numbers, too.

The president's strategy of appealing to the Christian right appears misguided, since conservative voters tend to vote Republican regardless of whether the candidate is moderate or right wing. The Republican's core base is more reliable at turning out to vote than the Democrat's. In short, Christians vote, poor people and minorities don't (not is such large numbers), so why has Bush not moved to the centre ground and reach out to moderates when the people he appeals to will vote for him anyway?

Perhaps he presumes America has moved to the right. Has it? Would Bush have beaten Clinton, if the former president was allowed to stand for a third term?

2004-10-18T16:17:00.000+01:00

If Mr Bush wins, I warn you…

When Neil Kinnock led the British Labour Party from electoral basket case to near-challenger to Tory rule, he made a speech that laid bare the choices facing voters. "If Mrs Thatcher wins the next election, I warn you. I warn you not to be young, I warn you not to fall ill and I warn you not to grow old." Alas, voters ignored Kinnock. Services to the poor, the old and to students were cut back. Only now is investment in the health and education sectors reaching anything like sustainable levels.

A similar warning is needed for American voters, not least because the winner of the US election will probably have the opportunity to appoint up to three new judges to the supreme court. If Bush wins the next election, I warn you, this moderately conservative court will become a mouthpiece for the Christian right.

I warn you not to be gay, since the kind of judges Bush likes are those who support illegal police raids in Texas, where a homosexual man was arrested for having sex in his own home. I warn you not to fall foul of the law, since the kind of judges Bush likes say prison guards punching and kicking inmates is "insignificant" and not to be deemed as "cruel and unusual". I warn you not be disabled, since the kind of judges Bush likes are those who do not believe public buildings should be wheelchair-accessible. I warn you not to be a carer, since the kind of judges Bush likes are those who strike down laws allowing workers unpaid time off to look after a loved one.

Is this purely scaremongering from a John Kerry supporter? Consider the judges who voted for these decisions: Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas already sit on the supreme court. Bush has declared them his favourite justices.

2004-08-05T11:38:00.000+01:00

Kerry's record

No one sounds more convincing than a war veteran. So when John O' Neill, a Vietnam vet, publishes a book that calls in to question John Kerry's role in that war, American voters could be forgiven for believing his story that the Massachusetts Senator did not deserve all those purple hearts. If only O' Neill wasn't a partner in a Texas law firm with close links to the Bush family.

You couldn't make it up, could you?

2004-06-18T16:33:00.000+01:00

Liar liar

Compare and contrast a letter president Bush he sent to Congress suggesting that Saddam's Iraq was allied to al qaida, and his statement to reporters yesterday:

The Authorization for use of military force against Iraq is consistent with the United States continuing to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001. — President Bush, in a letter to Congress outlining the legal justification for commencing war against Iraq, March 18, 2003

This administration never said that the 9/11 attacks were orchestrated between Saddam and al Qaeda. — President Bush, in an exchange with reporters, June 17, 2004

You couldn't make it up, could you?

2004-06-18T14:30:00.001+01:00

What a nice fellow

But what a bad president. I think this cartoon sums up Ronald Reagan better than I could - Click here

He is credited with ending the cold war. Yet even this achievement requires qualification - Reagan provoked a new arms race before signing treaties limiting nuclear weapons. He placed greater emphasis on funding contras than human rights groups within the Soviet Union (something that President Carter opted for). The 40th president was every bit as lucky (as the 39th was unlucky not) to find a counterpart in Gorbachev with whom he could work with. He was equally fortuitious that the Soviet empire was disintegrating nicely on its own.

2004-06-10T11:48:00.000+01:00

An important film

Forget the silly side plot of father trekking across hideous amounts of snow to reach son, or the implausible scenario that an ice age could happen within a week. Forget the awful title, too.

The Day After Tomorrow is the most important film to come out from Hollywood in years. Director Roland Emmerich (Independence Day) takes a less than subtle dig at the Bush administration, casting Dick Cheney lookalike Kenneth Welsh as a blinkered vice president unprepared to accept that climate change is a real and present danger. (Emmerich also cleverly depicts the irony of hordes of desperate Americans crossing a Mexican border that is only opened after the US forgives Latin American debt.)

While the science presented on screen might be a little shaky, there is no disputing simple facts that by 2050, 1.25 million species will become extinct, the ice caps of Kilamanjaro will completely disappear and water-born diseases such as malaria will spread to previously unaffected countries, all as a result of global warming. These highly likely scenarios have not yet startled the world - certainly not the US - into taking effective action. Perhaps this very watchable film will. At the very least, it should raise environmental awareness in a country crying out for dependence on something other than foreign oil.

2004-06-08T14:19:00.000+01:00

Spreading cancer

The Bush administration is seeking increased funds for Nuclear research. No, not the kind of research that would improve surveillance and monitoring of countries suspected of developing them, but the kind that looks into ways of developing mini-nukes ('low-yield' as the Bush team calls them). They are less devastating than those dropped on Hiroshima yet still likely spread radiation and cancer across a wide area.

Nuclear bunker busters here we come. All well and good if you hit the right target, but accuracy went alarmingly astray in Iraq. A nuclear bomb landing in the wrong place would kill more than a wedding party.

If America is truly serious about stopping the spread of weapons of mass destruction, it should not set an example of developing its own. As Democrat Senator Diane Feinstein argues, "If the US government is not careful, our own new nuclear posture could provoke the very nuclear-proliferation activities that we are seeking to prevent."

2004-06-03T14:23:00.000+01:00

Australia totally unfair

In 1999, Australia won international praise for leading a peace keeping force to East Timor, helping that country overcome years of brutal Indonesian rule. Five years on, however, and military has seemingly been replaced by economic occupation , writes The Independent's Kathy Marks.

Canberra was one of only a few governments to recognise Indonesia's annexation of East Timor. Little wonder, given that Jakarta allowed it control of oil-rich seas only 90 miles from the Timorese coast.

Now the world's newest nation wants its waters back. Oh what oil revenues could do for a country where 41% of the population live in poverty, 12% die before they are 5, and where there are only 16, yes 16, doctors for 800,000 people.

Is one of the world's richest nations so short sighted to risk the emergence of a failed state so close to its doorstep? Depriving East Timor of economic independence is a good way to create one.

2004-04-26T12:19:00.000+01:00

Silly Cypriots

In telling its people to vote no to reunification, the Greek Cypriot leadership has failed its people and cut off its nose to spite its face, giving its Turkish Cypriot counterparts a victory in defeat.

By failing to campaign in favour for the UN deal to unite the divided island, 100,000 Greek Cypriots who were due to move back to homes they lost when the Turks annexed the North of the country may now never be able to see them. Meanwhile, the Turkish Cypriots, who voted for the Annan plan in spite of their inflexible leader Rauf Denktas, will likely see ended their economic and political isolation. They will receive aid and in all probability quasi-acceptance (much like East Germany before the wall fell) as an independent state - the very development that the Greek Cypriot leadership feared.

In any reproachment, peace deal or reunification process, no deal will ever be perfect, nor will it satisfy everybody 100%. Bad leaders take the all or nothing route. Good ones compromise.

2004-04-23T12:15:00.000+01:00

Every silver lining has a cloud

India's ruling party slogan for the upcoming elections is "Shining India". Prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee points to GDP rising by 7%, more than 100 million people as having been "rescued from poverty", mobile phone usage tripling in two years and an IT industry that is booming. Does the country's top software engineers any longer feel the need to leave the country (let's not forget the founder of Hotmail is Sabeer Bhatia, an Indian expat) when tech paradise exists in Bangalore?

There is no doubt that India, with a rising population of one billion and its arsenal of nuclear weapons, is an increasingly influential player on the world stage.

Yet clouds remain on its sunny horizon - some rather dark ones too. Most of the jobs that have been created since the country started liberalising its state-run industries in the early 90s have gone to urban rich kids attending good schools, not the 35% of Indians living on less than a dollar a day. Putting the country's economic boom in perspective, The Guardian notes that the IT industry Vajpayee is so proud of "generates less than 2% of national income, fewer than 5% of Indians have access any kind of phone and more than 40% of adults are illiterate."

The record of the ruling Bharatiya Janita Party under Vajpayee is mixed at best. It may present itself as a moderate party dragging a backward India into the 21st Century, but in all probability this is happening (and only for the few and not the many) despite of, rather than because of it. The BJP's core support still comes from a bunch of Hindu nationalist thugs who take pleasure in killing Muslims.

2004-04-02T16:26:00.000+01:00

And now for something nice

Humanitarian crisis in Sudan, bombs in Madrid, fear of foreigners, a complete mess in Iraq and a very bad US president. These are the issues that DDD has focused on so far in 2004. You would be forgiven for thinking that it is all rather depressing. The aim has never been to make people sad, however. Perhaps angry, but not sad.

So here are some happier stories, courtesy of that website of hope, The Great News Network.

The European Parliament gave its final approval Wednesday to European Union-wide legislation forcing companies that pollute the environment to cover the full cost of cleaning up the damage they make.

After a drought year in 2002/03, the Namibian government has predicted a bumper winter crop, the best in six seasons.

In one of the first programs of its kind in the United States, a coalition of major Silicon Valley companies has announced a plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Methane has been detected on Mars - another indication of past life

Have a relaxing and peaceful Easter - DDD is on vacation.

2004-04-02T11:02:00.000+01:00

At your worst when you're weakest, Tony

"We're best when we're at out boldest," UK prime minister Blair said of his government. How true.

What he neglected to say was that his government looks as timid and as frozen as a rabbit caught in headlights. On nearly every issue ranging from supporting an EU constitution (that really isn't that big a deal since it hardly changes anything) to facing down the media onslaught on immigration, Blair is on the back foot. Now his asylum minister Beverly Hughes has had to resign for not telling Parliament that she had, in fact, been aware of shortcomings in the immigration service. Her boss David Blunkett was quick to blame others, or in The Guardian's words, "the torrid political climate daily stoked over the past four weeks by rightwing newspapers and Tory MPs in alliance with civil service leaders whose behaviour they would never have tolerated when they were in government."

Yet this is not the Conservative's or Murdoch's doing, nor is it the fault of disgruntled civil servants or, indeed, Beverley Hughes. The government has simply lost control of the political agenda and allowed the scaremongers to paint a nightmare scenario of a Britain swamped with criminals and scroungers after the EU enlarges. If it came out fighting on this issue, it could have portrayed the opposition and its media partners as extremists, desperate to find an issue on which to attack a progressive and enlightened party. Calls for Hughes's resignation could have been viewed in this context and promptly dismissed.

What makes this all the more depressing is that the immigration argument can be won relatively easily. Rich countries can only benefit from skilled immigration, according to the Royal Economic Society. Wages in northern Europe could rise by up to 5.6% if unfettered skilled immigration from the East were allowed. Companies want to invest in countries with an abundant supply of skilled labour.

More to the point, the influx of migrant workers that the Daily Mail and co. have predicted is based on no firm evidence nor historical lesson.

John Things can only get better 'O Farrell neatly separates reality from hysteria: "In 1973 Britain joined the EEC, and few who witnessed it will ever forget the uncontrollable wave of immigration that followed. Hordes of Dutch people pouring into the country and swamping our traditional British way of life, forcing us to wear clogs and eat waxy cheese. "It was terrible," said one scared pensioner, "I mean, you'd get one windmill go up in the street, and then another went up next door, and before you knew it the whole neighbourhood stank of tulips and everyone was cycling everywhere, speaking impeccable English..."

2004-03-31T12:03:00.000+01:00

What Rwanda taught us

Nicholas Kristoff continues to alert readers to the increasingly desperate situation in Sudan: "While the world now marks the 10th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide and solemnly asserts that this must never happen again, it is. Some 1,000 people are dying each week in Sudan, and 110,000 refugees have poured into Chad. Worse off are the 600,000 refugees within Sudan, who face hunger and disease after being driven away from their villages by the Arab militias."

The Economist has a few tips for Western governments -

1) Don't assume, as you did in Rwanda, that genocide springs from spontaneous ethnic antagonism. It is usually planned over many months.

2) Genocide does not erupt out of chaos - "The small gang of Hutus [in Rwanda] who organised the genocide were rational men in pursuit of a rational—albeit evil—objective."

3) Donors must make it clear to rulers that aid will cease forever unless genocide ceases immediately - again this didn't happen in Rwanda.

4) "Failing that, western powers could have used force to end the killing. Romeo Dallaire, the UN's soldier on the spot, said it would have taken only 5,000 troops."

Although there is still time to reverse the situation in Sudan, The Economist's advice appears to be falling of deaf ears.

2004-03-25T12:28:00.000Z

Got Saddam, now for Sudan?

Why is no one talking about Sudan? Its government, according to The New York Times's Nicholas Kristof, "is one of the world's nastiest". It has armed the Janjaweed - brutal Arab gangs hired to crush the rebellious black south - who have embarked on "a campaign of murder, rape and pillage... that has forced 700,000 black African Sudanese to flee their villages."

To the Bush administration's credit, it has pushed a peace plan and requested that the warring factions stick to it. Yet still greater pressure must be applied - including the threat of force.

It would be easy for the international community to shy away from this obligation - no wants another war so soon after Iraq, and with all the divisions this opened.

Yet the case for involvement in Sudan, should it come to it, could be stronger than the case for removing Saddam. It would likely be cheap (if past African missions in Sierra Leone are anything to go buy), quick (a few GIs scared the life out gun-wielding rebels in Liberia) and well supported (preventing genocide is not a grey area like assessing Iraq's weapons stockpile or links to al Qaida).

Sudan's fate has direct consequence for western security, too. Bin Laden may have fled the country but who's to say those of a similar persuasion aren't left behind? The conditions are perfect for them. And Europe does not want a million refugees knocking on its door, a likely scenario if the Janjaweed are allowed free reign.

When suffering is prolonged and large in scale, and when a government fails miserably in its duty to protect its people - indeed if it goes out of its way not to - shouldn't that duty then becomes ours?

2004-03-22T11:36:00.000Z

Bush: soft on terror

"I find it outrageous that the president is running for re-election on the grounds that he's done such great things about terrorism. He ignored it. He ignored terrorism for months, when maybe we could have done something to stop 9/11. Maybe. We'll never know... I think he's done a terrible job on the war against terrorism."

It would be easy for George Bush to dismiss this criticism, had it come from a Democrat. Yet this stinging attack comes from his own former terrorism adviser Richard Clarke, who served four presidents including Bush senior.

"On January 24, 2001, I wrote a memo to Condoleezza Rice asking for, urgently -- underlined urgently -- a Cabinet-level meeting to deal with the impending al Qaida attack," claims Clarke in a CBS interview. Yet a full cabinet-level meeting on the subject was not convened until a week before the twin towers attacks. "It was as though they [the Republicans] were preserved in amber from when they left office eight years earlier. They came back. They wanted to work on the same issues right away: Iraq, Star Wars. Not new issues, the new threats that had developed over the preceding eight years."

Clinton, on the other hand, went to "battle stations" whenever Clark warned him of a pending attack. This attitude helped thwart a major attack on Los Angeles International Airport.

Bush has pinned his hoped on winning November's election by running ads showing how well he dealt with the September 11 aftermath. Perhaps his opposition should run some detailing what he didn't do to prevent it.

2004-03-18T14:17:00.000Z

Bear market for rare animals

Should hunters be allowed to shoot rhinos, tigers and other rare species, and sell them as trophies to rich old boys, who stuff and mount them above their mantle piece? Bloodybusiness.com says no.

The EU takes a different approach, however. It allows imports of animals killed for trophies if the income generated is used for conservation. Hunters who wish to sell their kill must demonstrate that the money raised is used to boost populations of rare species. Namibia has an excellent conservation record, in part due to the cash it receives from trophy hunting, which is ploughed back into nature preserves and sanctuaries.

Yet isn't there something fundamentally cruel about putting a bullet through a tiger, so old farts can stare at its severed head in the comfort of their living room? Isn't the fact that developing countries have to resort to selling trophies in the first place, a damning indictment of the the international community's failure to make this unnecessary?

2004-03-16T10:29:00.000Z

Please don't leave

Spain's new prime minister, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, says his first priority is counter-terrorism. Then he announces his country is to withdraw its troops from Iraq if there is no United Nations mandate to replace the US-led force. While greater UN involvement in Iraq would certainly add legitimacy to the occupation, it is difficult to see how such a threat can prevent terrorism, either inside or outside of Iraq.

Pulling troops out when more are required to restore order will not make Iraq any safer from Bin Laden and his crew. Nor will Spain be less of a target itself. It already was one before Saddam was ousted, argues Tom Friedman: "The notion that Spain can separate itself from Al Qaeda's onslaught on Western civilization by pulling its troops from Iraq is a fantasy. Bin Laden has said that Spain was once Muslim and he wants it restored that way."

We can argue whether the war was justified and whether it pushed more disaffected Muslim youths into the hands of extremist groups. That discourse should be a legitimate part of any election in countries whose leaders supported Bush.

Yet new leaders must fight today's battles and deal with the situation as they find it. The war happened. Right now, Iraq needs Spain's troops to stay.

2004-03-12T16:10:00.000Z

"We are all Madrileños now"

Some intelligent reactions to yesterday's attacks:

"For outgoing prime minister, Jose Maria Aznar, these days will mark a grim epitaph on a premiership dedicated to combating terrorism. His iron centrist fist... inflamed moderate nationalist feeling in Catalonia and the Basque country, with their long separatist traditions. Under Mr Aznar, Madrid's dialogue with its two most troublesome regions had all but disappeared. Whoever is found responsible for yesterday's carnage, both Madrid and its regions will have to work harder than ever to dissociate the legitimate discourse of separatism from the horrors of yesterday's massacre of innocents." The Guardian

Whether or not al Qaida had anything to do with yesterday's blasts, Spain is certainly on bin Laden's hit list and not only because of its support for war in Iraq. "History, always prominent in the rhetoric of Islamic extremism, also makes Spain a special case. By AD711 the Iberian peninsula had been mostly conquered by Muslim armies. It was not completely abandoned by them until Catholic Spain drove out the last Islamic ruler from Granada in 1492. To bin Laden and his followers Spain represents part of the lost lands of the historic Muslim nation, which he vows to restore." The Sidney Morning Herald

The attacks in Madrid were a "reminder that terrorism is a worldwide threat and that fighting it is not America's problem alone... Each new terrorist act demonstrates that military action alone is not the solution. Terrorism cannot be eradicated simply by driving the Taliban out of Kabul or capturing Saddam Hussein." The New York Times

2004-03-11T09:01:00.000Z

Looking for women

China's single child policy has had its successes. More than 300 million births are said to have been prevented since the Communist authorities introduced the policy in 1980, meaning fewer mouths to feed in poor, rural areas. It is a key instrument in China's battle to keep its population below 1.6 billion until 2050. However, the road to hell is often lined with good intentions.

An excellent report by Justin McCurry and Rebecca Allison in The Guardian reveals the dire consequences for a scheme that has further eroded the rights of women, led to an explosion in abortions and has meant that by 2020, there will be 40 million single, Chinese men.

"There is alarming evidence that the intense pressure on couples to make sure their only child is a boy has prompted a resurgence of female infanticide. Rural families are said to be particularly tempted to kill female offspring, such is the pressure to produce a child capable of coping with the physical demands of farming and prevent cash-strapped farming households from being plunged even deeper into poverty."

The dearth of women to marry has led to an increase in prostitution, kidnappings and deferral to illegal brokers, who dupe rural women into moving to the city with bogus job offers. More single men. More organised crime.

Time for a rethink, perhaps. A contraception education programme, targeted primarily at rural areas, would likely yield better results with fewer side effects, (it will also help tackle the country's ballooning AIDS epidemic).

Addressing the stereotype that men are better than women is vital. Beijing is showing some positive signs - "girls make good babies too" slogans are a start. What is really needed, however, are properly enforced equal pay laws to help women support their families. This would this boost women's standing in their own communities. Richer women have fewer babies, too.

2004-03-09T11:57:00.000Z

Empty promises

President Bush has consistently over-predicted the number of jobs his administration will create. Paul Krugman's chart is revealing to say the least. The signs are that the electorate is starting to take note: Kerry would win if the election were held today, according to a Washington Post poll. But voters are fickle. There is a long way to go yet.

Bin Laden broken?

Fareed Zakaria, meanwhile, makes a bold statement on al qaida. "For a decade they had attacked high-profile American targets only—embassies, a naval destroyer, the World Trade Centre. Once the United States mobilised against them, and got the world to join that fight, what have they hit? A discotheque, a few synagogues, a couple of restaurants and hotels, all soft targets that could not ever be protected, and all outside the Western world... That Islamic extremist groups are now targeting Shiites is surely a sign of desperation." Let's hope he is right, though I fear he may not be. The British Embassy in Turkey was no discotheque.

2004-03-04T14:34:00.000Z

Independent Jews

John Kerry has a very interesting story to tell on Vietnam. Yet to beat George Bush, he needs to up his game, argues former Nixon speechwriter William Safire.

During the primaries, Kerry adopted his rivals' anger against the war in Iraq and their populist stance on trade protection. "Such red meat tastes great to the already convinced, but will come across as hot air to independents who decide close general elections — a group where Kerry is weakest. Their eyeballs also roll heavenward when a politician who voted to welcome China into the World Trade Organisation waggles a finger at election time to warn the Chinese leaders that "they will feel the full force of our trade laws" if they don't adjust the value of their currency."

Sidney Blumenthal, meanwhile, explains President Bush's dilemma in trying to "chase his base". By proposing a constitutional amendment against gay marriage, banning forms of stem cell research and opposing abortion to appease the evangelical right, he has instigated a religious war, which is not only alienating liberals but also his Jewish supporters.

"Bush outsourced his foreign policy on the Middle East and Israel to the neocons in part for an electoral purpose, hoping to capture the Jewish vote, which will not be fulfilled because of his anxious devotion to the 'theocons'."

The climate Bush has created has allowed Mel Gibson's The Passion of Christ (that reportedly blames Jews for Jesus's death) to become a box-office smash, argues the former Clinton aide. It is this very climate, however, that may serve his undoing. In a close race, the Jewish vote matters.

2004-03-02T17:34:00.000Z

What the US owes Haiti

The press has largely blamed ousted leader Jean-Bertrand Aristide for the chaos in Haiti. The US marines are likely to be credited with any restoring of order.

Some take a different view: "The crisis in Haiti is another case of brazen US manipulation of a small, impoverished country," argues Jeff Sachs, the highly regarded director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University (thank you Lance Knobel for citing his article in the Financial Times).

The hard right in Washington had been itching to remove him ever since the Bush administration assumed office, and even before then had described his election victory in 2000 as a sham (it was deemed fair by international observers). Former Senator Jesse Helms "obsessively saw him as another Fidel Castro." Critics like him succeeded in "forcing the withdrawal of US troops" when they restored order (and Mr Aristide to power) after the last serious outbreak of violence in 1994. That speedy withdrawal, "which left behind about eight miles of paved roads and essentially nothing else" is a reason why chaos returned.

"Unfortunately, Washington is rarely willing to make the commitment to true democracy requires," argues Kenneth L Cain, who served as a United Nations human rights officer in Somalia, Rwanda, Haiti and Liberia in the 1990's. "There is a good reason: it's very hard." It takes relatively few soldiers to bring peace, yet sustaining it by underpinning democracy is much more difficult. Nevertheless, if the US wants to avoid a repeat of the past few weeks, "American policy toward Haiti should include a long-term commitment of time and money". If it is willing to help a faraway country like Iraq in this respect, the same sort of dedication should be shown to its poorest neighbour.

2004-02-27T16:55:00.000Z

Enlarging on nothing

The EU yesterday published a report on migration. It allays fears that Britain will be flooded with poor people from eastern Europe, when their countries join the European Union in May. Most of those who do move will be young, single and bright. This risks a brain drain, therefore having a far greater impact on the new EU countries than the existing members.

If history is any guide, most people will stay put. Around 200,000 Spaniards sought work in other countries in the early 1970s, but this number fell to a few thousand (even when unemployment rates were high) after Spain joined the club.

These findings are barely mentioned in the UK press, which has continued its assault on everything foreign. "Millions of migrants flood in" and "Sick migrants will 'swamp our wards'" are two of several headlines currently doing the rounds.

The complete lack of balance in the UK press demonstrates two things:

1) That newspaper companies with flagging circulations will do and print anything to sell them.

2) That they are happy, even, to print stories with racist undertones, which do nothing if not ignite the flames of prejudice.

I received a call today from a Daily Mail journalist, who was positively salivating at the prospect of writing a story about underqualified migrant nurses from eastern Europe. Needless to say, I eventually put the phone down on him.

2004-02-25T11:04:00.000Z

A very poor performance

Just how committed are rich countries to helping the poor?

Not very, according to the Commitment to Development Index (CDI) drawn up by Foreign Policy Magazine and the Centre for Global Development.

The world's two largest economies - Japan and the US - rank last out of the 21 countries analysed. The Netherlands is judged to be the most committed to development, although it still only scores 5.6 on a ten-point scale.

In ranking commitment to development, the CDI "rewards generous aid giving, hospitable immigration policies, sizeable contributions to peacekeeping operations, and hefty foreign direct investment (FDI) in developing countries. The index penalises financial assistance to corrupt regimes, obstruction of imports from developing countries, and policies that harm shared environmental resources."

While poor countries have a lot to do to put their own houses in order, these findings clearly show that the rest of the world is not going out of its way to spur change. Despite the pledge to give a measly 0.7 of national income to development aid budgets, few countries have put their money where their mouths are.

As the report's authors note:

"Political leaders in the world’s richest nations regularly proclaim their fervent desire to end poverty worldwide. These leaders boast of their spending on foreign aid...

... Yet the hard truth is that even the best-performing nations in the CDI have a long way to go to make their policies as helpful as possible for poor families in developing countries."

"What rich countries do to and for the rest of the world comes back to affect them—poverty and instability do not respect borders. Surely the United States would benefit if Mexico were as stable and prosperous as Canada. Surely West European nations would benefit from an economic resurgence in Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic. Call it trickle-up economics: When the poor become better off, so do the rich."

2004-02-23T12:39:00.000Z

Don't blame foreigners

President Bush looks set to become the first president since the war to preside over a net job loss during his term in office. Rival Senators John Kerry and John Edwards are focussing on US employment figures to take his job.

They need to be careful, however, not to create the wrong scapegoats. John Edwards has already blamed "lax Chinese trade law enforcement" for the loss of manufacturing jobs and has said that he would have voted against the North American Free Trade Agreement, which Bill Clinton signed twelve years ago.

As The Guardian aptly notes, Edwards's rhetoric may "raise the temperature". Bush may blame unemployment on free trade and outsourcing to developing countries, deflecting criticism away from himself.

This protectionist speak will further scupper prospects for international trade, which is still the "brightest hope for pulling much of the world out of poverty" and, ironically, the best way to improve those American job stats. The NAFTA, after all, created 13 million of them between 1992-2000.

And while India and China may now be able to do white collar jobs like they couldn't in the past, the challenge is to stay competitive rather than shut up shop. America, like every other rich country, should "get serious about some of the things we just gab about — job training, life-long learning, and wage insurance," argues former labour secretary Robert Reich.

Kerry and Edwards should leave trade alone and focus instead on these issues, which Bush has said little on and done virtually nothing about.

2004-02-20T11:23:00.000Z

Condoms work better

A year ago, president Bush pledged $15 billion to fight HIV/Aids. A year later, and the initiative is only just getting started. Why? This administration is ideologically opposed to working with others. Never mind what works.

It could have given the cash, immediately, to Kofi Annan's Global Fund to Fight Aids, a highly reputable international group with a good implementation record. Instead it set up a new bureaucracy.

More worrying still is the prospect that American companies will profit from Aids programmes in developing countries. The Bush team will award contracts "not to African groups but to American contractors, who often charge a lot more for the same work", reports The New York Times. Perhaps the most dubious development, however, is that "religious groups with no AIDS work experience will apparently be getting money." They are likely to promote abstinence-only education, fine in a middle class suburb in the US, but not in Africa. Condom-awareness training is much more important here, given that poverty has led girls into sugar-daddy relationships.

Getting your base onside (in Bush's case, the religious right) is one thing, and understandable in an election year. Doing so by compromising the lives of African children is another.

2004-02-16T14:53:00.000Z

What price timidity?

The Financial Times sums up recent developments in Russia: "Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, barely even pretends to support real democracy any more. Last week he launched his re-election campaign with a 30-minute speech that in the best Soviet tradition was broadcast on state television several times."

Russians credit the former secret service chief with restoring order, national pride and economic growth. "But he has abused his popularity to crush his critics, ranging from independent television to Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the jailed business tycoon."

The EU and US have largely stayed silent on these issues or at best have sent out mixed signals. Gotta protect those pipelines, after all. So they protest about human rights abuses in Chechnya only intermittently and have little or nothing to say on Russian interference in ex- Soviet states, including Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine.

Paying lip service to Amnesty while signing oil deals with the Kremlin is a fools diplomacy. So much more can be achieved by being frank, loud and open. Moscow would still, whatever was said against it, "need to sell its oil and gas abroad just as much as the west needs to buy them".

"By standing up for democracy, the west would send a powerful message not just to Russia but also to the rest of the world."

2004-02-13T12:28:00.000Z

Not the end of the affair

Last week, DDD said the presidential election would be the largest smear campaign in history (Forget the war, what about his sex life? 6 February). That campaign has begun in earnest.

Senator Kerry is in the spotlight for an alleged affair.

Matt Drudge, the blogger who broke the "news", has previous when it comes to disseminating scandal and gossip. His assertion that President Clinton's senior adviser, Sidney Blumenthal, is a wife beater, ended up with the lawyers. Blumenthal is no more a violent husband than Drudge is a credible journalist.

The latter just happens to be well connected to the Republican rumour-mill. This network of think tanks, investigative reporters, lawyers and right-wing politicians find a receptive audience in conservative talk show hosts and Murdoch-owned TV stations.

Opting for elicit tales of bedroom antics over bombs in Baghdad. How patriotic.

2004-02-12T14:11:00.000Z

Seeing the wood for the trees

Slash-and-burn policies that have devastated the countryside, whole villages uprooted to make way for huge infrastructure projects and air so bad that the fumes from Manchurian factories hover above Hong Kong harbour.

Welcome to China 2004. This is what free trade does, claim anti-globalisation protestors. As China connects with the outside world, so economic forces conspire to erect dams in place of trees, industrial smog in place of blue sky.

This is only half the story, however. Just as globalisation throws up all sorts of challenges, it also provides the solutions. Opening up means facing up. Exposure to criticism, the Internet and opportunities for western NGOs to collaborate with their eastern counterparts, "are spearheading a quiet grassroots environmental movement engaged in consciousness-raising, problem-solving and advocacy," argues Guobin Yang in the International Herald Tribune.

The Green Plateau Initiative, for example, advises villagers in Yunnan province how to redesign their houses, which are built using wood from increasingly depleted forests. Green Plateau's Shi Lihong, an environmental campaigner I interviewed for World Link, has organised awareness workshops that place emphasis on role play and games, departing from China's traditional teaching methods of churning out facts and figures for children to memorise. "If one person plays, say, the government spokesman and another a farmer, it’s much more interesting for the kids."

Environmental protection has long been modernisation's sacrificial lamb. But if China is starting to realise that and in some quarters even reject it, excuses that richer countries give wear ever-more thin.

2004-02-11T17:10:00.000Z

Ruling with ignorance

Thabo Mbeki made no mention of HIV/Aids in his annual state of the nation address. Later when interviewed, he merely retorted that "tuberculosis is also a big problem. My doctors say there is a diabetes epidemic. Why does nobody talk about it? There are many health issues." In any case, he said, South Africa did not have reliable statistics on causes of deaths.

The World Health Organisation would be happy to provide him with some, though I suspect they would make uncomfortable reading for a President who only recently accepted the link between intercourse and Aids - 20% of South Africans aged 15-49 are HIV positive.

Meanwhile, in Brazil

Ten million condoms will be handed out at the forthcoming Rio carnival as part of an Aids awareness campaign. According to the AFP news agency, "The campaign will use public billboards, including one showing a fish swimming inside a condom. In one television add, one man pours beer into a condom to convince a friend that it can hold back anything."

Shocking for some, perhaps. Distasteful, maybe. But better than sitting on the fence? Yep.

2004-02-09T12:08:00.000Z

The high cost of cheap food

Supermarkets have brought convenience, choice and affordable food to consumers. The pile 'em high and sell 'em cheap philosophy has proved so successful that if Walmart were a country it would be the world's 31st richest.

Cost cutting, however, means corner cutting. If coffee gets cheaper, if sugar gets cheaper, if poultry gets cheaper, someone, somewhere, is getting paid peanuts. Engaging in a race to the bottom inevitably ends up in hell.

Today's food and manufacturing sectors have become dependent on "hidden armies of cheap migrant labour, both legal and illegal," argues Felicity Lawrence, author of a forthcoming book Not on the Label. These exploited souls "cut our daffodils in Cornwall, pack our carrots in Lincolnshire and pick our fruit in Kent. They piece together our microwaves in the north and build our electrical goods in the south." And 19 of them died looking for cockles on Morecambe Bay in Lancashire when the tide swept them away.

Skimping on costs may lead to cheaper groceries, but it also means peasants in developing countries are forced to supplement their income by growing and selling drugs. It does nothing to improve housing conditions where animal and farmer live in close proximity, allowing deadly viruses such as bird Flu and Sars to spread. Poverty pay and its social consequences increase alienation toward the West and play nicely into the hands of al Qaida.

For these reasons, the food we eat and the price we pay for it is more than just an agricultural issue, or political one for that matter. It's a security issue, and concerns all of us.

2004-02-06T15:20:00.000Z

Forget the war, what about his sex life?

If you expect this year's presidential race to focus on war in Iraq, tax cuts and the economy, think again. These are merely reasons why it will be close. And it is because it will be close that both candidates - Bush and it looks like either Kerry or Edwards - will go negative. To their credit, the Democrats have largely stuck to the issues when competing against each other, but take a look at what the Republicans have to say about Kerry (click here) and Edwards (click here).

Vote 2004 could be the largest smear campaign in history.

2004-02-04T10:38:00.000Z

How to be a really bad democrat

Iran looks to be heading back down the road to clerical dictatorship, after a brief flirtation with reform. When Mohammad Khatami became President in 1997, things looked so much rosier. Iranians thought they were getting their Gandhi. They would be able to say what they like, wear what they want and see their country become a true democracy, where power rested in the people they elected and not in a judiciary stuffed full of hardliners.

But Khatami has disappointed. His co-habitation with supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has exacted few tangible benefits. He has appeared at times more concerned with preserving the existing order than rocking the boat.

Now the conservatives sense they can crush the reform movement, and have barred thousands of candidates from standing in the forthcoming elections. To its credit, the movement is fighting back - one hundred parliamentarians resigned yesterday. A case, perhaps, of too little too late. We'll see.

Yet the mullahs have also miscalculated. Iran has a young population, high unemployment and a basket case economy. "By shutting off the last safety valve within the political system," The New York Times notes, "the conservatives are sowing the seeds of more radical forms of discontent."

If you shut the door on Gandhi types, you leave it wide open for the Saddams.

2004-02-02T17:08:00.000Z

How to be a good dictator

Berkeley's Lydia Chavez puts forward some interesting explanations as to how Cuba's Fidel Castro has been able to stay in power for so long.

"Unlike in many of Latin America's freely elected governments, Mr Castro has actually provided his constituents with public services - and without earning a reputation for corruption."

"He still delivers what the majority of Latin American residents fail to get - free health care and education, and a relatively drug- and crime-free environment. Even World Bank president James Wolfensohn acknowledged in 2001 that Cuba had done a 'great job' on education and health care."

"Amazingly, many Latin American leaders fail to make the connection between reducing poverty and their own popularity."

Perhaps, if Mr Castro allowed his people to "travel, publish what they want, dance when and where they want, and experience the world as Mr Castro experienced it," he could win a fair election.

2004-01-30T12:09:00.000Z

Not on your own, John

Who can beat George Bush? The Economist comes to the conclusion that the Democrat front-runner, John Kerry, has the best chance of giving its darling a run for his money.

However, Kerry lacks charisma. On domestic policy, he has a left-wing record in the Senate that the Bush team is sure to exploit in cynical TV ads. He also has little to say about the White House's spending binge that has plunged the US into the red.

Perhaps his only strong point is foreign policy, where experience of combat in Vietnam and his longstanding membership of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, may boost ratings.

In deciding their contender, Democrats appear to be thinking with their heads rather than their hearts. Firebrand Howard Dean has seriously dented his chances with his now infamous I had a scream speech. Early days it may be, but "dated Dean, married Kerry," is the likely outcome of this year's primaries.

Alas, every candidate in the race divides the head and the heart (perhaps Senator Clinton wouldn't?). The youthful optimism of Senator John Edwards is appealing, but he has no outstanding record outside a courtroom.

He'll make a good running mate - a mix that would combine Kerry's stoicism with Edwards's charisma, Kerry's northern base with Edwards's Southern charm.

Not ideal, but the best the Democrats can offer? Probably.

2004-01-27T15:33:00.000Z

The year of the monkey

Which country is wary of Turkey's application to join the EU?

France

Which country wants to lift the EU arms embargo, imposed on China after the Tianamen Square massacre?

France

President Chirac must know what other European leaders, who might want to keep the ban, don't.

That the China Daily is no longer Beijing's mouthpiece and can print what it likes, perhaps? Click here and make up your own mind.

Or that the banned Falun Gong is more than just a spiritual group, that it is in fact a terrorist cell? Click here and make up your own mind.

If the French want to resume arms sales to China, why not be consistent and forgive Turkey its beatings, arbitrary detentions and harassment against the Kurdish minority?

Or recognise what the other leaders do: that the prospect of EU membership is encouraging Turkey to change its ways, while sending bombs and bullets Beijing's way will encourage only more of the same.

So, Jacques, what's it to be?

2004-01-26T14:59:00.000Z

Who can match him?

Tony Blair's job is apparently on the line. The press wants change and his parliamentary colleagues may soon come to the same conclusion. Yet not because of the controversy over Iraq or tuition fees for higher education, The Guardian's Peter Preston argues. "The single answer is much simpler than that. We're bored ... Eleven years of Frasier, nine years of Friends, five years of the Sopranos, seven years of Blair ... We don't care what a twinkling bloke he is any longer. We've had it up to here with mission visions and rictoid grins. Now please, can we switch channels?"

Before Labour's backbenchers use that remote, Preston reminds them of what they would be giving up:

"Seven years on, Mr Blair remains a class act. Watch him on Newsnight confronting an audience of topped-up sceptics. It's no contest, whatever the bent ref from the Daily Mail thinks. He knows his stuff; he has the statistics and the charm and the appetite for persuasion. Would Chirac or Schroeder dare to try to pull the same stunt? No way. Would Karl Rove let George W anywhere near a free-range, free-fall interrogation like this? Thank you and goodnight, President Gaffe."

Blair is currently the most pragmatic and charismatic leader on the world stage. Can you name an equal?

2004-01-23T16:46:00.000Z

Is there life on Mars?

David Bowie may have to wait a while for the answer to his question. But at least there's water.

2004-01-22T14:06:00.000Z

Don't be a stranger

The UK has always feared the foreigner. An island mentality that is so responsive to emotive words such as "hoardes", "swamping" and "floods" is alive and well in middle England.

Enter politicians more concerned with winning votes than challenging myths that Britain is under siege from "darkies". Enter newspapers willing to play on fears and prejudice to boost flagging sales. Hey presto folks - you got your hysteria.

The Daily Express is the worst offender. When eastern European countries join the EU later this year, the paper claims, Roma "gypsies" will arrive in their millions seeking access to work and Lo! benefits. Poor old blighty. Murdoch publications - The Sun and The Times - have been quick to jump on the bandwagon.

Next to pictures of dark men holding children in rags are headlines "See you in May" and "We can't cope with huge gypsy invasion", which shout out from the newstands at commuters passing by.

And now for some facts

European workers who come to England will not be able to claim unemployment benefit. Membership of the EU will increase opportunities for eastern Europeans in their own countries, decreasing the likelihood of them leaving, as regional aid and foreign investment pour in. This is what happened when Spain joined - similar scare stories surfaced but Madrid didn't come to London. Brits moved to the Costa Del Sol instead. And what about the claim that 1.6 million Roma are ready to "flood in"? Independent reports estimate a mere 5,000-13,000 migrant workers will make the trip.

Good. Britain is crying out for skilled labourers.

Why isn't the government pushing these arguments? Perhaps it feels it would add fuel to the fire. And heaven forbid it should ever be perceived soft on immigration. By failing to do anything more than write a couple of letters, it risks loosing the agenda to racists and bigots who always do well at the ballot box when nationalism is given a chance.

Don't let it happen, Tony.

2004-01-21T13:57:00.000Z

Let's talk

The World Economic Forum kicks off its annual meeting in Davos today, representing the largest gathering of leaders anywhere on the planet. The theme of this year's event: Partnering for Security and Prosperity.

"We will not have strong sustained economic growth across the world unless we have security," argues the Forum's executive chairman, Klaus Schwab. "But we will not have security in unstable parts of the world without the prospect of prosperity. And this is the Davos equation: security plus prosperity equals peace."

That equation only works, however, if security amounts to more than increasing military spending, checks at airports and wars. And if prosperity is measured by more than the quarterly GDP figures for the G7.

Kenneth Roth of Human Rights Watch echoes similar views in his article for Global Agenda, the Forum's magazine. The Bush administration in Iraq, he says, largely ignored human security concerns in pursuit of national security (finding weapons of mass destruction). The absence of the former now threatens the latter. "The Pentagon's civilian leaders launched the war with only 150,000 combat troops. As a result, once the Iraqi government fell, coalition forces were quickly overwhelmed. Looting was pervasive. Arms caches were emptied. Violence was rampant. A humanitarian intervention would have taken better steps to prevent such predictable disorder."

A disorder that claims the lives of US soldiers daily, hinders prosperity and therefore, peace. Where does that leave the Davos equation?

People like Kenneth Roth quite clearly need to be heard.

2004-01-20T11:26:00.000Z

Wanted: a contender

Hopeful challengers to president Bush may have found a way to beat him, if yesterday's Iowa straw poll is anything to go by: Don't mention the war. It's the economy, stupid.

Howard Dean, the anti-war candidate, failed to woo Democrats while John Edwards, the North Carolinian senator who finished second behind John Kerry of Massachusetts, focused on issues nearer to home.

As George Bush prepares to give his own, somewhat rosy perspective of the state of the union, The Independent paints a fuller picture.

$127 billion: Amount of US budget surplus in the year that Bush became President in 2001

$374 billion: Amount of US budget deficit in the fiscal year for 2003

$1.58 billion: Average amount by which the US national debt increases each day

2.4 million: Number of Americans who have lost their jobs during the three years of the Bush administration

9 million: Number of US workers unemployed in September 2003

1,000: Number of new jobs created in the entire country in December. Analysts had expected a gain of 130,000

1st: This administration is on its way to becoming the first since 1929 (Herbert Hoover) to preside over an overall loss of jobs during its complete term in office

+6%: Percentage change since 2001 in the number of US families in poverty

43.6 million: Number of Americans without health insurance in 2002

Blame Bush for this mess and present credible alternatives to fix it, and the White House is there for the taking. Only one, small question remains - who is up to the task?

2004-01-16T16:01:00.000Z

Africa develops

Africa, often in the news for all the wrong reasons - war, famine and the like - is, according to The Economist, showing signs of recovery. Although despotic rulers still hold sway, thousands starve and millions remain homeless due to savage wars, consider the following:

"In the 1960s and 1970s, no African ruler was voted out of office. In the 1980s, one was. Since then, 18 have been, and counting. That still leaves a lot of countries where polls are rigged and dissidents disappear, but it is surely a sign that some African governments are becoming more accountable to their people."

"Africa's media, too, are shaking off their shackles. Under most of the military regimes of the 1970s and 1980s, independent newspapers and radio stations were simply not allowed. Today, they are as numerous as they are irreverent."

"In the past couple of years, Africa has also grown more peaceful. Angola and Sierra Leone are at peace. The pointless border clash between Ethiopia and Eritrea has stopped. Congo's war, the worst anywhere since the second world war, is formally over. Liberia's warlord, Charles Taylor, has been driven into exile. Even in Sudan, which has known only 11 years of calm since 1962, government and rebels are on the verge of signing a power-sharing deal."

Well, it's a start at least.

2004-01-15T11:38:00.000Z

Not so clever cats

So you get the flu. It's cold, wet and rainy but you didn't put on a warm enough coat. You start to feel better, after a while. The weather is still hateful. You go out in a t-shirt.

This is effectively what China has done with SARS. Largely thanks to Beijing's stupidity, the debilitating respiratory illness is back. When hundreds died in 2002, scientists did a good job of locating the likely source of the outbreak - Guandong city. They have since gone further and tracked the outbreak to local markets and perhaps even to the civet cat, a wild game delicacy in Southern China.

They also suggested that people who live and sleep in close proximity to animals increase the likelihood of viruses passing from the animal kingdom to humans. The recent outbreak of bird flu in Vietnam is thought to have developed in this way.

China, on the other hand, has only recently begun a cull of civet cats and even that was performed without risk assessment and without regard to the safety of those performing the cull.

In democracies, it's a safe bet that most governments would have fallen after such incompetence. Perhaps when idiocy is allowed to reign supreme, it flourishes.

But China's leaders aren't the only sillies. What about all those intelligent folk who said they value economic freedom more than political freedom? Throughout the 90s, these guys compared Russia, which democratised before it privatised, with China, which exposed itself to the market but not the electorate.

Yet it's China that will pay the price for its secrecy and for its arrogance, for its sole reliance on economic freedom, and for the nine lives of its leaders.

And for putting human health second to national pride.

2004-01-13T10:55:00.000Z

O'Neill by mouth

Just as the phrase "anti-Semitism" is used to slur critics of the Sharon government, "unpatriotic" is a peg attached to those who question the Bush administration. "Woolly liberal" is another tag, easy to place on The New York Times commentators such as Paul Krugman and Democrat front-runner Howard Dean (although neither are).

But the president is having a harder time dismissing the comments of his former treasury secretary, Paul O' Neill, who claims the administration had planned the war in Iraq before 9/11, had never any intention of balancing the budget, and knew its tax cuts were tailored for the rich but still said in public that they weren't.

Paul Krugman: "The point is that the credentials of the critics just keep getting better. How can Howard Dean's assertion that the capture of Saddam hasn't made us safer be dismissed as bizarre, when a report published by the Army War College says that the war in Iraq was a "detour" that undermined the fight against terror? How can charges by Wesley Clark and others that the administration was looking for an excuse to invade Iraq be dismissed as paranoid in the light of Mr. O'Neill's revelations?"

And on the economy, Krugman isn't the only one who predicts the US might one day file for bankruptcy. The IMF has cast serious doubt about the prudence of Bush's economic policy.

Yet all the US media seems to care about (after gentle prodding no doubt by White House staffers), is O'Neill's possible use of classified documents. Surely, whether or how these documents were used is unimportant. What they may reveal undoubtedly is - that Bush misled voters. That Bush lied.

Surprised?

2004-01-08T16:55:00.000Z

But some of my best friends are Jewish... honest

Leaders of the world's Jewish community were backtracking and boot licking in Brussels today. And so they should. To disagree with opinion poll findings that many Europeans see "Israel as the greatest threat to world peace" is one thing. But to accuse the European Commission of anti-Semitism is another, altogether unjustifiable stance. "Opinions may be flawed," as the Financial Times said yesterday, "but they are nonetheless genuinely held."

Of course it's worrying that attacks on Jews are increasing in Europe. Leaders of all religions and of all countries need to get tougher on the extremists.

But the phrase 'anti-Semitism' has become a knee-jerk reaction used against any reasonable critic of Israel - an effective way for Ariel Sharon to deflect criticism of some really bad policies. So it's depressing when the World Jewish Congress follows his lead.

Showing concern at the dreadful conditions in Gaza and on the West Bank (as the EU has done) is not anti-Jewish, just as expressing outrage at suicide attacks (as the EU has also done) isn't anti-Palestinian.

Even president Bush has called into question the construction of a security fence that divides several Palestinian towns in two. So is Israel's most staunchest ally anti-Semitic too?

Violence and derogatory language is unacceptable. But so too are bloody-minded responses to legitimate concerns.

2004-01-07T15:23:00.000Z

Reporting kills

2003 was a dangerous year to be a writer or reporter. Forty-two journalists were killed, the highest number since 1995. At least 766 were arrested and 1,460 physically attacked or threatened.

This is not wholly surprising - war often increases media casualties and conflict in Iraq certainly claimed the lives of many journalists. But as Reporters Without Borders argues in a new report, not all of these deaths and incidents of intimidation can be attributed to the overthrow of Saddam.

Press freedom, war or no war, is under attack across the world. Here are some examples the Paris-based organisation highlights:

" The Arabic-language press continues to groan under the weight of repressive and sclerotic regimes (Saudi Arabia, Syria) or sham democracies (Jordan, Yemen, the Palestinian Authority), while Lebanon, for so long a haven of media freedom, is displaying an ever more worrying contempt for the rule of law."

"In Russia, a journalist was sentenced to one year of forced labour in a defamation case, for the first time since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. Independent coverage of the war in Chechnya became virtually impossible for both Russian and foreign reporters, because of obstacles thrown up by the Russian Army and the risk of kidnapping. A correspondent with Agence France-Presse (AFP) was abducted in July."

"China remains by far the world's largest prison for Internet-users." As of 1 January 2004, 48 Internet-users are behind bars "because of the dreaded efficiency of the Chinese cyber-police (a staff of 30,000)."

Developed countries have problems, too:

In Italy, "the conflicts of interest of Silvio Berlusconi, both prime minister and owner of a media empire, still poses a threat to pluralism of news and information."

"The relentless growth in violations of press freedom since 2001 is undoubtedly linked to the fight against terrorism and to anti-terror laws adopted by some countries since the 11 September attacks."

Has the war on terror, therefore, become a smokescreen for despots to silence critics? To fight terrorism, is it necessary to kill, beat and imprison journalists? Are western countries so afraid to lose the support of Russia, China and Saudi in this war, that they are willing to turn a blind eye?

Are they so shortsighted that they cannot see what comes with, and predict what comes after, the intimidation of journalists... awful regimes that one day they may have to fight?

2004-01-06T17:09:00.000Z

The new star?

India is "becoming a powerhouse very fast," according to management guru Peter Drucker. "The medical school in New Delhi is now perhaps the best in the world. And the technical graduates of the Institute of Technology in Bangalore are as good as any in the world. Also, India has 150 million people for whom English is their main language. So India is indeed becoming a knowledge center."

The even better news is that India and Pakistan are talking again, though Lance Knobel aptly provides a few words of caution: "The news is decidedly good for the entire world. Both political systems are so febrile, however, that there is no guarantee that the current rapprochement will last."

"The dominance of the U.S. is already over," says Drucker. What is emerging is a world economy of blocs represented by NAFTA, the European Union and ASEAN. There's no one center in this world economy." Yes, India is important too.

The basketcase?

The US, meanwhile, is playing a dangerous game of spend today and spend tomorrow. The 'Argentina can never happen here' school still holds sway. Oh yes it can happen, argues Paul Krugman in The New York Times. Even Robert Rubin, former Treasury Secretary and darling of the financial markets, is not ruling it out. "Realistic projections show a huge buildup of debt over the next decade, which will accelerate once the baby boomers retire in large numbers." Instead of putting money aside for this event, the Bush administration has cut taxes.

America has people at the top who are leading their country to bankruptcy. Argentina may cry for them. Will voters?

2003-12-23T11:33:00.000Z

And now for The Great News

Over the past few months DDD has commented on suicide, lynchings and hangings. You would be forgiven for thinking this site is dedicated to the negative and to the morbid. Just to prove the critics wrong, here are some stories that should give some comfort and reassurance for 2004:

The Pakistan supreme court has granted Muslim girls the right to marry according to their 'free will' without the consent of their parents or guardians.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qurie plan to meet this week.

In Zimbabwe a judge has ruled that the country's only independent daily newspaper, the Daily News, must be allowed to publish.

Half a million of the world's poorest TB patients are set to benefit from free life-saving drugs under an agreement between the World Health Organisation and the pharmaceutical company Novartis.

Scientists in North Carolina have found a chemical that helps stop alcoholism.

Australia's Federal Parliament has tabled a plan to protect more than 11 million hectares of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park - creating the largest network of marine sanctuaries on Earth.

With thanks to The Great News Network for these stories.

Thank you for reading this website. Have a lovely Christmas and a happy new year.

DDD

2003-12-22T10:55:00.000Z

Tis the season of euromythery

Britain has always been uneasy about its membership of the European Union. Much of this can be explained by leaders who claim the credit for good policies but find Brussels a convenient scapegoat for when things go wrong. And much of it is down to a deeply sceptical press that ignores the novel ideas emanating from the European Commission and opts instead for printing lies.

Take The Times, that publication of supposedly good repute. Surely it would get its facts right? When it comes to bananas, they're completely bent. "The yellow fruit must be sold straight due to barmy bureaucrats," is the latest one doing the rounds.

But here are some real stories that include facts (of all things)!

European consumers in 2004 can enjoy:

More live football games on terrestrial TV

A crack down on spam email - anyone with hotmail would notice the difference already

Air passenger compensation for delayed flights and overbooking

Lower car prices with the introduction of multi-brand showrooms

Faulty goods can be returned, repaired or replaced, up to two years after delivery, whether they're bought in London or Rome.

But the UK media circus chooses to ignore these stories in favour of sensation, scandal and soundbite. Hey, why let the facts get in the way of a good story?

2003-12-18T11:11:00.000Z

Hanging in the balance

"Bush and Tony Blair were stretching the truth in order to risk their own political careers to get rid of a really terrible dictator. And Jacques Chirac was stretching the truth to advance his own political career by protecting a really terrible dictator." Perhaps on this occasion it is Tom Friedman who is stretching things a little. He ignores, for example, Chriac's fairly good arguments against war - that Saddam was not a clear and present threat.

Nevertheless, Friedman's post-war analysis is spot on - that Saddam has been toppled is still no bad thing. But America must get to grips with the security situation. "There are no more excuses for political drift" with Saddam gone.

And the Iraqis, too, need to step up to the challenge. Calling for Saddam's head and squabbling among the Shias, Sunnis and Kurds bodes ill for their country. They have to stop "telling us whom they want to die. Now we have to hear how they want to live and whom they want to live with."

Maybe Friedman is correct that history will judge unkindly the main actors in this episode. But that depends on whether what comes after the war is better than what went before it. A case of wait and see, then, rather than hanging anyone out to dry.

2003-12-17T12:53:00.000Z

Le Pen won after all

Should the wearing of headscarves in school be banned? Jacques Chirac thinks so. The more western you look, the more western you become, the argument goes.

More about why he is wrong in a minute, but a brief point on the sheer stupidity of the timing: Attacks on Muslims and indeed on all minorities are increasing in France, where ethnic tension is particularly high in places like Toulouse and Marseilles, and where the voters nearly opted for a fascist instead of Chirac. Banning headscarves in school would somehow eradicate all this, would it?

Now, on to the stupidity of the proposal itself. The European Convention on Human Rights (thanks James Marsh for pointing this out) stipulates that "everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion." And everyone has the right in public and in private to express their religion or belief, "in worship, teaching, practice and observance." France was a founding signatory of this convention.

It can only be overruled "in the interests of public safety (how is wearing a headscarf more dangerous than wearing a scarf and hat?), for the protection of public order (so you expect fewer race riots, M. Chirac?), health (no one ever died because they wore one, I think) or morals (coming from a President who fought tooth and nail for immunity from prosecution!)."

But what about about "the protection of the rights and freedoms of others"? Well, Christians or Jews don't have to wear one.

There is shoving religion down one's throat and there is strangling someone because of their religion. France has a good record on both.

2003-12-16T15:27:00.000Z

Beggar thy neighbour

Europeans are swinging their handbags perfectly fine without Margaret Thatcher.

Their proposed constitution lies in tatters, the Germans are most upset with the Poles and Spanish, and the rich countries of the EU don't want to pay for the things they want. Let's re-phrase that - they're failing to put their money where their mouths are.

Germany, France and the UK have written to European Commission President Romano Prodi calling for budget discipline. Arguably, all three need to take their own advice.

It smacks of stinginess and short-sightedness . We're talking about the EU budget here, which accounts for little more than 1% of Europe's total income. It costs a UK taxpayer just a penny per day.

The same countries are calling for increased border controls, new measures to tackle terrorism, cooperation in peacekeeping and defence, and of course they all want lots of cash for their farmers and inner city areas. If the budget is slashed, all this is threatened.

Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face.

2003-12-15T11:56:00.000Z

More questions than answers

The capture of Saddam is as welcome news as it is puzzling.

Welcome because regardless of whether you joined the Stop the War Coalition or are a hawk in the Bush administration, it's good to see brutal dictators toppled from power and good to see them behind bars.

But it's also puzzling. Saddam looked more of a "tramp" than a leader orchestrating deadly suicide attacks and insurgency, The Guardian's leader suggests. So if he was not behind the Red Cross and UN compound attacks, who was?

The New York Times's leader asks, "What happened to Iraq's unconventional weapons programs in recent years and what was going on in that shadowed regime in the last weeks before the war, when the Iraqi leader seemed reluctant to take steps that might have stayed the president's hand"?

Perhaps now Saddam is in custody some of these questions can be answered. But several issues remain that only the Bush administration can address. Will it seek help from friends to rebuild Iraq, including the United Nations? How tolerant will Iraq become?

Any future trial should indicate which path the US will take. Again, The New York Times hits the nail on the head: "It must be above any suspicion that it is merely an exercise in retribution or propaganda. We would suggest this trial be conducted in Iraq under United Nations auspices by international and Iraqi judges. A tribunal picked by Americans would lack legitimacy."

2003-12-12T11:31:00.000Z

Rising sun's suicidal sons

In politics as in life, problems tend to be brushed under the carpet when things are going well. Life is rosy - why rock the boat? Japan is no different.

It is set for moderate growth next year, according to Bank of Japan governor Toshihiko Fukui.

But to get a true picture of Japan's economic as well as social wellbeing, don't look at export figures (which look OK now) or GDP (which is average). Check out the suicide rate. The phenomenon of unemployment, which the Japanese knew little about until recently, and the social stigma attached to it, has together with increased debt (another taboo) exacerbated an almost national pastime of throwing oneself onto the tracks.

Will the government respond , or use moderate growth as cover to do nothing? If history is any guide, it will do nothing.

If it does find courage from somewhere, perhaps it should reform the nation's lending system, which places corporate debt responsibility on the individual, forcing owners of small and medium-size businesses to go personally broke when their businesses fail. The more bankruptcies there are, the more suicides there are.

Reform must go even further, however. Cosy relationships between politicians, bureaucrats and big business conglomerates may have driven Japan's post-war renaissance. But these same relationships are now costing it dear. Throwing cash at buddies in the construction industry, for example, has contributed to a budget deficit reaching 7% of national income but has failed to increase employment much (and thus lower the suicide rate much).

Until these relationships are broken up and until politicians take some tough decisions, the stations will still be packed full of people with little interest in catching trains.

2003-12-11T13:58:00.000Z

Credit where it's due

UK Chancellor Gordon Brown has announced more borrowing to fund investment in schools and hospitals. Opposition parties decry what they see as putting off until tomorrow what should be paid for today (or in the Tories' case what shouldn't be paid for at all). Like a credit card used to buy Christmas presents in December, it will all have to be paid for in January.

However, Tory accusations that Britain's public finances are drowning in a sea of debt is nothing more than election speak (they would do better to focus on the real concern for the UK economy - consumers mortgaged up to their eyeballs). The Labour government paid back debt when it came to power, giving it more leeway to draw on credit now. The UK's debt to national income ratio is the lowest in the G7, precisely because it put money aside during the good times.

A pity the French, Germans and Italians failed to do so. All three countries are now grappling with large budget deficits (particularly France) and mountains of debt (particularly Italy) thanks to fiscal ill-discipline.

But the Bush administration wins the award of best mis-manager. Its tax cut turned a record surplus into a record deficit in just three years. While Brown's policy of investing in public services has created jobs, the Bush tax cut has benefited only those rich enough to receive it. America's credit card is fast nearing its limit.

2003-12-10T19:37:00.000Z

Run Hillary run

George W Bush's second term as president is by no means guaranteed. Howard Dean is making waves for the Democrats.

The former governor of Vermont was previously dismissed as a left-wing crank (even though he is a fiscal conservative), an appeaser to terrorism (he opposed war in Iraq) and on the fringes of a hopelessly divided party. Indeed, he was the man Republicans least feared.

Enter Al Gore. His endorsement of the Dean campaign has changed everything. The former vice-president is impressed with Dean's ability to enthuse the grass roots of the party, whose desertion of Gore in 2000 handed Bush victory.

The Democrat's core voters are certainly pining for a man of principle who is not afraid to speak his mind. But broader appeal and charisma will still be important in 2004 - sticking your neck out often plays better with historians. Dean's eventual running mate should be the woman Republicans most fear....

2003-12-09T16:01:00.000Z

Putin's mess

Russia's president has only himself to blame for the latest terrorist atrocity.

The military's presence in Chechnya has done nothing to make Russia proper more secure. Moscow endures suicide bombs and theatre sieges, because Grozny suffers at the hands of drugged-up Russian soldiers who stand accused of "committing hundreds of forced disappearances, extrajudicial executions, and widespread acts of torture and ill-treatment."

As DDD has often repeated, deciding between human rights and security is a false choice. Would the suicide bombers still be killing innocent civilians in Moscow, had elections in Chechnya been fair, the right of self-determination (or the some degree of autonomy at least) assured, and had the military not been so heavy handed?

Once democratic means of regime change are no longer possible, violence frequently becomes the ordre de jour.

Yet Putin is extending his authoritarian grip beyond the breakaway caucus. Across Russia press freedom and fair elections are seriously under threat. History teaches us that curtailing individual rights is seldom achieved, and certainly not maintained, peacefully. Take Apartheid South Africa and Iran under the Shah.

And history also tells us to speak up: the international community did eventually against South Africa but failed to against Iran - one is now democratic and one is ruled by clerics.

Message to Russia, therefore: Get your men out of Grozny and leave those ballot boxes well alone.

2003-12-05T13:01:00.000Z

India's criminals

"The hallmark of successful democracy is not holding elections or even promoting the will of the majority," says Newsweek's Fareed Zakaria.

India proves Zakaria's point: Its politicians are awash with get out of jail free cards, as local police turn a blind eye or help them out. They whip up ethnic hatred, play on deeply ingrained prejudices and are quick to deal the race or religious cards come election time. Take Gujarat: Chief Minister Modi did little to prevent (some say he openly encouraged) mob violence against Muslims last year, at the cost of thousands of lives. Police were accused of letting the crowd do its worst.

Having strong, independent institutions that provide checks and balances to elected politicians is key. India, the world's largest democracy, has these but needs more:

The electoral commission is not subject to political interference. And the supreme court has proved a reliable stalwart against Hindu nationalism. Modi reluctantly arrested those accused of orchestrating the Gujarat violence, but it was the supreme court that ensured their trial will be a fair one.

Perhaps the supreme court could hear the case for an independent police commission? Then India's criminals, including several chief ministers, would really feel the heat.

2003-12-05T10:00:00.000Z

The Mason - Dixon line

The United States has unveiled a lynching memorial. Nations deal with nightmares the same way people do — by trying to forget them, but some things are so horrific they cannot be forgotten. The memorial was not unveiled in the deep South, where the lynching of blacks was common place in the early part of the 20th century, but in Minnesota. Does this mean America is coming to terms with its past, or is the location of the memorial indicative of a country still bitterly divided?

2003-12-04T14:33:00.000Z

Don't be loco, sign Kyoto

The Kyoto treaty, which seeks to protect the ozone layer by limiting carbon emissions, is nearly dead. Russia is unlikely to ratify, while the US refuses outright.

Some say America will only do something about the greenhouse effect should oil become unaffordable. The this White House sees oil-price rises as an excuse to drill for more oil. Polar meltdown here we come.

There are some steps that can be taken before we get to that point, however.

1) Tell Russia it can't benefit from WTO membership until it signs Kyoto.

2) Exert greater pressure on the 13 out 15 EU members failing to practice what they preach (well done Britain and Sweden for meeting Kyoto's targets).

3) A worldwide agreement on aviation fuel tax. This is untaxed for the most part, even though its contribution to ozone depletion is steadily increasing. Perhaps the revenue raised can subsidise greener alternatives.

2003-12-03T15:30:00.000Z

What would Robin Hood think?

Tony Blair is seeking to introduce university tuition fees, payable by the student after graduation.

Students aren't happy and neither are left-wing MPs. Both groups believe this is the start of American-style privatisation, where students are left with massive debts. Education is a right and not a privilege, they say. Indeed.

But ask the same people whether a cleaner should pay for a lawyer's education. That is essentially what is happening now. Who benefits most from a college degree, a refuse collector, or the person who attained it?

There is a lot of waxing hysterical over fairly tame and common-sense steps. The paying back of loans will be linked to ability to pay. A graduate earning £18,000 ($31,000) would only have to pay £5 a week. Maintenance grants and bursaries for students from poorer backgrounds will be re-introduced.

The alternative to tuition fees and students taking on more of the financial burden is robbing from the poor to pay for the rich. What would Robin Hood think? The words turning and grave spring to mind.

2003-12-02T11:20:00.000Z

But you don't always get what you vote for

President George W Bush lost the popular vote to Al Gore in 2000 by an even greater margin than Nixon had lost to Kennedy in 1960. Yet he was able to pull through with the help of dubious vote counts in Florida. To improve confidence in the electoral system and to prevent the Florida fiasco occurring again, state governments are introducing electronic vote machines.

The head of the company that designed these machines said recently, "I am committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year." He was at a Republican fundraiser at the time. His machines leave no paper trail, so it's impossible to check they are counting properly, or whether they have been tampered with. The company refuses to make its software available for public inspection. It should be compelled to. The credibility of US democracy may be at stake.

2003-12-01T12:25:00.000Z

You get what you vote for

Who is to blame when things go wrong? Shoddy leaders, or those who elected them?

Instead of choosing moderates who stand the best chance of working across the sectarian divide, Ulster's electorate has opted instead for the anti-agreement DUP lead by Ian Paisley, and for Sinn Fein / IRA. Understandably, voters are tired of infighting, sporadic violence and the seeming incapability of Northern Ireland's politicians to make the Good Friday agreement work.

But they have shot themselves in the foot. Venting frustration is one thing. Cutting off your nose to spite your face is another.

If politicians break election pledges, it's easier to apportion blame. But if they simply do as they said they would, what then? Paisley has promised to do his worst for power sharing - thanks to stupid voters, he can deliver.

2003-11-27T13:59:00.000Z

Don't throw the baby out with the bath water

How far should history determine the future? How important is heritage? Lee Chee Keng, a Beijing-based playwright, adroitly sums up China's challenge:

"As China experiences the benefits of modernisation, it is at the same time encountering the dilemma that plagues every rapidly developing country: how to benefit from the new while preserving the old."

Since it began opening up its economy to outside influences and loosening state-controlled prices , China's food costs have risen dramatically. Yet as Lee points out, "it no longer cost 5,000 yuan (£355) just to install a private telephone line."

But what if "the Great Wall stands in the way of a planned highway that would propel economic development in the area, should the Great Wall give way to development?"

The Three Gorges Dam project gives some indication as to what might happen. The Hydro-electricity produced will account for 10% of the country's energy needs and reduce reliance on dirty-energy sources, a promise that won China the 2008 Olympics. But this comes at a huge cost: Literally millions of people have been uprooted, their towns and cities flooded. All in the name of progress.

If China democratised, its people could decide for themselves what they want to keep. Until that happens, better book that trip to The Great Wall, just in case...

2003-11-26T11:33:00.000Z

Kofi's killer facts

There are 40 million people living with HIV/Aids. Three million died of the disease in the past year alone. So much can be done to prevent its spread. Better sex education (well done Brazil) and free condoms (thank you Coca Cola for use of its trucks and sophisticated distribution networks), cheap anti-retroviral drugs to help those with the illness lead normal lives (enter nice pharmaceutical companies please), and political leadership to breakdown damaging stereotypes and the social stigma attached to Aids suffers (Botswana can teach South Africa a thing or two).

Ultimately, fighting Aids requires cash. UN secretary general Kofi Annan has only got half of what he asked for, around $4.7 billion (£2.8 billion). A costly business, indeed.

But consider this: 68 million fewer workers by 2020, persistent poverty as households in developing countries are deprived of able-bodied farmhands, and Aids-infested youth who, knowing they are to die, take to arms, rape and torture, as is happening in parts of Africa. This is not just a health issue, it's a security issue.

The war in Iraq will likely cost over $100 billion. Surely, we can find cash for Kofi?

2003-11-25T17:14:00.000Z

Deep within us

You may not remember eating deca-brominated dipheyl ether (a chemical used to prevent fire in everyday products such as cars and TVs), but chances are it's in your body. According to a study undertaken by WWF-UK, we're also full of poly chlorinated biphenyls (a pesticide), which was found in 99% of those who gave blood.

Many of the chemicals found in these tests are cancer-causing agents. Shocking it may sound, but chemicals that have been on the European market for over 22 years have not been tested for their impact on human health. This is about to change under new EU proposals. It will cost billions, industry leaders say.

So too, does cancer.

2003-11-24T13:56:00.000Z

Beware the cavemen

When US secretary of state Colin Powell was in London last week, he failed to attend an awards ceremony because of security fears.

As Tom Friedman argues, "What good is driving bin Laden into a cave if our secretary of state has to live in a bubble?" The Israeli cafe culture has survived despite frequent suicide attacks. "Message to suicide bombers: You're dead and we're not afraid. That is the best deterrence," continues The New York Times columnist.

Millions of rugby fans, celebrating England's world cup victory, want to see their heroes parade the Webb Ellis trophy through London. If this is cancelled, then the terrorists have won. "We defeat them not just by how we react, but by how we don't react."

2003-11-24T10:44:00.000Z

The Jewish question

In which European country is the Jewish population growing fastest?

Germany

In which European country are attacks on Jews rising dramatically?

Germany

In which EU country is there 4 million unemployed?

Germany

Scapegoats? You bet.

2003-11-24T10:22:00.000Z

England rules Rugby

Not since 1966, when England won the soccer world cup, have the English sported such broad smiles. Oxford Street resembled a ghost town last Saturday, as millions watched captain Martin Johnson pick up Rugby's William Webb-Ellis trophy. Bill is coming home. Yet few Brits even know the rules.

2003-11-21T12:52:00.000Z

Don't be chicken, Turkey

At the crossroads between West and East, Christianity and Islam, democracy and dictatorship, lies Turkey. Ironically, yesterday's attacks may push the country West for help against extremist Muslims, but also threatens its shaky democracy. This is nothing new, however. Support for America has always allowed Turks a free hand to suppress internal dissent, as its allies turned a blind eye.

But the newly elected government had been making good progress on human-rights reforms, in a bid to join the EU. The death penalty has been abolished and laws passed banning torture.

Yet there is still more to do. No doubt conservative elements in the military, all too influential, will use this latest terrorist outrage to resist further reform. European leaders should gently remind its neighbour that EU membership still depends on upholding basic democratic principles. Its so far impressive leader, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, must keep a cool head.

Deciding between security and democracy is a false choice. Continued beatings, arbitrary detentions and harassment against the Kurdish minority will push more young Turks into the hands of extremists. Where is the security in that? Deepening democracy is the path Jihadis most fear

2003-11-20T15:23:00.000Z

Strike back with force

It has happened again. Many dead, hundreds wounded. Istanbul joins a growing list of countries to suffer an Al Qaida attack: Bali, Jakarta, Casablanca, Bombay, Mombasa, Najaf, Jerusalem, Riyadh and Baghdad, all since September 11.

It would be easy to blame Bush and Blair for this latest atrocity. The Iraq war has caused anger and fostered resentment toward the West, particularly among Arabs who view the ousting of Saddam as colonial occupation, not liberation.

But does it justify bombing HSBC? Or a hotel? Or a nighclub? Blaming Blair and Bush is too simplistic.

Try this for size: Mr Sharon, tear down that wall and limit the security checks on ordinary Palestinians so they can earn a living; Saudi Arabia, please democratise; western countries, treat minorities better.

These are policies that tackle the root causes of terror. These are policies for the long term.

In the short term, however, we have to deal with the situation as we find it: Our business must be the destruction of those who make it theirs to destroy.

2003-11-19T12:09:00.000Z

More debt please

While some of the world's richer countries - the UK particularly - start to worry about consumer debt, which is at record levels, some developing countries are welcoming it. "Give us the money and we'll get the job done." The buzzword of the moment: microfinance. Lending small amounts to groups of women in Bangladesh, for example, has enabled them to purchase basic tools to make garments. They have sold these on at a healthy profit and have a good repayment record. Giving small loans in this way empowers poor women. It bypasses often corrupt governments and stifling bureaucracies that eat up development aid. And it also bypasses their husbands. Bad news for pimps, perhaps.

2003-11-18T16:51:00.000Z

Horses for courses

France's love affair with the cigarette maybe coming to an end. Taxes are set rise in January, much to the consternation of tobacconists, who are on strike. Smokers are addicts and therefore victims, so their argument goes. It would be wrong to punish them. The poor would suffer et cetera et cetera.

But would the poor really suffer, or just give up? A recent poll sheds some light on this burning issue - 67% of French smokers say the price of cigarettes would influence their decision to quit. Only 47% would gave up because they might die.

There are over 66,000 smoking-related deaths in France each year. Why should non-smokers have to pay for this?

Smokers argue they have been made the scapegoat for the dire state of French finances. Is this a health issue, or the government's attempt to climb out of a fiscal quagmire? They question whether the money will be used as intended.

Here they have a point. Horses for courses, as we Brits like to say. Raising specific taxes for specific ends simplifies politics. Politicians can explain these policies more effectively in a way that voters can better understand. That is why London mayor Ken Livingstone, who recently introduced a congestion charge, is likely to win re-election.

Road tolls to buy buses. Cancer-stick taxes to fund cancer treatments.

2003-11-17T10:06:00.000Z

One hundred dollar Levis

My former boss at World Link, Lance Knobel, makes a simple but incisive comment about the looming US/EU trade war: "Stephen Byers reckons targeted trade sanctions by Europe could hurt president Bush's re-election chances. I'd guess that it would just increase anti-European sentiment, which would probably help Bush."

He could use the sanctions on orange juice and Levis Jeans to demonstrate the futility of multilateralism. The look what they have done to us school could serve to justify further isolationism and bilateralism.

Then again, to do nothing in the face of America's flagrant disregard for international law would be far more damaging. Protectionism could proliferate. The if America can get away with it, why can't we school is likely to gain ground.

2003-11-14T15:43:00.000Z

Beg to differ

Should you give money to a homeless person? The principle that you should always help someone needier than yourself is certainly admirable. But does it work? Does it cure a mental illness, an alcohol problem or a drug addiction? Chances are, giving money to beggers perpetuate these problems.

It's not the giving that is wrong, but the way it is given.

There are other options. Donating to a charity can channel resources to where they are really needed: into support services, both medical and psycological, and into helping find and provide adequate shelter.

Some advocate a ban on begging and on giving to beggers. Others suggest a Giuliani-style, forced removal of rough sleepers from the streets.

These measures do not answer the real question: why.

Why do rich countries have homelessness at all? Why is it that so many ex-soldiers with combat experience sleep rough?
Why should politicians get away with their failed policies, which are plain to see when you walk past the sleeping bags and gag at the urine-stenched tragedy that is London's Charring Cross? But not be so obvious if they are banished out of sight, out of mind.

Round up the causes of homelessness, not its victims.

2003-11-12T16:02:00.000Z

Italians suspect foul play

Fans hate it. The clubs fear extinction because of it. And politicians who own them often fight it, tooth and nail. Yes folks, it's logical economics, hated by just about everyone in football. Logical economics has already claimed one major scalp: Fiorentina, twice winners of the Italian championship, were thrown out of the Italian football league altogether after failing to convince the Italian Football Federation it had enough money to survive.

But just as the world's most passionate football nation thought the worst was over, logical economics is set to return with a vengeance, this time in the guise of the European Commission. Its competition commissioner, Mario Monti, has cast doubt on Italian accounting law, which allows the clubs to spread their debts over ten years. The financial health of the club is overstated, misleading investors. The clubs' position in the transfer market is strengthened as a result, to the detriment of other clubs in Europe.

The azzuri are worried their beautiful game is under threat. If they are looking for scapegoats, they should look no further than their own club owners, who can't add up. The Commission is simply trying to level the playing field.

2003-11-11T17:40:00.000Z

God sack our Queen

Most Brits would vote to keep the monarchy, if a referendum was held tomorrow. The republican movement in this country is weak. Despite royal scandal after royal scandal, the debate usually centers on lurid sex details, court injunctions and the right to privacy.

Seldom is the real issue addressed. Who asked the Prince to be Prince, the Queen to be Queen? Apparently, God did. If a caste system, where you are born butcher, baker, candlestick maker, is no longer accepted, why are Henry VIII's relatives allowed free reign? In a supposed meritocracy, this is lunacy of hereditary proportions.

Some royally disagree. At least, in writing this weblog, I can no longer be sentenced to death for treason. God save the Human Rights Act 1998.

2003-11-10T16:17:00.000Z

An eye for an eye leaves everyone blind

The prisoners at Guantanamo have been held without access to civilian lawyers, and without trial and charge. If these people are truely guilty of murder and terrorism, the American government should feel comfortable letting the wheels of justice turn. At least now the US Supreme Court is looking into it.

Having to chose between safeguarding basic rights and improving security is a false choice. Abusing human rights in the name of security leads eventually and innevitably to less security. Al Qaida's vitality, after all, was born of Saudi brutality.

2003-11-07T10:52:00.000Z

Passing the buck

Walmart has been accused of employing illegal immigrants as cleaners. Don't blame us, blame the sub-contractors.

Railtrack, which took over railway maintenance in Britain when the trains were privatised, used a similar tactic when it was held responsible for fatal crashes. The response usually more outrageous: You better talk to the sub-contractor's sub-contractor's sub-contractors.

If large, private companies fail to take responsibility for their mistakes that have dire social consequences, then their businesses (as Railtrack's dissolution proved) will fail.

Engaging in a race to the bottom - reducing costs in an all-out war to stay competitive - inevitably ends up in hell.

2003-11-05T10:58:00.000Z

2003-11-05T10:07:00.000Z

Goodbye Lenin

The best and most original film I have seen this year. It brings to the fore not only the extraordinary events of October 1989 when the wall came down in Berlin, but also provides a balanced account of life thereafter.

A moving story with a good dose of humour too, Goodbye Lenin not only illustrates the harsh realities of Soviet Germany, but also provides a thoughtful critique of Western values that flooded the East after communism's collapse.

True, there is now freedom of press, speech and movement. But there is also some degree of nostalgia and resentment, as the Coca Colas and Ikeas of this world take the place of traditional industries. Alcoholism and despair fill the void, particularly among the older generation used to a simpler and more predictable way of life.

Yet national unity is a goal that most desire, reaching fever pitch when Germany lifts the World Cup a few months later. And the younger generation revels in the new choices and opportunities.

Alex, the film's lead, provides a bridge between the old and the new, presenting a third way: a fair, perhaps socialist society. But one that is open to news ideas - not hidden from view by a wall.

2003-11-04T10:54:00.000Z

The fairer sex

Women live longer, so face higher pension costs to cover them for a longer life. Men, particularly young men, cause more car accidents, so pay more for car insurance. These traditional assumptions, however, are challenged by a fascinating debate in Brussels.

Are some of Europe's awful drivers women? Yes. Do all women live longer than all men? No. Who knows who might drop down dead next? There are a number of factors that determine life expectancy, such as socio-economic or marital status, the region a person lives in or levels of smoking. Gender is at best a very rough guide.

Using gender as a basis to calculate risk is arbitrary, says the EU's employment commissioner, Anna Diamantopolou. Risk assessment should be calculated on a case-by-case basis, not group-by-group. If you cause accidents on the roads, you pay more insurance, regardless of your sex.

Critics have legitimate concerns. Would car insurance become cheaper for men if gender is taken out of the equation, or, as is likely, become more expensive for women?

These new ideas could represent another step on the long road to gender equality... in principle at least.

2003-11-03T11:38:00.000Z

Bashing Bush's Blunders

I am pleased to see that Sidney Blumenthal, a senior adviser to president Clinton, has begun writing a regular column for The Guardian. Expect a passionate defence of democratic principles and a critique of the Bush administration that may appear alarmist (he likes conspiracy theories) but is indeed supported with hard evidence.

His biography of his former employer, "The Clinton Wars", makes for compelling reading. The book details the sham of the impeachment trial and the ideological bias of the independent counsel set up to investigate the Clintons' financial affairs. Kenneth Starr, the prosecutor-and-chief, could find no wrongdoing. In desperation, he turned to investigarting the president's sex life.

Blumenthal details a disturbing partnership between conservative lawyers and think tanks hell-bent on ruining Clinton's second term, Republican politicians and journalists willing to print anything with the full backing of the news organisations they worked for.

It is the very same partnership that has given Bush an easy ride over Iraq and glossed over his administration's dire economic record. The very same partnership that will likely secure him a second term. Depressing.

2003-10-30T18:22:00.000Z

Don't believe everything EU read

What have the following stories got in common?

Ambulances turn yellow for Europe

EU law bans church bells

Sale of second hand toys by charity shops illegal

You would be forgiven for thinking that they have all come about as a result of unwarranted EU interference.

In fact, they are all made up. If proof were ever needed that a right-wing, anti-European agenda existed in the UK press, this is it.

2003-10-30T14:26:00.000Z

A different kind of war?

"The people who mounted the attacks on the Red Cross are not the Iraqi Vietcong. They are the Iraqi Khmer Rouge - a murderous band of Saddam loyalists and Al Qaeda nihilists, who are not killing us so Iraqis can rule themselves. They are killing us so they can rule Iraqis." Tom Friedman sums up the current situation in Iraq with chilling words.

There are similarities, however, with today's Iraq and yesterday's Vietnam. The US went into to Vietnam to stop Communism and went into Iraq to stop terrorism. In both cases, war did not prove the means to produce the desired ends.

Perhaps supporting human rights groups stands a better chance. Pro-democracy groups in Eastern Europe ultimately defeated the Soviet Union from within. Could similar groups in Saudi Arabia force change there, the birthplace of Al Qaeda?

2003-10-29T21:16:00.000Z

Like Lamy to the slaughter

He was widely blamed for the collapse of the Cancun trade talks last month. But EU trade commissioner Pascal Lamy is having none of it. At a press briefing with economic journalists, which I helped organise, the Frenchman spoke eloquently and indeed, convincingly, placing the blame at several doors.

"We fed the beast meat," Lamy argued, "but no one else wanted to... no one made concessions like we did." For example, some of the so-called Singapore issues, which among other things would open up public procurement in developing countries to foreign competition, were dropped. The EU has also reformed the Common Agricultural Policy, agreeing to scrap trade-distorting subsidies and link farm payments to environmental protection instead of production.

"Did we go far enough on CAP reform," Lamy asks? "Maybe we did too little, too late." But did developing countries gain anything from walking out? or the US by maintaining steel tariffs that are doing little but pushing up the cost of cars for American consumers and propping up a declining industry?

Perhaps if the US scrapped its own farm bill, which goes in the opposite direction of the CAP reform, and if developing countries lowered the trade barriers they erect between each other, we can rekindle the spirit of Doha.

2003-10-28T12:58:00.000Z

Bushism of the day

"The best way to get the news is from objective sources. And the most objective sources I have are people on my staff." Two words, responds Paul Krugman of The New York Times , "emperor and clothes".

The renowned economist is unrelenting in exposing the lies and half truths of the Bush administration. And unlike the rest of the US news media, he isn't afraid to call a spade a spade. Republican tax cuts are just plain "stupid".

Bush will likely be the first president since Herbert Hoover to preside over a net loss of American jobs. Over two million people have been thrown out of work since January 2001, while ten million jobs were created in Clinton's time. A record budget surplus has been turned into a record budget deficit in just three, scandalous years. Where has the money gone? Tax cuts for hard working families, claims the White House. Funny how in Bush world hard working families are golf course owners, Lexus drivers and oil billionaires.

2003-10-27T17:05:00.000Z

From Russia, No Love

Russia is set to overtake the UK economy in 2027, according to Goldman Sachs. The Russians have lots of oil and gas, and a strong president pushing through needed land and tax reforms. The Ruble is stable and the economy is growing faster than any other in the G8. Foreign investment is rising.

But how many companies still don't invest in Russia because of the perception (and, alas, stark reality) that the country is riddled with corruption? Is financial reporting transparent enough? No. Lack of press freedom doesn't help.

In any case, the size of an economy is irrelevant if only a few share its benefits. Russia remains one of the most unequal societies in the world. Just as several commentators predict that China will overtake the US as the world's largest economy, many also predict social tension to rise, as is the norm in authoritarian countries with poor human rights records, and where the have nots outnumber the haves.

2003-10-27T10:03:00.000Z

After Mandela

South Africa worries me. Could it become another Zimbabwe? It would be complacent to presume democracy in SA is safe. President Mbeki is not a reactionary like President Mugabe and has shown restraint in forcing white farmers to give their land to black South Africans, an issue that Mugabe has exploited to crush opposition. Mbeki recognises this must be done, if at all, in a way that ensures food security and provides the dispossessed with adequate compensation. The Truth and Reconciliation process has also helped to heal old wounds. Though the greatest challenges lie ahead.

What about the spiraling crime rate and the government's arrogant (criminal in itself) barring of anti-retroviral drugs in this Aids-ravaged country (only recently has it admitted it was wrong)? How about the unemployment rate of 40% plus and the corrupt police force? Then there is the near one-party state that could be exploited in Mugabe-like fashion, perhaps when moral guardians such as Mandela pass on and younger, more angry leaders take the helm.

Scratch below the surface and you have a white population in fear (many have left for Wimbledon) and a black population still in despair. You have a history of violence and counter-violence, an alomost total separation of the races (how many black South Africans are playing for the Spring Boks down under?) and a world that too frequently in this region has looked on while chaos reigns. This all sounds gloomy.

The key to preventing such a scenario is rapid economic development that leaves no South African behind.

Greater investment in education that fosters not just skills development but tolerance, political will to resist the temptations that Mugabe couldn't, and an ever-vigilant international community that also contributes more to economic renewal, can allow South Africa to remain a beacon of democracy and prosperity in Africa.

2003-10-24T14:07:00.000+01:00

2003-10-24T12:07:00.000+01:00

Housing Cost

If you don't own the home you live in, should you have a right to buy it? Margaret Thatcher reckoned so. Her 'right to buy' initiative allowed council house tenants the chance to get on the housing ladder.

The UK Labour Party now supports this policy and conceded the right to buy allowed many working class families to climb out of poverty.

But that's only half the story. The buying up of social housing meant fewer council houses for the needy. Witness the explosion in homelessness after Thatcher's policy was introduced. The government has at least recognised this and cut the discounts buyers receive.

Given the current prime minister has "no reverse gear", perhaps he should consider further ammendments. For every council house sold, a new council house should be built.

But this would cost billions, critics say. Perhaps. So why not levy hefty taxes on people who feel the need to own two, three or even four houses?

2003-10-23T15:49:00.000+01:00

Spurs

Kanoute is out for two months. Blx

2003-10-23T15:35:00.000+01:00

Gore War

What would have happened if Al Gore had won? Would the world still seem like such a dangerous place? Inevitably, yes. Whatever your views on Iraq, it's not just America that is creating instability. It is bad, undemocratic governments. It is a lack of opportunity and poverty that whip up frustration with the way things are. The US, and particularly the Bush administration, is blamed for just about everything. But a plague on all houses. Should the Bush administration be blamed for Palestinians and Israelis killing each other? Or should their own leaders - Sharon and Arafat - be castigated for showing little or no will to stop the carnage? Is it America's fault that the Cancun talks on free trade collapsed, or should the EU and developing countries, rigid in their views on farm subsidies, take some responsibility?

Whoever is to blame for the world's ills, there is no doubt that America can and must do more to cure them. From signing the Kyoto Protocol to reducing steal tariffs to winning the peace as well as the war in Iraq, the Bush administration has its work cutout and many battles to fight. I can't help thinking that Gore would have faced these challenges head on, instead of retreating behind the flag of insulation.

Got a comment? email: nickdesouza@hotmail.com