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Neo-cons see Iran behind Shiite uprising
By Jim Lobe
Washington, DC, Apr. 9 (IPS) — Neo-conservatives close
to the administration of President George W Bush are pushing for retribution
against Iran for, they say, sponsoring this week’s Shiite uprising
in Iraq led by radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.
Despite the growing number of reports that depict the fighting as a
spontaneous and indigenous revolt against the US-led occupation, the
influential neo-cons are calling on Bush to warn Tehran to cease its
alleged backing for al-Sadr and other Shia militias or face retaliation,
ranging from an attack on Iranian nuclear facilities to covert action
designed to overthrow the government.
But independent experts say that while Iran has no doubt provided various
forms of assistance to Shia factions in Iraq since the ouster of former
President Saddam Hussein one year ago, its relations with Sadr have
long been rocky, and that it has opposed radical actions that could
destabilize the situation.
“Those elements closest to Iran among the Shiite clerics [in Iraq]
have been the most moderate through all of this,” according to
Shaul Bakhash, an Iran expert at George Mason University in Virginia.
Many regional specialists agree that Iran has a strategic interest in
avoiding any train of events that risks plunging Iraq into chaos or
civil war and partition.
Neo-conservatives centered in Vice President Dick Cheney’s office
and among the civilian leadership in the Pentagon have strongly opposed
any détente with Iran, and have frequently blamed it for problems
the United States has encountered in both Afghanistan and Iraq.
Neo-conservatives outside the administration, such as former Defense
Policy Board chairman Richard Perle and his colleagues at the American
Enterprise Institute (AEI), Michael Ledeen and Reuel Marc Gerecht, called
even before the Iraq war for Washington to support indigenous efforts
to oust the “mullahcracy” in Tehran, which is seen as an arch-enemy
of both the United States and Israel.
Some neo-conservatives have seized on Sadr’s uprising as a new
opportunity both to raise tensions against Iran and to divert attention
from Washington’s bungling of relations with the Shia community
in Iraq.
Top US officials both here and in Iraq have not yet named Iran as the
hidden hand behind Sadr, although a senior reporter at the right-wing
Washington Times, Rowan Scarborough, quoted unnamed “military sources”
Apr. 4 as telling him that Sadr “is being aided directly by Iran’s
Revolutionary Guard and by Hezbollah, an Iranian-created terrorist group
based in Lebanon.”
Unnamed “Pentagon officials” gave a similar account to the
New York Times, although Times reporter James Risen stressed that CIA
officials disagreed with that analysis, adding that some intelligence
officials believe the Pentagon has been eager to link Hezbollah to the
violence in Iraq to link the Iranian regime more closely to anti-American
terrorism.
The Iran hand was first raised in connection with Sadr’s revolt
by Michael Rubin, who just returned as a “governance team advisor”
for the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) in Iraq to his
previous position as a resident fellow at AEI.
In a column published in the Los Angeles Times on Apr. 4, he complained
that Washington and the CPA had failed to provide liberal and democratic
Iraqi leaders with anything like the kind of support that Iran was supplying
to radical Shia leaders and their “gangs.”
Rubin said that on a visit to the Shia-dominated south he found that
Iranians were pouring money and arms to key Islamist parties, including
the Da’wa, the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI),
and Sadr himself, whose rise over the past year, according to Rubin,
is explained by the “ample funding he receives through Iran-based
cleric Ayatollah Kazem al Haeri, a close associate of Iranian Supreme
Leader Ayatollah Ali Khameini.”
Another senior CPA adviser, Larry Diamond, a neo-conservative who specializes
in democratization at the California-based Hoover Institution, told
IPS that Sadr’s Mahdi Army, and other Shia militias, are being
armed and financed by Iran with the aim of imposing “another Iranian-style
theocracy.”
“Iran is embarked on a concerned, clever, lavishly-resourced campaign
to defeat any effort for any genuine pluralist democracy in Iraq,”
said Diamond. “The longer we wait to confront the thug, the more
troops he’ll have in his army, the more arms he’ll have and
financial support — virtually all coming from Iran — the more
he will intimidate and kill sincere democratic actors in the country,
and the more impossible our task at building democracy will become.
“I think we should tell the Iranian regime that if they don’t
cease and desist, we will play the same game, that we will destabilize
them,” he added.
On Apr. 6, the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page took up the
same theme, arguing that Sadr has talked “openly of creating an
Iranian-style Islamic Republic in Iraq [and] has visited Tehran since
the fall of Saddam. His Mahdi militia is almost certainly financed and
trained by Iranians,” the editorial continued, adding, “Revolutionary
Guards may be instigating some of the current unrest.”
“As for Tehran, we would hope the Sadr uprising puts to rest the
illusion that the mullahs [in Tehran] can be appeased. As Bernard Lewis
teaches, Middle Eastern leaders interpret American restraint as weakness.
Iran’s mullahs fear a Muslim democracy in Iraq because is it a
direct threat to their own rule.”
“If warnings to Tehran from Washington don’t impress them,
perhaps some cruise missiles aimed at the Bushehr nuclear site will
concentrate their minds,” the Journal suggested.
On Apr. 7, New York Times columnist William Safire asserted the existence
of an axis involving Sadr, Iran, Hezbollah, and Syria. “We should
break the Iranian-Hezbollah-Sadr connection in ways that our special
forces know how to do,” he wrote.
But this line of reasoning appears particularly curious to Bakhash,
who notes that the Sadr family, including Moqtada himself, is precisely
the kind of Iraqi Shi’ite who would be deeply suspicious of Tehran.
“Sadr’s father was a strong Iraqi nationalist, like Moqtada
himself,” he told IPS. “He often used to question why there
were in Iraq ayatollahs who spoke Arabic with a Persian accent.”
Like other experts, Bakhash believes that Iran has indeed been heavily
involved with the Iraqi Shia community, but sees the leadership providing
far more support to SCIRI and its Badr brigades than to Sadr, who, from
Tehran’s point of view, is seen as untrustworthy.
Bakhash also questions the neo-conservative assumption that Iran wants
to destabilize Iraq now. “Obviously the Iranians are not unhappy
to see the Americans discomfited in Iraq, but I don’t think it’s
the policy of the Iranian government to destabilise Iraq right along
its own border,” he said.
Middle East historian Juan Cole of the University of Michigan also questions
the notion of a link between Iran and Sadr in the current uprising.
While Sadr’s views on theocratic government are consistent with
those of Iranian hardliners, according to Cole, his outspoken Iraqi
nationalism poses a major challenge to Khameini’s claim to authority
over all Shi’ite religious communities, including those outside
Iran.
Contrary to the Journal’s assumptions, adds Cole, Sadr did not
receive much encouragement from the Iranians leaders he met in Tehran.
“The message he got was that he should stop being so divisive and
should cooperate more with the other Shi’ite leaders.”
Geoffrey Kemp, an Iran specialist at the Nixon Center and Middle East
adviser on former president Ronald Reagan’s National Security Council
staff, says he has little doubt the Iranians have influence with several
different Shi’ite groups, and that there might even be “rogue
elements” inside Iraq who back Sadr.
But he agrees that Tehran’s strongest ties are with SCIRI and the
Badr Brigades, who were trained by the Revolutionary Guard inside Iran
during Hussein’s rule. “The situation is far too complex to
make simplistic statements about what Iran is or is not doing,”
Kemp told IPS. “But to suggest that this is an Iranian-inspired
insurrection is a stretch.”
“The neo-conservatives are all so heavily invested in the success
of Iraq that instead of blaming the Pentagon for some extraordinary
blunders, they want to blame everyone else — the State Department,
the Iranians, the Syrians for the mess that was partly of their own
making.”
US, France blocking Haiti probe
By Thalif Deen
New York, New York, Apr. 13 (IPS)— The United States and
France have intimidated Caribbean countries into delaying an official
request for a probe into the murky circumstances under which Haitian
President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was ousted from power in February,
according to diplomatic sources here.
The two veto-wielding permanent members of the 15-nation Security Council
have signaled to Caribbean nations that they do not want a UN probe
of Aristide’s ouster.
Any attempts to bring the issue or even introduce a resolution before
the Security Council will either be blocked or vetoed by both countries,
UN council sources said.
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who has been caught in the middle of
the dispute, says he is unable to act unless he has a formal request
to do so either by the Security Council or the 15-member Caribbean Community
(CARICOM), of which Haiti is a member.
“We have read news reports that CARICOM wants a UN investigation.
But unless we receive an official request either from CARICOM or from
the Security Council, we cannot act on it,” said UN spokesman Farhan
Haq.
Aristide left Haiti in the midst of a violent uprising Feb. 29. Now
in Jamaica, Aristide, the country’s first democratically elected
leader, was kidnapped by the US, with strong backing from France. Both
countries have dismissed the charge.
“I don’t think any purpose would be served by an inquiry,”
US Secretary of State Colin Powell told reporters during a 24-hour visit
to Haiti last week. “We were on the verge of a bloodbath and President
Aristide found himself in great danger,” he said.
At its summit meeting Mar. 27, CARICOM heads of government “reiterated
their call for an investigation under the auspices of the United Nations.”
But despite that announcement, the group has been dragging its feet
over a formal request for a probe.
“The reasons are obvious,” says a Caribbean diplomat, speaking
on condition of anonymity. “We are under tremendous pressure not
to follow up on our request.”
A two-day meeting of the 15-member CARICOM and UN officials that began
Apr. 12 also failed to resolve the issue. The gathering focused on ways
to strengthen cooperation between Caribbean nations and the world body.
In a statement issued last month, CARICOM said, “In the light of
contradictory reports still in circulation concerning the departure
of President Aristide from office, heads of government [of CARICOM]
believed that it is in the compelling interest of the international
community that the preceding events and all the circumstances surrounding
the transfer of power from a constitutionally elected head of state,
be fully investigated.”
One constitutional expert who closely monitors the United Nations says
it is obvious where the blame lies.
“It is clear that the United States and France violated the UN
charter as well as the 1973 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment
of Crimes Against Internationally Protected Persons, with respect to
their criminal treatment of President Aristide,” said Francis Boyle,
professor of international law at the University of Illinois College
of Law.
Boyle said that Aristide still remains the lawful president of Haiti,
a member state of the United Nations. He said Annan should have publicly
taken that position, and the Security Council should have demanded Aristide’s
immediate return to Haiti.
Just days prior to Aristide’s flight from Haiti, the Security Council
denied his request for military intervention to quell the uprising,
but it authorised an international military force just hours after he
left the country.
Boyle said it is important for CARICOM to take the matter to the 191-member
UN General Assembly, “in order to uphold the integrity of the UN
Charter, which Annan and the Security Council have repeatedly failed
and refused to do.”
Boyle also urged the Caribbean nations and other states to sue both
the United States and France for violating the 1973 Convention before
the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Hague, “in order
to have the World Court as well condemn what these two malefacting states
have done to Haiti and President Aristide, and to secure his return
to Haiti by means of an ICJ order.”
Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University
and a special adviser to Annan, has called on the United Nations to
restore Aristide to power.
To trained observers, he said last month, the events surrounding the
ouster of Aristide “have the hallmarks of a US-led operation against
Aristide, similar to the 1991 coup against him during the administration
of George H.W. Bush, in which the US government fingerprints abounded
(including thugs who subsequently acknowledged being on the payroll
of the Central Intelligence Agency).”
The situation in Haiti clearly shows it is the Security Council, not
the United Nations, which is really ineffective, Joan Russow of the
Global Compliance Research Project told IPS.
“The Security Council has continued to violate the principle of
sovereign equality in the UN Charter. The Council has been discredited
primarily because of the use of the veto by the United States and specifically
by the US practice of intimidating, cajoling, and offering cheque-book
diplomacy.”
In the case of Haiti, she said, the General Assembly should request
the International Court of Justice in The Hague to examine the US intervention.
European anti-terror plans in trouble
By Stefania Bianchi
Brussels, Apr. 7 (IPS) -- Anti-terrorism measures agreed by
European leaders only a few weeks back have run into difficulties.
Following the Mar. 11 Madrid bomb attacks, European Union (EU) leaders
agreed Mar. 25 to a wide range of cross-border efforts to fight terrorism.
These included appointment of an anti-terror coordinator, improvement
in intelligence cooperation, more access to communication data (over
telephones and the internet), and the setting up of a European register
on convictions.
But the plans have run into trouble over responsibilities and budgetary
restrictions.
Concerns have been raised over the powers of the anti-terrorism coordinator
and how he could persuade intelligence agencies of the EU’s member
states to share more information.
The coordinator Gijs de Vries who was appointed just over a week ago,
has indicated already that the responsibility lies primarily with
member states.
“My personal responsibilities are restricted,” de Vries
told members of the European Parliament’s Citizens Freedoms and
Rights Committee Apr. 6.
“The EU has limited responsibility on terrorism,” he said.
“Combating terrorism is primarily a national responsibility and
subject to national parliaments’ scrutiny.” De Vries also
stressed that, “the Union will not replace the member states
in the fight against terrorism.”
Some observers are concerned that member states may not support de
Vries in his mission.
“The decision to appoint Gijs de Vries as the new counter-terrorism
coordinator is an important step, but whether he will receive the
support and trust of the national secret services remains to be seen,”
said Mirjam Dittrich from the European Policy Center.
Liberal Democrat member of the European Parliament (MEP) Graham Watson
told the BBC that there are “clearly concerns about whether countries
can trust each other over intelligence. I think the question that
needs to be asked is can we afford not to trust each other in these
areas.”
Some EU officials are also concerned that the anti-terrorism measures
may be over-ambitious, given the bloc’s budgetary restrictions.
EU budget commissioner Michaele Schreyer said this week that the EU
needs to increase spending to fund a raft of anti-terror laws and
for the bloc’s enlargement in May.
“I think it is clear it is a very small budget and not big enough
to fit the very ambitious agenda set out by national governments over
the last month in particular,” Schreyer told media representatives
Apr. 5.
There are also political problems. Some EU officials and observers
say that the proposed anti-terrorism measures are nothing new and
that the goodwill that member states have shown since the Madrid bombings
will evaporate.
Many officials say that what Europe needs is not new posts but implementation
of measures agreed after the Sept. 11 bombings in New York.
“We drew up an action plan to combat terrorism: we made all kinds
of commitments, and then somehow a year or so after the attacks on
New York, the enthusiasm for it seemed to just peter out,” Schreyer
said.
Didier Bigo from the Brussels-based Center for European Studies says
it is “striking” to see how the measures have been presented
politically as being brand new and rather ambitious.
“They are, however, neither new nor particularly adequate in
view of the apparent low degree of protection and guarantees of human
rights, civil liberties of all EU citizens, and the actual rule of
law that they provide,” he said.
Critics of the EU’s proposals say that the bloc must look beyond
security to the root causes of terrorism.
“While no cause justifies terrorism, we cannot afford to not
deal with the issues that lie behind terrorism,” Dittrich said.
“What Europe needs, aside from enhanced coordination in security,
is a long-term strategy to tackle the root causes of terrorism.”
Groups say partial debt forgiveness
inadequate
By Emad Mekay
Washington, DC, Apr. 9 (IPS) — International creditors
of the African nation of Niger have agreed to cancel $1.2 billon of
its debt over time under a controversial debt relief scheme, rewarding
the country for its pro-free market economic restructuring plan.
Niger becomes the 11th nation to reach the completion point of the
Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative (HIPC) — the mark
where creditors permanently grant debt forgiveness. But doubts remain
over whether the move will actually reduce poverty in one of the world’s
poorest nations.
“Our call is for a 100 percent debt cancellation,” said
Neil Watkins of Jubilee USA Network, a leading group that lobbies
for debt forgiveness.
“Even though debt relief has been beneficial in many cases, the
overall record has been that after eight years the HIPC initiative
has been too slow with too many conditions for not enough countries.”
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank’s International
Development Association (IDA), which offers concessional loans on
easy terms, say they agreed this week that Niger has made the economic
changes necessary to receive the partial debt cancellation.
The Washington-based organizations say they also moved now to offset
recent negative economic news for the country, including a decline
in uranium exports, lower US dollar discount rates and a shortfall
in external grant financing.
Despite the market slump, uranium still provides 72 percent of Niger’s
export proceeds.
Under the HIPC, the World Bank will forgive $408.7 million of the
nation’s debt while the IMF will cancel 59.9 million dollars.
Members of the Paris Club, 19 governments of northern countries with
large claims on other nations, are expected to grant debt relief of
$300 million.
Several Paris Club creditors have said they will provide additional
sums estimated to total about $33 million; France, the United Kingdom
and the United States have already started that process.
Non-Paris Club creditors are expected to provide debt relief worth
about $210.3 million to Niger, said the IMF and the World Bank in
a statement.
The bank estimated Niger’s foreign debt at 1.8 billion dollars
at the end of 2002, up from 1.6 billion in 2001.
The IMF and World Bank, often blamed for slapping burdensome conditions
on borrowing nations, said the new relief comes as a result of Niger’s
adherence to free market economic principles.
The country has embarked on an ambitious program to privatize 12 state-owned
companies, including the water and telephone utilities.
Niger, a landlocked nation of 11 million people on the southwestern
edge of the Sahara Desert, has a very narrow national resource base
and is highly vulnerable to external shocks, such as droughts.
Its gross domestic product (GDP) per capita was only about 200 dollars
in 2002. Two-thirds of the population lives below the poverty line,
while one-third can be considered extremely poor.
The Human Development Index of the United Nations Development Program
ranked Niger 174th out of 175 countries in 2003.
The IMF and World Bank are scheduled to hold their spring meetings
in Washington from Apr. 24 to 25, with debt one of the many issues
on the official agenda. Anti-debt campaigners say they plan dozens
of events that will bring the failings of the HIPC to light.
The program was launched in 1996, after the two international financial
institutions (IFIs) came under strong criticism for their handling
of poor nations’ debts. The HIPC permits all creditors, including
multilateral lenders, to provide debt relief to the world’s poorest
and most heavily indebted countries.
To date, 27 countries — two-thirds of the HIPCs — have reached
their decision points, the stage at which creditors agree to consider
debt relief, which amounts to more than $51 billion.
Of these nations, 11 countries — Benin, Bolivia, Burkina Faso,
Guyana, Mauritania, Niger, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Niger, Tanzania
and Uganda — have now reached the points where creditors actually
write off the debts.
The HIPC has been criticized by civil society groups, activists, some
economists and even some experts at the bank and IMF, who argue that
debt relief has failed to trickle down to the grassroots in highly
indebted countries.
In a 2002 report, staff at the Bank and the Fund described HIPC as
a project that had gone largely off-track. As many as 10 of the 27
countries would still face debt problems after reaching their completion
points, the report conceded. That is twice as many as anticipated
in 2001.
Some countries, like Bolivia, were also borrowing much more than had
been previously anticipated — often to compensate for lack of
tax revenues due to slower than expected growth, it added.
Advocacy groups want all debt owed by these nations cancelled, arguing
it will free up desperately needed money for social services and health
care, especially the fight against HIV/AIDS.
More than one-half of African nations spend more on debt payments
to the IMF, World Bank and rich countries than on health care for
their citizens.
The groups estimate that wealthy nations will spend at least $10 billion
annually in aid to fight HIV and AIDS; Africa governments pay $15
billion each year to service their debts.
“The spread of the AIDS virus won’t stop and wait for the
IMF and World Bank to cancel the debt,” said Marie Clarke, Jubilee
USA Network National Coordinator.
“While the IMF and the World Bank fiddle around with HIPC, the
AIDS pandemic claims 8,000 lives each day this tragedy cannot be allowed
to continue,” she said.
Military marching out of parliament
— for good
By Andreas Harsono
Jakarta, Indonesia, Apr. 12 (IPS) --- For nearly 50 years,
the Indonesian military held 20 percent of seats in parliament, but
the time has now come for these unelected officers to leave the legislative
building for good — and find a new place in the country’s
changed political landscape.
When the new and expanded parliament, for which elections were held
in April, convenes in October, there will no longer be in its midst
the 75 military-clad members who used to be appointed by Indonesian
leaders, including former dictator Mohamed Suharto.
This change marks the phaseout of yet another step in the democratic
reforms underway since 1998 in the world’s fourth most populous
country.
“It’s going to be different because we used to see these
officers coming on time (for legislative sessions),’’ remarks
Ujang Royadi, an employee in Senayan, as the parliament building in
central Jakarta is popularly called, as if to say that civilian politicians
are not as disciplined as the military officers.
But democracy is not only a matter of arriving for sessions on time.
The laws that allowed the nomination of military offices into parliament
-- thereby institutionalizing the military’s role in Indonesian
politics -- has long been cited as one of the biggest flaws of the
country’s political system.
“We have not been a democracy yet over the last five years, because
we still had those unelected people. But [now] we will be more democratic
indeed,’’ says Rahman Tolleng, a former legislator who in
the early 1970s witnessed how the Indonesian military took over 20
percent of parliamentary seats.
The idea of putting unelected officers in parliament began in 1959,
when Indonesia’s founding President Sukarno dismissed the democratically
elected parliament and appointed politicians to represent various
groups in a pseudo-parliament. He included the military in it.
Sukarno was toppled in a coup in 1965 and the military-backed regime
of Suharto strengthened the military’s role in the early 1970s.
Suharto had the Indonesian military occupy 100 of the 500 seats in
parliament.
The argument for doing this at the time was to stabilize Indonesia’s
secular constitution and protect it from either the communists or
the Muslim fundamentalists.
Suharto then began the militarization of the Indonesian political
structure, installing active military officers as ministers, governors,
regents, and other officials. The military also introduced a doctrine
called its “dual function” to justify their presence in
civilian roles.
After Suharto was forced to step down in 1998 amid popular protests,
civil society organizations immediately called on the military to
get out of their parliamentarian seats — national, provincial,
and local — as well as to dismantle their territorial commands.
But during the transitional period in democratic reform since then,
civilian leaders, including the incumbent President Megawati Sukarnoputri,
agreed to let these unelected military officers keep their parliamentary
seats after reducing their number from 100 to 75.
It was only in 2002 when the People’s Consultative Assembly,
the country’s highest representative body, agreed to scrap the
military seats altogether.
The Indonesian military also began to ban active military officers
from seeking elected office, agreeing to peacefully step back from
parliament - whose membership will now be increased to 550 —
when its new members convene in October. But while the military’s
departure from parliament is a positive sign for an emerging democracy,
genuine reform in the military’s role in politics is another
issue.
Tolleng said that as long as the territorial commands — another
Suharto legacy — are still in place, it is actually easy for
the military to jump back into politics.
The continued existence of these commands show that the idea of civilian
supremacy is not fashionable among many Indonesian officers. “Especially
among the retired ones,’’ said Agus Widjojo, a retired three-star
general who helped draft the pullout of the military from parliament
two years ago.
Rizal Sukma, a defense analyst at the Centre for Strategic and International
Studies here, said that in truth, many active military officers continue
to intervene in daily politics.
“The armed forces’ headquarters still directs the Ministry
of Defense, rather than the other way around,’’ said Rizal,
citing examples like active generals who are still directing weapons
procurement and defense policies.
Last year, a controversy broke out when military headquarters reportedly
decided to buy four Russian Sukhoi jet fighters and two helicopters
without the involvement of Defense Minister Matori Abdul Djalil, who
was confined in a Singapore hospital at the time.
“Old habits die hard,’’ Rizal said in an interview.
Critics said that Djalil, a close, mild-mannered confidante of Megawati,
does not understand military issues well enough to win respect from
his generals. His lack of expertise is a liability given the strong
political tradition of the Indonesian military and has created difficulties
between the generals with their civilian minister.
“It is still new for our generals to accept a civilian to be
their boss,’’ said Widjojo.
But despite the hurdles, the overall trend of sweeping parliament
clean of military appointees has become difficult to reverse.
Posma Lumbang Tobing, a police general, is the last officer to head
the current military faction in Senayan. “We also contributed
a lot to the parliament,’’ he said, adding that a team of
academics will be writing a book about the military faction that has
been in parliament for 45 years.
Said Tobing: “At least, we instilled discipline in being on time,
hopefully future members will have that discipline.’’
April vote between old and new politics
By Suvendrini Kakuchi
Seoul, South Korea, Apr. 8 (IPS)— South Korea’s
hotly contested parliamentary elections this month pose a problem
for Lee Jeong-ju, the owner of a large shop selling ladies’
handbags in central Seoul who describes himself as a die-hard democrat.
“I’m almost certain I will vote for the reformist Uri
Party, even though as a businessman I am worried whether this party
has the experience to guide the economy,’’ says 36-year-old
Lee, whose views in many ways echoe those of many other voters in
the days leading to the Apr. 15 vote.
“President Roh is seen as standing for justice, transparency,
and accountability to the people. On the other hand, sticking with
the old guard is expected to bring stability needed for economic
growth,’’ says Ben Lim, a lawyer and advisor to successive
governments.
The upcoming general election, perceived to be crucial for South
Korea’s democracy, pits impeached President Roh Moo-hun’s
Uri Party against the Grand National Party and Millennium Democratic
Party, which comprise conservative politicians.
In the last polls in December 2002, Roh garnered 49 percent of the
vote while his conservative opponent got 47 percent. Candidates
will contest 299 seats in parliament next week. Polls indicate that
the opposition is struggling against the Uri Party mainly because
of an impeachment they brought against Roh on Mar. 12, one that
triggered angry protests among the public and divided the country.
At the time, Roh’s foes in parliament sought his impeachment
on the grounds of “illegal campaigning’’ when he
called for support for his parliamentary faction ahead of the April
election. A Constitutional Court will decide whether to return Roh’s
powers for the rest of his term until 2008. Calling for sweeping
reforms, the Uri Party is campaigning on promises of more jobs,
support for labor unions, unification with North Korea, and cleaner
politics and businesses.
But some say that Roh’s biggest chance for victory may actually
have emerged through the impeachment, which followed his casual
remarks at a television show that indicated his support for his
Uri Party.
“What’s wrong with saying you support your own party?’’
asks Lee. “It is very arrogant of opposition politicians to
impeach him.’’
From a larger point of view, the election promises a regime change
and takes up a generation issue. Roh, 57, and most candidates running
in the Uri Party are in their forties and fifties. They are highly
popular with the younger generation, which marks a contrast with
Korea’s conservative culture that has long respected its elders
and seen as the ones who can — and should — lead the country.
Professor Kim Il-young, political scientist at Sungkyung University,
explains that Roh’s popularity signals the growing power of
the younger generations — youth in their 20s and 30s —
who represent an affluent and confident South Korea.
Reared at a time when South Korea’s newly industrialized economy
grew rapidly, these youth, say Kim, do not share the stoic endurance
of the older generation that faced the horrors of the Korean War
and worked hard to make their country rich.
Referred to as the “red devils,” the younger South Koreans’
voice has increasingly been heard in recent years through phenomenon
such as the nationalism in the 2002 football World Cup, when the
national team entered the finals in a dramatic achievement for an
Asian team in a European-dominated game.
“The skills of the flamboyant young soccer team gave the new
generation tremendous confidence,’’ Jim says, adding that
from a sociological point of view, these are the people who “believe
that by taking to the streets they can demand change, unlike the
stoic older generation that views change suspiciously.’’
Choi Yul, head of the Green Foundation, cannot agree more.
A former leader of the violent student protests that led the democratic
movement in the seventies, Choi says the current atmosphere of heady
“people power” is too strong even for many politicians.
But this, he adds, should not be cause for worry but be seen a sign
of democratic maturity.
“I don’t know why conservatives should be frightened.
The world should view the mass demonstrations against Roh’s
impeachment as steps toward freedom of speech and anti-corruption,
which is a good thing,’’ he insists.
The April election is also important because it takes places in
a changed political environment. Vested interests such as regionalism
and money politics heavily colored the “older” South Korea,
which has been led by successive military governments that pushed
economic growth ahead of issues of human rights.
Even South Korea’s celebrated democratic presidents, Kim Young-sam
and Kim Dae-jung, are seen as part of the older brand of politics,
slower to implement reform.
Roh, however, is perceived as fresh and idealistic, not scared to
speak his mind. Among his strengths is the perception of him as
a people’s leader without connections to old interests.
Media editorials, however, warn that the younger generation is going
too far and is far too impatient for change. In its Apr. 5 editorial,
the English-language Korea Times newspaper points out that there
are wide economic and social problems still dogging the country
and that a stable and competent government remains crucial to its
survival.
Energy crisis highlights risk of
dependency
By Mario Osava
Rio De Janeiro, Apr. 12 (IPS)— Natural gas, which has
fuelled growing physical integration among countries in the Southern
Cone region of South America, has now revealed the risk of energy
dependency.
The recent reduction in Argentina’s natural gas exports to
Chile and Uruguay, a result of Argentina’s inability to cover
domestic demand while fully living up to the terms of export agreements,
has become a source of tension between countries that enjoy strong,
friendly relations.
The Uruguayan government seems to have a solution close at hand
to avoid blackouts, which have largely become a thing of the past:
buying electricity from its other giant neighbor, Brazil.
But in the case of Chile, there are no near-by alternatives to make
up for the shortfall in gas from Argentina.
The average 22 million cubic meters a day of gas that Argentina
was exporting to Chile represented more than one-fourth of the energy
consumed in Chile. But the exports have been reduced by 3.3 million
cubic meters a day so far and the flow continues to shrink, due
to the continuing energy crisis in Argentina.
The Chilean government has protested, demanding compliance with
the energy integration agreement signed by the two countries in
1995, under which Argentina committed itself to putting the same
priority on exports to Chile as on supplies for its domestic market.
Bolivia, another major South American exporter of natural gas, is
not a possible source of fuel for Chile due to the longstanding
territorial dispute between the two neighbors, dating back to when
Bolivia lost its Pacific shoreline to Chile in the War of the Pacific
(1879-1883). Since then, La Paz has continually demanded an outlet
to the sea.
When it comes to energy supplies, solidarity with one’s neighbor
apparently dries up when there are shortages at home. Although Brazil
came to Argentina’s aid, providing it with gas between Mar.
30 and Apr. 2, it turned down a request to continue the flow of
supplies within the framework of a bilateral accord for cooperation
in emergency situations.
Under that agreement, energy is not sold, but must merely be returned
at some point in the future. Brazil has set a 45-day deadline in
this case.
“The priority of the Brazilian government is ensuring domestic
supplies,’’ said the Ministry of Mines and Energy.
Southern Brazil is currently plagued by a drought that has drastically
reduced the level of water in the dams, and thus the capacity to
generate hydropower.
Nor can Brazil count on imports of gas from Argentina, which supplied
several of its gas-fired thermal power plants.
If Argentina wishes to import electricity from Brazil this month,
it will have to pay the higher prices of gas- or coal-fired thermal
power, depending on the availability of surplus energy, as authorities
in Brazil have made clear.
Argentina’s energy crisis, which is blamed on the privatized
power companies’ failure to make the necessary investments
in the infrastructure needed for internal distribution of gas, has
revealed the risks of “energy integration’’ between
countries prone to a certain level of instability.
As the energy industry was privatized in much of the region, the
1990s gave rise to a broad network of cross-border pipelines distributing
fuel from gas-rich Argentina and Bolivia to their neighbors in the
Southern Cone region of South America.
The use of natural gas has boomed in Argentina, Chile and Uruguay,
largely because they have much colder winters than the rest of South
America, and the need for heating has created a market for the fuel
along with broad distribution networks, Rosalino Fernandes, coordinator
of the Brazilian Petroleum Institute’s (IBP) Gas Committee
said.
Climatic differences explain the dissimilarity in the development
of energy between Brazil and its neighbors to the south, he noted.
In addition, Brazil has abundant sources of hydropower, a lower-cost
form of energy which accounts for more than 80 percent of domestic
consumption.
But what the Argentine crisis confirms is “the need to diversify
energy sources,’’ to ensure stability of supplies, said
Fernandes, who is also a technology consultant at White Martins,
an industrial gas company.
In 2001, Brazil was forced to adopt energy rationing measures when
scant rainfall in the country reduced the capacity to generate hydropower.
The drought heightened the role of natural gas in the generation
of thermoelectricity and underscored the need to meet the official
goal of increasing the proportion of electricity provided by gas-fired
plants from two to 10 percent of total energy production by 2010.
Brazil has been importing gas from Bolivia since 1999. However,
this country of nearly 180 million still consumes just 22 million
cubic meters a day of natural gas, compared to the more than 70
million cubic meters consumed in Argentina, a country of 37 million,
Fernandes pointed out.
Last year’s discovery of large gas deposits that will at the
very least triple Brazil’s reserves has reduced the country’s
dependence on imports.
However, if the Brazilian economy once again attains steady growth
and investment in the energy industry remains low, this country
will need to increase imports of gas from Argentina and Bolivia,
in order to ward off another energy crisis, which could hit in 2012,
said Leonardo Campos, an expert with the Brazilian Infrastructure
Center (CBIE), a local consultancy.
If that scenario plays out, Brazil will become a growing importer
and the network of gas pipelines in the Southern Cone region will
continue to expand, despite the risks posed by interdependence,
as demonstrated by Argentina’s current crisis.
Women demand a place at the negotiating
table
By Joyce Mulama
Nairobi, Kenya Apr. 9 (IPS) — Strategic Initiatives
for the Horn of Africa, a regional organization that promotes women’s
participation in politics, has called for gender issues to be addressed
in the Sudanese peace negotiations.
“So far, there is no voice of women in the talks. Women are
not visible in whatever has been accomplished at the negotiations
and that is why we are advocating for them to have a say in the
process, because they are the ones who have been affected most by
the civil war in Sudan,” Hala Elkanib, Director of Strategic
Initiatives for the Horn of Africa (SIHA), told IPS in Nairobi.
SIHA serves as an umbrella organization for 18 groups from Djibouti,
Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia and Sudan.
Negotiations to end 21 years of civil war in Sudan are currently
underway in Kenya between government and the rebel Sudan People’s
Liberation Army. The conflict between Muslim authorities in the
north and southern rebels has led to the death of over two million
people and caused an additional four million to become internally
displaced. About half-a-million Sudanese have been turned into refugees.
The talks, which began in 2002, bore fruit last September when the
warring parties agreed to integrate troops from both sides into
a national army. Further progress was made at the start of this
year when they reached consensus on sharing Sudan’s oil wealth
and other government revenues.
However, a settlement has yet to be established for control over
the contested areas of Abyei, the Nuba Mountains and the Southern
Blue Nile.
“We are lobbying civil society groups and political parties
in Sudan to ensure women are represented at an equal level to their
male counterparts. We demand a 50 percent representation,”
said Elkanib, who hopes this will result in policies which protect
women and girls from violence, particularly that arising from armed
conflict.
She was speaking in Nairobi this week during the launch of the ‘Stop
Violence Against Women and Girls In the Horn of Africa’ campaign.
Said Anisia Achieng, Director of Sudanese Women’s Voice for
Peace, a non-governmental organization (NGO) based in Nairobi, “We
want women and girls to be protected. We are demanding control over
the use of guns which have been responsible for the death and trauma
of women in Sudan.”
“More than ten women in Sudan die daily from abuse of arms,
which includes rape,” she added. However, this figure could
be higher because many attacks on women go unreported.
Accounts of violence against women have also emerged from the Darfur
region of western Sudan, where the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army
and the Justice and Equality Movement are battling government troops
and Arab militias backed by Khartoum.
Human Rights Watch, an NGO based in New York, has accused the militias
of routinely raping women and girls in the area -- as well as setting
fire to villages and crops, and looting livestock.
Following concerted pressure from the international community, the
government and rebels this week agreed to a 45-day ceasefire so
that aid could be delivered to the area. United States officials
believe the conflict in Darfur may have displaced up to a million
civilians in the past year.
Activists say that traditional practices in the Horn of Africa have
contributed to a culture where violence against women is condoned
-- especially the practice of female genital mutilation (FGM). And,
they have called on governments to work with communities to phase
these practices out.
According to SIHA, FGM is almost universal in Eritrea, Somalia and
Ethiopia. About 95 percent of women have been circumcised in Eritrea,
98 percent in Somalia and 90 percent in Ethiopia.
The practice involves the cutting away of part - or all - of a girl’s
clitoris and other parts of the genitalia, in some instances to
initiate her into adulthood. There are numerous side-effects to
the procedure, which may be performed with crude equipment such
as broken glass or a tin lid. These include the transmission of
HIV, sexual dysfunction, and urinary tract infections.
“FGM is harming our girls, some who go through it at the age
of six years,” noted Asmahan Abdisalaam, Chairperson of the
Somali chapter of SIHA.
“We need the government to collaborate with anti-FGM organizations
in changing attitudes of communities, educating parents who give
up their daughters for the practice and the circumcisors who carry
out the job, about the danger of FGM on women and girls.”
A campaign to root out FGM in Somalia was launched last month on
International Women’s Day (Mar. 8), led by four women’s
groups. They hope to end misconceptions about the practice, namely
that it is required under Islamic law. Human rights activists and
Muslim scholars say there is no basis for this belief.
The ‘Stop Violence Against Women and Girls In the Horn of Africa’
campaign has also drawn attention to the insufficiencies of laws
against domestic violence.
“The Ethiopian legal system provides legislation against assault
and physical injury. But these provisions are difficult to apply
when convicting a husband or intimate partner, because male-female
relations are considered private matters,” said Yetnayet Andarge
of the Ethiopian Women Lawyers Association.
“These issues therefore cannot be discussed in public. For
this reason, the laws are flawed,” she added.
Jane Kiragu, Executive Director of the Kenyan chapter of the Federation
of Women Lawyers, agrees.
“The law should not only be out there, but also govern inside
homes, in bedrooms where domestic violence is rife,” she said.
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