MORE UNILATERALISM:

May 9, 2006

US food aid for crisis-hit Darfur (BBC, 5/09/06)

President George W Bush has announced US emergency food shipments to ease the crisis in Sudan’s Darfur region, urging Congress to approve $225m in aid.

He also said he was sending his secretary of state to the UN Security Council to help speed up the deployment of UN peacekeepers to the region. [...]

Calling the situation in Darfur a “genocide”, President Bush said five aid ships would be urgently redirected to Sudan to provide extra help for the two million people displaced by the conflict.

He said: “These actions will allow the World Food Programme to restore full food rations to the people of Darfur this summer.”

Money for the world’s largest aid operation has been running out. Rations for May have been cut in half.

Mr Bush said: “Darfur has a chance to begin anew… America will not turn away from this tragedy.”

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Posted by orrinj

BECAUSE LIFE MEANS ACTING AMERICAN:

May 8, 2006

How America is earning respect abroad (James Sloan Allen, 5/09/06, CS Monitor)

People from these countries who spend time in the United States under exchange programs not only prize the democratic culture they find here; more important, they typically go home bent on instilling the virtues of America in their own nations… [...]

In Azerbaijan, a young woman declares, “My understanding of the meaning of life has totally changed” since she resided in the US. Surprisingly, she reports that this is partly because after experiencing America’s “freedom of speech and belief and the respect for law and government … I started to read the Koran and came to my religion and understanding of it only in the US, not in my country.” At the same time, touched by “how the American people care about and help” others, she vowed to “do my best to have an open and big heart and help those who need it.” Today she is a Muslim with democratic ideals who has thrown herself into the work of securing rights for children.

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POPING LIKE W:

May 8, 2006

The Pope Is Asking China for Freedom, Not Forgiveness: The Chinese authorities have begin ordaining illegitimate bishops again. But this time the Vatican is responding firmly. It is the new course inaugurated by Benedict XVI (Sandro Magister, 5/08/06, Chiesa.org)

Speaking at the synod on October 12, bishop Zen of Hong Kong drew these conclusions from the whole affair:

“It has become more and more clear that the Chinese bishops ordained without the approval of the Roman pontiff are accepted neither by the clergy nor by the faithful. It is to be hoped that in the face of this ‘sensus Ecclesiae’ the government of Beijing will see the advantage of coming to a normalization of the situation, even if the ‘conservative’ elements within the official Church are creating resistance for obvious motives of self-interest.”

The “conservatives” within the official Church include, for example, Beijing bishop Michael Fu Tieshan, who is not recognized by Rome and is unwelcome to most of the faithful, and one of the new bishops ordained in recent days, Joseph Ma Yinglin, who is also a member of the People’s National Congress, the Chinese parliament.

But above all, there are the “conservatives” within the communist regime, for whom the normalization of relations between the Vatican and China would be a catastrophe. This is the view, in particular, of the Patriotic Association that controls the official Church. Its vice-president, Anthony Liu Bainan, does everything he can to keep the Church nationalist and separated from Rome, and it is especially to him that the recent resumption of illegitimate ordinations is due. It is clear that this objective clashes with the project of a “harmonious society” as enunciated by president Hu Jintao.

The resumption of illegitimate episcopal ordinations on April 30 and May 3 has temporarily given an advantage to the “conservatives.” And the initial silence of the Vatican authorities was also greeted with alarm by the newly nominated cardinal Zen, who declared in an interview: “I cannot be the only one to protest. If we remain silent, we are preparing the way for an unconditional surrender.”

But a few hours later, on May 4, the Holy See published the forceful declaration reproduced above. It states that the illegitimate bishops and those who consecrated them are subject to excommunication (according to the canon cited, number 1382 of the Code of Canon Law), but that they are spared from this because they have acted under constraint.

In the note, the Holy See restates that it is not withdrawing from dialogue with the Chinese authorities, in order that “such unacceptable acts of violent and inadmissible constrictions not be repeated.”

For Benedict XVI, the central issue for China is definitely that of religious liberty. Or rather, that of liberty plain and simple.

Shifting the Church from Realpolitik to to Crusade would be enormously helpful.

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MICROFINANCING THE REFORMATION:

May 7, 2006

Afghan women start businesses, help reconstruct a torn nation: Some 10,000 women have been trained as entrepreneurs, some of whom are now economically self-sufficient (David Montero, 5/08/06, The Christian Science Monitor)

The ambitions of [Pashtun] Begum, once considered rare for women in Afghanistan, highlight a silent but powerful revolution here. A growing number of female entrepreneurs – some 10,000 have been trained – are emerging from the isolation of war and oppression of the Taliban to contribute toward a more prosperous nation and greater independence for women, observers say.

According to Microfinance Times, 75 percent of all active microcredit borrowers in Afghanistan are now women, many of whom use their loans to start businesses. Beauty parlors, tailoring shops, and bakeries are just some of the enterprises these women now own. Their efforts, observers say, are indispensable in the struggle to reverse decades of deprivation in Afghanistan.

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UNSTALLING TALKS & INSTALLING PEACEKEEPERS:

May 7, 2006

Next steps to peace in Darfur: A peace deal signed Friday could pave the way for a UN peacekeeping force (Katharine Houreld and Claire Soares, 5/08/06, The Christian Science Monitor)

Observers say that the most important result of the deal is that it could pave the way for a UN peacekeeping force to enter Sudan. In the past few days different spokesmen for the Sudanese government have confirmed that the government would now at least consider allowing UN peacekeeping troops on the ground, something Khartoum had flatly rejected before Friday’s deal. [...]

Sounding a cautiously optimistic note, US Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick said the agreement represented “an opportunity for peace.” He went to Nigeria after talks stalled between rebels and the government over security issues. Eventually both the Sudanese government and the largest rebel faction, the Sudan Liberation Movement, led by Minni Minnawi, signed the deal on Friday.

All in a day’s work for the Crusader State…

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TEXTBOOK:

May 7, 2006

Sudan agrees to UN troops for Darfur as treaty signed (Mohamed Osman, 5/07/06, Sunday Herald)

A spokesman for the Sudanese government has confirmed that United Nations peacekeepers will now be welcome in Darfur after a peace agreement between Khartoum and the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA), the main rebel group involved in the conflict.

Bakri Mulah, secretary-general for external affairs in the information ministry, issued the invitation on behalf of the Khartoum government after the agreement was reached on Friday in Abuja, the Nigerian capital.

The Sudanese government initially rejected calls for UN peacekeepers to replace the thousands of African Union peacekeepers currently in Darfur.

“We heard the appeal of the UN secretary-general Kofi Annan [for UN peacekeepers to join those of the African Union] … Now there is no problem,” a spokesman said.

The government of Sudan and the main Darfur rebel faction expressed hopes that three years of fighting could now come to an end.

A nice illustration of how the UN can be useful, following our lead.

Comments Off | AXIS OF GOOD, CRUSADER STATE/JACKSONIANISM, ISLAMIC REFORMATION, KOFI ANNAN, UNITED NATIONS | Permalink
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JUST DON'T DIRTY MY HANDS:

May 6, 2006

Hamas sanctions squeeze the life out of West Bank (Jane Flanagan, 07/05/2006, Sunday Telegraph)

With Hamas refusing to condemn a recent suicide attack, aid workers fear that the isolated Palestinian government – and the limited services available to its people – may soon collapse. Aid agencies would be overwhelmed if expected to pick up the pieces.

“All the international aid agencies put together will not be able to replace the services that the Palestinian Authority provides,” said David Shearer, the head of the United Nations Office for Humanitarian Affairs.

As government coffers empty and the flow of trade and goods into the Palestinian territories dries up, medical supplies in hospitals are running dangerously low and basic food supplies are unaffordable for most families.

Last week a group of 36 aid agencies working with Palestinians, including the British groups Merlin and Save the Children UK, wrote a joint letter to Israel urging it to fulfil last November’s agreement to allow trade in and out of Gaza. Israel has remained insistent on keeping tight checks on traffic to prevent terrorist attacks.

The economy of the Palestinian territories has been propped up by outside support since the early 1990s, when the PA was created out of the Oslo peace process as the future government of a nascent Palestinian state. In spite of the continued fighting that stalled progress towards creating a Palestinian state, the international community kept faith with the PA, ploughing in billions of pounds.

The World Bank estimates that only 12 per cent of the PA’s economic activity was ever internally generated. The rest came from outside, either through Palestinians earning wages in Israel or foreign donor support. When Yasser Arafat, then the Palestinian leader, launched the armed intifada in late 2000, Israel closed the checkpoints to the occupied territories, reducing the income from foreign earnings to a trickle. By the time Hamas won power in January’s general election, the PA was in debt to the tune of £451 million.

When aid was suspended by Brussels and Washington, Hamas asked Muslim nations for funding and won promises of tens of millions of pounds from friendly Arab nations – only to run into another problem. International banks have refused to transfer these Arab funds to the PA, for fear of being proscribed by the United States banking authorities for helping Hamas, which is on Washington’s list of terrorist organisations.

They have reason to be cautious. Five years ago, when al-Aqsa Islamic Bank in the West Bank city of Ramallah was described by President George W Bush as “a financial arm of Hamas”, its global business vanished overnight. Both America and Europe agree that economic sanctions should hurt the Hamas administration, not the Palestinian people.

Odd thing about our Left, you could starve every Palestinian to death via transnational sanctions and they’d not bat an eyelash, but the use of military force in places where it can save lives by changing the regime and allowing sanctions to be lifted is more than they can tolerate. It’s as if the positive use of American force serves to delegitimize any cause in their eyes.

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LOSING THE WoT:

May 6, 2006

Al-Qaeda faces an ideological crisis (Amr Hamzawy, May 06, 2006, Daily Star)

Three remarkable aspects of Osama bin Laden’s latest videotape suggested that its strident tone masked an ideological crisis for Al-Qaeda. First, in his speech, broadcast on the Arab satellite network Al-Jazeera on April 24, bin Laden betrayed a need to justify his organization’s terrorist mission not just to extremists, but to broader Muslim publics. [...]

The second remarkable aspect of bin Laden’s videotape was his addressing, albeit by assailing them, Arab liberals. In previous videotapes, he accused pro-Western Arab governments and official religious institutions of seducing their populations away from the path of jihad. But this time he blamed Arab liberal intellectuals and writers for betraying the true spirit of Islam. For bin Laden, the liberals disseminate “blasphemous ideas” of democracy, human rights, and moderation, and in so doing diminish the degree of popular support for Al-Qaeda’s jihad. [...]

Finally, bin Laden tried to seize on Hamas’ victory in the Palestinian elections. His Egyptian deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, had taken the exact opposite position. While Zawahiri claimed that Hamas’ participation in elections would only serve as an act of submission to Western conspiracies by detracting Palestinians from jihad, bin Laden endorsed the Hamas government and called on Muslims to support it. However, it would be misleading to interpret this new position as an attempt to give sustenance to Hamas. Rather, it was much more a bid to ride the movement’s coattails. [...]

Arab politics have transcended the legacy of Al-Qaeda. Today gradualism, participation, and democratic reform, rather than radical violence and jihad, set the agenda.

That was easy.

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NOW THAT'S MUSCULAR WILSONIANISM:

May 6, 2006

Sudanese, Rebels Sign Peace Plan For Darfur: U.S. Pressured Parties; Doubts Remain on Deal (Glenn Kessler, May 6, 2006, Washington Post)

With a prod from the United States, the government of Sudan and the biggest Darfur rebel faction signed a complex peace plan yesterday that diplomats and experts said would require careful implementation to ensure an end to a conflict that has left as many as 450,000 people dead and 2 million homeless. [...]

U.S. officials say an accord is essential in order to persuade the Sudanese government to accept a U.N. peacekeeping force that would include logistical assistance from 400 to 500 NATO officers. The African Union currently has a 6,000-person force with a limited mandate in place. Many experts say it has been ineffective at stopping the fighting.

As the negotiations in Abuja stretched into the wee hours, Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo told the rebel leaders that they would miss a historic opportunity if they did not accept the agreement.

Zoellick said that at some time between 2 and 4 a.m. Friday, he pulled out a letter from President Bush to Minnawi pledging to “strongly support” implementation of the deal and make sure anyone who broke it would be “held accountable” by the U.N. Security Council. Zoellick read the letter to the assembled gathering. One problem, he said, was that it was clear that many rebels had not read the tentative agreement and did not realize that issues they kept raising had already been addressed.

In the past year, Zoellick has become the administration’s point man on Sudan, making four trips to Khartoum, the capital, and the Darfur region to press the two sides to agree. He also has shepherded efforts to implement another peace deal, signed last year, that ended a 20-year conflict between the Muslim government and rebels in the southern part of the country, which is largely animist and Christian.

The Darfur agreement is an amended version of a draft document produced earlier in the week by the African Union, which mediated the talks.

One faction that refused to sign is led by Abdel Wahid al-Nur, who founded the movement that launched the revolt against the government but has since split. The other rebel group is the Justice and Equality Movement.

“We won’t sign it because the deal does not protect the people of Darfur. We don’t have any real power in this deal,” Ahmed Tugod, a JEM negotiator, said in an interview. “It only answers part of our problems, and we reject partial solutions.”

Analysts yesterday were divided on the prospects for success.

Prod? First we told The Sudan it had to give autonomy to its South, now its West. That’s a bit more than prodding.

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DEFENDING THE E RING FROM THE CIVILIANS:

May 5, 2006

Stakes high in battle between Rumsfeld, generals (James Kitfield, May 5, 2006, National Journal)

Given the nearly unprecedented nature of the controversy, what is perhaps most remarkable is how utterly unsurprising it is to anyone who has spent time with senior military officers, in the field, over drinks at the officers’ club, or especially on the ground in Iraq. The fact that the Army chief of staff came out of retirement to take the job after sources say at least three active-duty generals declined it, and reports that the Marine Corps commandant, Gen. Michael W. Hagee, may retire before his term is up, speak volumes about the frayed state of civil-military relations in today’s Pentagon.

Practically from the moment they first occupied the E Ring, Rumsfeld and his tight circle of senior aides demonstrated a dismissive attitude that has grated on uniformed leaders. In the view of Bush’s civilian team, President Clinton had allowed the generals and the admirals to run roughshod. Rumsfeld and his band of reformers were a rude awakening for senior military leaders conditioned to expect a measure of courtesy from civilian bosses as a privilege of their rank; instead, Bush’s team set out to show the generals who was boss.

Rumsfeld’s incessant needling of the Army, in particular, to more rapidly reshape itself into an expeditionary force, at a time when the service has been run nearly ragged by back-to-back-to-back deployments to Afghanistan and Iraq, added insult to injury. From the beginning, the Rumsfeld reformers have also considered themselves bold revolutionaries who deal only in transformative ideas, and their “roll the dice” spirit in nearly all things has often been at odds with the more cautious nature of a uniformed military pledged to securing the Republic.

It’s only natural for the bureaucrats at the Pentagon not to want to transform and not to want civilian oversight, but, that’s just tough. With all due regard for Mr. Kitfield, who has an essay in our book, the Iraq stuff is just a smokescreen.

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Posted by orrinj

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