People Before Profit blog

Victory for womens rights in Mexico

Sun, 31 Aug 2008 09:25:00 +0000

Women’s rights groups and allies celebrated Aug. 28th after Mexico’s Supreme Court voted 8-3 in a landmark decision to uphold a law allowing abortion in the country’s capital, Mexico City. The ruling could open the doors for other states to challenge measures that criminalize abortion. The decision is historic especially in a region where almost all countries severely restrict abortion or ban it completely.

The law allows unrestricted abortions in the first trimester of pregnancy. It was passed last year by the Mexico City Assembly, which also established free public clinics.

The right-wing government led by President Felipe Calderón, backed by anti-abortion groups and the powerful Roman Catholic Church, had challenged the law, claiming it was unconstitutional.

In their ruling the judges found that Mexico’s constitution did not explicitly guarantee the right to life of the fetus, and that those advocating for the rights of the unborn had to be in line and balanced when it comes to women seeking an abortion.

“By decriminalizing abortion, women are free to decide over their bodies, their physical and mental health, and even their lives,” magistrate José Ramón Cossío Díaz told the New York Times. Díaz voted in favor of the law.

Most Latin American countries allow abortions only under very limited circumstances, such as following a rape or incest and to save the life of the mother. Leaders of women’s rights groups say in most cases women continue to face restrictions even in those cases. Abortion is outlawed in Nicaragua, El Salvador and Chile. Last month a congressional committee voted down a bill that would have legalized abortion in Brazil.

Women’s rights organizations have been advocating for decades to legalize abortion in Mexico, which is known as the second most-populous Catholic country in the world, next to Brazil.

“This is a triumph of the recognition of women’s fundamental rights,” Maria Luisa Sanchez, an abortion rights leader in Mexico, told the Reuters news agency. “It will surely establish a precedent for Mexico, for the other states and for the region of Latin America,” she said.

Since April 2007, when the law was passed, Mexico City health officials say some 12,500 women have had abortions in public clinics and hospitals there. Women’s rights groups add that many of the women were between the ages of 18 and 29.

Between 1990 and 2005, an average of 13 women died each year due to illegal abortions in Mexico City, according to pro-abortion groups. Since last April only one woman, aged 16, has died during the procedure, after misinformation was given to the doctor about the length of her pregnancy.

Mexico’s President Calderón was largely silent during the legal battle, but his attorney general and the National Human Rights Commission sought to reintroduce a ban on abortion.

Meanwhile leftist Mexico City Mayor Marcelo Ebrard supports the ruling and many speculate he is preparing to challenge Calderón for president in 2012. Ebrard is known for supporting progressive measures including gay civil unions.

In other news leftist President Rafael Correa of Ecuador is attempting to pass a new constitution that could pave the way toward legalizing abortion.

Opinion: Olympic follies and triumphs

Sat, 30 Aug 2008 02:31:00 +0000

To run a full marathon experts suggest that the aspiring athlete requires at least six months of rigorous training, proper gear, a particular diet, regular check-ups, mental focus and preparation, and a variety of gadgets depending on one's budget. Ironically, the poorest countries in Africa have also produced some of the world's best marathon runners.

I never imagined running a full marathon myself. Only when my doctor advised me, following back surgery over a year ago, that I should not walk more than 20 minutes at a time did I decide to run one. And I have.

Human nature is strange. Our weaknesses can sometimes turn into a launch pad for our most triumphant moments. My running 'career', however, started in the Gaza Strip. As early as my elementary years in the Nuseirat refugee camp I was habitually chased, along with many school children, by Israeli troops. Running the distance meant dodging a bullet and reaching home alive. My greatest running moment was in high school, though, when I outran a military jeep. Along with my younger brother and a cousin, our goal was to reach a citrus orchard by the Gaza Valley before being run over. As bullets whizzed all around we made our final leap into a thicket. Bleeding from my face and arm after colliding with thorns and branches I looked triumphantly at the rest but said nothing. That day we won more than gold. We won life.

When four Palestinian athletes marched with the Palestinian flag into the Olympic Games in Beijing it was a statement, a declaration of sorts, that Palestinians insist on their right to exist on equal footing with the rest of the world, to raise their flag without fear and wear their country's name spelled out the way it should be, not as a Palestinian Authority but as Palestine. The 1.5 million Palestinians living in besieged Gaza must have savoured that moment more than anyone else. One from amongst them, Nader Al-Masri, had a big smile on his face as he marched, nervously but proudly. Gaza lived a moment of freedom that day, one that even Israel couldn't take away.

But the Olympics are, of course, not a singular idea. Its meanings are convoluted and they vary. Some NBC commentators seemed more interested in igniting Cold War fever as they cheered for their athletes. It was a nationalistic circus, courtesy of the world's largest multinational corporations, catering to the sensibilities and prejudices of every nation, although they were all selling the same product in the end. While sports has long an avenue in which greater participation by women meant greater gender equality the fact that 'sex sells' appeared to be a more dominant mantra that women's rights. Olympic women role-models have already been featured in various Playboy editions. In many instances winning gold was no longer about national pride but access to contracts, endorsements, and millions of dollars of income.

Yet despite the political manipulation and corporate takeover of sports the human spirit continues to triumph. When Germany's Matthias Steiner claimed a gold medal following a stupendous effort he raised his medal and a photo of Susann, his wife, who died in a car accident last year. Susann's modest smile in the photo cannot be matched by the fake smiles of Nike's top models combined.

And as Georgia and Russia embarked on a bloody fight that is seen by many as marking the beginning of a new Cold War, the ravenous struggle underway between Russia and Nato over influence in Eurasia, nothing could stain the beautiful moment when Nino Salukvadze, of Georgia hugged and kissed Russian rival Natalia Paderina after the latter won silver and the former bronze in shooting.

Holding true to family tradition, I cheered for athletes representing the poorest countries. What victory represents for an athlete whose running gear was a last minute donation is difficult to imagine. Al-Masri is from Beit Hanoun, a small, half-destroyed town on the border with Israel. He trains among the constant sound of bullets and shells. After many appeals involving the Israeli media the runner was allowed to leave his Gaza prison temporarily. Thanks to the help of Chinese coaches Al-Masri received a bit of training before embarking on his first competition. He returns to Gaza without medals. His resilience, his insistence on hope under the most desperate of circumstances will not generate him much by way of money or contracts, but it will comfort his countrymen.

For Al-Masri, and all the athletes who participated in the Beijing Olympics as an embodiment of a noble idea, as ambassadors of hope, of equality and of dignity, they crossed the finishing line the moment they refused to kneel to adversity or surrender to despair. This is not rhetorical pandering and is something that can only be understood by those who have been told that they are not worthy enough, maybe because they are not of the right skin colour, nationality, gender, or come from the wrong part of the world.

Gaza cannot wait to greet returning Al-Masri, whose stories of the Great Wall and the grandeur and wonders of China are likely to be unequalled in a place used to the same old stories: of siege, Israeli incursions and violence. Al-Masri's town will certainly take a time away from grief, and rejoice the return of its champion. A Palestinian poet once wrote: 'Our celebrations will plant us firmly into the earth.' Beit Hanoun will live up to that promise.

Ramzy Baroud (www.ramzybaroud.net) is an author and editor of PalestineChronicle.com. His work has been published in many newspapers and journals worldwide. His latest book is The Second Palestinian Intifada: A Chronicle of a People's Struggle (Pluto Press, London).

WORLD NOTES: August 30

Fri, 29 Aug 2008 06:42:00 +0000

Indonesia: Strike at Nike supplier

Some 7,000 workers at the Hardaya Aneka shoe factory in Tangerang, who make 15,000 pairs of Nike sneakers a day, stopped work Aug. 21 to protest 60 percent cuts in customary bonuses for holidays marking the end of Ramadan fasting. Strikers roughed up company security agents attempting to ban media coverage of the plant occupation.

The Jakarta Post said the still unconfirmed prospect of massive layoffs in September due to non-renewal of the Nike contract contributed to worker discontent.

In July, the company refused the government’s request to shift weekday production to a weekend day twice monthly as an energy saving measure.

Peru: Protests spread

Irate at decrees seen as promoting privatization of communal territory, protesters during August shut down an oil pipeline in the Amazon region, occupied a hydroelectric plant and blocked highways.

Under the recently approved U.S.-Peru Free Trade Agreement, Peru’s government must open up indigenous lands to mining operations. Demonstrators in southern Peru, where 60 percent of respondents to a survey identified themselves as socialist, occupied drilling platforms, a helicopter port and mining company buildings.

Strikers denounced governmental failure to rebuild housing following last year’s severe earthquake.

“[President] Garcia’s popularity is in free fall,” according to Upsidedownworld.org. Increasingly, indigenous Peruvians, almost half the population, look to indigenous President Evo Morales in Bolivia for inspiration.

Iraq: Regional help will expand oil production

The Associated Press this week reported that the Iraqi government and foreign oil companies were unable to arrive at arrangements to bolster Iraqi oil production.

Nevertheless, Iran, now Iraq’s top trading partner, recently pledged to supply oil for Iraqi electricity generating plants. Iraqis are continuing negotiations with Russia to build and refurbish power plants.

The Azzaman web site also reported plans for a Chinese company to construct a power plant in southern Iraq — the country’s largest infrastructure project since 2003. Another Chinese corporation is developing a nearby oil field. Additionally, Iraq and Syrian officials agreed in mid-August to repair a war-damaged pipeline. Eventually a million barrels of oil daily will move from Iraq to Mediterranean ports in Syria.

Kenya: Prisoner transfers exposed

In Nairobi, security operatives have been searching for Fazul Abdullah Mohamed, accused of organizing the 1989 attack on the U.S. embassy there.

Human rights groups have expressed concern at the reported arrests recently of 15 terrorism suspects and their subsequent delivery under U.S. auspices to Ethiopia. Alarm bells rang with the discovery that planes operated by the Prescott Support Group were landing at night at Nairobi’s Wilson Airport with CIA operatives aboard.

Two months ago, Kenya’s Civil Aviation Authority licensed the U.S. company “to carry out mapping activities in northern Kenya.” Press TV cites earlier reports linking Prescott with the practice of so-called extraordinary rendition of drugged and bound prisoners to venues of torture and interrogation.

Cuba: Controlling migration through Mexico

Cuba’s government has yet to solve the problem of emigration to the United States. A Granma analysis Aug. 22 accuses Washington of failing to honor agreements to grant 20,000 entry visas annually to legal migrants. It blames the 40-year-old U.S. Cuban Adjustment Law under which the U.S. tempts Cubans into dangerous ocean crossings.

Now an estimated 10,000 Cubans enter the United States annually through Mexico. Negotiations Sept. 11 in Mexico City between Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque and his Mexican counterpart are aimed at putting the brakes on a smuggling business yielding millions in profits from individual migrant payments of $10-15,000.

The Yucatan daily Por Esto has documented collaboration between Cuban Americans — primarily the Cuban American National Foundation — and Mexican drug cartels.

World Notes are compiled by W.T. Whitney Jr. (atwhit @roadrunner.com)

Musharraf resigns, Pakistan hopes for better days

Fri, 22 Aug 2008 06:37:00 +0000

There were celebrations throughout Pakistan after President Pervez Musharraf resigned Aug. 18. Jubilant crowds gave out sweets and congratulated each other for the democratic victory, one daily newspaper, The Frontier Post, reported.

“Today, the shadow of dictatorship that has prevailed for long over this country, that chapter has been closed. It hasn’t happened very easily. We passed through a long struggle and we had come very close to the process of initiating impeachment,” said Information Minister Sherry Rehman, a member of the Pakistan People’s Party, the party of slain former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.

Musharraf, the former general of Pakistan’s army, came to power in a coup in 1999 ousting then-Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.

A staunch ally of the Bush administration’s “war on terror,” Musharraf was facing impeachment by the ruling parliamentary coalition on charges he violated the nation’s constitution. An overwhelming majority of the Pakistani people – 85 percent according to a poll by the GOP-connected International Republican Institute – wanted Musharraf to resign. A majority of Pakistanis in urban areas said they think life will get better with Musharraf gone.

But that is the big question confronting Pakistan’s delicate democracy. Will the PPP now led by Bhutto’s husband, Asif Azari, along with its main coalition partner, Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League – N, be able to put aside competing interests and govern this complex and crisis-ridden country?

Pakistan has been under military rule for most of its 61-year history. The army has been woven into every aspect of Pakistani life. Army-run businesses control significant sections of the economy, including construction.

The economy is in shambles. The nation’s 165 million people are suffering from soaring prices on food, fuel and other necessities.

In his resignation speech, Musharraf sought to prettify his nine-year rule, but he is largely blamed for much of the crisis. Pakistan’s failure to build power plants has resulted in regular and prolonged blackouts. This has contributed to a massive flight of capital out of the country. Within a half hour of Musharraf’s resignation, Pakistan’s stock market reportedly rose 500 points.

Pakistan has received billions of dollars in military aid from the U.S., which used the country as a launching pad for operations against the former Soviet Union and the left-led Afghanistan government in the 1970s and ’80s. The destabilizing results of that military relationship continue to reverberate today.

Pakistani people in provinces bordering Afghanistan face daily terror from shadowy groups using the garb of extremist religion. Women and girls are particularly targeted. These criminal groups run drugs and arms to and from Afghanistan.

According to The New York Times, Musharraf did “little to undercut the power of extremist clerics in the nation, or to curb the Taliban and other militant groups, which had long been used by Pakistan’s intelligence services to exert influence in India and Afghanistan.”

The Bush administration ignored or even encouraged this, seeing Musharraf as a useful and compliant partner in the U.S. drive to dominate the region, politically, economically and militarily.

Bush (and John McCain) justified backing Musharraf against the will of the Pakistani people, arguing that it was necessary to prevent extremists from taking over the nuclear-armed nation.

Yet, the reality in Pakistan is that the extremist forces have very little support among the people. In the February elections, extremist right-wing clerical parties got even lower vote totals than the tiny percentage won by Musharraf’s party.

Recently, under pressure, the army has stepped up its campaign against Taliban-like forces in the border areas. This has resulted in some 300,000 people fleeing their homes and seeking refuge in camps, which are inadequately staffed and lack food, water and other basic supplies, according to an urgent appeal for help sent out by the Pakistan Peace and Solidarity Council. (For more info: pscpak@gmail.com.)

Now many Pakistanis worry that with Musharraf gone there will be no common purpose to unite the two opposition parties that now lead a tenuous governing coalition, and a power struggle will ensue. Currently the two parties are debating whether to reinstate the chief judge dismissed by Musharraf last year, provoking a tidal wave of protest by Pakistan’s legal community. Pakistan People’s Party leader Ariz favors keeping the new chief justice named by Musharraf, while the Muslim League’s Sharif campaigned on reinstating the former judge, a position shared by many Pakistanis.

Under Pakistan’s constitution, the chairman of the Parliament’s Senate, Mohammedmian Soomro, is now acting president. A new president must be elected within 30 days by members of both houses of Parliament and the four provincial assemblies.

talbano @pww.org

WORLD NOTES: August 23

Fri, 22 Aug 2008 06:29:00 +0000

Iraq: Who controls contract workers?

The Congressional Budget Office reported Aug. 11 that the 190,000 private contractors working in Iraq and neighboring countries match the number of U.S. troops there. They earn up to 12 times more than do enlisted soldiers. Through 2008 they will have cost U.S. taxpayers $100 billion — equal to Iraq’s 2007 gross domestic product.

A Florida legal action against contractor giant Blackwater highlights jurisdictional uncertainties. The Iraqi government, Iraqi law prevails. A recently approved U.S. House bill invokes U.S. law.

The Office of Management and Budget’s Craig Jennings, speaking to Inter Press Service, condemned “privatization of war” and funding of corporations “whose dealings are opaque to taxpayers.”

Poland: Missile defense deal signed

After 18 months of talks, Polish and U.S. officials in Warsaw signed an agreement Aug. 14 on United States installation of 10 missile interceptors in the NATO country. The Polish parliament has yet to approve.

Prime Minister Donald Tusk said the United States would also supply Poland with Patriot missiles and bolster its defense efforts in other unspecified ways. The AP report quoted Russian General Anatoly Nogovitsyn’s warning that Poland “is exposing itself to a strike.”

Parallel accords were reached last month to deploy U.S. radar detection devices in the Czech Republic. Russia sees the deployments as a threat to its security.

Mexico: Voters resist oil sell-off

In the Aug. 10 second stage of a referendum on Pemex, 91 percent of 400,000 voters in seven states rejected government proposals to privatize the giant oil corporation, state-owned since the 1930s.

On July 27, 80 percent of 2,500,000 citizens turning out in 10 states and Mexico City did likewise, Prensa Latina said.

The Broad Progressive Front, led by the Party of the Democratic Revolution, organized the referendum despite ongoing internal friction over its future national leadership.

For Guerrero legislator Ramiro Solorio Almazán, quoted in July by La Jornada, “sovereignty and national security” are at stake: “We Mexicans are Pemex; to sell it off would be to relinquish the patrimony of our children.”

Philippines: Autonomy delayed

The Philippines Supreme Court began hearings Aug. 15 on a government proposal granting an area of provisional autonomy to the independence-seeking Moro Islamic Liberation Front. The government plan was ostensibly aimed at facilitating talks to end 40 years of war that has killed 120,000 people and displaced two million from homes in Mindanao.

After the court on Aug. 4 stayed plans to finalize the autonomy agreement, the following day MILF forces occupied 15 villages outside the proposed autonomous area. The incursion plus the military’s aerial bombardments and artillery attacks displaced 160,000 people.

Liberia: Unionized rubber workers gain

The Firestone Agricultural Workers’ Union of Liberia and Firestone Corporation signed an agreement Aug. 6 after four months of bargaining. The Liberian Supreme Court had earlier ruled in favor of the union as a bargaining unit, and a year ago, the union won internationally monitored elections over a company union.

Under the three-year contract, 4,500 rubber plantation workers gain 21 to 24 percent wage increases retroactive to January 2007. Work quotas were abolished and mechanized production will replace some hand labor. Firestone agreed to build new high schools in the area.

Under auspices of the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions, the U.S.-based United Steelworkers helped build the union, ICEM’s web site said.

Bolivia: Cuban doctors attacked

Cuban health workers serving abroad are usually safe. (In 2006, over 28,000 Cuban doctors worked in 68 countries.)

However, the Erbol web site reported that in the right-wing controlled separatist state of Santa Cruz, during Aug. 10 voting on a referendum aimed at deposing President Evo Morales, 40 thugs associated with the Santa Cruz Youth Union abducted six Cuban medical workers from San Ignacio, stole their possessions and left them stranded outside the city. Insults and death threats were heard and one doctor was severely injured. The Youth Union is known for fascist paraphernalia and racist assaults.

Cuba’s ambassador said some 2,000 Cubans working “unconditionally in support of the beloved and fraternal Bolivian people in areas of health, education, and alternative energy” will continue at their posts.

World Notes are compiled by W.T. Whitney Jr. (atwhit @roadrunner.com)

Cubas health care: A continuing success story

Sat, 16 Aug 2008 11:59:00 +0000

Health care Cuban style has many admirers. One reason is favorable statistical measures of health outcome vying with those of wealthy nations. Preventative strategies, health education, and universal access through a unique primary care system all contribute.

This writer, a pediatrician, has long followed the country’s improved infant mortality rates. In Cuba that measure — a sensitive marker of social support within a society — has remained for two years at a low 5.3 babies dying in their first year out of 1,000 births. The most recent U.S. infant mortality rate is 6.3, with the added twist that African American babies die at twice that rate. The worldwide infant mortality rate is 52, that for the rest of Latin America is 26.

Cuban health care has also been applauded because of its international outreach. The most recent class of new doctors graduating Aug. 2 from the Latin American School of made for a four-year total of 5,960 young people from 27 nations completing a free six-year course of medical study. Currently 21,000 foreign medical students are studying in Cuba. Two years ago, 28,664 Cuban doctors were serving in 68 countries.

But the development of capabilities to deliver specialty care for complicated illnesses is just as noteworthy. In fact, Cuba long ago became a referral center for Latin America and elsewhere. In a survey of Cuban health care published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1983, Robert Ubell wrote, “For some of these nations, it is not Boston, Mass., but Havana, Cuba that is the center of the medical world.”

That aspect of Cuban health care has gained new visibility. Cuba has developed facilities and a multidisciplinary team to carry out pediatric liver transplants. The Ministry of Public Health arranged for the training of specialists and devised referral networks and systems of follow-up care. Since 2006, Havana’s William Solar Pediatric Teaching Hospital has performed 14 pediatric liver transplants. The government covers costs for these complicated operations — up to $200,000 each — and for immunosuppressive therapy costing $20,000 annually per patient.

A Havana friend told me about her granddaughter afflicted with biliary atresia, a birth defect preventing bile from draining into the small intestine. The infant would have died from liver failure had not she and her mother been sent by Cuba’s health ministry, along with other affected babies, to the La Paz Children’s Hospital in Madrid for a new liver. Mother and child spent a year in Spain, courtesy of the Spanish hospital and the Cuban government.

That new program, which began in 2002, called for Cuban surgeons to receive training in Spain enabling them to perform the operation in Cuba. The report on the medicc.org web site emphasizes the important contribution to the program provided in the community through the family doctor system and polyclinics. Another success story derives from experience in Cuba with HIV infection, summarized in an Oxfam report timed with the recent 17th International AIDS conference in Mexico City. Cuba boasts by far the lowest prevalence of HIV infection in the Americas.

Planning for surveillance, diagnosis, treatment programs, ongoing care and nutritional support began in 1983, two years before Cuba’s first patient with AIDS appeared. Since then, Cuba has developed sex education programs for all aimed at prevention.

The prevalence of HIV infection in Cuba is 52 per 100,000 adults. Comparable figures are: 456 for Argentina, 508 for the U.S., 1,236 for Barbados and 3,377 for Haiti. In Cuba, the annual mortality rate for AIDS patients fell from 24 percent in 2000 to 6 percent in 2007, a drop attributed to availability at no cost of seven anti-retroviral drugs produced in Cuba since 2001. Virtually all those afflicted with AIDS there receive treatment. Worldwide, 70 percent of HIV infected persons needing treatment — 10 million people — receive none.

Factors contributing to the Cuban AIDS success story, according to Oxfam, include dedication to health care as a human right, a continuum of health care from community to specialists, respect for the civil rights of persons living with HIV and availability of nutritional, counseling and educational services in patients’ communities.

The International Journal of Cuban Health and Medicine, HYPERLINK http://www.medicc.org www.medicc.org, features more information on medical care in Cuba.

atwhit @roadrunner.com

War or peace? U.S. faces a choice in the Georgia-Russia conflict and beyond

Sat, 16 Aug 2008 10:44:00 +0000

Commentary

Georgia, in a geo-political sense, is an outpost of the United States and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) that sits directly on the border of Russia on one side and close to the Middle Eastern theater of war and Central Asia on its other side. South Ossetia, which Georgia invaded, is at the crossroads of strategic oil and gas pipeline routes.

Georgia actually hooked up with NATO in a written agreement it signed in April 1999 at the very start of the war the alliance began against Yugoslavia. Georgia also has signed bi-lateral agreements with the U.S. Both sets of agreements are designed to protect Anglo-American oil interests in the Caspian Sea basin as well as pipeline routes. Since the signing of the 1999 agreement the country has received large amounts of U.S. military equipment.

There is plenty of evidence that Georgia acted with at least the knowledge, if not the encouragement, of the neo-cons in control in Washington.

In mid-July, Georgian and U.S. troops held a joint military exercise called “Immediate Response” that we now know involved 1,200 U.S. and 800 Georgian troops.

The Associated Press reported July 15 on an announcement by the Georgian Ministry of Defense that had stated “U.S. and Georgian troops will train for three weeks at the Vaziani military base” near the Georgian capital, Tbilisi. The exercises were completed less than a week before the Aug. 7 Georgian attack on South Ossetia.

A day after the U.S.-Georgian war games began, the Russian Defense Ministry started its own military maneuvers in the North Caucasus region. No surprise, but no comfort to those who seek a world without danger of war.

Who knew

While NATO and U.S. military advisers likely did not participate in the Georgian military operation itself, it is clear they were involved in planning and logistics.

Israel, for example, admits that the ground assault mounted against South Ossetia by the Georgians on Aug. 7 was aided by Israeli military advisers. Israel also admits to supplying Georgia with Hermes-450 and Skylark unmanned aerial vehicles, which were used by the Georgian military in the weeks leading up to the attack and at the war games with the U.S. A military jet factory on the outskirts of Tbilisi is producing Su-25 fighter jets, under the supervision of technical personnel from Israel.

When the police try to figure out who committed a crime they start by making a list of the crime’s beneficiaries. In this conflict those who see their long-term interests served by a broader U.S. – Russia military confrontation benefits more than even the right-wing despotic government of Georgia. The neo-cons in Washington and the big oil interests around the world, salivating over the world’s largest supply of “black gold” in Russia, want to see how far they can push the Russians in this region so they can plan even bigger land and resource grabs in the future. The right-wing despots in power in Georgia, meanwhile, want to take over two little autonomous border regions.

We can assess whose interests come first by carefully analyzing what happened.

If the big objective was to achieve Georgian control over the provincial government in Ossetia, we would have seen a very different type of operation. Well trained special forces would have been sent in to occupy key political buildings, communications networks and a variety of other major institutions. Instead we saw all out bombing raids on residential areas, hospitals and even a university. Provoking Russia, rather than giving South Ossetia to Georgia, was the aim. The South Ossetian and Georgian people were not clamoring for the chance to kill each other. They were not itching for the chance to jump into a civil war. Both, in fact, are victims of those who don’t mind creating a broader Middle East and Central Asian war to serve the long term interests of the ultra-right in the U.S., leading circles in NATO, multi-national oil corporations and even those looking for a launching pad for an attack on Iran.

The Russians continue to yell about the dangers inherent in NATO arming of Georgia. Sergey Lavrov, the country’s foreign minister, told Russia Today on August 9, “It all confirms our numerous warnings to the international community that it is necessary to pay attention to massive arms purchasing by Georgia during several years. Now we see how these arms and Georgian special troops who had been trained by foreign specialists are used.”

Moscow’s envoy to NATO, Dmitry Rogozin, sent official notes to the representatives of every NATO country a day after the Georgian attacks. He shared with them intelligence information the Russians had gathered. According to Rogozin, Georgia had initially planned to “start military action against Abkhazia (another autonomous region on the Black Sea that Georgia wants to control) but Abkhazia was too well fortified and unassailable for Georgian armed forces, therefore a different tactic was chosen aimed against South Ossetia, which is more accessible territorially. I have no doubts that Mikheil Saakashvili (Georgia’s president) had been cautioned about his actions by his sponsors – the people with whom he is negotiating his entrance into NATO.”

The argument that the attack on Ossetia was an orchestrated provocation against Russia is strengthened too by the fact that a Georgian occupation of South Ossetia was never militarily possible. The swift Russian success in repelling the invaders proved that.

From the point of view of NATO militarists a humanitarian disaster was just as much, if not more useful than a Georgian military victory – so it was the humanitarian disaster they went for.

It brought about the expected result – a swift response from the Russians, now angry that NATO was waving a red flag in their face and none to happy about 34,000 South Ossetians streaming into their country as they fled Georgian attacks. Needless to say, the Russians also weren’t happy about all their dead peace keepers in Ossetia – the first to be killed by the invading Georgians.

A test or more?

We still don’t have the answer to the next logical question: Was this simply a test to see how far Russia could be pushed or was this part of a deliberate neo-con strategy to not only trigger a Russian response but suck the Russians into a bigger conflict, first with Georgia and later with other Western forces? If it was the latter we run the risk of the conflict escalating into all out war.

There is evidence that the neo-cons are willing to risk at least some serious escalation. Georgia has the third largest contingent of “coalition” forces in Iraq after the U.S. and the UK, with some 2000 troops. Georgian troops in Iraq are now being repatriated in U.S. military planes, theoretically at least, to fight Russian forces.

It would not be beyond a few in the Bush administration, some observers note, to use these troops and Georgian troops already in Georgia as canon fodder against any massive deployment of Russian forces.

By early May of this year the Russians began sending out alarms about the destabilizing effect of continued Western arms shipments into Georgia.

Wired News on May 19 quoted the Russian defense Minister: “Georgia has received 206 tanks, of which 175 units were supplied by NATO states, 186 armored vehicles, of which 126 were supplied by NATO, 25 helicopters, of which 12 were supplied by NATO, 70 mortars, ten surface-to-air missile systems, eight Israeli-made unmanned aircraft, and other weapons.

The Interfax News Agency reported on Aug. 7 that the Georgians were, at that point, waiting for delivery of 145 armored vehicles, 262 guns and mortars, 14 combat aircraft including four Mirazh-2000 destroyers, 25 combat helicopters, 15 American Black Hawk aircraft, six surface-to-air missile systems and other arms.”

On top of the steady flow of U.S., NATO and Israeli military equipment into Georgia there appears to be a steady flow of personnel provided as “trainers” and “consulters.”

The Pentagon admits to at least 100 “military trainers” in Georgia. A Pentagon spokesman said “there are no plans to re-deploy the 130 U.S. troops and civilian contractors who we now have stationed in and around Tbilisi. Some say the numbers stationed there are much higher.

Georgia and NATO

Although Georgia is not officially a part of NATO it can almost be described as a “de-facto” NATO state now.

First, under a March 31, 2006 agreement between Moscow and Tbilisi, Russia’s two Soviet-era military bases in Georgia – Akhalkalaki and Batumi – have been closed down. The Russian pullout from Batumi began in May, 2007 and the last Russian troops left Batumi the first week of July, 2008. Six days after they left the U.S. began its joint war games with Georgia and 29 days after they left Georgia attacked South Ossetia. If that doesn’t qualify as a provocation it would be hard to imagine what would.

Second, well before the last Russian troops pulled out Georgia’s president bragged that his country was already a real part of NATO. In a 2005 speech at the inauguration of a military base in Senskaya he boasted that the base “fully meets NATO standards.” Soon after Georgia opened a second military base at Gori which the Georgian president also said would “comply with NATO regulations in terms of military requirements as well as social conditions.”

BTC pipeline

A July, 2006 report by Global Research sheds a great deal of light on the reasons for Israel’s participation in the movement by the West to arm Georgia:

Israel is a partner in the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline which brings oil to the Eastern Mediterranean. More than 20 percent of Israeli oil; is imported from Azerbaijan, of which a large share is pumped through the BTC pipeline. Controlled by British Petroleum, the BTC pipeline has dramatically altered the political realities in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Caucusus.

“The BTC pipeline considerably changes the status of the region’s countries and cements a new pro-West alliance. Having taken the pipeline to the Mediterranean, Washington has practically set up a new bloc with Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey and Israel,” Komerzant reported in July of 2006.

The Global Research report noted that “while the official reports state that the BTC pipeline will ‘channel oil to Western markets,” what is rarely acknowledged is that part of the oil from the Caspian Sea would be directly channeled towards Israel, via Georgia. In this regard, an Israeli-Turkish pipeline project has been envisaged which would link Ceyhan to the Israeli port of Ashkelon and from there through Israel’s main pipeline system, to the Red Sea.

The report notes that Israel’s objective is not only to acquire Caspian Sea oil for its own consumption needs but also to play a key role in re-exporting Caspian Sea oil back to Asian markets through the Red Sea port of Eilat. The strategic implications of this re-routing of Caspian Sea oil are far reaching.

Israel, therefore, has a major interest in “protecting” Eastern Mediterranean transport and pipeline corridors and in channeling both military aid and training to Georgia and Azerbaijan.

The first major military cooperation agreement between Tbilisi and Tel Aviv was signed a month before Georgia signed its first agreement to work with NATO. It was signed in 1999 by then Georgian President Shevardnadze and then Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu. The military agreements were, of course designed to undermine Russia’s presence and influence in the Caucasus and Central Asia.

The current crisis in Georgia, then, is the result of a long process of escalation and confrontation pursued by the neo-cons, intent on world domination. It has the potential, if not curbed, of creating a situation far worse than what we saw in the Cold War era.

Most Americans, it is safe to say, don’t know the details behind the events unfolding these days in the Caucasus. As they discover them, however, it is safe to say they will opt for economic cooperation and friendship with Russia over confrontation and war.

Beijing Olympics showcase harmony concept

Sat, 16 Aug 2008 04:19:00 +0000

The Beijing Olympics opening ceremony began at 8:08 a.m., on the eighth day of the eighth month of 2008. The exact time was picked by organizers because of the meaning of the number eight to the Chinese. It represents luck, prosperity and wealth. It was an appropriate number, apparently, as the opening ceremony and the Olympics in general have painted a picture of the new China: increasingly prosperous, powerful, harmonious and open.

“I’m proud when watching the opening ceremony,” said Juan Ziyi, an undergraduate student at New York’s City College, referring to what has been called the most lavish opening ceremony in the history of the modern Olympic movement. “People don’t understand China’s history or how we are now. I think this will show people that we are a powerful country, but also that no one has to fear China [because we are also] a friendly country.”

A major theme of the Olympics has been “harmony.” Indeed, this has been the overriding theme of the Chinese Communist Party for a number of years. China aims at building a “harmonious society,” which means a number of things: shrinking the wealth gap between the rich and the poor, improving relations between humanity and the environment, and a peaceful world order—something especially important, given that experts say China is likely to be the world’s dominant power within a few decades.

The March of Nations, in which all nations sending a delegation to the Olympics entered, was viewed by many as a showcase of a more harmonious society. As expected, the largely Chinese audience applauded very loudly for the delegations from China and the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (North Korea). However, many were surprised at the loud cheers for the United States and Japan. There have been simmering tensions—which have flared up at various times over the years—between Japan and China since Japan occupied and brutalized China during World War II. But when the Japanese delegation came in, waving Japanese and Chinese flags, the audience erupted in applause.

France also won a surprising amount of applause. The Chinese people had only a few months earlier been organizing boycotts of any French chain, after demonstrations in favor of separating China from Tibet turned particularly ugly and a young, wheel-chair bound Chinese athlete was attacked.

Obviously, the Chinese weren’t happy with either the assault on the athlete or the western-backed campaign to separate Tibet from China.

“People should come to China to understand,” said Wei, another student at City College of New York. “The idea to make Tibet independent comes from outside China. I spent a year there.” The government makes many special provisions for the preservation of Tibetan culture, she said.

Among other things, the central government limits the number of non-Tibetans who can move into Tibet per year, in order to preserve the standing of the Tibetan ethnic group, as well as, like all ethnic minority groups in China, exempts Tibetans from the famous one-child policy.

Of course, as with anything of this scale, not everything has gone perfectly. The father-in-law of the U.S. men’s volleyball team coach, Todd Bachman, died after being stabbed, along with his wife and his Chinese tour guide, by a disturbed man who later killed himself.

After the incident, President Hu Jintao visited the surviving victims and offered condolences. Judging by both official statements and message boards, many Chinese were horrified at the incident and the Bachman family said the outpouring of compassion by both U.S. and Chinese officials and people was tremendous.

“As the most precious thing in the world, a life is never inferior or superior to another despite the different nationalities, ethnic groups, or colors of skin,” wrote Ding Gang, editor of the People’s Daily, newspaper of the Chinese Communist Party. “Love for and care about life is the most fundamental and greatest affections of human being. Chinese people would like to let all of our sincerest sympathy and deepest condolences go out to American people, to American athletes, and to the families and friends of the victim.”

Also, an al-Qaeda style terrorist organization, the East Turistan Islamic Movement has been responsible for a wave of terrorist attacks, which have killed dozens of people in Western China. The organization’s goal is to separate parts of western China into a new Taliban-styled state. ETIM has also threatened violence at the games themselves, but Chinese authorities seem to have greatly lessened the danger.

Nevertheless, despite the difficulties, the Olympic Games seem so far to be an overwhelming success. The games are going on as intended and millions of people have finally been able to get a glimpse at the modernity and prosperity of the new China.

“We are very proud,” said Ziyi Zhang. “For many years people have thought wrong about us, but now they are seeing different. For us, we think the more people see China, the more they will like China.”

dmargolis@pww.org

One more pothole

Fri, 15 Aug 2008 06:36:00 +0000

BERLIN — A former top leader of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) has been saved from expulsion and possible disgrace and Germany’s oldest party, founded in 1863. Wolfgang Clement, 68, has huffed and puffed its way out of one more pothole. Clement, once the powerful economics minister in the cabinet of Gerhard Schroeder, now on the board of one of Europe’s most powerful coal, atom and energy giants, can continue sniping at any attempt by the party to look leftward. But more pitfalls on its hurtling downhill drive are undoubtedly in the offing.

The SPD has been losing members and voters by the thousand since Schroeder with his Green coalition partners defied traditional party principles and the constitution by supporting the NATO war against Serbia. Far worse in terms of popularity were the economic “reform” measures which cut basic supporting payments for the jobless, forcing them to accept absolute minimum-pay jobs or else lose even their sparse welfare payments. This reduced hundreds of thousands to despair while chopping away at the wages of those workers with regular jobs. The retirement age was raised from 65 to 67, although even men and women over 45, once laid off, had only narrow chances of ever finding new jobs. Another series of “reforms” made medical and dental care costlier. But taxes for the super-wealthy and the corporations were actually reduced to even lower rates than before. All inner-party opposition to such measures was harshly stamped out.

Met by loss of popularity at the polls, the Social Democrats were forced in 2005 to become junior parties of the right-wing Christian Democrats, led by the politically born-again East German whiz kid Angela Merkel. The Merkel bunch, always supportive of just such harsh “reforms”, was hardly good medicine for the SPD, whose popularity in the opinion polls dropped much faster than that of its coalition partners. The chances for a comeback in the national elections next year have been looking slimmer and slimmer.

Then, a year ago, a dynamic provincial SPD-leader in the state of Hesse showed how the tables might be turned. In elections last January, Andrea Ypsilanti, 51, led a sharp attack against the ruling Christian Democrat, Koch, who had stooped to the dirtiest of racist, anti-foreigner level in his campaign. She defied his appeal to old prejudices and promised truly social measures in her state, like an anti-poverty program and a return to free college education. The result was a radical cut in Koch’s prevailing rightwing majority – his CDU got 36.8, the SPD got 36.7 percent, just short of victory.

But the appearance of the new party, The Left, on the West German scene had altered the whole scene. It squeezed past the 5 percent hurdle (with 5.1 percent) and won its first six seats in the Hesse state parliament. Without claiming a share in a new state government, it was willing to use its six votes to support an SPD-Greens coalition as long as a progressive policy was followed. This would have given Ypsilanti a one-vote lead and made her minister president, only the second German woman to attain such a position. But one Social Democrat in the legislature said, “Not with me. I reject any and all cooperation with The Left”, which is still labeled as the evil offspring of the nasty old GDR (though the leader of The Left in Hesse, a West German, is a leading figure in the Hessian peace movement). Ypsilanti gave up, at least until now, and the reactionary racist, Koch, is still acting minister president.

But Wolfgang Clement, who does not even come from Hesse, had sabotaged Ypsilanti by stating in a key newspaper before the election that, though a Social Democrat, he would not vote for Ypsilanti. He opposed her call to move away from atomic energy and big new coal plants. Clement’s opposition was no surprise; after leaving office as a Social Democratic minister he joined the board of the giant utility network, RWE, which stood to lose over 3 billion Euros after even a partial renunciation of atomic power. His position was no different from that of any hired lobbyist – and of former Chancellor Schroeder and other Social Democratic bigwigs who received similar jobs with big business almost before they had cleaned out their desks in their government offices.

By no means all the grass roots Social Democratic membership had quit in disgust (although the number of members recently dipped below that of the Christian Democrats for the first time since 1945). Some decided to stay and fight to save the party’s political honor; they accused Clement of betraying his own party and called for his expulsion.

What followed recalled a hive full of bees when a bear barges in. How could anyone attack Clement, with his long career in the party and his many services to it? How ungrateful such heretic members could be, demanded virtually every rightwing media pundit in or outside the SPD. Some of the opposition backed down. If Clement took back what he said and refrained from such sabotage in future there was no need to expel him. At first Clement remained obstinate and arrogant as ever. But as the hole got deeper, threatening to split the party even more, its weak-kneed chairman Kurt Beck tried to smooth the path and save his own political neck by pressuring Clement to retreat just a little. Almost no-one recalled the many left-wingers expelled over the years for far lesser reasons.

Finally the stubborn old warrior came by bicycle to a press conference where he half-heartedly apologized to anyone he might possibly have distressed. But, he added, I haven’t changed my views and will continue to utter them loudly whenever I see fit.

That may have been the end of this summer episode. It has hardly ended the downward course of the party in its fighting to survive as a major player. Its main effort currently is to sound more progressive again, by swiping demands of The Left for a minimum wage and improvements in pensioning and jobless pay. It has usually tended to cave in whenever the Merkel bunch put the screws on, but with key provincial elections, the vote for European Union delegates and the big national election all approaching, it wants to look tougher again. It is trying desperately to stay well ahead of the Left, which is now getting 11-14 percent in national opinion polls, with the SPD in the low 20’s. In one East German province, Thuringia, The Left is now neck and neck with the ruling Christian Democrats, both have approval rates of 31 percent, while the SPD is down to 20 percent.

In West German Saarland, the home of The Left’s co-chairperson Oskar Lafontaine, the SPD is equally desperate. But current suspense centers on the Bavarian elections on Sept. 28, when the SPD and Greens hope to end the long-standing “Christian” majority, while keeping the Left from winning any seats. It looks like a tight race either way. But it would seem that the only real hope for the SPD is to break its strong ties with big business and recall its one-time struggle for the rights of working people. If it took such a policy, its present writhing and despairing about possible arrangements with The Left could become superfluous. It might regain strength and get out of some nasty potholes. But that’s a very big “if”!

Remembering the 1968 Olympic Games

Mon, 11 Aug 2008 05:37:00 +0000

Forty years ago at the Summer Olympics in Mexico City, Tommie Smith and John Carlos raised their black-gloved fists in protest against racism and injustice. Students at San Jose State University, Smith won the gold medal and Carlos won the bronze medal in the 200-meter race. As the American flag rose and the National Anthem played, the two sprinters bowed their heads, closed their eyes and raised their fists.

Smith told the media his raised right fist represented Black Power in America, Carlos’ raised left fist represented Unity in Black America. The black scarf around his neck represented Black pride and their black socks (no shoes) represented Black poverty. Carlos said he wore beads around his neck to represent those Africans who died in the Middle Passage and those who lost their lives through lynching.

Harry Edwards, a young sociologist, asked all Black athletes to boycott the 1968 Olympics to bring attention to the civil rights movement and its struggles. Edwards organized the Olympic Project for Human Rights (OPHR). There was much debate before the games about which kind of protest should take place. Because of the serious consequences of a boycott, the athletes finally decided against it. Students at Black colleges were told they would be expelled if they even joined OPHR. Those in the military were threatened with severe punishment. Members of the track and field team believed that it was important to go to Mexico City and to do their utmost to win and use their victories as a platform to make their statement. Sports historians often call the 1968 Olympic US Track and Field team the greatest team ever. The team won 22 medals, 12 gold and set 8 world records in the process. Tommie Smith had broken 13 world records in his career.

It was decided that each athlete would come up with his own form of protest. Some of the Black athletes went to the medal stand in black socks without their shoes. Some wore black armbands or black ribbons. Some wore black berets similar to those worn by the Black Panthers. Everyone did something to protest racism and injustice, but the action of Tommie Smith and John Carlos, a secret they kept from the team, brought worldwide attention. Afterwards Smith and Carlos were suspended from the US Team and banned from the Olympic Village. There were death threats made on them and their families. American officials told them they had disgraced their country and the media criticized and ridiculed them. But many others supported Smith and Carlos. Peter Norman of Australia, who had won the 200 meter silver medal, wore an OPHR badge on the evening of the protest. Norman, a white man, was ostracized upon his return to Australia and was not chosen for the 1972 team in spite of qualifying.

Both Smith and Carlos continued their participation in sports and both have served as track and field coaches. In 1998 they were honored as heroes on the 30th anniversary of their protest. San Jose State University erected a statue to commemorate their courage in 1968. Both received an Arthur Ash Courage Award. A documentary about the 1968 protest, “Salute,” will be shown at the Sydney Film Festival in 2008. The director of the film is the nephew of Peter Norman.

Said Tommie Smith, “Of course I was afraid. I was terrified, but I was on a mission. I believed I was saved because of my belief in others, not necessarily myself, because I am a vessel to be used for the betterment of Human kind.”

American youth witness greening of Cuba

Wed, 06 Aug 2008 05:21:00 +0000

HAVANA — July 14 — A group of 41 tired Americans walked across the International Peace Bridge connecting Canada and Buffalo, NY. These were not your everyday Niagara Falls tourists — when they arrived in Buffalo, banners, people and cheers awaited them. These Americans had just traveled to Cuba with the Venceremos Brigade, against US travel restrictions. This year was the Brigade’s 39th solidarity delegation to the Island, a challenge not only to U.S. travel restrictions but also to the U.S. imposed economic blockade of Cuba.

The Venceremos Brigade worked side-by-side with Cuban workers in yucca fields and in the largest publishing house in the country. However, their most important job was learning about Cuba, the effects of the blockade, and the struggle of the Cuban 5 so that we could bring what we learned back to the U.S. where information from Cuba is largely restricted. Brigadistas traveled from Havana to Santa Clara and into the mountains to a community called Jibacoa, along the way meeting with Cuban students, professionals, workers, politicians, soldiers, farmers and doctors.

Youth in Cuba

Ashley Wolford, a 22 year-old Brigadista from Chicago, was surprised by the treatment of young people in Cuba. “Coming from Chicago where youth are criminalized, seeing junior highs with full security teams, police and metal detectors and everything, I found Cuba totally different. When we visited a school for children that had committed crimes, we found out that criminalizing young people is illegal in Cuba. The school even had students that had committed serious crimes, but the school had no bars on windows, no people in uniform, no high fences, no handcuffs, no metal detectors, and students went home to their families on the weekends!”

The Brigade also toured a home for children without parents, a tour that Ashley found very moving. “Again I was shocked to see that children were not institutionalized. The home was not given any name because when the children go to school their friend’s homes don’t have a name. The home was a home not an institution. Growing up in the foster care system here in the U.S. where there is no space that feels like a home, and where you get kicked out as soon as you’re ‘too old,’ it was amazing to see that the children are given homes after they leave, have access to college, and continue to visit their family for advise and celebrations.”

Solidarity

Brigadistas learned a lot about solidarity in Cuba as international solidarity was a theme on the trip. They met with Cuban soldiers who had fought along side their counterparts in Angola and the Congo in their independence struggles. They met doctors who had just returned from volunteering in Venezuela. They also found an incredible amount of solidarity expressed towards the American people and the struggles in our country.

“Something that really struck me was the Fourth of July Celebration we went to,” said Benjamin Cline, from Chicago. “It is really cool that even though Cuba has been under a U.S. imposed economic embargo, yet Cubans still show solidarity with the American people by celebrating the Fourth of July, a day which marks our Independence from British rule. They celebrate our independence even though we placed an embargo on them when they struggled for their independence and won,” Ben also noted. “It was interesting that the event was a symphony. Most of our delegation had never been to a symphony before because they are not accessible in the United States, but in Cuba tickets are cheap, and working people there see ‘classical’ art like symphonies and ballets all the time.”

Green For All

People from around the world are traveling to Cuba to study urban and organic agriculture which has been perfected there over the course of the last 10 years. Cuba went ‘green’ early not only out of respect for the environment, but largely out of economic need. After the fall of the Soviet Union, Cuba went through what they call ‘the special period.’ During that time, Cuba was economically devastated. They did not have access to petroleum-based fertilizer, and lost much of their ability to import food. In order to prevent hunger, many resourceful new methods of agriculture were developed. There was a transition from cash crops to sustainable agriculture (growing what people needed to eat), new methods of organic agriculture were developed, and an urban agricultural movement developed.

Now, in a time of global environmental crisis, Cuba is more consciously developing these and other ‘green’ designs. The use of solar panels in rural areas has made it possible for rural school houses to run computers, TVs and VCRs. On farms many farmers are now making gas for their stoves from pig poop! These ‘green’ features are both economically necessary, but also innovative new approaches to sustainability.

There is so much for us to learn from Cuba! Next year is the 40th Venceremos Brigade, and the 50th Anniversary of the Revolution. If you are interested in joining the Brigade next summer (Starting July 19th) email cuba@yclusa.org.

Chavez trip builds Russian alliance, worries Washington

Mon, 04 Aug 2008 03:15:00 +0000

The main story from Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’ recent tour to Belarus, Portugal, Spain and Russia was his visit to Moscow July 22-23. Chavez and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev agreed on banking cooperation, joint energy ventures, arms sales and trade. But stories surfaced suggesting that close ties between the two nations represent a possible security threat to the United States.

Russia and Venezuela ended up deciding on a binational business council and a joint bank aimed at fostering independence from European and U.S. bankers. The leaders arranged for cooperation between the state oil corporations of both nations to exploit Venezuela’s Orinoco Delta oil reserves. Private Russian investment in Venezuelan enterprises was on the agenda, as was the purchase by Lukoil, Russia’s state oil company, of a refinery in Italy to process heavy Venezuelan oil.

Trade between the two countries, predominately fertilizers, aluminum, steel and maritime products, rose from $34 million in 2003 to more than $1.1 billion last year.

World media focused on proposed Venezuelan arms purchases from Russia. The shopping basket includes coastal and air defense systems, warships, patrol aircraft, tanks, missiles and diesel submarines, all at a cost exceeding $1 billion. Venezuela will borrow from Russian banks to finance the deal. Russia has already supplied Venezuela with fighter jets, helicopters and 100,000 Kalashnikov assault rifles.

While Chavez and accompanying officials were in Europe, the international press circulated information that Venezuela would buy an additional $30 billion worth of weaponry from Russia, also that Venezuela would allow Russia to situate a military base in its territory. TeleSur surveyed these reports and featured an official denial of both stories from Venezuela’s Information Ministry.

The ministry denounced unquestioning acceptance of “falsification,” along with the media’s readiness, especially in Venezuela, to circulate it, and called the reporting a “new element in the constant campaign that imperialism promotes against our country.”

The day before Chavez’ arrival in Moscow, Izvestiya said Russian nuclear bombers would be sent to bases in Cuba specifically in response to U.S. plans to mount a missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic. The Russian Foreign Minister denied the story, blaming unnamed foreign states for circulating false reports.

Defense analyst Leonid Ivashov suggested, according to Agence France Presse, that Cuba should be used “not as a permanent base — this is unnecessary — but as a stopover airfield, a refueling stop.” A chorus of media comparisons burgeoned between the alleged Russian plans and the missile crisis of 1962, described by AFP as a “terrifying two-week brinkmanship.”

As if on cue, Air Force General Norton Schwartz told a Senate committee that the presence of Russian bombers in Cuba “crosses a threshold, crosses a red line for the United States of America.” Schwartz, nominated to head the Air Force, was testifying at a confirmation hearing.

The flurry, at the time a Latin American revolutionary was visiting with sympathizing Russian leaders, showed up in the dominant media as a reminder of ostensibly similar encounters in the past. For Washington, the provoking of fear could be seen as a possible counterweight to what President Chavez termed “polycentrism ... a world based in a multipolar order.”

Former Cuban President Fidel Castro commended his government for maintaining “a worthy silence.” The matter of bombers, he stated, is out of Cuban hands. “You will be killed either way, whether you say yes or no. Imperialism applies Machiavellian strategy to Cuba. One need not explain, ask for excuses, or apologize.”

In line with the crescendo of skewed reporting on Russian and Latin American alliances that nurtures fear, Reuters and other sources said during Chavez’ visit to Moscow that Iran is to receive Russian missile batteries capable of defending against attacks on its nuclear facilities.

atwhit @roadrunner.com

Health care: What sets Canada apart

Sat, 02 Aug 2008 10:29:00 +0000

World Notes: August 2

Sat, 02 Aug 2008 04:28:00 +0000

United Kingdom: Unions pressure Labor Party

Union general secretaries winnowed through some 4,000 proposals before submitting 120 demands to government ministers at the Labor Party’s National Policy Forum held July 25-26 at Warwick University. Voting as a block, the unions achieved passage of a short list of proposals to be submitted to the next Labor Party convention.

The Forum was receptive because unions currently pay 90 percent of Labor Party expenses. Among the demands were scrapping National Health Service prescription charges, applying the minimum wage to younger workers and inserting fair employment clauses in procurement contracts.

Grim words from Prime Minister Gordon Brown as to excessive militancy suggested to the UK Guardian that many proposals may not be incorporated into the party’s final electoral program.

South Korea: Labor actions sweep country

Labor actions swept across South Korea during July. Hospital workers protesting U.S. beef used in hospitals carried out a one-day strike July 23. The next day the police announced the imminent arrest of officials of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions for their part in organizing recent strikes, marches and demonstrations against beef imported from the United States.

The Korea Times said hundreds of police received awards for what unions regard as police repression. Unionized Hyundai auto workers carried out a six-hour strike on July 18, their fourth work stoppage during July, this one causing losses of $87 million. Their union is demanding salary increases and a seat on the Hyundai board.

South Africa: Unions look at safety, wages & prices

The National Union of Mineworkers announced in July that if arbitration fails, disputes with three mining corporations: DeBeers (diamonds), Exxaro (coal) and Kumba Resources (iron) would lead to strike actions.

With no prosecutions for 87 mine deaths so far this year and 1,500 deaths over five years, safety is at issue, especially for miners at Gold Fields set to strike in August.

LabourStart said rising prices over two months — electricity, 27.5 percent; food, 16.8 percent and fuel, 37 percent — triggered nationwide demonstrations in many cities, called by the COSATU labor federation. The tens of thousands who took to the streets on July 9 are aiming for a national strike on Aug. 6.

Occupied West Bank: New settlement coming

In late July an Israeli planning committee authorized a settlement in the occupied West Bank that, if approved by Defense Minister Ehud Barak, would be the first there in 10 years. Construction would violate Israeli promises made last year during peace talks.

The Al Jazeera report notes that some Israelis removed from Gaza in 2005 are already living at the site.

The decision came in the wake of West Bank demonstrations in July against the Israeli “separation wall,” condemned as a violation of international law four years ago by the International Court of Justice. Ten percent of West Bank land now lies on the Israeli side of the wall.

Mexico: Monopoly has advantages

Monsanto Corporation, purveyor of 90 percent of the world’s genetically modified (GM) seeds, announced in July its readiness to begin trials of GM seed corn. Under its as yet unpublished “Regimen for the Special Protection of Corn,” Monsanto bears no responsibility for adverse effects of GM crops.

Silvia Ribiero, writing in rebelion.org, notes studies demonstrating the mediocre productivity of GM varieties. Their advantage stems from likely contamination of native crops by GM varieties and farmers being forced to pay royalties to the corporation.

Reassurances from Mexican agricultural and environmental officials as to GM safety testify to corporate pressures, according to Greenpeace Mexico. At risk are small farmers and native strains of corn. Greenpeace called for bio-monitoring of GM seeds.

Cuba: U.S. stonewalls prisoners’ wives

Supporters of the five Cuban anti-terrorist fighters unjustly imprisoned in U.S. jails have denounced U.S. refusal over eight years for Olga Salanueva and over nine years for Adriana Perez to visit husbands Gerardo Hernandez and Rene Gonzalez in jail.

On July 16, U.S. officials in Havana spurned Salanueva’s ninth application for a visa; now she is “permanently ineligible.” Perez’ ninth application is pending.

Antiterroristas, a Cuban web site, reported on a recent wave of worldwide demonstrations in support for the women, joined by Nobel Prize winners, parliamentarians and intellectuals.

In Washington, retired Army colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, associated with former Secretary of State Colin Powell, said, “Why are we frightened of two women who want to see their husbands?”

World Notes are compiled by W.T. Whitney Jr. (atwhit @roadrunner.com)