People Before Profit blog

Cyprus “blackmailed” by European Union

Mon, 01 Apr 2013 11:34:00 +0000

It has been well known for some time that the countries of the European south, Greece in particular, have suffered greatly due to the world crisis of capital. The crisis has now turned on the Mediterranean nation of Cyprus with a vengeance. The main Cypriot banks, Bank of Cyprus and the Laiki Bank, suffered massive losses due to their speculation in Greek bonds forcing Cyprus to turn to the stability mechanism of the European Union to bail out its banks.

The leading elements of the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), popularly known as the "Troika", demanded, among other measures, a "haircut" of the deposits in Cypriot banks. The current president of Cyprus, Nicos Anastasiades had himself suggested that this "haircut" be applied to all deposits, something like 6.6 percent for deposits less then €100,000 and almost 10 percent for deposits of €100,000 and greater. This proposal meet with great popular opposition and was voted down of Tuesday March 19th with all of the Representatives from the DISY party, (the party of Anastasiades), abstaining.

Anastasiades, who was elected president of Cyprus in February, had, both before and shortly after the election, promised that there would be no such "haircut." Thus his creditability has been severely damaged and many Cypriots are now blaming him for allowing this attack on the Cypriot economy.

Following the rejection of the original proposals Anastasiades and the "Troika" went back to the drawing board and came up with an alternative package that was approved on Friday March 22nd, over the objections of AKEL. What is now being called the Anatasiades-Eurogroup Agreement, limits the "haircut" to only those deposits over €100,000. These "haircuts" will be very severe, in certain cases as much as 80 percent, but the exact per-cent has not yet been clearly defined. The Laiki bank will be closed and deposits of €100,000 and greater will be frozen. Potential losses on such deposits may be as high as 80 percent. Those deposits below €100,000 will be transferred to the Bank of Cyprus. Deposits over €100,000 at the Bank of Cyprus will also be frozen and may be subjected to losses as high as 40 percent. An AKEL suggested amendment to protect deposits held by pension funds was rejected but an AKEL (i.e. communist party) proposed "Solidarity Fund," intended to encourage popular investment in the nations energy sector, passed with the support of all parties. The banks are now scheduled to reopen on Thursday, March 28th.

Basically, the final agreement capitulates to demands articulated by the head of the International Monetary Fund, (the IMF, one of the constituents of the "Troika"), Christine Lagarde, among whose goals were to shrink the banking sector, cut the budget and privatize state assets measures which, for Cypriots will translate into job losses and benefit cuts. Indeed the closing of Laiki Bank alone will result in the direct loss of some 1,500 jobs, this in a country whose total population is 800,000 plus 200,000 immigrants.

In an official statement AKEL called the agreement the climax of the first phase of the "Troika's" plans against the Cypriot people, and said that the agreement, which they called the results of blatant blackmail by the "Troika", would lead to higher unemployment and the implementation of additional austerity measurers, including cuts and privatizations, and will cause huge problems, not only for the nation's working people but also for small and medium businesses. In short the same measures that have led to disaster wherever they have been applied are now being forced on Cyprus. AKEL, which form the beginning of the crisis of capital struggled successfully to protect the people of Cyprus, is now calling on the government to seek a settlement of the fiscal crisis outside the framework of the "Troika", which is threatening to stop all capital flows to the nations banks unless all that it demands is acceded to.

AKEL's official statements seem to reflect the sentiment of the Cypriot masses since there have been daily demonstrations against what is widely perceived to be an EU sponsored plot against the nation. For instance on Tuesday March 26th young people marched through the streets carrying signs, which among other things, compared German chancellor Angela Merkel to Hitler and there seems to be generally agreement with AKEL's estimation that the "Troika" and Germany are taking a neo-colonial approach to Cyprus and to the rest of Europe. AKEL itself has called for a popular demonstration on Wednesday March 27th.

Relative to most EU member nations the Cypriot economy is small but the prospect of similar bank "haircuts" has rippled through the Euro-zone, particularly the European south provoking widespread panic and indignation.

Photo: Demonstrators protest the Troika in Cyprus. Gary Bono/PW

BRICS summit considers development bank

Wed, 27 Mar 2013 11:29:00 +0000

On Tuesday, a summit meeting of the BRICS countries got underway in Durban, South Africa. One of the aims was to work toward a new development bank to be funded by the five BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa), as well as other projects.

The reaction in the corporate-controlled press in the United States and worldwide was generally negative. Representatives of entities ranging from Goldman-Sachs to the ultra-left denounced the effort as either unfeasible because of the diverse nature of the countries involved, or simply a new form of imperialism seeking to dominate and exploit the poorer countries. But others see the rise of the BRICS countries, and especially their proposed venture into the financing of international development projects, in more positive terms.

The countries are certainly different. China, with a population of 1.3 billion and an annual gross domestic product of GDP $7.3 trillion, has an economy in which both state and private companies play major roles, internally and internationally. India, with 1.2 billion inhabitants and a GDP of $1.85 trillion, is nearly as big as China but also poorer. Brazil's 200 million people have a GDP of $2.48 trillion. Russia has a population of 142 million and an annualized GDP of $1.86 trillion. South Africa, with a population of 52 million and a GDP of $408 billion, is the smallest economy among the BRICS countries but also the largest economy in sub-Saharan Africa. The world GDP is about 70 trillion, and the combined GDP's of the five BRICS countries come to about $13.9 trillion, or 20 percent of world GDP, a very substantial economic and financial force, at least potentially. In comparison, U.S. GDP is about $15 trillion, that of the European Union $16 trillion, and of Japan just under$6 trillion.

Much of the discussion in and around the Durban summit focused on Africa. The purpose of the BRICS group is not just to coordinate their own economies, but also to explore ways of competing with the United States and Europe in development and trade projects in Africa, where all of the BRICS countries are now shaping up to be major players.

Africa, especially the sub-Saharan part, is the poorest region of the world. A legacy of colonialism is that almost all African countries are stuck in an economic and trade model of exporting raw materials and importing manufactured goods, an exchange which is rigged against the Africans. Even when the raw materials are extremely valuable, this model does not allow local industry to reach a takeoff point that it would be able to compete with products imported from the wealthy industrialized countries. For financing development aid, African countries have not been able to pool their resources but instead have had to go hat in hand to the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the former colonial powers plus the United States. These entities require, for their "help", very onerous concessions such as unfavorable trade deals, privatization of government functions and budgetary austerity that severely impacts the ability of the African governments to provide for the basic needs of their people. It is little to be wondered that the poorest countries in the world are almost all in sub-Saharan Africa.

It's a vicious cycle. Without bringing in outside trade and investment, African government cannot even run the bare bones functions of administering their countries. Yet the price of that trade and aid is to dig themselves even deeper in the hole.

It was not always so. Before the collapse of the Soviet Union and its Eastern European allies, especially Czechoslovakia and the German Democratic Republic, these countries financed important development projects in a number of poor African states, and did not force privatization and austerity on them in exchange. The fact that the communist-ruled states were offering these things had a moderating influence on the demands imposed by the capitalist powers.

With the Soviet and Eastern European help gone, the African governments saw the only source of trade and aid end up exclusively in the hands of their former colonial rulers and the wealthy industrial countries of the West, who profit from the unequal existing arrangement.

Two lifelines offer themselves. One is the effort of the left-wing Latin American governments to extend to Africa the same sort of institutions of economic cooperation that have been so fruitful for a number of countries in Latin America and the Caribbean. These efforts offer development aid and trade advantages without demanding neo-liberal concessions from the poorer countries. To extend these efforts to African countries was a major focus of the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez before his untimely death, but also has been of interest to Brazil and other countries in the region.

The idea of a BRICS development bank is another one that arouses interest, but the details are important. Will help and financing from the BRICS Bank, or other financial agencies that the BRICS countries might eventually develop, lack the onerous strings that are attached to financing from the International Monetary Fund or the World Bank?

Time will tell. Meanwhile, there is massive new investment by China, and also significant amounts by the other BRICS countries, in African countries. This has set off a jealous reaction among Western capitalists. There have been some African complaints about the behavior of private Chinese companies, and some on the left complain that the BRICS countries are no better than the Western imperialists. But for any African country to have a strong competitor to play off against the companies and governments is seen as a step forward by many African leaders.

U. S. intervention in Cuba remains intense

Tue, 26 Mar 2013 14:03:00 +0000

The U.S. government's assault on Cuba's sovereignty continues. An economic blockade remains in force after a half century. Cuba is designated a terrorist state. The Cuban Five political prisoners still are not free. Now a report from the U.S. General Accounting Office reveals that monies for projects directed at changing Cuba's government increased sharply after 2004, the George W. Bush administration, and have remained high during the Obama administration.

Between 1996 and 2011, Congress appropriated $205 million to enable the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the State Department to carry out so-called "democracy promotion" programs in Cuba. According to the 58-page report issued on February 7, 2013, 90 percent of the total was dispensed between 2004 and 2011 and half of that was spent during Obama's first term.

The GAO was responding to a request in September 2011 from then-Sen. John Kerry, chairperson of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Kerry, now Secretary of State, was seeking follow-up on problems the GAO identified in 2006 and 2008. It had been established that organizations administering the interventionist Cuba programs were holding onto large amounts of money and providing luxury items for their Cuban contacts. In 2011, Kerry ordered a brief freeze on $20 million heading for USAID and State Department Cuba projects.

The GAO's overall judgment was that, "USAID's program is improved, but State [Department] could better monitor its implementing partners." Emphasizing reduction of hazards to U.S. funded operatives, the report observes that, "Conditions in Cuba pose security risks to the implementing partners." The GAO attributes "surveillance, arbitrary arrests, detentions, travel restrictions, exile, [and] criminal prosecutions" on the part of Cuban authorities to government repression. There is silence on the fact that Cuba, like other nations, has laws criminalizing anti-government actions undertaken at the behest of hostile foreign nations.

One object lesson the report highlights is the example of Alan Gross, the highly paid USAID "sub-partner" who handed out sophisticated communications equipment and is now imprisoned in Cuba. Imprisonment in 2003 of U.S. - paid anti-government pseudo-journalists and librarians, not mentioned, may have served as another cautionary tale.

The GAO reports that now for the sake of risk reduction, 90 percent of USAID and State Department Cuba funding for Cuba programs goes to "for - profit and nongovernmental organizations with a worldwide or regional focus" and very little to groups working exclusively in Cuba. In addition, "Cuba democracy assistance efforts have expanded beyond a focus on traditional activists to include groups such as poor and rural communities, religious organizations, small businesses, and information technology enthusiasts." Support has increased for independent bloggers, social networking, and for developing information technology.

The GAO report released to the public refers to an earlier, "sensitive but unclassified" version that touches upon funding recipients. Yet even there, says the Miami Herald, the "USAID does not release the names of most of its partners and sub- partners [so as] to protect them from Cuban authorities." The Herald applauds the GAO's "exhaustive review." USAID spokesperson Mark Lopes is quoted: "Our Cuba democracy programs are comparable to what we and other donors do to support people in repressive societies all over the world."

On March 14 the Cuban Foreign Ministry responded to the report by denouncing U.S. funding as "destined to promote the overthrow of the Cuban government." The Ministry took occasion to protest other instances of U.S. funding for "regime change" not covered in the report, particularly the $30 million in annual U.S. funding for Radio and TV Marti broadcasts to the island and support for intelligence agencies operating in Cuba.

The Ministry's statement views the U.S. government's move of diversifying anti-Cuba funding away from contracting groups focused solely on Cuba as an attempt to avoid "corruption that has predominated over the years with [money] serving to fatten the pockets of the most recalcitrant ultra-right wingers in Miami." Leaving recipients unidentified is in line with the "covert nature" of the projects and "execution beyond the reach of Cuban laws." "Other official documents that have come to light" suggest to the Foreign Ministry that the "new sectors of Cuban society" targeted by U.S. interventionists include "Blacks, homosexuals, professionals, intellectuals, and artists."

The statement concludes: "The GOA document is extremely revealing as to the firm imprint of the Obama administration on those policies and of the strong impulse it provides for them. The administration's purpose is to perfect their design, disguise them better, and make it more difficult for Cuba's institutions and legal system to detect and neutralize them."

France sends troops into Central African Republic

Mon, 25 Mar 2013 13:08:00 +0000

France has sent 350 troops to counter the Seleka (rebel) forces that have taken control of Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic.

The entrance of French troops follows closely a takeover of Bangui by Seleka forces which, on Sunday, also seized the presidential palace and forced Pres. Francois Bozize to flee the country. Some reports were that he had fled to Cameroon, others that he had gone to the Republic of the Congo.

The rebels are mostly fighters from previous rebellious armies who are angry because they accuse Bozizé of reneging on agreements which would have given them some economic benefits. Since December, Seleka had been in negotiations with Bozizé with the idea of forming a joint government, but this broke down earlier this year.

Bozizé himself originally came to power in a coup d'etat in 2003, in which he overthrew a former colleague, President Ange-Felix Patasse. Patasse had been elected in 1993. Neither Bozizé nor Patasse have been strangers to political and military intrigue. Both served former Emperor Jean-Bedel Bokassa, who ruled the country by bloody repression from 1966 to 1979, only to turn on him when this suited their political ambitions.

As for the Seleka rebels, it appears hard to characterize them in ideological terms. They are a collection of fighters whose roots are in different rebellions in the recent past. Their main demands were that the government live up to its commitments made in previous peace negotiations (in 2007 and again in 2011) to provide for ex-rebel fighters economically. The main Seleka leader, Michel Djotodia, has now declared himself president of the Central African Republic.

The rebellion was denounced by the African Union's Peace and Security Council. Both French and South African troops have been sent to the Central African Republic, with some of the latter being killed according to latest reports. In the past, France has interfered many times in the country's internal affairs, and the United States has a military presence there. Former Libyan Strongman Gadaffi and the government of neighboring Chad have also been involved in the Central African Republic.

The roots of this instability are economic. The Central African Republic is one of the poorest countries in the world. Its Gross Domestic Product (calculated by the purchasing power parity method), is only $767 a year. Although it is known to have fabulous subsoil wealth (gold, uranium, oil, diamonds and other things), this has not benefited the mass of the country's population in spite of inspiring the covetousness of outsiders.

As a result, the Central African Republic has poor infrastructure, a low level of education and health care, a high level of inequality, and a weak state which often cannot pay its employees or deal with corruption and armed rebellion. It does not completely control its own currency, but uses the Central African CFA Franc, a source of worry in the whole region because of the potential power it gives the French Finance Ministry.

In other words, the situation is just about the same as that of the other countries in the Sahel region which includes Mali, Niger, Chad and Burkina Faso: Landlocked, no industrial development, dependent on export of raw materials whose prices are at the mercy of international markets, and subject to rules of trade and finance made in Paris, New York, and Washington.

In many cases, the only present-day sources of financial aid for development are the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the European Union and governments of wealthy Western countries whose main interest is in assuring the profits of major corporations. In the past, those Francophone African leaders who have tried to make radical changes have been overthrown and often killed (Tomas Sankara in Burkina Faso, Patrice Lumumba in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Marien Nguoabe in the Congo Republic) by agents of the Western powers and their local allies.

As the worldwide battle for key resources such as gas, oil, and minerals intensifies, with China now a major player in Africa, the willingness of France, Britain, the United States and other wealthy and powerful countries to intervene to block any change in this state of affairs is likely to increase.

Before his untimely death earlier this month, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez had been involved in an ambitious effort to try to extend the economic advances that he and others have been able to achieve in the Western Hemisphere to impoverished African countries.

The general idea was to include African economies in some of the structures of international cooperation which have had such success in South America. These are structures which, for example, offer aid and credit without demanding the measures of austerity, privatization and free trade that the IMF and World Bank demand. It is likely that if Chavez' colleague Nicolas Maduro wins the Venezuelan presidential elections on April 14, these efforts will continue. Other Latin American countries as Cuba, Brazil and Argentina are also involved.

Africa's death toll from poverty-related causes, especially preventable diseases of babies and children, and from the instability and internal conflict that now afflicts the Central African Republic and so many other African countries, is of holocaust proportions. In the Central African Republic, 105 of every 1000 babies born each year die before their first birthday.

In socialist Cuba, that number is 5. That means 100 African babies dead who could have been saved. One hundred sixty four out of every 1000 children in the Democratic Republic of the Congo die before their fifth birthdays. And no wonder: Only 34 percent of Central African Republic citizens have access to proper human waste disposal (for Cuba it is 91 percent). Other statistics are similarly shocking.

Capitalist apologists from the West who complain about Venezuelan or Cuban "inroads" in Africa need to be confronted with these figures.

Photo: French troops outside the town of Birao, Central African Republic. Schalk von Zrydam/AP

After a long winter, tropical rain forest sounded lovely

Mon, 25 Mar 2013 12:37:00 +0000

CHICAGO - I used my frequent flyer miles to get out of Chicago just a couple of hours before the biggest snow storm of the winter. A week in Costa Rica and a visit to a tropical rain forest sounded lovely.

Costa Rica has a population a little larger than Chicago and an area equal to West Virginia. Progressives have long applauded Costa Rica's abolition of the national army. Using the military budget for education and people's welfare was a wonderful idea. As a result, Costa Rica enjoys a higher standard of living than most other Latin American countries. But I had also heard that rain forests were being cut down to create cheap pasture for beef for McDonald's hamburgers.

Of course I wanted to see the rain forests. Three days in Tortuguero National Park was all a tourist could ask for. We saw bands of monkeys - all three local species; crocodiles sliding out of the canals to sunbathe; toucans and other brilliant birds; monarch butterflies; and tiny jewel-tone venomous frogs. But we also saw pop bottles and other garbage floating in the waterways, endangering the fish and all other life. It was obvious that profit was being put ahead of the environment.

Still, there were many signs of victories that people had won in addition to abolition of the army. Costa Rica enjoys national health care for all. Pregnant women's job rights were protected and public places including the extended grounds of the national university were tobacco smoke-free. My most inspiring experience at the university was meeting the young people of Frente Amplio, the equivalent of the Young Communist League. The 12 proposals in their pamphlet included a call for true equality and democracy in education and the work place, overcoming poverty, strengthening democracy and a more just and inclusive society, socialism.

A democratic revolution in Costa Rica in 1948 had won fundamental democratic rights. These included abolition of the army, health care for all, minimum wage, and other benefits.

But the party now in power is expected to win the coming national elections. Laura Chinchilla, the current president, is not allowed to run for another term.

According to teacher unionists, Chinchilla is following a neoliberal agenda. An example of the strong U.S. imperialist influence is the 5,000 US troops allowed into Costa Rica despite massive protests. The excuse was the need to "stop drug shipments."

My friend and guide, Professor Maria Perez Yglesia, got me an appointment with the president of the High School Teachers Union, Beatriz Ferreto López. I expected a discussion with two or three teacher unionists. Instead, an audience of 40 unionists was eagerly awaiting my "speech." It was part of their celebration of International Women's Day. I was surprised. In my 80 years as an activist, I had never made a presentation in Spanish. But not to worry. We got over the language barrier with the help of a Princeton University graduate in the audience. And it was easy to understand each other because their issues were so similar to what teachers are facing in the Chicago Public Schools.

Cuts in the educational budget were leading to a loss of some student services. For example, cutbacks in bus service made it difficult to impossible for students in rural areas to get to school. These cutbacks were also leading to threats to cut teachers' salaries. Still, local corporations were pushing for privatization of public schools. Public university budgets were being slashed. Teachers' unions and all public service unions were under attack. Public service unions are strong in Costa Rica but organizing in the private sector was difficult. "Try to organize a union and you're fired," some told me.

I learned that the political left was influential in Costa Rica. But they were divided. A united left could form a winning coalition. The people of Costa Rica deserve nothing less.

Photo: Lumpkin, center front. To her right, Beatriz Ferreto López and Dr. Maria Perez Yglesias. Courtesy Beatrice Lumpkin

Hugo Chavez and Yewri Guillen: two lives connected

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 12:44:00 +0000

The late Hugo Chavez and the late Yewri Guillen were both Latin Americans who, although they never knew each other and came from different countries, are deeply connected.

Yewri Guillen was an 18-year-old Dominican who died in April 2011, just as he was to be sent to the U.S. minor leagues. He was signed as a prospect by Major League Baseball's Washington Nationals franchise for $30,000. While this is certainly a significant amount of money, it paled in comparison to what the Nationals paid to U.S.- born prospect Bryce Harper at about the same time -- a cool $6 million.

Upon signing at 16, Guillen was whisked away to one of the baseball academies affiliated with Major League Baseball and their franchises that dot the Dominican landscape. Prospects ate, slept and breathed baseball, as there were no schools or academic classes made available by the teams.

Then, Guillen began suffering painful headaches for which he was given tea and aspirin by academy personnel. During his time at the Nationals' Dominican facility, he never saw a doctor or a certified trainer because none were employed at the premises.

When the symptoms worsened, Guillen's family could not afford the fee to enter him at the best local private hospital because his MLB contract wasn't finalized. As his sickness progressed, the Nationals franchise chose not to cover his hospital costs. He was diagnosed with bacterial meningitis, but it had progressed too significantly for anything to be done.

After his death, the family had to sign an agreement pledging not to sue over the lack of certified trainers or doctors that likely could have diagnosed his illness when it was treatable. In exchange, the team finally released Guillen's signing bonus and insurance money to the family.

The tragic story of Yewri Guillen was an example of what the Chavez government sought to eradicate in the recruitment of Venezuelan ballplayers.

Venezuela is home to many top baseball talent including Miguel Cabrera - the first Latin American to win the Triple Crown, 2012 World Series MVP Pablo Sandoval and seven others that appeared in the 2012 World Series.

Yet for all of the top tier talent available, only five teams have set up academies in Venezuela. This is primarily due to the safeguards instituted by Chavez's government. In Venezuela, if a player is signed before age 18, the government must approve the contract to ensure the youth is receiving a fair deal. Signing bonuses are taxed at a 10 percent rate to compensate Venezuela for producing such elite talent that will make American baseball owners fabulously wealthy.

The Chavez initiatives also require schooling/education for prospects in a meaningful way and a guarantee for health care if a player is injured. These rules reflect Venezuelan (and Chavez's) desire to keep the worst aspects of MLB recruitment from infecting the country, recognizing the deeply rampant exploitation taking place in areas like the Dominican Republic where MLB teams play on the financial desperation, the lack of government regulation and the precarity of workers to ensure a steady pipeline of cheap talent.

After all, 97 percent of the players recruited in the Dominican Republic never make it to the leagues, which makes their lack of educational opportunities even more problematic. Twenty-one of the 30 MLB teams that have academies in the Dominican Republic do not have certified trainers or doctors on staff. The lucky few prospects that make it through often receive significantly smaller signing bonuses than their American counterparts who are recruited by the same MLB teams.

Major League Baseball publicly proclaims that it abhors the politicizing of sport and leveled such criticisms at Chavez during his life. However, it would be much more accurate to say that MLB only dislikes politics that inhibit their laissez faire ability to make huge profits on the cheap in Latin American countries like the Dominican Republic.

Guillen and Chavez's deaths highlight important issues. For Guillen, it shows the need for substantive and meaningful protections for MLB prospects in places like the Dominican Republic. Chavez's death demonstrates the imperative need for fighting back against any policies that would weaken or dismantle the regulations that currently safeguard prospects from MLB greed in Venezuela.

As players take the field both in the games and in the uncertainly contentious politics of the post-Chavez world of Venezuela, it is important for those who stand for justice get ready to play ball.

Photo: Teammates mourn the death of Yewri Guillen. (CC)

France and U.K. decide to go all out in Syria, others have doubts

Mon, 18 Mar 2013 11:16:00 +0000

This past week, French President Francois Hollande and British Prime Minister David Cameron announced that their governments would push for an end to the European Union embargo on selling weapons to rebel forces in Syria. However, they have not been able, so far, to persuade either the other European Union nations or the United States to join them in taking the plunge.

It is not as if the European countries and the U.S. were not already intervening with financial help channeled through the gulf monarchies and Saudi Arabia. Before she left the State Department, Hillary Clinton did yeoman work in organizing support for the rebels, through her creation "the Friends of Syria" and other means. At the most recent "Friends of Syria", on February 28, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry announced that the U.S. will be sending more "non-lethal aid" to the rebels.

But the issue of giving advanced weapons directly to the rebels has been one from which the NATO powers have so far held back. Such a move would have strong diplomatic repercussions and, moreover, there is still a fear that in the end, the weapons would end up in the hands of the Al Nusra Front, extremist Islamic militants with Al Qaeda links.

The argument that has been pushed by those seeking to arm the rebels is that if this were not done, non-extremist elements in the rebel coalition would be in danger of being defeated by the Islamists in the race to replace the government of Bashir Al Assad, and the position of Al Qaeda in the entire region would be enhanced. However, to determine where the weapons end up or what impact their provision would have not only on Syria but on the whole of the Middle East and the Islamic world is a difficult piece of clairvoyance.

The roughly similar situation in Libya, with NATO's intervention to overthrow Gadaffi, has not left a stable, peaceful region in its wake. Rather, it has unsettled the whole of North and West Africa. A similar situation may be developing in Mali, where French troops intervened earlier this year and, along with Malian troops and contingents from other African states, are still battling Islamist rebels who move back and forth across the porous borders of the Sahel region.

The destabilizing influence of the Syrian conflict is used by both proponents and opponents of giving arms to the rebels to bolster their arguments. Those in favor claim it is necessary to prevent the Islamists to take over the leadership of the rebel coalition. Those against question whether outsiders providing arms to the rebels can really determine, once the arms are handed over, in whose hands they will eventually end up.

This state of affairs is already threatening neighboring Lebanon with more sectarian conflict, and the refugee situation is out of control in Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq and other neighboring countries.

In France, the proposal to arm the rebels generated an immediate negative response from the left. Jean-Luc Melenchon, leader of the Left Front and the left's candidate for president in 2012, called the proposal an "absolute mistake" and compared it to sticking one's finger into a terrifying set of gears. "Wasn't the Libyan experience enough for us? ...There is no other exit for the crisis than negotiations and politics."

The intervention in Syria and aid to the rebels are supported by Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and other monarchies that are themselves hardly examples of democratic government and respect for human rights. There is evidence that militant Islamist groups from as far away as Russia have been travelling to Syria to join the rebel ranks.

Opposition to support for the rebels has come from Russia, China, Iran, Iraq, and most left-wing forces in and out of power worldwide. Russia has been taking the lead in denouncing outside intervention and calling for a negotiated settlement. Syrian communists have been critical of Assad but especially vocal in denouncing outside intervention. Here in the United States, the Communist Party of the USA (CPUSA) and others on the left have also been calling for a negotiated settlement and an end to outside intervention.

At writing, most other European Union states, including, crucially, Germany, still seemed reluctant to end the arms embargo. British Foreign Minister William Hague suggested that Britain and France might have to go it alone if the EU does not change its position.

A Syrian man sits on the balcony of his destroyed house. AP

Warnings about destabilization in Venezuela should be taken seriously

Fri, 15 Mar 2013 15:32:00 +0000

A few days before the death of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, then Vice President and now Acting President Nicolas Maduro, who is also the candidate of the left for the April 14 presidential elections, accused a group of right wing former U.S. officials -- Roger Noriega, Otto Reich and John Negroponte - of working to destabilize Venezuela.

Maduro repeated the accusations after Chavez' death and strongly suggested that his opponent in the new presidential elections scheduled for April 14, Miranda State Governor Henrique Capriles Radonski, is in contact with those circles. On Wednesday Maduro added that Venezuela had detected a plot from those same circles to kill Capriles. The implication was that the attack on Capriles might be a provocation to create a pretext for outside intervention in Venezuela. Maduro did not give details.

Also, in the wake of Chavez' death, the Venezuelan government expelled the air force attaché of the U.S. embassy in Caracas and another diplomat, charging that they had made inappropriate contacts with Venezuelan military officers. The United States retaliated by expelling the second secretary and another diplomat at the Venezuelan embassy in Washington D.C.

Finally, the Venezuelan government has ordered an investigation as to whether Chavez' cancer might have been induced by enemies of his Bolivarian political project.

The media in the United States have been on a nonstop campaign of slander against Chavez, Maduro and the leftist government of Venezuela, so it was no surprise that these developments caused various media to suggest that Maduro is paranoid or lying.

But all of the things that Maduro mentioned have at least some history behind them.

There are theories that certain microorganisms can stimulate the growth of cancer, and there are cases of it being induced via the introduction of radioactive substances into a person's body.

As to the involvement of U.S. embassy and military personnel in fomenting coups d'état in countries whose governments the U.S. government does not like, there are a great many examples. A running joke in Latin America is this: Question, "Why has there never been a coup d'état in the United States?" Answer: "Because there is no U.S. embassy in Washington D.C."

Latin American coups in which the United States played a role are so many that they can't be listed here; Readers may recall Honduras in 2009, Haiti in 2004, Venezuela itself in 2002, Chile in 1973, Brazil in 1964 and Guatemala in 1954 as just a few of dozens. In the 1980s the U.S. worked to undermine the left-wing Sandinista government in Nicaragua by funding violent terrorist actions. There are suspicions about the coup in Paraguay last year also.

Maduro's accusations were directed mostly at right wing Republicans linked to the Cuban exile circles in Miami and to other cold warriors such as ex Lieutenant Colonel Ollie North and Elliot Abrams. He named three specific individuals.

The first is Otto Reich, who was heavily involved in preparations for the failed 2002 coup in Venezuela. He was, at that time, Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs in the government of George W. Bush. Previously, Reich had served Reagan as head of a unit that disseminated right wing propaganda about Latin America to the U.S. public. From 1986 to 1989 he was the U.S. ambassador in Venezuela.

Reich is closely connected to right wing Venezuelan lawyer Robert Carmona-Borjas, who had to flee from Venezuela in 2002 after the failure of the coup with which he, too, was intimately involved. In the United States, Carmona-Borjas set up the Arcadia Foundation, whose ostensible purpose is to fight government corruption internationally; in fact it is used by the U.S. and international right to attack progressive governments, especially in Venezuela. The fingerprints of Reich and Carmona-Borjas were all over the Honduran coup of the spring of 2009.

A second individual denounced by Maduro is Roger Noriega. As a U.S. permanent representative to the Organization of American States, Noriega was a strong supporter of the 2002 Venezuelan coup attempt and, after leaving the OAS post, also of the overthrow of Haitian President Jean Bertrand Aristide in 2004. After the Honduran coup of Spring 2009, Noriega worked as a lobbyist for the coup regime.

Finally, there is John Negroponte, former Deputy Secretary of State, former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, former Director of National Intelligence, and former U.S. ambassador to Honduras, the last named during the Reagan administration when Negroponte was a major player in the contra wars. (Negroponte was named to a State Department advisory panel by former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton).

Now, Reich, Noriega and Negroponte are in the U.S. press and media almost daily, calling for a tough line by the Obama administration against Venezuela.

The Venezuelan government claims these people are the ones with whom candidate Capriles Radonski and his representatives have been colluding. Capriles, for his part, accuses Maduro of being a "traitor" who is selling out Venezuela to Cuba.

Could it be that either public or private individuals in the United States, including the ones named by Maduro, as well as the CIA, the military, and other agencies, are working secretly to create provocations that will destabilize Venezuela and either affect the April 14 elections or their aftermath? The history of U.S.-Latin American relations and the careers of these shadowy figures show that this is by no means a crazy suggestion.

Post Chavez, the working class and other poor people of Venezuela would not tolerate another situation like the 2002 coup, and would fight back even more fiercely than they did then. We should support them one hundred percent.

Photo: Venezuela's acting President Nicolas Maduro speaks at the opening of the Ninth International Book Fair of Venezuela which pays tribute to late President Hugo Chavez, in Caracas, Venezuela, March 13. Ariana Cubillos/AP

Murders of journalists on the rise worldwide

Thu, 14 Mar 2013 14:30:00 +0000

WASHINGTON - Worldwide intimidation of journalists, up to and including unsolved murders, is rising, a panel of experts on the issue warns.

And the United States, despite its free press traditions and its constitutional protections, rarely protests or raises the issue, the panel adds.

Indeed, the U.S. set a counter-example by letting its military round up 14 journalists in Iraq and Afghanistan during the fighting in those two nations. It jailed them with other "terrorists," on unspecified charges, at the infamous Guantanamo Bay prisoner center on the island of Cuba, the panel notes.

And other nations, which all have less protection for journalists, took their cue from those detentions and other anti-journalist actions by U.S. administrations.

The Committee to Protect Journalists, a non-profit press freedom watchdog group, convened the panel - Frank Januszi of Amnesty International, Mohamed Keita of CPJ's African program and Mark Feldstein, a longtime network news foreign correspondent who now teaches at the University of Maryland - on March 12.

CPJ also issued a book, with details, on governmental campaigns to curb media, intimidate journalists, censor news - including the Internet - and allow killings of reporters, with virtually no investigation.

Governments imprisoned at least 231 journalists in 2012, with 61 in Turkey alone. And 66 were killed, 28 of them in Syria.

The "war on terror" is the ostensible excuse for governmental arrests and crackdowns. Some 140 governments, including the U.S., enacted "anti-terrorist" laws since the Sept. 11, 2001, al-Qaeda attacks on New York and Washington.

But many of those laws are vague, as are the "terrorism" or "anti-state activities" charges that governments use to arrest media members, repress dissent and subdue or stop questions, the panelists said.

And governments often use the vague terrorism language to punish reporters who write stories questioning official policy or reporting on groups, such as the Turkish Kurds, whom those governments consider terrorists. The governments consider reporting to be aiding and abetting the terrorists, the panel agreed.

The panelists' descriptions of governmental actions against journalists, and governments' jaundiced view of independent reporting, including reporting as a form of treason, echo what unionists suffer, particularly in war-torn nations.

In Colombia, for example, unionists are routinely threatened, kidnapped and murdered. Nineteen were murdered in Colombia last year, a pro-worker Colombian investigating senator told PAI in February. CPJ reports one Colombian journalist was murdered in 2012, too.

There are eight unsolved journalist murders in Colombia and 3,000 murders of unionists over 30 years. Right-wing paramilitaries have confessed to 450 of the unionist murders there, to get lighter sentences from a Truth and Justice Commission.

The U.S. should be crusading constantly for open media and against such repression, the panelists said, both raising the issue publically and in government-to-government discussions between national leaders. It isn't.

Instead, the panelists added, U.S. outrage is selective: It protests openly against repression in nations where relations are bitter, such as Iran, but soft-pedals or shunts aside the problem in nations that are allies, such as Turkey, nations it deems vital to the war on terror, such as Ethiopia, or nations vital in other ways, such as China.

Januszi, a former State Department official and human rights staffer for then- Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry, said he was able to use the weight of the U.S. government in private conversations with foreign officials to get activists released - by giving their nations the choice of release or U.S. exposure.

But the U.S.' current record hampers that effort, they said. The Guantanamo detentions are a particular problem. Januszi recalled the last meeting he had, as a Kerry staffer, with his Chinese contact. The man turned down a list of human rights activists the U.S. wanted released, saying the U.S. had no credibility on the issue.

And while other governments - and terrorist groups - jail, intimidate or kill reporters, the U.S. controls them by prosecuting their sources, the panel said. The Obama administration does that even more than its predecessors. U.S. control of sources followed 2001 passage of the "Patriot Act," which the panel criticized for being approved in an atmosphere of jingoism and hysteria after the Sept. 11 attacks.

The U.S. press, too, was at fault there, by uncritically cheerleading the war on terror's first months, with such things as news anchors wearing U.S. flag lapel pins.

Photo: In this photo released by the U.S. Department of Defense, detainees wearing orange jump suits sit in a holding area at Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval Base on the island of Cuba. Among those thrown into Guantanam on "unspecified charges," were 14 journalists from Iraq and Afghanistan. Shane T.McCoy /U.S. Navy/AP

Cuban 5 wives meet with UN human rights chief

Thu, 14 Mar 2013 10:29:00 +0000

Denial of the right of a spouse to visit an incarcerated person is a violation of human rights, said United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Navenethem Pillay. Human rights organizations have been highly critical of the conditions of incarceration of five Cubans serving time in U.S. prisons as a result of their activities monitoring anti-Cuba terrorist groups in Miami.

In a meeting in Geneva with the wives of two of the five, Pillay expressed her intention to do whatever is possible to find a solution to the case, reported the Cuban Permanent Mission there.

Adriana Perez, wife of Gerardo Hernandez, and Olga Salanueva, wife of Rene Gonzalez, requested Pillay's intervention on human rights grounds to be able to visit their husbands whom they have not seen in over a decade. The U.S. State Department has repeatedly refused to grant the Cuban women entry visas.

Hernandez is serving a life sentence in a California maximum-security prison and Gonzalez is barred from returning to Cuba while serving probation in Florida after a 12-year term.

By refusing to issue the wives visas, the State Department is in effect denying the women the right to see their husbands. Pillay acknowledged the visa denial as a violation of human rights, constituting an additional punishment.

It's not surprising that Perez and Salanueva found a sympathetic audience in Pillay. A South African of Tamil descent, Pillay has her own history in defense of human rights. In 1973, despite being barred as a non-white from entering any South African courtroom, she won the right for political prisoners on Robben Island, including Nelson Mandela, to have access to attorneys. She had attended law school at Harvard, supported by donations from the local Indian community where she grew up, the daughter of a bus driver. In 1995, when Mandela appointed the Harvard-educated Pillay to the country's High Court, she entered a South African courtroom for the first time. Pillay also spent time running a shelter for victims of domestic violence.

Support for Commissioner Pillay's position can be sent to her by fax or mail:

High Commissioner of Human Rights Navanetham Pillay

United Nations Office of Geneva

8-14 Avenue de la Paix

1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland

Fax: +41 22 917 9011

Photo: In this undated photo, Rene Gonzalez, center, stands with his daughter and an unidentified man. (PW file)

Church faces big choices as cardinals pick a new pope

Tue, 12 Mar 2013 16:16:00 +0000

The cardinals have assembled in Rome to begin choosing the next pope. The secret conclave will choose Pope Benedict XVI's successor in a series of ballots, the first of which will be taken tonight.

Although the former Cadinal Ratzinger was selected in 24 hours after just four rounds of voting, this time around observers say it will probably take until Friday before white smoke emanating from the Sistene Chapel's furnace indicates a pope has been elected.

While there is much speculation about who will became pope, there are actually issues more important than that to both Catholics and non-Catholics around the world.

The theological differences among the cardinals are not too great, with most of them being essentially conservative.

According to press reports, cardinals, who are a bit more reform-oriented, are backing one or more of the Italian candidates who they think would show at least some significant independence from the Vatican and the Curia while, at the same time, being able to deal with them. The more conservative "Romans" are backing the Brazilian candidate, Otto Scherer, according to reports. Coming from Latin America, they believe he will give them the cover of favoring change while not actually changing much of anything. Neither of these blocs has enough power to elect the Pope so they will move to forge alliances, including with the American cardinals. While New York's Timothy Dolan is mentioned in the top 20 possible selections it is thought that he is a highly unlikely choice.

Chris Pumpelly, communications director of Catholics United, said he hoped that "at the very least, if we get a cardinal from the developing or third world or from the global South to become Pope we could expect that such a person would have a heightened understanding of the needs of the big part of humanity that suffers under incredible poverty."

For Pumpelly and for the majority of Catholics, for that matter, there are issues of much greater concern than just who wins the papal election this week.

First, the Catholic Church has been marred by sex abuse scandals in recent years, an issue most Catholics hope the next pope will address.

"In this regard, it is unfortunate that some of the American cardinals havn't taken themselves out of the voting process," said Pumpelly.

"Catholics in the 21^st century want honesty and transparency from their Church. When Cardinal Mahoney of Los Angeles, who was involved in allegations of sex abuse, does not remove himself from the voting process it does not look good. The same goes for the cardinals from Boston and New York. There were questions and concerns about the cardinal in Scotland and his alleged involvement in sex abuse. He recused himself from the voting which is as it should be."

In addition to sex scandals, the Church will have to address transparency in financial dealings, Pumpelly said, in response to a question about growing allegations concerning the Vatican Bank.

"The scandals associated with the Vatican bank, particularly over the last four decades, are so sordid and improbable as to strain the creativity of a supermarket tabloid," wrote Lynn Stuart Parramore recently in an Alternet article.

On May of 2012, Pope Benedict's butler was arrested for leaking documentation of financial corruption involving the Vatican and major Italian companies. The Vatican Bank's chairman, Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, was dumped when the bank's role in money laundering for drug traffickers was exposed.

Right-wing politicians, organized crime bosses and wealthy tax evaders apparently dealt with the Vatican Bank regularly.

In order to restore a semblance of respectfulness to the face of its operations. Pope Benedict appointed Ernst von Freyburg, a German lawyer , as the new director of the bank. That became problematic when the press began to probe Freyburg's links to companies that made warships for Nazi Germany.

Then there were other outrageous moral scandals like the Church's top exorcist claiming that a pile of bones buried in a church tomb belonged to a schoolgirl forced to perform sex for priests' sex parties.

"For the good of the Church things will have to be done differently, whoever is Pope," said Pumpelly. "In these times the people will not stand for Church leaders who cannot be held to the same standards we hold any public or political official. We are all human beings, prone to mistakes and failings but that does not relieve us of our responsibility to live lives of truthfulness in all our dealings with one another."

Photo: Cardinals attend a Mass for the election of a new pope inside St Peter's Basilica, at the Vatican. Andrew Medichini/AP

Poor people in the U.S. also benefitted from Venezuelan oil

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 13:08:00 +0000

BOSTON - Former U.S. Rep. Joseph Kennedy II offered his prayers Tuesday to the family of late Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, saying he cared deeply about the poor and helped nearly two million Americans through the former lawmaker's heating assistance charity.

Kennedy, who heads Citizens Energy, said Chavez cared about the poor at a time when "some of the wealthiest people on our planet have more money than they can ever reasonably expect to spend."

A spokesman for Kennedy said Chavez and the people of Venezuela have donated about 200 million gallons of heating oil over an eight-year collaboration with Citizens Energy. The charity distributes heating oil to lower income families in 25 states and Washington, D.C., offering 100 gallons per family.

Kennedy, a son of the late Sen. Robert Kennedy and nephew of President John F. Kennedy, founded Citizens Energy in 1979 with the goal of reducing home heating oil costs for the poor and elderly after the energy crisis of the 1970s.

The former Massachusetts Democratic congressman drew fire from U.S. critics of Chavez when he began the fuel assistance collaboration with Venezuela's state oil subsidiary in 2005. The critics said Chavez was using the heating oil program as propaganda against the Republican administration of President George W. Bush.

Kennedy's son, newly elected U.S. Rep. Joseph Kennedy III, D-Mass., also released a statement saying: "My thoughts and prayers are with President Chavez's family," the younger Kennedy said in a statement. "In this time of transition, it is my hope that the United States and Venezuela can build a productive relationship for the future."

On Dec. 6, 2005, Rep. Jose Serrano, D. N.Y., along with Citgo CEO Felix Rodriguez, leaders of neighborhood organizations, and Venezuela's ambassador to the United States, Bernardo Alvarez, delivered the first installment of 8 million gallons of Citgo heating oil earmarked for New York City, to be sold to those in need at a substantially reduced rate.

Rep. Serrano issued this message: "Hugo Chavez was a leader that understood the needs of the poor. He was committed to empowering the powerless. R.I.P. Mr. President.

Serrano represents one of the most Democratic and heavily Hispanic districts in the country, in New York City.

On Jan. 27, 2006, Rep. Chaka Fattah, D-Pa.. announced that Citgo, a U.S. subsidiary of the publicly-owned Venezuelan national oil company PDVSA, was going to begin shipping 5 million gallons of discounted heating oil to Philadelphia as part of a plan to provide assistance to 25,000 low-income families throughout the city.

AP, Dan Margolis, Rosita Johnson, and Barbara Russum contributed to this article.

Photo: In November of 2005, Joseph P. Kennedy II, chairman and president of Citizens Energy Corp, right, carries a fuel oil hose to a home in Quincy, Mass. Venezuelan officials had just signed an agreement to provide 12 million gallons of discounted home heating oil to low-income Massachusetts residents. The fuel was offered by Citgo, a subsidiary of Venezuela's state-owned oil company. Charles Krupa/AP

Groups fight to remove Cuba from “terrorism sponsors” list

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 11:03:00 +0000

At the headquarters of the National Press Club in downtown Washington D.C., a consortium of organizations announced a new push to get Cuba taken off the State Department's "State Sponsors of Terrorism" list on Thursday last week.

The event, in the form of a panel discussion, was sponsored by the Center for International Policy, the Latin American Working Group (LAWG), and the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA). The MC was Wayne Smith, Senior Fellow at the Center for International Policy, who was the head of the U.S. Interests Section (instead of embassy) in Havana from 1979 to 1982, having been appointed by Jimmy Carter. Other participants were Congressman James P. McGovern, D-Massachusetts, former ambassador Anthony Quainton who is now "Diplomat in Residence" at American University, Robert Muse of Muse and Associates, and Adam Isacson of WOLA.

Congressman McGovern, who has followed U.S. Cuba policy closely, just got back from a visit to Cuba with a bipartisan delegation headed by Senator Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont. McGovern participated in a two hour meeting with Cuban President Raul Castro. He and the other speakers pushed for an overall change in U.S.-Cuba policy, of which removal of Cuba from the State Sponsors of Terrorism would be a useful first step.

It would be of symbolic value, but it would also be a necessary step if current restrictions on trade with Cuba are going to be lifted, because presence of a country on the State Sponsors of Terrorism list prohibits certain kinds of trade, aid and financial transactions. To get a country off the list, the administration would have to certify that it is not supporting terrorism and that it agrees not to do so in the future.

Cuba was first put on this list in 1982, during the Reagan administration. What was Cuba doing around then that merited this?

First of all, it was helping the independent nation of Angola to resist armed intervention orchestrated by the apartheid regime in South Africa. The South African government wanted to reduce Angola to a client state so that it could not be a rear base for South Africans fighting to end apartheid and Namibians fighting for their independence. To this end, the South African regime teamed up with Angolan warlord Jonas Savimbi and his UNITA organization. Savimbi was a particularly brutal example of the warlord type, which did not prevent the U.S. government from supporting him also. Cuban support for the Angolan government started in the 1970s and went through a number of phases, culminating in the crucial siege of Cuito Cuanavale in 1987-1988, in which Angolan and Cuban troops defeated a South African-organized column. Most analysts think it was this defeat that finally motivated the apartheid regime to seek a negotiated settlement with tjhe African National Congress and the SWAPO freedom organization in Namibia, bringing independence to Namibia and the end of apartheid in South Africa.

In Central America, Cuba provided support such as training for revolutionaries who were trying to overthrow series of bloodthirsty dictators and their regimes. The United States, on the other hand, was supporting those regimes with money, arms and logistical help. In the case of Nicaragua the United States was providing this support to the "Contras," right-wing armed groups who specialized in murdering school teachers and labor activists, and who were also involved in the drug trade.

The United States also conducted some direct terrorist activities. To give just one example, in the World Court in the Hague found the United States guilty of placing deadly mines in the harbor at the Corinto and two other ports in Nicaragua. The mines caused the deaths of two people and damage to numerous ships and boats belonging to Nicaragua but also to other nations. Nicaragua filed a complaint with the World Court against the United States; the court ruled for Nicaragua but the United States never even acknowledged this ruling.

So Cuba was put on the State Sponsors of Terrorism list largely because of its support for struggles against tyranny and racism.

The United States at that time was supporting that selfsame tyranny and racism, with money, arms and direct intervention. It was doing this through terroristic methods.

Most of these things went on under Republican administrations, but plenty of Democratic Party leaders, either for their own ideological reasons or out of fear of the Cuban exile lobby in the United States, have, with the exception of President Jimmy Carter and a few others, not done much to change this. Some have been just as gung ho about attacking Cuba as the Republicans.

Apartheid is gone, Savimbi is dead, and the civil wars in Central America are over. Cuba has cordial diplomatic and trade relations with all the countries which were supposedly victims of Cuban terrorism, even those with right wing governments. But Cuba has stayed on the list, under pretexts I have dealt with in a previous article.

The classification of Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism when it is nothing of the sort, and when it is in fact playing a major role in trying to end the civil war in Colombia in negotiations which the U.S. says it supports, is so absurd that perhaps the current administration can be shamed, pressured or cajoled to drop Cuba from the list. President Obama does not need permission from Congress to do this; it can be done with the stroke of a pen.

The public voice needs to be heard on this, or nothing will happen. There is a petition circulating on the internet calling for the removal of Cuba from the "State Sponsors of Terrorism" list. We should all sign it and circulate it as widely as possible.

Photo: Students head to class at the Latin American Medical School (ELAM) in Havana, Cuba. Cuba has a reputation worldwide for providing free medical school to students who come from anywhere to Havana. The U.S. is the only country that still claims Cuba has ties to terrorism. Javier Galeamo/AP

Hugo Chavez, popular Venezuelan president, dies

Wed, 06 Mar 2013 11:56:00 +0000

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, born in Baranas State on July 28, 1954, died on March 5, 2013, after an almost two-year struggle with cancer. He last appeared in public on December 8, 2012, just before leaving for Cuba to undergo surgery there for the fourth time in an effort to arrest his illness.

In life, Chavez was almost a legendary figure. First elected to Venezuela's presidency in 1998, he was popularly re-elected three more times in 2000, 2006, and 2012. Candidates that supported Chavez's Bolivarian movement won National Assembly elections overwhelmingly. Chavez also won a 2004 presidential recall referendum, and three separate elections related to Venezuela's Constitution - all by large majorities.

Chavez was one of eight siblings born to school teacher parents who were so poor that he had to be raised by his paternal grandmother, whom he adored unreservedly. She encouraged his dedication to reading and the study of history.

An early infatuation with baseball took him to a military academy in Caracas on the theory that avenues were open there to a professional baseball career.

As an officer, he read historical and socialist material and came to admire Simon Bolivar and other progressive and revolutionary leaders, past and present, in Latin America. In 1994, Chavez went to Cuba where he met Fidel Castro. As a staunch opponent of the neoliberal economic policies that he saw crushing the hopes of millions in his country, Chavez began almost non-stop political barnstorming across Venezuela.

President Chavez applied himself to the task of converting the continental unity dreams of people like Simon Bolivar and Jose Marti into political and social alliances among Latin American and Caribbean nations. Under his leadership Venezuela took the lead role in promoting the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America. Cuba was a close partner in this undertaking and worked with Venezuela also in the Union of South American Nations and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean Nations.

As president, Chavez took on the task of building in his country what he called, "21^st century socialism." He gave strong backing in 2007 to the formation of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela.

During his presidency, the government developed an elaborate network of social and humanitarian projects referred to as "missions." Health care, education, literacy, housing, food distribution, and job-creating missions were among these.

Over the 14 years of his presidency, poverty, malnutrition, and infant mortality fell. School enrollment, professional education, life expectancy, food production, and nationalization of key industrial enterprises all increased.

Socialist-inspired achievements under Chavez reversed the process of redistribution of wealth from the poor to the rich that had been going on in Venezuela. The income gap between rich and poor narrowed, Profits from the nation's nationalized oil industry were used to fund education and infrastructure projects that benefited millions.

Chavez called on his people and others in Latin America to look out for their own common interests, which would not line up with those of multi-national corporations headquartered in the U.S. and elsewhere.

Some of those forces, in the U.S. and elsewhere, showed just how alarmed they were about this when they backed a failed April 2002 military coup against Chavez.

Right up until the president's death, his political opposition has received financial backing from business interests in the U.S. and elsewhere who are unhappy about the direction Venezuela has taken. Sabotage, protest, and recall campaigns since then have been funded from outside the country.

In announcing Chavez' death on March 5, Vice President Nicolas Maduro told Venezuelans that, "In this historic tragedy, we call upon men and women to be vigilante of peace and of respect for the homeland. We, civilians, and military people, take on his legacy, his challenges, his undertaking. With participation and support by all the people, his banners will be raised up with dignity. Thank you, a thousand times, thank you."

The Cuban government issued an official statement which said, in part: "President Chavez has carried out an extraordinary battle throughout his short and rich life. We remember him always as a patriotic soldier in the service of Venezuela and the Great Homeland (Patria Grande), as an honest, clear, daring, and brave revolutionary fighter, as a leader and supreme commander who reincarnated Bolivar in order to complete what he could not finish...The Cuban people feel he is one of their most distinguished sons and have admired, followed, and loved him as one of their own; Chavez is Cuban also!"

Argentina, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, and other Latin American countries are taking special steps to mourn Venezuela's fallen leader.

Photo: Hugo Chavez ScrapeTV

Battle for Venezuela’s presidency in overdrive

Wed, 06 Mar 2013 11:46:00 +0000

The struggle over succession to Venezuela's presidency was in overdrive during the week prior to the death of President Hugo Chavez on March 5. The likely contenders in elections constitutionally mandated to take place within 30 days after a president departs were engaged in contentious verbal battle.

Vice President Nicolas Maduro, who was favored by Chavez, is the presidential candidate of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela. He is at loggerheads with right wing Miranda state governor Henrique Capriles Radonski, who took 44 percent of the vote in presidential elections last October 7.

Maduro, who had monitored Capriles' travels to Colombia and the United States, claims Capriles was lining up future support from pro-business backers outside Venezuela.

As a likely candidate for some or all right wing opposition parties, Capriles will be up against big odds in contesting a political movement claiming remarkable social gains over Chavez' 14-year long presidency. Health care, education, housing, food distribution, and job creation initiatives brought extreme poverty down from 23 to eight percent, middle income household spending from just over $2,000 per capita to almost $4,000, and increased school enrollment from 6.2 to 7.5 million students.

By contrast, the 40-year-old Capriles' background is basically one of steady accumulation of personal wealth. His businessman father brought Kraft Foods Corporation into Venezuela. After becoming a lawyer, Capriles took graduate courses in the Netherlands, Italy, and at Columbia University in New York.

Vice President Maduro told reporters Capriles went to Colombia recently to meet with "paramilitary groups" and a well known but unnamed enemy of President Chavez. He indicated that as of March 1, Maduro was in Miami where he met with exiled Venezuelan bankers and representatives of former U.S. State Department officials, Otto Reich and Roger Noriega. Otto Reich was the first to inform diplomats in Washington that the Bush administration was backing the right wing coup that removed Chavez briefly in April, 2002. Noriega co-authored the anti-Cuban Helms-Burton Law of 1996.

Capriles' own attitude toward Cuba was on display during the brief 2002 coup when he and others forcibly entered the Cuban Embassy. That escapade led to a brief imprisonment in 2004, an occasion, he says, for meditation and strengthening of his religion.

From Miami, Capriles went to New York in order, said Maduro, to confer with supporters, among them Under Secretary of State Roberta Jacobson. Capriles' U.S. contacts are "the central nucleus of the whole campaign against Venezuela. With imperialists' dollars, they finance groups here in Venezuela that have tried to destabilize us for a long time." Maduro claimed Capriles owned a $5 million apartment in New York.

The New York Times, however, challenged Maduro's version of the ownership and price of the apartment. Its reporter heard from Under Secretary of States Jacobson who said she wouldn't be meeting with Capriles.

Capriles shot back at Maduro via Twitter: "Nicolas, what pains you most is that you and your kind travel around on Venezuelans' money [while] my trip is paid through my own resources. I come to the United States to visit my nephews. You traitors go to Cuba to get orders from the Castro brothers and hand over money from Venezuelans!"

The Hinterlaces polling organization recently released survey data showing that only 29 percent of Venezuelans support opposition forces headed by Capriles. Interviewed, on José Vicente Rangel's Sunday talk show on March 3, Oscar Schemel, the survey group's head said low ratings were "because their talk and interpretation are based on hate." He indicated that some Chavez enemies resent the "authoritarian and sectarian behaviors of these sectors of the opposition."

Vice President Maduro told government ministers, army commanders, and 20 socialist governors attending a meeting just hours before Chavez' death that "right wing imperial forces" are making plans for "thorough-going destabilization of Venezuela and for striking at the essence of the workings of democracy and the political system." Foreign Minister Elías Jaua announced expulsion from Venezuela of two U.S. Air Force attaches for "participating in illegal acts that promote destabilization."

Photo: Vice president Nicolas Maduro is the United Socialist Party of Venezuela's candidate running to replace Hugo Chavez. He is seen here with Diosdado Cabello, president of Venezuela's National Assembly. Ariana Cubillos/AP

German troops in Africa evoke bad memories

Tue, 05 Mar 2013 13:04:00 +0000

BERLIN - Germans are talking a lot these days about soccer, about horse meat being sold as beef, about "bio" eggs that are the same as the regular ones, about the end of the Pope's reign, and about a recent court decision that allows a gay man or woman to legally adopt the child of his or her partner.

Far less attention has gone to a Feb. 28 decision by Bundestag members of most political parties to send German troops to Mali. Both government parties, Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats and the Free Democrats, and the two opposition parties, the Social Democrats and the Greens, voted in favor. One courageous Green delegate defied party discipline and abstained. Only the Left Party, which among other trends includes groups that trace their lineage back to the Socialist Unity Party that ruled the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) until it was absorbed into the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) in 1991, stood as a bloc against sending troops into North Africa.

The decision to send 180 soldiers for "training" and 330 to aid in transportation and air refueling well into northern Mali, are now valid for one year. Experience teaches us, however, that a vote like this can be used to increase troop levels in the future. As one Christian Democrat made clear, this "process...could last a long time."

The Green party delegate Kerstin Müller praised the ongoing French intervention in Mali, saying Paris was "acting in principle quite properly." She described the French action as "an emergency operation to prevent even worse from happening."

Gernot Erler, a spokesperson for the Social Democrats, said it would be "politically irresponsible if Germany did not support France." No, of course not with combat troops, he insisted. But in war-torn desert regions of Mali how could any thin red lines be distinguished between combat and non-combat?

Just as it is with beef and eggs sold here, things are not always as they appear. A delegate from the Free Democrats, still part of the government coalition, lifted the lid a little by stating that with Mali it was fully clear that "a destabilization in that region would have a lasting influence on German security interests."

This recalled the words of one Social Democratic Minister of Defense, who said in 2004 that Germany's security needs to be defended "even at the Hindu Kush Mountains." Similar views have been expressed when troops, warships or rocket launchers were sent not only to Afghanistan, but also to Serbia, Lebanon, Somalia and Turkey. Usually some benevolent motivation was invoked.

Three years ago, however, Horst Koehler, the president of Germany, was forced to resign after spilling the beans in a radio interview. He said the largely pacifist German public was finally coming to terms with the concept that their country could no longer avoid involvement in military missions, that help "protect our interests, for example, free trade routes, or to prevent regional instability, which might certainly have a negative effect on our trade, jobs and income."

Jürgen Trittin, a leader of the Greens, warned at the time that Koehler's comments were inconsistent with Germany's constitution, accusing the president of being a "loose rhetorical cannon." But now the same Green Trittin said, "Germany should constructively consider requests for support from its partner or from the European Union - for example in the sphere of logistics or military training."

What it boils down to is four traditional parties all cooking up the same stew. They try to sound different but are basically the same. It would really be like a one party system - except that the Left is still around, at least until September.

The Left's representative in the Bundestag, Christine Buchholz, used the short time granted her to say: "Mali has many problems, but none of them can be solved militarily...Afghanistan proves that terror can't be fought by means of war. War is itself terror."

She warned against supporting French bombing when the German government has no knowledge of how many civilians are victims of these air raids. She questioned the motivation of France for intervening in Mali, where it seemed less a matter of fighting terror than securing its own economic interests, such as Mali's uranium. "What we really need is a major debate about the economic and social problems caused in the world by dealing in weapons." Germany has gained third place in the export of planes, warships, tanks, firearms and other military "goods" - large amounts going constantly to North Africa and the Near East. Perhaps her remarks provoked some people to do some thinking.

It is ironic that on the same evening the Bundestag voted for German troops in Africa, the Left Party in Berlin marked the 80^th anniversary of the Reichstag Fire, a giant conflagration that destroyed the very building in which the Bundestag meets today.

The Nazis tried to blame that 1933 fire on the Communists, despite the fact that Nazi storm troopers had entered and left the building via a tunnel connecting it with the government palace of Hermann Goering, the number two Nazi leader. Even before it could be extinguished the Nazis blamed the Communists for the fire and had, within hours, arrested 10,000 party members and leaders, as well as Social Democrats and other anti-fascist intellectuals. The fire provided a cover to seize full power, end all constitutional guarantees and institute the death penalty for anyone opposing the Nazi rule.

In the world-famous Reichstag Fire trial the following September, the Bulgarian Communist Georgi Dimitroff, one of those accused of lighting the fire, led his own brilliant defense so skillfully that he was not only acquitted but caused Goering, exposed as a liar, to lose self-control and shout threats to kill Dimitroff after the trial. This plan was thwarted when the Soviet Union granted Dimitroff and two other accused Bulgarians Soviet citizenship and was able to get them out of the country quickly. It was a great but unfortunately a short-lived victory.

The evening anniversary ceremony began with a recording of the moving song "Es brennt" ("It's burning") by the Yiddish singer Lin Jaldati (1912 -1988), who survived Auschwitz and moved to the GDR in 1952. An actress read from the once-famous book "Our Street" by the writer Jan Petersen (1906-1969), probably the first book to reach the outside world and tell of the Nazis' violence, torture and murder.

Hans Modrow, the last prime minister of the GDR before it was absorbed into West Germany, was among the speakers at the memorial. The highlight of the evening came, however, as Elfriede Bruening, now 102 years old, spoke movingly about her own experiences as a young Communist writer trying to survive in Nazi-Germany.

The evening was redolent with historical allusions. The room, filled to the last seat, was in the building which was once headquarters of the Communist Party; outside was the square where 130,000 participants made a last, dramatic but vain protest against the Nazi take-over.

On the other side of the square is the long broad street named Dimitroff Strasse by the GDR in 1950. The name was changed back to Danziger Strasse in 1995 by the all-Berlin city authorities, contrary to the wishes of the elected borough council where it is located.

More than one speaker referred to the danger of fascists today: in nearby Hungary, in Greece, in the Netherlands and much closer, in towns of Germany and neighborhoods of Berlin where the Nazis have declared their "liberated zones" -- threatening foreigners and leftists. the speakers described how some in power downplay Nazi violence. They described how some in power, despite oh so many words about democracy, ignore or protect fascists while attacking leftists.

One speaker recalled the words of Bertolt Brecht (in his play "The Resistible Rise of Arturo UI") "The womb from which that crawled is fertile still" - also translated, referring to Hitler, "The bitch that bore him is in heat again."

Shadows from the past, sadly evoked by events of the present, from Afghanistan and Gaza to Syria and Mali, led less to thoughts of horse meat in beef than to those terrible Apocalyptic horsemen in the Bible: Conquest, War, Famine and Death.

Photo: In Munich, southern Germany, protesters hold banner reading "Peace for Afghanistan." Uwe Lein/AP

Presidential elections in Cyprus

Tue, 05 Mar 2013 10:08:00 +0000

The second round of elections in Cyprus was held on Sunday February 24^th. In this round the candidate of the center-right DHSY party, Nicos Anastiades defeated independent candidate Satvros Malas.

About 80% of those eligible to vote cast ballots in the election. Although such a turnout would be very good by US standards in Cyprus, where Presidential election typically draw over 90% of the voters, it was rather low. This is an indication that many supporters of the third place finisher, Giorgios Lillikas, who was eliminated in the election's first round, simply gave up and did not come out in the numbers needed to support Malas in the second round.

This election is of particular significance because it took place in the context of the world crisis of capital. The crisis has hit Cyprus hard due to the close connections of the nation's banks to the Greek economy and has forced the country to turn to the European Union for a bailout. In return for bailout the so-called "Troika"- the IMF, the European central bank and the European Commission money are demanding that Cyprus bow to its demands.

While Malas could have been expected to resist any demands that would undermine the independence of the nation and the welfare of its working people there is no such expectation for an Anastiades Presidency. In fact, Anastiades, a close associate of Germany's Angela Merkel, has already hinted that he will not only accede to the demands of the Troika but will orchestrate even deeper attacks on the social welfare of Cypriots. In the future the people of Cyprus will have to vigilantly defend the gains of the past against attempts by pro austerity forces in the EU and in Cyprus itself.

In terms of international relations there is also evidence of future problems. Within a few days of the election and in a seeming affront to the independence and dignity of Cyprus, the newly elected President and DHSY party leader offered up Cyprus to NATO's misnamed "Partnership for Peace" program. Anastasiades took this action unilaterally and did not even bother to consult with the multi-party National Council.

The ostensible reason for NATO's existence, the putative threat to Europe posed by the Soviet Union, has long ceased to exist; yet NATO not only still exists but also is expanding. Progressive people all over the world had long pointed out that the real reason for NATO was to act as an agent of imperialist aggression. Now, so many years after the end of the Soviet Union this should be clear to everyone. Pointing out that the so called, "Partnership for Peace" is nothing but a NATO front, Official AKEL spokesperson Georgios Loucaides remarked that:"NATO is responsible for unjust wars, juntas, dictatorships, death and bloodshed all over the world,"

In fact, as was pointed out by Loucaides, Cypriots hold NATO responsible for the 1974 invasion of Cyprus by NATO member Turkey. The immediate result was the displacement of some 200,000 Cypriots and the disappearance of thousands of others. The consequent occupation of about 1/3 of Cyprus by Turkey continues until this day.

In any event the recent electoral results in Cyprus seem to be in keeping with the tendency, in the face of the crisis of capital, for voters to try an alternative to the governments in power, perhaps in the hope that a different government will be better able to address the crisis.

The crisis, however, is one of capital and the austerity remedies that have been imposed in the interests of a narrow sector of finance capital have made the situation worse wherever they have been applied. Any alternative policy, while perhaps producing different results can't ultimately solve the problem as long as the remedy proposed remains within the confines of the capitalist system.

Map: Cyprus is an island country located in the eastern portion of the Mediterranean Sea. (CC)