February 2012
Vol 12, No.02
IRAN: THE PRICE OF RESISTANCE By Chandra Muzaffar
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uropean Union foreign ministers have agreed to a full-fledged embargo on all imports of Iranian crude oil. Towards this end, various measures will be adopted gradually from 23 January to 1 July 2012. In December 2011, the US Congress (with a 100 to 0 vote in the Senate) presented a mandatory sanctions package to President Obama which starting June 2012 will prohibit any third-country banks and companies from dealing with Iran’s Central Bank. Both the EU and US moves, it is alleged, are aimed at pressurising Iran to stop its so-called ‘nuclear weapons’ programme through the emasculation of its oil exports which account for more than 80% of its national revenue. NUCLEAR WEAPONS PROGRAMME
The first question we should ask is: Does Iran have a nuclear weapons programme? The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) — its
mischievous attempt to raise doubts about Iran’s nuclear energy programme notwithstanding — admits in its November 2011 Report that there is no evidence of a nuclear weapons programme. Incidentally, every nuclear installation in Iran has been inspected hundreds of times by the IAEA making them the most thoroughly inspected nuclear facilities on earth! Even the US’s own classified National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) 2011 — which the well-known investigative journalist, Seymour Hersh, had exposed in May 2011 — states quite clearly that Iran is not producing nuclear weapons and had in fact halted such a programme way back in 2003. NIE 2011 in a sense reiterates what is contained in NIE 2007. Of course, Iran continues to enrich uranium up to the 20% level required for the production of medical isotopes. This is far below the 85% plus necessary to manufacture a nuclear bomb. Every major leader in
Iran has emphasised over and over again that they have no intention of making a bomb. They regard it — rightly — as haram (or prohibited in Islam).
Because its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes — medical research and electricity — the Iranian government agreed to a nuclear fuel swap deal initiated by Brazil and Turkey in May 2010 which would have seen Iran shipping low-enriched uranium to Turkey in return for fuel for a research reactor. The Western powers and Israel rejected the deal. Turn to next page
ARTICLES . A FTER V ETO ,
U.S. IS P LANNING ‘A C OALITION OF W ILLING ” A GAINST SYRIA......................................................P 6 THE
. T HE P RESIDENT W HO S IGNED I NDEFINITE D ETENTION W ITHOUT T RIAL I NTO LAW..................................................................P 8
.A SECRET WAR IN 120 COUNTRIES .THE PERILS OF 2012.................................P 7
(PART II)...........................................................P 9
.SAVING AND SHARING FOOD...........................P 11
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Their rejection underscores the stark hypocrisy that surrounds the entire issue of Iran’s nuclear programme. If it is nuclear weapons that they are concerned about why didn’t they accept a deal that would have, to a large extent, curbed any clandestine move by Iran to produce such weapons? Or, are certain Western powers and Israel against Iran producing nuclear energy even for peaceful purposes — a right that Iran possesses as a signatory to the NonProliferation Treaty (NPT)? It is important to raise these questions for two other reasons: One, the countries that are most vocal in demanding that Iran terminate its uranium enrichment programme are all nuclear weapon states. The US has an arsenal of more than 5000 nuclear warheads while Israel, an undeclared nuclear state — the only nuclear weapon state in West Asia and North Africa (WANA) — has perhaps between 200 and 400 warheads. Two, countries such as the US, Britain, France and even Israel had no qualms about assisting Iran to launch its nuclear programme in the fifties when it was under the Shah, Reza Pahlavi. US President, Dwight Eisenhower, saw it as an “atoms for peace” enterprise. One does not have to second guess why they were all so enthusiastic about the Shah’s nuclear energy programme — because the dictator was their gendarme in that corner of WANA, protecting their strategic, political and oil interests with all his brutal might. Why did the West and Israel change their attitude towards Iran’s nuclear programme? Was it because an Islamic Revolution had occurred in Iran in 1979? Was Islam the decisive factor? Islam per se was not the major reason for the change in attitude. After all, the West counts as its allies a
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number of countries that view themselves as ‘Islamic States’ and subscribe to a somewhat narrow, exclusive idea of Islam and Muslim identity. Saudi Arabia, Qatar and most of the Gulf Sheikhdoms would be outstanding examples. Colluding and collaborating with these states and other Islamic movements has never been a problem for the centres of power in the West. INDEPENDENCE
The real reason why the Islamic Republic of Iran and its nuclear programme became anathema for the West and Israel was because of Iran’s defence of its independence and integrity in the face of US and Western hegemony. The Islamic Republic under the guidance of its charismatic leader Ayatollah Khomeini was not prepared to submit to US dominance or acquiesce with Israeli arrogance. From the outset — from 1979 itself — Iran
was determined to manage its own destiny which is why it nationalised oil and strengthened its self-reliance. In an earlier period — in 1953 to be exact — another Iranian leader, this time a highly principled secular democrat, Mohammad Mosaddegh, had also sought to assert Iranian independence and sovereignty by nationalising oil. This incurred the wrath of the British and American elites whose companies dominated the local oil industry. With the help of their intelligence services, they managed to oust Mosaddegh from his Prime Ministership and restore full authority to the Shah. Others in WANA, at different times
L E A D A R T I C L E and in different circumstances, have also paid the price for resisting dominance. Gamal Nasser in Egypt, Houri Boumediene in Algeria, Hafiz Assad in Syria, Yasser Arafat in Palestine (and other Palestinian freedom fighters), Saddam Hussein in Iraq, and Muammar Gaddafi in Libya, had all at some point or other in their lives refused to yield to hegemonic power. Today, there are leaders like Hassan Nasrallah in Lebanon, Khalil Meshal in Palestine, and Bashar Assad in Syria who continue to resist Israeli power and US hegemony and are therefore targeted by Tel Aviv and Washington. It is appropriate to observe at this juncture that resistance to US hegemony has had a longer and perhaps more tragic history in parts of Latin America. From Simon Bolivar and Jose Marti to Salvador Allende, Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez, Evo Morales, and Rafael Correa these and other illustrious leaders have unflinchingly opposed attempts by the US elite to subjugate the people of Latin America and subordinate the continent to the whims and fancies of its northern neighbour. Indeed, today there is a new determination in Latin America to strengthen the independence of individual states and of the region as a whole through cooperation and collective action that is both innovative and dynamic. There is no doubt at all that it is Iran’s refusal to be subservient to the US, Israel and their allies, its readiness to resist, that has incensed the powersthat-be. It explains why they are going all out to emasculate the Iranian economy, manufacture mass disaffection with the government and, at the right moment, engineer a regime change. The excuse they are using for this manipulation is of course Iran’s unproven nuclear weapons programme. In the scenario that is unfolding before our eyes, there are shades of the buildup that led to the invasion of Iraq and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003. continued next page
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continued from page 2 TARGETING IRAN
While Iran’s desire to remain independent has been a prominent feature of the nation’s personality since the Revolution 33 years ago, there must be situations and circumstances that are more current and contemporary which have given rise to this obsession in Tel Aviv and in certain Western capitals with the targeting and taming of Iran. What are these situations and circumstances? There are many. We shall highlight some of them. 1) In the wake of the Arab uprising, the Israeli elite has become extremely apprehensive about the state’s security and its future. It is afraid that popular movements sweeping through WANA would eventually challenge the legitimacy of the Israeli regime. Though Israel’s protector, the US, has sought assurances from some of the Islamic parties that have come to power that they will not question the Israeli presence, the Israeli elite regards the increasing influence of states and movements in WANA that are firmly opposed to Israeli suppression of Palestinian rights— the most powerful of which is of course Iran— as a huge threat to Israel’s very existence. This is why it wants its protector, buttressed by its European allies, to castrate Iran immediately. 2) This fear has increased dramatically in recent months with the economic decline of its protector and the economic crisis embroiling various European states. Israel knows that the US’s decline is part of a general decline which in a sense is irreversible and would therefore want its protector to act decisively against Israel’s foes like Iran now when the US still has the military muscle rather than wait until it is too late. For the US elite itself, the most serious implication of its decline is its loss of control over WANA, the world’s major oil
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exporting region which is, at the same time, of tremendous geostrategic significance. When hegemonic powers are losing their dominance, do they not become more bellicose in attempting to perpetuate their power and privilege? Should we be surprised when they turn against other actors on the ascendancy who are perceived as the cause of their decline? 3) For both the US and Israeli elites and European leaders allied to them, it is Iran which is the lynchpin of the challenge to their hegemony over WANA. Iran maintains a tried and tested link to the Syrian leadership and to the Hezbollah in Lebanon. Hamas is also to a certain degree part of this link which in broad terms constitutes the resistance to USIsrael hegemony. As the fulcrum of this resistance, Iran has displayed remarkable tenacity — a tenacity which is now expressing itself in its ability to take on US drones and US spies and to openly challenge US military power. Similarly, the Syrian crisis, orchestrated to a large extent by external forces, has revealed the resilience of the Bashar Assad government. Likewise, in defending Lebanon against the Israeli assault in 2006, the Hezbollah showed that it possesses both strategic depth and immense courage which in the end thwarted the Israeli agenda. Both Israel and the US are determined to not only break the link of resistance but also to crush each of the component elements of the link. 4) What has strengthened their determination to act against Iran in particular is the situation in Iraq. The Israeli and US elites had hoped that the conquest of Iraq would help to create a new environment in WANA which would reinforce their grip over oil and strengthen their geostrategic position in the region through a subservient leadership in Baghdad eager to do their bidding.
A R T I C L E S Given Iraq’s importance, the Baghdad leadership, they reckoned, would succeed in shaping an atmosphere in the region conducive to Israel even if it were at the cost of Palestinian self-determination. However, things have not worked according to plan. While US and British companies have managed to secure lucrative oil deals, Israeli and US elites have failed to gain political control over Iraq. A nation that is politically unstable, socially chaotic and deeply divided along sectarian lines, there is endless jockeying for power among contending groups. In the midst of this maelstrom, most of the groups within the majority Shia community seem to have gravitated towards Shia Iran. Shia affinity has undoubtedly smoothened the forging of political ties across the Iraq-Iran border. Recent political developments in Iraq indicate that the influence that emanates from these ties is considerable. It is this that annoys and angers the Israeli, US and British elites. Their political defeat in Iraq which is a major setback for them in WANA and beyond is one of the primary reasons why they are now training their guns on Iran. 5) Iran’s influence over Iraq has also riled some regional actors. The monarchical elite in Saudi Arabia, with its Wahabi orientation, often manifests an almost visceral hatred towards the Shia sect. Some Saudi leaders regard it as their duty to defend the Sunni majority against the rising Shia tide. They are not alone in perceiving growing Shia influence and power — in Iraq, in Syria through the Alawite elite, in Lebanon via Hezbollah, and in Bahrain— as a mortal threat to the Sunnis. The Qatari leadership and even some Turkish politicians and intellectuals have begun to ring the alarm bells. The latter, it is said, are backing some hard-line Sunnis in Iraq. These anti-Shia sentiments which are continued next page
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spreading quite rapidly in WANA have heightened the antagonism towards Iran. They have strengthened the hand of the US and Israel and their European allies as they prepare to move against the Iranian Republic. 6) For the US curbing Iran’s influence goes beyond WANA. Iran has become close to Russia in the last couple of years. The relationship is strategic and economic especially since they have overlapping interests in Central Asia and the Caspian region. Russia itself is re-asserting its power in Eastern Europe, Central Asia, West Asia and South Asia, much to the chagrin of the US. That is why it is uneasy about a RussianIranian nexus developing in the future. 7) Of even greater significance to the US’s hegemonic agenda is the relationship between Iran and China. Largely economic in nature, China imports 9% of its oil and 15% of its gas from Iran. China has massive investments in the oil and gas industry in Iran, and is helping to upgrade its infrastructure in general. Since access to energy is critical for China’s development, the US which is determined to contain China, is keen on exercising control over China’s sources of energy supply. What this means is that curtailing Iran’s oil and gas exports may in fact be part of a larger agenda whose principal goal is the containment of China, the nation that the US and the West view as the most formidable challenge ever to their centuries old dominance. 8) Iran’s expanding ties with various Latin American countries also irks the US. Countries such as Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Ecuador, Bolivia and Brazil, among others have become good friends of Iran in recent years. Most of these states are opposed to US dominance over Latin America. A couple of them have become very critical of
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Israeli occupation of Palestine. Since Venezuela and Ecuador are also major oil exporters, the US is worried that the ties that Iran, also an important oil exporter, is forging with them could enhance their collective clout in the global economy to the detriment of the US. This is yet another reason why the US sees Iran as a challenge to its hegemonic power. 9) It is not just because of Iran’s ties with oil exporting states in Latin America or its export of oil to China that oil is also a factor that explains the targeting of Iran. As one of the top five oil exporters in the world, Iran is an attractive destination for a lot of oil companies especially from the US — a country which has been excluded from Iran’s petroleum sector for more than three decades. According to petroleum experts there are oil and gas fields that have yet to be explored fully. There is also money to be made from infrastructure investments. US and other Western oil firms are hungering to go in— just as they moved into Iraq after the invasion in 2003. 10) A final factor that is responsible for this fixation with Iran is perhaps the position of the US dollar. The dollar, needless to say, is one of the most crucial pillars of US global hegemony. This is the reason why any attempt to redefine its role as the world’s principal reserve currency elicits an immediate response from US financial and political circles. In the last few years Iran has been steadily distancing itself from the US dollar in its trade transactions. At the end of December 2011, it signed an agreement with China that states that the Iranian rial and the Chinese yuan would be used in bilateral trade. In early January 2012, Iran made a similar arrangement with Russia, the rial and the rouble replacing the US dollar. Iran and India are holding discussions on moving out of dollar
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settlements. Trading in gold is an option they are considering. These moves by Iran have assumed great significance because others, including US allies, are abandoning the dollar in some of their bilateral trade arrangements. Japan and China, for instance, have announced that they will trade in yen and yuan. Because Iran is perceived as one of those nations pushing hard for the abandonment of the dollar, the US has her in its sights. It has been suggested that one of the reasons why the US decided to invade Iraq in 2003 was because Saddam Hussein had switched from the dollar to the euro for the sale of his country’s oil.
SUFFERING MISTAKES
The ten points elaborated here prove that the US and its allies have zero tolerance for any challenge, however minor, to US hegemonic power or to the position of Israel. Those who resist their power and position will pay the price. In the last 30 odd years, Iran has paid the price of resistance in hundreds of ways. Less than a year after the Islamic Revolution, a war was imposed upon Iran — a war led by the Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein, on behalf of all the Gulf Sheikhdoms, a number of other Arab states, the US, Britain, certain other Western governments, and even the Soviet Union. Though Iran’s adversaries had different motives, their common objective was to crush the Revolution which they saw as a challenge to their interests. A million lives were lost on both sides of the continued next page
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continued from page 4 divide in the eight year war which emasculated the Iranian economy and sapped the nation’s energy. In June 1981, a vicious bomb explosion wiped out some top political leaders, a huge number of parliamentarians, and leading figures in the Judiciary. This, and other subsequent terrorist attacks, it is alleged, were master-minded by a militant group operating from Iraq called the Mujahideen-e-Khalq. In recent years the Islamic Republic’s nuclear programme has been subjected to a cyber- attack and four of its scientists have been assassinated. And for decades, Iran has been under US economic sanctions which have had a negative impact upon its development programme. Indeed, very few countries have been subjected to the pain and suffering that Iran has gone through in the last 33 years. The perseverance and fortitude of the Iranian people, as we have alluded to, is awe-inspiring. And yet, an objective analysis of Iran’s response to hegemony would suggest that Iranian leaders and activists have also made serious mistakes. From the perspective of international law and diplomacy, it was clearly wrong of Iranian students to seize the US Embassy in Tehran on 4 November 1979 and hold its occupants hostage for 444 days. Storming the British Embassy in the nation’s capital on 29 November 2011 was also a foolish act for which Iran’s Minister of Foreign Affairs has apologised. Likewise, allegations of foul-play in the June 2009 Presidential Election could have been better handled. The Iranian authorities should have countered those allegations by demonstrating their commitment to total electoral transparency and accountability. The language that the current Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, sometimes employs on matters of grave international significance is intemperate and injudicious. However difficult the situation maybe, there is no need to deliberately provoke or irritate one’s
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enemies. As a case in point, though Ahmadinejad’s oft-quoted remarks about Israel were distorted and twisted by the Western media and politicians, the Iranian President could have adopted a more mature yet principled stance vis-à-vis the Jewish state. HEGEMONIC AGENDA
Ahmadinejad’s predecessor, Muhammad Khatami, proved that it was possible to defend Iran’s independence and dignity without being unduly confrontational. He sought to meet the challenge of hegemony by insisting upon dialogue among civilisations and the politics of inclusiveness. Khatami was prepared to talk to the US leadership. But instead of welcoming the offer of dialogue, US President, George Bush Junior, chose to castigate Iran as part of an “axis of evil.”
The demonization of Iran proves yet again that regardless of whether the target adopts a confrontational or conciliatory approach, the hegemon will continue to pursue its agenda. It is an agenda that has a power and potency of its own. In the context of WANA, Israel, it is so apparent, is the driving force behind US hegemonic power. Making people everywhere aware of this and what its consequences are is one of the most urgent tasks at hand. This task is perhaps a little less difficult today compared to the past for two reasons. One, as we have stated a number of times before, US helmed hegemonic power is declining. People are becoming much more critical of US’s global role now. Two, the citizens
A R T I C L E S of WANA in particular are acutely conscious of what hegemonic intervention can lead to after witnessing the chaos and catastrophe that have befallen Iraq and Afghanistan. They are also beginning to sense — after the initial euphoria — that Libya may also be heading towards calamity. Foreign intervention they know is not the solution. It is the problem. IMMEDIATE MEASURES
While mass consciousness building about the danger of hegemony as the ultimate repudiation of human dignity will take time, we could propose some immediate measures that should be taken to avert military strikes against Iran and to prevent a war in WANA. The BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) grouping could through the UN Security Council suggest a new nuclear deal which would allow Iran limited uranium enrichment under strict supervision within a larger treaty signed by all the states in WANA and other leading powers that pledges to create a nuclear weapon free zone in the region within a certain time-frame. The manufacture, storage, sale and distribution of other weapons of mass destruction should also be prohibited. As the formulation of such a treaty begins in earnest, all sanctions against Iran should also be lifted. There are other challenges notably the Israeli occupation of Arab lands, the establishment of an independent, sovereign Palestinian state and the status of Israel, which should also be resolved at the same time. Is there still time to persuade the powers-that-be to consider proposals like this? Or is it already too late in the day? Is the hegemon — or is Israel — about to strike? 27 January, 2012
Dr. Chandra Muzaffar is President of the International Movement for a Just World (JUST) and Professor of Global Studies at Universiti Sains Malaysia.
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By Jean Shaoul & Chris Marsden The veto by Russia and China of a United Nations Security Council resolution will not halt ongoing preparations for Western-backed intervention against Syria. The discussion on the resolution was a political manoeuvre from the outset, designed either to force Moscow and Beijing into agreeing to a UN cover for a Libya-style operation against the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, or justify a predetermined alternative route to regime-change. This goal has nothing to do with the humanitarian posturing of the US, France, the UK and the various despots that make up the Arab League. The aim is to install a pro-Western government dominated by Sunni forces close to the Gulf States, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, thus further isolating Iran, the main ally of the current Syrian regime. Iran is seen as the only regional obstacle to total US hegemony over the oil-rich Middle East and Caspian Basin. Eliminating the Assad regime and weakening Tehran would also serve to push Russia and China out of their remaining bases of influence. The US, Britain and France sought to use a demand from the Arab League, supposedly based upon the report of its observer mission to Syria, to condemn the crackdown by the Assad regime and call for Assad to hand over power to his deputy in preparation for a new government that would include the opposition. According to the proposed resolution, this would be followed by new elections. The invocation of the League’s mission was thoroughly dishonest. The observers had found that the violence was abating and that the Syrian government was complying with most of the Arab League’s requirements. They had called for an
extension of their mission in Syria. The response of Saudi Arabia was to end its participation while the Emir of Qatar went on CNN to call for Arab military intervention. Qatar assumed the role of Arab League chair by paying off the Palestinian Authority, whose turn it was to hold the post, with $400 million in aid. It used its position to suppress the observers’ report, demand that Assad quit, and call off the mission. It then forwarded the “recommendation” that Assad step aside to the UN. While some aspects of the Arab League’s proposals were omitted from the final draft, the resolution, if passed, would have still provided the US with a cover for action against Syria. It welcomed the League’s demands, including for Assad to leave, while not detailing them as in earlier drafts of the resolution.
As Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov pointed out, the resolution’s call to “withdraw all Syrian military and armed forces from cities and towns and return them to their original home barracks” was an ultimatum the regime could not possibly accept, given that it faces an armed insurrection (backed by the West). That demand was inserted for the purpose of creating a casus belli for more direct military intervention. Moscow also objected to the resolution’s placing the entire blame for
the violence on the regime. It stated that “measures must be taken to influence not only the government…but also the armed groups, because unless you do it both ways, you are taking sides in a civil war.” As the debate on the vote reached its belated deadline, the Syrian opposition was mobilised. The Syrian National Council (SNC) and the Free Syrian Army, which are backed by Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia, as well as the London-based Syrian Observatory, went on a propaganda offensive. Reports flooded the media that Syrian security forces had bombarded districts of the city of Homs. The figures on alleged casualties increased with each passing hour, first 200, then 260, then 300-plus, with reported injuries of more than 1,000. Seven Syrian embassies were attacked, including in the UK, France and Australia, in a coordinated campaign meant to highlight what was denounced as the worst massacre yet. Homs became the pulpit from which the US, France and Britain posed as outraged defenders of human rights. US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that Russia and China were complicit in atrocities perpetrated by the Assad regime. “To block this resolution is to bear the responsibility for the horrors that are occurring on the ground in Syria,” she declared. President Barack Obama issued a statement condemning what he called “the Syrian government’s unspeakable assault against the people of Homs” and accusing Assad of having “murdered hundreds of Syrian citizens, including women and children.” Washington’s UN envoy Susan
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Rice said that Russia and China aimed to “sell out the Syrian people and shield a craven tyrant.” She later wrote on Twitter, “Disgusted that Russia and China prevented the UN Security Council from fulfilling its sole purpose.” None of the establishment media even hinted at the cynical and hypocritical character of these statements of supposed moral revulsion from officials who have praised the US intervention in Iraq, which involved atrocities such as the destruction of Fallujah that go far beyond anything committed by the Syrian regime, and who bear political responsibility for massacres, targeted assassinations and torture in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Libya. French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe proclaimed, “Those who block the adoption of such a resolution will bear a heavy responsibility in history… the massacre in Homs is a crime against humanity and those responsible will have to answer for it.” The highly belligerent tone of the US, French and British denunciations of Russia and China was a noteworthy and ominous indication of mounting intrigues directed against Moscow and Beijing. The latter undoubtedly have taken note. It is impossible at this stage to know precisely what happened in
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Homs. The Assad regime has denied reports of shelling, stating that the only film of casualties made available, showing eight bodies in a room, revealed no signs of mortar fire. The government claims that the corpses were of “citizens who were kidnapped and killed by armed gunmen.” The New York Times in an account published Sunday that echoes the line of the Obama administration and the Syrian opposition nevertheless acknowledged that the renewed fighting in Homs was provoked by the opposition. Citing oppositional “activists,” the newspaper reported that Syrian Army “defectors” attacked two military checkpoints Friday and abducted between 13 and 19 Syrian soldiers. This attack coincided with the negotiations in the UN Security Council on the Western-backed resolution. But nothing could stop the media from reporting in chorus and uncritically the claims of the opposition. Only Reuters made the obvious point that “It was not immediately clear what had prompted Syrian forces to launch such an intense bombardment, just as diplomats at the Security Council were discussing the draft resolution supporting the Arab League demand for Dr. Assad to step aside.” The BBC was alone in reporting that whereas “Early accounts of the casualties in Homs on Saturday talked
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A R T I C L E S of as many as 200 deaths... one of the main activist groups [the Local Coordinating Committees] later revised its confirmed toll down to 55.” The US and France now appear set to proceed outside of the UN, forming a new version of the “coalition of the willing” that pursued the 2003 war against Iraq—with the Arab League and Turkey providing political cover. “Faced with a neutered Security Council, we have to redouble our efforts outside of the UN with those allies and partners who support the Syrian people’s right to have a better future,” Clinton stated. French President Nicolas Sarkozy said France would work with its European and Arab partners to create what he called a “group of friends of the Syrian people.” With Arab League foreign ministers slated to meet in Cairo next Saturday, Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohamed Kamel Amr called for a solution in Syria “within an Arab context.” 6 February, 2012 Jean Shaoul has written on privatisation and the use of private finance in transport and healthcare. Chris Marsden is a regular contributor to the World Socialist Website (wws.org) Source: Countercurrents.org
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By Joseph E. Stiglitz T he year 2011 will be remembered as the time when many ever-optimistic Americans began to give up hope. President John F. Kennedy once said that a rising tide lifts all boats. But now, in the receding tide, Americans are beginning to see not only that those with taller masts had been lifted far higher, but also that many of the smaller boats had been dashed to pieces in their wake. In that brief moment when the rising tide was indeed rising, millions
of people believed that they might have a fair chance of realizing the “American Dream.” Now those dreams, too, are receding. By 2011, the savings of those who had lost their jobs in 2008 or 2009 had been spent. Unemployment checks had run out. Headlines announcing new hiring – still not enough to keep pace with the number of those who would normally have entered the labor force – meant little to the 50 year olds with little hope of ever holding a job again. Indeed, middle-aged people who
thought that they would be unemployed for a few months have now realized that they were, in fact, forcibly retired. Young people who graduated from college with tens of thousands of dollars of education debt cannot find any jobs at all. People who moved in with friends and relatives have become homeless. Houses bought during the property boom are still on the market or have been sold at a loss. continued next page
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More than seven million American families have lost their homes. The dark underbelly of the previous decade’s financial boom has been fully exposed in Europe as well. Dithering over Greece and key national governments’ devotion to austerity began to exact a heavy toll last year. Contagion spread to Italy. Spain’s unemployment, which had been near 20% since the beginning of the recession, crept even higher. The unthinkable – the end of the euro – began to seem like a real possibility. This year is set to be even worse. It is possible, of course, that the United States will solve its political problems and finally adopt the stimulus measures that it needs to bring down unemployment to 6% or 7% (the precrisis level of 4% or 5% is too much to hope for). But this is as unlikely as it is that Europe will figure out that austerity alone will not solve its problems. On the contrary, austerity will only exacerbate the economic slowdown. Without growth, the debt crisis – and the euro crisis – will only worsen. And the long crisis that began with the collapse of the housing bubble in 2007 and the subsequent recession will continue. Moreover, the major emergingmarket countries, which steered successfully through the storms of 2008 and 2009, may not cope as well with the problems looming on the
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horizon. Brazil’s growth has already stalled, fueling anxiety among its neighbors in Latin America. Meanwhile, long-term problems – including climate change and other environmental threats, and increasing inequality in most countries around the world – have not gone away. Some have grown more severe. For example, high unemployment has depressed wages and increased poverty. The good news is that addressing these long-term problems would actually help to solve the short-term problems. Increased investment to retrofit the economy for global warming would help to stimulate economic activity, growth, and job creation. More progressive taxation, in effect redistributing income from the top to the middle and bottom, would simultaneously reduce inequality and increase employment by boosting total demand. Higher taxes at the top could generate revenues to finance needed public investment, and to provide some social protection for those at the bottom, including the unemployed. Even without widening the fiscal deficit, such “balanced budget” increases in taxes and spending would lower unemployment and increase output. The worry, however, is that politics and ideology on both sides of the Atlantic, but especially in the US, will not allow any of this to occur. Fixation on the deficit will induce cutbacks in social spending, worsening
inequality. Likewise, the enduring attraction of supply-side economics, despite all of the evidence against it (especially in a period in which there is high unemployment), will prevent raising taxes at the top. Even before the crisis, there was a rebalancing of economic power – in fact, a correction of a 200-year historical anomaly, in which Asia’s share of global GDP fell from nearly 50% to, at one point, below 10%. The pragmatic commitment to growth that one sees in Asia and other emerging markets today stands in contrast to the West’s misguided policies, which, driven by a combination of ideology and vested interests, almost seem to reflect a commitment not to grow. As a result, global economic rebalancing is likely to accelerate, almost inevitably giving rise to political tensions. With all of the problems confronting the global economy, we will be lucky if these strains do not begin to manifest themselves within the next twelve months. 1 January, 2012 A version of this article first appeared in Project Syndicate. Joseph E. Stiglitz is a Nobel Laureate in economics, and the author of Freefall: Free Markets and the Sinking of the Global Economy. Source : Al-Jazeera
THE PRESIDENT WHO SIGNED INDEFINITE DETENTION WITHOUT TRIAL INTO LAW By American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) P resident Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) into law today. The statute contains a sweeping worldwide indefinite detention provision. While President Obama issued a signing statement saying he had “serious reservations” about the provisions, the statement only applies to how his
administration would use the authorities granted by the NDAA, and would not affect how the law is interpreted by subsequent administrations. The White House had threatened to veto an earlier version of the NDAA, but reversed course shortly before Congress voted on the final bill. “President Obama’s action today
is a blight on his legacy because he will forever be known as the president who signed indefinite detention without charge or trial into law,” said Anthony D. Romero, ACLU executive director. “The statute is particularly dangerous because it has no temporal or geographic limitations, and can be continued next page
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used by this and future presidents to militarily detain people captured far from any battlefield. The ACLU will fight worldwide detention authority wherever we can, be it in court, in Congress, or internationally.”
Under the Bush administration, similar claims of worldwide detention authority were used to hold even a U.S. citizen detained on U.S. soil in military custody, and many in Congress now assert that the NDAA should be used
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in the same way again. The ACLU believes that any military detention of American citizens or others within the United States is unconstitutional and illegal, including under the NDAA. In addition, the breadth of the NDAA’s detention authority violates international law because it is not limited to people captured in the context of an actual armed conflict as required by the laws of war. “We are incredibly disappointed that President Obama signed this new law even though his administration had already claimed overly broad detention authority in court,” said Romero. “Any hope that the Obama administration would roll back the constitutional excesses of George Bush in the war on terror was extinguished today. Thankfully, we have three branches of government, and the final word belongs to the Supreme Court, which has yet to rule on the scope of detention
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A R T I C L E S authority. But Congress and the president also have a role to play in cleaning up the mess they have created because no American citizen or anyone else should live in fear of this or any future president misusing the NDAA’s detention authority.” The bill also contains provisions making it difficult to transfer suspects out of military detention, which prompted FBI Director Robert Mueller to testify that it could jeopardize criminal investigations. It also restricts the transfers of cleared detainees from the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay to foreign countries for resettlement or repatriation, making it more difficult to close Guantanamo, as President Obama pledged to do in one of his first acts in office. 1 January, 2012 The ACLU, litigates across the U.S and all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. Source: aclu.org
120 COUNTRIES (PART II)
By Nick Turse While Olson made reference to only 51 countries of top concern to SOCOM, Col. Nye told me that on any given day, Special Operations forces are deployed in approximately 70 nations around the world. All of them, he hastened to add, at the request of the host government. According to testimony by Olson before the House Armed Services Committee earlier this year, approximately 85% of special operations troops deployed overseas are in 20 countries in the CENTCOM area of operations in the Greater Middle East: Afghanistan, Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Lebanon, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan, and Yemen. The others are scattered across the globe from South America to Southeast Asia, some in small numbers, others as larger contingents. Special Operations Command won’t disclose exactly which countries
its forces operate in. “We’re obviously going to have some places where it’s not advantageous for us to list where we’re at,” says Nye. “Not all host nations want it known, for whatever reasons they have — it may be internal, it may be regional.” But it’s no secret (or at least a poorly kept one) that so-called black special operations troops, like the SEALs and Delta Force, are conducting kill/capture missions in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and Yemen, while “white” forces like the Green Berets and Rangers are training indigenous partners as part of a worldwide secret war against al-Qaeda and other militant groups. In the Philippines, for instance, the U.S. spends $50 million a year on a 600-person contingent of Army Special Operations forces, Navy Seals, Air Force special operators, and others that carries out counterterrorist operations with Filipino allies against insurgent groups like Jemaah Islamiyah and Abu Sayyaf. Last year, as an analysis of
SOCOM documents, open-source Pentagon information, and a database of Special Operations missions compiled by investigative journalist Tara McKelvey (for the Medill School of Journalism’s National Security Journalism Initiative) reveals, America’s most elite troops carried out joint-training exercises in Belize, Brazil, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Germany, Indonesia, Mali, Norway, Panama, and Poland. So far in 2011, similar training missions have been conducted in the Dominican Republic, Jordan, Romania, Senegal, South Korea, and Thailand, among other nations. In reality, Nye told me, training actually went on in almost every nation where Special Operations forces are deployed. “Of the 120 countries we visit by the end of the year, I would say the vast majority are training exercises in one fashion or another. They would be classified as training exercises.” continued next page
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Once the neglected stepchildren of the military establishment, Special Operations forces have been growing exponentially not just in size and budget, but also in power and influence. Since 2002, SOCOM has been authorized to create its own Joint Task Forces — like Joint Special Operations Task Force-Philippines — a prerogative normally limited to larger combatant commands like CENTCOM. This year, without much fanfare, SOCOM also established its own Joint Acquisition Task Force, a cadre of equipment designers and acquisition specialists. With control over budgeting, training, and equipping its force, powers usually reserved for departments (like the Department of the Army or the Department of the Navy), dedicated dollars in every Defense Department budget, and influential advocates in Congress, SOCOM is by now an exceptionally powerful player at the Pentagon. With real clout, it can win bureaucratic battles, purchase cutting-edge technology, and pursue fringe research like electronically beaming messages into people’s heads or developing stealth-like cloaking technologies for ground troops. Since 2001, SOCOM’s prime contracts awarded to small businesses — those that generally produce specialty equipment and weapons — have jumped six-fold. Headquartered at MacDill Air Force Base in Florida, but operating out of theater commands spread out around the globe, including Hawaii, Germany, and South Korea, and active in the majority of countries on the planet, Special Operations Command is now a force unto itself. As outgoing SOCOM chief Olson put it earlier this year, SOCOM “is a microcosm of the Department of Defense, with ground, air, and maritime components, a global presence, and authorities and responsibilities that mirror the Military Departments, Military Services, and
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Defense Agencies.” Tasked to coordinate all Pentagon planning against global terrorism networks and, as a result, closely connected to other government agencies, foreign militaries, and intelligence services, and armed with a vast inventory of stealthy helicopters, manned fixed-wing aircraft, heavilyarmed drones, high-tech guns-a-go-go speedboats, specialized Humvees and Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles, or MRAPs, as well as other state-of-the-art gear (with more on the way), SOCOM represents something new in the military. Whereas the late scholar of militarism Chalmers Johnson used to refer to the CIA as “the president’s private army,” today JSOC performs that role, acting as the chief executive’s private assassination squad, and its parent, SOCOM, functions as a new Pentagon powerelite, a secret military within the military possessing domestic power and global reach. In 120 countries across the globe, troops from Special Operations Command carry out their secret war of high-profile assassinations, lowlevel targeted killings, capture/kidnap operations, kick-down-the-door night raids, joint operations with foreign forces, and training missions with indigenous partners as part of a shadowy conflict unknown to most Americans. Once “special” for being small, lean, outsider outfits, today they are special for their power, access, influence, and aura. That aura now benefits from a well-honed public relations campaign which helps them project a superhuman image at home and abroad, even while many of their actual activities remain in the ever-widening shadows. Typical of the vision they are pushing was this statement from Admiral Olson: “I am convinced that the forces… are the most culturally attuned partners, the most lethal hunter-killers, and most responsive, agile, innovative, and efficiently effective advisors, trainers, problem-
A R T I C L E S solvers, and warriors that any nation has to offer.” Recently at the Aspen Institute’s Security Forum, Olson offered up similarly gilded comments and some misleading information, too, claiming that U.S. Special Operations forces were operating in just 65 countries and engaged in combat in only two of them. When asked about drone strikes in Pakistan, he reportedly replied, “Are you talking about unattributed explosions?” What he did let slip, however, was telling. He noted, for instance, that black operations like the bin Laden mission, with commandos conducting heliborne night raids, were now exceptionally common. A dozen or so are conducted every night, he said. Perhaps most illuminating, however, was an offhand remark about the size of SOCOM. Right now, he emphasized, U.S. Special Operations forces were approximately as large as Canada’s entire active duty military. In fact, the force is larger than the active duty militaries of many of the nations where America’s elite troops now operate each year, and it’s only set to grow larger. Americans have yet to grapple with what it means to have a “special” force this large, this active, and this secret — and they are unlikely to begin to do so until more information is available. It just won’t be coming from Olson or his troops. “Our access [to foreign countries] depends on our ability to not talk about it,” he said in response to questions about SOCOM’s secrecy. When missions are subject to scrutiny like the bin Laden raid, he said, the elite troops object. The military’s secret military, said Olson, wants “to get back into the shadows and do what they came in to do.” 5 August, 2011 Part I of this article appeared in the JUST Commentary January 2012 Nick Turse is a historian and essayist. Source: TomDispatch.com
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By Devinder Sharma With the world population crossing 7 billion, feeding the teeming population is becoming a major concern. At times of diminishing land resources, and in an era of climate change, ensuring food security is the biggest challenge. All efforts are aimed at increasing food production. Somehow an impression has been created that the world needs to increase crop production manifold if it has to meet the food requirement for the year 2050. The global population would then be 9 billion. What is however deliberately being glossed over is that there is at present no shortage of food. It is not production, but access and distribution that need immediate attention. At present, the total quantity of food that is produced globally is good enough to meet the daily needs of 11.5 billion people. If every individual were to get his daily food requirement as per the WHO norms, there would be abundant food supplies. In terms of calories, against the average per capita requirement of 2,300, what is available is a little more than 4,500 calories. In other words, the world is already producing more food than what would be required in 2050. So where is the need to panic? Why then is the world faced with hunger? Simply put, one part of the world is eating more and the other is left to starve. Hunger has grown over the years because of gross food mismanagement. Let me explain. At the 1996 World Food Summit, political leaders had pledged to pull out half the world’s hungry (at that time the figure was somewhere around 840 million) by the year 2015. In other words, by 2010, the world should have removed at least 300 million people from the hunger list. Instead it has added another 85 million to raise the hunger tally to 925 million. In my understanding, this too is
a gross understatement. The horrendous face of hunger is being kept deliberately hidden. But nevertheless, let’s again go back to the question we posed earlier: If there is no shortage of food than why the growing pangs of hunger? Consider this. An average American consumes about 125 kg of meat, including 46 kg of poultry meat. While the Indians are still lagging behind, the Chinese are fast catching up with the American lifestyle. The Chinese consume about 70 kg of meat on average each year, inclusive of 8.7 kg of poultry meat. The Indian average is around 3.5 kg of meat, much of it (2.1 kg) coming from poultry. If you put all this together, the Chinese are the biggest meat eaters, and for obvious reasons - devouring close to 100 million tonnes every year. America is not far behind, consuming about 35 million tonnes of meat in a year.
When I said earlier that one part of the world is eating more, this is what I meant. Six times more grain is required to provide the proteins that are consumed by the meat-eaters. Changing the dietary habits therefore assumes importance. But still worse, Americans throw away as much as 30 percent of their food, worth $ 48.3 billion. Why only blame the Americans, walk into any marriage ceremony in India and you would be aghast to see the quantity of food that goes to waste. Food wastage has therefore become our right. Considering FAO’s projections of
the number of people succumbing to hunger and malnutrition at around 24,000 a day, I had calculated that by the year 2015, the 20 year time limit that World Food Summit had decided to work on to pull out half the hungry, 172 million people would die of hunger. These people are succumbing to hunger because both at the household and at the national level, we have allowed food to go waste. In America, for instance, hunger has broken a 14-year record and one in every ten Americans lives in hunger. In Europe, 40 million people are hungry, almost equivalent to the population of Spain. In India, nearly 320 million people live in hunger. The International Institute for Food Policy’s Global Hunger Index 2011 ranks India 67th among 81 countries. While India ranks lower than Rwanda, what is still more shocking is that Punjab – the food bowl – ranks below Sudan and Honduras in ensuring food security. Is it so difficult to remove hunger? The answer is No. A simple act of saving and sharing food is the best way to fight hunger. It can begin at the household level, at the community level and of course at the regional and national levels. If every household were to ensure that no food is wasted, and then organise the left over to be delivered to the poor and needy, much of the hunger that we see around can be taken care of. A small initiative in Rewari town in Haryana has galvanised the township into saving and sharing food. If it can happen in Rewari, it can happen in your neighbourhood too. Try it, and you will see that you too can make a difference. 26 November, 2011
Devinder Sharma is a food and agriculture policy analyst. Source: Ground Reality
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