Category Archives: International News

U.S. Withholding Aid To Mexico Over Human-Rights Abuses

The Obama administration is withholding $26 million in aid to Mexico, recommending that the government give more power to its human rights commission and crack down on abusive soldiers.

In a report released Friday, the State Department said the Mexican government, which is mired in a violent battle with powerful drug cartels, has met human rights requirements to receive $36 million in previously withheld funds that are part of a $1.4 billion Merida Initiative.

Read more: U.S. Aid Mexico, Mexico Drug War, Mexico, U.S.-Mexico Relations, Mexico Human Rights, State Department, U.S. Aid, World News

Sunil Sharan: Enemy in Need can be Friend Indeed

Come hell or high water, India and Pakistan’s leaders continually nose-thumb one another. Each snub is met with a counter-snub; every kindness by suspicion and prickliness. Memories of ghosts past inspire cold shoulders today. Would the enemy crow about its magnanimity for all time to come? Might acceptance of help be construed by the other as weakness to be parlayed into future gain? Or, worst perhaps of all, would public opinion shift and make redundant much of the carefully-constructed paraphernalia of conflict?

Pakistan started getting inundated in late July. Only two weeks later, on August 13, with much of the country deluged, did India extend an offer of $5 million in aid. Predictably, Pakistan stonewalled. Both countries had swallowed pride before to accept assistance in kind after massive earthquakes, but taking pity money now was stooping just too low. And, funnily enough, the man who wrote the check, India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, did not once bother to commiserate with his neighbour in his Independence Day address two days later. Instead, like a stuck record, he once again cautioned Pakistan against fomenting terrorism in his country. For a man being hailed globally as a model of grace and humility, this was no shining moment.

Hackles raised, Pakistan dug in. Already paralyzed by bomb blasts, ground war, air strikes, a plane crash, and with a huge chunk of the country now deluged, was the country in any position to terrorize anyone? Moreover, its image in the West as the house of terror, a portrait etched to perfection by India, was already coming in the way of flood relief. A new imbroglio was thus created. Only a phone call from Manmohan Singh to Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani of Pakistan and a nudge, oops, more like a shove, from the Americans were able to resolve it. Gilani acquiesced in the subcontinental fashion, wherein ‘yes’ is often mouthed when ‘no’ is actually meant, and seemingly sealed the deal by sending choice mangoes to Singh.

While the mangoes were no doubt delicious, the money itself was presumed to be rancid. Gilani’s government went into contortions. Well, like bitter medicine, it had to be taken, but how to imbibe it? Direct ingestion would churn the stomach too much. Finally the via media of the UN was suggested and accepted without fuss. This time round India loosened its purse-strings by upping the offer to $25 million, and Pakistan showed tact in not balking.

The India-Pakistan side-show had once again stolen the thunder from the main task at hand, to get the world to come to Pakistan’s aid quickly and generously. Reams of global newsprint and gobs of cyberspace instead focused on the countries’ visceral mutual dislike, which always seems to make for fascinating copy and against whose powers even force majeure withers away. Noted commentators on both sides got into the act. Oh, how low can we go to accept money soaked with Kashmiri blood? We must not allow them to grandstand before the world. To show how caring they are and how much better off Kashmir would be with them.

The other side pulled no punches either. The money would go to the Taliban, who in turn would storm in on horse-hoofs and balkanize India. This must surely be the most potent $5 million in history! Others cussed at the churlishness of the Pakistanis. Look at them, beggars affording to be choosers, and when we extend a hand, instead of grasping it gratefully, they slap it. All they think about is Kashmir, Kashmir, Kashmir.

All the while the lives and livelihoods of millions were being washed away. Helping Haiti had become somewhat de rigueur for the world. So many global celebrities got into the act that fundraisers were held as far away as India. But even a candle isn’t being lighted by the country, at least visibly, when it comes to Pakistan.

Granted that public giving in response to disasters is somewhat removed from the subcontinental psyche. What after all is the government for? But many Indians hail from across the border and ramble on and on about a shared heritage and pleasant memories. Wagah, the India-Pakistan border post, has no dearth of candle-lighters ushering in peace. Bear-hugs and lavish meals abound whenever cricket teams and fans cross over. But if a crisis of such magnitude doesn’t shake people’s apathy, of what good is all the faux amity?

Or, perhaps Indians have decided it best to shy away from all things Pakistani? If Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan could have brickbats rain on him for innocuous comments made in favor of Pakistan earlier this year, imagine what fate could befall on lesser people. Some of India’s Muslims must surely want to mobilize relief for what in many instances are families and friends in the proximate country. Bucking the majoritarian trend can often invite peril though.

Global warming is hot but its effects have remained so far in the speculative domain. Many experts are now talking about a causal link between climate change and the devastation wrought in Pakistan. Sure, the river Indus is long and mighty, but no less so are its counterparts in India, the Ganges and the Brahmaputra. Who can say where nature will go awry next?

While the UN plays an intermediary role, the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) is conspicuously missing in action. The body has been reduced to issuing banal statements once in a while. At best, it has served to bring India and Pakistan together when at their antagonistic worst. South Asia is no stranger to natural calamities. Why doesn’t SAARC establish a relief corpus to be funded by member countries and others? Much of the unseemliness witnessed recently would then be avoided. And, enemies in need might just be able to become friends.

Read more: Floods, Yousaf Raza Gilani, India, South Asia, War on Terror, Bollywood, Terrorism, Pakistan, United Nations, Angelina Jolie, Pakistan Floods, Taliban, Barack Obama, Kashmir, Haiti Earthquake, Manmohan Singh, Haiti, Haiti Earthquake Relief, Hillary Clinton, Un, Shah Rukh Khan, Saarc, Water, Hurricane Katrina, World News

Rebuilding Zimbabwe, 04.09.10

Rebuilding Zimbabwe, presented by Tichaona Sibanda. Reports that South Africa will start deporting ‘illegal’ Zimbabwean immigrants in December will come as a big blow for many families who have long relied on remittances sent home by their loved ones. Vincent Chikwari, a pro-democracy activist said there are over a million Zimbabweans who

Read more: Zimbabwe, South Africa, Home News

Stacie Krajchir: The World’s Poshest Pools (PHOTOS)

There’s no argument, hotel pools are downright exciting; there’s something slightly tempting about all that glistening water set in a myriad of unfamiliar and seductive surroundings.

Some pools are hailed for their exclusive design or location, others for privacy, and of course there are those known solely for its serious social scene. Regardless of your pool personality, take a plunge into some of the world’s poshest pools.

Read more: South Africa, India, Thailand, Jackson Hole, France, Bali, Iceland, Miami, Slidepollajax, Swimming Pools, Travel News

Andy Thayer: The “End” of the Iraq War?

In his speech to the nation Tuesday night, President Obama essentially claimed to be ending the U.S. war in Iraq, and preparing to wind up U.S. domination in Afghanistan and by implication, elsewhere. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Taking a look at Iraq alone, the violence that the United States illegally initiated seven years ago has not ended. Instead of predominantly white bodies being draped in flags, it is now brown bodies. Troops bearing the national flag of the United States are increasingly bearing corporate flags as hated mercenaries replace regular troops. The killing continues, albeit in somewhat different form.

Iraq’s infrastructure is a shambles after decades of U.S. sanctions, war and occupation. The mess is exacerbated by a corrupt and incompetent U.S.-directed rebuilding effort. At least 30% of the nation remains unemployed. Is it any wonder that violence is endemic in a country where various armed forces are one of the few steady sources of employment for those Iraqis who remain in their country?

The new U.S. embassy in Iraq is by far the largest in the world and is emblematic of the real relationship between the United States and its client Iraqi “government.” If instead of being put in downtown Baghdad, it was instead plunked down in Chicago’s downtown, the new U.S. embassy would stretch clear across Chicago Loop, enveloping City Hall, the County Building, the Daley Center, Daley Plaza, the James R. Thompson Center, Block 37, Macy’s and more – extending from Millennium Park all the way over to the south branch of the Chicago River.

Fearing a backlash in November’s elections as corporate giveaways have failed to stimulate the U.S. economy, President Obama now claims that he’s winding up the war in Iraq so that we he can focus on promoting economic prosperity at home.

Not only does the occupation of Iraq continue, albeit in different form, Obama has dramatically escalated the war in Afghanistan, and spread it into Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, leading to the highest military spending by any country in world history.

Like President Kennedy, he conducts assassinations abroad and encourages bloody coups in countries like Honduras, and then feigns bewilderment that his “war on terrorism” might never end, and that U.S. citizens and officials might themselves come under violent attack.

Amidst the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, the United States spends as much on its military as the rest of the world’s countries combined. It has troops occupying bases in over 130 countries around the globe – most in opposition to the express wishes of the inhabitants of those countries. The United States maintains by far the largest nuclear arsenal in the world, yet denounces alleged nuclear programs of relatively weak countries like Iran and North Korea, while at best, only clucking at the military attacks of its own nuclear armed client state, Israel.

Like President Johnson, President Obama cannot fight imperial wars abroad and deliver social justice at home. The “peace prize” President is really a war emperor, and it’s about time that we pointed out that he’s wearing no clothes.

In 1967 Martin Luther King courageously announced his opposition to the Vietnam War, saying the United States is “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.” King’s words – which earned him vicious denunciations almost all liberal and conservative leaders alike, and undying hatred of the Johnson administration – are even more true today.

Justice at home is held hostage to military spending which sucks up 57% of all federal spending. As in Dr. King’s time, social justice movements today, regardless of issue, which do not clearly break from the two parties and their bipartisan support of U.S. military domination other countries, are doomed to failure.

***

Andy Thayer is one of many activists organizing for a Midwest Regional March for Peace & Justice in downtown Chicago on October 16th. The aim of the event is to clearly reject Obama’s wars, in his home town, on the eve of the Congressional midterms. For more information on the Midwest Regional March, email CCAWR@aol.com

Read more: Iraq War, Yemen, Nobel Peace Prize, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Obama, Somalia, Iraq, Peace, Anti-War, Chicago News

Joan Z. Shore: A Cold Cup of Tea

The Tea Party has it all wrong for this simple reason:

America’s descent into calamity, corruption and godlessness didn’t begin with the Obama administration. It began at least eight years earlier, when George W. Bush moved into the White House dragging along his venal vice president and their conniving cronies.

I’ll wager that many of today’s Tea Partiers actually voted for GWB the second time around, and maybe the first. They didn’t raise their voices against the wasteful Afghan war, the unjustified invasion and occupation of Iraq, the disgraceful devastation of New Orleans, the hideous shame of Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo, or the burgeoning greed and fraudulence on Wall Street.

For eight years, these patriotic Americans were silent. As George and Laura began packing up to return to their home in Texas, ordinary Americans began losing their homes everywhere….and their jobs….and their savings. The damage had begun; it was too late to turn the tide. Now, the Tea Partiers are throwing the book at Obama. (Let’s be explicit: they are calling the kettle black!)

Where were these people during the years of corporate scandals, of mounting national debt, of industrial outsourcing and outrageous gasoline prices? Were they glued to their cell phones and computers, guzzling caffé lattes at Starbucks, playing video games with their kids, blissfully maxing out their credit cards at Wal-Mart?

Have they just now awakened to the fact that America is falling to pieces? Some of us knew it all along, could see it coming, and probably should have formed our own Tea Party years ago.

Unquestionably, America’s political system needs a third voice, a third party. It has happened in Britain. But American conservatives are too querulous, and American liberals and self-styled progressives are too timid. And so the role may fall to these sturdy, stolid, God-fearing Christians who are now stirring up a tempest in the nation’s teapot.

Had they raised their voices eight years ago, I might have joined them. But now, in 2010, they are looking and sounding a lot like the Mad Hatter and the White Rabbit — “I’m late! I’m late!”

Read more: New Orleans, Third Party, Tea Party, Wall Street, Britain, Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, Obama Administration, George W. Bush, Politics News

Milla Jovovich, Pregnant Ali Larter & Wentworth Miller In Japan (PHOTOS)

The stars of ‘Resident Evil: Afterlife’ took the film to Tokyo on Thursday.

Stars Milla Jovovich, Wentworth Miller and an adorably pregnant Ali Larter premiered the film in Tokyo. Larter announced in July that she and husband Hayes MacArthur are expecting their first child together.

The film opens in the US on September 10.





Read more: Wentworth Miller, Film, Resident Evil: Afterlife, Ali Larter Pregnant, Ali Larter, Milla Jovovich, Japan, Entertainment News

Stacie Krajchir: The Sexiest Pools to Take a Plunge

The Sexiest Pools To Take a Plunge

There’s no argument, hotel pools are downright exciting; there’s something slightly tempting about all that glistening water set in a myriad of unfamiliar and seductive surroundings.

Some pools are hailed for their exclusive design or location, others for privacy, and of course there are those known solely for it’s serious social scene. Regardless of your pool personality, take a plunge into some of the world’s poshest pools.

Read more: Jackson Hole, South Africa, Thailand, France, India, Miami, Iceland, Bali, Swimming Pools, Slidepollajax, Travel News

Rabbi Steve Gutow: What the Peace Talks Need

As the leaders of Israel, the Palestinian Authority, Egypt, and Jordan meet in Washington this week to begin the first direct peace talks in 20 months, the deliberate and flagrant murders by Hamas in Hebron remind us of the urgency, and difficulty, of the task at hand. Radical voices continue to call for vengeance and promise more violence, but what the Israelis and the Palestinians need today is resolve. Resolve from their leaders and citizens to persevere in the face of prolonged talks and painful concessions. Resolve from the US government to work as hard to help the parties reach a settlement as they did in bringing them to the table. And resolve from their allies internationally and in civil society to bring the support of a domestic constituency to embrace the need for flexibility, persistence, and a two state solution.

The pursuit of peace has never been without its detractors. We saw this in 1995 when Yitzchak Rabin was assassinated by an extremist opposed to Oslo and we saw it this week in Hamas’s proud announcement that this would be only the first of many attacks aimed at discouraging talks. But the future of Israel and Palestine will not be written by the extremists, nor will their horrific violence in Hebron highjack the process.

Which brings us back to resolve. Already the skeptics on both sides are sounding alarms about rejectionist attitudes or impossible conditions. But opportunities are running out. We cannot risk continuing what Prime Minister Netanyahu has called the “circle of grief.” These talks represent a rare opportunity, which should not be allowed to go to waste.

It was in that spirit that the Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA) joined with the American Task Force on Palestine (ATFP) to call upon the parties to persevere in their negotiations and to support an active role for the US in facilitating an agreement, which would lead to an independent and viable Palestinian state living in peace alongside an Israel with secure and internationally recognized borders. Joining two centrist, pro-two state American Jewish and Palestinian groups is the antithesis of what happened in Hebron. We need to show the detractors on our right and our left that a two state solution is not just preferred, it’s possible. That the hope for the future of both states lies at the negotiating table and not in violence or economic or diplomatic aggression.

The mainstream must have as much resolve as those on the extreme have hate. This process will be long and difficult, but concrete steps in the short term can build confidence, advance the talks, and demonstrate the benefits of continued engagement. The US and international community should continue to help the Palestinian Authority strengthen its economy and security infrastructure, as it should be expected to work harder against incitement and terrorism.

A successful peace process will not just benefit the Israelis and the Palestinians. America has a vital interest in this as well. Restarting these negotiations was a success, but they will derail again without continued US involvement. Both President Obama and Secretary Clinton have promised this, but it has required a US hand to bring both sides to the table and it will require that same steadying and supportive hand to guide talks towards a successful outcome ending over six decades of conflict.

Attacks like those in Hebron were designed to dishearten us, but our resolve will not falter. Developing a domestic movement for peace is crucial in buttressing confidence building measures, while building a coalition of centrists will allow us to rally our communities around the call for two states – denouncing inflammatory and counterproductive calls for divestment and boycotts or violence and incitement.

It’s time to move forward and demonstrate that peace, while difficult to achieve, is not a fantasy and that a mainstream Jewish and Palestinian coalition can fill the public square with messages of hope and support. A shared commitment to peace and security can steel us all for the talks ahead.

Rabbi Steve Gutow is the President of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs. For more information and updates, visit jewishpublicaffairs.org and follow @theJCPA on Twitter.

Read more: Palestinians, Hillary Clinton, Israel, Peace, Barack Obama, Israel-Palestinian Conflict, Politics News

Anya Landau French: Obama Renews Cuba Embargo for Another Year

Well, I can’t say it was any big surprise. Yesterday, President Obama renewed his authority under the otherwise defunct Trading with the Enemy Act (TWEA) of 1917, which would have otherwise expired on September 14, 2010. In plain English, President Obama renewed the U.S. embargo on Cuba for another year.

Bear with me as I wonk out for just a moment, and recall how I explained this obscure presidential declaration last year:

Keep in mind that everything the President – any US President – does must have its foundation in some law giving the office broad or specific authority to act. Back when President Kennedy first declared the embargo, he had broad authority to declare national emergencies and leave them there – often far past their use and beyond the reach of congressional oversight.

So, in 1977, Congressional scaled back that authority for future national emergencies; but it grandfathered in existing authorities (such as the one for the Cuba embargo) as long as the President determined, on a yearly basis, that continued exercise of that authority was still in the national interest. President George W. Bush last signed this determination on September 12, 2008. (Note that Cuba is the only country against which sanctions derived from the 1917 Trading with the Enemy Act are still in place.)

And so for close to 3 decades now, the embargo remains in place because of a yearly presidential determination that it ought to.

Last year, Amnesty International, one of the Cuban government’s staunchest human rights critics, but also one of the U.S. embargo’s staunchest opponents, issued a clever call for President Obama to decline to renew his TWEA authority. Had he heeded the call, it wouldn’t have simply wiped away the embargo, much of which now codified into law (but it would have called into question the legal standing of some of the most important and sweeping parts of it, like the travel ban). President Obama also could have made a bold foreign policy statement, by making a clean break with the United States’ single most ridiculous and demonstrably failed foreign policy, and possibly even shaking up the annual U.N. vote in which every country except Israel and a small island in the South Pacific, votes to condemn it. But Amnesty’s call went unheeded, the U.N. voted 187- 3, and President Obama, who six years ago unequivocally opposed the Cuba embargo, officially came to own it.

Nevertheless, Amnesty International sent another letter to Mr. Obama last month, reasoning this time that not renewing his authority would “surely be welcomed by many US citizens keen to travel to and engage with Cuba. It would also send a clear message to Congress, that after 50 years of tension, new avenues should develop in the relationship with Cuba.”

It’s true that by signing that piece of paper yesterday, President Obama again missed a chance to send a positive, constructive signal on Cuba policy. But it’s not too late. Maybe he’s got another signal in mind, one that would make a tangible change right now, by again allowing the kinds of people-to-people cultural travel to and contacts with the Cuban people that President Clinton encouraged more than a decade ago (and which President Bush closed down in 2003).

By using the limited authority he has to ease the current travel restrictions, President Obama would assuredly encourage Congress to take the final step – as only Congress can do – and end the counterproductive travel ban for all, not just for some, Americans.

This post originally appeared at http://TheHavanaNote.com

Read more: Cuba Travel Ban, Amnesty International, Trading With the Enemy Act, Cuba Embargo, Cuba, President Obama, World News