Wednesday, March 30, 2011
THE SPECTATOR: One can only gape in stunned amazement at the extent of the idiocy being displayed by the leaders of America, Britain and Europe over the ‘Arab Spring’ – which should surely be renamed ‘the Arab Boomerang’.
First of all, their declared policy is utterly incoherent. They claim that their aim in Libya is not regime change. Yet bombing Gaddafy’s compound hardly signals their desire that he should stay alive, let alone in power. Yesterday Obama said Gaddafy should leave power. Today he said overthrowing Gaddafy by force would be a mistake. In similar vein, Britain’s Foreign Secretary William Hague says the UK wants Gaddafy to leave power -- but that’s not regime change, because apparently it’s up to him to decide to do so. Presumably, for both Hague and Obama, if Gaddafy did decide to give up power this would have nothing whatever to do with the fact that they are bombing Libyan forces fighting for him to retain power. And they would also have us believe that the fact that the western air strikes are enabling the Libyan rebels to advance does not mean that the west intends its air strikes to enable the rebels to advance.
One is reminded of Humpty Dumpty, who told Alice in Through the Looking Glass: ‘When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less’. Especially where the restrictive wording of a UN resolution is involved.
And what might the results of this incoherent support for freedom against tyranny be? Well, in Egypt the Muslim Brotherhood appears to be in pole position to come to power in the elections planned for later this year. And in Libya, either Gaddafy will survive, in which case the begetter of the atrocity against the west over Lockerbie will doubtless be sufficiently enraged against the west to return to anti-western terror; or, should he fall, there seems to be a more than sporting chance that the Islamists he has until now fought off will eventually come out on top. Continue reading and comment » | Melanie Phillips | Tuesday, March 29, 2011
FRANKFURTER ALLGEMEINE: In Amerika wird darüber gestritten, ob Libyens Auf-ständische bewaffnet werden sollen. Befürchtet wird, ungewollt Terrororganisationen zu fördern. Auch London erwägt Waffenlieferungen. Truppen Gaddafis eroberten derweil den Ölhafen Ras Lanuf.
In der amerikanischen Regierung gibt es offenbar große Zweifel am Sinn von Waffenlieferungen an die libyschen Rebellen. Es sei eine heftige Debatte darüber entbrannt, ob die Aufständischen bewaffnet werden sollten, berichtete die „New York Times“ am Mittwoch. Im Weißen Haus, Außenministerium und Pentagon gehe die Angst um, ungewollt Terrororganisationen mit Waffen zu versorgen.
„Al Qaida in dem Teil des Landes ist offensichtlich ein Thema“, zitiert die Zeitung einen hohen Regierungsbeamten. Die amerikanischen Geheimdienste versuchten zurzeit fieberhaft, Informationen über die Oppositionellen zu beschaffen. Amerikas Präsident Barack Obama hatte sich in Interviews am Dienstagabend (Ortszeit) nicht festgelegt, ob er für eine Bewaffnung der Aufständischen ist, einen solchen Schritt aber auch nicht ausgeschlossen.
Der Nato-Oberkommandeur, der amerikanische Admiral James Stavridis, hatte vor einem Senatsausschuss in Washington ausgesagt, dass es zumindest Hinweise darauf gebe, dass sich Mitglieder von Al Qaida und der schiitischen Hizbullah-Bewegung unter den befinden könnten. » | FAZ.NET | Mittwoch, 30. März 2011
LE POINT: Le président syrien fait face depuis plusieurs jours à des contestations.Le président syrien Bachar al-Assad est intervenu publiquement mercredi pour la première fois depuis le début de la contestation dans son pays, sans annoncer la levée de l'état d'urgence, une mesure hautement symbolique que lui seul a le pouvoir de prendre. Bachar el-Assad a prononcé un discours télévisé devant le Parlement, au cours duquel étaient attendues l'annonce de la fin de l'état d'urgence en vigueur depuis près d'un demi-siècle et de nouvelles lois sur les médias et le pluralisme politique. Mais le président syrien, qui est apparu détendu face à un auditoire acquis, ne s'est finalement pas engagé sur la mise en oeuvre de réformes pour calmer la contestation sans précédent depuis son arrivée au pouvoir en 2000.
"Nous sommes totalement favorables à des réformes. C'est le devoir de l'État. Mais nous ne sommes pas favorables à des dissensions", a-t-il poursuivi, avant d'indiquer que la lutte contre la corruption et le chômage était une "priorité" du prochain gouvernement. Le cabinet dirigé depuis 2003 par Mohammad Naji Otri a démissionné mardi, et la presse syrienne a affiché mercredi sa préférence pour un gouvernement de technocrates afin de mener à bien les réformes. Mais le dirigeant syrien n'a annoncé mercredi aucune des mesures de libéralisation du régime, dont l'imminence avait été annoncée par ses proches. » | Source Reuters | Mercredi 30 Mars 2011
BBC: The trial of Dutch political leader Geert Wilders on charges of inciting hatred against Muslims is to go ahead, an Amsterdam court has ruled.Mr Wilders, whose Freedom Party props up the government, had argued the court could not try the case as the alleged offences took place in The Hague.
He insists his remarks on Islam were part of a legitimate political debate.
An original trial was halted last October after claims of bias by Mr Wilders against the judges were upheld.
Mr Wilders has described Islam as "fascist", comparing the Koran to Hitler's Mein Kampf.
In his ruling on Wednesday, Judge Marcel van Oosten said the court would pursue the charges against him for the comparisons he had made with Nazism, according to Dutch media. » | Wednesday, March 30, 2011
DEUTSCHE WELLE: Dutch court orders resumption of Wilders race hate trial: After months of adjournments and objections, a Dutch court has given the go-ahead for the race hate trial of Dutch anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders, who faces charges including inciting hatred. » | Darren Mara (AFP, AP, dpa) | Wednesday, March 30, 2011
THE SYDNEY MORNING HERALD: Court orders trial of Dutch anti-Islam MP » | AFP | Wednesday, March 30, 2011
THE GLOBE AND MAIL: Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi may be offered a way out, even as the more than 40 nations gathered in London vowed to keep bombing his battered forces into submission.
The tough talk of relentless pressure aimed to oust the unpredictable and brutal despot who has ruled Libya for 41 years didn’t entirely drown out hints of possible exile and the possibility of avoiding a war crimes trial, with UN envoy Abdel-Elah Al-Khatib was headed to Tripoli.
Col. Gadhafi and his sons have so far vowed to fight to the death and unleashed a new salvo of furious accusations at what he calls Western “Crusaders.”
Still the possibility of exile remained.
“It depends on the country which may offer to welcome Gadhafi,” Italy’s Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said.
American, British and Canadian warplanes are flying bombing runs from Italian airbases, but the government in Rome remains fearful that a prolonged civil war or Col. Gadhafi regaining the military advantage would threaten Italy with a flood of hundreds of thousands of Libyan refugees.
Mr. Frattini, said “no country” has yet offered the Libyan leader exile, “even the African countries which may be ready” to consider it. Africa’s other pariah despot, Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, may be Col. Gadhafi’s best hope for a comfortable exile on the continent. Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez, another Col. Gadhafi admirer, might also offer the Libyan leader safe haven. » | Paul Koring | Tuesday, March 29, 2011
RUSSIA TODAY: The Russian Orthodox Church has come up with its view of the current situation in the country. According to its report, many of the problems Russia is facing are rooted in alien liberal values.The document called “Tranfiguration and Modernization: Spiritual Basics, Aims, Risks and Chances” was presented during a meeting of the Economy and Ethics council curated by Patriarch Kirill, Nezavisimaya Gazeta newspaper reports. The authors are concerned about the fact that “in the background of official optimistic rhetoric, protest mood is growing in the country”. They quote statistics which suggest that the number of “discontented Russians ready to take part in protest rallies is nearing half of the population”.
Going deeper into the reasons for the current state of the country, the authors conclude that the problem is in liberal ideas which became popular in the 1990s. They put most blame on individualism, consumerism, and the cult of money. In their opinion, this “implies the liberation of a sinful personality” who is given the right to discharge everything that limits him or her in self-accomplishment, including moral values. In this perspective, liberal values are completely opposite to Christianity. » | Wednesday, March 30, 2011
INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS TIMES: The parliament of Bahrain has accepted the resignations of eleven Shia opposition politicians, thereby widening the gulf between the Sunni ruling elite and the largely Shia protest movement in the tiny kingdom.
The state-controlled Bahrain News Agency reported that eleven members of the opposition Al Wefaq party quit to protest the government’s violent crackdown on protesters. Seven other Wefaq officials had previously quit over the same grievance.
Al Wefac, which has refused to enter into any dialogue with the ruling family, is the largest and most prominent of Bahrain’s seven opposition parties. » | Tuesday, March 29, 2011
INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS TIMES: The tiny Persian Gulf state of Qatar has become the first Arab nation to recognize the rebels of Libya as representing that country’s legitimate ruling body.
The announcement comes following an oil marketing contract between the Benghazi-based rebels and Qatar.
Reportedly, the Qatar Petroleum company agreed to market crude oil produced from oil fields in eastern Libya, which are now firmly under rebel control.
"We contacted the oil company of Qatar and thankfully they agreed to take all the oil that we wish to export and market this oil for us," said Ali Tarhouni, a rebel official in charge of economic, financial and oil matters, according to media reports.
"Our next shipment will be in less than a week," he said, speaking from the rebel-held city of Benghazi. » | Monday, March 28, 2011
THE WASHINGTON POST: DUBANAH AL-KABIRAH, Egypt — The Egyptian revolution has brightened the future for many of the 3,000 people in this dusty farming village. Bribery has diminished at city hall, police have stopped harassing peasants and city-slicker businessmen can no longer buy their way into juicy land deals.
But perhaps the most obvious winners are the scowling men in long, black beards. They are the Salafists, Islamic fundamentalists who would like to see the strictest form of Islam applied to the way people live in Dubanah al-Kabirah, all of Egypt and across the Middle East.
Under President Hosni Mubarak, thousands were jailed indefinitely without trial or charges, part of Mubarak’s campaign to prevent Egypt from heeding the call to jihad from Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda underground. That left most of the traditionally easygoing Muslims of Dubanah al-Kabirah free to practice the conservative but tolerant strain of Islam for which Egypt has long been known.
But since Mubarak fell Feb. 11, many Salafists held for years without a legal basis have been released, here and across the country. In Dubanah al-Kabirah, they have returned home, and the most aggressive of them are seeking to impose their radical views with a boldness they would never have dared exhibit in Mubarak’s days.
Dubanah al-Kabirah, near the Nile about 70 miles south of Cairo, is just one tiny village in a nation of 80 million people and an Arab region of 340 million. But what is happening here is a cautionary tale about the unforeseeable consequences of nearly all the political uprisings that have exploded across the Middle East since December.
The youthful protesters who occupied Cairo’s Tahrir Square demanded genuine Western-style democracy, a goal applauded in Washington and around the world. The generals who took over from Mubarak have promised that goal will be reached eventually. But Mubarak’s departure set in motion a process that could change Egypt in many other ways as well, ways that Washington would find harder to applaud. » | Edward Cody | Friday, March 25, 2011
THE GUARDIAN: Libyan leader condemns 'crusader strategy' amid speculation that his foreign minister has defected
Muammar Gaddafi told the London conference discussing Libya's future without him that there was no room for compromise with the Benghazi-based rebels, whom he described bluntly as al-Qaida terrorists supported by Nato and representing no one.
Far from showing any sign of bending to demands from Barack Obama, David Cameron and other world leaders that he step down, Gaddafi issued a characteristically defiant challenge to what he called a "new crusader strategy or imperialist plan".
But three powerful explosions that shook Tripoli in mid-afternoon – apparently the first daylight attack in 10 days of UN-mandated air strikes – seemed to presage a possible escalation of the conflict. Libyan officials made no comment.
In another dramatic development, there was speculation that Gaddafi's foreign minister, Mousa Kousa, might have defected during a visit to Tunisia.
The Libyan leader warned that the UN-imposed no-fly zone would turn north Africa into "a second Afghanistan" in an extraordinary letter sent to the European Parliament, the US Congress and "the Europeans" meeting in London.
"Stop your barbaric and unjust offensive against Libya," he wrote. "Leave Libya for the Libyans. You are carrying out an operation to exterminate a peaceful people and destroy a developing country. We are united behind the leadership of the revolution, facing the terrorism of al-Qaida on the one hand and on the other hand terrorism by Nato, which now directly supports al-Qaida."
The full text shows the Libyan leader to be baffled by the ingratitude of the world towards him after years of rapprochement and utterly dismissive of concerns about the use of violence against his own people. » | Ian Black in Tripoli | Tuesday, March 29, 2011
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: It should come as no surprise to the West that intelligence officials have identified "flickers" of al-Qaeda among the Libyan rebels seeking to overthrow the regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.Since widespread anti-government protests erupted in Libya last month Col Gaddafi has repeatedly claimed that al-Qaeda was actively involved in stirring up the unrest. At the start of the uprising he even made the bizarre claim that al-Qaeda had supplied Libyans with pills that induced them to revolt. "Our children have been manipulated by al-Qaeda," he declared.
Saif al-Islam, his second eldest son and heir apparent, has also made much of al-Qaeda's role in the revolt, warning the West that it has made a "terrible mistake" in backing the rebels. "Believe me, one day when you wake up, you will find that you support the wrong people," he said after French warplanes had bombed Libya's air defences. "You've made a terrible mistake."
While the Gaddafi regime has undoubtedly exaggerated the extent of al-Qaeda's influence in their country, there is nevertheless disturbing evidence that the Islamist terror group is seeking to turn the current political unrest to its advantage.
The Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, a militant Islamist group committed to the establishment of a fundamentalist Islamic state in Libya, was set up in 1995 by groups of Libyan jihadi fighters who had returned home after fighting with the Mujahideen in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union.
The LIFG later established ties with like-minded organisations, particularly al-Qaeda's North African wing, which is predominantly based in Algeria and has claimed responsibility for a number of terrorist attacks against European targets. » | Con Coughlin | Tuesday, March 29, 2011
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Libyan rebel forces may have been infiltrated by al-Qaeda fighters, a senior American military commander has warned.
Admiral James Stavridis, Nato's Supreme Allied Commander, Europe, said that American intelligence had picked up "flickers" of terrorist activity among the rebel groups. Senior British government figures described the comment as "very alarming".
The admission came as the American, Qatari and British Governments indicated that they were considering arming rebel groups, who yesterday suffered a series of setbacks in their advance along the Libyan coast towards Tripoli.
The plan is likely to spark further splits in the international coalition, with Nato and Italian sources indicating the move would require another United Nations resolution.
On Tuesday more than 40 ministers from around the world met at a conference in London to discuss the situation in Libya.
They agreed to establish formal links with opposition groups in the rebel-stronghold of Benghazi with several countries sending official envoys to the area. Libyan opposition leaders yesterday also travelled to Britain for talks with David Cameron and Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of State. (+ video) » | Robert Winnett, and Duncan Gardham | Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
How refreshing it would be if these people were to be less hypocritical and more even-handed! Why is it more acceptable for the Bahraini élite to brutalise their own people, whereas it is totally unacceptable for the Libyan régime to do so? – © Mark
THE TIMES: Obama’s words won’t move Gaddafi » | Analysis | Giles Whittell, Washington | Tuesday, March 29, 2011 [£]
THE TIMES: Gaddafi son ‘killed by suicide bomber’ appears ‘live’ on Libyan TV » | Philippe Naughton | Tuesday, March 29, 2011 [£]
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