A step backwards for South Africa

President Jacob Zuma

“If passed, this bill will unstitch the fabric of our constitution”, said Lindiwe Mazibuko, leader of the Democratic Alliance opposition, attacking the controversial Protection of State Information Bill which was passed by South African MPs last week. Amnesty International called it a “draconian secrecy bill” which marked a “dark day for freedom of expression in South Africa”.

It is easy to see why this bill has become the subject of public opprobrium in South Africa. Despite being watered down significantly since it was first introduced, with over 100 amendments, the bill envisages tough sentences of up to 25 years for anyone found in possession of classified information. Its aim is to protect state secrets by allowing the police, intelligence and security services to classify documents in the national interest, defined very broadly thus raising the prospect of it including government corruption and misconduct. More worryingly, the bill contains no public-interest clause which would be crucial in ensuring that whistle-blowers and investigative journalists are not smothered.

It is the timing, however, that casts a dark shadow over the supposed intentions of the bill. South Africa’s media have been particularly active in exposing government corruption and nepotism within the African National Congress (ANC) party. President Jacob Zuma’s spokesman, Mac Maharaj, has been accused by two newspapers of accepting bribes from Thales, a French arms company, in a dodgy 1999 arms deal. The newspapers exposed the alleged wrongdoing using secret documents, something which could cost them lengthy jail sentences under the new law. Perhaps ominously for South Africa’s media, Mr Maharaj has filed a lawsuit against the Mail and Guardian for publishing confidential evidence given to prosecutors, which carries a sentence of up to 15 years in jail. Zuma recently established an independent commission of inquiry into the scandal which makes the issue all the more sensitive and the bill all the more salient. The new law could enable the government to classify pertinent information as secret by invoking national security concerns, since the multi-billion dollar arms deal falls neatly within the defence sphere. As Mondli Makhanja, chairman of the South African National Editors’ Forum has said, “Zuma himself is a securocrat and there’s a desire to cover up wrongdoingwithin government”.

The bill’s critics ought not to be overly apocalyptic; it has not yet become law and still has to pass the upper house of the legislature. Should it pass that hurdle it could always be challenged at the Constitutional Court. Sadly, the equally colourful language the ANC has used to defend it does little to dispel fears about its Orwellian tendencies. The bill is not about covering up corruption but about addressing the threats posed by “foreign spies”; even more dubiously, the State Security Minister has insinuated that the activists protesting against the bill could have been “used” by South Africa’s enemies. It would be a pity for South Africa if press freedom were sacrificed in the name of national security.

The massacre behind EURO2012

THOUSANDS OF DOGS AND CATS ARE BEING KILLED IN UKRAINE TO "CLEAN UP" THE COUNTRY, SO THAT OUR RICH AND FABULOUS FOOTBALL PLAYERS AND THEIR FASHIONABLE WIVES CAN PREPARE FOR ONE OF THEIR MANY PARADES!!!!

Please be aware of the price that this polished, rich, CIVILIZED!!!! world is making innocent people and loving animals pay!

Be so kind as to copy and paste this image and to send it to all your contacts.

Click here to sign a petition to stop this horrific massacre!

The Death of Alfonso Cano is not the death of the FARC.

November 4^th the Colombian army killed the head of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia. Even if this has been a severe blow for the guerrilleros, they do not seem to be opening up for a peaceful agreement.

Source: PressTV

The death of Alfonso Cano during a military action early in the morning on November 4^th, in the department of Cauca, is the toughest hit endured till now by the FARC; also because it happens right after the disappearance of two other leaders: Raul Reyes in March 2008 and Mono Jojoy in September 2010. Cano is the fourth component of the summit of the FARC to be killed in a military operation and the fifth if one counts that the legendary chief of the guerrilla Manuel Marilanda Velez, also known as Tirofijo, died of an apparently natural death in 2008. Today, of the seven men that in the 90’s obtained quite a few successes there are only two left: Timoleon Jimenez, nicknamed Timochenko, and Ivan Marquez.

The leadership of the FARC, as all Stalinist-inspired organizations, acts as a military council with a visible leader but with a collective, real, not purely representative, management. Its ability to substitute dead leaders, though, is failing, and not only for the disappearance of the men that have marked the history of the group in the last decades, but also because the gerrilleros with a national importance are always less.

Source: Blitz Quotidiano

Pessimism

The blow suffered by the FARC is severe also from a military point of view. Alfonso Cano was the promoter of a new strategy of resistance to the Colombian army that was having quite some success. The continuous wave of attacks typical of the guerrilla, with the use of snipers and the launch of bombs in some departments of the country, the placement of landmines car bombs in the cities and, more recently, the organization of some fortunate ambushes against the army, had raised concern about the possible resumption of the FARC. The strategy of Cano had given a certain breathing space to the guerrilla.

It is therefore probable that, at least for some time, his death will strengthen the uncertainty and disorient the chain of command. Without counting the severe blow that the disappearance of FARC’s leader represents for the spirit of the group, every month it has to deal with hundreds of demobilized.

The death of Cano underlines also the strategic defeat of the organization, but it does not mean the end of the guerrilla nor the approach to a peaceful resolution. Most probably, for some time at least, the Revolutionary Army will take care of healing its wounds: the changes in the summit, the concern for the safety of the survived leaders and the preoccupation for the air supremacy demonstrated by the government, will bring to a greater isolation. At least in the short run it is unlikely that the new leadership will give any signs of rapprochement to the government, an act that inside the group would be interpreted as a defeat.

Despite the very little triumphalistic tone with which the president Juan Manuel Santos has announced the death of Cano, his message to the guerrillas has been clear. Santos has made it clear to them that the only way to avoid death or a life in prison is the demobilization and the opening up to negotiations. A message that very probably this old peasant guerrilla, transformed into a “war machine”, (as written by Eduardo Pizarro, one of the major experts of the FARC) will interpret as a provocation.

One can make many hypotheses about the possible scenarios that will open up after the disappearance of this great leader Alfonso: the guerrillas could sit on the table of the negotiations, join the drug traffic and the other many discussible actions of the new paramilitary groups, or disintegrate in small groups that, in some cases, already have some alliances with the successors of the paramilitary in charge of operating and administrating the traffic of cocaine. Finally, they could create new fronts more faithful to the tradition of the guerrilla.

For now it is impossible to say with certainty which way the Revolutionary Army will take: their history, their logic and the changes that they have suffered in the last years do not leave hope for anything good. Certainly the organization will not give up easily.

Maybe the constant succession of setbacks and losses, the last worst than the previous ones, will change the situation. 

Do you think the eurozone should introduce eurobonds?

Source: BBC

Jose Manuel Barroso, the European Commission President, is set to unveil plans for the introduction of eurobonds in the crisis-stricken eurozone. This is a highly contentious topic and flies in the face of adamant German opposition. What is your opinion on this issue? Could it prove a long-term solution to the crisis or would it merely encourage fiscal profligacy? Vote and debate here.

Enter the experts



Source: Financial Times



The euro crisis and the broader economic malaise swallowing the developed world have eroded people’s trust in the political establishment and rendered parties the subject of public opprobrium. Since both left and right parties are seen to be responsible for the mess in which we find ourselves now, neither would have commanded sufficient respect to lead us out of it. Therein lies the appeal of technocratic governments, whose knowledge and detachment from petty everyday politics has enabled them to sweep up popular approval from under the feet of the traditional parties, casting doubt on the traditional link between elections and legitimacy. However, not everyone has warmed to the idea of an unelected government and political commentators have decried the suspension of democracy. The Economist argues that technocrats may know exactly what sort of fiscal adjustment is necessary to extract a country from financial ruin, however will not be so adept at distributing the necessary economic pain without the political know-how of politicians. Furthermore, the fact that their legitimacy rests solely on respect and personal clout means that it will be harder for them to canvass support for painful economic measures without an electoral mandate. Normally the public would accept such measures because the legitimacy of the governing party would translate into legitimacy for its policies.

However, the fact that in Italy  53% of the population favours a technocratic government and are prepared to accept tough measures which would move Italy away from the brink of financial ruin, paints a different picture. The caretaker Prime Minister Mario Monti has made a considerable effort to include groups which have traditionally been marginalised and neglected on the political arena, namely women and young people. It can be said that the former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi made a valiant attempt to bring a hybrid of these two groups into the political system by stuffing his cabinet with young women, provided they were pretty of course. Unsurprisingly that failed to convince the Italian public of the seriousness of his intentions and did precious little to enhance his legitimacy. Furthermore, Monti’s technocratic government is not operating above democracy. It still had to win the confidence of parliament and will have to work hard to garner the support of elected politicians (who no doubt are relishing the opportunity to use unelected professors as scapegoats for their own failings) to implement its ambitious reform programme. The assumption that elections provide a sort of carte blanche in terms of policy legitimacy to politicians is overly simplistic; undoubtedly the extreme situation has played its part in demonising the whole political establishment, however one must not underestimate the clout that impartiality and expertise can wield, for the better. It was not by chance that Greek philosophers such as Aristotle feared the tyranny of democracy and sought to balance it with wise and dispassionate rulers.

Without entering into a philosophical debate about the merits of democracy there is another reason why technocratic governments ought to be seen as more than a mere stopgap in times of emergency. As the traditional mainstream political parties have been disparaged to such an extent as to leave a gaping political vacuum in Italy and elsewhere, extremist parties at both ends of the spectrum are eager to step in. History teaches us that extremist ideas have a particular appeal in times of hardship, and the rise of various extreme right and left parties throughout Europe is testament to this. In Greece the political extremes collectively muster more support than either of the two mainstream parties, and in Italy the Northern League is relishing the opportunity to return to the opposition ranks, presumably so that it may pander to the extremist streaks of its electorate. In contrast to the past, extremist parties in creditor and debtor nations alike, are railing against the EU in addition to their more traditional themes of immigration and globalisation. Given that Brussels is largely seen as the cause of many of Europe’s ills which are reverberating across the continent, this populist stance is one which is likely to pay hefty political dividends as growth falters and unemployment rises.

Mainstream political parties may be complacent about their superior knowledge of the meandering corridors of power and tortuous machinery of government, however they must not overestimate the legitimacy their electoral mandate confers upon them. If they adopt an overly obstructionist stance to a technocrat's reform programme they will further chip away at the infinitesimal amount of public respect they still hold, and pave the way for nefarious extremist ideas to take hold of disillusioned voters. 

Lost in a Roman wilderness of pain

Source: Reuters

So sang Jim Morrison in “The End”, the Doors song that Italian radio host Oscar Giannino has aptly been playing every morning on Radio 24 as his soundtrack to Silvio Berlusconi’s unbecoming fall. Yet even the advent of Super Mario and his technocratic government has not dissuaded him from this morning ritual for, as he rightly points out, Berlusconi’s fall was simply the first step in a long road to economic and political recovery.

The conflagration that is the euro crisis has already toppled the governments of Spain and Greece, so it came as no surprise that where underage prostitutes, bribery and tax evasion allegations had failed, widening bond spreads  and mounting interest rates succeeded. It paints a wretched picture of Italian politics.  Had it not been for the fickle markets and the burgeoning pressure from Brussels, Berlusconi might never have stepped down. His loss of majority in the Chamber of Deputies was blatantly the final straw, but had it not been for the festering euro crisis threatening to engulf Italy he probably would have taken advantage of the window his noncommittal resignation promise gave him and canvassed enough support to keep trundling gaily along as he has for the past eight and a half years. Berlusconi’s shameful relinquishing of power is reminiscent of Bettino Craxi’s indecorous fall when Romans threw coins at him to express their disgust at his venality. As Berlusconi slipped out of a side door of the President’s palace to avoid the crowd that had gathered outside, angry Italians burst into a performance of the Hallelujah chorus from Handel’s “Messiah”.

However, as The Economist points out, Berlusconi’s exit was in no way cathartic, because although the markets rallied temporarily straight after the announcement, the full extent of the power vacuum he left in his place slowly became visible as the mist cleared. That vacuum has for now been filled by Mario Monti and his caretaker government, which this week won confidence votes in both chambers. The main political parties at both ends of the spectrum have been vilified to such an extent that no political figure features in Monti’s cabinet, probably in an attempt to avoid compromising its authority which rests solely on its expertise, rather than direct democratic legitimacy. Democracy has a lot to answer for now, as it fell upon Gianluigi Buffon, the captain of the national football team, to launch an appeal to the discredited political class to be “cohesive, cultured and responsible”, adjectives which scarcely come close to describing the mass of squabbling buffoons that are supposed to be running a country. In any case, it is endearing to see that Berlusconi seems to have finally grasped the full extent of the quagmire in which Italy finds itself by announcing that the reform of the judiciary is paramount and that he would be ready to “pull the plug” on Monti. Priorities, as you might say.

Source: Corriere della Sera

 The task facing Monti is huge, and success is in no way guaranteed. His team of experts have been brought in to tackle some of Italy’s most deep-seated structural problems which have hindered growth and killed off its competitiveness. Shaking up the professional services, which have contributed to the creation of a two-tier market and crystallised their privileges to the detriment of the young, is fundamentally necessary to achieve Monti’s stated task of integrating women and young people in Italy’s staid labour force. It is also key to his policy of distributing the necessary economic pain equally so as to maintain popular legitimacy.  Fostering growth will also be paramount to bringing Italy on a stable path of debt reduction, and Monti has already indicated that he will probably not be introducing a “super-tax” targeting the rich as that would demonise wealth and deter entrepreneurs, badly needed in Italy. Crucially, it was also a measure which was anathema to Berlusconi’s People of Freedom (PdL) party. One of his most contentious tasks will be cut the infamous "costs of politics", as they are known in the Italian media. This ranges from a reduction in politicians' salaries, notoriously generous in Italy, to scrapping a whole bureaucratic layer, namely the provinces, which are sandwiched between the regions and municipalities and are widely seen as superfluous. Whilst most politicians pay lip service to the principle of cutting their benefits, when it comes to the substance their discourse suddenly becomes imbued with a hefty dose of victimisation. After all, many of them are leaving lucrative careers in law and business to enter the political arena, and it would simply be unacceptable for them to suffer a sharp decrease in salary because of this lofty decision. So much for being a politician to serve the country then.

The fact that the PdL still commands a majority in the Senate means Monti will have to prove adept at working his way through the convoluted party politics of Italy. The Northern League is adamantly against his technocratic government and is unlikely to set aside its populist tendencies for the country’s good; similarly Berlusconi has made clear that he will not retire to some quiet corner and write his memoirs. Reassuringly, the former prime minister has given Monti’s government the green light to proceed with structural reforms until 2013, when elections are due to be held, however the vicissitudes of Italian politics and the mercurial qualities of Berlusconi mean the future is murky at best. Oscar Giannino will probably be in no hurry to change his song given the uncertainty ahead.

China looks abroad for convenient manpower

China, in our imagination, has always been the place where we (westerners) transported the production of our cheap (translated: Made in China) consumer goods. It seems as if this chapter is closed, and it seems like the Chinese are having some trouble with the overlap between the internal production market and the internal consumer market. What this means is that the foreign (export) market is not big enough for the amount of China Made goods and that, therefore, they want to sell them to their own people. Nevertheless the average Chinese seem not to earn enough to buy their own products. What to do? Transport the production of goods to South-East Asia, where manpower is cheaper, making products affordable to the Chinese consumer.

Chinese consumers... Rather than producers!

Basically they want to do with South-East Asia now what we did some time ago with them! The difference is there were many Chinese to exploit and few of us exploiting, while now there are a few South-East Asians and 2 billion Chinese.

Frank Leung, owner of New Wing Footwear, a Hong Kong based company that produces women’s shoes, flew from Dacca (Bangladesh) to Addis Abeba (Ethiopia) looking for new production bases, as an alternative to the one in Dongguan, in southern China.

The need to move abroad is ever more urgent. In the last two years the cost of manpower in China has increased by 20%, reducing profit margins and straining, especially in some areas, the economy of China. The increase in prices and the strong Yuan has obliged Leung to reduce the number of his employees form 8.000 to 3.000.

In Bangladesh, says Leung, the salaries of the workers are 4 times cheaper than in China and the legal working hours are 48 instead of 40. Moreover the government offers a tax holiday, a 10 years tax exemption. “But the roads are blocked by traffic and the electrical power system is unreliable. Logistic problems that prevent an efficient production”, says Mr. Leung.

A couple of weeks after his trip to Dacca, Frank flew to Addis Abeba. There the salaries are even lower than in Bangladesh, but there is a total lack of supporting industries, like the factories of shoe soles of cardboard: “Ethiopia is not suffocated by traffic but it is out of the world”.

Vietnamese producers... Rather than consumers

Factories in Vietnam

The situation of Guangdong has lead many factory owners to move their production centers to South-East Asia. In November the consulting company Gavekal Dragonomics has forecasted a slowdown of in the growth of the Chinese exports, that next year shall rise by only 9%. In the first three trimesters of 2011 the volume of the exports has increased by only 12%.

Many entrepreneurs, like David Liu, owner of a handbag producing company, had thought to move to countries like Vietnam, but then preferred to remain in Dongguan because the network of suppliers and the productivity of the workers are better.

He went to the province of Hunan, in central China, several times thinking of opening a factory there. He then found that the supporting industries and the factories that produce machinery are too far away. Therefore he decided to stay in Dongguan and keep his expert labor force.

His profit margins have fallen from 10% to 3%, so that he was obliged to apply a 10% premium to the European resellers on the prices of luxury handbags.

He is the rule, not the exception. The unit price of the Chinese exports in the EU has increased, between January and August, by 10%.

Some companies have decided to have factories both in China and in other countries. From 2007 to today Texhong Textile has opened new factories in Vietnam, where, this year, it has generated 2.000 new jobs.

In Vietnam the average salary is 140 Euros, in China it is 230 Euros. The Vietnamese factories are more automated and require less manpower. Today Texhong gives 10.000 jobs in China and 4.000 in Vietnam. Most importantly, we should note that 9/10^ths of its production is sold in China.

The previously mentioned Gavekal has found out that also many other industries with high employment of manpower are (textiles, clothing, toys) are transferring their production to South-Eastern Asia.

In 2011 the price of Chinese products increased by 20%. According to the economist of Credite Suisse Dong Tao, they can do it because no other developing country has the efficiency of China. The huge manpower, the productivity and an excellent network of ports and highways make Beijing a power without rivals. 

Obama and the race for African minerals

The United States are helping Uganda to capture Joseph Kony. But their intervention is not a selfless one.

On October 14^th the president of the United States Barak Obama  decided to send 100 soldiers of the Special Forces to Uganda to help the president Yoweri Museveni, a corrupt dictator, to suppress the local rebels of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). This act has to be interpreted first of all as an exchange of favors with Museveni, who, in turn, has sent thousands of soldiers to fight against Somali Islamists of Al Shabaab: while Uganda fights a war to recuperate Somalia, Washington helps the dictator to get rid of the LRA. It should not come as a novelty that the Pentagon has a penchant for Uganda, since in June it has sent 45 million dollars worth of equipment, including for small drones, to Kampala. 

A relative threat

The rebels of the LRA come from the north of Uganda and act on an area that extends throughout different states. They do not have heavy weapons nor can they hope to destabilize the Ugandan government (and even less to become a threat for the “national security” of the United States). The much feared Kony hides with a few hundred fighters somewhere along the border with the Democratic Republic of the Congo and South Sudan. Precisely the proximity of Uganda to South Sudan can help shed light on the entire situation. Until now, in the eyes of the Sudanese government of Khartoum, the LRA has been a very useful barrier, adequately supplied with weapons, against Museveni, considered a puppet in the hands of the western powers. In this area, in fact, there is a merciless fight going on between China (an ally of Sudan) and Europe/USA for the control of petrol and mineral resources.

In this sense Uganda is a land rich with  opportunities. Any student of Realpolitik knows that the USA do not plan any humanitarian intervention without a profit and the real stake for Washington seems to be the control of the minerals and of the mining activities. Uganda – and the near Democratic Republic of the Congo –possess diamonds, gold, platinum, tin and many other minerals. Some of which are a group of 17 elements from the periodic table, used in the construction of digital equipment, on which China exercises a virtual monopoly.

Still, one should not forget the petrol and the control of the pipelines. According to Paul Atherton, of Heritage Oil, “Uganda could have several billion barrels of petrol” (source: Asia times, Hong Kong), since in its subsoil hides the greatest deposit of Sub-Saharan Africa, which was recently discovered. This could bring to the construction of a 1200 km pipeline, with a cost of 1,5 billion dollars, which goes from Kampala to the coast of Kenya. Furthermore there are discussions about a new pipeline for the independent South Sudan. Washington wants to be sure that all this petrol remains available to the US and Europe.

The Obama administration insists on saying that its 100 soldiers will be “advisors” and not fighting troops. But one can expect that these “advisors” will extend their operations from Uganda to South Congo, to the Central African Republic and to the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

It is in any case not the first time that Washington intervenes in the region. In 2008 president George Bush had already tried. He miserably failed because of the Ugandan army, which – surprisingly – is particularly corrupt. Kony received a tip and managed to escape before the attack was brought forward. 

The crazy idea to attack Tehran

Israel knows well that bombing Iran would start a very dangerous regional conflict. Even so, Benjamin Netanyahu and his ministers, lately, act in an illogic way.

If Iran would dare to put in act a nuclear attack on Israel it would commit mass suicide. The Jewish state would react and the world, for sure, would not sit back and watch. The Israelis know it, and most importantly, also Tehran knows it. Still we are told day after day that the Iranian leaders are “crazy” and totally unpredictable.

Israel threatens to bomb Tehran before it is too late, and many Israelis are in favor of an attack. But this terribly serious debate on the eventuality of bombing Iran makes one suspect that it is the Israelis to be crazy. While the insanity of the Iranians is still to be proven the one of the Israelis is already evident.

Israel does not have a national leadership. The majority of its decisions do not have a logic explanation: like the construction of new accommodations for the settlers 

of the occupied territories, like the decisions that have strengthened Hamas, like the endless siege of Gaza, like the liberation of the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in exchange for prisoners belonging only to the Islamic organization.

There is no logic in keeping in jail a Palestinian leader like Marwan Barghouti that could help in creating a dialogue, or in undermining the relationships with Turkey. There has been no logic in the Operation Cast Lead, which has brought to Israel more damages than benefits. Naturally there is also no logic in continuing the occupation of the Palestinian territories, which damages Israel more than anything else.

Not even the Israeli public opinion behaves in a logic way. The majority of the citizens knows very well that bombing Iran would set off a dangerous regional war, but still the ones in favor of such action are more than the ones against it. The risks deriving from an attack are obvious and so serious that they make any sane person shudder. The threat of Iran really using a nuclear weapon is non-existent but Israel continues to play with fire. Israelis say that they would rather have thousands of missiles today than the imaginary risk of “crazy” Iran using the suicide weapon in the future. In short: they prefer folly raised to system, with threats and explicit preparations for what is a potentially suicide mission for Israel.

Even if all these declarations and maneuvers only want to be a threat, they would still be sign of little wisdom. A threatened Iran is also a dangerous Iran: led by desperation they could also decide to launch a preventive attack against the Jewish state.

Atomic Powers

Tehran needs atomic weapons to defend its regime. Having seen the ex Iraqi and Libyan leaders, Saddam Hussein and Gheddafi, getting bombed it understood that if it would possess the atomic weapon the world would not dare to touch it, as it does not dare to touch North Korea or Pakistan. Furthermore Iran wants to become a regional power in the Middle East. Naturally it would be better if it would not achieve this and if the rest of the world would be able to make pressure to prevent it from arming itself with atomic: but it is clear to everyone one that no bombing can keep Tehran from becoming an atomic power.

The only conclusion that one can make from all this is that in the Middle East there is an illogic government, but that it is not necessarily in Tehran. Fear – in part unjustified - reigns in Israel and this is the result of always demonizing everything, from the swine flu to the Iranian nuclear program. In addition to these fears there is the megalomaniac idea that Israel can do everything it wants in this region. The alleged “real men” are the ones that, pretending to be brave are in reality the vile ones. The real brave ones are the ones that try to stem the folly, like Meir Dagan, the ex chief of the secret services and the Minister of the Interior Eli Yishai.

Europe in Pieces: the new political and economic balances after the 2012-2014 crisis

In the Social Contract Rousseau asks himself: “If Athens and Rome collapsed which state can last forever?”. “The political body, as the human one, starts to die from the moment of its birth and has in itself the causes of its dissolution.”

The history of the decay of an endless number of European states – from the kingdoms of  Burgundy and Aragon to the Soviet Union – seems to confirm the theory of the French philosopher. The states, as all human institutions, sooner or later disappear. After 1989 the Deutsch Demokratischen Republik  united itself with West Germany. Czechoslovakia divided itself in two after the pacific divorce between Prague and Bratislava, while Yugoslavia has been dismembered between 1991 and 2006. In the last years the map of Europe has changed according to the birth or death of national states and to the expansion of the European Union. Today the discussion is about which state will be the next to fall. Some say Belgium, others say Italy.

The world is assisting to the collapse of the Eurozone, which is not a sovereign state, but still is a political body, therefore subject to the whims of fate. Born twelve years ago, the Eurozone could soon enter the list of the organizations who died at a young age. It does not have a tax administration or a political government, and if it will not be able to transform itself it is destined to disappear.

The threat of a conflagration torments the euro-lovers and fills the euro-skeptics  of schadenfreude, the pleasure given by others' misfortunes. The ones still hope in an intervention of the international cavalry, while the others wait with trepidation for the whole construction to blow into pieces. In the conservative British circles they are overjoyed and superbly maintain that the “The nosy bureaucrats of Brussels are finally getting what they deserve. Those Greek villains, that have falsified the numbers to get in the European Union, will do it again and hoping in other major rescues”. According to this analysis, in the European summits there is nothing but chatter going on. The piloted default is an illusion and the rescue fund of the Eurozone is half empty piggy-bank. The European Central Bank is impotent. There is no European treasury and the German tribunals are preventing any intervention. The politicians continue to quarrel and to defer the solution of the problems. Greece will also drag in its fall the French and German banks. And these will give the coup de grace to Italy, which will take Spain along with it in its downfall. Portugal will not wait long to follow the others and lastly it will be Ireland’s turn.

The banks of the old continent will shut down and the ATMs will be dry. Some volunteers will feed the hungry in the Roman squares, the Spanish plazas de toros will receive the indigent and the romantic Parisian bridges will pullulate with the unstable homes of the clochardes. Europeans will learn the art of bartering again and when the ATMs will start spitting out money again it wont be Euros anymore, but perhaps francs, marks, pesetas… or Dinhar.

One day history books will talk about the Euro crisis in this way: the disintegration of Euroland had led to dangerous political cracks and the refusal to approve a constitution for the whole EU had brought it to a paralysis.

When, in April 2012 Greece goes into default and exits the EU, a European Rescue Committee (ERC) meets in Luxemburg and suspends the treaties. Leaders of this committee are the polish premier Donald Tusk and the former chancellor of Germany Angela Merkel. With the approval of 16 states among the 27 of the Union, the committee claims to act in a democratic way. “We have already seen, more than once, a system fail”, claims Tusk “we will not let it happen again”. The president of the Commission Jose Barroso and the president of the European Council Herman Van Rompuy leave the scene. In the mean time a self-styled Committee of the free nations of Europe is called in London by the conservative William Hauge and challenges the ERC. The two organisms accuse each other of being illegitimate. The disintegration is happening: two separate single markets, three areas of free trade and twenty monetary regimes.

The French and the Flemish pull up the draw bridge, the channel tunnel is closed. The ports and the airports controlled by the ERC confiscate the loads coming from Great Britain. The requests of London to the IMF for the reimbursement of the 75 billion pounds contribution for the third rescue of Ireland go unheard. The economy is paralyzed. The line of trucks exiting the country in the port of Dover is hundreds of kilometers long. Fuel is running out. London is devastated by riots and Barclays' headquarters are going up in flames. Hunger hits England. After the votes the Deputy prime minister Nick Clegg declares that there is no more EU whatsoever and that, therefore, England’s adhesion has no more reason of being. The ERC has not yet abandoned its plans for a monetary union and a European integration. To keep the nationalist sentiments under control the word “euro” is cancelled and the national governments can give a new name to the common currency. A Constitutional Commission is back to work.

To make matters worse, the day that Great Britain abandons the Union, the Scottish first minister, Alex Salmond, makes public that he has achieved a financial agreement with Poland, Germany and Luxemburg. Before the great depression of 2012-2014 it seemed as if Salmond only wanted more autonomy for Scotland, but the crisis pushes him to ask the referendum for independence. “Brave Scots”, says Salmond to his fellow citizens, “do you want to continue being subdued to London, as it has happened for Greece, Sicily and Latvia? Or do you want to revive the historic mission of Scotland, and be part, together with other European nations, to the Union, as a free, sovereign and proud reign?”. 

What drives conflicts?

Do you think the conflict in Darfur is one for resources or does it have deeper political and ethnic roots? Scholars are divided on this issue, come to be known as the greed vs grievance debate, which raises questions about what sparks conflicts and what propels them.  Vote and express your opinion here!

Mammon's Bells: The Church of England's Fraught Relationship with the Protesters

“The alarm bells are ringing all over the world. St Paul’s has now heard that call” said the Bishop of London, Dr Richard Chartres, after the debacle surrounding St Paul’s cathedral and its fraught relationship with the protesters camped outside seems to have subsided for the time being. One might point out that St Paul’s has heard that call rather belatedly, to say the least.

About 200 people and dozens of tents have been pitched in the churchyard since October 15^th to protest against “corporate greed and inequality” in the City, inadvertently sparking a massive public debate about the Church’s position in society. The Church’s first response was to close St. Paul’s for a week, because of health and safety concerns.  The next episodes in the saga saw the resignations of the canon chancellor Dr Giles Fraser because of the recourse to legal means, and the dean of the cathedral, the Right Reverend Graeme Knowles over his mismanagement of the case. This rapid succession of events seemed to prompt the sharp U-turn in the cathedral’s position, which in the space of two days announced the suspension of legal action against the protesters.

The convoluted evolution of the debacle has led many to question where the Church of England stands when it comes to the competing demands of God and Mammon. The location of St. Paul’s in the middle of the financial centre of the UK could not be more apt to highlight the situation. It professes to be a friend of the poor and marginalised in society, thus leading one to assume it would throw its full weight behind the protesters’ cause, however vague and ill-framed it might be. Its initial actions, both the closure of the cathedral and the resort to legal means, belie this traditional stance. The week-long closure to the public could not contrast more stridently with Dr Chartres’s later overtures to the protesters. It visibly showed a disinclination to engage with the protesters and more importantly to kick-start a public discussion on economic justice and the broader societal issues regarding the role of finance, all within the church’s remit. As Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church at Oxford University has said, “it’s not the business of the Church to be a set of economists. What the Church can do is to invite people to think thoughtfully, be honest and to ask the right questions”.

However we may be going too far in claiming that the Church of England actively sought to shun its role in helping the most vulnerable elements of society by attempting to evict the protesters. Nor does it follow necessarily that the Church ought to position itself squarely in either the establishment or anti-establishment camps. Church historian Stephen Tomkins argues that this debate stretches back 2000 years to the birth of Christianity itself. The Church has ambivalently been both a radical and conservative force in society, thus making it too diverse a phenomenon to be on one side or the other. Furthermore, from the article on the Financial Times written by Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, it transpires that he sympathised significantly with the protesters in backing a “Robin Hood” tax on financial transactions. It is regrettable that he did not speak out sooner to assuage the public ire. Thus whilst the Church’s fudging response was indeed shambolic and plain incompetent, it is inaccurate to lambast it for having forgone its duties to society. In excessively prioritising and mismanaging the practical issues of health and safety it allowed the broader philosophical debate to run ahead, scuppering its chance to be at the forefront of it.

Columbia’s Spy-Agency Dissolved Amid Rampant Corruption

Last Monday saw the dissolution of Columbia’s spy agency, the DAS, as the culmination of a series of scandals that had racked the agency for years. Columbia’s President, Juan Manuel Santos, issued an executive order late on Monday announcing that the current employees will be transferred to other offices and that a new entity will replace the disgraced agency. The DAS had long been mired in scandals which included spying on presidential foes such as judges, human rights activists and reporters during Alvaro Uribe’s administration, who preceded Santos. The agency had also been accused of colluding with right-wing paramilitary groups that have wrought havoc on Columbian society by killing and displacing thousands of people and targeting labour activists. Uribe had prioritised the demobilisation of these paramilitaries, which were set upon in the 1980s to fight left-wing guerrillas, as one of the pillars of his security policy; however the allegations that surfaced subsequently have cast a shadow on its effectiveness.

Only last month a Columbian court sentenced a former intelligence chief, Jorge Noguera, to 25 years in prison for collaborating with right-wing paramilitaries that were involved in the assassination of a prominent academic activist. Noguera led the DAS from 2002 to 2005 which coincided with part of Uribe’s administration and was a close friend of the President. To highlight the extent of corruption with the DAS one need only look at the case of another former DAS chief, Maria del Pilar Hurtado, who has obtained political asylum in Panama with Uribe’s help to avoid charges of illegally ordering wiretaps of government opponents. The former President’s chief of staff, Bernardo Moreno has similarly been charged and jailed pending trial for allegedly ordering illegal espionage of Uribe’s foes. The scandal broke back in February 2009 and subsequently led to the imprisonment of at least 20 DAS officials.

The current DAS director Felipe Munoz said 92% of the agency’s employees would maintain their government jobs by being transferred to the chief prosecutor’s office, the Foreign Ministry and the national police. Santos further emphasised that “a lot of people in the DAS have been stigmatized, unjustly I would say. So many law-abiding people shouldn’t pay for a few sinners”.

However, the new agency, details of which Santos said would be announced soon, is still shrouded in uncertainty. Given the scale and extent of the scandals in which the DAS was mired, it is worrying that neither Santos nor Munoz explained how they would prevent previous DAS employees involved in illegal activities from simply being transferred to the new agency. As it does not seem to be merely a case of a few rogue employees engaging in illicit activities this issue is anything but marginal. Another concern regards the U.S. funding for the new agency. Previously the DAS collaborated closely with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, receiving training and equipment, as its responsibilities also included fighting Columbia’s drug traffickers. Despite the U.S. claiming that aid was closely monitored to avoid it being mishandled or funnelled into illegal channels, it remains unclear how much assistance the new agency would receive given the pervasiveness of the scandals. How these issues are tackled will largely determine whether scrapping the DAS will successfully eradicate the corruption that pervaded it or whether it is merely a superficial measure.