July 14, 2003

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World Media Watch

by Gloria R. Lalumia

BUZZFLASH NOTE: Once again, these are the views and perspectives of the individual papers, not of BuzzFlash or Gloria. They offer BuzzFlash readers a way of reading what other nations are saying about the crisis, whether we like it or not. We repeat: This is not an endorsement of their viewpoints.

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1//The Sydney Morning Herald, Australia--FRASER LASHES PM'S 'SLAVISH' SUPPORT OF US (The Howard Government is endangering the integrity and independence of Australian foreign policy and risked making the nation a "completely subservient ally of the United States", the former prime minister Malcolm Fraser warned yesterday. As the Prime Minister, John Howard, began talks in northern Asia to gather support for the United States-led plan to force North Korea to abandon its nuclear program, Mr Fraser said it was time to ask whose national interests the Government was serving.)

2//The Chosun Ilbo, South Korea--MORE IN U.S. CALLING FOR REGIME CHANGE (The emphasis of Washington's North Korean policy appears to be shifting gradually toward regime change, as more officials conclude that anything short of that will fail to conclusively solve the nuclear crisis. At the same time, American policymakers are striving to ensure that the North's nuclear ambitions and human rights abuses are high-profile issues. The Republican policy committee in the U.S. Senate recently brought a Japan-based opponent of the Kim Jong Il regime to the United States for a week and introduced him to several high-ranking officials...During his stay in Washington, Park met several congressmen and policymakers in the George W. Bush administration. Park also attended a seminar held by the American Foreign Policy Council on Wednesday, where he said, "We have to prepare for the collapse of the North Korean regime; if the United States takes military action the Kim regime will collapse in three days.")

3//The Daily Yomiuri, Japan--JAPAN, U.S. TO JOIN FORCES OVER N. KOREA NUCLEAR THREAT (The government plans to join forces with the United States to tighten the international noose around North Korea after Washington confirmed that Pyongyang had begun reprocessing spent nuclear fuel rods, government officials said Saturday...Liberal Democratic Party Secretary General Taku Yamasaki said, after hearing the news about the reprocessing, that if it was true, North Korea's nuclear arms program had passed the stage of suspicion and had become a full-fledged threat to the international community.)

Related Story: ILLEGAL N KOREAN CARGO NOW IN JAPANESE SIGHTS (Australian PM in Tokyo)

4//Asia Times Online, Hong Kong--INDIA: THE GAMES THE PENTAGON PLAYS (An acknowledged master of psyops, the Pentagon has succeeded in conveying to India its very low opinion of the Indian army without allowing a public uproar to build up...But the defense establishment and the strategic community is outraged.... What should worry India even more than the US indictment of the Indian army and other policymakers, however, is the obvious US attempt at driving a wedge between India and China...Nevertheless, it would thus appear that just as the Pentagon leaked bit by bit to avoid public uproar, an anti-American public uproar is building up in India bit by bit. It is leading to a reappraisal of American goals in India by the strategic community and also of whether India should play the role of a policeman in the expanding American empire.)

5//The Independent, UK--"I'M THE MOST PERSECUTED MAN IN ITALY,' SAYS BERLUSCONI (Silvio Berlusconi, Italy's richest and most powerful man, has made an extraordinary defence of his much-criticised leadership in which he describes himself as his country's most persecuted man and lashes out at foreign media... Talking into the early hours of yesterday in the opulent Villa Madama in Rome, the Italian Prime Minister gave an unscripted speech that was a bizarre blend of showmanship, political insight, exaggeration and paranoia...Despite his ownership of the Mediaset TV empire, influence over state TV and control of some newspapers, Mr Berlusconi claimed that "85 per cent of the Italian press is against this government.)

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1//The Sydney Morning Herald July 14 2003
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/07/13/1058034877742.html

FRASER LASHES PM'S 'SLAVISH' SUPPORT OF US
By Mike Seccombe and Kelly Burke

The Howard Government is endangering the integrity and independence of Australian foreign policy and risked making the nation a "completely subservient ally of the United States", the former prime minister Malcolm Fraser warned yesterday.

As the Prime Minister, John Howard, began talks in northern Asia to gather support for the United States-led plan to force North Korea to abandon its nuclear program, Mr Fraser said it was time to ask whose national interests the Government was serving.

Elaborating on an opinion piece he wrote in today's Herald, Mr Fraser warned that Australia was losing influence in the Asian region, making "unnecessary enemies" in the world and compromising the rights of its citizens through "slavish" support of the Bush Administration.

He cited the controversy surrounding Mr Howard's claim, on the basis of fraudulent intelligence, that Iraq had tried to buy African uranium, and the Government's failure to stand up for Australians held by the US since the Afghan war.

It was now clear that the US and British governments had misled their publics with allegations about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, and Australia had gone along with them.

Mr Fraser said it was "inconceivable" that the Prime Minister's department would not have alerted him to the truth about the nuclear claims had it been aware of them, and "impossible" to believe that it did not know.

The Government's meek acceptance of the detention and military trial of the alleged al-Qaeda member David Hicks posed the question of whether Australia was any longer "able to stand for Australians who may need the protection of their nationality".

(MORE)

2//The Chosun Ilbo Updated July.11, 2003 17:44 KST
http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200307/200307110011.html

MORE IN U.S. CALLING FOR REGIME CHANGE
by Joo Yong-jung

WASHINGTON - The emphasis of Washington's North Korean policy appears to be shifting gradually toward regime change, as more officials conclude that anything short of that will fail to conclusively solve the nuclear crisis. At the same time, American policymakers are striving to ensure that the North's nuclear ambitions and human rights abuses are high-profile issues.

The Republican policy committee in the U.S. Senate recently brought a Japan-based opponent of the Kim Jong Il regime to the United States for a week and introduced him to several high-ranking officials. Park Gap-dong is the joint chairman of a civic group called the Chosun Democratic Unification and Nation Saving Front; in the years before the Korean War he operated underground in the South as the chief of Namgodang, or the South Workers Party. He settled in the North during the war but was soon purged from the party by Kim Il Sung and defected to Japan, where he organized the Chosun front. In the decades since he has been working to topple the Pyongyang government.

During his stay in Washington, Park met several congressmen and policymakers in the George W. Bush administration. Park also attended a seminar held by the American Foreign Policy Council on Wednesday, where he said, "We have to prepare for the collapse of the North Korean regime; if the United States takes military action the Kim regime will collapse in three days."

Another Washington nonprofit organization, the National Endowment for Democracy, will recognize other opponents of the Kim Il Jong government when it gives out its annual Democracy Awards next week. Yun Hyun, director of the Seoul-based North Korean Human Rights Citizens Alliance, will be honored, as will defectors such as Kang Chol-hwan, Ahn Hyeok and Lee Sun-ok. A seminar held in conjunction with the awards ceremony will feature presentations with titles such as "concentration camps," "famine" and "refugees: desperate human rights crisis in North Korea."

Senators such as John Kyl and Sam Brownback, both Republicans, will deliver speeches at the seminar.

Concerns by U.S. politicians and various other organizations about the defector issue have suddenly increased this year. An active discussion is taking place, following the Senate's passage of a bill to receive defectors as refugees; the same bill is now triggering discussion in Congress.

America's religious and human rights organizations are busy forming a North Korean freedom alliance group, which should be operational by the end of this month. They are even planning a "safe harbor" campaign, designed to encourage high-ranking officials and scientists from the North to defect. Congress and the State Department are also pushing to increase the number of hours that Radio Free Asia is broadcast; now it is only four hours a day.

(MORE)

3//The Daily Yomiuri Latest news as of: July 13, 2003
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/index-e.htm

JAPAN, U.S. TO JOIN FORCES OVER N. KOREA NUCLEAR THREAT
Yomiuri Shimbun

The government plans to join forces with the United States to tighten the international noose around North Korea after Washington confirmed that Pyongyang had begun reprocessing spent nuclear fuel rods, government officials said Saturday.

The government is trying to increase pressure on North Korea in an attempt to get it to agree to multilateral talks, with a view to finding a diplomatic solution before the nuclear crisis spirals even further out of control, the officials said.

Liberal Democratic Party Secretary General Taku Yamasaki said, after hearing the news about the reprocessing, that if it was true, North Korea's nuclear arms program had passed the stage of suspicion and had become a full-fledged threat to the international community.

(SNIP)

Government officials close to the prime minister said North Korea had crossed the line, adding that Pyongyang should not take the United States lightly.

"Japan also needs to gird itself to deal with the problem," he said.

In order to cut off funds to North Korea's nuclear development program, the government plans to step up efforts to tighten controls on illegal bilateral transactions, including exports of materials for making missiles and smuggling of narcotics and counterfeit bank notes into the country, the officials said.

In addition to strengthening regulatory measures, including more thorough safety inspections of North Korean ships, including the cargo-passenger vessel Man Gyong Bong-92, the government has also begun cracking down on illegal exports to North Korea.

(MORE)

Related Story:
ILLEGAL N KOREAN CARGO NOW IN JAPANESE SIGHTS (Australian PM in Tokyo)
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/07/13/1058034879438.html

... North Korea's nuclear arms program will be at the top of the agenda when the Prime Minister, John Howard, meets his Japanese counterpart, Junichiro Koizumi, in Tokyo on Wednesday... Mr Howard will have to deal with anxiety in Japan and South Korea about provoking a military response from Pyongyang.

(MORE)

4//Asia Times Online July 12, 2003
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/EG12Df05.html

INDIA: THE GAMES THE PENTAGON PLAYS
By Sultan Shahin

NEW DELHI - An acknowledged master of psyops, the Pentagon has succeeded in conveying to India its very low opinion of the Indian army without allowing a public uproar to build up. The method it used was leaking to sections of the media bit by palatable bit a classified US government report highly damning to the Indian defense services and their policymakers.

(SNIP)

Speculation is rife as to why the US leaked this classified document at a time when it desperately needs the Indian army to help its occupation forces in Iraq. The Indian army alone could spare 20,000 soldiers, even as the main US ally in the occupation of Iraq, the United Kingdom, has sent only 14,000 troops. Why denigrate an army and antagonize it right when you need it the most? Indian politicians are still debating whether or not to send the troops.

It seems that at the time that the leaks started - they must have first reached Jane's Foreign Report, which first mentioned this document, some time in March - the Pentagon did not believe, though it was being told, that it would face a Vietnam-like quagmire in Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein. It had its eyes on Indian troops even then. But it thought that it would need them only for normal policing duties, and could tell India that even though it did not think highly of their professionalism, it could invite them to Iraq as a sort of favor. After all, this would give them an opportunity to learn working under the command of the world's best army. The US may have thought that India would be grateful for the opportunity, particularly if it had been softened by the leak of a classified document detailing the low opinion of US army officers about the Indian army.

All this has changed though with the unfolding security nightmare in Iraq, and the American behavior in leaking the document looks foolishly arrogant. Now the US is asking for Indian troops for a very different reason as the body bags mount.

(SNIP)

Through its policy of palatable leaks, in small doses, assisted by relevant Indian government departments, the Pentagon has succeeded in avoiding a public uproar. But the defense establishment and the strategic community is outraged. Only a few army officers have, however, mustered the courage to speak, that too off the record, to the lone print media outlet, Outlook news magazine, that is asking questions.

(SNIP)

What should worry India even more than the US indictment of the Indian army and other policymakers, however, is the obvious US attempt at driving a wedge between India and China. The first installment of the leak in March to Jane's Foreign Report was clearly aimed at putting a spanner in the then-ongoing negotiations between the officials of the two countries for the agreements that were signed during last month's week-long visit of Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee to China.

(SNIP)

Earlier in the month, though, according to a news report from Washington, the Pentagon has attempted some damage control by saying that the paper was a "contract report" prepared by several authors and not by the Pentagon. A defense spokesman also termed as "misleading, selective and inaccurate" some of the quotes from the report run in the Indian press. The US, he said, has a high regard for the Indian army, "which was evident in the nature of ongoing Indo-US military exchanges".

Nevertheless, it would thus appear that just as the Pentagon leaked bit by bit to avoid public uproar, an anti-American public uproar is building up in India bit by bit. It is leading to a reappraisal of American goals in India by the strategic community and also of whether India should play the role of a policeman in the expanding American empire. The fact that Vajpayee brushed aside bureaucratic objections in finalizing a deal with China and accepted a Chinese proposal that India had rejected some years ago must have set alarm bells ringing in Washington. What the US perhaps needs to realize is that for all its shortcomings, India simply cannot be treated as its smaller and much weaker allies, like Pakistan. For all its sloppiness, India does have a mind of its own. Apparently India has a view of its destiny that does not quite correspond to the role the US has in its mind for India.

5//The Independent 13 July 2003
http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/story.jsp?story=423987

"I'M THE MOST PERSECUTED MAN IN ITALY,' SAYS BERLUSCONI
'This image of my personality in the media is one I don't recognise. It's the opposite of the way I am'
By Stephen Castle in Rome

Silvio Berlusconi, Italy's richest and most powerful man, has made an extraordinary defence of his much-criticised leadership in which he describes himself as his country's most persecuted man and lashes out at foreign media.

The comments came just hours after the Italian premier forced a junior minister, Stefano Stefani, to quit for insulting German tourists and thereby prompting Germany's Chancellor, Gerhard Schröder, to cancel his Italian holiday.

(SNIP)

Talking into the early hours of yesterday in the opulent Villa Madama in Rome, the Italian Prime Minister gave an unscripted speech that was a bizarre blend of showmanship, political insight, exaggeration and paranoia.

Mr Berlusconi said the delay in forcing the resignation of Mr Stefani, who claimed that Germans were arrogant "blond hyper-nationalists", arose because Italy's political system "doesn't give the Prime Minister the power to make the under-secretary resign". Mr Schröder will visit Italy next year, Mr Berlusconi said, declaring the rift between Rome and Berlin closed.

(SNIP)
While speaking about plans for the EU presidency, Mr Berlusconi lived up to his reputation for departing from the script, calling for the creation of a European government with each prime minister, while retaining his job as a national premier, taking on a portfolio and replacing a European Commissioner - an idea unlikely to gain support and certain to horrify British Eurosceptics.

(SNIP)

But his sense of humour was distinctly lacking when questioned about his image in the foreign media, something he regards with "bitterness". A (now suspended) corruption case against him was, he said, politically motivated, and the politicisation of the legal system constituted a "cancer in our democracy".

"No Italian has ever been so persecuted as myself," he said, claiming the judiciary "tried to eliminate Signor Berlusconi as it eliminated all the leaders of the centre right".

Despite his ownership of the Mediaset TV empire, influence over state TV and control of some newspapers, Mr Berlusconi claimed that "85 per cent of the Italian press is against this government. If there is someone who is the subject of satirical attack on TV it is me. This image of my personality and my way of acting is one I don't recognise. It is the opposite of the way I am.

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