World Media Watch

by Gloria R. Lalumia

BuzzFlash Note: WMW provides BuzzFlash readers foreign views and perspectives that are not usually available from the media here in the U.S. The presentation of these articles from these international publications is not an endorsement of their viewpoints.

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WORLD MEDIA WATCH FOR SEPTEMBER 29, 2004

1//Asia Times Online, Hong Kong--AMERICA'S NEW STRATEGY IN IRAQ (The new US strategy, then, is targeted at the cities where the guerrillas and their clerical leadership dominate, notably Fallujah, Samarra, Tal Afar and Sadr City, though there are several others that have not been in the news lately. The US method is to negotiate with the clerics, offering extensive reconstruction aid in exchange for calling off the insurgency and perhaps delivering the guerrilla fighters over to the United States. They call this negotiating with the moderates to split with the militants.... The calibrated increases in the destructiveness of US air attacks over the past few months appears to have numbed local and international outrage, a condition that allows for further escalation and many more casualties. The actions of the Iraqi people - both insurgents and civilians - may constrain this strategy before it reaches the point of blanket bombing and wholesale destruction. But even the most ferocious Iraqi resistance may not be sufficient to deter the coming November offensive. The Iraqis need and deserve the support of the international community; the best (and least destructive) deterrent against this impending onslaught would be the threat of uncontrollable worldwide protest should the US attempt to level either Fallujah or Sadr City.)

2//The Independent, UK--BLAME ME (...UP TO A POINT) (Tony Blair admitted yesterday that his stance on Iraq had led to a collapse in his trust ratings and appealed to Labour to set aside differences on the war and work for a historic third term...Although Mr Blair struck his most conciliatory tone on Iraq, his words failed to satisfy critics who have been demanding that he say sorry for the war. He dropped from his final draft a line saying he was "sorry" for the divisions over Iraq. An aide admitted last night: "He does not feel apologetic. He is sorry the intelligence was wrong but he was not at fault. He believes he was right. He is not contrite." The Prime Minister was speaking just hours after two British soldiers were killed on the outskirts of Basra and amid fears about the fate of the British hostage Ken Bigley.)

3//Institute for War & Peace Reporting, UK--CONFUSION OVER AFGHAN LEADERSHIP (While some voters ponder their choice of 18 candidates for the presidential election on October 9, others don't really know what a president is, according to a recent IWPR survey. Many confused a president with a king, which should come as no surprise since the country was ruled by a monarch for much of the past 300 years. People often use the world "pacha", or king, when asked what qualities are needed for a good president. "I don't know the president," said a 55-year-old man in the Imam Sahib district of Basoos village, Kunduz province. "I only know the king, and I want my rights [to be granted] from him." The views were obtained in a nationwide survey of 3,000 people in 21 provinces - conducted in mid-August by 100 journalists, as part of a workshop organised by IWPR on journalism and the presidential election.)

4//The Moscow Times, Russia--ILLARIONOV SAYS KYOTO WILL BE RATIFIED (Andrei Illarionov, the country's fiercest opponent of the Kyoto Protocol, said Tuesday that Russia will ratify the international treaty to limit greenhouse gases even though he believes the move will destroy its chances of doubling GDP by 2010. Illarionov, President Vladimir Putin's top economic adviser, said Russian officials do not believe in the treaty's scientific or economic merits but will ratify it anyway in a political gesture toward the European Union...Illarionov's comments are a powerful indication that Russia will in fact ratify the treaty after years of foot-dragging, analysts said. "If he says that Russia will ratify, it means that there is a decision," said Ksenia Udayeva, an analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Center. "His statement basically means that now Russian authorities think it is the correct political moment.")

5//The Toronto Star, Canada--PARLIAMENT MUST VOTE ON MISSILE DEFENCE: LAYTON (It would be "unspeakable arrogance" for Prime Minister Paul Martin to join the American missile defence system without a parliamentary vote, says NDP Leader Jack Layton. In notes for a speech today at Carleton University, Layton said Martin supports the system because he wants to curry favour with U.S. President George W. Bush. Layton condemned the suggestion that the federal cabinet can approve or reject the proposal without parliamentary backing. "Parliament must vote on whether to join Star Wars missile defence," he said. "Parliament will vote on whether to join Star Wars missile defence.")

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1//Asia Times Online, Hong Kong Sep 29, 2004
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FI29Ak01.html

AMERICA'S NEW STRATEGY IN IRAQ
By Michael Schwartz
Michael Schwartz, professor of sociology at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, has written extensively on popular protest and insurgency, and on US business and government dynamics.

(SNIP)

The new US strategy
The new US strategy, then, is targeted at the cities where the guerrillas and their clerical leadership dominate, notably Fallujah, Samarra, Tal Afar and Sadr City, though there are several others that have not been in the news lately. The US method is to negotiate with the clerics, offering extensive reconstruction aid in exchange for calling off the insurgency and perhaps delivering the guerrilla fighters over to the United States. They call this negotiating with the moderates to split with the militants.

If they can get an agreement, then the US marches into town and arrests at least some of the guerrillas, using informants to determine whom to target. If the guerrillas resist arrest, the US annihilates them and the areas in which they take refuge. If they melt into the population, then the Iraqi police and National Guard take up stations within the city to enforce the rule of a re-established local government. US troops outside the city maintain the capacity to intervene against any effort to challenge the police or National Guard.

To force an agreement, the US threatens both economic and military attacks on the city as a whole. Part of the plan is to use brutal air power that can annihilate buildings or whole city blocks in an effort to convince residents and leaders that the cost of resistance is simply too high. The underlying assumption is that the "moderates" will eventually choose to negotiate rather than see their city destroyed. As one marine officer in Fallujah told Washington Post reporter Rajiv Chadrasekaran, the goal is "to split the city, to get the good people of the city on one side and the terrorists on the other".

The new plan is designed to achieve two goals. First, the US hopes to reduce drastically the number of attacks on US convoys and bases outside the cities. These attacks are planned within the cities, the weapons used are stockpiled there, and the guerrillas are protected from detection by their civilian identities as members of local communities. By demobilizing, arresting or killing the guerillas, the new plan holds the potential to reduce direct attacks on US forces drastically.

Second, by replacing guerrillas with police as the source of law and order in the city, the US hopes to obtain control over local public life, including establishing pro-American political leadership, instead of the current clerical leadership hostile to the US presence. This will permit US control of the electoral process in January and guarantee a legislature compliant with US policy.

There is considerable urgency in this venture because the current US strategy in Iraq centers around the elections that are scheduled for January. Sistani has made clear that he will not wait beyond January for elections - he has already agreed to wait six months beyond his own original deadline, and any further delay might provoke him into much more forceful protest than he has embraced so far. But elections that exclude the areas currently under insurgent control will produce yet another government with no legitimacy, including a possible boycott by Sistani himself. Nor can the United States let these cities be part of the election without reconquering them, since they would then send revolutionary representatives to demand that the legislature call for US withdrawal, a demand that would be supported by upwards of 90% of the population. Recent polls conducted by the occupation report less than 10% support for a continuing US presence.

Thus the US must quickly (within four months) re-establish its control of these liberated areas, and this control must be peaceful enough to allow for the semblance of fair elections. This is why the moderates are central to the new US strategy. Occupation by American troops is counterproductive - it generates stronger and more determined resistance among the population. Permanently pacifying even a single city against this sort of resistance requires tens of thousands of US troops patrolling all the neighborhoods - far beyond the numerical capability of US forces. The Iraqi police and National Guard are notorious for surrendering or defecting to guerrillas, but the US hopes they will be able to maintain order if respected local leadership silences the guerrillas and validates their presence, as Sistani has done in Najaf.

(SNIP)

Perhaps the greatest success of the new strategy thus far is a negative one. The havoc and destruction wreaked by the terror bombing and invasion of Tal Afar generated a strong reaction from Turkey, a ripple of outrage in Iraq and the Middle East, and no protest at all in Europe or the United States. The less severe, but still brutal, attacks in Sadr City and Fallujah have generated almost no complaints or declarations of solidarity. This is a stark contrast to the April battle in Fallujah, which generated worldwide denunciations, and the siege of Najaf, which threatened to mobilize the international Shi'ite community.

What the US may have gained, therefore, is the apathy of the world to escalating violence against Iraqi civilians. This, more than the success or failure of these individual campaigns, may lay a foundation for the massive offensives that the US military appears to be preparing for in the period just after the US elections in November. The world is fully aware of the ability of the US Air Force to level even a very large city, using 2,000-pound (900-kilogram) bombs delivered in great numbers by carrier-based aircraft. The calibrated increases in the destructiveness of US air attacks over the past few months appears to have numbed local and international outrage, a condition that allows for further escalation and many more casualties.

The actions of the Iraqi people - both insurgents and civilians - may constrain this strategy before it reaches the point of blanket bombing and wholesale destruction. But even the most ferocious Iraqi resistance may not be sufficient to deter the coming November offensive. The Iraqis need and deserve the support of the international community; the best (and least destructive) deterrent against this impending onslaught would be the threat of uncontrollable worldwide protest should the US attempt to level either Fallujah or Sadr City.

2//The Independent, UK 29 September 2004
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=566786

BLAME ME (...UP TO A POINT)
As two more British soldiers die in Iraq, Blair tries to quell war furore controversy

By Andrew Grice, Political Editor

Tony Blair admitted yesterday that his stance on Iraq had led to a collapse in his trust ratings and appealed to Labour to set aside differences on the war and work for a historic third term.

The Prime Minister finally apologised for the flawed intelligence about Saddam Hussein's weapons programme, but refused to say sorry for taking the country to war on a false prospectus. He told the Labour conference in Brighton: "The evidence about Saddam having actual biological and chemical weapons, as opposed to the capability to develop them, has turned out to be wrong. I acknowledge that and accept it.

"I can apologise for the information that turned out to be wrong, but I can't, sincerely at least, apologise for removing Saddam. The world is a better place with Saddam in prison not in power."

Although Mr Blair struck his most conciliatory tone on Iraq, his words failed to satisfy critics who have been demanding that he say sorry for the war. He dropped from his final draft a line saying he was "sorry" for the divisions over Iraq. An aide admitted last night: "He does not feel apologetic. He is sorry the intelligence was wrong but he was not at fault. He believes he was right. He is not contrite." The Prime Minister was speaking just hours after two British soldiers were killed on the outskirts of Basra and amid fears about the fate of the British hostage Ken Bigley.

Mr Blair's decision to address the Iraq issue "head on" was aimed at wooing "soft" critics of his Iraq policy. In the conference hall, his words on Iraq were greeted with silence by some delegates and the overall response was more muted than in recent years. His speech was twice interrupted by hecklers, first over Iraq and second by hunt supporters, who were ejected from the hall.

(MORE)

3//Institute for War & Peace Reporting, UK (ARR No. 136, 27-Sep-04)
http://www.iwpr.net/index.pl?archive/arr/arr_200409_136_2_eng.txt

CONFUSION OVER AFGHAN LEADERSHIP
Survey reveals that many believe the president to be a king.
By Rahimullah Samander in Kabul

While some voters ponder their choice of 18 candidates for the presidential election on October 9, others don't really know what a president is, according to a recent IWPR survey.

Many confused a president with a king, which should come as no surprise since the country was ruled by a monarch for much of the past 300 years. People often use the world "pacha", or king, when asked what qualities are needed for a good president.

"I don't know the president," said a 55-year-old man in the Imam Sahib district of Basoos village, Kunduz province. "I only know the king, and I want my rights [to be granted] from him."

The views were obtained in a nationwide survey of 3,000 people in 21 provinces - conducted in mid-August by 100 journalists, as part of a workshop organised by IWPR on journalism and the presidential election.

Under Afghanistan's new constitution, approved by the Loya Jirga in January, the president is the head of state and is directly elected by the people. His powers are held in check by the national assembly - scheduled to be elected next year - and the courts.

The president will serve a five-year term in office and may be re-elected only once.

But some are not aware of these constitutional provisions.

Even the concept of king is subject to different interpretations.

Mohammed Alam Badli, 60, a tribal leader, from Khugiani district, Nengarhar province, offered a definition of a king that could suit a president as well.

"Countries are like pots, and kings are the lids," he said. "On the pots that don't have lids, flies and mosquitoes will enter. But the pots that have lids will be clean and tidy and safe."

Some see the monarch as the representative of God and his prophet; while others believe the king to be the "shadow of God", a phrase often used in Islamic prayers.

And there are those who view the monarch as a patriarchal figure. A 20-year-old resident of Nengrage village, Nur Gram district, considered a good king to be like a father. Another citizen of the same village preferred to see him as the head of the household.

Part of the reason people cling to the idea of a king may be that the country's brief experience with presidents has not been positive.

(MORE)

4//The Moscow Times, Russia Wednesday, September 29, 2004. Page 1.
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2004/09/29/003.html

ILLARIONOV SAYS KYOTO WILL BE RATIFIED
By Greg Walters, Staff Writer

Andrei Illarionov, the country's fiercest opponent of the Kyoto Protocol, said Tuesday that Russia will ratify the international treaty to limit greenhouse gases even though he believes the move will destroy its chances of doubling GDP by 2010.

Illarionov, President Vladimir Putin's top economic adviser, said Russian officials do not believe in the treaty's scientific or economic merits but will ratify it anyway in a political gesture toward the European Union.

The EU has long been pressing Russia to move forward on Kyoto, which needs Russia's ratification to come into force.

Asked Tuesday whether Russia will ratify the Kyoto Protocol, Illarionov said simply, "I think so." The move would be a purely political calculation for Russia, he said. But he declined to say what Russia might receive in return.

"It's not back-scratching," he said by telephone. "It's a gesture toward the European Union. Nothing more."

Illarionov said senior officials believe the treaty will not help the environment or boost the economy, contrary to claims by its supporters. He declined to comment on Putin's personal views.

"Nobody among Russian officials believes the protocol is good for Russia," Illarionov said. "Nobody sees any sense in the economic nature of this document. Nobody sees any scientific relevance in this document. Nobody sees any advantages for Russia in this document. It is just purely politics."

Illarionov's comments are a powerful indication that Russia will in fact ratify the treaty after years of foot-dragging, analysts said.

"If he says that Russia will ratify, it means that there is a decision," said Ksenia Udayeva, an analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Center. "His statement basically means that now Russian authorities think it is the correct political moment."

(MORE)

5//The Toronto Star, Canada Sep. 28, 2004 08:26 PM
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Ar...

PARLIAMENT MUST VOTE ON MISSILE DEFENCE: LAYTON
From the Canadian Press

OTTAWA - It would be "unspeakable arrogance" for Prime Minister Paul Martin to join the American missile defence system without a parliamentary vote, says NDP Leader Jack Layton.

In notes for a speech today at Carleton University, Layton said Martin supports the system because he wants to curry favour with U.S. President George W. Bush.

Layton condemned the suggestion that the federal cabinet can approve or reject the proposal without parliamentary backing.

"Parliament must vote on whether to join Star Wars missile defence," he said. "Parliament will vote on whether to join Star Wars missile defence."

He echoed comments made earlier in the day by Conservative Leader Stephen Harper, who also said the House should vote on the question.

Unlike the NDP, the Conservatives support joining the defence shield, but Harper said he wants to see the details of the proposal before taking an official stand for or against.

Layton reiterated the litany of arguments he has used for months to condemn the missile defence system: it's too expensive; it won't work; it will lead to weapons in space; it will destabilize the world and kick off another arms race.

Defence Minister Bill Graham said this week that he supports the missile plan because it's part of the Canada-U.S. relationship.

"My view is, on continental defence matters, we should be really accommodating of the Americans and work with them as closely as we possibly can," the minister said.

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