December 12, 2005

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 DECEMBER 12, 2005

1//The Toronto Star, Canada--A ‘SILENT EXODUS’ FROM IRAQ (Eight Iraqis sit cross-legged on mats in the south Syrian capital, seemingly oblivious to the fact that Saddam Hussein is on the television behind them, beaming defiance from a Baghdad courtroom. The former Iraqi dictator doesn't matter much to them now. Hang him, don't hang him whatever. He was the old Iraq. The old Iraq is gone. Sadly for the refugees in this barren, third-floor walkup, the new Iraq is gone as well. They live in limbo today, displaced as part of what United Nations' officials are calling a "silent exodus" of as many as 500,000 Iraqis who have quietly slipped into Syria over the past two years, since a deepening insurgency took hold of their country. Syria, already straining under the double dilemma of rising international isolation and acute poverty, can ill afford the inflow of mostly destitute Iraqis. But in the spirit of Arab brotherhood, asylum has been granted. And now, three Damascus neighbourhoods are overflowing with Iraqis, while thousands more have taken shelter along the Euphrates River valley, where tribal custom obliges unconditional hospitality. … UNHCR representative El Ouali, who is embarrassed to admit his office is registering Iraqis at the rate of 500 a month, says the simple counting of displaced persons could take 20 years, given his current resources. "There are hundreds of thousands of Iraqis out there and they are being ignored. What we normally do as an agency is to assess their needs and seek out third-country asylum. "But we are not doing that for the Iraqis. They came here for help and all we can do is select a tiny few. But on what basis do you select when you don't have the resources to do the job? It's not moral.")

2//Asia Times Online, Hong Kong--WHY SOUTHEAST ASIA IS TURNING FROM US TO CHINA (The United States is rapidly losing its influence in the Southeast Asia region to China, thanks to an overly narrow focus on terrorism and a propensity to place bilateral ties above multilateral relationships, according to US and Chinese analysts. "China makes a point of dealing with Southeast Asia as a region and has a very aggressive ASEAN policy," said Catharin Dalpino, an Asia specialist at Georgetown University who served in the Clinton administration. "This also helps its bilateral relationships with Southeast Asia quite a lot." ASEAN is the acronym for the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations that includes Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and Brunei. … In that context, added Dalpino, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's decision to skip an ASEAN meeting last July "was a big mistake". Pointing to the lack of US participation in this month's summit, Ren added that the Bush administration is "not interested in participating in this process right now".)

3//The Independent, UK--BROWN SUPPORTERS PANIC AFTER SURGE IN TORY SUPPORT (The surge in support for the new Conservative leader, David Cameron, has caused panic among allies of Gordon Brown who are renewing pressure on Tony Blair to hand over power at next year's party conference. One senior minister close to Mr Brown said: "Our worry is that Blair's support is going to be transferred directly to Cameron. The longer that Gordon has to wait, the worse that will get. Blair will have to hand over to a new leader at the 2006 conference." The minister added: "A few weeks ago, someone suggested that we could be facing a meltdown. Everyone laughed, but they would not be laughing now.")

4//The Moscow Times, Russia--SCHRODER TO HEAD NEW GAS PIPELINE (Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder on Friday was named to a key post on the $4.75 billion North European Gas Pipeline, the project he and President Vladimir Putin signed off on shortly before he left office. The pipeline will give Gazprom direct access under the Baltic Sea to some of Europe's richest gas consumers, and has left transit countries Ukraine and Poland fearful of losing access to Russian gas. The appointment of Schröder, a close ally of Putin and an enthusiastic backer of the pipeline project, as head of the pipeline company shareholders' committee came as pipes were ceremonially welded at the official start of construction. … Rainer Bruederle, an official of Germany's right-wing Free Democratic Party, said he hoped that Schröder's post would be purely honorary because if it were not it would raise questions about whether Schröder had kept his public and private affairs separate, The Associated Press reported. It was not clear what role Schröder or the shareholder's committee would play in the pipeline's management, or under what financial terms Schröder had accepted the post, if any.)

5//MercoPress, Uruguay--VENEZUELA CALLS FOR A MORE “POLITICAL” MERCOS (Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez officially signed Friday in Montevideo, Uruguay, the incorporation of his country as a Mercosur “full member” and called for a more “political” block with a greater input of strategic planning. The event took place during Mercosur bi annual presidential summit and is only the first step of a long process, estimated anywhere from one to three years, in which Venezuela will for the meantime have a voice “but no vote”. … The Venezuelan president also talked of “injecting a greater strategic input to Mercosur”, taking advantage of its strong standing to put pressure on international negotiations. He also called on other Latin American countries to join the energy integration of the continent which basically means constructing a natural gas pipeline extending from Venezuela to Patagonia, connecting all of South America. … Mercosur full members are Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and now in the incorporation process, Venezuela.)

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1//The Toronto Star, Canada Dec. 11, 2005. 01:00 AM
http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer...

A ‘SILENT EXODUS’ FROM IRAQ
Mitch Potter
Middle East Bureau, Damascus

Eight Iraqis sit cross-legged on mats in the south Syrian capital, seemingly oblivious to the fact that Saddam Hussein is on the television behind them, beaming defiance from a Baghdad courtroom.

The former Iraqi dictator doesn't matter much to them now. Hang him, don't hang him whatever.

He was the old Iraq. The old Iraq is gone.

Sadly for the refugees in this barren, third-floor walkup, the new Iraq is gone as well.

They live in limbo today, displaced as part of what United Nations' officials are calling a "silent exodus" of as many as 500,000 Iraqis who have quietly slipped into Syria over the past two years, since a deepening insurgency took hold of their country.

Syria, already straining under the double dilemma of rising international isolation and acute poverty, can ill afford the inflow of mostly destitute Iraqis. But in the spirit of Arab brotherhood, asylum has been granted. And now, three Damascus neighbourhoods are overflowing with Iraqis, while thousands more have taken shelter along the Euphrates River valley, where tribal custom obliges unconditional hospitality.

"We don't know who we are any more," says Majid Majhoul Hawi al-Moussawi, 43, who packed up his family and fled Baghdad seven months ago, after an ordeal in which his 16-year-old daughter, Hanan, was kidnapped by a criminal gang.

"Are we Iraqi? Is there going to be an Iraq any more? We are just sitting here waiting and nobody cares. What is our country?"

Moussawi, 43, was once a three-star general in the Iraqi navy and his $200 monthly pension is now the family's only income. He considers the family lucky to have escaped intact. Ten former Baathist officers he knows have been hunted down and killed in Baghdad since the summer of 2003 in apparent acts of vengeance.

Hanan was abducted last spring as she was walking home from school with friends. She describes screaming in panic as four gunmen jumped from a car and pulled her inside. She could see three unfamiliar faces, the fourth face was covered by a mask.

"I was terrified. I don't know where they took me, but we were in a room. I could hear them talking on the telephone to my dad, demanding money. But I knew we didn't have any," Hanan recalls in a shy whisper.

Religious leaders from Baghdad's al-Shab district intervened, persuading the kidnappers they had no hope of getting a single dollar, let along the $20,000 (U.S.) ransom demanded. The girl was released unharmed.

"When we got Hanan back, that was it," says Moussawi. "My daughter was too terrified to even leave the house. She couldn't go to school.

"So, we locked the door and left for Syria, the only country that would have us. We are grateful, but there is no work. There is nothing for us here."

All those in the room have similarly chilling tales. Raisan Musayer Abdullah, 43, was a lawyer in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk until the spring of 2004, when he came home to find a chilling message sprayed on his front door: "Leave now or we will kidnap your daughters."

A Sunni Arab, Abdullah says the warning came from Kurdish peshmerga militiamen determined to cleanse Arabs from the oil-rich city.

"They think every Arab was with Saddam and you cannot argue. All you can do is give up your house and go." Abdullah made for Damascus with his wife and five children.

(SNIP)

Syrian officials, locked in a pugnacious battle with the international community over the accusations of a UN investigation into the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri, sound almost offended when asked if they have considered seeking international aid for the burgeoning Iraqi diaspora.

"It's not for the international community to say anything," Syrian Information Minister Mahdi Dakhlallah told the Star. "We are supporting the Iraqis as brothers. It's not for the satisfaction of the United Nations."

But Syria's support is limited. While Iraqi children are welcomed in Syrian schools, public health care was withdrawn in January by government decree.

And six months after arriving, Iraqis become illegal residents unless they cross back into Iraq and refresh their entry stamp. Many cannot afford the journey, a fact that leaves them open to harassment and exploitation by corrupt elements within the Syrian security services.

UNHCR representative El Ouali, who is embarrassed to admit his office is registering Iraqis at the rate of 500 a month, says the simple counting of displaced persons could take 20 years, given his current resources.

"There are hundreds of thousands of Iraqis out there and they are being ignored. What we normally do as an agency is to assess their needs and seek out third-country asylum.

"But we are not doing that for the Iraqis. They came here for help and all we can do is select a tiny few. But on what basis do you select when you don't have the resources to do the job? It's not moral."

2//Asia Times Online, Hong Kong December 10, 2005
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/GL10Ae01.html

WHY SOUTHEAST ASIA IS TURNING FROM US TO CHINA
By Tim Shorrock

WASHINGTON - The United States is rapidly losing its influence in the Southeast Asia region to China, thanks to an overly narrow focus on terrorism and a propensity to place bilateral ties above multilateral relationships, according to US and Chinese analysts.

"China makes a point of dealing with Southeast Asia as a region and has a very aggressive ASEAN policy," said Catharin Dalpino, an Asia specialist at Georgetown University who served in the Clinton administration. "This also helps its bilateral relationships with Southeast Asia quite a lot."

ASEAN is the acronym for the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations that includes Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and Brunei.

Against China's regional approach, the US is "notoriously bilateral, and almost gratuitously so in Southeast Asia," Dalpino said, adding that the fact that US officials won't be attending the first East Asia Summit, scheduled for December 14 in Kuala Lumpur, underscores US alienation from the region.

Besides the ASEAN bloc, China, South Korea and Japan are members of the 16-nation summit - the world's newest grouping - with India, New Zealand and Australia attending as newly accepted members.

By making Southeast Asia a "second front" in its global "war on terror", the Bush administration has signalled that "we care less about other areas of policy", Dalpino said, addressing a forum on China and Southeast Asia sponsored by the Sasakawa Peace Foundation USA.

Minxin Pei, director of the China Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, agrees that the US "has ceded the region to China's initiative".

He said US military policies following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks have played a significant role in the estrangement. But he dated the problem back to the Asian financial crisis of 1997 and 1998, when the Clinton administration used its influence on the International Monetary Fund to impose solutions on Asian countries that supported US economic goals in the region.

During the crisis, "the US showed to the East Asian countries it really did not care about them", he said.

Conversely, the Asian crisis was a turning point for China's ties with the broader Asian region, said Ren Xiao, director of the Asia-Pacific Studies Department at the Shanghai Institute for International Studies.

(SNIP)

China, Ren stressed, has built its ties with Southeast Asia out of altruism. "China's foreign policy way of thinking has much to do with its geographical location," he said. "That is to say, we must have a stable and peaceful neighboring area."

But Pei, the Carnegie scholar, suggested that China wants to preserve its big-power status and minimize US influence in the region. "China is very much afraid that the US would develop strategic alliance ties that would be used to contain China," he said. With Japan's influence in the region diminished, "China is indisputably the regional power as viewed by Southeast Asian countries."

However, Pei said the ASEAN countries don't want to be seen as satellites of China and are using their ties to Beijing "to convince other big powers to come in". That's why India has been so active in the region in recent years, he said.

In that context, added Dalpino, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's decision to skip an ASEAN meeting last July "was a big mistake". Pointing to the lack of US participation in this month's summit, Ren added that the Bush administration is "not interested in participating in this process right now".

(MORE)

3//The Independent, UK Published: 12 December 2005
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article332505.ece

BROWN SUPPORTERS PANIC AFTER SURGE IN TORY SUPPORT
By Colin Brown and Marie Woolf

The surge in support for the new Conservative leader, David Cameron, has caused panic among allies of Gordon Brown who are renewing pressure on Tony Blair to hand over power at next year's party conference.

One senior minister close to Mr Brown said: "Our worry is that Blair's support is going to be transferred directly to Cameron. The longer that Gordon has to wait, the worse that will get. Blair will have to hand over to a new leader at the 2006 conference."

The minister added: "A few weeks ago, someone suggested that we could be facing a meltdown. Everyone laughed, but they would not be laughing now."

The Chancellor has told allies the Tories have been strengthened by a contest for their leadership, and he would prefer to win through a challenge for the Labour leadership, rather than as a "coronation".

John Reid, the Defence Secretary, is the favourite among cabinet colleagues to throw his hat in the ring, but Mr Brown's allies are growing more anxious about the inheritance, including the Prime Minister's drive for Tory-backed reform of public services such as education.

Baroness Morris of Yardley, the former education secretary, will give her backing this week to an alternative education "white paper" by Labour MPs opposed to allowing selection in secondary schools. Signatories include John Denham, a former home office minister, Angela Eagle, the former work and pensions minister, and dozens of Labour MPs.

Lady Morris said she supported the alternative proposals because the government plan would "exacerbate" class divisions and make it harder for children from poorer backgrounds to get into good schools.

(MORE)

4//The Moscow Times, Russia Monday, December 12, 2005. Issue 3314. Page 16.
http://www.moscowtimes.ru/stories/2005/12/12/001.html

SCHRODER TO HEAD NEW GAS PIPELINE
By Valeria Korchagina, Staff Writer

BABAYEVO, Vologda Region -- Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder on Friday was named to a key post on the $4.75 billion North European Gas Pipeline, the project he and President Vladimir Putin signed off on shortly before he left office.

The pipeline will give Gazprom direct access under the Baltic Sea to some of Europe's richest gas consumers, and has left transit countries Ukraine and Poland fearful of losing access to Russian gas.

The appointment of Schröder, a close ally of Putin and an enthusiastic backer of the pipeline project, as head of the pipeline company shareholders' committee came as pipes were ceremonially welded at the official start of construction.

High-ranking Russian and German officials wearing fur hats stood in temperatures of minus 15 degrees Celsius and watched the welding in a forest clearing near the Vologda region town of Babayevo, 475 kilometers north of Moscow.

Further highlighting the close energy ties between Russia and Germany, Matthias Warnig, the head of Dresdner Bank's Russian operations, was appointed CEO of the pipeline project. Putin and Warnig have been friends since Putin's days in the St. Petersburg city administration in the 1990s.

The Wall Street Journal reported the two men knew each other in East Germany when Putin was a KGB agent, but Warnig has denied this.

Dresdner last week sealed an $800 million deal to buy one-third of Gazprombank, and in October advised Gazprom on its $13 billion purchase of Sibneft.

In Moscow and Berlin, analysts welcomed the appointments as giving the project political clout in Western Europe, but some politicians in Germany questioned whether Schröder's involvement was appropriate, given his recent role in green lighting the project.

"It stinks," said Reinhard Buetikofer, co-chairman of Germany's Greens, the junior member in a coalition with Schröder's Social Democrats until September, The Associated Press reported.

Rainer Bruederle, an official of Germany's right-wing Free Democratic Party, said he hoped that Schröder's post would be purely honorary because if it were not it would raise questions about whether Schröder had kept his public and private affairs separate, The Associated Press reported.

It was not clear what role Schröder or the shareholder's committee would play in the pipeline's management, or under what financial terms Schröder had accepted the post, if any.

(MORE)

5//MercoPress, Uruguay Saturday, 10 December 2005
http://www.mercopress.com/Detalle.asp?NUM=6897

VENEZUELA CALLS FOR A MORE “POLITICAL” MERCOS

Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez officially signed Friday in Montevideo, Uruguay, the incorporation of his country as a Mercosur “full member” and called for a more “political” block with a greater input of strategic planning.

The event took place during Mercosur bi annual presidential summit and is only the first step of a long process, estimated anywhere from one to three years, in which Venezuela will for the meantime have a voice “but no vote”.

Mr. Chavez began thanking his fellow presidents for “having opened the door” to Venezuela and the dream of Liberator Simon Bolivar of a united America.

“There’s no better day for Venezuela to incorporate as a full member of Mercosur”, said President Chavez sitting next to the leaders of Uruguay, Tabare Vazquez; Argentina, Nestor Kirchner; Brazil, Lula da Silva; Paraguay, Nicanor Duarte and associate members presidents, Chilean Ricardo Lagos, Bolivia’s Eduardo Rodríguez plus all the other country and international organization representatives.

“Yes, I believe Mercosur must be more political. I believe it’s a political project, a collective project for the peoples, for the polis”, underlined Mr. Chavez adding that Venezuela’s Mercosur move does not mean “any distancing from the Andean Community or the Caribbean, all these blocks must articulate”.

The Venezuelan president also talked of “injecting a greater strategic input to Mercosur”, taking advantage of its strong standing to put pressure on international negotiations.

He also called on other Latin American countries to join the energy integration of the continent which basically means constructing a natural gas pipeline extending from Venezuela to Patagonia, connecting all of South America.

“We’re talking of a gas pipeline of seven to eight thousand kilometres, interconnecting with existing networks, demanding an investment of 12 billion US dollars in several years”, said Mr. Chavez who highlighted that Venezuela’s gas reserves are enough to supply the region’s development for the next fifty years.

“Venezuela has accomplished a great turn around, before all the oil was sent exclusively to United States”.

(SNIP)

Mercosur full members are Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and now in the incorporation process, Venezuela.

"I give a hearty welcome to a friend" said Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. "Mercosur continues to be an engine for economic integration, even more important for our countries."

Argentine president Nestor Kirchner was particularly enthusiastic, “we’re welcoming the incorporation of Venezuela which is a signal of the group’s vitality, a landmark which projects Mercosur to the whole continent”.

Mr. Kirchner also made it a point to congratulate Chavez for his recent “legitimate electoral victory”, an event marred by controversy and claims of “lack of guarantees” from the opposition which finally stepped down.