May 3, 2006

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 MAY 3, 2006

1//The Guardian, UK--REMEMBER NINE GOOD YEARS, BLAIR URGES VOTERS (Tony Blair yesterday appealed to voters in tomorrow's local elections not to punish Labour by letting "nine bad days of headlines obscure nine years of achievement". Mr Blair made the appeal as Labour officials said they were expecting to perform badly in the local polls, reopening the question of Mr Blair's leadership. Mr Blair, speaking in Blackpool at the shopworkers' union, Usdaw, one of the few unions still supportive of the prime minister, said: "The whole point about government is that there are challenges. No government ever fails to make mistakes; no government ever fails to encounter difficulties. But the question is, when you step back and you look at the big picture, not each and every detail of it, is there improvement happening?" Mr Blair added: "Yes, it's difficult in government, especially as you go on, and when you are into the third term of a government it is especially difficult, but the third term of government is better than the fourth term of opposition." … Labour is expecting to come third in terms of national share of the vote. Labour's only hope is that the media frenzy over the mishandling of foreign prisoners, and the adultery of the deputy prime minister, John Prescott, will not have an impact on local voters.)

2//Asia Times Online, Hong Kong--IRANIAN CRIES IN THE WILDERNESS (Iranian leaders have been signaling to Washington since late last year that Iran wanted direct negotiations with the United States on Tehran's nuclear program and other outstanding issues between the two countries. The campaign began with private talks between Iranian officials and foreign visitors in the country, and has included public suggestions by members of the Iranian parliament for US-Iranian talks. But last week, President Mahmud Ahmadinejad indicated for the first time that he was open to talks with Washington. In an hour-long press conference on April 24, Ahmadinejad said Iran "is ready to talk to all world countries, but negotiation with anybody has its own conditions", and then specifically named the United States. "If these conditions are met, we will negotiate." Ahmadinejad's remark, which was reported by the independent Paris-based Iran News Service, went unnoticed in the US media. However, the media did report the Iranian president's statement in the same press conference that talks with the US on Iraq were not necessary now that a government had been set up in Baghdad. … Journalist Praful Bidwai reported for Inter Press Service last week that government officials and other experts in Tehran told him there was "fairly broad agreement" that a compromise proposal on the nuclear issue and security guarantees and normalization of US relations with Iran could be negotiated.)

3//The News International, Pakistan--N-PROLIFERATION PROBE OVER: FO (The release of a senior nuclear scientist linked to Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan marks a closure of investigations into the proliferation of weapons technology by the pioneer of the nation’s nuclear bomb, the Foreign Office said on Wednesday. Mohammed Farooq, who worked at the Khan Research Laboratories (KRL), was released last week after two years in detention — the last of 11 people held for their alleged links to AQ Khan’s black market network. … The spokeswoman reiterated that Pakistan would not allow outsiders, including the IAEA or the United States, access to those who were implicated in the proliferation, and that it if there were further questions in the case, it would address them.)

4//Spiegel Online, Germany--IRAQ: ON THE VERGE OF COLLAPSE (The British and the Americans are guarding Iraq's Persian Gulf oil platforms -- the troubled country's only real sources of revenue -- like crown jewels. But Iraqi oil is flowing sluggishly at best, while hoped-for investments haven't materialized and the Iraqi oil industry is on the verge of collapse -- both technical and political. … Because its northern pipeline into Turkey has been out of commission for months as a result of ongoing terrorist attacks, Iraq currently processes all its oil exports through the two terminals on the Gulf, where it earns about 80 percent of its revenues. No other country or economy in the world is quite as vulnerable at a single point.)

5//The Scotsman, UK--UK TROOPS ‘DOOMED TO FAIL’ IN AFGHANISTAN (British Army commanders formally took over responsibility for Afghanistan's lawless Helmand province yesterday as Britain's strategy to eradicate opium production and defeat Taleban insurgents was criticised as "doomed to failure". A report published by the Senlis Council, an independent think tank that monitors Afghanistan's drugs trade, paints a depressing picture of the prospects for the deployment of 3,300 British troops to southern Afghanistan later this month. … The council says widely advertised previous eradication operations in Helmand have worsened the security situation. It says 1,500 Afghan militia- men have been hired by a US private security company to guard labourers who burn or plough up poppy crops in Helmand. A small number of farmers have been paid to switch to legitimate crops but poor management and other difficulties mean such schemes have paid out only a small amount of money. Many of the province's one million residents view the Taleban as their defenders and are helping them mount attacks against coalition and Kabul government troops. "There are widespread allegations that the poppy eradication process is corrupted at many levels and that wealthy individuals are being exempted from eradication," says the report.)

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1//The Guardian, UK Wednesday May 3, 2006

REMEMBER NINE GOOD YEARS, BLAIR URGES VOTERS
Patrick Wintour, Political Editor

Tony Blair yesterday appealed to voters in tomorrow's local elections not to punish Labour by letting "nine bad days of headlines obscure nine years of achievement".

Mr Blair made the appeal as Labour officials said they were expecting to perform badly in the local polls, reopening the question of Mr Blair's leadership.

Mr Blair, speaking in Blackpool at the shopworkers' union, Usdaw, one of the few unions still supportive of the prime minister, said: "The whole point about government is that there are challenges. No government ever fails to make mistakes; no government ever fails to encounter difficulties. But the question is, when you step back and you look at the big picture, not each and every detail of it, is there improvement happening?"

Mr Blair added: "Yes, it's difficult in government, especially as you go on, and when you are into the third term of a government it is especially difficult, but the third term of government is better than the fourth term of opposition."

Admitting life was tough for many people, he accepted that many were worried by the state of the health service. He said: "I understand why at the very time when there's record investment going in and yet the health service is undergoing tremendous change, people scratch their heads and say, 'Well, how can this be?' But if you step back and ask yourself this question: is our National Health Service in better shape today than it was a decade ago under the Conservatives, the answer is yes."

Labour officials claimed there was no collapse in Labour support over the weekend, and issued a highly positive final election broadcast, but they privately admitted the party's turnout is likely to be depressed. Labour is expecting to come third in terms of national share of the vote.

Labour's only hope is that the media frenzy over the mishandling of foreign prisoners, and the adultery of the deputy prime minister, John Prescott, will not have an impact on local voters.

(MORE)

2//Asia Times Online, Hong Kong May 2, 2006

IRANIAN CRIES IN THE WILDERNESS
By Gareth Porter

WASHINGTON - Iranian leaders have been signaling to Washington since late last year that Iran wanted direct negotiations with the United States on Tehran's nuclear program and other outstanding issues between the two countries.

The campaign began with private talks between Iranian officials and foreign visitors in the country, and has included public suggestions by members of the Iranian parliament for US-Iranian talks. But last week, President Mahmud Ahmadinejad indicated for the first time that he was open to talks with Washington.

In an hour-long press conference on April 24, Ahmadinejad said Iran "is ready to talk to all world countries, but negotiation with anybody has its own conditions", and then specifically named the United States. "If these conditions are met, we will negotiate."

Ahmadinejad's remark, which was reported by the independent Paris-based Iran News Service, went unnoticed in the US media. However, the media did report the Iranian president's statement in the same press conference that talks with the US on Iraq were not necessary now that a government had been set up in Baghdad.

Although Ahmadinejad did not say what Iran's conditions for talks were, the Iranian response to the US proposal last November for bilateral talks on Iraq may be a good indication of what Tehran has in mind. When Iraqi President Jalal Talabani took the US proposal to Tehran on a visit in November, in which he met Ahmadinejad, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other top leaders, he was told Iran would agree to talks on two conditions: they would remain private and they would involve all outstanding issues between the two countries.

Despite a common view in the media, reflecting official US views, that Ahmadinejad has taken Iranian policy in a much more radical direction since he took office last August, Iranian leaders, including those who have been critical of some of Ahmadinejad's public rhetoric, have publicly emphasized that Iran's nuclear policy is not determined by the president.

In late February and early March Hassan Rohani, the secretary of the Supreme National Security Council for 16 years, stated on two different occasions that Iran's stance on the nuclear issue was decided by the state's top officials and not by the current government. "Iran's general policies do not change with new governments," he said on February 20.

Although it was the first time that Ahmadinejad had commented on the subject of talks with the US, his press-conference remark was not the first direct public indication by the Iranian government of interest in negotiations with the US on both the nuclear issue and other security questions.

On March 6, Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said, "What we are saying is that if America abandons its threats and creates a positive atmosphere in which it does not seek to influence the process of negotiations by imposing preconditions, then there will be no impediment to negotiations."

These new public signals came against a background of a quiet diplomatic campaign by Iranian officials in recent months to communicate Iran's readiness to negotiate directly with the US on broad security issues. They have sent that message through both diplomats and other prominent figures who have met with them in Tehran.

(SNIP)

Some analysts familiar with the thinking of Iranian national-security officials believe they have gone ahead with partial enrichment to position themselves for broader talks with the US going beyond the nuclear issue.

"Enrichment has become a big bargaining chip," said Iranian journalist Najmeh Bozorgmehr, who has had access to top Iranian leaders in off-the-record interviews for the past several years. "They are producing facts on the ground that would give them leverage in negotiations with the United States."

Bozorgmehr, now a fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, said the Iranians hoped to get the removal of sanctions, security guarantees and guaranteed fuel supply in return for concessions on the fuel-enrichment issue.

Journalist Praful Bidwai reported for Inter Press Service last week that government officials and other experts in Tehran told him there was "fairly broad agreement" that a compromise proposal on the nuclear issue and security guarantees and normalization of US relations with Iran could be negotiated.

3//The News International, Pakistan Wednesday, May 03, 2006, Rabi-us-sani 4, 1427 A.H.

N-PROLIFERATION PROBE OVER: FO
Rules out action against two charities declared terrorist entities by US; says Kabul asked to fence, mine border to stop infiltration

ISLAMABAD: The release of a senior nuclear scientist linked to Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan marks a closure of investigations into the proliferation of weapons technology by the pioneer of the nation’s nuclear bomb, the Foreign Office said on Wednesday.

Mohammed Farooq, who worked at the Khan Research Laboratories (KRL), was released last week after two years in detention — the last of 11 people held for their alleged links to AQ Khan’s black market network.

“We have conducted thorough investigations in this affair. We have shared our information with the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) and other countries, including the United States,” Foreign Office spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam told a weekly press briefing. “As far we are concerned this chapter is closed. I would presume that with Dr Farooq’s release there is a closure to that case,” she said.

The spokeswoman reiterated that Pakistan would not allow outsiders, including the IAEA or the United States, access to those who were implicated in the proliferation, and that it if there were further questions in the case, it would address them.

“We have repeatedly said that whatever information is required, questions can be forwarded to the government of Pakistan. We would get the answers. We will do the investigations and transmit this information. There is no question of direct access,” Aslam said.

(MORE)

4//Spiegel Online, Germany May 1, 2006

IRAQ: ON THE VERGE OF COLLAPSE
By Bernhard Zand
Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan

The British and the Americans are guarding Iraq's Persian Gulf oil platforms -- the troubled country's only real sources of revenue -- like crown jewels. But Iraqi oil is flowing sluggishly at best, while hoped-for investments haven't materialized and the Iraqi oil industry is on the verge of collapse -- both technical and political.

The HMS Bulwark, Her Majesty Elizabeth II's most state-of-the-art warship, has been bobbing at the mouth of the Shatt al-Arab River for days. With its crew of more than 600 men, the amphibious ship, outfitted with landing craft and the latest technology, has a mission in fragile spots in the Persian Gulf -- but nothing happens. The coasts of Kuwait, Iraq and Iran are dimly visible on the horizon. The sea is calm as a dozen fishing boats crisscross the waters around the ship. Sometimes the calm lasts for days.

And then, suddenly, after weeks of monotony, something does happen. Four Iranian patrol boats traveling at high speeds -- 45 knots, or about 80 kilometers per hour (50 mph) -- approach the Bulwark from the East. They're manned by members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards -- not regular navy personnel. It's considered an ominous sign.

Captain Clive Johnstone sprints from his cabin to the command deck, and for a moment he loses his typically British cool. "All men without orders leave the bridge immediately!" he barks.

Johnstone anxiously has his crew establish radio contact with the Iranians. It takes a few minutes to make the connection, but by then the Revolutionary Guards, or Pasdaran, have already stopped their boats -- at a point they believe marks the nautical border between Iran and Iraq.

The enemy that's making officers of the Royal Navy on the Bulwark so nervous consists of bearded men piloting small, agile, high-speed boats. Even the mightiest warship is vulnerable, as the suicide attack on the USS Cole in the Yemeni port city of Aden in October 2000 illustrates. In that incident, explosives hidden on a fishing boat manned by al-Qaida terrorists ripped an enormous hole -- six by 12 meters (19 by 39 feet) -- into the hull of the American destroyer, killing 17 American sailors.

Far more would be at stake if the same kind of attack were to occur here in the northern Gulf. The Bulwark lies at anchor between two giant oil platforms, the Basra and the Khawr al Amaya terminals. Two pipelines running along the ocean floor connect the platforms with the mainland 20 kilometers (12 miles) away. When both platforms operate at full capacity, they can load about 2 million barrels of oil onto waiting tankers -- about as much oil as France consumes in a day, or more than 2 percent of daily global demand. "A successful attack on one of these terminals would raise the world market price by several dollars within hours," says Commodore Bruce Williams, commander of the multinational fleet that monitors the waters off the Iraqi coast from its base on the Bulwark.

The world's most vulnerable economy

Because its northern pipeline into Turkey has been out of commission for months as a result of ongoing terrorist attacks, Iraq currently processes all its oil exports through the two terminals on the Gulf, where it earns about 80 percent of its revenues. No other country or economy in the world is quite as vulnerable at a single point.

(MORE)

5//The Scotsman, UK 2 May, 2006

UK TROOPS ‘DOOMED TO FAIL’ IN AFGHANISTAN
Tim Ripley

British Army commanders formally took over responsibility for Afghanistan's lawless Helmand province yesterday as Britain's strategy to eradicate opium production and defeat Taleban insurgents was criticised as "doomed to failure".

A report published by the Senlis Council, an independent think tank that monitors Afghanistan's drugs trade, paints a depressing picture of the prospects for the deployment of 3,300 British troops to southern Afghanistan later this month.

It says previous efforts to eradicate poppy farming in the province have fuelled the insurgency that is threatening to overwhelm the Kabul government's control of the lawless region.

Most controversially, it recommends that forced eradication should be replaced by the legal cultivation of poppies for use in legitimate painkilling drugs, such as morphine. The leading producers of legal opium are currently India and Australia.

(SNIP)

Britain has been leading international efforts to counter the drugs trade in Afghanistan since 2002.

But the Senlis Council is pessimistic about the prospects of British troops. After a field visit to Helmand earlier this year, the council reported that opium was the only cash crop in Helmand, generating 50 per cent of the total economic income of the province's population.

The council says widely advertised previous eradication operations in Helmand have worsened the security situation.

It says 1,500 Afghan militia- men have been hired by a US private security company to guard labourers who burn or plough up poppy crops in Helmand. A small number of farmers have been paid to switch to legitimate crops but poor management and other difficulties mean such schemes have paid out only a small amount of money.

Many of the province's one million residents view the Taleban as their defenders and are helping them mount attacks against coalition and Kabul government troops.

"There are widespread allegations that the poppy eradication process is corrupted at many levels and that wealthy individuals are being exempted from eradication," says the report.

"According to farmers, the eradication teams only eradicate fields where the owners or farmers do not pay a 'ransom'. There are strong indications that the farms belonging to powerful people are not being eradicated while the poorer farmers' livelihoods are being destroyed."

Although the British government has stressed that its troops will not carry out eradication but provide security for those involved in it, the report says local people will not see that distinction, and will turn against international military forces.

"The local population has now come to identify international troops with eradication activities rather than with reconstruction efforts."