June 2, 2006

World Media Watch

edited 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 JUNE 2, 2006

1//The Moscow Times, Russia--WORLD PRESS DESCENDS ON CITY (The Kremlin has complained about Russia's image in the Western media and hired an international public relations firm to improve foreign coverage of the Group of Eight summit in St. Petersburg next month. But starting this weekend, it will have an opportunity to deliver its message directly to the people who run the world's newspapers. Some 1,500 editors, publishers and senior executives from 111 countries are descending on the city for a four-day annual conference, held in Moscow for the first time. While discussing trends in the global newspaper business, they will also be trying to gauge for themselves the state of press freedom in Russia. Mikhail Seslavinsky, head of the Federal Press Agency, said Thursday that he hoped "the people who come to Moscow will be able to immerse themselves in an atmosphere that at times contradicts the sometimes-funny stereotypes about a wild country with total censorship and endless criminal conflicts." President Vladimir Putin will welcome the participants during a Kremlin ceremony on Monday, and at least two senior officials will be sitting down with the visiting editors during the conference. … Seslavinsky, speaking at a news conference, said Russia welcomed a discussion of press freedom. "We are counting on a serious discussion about this issue inasmuch as freedom of speech is a pressing problem not only for our country and newly independent states, but also for many countries in Europe and the United States," he said.)

2//Turkish Daily News, Turkey--IRANIAN MINORITY GROUPS SEEKING US HELP TO TOPPLE REGIME (Gathering in Washington, representatives from four large Iranian minority groups urged the United States and the Western world to help them overthrow the Islamic regime in Tehran. … The one-day conference, held at a congressional building on Tuesday, was organized by two groups, the Kurdish National Congress of North America and the Kurdish American Committee for Democracy in Iran; a flag of the ill-fated Mahabad Kurdish Republic -- created in western Iran in 1946 and destroyed later that year -- was hanging in front of the speakers. … Some analysts suggested that ethnic tensions could crack Iran's firm resolve against the Western world. "Iran can successfully employ overwhelming force against geographically isolated groups, but it would be much more difficult to handle angry Arabs, Azeris, Baluchis, Kurds and other minorities if they act against the state simultaneously," said Abbas William Samii, a regional analyst at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, which is funded by the U.S. government and broadcasts mainly to the Middle East and former communist states. … Asked to comment on the possibility of U.S. air strikes against Iran's nuclear and military facilities, IKDP's Hejri said any military attack would lead to the Islamic regime's emergence as a victim of foreign aggression. The United States so far has not endorsed an official policy of regime change in Iran at a time when a diplomatic process still is under way over Tehran's nuclear program. But many Washington analysts believe that regime change is what President George W. Bush administration wants.)

3//IRINNews.org, NY--SECULAR SYRIA ALLOWS ISLAM TO FLOURISH (… Internationally isolated and facing continuing domestic opposition, Syria is witnessing a revival of Islam in public and private life two decades after the secular government fought a bloody campaign to suppress an armed uprising against the state by Islamic extremists. “The relationship between the government and the direction of Islam is now suitable,” said Muhammad Habbash, the country’s leading Islamist MP and head of the Islamic Studies Centre in Damascus. “We can now speak about what role Islam can play in people’s lives.” … For Habbash, the state’s changing approach to Islam comes against a backdrop of regional upheaval since the launch of the US-led “war on terrorism,” which has seen Islamist parties winning elections in Iraq and Palestine, escalating conflict between Israel and Islamist militia groups in Lebanon and an increasingly influential role for long-time Syrian ally and theocratic republic Iran. “The Syrian regime realised it has the same agenda as conservative Islamists,” said Habbash. “They’ve formed an alliance to resist the current US administration’s plan to change the region.” However, warns Aleppo’s Mufti Ibrahim Salkeeni, US intervention in the Middle East has also served to radicalise many young Syrians. “American practises … are pushing some young people in Aleppo to become like time bombs – and we don’t know when these will explode,” he said. “The more the pressure increases, the more explosions there will be.”)

4//Xinhua Online, China--CHINA, ARAB STATES TO HOLD FIRST OIL MEETING (-- China and Arab states will hold their first meeting on oil issue at some time between the year of 2006 and 2008, according to an action plan issued here Thursday. The action plan was signed by Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing and League of Arab States Secretary-general Amr Mahmoud Moussa during the second ministerial meeting of the China-Arab Cooperation Forum. … The plan says China and the Arab countries will encourage their enterprises to enhance investment and set up joint ventures and conduct cooperation in exchanging experience and technology transfer in the energy sector. The Arab countries have been China's largest crude oil supplier. China imported 55.36 million tons of crude oil from Arab countries in 2005, 43.7 percent of its total oil import. … The two-day meeting was attended by delegates from China and 22 Arab countries, who also signed the meeting's communique, an environmental cooperation plan and a memorandum of understanding for a meeting between Chinese and Arab entrepreneurs.)

5//The Toronto Star, Canada--PEOPLE WARY OF TORY MAJORITY: POLL (Canadians may be willing to re-elect Stephen Harper's Conservatives but they're hesitant about a Tory majority, a new national poll suggests. The Decima survey put support for the Conservatives at 38 per cent — slightly higher than on election day but lower than other recent polls. Forty-three per cent of respondents said they wanted to see the Conservatives win the next election, but just 30 per cent said they'd like to see Harper form a majority government. … For Tories in power in Ottawa for the first time in 13 years, the survey results may appear as a glass half empty or half full. "It's one thing to say I'm more comfortable with the idea of Conservatives governing the country than Liberals," pollster Bruce Anderson, CEO of Decima, said Thursday. "It's a further step to say: 'And let's give them the biggest possible mandate because we completely buy into their agenda."' … Anderson noted that … More women, nationally, wanted to see a Conservative majority than a Liberal majority.)

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1//The Moscow Times, Russia Friday, June 2, 2006. Issue 3424. Page 1.

WORLD PRESS DESCENDS ON CITY
By Anatoly Medetsky, Staff Writer

The Kremlin has complained about Russia's image in the Western media and hired an international public relations firm to improve foreign coverage of the Group of Eight summit in St. Petersburg next month. But starting this weekend, it will have an opportunity to deliver its message directly to the people who run the world's newspapers.

Some 1,500 editors, publishers and senior executives from 111 countries are descending on the city for a four-day annual conference, held in Moscow for the first time. While discussing trends in the global newspaper business, they will also be trying to gauge for themselves the state of press freedom in Russia.

Mikhail Seslavinsky, head of the Federal Press Agency, said Thursday that he hoped "the people who come to Moscow will be able to immerse themselves in an atmosphere that at times contradicts the sometimes-funny stereotypes about a wild country with total censorship and endless criminal conflicts."

President Vladimir Putin will welcome the participants during a Kremlin ceremony on Monday, and at least two senior officials will be sitting down with the visiting editors during the conference.

The World Association of Newspapers acknowledged that its selection of Russia as the location for its conference had raised hackles among many of its members, who questioned the wisdom of meeting in a country perceived to have a poor record on media freedom.

"Many believed that the WAN event might be 'used' by the Russian authorities to claim that we were giving them some kind of stamp of approval," WAN chief executive officer Timothy Balding said by e-mail.

Other members, however, argued that it would be better to speak about their "serious concerns" in Russia itself, Balding said.

A final decision was made in November 2004, with Moscow beating out Barcelona, Spain, and Goteborg, Sweden. WAN refused to accept a bid from Shanghai because of concerns about freedom of the press in China, said the Russian Guild of Press Publishers, which invited WAN to Moscow.

Seslavinsky, speaking at a news conference, said Russia welcomed a discussion of press freedom.

"We are counting on a serious discussion about this issue inasmuch as freedom of speech is a pressing problem not only for our country and newly independent states, but also for many countries in Europe and the United States," he said.

"In the course of the congress, we will openly demonstrate to the whole publishing world what is happening in our country and what problems we have, and we will say how difficult the 20-year period of freedom of speech has been and what challenges the 21st century has thrown."

The 59th annual World Newspaper Congress and accompanying 13th World Editors Forum begins Sunday morning with four round-table discussions, one of which is titled "The Russian Media: From Dictatorship to Democracy?"

Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov will throw a welcoming party in the Moscow International Music House on Sunday evening.

Attendees also will meet past and "possible future" leaders of Russia at breakfasts or lunches, WAN said in a statement. They include Mikhail Gorbachev and two people whom WAN is billing as possible successors to Putin: First Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and the president of Russian Railways, Vladimir Yakunin.

2//Turkish Daily News, Turkey Thursday, June 1, 2006

IRANIAN MINORITY GROUPS SEEKING US HELP TO TOPPLE REGIME
Iranian Kurd parties say they want a federal Iran, not secession

Ümit Enginsoy

WASHINGTON - Turkish Daily News - Gathering in Washington, representatives from four large Iranian minority groups urged the United States and the Western world to help them overthrow the Islamic regime in Tehran.
"The peaceful removal of this regime, which is the world's strongest supporter of terrorism, will help to stabilize the region, particularly in Iraq," said Mustafa Hejri, secretary-general of the Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran (IKDP), one of the groups taking part in a conference here.

"To achieve this, the international community, particularly the West, must be united and speak with one voice. So far, the regime has gained the most from the differences in approach between Europe and America in dealing with Iran," he said. "They must redirect their support to the democratic opposition forces both inside and outside Iran."

The Komala Party was another Iranian Kurdish group at the conference. The Diplomatic Mission of Southern Azerbaijan, whose representative Ali Riza Nazmi Afshar said was speaking on behalf of the Azeri Turks of Iran, the Baloochestan People's Party and the Ahwaz Human Rights Organization -- representing the Arab minority in the southwestern region of Khuzestan -- were also participating.

The one-day conference, held at a congressional building on Tuesday, was organized by two groups, the Kurdish National Congress of North America and the Kurdish American Committee for Democracy in Iran; a flag of the ill-fated Mahabad Kurdish Republic -- created in western Iran in 1946 and destroyed later that year -- was hanging in front of the speakers.

Accusing the Tehran administration of following nationalist Persian policies and persecuting ethnic minorities, all speakers called for joint action among opposition groups to overthrow the Islamic regime.

"We need to have a united and democratic coalition of all opposition groups in Iran, including the Persians," said Abdullah Muhtadi, a senior representative of the Kurdish Komala Party. "The nationalities represented here are ready to be part of a united coalition."

Afshar said pressure to overthrow the religious regime should come both from inside and outside, adding, "Our part in Azerbaijan has started."

(SNIP)

Some analysts suggested that ethnic tensions could crack Iran's firm resolve against the Western world.

"Iran can successfully employ overwhelming force against geographically isolated groups, but it would be much more difficult to handle angry Arabs, Azeris, Baluchis, Kurds and other minorities if they act against the state simultaneously," said Abbas William Samii, a regional analyst at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, which is funded by the U.S. government and broadcasts mainly to the Middle East and former communist states.

The unrest comes at a time when Iran and the Western world are involved in a major dispute over the Islamic republic's nuclear program. The United States and it allies accuse Tehran of developing nuclear weapons while Iran maintains that its program is aimed at peaceful energy production.

At the Washington conference, Iranian Kurdish representatives were cautious over their objectives.

"Kurds have a right to self-determination. But Kurds in Iran are for a federal Iran," said Komala's Muhtadi. "Iranian and Iraqi Kurds have good relations, influence each other, but are not controlled by each other."

Asked to comment on the possibility of U.S. air strikes against Iran's nuclear and military facilities, IKDP's Hejri said any military attack would lead to the Islamic regime's emergence as a victim of foreign aggression.

The United States so far has not endorsed an official policy of regime change in Iran at a time when a diplomatic process still is under way over Tehran's nuclear program. But many Washington analysts believe that regime change is what President George W. Bush administration wants. Washington also accuses Iran of being the "central banker" of terrorism, disrupting stability in Iraq and undermining peace in the Middle East.

Azeris are believed to make up some 25 million of Iran's 70-million population. Another 10 million are estimated to be Kurdish, Arab, Baloochi and Turkmen.

3//IRINNews.org, NY (UN Integrated Regional Information Network) Friday 2 June 2006

SECULAR SYRIA ALLOWS ISLAM TO FLOURISH

DAMASCUS/ALEPPO, 1 Jun 2006 (IRIN) - The three Muhammads were all sure of one thing. “I want to be the imam of a mosque,” says ten-year old Muhammad, on his way home from a lesson in Aleppo’s Islamic school. “I want to be a preacher too,” chimes his friend, also named after the Prophet of Islam, dressed in his finest black gelab.

“We like to study the Qu’ran,” explains the third Muhammad, also a resident of Syria’s second city, “because it’s our religion.”

Internationally isolated and facing continuing domestic opposition, Syria is witnessing a revival of Islam in public and private life two decades after the secular government fought a bloody campaign to suppress an armed uprising against the state by Islamic extremists.

“The relationship between the government and the direction of Islam is now suitable,” said Muhammad Habbash, the country’s leading Islamist MP and head of the Islamic Studies Centre in Damascus. “We can now speak about what role Islam can play in people’s lives.”

Habbash’s recent invitation to lecture army cadets on religious morals – the first time the Syrian military has officially cooperated with Islamist figures since the ruling Ba’ath party came to power in 1963 – is just one of a series of recent moves to allow Islam into public life by a state that once stopped at nothing to suppress it.

In 1982, following a three-year terrorist campaign against the state by the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, security officers ordered the shelling of the central city of Hama, which the Brotherhood had declared an Islamic emirate. The offensive resulted in the deaths of an estimated 20,000 people.

(MORE)

Indeed, the past few months have seen a number of moves aimed at institutionalising Islam into Syria’s old secular state. Mosques have been re-opened between prayer times, the president has begun ending public speeches with invocations to Allah and state auditoriums have been used for the country’s first Qur’an reading competition.

(SNIP)

Though three quarters of Syria’s population are Sunni Muslim, the ruling party has long drawn its leaders from the minority Allawi sect, an offshoot of Shi’a Islam, which – along with Druze and other Muslim sects – makes up just 16 percent of the national population. Pan-Arab and secular, the Ba’ath Party has historically ruled on a domestic platform of protecting the rights of Syria’s minorities.

For Habbash, the state’s changing approach to Islam comes against a backdrop of regional upheaval since the launch of the US-led “war on terrorism”, which has seen Islamist parties winning elections in Iraq and Palestine, escalating conflict between Israel and Islamist militia groups in Lebanon and an increasingly influential role for long-time Syrian ally and theocratic republic Iran. “The Syrian regime realised it has the same agenda as conservative Islamists,” said Habbash. “They’ve formed an alliance to resist the current US administration’s plan to change the region.”

However, warns Aleppo’s Mufti Ibrahim Salkeeni, US intervention in the Middle East has also served to radicalise many young Syrians. “American practises in Iraq and Palestine are pushing some young people in Aleppo to become like time bombs – and we don’t know when these will explode,” he said. “The more the pressure increases, the more explosions there will be.”

With daily terror attacks in neighbouring Iraq, many ostensibly claimed by Islamic extremist organisations, security forces have waged a public campaign against Islamist groups operating inside Syria. Dozens of clashes between Syrian anti-terrorism forces and militant groups have been reported by official state news agency SANA. One such group, Jund as-Sham, or “Soldiers of the Levant”, has reportedly planned terror attacks against public buildings in Damascus.

“Syria is aiming to change its policy of silence on these issues,” said Imad Fauzi Shueibi, head of the Data and Strategic Studies Centre in Damascus, in an interview last year. “It wants to show the US that Syria is supporting the campaign against terrorism.”

The Muslim Brotherhood, whose exiled leader Ali Sadradeen Bayanouni recently united with former Syrian Vice President Abdel-Halim Khaddam to lead an opposition group calling for regime change in Damascus, remains outlawed. Association with the group is punishable by death. “The Muslim Brotherhood represents perhaps two percent of Syrian Muslims,” said Sheikh Mahmoud Abu Hudda, an Aleppo dentist and Islamic scholar who has lectured in Europe and the US on Islam’s place in what he calls the “global culture.”

Though independent political parties are not legal under the autocratic Syrian regime, senior members of the Ba’ath party are currently negotiating the introduction of a new Parties Law that would grant licenses to those parties not based on ethnic identity or religion.

For Mohammed Akam, professor of Arabic-language studies at Aleppo University, the state’s increasing acceptance of Islam’s role in society is a welcome development. Nevertheless, he added, the new strategy is no substitute for the reformation of an outdated political system. “The conflict between the state and the Muslim Brotherhood was actually a conflict of ideologies,” he argued. “We need a party without ideology. Between secularism and freedom, I prefer freedom. Secularism is a kind of ideology, but democracy is a way of including all.”

4//Xinhua Online, China 2006-06-01 13:00:07

CHINA, ARAB STATES TO HOLD FIRST OIL MEETING

BEIJING, June 1 (Xinhua) -- China and Arab states will hold their first meeting on oil issue at some time between the year of 2006 and 2008, according to an action plan issued here Thursday.

The action plan was signed by Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing and League of Arab States Secretary-general Amr Mahmoud Moussa during the second ministerial meeting of the China-Arab Cooperation Forum.

The two sides vowed to establish a dialogue mechanism to further promote their energy cooperation. Under the mechanism, China and the Arab countries agree to increase visits and dialogue and coordinate in relevant activities of the United Nations and other international organizations.

"The two sides attach importance to energy cooperation, particularly the cooperation in the sectors of oil, natural gas and renewable energy," says the action plan.

The plan says China and the Arab countries will encourage their enterprises to enhance investment and set up joint ventures and conduct cooperation in exchanging experience and technology transfer in the energy sector.

The Arab countries have been China's largest crude oil supplier. China imported 55.36 million tons of crude oil from Arab countries in 2005, 43.7 percent of its total oil import.

Energy cooperation constitutes an important part of China-Arab cooperation, which complies with interests of both sides and contributes to the stability of international energy market, said Zhai Jun, the director general of Chinese Foreign Ministry's Asian and African division.

The two-day meeting was attended by delegates from China and 22Arab countries, who also signed the meeting's communique, an environmental cooperation plan and a memorandum of understanding for a meeting between Chinese and Arab entrepreneurs.

According to these documents, Arab-China trade volume is expected to reach 100 billion U.S. dollars in 2010.

China's trade with the Arab world has grown tenfold in the past decade to hit 51.27 billion US dollars in 2005.

The third ministerial meeting of the China-Arab Cooperation Forum will take place in Bahrain in 2008.

From 2006 to 2008, China will train 500 Arab professionals in various fields every year.

(MORE)

5//The Toronto Star, Canada Jun. 1, 2006. 07:25 PM

PEOPLE WARY OF TORY MAJORITY: POLL
Canadian Press

OTTAWA — Canadians may be willing to re-elect Stephen Harper's Conservatives but they're hesitant about a Tory majority, a new national poll suggests.

The Decima survey put support for the Conservatives at 38 per cent — slightly higher than on election day but lower than other recent polls.

Forty-three per cent of respondents said they wanted to see the Conservatives win the next election, but just 30 per cent said they'd like to see Harper form a majority government.

The survey of 1,008 Canadians, conducted May 25-28, had the Liberals at 29 per cent and the NDP at 21.

For Tories in power in Ottawa for the first time in 13 years, the survey results may appear as a glass half empty or half full.

"It's one thing to say I'm more comfortable with the idea of Conservatives governing the country than Liberals," pollster Bruce Anderson, CEO of Decima, said Thursday.

"It's a further step to say: `And let's give them the biggest possible mandate because we completely buy into their agenda."'

Decima asked respondents what outcome they'd like to see in the next federal election, notwithstanding their voting preference.

Alberta and Quebec respondents were most content with a Conservative win, and Alberta was the only province where a majority (55 per cent) wanted a Tory majority government.

Atlantic Canada preferred a Liberal win, with Ontario and B.C. evenly split. None of those regions much wanted a Tory majority, with all three polling 25 per cent or less.

Anderson noted that:
— More women, nationally, wanted to see a Conservative majority than a Liberal majority.
— Fifty-nine per cent of Bloc voters want a Tory government.
— Even amongst New Democrats, 28 per cent would prefer a Conservative win.

"The kind of resistance that we'd seen to (the Conservative party) in the previous year and a half has dropped away quite significantly," said the pollster.

(SNIP)

Anderson, who has further surveys in the works plumbing public attitudes on the Kyoto protocol on greenhouse gas emissions and Canada's military mission in Afghanistan, believes those two issues may be causing hesitation for some voters — even those who on balance approve of Conservative management to date.

He puts the public mood in these terms: "We're going to need the check and balance of a minority government — at least until we feel like we know more and are more confident in the balance, the centrism, the pragmatism that we like in our governments."