Major violence has broken out in the past few weeks in Kenya over election result disputes, resulting in lots of deaths, injuries and people fleeing their homes. All this mainly stems from overwhelming anger by the opposition and its supporters over the election results which they believe contained significant vote-tampering. The incumbent, President Mwai Kibaki won by a very small margin of 230,000 out of a total of 10 million.
However, it is unfortunate that this great anger and violence that has broken out is strongly based on ethnic tensions. This ethnic tension is a result of continued corruption and patronism during Kibaki's rule in which his fellow Kikuyu were perceived to have benefited whilst many other Kenyans have suffered from poverty and unemployment.
The incumbent party is mainly Kikuyu-supported whilst the opposition has their support mainly based on other, smaller tribes such as the Luo.

This goes to show that ethnic-based tensions and conflicts are still apparent in Africa. Even more disturbing though is the fact that this has taken place in a country considered one of Africa's more stable and even prosperous nations. Ethnic-based politics and tensions have been around since independence as Kenya's first leader Jomo Kenyatta favored his fellow Kikuyus. His successor Daniel arap Moi was a member of another group, the Kalenjin and they were rewarded accordingly during his reign. As the current President Kibaki is also a Kikuyu, many Kikuyu have become the victims of violence and resentment.

Nevertheless it's hard to understand exactly why ethnic violence has broken out when in previous years there has been relative peace and coexistence between the different groups of Kenya. Media pieces like this from Newsweek describe the stability that existed in places like the Mathare slum and of how surprised some Kenyans themselves are of this outbreak of ethnic tension.
This other Newsweek story presents a grim account of gang violence in Nairobi, again based on ethnic identities. This was preceded by violence last year concerning a sect, the Mungiki, which committed atrocities and engaged in firefights with Kenyan police.

"Throughout much of last spring, in part because of the run-up to the elections but also for a host of other reasons, huge swaths of Kenya were succumbing to a particularly undulant, brutal kind of gangsterism. In episode after episode, many of which were documented by Kenyan reporters, innocent people were beheaded, skinned, raped, murdered and tortured by members of a secretive outlawed sect called Mungiki."

China's economic growth has been described as staggeringly impressive in many quarters especially in the last few years. One of the most recent examples of this impressive is the huge amount of foreign reserves that China has amassed which now stands at around 1.4 Trillion $US. With this amount, China has a lot of potential to impact world financial markets significantly especially through using some of its reserves to make investments and purchases of foreign assets.
Well apparently, not so fast as the following article says.

This article in Asian Times warns of a coming crash in China's stock market but it also paints a pessimistic picture of China's financial health, specifically that many of China's banks which are state-owned, are basically unprofitable and holding onto bad loans which combined total over a trillion. Many Chinese state-owned enterprises borrow large amounts from these state-owned banks which many do not pay back.
The following excerpt explains this scenario:

"To see why a crash may be coming, it is worth examining the behavior of the China Investment Corporation, the US$200 billion sovereign wealth fund set up by the Chinese government in September.
...
Six weeks ago, the power of sovereign wealth funds was celebrated and China Investment's moves into the market were awaited with bated breath.
Well, so much for that. A third of China Investment's portfolio is to be invested in Central Huijin Investment Company, a purchaser of bad loans from the Chinese banks, and another third will recapitalize China Agricultural Bank and China Development Bank, to shape them up for privatization.
....
The lackluster investment strategy of China Investment exposes a central flaw in the Chinese economy, its lack of a rational system of capital allocation. For more than a decade, Chinese state-owned companies have made losses and have been propped up by the banking system.
...
None of these losses have resulted in bankruptcy; instead the cash flow deficits have been covered by the Chinese banks. As a result, these banks have an enormous volume of bad loans $911 billion at May 2006, according to a later-withdrawn estimate by Ernst & Young, which must surely have ballooned to $1.2 trillion to $1.3 trillion now.

That explains why China Investment is somewhat unaggressive in its international investment strategy. China's $1.4 trillion of reserves will in fact almost all be required to prop up the banking system when the inevitable liquidity crisis occurs."

The writer goes on to say that with this huge banking problem, China will experience an economic downturn such as what happened to Japan in the nineties after exorbitant corporate overspending and the subsequent bursting of their economic bubble. Slow economic growth or huge inflation will ensue and then China might experience significant domestic turmoil. This will surely have a very negative effect on the world economy especially as the US economy isn't doing so good lately.

Iraq doesn't exist anymore?

That's the bold opinion that is stated in this interview that Counterpunch has with a writer, Nir Rosen who spent 2 years in Iraq.

"Now Iraq doesn't exist anymore. ........ There is no Iraq. There is no Iraqi government and none of the underlying causes for the violence have been addressed, such as the mutually exclusive aspirations of the rival factions and communities in Iraq."

Lots of interesting stuff, but nothing that's said is really surprising, such as that the US had no real plan for Iraq after they invaded in '03, that the exodus of middle and upper-class Iraqi professionals is devastating for society and that ultimately the current decrease in violence is only a temporary lull which is likely to intensify in future. Rosen also says that he does not believe that the sectarian conflict which has ravaged Iraq in the last few years was deliberately facilitated by the US as they did not know enough about the state of affairs in Iraq before they invaded. I'd think that was reasonable, as the US administration was really narrow-minded, or just plain ignorant and idiotic, in the way they envisaged how the situation would turn out to be after they invaded and deposed Saddam. This doesn't take away from the American responsibility from the mess they caused in Iraq with the fighting, the deaths,the internal and external refugee exodus and all that.

2008 Prediction for Africa from the Economist

The Economist puts out a bold prediction for Africa in its World in 2008 report by stating frankly that African will be worse.
China will wear out its welcome but the main point is that in spite of economic growth, there will not be enough jobs to bring people out of poverty, whether in urban slums or the rural areas.
As the article says, lack of infrastructure and foreign investment will make it very difficult for governments to provide much jobs to locals. Less understandably, the article also mentions that hurdles to foreign employees such as small numbers of available work visas will also affect improvement. Why exactly do there need to be more foreign employment if there are already a lack of jobs. The author might be referring to Africans who have immigrated abroad and want to return to work in their home countries. If so there might be a valid point though I didn't know that they would need work visas.

Almost every time one reads about Africa, it's bad news and the sad part is that there's a lot of truth in them. There are some little pieces of optimism such as the renewed purpose of the African Union in dealing with continental issues, ineffective though it may be for now and NEPAD, as well as the rebuilding in Sierra Leone and Liberia, but they only represent a small part of the state of affairs in Africa, much of it not good.

Why is there so much international focus on humanitarian violations of enemies of West, especially by Western liberals but not on allies of the West who commit humanitarian violations of their own? This article asks and states a very interesting point relating to human rights violations and oppressions and the focus in the West. For instance, Sudan and Zimbabwe receive a lot of bad press, and deservedly so, and their leaders made to look like devils or psychos (Mugabe), but others like Western allies Uganda and Ethiopia do not receive much attention.
It's very interesting and it really makes you think about atrocities and injustices happening in Africa, in that even in supposedly clearcut cases of oppression, there might be others that are just as bad but are not mentioned much at all. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying there isn't massive atrocities occurring in Sudan, Darfur but that the author makes a really good point.

Following the mass street marches led by monks against the military junta in Burma, repressive measures have been fully undertaken by the junta to crush these marches including mass arrests, raids on monasteries and military presence in the streets. Around the world, concerned activists held rallies on October 6 to call on their governments to take action and to show support for the people of Burma.
While concerns arise over whether Western governments have the will and means to mount any form of intervention, the bigger question is over the stance of China and India to the situation in Burma, as they are both trading partners of the regime. This would be a great opportunity for China to use its moral powers in persuading the junta to allow more freedoms and to gain goodwill from the world. But given the official Chinese stance of non-involvement in "internal affairs" of other countries and respect for sovereignty, it's hard to see Beijing agreeing to Western intervention or to press hard on the Burmese junta to stop its repression.

This past week Buddhist monks in Myanmar (Burma) marched in the streets for days to protest the military junta that rules the country. With the junta being one of the most oppressive regimes in the world and having ruled for over 19 years, many Myanmar citizens went out onto the streets as well to support the monks and criticize the government. Predictably the junta responded with armed suppression, firing on and arresting many protesters and critics. Some were even killed but the actual death toll remains unclear.
The junta even cut the nation's Internet, after images and blogs on the protests were posted within Burma, allowing the world to see and know what was going on. Some of the photos quite clearly showed the protestors as well as the troops, as these from racoles on flickr. It's very remarkable how technology can make us seem close to events yet be so far away and helpless. Also knowing the about backdrop to these protests, of the military regime and how back in 1988 thousands of Myanmese were killed in similar street protests, makes me understand how poignant and desperate the situation is.
The protestors, as well as Myanmar diaspora around the world are putting hope on the UN and the world in general, and even the US to help them overcome junta rule. To me, it seems unlikely though that the military junta will bow to world pressure and relinquish their rule, especially given they have tacit support from some neighboring countries who do a lot of trade with Myanmar for its natural resources. The junta has enjoyed a long and relatively stable rule and have endured a lot of world criticism that they do not care much about their lack of legitimacy on the world stage.

"you got rid of one Saddam and you left us with 50."

This is a good article from the Guardian on the situation in Iraq. A historian visited Iraq and not surprisingly came up with the conclusion that the Americans really messed up the invasion, ignored realities of the nation and made things much worse than it was under Saddam. This is best summed up by what one Iraqi said in the article which is both the title of the article and of this post. By ignoring skeptics, critics and informed experts on Iraq, the American Bush-led administration, as well as UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, rushed into Iraq with a simplistic and short-sighted mission to topple Saddam and take over the country. This initially succeeded but when it came to the nitty-gritty of running the country and helping Iraqis rebuild a post-Saddam society, they failed miserably. Of course, there are accusations, quite a lot of them actually, that the Americans were never really interested in helping the Iraqi people and were just interested in oil. But that's another story of course.

About the civil struggles that have broken out between Sunni, Shiite and Kurd elements, historian Charles Tripp had this to say- "...we were trying to say that there was a complex society in Iraq which shouldn't be reduced to the caricature of Saddam Hussein sitting upon the oppressed masses. The oppressed masses have their own agenda - and sometimes they're very nasty indeed."

It's getting harder to post more here, not just because of school but also because of a change of heart. I'm still interested and concerned in world affairs but more and more it seems this will decrease in the future. Anyways, for now I'll just post this on Israel's declaration of Gaza as hostile. Israel bases this decision on the firing of rockets by militants in Gaza. Since last year Gaza has been under an embargo as Israel maintains a tight grip over it. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says it best with this, "There are 1.4 million people in Gaza, including the old, the young and the sick, who are already suffering from the impact of prolonged closure. They should not be punished for the unacceptable actions of militants and extremists."

Interesting points made by Gwynne Dyer on Asian dynamics among several powers and China. Apparently the growing "might" of China is causing enough alarm and concern to Japan, India, the US and Australia to cause them to want to form some sort of unofficial alliance and work together. Of course the situation is not as simple as it sounds like here. However that doesn't mean that the gist of it isn't correct. I've read of the US desire for a stronger India acting as a counterpart to neighboring China in several sources. As Dyer and others have written, that is what the US nuclear deal with India in 2005 was about as the cooperation offered by the US was very significant.
China isn't trying or going to be very belligerent (except over Taiwan) as they have been increasing cooperation and agreements with many of its neighbors especially SouthEast Asia. It's no secret that China is trying to upgrade and strengthen its military but so what? Why is this not allowed, why is there so much furor over China's military spending when much smaller England and France spend just as much or even more. If there is any evidence that China will use its military to attack or invade any other country, then that'd be a very serious concern.

These Guardian articles focus on the harshness of the situation in Afghanistan and the serious toll on British troops. What's really telling is the underlying point that the Taliban have regrouped and rearmed enough that they have become a serious threat to the British. While this is true for the Canadians as well, the British military is supposed to be more competent and feared. For instance, this quote from the second article- "In terms of soldiering, the conflict has offered some of the most intense fighting for 50 years, with two million rounds of ammunition so far fired by British forces." gives an idea of the fierceness of the fighting there for the British.

This Toronto Star article suggests that if fighting the Taliban isn't working in bringing peace to Afghanistan, maybe it might be better to talk with them. The article details several reasons why American, NATO and Canadian forces are ineffective such as the limited use of force which cannot provide full victories over insurgents, the confusion over differing commands operating in the same areas and the contradicting strategies and actions.

While Canadians are wondering whether their troops should pull out from Afghanistan because of the constant vicious attacks and casualties they face, a senior British commander in Afghanistan has said that it could take many years, possibly even 30, of British armed occupation in Afghanistan to create real stability and peace in that country.
That sounds very bleak and hopeless but judging from past experience as mentioned in the article and also from the conditions of Afghanistan in terms of the physical size and terrain, the population size and the divisive social relations, it's not an unrealistic judgement. Of course, it's going to take more than military occupation from Western countries to improve conditions, but it is a prerequisite because if not them, how is some sort of stability and order going to be maintained or upheld? The central government is weak, and so is their army and given the fractiousness of the politics, with the various warlords based in different home provinces, it would not take much for the Hamid Karzai and his government to be overthrown if Western troops pull out.
I'm not naive to the possible self-serving motives and overbearing conduct of the West but I think in some ways, those people who constantly protest Canada's involvement in Afghanistan are naive as well. To pull out of a country that you are involved in for humanitarian intervention reasons because of military casualties means a weakness and superficiality to your humanitarian intentions. If Canada should exit Afghanistan now or soon, then it shouldn't promise any more troops to any peacekeeping and intervention missions again anywhere else including Darfur.

Over the past month and longer, there has been a growing concern and unease over unsafe food, food-based and similar products from China especially with the deaths of the dogs and cats in America from unsafe petfood ingredients from China, as well as toothpaste that led to deaths in Panama. I think that while these concerns are valid, they also expose the problems of mainstream Western media, in always trying to follow each other and never being innovative.
Back then, China was supposed to be the next big superpower, a belief that many still believe, now China is a chaotic mess with unsafe and dangerous exports that are fit for no human (and pet) consumption. Add in China's Darfur issues and its growing environmental problems and it's clear the picture is far from rosy. I think that while many focus on China's massive growth in economy and modernity, many widely ignore that China's problems are also growing at a massive rate.
Hence the media exaggerated China's economic growth and power, and they are also exaggerating China's export problems.
It's not that there aren't any problems. While it is likely, in my opinion that is, that non-electronic exports from China probably have had problems in the past, it is only now because of the deaths of dogs and cats in America that has led to such a wide outcry and concerns. I was so annoyed while that pet crisis was going on because the coverage by the american media was so intense and overdramatic. It seems highly unlikely that all these years Americans have imported tons of items from China yet all of a sudden this year they have discovered so many problems such as with "Thomas and friends". Ridiculous.

Shopping, even if it's "green" isn't as good for the environment than shopping less. This also goes for "carbon trading" as well where people buy carbon shares to offset their polluting. I mean, it just doesn't make sense that spending more money and consuming more products will save the earth's resources. Rather, reduced consumption and shopping, more recycling and thrift, and the need for more responsible and efficient protection and management of our environment are better ways.

http://alternet.org/environment/54208/?page=1

This article suggests what people can try with their shopping habits to reduce their environmental impacts.

http://alternet.org/environment/54215/?page=1

So the fighting in Gaza has culminated in Hamas victory and total control of the Gaza Strip. The Palestinian state which was always geographically split finds itself politically split as well with Ftah retaining control of the West Bank. This Guardian article provides some interesting insight into the Hamas fighting and victory, claiming that Hamas was targetting key elements of Fatah "one group of Fatah agents who were following the Zionist agenda", not Fatah as a whole and that some Fatah members provided assistance. Furthermore according to some people including civilians, Hamas won so decisively because they were motivated and disciplined while many Fatah fighters were simply criminal thugs who took advantage of their status and uniform for money and power. This also meant Hamas fighters were ruthless and much better soldiers.
The article has Hamas announcing that they still recognise Palestinian President (and Fatah leader) Abbas as President though he has formed a new Cabinet, dropping all Hamas members.
The most obvious outcome for now, would be that Abbas and Fatah would hardly want to reconcile with Hamas. However taking into account past proliferation of Palestinian peace deals and the sobering fact that refusal to deal with Hamas would cause a definite breakup of Gaza and West Bank, it is a bit likely that the 2 sides might negotiate.
Whether one believes Hamas' account and feels this fighting was for the better of the Gaza Palestine or that this is a ruinous occasion, it is apparent that the rule of the gun.

Did those peace talks in Saudi Arabia really happen or were they just a figment of my imagination? Yes, those peace talks really did happen, earlier this February when the Saudis brokered a peace between Hamas and Fatah after some violence. Well, this violence is much worse and talk abound that it has increased from conflicts to all-out civil war. Hamas, after capturing several Fatah bases including their security headquarters in Gaza City seems to have gained complete control of Gaza. Terribly tragic and one wonders what Hamas and Fatah could be thinking. I think though that maybe they have been living in so much violence and oppression that when violence against their oppressor is ineffectual and impractical, then violence against each other is the only way to release their anger and hatred. The Palestinians have been under sanctions since last year after Hamas repeatedly refused to acknowledge Israel and to denounce their aim of destroying that country. So of course this frightening state of affairs in Gaza must be blamed indirectly on the US and the European Union, not to mention Israel whose sanctions have caused so much deprivation and desperation for the Palestinians.
This article, published just a week ago, mentions the problem very clearly:

"Western donors led by the United States cut off direct financial aid to the Palestinian Authority in March 2006 after Hamas defeated President Mahmoud Abbas's secular Fatah faction in parliamentary elections.
Coupled with Israel's withholding of tax revenues that it collects on the Palestinians' behalf -- the Authority's main domestic source of funding -- the sanctions have pushed the Hamas-led government to the brink of financial collapse. "

Palestine, as if it hasn't had enough sorrow and hopelessness, is undergoing 2 different conflicts. One is of Hamas, the ruling party, battling Israel by firing rockets into Israel and paving the way for Israeli retributory air strikes. The other is of civil conflict between Hamas and Fatah, the former ruling party which Yasser Arafat led.
Of course, Hamas being Hamas, has not backed down and vowed continued defiance, fighting a bttle it cannot win but which it thinks is better than nothing. It's not surprising as it represents both Hamas' hardline stance and the fatalistic attitude prevalent to many Palestinians.
I think back to when Hamas came to power in the elections unexpectedly and they tried to reach out to Fatah. I realise that Hamas probably did that because they were shocked and unprepared to lead, not just because of lack of experience but possibly because they did not want to be in charge as this meant they would have a burden of representing the whole Palestine nation, not just their own suppporters and being more responsible and moderate.
They were always a hardline, fundamentalist organisation with lots of support which were trying to gain more political power by competing in elections, but not to win.

Well instead, things haven't changed much with Hamas as their stance towards Israel hasn't changed much as they still refuse to acknowledge Israel's right to exist as a nation and this has caused the US and the EU to criticise them harshly and withhold aid. This action reflects badly on Hamas but also that of the US and EU themselves, who can't seem to care that their sanction policies affect people who are already severely affected and causes more suffering.

Thursday's Toronto Star had several interesting articles on unrest and violence around the world.

This article is on Haiti which is plodding along under a democratically-elected government for about a year now, whilst going through serious violent crime, poverty, HIV/AIDS and environmental troubles. Haiti, with its proud history as the first (and only) black country to win independence through force against the French, is actually the Western Hemisphere's poorest country and faces a bleak future. The article's author believes that Haiti needs continued foreign aid in order to experience any improvement at all, otherwise it might become a "failed state"- a country where the government and rule of law has "failed" completely and cannot serve society or maintain order at all. The current political stability is however one good aspect of the country and needs to continue in order for the country to improve any more.
The UN, including Canada, has been trying to help the country since the civil conflict and coup that forced former Prime Minister Jean-Bertrand Aristide out. This help has been seen as dubious by some who heavily criticise the UN for helping maintain an oppressive regime. For instance UN forces have trained Haitian police who, both UN and Haitian police, have engaged in raids and gunfights that have killed many and detained political prisoners. Zmag maintains a section dedicated to Haiti which accuses the US of facilitating regime change in the overthrow of Aristide and supporting an oppressive Haiti government in carrying out massacres, tortures and jailings of opposition figures.
I certainly think the US was complicit (or even gleeful) in allowing Aristide to be overthrown and for the rebels to take charge though I am not sure about other details, especially in what the US would gain from that turn of events.

This past week, serious fighting broke out in Lebanon as a Palestinian fundamentalist group Fatah al-Islam carried out a bank robbery which caused the Lebanese army to respond with strikes on the Palestinian refugee camp where the group is based in. Many people in the camp have been killed and thousands affected. The Lebanese army and government has been criticised for the attack on the camp as many civilian refugees were killed or injured. However the government defended these actions by saying that they were necessary to defeat the fundamentalists as well as to uphold the integrity and strength of the state.
It's interesting to see that the state does not have any rule over the Palestinian refugee camps as they are run by the refugees themselves. The continued existence of these refugee camps is a tragedy as it signifies that the Palestinians have not been able to integrate into society and so improve their wellbeing and be accepted. These Palestinians were originally from lands in Israel and were forced out when Israel was being created. Given that this was in the late 40s, this means that many of these Palestinians were born and grew up in the camps. Such a sad fate for a people who have suffered much including being stripped of their land.

Fighting in Somalia causes several more deaths for Ugandan peacekeepers, members of an African Union (AU) peacekeeping force, of whom most are yet to be deployed. And judging from the worsening conditions it doesn't seem likely the rest of these peacekeepers would ever be deployed soon, as there is no actual peace to be kept as a person quoted says.
I personally don't think the AU can handle the situation, especially since they're trying to deal with another crisis at the same time, in Darfur. The article also has a South African security studies researcher stating how Somalia can descend into "Islamist extremism" which would be exactly what the West (the US) would fear.

While Somalia has calmed down a bit with a tentative cessation of hostilities, people in Iraq are not so fortunate and still going through the same crisis as always. It would be justified though to say that that is not true because their crisis is worse than before and always so. The situation there is so tragic. If the Americans leave the bloodshed in Iraq might intensify. If the Americans stay, as they are doing now, the bloodshed intensifies as does the suffering of the country because America cannot govern Iraq well at all and still have no real idea of how to improve the situation. This piece explains some of the problems with America and how dire the situation really is.

Clearly the Iraqis, with the exceptions of the Kurds up North, are trapped in an Earthly Hell as their country falls apart and becomes awash with blood. Which is why many Iraqis are fleeing their country, to Syria, Jordan, Saud Arabia and even Iran, as this article made clear in December 2006. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates there are about 2 million now as well as 1.9 million internally displaced.

An innovative non-governmental organisation is JHR- Journalists for Human Rights, founded in 2002, which strives to highlight human rights issues and abuses in Africa. It does this by sending Canadian journalists to Africa to train African journalists in journalism to help them to report and write on their own countries, thus generally speaking, strengthening the media's capability to do its job. JHR's site features news articles and a blog by its reporters and trainers in Africa. The organisation has set up operations in countries like Ghana, South Africa, Ivory Coast, Senegal, Tanzania and Uganda and is starting up in Sierra Leone.
For African countries themselves, JHR's mission is a really important and worthy one. The obvious concerns for those countries are health, education, security and economy but having an efficient and active media is also important. It's not only about writing the news but it's also about empowering society and creating accountability by leaders, politicians, the police and other bodies in society. Of course, African journalists face much more hardships than North American journalists such as in having computers or even reliable electricity power.
On the domestic front- Canada and the US, JHR raises awareness through events, press releases and media pieces, as well as having university chapters in many schools. Besides raising knowledge of African issues among people, JHR's efforts also helps build students and future journalists understand the importance of human rights and Africa. Hopefully this will lead to more journalists focusing on Africa and more news coverage in the future.

This is a hectic time for me because of exams, personal issues and other stuff. I've been reading over all kinds of info about Development, China, International Law, world poverty and so on.
In the real world though, there's been a lot of tragic and violent acts happening. From the continuing fighting in Darfur and Afghanistan to the opposition crackdown in Zimbabwe to the bombing in Algeria, it's obvious our world is not a peaceful one at all. The saddest and worst place though, is still Iraq, where dozens of people die daily in car and suicide bombings including today. This is in addition to gunfights, murders, religious and sectarian violence and resistance against the US army. Is there any chance circumstances will improve? Iraq's breakdown worries its Arab neighbors terribly.

Zimbabwe is gaining some really notorious attention in the world and incurring major international criticisms for the recent beating of opposition leaders including Morgan Tsvangirai who suffered a cracked skull. Conditions in that Southern African country have been declining severely in the last few years with massive inflation and political repression. The BBC has some articles on the recent troubles in Zimbabwe including this one detailing the lives of 3 people, each one suffering from the poor economic situation and this one describing long-time ally South Africa now openly criticising Zimbabwe.

This is a subject that usually gets little attention but it could be one of the main factors to potential crisis in Asia. The looming situation of large numbers of men living in a society with a deficit of women is a serious issue in China, India and other countries. The problem is especially marked in rural-based peasant communities of which there're many in China, where girls are valued much less than boys for several reasons including the lack of manual labor usually provided by boys and the need for somebody to remain and take care of old parents which girls cannot fulfill when they leave after marriage. I can't imagine what can solve this problem given that huge inequalities already exist and it's only a matter of time when these boys grow up and the effects of female deficit are felt. There're a range of actions governments can take to try to curb and reduce the gender inequality to prevent it from getting worse but the fact is the ineqaulity is already bad.

Peace talks are set to begin soon in Saudi Arabia.
Both Palestinian PM Ismail Haniyeh and President Mahmoud Abbas, of Hamas and Fatah respectively havearrived in Mecca for the planned peace talks.
It's about time too. Violence has continued for weeks now with killings, gunbattles and kidnappings occuring regularly. The Palestinians are already living in terrible conditions, thanks to Israel, and they don't need this factional civil war. It's simply not going to achieve anything and one wonders at how depraved and psychotic the soldiers/ militia of both organisations are to be indulging in this.

After years of warlordism and anarchy, a motivated fighting force arises and routs its enemies, spreading across the country and maintaining order. This force happens to be Islamist, meaning its people are Muslims fighting to create a society based on Islamic rules.
Within months, neighboring Ethopia intervenes in aid of the lameduck "government" by sending troops and maanges to defeat the Islamist forces. Then US air units launch attacks on these Islamists, claiming the death of Al-Qaeda members. This article describes the US interest and involvement in this conflict.
As much as some might think the American/Ethiopian-backed forces and their defeat of the Islamists will bring a new order and peace for the country, I believe the experience will be similar to Afghanistan where despite a central government put in place and backed by the US. instability and conflict still abounds with a resurgent and durable Taliban active in parts of the country. A significant difference is that in Somalia, the Islamists probably represent the interests of many of the population and are not as primitive and oppressive as the Taliban.

Kingdom of Capital

This article provides some issues to think about when banking. Don't you ever wonder if there was anything immoral about banks in any of their operations? Especially about the vast amount of money they hold and invest and the profits they make. The writer starts off by describing his personal gripes with banks and talks about HSBS and remittances. It gets more interesting from the middle downwards especially the "clout from the castle" paragraph.

From 1970 to 1996 an estimated 30 per cent of sub-Saharan Africa’s potential GDP has been sucked out of the region through capital flight

George Monbiot writes about the IMF and its very undemocratic structure which is a main reason why it is so largely ineffective in reducing third world poverty. Because rich countries like the US, Japan and those from Western Europe have most of the shares or voting power in the organisation, they get to control the decisions and implement policies and plans favorable to them and veto those which are not.

Moving on to Africa, this article talks about the many struggles the Democratic Republic of Congo, formely Zaire, had to face in its recent elections. The first paragraph is one of the funniest things I've ever read. It is really hilarious even if somewhat tragic in what it is based on. The article is quite grim and makes clear the problems that still plague this country.

Situation in Palestine

An article from Zmag about the misery in Palestine. Recently civil unrest broke out again as fighters from Fatah and the ruling Hamas fought gun battles and burned buildings.
It's sad that a people that are oppressed by an outside power must oppress each other through bitter infighting. The article tries to explain a little why they do this.

An excerpt:
Instead, the economic strangulation of Gaza has been the catalyst for internal Palestinian conflict. Inevitably, social bonds grow weak and fragile, even tear, when nearly half the population is unemployed and more than three-quarters are living in poverty.


As convincing as explanations for the internal conflict like this are, it is inevitable that the Palestinians must find a way to make peace amongst themselves before they can ever rise up and become a nation

This Counterpunch story is from Nablus in the West Bank where Palestinians live in very real fear of Israeli oppression on a daily basis. This is a city filled with poverty, misery and hardship from Israeli violence and interference, with the most recent Israeli attacks starting in June. The writer describes several personal accounts of tragedy of Palestinians who've suffered family members killed, arrested on groundless reasons or who've broken down mentally and emotionally.

No improvement of any sort will happen anytime soon with the crisis in Darfur. Instead the situation there is bound to get worse and worse as the Sudanese government refuses to cooperate with the UN, even as Kofi Annan spoke out about possible catastrophe in Darfur.
This other BBC article highlights the problems with Darfur especially the political games that are being forced upon the UN.

However one good and sadly humorous piece of news reagarding the African Union (AU) force currently there: "However, Africa does not always follow the script. The African Union force apparently does not even have enough money to pull its troops out, so it might stay anyway and if a deal can be worked out, it might yet form part of a UN force."

The UN and world powers are heavily being pressured by advocacy groups and activists to send a force to Darfur right away, with their rationale being the terrible tragedy happening there warrants the violation of a state's sovereignty over its borders. However both logistically and politically it seems very unlikely for the West to actually do this, as the article mentions. Furthermore with the Iraq invasion and occupation, the US and Britain lost a lot of moral capital so that even oppressive governments like Sudan's can seem righteous in refusing the UN and the powers from sending in any troops.

Darfur

The situation is not very good at the moment in this region located in West Sudan. Actually the situation has not been good for a very long time but it's just there was a possibility of improvement with the UN Security Council voting to approve sending a peacekeeping force to that area to attempt to stop the violence. Unfortunately Sudan's government rejected the UN resolution, maintaining that this would violate its sovereignty.
AllAfrica.com has a good editorial here from the Lagos magazine This Day talking about the Darfur situation and strongly critical of the Sudanese government.

For those who want a quick summary of the Darfur conflict, here's a Q&A from the BBC.

Hurricane Katrina laid bare a lot of problems and issues which America suffers from. Unable to be ignored or covered up, the tragedy broadcasted these problems to the world not surprisingly. However many Americans were forced to recognise or realise these problems.
This article highlights many of these problems- racism, corruption, cronyism, hypocrisy, poverty, and so on. It might be sort of long, being 4 pages but it's well worth the read.

"To truly grasp how events in New Orleans unraveled, America would have to grapple with its ahistorical understanding of race, ambivalence toward class and antagonism toward government. But those rabbit holes proved too deep and too ugly, and in the end it was a journey the country had neither the will, curiosity nor leadership to make."

Blackwater USA security firm, notorious for when several of its men were killed and their corpses displayed in Fallujah Iraq, benefitted and profited greatly from the Katrina disaster in New Orleans, to the tune of over $30 million. Blackwater is one major example of private companies which have reaped huge contracts from the American government for performing actions which should have been the responsibility of the government but have been offloaded to the private sector at huge costs. Of course Blackwater in addition to New Orleans has also provided private paramilitary or mercenary sevice on behalf of the US in Iraq for which its main purpose is for.
Blackwater is experiencing large growth because of the frequency with which its services have been called upon.
In the Black (water) provides some background about this company and its operation in New Orleans.

An extract: "We saw the costs, in terms of accountability and dollars, for this practice in Iraq, and now we are seeing it in New Orleans," says Illinois Democrat Jan Schakowsky, who has been one of Blackwater's few critics in Congress. "They have again given a sweetheart contract--without an open bidding process--to a company with close ties to the Administration."

A little over a year ago, the calamity in New Orleans caused by Hurricane Katrina occured. With much of the city wrecked and destroyed by the ensuing floods, it will be a long time before things can even be remotely described as normal. Repairs, reconstruction and resettlement will have to take place on a massive scale to rebuild the city to as good a normal a condition as should be.
These articles from The Nation talk about some of the distressing and sinister aspects on the politics behind the disaster, the city and rebuilding efforts.

To start it off, here's Naomi Klein writing about the increasing privatisation of government and its duties and responsibilities such as disaster-relief. There's a large consensus among many that privatisation means more efficiency, expertise and accountability. Miss Klein tries to break this consensus/myth by examining how privatisation of disaster-response played a large part in all the neglect and tragedy in New Orleans.
Basically privatisation is the allocation of duties to private firms from the government, whether it be federal, provincial or city. Besides duties, control of national resources are also privatised such as in impoverished African countries for instance. Anyways the rationale behind privatisation is that by having private companies perform tasks and services instead of government, the tasks are done more efficiently especially since these companies are profit-driven, government is slimmed down and becomes more effective by focusing on fewer tasks in addition to saving money because of this reduction in duties.

Well many of this is erroneous and false. While private companies may do things more efficiently, they also do things for profit and it is profit not people which is their main priority.
Look at Bolivia for instance with the water riots in Cochabamba. Privatising several essential services like water, the corporation that controlled the water service started charging exorbitant rates for water usage until finally poor and other Bolivians rose up and rioted against this, in a rare successful show of people power, forcing the government to rescind its water contract and the corporation to leave.

Anyways a few extracts from the article illustrate the problems more clearly with the New Orleans calamity: "We saw the results in New Orleans one year ago: Washington was frighteningly weak and inept, in part because its emergency management experts had fled to the private sector and its technology and infrastructure had become positively retro. At least by comparison, the private sector looked modern and competent."
and "But the honeymoon doesn't last long. "Where has all the money gone?" ask desperate people from Baghdad to New Orleans, from Kabul to tsunami-struck Sri Lanka. One place a great deal of it has gone is into major capital expenditures for these private contractors."
and finally "state-within-a-state [private contractors] has been built almost exclusively with money from public contracts, including the training of its staff (overwhelmingly former civil servants, politicians and soldiers). Yet it is all privately owned; taxpayers have absolutely no control over it or claim to it."

Klein ends by forseeing a bleak future called disaster apartheid which even now is apparent in the present.

Uganda- the LRA's Joseph Kony speaks out against the government claiming that government forces have fired on LRA members and thus, breaking the truce in place between the government and the LRA. Also Kony is unhappy with how government forces have been ordering the LRA as it retreats to designated areas across the border in neighboring Sudan.
The government denied all of this saying they were "following the truce religiously".
So it doesn't take much to see how precarious this truce is as well as how much caution should be applied to any hopes about progress from the truce.

This blog has some good posts about the northern Ugandan civil war. This one especially has some interesting points about the conflict and the LRA, such as
".....though it is obvious, let us be clear: military might is a non-starter regarding the LRA. While rooted in a bizarre cult, the LRA is conducting a classic insurgency against an unpopular ruling authority. This crisis can only be addressed by improving overall living conditions throughout northern Uganda - so that even the LRA lieutenants can see that they are pursing a false agenda."
The AllAfrica article at the beginning is a good one for understanding the depth of suffering that has developed because of the civil war. People such as Kony seem so demented but undoubtedly their craziness also carries genius.

Ceasefire begins in Uganda

Some hopeful news from Uganda where the rebel Lord's Resistance Army and the Ugandan government agreed to a truce which came into effect yesterday on August 29. The Ugandan military or UPDF is creating a set of land corridors for the LRA to safely retreat into designated points in Southern Sudan as part of the truce.
UPDF troops are standing down as are LRA troops and some sort of calm is returning to most parts of northern Uganda. This article details what is happening at the moment with the Internally Displaced Persons or IDPs who have been living and languishing in refugee/IDP camps for years suffering from immense poverty, lack of resources and infrastructure and diseases. Of course lack of infrastructure and lack of food are also impediments to many of these people from returning to their homes.
With the truce in effect now and a safer environment, hopefully the government will devote more money, resources and effort to improving conditions in the North for these people.

This civil war has been going on for about 20 years since the early eighties when Joseph Kony too action against the Ugandan military with his LRA, which he is still heads. He claims to represent the interests of Northerners, specifically the Acholi, who had feared discrimination by the Ugandan government. After experiencing waning support by the Acholi, he turned his wrath onto them, attacking villages, killing and looting, making thousands of people internal refugees/IDPs and abducting children to serve as female slaves and child soldiers.

This is not to say that Uganda's government has been like a bunch of angels because they've been accused of discrimination and oppressiveness especially against the people in the North. Furthermore Prime Minister Museveni's actions such as taking Uganda into the War in Congo in the late-nineties, his crackdowns against opposition and critical media, as well as changing the consititution to allow a Prime Minister to serve more than 2 terms, thus benefitting Museveni, have caused him to be viewed as dictatorial and repressive.

Still whatever the faults of the Ugandan government and Museveni, the LRA cannot be seen as legitimate guerilla resistance in any manner because of their terrible actions against civilians and widespread lack of support from the public. Instead of fighting oppression, they have become the oppressors, forcing a great deal of suffering, fear and misery onto the civilians of Northern Uganda. They have achieved some notable attention due to their frequent abductions and near-slavery of Northern Ugandan children and the 'Night Walks', the nightly marches that thousands of children make from their villages to towns in order to sleep securely and avoid being abducted by the LRA in their homes. Two Canadians even created a campaign called Guluwalk to highlight these walks by recreating them in Toronto with volunteers.
For further insight into the plight of the children in Northern Uganda, check out this documentary here.

Lessons learned

Israel sure learned some lessons indeed after their recent failed invasion and attempts to vanquish Hezbollah. This is a good article from The Nation on the recent war in Lebanon. Inspite of the terrible damage inflicted on Lebanon, Israel lost in a major way in that despite overwhelming military force and technology, they could not prevent Hezbollah from fighting back whether firing rockets or ground action.
The real lessons referred in the article title are the ones that we, the public can learn from the conflict. There are 4 here and all are very true and useful. Especially true is that we must not accept a government or state's actions "at face value" which can be applied to the US as well as obviously, Israel. We always have to look at the facts, get the story from both sides and look at any issue critically. The most glaring question relating to Israel's military actions is how does kidnapping several Israeli soldiers justify waging war onto a nation.

Again sticking with LA Times, here's an editorial from the famous economist Jeffrey D. Sachs, author of "The end of Poverty", a book that I'm planning on reading later this year. Besides denouncing skeptics of foreign aid he makes his case that there is indeed much hope for Africa and provides several steps on what needs to be done to substantially help Africa with a very vital one being support in the areas of agriculture, health and agriculture. If China and India can do it, so can Africa, he basically states. A little too optimistic in my view but I support his overall point that the West does have a responsibility and must continue to aid Africa.

However on the issue of western aid for Africa, there is much more than just charity and developmental aid that can help Africa. There's also political and economical measures that the West can do especially with fairer trade practices. One of the biggest contentious issues Africa has with the US is the farm subsidies that American farmers get from their government which thus allows them to sell their produce on the world market for far cheaper than African farmers can so driving them out of business and livelihood. See this op-ed about the most recent WTO failure in Geneva back in July to read about American subsidies and their detrimental effect.
This article from the Washington Post however reveals another disturbing fact with American farm subsidies, namely that many Americans who are paid subsidies are not even farmers but receive such payments because they own land that used to be farmed.
In many cases people are being paid even if they are using such land for other uses such as building residential neighborhoods, starting timber plantations or just living on the land. These people often are not farmers but land developers, investors or landowners who've inherited their land. For them it's a good piece of change they get from the government. According to one of these recipients, an oilman who purchased 20 acres and lives on the land "The money is free".
In Texas "..... so many landowners and farmers are collecting money on their former ricelands -- $37 million last year alone -- that the acres no longer used for rice outnumber the planted ones."
Of course the federal government should repeal or change the laws granting these subsidies so that the only ones who receive subsidies are those who farm and get low prices for their produce. Sadly obstacles such as this- "Efforts to overhaul the farm subsidy network have been repeatedly thwarted by powerful farm-state lawmakers in Congress allied with agricultural interests" abound.

If American lawmakers can't even stop farm subisidies going to those who don't need or deserve them, how can they stop subsidies going to American farmers who export their crops onto the world market and compete unfairly with poorer farmers?

Sobering situation of Africa and development
This article in the LA (Los Angeles) Times describes the grim situation in Africa regarding its developement or lack of. Fifty years after African colonies started gaining independence, Africa's "dependence on foreign "experts" is greater than ever, and the influence of proliferating Western aid agencies is more powerful than ever".
Among the sad facts the writer gives is that every year tens of thousands of African professionals emigrate to foreign nations while 100,000 foreign (Western) experts come to Africa, also that "Roughly 40% of African savings are held outside the continent, compared with 6% in East Asia and 3% in South Asia". Corruption is also a big issue as many African governments and bureaucrats take their nation's revenues for themselves and mire their people in deeper poverty.

The writer makes a striking point that development aid should be phased out and ended as he believes this has caused and furthered dependency and poverty in African countries. Though I understand his point, it seems rather drastic to me. In many cases African nations have little or no money to perform required services such as medical health services or food distribution and without aid agencies many people would undoubtedly suffer more. Still I'm not unaware that in some cases development aid does causes dependency as well as additional problems like inflation and corruption. Definitely aid agencies must focus more on helping local people become more self-sufficient and put in place permanent solutions instead of just relief and charity.
I'm also skeptical about the writer's emphasis on business measures such as allowing businesses to registered in shorter time than it is now. Anyways at your convenience, please read it and form your own opinions. I know it's kind of old but I only recently came upon it in a local newspaper.

A fine article by Gwynne Dyer on the recent presidential elections in the Democratic Republic of Congo, formely known as Zaire. This country has suffered a great deal, even when you consider how much the continent has suffered. One of the largest countries in Africa and with hundreds of ethnicities, cultures and languages, decades of poor governing and corrupt dictatorship, a regional war involving up to 6 African countries and continual strife have made the DRC one of the worst countries in the world in terms of poverty, infrastructure, developement and law and order.

The civil war in Sri Lanka has intensified within recent weeks as violent clashes, bombardments and many thousands of people forced to flee have occured. This article in Der Spiegel describes the grim situation.

Regarding the Mideast conflict in Lebanon, Hezbollah has come in for some criticism including that of using human shields by blending in with the civilian population in Southern Lebanon. While this may have some element of truth in it, there is also some hypocrisy as this Counterpunch writer alleges in this article. Furthermore and not surprisingly there is also media bias against Hezbollah.

Middle East conflict

So Israel has begun its invasion of Lebanon and possibly attempts to recreate the past. Of course the stakes are much higher than before as Syria and Iran alarmed and angered at Israel's military actions, are ready to strike back if attacked by Israel.
Already hundreds of Lebanese have been killed as well as over 30 Israelis but the conflict harbors no possibility of ending soon. It is indeed alarming when one considers all this was conducted merely because 2 Israeli soldiers were kidnapped by Hezbollah in a bold raid behind Israeli territory. Are the lives of 2 Israelis worth the death and destruction inflicted on Lebanon? Apparently so if one regards the comments of GW Bush and Tony Blair on the conflict who both blamed Hezbollah and insisted that Israel's actions were justified.

From mere artillery barrages to retaliatory Hezbollah attacks on Israeli towns and a navy ship to the destruction of vital Lebanese infrstructure to the current ground invasion. The big question has to be what is Israle's objective, both militarily and strategically? Would it be a re-occupation and creation of a buffer zone in southern Lebanon or an annihilation of Hezbollah? Whatever the outcome it will surely mean only continued grief for the Lebanese who have suffered terribly already.

Israeli capture of Lebanese village.
Condoleeza Rice: No "false ceasefire"
- same old story as US resists pressure to directly condemn Israel or open talks with Hezbollah.

A fine article in the Trinidad Express about the unjustness of Israel's
actions in the Middle East.

Israel bases its massive offensive against the Palestinians on the abduction of one of its soldiers by Islamic militants, in the process attacking and destroying Palestinian utilities like power stations and such. And the mainstream media says hardly anything about these gross violations committed against civilians. This forceful article speaks about the double standards in the media coverage of Israeli actions and makes a very compelling argument.

The India-China rivalry continues despite increasing relationships and cooperation between the two Asian regional and potential world powers. This situation is one of my favorite topics regarding geo-politics and one that I believe will seriously be a major issue in the future. This article from AsiaTimes describes the current state of affairs between China and India and the writer feels that recent and ongoing cooperation cannot potential strategic competition. Laudably the writer does not provide any exagerrated and erroneous accounts of future war or conflict, instead he believes both countries will try hard to boost their strength and maintain an independent foreign policy whilst improve on relationships with neighboring countries including each other. This will no doubt be for the benefit of Asia and the world to have more powerful but peaceful nations which can reduce the hegemony of the US and Western dominance.

Article on the calls for intervention in Sudan.
The writer addresses the vital issue of whether US intervention would actually be good in Sudan to solve the humanitarian crisis as opposed to its current occupation in Iraq. It does seem that US intervention in Sudan to stop the ethnic violence perpetuated by govenrment-assisted militia, Janjaweed against Darfurians would be a valid action. But the author says that imperialism in any form is still imperialism even if it can seemingly stop a current crisis.

The war in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), formely Zaire, which went on in the late nineties and involved several African countries and the ensuing conflicts and upheavals since have approximately accounted for four million lives. This is the spectacular but credible claim made by the English medicine journal, the Lancet. This article on Zmag details some of the fighting and the reasons behind them in the Congo, involving foreign countries, American former top-level government officials and multinational corporation.
The article is very detailed especially in describing the various resources found in the DRC in which many countries and corporations have vested interests in.

US Trade and China
Spreading China fears to boost public support and score cheap political points is what Democrats are trying to do to Bush. Still there do exist likely conflicts with regard to trade between US and China as this article points out.


US and India.
Bush visited India recently as well as Pakistan and Afghanistan. The US is undoubtedly making a big effort to improve ties with India because of its growing economy, its shared democracy heritage but especially because of its strategic geo-political status as a major Asian ally and potential bulwark to China. This article shows that it will not be simple for America, especially with balancing its alliance with rivals India and Pakistan.

So why and how has Bush and the Republicans become so dominant in US? Because the Democrats have no spine, and because they're just as corrupt as the Republicans.
See this post in Pressaction about Democract Sen. Dianne Fienstein and her massive profiteering through her husband's business with the War/ Occupation on Iraq. While it's just one example, she is certainly not the only Democrat legislator/ Senator who benefits from criminal actions of the ruling party.
The writer makes a great case why the Democrats deserve so much criticism as the Bush adminsitration. This isn't surprising in any country where there's only two parties competing for power as you either have a situation where the two of them fight tooth and nail and tear the country apart or where the two have a kind of informal arrangement where both parties alternate power after each election or two and both parties commit the same crimes in power with the other one condoning it.

Found a Newsweek article from last year that talks about poverty in Asia. It's a bit long but gives some good information. it's quite true that when it comes to Asia, especially East Asia, people think about prosperity, whether the Asian tigers, China's booming economy or India growing modernity.
It seems surprising to hear how there's more poverty in Asia but then, the number of people in Asia is much more than Africa too- China by itself has more people than Africa. Still I think it's a major issue and it's good to see the South Korean president talking about it being a big priority.

International relations theory is just killing me nowadays. That and school in general.
I'm sure from that, you can figure out why my long absence.

Here're 2 good articles from online magazine Slate. The first by Christopher Hitchens is on North Korea. It's blunt, direct and tells it as it is, describing North Korea. Ironically GW Bush has to be given some small credit for his stance on that country and its leader. Everytime I think about this country it makes me feel disgusted and scared how anybody can so openly and blatantly wield absolute power and dominance over a country. At the same time, I do understand why this is allowed to happen, because all the neighboring countries stand to lose something if the regime and leader are brought down or attempted against.

The second, is on the recent Hamas victory in the Palestinian elections. I think the real test will be to see if the results will be accepted and peace maintained in the upcoming elections. It's good that a new party other than Fatah won, it gives the Palestinian state a solid chance to start over
and curb the corruption and inefficiency characterised by the previous administration. Let's just hope violence doesn't break out soon or in the near future, whether between the different Palestinian factions or with Israel.

Naomi Klein writes a powerful article on the issue of torture and America's history of it. She contrasts America's disgust and shame of the current Iraq, Guantanamo and secret prison torture scandals with the fact that America has been conducting and "teaching" torture ever since Vietnam. Of course most American civilians won't be aware of their country's role in training Latin American officers in vicious counterinsurgency programs like forceful interrogation or the Phoenix program which resulted in thousands of deaths of suspected Vietcong members under custody, but it is much worse when members of government like Senators or Congressmen profess ignorance of this.

See here for Our Amnesiac Torture Debate

I haven't posted on this for a long time because of school and work. During this time away, I thought about what's the real purpose of this blog, what is the main goal or theme, because I know I've covered many with the articles and sites I linked to. For now, I have to give a simple explanation and say the things I post here are about injustice in this world, in different forms and places but always about injustices.

This article from Counterpunch talks about the media's role during the Katrina aftermath.
It especially blasts the misrepresentation of looting and disorder by the media and describes the real circumstances behind the poverty in New Orleans.

A little-known yet brutal occupation exists quite close to North America, the situation in Haiti. Two websites that focus on the ongoing situation there and try to shed light on the atrocities happening include "Canada out of Haiti" and Zmag's Haiti watch.

Canada has been helping a UN force establish control and security in this Caribbean country. In 2004 former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was forced into exile after an opposition-led uprising spead rapidly whilst America and other leading nations urged Aristide to step down. However under the supervision of the UN and Canada, leading political and media activists have been jailed without trial, and even worse, Canadian-trained police have been alleged to have committed massacres in slum areas in Port-au-Prince and fire on unarmed protestors in demonstrations against the government.
This piece in the McGill daily explains a lot about the events and immediat history of the Haiti situation.

2005 seems to be the year of the disasters. The Tsunami, Katrina, now the Pakistan earthquake with tens of thousands dead. In addition there was Hurricanes Rita, Stan and the ensuing flooding which killed over a thousand in Central America.

Now that New Orleans has been destroyed and its population dispersed all over the country, it's time for the wealthy, the developers and corporate using federal and private-charity relief funds to rebuild and remake the city completely to benefit the rich and big business without having to deal with the poor who will be strongly discouraged from returning.
A horrendous idea? Yes, but is it true? Naomi Klein says it is.

The damage and suffering caused by Hurricane Katrina has been terrible, even more so as it seems that the city of New Orleans will be lost or completely evacuated for at least 2 months in order for authorities to clear it up and drain waters away.
The suffering of the people who were still in the city when Katrina struck has been prolonged and increased by slow, uncoordinated and insufficient relief efforts.
With all the coverage of the hurricane's aftermath by American media, one of the worst things has been the villification of people trapped in the city as criminals and gangsters as coverage has fixated at times on reports of snipers, rapes, gangs, etc.
This Zmag article talks about the unfair coverage by US media on Katrina and about some of the factors that has led to the weak relief efforts.
One damning factor is the occupation in Iraq because not only were budgets for emergency services weakened/ reduced to allow for funding for the Iraq war/occupation, but also manpower in the form of the state's (Louisiana) National Guardsmen were reduced because many of these Guardsman are fighting in Iraq where they were sent by their President.

Death, disorder and chaos

Well, the damage wrought by Hurricane Katrina on New Orleans and surrounding areas is turning out to be catastrophe. Not just the immense physical damage done to the city but the fates of the people still in the city, with all the chaos and disorder not to mention the suffering.

What is striking besides the suffering of people, is how seemingly slow and inefficient relief services are in reaching those in need. Of course there's numberous reports of disorder including looting, shootings and even rapes which is extremely sad.
The conclusion so far is that the events in New Orleans are resembling those of poor 3rd world countries, and nothing like the world's richest and supposedly most developed country.

To have a better understanding and empathy for those Palestinians, this Zmag article talks about the situation around a few small former Israeli settlements in the West Bank.
Around the former settlements of Ganim and Kadim (population: 300) lie the Palestinian city of Jenin and many smaller satellite villages.
As the article says: "According to a map made by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, there are currently five major trenches, three fixed checkpoints, two earthen mounds, and three roadblocks in the area – all barring Palestinian freedom of movement between villages as well as the city of Jenin, all purportedly to protect of the tiny settlements of Ganim and Kadim. "

What this means essentially is that tiny Israeli settlements exist at the expense of larger Palestinian towns around them as everything is geared towards the luxury and protection of the Israeli settlers while larger numbers of neighboring Palestinians are made to suffer from isolation and poverty due to lack of access to surrounding areas including fertile land, long waits through checkpoints for travel, poor infrastructure, barren land and general poor economic and physical conditions.

This is a long, extensive article on the Darfur crisis in Sudan and the sinister role of oil.

The Darfurian genocide has resulted in deaths of hundreds of thousands and the forced migration of millions to refugee camps across the border in Chad.
The author states that oil is the main reason for inactivity by the US who do not want to risk losing access to precious oil in Sudan, which they would if they imposed sanctions on it.
As well, the long-running civil war between the government and the oppressed South has only recently been ended with a tense peace agreement so the US is now eager to move in as have oil companies from other countries.

Millions in slavery today

Forced labour - a global problem as this BBC newsreport says.
Actually forced labour is too restrained and vague a term to describe what is essentially modern-day slavery and human trafficking.
From kidnapped teen prostitutes to sex slaves to child soldiers and labourers, the range of "forced labourers" is wide and happens all over the world, especially in South Asia, Latin America and West Africa.
12.3 million indeed.

The BBC has this in-depth section on modern-day slavery here. News reports, photos, videos, and statistics on this disturbing issue are presented.

Terrorism experts? Hardly.

A fine article on American media coverage and hyping up of "terrorists" and the terrorist threat. Many times, so-called terrorism experts never get into the real reasons why terorrists happen, such as political tensions and general rage against American foreign policies etc.

The Nation's Daily Outrage todayfeatures 5 ideas
on solutions addressing major issues. Regarding the world, eliminating poverty and curbing America's militarism sure look like good ideas, you can only wish that those in power get it, if ever.

The Gaza withdrawal has been seen in diferent lights by different people on different sides in the Middle East. Some see it as a cover for the Israelis to hold on to their settlements in the more precious land of the West Bank whilst seeming cooperative towards the Palestinians getting their own state but really just throwing a bone to the Palestinians in the form of barren Gaza, others see it as a great victory for the Palestinians. So one opinion is an Israeli victory while the other is a Palestinian victory. This spiked-online.com article says, it is neither.

From the troubles the Israeli army has been enduring in forcing out the settlers and dealing with anti-withdrawal protestors plus the heat that Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon has been receiving from politicians and some of his people, it's clear this is not an easy or desirable measure in pulling out from Gaza.
At the same time, the Palestinians seem to be unclear in who exactly will be running things, whether it's the PA, the official authority, or those other organisations like Hamas for instance.

Gwynne Dyer writes of how
basically the Israelis had to withdraw for their own safety.

Certainly when looking at scenes of the Israeli withdrawal, one sees and hears so much of the pain and anguish of many of the settlers and yes, one understands that they are losing their homes, yet compared to the suffering their Palestinian neighbors endure, the settlers' sadness seem like nothing. I mean, those settlers did get compensated by their government, plus they will move into new homes, they will not be homeless.
Here's a good article from the Guardian. The writer contrasts the circumstances of the settlers withdrawal with that of the Palestinians in Rafah when their homes were demolished by Israelis for "security reasons".

Ariel Sharon's speech on the Gaza pullout, something honest and surprising from a politican for a change.
He seemed to have compassion in acknowledging the Palestinians' sad plight:
"They are crowded into especially densely populated refugee camps, in poverty and suffering, in hothouses of increasingly rising hatred, without any horizon of hope."

He understood that life "without any horizon of hope" is a proven prescription for turning human beings into walking bombs.
That anger caused by this disparity would build up into rage and terror which would erupt into more fighting between Israeli military and Palestinian militants.

And the majority of Israelis seem to support Sharon's withdrawal plan from Gaza as this article says, and the withdrawal is going ahead of schedule.

Remember that shooting of some Brazilian illegal immigrant who was acting suspiciously in the London subway? And he was dressed suspiciously too. The police shot him dead then realised it was a big mistake.
Well the thing is, it turns out he was neither running through the subway or dressed in a bulky jacket. Footage shows his death was practically, done in cold blood.

The question must be, why did the police kill that man?? All their excuses have been proven dead wrong and false.

Here's a look at Afghanistan via a roundup of the state of affairs there by Reuter's Alertnet.
It has become Asia's poorest nation, and while the devastating conflicts and wars are well-known, it's also suffered terrible natural disasters including famine and flooding.

Lawlessness in rural areas, the presence of millions of mines and unexploded ordnance strewn throughout the countryside, and health crises including tuberculosis and cholera all blight the country though things seem to be improving in the main cities.

This article describes how hypocritical the cosy relationship between the US and Saudi Arabia is, especially given the US reasons to invade Iraq such as alleged involvement in 911 which we all know were fraudulent and for which the Saudis were more at fault. Yet, all is good for the Saudis given they're the number one supplier of oil in the world. In spite of their harsh, authoritarian, not to mention bigoted, regime, where the state religion happens to be the most fundamental extremist version (Wahhabism) of their faith, executions are carried out publicly and women are not allowed to drive, Saudi Arabia receives far less condemnation from the US and other western nations than Iraq, Iran and Cuba for instance.

In Gaza,an update on the exit of the settlers to make way for the Palestinians to their own land. Not surprisingly lots of violence, drama and threats from those settlers.

A short excerpt: "One policeman had burning acid thrown into his face and several people had bloody faces. Four officers were injured, police said. "

Sri Lanka peace at risk
following the assassination of Foreign Minister Kadirgama last Friday which has led to increased tension and fears of heavy violence to erupt in the country.

This island nation is currently under a state of an ongoing ceasefire to a long, brutal civil war between the Sinhalese and minority Tamils, many of which live in Toronto. The Tamils have long fought for a separate homeland on the island because of blatant discrimination by Sinhalese though their organisation, the LTTE, popularly called the Tamil Tigers is considered a terrorist group by many. The Tigers are suspected in the death of the Foreign Minister because of his outspokenness against them, though there's no real evidence.

Gaza pullout begins

Israel begins its much-anticipated and bitter withdrawal from the Gaza strip. 8,500 settlers are supposed to be moved out so that the land can be given back to the Palestinians to fully control which Israel has occupied since the Six day war of 1967. The Gaza land, however is only one piece of land owed to the Palestinians but settled by Israelis. The West bank is the other piece and is larger with 2.4 million Palestinians but still settled by Israel and there's fears that Israel is withdrawing from Gaza in order to consolidate their hold, both politically and militarily on the West bank.

Over the last few weeks, there's been some desperate tactics by settlers and anti-pullout Jewish radicals/extremists who strongly resist ceding any land to the Palestinians, including sending activists to the settlements to obstruct police and an emotional campaign to change Ariel Sharon's mind.

With this kind of mindset, it's hard to think who's worse, the Israeli government or the Israelis themselves. Mind you, I don't think all Israelis are like this, but certainly these activists and settlers represent a major part of Israeli society. In addition, many in Sharon's own right-wing party have fiercely criticsed his plan including former PM Benjamin Netahyahu who resigned from the cabinet in protest of the Gaza pullout.

These stories from Reuters Alertnet talk about the "forgotten" humanitarian crises, those that are largely unknown and unreported by most media.

-World's forgotten crises scream for attention
-Congo war tops AlertNet poll of 'forgotten' crises

The Congo war/conflict which has caused the most bloodshed of any war since WW2, the West Africa conflicts, the HIV/AIDS epidemic, the Colombian civil war, were all cited by experts as crises that are going on, little noticed, but still causing death,displacement and suffering.
Most telling is the fact that so much attention was paid to the tsunami and its high death toll that happened at the beginning of 2005, while several crises including the ones mentioned above have death tolls that dwarf the tsunami total, especially the Congo war which since the late 90s has resulted in the deaths of over 2 million.

Everyone knows about AIDS and that it affects so much people. For those in North America, AIDS hasn't reached a point where society is becoming devastated by it, but elsewhere it's a different story.
In Africa, there're some countries where at least a third of adult professionals including teachers, police and other workers are infected, and in Botswana, upwards of 40 percent of the total population is infected. In fact, deaths actually outnumber births in several Southern African countries.
Elsewhere AIDS is rising rapidly in India, China, SE Asia, the Caribbean and Russia.
AIDS in increasingly becoming a global tragedy as this article states.

Education, lifestyle changes, condoms and improved health care including cheaper drugs, these are all methods to combat AIDS.

A site with close-up photos, some graphic and sad, of crisis sites around the world. The site is amazing, and describes itself as the "web's ONLY daily magazine of uncensored news pictures online". Visit here and see.
They have a page on Niger, see here ,where there's a severe food shortage now.

However this is bizarre, the Niger president says there's no food shortage. In the very likely situation he's wrong, I say this kind of nonsense he says really reflects badly on African leaders, as it undermines their integrity. I mean, why are you denying there's a food crisis going on when hundreds of thousands of your people are starving?

Debt relief, trade justice and more aid were requests of NGOs and poor countries to the G8 at their summit this past July. While some debt relief and more aid were promised, trade justice in the form of removal of trade barriers and subsidies by developed countries was not achieved at all.
This article makes the case for an end to subsidies which rich countries such as US provide to their own farmers so giving them an huge advantage over farmers from poor countries on the world market.
This results in farmers of poor countries struggling to survive as they're overwhelmed by competition from richer countries and low prices. Also these farmers tend their farms manually, while those from rich countries often use mechanised methods. For example, there are about 25,000 American cotton farmers while Western African has over 5 million people who owe their living to cotton.

Blood and gravy- how (official) corruption goes on in Iraq with Halliburton. Besides Halliburton's extortion against competitors, its selfish and abominable behavior extends to its own employees, food servers who hail from poorer countries like Turkey and Phillipines. And just to show its evenhandedness, Halliburton treats American soldiers shabbily too, reserving low-quality, spoiled food for them. This other article also highlights the shabby treatment meted out to workers and soldiers as well, just scroll to the middle.
An excerpt:
"In videotaped testimony, Rory Mayberry told the hearing that instead of preparing meals for 600 Turkish and Filipino workers that were appropriate for their cultural practices and religious beliefs, KBR fed them "leftover food in garbage bags and boxes" after US troops had finished eating.
Mayberry said that on some occasions KBR also served "outdated or expired" food to soldiers, and that company bosses told employees not to follow time consuming sanitation rules issued by the military."

KBR is Kellogg Brown and Root, a subsidiary of Halliburton.

Why is Africa so poor?
Because the white man exploited it so much?
Because those Africans can't stop being so barbaric towards each other?
Why??
This is a great and quite lengthy article about the factors of Africa's poverty.
http://globalpolitician.com/articledes.asp?ID=966&cid=8&sid=59
I recently came across it after seeing it linked on a forum.
The site is full of good articles dealing with politics, news and world events so it's worth taking a long look at.

The writer of that article makes a great point, that Africa's poverty cannot be to any one specific reason but to a combination of factors involving both the Europeans and Africans. These factors include the horrendousness of colonialism, the kleptocratic and tyrannic native regimes and leaders, and neo-colonialism.

There's a terrible famine crisis occuring in Niger and it's no surprise who are among the main culprits to blame. Though the article doesn't give much details on how the IMF and EU through their economic programmes forced staple food prices high, I strongly believe that reasoning.
Given the huge focus given to the recent Live8 concerts and G8 meetings with their spotlight on ending African poverty, the world's richest countries must certainly react quickly and strongly to end or alleviate this crisis.