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.