Les rêves de grandeur des Albanais

Un chiffre rond et des célébrations d'une ampleur inédite. Quelque six millions d'Albanais des Balkans fêtent les 100 ans de leur indépendance de l'Empire ottoman proclamée un 28 novembre par Ismail Qemali, chef du premier gouvernement de l'Albanie libre. Mais, comme le soulignent tous les médias de la région, aujourd'hui ces réjouissances concernent une population éparpillée sur au moins cinq Etats : l'Albanie, le Kosovo, la Macédoine, le Monténégro et la Serbie. Et la perspective d'une union nationale au sein d'une "Grande Albanie" est présente dans tous les esprits.

"L'avenir nous invite à créer un espace unique pour une nation unique" : le Premier ministre du Kosovo, Hashim Taçi, a dit ce que tout le monde pensait tout bas. Le chef du gouvernement kosovar a aussi indiqué que son pays, qui n'est toujours par reconnu par l'ensemble de la communauté internationale, allait se poser en défenseur de Albanais de Macédoine, mais aussi de la vallée de Presevo, dans la Serbie voisine. "Nous serons les gardiens de leurs droits et leurs revendications", a-t-il dit le 25 novembre lors d'une réunion des leaders albanais de la région, à Skopje. "Par l'intermédiaire de l'Union européenne nous allons réaliser notre projet d'unité nationale", a lancé le Premier ministre albanais Sali Berisha, devant une foule exaltée de 10 000 personnes dans la capitale macédonienne.

C'est à Tirana, la capitale albanaise, qu'aura lieu le point d'orgue des cérémonies, ponctuées par de nombreuses initiatives - parfois insolites - visant à renforcer la fibre patriotique, comme la confection d'un gâteau de treize tonnes à l'effigie de l'aigle bicéphale, la peinture d'un drapeau géant portant le même symbole le long de "l'autoroute de la Nation" reliant l'Albanie au Kosovo, ou encore le sacrifice de quelque 2000 moutons lors d'un méchoui en plein air le 28 novembre.

Détourner les Albanais de leurs problèmes quotidiens

Ces excès n'ont pas fait l'unanimité dans la presse locale. Dans le journal Panorama, l'essayiste Edmond Tupja s'interroge sur le sens de ces célébrations "dans un pays où d'autres libertés fondamentales - justice, expression, science, éducation - sont en panne". Son confrère du magazine Klan, Koloreto Cukalli, se permet même d'imaginer une "célébration qui tourne à vide", boycottée par des Albanais plus soucieux d'améliorer leur quotidien que de faire la fête. Pour beaucoup, l'ampleur des cérémonies tend justement à détourner les Albanais de leurs problèmes présents.

A l'instar du quotidien Express du Kosovo voisin, de nombreux journaux se sont également interrogés sur le sens de cette "hystérie irrépressible où le patriotisme devient presque une compétition". Mais dans ce pays, où les Albanais représentent plus de 90 % de la population et sont avides de reconnaissance internationale, le ton était souvent beaucoup plus compréhensif. "Cette jubilation est légitime, malgré les excès, l'euphorie, le folklore, le mauvais goût, la médiocrité ou l'amateurisme des symboles sur les places publiques", écrit l'éditorialiste Shkëlzen Maliqi. Je pense que l'on peut pardonner aux Albanais cette exaltation éphémère, après un siècle de corps à corps avec le destin, d'insécurité, d'isolement, de dictature, de répressions et de stagnation... Les Albanais fêtent leur joie d'être aujourd'hui sur la bonne voie", poursuit-il.

Mais dans des pays où les Albanais sont minoritaires, ces célébrations ont souvent pris des airs de provocation. Des heurts entre groupes de jeunes Macédoniens et membres de la communauté albanaise (25 % du pays) ont eu lieu à Tetovo, dans l'ouest de la Macédoine, où la population a arboré des drapeaux albanais sur les façades des maisons. Les Albanais du Monténégro ont également défié la récente loi interdisante le déploiement des symboles nationaux des minorités dans les lieux publics. A Presevo, en Serbie, la population albanaise a érigé un monument à la gloire des combattants de l'Armée de libération du Kosovo morts lors d'accrochages avec les forces gouvernementales. Une initiative qui a provoqué la colère du Premier ministre serbe Ivica Dacic, rapporte la radio B92 de Belgrade. "Il s'agit d'une provocation inutile. L'Etat va réagir", a-t-il déclaré.

Source - http://www.courrierinternational.com/revue-de-presse/2012/11/28/les-reves-de-grandeur-des-albanais

Canadian energy: The sands of grime

THE oil town of Fort McMurray gets a bad press. GQ magazine portrayed it as a hellhole of testosterone and tattoos, where drunken oilworkers shower strippers with cash and get into fights because there’s nothing else to do. Esquire called it “the little Canadian town that might just destroy the world”.

There is a grimy grain of truth in such stories. Extracting oil from Alberta’s oil sands does indeed cause environmental problems. And Fort McMurray is a bit macho. It is a frontier town of ultra-low temperatures (-20°C is about average in winter; -51°C has been recorded) and ultra-high wages (average household income is C$178,000, which is also $178,000). The population is mostly young and male. Some do indeed prefer more raucous entertainment than say, joining a book group to discuss “Eat, Pray, Love”. “I wish they’d ban truck nuts,” sighs a female resident, referring to the toy testicles with which some young men decorate their trucks.

But there is another story about Fort McMurray: a tale of innovation and energy reserves so vast that they could have geopolitical consequences. Canada’s oil sands contain some 170 billion barrels of oil that can be recovered economically with today’s technology (and perhaps ten times that in total). Canada thus has the world’s third-largest proven oil reserves, after Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. And since most oil-rich nations’ reserves are under state control, Canada has the largest reserves that private companies are free to invest in—more than half of the global total, reckons Ken Hughes, Alberta’s energy minister.

Other countries welcome the idea of plentiful energy from a stable democracy. It could reduce the rich world’s dependence on the Middle East. There are “no bribes or body bags”, grins an oil-industry booster. And the potential is immense. A new study by the Alberta Geological Survey estimates that the province has huge resources in its shale beds as well as its oil sands: 3,400 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 420 billion barrels of oil—numbers comparable to America’s.

However, Canada’s output of 3.5m barrels of oil a day is less than half that of America. (America’s output is set to exceed Saudi Arabia’s) Several problems hobble Canadian energy: geology, capital, people and pipes.

First, geology. Canadian oil is hard to extract. It mostly comes in the form of bitumen, which is “hard as a hockey puck” at 10°C, as the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP), an industry body, puts it. If it is far below ground, it must be blasted with steam to make it flow, and then pumped out. This process (known as “steam-assisted gravity drainage”) was developed in Alberta. In the past decade, with high oil prices, it has made the oil sands economical to exploit. But precariously so: the best projects break even when oil is $30 a barrel, but many new ones need it to be $80 or more. (West Texas Intermediate is currently $85.)

Canada gets less than it should for its oil because it lacks enough pipelines. Environmentalists oppose them, arguing that pipes leak (which is always possible) and that Canada’s heavy oil causes more greenhouse-gas emissions than other oil (which is true, but not by much). President Barack Obama has delayed the approval of a pipeline called Keystone XL, which would move Canadian oil to America’s Gulf coast. A decision is expected soon.

Alex Pourbaix of TransCanada, the firm behind the Keystone pipeline, insists that the project will be good for both countries. Canada forgoes a fortune—perhaps $20 a barrel—because it cannot get its oil to the sea. Canadian gas sells at a discount, too: North American prices are far lower than those in Asia.

Getting the oil to the sea

Another proposed pipeline, Northern Gateway, would carry oil to Canada’s west coast, whence it could be shipped to Asia. Canada would benefit from having a choice of customers. But the government of British Columbia, and various aboriginal groups, have yet to say yes.

To exploit its hydrocarbons, Canada needs capital: some $50 billion-60 billion a year, on recent trends. Such sums are “far more than Canadian capital markets can raise,” says Dave Collyer of the CAPP. Canada gets plenty of foreign investment: Syncrude, one of the biggest oil-sands developers, is a joint venture that includes American, Chinese and Japanese partners. But lately the country has grown frostier towards foreign capital.

In October Canada’s federal government temporarily blocked a $5.2 billion bid by Petronas, Malaysia’s state energy giant, for Progress Energy Resources, a Canadian natural-gas company. It has yet to approve a $15 billion offer by CNOOC, a Chinese state-owned firm, for Nexen, a Canadian oil-and-gas firm. A deadline passed last week; a decision may come next month. Mr Hughes says he is keen on foreign investment so long as foreign firms abide by the same rules as Canadians; but it is not up to the provincial government.

The other big bottleneck is human capital. Hardly anyone lives near the oil sands, so labour must be imported, from other parts of Canada and from abroad. People from 127 countries live in Fort McMurray, says Ken Chapman of the Oil Sands Developers’ Group. They speak 69 languages. The Walmart in town looks like the United Nations, except that all the shivering Africans are buying woolly hats. Mr Hughes expects to see a skills shortfall of 100,000 people in Alberta by 2017. Canada’s immigration rules are more liberal than America’s, but firms still gripe about delays. An Irish worker in Fort McMurray complains of having to fly to Calgary to sit a test of English proficiency. It’s her native language, and the test is online.

Companies poach staff from each other, bidding up labour costs. It would be easier to attract workers to Fort McMurray if the town were more liveable; a one-bedroom flat can cost $2,000 a month. To build more homes, however, the town must wrestle with provincial red tape—and also attract legions of builders, plumbers and electricians, all at inflated wages.

Working conditions in the oil sands are tough. Touch a metal pipe with your bare hand at minus 40 and it sticks. “It’s not for everybody,” shrugs an oil-firm boss. At remote work camps, companies provide hot food, warm cabins, broadband and squash courts. All this is costly. Many firms make equipment elsewhere and truck it in, so that fewer people have to toil in the cold. Some are hoping dramatically to raise the proportion of man-hours worked off-site.

With so many bottlenecks and a volatile oil price, firms are growing cautious. Suncor Energy and Canadian Natural Resources, among others, are putting new investments on hold. “It’s the uncertainty,” says Marcel Coutu, the boss of Canadian Oil Sands, a firm that owns 37% of Syncrude. “No one knows when or whether those pipelines will be built.”

Source - Economist

Brazil in Africa: A new Atlantic alliance

IN THE sweaty heat of northern Mozambique, Vale, a Brazilian mining giant, is digging up coal at its mine near the village of Moatize. A 400,000-tonne mound sits ready to burn. The mine can churn out 4,000 tonnes an hour but the railways and ports cannot cope. Vale is working to improve a line through Malawi to take the coal for export. OAS Construtora, another Brazilian firm, has signed a deal with the miner to build part of a new port at Nacala, 1,000km (620 miles) to the north-east, to do the same.

The continent is an important part of Vale’s future, enthuses Ricardo Saad, the firm’s Africa boss. He is not alone in his excitement about Brazil’s prospects. Relations with Africa flourished during the presidency of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. He travelled there a dozen times and African leaders flocked to Brazil. His zeal was in part ideological: he devoted much of his diplomacy to “south-south” relations—at the cost, critics say, of neglecting more powerful (and richer) trade partners, such as the United States.

Lula stressed his country’s “historic debt” to Africa, a reference to the 3.5m Africans shipped to Brazil as slaves. Outside Nigeria, Brazil has the world’s biggest black population. Dilma Rousseff, Brazil’s current president, is continuing those policies—though with more emphasis on how the relationship benefits Brazil. There are many ways that it can. Africa needs infrastructure and Brazil has lots of construction firms. Africa sits on oil and minerals in abundance; Brazil has the firms to get them out. Its agribusiness giants are also eyeing up Africa. If the continent’s economy continues to grow as it has in recent years, it will produce millions of customers much like Brazil’s new middle class.

Brazilian businesses seem keen. In 2001 Brazil invested $69 billion in Africa. By 2009, the latest figures available, that had swelled to $214 billion. At first Brazilian firms focused their efforts on Lusophone Africa, Angola and Mozambique in particular, capitalising on linguistic and cultural affinity to gain a foothold. Now they are spreading across the continent.

So far a few large firms dominate. Vale’s coal mine in Mozambique is its biggest operation outside Brazil. Odebrecht has been building things in Africa since the 1980s. Early on it was involved in construction of the vast Capanda dam in Angola. It erected the country’s first shopping mall in the capital, Luanda. In Ghana, where demand for homes is so fierce that tenants have to pay up to two years’ rent in advance, OAS, a contractor of Camargo Corrêa, a big conglomerate, is putting up social housing.

Andrade Gutierrez, another construction firm, works on everything from ports to housing and sanitation projects in Angola, Algeria, Congo and Guinea. Petrobras, Brazil’s state-owned oil behemoth, is already pumping oil in Angola and Nigeria and is on the hunt for more in Benin, Gabon, Libya, Nigeria and Tanzania. Consumer companies are setting their sights on a growing market, too. O Boticário, a Brazilian cosmetics firm, has been peddling its products in Angola since 2006.

Brazil v China

Since Brazil cannot compete with the likes of China in the scale of its investment, it has to offer something extra: in particular, technical expertise. With similar climates, agriculture has been a fruitful field of collaboration. In 2008 Embrapa, a Brazilian agricultural-research institute, set up an office in Ghana. Through Embrapa, Brazil has provided technical assistance to the cotton industry in Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mali. Brazilian companies that produce soya, sugar cane, corn and cotton were sniffing out investments in Tanzania earlier this year.

Brazilian firms hope that their reputation will ensure that opportunities keep coming. They are keen to distinguish themselves from competitors, especially the Chinese. They do not want to be seen as grabbing everything they can, says Rodrigo da Costa Fonseca, Andrade Gutierrez’s president in Africa. Whereas Chinese firms are lambasted for their working practices, their Brazilian counterparts emphasise that they play by the rules, are good employers and want to build enduring relationships by offering development aid as well as private investment.

In particular, Brazilians stress that in Africa they employ Africans (Chinese firms are often criticised for shipping in their own people). Around 90% of Odebrecht’s employees in Angola are locals, as are 85% of Vale’s employees in Mozambique.

The Brazilians have not managed to avoid all criticism. Vale has come under fire for its resettlement of over 1,000 families to make way for its coal mine. Most have been moved to a brand-new village at Cateme, 40km away from Moatize. Disgruntled villagers say the cost of living has soared because of the added expense of getting to Tete, the provincial capital. The ground is less fertile and water less plentiful at the new location, say inhabitants, and the houses provided by Vale are shoddily built. In January angry villagers blocked a nearby railway line in protest.

Vale says it is dealing with these problems—fixing the houses and putting on a bus into town. The company is paying the price for being first in, says Altiberto Brandão, who runs Vale’s mine at Moatize. Vale has a 35-year concession so it needs to keep locals on its side: “we don’t want 35 years of problems,” Mr Brandão insists.

Brazil is still enjoying its honeymoon in Africa, says Oliver Stuenkel of the Global Public Policy Institute, a think-tank. Still, Brazil should learn from the mistakes of others, he says. With its prominence in mining, there is always a danger that Brazil is seen as a new colonial power. Though its presence is growing, it is still paltry compared with China’s. Unlike China, Brazil does not need Africa’s resources but is more interested in diversifying its markets. There is no construction in Europe—there is nothing left to build there, laughs OAS’s Africa head, Leonardo Calado de Brito. “Africa is the place to be.”

Source - Economist

Storms that changed the course of history

DIVINE WINDS

The Mongols may have ruled the largest contiguous empire in human history -- at its height, it dominated a quarter of the earth's population -- but they failed twice to bring Japan to its knees. On both occasions (in 1274 and 1281), the invading Mongolian fleets were thrashed by powerful typhoons and suffered heavy losses. In the second invasion, some 80 percent of Kublai Khan's hastily built warships sank during a two-day storm, known in Japan as "kamikaze" or "divine wind." In the popular mythology of the time, Raijin, the god of thunder, was said to have stirred up the divine wind and shielded Japan from the Mongols. Some 660 years later, kamikaze would take on another meaning, becoming synonymous with the suicide attacks carried out by the Japanese during World War II.

SUNKEN ARMADA

In 1588, the "invincible" Spanish Armada of 130 ships set sail to attack the English Channel, but was delayed by a series of storm that forced the fleet back to Lisbon. When the Spanish fleet finally arrived two months later, the British Navy, led by Lord Charles Howard and Sir Francis Drake, had regrouped and was able to mount a spirited defense of the Channel. Disorganized and battered by British artillery, the Armada retreated and began the treacherous journey back to Spain. Along the way, the leading Spanish ships were rocked by a cyclonic depression off the Bay of Biscay and, three days later, the rearmost ships were battered on the rocks off the shores of Ireland. In total, the Spanish lost more ships in bad weather than in combat with the British.

PARIS HAILSTORM

If the opulence of the royal court at Versailles and France's increasingly shaky financial situation were at the root of the revolution of 1789, perhaps so was the weather. Beginning in 1785, a series of bad harvests -- possibly the result of volcanic eruptions in Iceland that shifted weather patterns -- contributed to food shortages that roiled an already restive underclass. But the final straw was quite possibly a hailstorm in May 1788 that destroyed crops in a 150-mile radius around Paris, sending grain prices through the roof. Ten months later, following the failed meeting of the Estates-General and the formation of a breakaway National Assembly, the French Revolution was underway. 

BHOLA CYCLONE

The Great Bhola cyclone wasn't particularly strong by historical standards -- it may not have even been the strongest gale to strike the Indian Ocean in 1970 -- but its fateful timing and unlucky course through the densely populated Ganges Delta of East Pakistan made it the deadliest cyclonic storm ever. Carrying 115 mile per hour winds, it destroyed crops and razed entire villages, leaving roughly half a million people dead when all was said and done. Relations between Pakistan and its disconnected easternmost province were already strained before the storm, but the Pakistani government's handling of the Bhola cyclone caused the tensions to boil over into violent anti-government protests and, by 1971, civil war. Nine bloody months later, Bangladeshis had won their independence from Pakistan.

KATRINA

The category-five monster that slammed into New Orleans, Louisiana, on August 29, 2005, holds an infamous place on record as causing the most extensive damage ($108 billion worth) and as one of the five deadliest hurricanes in the history of the United States. Some 1,833 people died as a result of the storm, as flood waters from the Gulf of Mexico and Lake Pontchartrain overflowed the antiquated U.S. Army Corps of Engineer-designed levees that protected the city's inhabitants. And yet, it's not as if they didn't see the devastation coming. Experts had long warned about the cataclysmic effects of a major hurricane's direct impact on low-lying New Orleans and, alert to the danger, President George W. Bush declared a state of emergency two days before Katrina made landfall. But no one, it turns out, was really quite ready for the chaos that ensued. With inadequate preparations made for evacuation, looting and rioting broke out across the city, while residents drowned in the attics of their homes or were left to die in hospital beds, The president's unqualified FEMA appointee, Michael Brown, was shown to be just that, while Bush was lambasted for a belated and inadequate National Guard response -- and for appearing distant. (In Bush's memoirs, he called the scathing comments from Kanye West -- "George Bush doesn't care about black people" -- the worst moment of his presidency.) Worse, the perception that America couldn't handle its affairs at home though it had committed heavily to wars overseas seemed to change the national tenor to the effort in Iraq. And it certainly didn't help Bush's cause that Cuba and Venezuela, two nations he vilified, were the first to offer to come to America's aid with pledges of donations and aid.

CYCLONE NARGIS

On May 2, 2008, a strengthening Cyclone Nargis came off the warm waters of the Bay of Bengal and pummeled central Burma, causing what would become the worst natural disaster in the country's history. Some 138,000 people are thought to have died as a result of the storm, though figures are notoriously inaccurate, as the government is thought to have suppressed the death toll. High winds, storm surges, and heavy rains destroyed entire villages, stranding millions in remote areas without access to food, water, or medicine. Compounding matters, the ruling military junta refused offers of international aid for nearly four days, only finally appealing to the United Nations on May 6. The first international air deliveries of supplies started arriving two days later, and in limited quantities, as the junta refused access to NGOs and humanitarian relief agencies waiting with planes full of supplies just across the border in Thailand. The international furor at the Burmese regime -- British Prime Minister Gordon Brown accused the government of creating a "man-made catastrophe" -- focused attention on the paranoid callousness of the ruling junta. It may not have directly empowered the opposition movement, but the shocking images of corpses dangling from trees and of families starving even weeks after the storm, exposed the regime's incompetence and cruelty and foretold the beginning of the end of the military junta.

Source - Foreign Policy

Qatari emir's visit to Gaza is a boost for Hamas

Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani in Rafah, Gaza. Photograph: Abed Rahim Khatib/Demotix/Corbis

Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani is used to basking in the limelight. But when the emir of Qatar arrived in Gaza on Tuesday – the first Arab leader in years to visit the impoverished coastal strip – he was hailed for breaking its siege, demonstrating his country's huge and growing influence in the Middle East.

Palestinians rolled out the red carpet for the emir as his black Mercedes bumped along a rutted main road that he has promised to rebuild, past white and maroon Qatari flags, the song Thank You, Qatar playing endlessly on local radio and TV.

Sheikh Hamad flew to Egypt and crossed the border into Gaza, a move billed as breaking the blockade in force since the Islamists of Hamas took power in 2007. It also underlined the ability of the tiny, fabulously rich Gulf state to punch above its weight internationally.

He arrived with 90 tonnes of aid and pledged $400m (£250m) to invest in housing and infrastructure to replace property damaged in the 2008-09 war with Israel.

Flanked by his wife, the elegant and high-profile Sheikha Mozah, he spoke to a large crowd at Gaza's Islamic University, the biggest event of a six-hour stay.

The last head of state to visit the strip was King Abdullah of Jordan, who went there in 1999 for talks with then Palestinian president, Yasser Arafat.

Predictably, the brief royal visit was the top news item on al-Jazeera, the satellite TV channel owned by the emir's family and which has been an unabashed and influential cheerleader for the uprisings of the Arab spring from Tunisia to Syria.

Qatar's ambitious move was a stunning boost for Hamas, shunned by Israel, the US and western countries as a terrorist organisation. Ismail Haniyeh, its deposed prime minister, called it a historic event that had broken the "unjust blockade".

"The visit gives Hamas legitimacy in the Arab world and internationally," said Mkhaimar Abusada, an independent analyst at Gaza's al-Azhar university. It was further striking evidence that Qatar, whose per-capita income is now the highest in the world, is in effect using its enormous oil and gas riches and close ties to Islamist organisations to expand its regional influence in the wake of its involvement in the uprisings against Libya's Muammar Gaddafi and Bashar al-Assad in Syria.

"The emir is confirming that Qatar is the principal supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood takeover in Egypt and everywhere else," said Ahmed Asfahani, the respected al-Hayat newspaper columnist. "Qatar is using the Brotherhood to promote its own interests. It also shows that Qatar is trying to replace Iran as a major player on the Palestinian issue."

Observers in the region also see the visit in part as a reward to Hamas for ending its support for Assad. Until a few months ago, the movement's exiled leadership was based in Damascus, helping bolster Syria's credentials as a key member of the "axis of resistance" confronting Israel, along with Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

But its veteran leader, Khalid Mish'al, decamped to Doha. And Haniyeh came out in open support of the right of the Syrian people to oppose Assad.

Mahmoud Abbas, the western-backed Palestinian president and leader of Fatah, had let it be known from his headquarters in the West Bank town of Ramallah that he was furious about the visit, which plays into the hands of his bitterest rival. "Nobody's happy about it," said one Palestinian source. "It definitely makes a statement. And of course there is a track record of Arab regimes playing into intra-Palestinian politics."

The PLO welcomed any help with reconstruction in Gaza, but called on "all Arab brethren to … use their leverage to ensure an end to the division and the policy of creating a separatist entity in the Gaza Strip, as [this] principally serves the Israeli agenda." There is also an unspoken fear of eroding the claim of Abbas's Palestinian Authority to be the sole representative of the Palestinians.

Israel angrily condemned the Qatari visit as well. "We find it weird that the emir doesn't support all of the Palestinians but sides with Hamas over the Palestinian Authority [in the West Bank] which he has never visited," said its foreign ministry spokesman, Yigal Palmor. "The emir has chosen his camp and it is not good."

In the background, it is possible to discern a new pattern of relations emerging in a political landscape transformed by the Arab spring in which a key player is the Egyptian president, Mohamed Morsi, a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood.

In the era of Hosni Mubarak, Qatar was often at loggerheads with Egypt, which, like many other Arab governments, hated al-Jazeera and saw it as a disruptive instrument of Qatari policy. Even now, Doha is being more radical than Cairo. Formally, Egypt considers Abbas as the representative of Palestinians and Gaza as under PA authority (or that the end state of Palestinian reconciliation should be a West Bank and Gaza united under PA control). The emir called publicly for efforts to promote reconciliation between the Palestinian rivals to confront Israel. "It will be interesting to see if Qatar is now going to play a more active role in mediating between Hamas and Fatah, or even Hamas and Israel," said Abusada.

Doha has won admiration and irritation in equal measure in the Middle East and beyond. Uniquely, it maintains cordial, if low-key, relations with Israel as well as Iran, hated by other Gulf Arabs. It is also home to a large US air base. Its wealth speaks eloquently. In September, it announced plans to invest $18bn over five years in Egypt. Its aid also helped reconstruction in south Lebanon after the 2006 war between Hezbollah and Israel. At that time, the emir worked closely with Assad, only to turn against him when the Syrian uprising began 19 months ago. In Libya last year, Qatar bankrolled the anti-Gaddafi rebels but channelled resources through Islamist brigades only to face criticism later that it was behaving in a manipulative manner. Now Qatar has become a key supporter of the armed Syrian opposition, amid growing concern in the west that the weapons it pays for are reaching jihadi-type groups rather than democratic forces.

Among its other accomplishments, Qatar is to host the 2022 World Cup, having defeated bidders including the US and Japan. Following intense lobbying it also recently managed to join La Francophonie – the 57-member bloc of French-speaking nations – as an associate member. French is barely spoken in Qatar but it insists it is committed to promoting use of the language.

Source - Guardian

Why Catalonia Isn’t Likely to Leave Spain Anytime Soon

Immense legal and economic roadblocks lie in the way of any move toward independence. And then of course, there are the politicians.
By Lisa Abend / Madrid

It has been a week of upheavals in Spain, with police violence against protestors surrounding the parliament building in Madrid, new doubts about a planned bank bailout, and the release of a national budget that requires more painful cuts in the coming year. But perhaps none of the events of the past few days has raised greater questions about Spain’s future than those occurring in Catalonia. On Tuesday, regional president Artur Mas called for early regional elections in an effort to gauge support for the pro-independence platform it was newly adopting. Two days later, the Catalan parliament went further, approving a resolution to hold a non-binding referendum on secession once the new legislature is installed. Yet for all the momentum—momentum that comes on the heels of a massive pro-independence demonstration in Barcelona two weeks ago—no one here really knows if secession is even possible.

“The voice of the street must be expressed at the polls,” Mas told the Catalan parliament on Wednesday. Explaining the snap elections as an inevitable reaction to a secessionist march that had drawn an estimated 1.5 million people into the streets of Barcelona, he signaled a new ideological direction for his party, Convergència I Unió [CiU)]. “The time has come,” he said,  “for Catalonia to exercise its right to self-determination.”

Not everyone sees it that way. For Alicia Sánchez-Camacho, head of the Catalan Popular Party, the bid for independence is making a bad situation worse. “To call snap elections, when we’re not even halfway through the legislative term is irresponsible and proof of Mas’ failure to govern,” she says. “And by pushing for independence, he’s taking the economic crisis and adding an institutional one to it, which will only generate instability and uncertainty.”

It is also not at all clear that separation is a real option. Apart from the questions about economic viability (everything from loss of investments to membership in the European Union), there are also serious doubts about how and whether Catalonia could legitimately establish itself as an independent state. “There’s no chance,” says Enrique Alvaro, professor of constitutional law at Madrid’s University of King Juan Carlos. “The Spanish constitution doesn’t permit secession. You’d have to reform the constitution, and both of the major parties have made it clear they aren’t willing to do that.” Even if they were, reforming the constitution is an onerous process that requires, among other things, a 2/3 majority in the national legislature, the dissolution of the sitting parliament, and new elections.

Even those with doubts about the viability of secession agree, however, that a consultation of the sort that the Catalonian parliament approved on Thursday would be a critical first step. “You have to answer the big question: What percentage of Catalans really want to separate from Spain?” says Francesc de Carreras, professor of constitutional law at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. “We have have to clear that up. And the only way to do that is by voting.”

Yet even that is tricky. In 2008, Basque leader Juan José Ibarretxe tried to call for a similar non-binding “consultation” in his region, only to have the proposal shot down by the Spanish government as unconstitutional. And already, deputy prime minister Soraya Sáenz de Santamaria has vowed that the government will use its “juridical and judicial instruments to stop” a Catalan attempt to do the same.

But the Catalan parliament is hardly backing down. “If we can do it through a referendum authorized by the Spanish government, good,” Mas said in a speech before his fellow legislators. “But if the government turns its back and doesn’t authorize any time of referendum or consultation, well, we’ll have to do it just the same.”

Some constitutional law experts think that Catalonia could pull it off by looking outside Spain. “You would have to do a good job of winning international support,” says Ferran Requejo, political scientist at Barcelona’s Pompeu Fabra university. “Secession is completely illegal in Spain, so you’d have to look for legitimacy outside.”

Few countries, however, are going to support a unilateral declaration of independence, especially those—like Great Britain and the Canada—that have secessionist issues of their own. And Catalonia may face other challenges in arousing international sympathies. “We’re not talking about Kosovo or Southern Sudan,” says José Ignacio Torreblanca, professor of political science at Spain’s National Distance University. “With autonomy as great as it is in Catalonia, it’s very difficult to make the case that you’re a victim, that its worth jumping over the Spanish constitution so you can liberate yourself.”

The pro-independence parties are banking on the idea that a referendum—even a non-binding one—could shift that balance, winning support for negotiation both at home and abroad. If there were a significant turnout and an overwhelming majority—not 51% but something more like 70%–voted in favor of independence, Catalonia might find itself in a position to pressure Madrid into negotiating a revision of the constitution that would allow for legal separation or, at the very least, a more federal state. “Democratically, Catalonia has to prove that a clear majority of its citizens are in favor of independence,” says De Carreras. “And if they do that, then, democratically, Spain is going to find it very difficult to say, “Ok, even though you’re the majority, we’re going to ignore you.’”

Apart from the legalities of secession, the impetus behind the move to separate may depend on Mas’ motives. Catalonia recently requested a 5 billion euro bailout from the state, and has been forced to make drastic cuts in public services. “They’ve the highest public debt in the country, and are making cuts as severe or worse as those in the rest of Spain,” says Alvaro. “I don’t think there’s any doubt that he [Mas] is pushing separatism as of way of distracting people from the economic situation.”

Indeed, Mas and his party are recent converts to the secessionist cause.  Although nationalist, the CiU historically has confined itself—like the majority of Catalans—to supporting greater autonomy rather than outright independence. If that has changed for both the party and the population at large (recent polls say that 51% of Catalans now support secession), it is partly due to the economic crisis. “Many Catalans have constructed this idea that the cause of the crisis is with the rest of Spain,” says Torreblanca. “They figure if you get rid of the cause you solve the problem.”

The region is the most indebted in the country, but many Catalans blame the debt on what they call “fiscal looting,” a reference to the disproportionate amount of taxes they pay to the state, compared with other regions. Last week, Mas tried to wrangle a new fiscal pact from the Spanish government that would give Catalans control over tax collection. When prime minister Mariano Rajoy refused to negotiate, Mas said he had no choice but to embrace secession.

“Fiscal reform was CiU’s main platform,” says Requejo. “Once that was rejected, Mas had to legitimize his party. When you combine that with the massive demonstration [on September 11], it’s logical that he would turn to independence.”

Read more: http://world.time.com/2012/09/28/why-catalonia-isnt-likely-to-leave-spain-anytime-soon/#ixzz27ynKuPb2

How Myanmar Liberates Asia

Myanmar's ongoing liberalization and its normalization of relations with the outside world have the possibility of profoundly affecting geopolitics in Asia – and all for the better.

Geographically, Myanmar dominates the Bay of Bengal. It is where the spheres of influence of China and India overlap. Myanmar is also abundant in oil, natural gas, coal, zinc, copper, precious stones, timber and hydropower, with some uranium deposits as well. The prize of the Indo-Pacific region, Myanmar has been locked up by dictatorship for decades, even as the Chinese have been slowly stripping it of natural resources. Think of Myanmar as another Afghanistan in terms of its potential to change a region: a key, geo-strategic puzzle piece ravaged by war and ineffective government that, if only normalized, would unroll trade routes in all directions.

Ever since China's Yuan (ethnic Mongol) dynasty invaded Myanmar in the 13th century, Myanmar has been under the shadow of a Greater China, with no insurmountable geographic barriers or architectural obstacles like the Great Wall to separate the two lands -- though the Hengduan Shan range borders the two countries. At the same time, Myanmar has historically been the home of an Indian business community -- a middleman minority in sociological terms -- that facilitated the British hold on Myanmar as part of a Greater British India.

But if Myanmar continues on its path of reform by opening links to the United States and neighboring countries, rather than remaining a natural resource tract to be exploited by China, Myanmar will develop into an energy and natural resource hub in its own right, uniting the Indian subcontinent, China and Southeast Asia all into one fluid, organic continuum. And although Chinese influence in Myanmar would diminish in relative terms, China would still benefit immensely. Indeed, Kunming, in China's southern Yunnan province, would become the economic capital of Southeast Asia, where river and rail routes from Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam would converge.

Much of this infrastructure activity is already under way. At Ramree Island off Myanmar's northwestern Arakan coast, the Chinese are constructing pipelines to take oil and natural gas from Africa, the Persian Gulf and the Bay of Bengal across the heart of Myanmar to Kunming. The purpose will be to alleviate China's dependence on the Strait of Malacca, through which four-fifths of its crude oil imports pass at present. There will also be a high-speed rail line roughly along this route by 2015.

India, too, is constructing an energy terminal at Sittwe, north of Ramree, on Myanmar's coast, that will potentially carry offshore natural gas northwest through Bangladesh to the vast demographic inkblot that is the Indian state of West Bengal. The Indian pipeline would actually split into two directions, with another proposed route going to the north around Bangladesh. Commercial goods will follow along new highways to be built to India. Kolkata, Chittagong and Yangon, rather than being cities in three separate countries, will finally be part of one Indian Ocean world.

The salient fact here is that by liberating Myanmar, India's hitherto landlocked northeast, lying on the far side of Bangladesh, will also be opened up to the outside. Northeast India has suffered from bad geography and underdevelopment, and as a consequence it has experienced about a dozen insurgencies in recent decades. Hilly and jungle-covered, northeast India is cut off from India proper by backbreakingly poor Bangladesh to the west and by Myanmar, hitherto a hermetic and undeveloped state, to the east. But Myanmar's political opening and economic development changes this geopolitical fact, because both India's northeast and Bangladesh will benefit from Myanmar's political and economic renewal.

With poverty reduced somewhat in all these areas, the pressure on Kolkata and West Bengal to absorb economic refugees will be alleviated. This immeasurably strengthens India, whose land borders with semi-failed states within the subcontinent (Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh) has undermined its ability to project political and military power outward into Asia and the Middle East. More broadly, a liberalized Myanmar draws India deeper into Asia, so that India can more effectively balance against China.

But while the future beckons with opportunities, the present is still not assured. The political transition in Myanmar has only begun, and much can still go wrong. The problem, as it was in Yugoslavia and Iraq, is regional and ethnic divides.

Myanmar is a vast kingdom organized around the central Irrawaddy River Valley. The ethnic Burman word for this valley is Myanmar, hence the official name of the country. But a third of the population is not ethnic Burman, even as regionally based minorities in friable borderlands account for seven of Myanmar's 14 states. The hill areas around the Irrawaddy Valley are populated by Chin, Kachin, Shan, Karen and Karenni peoples, who also have their own armies and irregular forces, which have been battling the Burman-controlled national army since the early Cold War period.

Worse, these minority-populated hill regions are ethnically divided from within. For example, the Shan area is also home to Was, Lahus, Paos, Kayans and other tribal peoples. All these groups are products of historical migrations from Tibet, China, India, Bangladesh, Thailand and Cambodia, so that the Chin in western Myanmar have almost nothing in common with the Karen in eastern Myanmar. Nor is there a community of language and culture between the Shans and the ethnic Burmans, except for their Buddhist religion. As for the Arakanese, heirs to a cosmopolitan seaboard civilization influenced by Hindu Bengal, they feel particularly disconnected from the rest of Myanmar and compare their plight to disenfranchised minorities in the Middle East and Africa.

In other words, simply holding elections is not enough if all elections do is bring ethnic Burmans to power who do not compromise with the minorities. The military came to power in Myanmar in 1962 to control the minority-populated borderlands around the Irrawaddy Valley. The military has governed now for half a century. Myanmar has few functioning institutions that are not military-dominated. A system with generous power awarded to the minorities must now be constructed from scratch; peaceful integration of restive minorities requires vibrant federal institutions.

Myanmar, it is true, is becoming less repressive and more open to the outside world. But that in and of itself does not make for a viable institutionalized state. In sum, for Myanmar to succeed, even with civilians in control, the military will have to play a significant role for years to come, because it is mainly officers who know how to run things.

But given its immense natural resources and sizable population of 48 million, if Myanmar can build pan-ethnic institutions in coming decades it could come close to being a midlevel power in its own right -- something that would not necessarily harm Indian and Chinese interests, and, by the way, would unleash trade throughout Asia and the Indian Ocean world.

Source - Stratfor

The ongoing battle for gay rights in the Arab world

Posted By Brian Whitaker

When the European parliament issued a critical report on Egypt's human rights record in 2008, the Mubarak regime responded with nationalistic fury. The Muslim Brotherhood, on the other hand, sided with Europe. "Respect of human rights is now a concern for all peoples," its parliamentary spokesman, Hussein Ibrahim, declared at the time. 

That Islamist movements, or at least the more mainstream ones, should take an interest in human rights is not especially surprising. They have, after all, experienced repression at first hand and had years to reflect upon it. There are some obvious limits, though. While acknowledging universal rights up to a point, they still hanker after cultural relativism. Ibrahim for his part added an important rider, that "each country has its own particulars" -- and made very clear that in Egypt's case the Brotherhood excludes gay rights.

It's a similar story in Tunisia now where the moderately Islamist Ennahda party dominates the post-revolution government. Samir Dilou, the country's first human rights minister (and a member of Ennahda) caused an outcry from activists last month by saying on television that sexual orientation is not a human right and described homosexuality as a perversion requiring medical treatment. Amnesty International quickly sought to disabuse him, pointing out in a letter that "homosexuality stopped being seen as an illness or a "perversion" by world medical organizations and associations decades ago."

Dilou's remarks, though, confused and homophobic as they might seem, also suggest that Islamists -- some of them at least -- are beginning to shift their ground. He didn't, for example, invoke religious scripture to denounce homosexuality as one of the most heinous sins known to man or suggest that gay people should be put to death, as many Islamic scholars have previously done. "We are not inciting anybody against homosexuals," his press secretary said later, but "Tunisia's distinctiveness as an Arab-Muslim society must be respected."

Unintentionally, perhaps, Dilou's remarks also raised a tricky question for Tunisia's "distinctive" society. If homosexuality is now to be regarded as an illness rather than a sin, how can they justify continuing to criminalize it, with punishments of up to three years in jail for offenders?

The "sickness versus sin" debate is a familiar if futile one, but sometimes a necessary step in adjusting to reality -- an attempt to find some middle ground between moralistic rejection of homosexuality and acceptance. To those who can't accept gay people the way they are, the idea of "curing" them can seem more enlightened than punishing them, and some societies have hovered for a time between the two. Britain in the 1950s, for instance, provided "treatment" for gay men (sometimes even in the form of chemical castration) as an accompaniment, or sometimes an alternative, to prison.

Arab societies today are in a similar position. Discovering a gay son or daughter in their midst, some families react punitively and throw them out of the house. Others send them to psychiatrists. Which they choose is partly a matter of class and partly a matter of how "traditional" or "modern" the family consider themselves to be.

Same-sex acts are illegal in most Arab countries, and even in those where they are not other laws can be used -- such as the law against "habitual debauchery" in Egypt. With a few exceptions, though, the authorities do not actively seek out people to prosecute. The cases that come to court often do so by accident or for unrelated reasons. This is mainly a result of denial: large numbers of prosecutions are to be avoided since that would cast doubt on the common official line that "we don't have gay people here."

 To continue denying that gay Arabs exist, though, is increasingly difficult. Thanks to the internet, young Arabs who experience same-sex attractions can now find information that helps to explain their feelings and gives them a sense of identity, as well as providing the means to contact others of a similar disposition. Gay activism in Arab countries is still on a relatively small scale, but it is growing. The Lebanese LGBT organization, Helem, has been functioning openly in Beirut for almost 10 years now and has won some recognition from the government for its work on sexual health. There are numerous gay Arab blogs and websites, and the latest addition in Tunisia is a magazine called "Gayday".

Inevitably, this draws a response from those who are fearful of change -- sometimes a violent one. In post-Saddam Iraq, men suspected of being gay, or simply not "masculine" enough, have been killed by vigilante squads and the number probably runs into the hundreds. The authorities turn a blind eye while newspapers provide incitement with articles condemning "fashionable" (i.e. western) hairstyles and clothes. Many Arabs blame the West for spreading homosexuality and other forms of "immorality" but also look to the West for solutions. A series of articles at IslamOnline (an Egyptian-based website supervised from Qatar by the famous cleric, Youssef al-Qaradawi) provided what was claimed to be a scientific look at homosexuality, based on the idea that sexual orientation is a choice which can also be "corrected". Its main source for this was not Islamic teaching but the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH), a fringe psychiatric organization in the United States which promotes "sexual reorientation therapy."

Such arguments may offer a rationale for not punishing homosexuality but they cannot offer a genuine way forward. The arguments themselves are already thoroughly discredited and adopting them is nothing more than an avoidance mechanism, postponing the day when fundamental questions will have to be addressed.

The core of the Arab Spring is a revolt against authoritarian rule, but to bring real change the struggle cannot be limited to merely overthrowing regimes; it also has to tackle authoritarianism in society more widely. Doing that is more about changing attitudes and ways of thinking than politics: even as dictators fall, the Mubaraks of the mind are yet to be confronted. Attitudes towards gay rights are therefore an important measure of how far, or not, a society has moved from authoritarianism. Gay rights in the Middle East are not simply about gay people; they are intimately bound up with questions of personal liberty, the proper role of governments, and the influence of religion. Demands for gay rights add to the broader pressure for change and, conversely, progress in these other areas can ease the path towards gay rights.

Criminalization of homosexuality, for example, reflects abhorrence of the act but also a philosophy of government that seeks to regulate people's behavior in matters that ought to be no concern of the state. This applies at many levels, not just sex -- from the imposition of dress codes in some countries to the notion that publishing a newspaper or establishing an NGO requires permission from the government.

As far as religious attitudes to homosexuality are concerned, the debates in Islam are very similar to those in Christianity and largely boil down to a question of how believers interpret the scripture. So far, Muslims have generally been more resistant than Christians to admitting the possibility of new scriptural interpretations. One reason is that the "doors of ijtihad" (independent interpretation rather than dogmatic acceptance of established views) have long been considered closed. Another is insistence on ahistorical readings of the Qur'an -- the idea that its injunctions are valid for all times and all places and cannot be modified in the light of changing times and circumstances.

To successfully make an Islamic case for gay rights, those barriers have to be broken. Again, though, the key point is not homosexuality itself but the underlying principle: a more open and questioning approach to religious teaching unblocks the road to many other things.

While the calls for freedom heard during the first year of the Arab Spring have been mainly directed against unaccountable governments -- a demand, in a sense, for collective liberty -- there is also an undercurrent seeking liberty at a more personal level. This is a fundamental issue but one that Arab societies are reluctant to recognize because of the value placed on pretensions of unity (national, cultural, and religious) and conformity with social norms.

The rights of minorities are rarely considered seriously and, if they are discussed in public at all, it's usually to emphasize how harmoniously everyone is getting along. When conflicts break out -- as between Christians and Muslims in Egypt -- they are quickly hushed up rather than being examined and addressed. At the root of this is an aversion to fitna or social strife -- a feeling that difference is a problem and a source of embarrassment. The idea that diversity has some intrinsic value, and that it can enrich a society if handled properly, has not yet taken hold. Overcoming that is one of the main challenges for ethnic and religious minorities, along with those who are outsiders for sexual or other reasons.

Another huge challenge for the future is entrenched and continued patriarchy. Arab leaders personify it, but it is imbued throughout society and built on rigidly-defined gender roles in which traditional concepts of "manliness" are highly prized. Intentionally or not, gay people undermine that simply by asserting their presence -- as do women.

In the meantime, of course, Arabs are preoccupied with more broadly rendered and elemental struggles in Syria and elsewhere. But in this the question of gay rights cannot be set aside indefinitely. At some point it will have to be recognized as a part of the process of change, and inseparable from it.

Brian Whitaker is the author of Unspeakable Love: Gay and Lesbian Life in the Middle East (Saqi Books and University of California Press)

Foreign Policy

The Rise of Qatar

The upheavals in the Arab world have done much to highlight Qatar's rising prominence and its policy of active involvement in most of the areas of regional unrest. This policy – a mixture of opportunism and ambition – together with tremendous economic power and the willingness to use it for political ends, as well as the weakness of major centers of power in the region and beyond, enable the emirate's entry into the vacuum that has been created and the emergence of its new political status.

Qatar’s economic strength is a direct result of its natural gas reserves. Currently the largest exporter in the world of natural gas (LNG), the emirate has the largest natural gas reserves in the world after Russia and Iran. This coveted resource has ensured that Qatar’s 250,000 citizens (out of about one million residents) have the highest per capita gross income in the world, with the extraordinary growth rate of more than 18 percent in 2011.

Alongside this economic clout, the ruling al-Thani family has created an enormously influential tool in the form of the al-Jazeera television network, which since its launch in 1996 has become an effective tool in the emirate’s foreign policy. The network has long enjoyed large audiences in the Middle East, and the revolts in the region only increased its popularity. Furthermore, the network is a key instrument for gaining state influence. The network adapts the nature of its reports so as to curry favor with certain leaders, even outside the Arab world, and criticizes those who recognize the impact the station has on public opinion – as a means of applying pressure to change positions vis-à-vis Qatar. Indeed, more favorable TV coverage of the Saudi royal household on al-Jazeera proved itself to be valuable in improving Qatar-Saudi relations.

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Al-Jazeera gives the conflicts within the Arab world a great deal of exposure, and this in itself provides the ruling dynasty with much immunity against criticism of the lack of democracy in the emirate. The events of the
"Arab spring" placed all the royal households of the Arab world, including that of Qatar, is a difficult position. On the one hand, all are trying to preserve the traditional regime and the absolute control of internal political processes; on the other hand, there is an impetus to adopt a position that ostensibly identifies with the masses that took to the streets to protest corruption and oppression. Significantly, al-Jazeera director Wadah Khanfar, who had made a name for himself as an ardent supporter of democratic processes and the involvement of civil society in the Arab world (as well as being a supporter of Islamic movements, including Hamas) was already ousted in September 2009, in order to ensure network obedience to the emir. Not coincidentally his successor is a member of the al-Thani tribe.

Qatar’s involvement in the Arab world over the last decade is impressive. In the crisis in Yemen, Qatar served alongside other members of the Gulf Cooperation Council as a mediator and arranged the ouster (though with good terms) of former President Saleh. Among Arab states, it leads (with considerable Saudi backing) the activism regarding the civil war in Syria; leaders do not even deny that they are sending weapons and major financial aid to the Syrian opposition. Naturally these arms shipments are raising important questions, such as where were the weapons bought, how do they reach their destinations, is Qatar getting encouragement, support, or cooperation from other states that are not interested in being revealed as actively assisting the Syrian rebels, and more. Qatar is also involved in the establishment of the new government in Tunisia and perhaps more than any other Arab entity helped topple Qaddafi’s regime.

It pushed for NATO military action in Libya and even sent (in addition to the UAE) six fighter jets as symbolic assistance to the NATO effort to enforce the no-fly zone over Libya. Qatar was the first Arab state to recognize the rebel government of Libya, it sold oil in its name, and it supplied it with extensive economic and military aid. It trained and equipped the opposition forces and even sent its own forces to help with the actual fighting. This policy enabled Qatar to divert attention away from what has been happening in the Gulf and prove it is a responsible member of  the international community. From its perspective, it has already reaped the benefits of its investment: Western leaders have been effusive in their praise of Qatar’s act of moral leadership.

The emirate’s recent involvement in the inter-Palestinian conflict is also noteworthy, and it has at least temporarily taken the place of Egypt, which is preoccupied with its own internal issues, as the primary mediator between Fatah and Hamas. The framework agreement achieved on February 6, 2012 between Fatah and Hamas was signed in Doha, Qatar’s capital, and bears its name. Qatar also mediated between Jordan and Hamas leader Khaled Mashal, and the Qatari heir to the throne attended the meeting between the King Abdullah of Jordan and Mashal.

In late February 2012, the Emir of Qatar announced a new initiative calling for an international investigation of all Israeli activity in Jerusalem since 1967 designed to “erase its Muslim and Arab sites.” The Emir called on the participants of the Doha International Conference for Defending and Protecting Jerusalem to demand that the UN Security Council convene a committee to investigate the issue. This initiative will earn Qatar more bonus points in the Arab street – points it needs because of its policy towards Syria – though the initiative’s chances of realization are very slim.

Qatar’s public activism on the Palestinian-Israeli issue has hurt Israel. Qatar’s connections with entities such as Iran and Hamas – connections that, in its view, immunize it against harm from those same elements – led Israel in March 2011 to sever its ties with Qatar and close the diplomatic mission in Doha, forbid Qatari passport bearers from visiting the West Bank, and stop the cooperation between Qatar and Israel’s security industry. 

Nonetheless, Qatar has not hidden its willingness to maintain open relations with Israel on condition that Jerusalem prove its serious commitment – in Qatar’s view – to the political process, a low threshold condition compared to the terms posed by the rest of the Arab world for establishing open relations with Israel.

Qatar’s investments in East Asia, Europe, and the United States in infrastructure projects, real estate, financial institutions, and even soccer clubs are turning the emirate into a key player with influence in these arenas. In the annals of modern history, it is hard to find a similar instance of so tiny a nation implementing a foreign policy of such high profile. For the sake of comparison, Luxembourg has similar statistical characteristics but its ambitions – and its political influence – are far more humble.

Qatar excels in identifying processes and trends in the region and beyond and is quick to confront them. For Qatar, the rapid identification with trends in Arab public opinion is necessary in order to maintain its security, as long as these trends do not reach its own doorstep or threaten its relations with its stronger neighbors, Saudi Arabia and Iran. This was true in the case of the Arab spring and the key role Qatar played in its events. At home too, Qatar is trying to preempt the criticism that might be leveled against it. Emir Hamad Ben Khalifa recently announced that for the first time in the nation’s history he would hold elections for the Qatari Shura Council in the second half of 2013. According to him, in light of the huge changes in the region, pacifying messages are not enough; it is necessary to promote ongoing reforms. The promise to hold elections will allow Qatar to weather at least the next few months peacefully. Accordingly, and spurred primarily by survival instincts, the emirate can continue to enjoy political and economic stability and furnish political and economic support for the radical forces in the region, while taking advantage of the leadership vacuum left by larger nations to promote its own particular agenda.

Guzansky, Yoel and Eran, Oded
Jerusalem Post

French-German political alliance

By Frederick Deligne, Nice-Matin, France

Twitter a truly global tool with 72% of accounts outside of the U.S.

Click on the map to enlarge

Twitter is growing in popularity across the world, with U.S. accounts now representing just slightly more than one quarter (28.1 percent) of the total Twitter population, according to new data.

With 33.3 million accounts, Brazil now outranks Japan (29.9 million accounts) as the second most Twittering country, but Japanese remains the second most used language on Twitter after English, according to Paris-based social media research company Semiocast.

Semiocast said it analyzed the explicit and implicit location data, along with the activity levels, of 383 million Twitter profiles created before January 1, 2012.

The U.S. still has a commanding lead as the country with the most accounts (107.7 million accounts in total), but its global share is shrinking as users around the world sign on to the service.

Folks in the Netherlands, meanwhile, bested their Japanese and American peers in terms of activity, and are the most active people on the information network, Semiocast found. Thirty three percent of accounts located in the Netherlands tweeted at least one public update between September 1 and November 30, 2011 — that’s six percent higher than the global average.

As the nearly six-year-old Twitter continues its international expansion, it will face a variety of challenges, including legal discrepancies around freedom of speech. Twitter recently added the capability to withhold tweets from users in a particular country, while leaving them accessible to users elsewhere, should it need to comply with tweet takedown orders.

Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Semiocast’s data.

Photo credit: Eric Fischer/Flickr
Jennifer Van Grove 

Source - Venture Beat

7 ways to fix unemployment

Level of unemployment in the world

Unemployment is regarded to be one of the biggest concerns in the world, even more overriding than climate change or terrorism. More than 200 million people globally are out of work, a record high figure for the global economy. Unemployment is related to high suicide rates, crime and violence, unhappiness, bad environment practices.

Below are outlined draft steps targeted at fixing the issue of global unemployment. They could appear to be pretty bold and unreal. Nevertheless, I believe that only bold steps and extraordinary measures are able to tackle such urgent problem as unemployment.

1. Migration. To open interstate borders to all persons who are willing to emigrate and be capable of passing the exam on knowledge of language, history, geography, culture of a country. Thus, the main criteria to get a a foreign visa or work permit are not financial or professional, but willingness to adapt to a new country and accept foreign values. Security verification is not to be waived. But it must be executed on the final stage of the process which should be short (not more than three month). Opening interstate borders will decrease pressure on unemployment-stricken economies and boost the host economies. However, immigrants will not be entitled to demand social payments during one year. In such a way, host economies will not be burdened by social payments. If an immigrant do not find a job within three months since arrival to a host country, one must leave the country.

2. Entrepreneurship. To set up special state funds for unemployed who want to establish one’s own business. Those funds must offer interest-free or low-interest loans. If a country lacks cash for such loans, international monetary organization or big businesses should provide such kind of interest-free loans or fellowships. The special focus must receive hi-tech and green businesses. One should remember that small businesses account for the majority of job places in the developed world.

3. Primary Education. To introduce special school courses to define which disciplines fit best child’s skills so that to properly choose career path. Also such courses must provide information on the most demanded jobs in the market. Nowadays the majority of school graduates lack long-term vision of labor market. As a result, there are huge imbalances in the world labour market and many people devote their lives to jobs which they show no interest in.

4. Higher Education. To introduce special courses in universities which teach students how to find job and compose one’s CVs.

5. Higher education. To establish a special body within each faculty of university/college and even schools which deal with establishing partnership between potential employers and students. Such body must help students to find a relevant job during studying.

6. A reform of unemployment insurance. To put into effect a reform that links unemployment compensation to searching for a new job. Refusal by an unemployed person to take an “acceptable” job offer automatically results in the end of state support for him or her. An unemployed person must accept a “comparable” job for the first six months of unemployment, and must take any job on offer after eighteen months on the dole or lose state benefits.

7. To start structural reforms in unemployment-stricken economies. Though not creating jobs in a short-term perspective, it is essential for boosting future productivity and flexibility which will contribute to long-term employment opportunities.

To eliminate unemployment is out of reach task, but to reduce it as much as possible is an urgent requirement for every government. Without fixing unemployment, the present economic order is doomed.

Nuclear Iran hard to get

By Tom Janssen, The Netherlands

Pressure buidling on Iran

Source - By Patrick Chappatte, The International Herald Tribune

Hirsh Goodman on the future of Israeli-Palestinian relations

HIRSH GOODMAN is a senior research associate at the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University.

He firmly believes in a multi-state solution. He think a one-state solution would be a recipe for continued conflict.

"Ultimately, the resolution is going to look like Switzerland. There are going to be three independent sovereign nations; Gaza, governed by Hamas, until they decide otherwise; Israel, with its majority Jewish population and minority Arab population; and Palestine with its ’67 borders. There will be three sovereign states with a federal governing body to deal with issues like traffic protocol and so on. Israel has to negotiate separately with Gaza and with the PA. Gaza and Hamas want a ceasefire and the PA wants peace".

In my point of view, it's an impossible solution. Unfortunately.

Switzerland is a nation united around Christian values (despite of two different branches: Catholics and Protestants), around common enemies. Modern Israel is a nation of two religions: Islam and Judaism. And there are no common foe for Palestinians and Jews. For now, it would be better to divorce peacefully and live in peace.

Is English or Mandarin the language of the future?

English has been the dominant global language for a century, but is it the language of the future? If Mandarin Chinese is to challenge English globally, then it first has to conquer its own backyard, South East Asia. How is it going now? Let's discover the cases from Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam.

In Malaysia's southernmost city of Johor Bahru, the desire to speak good English has driven some children to make a remarkable two-hour journey to school every day.

Nine-year-old Aw Yee Han hops on a yellow mini van at 04:30. His passport is tucked inside a small pouch hung around his neck.

This makes it easier for him to show it to immigration officials when he reaches the Malaysian border.

His school is located on the other side, in Singapore, where unlike in Malaysia, English is the main language.

It's not your typical school run, but his mother, Shirley Chua thinks it's worth it.

"Science and maths are all written in English so it's essential for my son to be fluent in the language," she says.

An estimated 15,000 students from southern Johor state make the same bus journey across the border every day. It may seem like a drastic measure, but some parents don't trust the education system in Malaysia - they worry that the value of English is declining in the country.

Since independence from the British in 1957, the country has phased out schools that teach in English. By the early 1980s, most students were learning in the national language of Malay.

As a result, analysts say Malaysian graduates became less employable in the IT sector.

"We've seen a drastic reduction in the standard of English in our country, not just among the students but I think among the teachers as well," says political commentator Ong Kian Ming.

Those who believe that English is important for their children's future either send their kids to expensive private schools or to Singapore, where the government has been credited as being far-sighted for adopting the language of its former colonial master.

Nearly three-quarters of the population in Singapore are ethnic Chinese but English is the national language.

Many believe that this has helped the city state earn the title of being the easiest place to do business, by the World Bank.

However, the dominance of English is now being challenged by the rise of China in Singapore.

The Singapore Chinese Chamber Institute of Business has added Chinese classes for business use in recent years.

Students are being taught in Mandarin rather than the Hokkien dialect spoken by the older Chinese immigrants.

These courses have proved popular, ever since the government began providing subsidies for Singaporeans to learn Chinese in 2009 during the global financial crisis.

"The government pushed to provide them with an opportunity to upgrade themselves so as to prepare themselves for the economic upturn," says chamber spokesperson Alwyn Chia.

Some businesses are already desperate for Chinese speakers.

Lee Han Shih, who runs a multimedia company, says English is becoming less important to him financially because he is taking western clients to do business in China.

"So obviously you need to learn English but you also need to know Chinese," says Mr Lee.

As China's economic power grows, Mr Lee believes that Mandarin will overtake English. In fact, he has already been seeing hints of this.

"The decline of the English language probably follows the decline of the US dollar.

"If the renminbi is becoming the next reserve currency then you have to learn Chinese."

More and more, he says, places like Brazil and China are doing business in the renminbi, not the US dollar, so there is less of a need to use English.

Bilingualism

Indeed, China's clout is growing in South East Asia, becoming the region's top trading partner.

But to say that Mandarin will rival English is a "bit of a stretch", says Manoj Vohra, Asia director at the Economist Intelligence Unit.

Even companies in China, who prefer to operate in Chinese, are looking for managers who speak both Mandarin and English if they want to expand abroad, he says.

"They tend to act as their bridges."

So the future of English is not a question of whether it will be overtaken by Mandarin, but whether it will co-exist with Chinese, says Vohra.

He believes bilingualism will triumph in South East Asia.

It is a sound economic argument, but in Vietnam's case, there is resistance to learning Mandarin. 

The country may share a border with China, but the Vietnamese government's choice to not emphasise Mandarin is an emotional one, says leading economist Le Dang Doanh.

Shirley Chua fears her son's English will suffer in the Malaysian school system.

"All the streets in Vietnam are named according to generals and emperors that have been fighting against the Chinese invasion for 2000 years," he says.

Tensions flared up again last May over the disputed waters of the South China Sea.

Anti-Chinese sentiment means that young Vietnamese are choosing to embrace English - the language of a defeated enemy. Many families still bear the psychological scars from the Vietnam War with the United States.

Yet there is no animosity towards English because the founding father of Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh, made a clear distinction between the so-called American imperialists who were bombarding Vietnam and the American people, says Le Dang Doanh.

Many Vietnamese who have lost family members during the war are now studying in America, he says.

"We never forget any victim in the past but in order to industrialise and normalise a country, Vietnam needs to speak English."

The Vietnamese government has an ambitious goal to ensure all young people leaving school by 2020 will have a good grasp of the English language.

But it's not hard for young Vietnamese to accept English. For some, the language offers a sense of freedom in Vietnam, where the one-party communist state retains a tight grip on all media. 

In a public square in central Hanoi, a group of young men are break-dancing to the pulsing beats of western hip hop. Ngoc Tu, 20, says he only listens to English music.

"The Ministry of Culture has banned a lot of [Vietnamese] songs and any cultural publications that refer to freedom or rebellion but... English songs are not censored."

It is debatable whether English or Mandarin will dominate in South East Asia in the future. There are arguments for both on the economic front.

But culturally, there is no dispute.

Even Mandarin language enthusiasts like Singaporean businessman Mr Lee, says that English will remain popular so long as Hollywood exists.

The success of movies such as Kung Fu Panda, an American production about a Chinese animal, has caused a lot of anxiety in China, he says.

There have been many cartoons in China about pandas before, but none had reached commercial success, says Mr Lee.

"The moment Kung Fu Panda hit the cinemas everybody watched it. They bought the merchandise and they learned English."

PERSONAL OPINION
Robert Lane Greene Author of You Are What You Speak:
The assumption that Mandarin will grow with China's economic rise may be flawed. Consider Japan which, after spectacular post-war economic growth, became the world's second-biggest economy. The Japanese language saw no comparable rise in power and prestige.

The same may prove true of Mandarin. The character-based writing system requires years of hard work for even native speakers to learn, and poses a formidable obstacle to foreigners. In Asia, where China's influence is thousands of years old, this may pose less of a problem. But in the West, even dedicated students labour for years before they can confidently read a text of normal difficulty on a random topic.

Finally, many languages in Asia, Africa and the Amazon use "tones" (rising, falling, flat or dipping pitch contours) to distinguish different words. For speakers of tonal languages (like Vietnamese) learning the tones of Mandarin poses no particular difficulty. But speakers of non-tonal languages struggle to learn tones in adulthood - just ask any adult Mandarin-learner for their funniest story about using a word with the wrong tone.

Source - BBC