Archive for October, 2009
Obama welcomes US economic growth
President Barack Obama has welcomed the news that the US economy returned to growth between July and September.
Official figures showed the economy grew by 3.5% during the quarter, its first expansion in more than a year.
The growth was helped by a substantial government spending plan, including a scrappage scheme to boost car sales.
While Mr Obama called it “welcome news”, he said the US was still a “long way” from recovering from the “deepest downturn since the Great Depression”.
The return to growth of the world’s largest economy also sent shares on Wall Street sharply higher. The main Dow Jones index closed up 200 points, or 2.1%, at 9,962.58.
Mr Obama said the figures were “an affirmation that this recession is abating and [showed] the steps we’ve taken have made a difference, but I also know that we’ve got a long way to go to fully restore our economy.”
He said there were other benchmarks for measuring economic progress, such as “whether we are creating jobs, whether families are able to pay their bills and whether businesses are hiring and doing well”.
Compared with the previous three months, the US economy grew by 0.9%. In the same period, and on the same measure, the UK economy unexpectedly stayed in recession after it shrank by 0.4%.
Firestone in Liberia ‘pollution’
An investigation by the government in Liberia has concluded that the Firestone Rubber Plantation Company has polluted local water sources.
The three-month investigation found that a plant south-east of the capital Monrovia was responsible for high levels of orthophosphate in creeks.
The report called on Firestone to improve its waste treatment facility.
Firestone said it believed it fully complied with environmental law and its waste water was not harmful to health.
Sample testing
The Firestone plant is about 48km (30 miles) south-east of Monrovia and the creeks are a water source for tens of thousands of villagers.
Many residents had said they could no longer use the water.
The BBC’s Jonathan Paye-Layleh in Monrovia says residents in the town of Kpanyah town had been complaining of developing skin rashes on venturing into affected creeks.
The investigation team included government ministries, Firestone representatives and local residents.
Water samples were collected and tested at the American University of Beirut in Lebanon. Testing was also carried out in Liberia.
The tests confirmed high levels of orthophosphate.
The report called on the management of Firestone to adhere to the Environmental Protection and Management Law.
Firestone said it believed it was in full compliance with the law and with its environmental commitments to the government and that it “strongly disagreed with any characterisation to the contrary”.
It said an external consultant had found the plant’s waste water was not harmful.
Firestone said that phosphate was also not harmful to human health but that it would work to address any elevated levels.
It said it believed its water treatment system was working as designed and intended.
For Obama, Peace in the Morning, War in the Afternoon
Hours after thanking the world for the Nobel Peace Prize this morning, President Obama will gather with his war advisers to ponder sending 60,000 more troops into a country where our national security objectives are unclear at best.
Instead of embracing General McChrystal’s proposal for a substantial increase in the U.S. military presence — or even adopting a “McChrystal-Light” strategy — the Obama administration should begin a phased withdrawal of troops over the next 18 months, retaining only a small military footprint relying on special forces personnel. Otherwise, America will be entangled for years — or decades — in pursuit of unattainable goals.
We need to “define success down” in Afghanistan. That means abandoning any notion of transforming ethnically fractured, pre-industrial Afghanistan into a modern, cohesive nation state. It also means reversing the drift in Washington’s strategy over the past eight years that has gradually made the Taliban (a parochial Pashtun insurgent movement), rather than al Qaeda, America’s primary enemy in Afghanistan. A more modest and realistic strategy means even abandoning the goal of a definitive victory over al Qaeda itself.
Instead, we need to treat the terrorist threat that al Qaeda poses as a chronic, but manageable, security problem. Foreign policy, like domestic politics, is the art of the possible. Containing and weakening al Qaeda may be possible, but sustaining a large-scale, long-term occupation of Afghanistan and creating a modern, democratic country is not.
Peace? The Promise of Peace? Eh, Close Enough
Worse choices have been made than Barack Obama for the Nobel Peace Prize.
There was Woodrow Wilson in 1919, an award that rates as one of history’s more grotesque international jokes. Wilson promised to keep us out of war and promptly got us into it, meanwhile laying the ideological and geopolitical foundations for 90 years of war-nationalism, war-liberalism, and war-socialism. To say nothing of saddling us with the terrible idea of world government. Among those who weren’t Nazis or communists, Wilson may have done more than any other individual to promote human suffering in the last hundred years.
So yes, there have been worse choices. (Next to Wilson, I’d have to give Al Gore and Yasser Arafat both honorable mentions. We could go on, of course.) But still, Barack Obama? Seriously? I doubt the committee has any idea how badly their choice will be mocked in the United States.
Over here, the prize will be a disappointment to the anti-war left, the anti-war right, and, of course, the pro-war right. The only contingent I can see taking pride in it over here is the establishment left, which hasn’t had much time lately for substantive work on peace, but which is always happy to make speeches and receive awards. Sometimes, the American image abroad is just that important.
Rather than piling on in what is sure to be a bipartisan laugh-fest, let’s think about what Barack Obama actually could have done for world peace. And weep.
EU clears hurdle to Lisbon treaty
EU leaders meeting in Brussels have agreed a deal designed to win Czech backing of the Lisbon Treaty, clearing a major hurdle to its ratification.
The Czechs were granted an opt-out from the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights, similar to that of the UK and Poland.
Czech President Vaclav Klaus was satisfied with the concession, Czech PM Jan Fischer told reporters in Brussels.
But EU leaders failed to agree on funding for a climate change pact to help developing nations.
“The road to ratification stands open,” said Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt, whose country holds the EU’s rotating presidency.
‘No problem’
The Czech Republic is the only one of the 27 EU nations not to have ratified the treaty, which aims to streamline decision-making and bolster the bloc’s role on the world stage.
The BBC’s Oana Lungescu in Brussels says Mr Klaus – an ardent Eurosceptic – had feared that without the opt-out, the charter would allow thousands of ethnic Germans who were expelled from Czechoslovakia after World War II to reclaim their lands.
“Vaclav Klaus was content with the text. He has been informed about all modifications… and does not have a problem with it,” PM Fischer said after EU leaders agreed on the text at a summit.
But there is one final legal hurdle to Prague’s ratification – the Czech Constitutional Court is expected to rule next week on whether the treaty complies with the country’s constitution.
Presuming the court dismisses the latest challenge to the treaty, the Czech prime minister said his country could ratify the treaty by the year’s end.
What now after Irish ‘Yes’ vote?
Political sensitivities surrounding the second Irish referendum mean that the road ahead for the Lisbon Treaty is less clear than many EU leaders would wish.
Since Irish voters rejected the treaty in the first referendum, in June 2008, politicians across Europe have tried to avoid giving voters the impression that the Lisbon Treaty is a fait accompli.
But this time the Irish verdict is overwhelmingly “Yes” – so the Lisbon ratification process is likely to speed up, because the Czech Republic would appear to be the only odd one out.
The Eurosceptic Czech President, Vaclav Klaus, is still quite capable of throwing a spanner into the Lisbon works – and the complex machinery of ratification might yet grind to a halt for a few more months.
He will not sign the treaty until the Czech Constitutional Court has ruled on another legal complaint by a group of Czech senators – and that complaint has only just been filed.
The only other country yet to ratify Lisbon is Poland – but Polish President Lech Kaczynski is expected to sign the treaty within days, now that it has got the Irish thumbs-up.
EU eyes bigger global role
The ‘Yes’ vote by Irish voters on the Lisbon Treaty has brought forward the prospect that the European Union might play a greater role in world affairs.
There are two provisions in the treaty which might make this possible. These are for a permanent president of the European Council and a beefed-up foreign policy representative.
The hope among supporters of the treaty is that these posts will enable the EU to speak more clearly and coherently on major world issues.
The fear among critics is that this will go too far and take away the role and influence of national governments.
However, it can only go so far, because national vetoes remain over joint EU-wide foreign policy and security decisions – unlike trade, where member states pool their powers by majority voting if necessary.
So even a powerful new president could not speak for the EU as a whole if it was divided, as it was over the invasion of Iraq in 2003.
But the negotiations with Iran, for example, show how things could develop.
Three EU member states – Great Britain, France and Germany – work alongside the present EU foreign policy representative, thereby enabling individual governments to retain their independence of view while combining together for greater effect.
Will Zuma bring tribalism to South Africa?
South Africa’s first democratically elected president, Nelson Mandela, promoted a “Rainbow Nation”; his successor Thabo Mbeki an “African Renaissance”; so what will be the overarching vision of a Jacob Zuma presidency?
He has not yet outlined one, but the initial signs are that Mr Zuma will promote a new conservatism in South Africa, digging deep into the nation’s cultural and religious roots and threatening Western-styled liberal values enshrined in the constitution.
Mr Zuma’s supporters showed these traits throughout his long and bitterly fought presidential campaign, offering prayers to ancestors, denouncing same-sex marriage as a “disgrace to God”, promising a referendum on the death penalty, condemning political rivals as “witches” and “snakes”, and defending polygamy as “African”.
For Mr Zuma’s critics, he has mixed a deadly cocktail of religion, politics and ethnicity to quench his thirst for power.
“The genie is out. He won’t be able to put it back,” one critic said.
“Mbeki declared this to be the African century, but we now risk going backwards.”
Without singling out anyone for criticism, a stalwart of the governing African National Congress (ANC), Zola Skweyiya, expressed a similar concern in the run-up to the party’s conference in 2007.
“The demon of tribalism is rising from every corner and we ignore it at our peril,” Mr Skweyiya wrote in Johannesburg’s Mail & Guardian newspaper.
“We thought we would not go through what the rest of Africa has gone through, but we are just another African country. There is nothing special about us.”
Not ‘power-obsessed’
Mr Zuma’s supporters believed that a clique from Mr Mbeki’s Xhosa ethnic group was determined to hang on to power and block him from becoming the first Zulu to lead South Africa.
Fans Line Up For Oprah Taping At Texas Fair
DALLAS (AP) ― Click to enlarge1 of 1
Winner of the “Bob Hope Humanitarian Award,” Oprah Winfrey at the 54th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards held at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.
Frank Micelotta/Getty Images
Close numSlides of totalImages Fans braved light rain as they lined up before dawn to get into the State Fair of Texas for the taping of Oprah Winfrey’s TV show.
Drizzle early Monday greeted fans of the Chicago-based talk show host.
Winfrey and her friend Gayle King on Sunday afternoon checked out the fair in Dallas. Both wore cowboy hats as they made their way through the crowds, amid tight security by police.
The State Fair of Texas runs through Sunday.
Ex-guerrilla leads Uruguay polls
A former left-wing guerrilla has taken a commanding lead in several exit polls from Uruguay’s presidential election.
Most polls show Senator Jose Mujica has narrowly failed to secure the 50% needed to avoid a run-off vote.
If a second round is officially confirmed, he is likely to face his main conservative rival, the former president, Luis Alberto Lacalle.
The winner will replace outgoing socialist President Tabare Vazquez and take office in March next year.
Exit polls on Sunday suggested 74-year-old Mr Mujica had gained about 48% of votes, with Mr Lacalle trailing on around 30%.
A 29 November run-off would take place between the two frontrunners.
Mr Mujica, a senator of the governing left-wing Broad Front Party, was a former member of the rebel Tupamaros movement in the 1960s and 1970s.
Mr Lacalle, famed for having survived an attempt to poison him – and other National Party leaders – with tainted wine in the 1970s, is a 68-year-old lawyer.
He has pledged to remove the income tax imposed by President Vazquez and trim the size of government in the country of 3.4 million.
During the election campaign, he sought to capitalise on concerns among some voters about his rival’s militant past.
Mr Lacalle has crafted a political comeback 14 years after leaving office when his senior aides were accused of corruption.
As well as presidential and congressional elections, voters also took part in a referendum.
That will decide whether to revoke a law which gives immunity to former security officials accused of human rights abuses during Uruguay’s period of military rule.
