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Showing posts with label Tony Blair. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Tony Blair. Show all posts

Thursday 5 July 2012

British rivate banks have failed - need a public solution

Private banks have failed – we need a public solution

The Barclays scandal has underlined the City's unmuzzled power. But it also offers a chance to take democratic control

Bob Diamond, who resigned as chief executive of Barclys on Tuesday, is fighting for a payoff of over £20m. Photograph: Dylan Martinez/REUTERS

The greatest danger of the rate-fixing scandal now engulfing the City of London is that it will be managed and defused in the usual way, and nothing will really change. Tuesday's forced resignation of Bob Diamond, the Barclays chief executive, follows well-worn procedures for dealing with crises that potentially threaten those in power: denounce the worst offenders, let a few symbolic heads roll, set up an inquiry under a safe pair of hands, and tweak the regulations to prevent a repetition of the most egregious misdemeanours.

That's been the pattern of the past few years as Britain's establishment has lurched from the disaster of the Iraq war to the disgrace of parliamentary expense fiddling and media phone-hacking (though in the case of Iraq, the only heads to roll were BBC executives and an army corporal). As for the banks that triggered the greatest economic crisis for 80 years, they have been bailed out and featherbedded, with only the loss of the odd sacrificial City baron to show for their reckless mayhem.

But we can't afford to allow such political dereliction again. The racket revealed around the rigging of the crucial Libor inter-bank interest rate – affecting $500tn worth of contracts, financial instruments, mortgages and loans – has underlined the scale of corruption at the heart of the financial system. It follows the exposure of the mis-selling of dodgy derivatives and payment protection insurance, voracious tax avoidance and last month's breakdown of the RBS-NatWest basic payments system.

It's already clear that the rate rigging, which depends on collusion, goes far beyond Barclays, and indeed the City of London. This is one of multiple scams that have become endemic in a disastrously deregulated system with inbuilt incentives for cartels to manipulate the core price of finance. Not only that, but the rigging has been public for years – it was first reported in 2008 – and no action has been taken until now.

That echoes the phone-hacking scandal, which erupted eight years after Rebekah Brooks told parliament News International was bribing the police and her admission was entirely ignored. On Tuesday Barclays sought to implicate Whitehall officials in its rate-rigging in 2008, and an angry Diamond, fighting for a payoff of over £20m, can be expected to go further when he appears before the Commons on Wednesday.

As they did with the Murdoch press, politicians who have abased themselves before the financial elite are now denouncing corrupt bankers and each other for failing to bring them to heel. David Cameron, whose party relies on City donors for more than half its income, wants a narrowly Libor-focused parliamentary inquiry to avoid the bigger picture and focus blame on New Labour's enthusiasm for "light touch regulation" in the runup to the crash.

Ed Miliband is rightly pressing for a much broader, Leveson-style public inquiry into the entire banking system. But the reality is that the whole political class embraced deregulated finance in the boom years. While Tony Blair and Gordon Brown pampered the banks, George Osborne and the Conservatives were demanding still less regulation, and even the Liberal Democrat Vince Cable, now the bankers' scourge, endorsed a financial "light touch".

This is yet another disgrace for the country's governing elites. The new revelation of corruption comes after the exposure of the deception of the Iraq war, fraud in parliament and the police, the criminality of a media mafia and the devastating failure of the banks four years ago. It could of course have happened only in a private-dominated financial sector, and makes a nonsense of the bankrupt free-market ideology that still holds sway in public life.

Political and business powerbrokers insist it's all a problem of leadership, bad apples and a culture that has gone awry. But such cultures are generated by structures and systems – and in the case of the City, deregulated short-term profit maximisation has as good as required them. It's certainly necessary to have a clearout of City bosses, prosecutions and wide-ranging inquiries, but only far-reaching change will clear this cesspit.

The financial system has already failed at huge economic and social cost. It has been shown to be corrupt, incompetent, rapacious and economically destructive. The City's claims to be an indispensable jobs and tax engine for the British economy are nonsense: the bailout costs of 2008-9 dwarfed the financial tax revenues of the boom years, which were below those of manufacturing even at their peak.

In fact, the banks are pumped up with state subsidies and liquidity that they are still failing to pass on in productive lending five years into the crisis. A crucial part of the explanation is the unmuzzled political and economic power of the City: its colonisation of Whitehall and public life, effective grip on its own regulation, revolving-door pull on politicians and civil servants, and purchase of political parties. Finance has usurped democracy.

The crash of 2008 offered a huge opportunity to break that grip and reform the financial system. It was lost. The system was left as good as intact, and even the part-nationalised banks, RBS and Lloyds, have since been run at arm's length to fatten them up as quickly as possible for re-privatisation (savage RBS cost-cutting lies behind its humiliating performance last month), instead of as motors of investment and recovery.

The rate-rigging scandal now offers a second opportunity to build the pressure for fundamental change. That's hard to imagine being carried out by a coalition dominated by the City-funded Tories, but Labour has also yet to break fully with its pre-crisis economic model.

Tougher regulation or even a full separation of retail from investment banking will not be enough to shift the City into productive investment, or even prevent the kind of corrupt collusion that has now been exposed between Barclays and other banks. As a report by Manchester University's Cresc research team argues this week, the size and complexity of the modern banking system makes it "near ungovernable".

Only if the largest banks are broken up, the part-nationalised outfits turned into genuine public investment banks, and new socially owned and regional banks encouraged can finance be made to work for society, rather than the other way round. Private sector banking has spectacularly failed – and we need a democratic public solution.

• This article was amended on 4 July 2012. The original misspelled Rebekah Brooks's name as Rebecca. This has been corrected.

Monday 5 December 2011

Experts urge Europe to look toward Asia-Pacific


By Zhang Haizhou and Hu Yinan (China Daily)

BEIJING / LONDON - As the world's center of gravity shifts toward the Asia-Pacific region, concerns are growing in Europe that the former center of global geopolitics may be sidelined.

European politicians and analysts have urged Europe to shift its focus increasingly toward the Asia-Pacific, following Washington's strategic adjustment toward the region.

The rationale for Europe today is about power, which, in one aspect, is about being "able to play in a world that will otherwise be dominated by America and China", said former British prime minister Tony Blair. Tony BlairImage by Medienmagazin pro via Flickr

A "strong Europe" is needed to leverage the collective power of European states, all of which are relatively small in size, Blair said in Beijing last week.

"Unless you come together, your individual countries - and that includes the UK - are not going to be strong enough," said Blair.

Commenting on what the US' ongoing policy shift towards the Asia-Pacific means for Europe, Blair said Washington "has always had a strong presence in this part of the world and continues to do so".

One of the things a strong Europe can do, he said, is to help the relationship work between the United States and China.



"I believe the relationship between America and China - a good and strong working relationship - is a vital part of making the world work today," Blair said.

As Europe's sovereign debt crisis intensifies, US President Barack Obama's foreign policy shift toward Asia - later acknowledged by European Council President Herman Van Rompuy, who said the 21st century "is going to be a Pacific one" - has left many in Europe worried.

In a speech on Nov 9, Van Rompuy declared that Europe has a major role to play in the Asia-Pacific region, both as a trading partner and as "a potential major factor contributing to (Asia's) stability".

He emphasized that this "should also be reflected in higher political attention paid to and political activity shown in the region".

The European Union was not invited to last month's ASEAN and East Asia summits in Indonesia, which the US and Russia took part in for the first time.

The absence has left the 27-nation bloc sitting on the sidelines in arguably what is the most important region, while its major ally and trading partner, the US, asserts a stronger foreign policy role there.

This was not the only important conference the EU has been absent from in the region.

Catherine Ashton, the EU's High Representative for Foreign Affairs, has not attended any major multilateral meeting in Asia since taking up the post in 2009.

It is "essential" that Ashton attends the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) "each year", Frans-Paul van der Putten, senior researcher at the Netherlands Institute of International Relations (Clingendael) in The Hague, pointed out.

"Ashton cannot afford to stay away from the ARF, given that the ARF is the only major trans-Pacific forum of which the EU is a member," he said.

"While the EU cannot be a trans-Pacific power, it should strengthen its visibility in this strategically crucial region with a focused and active Asia policy."

Suggesting the EU should also cooperate closely with the US to "strengthen its economic competitiveness", Van der Putten, however, suggested the 27-nation bloc "adopt a neutral stance with regard to US security policy in Asia".

Obama said during his recent visit to Australia that the US was "stepping up its commitment to the entire Asia-Pacific".

Up to 2,500 US Marines will deploy in Australia in the coming years.

Hillary Clinton last week visited Myanmar, the first trip by a US secretary of state in more than 50 years.

Tom Kane, a senior lecturer in International Politics at Britain's University of Hull, said he thinks the US "is likely to continue to balance its Asian interests against its European ones".

During World War II, the US government formally agreed to give Europe priority over Asia and the Pacific, "but, in practice, fought actively in both areas of operations from the very beginning", he said.

"Happily for all concerned, it will usually be able to cooperate productively with Europe and Asia, both at the same time," Kane added. 

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Wednesday 23 November 2011

Bush and Blair found guilty of 'crimes against peace' !

ExPrime Minister of the United Kingdom, Tony B...Image via Wikipedia

Bush and Blair found guilty


Committed international crime by invading Iraq

War Crimes Tribunal
Chief judge Datuk Abdul Kadir Sulaiman (centre) presiding over the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal against former United States president George W. Bush and former British prime minister Tony Blair yesterday. Pic by Sharul Hafiz Zam
  THE Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal (KLWCC) returned a guilty verdict against former United States president George W. Bush and former British prime minister Tony Blair on a charge of crimes against peace on its final day of hearing yesterday.

  Chief judge Datuk Abdul Kadir Sulaiman, in announcing the verdict, said both the accused had acted with deceit, selectively manipulated international law and committed an unlawful act of aggression and an international crime by invading Iraq in 2003.



  The tribunal found that both the accused had contemplated to invade Iraq as far back as September 2001 and had defied the United Nations Resolution 1441, which clearly did not authorise the use of military action to compel Iraq's compliance.

  Kadir added that the two accused had admitted since the Iraq war that they knew or believed the intelligence reports on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction to be unreliable and yet both proceeded to wage war against Iraq based on this false and contrite basis.

  Memoirs of both the accused that had been tendered as evidence during the proceedings were also found to implicate both Bush and Blair, both having admitted their own intention to invade Iraq, regardless of international law.

  It was suggested by the tribunal that the KLWCC file a report with the International Court of Crime against both the accused under the Nuremberg principles and include reports of genocide and crimes against humanity committed by Bush and Blair.

  The tribunal also recommended that the names of both accused be entered into the Register of War Criminals and publicised.

  The KLWCC was tasked to publicise the tribunal's findings to all nations who were signatories of the Rome Statue, so that the two criminals can be prosecuted if they enter the jurisdiction of these nations.

  The KLWCC should also suggest to the UN General Assembly to pass resolution to end Iraq's occupation and request that the UN Security Council pass a resolution to transfer sovereignty back to the Iraqis.

  Earlier, chief defence Jason Kay Kit Leon had argued that Bush had exhausted all means of diplomacy before launching an attack after receiving intelligence briefings on Iraq for two years, suggesting that then president Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and Iraq posed an imminent threat.

  He quoted Bush as having said that  he would not lead his nation to war on a lie which would be easily discernable after the war.

  Kay also mention that  Blair, in his memoir, had said he understood the need for the second UN resolution but knew the difficulty in getting one due to the politics within the UN Security Council permanent members.

  The prosecution had made out a compelling case over the four days.

  Chief prosecutor Professor Gurdial S. Nijar, in his summation, reiterated key documents of several intelligence reports that indicated there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq reported by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

  Neither was there an attempt by Saddam Hussein to obtain uranium from Niger by former United States diplomat Joseph Wilson and weapons inspector David Kay found that Saddam's nuclear facility had deteriorated to such a point that it was totally useless, all discovered well before the UN Resolution 1441.

  The tribunal reached a unanimous guilty verdict after four hours of deliberation.



KL tribunal convicts two former leaders with ‘crimes against peace’

PETALING JAYA: The Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal unanimously found former United States president George W. Bush and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair guilty of “crimes against peace”.

The tribunal found that the two had planned, prepared and invaded the state of Iraq on March 19, 2003, in violation of the United Nations Charter and international law.

“The charge is proven beyond reasonable doubt. The accused are found guilty,” read an official media statement from Perdana Global Peace Foundation, organisers of the tribunal.

“War criminals have to be dealt with, convict Bush and Blair as charged. A guilty verdict will serve as a notice to the world that war criminals may run but can never ultimately hide from truth and justice,” the statement read.

The tribunal noted that the UN Security Council Resolution 1441 did not authorise any use of force against Iraq but the US proceeded to invade Iraq under the pretext of the Sept 11 attacks and weapons of mass destruction.

“Weapons investigators had established that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. Iraq was also not posing any threat to any nation at the relevant time that was immediate that would have justified any form of pre-emptive strike.”

With the findings, the tribunal has ordered that Bush and Blair’s names be included in the war register of the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Commission.

It also ordered the findings of the tribunal to be publicised to all nations who are signatories of the Rome Statute.

The tribunal, held for four days here, was initiated by former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who is also the Perdana Global Peace Foundation president.

The tribunal members were Datuk Abdul Kadir Sulaiman, Tunku Sofiah Jewa, Prof Salleh Buang, Alfred Lambremont Webre and Prof Emeritus Datuk Dr Shad Saleem Faruqi.

Prof Niloufer Bhagwat and Datuk Zakaria Yatim were recused as tribunal members.

Related post:

War Crimes Tribunal Tries Bush, Blair for War Crimes against humanity! 

Saturday 19 November 2011

War Crimes Tribunal Tries Bush, Blair for War Crimes against humanity!


Telegraph.co.uk

Activists in Malaysia plan 'war crime trial' of George W. Bush and Tony Blair

Malaysian-led activists will hold a symbolic trial this month for former President George W. Bush and British ex-leader Tony Blair on charges of committing crimes against peace in the Iraq war, the event's organisers said on Tuesday. 
 Activists in Malaysia plan 'war crime trial' of George W. Bush and Tony Blair President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2003

 Video: rightwaystan War crimes exhibition held in Kuala Lumpur : http://t.co/pjPgRlpY



Streaming Video: Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal -
The following URL will stream video of each session of the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal within 1-2 hours after the specific session has ended. To access this streaming video please go to:
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/war-is-a-crime-exhibition
 
Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal
Schedule of Sessions
Saturday Nov. 19, 2011   9AM – 5 PM Kuala Lumpur time;
Sunday Nov. 20, 2011     9AM – 5 PM Kuala Lumpur time;
Monday Nov. 21, 2011    9AM – 5 PM Kuala Lumpur time;
Tuesday Nov. 22, 2011   9AM – 5 PM Kuala Lumpur time;

CONVERT TO YOUR TIME ZONE:
http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/converter.html

Sessions of the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal will also be online on You Tube.



The Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal is an initiative of Malaysia's retired Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, who staunchly opposed the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

The tribunal will convene a four-day public hearing starting Saturday to determine whether Bush and Blair committed crimes against peace and violated international law in the Iraq invasion, said Malaysian lawyer Yaacob Hussain Marican.

"For these people who have been immune from prosecution, we want to put them on trial in this forum to prove that they committed war crimes," Yaacob told The Associated Press.

Activists sent information about the charges to Bush and Blair recently but received no response, Yaacob said.

Francis Boyle, an American international law professor based in Illinois, will be among the prosecutors at the hearing, which follows two years of investigations by a Malaysian peace foundation founded by Mahathir that looked into complaints by people affected by the Iraqi war.
The effort is modelled after a 1967 Vietnam War crimes panel convened in Sweden and Denmark by philosophers Bertrand Russell and Jean-Paul Sartre, Yaacob said. The Vietnam tribunal said the U.S. committed acts of aggression against Vietnam and bombarded civilian targets, but it was mostly ignored in United States.

The Kuala Lumpur tribunal will have a seven-member panel of judges including two retired judges from Malaysia's highest court, peace activist Alfred Lambremont Webre of the United States and Mumbai-based lawyer Niloufer Bhagwat of India.

If the tribunal finds Bush and Blair guilty, it will enter their names into a symbolic "Register of War Criminals."

The tribunal is also scheduled to hold a separate hearing next year on charges of torture linked to the Iraq war against former U.S. officials including ex-Vice President Dick Cheney, former Secretary of State Donald Rumsfeld and ex-Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, Yaacob said.

Bush and Blair to be Tried for War Crimes

From: Mathaba

First time that war crimes charges will be heard against the two former heads of state.

On November 19-22, 2011, the trial of George W. Bush (former U.S. President) and Anthony L. Blair (former British Prime Minister) will be held in Kuala Lumpur. This is the first time that war crimes charges will be heard against the two former heads of state in compliance with proper legal process.

Charges are being brought against the accused by the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Commission (KLWCC) following the due process of the law. The Commission, having received complaints from war victims in Iraq in 2009, proceeded to conduct a painstaking and an in-depth investigation for close to two years and in 2011, constituted formal charges on war crimes against Bush, Blair and their associates.

The Iraq invasion in 2003 and its occupation had resulted in the death of 1.4 million Iraqis. Countless others had endured torture and untold hardship. The cries of these victims have thus far gone unheeded by the international community. The fundamental human right to be heard has been denied to them.

As a result, the KLWCC had been established in 2008 to fill this void and act as a peoples’ initiative to provide an avenue for such victims to file their complaints and let them have their day in a court of law.

The first charge against George W. Bush and Anthony L. Blair is for Crimes Against Peace wherein:

The Accused persons had committed Crimes against Peace, in that the Accused persons planned, prepared and invaded the sovereign state of Iraq on 19 March 2003 in violation of the United Nations Charter and international law.

The second charge is for Crime of Torture and War Crimes against eight citizens of the United States and they are namely George W Bush, Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, Alberto Gonzales, David Addington, William Haynes, Jay Bybee and John Yoo, wherein:

The Accused persons had committed the Crime of Torture and War Crimes, in that: The Accused persons had wilfully participated in the formulation of executive orders and directives to exclude the applicability of all international conventions and laws, namely the Convention against Torture 1984, Geneva Convention III 1949, Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the United Nations Charter in relation to the war launched by the U.S. and others in Afghanistan (in 2001) and in Iraq (in March 2003); Additionally, and/or on the basis and in furtherance thereof, the Accused persons authorised, or connived in, the commission of acts of torture and cruel, degrading and inhuman treatment against victims in violation of international law, treaties and conventions including the Convention against Torture 1984 and the Geneva Conventions, including Geneva Convention III 1949.

The trial will be held before the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal, which is constituted of eminent persons with legal qualifications.



The judges of the Tribunal, which is headed by retired Malaysian Federal Court judge Dato’ Abdul Kadir Sulaiman, also include other notable names such as Mr Alfred Lambremont Webre, a Yale graduate, who authored several books on politics, Dato’ Zakaria Yatim, retired Malaysian Federal Court judge, Tunku Sofiah Jewa, practising lawyer and author of numerous publications on International Law, Prof Salleh Buang, former Federal Counsel in the Attorney-General Chambers and prominent author, Prof Niloufer Bhagwat, an expert in Constitutional Law, Administrative Law and International Law, and Prof Emeritus Datuk Dr Shad Saleem Faruqi, prominent academic and professor of law.

The Tribunal will adjudicate and evaluate the evidence presented as in any court of law. The judges of the Tribunal must be satisfied that the charges are proven beyond reasonable doubt and deliver a reasoned judgement.

In the event the tribunal convicts any of the accused, the only sanction is that the name of the guilty person will be entered in the Commission’s Register of War Criminals and publicised worldwide. The tribunal is a tribunal of conscience and a peoples’ initiative.

The prosecution for the trial will be lead by Prof Gurdial S Nijar, prominent law professor and author of several law publications and Prof Francis Boyle, leading American professor, practitioner and advocate of international law, and assisted by a team of lawyers.

The trial will be held in an open court on November 19-22, 2011 at the headquarters of the Al-Bukhary Foundation at Jalan Perdana, Kuala Lumpur.

Bush and Blair to be ‘charged’

KUALA LUMPUR: Former US president George W. Bush and former British prime minister Tony Blair will be “charged” at a mock tribunal here for their war crimes today.

Perdana Global Peace Foundation president Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who initiated the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal, said the two former leaders would be charged for crimes against peace for planning, preparing and invading the sovereign state of Iraq on March 19, 2003, in violation of the United Nations Charter and international law.

The tribunal would hold the proceedings for four days at No. 88, Jalan Perdana here.

Crime against humanity: (Right) Tun Dr Siti Hasmah Mohd Ali, Tan Sri Norian Mai and Dr Mahathir at the “War is Crime” exhibition in Kuala Lumpur Friday.
 
It would be open to the public.

Dr Mahathir said although the two could not be jailed if they were found guilty, society could reject them by not inviting them to talks or events.

“Don't entertain these people or invite them to give talks,” he said after launching the “War is Crime” exhibition held in conjunction with the tribunal's efforts to criminalise war.

Dr Mahathir alleged that Blair had lied to the British parliament and the British people.

“What do you want to learn from him? To learn how to lie?” he added.

Dr Mahathir said that voters of countries at risk of going to war should also hold politicians accountable by making them reject war as a way to resolve problems.

Tribunal counsel Avtaran Singh said the “charge” have been served on the two leaders.

“If they are found guilty of the charges, the tribunal would continue with the second charge of torture and war crimes,” he added.

Avtaran said the United Nations Security Council and the International Criminal Court had failed to take action against Bush and Blair.

“Internationally, the system has failed,” he added

.- The Star

KL tribunal to try Bush, Blair for Iraq war crimes

Trial to go on despite absence of response from both leaders

 Professor  Gurdial S. Nijar
Professor Gurdial S. Nijar will head the prosecution during the trial
  The Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal  on Saturday will  try former United States president George W. Bush and former British prime minister Tony  Blair on a charge of committing crimes against peace during the Iraq War.

  Bush and seven  top US officials who served under him  will also face a separate charge of crimes of torture and war crimes at the tribunal.

  The three-day hearing, conducted by  seven senior judges headed by retired  Federal Court judge Datuk Abdul Kadir Sulaiman,  will go on although the two accused leaders and other defendants have yet to respond to the tribunal's notice.

  Datuk Dr Yaacob Hussain Marican, the secretary-general of the Kuala Lumpur Foundation to Criminalise War,  which is holding the tribunal, said the tribunal was being convened for the third time since 2007.

  Yaacob said the tribunal of conscience was modelled on  the one convened by philosopher Bertrand Russell in 1966 to try the perpetrators of the Vietnam War.

  Yaacob said although the tribunal  lacked enforcement powers, it would publish the verdict to get the world community to treat the accused as guilty persons.

  "The charges are being brought against the accused by the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Commission,  which comes under our foundation, following in-depth investigations into complaints received from war victims in 2009.

  "The commission  acts as a peoples' initiative to provide an avenue for  victims to file their complaints and let them have their day in a court of law."

  Professor  Gurdial S. Nijar, a  law professor and author of  law publications, and Professor Francis Boyle,  an American professor, practitioner and advocate of international law, will head the prosecution during the trial.

  The trial, to be held in an open court at the headquarters of the Al- Bukhary Foundation in  Jalan Perdana here, is open to the public.

  In conjunction with the tribunal, Perdana Global Peace Foundation will organise an exhibition, " War is a Crime",  with a conference on  Friday.

  Its chairman, Tan Sri Norian Mai, said the conference's theme, "The Arab Uprising", to be opened by former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, would see  speakers such as former US presidential candidate and congresswoman Cynthia McKinney and former United Nations assistant secretary-general Denis Halliday.

Sunday 11 September 2011

Facing still more of the same - 10 years after 9/11





Facing still more of the same

Behind The Headlines By Bunn Nagara

Ten years after 9/11, little has actually changed, least of all political attitudes.

UNTIL Sept 10, 2001, the world seemed a simpler place.
In a world gone madImage by Walt Jabsco via Flickr
Terrorism was a scourge that needed to be kept in check, if not eliminated while Afghanistan was a tribal wasteland in the boondocks and the legendary graveyard of foreign empires.

Iraq was an oil-rich autocracy and established US ally against Iran but with a tendency to slip into unilateral nationalist fervour, and the United States was a neo-conservative right-wing Republican bastion huffing and puffing for something to blow at.

The next day, two planes slammed into the two towers of New York’s World Trade Center. Neither bad coincidence nor pilot error was ever an issue.

Other aircraft had been hijacked the same day, but the twin crashes at the twin towers were more dramatic and dominated headlines, sound bites, political posturing and public imagination.

As the heart of lower Manhattan seemed to dissolve in a rising mound of smoke and dust, more than just debris was in the air. It was a time of change for the US and certain parts of the world.

Suddenly, the United States had the national tendency to slip into unilateralist fervour, Afghanistan and Iraq became targets that needed to be kept in check if not eliminated, and terrorism, oil-rich autocracies and Muslim states came to be profiled as one from many a Washington desk.

The neo-conservative right-wing bastion in the White House had found a couple of things to huff and puff at. Such was its enthusiasm that it forgot how Afghanistan remained very much a graveyard of foreign empires.

The result now, a full decade later, is described in Washington circles and elsewhere as the worst US policy overreaction of the century.



Within weeks, the George W. Bush administration blamed the attacks on Osama bin Laden and his followers, collectively called “al-Qaeda” as the Arabic translation of “the base,” the name the CIA originally gave Osama’s group and training camp. Nobody had claimed responsibility for the New York attacks, and al-Qaeda soon after denied any involvement.

The Taliban government in Afghanistan was then accused of sheltering al-Qaeda, so that made it fair game for elimination. In late 2001, Afghanistan’s Taliban leaders were ousted and replaced by the Pashtun activist and CIA point man Hamid Karzai.

The Zionist neo-cons in Washington were on a roll, “regime change” was the name of the game, and they were about to aim that exuberance and momentum at another target. But for the purpose to hit home, some points still needed to be made at home.

So Iraqi President Saddam Hussein was to be the new Hitler, he trashed his country’s wealth on costly palaces, he killed many people (decades ago), and he endangered the world or at least Israel with many nasty ABC (atomic, biological, chemical) weapons.

The problem was getting enough voters in the US and the general public in ally countries to go along with the idea. Bush and his British counterpart Tony Blair then decided the latter reason was the most persuasive: that Saddam had dangerous “weapons of mass destruction” (WMDs).

This was despite UN weapons inspectors having found no Iraqi WMDs, a recent major feature in Newsweek magazine coming round to the same conclusion, and the story about secret sourcing of radioactive material for a bomb discovered as fake. What mattered more instrumentally, however, was whether the UN Security Council could be massaged into endorsing a US invasion of Iraq.

It could, China’s abstention notwithstanding. As plans for an invasion of Iraq were being drafted, the US public also needed convincing.

So there was the ruse that Saddam was linked to al-Qaeda, and al-Qaeda was responsible for all the nasty things. Meanwhile Osama, having found that such issues could really rile the world’s sole superpower, “admitted” that he was responsible for the policy panic in Washington.

Thus Saddam was eliminated and replaced by a US ally, although the vast quantities of high-grade Iraqi oil seemed more elusive. But the violence and instability in Iraq also meant China could not access the oil either.

Still, the casualty rates in terms of human lives, economic cost and national destruction and degradation continue to mount. Ten years on and with the follies rather more exposed, senior US and British officials have queued to disown any responsibility for the continuing debacle.

Errors of judgment

Early this month, former head of British intelligence service MI5, Lady Eliza Manningham-Buller, gave a BBC lecture to enumerate the multiple errors of judgment across the Atlantic at the time. Critics replied that she should have said so then, since it is now too late.

Former British foreign minister Jack Straw pleaded innocence through ignorance, saying that the Blair government at the time had been misinformed by allies, including the US. As justice minister later, Straw refused to apologise personally to an Algerian pilot whose career was ruined after Straw wrongly accused him of training a Sept 11 hijacker.

Former US vice-president Dick Cheney also released a biography focusing on that period, typically accusing others who disagreed with him at the time. Former US secretary of state and chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, Gen Colin Powell swiftly blasted him for the effort.

Powell was followed by former US secretary of state and national security adviser Dr Condoleezza Rice, who also found Cheney small-minded and mistaken. Rice should be replying more fully in her own biography later this year, so her critics should in turn be prepared.

However, the whole point of being honest, truthful and accurate should be to acknowledge past mistakes and avoid new ones. With the military occupation of Afghanistan now set to extend beyond the promised deadline, and new occupations likely in Libya if not also Syria, avoiding mistakes is not going to be easy or even possible.

Tuesday 26 July 2011

The world is run by Tiger Wives, Tiger Moms





The world is run by Tiger Wives

Wendi Deng is not alone in lashing out when her spouse is under fire.

Wendi Deng Murdoch, Cherie Blair and Melania Trump are formidable in defence of their husbands-The world is run by Tiger Wives
Wendi Deng Murdoch, Cherie Blair and Melania Trump are formidable in defence of their husbands Photo: REX FEATURES/GETTY,By Cristina Odone

The hearings were beginning to pall. What had started as the trial of the media’s biggest mogul was settling into the siesta of the patriarch: Rupert Murdoch seemed to be talking in his sleep, while James Murdoch fanned away the MPs’ annoying questions, lest they disturb Dad.

Viewers longing for drama felt short-changed. None of the lawmakers had laid a glove on the media mogul. And then – splat! – the (slapstick) comedian Jonathan May-Bowles threw a “pie” of shaving foam at Murdoch Senior and unleashed the Tiger Wife.

In an instant, Wendi Deng, Murdoch’s Chinese-American spouse, leapt to her feet and sprang past bystanders to pummel her husband’s assailant. MPs, Murdochs and media types could only gape, electrified as proceedings fast-forwarded from Perry Mason to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

By the time Rupert Murdoch’s bodyguard had reached his master, the 42-year-old Wendi had landed a sensational right-hook on her opponent.

She then gained her husband’s side, and gently cleaned his face of foam. Within minutes, Deng was the toast of Twitter: hailed as a “smack-down sister” in her native China, and as a heroine and stunning show-stopper everywhere else.

Those who know Wendi well (and they include Tony Blair, Mark Zuckerman and Bono) won’t have batted an eyelid at her jaw-dropping performance. Rupert Murdoch’s third wife has form.

A volleyball player from southern China doesn’t climb to the top (Murdoch’s personal fortune remains a healthy $340 million) without fierce determination. Other people on Wendi’s ascent have already experienced her fury.

The first victim was Joyce Cherry, a pleasant American who, together with husband Jake, befriended Wendi during their trip to China. Impressed by the teenager’s brilliance and thirst for self-improvement, Joyce and Jake sponsored Wendi’s application for a student visa to America. Alas, 19-year-old Wendi soon bewitched Jake, who left poor old Joyce to marry their young protégée.

Victim number two was Jake himself: his usefulness came to an end a few months later when Wendi, now armed with the right papers, won a place to study business at Yale University.



Days from graduation, Wendi had a job at the Murdoch-owned Star TV, where she quickly caught the Big Boss’s eye. Hence the third corpse in the trail to marry Murdoch: Rupert’s second wife, Anna.

Within 17 days of his divorce, Wendi wed Rupert. If the Wendi house conceals a few skeletons, it also offers glimpses of her protective instincts.

Conscious of the 38-year gap between them, Wendi has placed Rupert on a tough regime of 6am weightlifting, washed down by a fruit and soy protein cocktail. She wags her finger at his workaholic schedule and has hired a personal trainer to put him through his paces (even at the price of her husband turning up on front pages in baseball cap and tracksuit).

None of this marital nurturing distracts Wendi from pursuing her own agenda: she has just released a film, Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, that aims to promote a more positive image of China.

She enjoys a glittering social life, attending film premieres and art gallery openings. And she remains her husband’s chief adviser on his business in China.

Yet Wendi the film producer, like Wendi the business consultant or Wendi the mother of Rupert’s young daughters Chloe and Grace, has failed to fire our imagination. But Wendi Deng, invincible Tiger Wife, has transformed Rupert Murdoch’s image around the globe – from dodderer in the dock to prized partner in his wife’s life.

In a culture that mourns marriage as a moribund institution, one spouse leaping passionately to the other’s defence fills us with admiration. Even the most hardened cynics couldn’t help thinking, as the warrior in a pink blazer bounced into the ring: “Wow, she really believes in this union!”

Wendi Deng’s slap didn’t just scotch rumours that hers was a sham marriage: a purely trophy wife would have winked at the assailant for giving the old man a heart-stopping scare. With a quick right hook, she jumped to the head of the queue of the defenders of matrimony. It is a short but colourful roll-call that stretches from Cherie Blair, to Anne Sinclair (aka Mme Strauss Khan), Melania Trump and Carla Bruni-Sarkozy.

From the moment she moved into No 10, Cherie Blair was under constant attack for her (supposed) greed, stinginess, and self-importance. She let the criticisms bounce off her like spring rain. But let anyone touch her Tony, and Mrs Blair roared. She hissed at the ungrateful electorate that did not deserve a paragon of virtue like her husband; she gnashed her teeth at the sleazy media that insinuated Tony was a disappointment.

Her manner resembled the termagant’s fury rather than the bride’s solicitude, but no one could doubt Cherie’s heartfelt loyalty. It won her few fans: among the cheats and cuckolds of Westminster, the sight of a prime minister’s wife defending her husband was unusual; it also reassured voters that despite new Labour’s destruction of cherished institutions from the House of Lords to foxhunting, marriage would remain intact.

Far more testing has been Anne Sinclair’s lot. When her charismatic husband Dominique Strauss-Kahn was arrested on rape charges in New York, the French TV journalist sprang to his defence: “I do not believe for a single second the accusations levelled against my husband.” She flew to stand by her man and stumped up the $1 million bail to move him from prison to his plush Manhattan apartment.

Such wifely devotion may yet save the former IMF chief’s political career: his wife’s total support, as much as the derailing of the case against him, may prove a great boost to DSK’s credibility as a presidential candidate.

Her counterpart in the French presidential contest, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, also wants to show the world that she looks out for her husband’s interests. The First Lady of France, pregnant but still displaying every sign of focus and competitiveness, has imposed a culture vulture’s menu on her philistine hubby: he is to watch films by Alfred Hitchcock, as well as Russia’s Andrei Tarkovsky; and read the French classics, from Balzac to Hugo.

Driving this self-improvement, say insiders at the Elysée Palace, is Carla’s ambition: she wants her man to be re-elected, and fears his present lowbrow image won’t do.

Nor should we forget Melania Trump, fearlessly vocal in her millionaire husband’s defence: Donald Trump is “brilliant”, everyone is envious of his success, and America should be so lucky to have him as their Republican Party candidate.

But Mrs T also gives us a revealing insight into their marriage when she confides that she has two children: “I have a big boy, Donald, and a little boy, Barron. I take care of both very well.”

Tiger Wife often needs to play Tiger Mother, it would seem.

The Tiger Wives’ Club is small but perfectly informed: these women know that their husbands need their commitment and support. In her eagerness to make her man shine, the Tiger Wife will disarm any assailant. She knows that her spouse is less than he seems; and that she, in fact, is rather more. She’s plucky; he’s lucky.

Source: The Daily Telegraph