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Larry Keiler

CIP Americas Program | Massacre in the Amazon: The U.S.-Peru Free Trade Agreement Spark... - 0 views

  • The FTA with the United States was negotiated beginning in May of 2004 under the government of Alejandro Toledo (2000-2005). The treaty was slated to replace the Andean Trade Promotion and Drug Eradication Act signed in 2002 and in effect until December of 2006. The FTA eliminated obstacles to trade and facilitated access to goods and services and investment flows. Modeled on the North American free Trade Agreement, it also includes a broad range of issues linked to intellectual property, public contracting and services, and dispute resolution.5
Pedro Gonçalves

Millionaire Mullahs - Forbes.com - 0 views

  • As minister of the Revolutionary Guards in the 1980s, Rafiqdoost played a key role in sponsoring Hezbollah in Lebanon--which kidnapped foreigners, hijacked airplanes, set off car bombs, trafficked in heroin and pioneered the use of suicide bombers. According to Gregory Sullivan, spokesman for the Near Eastern Affairs Bureau at the U.S. State Department, the foundations are the perfect vehicles to carry out Iran's shadow foreign policy. (One of them offered the $2.8 million bounty to anyone who carried out Ayatollah Khomeini's fatwa to kill British author Salman Rushdie.)
  • The largest "charity" (at least in terms of real estate holdings) is the centuries-old Razavi Foundation, charged with caring for Iran's most revered shrine--the tomb of Reza, the Eighth Shiite Imam, in the northern city of Mashhad. It is run by one of Iran's leading hard-line mullahs, Ayatollah Vaez-Tabasi, who prefers to stay out of the public eye but emerges occasionally to urge death to apostates and other opponents of the clerical regime.
  • The Razavi Foundation owns vast tracts of urban real estate all across Iran, as well as hotels, factories, farms and quarries. Its assets are impossible to value with any precision, since the foundation has never released an inventory of its holdings, but Iranian economists speak of a net asset value of $15 billion or more. The foundation also receives generous contributions from the millions of pilgrims who visit the Mashhad shrine each year.
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  • What happens to annual revenues estimated in the hundreds of millions--perhaps billions--of dollars? Not all of it goes to cover the maintenance costs of mosques, cemeteries, religious schools and libraries. Over the past decade the foundation has bought new businesses and properties, established investment banks (together with investors from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates), funded real estate projects and financed big foreign trade deals.
  • The driving force behind the commercialization of the Razavi Foundation is Ayatollah Tabasi's son, Naser, who was put in charge of the Sarakhs Free Trade Zone, on the border with the former Soviet republic of Turkmenistan. In the 1990s the foundation poured hundreds of millions of dollars into this project, funding a rail link between Iran and Turkmenistan, new highways, an international airport, a hotel and office buildings. It even paid $2.3 million to a Swiss firm to erect a huge tent for the ceremonies inaugurating the Iran-Turkmenistan rail link.
  • Then it all went wrong. In July 2001 Naser Tabasi was dismissed as director of the Free Trade Zone. Two months later he was arrested and charged with fraud in connection with a Dubai-based company called Al-Makasib. The details of the case remain murky, but four months ago the General Court of Tehran concluded that Naser Tabasi had not known that he was breaking the law and acquitted him.
Pedro Gonçalves

Let Russia Join the WTO -- By Anders Åslund and C. Fred Bergsten | Foreign Po... - 0 views

  • It's true that Russia needs the WTO less than many other countries, since it largely exports commodities that enjoy free-market access in any case. Yet Russia's potential gains from WTO accession have been assessed at 3.3 percent of GDP a year, a major jump for the economy. The main benefits would arise from freer trade of services and foreign direct investment.
  • (Russia's main gains from WTO accession will not be from enhanced market access, although Russian steel and chemicals exports will benefit. Instead, the greatest economic benefits are anticipated on the domestic market for services and greater attraction of foreign direct investment -- leading to improved competition at home.)
  • The United States still maintains the Jackson-Vanik Amendment, adopted in 1974 denying favorable trade status to Russia, citing its restrictions on the free emigration of Jews from the Soviet Union. The law, a relic of the Cold War, has no practical effect but is a serious irritant in relations between the two countries. And as a practical matter, if Jackson-Vanik remains in force, Russia would simply not apply WTO rules to the United States, perpetuating trade discrimination against American companies. Hence the amendment should be scrapped immediately after Russia joins.
Pedro Gonçalves

Millionaire Mullahs - Forbes.com - 0 views

  • The 1979 revolution transformed the Rafsanjani clan into commercial pashas. One brother headed the country's largest copper mine; another took control of the state-owned TV network; a brother-in-law became governor of Kerman province, while a cousin runs an outfit that dominates Iran's $400 million pistachio export business; a nephew and one of Rafsanjani's sons took key positions in the Ministry of Oil; another son heads the Tehran Metro construction project (an estimated $700 million spent so far). Today, operating through various foundations and front companies, the family is also believed to control one of Iran's biggest oil engineering companies, a plant assembling Daewoo automobiles, and Iran's best private airline (though the Rafsanjanis insist they do not own these assets).
  • The gossip on the street, going well beyond the observable facts, has the Rafsanjanis stashing billions of dollars in bank accounts in Switzerland and Luxembourg; controlling huge swaths of waterfront in Iran's free economic zones on the Persian Gulf; and owning whole vacation resorts on the idyllic beaches of Dubai, Goa and Thailand.
  • Rafsanjani's youngest son, Yaser, owns a 30-acre horse farm in the super-fashionable Lavasan neighborhood of north Tehran, where land goes for over $4 million an acre. Just where did Yaser get his money? A Belgian-educated businessman, he runs a large export-import firm that includes baby food, bottled water and industrial machinery.
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  • Until a few years ago the simplest way to get rich quick was through foreign-currency trades. Easy, if you could get greenbacks at the subsidized import rate of 1,750 rials to the dollar and resell them at the market rate of 8,000 to the dollar. You needed only the right connections for an import license. "I estimate that, over a period of ten years, Iran lost $3 billion to $5 billion annually from this kind of exchange-rate fraud," says Saeed Laylaz, an economist, now with Iran's biggest carmaker. "And the lion's share of that went to about 50 families."
  • One of the families benefiting from the foreign trade system was the Asgaroladis, an old Jewish clan of bazaar traders, who converted to Islam several generations ago. Asadollah Asgaroladi exports pistachios, cumin, dried fruit, shrimp and caviar, and imports sugar and home appliances; his fortune is estimated by Iranian bankers to be some $400 million. Asgaroladi had a little help from his older brother, Habibollah, who, as minister of commerce in the 1980s, was in charge of distributing lucrative foreign-trade licenses. (He was also a counterparty to commodities trader and then-fugitive Marc Rich, who helped Iran bypass U.S.-backed sanctions.)
Argos Media

BBC NEWS | Europe | Obama promotes nuclear-free world - 0 views

  • Barack Obama has outlined his vision of a world free of nuclear weapons in a major speech in Europe. The US president called for a global summit on nuclear security and the forging of new partnerships to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons. He said he hoped to negotiate a new treaty to end the production of fissile materials for nuclear weapons.
  • Speaking to a 20,000-strong crowd in front of Prague's historic castle, Mr Obama said the US had a moral responsibility to act in ridding the world of nuclear weapons.
  • "The existence of thousands of nuclear weapons is the most dangerous legacy of the Cold War," he said.
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  • He pledged to reduce the US nuclear stockpile, and urged others to do the same. But as long as a nuclear threat existed, the US would retain its nuclear capability, although it would work to reduce its arsenal.
  • He said his administration would work to bring the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) into force in order to achieve a global ban on nuclear testing. The agreement would ban all nuclear explosions for any purpose, but cannot currently come into effect as nuclear powers such as the US and China have not ratified it, and India and Pakistan have not signed it.
  • The most immediate and extreme threat to global security, the president said, was the possibility of terrorists possessing nuclear weapons.
  • "Al-Qaeda has said it seeks a bomb. And that it would have no problem in using it. And we know that there is unsecured nuclear material across the globe." Mr Obama announced a new effort to secure sensitive nuclear material within four years and break down the black market in the trade in illicit weapons.
  • He also said he would negotiate a new strategic arms reduction treaty with Russia by the end of this year. The speech came days after he and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev - meeting on the sidelines of the G20 summit in London - agreed to reopen negotiations about reducing nuclear warheads. They aim to produce a new arms control treaty to replace the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (Start) that expires at the end of the year.
  • "As long as the threat from Iran exists, we will go forward with a missile defence system," he said.
Pedro Gonçalves

The European dream is in dire need of a reality check | Simon Jenkins | Comment is free... - 0 views

  • In every one of the big European states, trust has gone into "a vertiginous decline". Five years ago, no country, not even Britain, showed more than half its voters hostile to Europe, and most were strongly supportive. Now, according to the EU's own Eurobarometer, distrust runs at 53% in Italy, 56% in France, 59% in Germany, 69% in the UK and 72% in Spain. The EU has lost the support of two thirds of its citizens. Does it matter?
  • "Anti-Europeanism" was growing across Europe even before the credit crunch – witness the Lisbon treaty referendums. It is reflected in the rise of nationalist parties and is rampant even among such one-time EU loyalists as Spain, Italy, Greece and Germany. As the head of the European Council on Foreign Relations, José Ignacio Torreblanca, said of yesterday's poll, "The damage is so deep that it does not matter whether you come from a creditor or debtor country … citizens now think their national democracy is being subverted."
  • Dreams make dangerous politics, and when they require the imposition of "yet more Europe" against the run of public opinion, they are badly in need of a reality check. The new requirement that the EU (in this case Germany) imposes budgets on indebted states goes far beyond anything domestic voters seem likely to tolerate.Barroso's dream is becoming the vision espoused by the Columbia professor of European history István Deák, who demanded last year in the New York Times "a new imperial construct" as the only alternative to save the continent from a "revival of tribalism". To Deák this new empire was "a sacred task … an almost religious goal: a new European faith that belongs to no church".
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  • Even a majority of Germans are now anti-EU, and a third want the deutschmark back.
  • Cameron and the sceptics therefore need to be constructive to be plausible. They need to argue for a European Bretton Woods, to write off bad debts and recalibrate regional economies by returning to revalued regional currencies. They need to propose European institutions that respect national politics and character, not just grab more power to the centre. There needs to be a sceptics' vision of Europe.Closer European union was an answer to war. After that it offered an answer to communist dictatorship. In both it could claim success. Finally, at Maastricht in 1992, it flew too near the sun. It pretended that one currency traded within a single politico-economic space could overcome economic diversity and yield a common wealth. It overreached itself. In refusing to recognise this failure, Barroso and his colleagues now risk jeopardising even Europe's earlier successes.
Argos Media

Obama will use spring summit to bring Cuba in from the cold | World news | The Observer - 0 views

  • The White House has moved to ease some travel and trade restrictions as a cautious first step towards better ties with Havana, raising hopes of an eventual lifting of the four-decade-old economic embargo.
  • The administration has moved to ease draconian travel controls and lift limits on cash remittances that Cuban-Americans can send to the island, a lifeline for hundreds of thousands of families.
  • The legislation would allow Americans with immediate family in Cuba to visit annually, instead of once every three years, and broaden the definition of immediate family. It would also drop a requirement that Havana pay cash in advance for US food imports.
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  • Brazil's president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, is expected to tell Obama on a White House visit this week that the region views the US embargo as anachronistic and vindictive. Easing it would help mend Washington's strained relations with the "pink tide" of leftist governments.
  • "It would signal new pragmatism, but you would still have the embargo, which is the centrepiece of US policy," said Erikson.
  • Wayne Smith, a former head of the US Interest Section in Havana, famously said Cuba had the same effect on American administrations as the full moon had on werewolves.
  • Recognising Castro continuity, and aghast at European and Asian competitors getting a free hand, US corporate interests are impatient to do business with Cuba. Oil companies want to drill offshore, farmers to export more rice, vegetables and meat, construction firms to build infrastructure projects.
  • Young Cuban exiles in Florida, less radical than their parents, have advocated ending the policy of isolation. As a senator, Obama opposed the embargo, but as a presidential candidate he supported it - and simultaneously promised engagement with Havana.
  • Compared to intractable challenges in Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Middle East, the opportunity for quick progress on Cuba has been called the "low-hanging fruit" of US foreign policy.
Pedro Gonçalves

Europe's Sovereignty Crisis - Joschka Fischer - Project Syndicate - 0 views

  • the EU must combine greater stability, financial transfers, and mutual solidarity if the entire European project is to be prevented from collapsing under the weight of the ongoing sovereign-debt crisis.
  • For a long time, Merkel fought this new EU tooth and nail, because she knows how unpopular it is in Germany – and thus how politically dangerous it is to her electoral prospects. She wanted to defend the euro, but not to pay the price for doing so. That dream is at an end, thanks to the financial markets.
  • The markets issued an ultimatum to Europe: either embrace more economic and financial integration on a federal basis, or face the collapse of the euro and thus the EU, including the Common Market. At the last moment, Merkel chose the sensible option.
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  • Other crisis countries in the eurozone have not been stabilized, because Germany – fearing a domestic political backlash – has not dared to embrace a community of liability by issuing Eurobonds, even if the European Financial Stability Facility’s new role means that virtually 90% of the path has already been traveled
  • The agreement at the most recent European Council will be more expensive, both politically and financially. Despite doubling financial aid and lowering interest rates, the agreement will neither end the Greek debt crisis and that of other countries on the European periphery, nor stop the EU’s associated existential crisis. It will only buy time – and at a high cost. Further aid packages for Greece may seem impossible to avoid, because the losses imposed on Greek debt holders have been too modest.
  • Had the European Council’s heads of state and government taken this foreseeable decision a year ago, the euro crisis would not have escalated to the extent that it has, the total bill would have been lower, and European leaders would have been rightly praised for a historic feat.
  • the bail-in of private investors, much applauded in Germany, is of secondary importance, and is intended only for the German public and the MPs of the country’s government coalition; indeed, upon close inspection, it turns out that banks and insurance companies have made a decent profit. Their losses will remain minimal.
  • the single currency’s collapse was avoided, and French President Nicolas Sarkozy was right to laud the establishment of a “European Monetary Fund” as a real achievement. But this bold move has huge political consequences that have to be explained to the public, because the move toward establishing such a fund – and, with it, a European economic government – amounts to an EU political revolution in three acts.
  • the two-speed Union, which has been a reality since the first rounds of enlargement, will divide into a vanguard (euro group) and a rearguard (the rest of the 27 EU members). This formalized division will fundamentally change the EU’s internal architecture. Under the umbrella of the enlarged EU, the old dividing lines between a German/French-led European Economic Community and a British/Scandinavian-led European Free Trade Association re-emerge. From now on, the euro states will determine the EU’s fate more than ever, owing to their common interests.
  • this jump into a monetary fund and economic government will lead to further massive losses of sovereignty for the member states, in favor of a European federal solution. For example, within the monetary union, national budget laws will be subject to a European supervisory body.
  • If the euro is to survive, genuine integration, with further transfers of sovereignty to the European level, will be unavoidable. This historic step cannot be taken through the bureaucratic backdoor, but only in the bright light of democratic politics. The EU’s further federalization enforces its further democratization.
Pedro Gonçalves

Monetary union, always unworkable, has set in train a European disaster | Simon Jenkins... - 0 views

  • Only a fool could want Europe to return to the divisive feuds and nationalist horrors of the 19th and early-20th centuries. Any student of the Balkans knows that such horrors are never far below the surface. But a monetary union that denies nations the freedom to breathe and adjust their economies in their own way over time runs just this risk of regressive reaction.Each step towards "ever-closer union" has brought reaction nearer
  • The Greeks are rebelling in their humiliation, and the Germans are rebelling in their generosity.
  • The Greeks are rebelling in their humiliation, and the Germans are rebelling in their generosity.
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  • Across Europe the old pro-EU consensus is evaporating.
  • The latest Euro-barometer of public opinion shows for the first time that overall distrust of the EU outstrips trust, predominantly so in Britain, Germany and France. Polls show ever fewer countries regarding membership as a good thing, with opposition strongest the farther north we go. It is ominous that the politics of euroscepticism is fusing along old historical lines. When the EU was a sound trading union it was backed in Protestant northern Europe. As it slid into institutional orthodoxy and heavy cross-border transfers, its appeal shifted to the Counter-Reformation south. The high-flown language of Valéry Giscard d'Estaing's first draft of the Lisbon treaty was that of a papal encyclical.
  • The attempt to impose fiscal union on all Europe will bring its demise.
Argos Media

EU seeks greater links with ex-Soviet states - The Irish Times - Fri, May 08, 2009 - 0 views

  • THE EU has invited six former Soviet republics to join an eastern partnership initiative promising closer ties amid growing fears of serious economic and political upheaval in the region.
  • At a summit yesterday, the union offered the prospect of free trade, additional economic aid, a gradual relaxation in visa restrictions and integration into the European single market. But the initiative stops short of offering the prospect of future EU membership to any of the participants and commits them to respect human rights and democracy.
  • “If we don’t export stability to this region, we will import instability,” said Swedish prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt who, along with Polish prime minister Donald Tusk, co-developed the eastern partnership plan in an attempt to stabilise eastern Europe.
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  • Ukraine, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and the 27 EU states signed up to a declaration promising a “more ambitious partnership”. The EU is also planning to boost the amount of aid it provides to the region to about €600 billion and provide technical assistance to the six states.
  • Moscow rejects European accusations of meddling in the region and Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov criticised the proposed partnership when he met his European counterparts, telling them it should “not get in the way of the post-Soviet era”.
  • EU diplomats attempted to soothe Russian concerns to prevent tensions between Nato and Russia worsening. “This is not anti-Russian,” said Czech deputy prime minister Alexandr Vondra, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency. “They are our close eastern neighbours and we have a vital interest in their stability and prosperity. This is an offer, not an EU projection of force.”
  • However, the commitment of EU states to the eastern partnership initiative came under question, with several high-profile EU leaders staying away. British prime minister Gordon Brown, French prime minister Nicolas Sarkozy, Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi and Spanish prime minister José Luís Zapatero did not attend.
  • Polish hopes that the partnership may be used to give countries such as Ukraine the chance to apply for EU membership face opposition from Germany and the Netherlands. Diplomats from both states insisted on watering down the declaration, which initially referred to the states as “European countries”. Instead, they were described as “partners” and promises of fast-track visa liberalisation were deleted.
Argos Media

EU pact challenges Russian influence in the east | World news | The Guardian - 0 views

  • A summit of 33 countries in Prague brought the EU's 27 governments together for the first time with the leaders of the post-Soviet countries of Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Belarus to inaugurate the so-called "Eastern Partnership".
  • The attempt to ringfence Russia's clout in a region that Moscow views proprietorially as its "near abroad" has been triggered by the destabilising events of the past nine months, notably Russia's invasion of Georgia last August and its gas war with Ukraine in January."This is only happening because Russia has annoyed everyone," said Michael Emerson, a Brussels analyst and former European Commission chief in Moscow.
  • Yesterday's summit also coincided with a fresh bout of worsening tension, with Russia and the west engaged in tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats and spies over the past week, Moscow raging at Nato military exercises in Georgia starting this week and the west incensed at Russian assertion of border controls in Georgia's two breakaway regions.
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  • Senior Czech officials organising yesterday's summit openly acknowledged that the eastern partnership was aimed at countering Russia's influence in its backyard."Foreign policy is always about the projection of interests," said Alexandr Vondra, the outgoing Czech deputy prime minister. "You can project your interests, but you must give the respective countries the freedom to make choices."
  • The policy launched yesterday breaks new ground by seeking to entice the authoritarian regime of Alexander Lukashenko in Belarus. The instability in Georgia, the recent unrest in Moldova, and the permanent feuding among Ukraine's political elites all point to the formidable challenges for a policy that the European Commission describes as "a strategic imperative".
  • The new policy treats the six countries as a regional bloc, aiming to establish free trade areas between them and the EU, to tap their energy resources, and to promote human rights and democracy-building projects. But while the initiative is aimed at bringing the six countries in, it is also intended to keep them out. The declaration adopted yesterday was changed to call the six countries "east Europeans" rather than "Europeans" lest the latter description encourage applications to join the EU, as pushed by Ukraine and Georgia and opposed by western Europe.Eastern clamour for visa liberalisation to make it easier to travel to the EU was also blocked, with the issue parked for the long-term.
Pedro Gonçalves

Barack Obama pleads with Congress to pass historic climate change bill | Environment | ... - 0 views

  • Democrats in Congress are poised to vote through a sweeping energy and climate change bill tomorrow that could deliver on one of Barack Obama's signature election promises and galvanise international efforts to agree action on global warming.The vote, which for the first time could see the US commit itself to cutting back the carbon emissions that cause climate change, prompted a frenzied last-minute PR offensive, with Obama making his third appeal in 48 hours for Congress to act on energy reform.
  • Passage of the bill, which would reduce US greenhouse gas emissions by 17% from 2005 levels by 2020 and offer incentives for energy efficiency and the development of clean energy technology
  • The bill sets less aggressive targets on reducing emissions than the EU has pledged, and is more generous to polluting industries than Obama had wanted
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  • The interventions from Obama capped an intensive lobbying effort for the bill by the White House and administration officials, Al Gore, and a broad coalition of environmental and business groups. The run-up had seen America's oil, gas and coal industry increase its lobbying budget by 50% in the first three months of the year to try to kill the bill. The spoiler campaign has run to hundreds of millions of dollars and involves industry front groups, lobbying firms, television, print and radio advertising, and donations to pivotal members of Congress.
  • The bill, now swollen to about 1,200 pages, would bind the US to reduce the carbon emissions from burning oil and coal by 17% from 2005 levels by 2020 and more than 80% by 2050.
  • t envisages measures to promote clean energy – from a development bank for new technology to new, greener building codes and targets for expanding the use of solar and wind power.
  • After the reduction of the original ­emissions-cut target to 17% and the granting of far more free pollution permits for the cap-and-trade scheme than originally envisioned, the most significant concessions include how farmers are rewarded for practices that reduce carbon ­emissions, and a four-year delay in new regulations that would have cut the profits of corn-based ethanol and encouraged the ­development of non-food biofuels instead.
Pedro Gonçalves

The Eternal Candidate: Turkey Bets on Regional Influence as EU Hopes Fade - SPIEGEL ONL... - 0 views

  • The Turks, who always used to complain to their Western allies about their rough neighborhood, apparently no longer have any enemies in the east. Turkey's old rival Russia has since become its most important energy and trading partner. Syria and Iraq, two countries with which Ankara has in the past been on the brink of war, are now friends of Turkey, and relations are even improving with Armenia. The Arabs, who never truly took to the successors of the Ottomans, now look with admiration to what they call the "Turkish model," a dynamic, open country that has a better handle on its problems than they do.
  • When Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan assumed office in 2003, he planned to lead Turkey into the European Union. But Europe was unmoved by this vision, and it has also lost much of its appeal within Turkey. According to Germany's Friedrich Ebert Foundation, a think tank linked to the center-left Social Democratic Party, as the Europeans have become weary of expansion, Turkey has lost interest in joining the EU. Indeed, what Erdogan meant when he spoke of Turkey's "alternative" to becoming an EU member is becoming increasingly clear.
  • Critics and supporters alike describe this new course as "neo-Ottomanism." Ankara remains formally committed to its European ambitions. However, frustrated by the open rejection with which it has long been met in Paris, Vienna and Berlin, and which it has been facing once again during the EU election campaign, Turkey is focusing increasingly on its role as a peacekeeping power in a region it either ruled or dominated for centuries.
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  • The Turkish press touts Davutoglu as "Turkey's Kissinger," and even Erdogan and Gül refer to him as "hoca" ("venerable teacher"). The country's foreign policy increasingly bears his signature. For example, at his suggestion, Turkish diplomats revived talks between Syria and Israel that had been discontinued in 2000, leading to secret peace talks that began in Istanbul in 2004. However, the talks were temporarily suspended in late 2008 because of parliamentary elections in Israel and the Gaza offensive.
  • Davutoglu is convinced that Ankara must be on good terms with all its neighbors, and it cannot fear contact with the countries and organizations branded as pariahs by the West, namely Syria, Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah. He believes that Turkey should have no qualms about acknowledging its Ottoman past -- in other words, it should become a respected regional power throughout the territory once ruled by the Ottoman Empire (see graphic).
  • Davutoglu, like President Gül, is from Central Anatolia and a member of a new elite influenced by Islamic thought. He completed his secondary-school education at a German overseas school, learned Arabic and taught at an Islamic university in Malaysia. He believes that a one-sided Western orientation is unhealthy for a country like Turkey.
  • The Turks say that they achieved more during the Gaza conflict than Middle East veterans like Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, arguing that Hamas's willingness to accept Israel's ceasefire offer was attributable to Ankara's intervention. They also say that the fact that Erdogan angrily broke off a discussion with Israeli President Shimon Peres at the World Economic Summit in Davos cemented his reputation in the Islamic world as a friend of the Palestinians. When street fighting erupted in Lebanon between supporters of the pro-Western government and of Hezbollah in May 2008, Erdogan intervened as a mediator.
  • Ankara is also seeking to reduce tensions in the Caucasus region, where the Turks have often acted against Russia, prompting Moscow to accuse Turkey of being sympathetic to the Chechen cause. After the war in Georgia last summer, the Erdogan government brought together officials from Tbilisi and Moscow. Turkey and Armenia are now seeking to overcome long-standing hostility by establishing diplomatic relations and reopening their shared border.
  • Off the Horn of Africa, the US Fifth Fleet turned over the leadership of Combined Task Force 151, which is responsible for combating piracy in the Gulf of Aden and off the coast of Somalia, to the Turkish navy. At the same time, a man paid an official visit to Ankara who had not appeared in public since 2007: Iraqi Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr, the head of the notorious Mahdi Army militia. Davutoglu had sent a private jet to bring him to Turkey from his exile in Iran.
  • Critics like political scientist Soner Cagaptay describe Ankara's foreign policy as "pro-Arab Islamist." In a recent op-ed for the Turkish daily Hurriyet, Cagaptay argued that Turkish diplomats, who had once "looked to Europe, particularly France, for political inspiration" have now fallen for the Arab world, and generally for Islamists
  • Diplomats like Hakki Akil, the Turkish ambassador in Abu Dhabi, disagree. According to Akil, Turkey has acquired "soft power" by expanding its sphere of influence from the Balkans to Afghanistan, transporting Russian, Caspian Sea and Iranian oil and gas to the West, and building housing and airports in Kurdish northern Iraq. Europe, says Akil, ought to be pleased with Ankara's course. As Akil's boss Davutoglu said in Brussels, political stability, a secure energy corridor and a strong partner on its southeastern flank are all "in the fundamental interest of the EU."
  • According to a recent internal European Commission report, Turkey has made "only limited progress." Some EU countries have already abandoned the idea of accepting Turkey into their midst. In Bavaria, conservative Christian Social Union campaigners promote a message of "No to Turkey" as they make the rounds of beer tents. At a televised campaign appearance in Berlin, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy made their opposition to EU membership for Turkey clear.
  • Ironically, Turkey's strategic importance for Europe "is even greater today than in the days of the Cold War," says Elmar Brok, a German member of the European Parliament for the conservative Christian Democratic Union who specializes in foreign policy issues. And then there is the paradox of the fact that the more intensively Turkey, out of frustration with Europe, engages with its eastern neighbors, the more valuable it becomes to the West. According to Brok, the West must "do everything possible to keep Ankara on board."
  • Brok and other members of the European Parliament envision making so-called "privileged partner" status palatable to Turkey. It would enable Turkey to have a similar relationship to the EU as Norway does today and to enjoy many of the benefits of EU membership, including access to the European single market, visa-free travel, police cooperation and joint research programs. But it would not, however, become a member.
Argos Media

Fears of EU split as 'last dictator' of Belarus is invited to summit | World news | The... - 0 views

  • An attempt by Europe to bring its "last dictator" in from the cold by inviting Alexander Lukashenko, the Belarussian president, to a summit of 27 EU government leaders could backfire by aggravating EU divisions, it was feared yesterday.Many European leaders are hoping that Lukashenko - who has been in power for 15 years, has been blacklisted by Brussels on account of his authoritarian rule and was until recently subject to a travel ban - will not take up the invitation to the Prague summit on 7 May.
  • The summit is to launch the EU's new "eastern partnership" policy with six former Soviet bloc states, aimed at increasing Brussels' clout in the region at the expense of Moscow's.
  • Lukashenko, head of the most isolated state in Europe, has been invited together with the leaders of Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Moldova. The Czech foreign minister, Karel Schwarzenberg, delivered the invitation in person to Belarus's president in Minsk on Friday.
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  • n European capitals elaborate plans are already being hatched to try to avoid being spotted shaking hands or being photographed with the leader the US state department has dubbed Europe's last dictator and whose ubiquitous security service still proudly calls itself the KGB.
  • The policy being launched in Prague is an attempt to use trade, travel and aid to forge greater integration between the EU and the former Soviet bloc states, while at the same time aiming to fob off the clamour from countries such as Ukraine and Georgia for full EU membership and seeking to counter Russian influence in what the Kremlin calls its "near abroad".
  • Lukashenko and dozens of regime cronies were placed on an EU travel blacklist for rigging elections in 2006, but the entry ban was suspended for the second time last month, meaning that he is free to take up the invitation to Prague.
  • The Dutch and the Swedes have been the biggest opponents of inviting Lukashenko, while the Germans, Poles and Italians have been strongest in arguing for engaging Minsk. Lukashenko will score a new coup later this month by exploiting the lifting of the travel ban and going to Rome, where he is to be received by the Pope.
  • "My understanding is he's not going to come to the summit," said the Brussels diplomat, reflecting the widespread wish that Lukashenko stay away to avoid embarrassment for all."Let's hope the question will not arise. We don't like what we see in Belarus," said the ambassador. Another west European diplomat did not rule out some boycotts of the Prague summit if the Belarus leader confirms his attendance.
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Obama Calls for Thaw in U.S. Relations With Cuba - NYTimes.com - 0 views

  • President Obama, seeking to thaw long-frozen relations with Cuba, told a gathering of Western Hemisphere leaders on Friday that “the United States seeks a new beginning with Cuba,” and that he was willing to have his administration engage the Castro government on a wide array of issues.
  • in another twist, Cuba’s strongest ally at the summit, President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, no fan of the United States, was photographed at the meeting giving Mr. Obama a hearty handclasp and a broad smile.
  • Cuba is not on the official agenda here; indeed, Cuba, which has been barred from the Organization of American States since 1962, is not even on the guest list. But leaders in the hemisphere have spent months planning to make Cuba an issue here.
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  • This week, the president opened the door to the discussions by abandoning longstanding restrictions on the ability of Cuban-Americans to travel freely to the island and send money to relatives there.
  • “I know there is a longer journey that must be traveled in overcoming decades of mistrust, but there are critical steps we can take toward a new day,” Mr. Obama said, adding that he was “prepared to have my administration engage with the Cuban government on a wide range of issues — from human rights, free speech, and democratic reform to drugs, migration, and economic issues.”
  • He said the United States needed to acknowledge long-held suspicions that it has interfered in the affairs of other countries. But, departing from his prepared text, he also said the region’s countries needed to cease their own historic demonization of the United States for everything from economic crises to drug violence.“That also means we can’t blame the United States for every problem that arises in the hemisphere,” he said. “That’s part of the bargain. That’s the old way, and we need a new way.”
  • On Cuba, the president’s words were as notable for what he said as for what he did not say. He did not scold or berate the Cuban government for holding political prisoners, as his predecessor, George W. Bush, often did.
  • But he also did not say that he was willing to support Cuba’s membership in the Organization of American States, or lift the 47-year-old trade embargo against Cuba, as some hemisphere leaders here want him to do.
  • “Let me be clear,” he said. “I am not interested in talking for the sake of talking. But I do believe we can move U.S.-Cuban relations in a new direction.”
  • The new tone from Washington drew warm praise from leaders like President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner of Argentina and President Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua. Mr. Ortega, who said he felt ashamed that he was participating in the summit meeting without the presence of Cuba, evoked images of the collapse of the Berlin Wall, saying, “I am convinced that wall will collapse, will come down.”
  • Mrs. Kirchner praised Mr. Obama for “what you did to stabilize the relationship from the absurd restrictions imposed by the Bush administration,” adding: “We sincerely believe that we in the Americas have a second opportunity to construct a new relationship. Don’t let it slip away.”
  • Mr. Obama’s speech on Friday night was only the latest in a string of overtures between the countries. On Thursday, Raúl Castro, Cuba’s president, used unusually conciliatory language in describing the Obama administration’s decision to lift restrictions on family travel and remittances.
  • “We are willing to discuss everything, human rights, freedom of press, political prisoners, everything, everything, everything they want to talk about, but as equals, without the smallest shadow cast on our sovereignty, and without the slightest violation of the Cuban people’s right to self-determination,” Mr. Castro said in Venezuela during a meeting of leftist governments meant as a counterpoint to this weekend’s summit meeting in Trinidad and Tobago.
  • On Friday, Mrs. Clinton responded, saying, “We welcome his comments, the overture that they represent, and we’re taking a very serious look at how we intend to respond.”
  • Earlier this week Brazilian officials signaled in Rio de Janeiro that President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, potentially flanked by the Colombian president, Álvaro Uribe, would raise the issue of accepting Cuba into the Organization of American States at the summit meeting. Cuba’s “absence is an anomaly and he is waiting for this situation to be corrected,” Marco Aurélio García, Mr. da Silva’s foreign policy adviser, told reporters.
  • On Friday, the secretary general of the O.A.S., José Miguel Insulza, said he would call for Cuba to be readmitted. And Mr. Chávez recently said he would refuse to sign the official declaration produced at the summit meeting because Cuba was not invited.
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