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Pedro Gonçalves

BBC NEWS | Americas | US offers migration talks to Cuba - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8064783.stm

US Cuba

shared by Pedro Gonçalves on 23 May 09 - Cached
  • Washington has offered to resume talks on legal immigration by Cubans to the US, the US state department says.It says the move aims to "reaffirm both sides' commitment to safe, legal and orderly migration". The talks were halted in 2003 after Havana refused to give exit permits to people who had been granted US visas.
  • In March, President Barack Obama eased restrictions on visits to the Communist island by Cuban-Americans and allowed them to send money home more easily. Curbs on sending medicines and food were also eased. The legislation overturned rules imposed by the Bush administration which had limited travel to just two weeks every three years and had confined visits to immediate family members.
Pedro Gonçalves

Africa's arc of instability has myriad causes | Observer editorial | Comment is free | ... - 0 views

www.guardian.co.uk/...-mali-algeria-western-response

Mali Africa

shared by Pedro Gonçalves on 20 Jan 13 - No Cached
  • Mali, little known or not, now belongs inside the arc of instability that was once defined as stretching from Afghanistan, in the days when the Taliban took charge, through Pakistan to the Middle East and the Horn of Africa via Iraq and Yemen. Now the arc is rapidly extending westwards beyond the Arab lands to Nigeria, west Africa and the Atlantic seaboard. The common denominators are poverty, underdevelopment, illiteracy, mass youth unemployment, misgovernance, authoritarianism, corruption, suppression of women's rights and of human and civil rights in general. All this and western political and commercial meddling, too.
  • Despite all this disassociation, despite the looking the other way and the simplistic analysis pitting cut-throat, dynamite-wielding Islamist killers against innocents abroad, this bigger story in which Mali's plight is now entangled ultimately involves us all, more intimately and continuously than could any random threat of a terror bomb in Paris or London. A major shift in perception and in action is required. Otherwise, be it indirectly through mass migration, people trafficking, arms and drugs smuggling, epidemic disease, the pernicious poison of official corruption and abuse; or directly through resulting, premeditated ethnic and sectarian, religion-based violence, the nonchalant, unthinking condemnation of a vast swath of humanity to impoverishment, physical, material and spiritual, will inevitably return to haunt the more fortunate peoples of the west.
Pedro Gonçalves

BBC NEWS | UK | MI6 boss in Facebook entry row - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...8134807.stm

MI6 John Sawers Facebook

shared by Pedro Gonçalves on 05 Jul 09 - Cached
  • Personal details about the life of the next head of MI6, Sir John Sawers, have been removed from social networking site Facebook amid security concerns. The Mail on Sunday said his wife put details about their children and the location of their flat on the site. The details were removed after the paper contacted the Foreign Office.
  • Foreign Secretary David Miliband told the BBC's Andrew Marr programme: "Are you leading the news with that? The fact that there's a picture that the head of the MI6 goes swimming - wow, that really is exciting. "It is not a state secret that he wears Speedo swimming trunks, for goodness sake let's grow up.
  • Sir John is due to replace Sir John Scarlett as head of the overseas Secret Intelligence Service (MI6). He has been the UK's Permanent Representative to the UN since 2007. Before that he was political director at the Foreign Office, an envoy in Baghdad and a foreign affairs adviser to former Prime Minister Tony Blair. He was in that post from 1999 to 2001 and was involved in the Kosovo conflict and Northern Ireland peace process. Elsewhere overseas he worked in the British embassy in Washington, as an ambassador in Cairo and to South Africa from 1988 and 1991 when apartheid was ending. Bookmark with: Delicious Digg reddit Facebook StumbleUpon What are these? E-mail this to a friend Printable version Print Sponsor BBC.adverts.write("storyprintsponsorship"); BBC.adverts.show("storyprintsponsorship"); bbc_adsense_slot = "adsense_middle";"pt" == "us" ? bbc_adsense_country = "pt" : bbc_adsense_country = "rest"; google_protectAndRun("ads_core.google_render_ad", google_handleError, google_render_ad);Ads by GoogleZON TVCABOAdira já ao 3Play ZON TVCABO e veja os seus canais preferidos!www.ZON.pt/Pacotes_ZON3Spanish Lessons For YouStep-By-Step Audio Lessons. Get Them Now! Learn Fast.www.How-To-Speak.com/SpanishUK Embassy Visa ServicesFast track your visa application. Appoint Migration Expert today.migrationexpert.com/UK BBC.adverts.show("adsense_middle"); BBC.adverts.write("mpu");Advertisementhttp://ad.doubleclick.net/adj/bbccom.live.site.news/news_uk_content;sectn=news;ctype=content;news=uk;adsense_middle=adsense_middle;adsense_mpu=adsense_mpu;rsi=J08781_10008;rsi=J08781_10
Pedro Gonçalves

Cuba Agrees to U.S. Talks in New Sign of a Thaw - NYTimes.com - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...01cuba.html

US Cuba Organizaion of American States Hillary Clinton El Salvador

shared by Pedro Gonçalves on 01 Jun 09 - Cached
  • Cuba notified the Obama administration it was ready to resume talks on migration issues and to negotiate direct postal service between the countries for the first time in decades. It also agreed to cooperate with the United States on counterterrorism, drug interdiction and hurricane relief efforts.
  • The decisions, conveyed to the State Department on Saturday in diplomatic notes, represent another step in the gradual unlocking of relations under the Obama administration, after nearly 50 years of a trade embargo that many in the hemisphere say has outlived its usefulness.“Greater connections,” Mrs. Clinton said, “can lead to a better, freer future for the Cuban people. These talks are in the interest of the United States, and they are also in the interest of the Cuban people.”
  • Mrs. Clinton is in El Salvador for the presidential inauguration on Monday of the leftist leader Mauricio Funes. As one of his first acts, Mr. Funes has said he will restore diplomatic relations with Cuba, leaving the United States as the only country in the Americas without such ties.
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  • On Tuesday, Mrs. Clinton plans to attend a meeting in Honduras of the Organization of American States. Members of the group want to make an even clearer break with the past by moving to readmit Cuba, which the organization expelled in 1962, citing its alliance with the Communist bloc. Mrs. Clinton has fended off calls for Cuba to be offered membership until Havana moves to accept the group’s democratic principles. On Sunday, she reiterated that the United States would oppose the efforts of several Latin American countries to immediately reinstate Cuba.“We believe that membership in the O.A.S. comes with responsibility, and that we must all hold each other accountable,” she said. Cuba, for its part, has said it has no interest in returning to an organization that the official newspaper Granma referred to recently as “that decrepit old house of Washington.”
Argos Media

As Jobs Die, Europe's Migrants Head Home - NYTimes.com - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...25migrants.html

Europe Economy Immigration

shared by Argos Media on 25 Apr 09 - Cached
  • Mr. Mituletu, who is planning to return to Romania next month, is one of millions of immigrants from Eastern Europe, Latin America and Africa who have flocked to fast-growing places like Spain, Ireland and Britain in the past decade, drawn by low unemployment and liberal immigration policies.
  • But in a marked sign of how quickly the economies of Western Europe have deteriorated, workers like Mr. Mituletu are now heading home, hoping to find better job prospects, or at least lower costs of living, in their native lands.
  • While unemployment is also rising in the Czech Republic, “it is much easier to be at home with family and with friends and not to have a job,” she said, “than to be here and not to have a job.”
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  • In Spain, where the growth has been the most explosive, the foreign population rose to 5.2 million last year out of a total of 45 million people from 750,000 in 1999, according to the National Statistics Institute. Ireland’s population, now 4.1 million, was also transformed, with the percentage of foreign-born residents rising to 11 percent in 2006 from 7 percent in 2002.
  • Alcalá, a Madrid bedroom community and the birthplace of Miguel de Cervantes, is home to so many Romanian immigrants — 20,000 by some estimates — that Romania’s president, Traian Basescu, campaigned here for parliamentary elections last fall.
  • But signs of the reverse migration of Romanians are already evident. “Slowly, slowly, they’re disappearing,” said Gheorghe Gainar, the president of a Romanian cultural association in Alcalá. “When you look for them, you don’t find them. Sometimes you ask a relative, and they say they’ve gone back.”
  • The reverse exodus from more prosperous countries in Western Europe is likely to add to the economic pressures already buffeting Central and Eastern Europe, where migrants from developing countries are in turn being encouraged to leave. The Czech government announced in February that it would pay 500 euros, or about $660, and provide one-way plane tickets to each foreigner who has lost his job and wants to go home. And in Bucharest, Romania’s capital, workers from China have been camped out in freezing weather in front of the Chinese Embassy for two months, essentially stranded after their construction jobs disappeared.
  • Like the Czech Republic, Spain is offering financial incentives to leave. A new program aimed at legal immigrants from South America allows them to take their unemployment payments in a lump sum if they agree to leave and not return for at least three years. The Spanish government says only around 3,000 people have taken advantage of the plan, but many others are leaving of their own accord.
  • Airlines in Spain are offering deals on one-way tickets to Latin America, and they say demand has increased significantly. Every day, Barajas airport in Madrid is the setting for emotional departures, as families send their jobless loved ones back home.
Argos Media

BBC NEWS | Americas | US 'must rethink Cuban embargo' - 0 views

news.bbc.co.uk/...7905544.stm

Cuba US Cuban Embargo Richard Lugar

shared by Argos Media on 18 Apr 09 - Cached
  • The US economic embargo on Cuba "has failed" and should be re-evaluated, senior Republican Senator Richard Lugar argues in a report. "We must recognise the ineffectiveness of our current policy and deal with the Cuba regime in a way that enhances US interests," Senator Lugar says.
  • President Barack Obama has promised a new look at US policy towards Cuba, including easing travel restrictions. But he has said he believes the embargo is an "inducement" for change in Cuba.
  • "After 47 years... the unilateral embargo on Cuba has failed to achieve its stated purpose of 'bringing democracy to the Cuban people'," he says. "It may have been used as a foil by the regime to demand further sacrifices from Cuba's impoverished people."
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • "By directing policy toward an unlikely scenario of a short-term democratic transition on the island and rejecting most tools of diplomatic engagement, the US is left as a powerless bystander, watching events unfold at a distance," the report says.
  • It stops short of calling for the trade embargo to be lifted but does urge: an end to restrictions imposed during the Bush administration on travel and remittances to Cuba reinstituting formal co-operation on migration and tackling drug-trafficking allowing Cuba to buy US agricultural products on credit.
Argos Media

Obama: 'We can move U.S.-Cuban relations in a new direction' - CNN.com - 0 views

edition.cnn.com/...index.html

US Cuba Obama Hugo Chavez Raul Castro

shared by Argos Media on 18 Apr 09 - Cached
  • President Obama said Friday he is seeking "a new beginning" in U.S. relations with Cuba.
  • the United States seeks a new beginning with Cuba."
  • Obama said that "decades of mistrust" must be overcome, but noted that he has already loosened restrictions that limited Americans from traveling to visit relatives in Cuba and from sending money to them. Obama lifted all restrictions Monday on the ability of individuals to visit relatives in Cuba, as well as to send them remittances.
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • "I am 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.
  • "Let me be clear: I am not interested in talking for the sake of talking. But I do believe that we can move U.S.-Cuban relations in a new direction."
  • They come a day after Cuban President Raul Castro said he was prepared to discuss "everything, everything, everything" with the United States. Castro told a summit of leftist Latin American leaders gathered in Venezuela, "We are prepared, wherever they want, to discuss everything -- human rights, freedom of the press, political prisoners," Castro said Thursday.
  • Chavez's press office said Obama walked up to Chavez to greet him, a meeting it called "historic." "President Chavez expressed his hope that relations between the two countries would change," the press office said, quoting Chavez as having told his U.S. counterpart, "Eight years ago with this same hand I greeted Bush. I want to be your friend." It said Obama then thanked Chavez.
  • Obama's push for a rapprochement with Havana is supported by most Americans, 71 percent of whom said they favor re-establishing diplomatic relations, according to a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll carried out April 3-5.
Argos Media

Obama Calls for Thaw in U.S. Relations With Cuba - NYTimes.com - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...18prexy.html

US Cuba Organization of American States Hugo Chavez Cristina Kirchner Lula da Silva Daniel Ortega

shared by Argos Media on 18 Apr 09 - Cached
  • 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.
  • ...13 more annotations...
  • 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.
Argos Media

Foreign Policy: The Idiot's Guide to Pakistan - 0 views

www.foreignpolicy.com/...cms.php

Pakistan North West Frontier Province Federal Administered Tribal Areas

shared by Argos Media on 31 Mar 09 - Cached
  • the Federally Administered Tribal Areas are not part of the North-West Frontier Province. The two are separate entities in almost every sense of the word. While the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) is, well, a province with an elected assembly, the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) are geographically separate areas governed through “political agents” who are appointed by the president and supported by the governor of NWFP (who is also a presidential appointee). Residents of NWFP technically live according to the laws drafted by the Parliament in Islamabad, while the only nontribal law applicable to residents of FATA is the Frontier Crimes Regulations, a colonial-era dictate sanctioning collective punishment for tribes and subtribes guilty of disrupting the peace. Within FATA, there are seven “agencies” and six “frontier regions.” The agencies are Bajaur, Mohmand, Khyber, Orakzai, Kurram, North Waziristan and South Waziristan; the somewhat more governed frontier regions (FRs) cling like barnacles to the eastern edge of FATA and include FR Peshawar, FR Kohat, FR Bannu, FR Lakki, FR Tank, and FR Dera Ismail Khan, each of them named after the “settled” districts they border.
  • All residents of FATA and the vast majority of those in NWFP are ethnically Pashtuns. Pashtuns also make up the majority in Baluchistan, the vast province bordering Iran and Afghanistan, which is named after the minority Baluch. Besides NWFP and Baluchistan, there are two other provinces in Pakistan; Punjab is populated mostly by ethnic Punjabis, and Sindh was historically dominated by Sindhis until millions of Muslims migrated from India at the time of Partition and settled in Sindhi cities such as Karachi and Hyderabad. Now, Sindh is composed of ethnic Sindhis and the descendents of these migrants, known as mohajirs.
  • Foreigners are prohibited from entering FATA without government permission. If you see a newspaper dateline from a town inside FATA, chances are that the Pakistani Army organized a field trip for reporters. Those traveling unaccompanied into, say, South Waziristan have either a death wish or a really good rapport with the Taliban, who effectively run North and South Waziristan and large portions of the other agencies and frontier regions.
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