Just Foreign Policy News
September 1, 2011
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I) Actions and Featured Articles
September 15 Rallies for Palestinian Freedom
On September 15 – the International Day of Democracy – activists around the country are planning demonstrations opposing U.S. threats against Palestine’s UN membership bid. So far, events are planned for New York City, Phoenix, AZ, San Francisco, CA, Washington, DC, Urbana, IL, Omaha, NE, Pittsburgh, PA, and Austin, TX. Attend an event – or organize one.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/September15/216475758396747?sk=events
http://september15.org/
Why I’m Protesting the Tar Sands Pipeline at the White House on Saturday
The key political fact about the proposed Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico is this: at the end of the day, the decision of whether to approve the permit for the pipeline or not will be a political decision wholly owned by President Obama.
http://www.truth-out.org/why-im-protesting-tar-sands-pipeline-time-take-sides/1314814147
Human Rights First: Kansas City Should Take Back "Freedom Medal" from Bahraini King
Kansas City gave a freedom medal to the King of Bahrain, who has presided over a brutal crackdown on democracy protesters.
http://actions.humanrightsfirst.org/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=4637
*Action: Tell Congress: $200 Billion In "Real Savings" If We End the Wars "On Time"
Most Americans don’t realize that the Super Committee can reach 1/6 of its debt reduction goal just by withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq and Afghanistan when we said we were going to. Urge your representatives in Congress to make this part of any debt reduction deal.
https://www.justforeignpolicy.org/act/endwarsontime
Help Support Our Advocacy for Peace and Diplomacy
The opponents of peace and diplomacy work every day. Help us be an effective counterweight.
https://www.justforeignpolicy.org/donate
II) Summary:
U.S./Top News
1) Rebel forces and armed civilians are rounding up thousands of black Libyans and migrants from sub-Sahara Africa, accusing them of fighting for Gadhafi and holding them in makeshift jails across the capital, AP reports. Virtually all of the detainees say they are innocent migrant workers, and in most cases there is no evidence that they are lying, AP says. "The danger is that there is no oversight by any authorities, and the people who are carrying out the arrests — more like abductions — are not trained to respect human rights," said Diana Eltahawy of Amnesty International. "They are people who carry a lot of anger against people they believe committed atrocities."
2) A U.S. diplomatic cable made public by WikiLeaks provides evidence that U.S. troops executed at least 10 Iraqi civilians, including a woman in her 70s and a 5-month-old infant, then called in an airstrike to destroy the evidence, during a 2006 incident in the Iraqi town of Ishaqi, McClatchy reports. U.S. officials denied at the time that anything inappropriate had occurred.
But Philip Alston, the U.N.’s special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, said in a communication to U.S. officials dated 12 days after the March 15, 2006, incident that autopsies showed that all the dead had been handcuffed and shot in the head. Among the dead were four women and five children. The children were all 5 years old or younger.
Alston now says that as of 2010 – the most recent data he had – U.S. officials hadn’t responded to his request for information. He said lack of response from the U.S. was the case with most of the letters to the U.S. in the 2006-2007 period.
At the time, U.S. military officials said the accounts of townspeople who witnessed the events were highly unlikely to be true, and they later said the incident didn’t warrant further investigation. Throughout the early investigation, U.S. military spokesmen said an al Qaida in Iraq suspect had been seized from the house after a fierce fight that had left the house a pile of rubble. But the diplomatic cable provides a different sequence of events and lends credence to townspeople’s claims that U.S. forces destroyed the house after its residents had been shot, McClatchy says.
3) A January 2006 Wikileaks cable shows that Timothy Carney – then-Charge d’Affairs to the post-coup interim regime and now Executive Vice President for the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund – "green-lighted" a MINUSTAH assault on Cite Soleil, even though he knew it would cause civilian casualties, writes Dan Beeton for the Center for Economic and Policy Research.
4) There have been almost 600 arrests in an ongoing protest outside the White House against the proposed Keystone XL Pipeline that would carry crude oil from the tar sands of western Canada to refineries along the Texas Gulf Coast, writes Sue Sturgis for Facing South. Environmentalists are especially worried about the project’s climate impact, since producing liquid fuels from tar sands generates anywhere from two to four times the amount of greenhouse gas pollution as production from conventional oil deposits.
Libya
5) In the days before the fall of Tripoli on 21 August, diplomats from Britain, France and the US had been working on a UN resolution that would have endorsed a ceasefire between the rebels and the regime and deployed UN observers to monitor the truce, the Guardian reports.
Bahrain
6) Former Howard Dean for president campaign manager Joe Trippi has signed on as a public relations guru for the kingdom of Bahrain, Justin Elliot reports for Salon. Bahrain’s regime has recently made headlines for shutting down the local office of Doctors Without Borders and for the death this week of a 14-year-old boy at a demonstration after he was reportedly hit by a police tear gas canister. "This is one of the progressive countries in the Middle Eastern Gulf," said Trippi, when asked about criticisms of Bahrain by human rights groups. "I have no problem working for them."
7) Activists said thousands marched through a restive village near the capital of Bahrain on Thursday for the funeral of a 14-year-old boy killed during a protest against the government the day before, the New York Times reports. "It’s a huge march in Sitra village; it’s tens of thousands," said Mohammed al-Maskati, head of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights. Despite fears of a crackdown, security forces did not confront the crowd.
Iran
8) Panelists at an event organized by the Iran Policy Committee, an organization dedicated to gaining U.S. support for the Mujahedin-e Khalq, suggested that delisting the group would enable it to commit attacks within Iran, NIAC reports. Lieutenant General Thomas McInerney said an MEK delisting should be part of a campaign of "proactive actions" against Iran. "I agree one hundred percent with what the General just said, it’s got to be tit for tat," said John Sano, formerly of the CIA.
Chile
9) Foreign Affairs Minister Alfredo Moreno says Chile will support the recognition of Palestine as a state in the event Palestine applies for admission during the upcoming U.N. General Assembly in September, the Santiago Times reports. But it does not want to weigh in on the question of the 1967 borders, saying this issue should be negotiated between Israel and Palestine.
Peru
10) Advocates for the rights of indigenous communities say a new law requiring consultation on projects of extractive industries could fundamentally change the relationship between these communities and the state, writes Simeon Tegel in the Guardian. Earlier this week, President Humala’s prime minister announced a new tax on the mining industry’s "surplus earnings" equivalent to more than $1 billion a year in additional government revenues. The money will be used for social programs.
Contents:
U.S./Top News
1) Libyan rebels round up black Africans
Thousands detained under suspicion of fighting for Gadhafi claim they are innocent migrant workers
Ben Hubbard, Associated Press, September 1
http://www.salon.com/news/libya/index.html?story=/news/feature/2011/09/01/ml_libya_rebel_lockups
Rebel forces and armed civilians are rounding up thousands of black Libyans and migrants from sub-Sahara Africa, accusing them of fighting for ousted strongman Moammar Gadhafi and holding them in makeshift jails across the capital.
Virtually all of the detainees say they are innocent migrant workers, and in most cases there is no evidence that they are lying. But that is not stopping the rebels from placing the men in facilities like the Gate of the Sea sports club, where about 200 detainees — all black — clustered on a soccer field this week, bunching against a high wall to avoid the scorching sun.
Handling the prisoners is one of the first major tests for the rebel leaders, who are scrambling to set up a government that they promise will respect human rights and international norms, unlike the dictatorship they overthrew.
The rebels’ National Transitional Council has called on fighters not to abuse prisoners and says those accused of crimes will receive fair trials. There have been little credible evidence of rebels killing or systematically abusing captives during the six-month conflict. Still, the African Union and Amnesty International have protested the treatment of blacks inside Libya, saying there is a potential for serious abuse.
Aladdin Mabrouk, a spokesman for Tripoli’s military council, said no one knows how many people have been detained in the city, but he guessed more than 5,000. While no central registry exists, he said neighborhood councils he knows have between 200 and 300 prisoners each. The city of 1.8 million has dozens of such groups.
[…] "The danger is that there is no oversight by any authorities, and the people who are carrying out the arrests — more like abductions — are not trained to respect human rights," said Diana Eltahawy of Amnesty International. "They are people who carry a lot of anger against people they believe committed atrocities."
[…]
2) WikiLeaks: Iraqi children in U.S. raid shot in head, U.N. says
Matthew Schofield, McClatchy Newspapers, September 01, 2011
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/08/31/122789/wikileaks-iraqi-children-in-us.html
[Schofield was on assignment in Iraq at the time of the Ishaqi incident.]
A U.S. diplomatic cable made public by WikiLeaks provides evidence that U.S. troops executed at least 10 Iraqi civilians, including a woman in her 70s and a 5-month-old infant, then called in an airstrike to destroy the evidence, during a controversial 2006 incident in the central Iraqi town of Ishaqi.
The unclassified cable, which was posted on WikiLeaks’ website last week, contained questions from a United Nations investigator about the incident, which had angered local Iraqi officials, who demanded some kind of action from their government. U.S. officials denied at the time that anything inappropriate had occurred.
But Philip Alston, the U.N.’s special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, said in a communication to American officials dated 12 days after the March 15, 2006, incident that autopsies performed in the Iraqi city of Tikrit showed that all the dead had been handcuffed and shot in the head. Among the dead were four women and five children. The children were all 5 years old or younger.
Reached by email Wednesday, Alston said that as of 2010 – the most recent data he had – U.S. officials hadn’t responded to his request for information and that Iraq’s government also hadn’t been forthcoming. He said the lack of response from the United States "was the case with most of the letters to the U.S. in the 2006-2007 period," when fighting in Iraq peaked.
Alston said he could provide no further information on the incident. "The tragedy," he said, "is that this elaborate system of communications is in place but the (U.N.) Human Rights Council does nothing to follow up when states ignore issues raised with them."
[…] At the time, American military officials in Iraq said the accounts of townspeople who witnessed the events were highly unlikely to be true, and they later said the incident didn’t warrant further investigation. Military officials also refused to reveal which units might have been involved in the incident.
[…] The Ishaqi incident was unusual because it was brought to the world’s attention by the Joint Coordination Center in Tikrit, a regional security center set up with American military assistance and staffed by U.S.-trained Iraqi police officers.
The original incident report was signed by an Iraqi police colonel and made even more noteworthy because U.S.-trained Iraqi police, including Brig. Gen. Issa al Juboori, who led the coordination center, were willing to speak about the investigation on the record even though it was critical of American forces.
Throughout the early investigation, U.S. military spokesmen said that an al Qaida in Iraq suspect had been seized from a first-floor room after a fierce fight that had left the house he was hiding in a pile of rubble.
But the diplomatic cable provides a different sequence of events and lends credence to townspeople’s claims that American forces destroyed the house after its residents had been shot.
Alston initially posed his questions to the U.S. Embassy in Geneva, which passed them to Washington in the cable.
According to Alston’s version of events, American troops approached a house in Ishaqi, which Alston refers to as "Al-Iss Haqi," that belonged to Faiz Harrat Al-Majma’ee, whom Alston identified as a farmer. The U.S. troops were met with gunfire, Alston said, that lasted about 25 minutes.
After the firefight ended, Alston wrote, the "troops entered the house, handcuffed all residents and executed all of them. After the initial MNF intervention, a U.S. air raid ensued that destroyed the house." The initials refer to the official name of the military coalition, the Multi-National Force.
Alston said "Iraqi TV stations broadcast from the scene and showed bodies of the victims (i.e. five children and four women) in the morgue of Tikrit. Autopsies carries (sic) out at the Tikrit Hospital’s morgue revealed that all corpses were shot in the head and handcuffed."
[…] The cable closely tracks what neighbors told reporters for Knight Ridder at the time. (McClatchy purchased Knight Ridder in spring 2006.) Those neighbors said the U.S. troops had approached the house at 2:30 a.m. and a firefight ensued. In addition to exchanging gunfire with someone in the house, the American troops were supported by helicopter gunships, which fired on the house.
The cable also backs the original report from the Joint Coordination Center, which said U.S. forces entered the house while it was still standing. That first report noted: "The American forces gathered the family members in one room and executed 11 persons, including five children, four women and two men. Then they bombed the house, burned three vehicles and killed their animals."
The report was signed by Col. Fadhil Muhammed Khalaf, who was described in the document as the assistant chief of the Joint Coordination Center.
The cable also backs up the claims of the doctor who performed the autopsies, who told Knight Ridder "that all the victims had bullet shots in the head and all bodies were handcuffed."
The cable notes that "at least 10 persons, namely Mr. Faiz Hratt Khalaf, (aged 28), his wife Sumay’ya Abdul Razzaq Khuther (aged 24), their three children Hawra’a (aged 5) Aisha (aged 3) and Husam (5 months old), Faiz’s mother Ms. Turkiya Majeed Ali (aged 74), Faiz’s sister (name unknown), Faiz’s nieces Asma’a Yousif Ma’arouf (aged 5 years old), and Usama Yousif Ma’arouf (aged 3 years), and a visiting relative Ms. Iqtisad Hameed Mehdi (aged 23) were killed during the raid."
3) As U.S. Charge D’Affairs, Clinton Bush Haiti Fund VP Green Lighted Assault on Slum Despite "Inevitable …civilian casualties"
Dan Beeton, Center for Economic and Policy Research, August 31, 2011
http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/relief-and-reconstruction-watch/as-us-charge-daffairs-clinton-bush-haiti-fund-vp-green-lighted-assault-on-slum-despite-inevitable-civilian-casualtiesq
A January 2006 cable recently made available by Wikileaks describes Haitian business leaders’ efforts to pressure MINUSTAH to crack down on slums, in particular Cite Soleil (site of the July 5, 2005 operation that resulted in dozens of unarmed civilian deaths and injuries, including of children). In the cable, then-Charge d’Affairs to the post-coup interim regime (and now Executive Vice President for the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund), Timothy Carney, describes how the business leaders also "pleaded" with him for more ammunition for the police:
[…] The cable describes how the business leaders (Reginald Boulos, President of the Haitian Chamber of Commerce and Industry; Rene-Max Auguste, President of the American Chamber of Commerce; Gladys Coupet, President of the bankers’ association, and Carl Auguste Boisson, President of the petroleum distributors’ association) wanted MINUSTAH to systematically sweep through Cite Soleil, one of Haiti’s poorest slums:
[…] Carney warned them that this would "inevitably cause unintended civilian casualties". But rather than a warning that such an operation should be out of the question, considering the "inevitable" civilian deaths it would entail, Carney merely cautioned that the business leaders should follow up the raid with "social programs and social spending", presumably to calm the expected outrage among Cite Soleil residents:
"¶6. (SBU) The Charge cautioned that such an operation would inevitably cause unintended civilian casualties given the crowded conditions and flimsy construction of tightly packed housing in Cite Soleil. Therefore, the private sector associations must be willing to quickly assist in the aftermath of such an operation, including providing financial support to families of potential victims. Boulos agreed."
(Indeed, there were dozens of civilian casualties – including children – during MINUSTAH’s raid into Cite Soleil in July 2005.)
[…] According to the cable, Carney – a founding board member of the Washington, D.C. based "Haiti Democracy Project", along with Boulos’ brother Rudolph – was effectively giving a "green light" to the Haitian elite’s call for an assault on Cite Soleil, even though he was sure civilians (bystanders, in this case, people inside their own homes), would be killed. The implications of the cable are all the worse considering that the term "gangs" was often a euphemism – like "chimeres" or "bandits" – to describe impoverished, pro-Aristide Haitians, and considering that a Lancet study determined that there may have been as many as 4,000 political murders during the 2004-2006 post-coup period.
[…]
4) Tar sands oil pipeline protesters direct ire at Obama
Sue Sturgis, Facing South, August 31, 2011
http://www.southernstudies.org/2011/08/tar-sands-oil-pipeline-protesters-direct-ire-at-obama.html
There have been almost 600 arrests so far in an ongoing protest outside the White House against the proposed Keystone XL Pipeline that would carry crude oil from the tar sands of western Canada to refineries along the Texas Gulf Coast.
The protest, which began on Aug. 20 and is scheduled to last until Sept. 3, is being billed as the biggest act of nonviolent civil disobedience in the history of the climate movement. Protesters are calling on President Obama to exercise his power to reject the pipeline, a decision he’s expected to make before the end of the year.
"This has become the test for the president to show the country and the global community that he’s serious about climate change," said Bill McKibben, the noted environmental activist and journalist who’s helping lead the protest.
Tar sands, also known as oil sands, are deposits of petroleum in the form of bitumen — a thick, sticky form of crude oil. Environmentalists are concerned about damage to the Canadian environment from extraction; about the effects of toxic pollution from the refining process on residents of Houston and Port Arthur, Texas; and about the possibility of pipeline leaks harming U.S. water supplies. The pipeline will cross the shallow Ogallala Aquifer, the main source of agricultural and drinking water in the Great Plains.
But environmentalists are especially worried about the project’s climate impact, since producing liquid fuels from tar sands generates anywhere from two to four times the amount of greenhouse gas pollution as production from conventional oil deposits.
The protesters charge that giving the pipeline the go-ahead would represent a betrayal of the promise Obama made during his campaign to open a "new chapter in American leadership on climate change." Many of the protesters outside the White House can be seen wearing Obama buttons and chanting his signature 2008 campaign slogan, "Yes We Can" — but not so much as a sign of political support than of warning.
[…]
Libya
5) Nato keeps war footing in Libya until Gaddafi regime smashed
Julian Borger in Paris, Guardian, Thursday 1 September 2011 12.31 BST
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/01/nato-war-footing-libya
[…] European capitals were caught by surprise by the speed of the Gaddafi regime’s collapse, and the fall of Tripoli on 21 August. In the days before diplomats from Britain, France and the US had been working on a UN resolution that would have endorsed a ceasefire between the rebels and the regime and deployed UN observers to monitor the truce.
"None of that is needed any more. This went much better than even the most optimistic of us expected," the European diplomat said. "There are no longer two parties to monitor, just one Libya. There is no need for a ceasefire and no need for any observers."
[…]
Bahrain
6) Joe Trippi doing P.R. for Bahrain
Justin Elliott, Salon, Thursday, Sep 1, 2011
http://www.salon.com/news/middle_east/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2011/09/01/joe_trippi_bahrain
The latest political operative to sign on as a public relations guru for the Persian Gulf kingdom of Bahrain is former Howard Dean for president campaign manager Joe Trippi.
Bahrain’s Information Affairs Authority will receive "strategic communications counsel, media relations, and third party outreach support" from Trippi as well as Sanitas International, a Washington public relations firm.
Since violently suppressing a Shia protest movement earlier this year, Bahrain’s Sunni ruling family has retained at least two pricey Washington lobbying and law firms to help it beat back negative attention. The Trippi/Sanitas deal marks the third such contract in recent months.
While the hottest period of the confrontation between the government and the protesters was earlier this year, the situation has not cooled down entirely. Bahrain’s regime has recently made headlines for shutting down the local office of Doctors Without Borders and for the death this week of a 14-year-old boy at a demonstration after he was reportedly hit by a police tear gas canister.
[…] "This is one of the progressive countries in the Middle Eastern Gulf," said Trippi, when asked about criticisms of Bahrain by human rights groups. "I have no problem working for them."
[…]
7) Large Protest in Bahrain After Boy’s Death
J. David Goodman, New York Times, September 1, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/02/world/middleeast/02bahrain.html
Thousands marched through a restive village near the capital of Bahrain on Thursday for the funeral of a 14-year-old boy killed during a protest against the government the day before, activists said.
Photographs of the boy’s face – smiling before his death and caked in blood shortly after – covered the coffin as it was lofted into the air in Sitra, an oil village six miles south of the capital, Manama, and a hub of opposition sentiment. Many in the crowd waved the red and white flag of Bahrain as they followed the body to its burial site.
Protesters and mourners held photocopied images of the boy during the march, and some chanted, "Down, down, Hamad!" in reference to the country’s leader, King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa, according to a witness. Activists said many people in Bahrain had been outraged by the death of the boy, identified as Ali Jawad Ahmad, and that thousands filled the street on Thursday in protest. "It’s a huge march in Sitra village; it’s tens of thousands," said Mohammed al-Maskati, the head of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights, who attended the march and said that some protesters had come from surrounding cities and towns. Images posted online showed a large crowd moving through the streets with the boy’s coffin.
But despite fears of a crackdown, security forces did not confront the crowd. The march broke up after the burial in the early afternoon, Mr. Maskati said.
However, overnight in the capital, hundreds of angry protesters clashed with security forces as they tried to retake a central square that had been the center of protests in the spring. They were pushed back by the security forces, who fired tear gas and blocked roads with buses, according to news reports.
Sitra is known for its activist Shiite population and was a stronghold of antigovernment advocates at the height of demonstrations this year. The government of Bahrain, with help from Saudi Arabia, violently put down the country’s peaceful protest movement in March.
Witnesses said the boy was killed on Wednesday morning when security forces fired a tear gas canister directly into a crowd at close range. He was struck in the head, the witnesses said, and died shortly afterward at a hospital.
[…] Despite the crackdown, small protests have continued regularly in many places. "The protest in Sitra is every day," Mr. Maskati said.
[…]
Iran
8) Mujahedin Supporters Envision "Tit for Tat" Campaign Against Iran
NIAC, Friday, August 19, 2011
http://www.niacouncil.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=7578
Washington, DC – The Iran Policy Committee, an organization dedicated to gaining U.S. support for the Mujahedin-e Khalq, organized an event on Thursday with former U.S. officials calling for the MEK to be removed from the U.S. list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations.
While the panelists argued that the MEK is not a terrorist organization, they said the group’s "hands were tied" by the terrorist designation and suggested that delisting the group would enable it to commit attacks within Iran.
Lieutenant General Thomas McInerney said an MEK delisting should be part of a campaign of "proactive actions" against Tehran. The MEK, he said, is the only "credible overt political-military counterforce to the Iranian regime."
"We need a very active tit for tat policy," said McInerney. "So every time they kill Americans, they have an accident in Iran."
John Sano, formerly of the Central Intelligence Agency, echoed those sentiments.
"I agree one hundred percent with what the General just said, it’s got to be tit for tat. We have known that the Iranians have been in Iraq talking to our enemies. We know that the MOIS has been in Iraq causing harm to U.S. personnel. And the only thing that can counter that is force," Sano said. "I know that may sound too militaristic, but you have to go with what your enemy understands."
[…]
Chile
9) Chile will support Palestine state in UN vote but abstains from boundaries controversy
Zach Simon, Santiago Times, September 1, 2011
http://en.mercopress.com/2011/09/01/chile-will-support-palestine-state-in-un-vote-but-abstains-from-boundaries-controversy
Chile will support the recognition of Palestine as a state in the event Palestine applies for admission during the upcoming U.N. General Assembly in late September, according to Foreign Affairs Minister Alfredo Moreno, who met with 15 Congress members earlier this week.
[…] When Chilean President Sebastián Piñera travelled to Israel and Palestine in March, he reasserted Chile’s support for peace in the region and an independent Palestinian state. However, he did not formally endorse the pre-1967 borders something that Minister Moreno said was not for Chile to decide.
"Nobody (in the Chilean government) is against the state of Palestine having a right to exist," opposition Dep. Ramón Farías told La Tercera. "Only the border issues should be a matter to be resolved between the two countries involved".
[…]
Peru
10) Peru may be turning a corner on its treatment of indigenous people
Peru’s divisions only deepened under the previous administration. A new law gives grounds for cautious optimism
Simeon Tegel, Guardian, Wednesday 31 August 201 http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/31/peru-indigenous-peoples
The symbolism could hardly have been more striking as indigenous Awajún member Eduardo Nayap – in suit, tie and colourful Amazonian feather crown – addressed Peru’s new congress last week.
Nayap, a member of President Ollanta Humala’s Nationalist party, was welcoming the chamber’s unanimous approval of a bill requiring prior consultation with indigenous peoples about legislation or infrastructure projects that would affect them or their territories. Humala is expected to sign it into law this week.
The measure, repeatedly blocked by Peru’s previous president, Alan García, is being hailed as a major advance for the country’s long-suffering native communities. Aidesep, the largest organisation representing Peru’s myriad Amazonian peoples, said it would help protect them from the "outrages by the Peruvian state of which they have been victims for centuries" [sic].
In a fractured, multi-ethnic nation where the legacy of the Spanish conquest continues to cast a long shadow over the social realities of the present, the political significance of the new law should not be underestimated. Indeed, Peru’s racial and geographic divisions only deepened over the past half-decade as García imposed his haughty, Lima-centric vision on the country, unforgivably bungling his way to the Bagua massacre.
But now, with the Peruvian economy heavily dependent on the export of primary commodities such as copper, gold, oil and gas, often located on indigenous lands, what concrete difference will the new law make? The first point to grasp is that the legislation does not give communities a right of veto. Instead, it is aimed at generating consensual agreement between them and the state that will allow "development" projects to move ahead. Critically, when consensus is not reached, the Peruvian state will still have the right to impose solutions on a case-by-case basis.
However, most commentators are downplaying this aspect of the legislation, preferring to concentrate on the potential for the new law to allow Peru to resolve its hundreds of "social conflicts" – the term used here for confrontations, often violent, generated when rural communities oppose road-building, mining, drilling, damming or other such interventions on or near their lands.
According to the Defensoría del Pueblo, Peru’s government-funded but independent human rights watchdog, the law establishes that the process of reaching agreement should be "a good faith, intercultural dialogue", with the representative organisations of the communities’ choosing.
Meanwhile, lawyer Hernán Coronado, of the Amazonian Centre for Anthropology and Practical Application, tells me that the law will require a profound change in the role of the Peruvian state, from previously being a promoter of corporate interests to being a neutral arbiter between the extractive industries and indigenous peoples. Given the massive imbalances in technical and legal knowledge and resources that often exist between the communities and industry, the state may even end up acting as a counterweight to the ambitions of transnational corporations coveting natural resources on indigenous lands, he says.
All this presupposes the political will in Lima to finally allow native communities to control their own economic and social development. And the devil may be in the detail – under Peruvian law, congress will need to elaborate regulations establishing the procedural nitty-gritty of how the consultations regarding an estimated $51bn of already-proposed infrastructure projects, including a series of vast, bitterly resisted hydroelectric dams in the Amazon, will actually work.
But just a month after Peru’s new government took office, the tone and emphasis have changed 180 degrees compared with the previous administration. Earlier this week, Humala’s prime minister, Salomón Lerner Ghitis, announced a new tax on the mining industry’s "surplus earnings" equivalent to more than $1bn a year in additional government revenues. The money will be used for social programmes. Contrast that with García’s government, which had an open-door policy for corporate executives but refused to acknowledge the legitimate expectations of some of Peru’s poorest citizens that national economic development not be at the cost of their families and environment.
[…]
–
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