Just Foreign Policy News
September 2, 2010
Video: Angelina Jolie – Pakistan needs our help
UN ambassador Angelina Jolie launches a new appeal to help those affected by the floods in Pakistan.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baUp7jmMNcY
The quickest way to donate $10 to UNHCR’s relief effort is to text "swat" to 50555 from your cell phone. If you want to donate more, you can do it here:
http://www.unhcr.org/emergency/pakistanfloods/global_landing.html
Iraq/Afghanistan: A Promise Kept, a Promise Deferred
As a candidate, President Obama said he wanted to end the mindset that leads to war. A key feature of that mindset is the belief Washington can and should determine who may participate in the governments of the broader Middle East. In both Iraq and Afghanistan, U.S. officials are still working to exclude from power people who are opposed to U.S. control over their governments or a long-term U.S. military presence. This is a recipe for permanent war. Lebanon, where the U.S. accepts the participation in power of people opposed to U.S. control, shows it is not an immutable fact that the U.S. must pursue this permanent war policy.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-naiman/iraqafghanistan-a-promise_b_702172.html
Bacevich: Washington Rules
Andrew Bacevich’s book, "Washington Rules: America’s Path to Permanent War," is a call for Americans to reject the Washington consensus for permanent war.
Get the book
https://www.justforeignpolicy.org/buywashingtonrules
September 24th: JFP "Virtual Brown Bag" with Andrew Bacevich
https://www.justforeignpolicy.org/bacevichtalk
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Summary:
U.S./Top News
1) The U.S. relief effort in Pakistan compares poorly to the U.S. relief effort in Haiti, and the U.S. hasn’t taken on board lessons learned in Haiti about collaboration with aid groups, argues Spencer Ackerman in Wired. Acknowledging the differences between the disasters, Ackerman notes that a month after the earthquake in Haiti, the U.S. had twice as much money earmarked, and the U.S. military had opened up its reconnaissance and data-sorting tools to civilian partners. Ackerman argues that the access problems in Pakistan argue for more such collaboration rather than less.
2) NATO said an airstrike in northern Afghanistan Thursday killed about a dozen insurgents, but Afghan officials said the victims were campaign workers seeking votes in this month’s parliamentary elections, AP reports. "I am able to confirm that a very senior official of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan was the target and was killed," Defense Secretary Gates said. But Takhar province governor Abdul Jabar Taqwa said the car in which candidate Abdul Wahid Khorasani had been riding was fired on by helicopters. He called the incident an obvious mistake, saying there were no Uzbek militants, foreigners or members of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan in the convoy. "There aren’t even any Taliban in this area," Taqwa said. "They were all working on Mr. Khorasani’s campaign." Reached at a hospital, Khorasani said windows of the six vehicles in the convoy had been plastered with his campaign posters and all those traveling with him had been members of his extended family. Khorasani suggested the attack may have been prompted by false information fed to the Americans by a political rival, and called for a thorough investigation. Afghan politicians have in the past been accused of deliberately feeding false information to foreign forces in hopes of prompting attacks and eliminating rivals. NATO said it would investigate.
3) The U.S. military’s Central Command has proposed pumping as much as $1.2 billion over five years into building up Yemen’s security forces, the Wall Street Journal reports. But they face resistance from some officials at the State Department and the Pentagon, who doubt Yemen’s ability to effectively use a flood of US money. Diplomats warn of a widening imbalance between fast-growing U.S. military support and the slow pace of civilian development assistance. "It tends to encourage a negative perspective in Yemen that all we care about is U.S. security," said a senior U.S. official. The State Department has been particularly concerned that the large influx of funds to Yemen could be diverted to the government’s war against a Shiite group known as the Houthis. The U.S. doesn’t believe claims by Yemen and Saudi Arabia that the Houthis are being funded and trained by Iran.
4) A run on Afghanistan’s biggest bank is prompting concerns that a US bailout of the bank would be politically radioactive in Washington, the Washington Post reports. Kabul Bank handles salary payments for soldiers, police officers and teachers. An unchecked run on Kabul Bank, which could spread alarm to other banks, would jeopardize not only depositors’ savings but President Obama’s Afghan strategy.
5) UK Deputy Prime Minister Clegg confirmed that Britain’s combat mission in Afghanistan would be over by 2015, Reuters reports.
6) A new SEC rule allows shareholders to field their own candidates for corporate boards and place them on the same ballot as management’s picks, Newsweek reports. The rule had long been sought by unions and social justice advocates. An attack on Chevron’s board would be aimed at getting a settlement for a lawsuit brought by Ecuadoran Indians in the early 1990s. Activists say that Texaco and Chevron have drawn out the case for decades through legal maneuvers and that the time has come to go after the board.
Iraq
7) Outside the ceremony marking the "end of U.S. combat mission" in Iraq, a somber mood prevailed, reports Ned Parker for the Los Angeles Times. Supporters of pro-US Ayad Allawi’s slate said the U.S. had betrayed them by backing the same candidate for prime minister as Iran. Officials talk of a ruling coalition that includes all the major political blocs as the only way forward. "The war for Iraq, who is going to control Iraq, is just getting underway," a senior US military officer said. "In the end if this doesn’t succeed, maybe we destroyed Iraq and imperiled the region."
Japan
8) Progress towards implementing the US-Japan agreement for the relocation of the Futenma air base within Okinawa could be tough to achieve, depending on the results of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan’s presidential election this month and the Okinawa gubernatorial election in November, Asahi Shimbun reports. "We cannot carry out the current plan as it is due to opposition from Okinawa residents," said Ichiro Ozawa, one of the two main rivals for president of the ruling Democratic Party, who would become the next Prime Minister. In the Nov. 28 gubernatorial election, Okinawa Governor Hirokazu Nakaima, who had accepted the relocation to Nago on certain conditions, is expected to be challenged by Ginowan Mayor Yoichi Iha. A victory by Iha or another candidate opposed to relocation within the prefecture will increase the difficulty for the central government to move the base to Nago.
Israel/Palestine
9) If the Obama administration accepts the myth that dismantling settlements is impossible for Israel, there are no prospects for peace, argues Rashid Khalidi, writing for the New York Times. US objections to settlement expansion have been occasional and timid. A minority of settlers may resist a peace deal requiring their departure, many are there because of generous government subsidies. These settlers would leave if provided with suitable incentives. The U.S. could withhold some of the $3 billion given to Israel as military aid annually and divert it toward housing settlers within Israel’s own borders.
Bolivia
10) The website "Abiding in Bolivia" mocks the Washington Post for reporting as news a New Yorker claim from five months ago that Bolivia was having trouble attracting investors to its lithium due to fears of nationalization, nothing that five days ago President Morales was in South Korea to sign a memorandum of understanding for a joint pilot lithium research and processing project.
Contents:
U.S./Top News
1) A Month In, Pakistan Flood Relief Efforts Stuck at 1.0
Spencer Ackerman, Wired, September 1, 2010
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2010/09/pakistan-flood-relief/
A month after the Haiti earthquake, the U.S. government had over 20,000 troops on the ground, $450 million in assistance money earmarked, and an innovative web-based system to let troops and aid workers collaborate like never before. A month after the floods in Pakistan, the U.S. effort doesn’t compare in any way. And that’s a major problem, considering Pakistan may be the most strategically significant country on the planet right now.
The flood waters along the southern reaches of the Indus River are starting to recede. But with 20 percent of Pakistan still underwater, some of the lessons of Haiti for civilian-military coordination look like washouts. In Haiti, the U.S. military, civilian agencies and non-governmental organizations made innovative use of information technology and social media, partnering in ways that were closer than in previous disaster-relief efforts – and certainly closer than the military has ever worked with civilians in such a context.
But it’s not putting those lessons to use in Pakistan. "No one has spoken to us," says an officer with the U.S. Southern Command, the regional command in charge of Haiti’s earthquake relief, somewhat surprised by the lack of interest in learning how the military in Haiti opened up its reconnaissance and data-sorting tools to civilian partners.
[…] But according to the U.S. embassy in Islamabad, a month after the flooding started, the United States has provided an aggregated $200 million for Pakistan. That’s less than half of what it gave Haiti’s much, much smaller population. (Nine million Haitians; 166 million Pakistanis.) With military operations supporting an embassy-led relief effort, the United States set to work rebuilding washed-out bridges, providing plastic sheeting for temporary shelter for over 150,000 people, and getting 13 water-filtration units into the country.
[…] In fairness, flood relief isn’t like earthquake relief. An earthquake is a one-time disaster; the floods continue. Getting access to flooded areas is harder than getting access to collapsed ones. The already-unpopular government has a political need to direct the aid effort. And Pakistan’s traditional uneasiness with U.S. troops on its territory have rendered a Haiti-style ground force unfeasible.
[…] But the access problems in flooded Pakistan make it all the more conspicuous that the United States isn’t using a lot of innovative technology that it put to work in Haiti.
After the Haiti earthquake, the military took the unprecedented step of letting civilian aid organizations log in to its All Partners Access Network, a web-based communication tool for uploading and sharing situation reports, maps and basic text messages. All of a sudden, the Red Cross and other NGOs had the kind of situational awareness that the military previously hoarded: The iteration of APAN used in Haiti acquired 1,700 members. Some within U.S. Southern Command considered APAN access a big leap forward for civil-military disaster relief cooperation. "I think we’ve stepped through the door, I don’t know if we’ve fully gone inside the room yet," SOUTHCOM tech expert Ricardo Arias told Danger Room in January.
In Pakistan, we’re not even in the building. SOUTHCOM hasn’t been consulted by anyone working with the flood relief efforts for its lessons-learned. Several public-affairs officers for commands dealing with Pakistan didn’t respond to questions about the use of APAN. Linton Wells, a former Pentagon chief information officer who’s long advocated for the military to work more closely with civilians in disaster relief, worked with SOUTHCOM in the days after the Haitian earthquake. While he cautions that he doesn’t have the same visibility into U.S. Central Command than he had into SOUTHCOM, he doesn’t see the same kinds of tech-based coordination from CENTCOM to aid workers – which, in fairness, has the other gargantuan tasks of running two wars shortly after a command change.
After the earthquake-relief experience, Wells, now at National Defense University, proposed that regional military commands create standing IT infrastructure for coordination with aid groups when disasters hit. "SOUTHCOM used APAN and set up an open-technology team who got the information out of the cloud and applied it to the situation," he observes. Wells argues that that model, which he calls "bridge-filter-channel," should govern how commands sync up the disparate efforts of aid groups in post-disaster environments. "It’s an organizational design issue," he says. "SOUTHCOM built the bridge-filter-channel. As far as I can tell, CENTCOM hasn’t."
[…]
2) Afghan president says airstrike killed civilians
Christopher Bodeen, Associated Press, Thursday, September 2, 2010; 2:31 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/02/AR2010090200407.html
Kabul, Afghanistan – NATO said an airstrike in northern Afghanistan on Thursday killed about a dozen insurgents, but President Hamid Karzai said the victims were campaign workers seeking votes in this month’s parliamentary elections.
NATO said its airstrike on a car in northern Takhar province’s normally quiet Rustaq district killed or wounded as many as 12 insurgents, including a Taliban commander and a local head of an allied insurgent group, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, responsible for attacks in Kabul and elsewhere.
However Karzai – who repeatedly warns that civilian casualties undermine anti-insurgency efforts – said the airstrike had killed 10 campaign workers instead. "The rationale for the airstrike still needs to be fully investigated," the president said at a joint news conference in Kabul with U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates.
Gates said he had not heard about civilian casualties, but said the attack had hit its intended target and promised an investigation. "I am able to confirm that a very senior official of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan was the target and was killed," Gates said.
Earlier, Takhar Gov. Abdul Jabar Taqwa said the car in which candidate Abdul Wahid Khorasani had been riding was fired on by helicopters following an initial pass by fighter jets. He called the incident an obvious mistake, saying there were no Uzbek militants, foreigners or members of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan in the convoy. "There aren’t even any Taliban in this area," Taqwa said. "They were all working on Mr. Khorasani’s campaign."
Reached by phone at a hospital in Kabul, Khorasani said windows of the six vehicles in the convoy had been plastered with his campaign posters and all those traveling with him had been members of his extended family, including a man named Amanullah, who had been allied with a local Uzbek warlord and recently returned from a lengthy visit to neighboring Pakistan. Khorasani said Amanullah had been among the 10 people killed in the attack, which he said also left seven wounded.
Khorasani suggested the attack may have been prompted by false information fed to the Americans by a political rival, and called for a thorough investigation. "I ask the international community and the Afghan government – investigate and find out who was the spy who gave you this bad information," he said.
A local politician with knowledge of the incident, but who declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter, said the attack was likely linked to rivalries among ethnic Uzbek politicians in the province.
Afghan politicians have in the past been accused of deliberately feeding false information to foreign forces in hopes of prompting attacks and eliminating rivals. Political violence is on the rise ahead of the Sept. 18 polls, with at least three candidates and five campaign workers killed.
An alliance spokesman said it was aware of the claims that civilians were killed and would conduct a thorough investigation.
[…]
3) U.S. Funding Boost Is Sought For Yemen Forces
Adam Entous, Siobhan Gorman and Julian E. Barnes, September 2, 2010
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704791004575465942358193732.html
Washington – The U.S. military’s Central Command has proposed pumping as much as $1.2 billion over five years into building up Yemen’s security forces, a major investment in a shaky government, in a sign of Washington’s fears of al Qaeda’s growing foothold on the Arabian Peninsula.
The timing and the final funding amount will depend on how supporters of the effort overcome resistance from some officials at the State Department and the Pentagon, who have doubts about Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh and the ability of his government, seen by many as corrupt, to effectively use a flood of American-taxpayer money.
The threat to the U.S. from al Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen has become a priority concern for the Obama administration, fueling a robust internal debate over how to calibrate assistance to address what many officials see as the biggest counterterrorism challenge outside Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Central Command, which oversees military operations across the Mideast and South Asia, argues a large infusion of cash is necessary to stanch al Qaeda gains and enable Yemen’s security forces to conduct more effective counterterrorism operations, U.S. military officials and diplomats say. The money would be used primarily for training and equipment.
But senior U.S. diplomats and experts warn of a widening imbalance between fast-growing U.S. military support and the slow pace of civilian development assistance, which is aimed at peeling away popular support for Islamists. "It tends to encourage a negative perspective in Yemen that all we care about is U.S. security," said a senior U.S. official.
More safeguards are needed, officials say, to ensure U.S. equipment and resources aren’t diverted by the Yemeni government to its fight against domestic rivals. In addition to battling the homegrown group al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the government in San’a faces rebels to the north and secessionist groups in the south of the country.
U.S. Special Operations teams in Yemen, birthplace of Osama bin Laden’s father, already play an expansive role in the country. Some spearhead an effort to track and kill al Qaeda leaders as part of a campaign authorized by President Barack Obama. Other teams run small development projects, a role typically handled by State Department aid officials.
[…] The White House is now weighing a proposal to add armed, aerial drones operated by the Central Intelligence Agency to the arsenal against al Qaeda in Yemen, mirroring the CIA’s drone campaign in Pakistan.
[…] The State Department has been particularly concerned that the large influx of funds to Yemen could be diverted to the government’s war against a Shiite group known as the Houthis. The U.S. doesn’t believe claims by Yemen and Saudi Arabia that the Houthis are being funded and trained by Iran.
[…]
4) Worried Afghans withdraw Kabul Bank deposits
David Nakamura and Andrew Higgins, Washington Post, September 2, 2010; 8:03 AM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/01/AR2010090107140.html
Kabul – With Afghans clamoring to pull their cash from their nation’s biggest bank, the United States risks a politically perilous decision: whether to step in to help shore up a wobbly bank critical not only to Afghanistan’s economy but also to the battle against the Taliban.
A swarm of customers at the headquarters of Kabul Bank in the Afghan capital on Wednesday raised the prospect of a full-scale bank run that would further alienate dispirited Afghans from their government and imperil American efforts to contain the insurgency.
On Thursday morning, scores of Afghans again flooded the Kabul Bank offices to withdraw their savings. The scene was crowded but orderly. At one branch, where government employees were trying to cash their paychecks, the bank staff declared a limit of $1,000 per customer.
Later in the day, the Ministry of Finance issued a statement declaring that all government employees would be able to cash their checks from Kabul Bank, which the ministry called "a reliable bank."
Still the uncertainty was taking its toll. One source with knowledge of Kabul Bank’s books said depositors had withdrawn $90 million on Wednesday and far more than that Thursday. Afghan President Hamid Karzai had scheduled a news conference for 5 p.m. Thursday at the presidential palace, though the subject of the conference was not disclosed by aides.
[…] A senior U.S. official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, played down the wider consequences that could result should Afghanistan’s banking sector implode, noting that only about 5 percent of Afghans have bank accounts. But Kabul Bank, which has taken in $1.3 billion in deposits, plays a pivotal political as well as economic role: It handles salary payments for soldiers, police officers and teachers.
[…] An unchecked run on Kabul Bank, which could spread alarm to other banks, would jeopardize not only depositors’ savings but President Obama’s Afghan strategy, which is built around efforts to rally the public against the Taliban. But any move by the U.S. government to help shore up Afghan banks probably would stir fierce opposition in the United States, where the use of taxpayers’ money to bail out Wall Street after the 2008 financial crisis still rankles many.
[…]
5) Clegg reaffirms 2015 pullout date for Afghan mission
Reuters, Tuesday, August 31 03:56 pm
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/22/20100831/tuk-uk-britain-afghanistan-clegg-fa6b408.html
Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg confirmed on Tuesday that Britain’s combat mission in Afghanistan would be over by 2015 and pledged to protect frontline troops from any sudden cuts in government spending.
Visiting soldiers at Camp Bastion in Helmand province, Clegg also called on Taliban fighters to become part of the political future of Afghanistan. "We have been very clear, we have put a full stop at the end of our engagement," Clegg said. "By 2015 there will not be any British combat troops in Afghanistan."
Britain has about 10,000 troops in the war zone and plans to withdraw soldiers from combat duty as part of a broader pullout of NATO coalition troops which will leave Afghan forces in charge of security.
Clegg told the British contingent that a political deal was needed to secure a peaceful future for Afghanistan. "Without a political settlement this is not going to end," he said.
[…]
6) Hostile Takeover
Thanks to a new SEC rule, activists may try to replace board members at Massey Energy and Chevron.
Joel Schectman, Newsweek, August 30, 2010
http://www.newsweek.com/2010/08/30/proxy-war-activists-may-try-to-fight-for-corporate-seats.html
Until last Wednesday, unions and activists who wanted to change corporate policy had to do it the old-fashioned way: lobby lawmakers, muster public pressure, and push for boycotts. But last week the Securities and Exchange Commission handed them a brand-new weapon to fight companies on social-justice and workers’ rights issues: the corporate ballot box. The new rule allows shareholders to field their own candidates for corporate boards and place them on the same ballot as management’s picks. Sought by advocates of corporate accountability for more than 30 years, it could change the way activists deal with corporations, allowing unions, for instance, to help elect a labor-friendly director on the board of Massey Energy, the company responsible for the deadliest mine disaster in 25 years, which workers regard as particularly unconcerned with safety. "This is a definite sea change," said Simon Billenness, an Amnesty USA board member who works on shareholder advocacy for the organization. "With the SEC’s decision, power has shifted away from company management, and when we are talking with shareholders about possible actions, we have a new tool."
[…] The new SEC rule could devolve power even further, allowing shareholders to advertise their board nominees alongside management on the list that goes out before a company’s annual meeting. That way, activist shareholders-displeased by a company’s treatment of workers, harm to the environment, or executive compensation-can elect a similarly minded reformer to the body most responsible for planning the company’s direction. An outsider brought in by a powerful campaign could shake things up among a calcified board. Directors, who might be serving on eight or nine other boards, would have to deal with a new member elected for the sole purpose of asking tough questions and ordering tough investigations.
[…] Chevron is another company where activists may go after directors. An attack on Chevron’s board would be aimed at getting a settlement for a lawsuit brought by Ecuadoran Indians in the early 1990s. That suit, which asks for $27 billion in damages, alleges that Texaco, which Chevron bought in 2001, contaminated vast areas of the Amazonian rainforest by dumping millions of gallons of oil into the jungle. In an e-mailed statement, Chevron says Texaco cleaned up the sites decades ago and that the case is a high-stakes deception run by New York trial lawyers.
By itself, Amnesty could never purchase enough stock to make an attack on the board. But the human-rights organization has in the past formed alliances with deeper pockets-including the New York City employee-pension fund, which had more than $600 million in the company’s stock-to file nonbinding resolutions asking for Chevron to settle with the Indians. Activists say that Texaco and Chevron have drawn out the case for decades through legal maneuvers and that the time has come to go after the board. "In the case of Chevron, there is a real question of whether this board is capable of resolving this liability and settling with the people that have been affected," said Simon Billenness, the Amnesty USA board member. "It raises the question of whether these are the right people for the job or whether we should use this new tool and push for someone different."
[…]
Iraq
7) U.S., Iraqis mark end of combat under cloud of pessimism
Iraqi politicians, security officers and civil servants, as well as a senior U.S. military officer, speak of daunting and dangerous challenges.
Ned Parker, Los Angeles Times, September 2, 2010
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iraq-handover-20100902,0,5576427.story
Baghdad – In a crystal-chandeliered palace once occupied by Saddam Hussein, American and Iraqi leaders gathered Wednesday for the latest ceremony to herald an independent, democratic Iraq. But in the same city, both inside and outside the domed palace serving as America’s military headquarters at the walled-off Baghdad airport compound, a more sober mood prevailed.
[…] Rival parties speak bitterly about one another. Maliki’s rivals argue that if he wins a second term, he will establish a dictatorial regime; Maliki’s backers warn that without his guidance, the government could slip into paralysis or slide back into civil war.
Allawi, for his part, has warned that if he doesn’t get the chance to head the government, the country risks violence. Allawi’s supporters are now whispering that the United States has betrayed them despite the fact that his slate won 91 seats to Maliki’s 89. "Mr. Maliki is supported by Iran and America. We don’t understand this," said Qutaiba Turki, a parliament member of Allawi’s list. "I think America killed freedom and democracy in Iraq when they left Iraq in the hands of Iran and Maliki."
[…] Officials talk of a ruling coalition that includes all the major political blocs as the only way forward, and wonder what happens if one side or the other fails to join in. All worry about the role of neighboring countries: Sunnis speak darkly of Iran’s role; Shiites point to the invisible hand of Turkey and Saudi Arabia.
[…] A senior U.S. military officer, who was not authorized to talk publicly, agreed Wednesday that violence is bound to continue. "The war for Iraq, who is going to control Iraq, is just getting underway," the officer said. "It’s too early to declare complete success…. In the end if this doesn’t succeed, maybe we destroyed Iraq and imperiled the region."
The American officer framed the conflict as one between secular and religious Iraqis, as well as a fight between Arab nations and Iran for influence in Iraq.
Perhaps the biggest challenge remains addressing the popular discontent over the government’s continuing failure to adequately provide for the general population. The longer the current stalemate goes on, the less faith Iraqis have in their democratic system. The country’s new elected leaders soon will have to show they can make good on promises of a better life, several leaders said.
"People have changed their point of view. They feel sorry for having done what they did. If they voted today, they would change their votes," said lawmaker Wael Abdul Latif, a former governor of Basra. "They think the current political powers have failed. "
Japan
8) Futenma relocation plan stuck between a rock and a hard place
Kentaro Kawaguchi, Keiichi Kaneko and Hiroshi Ito, Asahi Shimbun, 2010/09/02
http://www.asahi.com/english/TKY201009010302.html
Tokyo and Washington released a report Tuesday as scheduled on relocating the U.S. Futenma air station, but elections in Japan could again throw the entire plan out of sync.
The report contained the results of experts’ examinations on plans to build a facility on landfill off Nago’s Henoko district in Okinawa Prefecture to take over the functions of the U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma in Ginowan, also in the prefecture. But the studies did not resolve differences over what type of runway should be built at the Nago site and other issues.
"The relocation project will not make progress for the time being due to circumstances in Okinawa. But we must show the United States that it is making progress," a Foreign Ministry official said.
That could be tough to achieve, depending on the results of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan’s presidential election this month and the Okinawa gubernatorial election in November.
Prime Minister Naoto Kan and former party Secretary-General Ichiro Ozawa will battle in the DPJ election. While their differences over policies and funding are well known, they also disagree on the U.S. military situation in Okinawa.
"We can find a solution if we discuss the issue fully with Okinawa Prefecture and the U.S. government," Ozawa said at a news conference Wednesday. "We cannot carry out the current plan as it is due to opposition from Okinawa residents."
Kan’s basic stance is that Japan should abide by its agreement in May with the United States to essentially follow the contents of a 2006 accord.
[…] Ozawa in mid-June told DPJ lawmaker Hiroshi Kawauchi, "The current government (led by Kan) is not trying to understand the feelings of Okinawa." When Ozawa was president of the opposition DPJ in 2008, the party’s "Okinawa Vision," based on Ozawa’s ideas, advocated the relocation of the Futenma air base outside of Okinawa Prefecture or Japan. Late last year, he said, "Is it permissible to bury that blue, beautiful sea?" Many DPJ lawmakers share Ozawa’s view.
If Ozawa wins the election and becomes prime minister, he could abolish the relocation program, leading to a repeat of Japan’s strained relations with the United States that were seen when Kan’s predecessor, Yukio Hatoyama, tried to move the Futenma air station outside Okinawa.
The U.S. government expects a final decision on construction of the Nago facility early next year, although some officials say a decision will likely not come until spring.
In the meantime, people in Okinawa who felt betrayed by Hatoyama when he essentially returned to the 2006 accord could use their voting power to delay the relocation plan.
On Sept. 12, a municipal assembly election will be held in Nago. The current Nago mayor, Susumu Inamine, opposes Futenma relocation within the prefecture and also expressed dissatisfaction with the results of experts’ examinations on the new site. "The contents of the report have not taken into account the thoughts of the citizens in Nago and Okinawa Prefecture. I cannot accept them at all," Inamine said.
In the Nov. 28 gubernatorial election, Okinawa Governor Hirokazu Nakaima, who had accepted the relocation to Nago on certain conditions, is expected to be challenged by Ginowan Mayor Yoichi Iha. A victory by Iha or another candidate opposed to relocation within the prefecture will increase the difficulty for the central government to move the base to Nago.
[…]
Israel/Palestine
9) No Chance of Peace without Dismantling Settlements
Rashid Khalidi, New York Times, September 1, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2010/09/01/negotiating-with-the-israeli-settlers/no-chance-of-peace-with-settlements-around
[Khalidi is Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies at Columbia University. He is the author of "Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness."]
If the Obama administration accepts the myth that dismantling settlements is impossible for Israel, there are no prospects for peace. The settlements are illegal under international law. Yet settlers have been pampered for more than 40 years, and their violence against Palestinians is consistently tolerated. Peace depends on the Israeli government rectifying the problem they and their predecessors created.
The settler enterprise is a deliberate strategic creation of Israel, beginning with the occupation in 1967. This enterprise has been indulged and enlarged by every Israeli government since then.
From the outset, this was a project to colonize and control Palestinian land. It still is. As Ariel Sharon said in 1998: "Everybody has to move; run and grab as many hilltops as they can to enlarge the settlements, because everything we take now will stay ours. Everything we don’t grab will go to them."
Today, there are nearly 500,000 settlers living illegally in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. The U.S. has only occasionally and timidly objected. This irresoluteness, coupled with millions in tax-exempt funding, amounts to complicity in the 40-fold expansion of settlements since 1972.
The U.S. and Israel demand that the Palestinians engage in everything short of civil war (including torture and repression) to protect Israel’s security, and yet American leaders fail to demand that Israel confront its own Frankenstein. While a minority of settlers may resist a peace deal requiring their departure, many are there because of generous government subsidies. These settlers would leave if provided with suitable incentives. The U.S. could withhold some of the $3 billion given to Israel as military aid annually and divert it toward housing settlers within Israel’s own borders.
But so long as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fails to break with settler leaders, including his own foreign minister, and the U.S. vacillates on this issue, a just peace is far away.
Bolivia
10) Washington Post dreams lithium while Bolivia moves ahead
Abiding in Bolivia, Thursday, September 02, 2010
http://casa-del-duderino.blogspot.com/2010/09/washington-post-dreams-lithium-while.html
In the backward third-world country called the United States, one of their major news papers, The Washington Post, has got word about this new shiny metal called lithium. They have discovered that it is very important for the production of electronics and in the distant future, one day, they may even be able to manufacture batteries for electric cars- once they rediscover how to build a functioning automobile.
It also turns out that lots of this lithium stuff is located outside of US military control, in this country called Bolivia. Brian Palmer for the WaPo explains: "Bolivia, too, has vast deposits and has also started to refer to itself as ‘the Saudi Arabia of lithium.’" Err, maybe I missed the banners in the Ministry of Mining. Which Bolivians are saying this again? "An article in the New Yorker…"
Oh, for a thorough take down of the New Yorker Lawrence Wright’s parachute journalism on Bolivia and lithium, see the Andean Information Network. What else did this New Yorker article claim that the Washington Post is now reprinting five months later as "news"?
"New Yorker in March detailed the trouble Bolivia is having attracting investors to its lithium, mainly because of inadequate infrastructure and President Evo Morales’s predilection for nationalization."
We can confirm this fact using the advanced research tool known as Google (careful: may require ten years of uni to operate). And we find that five days ago, Morales was in this country called South Korea (do they make electronics or something?) to sign a memorandum of understanding for a joint pilot lithium research and processing project. Gosh, that nationalization thing sure is a terrible thing. When will Morales wake up to the desires of the international market?
[…] –
Robert Naiman
Just Foreign Policy
www.justforeignpolicy.org
Just Foreign Policy is a membership organization devoted to reforming US foreign policy so it reflects the values and interests of the majority of Americans.