South Korea vows 'stern retaliations' against North Korea (Updated 00:29 GMT)

South Korean K-9 self propelled artilleries carry out shooting exercises in June 2008 in Cheolwon, Gangwon. North Korea mainly attacked a military base of K-9 artilleries on Yeonpyeong Island yesterday (photo courtesy of JoongAngDaily)(HN, November 23, 2010) -- President Lee Myung-bak ordered his military Tuesday to punish North Korea for its artillery attacks "through action," not just words, saying it is important to stop the communist regime from contemplating additional provocation.

"The provocation this time can be regarded as an invasion of South Korean territory. In particular, indiscriminate attacks on civilians are a grave matter," a stern-faced Lee said during a visit to the headquarters of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in central Seoul, according to South Korea’s news agency Yonhap.

North Korea fired some 100 coastline artillery rounds across the western sea border onto Yeonpyeong Island Tuesday afternoon, killing two marines and wounding more than a dozen others.

The attack set houses on fire on the island that lies just south of the Northern Limit Line, the de-facto maritime border between the two Koreas drawn at the end of their 1950-53 war.

The South Korean military launched an immediate counterattack, firing about 80 K-9 self-propelled artillery shells toward the North's coastal areas. The exchange of fire lasted for about an hour.

Tuesday's attack was the North's most serious provocation since it torpedoed a South Korean warship in March that killed 46 sailors. It marks the first direct artillery attack on South Korean territory since the Korean War ended in an armistice, not a formal peace treaty.

"Reckless attacks on South Korean civilians are not tolerable, especially when South Korea is providing North Korea with humanitarian aid," the president said. "As for such attacks on civilians, a response beyond the rule of engagement is necessary. Our military should show this through action rather than an administrative response" such as statements or talks, he added.

"Given that North Korea maintains an offensive posture, I think the Army, the Navy and the Air Force should unite and retaliate against (the North's) provocation with multiple-fold firepower," Lee said. "I think enormous retaliation is going to be necessary to make North Korea incapable of provoking us again."

Lee's strongly worded comments came after a series of emergency meetings with senior presidential aides and security-related ministers at the underground bunker of the presidential compound Cheong Wa Dae. Participants included Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan, Unification Minister Hyun In-taek, Defense Minister Kim Tae-young, Home Affairs Minister Maeng Hyung-kyu and Won Sei-hoon, chief of the state spy agency.

Earlier in the day, Cheong Wa Dae issued a statement denouncing the North's latest provocation.

"North Korea will have to bear full responsibility" for all consequences, Hong Sang-pyo, senior secretary for public affairs at the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae, said. He also warned that the South will"resolutely retaliate" if the North makes any further provocations.

Hong said the government was trying to figure out the North's intentions, adding it regards the attack as a "localized situation," rather than a prelude to a full-scale war

"We have informed our allies and neighboring countries of the current situation through diplomatic channels," he said.

He dismissed rumors of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il's death as groundless. "We concluded that it is not a meaningful rumor or intelligence," he said.

Also in North Asia, Japan has been placed on high alert and officials in Tokyo demanded a quick resolution.

"The latest act of provocation undermines the peace and security of the entire northeast Asian region including Japan, not just those of South Korea," Japanese chief cabinet secretary Yoshito Sengoku said at a news conference, as he called the attack an "unforgivable act." "We demand an immediate end to this kind of action," he said.

(In early trading Wednesday in Japan, the Nikkei index in Tokyo was down about two percent and has fallen below the 10,000 yen level).

Separately, Asia Society Executive Vice-President Jamie Metzl, who just returned from South Korea, called the attack "a shocking escalation" by Pyongyang.

"With the North Korean economy in free fall, the country’s leaders have likely concluded that attacks like this only increase their negotiating power," says Metzl. "The North Koreans may well have recognized that South Korea has far more to lose from any conflict than does the north, and that concessions can possibly be extracted by taking advantage of this disparity."

Referring to the latest attack, as well as recent provocations, Metlz said: "These events could very well also point to conflicts within the North Korea establishment as different factions vie for power during a time of transition."

In a separate press briefing, Cheong Wa Dae spokeswoman Kim Hee-jung quoted the president as telling his military to strike North Korea's missile base around its coastline artillery positions if necessary.

"President Lee instructed (the military) to strike North Korea's missile base near coastline artillery positions if necessary... if there in any indication of further provocation," she said.
The spokeswoman also said that the North's provocation might have come in retaliation for one of the South's annual military exercises.

"Our Navy was conducting a maritime exercise near the western sea border today. North Korea has sent a letter of protest over the drill. We're examining a possible link between the protest and the artillery attack," said Kim.

Foreign ministry officials said they were in consultations with the United Nations over whether to refer the case to the global organization.

South Korea's rival political parties, meanwhile, canceled a budget committee meeting and agreed on bipartisan support for the government's response to the incident.

Background

This is not the first time a conflict of this nature has occurred between North and South Korea. In fact conflict has been brewing on the Korean Peninsula for 60  years now since, after World War II, the Korean peninsula was divided, with the North falling under the Soviet Union and the South under US military administration.

In June 1950 the North and South went to war. An armistice was signed in July 1953, enforcing the divide along the 38th parallel. No peace deal has been signed.

North Korea remains a Communist state and is a military power, though poverty-stricken. South Korea has become a major global economic player and hosted the last G20 summit in its capital Seoul earlier this month.

Some key events, beginning with the most recent, in conflict between the two Koreas are as follows: 

November 23, 2010: Two South Korean soldiers die as North, South Korea trade artillery fire

November 2010: North Korea unveils previously secret uranium nuclear facility

September 2010: North Korean leader Kim Jong il makes son, Kim Jong Un, four-star general, in move seen as preparation for succession.

March 2010: Cheonan, a South Korean warship with 104 men on board, is sunk by an explosion in the Yellow Sea. North Korea is blamed for the death of 46 sailors, but Pyongyang denies responsibility.

November 2009: North and South Korean warships clash in the Yellow Sea.

May 2009: North Korea conducts its second nuclear test

October 2006: North Korea conducts first nuclear test

June 2002: Naval battles kill five South Korean soldiers. Most likely 30 North Korean are killed or injured.

June 1999: First naval skirmish between two countries since the war. North Korean ship sinks in Yellow Sea.

September 1996: Gangneung submarine incident - 24 North Korean sailors die in the incident, which is believed to have been an attempt at infiltrating the south.

November 1987: Korean Airlines flight explodes, killing 115 people. North Korea blamed for attack.

January 1968: First assassination attempt on South Korea leader Park Chung-Hee. Other efforts to target top Seoul officials, some successful, follow in years to come.

HUM News Staff - Yonhap News Agency

Violence could cut short Guinea’s democratic celebration (News Brief)

(HN, November 22, 2010) --  After more than 26 years of autocratic rule, a tumultuous and at times brutally violent post-coup era, and a fraught electoral period, the people of Guinea were entitled to some time to celebrate the fact that a civilian had finally been elected president.

But in an indication of the deep-seated animosity, fears and mistrust that have led the bauxite-rich West African nation to the brink of disaster time and time again, the Nov. 15 announcement that former Prime Minister Alpha Condé had won the second-round run-off election was accompanied by ethnic riots, mass arrests and killings at the hand of security forces, as well as a state of emergency.

Both Condé and his defeated rival, Cellou Dalien Diallo, urged calm after the tight race's official result provoked street protests that left at least 10 dead, according to one West African human-rights group.

Compounding the tensions are the actions of a military at loose ends as it bids what is hoped to be a farewell to its central role in Guinean politics. Soldiers have begun what the International Crisis Group has called "active participation" in the violence: "beating, molesting and shooting defenseless civilians and destroying their property."

Conakry, Guinea - photo courtesy of US Department of State Guinea's international partners are desperate to normalize relations and resume -- or in some cases, begin -- supplying developmental assistance to the impoverished population. Guinea couldn't have done any better at starting out on the wrong foot if it had wanted to.

The European Union, World Bank and United States specifically are keen to rebuild relationships and turn the spigots of assistance back on. Development aid and a plan for a fishing partnership, suspended by Brussels, are foremost on the international agenda. Washington is especially prepared to reward democratic progress by swiftly unblocking aid.

Now, according to some Guinea watchers, efforts to develop infrastructure and public systems might have to wait just a bit longer -- a risk that the population, more than 30 percent of whom are under age 25, can barely afford. - Lauren Gelfand (continue reading @ WorldPoliticsReview)

World leaders seek to save the tiger from extinction (Report)

Tiger - photo courtesy of WorldWildlifeFund (WWF) (HN, November 21, 2010) An unprecedented 13- state summit that  aims to double the tigers population by the next Year of the Tiger in 2022 begins in Russia today.

Russian prime minister and self-proclaimed animal lover Vladimir Putin opened his native city to the world's first gathering of leaders from nations where the tiger's free rein has been squeezed ever-tighter by poachers.

"This is an unprecedented gathering of world leaders (that aims) to double the number of tigers," Jim Adams, Vice President for the East Asia and Pacific Region at the World Bank, said at the opening ceremony of the four-day event.  

The number of tigers in the wild has dwindled from 100,000 to 3,200 in the past century, according to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF)  The main threats to tigers are the destruction of their habitats in Asia - due to economic and industrial expansion - and poachers.

The wildlife charity warns that the tiger could become extinct within the next 12 years unless urgent action is taken.

Poachers represent a huge threat to the tiger's survival. The use of tiger bones in traditional Chinese medicines is widely known, although the ingredient hasn't been listed in official Chinese manuals for pharmaceuticals since 1993. Tiger is also served in high priced restaurants so that millionaires can eat endangered species to demonstrate their wealth. 

"It's essential to eliminate poaching," said Adams. "Solutions must begin at the local level. Trans-boundary cooperation must be reinforced."

The summit's Russian hosts said that a global initiative on tigers could provide lessons for other joint environmental pursuits.

The tiger summit will provide an example "for other challenges such as global warming," Russian Natural Resources Minister Yury Trutnev told the gathering.

The high-profile summit is due to be attended by Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao and delegations from India and Bangladesh -- the three nations with the largest volume of tiger skin and other organ trafficking.

Russia is the only country to have seen its tiger population rise in recent years. It had just 80 to 100 in the 1960s but now has around 500, with experts praising Putin for taking an active role in the cause.

Putin has personally championed the protection of the Amur Tiger in the country's Far East and was hailed by the Russian media for firing a tranquillizer dart at one of the fabled beasts in 2008.

The conference is expected to tackle the burden of funding a 12-year plan that reaches across the 13 nations. It is also believed to be the world's first gathering of leaders to address the fate of a single species.

But consensus on the need to save the tiger has been hampered by a lack of coordination on the ground to stop the trafficking of tiger parts such as paws and bones -- all prized in traditional Asian medicine.

Apart from Russia, 12 other countries host fragile tiger populations -- Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Thailand and Vietnam.

Experts stress that India and China are by far the biggest players in saving the beast.

India is home to half of the world population while the Chinese remain the world's biggest consumers of tiger products despite global bans.

-HUMNEWS Staff

World Toilet Day-Here's Why it Matters.

Today is World Toilet Day. It's a day dedicated to improving sanitation around the world. The United Nations says access to sanitation is a human right. But an estimated two-and-a-half Billion people don't have access to a toilet. And in some places, including North America, there's still a struggle for so called, potty parity.

Listen to a segment produced by our partner, CBC's The Current, on "potty parity" in the developed and developing worlds.

Click here to listen.

HUMNEWS HEADLINES - November 19, 2010 (Europe and Eurasia)

Rock of Gibraltar as seen from La Linea de la Concepcion just across the border in Spain (Photo David Stanley via Flickr)Andorra

Snow, snow and more snow (travel)

Armenia

Armenia’s President not to leave for Lisbon: The draft declaration not acceptable to Armenia

Armenia should sign new protocols (opinion)

Human rights activists say children’s rights are not protected in Armenia

Yerevan hosts Armenian-Indian tourism promotion seminar

Armenia’s political forces no positive breakthrough from OSCE summit

Chess: Armenia’s Aronian wins at World Blitz Championships

Armenia’s foreign trade turnover grows 21.1% in Jan-Oct. 2010  

Gibraltar

Gibraltar tobacco contraband on the rise

Should British Gibraltar be sovereign or Spanish? Why the Tripartite won’t work  

Kyrgyzstan

Violence at Kyrgyzstan court stops trial for April uprising

OSCE participating States agree to adapt police support to Kyrgyzstan  

EU to give Kyrgyzstan 4m euros in food, reconstruction aid

Montenegro capital Podgorica: the country will become an EU candidate in December. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons/Lakebolt)Liechtenstein

Liechtenstein keen to deepen ties with India

Govt. examining black money estimate reports

Moldova

Romanian president supports Moldova’s pro-European government before election there

Moldovan citizens to vote in polling station at embassy

EU may abolish visas for “Eastern Partnership” members

Mongolia

UK has worse wireless broadband than Mongolia

Japan, Mongolia aim to start FTA talks early FY11

Montenegro

No starting date for Montenegro’s EU accession talks

Hungary is interested in providing financial and technical assistance to Montenegro in energy

Russia, Turkmenistan, Iran Presidents finish visits in Azerbaijan (photo: Trend.az) Tajikistan

Premier Wen’s Tajikistan visit to deepen bilateral cooperation

Tajikistan denies laundering money

Tajikistan: The authorities of Gorney Badakhshan shut down 28 mosques

Tajikistan, Afghanistan pool efforts to combat terrorism

Turkmenistan

Caspian summit fails to clarify status, resource issues

Russia, Iran, Turkmenistan presidents end visits to Azerbaijan

Late, but not too late, for Sudan (Perspective)

Sudanese receiving medical attention - photo: MSF(HN, November 18, 2010) Well, we're in it now. What we do best. Diplomacy. The White House has dispatched Senator John Kerry to Sudan with a proposal for peace between the North and South. It’s a giant step toward avoiding the kind of bloodshed that killed more than two million people in Sudan’s previous 20-year North-South civil war, which ended only in 2005 – and is threatening to erupt once again.

In recent months, President Barack Obama has stepped up his own involvement and that of senior figures in his administration in support of a peace strategy for Sudan. On his behalf, Kerry has delivered a package of proposals designed to break the logjam that has brought the North and South to a dangerous crossroads.

We have written a memo that spells out some of the essential elements of what a grand bargain for peace in Sudan could look like. If you’re interested in the specifics of a possible peace deal – and in actions that you can take to support it – go to www.sudanactionnow.org.

There is little time to waste. On January 9, 2011, the people of Southern Sudan will vote for independence from the North, taking with them up to three-quarters of the country’s known oil reserves and placing millions of civilians in the direct path of war.

The government in Khartoum (the capital in the North) is led by Omar al-Bashir, whose accomplishments, which include overseeing war crimes during the previous North-South war and engineering the atrocities in Darfur, have brought him arrest warrants for war crimes and genocide from the International Criminal Court.

And yet renewed war in Sudan is not inevitable. A complex but workable peace can be brokered if all interested parties become more deeply involved. The current moment requires robust diplomacy – the kind that can leave a bad taste in your mouth, but that gets the job done. We believe that Kerry is a skilled emissary and can help the parties find the compromises necessary for peace.

Any agreement preventing a return to war would necessarily involve the National Congress Party, representing the North, and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, representing the South. But it would also involve the United States, whose post-referendum relationship with the two parties will have enormous influence over whether a deal gets done.

We believe that a grand bargain to lay the foundation for lasting peace between the North and South would oblige the parties to:

·        hold the Southern Sudan referendum on time and fully respect and implement the results;

·        reach a mutually satisfactory agreement concerning the territory of Abyei, a key disputed border area;

·        craft a multi-year revenue-sharing arrangement in which the oil wealth of Abyei and key border areas could be divided equitably between the North and South, with a small percentage going to the Arab Misseriya border populations for development purposes;

·        demarcate the uncontested 80% of the border and refer the remaining 20% to binding international arbitration;

·        create serious protections for minority groups, with consideration of joint citizenship for certain populations, backed by significant international consequences for attacks on southerners in the North or northerners in the South.

The US role as the invisible third party to the agreement involves a series of incentives offered to the regime in Khartoum to ensure agreement and implementation of a peace deal. In exchange for action on the North-South and Darfur peace efforts, the US would implement a clear, sequenced, and binding path to normalization of relations.

This would involve – in order – removal of Sudan from the State Sponsors of Terrorism list, exchange of ambassadors, lifting of unilateral sanctions, and support for bilateral and multilateral debt relief, together with other economic measures by international financial institutions. Conversely, the US must be prepared to lead international efforts to impose severe consequences on any party that plunges the country back into war.

Peace and security in Darfur should be an essential benchmark for normalized relations between the US and Sudan. The Obama administration should hold firm on this through the coming rounds of negotiation, and should appoint a senior official to help coordinate US policy on Darfur in order to ensure that peace efforts there receive the same level of attention as the North-South efforts.

Peacekeepers in Sudan - photo: UN What is needed now is political will – and not only in the US – to sustain this diplomacy. The European Union and Sudan’s neighbors – in particular Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya, and Uganda – will also need to play a robust role. And China’s diplomacy in Sudan, where it has invested massively in developing the country’s oil resources, will be a test of whether or not it intends to be a responsible stakeholder in Africa and the wider world.

Ensuring that governments work toward peace is where you come in. Keep the pressure on them. Support the peace process. Your voice can prevent a war. Not guns. Not money. Just our voices.

The way to peace in Sudan is not simple, but it is achievable. There are hard choices to be made. We can make those choices now, or we can persuade ourselves that peace is too hard or too complex, and then look on resignedly from the sidelines as hundreds of thousands of innocent men, women, and children needlessly die. It’s up to us.

George Clooney is an actor and co-founder of the NGO Not On Our Watch. John Prendergast is co-founder of the Enough Project and co-author of The Enough Moment: The Fight to End Human Rights Crimes in Africa.

This article was originally printed in the Project Syndicate www.project-syndicate.org

Cholera Cases in Haiti Set to Rise; Fears of Instability (NEWS BRIEF)

(HN, November 17, 2010) - The number of cholera cases in Haiti is expected to rise significantly beyond the latest figure of 11,000 as case monitoring improves and as health officials try to get ahead of an epidemic that is already causing political instability ahead of the November 28 presidential elections.

Cholera cases have now been found in every Haiti province, known as departments, as well as the capital Port-au-Prince. So far in Haiti, more than 11,000 cases have been cited and about 1000 people have died from the disease.

UN officials said as data collection improves, numbers will inevitably rise.

"We expect to have, once that data comes in, a significant increase in recorded cases. So people should not be surprised at that," said Nigel Fisher, the U.N. humanitarian coordinator in Haiti.Canadian Nigel Fisher leads the UN response in Haiti

Fisher said emphasis is continuing on educating the public about the disease and making sure they have access to oral rehydration salts and tablets to chlorinate their water. Plans are also being made to increase the number of cholera treatment centers across the country. 'It is [cholera] spreading and we have to contain, if not [the] number of cases, we have to try to contain the number of deaths," he said.

Today, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said there are "acute deficiencies" in the well-established preventative actions that are essential to controlling the spread of the epidemic. It said activities such as the distribution of clean drinking water, positioning of oral rehydration points in affected communities, waste removal, and safe burial of victims of the epidemic, all remain far below the needs.

UN officials fear the outbreak may be used by some faction to increase instability: on Monday protestors directed their anger at UN peacekeeping forces - claiming UN personnel were responsible for importing cholera into the country.

Separately, health officials have confirmed the first case of cholera in Haiti's neighbour, the Dominican Republic.

In Geneva yesterday Fadéla Chaib of the World Health Organization (WHO) said there was a scientific consensus that cholera will remain an issue in Haiti for several years to come. WHO is preparing for more cases, mostly in remote areas, opening new treatment centers. Several levels of assistance are being offered to cholera-affected people, Chaib said, underscoring that mild cases are being treated at the community level and serious ones referred to cholera treatment centers. Social mobilization and education efforts are now very important, given that many Haitians were very scared and know little about cholera. 

Last week, the UN launched a new $163.8 million appeal for Haiti. Elisabeth Byrs of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said it is intended for the purchase water purification tablets and rehydration salts, to increase the number of medical staff and to train medical personnel.

HEADLINES - November 17, 2010 - (THE CARIBBEAN)

(PHOTO: The Vincentian, Government leaders meet to talk about damage to agriculture after Hurricane Tomas) ANGUILLA

Chief Minister and Governor off to the OTCC in London

Anguilla National Council of Women asserts support for Gender Affairs Unit in Anguilla

Better Future for Children Via Football

ANTIGUA & BARBUDA

Remembrance Day Celebrated in Antigua and Barbuda

Cruise passengers wary of robberies, but undaunted

Vigilance and education are keys to prevention, cholera, Dengue (OPINION)

ARUBA

Francis Groeneveldt recognized as a role model for community service

THE BAHAMAS

Bahamas Police Charge man for rape of a Catholic Nun and Stealing from a Primary School

Runway Report: Islands of the World Fashion Week

Accounting sector getting familiar with Chinese practices

BARBADOS

Caribbean teens win film awards

Government working to have a fully functioning civil aviation system

CAYMAN ISLANDS

Cayman Airways fined $50,000 after complaints from disabled passengers

Garbage fees foul up

What is the future of Cayman?

DOMINICA

Basic telecommunications services for remote areas

Dominica volleyball players head to Antigua for international beach volleyball qualifier

GRENADA

Help for affected islands

(PHOTO: Magnum, People infected with cholera being treated by MSF on the grounds of St. Nicholas Hospital in Saint Marc.)HAITI

Haiti cholera outbreak: timeline

Haiti Cholera outbreak may reach 200,000 says Unicef

Michaelle Jean says world will not abandon Haiti

JAMAICA

High brain drain bolsters strong remittances to Jamaica

PUERTO RICO

Puerto Rico solid in Global Student Entrepreneur Awards

Fortuño attending Republican governors meeting

SAINT KITTS & NEVIS

Federation promoted at new look St. Kitts and Nevis stand at World Travel Market 2010

Despite achievements, PANCAP face challenges on HIVAIDS

SAINT LUCIA

Mad rush for water

Ministry of health says treat water before domestic use

Financial Regulators: No License Granted for Internet-based Banking

ST MAARTEN

Civil servants file 110 appeals against job offers from Govt.

SAINT VINCENT & THE GRENADINES

OECS Secretariat and PAHO to Help Health Sectors Affected By Hurricane Tomas

Picking up after Tomas

Teachers Union Humanitarian Side

(PHOTO: Virgin Islands Daily, Virgin Islands Parliament Closed for Asbestos) TURKS & CAICOS

Digicel launches $30,000 community facelift project

Hundreds Leaving Turks and Caicos (INVESTIGATION)  

VIRGIN ISLANDS

V.I. Legislature shuttered for asbestos removal

Headlines - November 16, 2010 (Asia and Pacific)

Overly warm waters, disease, and other factors can kill corals. In this case, "bleaching" turned this fire coral (which has a christmas tree worm on top) white. Photo courtesy of NOAA, FGBNMS.American Samoa

American Samoa on aid spending watch

No firm details of cannery jobs in American Samoa following agreement

American Samoa based airline introduces larger aircraft

Marine National Parks have experienced vast losses of coral reefs to bleaching and disease

Bhutan

Bhutanese Christian serving three years for showing film about Jesus

Bhutan to receive Asian Development Bank funding for rural biogas power  

Perfect Balance (opinion)

Brunei Darussalam

His Majesty urges Muslims to devote closer to Allah

Giving the local SME’s the upper hand

8^th ASEAN Skills Competition participants leave for Thailand

The new floods and draughts (environment)  

East Timor          

East Timor government prepares review of Oil Fund Law

Abbott likens PM to Burke and Wills

Kiribati

Kiribati climate change conference calls for urgent cash and action

Laos

Cambodia, Vietnam differ from Laos in cluster bombs ban

Laos donates US$100,000 to Vietnam’s flood victims

Maldives

Maldives grappling with globalization, says foreign policy expert

Maldivian shuttlers enjoy competition at Asian Games  

North Korea

Number of N. Korean defectors in South rising, says official

North Korea constructing light-water reactor, expert says

North Korea sets out political cleansing

North Korean Jo wins women’s 25m Pistol event

UN report A “Wakeup Call” on N. Korea: Hill (perspective)  

Palau

ADB aids Palau’s push for sustainable water, sanitation services

Papua New Guinea

Harnessing the full power of community investments

Investigation into flaws of Australia’s Pacific Island workers scheme  

Tonga

Tonga moves to greater democracy

Campaigning for Tonga’s historic election begins

ANZ downgrades Pacific growth forecast

Vanuatu

Pacific politics revamped from an island perspective

Tourism Vanuatu campaign targets Aussies

Hawksbill turtle swims from Vanuatu to Australia

Pakistan: The Pitfalls of Being a 'Strategic' Ally (PERSPECTIVE)

By Themrise Khan

(HN, November 15, 2010) - Recently, I was transporting two brave ladies visiting Islamabad from Baluchistan province to their scheduled destination. They were key informants for a research project I was involved in and I took the opportunity to continue my discussion with them en route. The conversation was intense and horrific, as they recounted stories of violence and bloodshed in their hometowns.

Baluchistan, Pakistan’s largest and most neglected province, is fast turning into a minefield of political terrorism - far removed but just as lethal as the extremist violence that has pervaded other parts of the country over recent years. It is one of the many internal conflicts that now plague almost all parts of Pakistan.

On the way back, my taxi driver who had been silent throughout the exchange, curiously asked me what I was doing with the two ladies. After briefly explaining my work, he expressed his shock at how the situation had deteriorated in Baluchistan.

“These are very brave women”, he remarked. He was equally impressed with the fact that in Quetta city, shops opened promptly at 9am and closed at 6pm, whereas everywhere else in the country, business doesn’t begin till at least noon. The fact was evident as we drove by lines of shops with their shutters down at a time nearing 11am. “We say we are God-fearing here but we are not”, he commented. 

The conversation gradually gave way to his own frustration with the current state of the country. He was decidedly unhappy with the present government, to put it mildly. But he also seemed fairly unhappy with the previous one as well. “If (former President Pervez) Musharraf wants to start a political party, why doesn’t he do it here? Why is he starting it all the way in London?” he asked.  “Everyone wants to steal from us but give us nothing in return." School girls in Baluchistan: among Pakistanis paying the price of instability. CREDIT: Michael Bociurkiw/HUMNEWS

But there did seem to be some things he was pleased with. The Chief Justice, because “he is clamping down on many aspects of bad government”; with the media, “because they have exposed all the corruption” and with (retired Pakistan cricketer and politician) Imran Khan, “because he is the only leader we have”.

The point of this extended anecdote, is to try and make sense of why Pakistan is still such a big deal to the rest of the world, given we now suffer from three complex maladies everyone would gladly steer clear of: insecurity, economic instability and weak governance.

Perhaps not the most obvious choice for a country of “strategic importance” for world super powers, recently suffering from their own complex maladies. Even a stranger choice for being wedged in between one nation in the west falling apart at the seams and another on the east that keeps growing more powerful by the day. Most analysts argue that’s exactly why Pakistan is so “strategic”.

Of late however, the usual arguments to support this claim are not really holding so true.

Domestic issues within the country, be they of peace and security, human rights and justice or economic blood-letting, have taken us far, far down the list of countries with even a bite-size of potential for economic growth or peace-building. This year, Transparency International listed Pakistan 34th on its Corruption Perception Index, up eight places from last years 42^nd spot. 

The corruption argument aside, the global financial crisis is sending rich countries of the world to those that can make it richer. Pakistan, unfortunately, cannot help in that department, considering we have always been positioning ourselves at the receiving end - flood disasters notwithstanding. Which is why Pakistan did not even warrant a pit-stop on US President Obama’s Asian (read Indian) recent tour. It's as simple as that.

But surely being a “strategic” ally must have some benefits for the country? Apart from the Kerry-Lugar financial settlement, most of which is going to the Pakistani military, they say there cannot be peace in the region without a stable Pakistan. 

Most of all, Pakistanis want their country to be stable.

According to the Pakistan Institute of Peace Studies, suicide bombings, drone attacks and political and sectarian violence have cost the lives of over 3,000 Pakistanis and over 7,000 injuries in 2009 - a figure 48% higher than 2008. These are not casualties of an active war per se, but innocent bystanders, daily wage earners and security guards, women and children. People who leave for work in the morning and just never come back home. In Karachi, just political and sectarian target killings have cost the lives of almost 250 people this year alone. 

But while we suffer domestically on a daily basis, this is the exact fuel the world needs to continue their “strategic” support to us. The murders and deaths of hundreds of Pakistani’s (and Afghans) warrants the presence of thousands of troops, international agencies, military resources and aid in Pakistan. 

The conclusions one draws from this that if Pakistan were ever stabilized, many people in many countries would be at a loss over what to do next, not to mention out of a job. And so we continue to be “strategic”, “important” and of course, “unstable”, until the next violence-ravaged nation emerges to take the crown.

But where in this cycle of dependency do people like the women of Baluchistan, or the taxi driver in Islamabad come in? In an ideal world, they should be the ones calling the shots, making the decisions, being the watchdogs. But in this world, when the word on the streets is that basic economic survival is now a luxury only the very rich can afford, how can anyone expect them to play any part in turning the tide? 

And so sadly, they remain nothing more than key informants in the larger scheme of things. 

But this is probably where Pakistan’s biggest strength lies. In a country where almost 80% of the population is a captive audience to self-destruction with no exit strategies, the tide is bound to rise sometime. It remains to be seen whether this will be while Pakistan is still “strategically important” to its “allies”, or when we realize how “strategically important” we are to ourselves.

HUM Contributor Themrise Khan is a Karachi-based writer

Postscript: As I write this, an enormous blast has ripped through Karachi’s financial centre, shaking my own house almost 5 miles away. This is the second such attack in the city in the space of a month, joining hands with the pall of political violence that also pervades the city. This is hardly the “stable” Pakistan that everyone eulogizes about. In situations like this, it is hard to think about the US, India or the Taliban as the culprits. The issue may be international in nature, but the damage is purely domestic. We had better rise now before there isn’t much left of us.

(REPORT) Myanmar (aka Burma) opposition leader freed

Aung San Suu Kyi outside her home moments after release (PHOTO: Mizzima)(HN, November 13, 2010) -- This morning the ruling military junta in Myanmar (aka, Burma) released opposition leader, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and Elder member, Aung San Suu Kyi fifteen years after she was placed under house arrest when her party the National League for Democracy won 58 percent of the voting in parliamentary elections in 1990. The results were annulled by the government in power and Suu Kyi has been imprisoned where she’s been since.

Her house arrest was due to end in May 2009, but was extended for eighteen months after she was convicted for violating the terms of her house arrest and until the NLD showed to be strong in last Sunday's elections in Myanmar. Suu Kyi has been under house arrest for more than 15 of the last 21 years.

The release comes less than a week after the ruling military government held parliamentary elections for the first time in two decades. The poll was seen as not free and fair by independent observers and harshly criticized by countries like the United States.

It is not clear what forced the government's hand to free Suu Kyi. It may be trying to project a more positive image to the outside world, or it may have been pressured into doing so by neighbouring China, Thailand or fellow members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

ASEAN chief Surin Pitsuwan said on Saturday he was "very, very relieved" and that he hoped she will not be detained again.

"I'm very, very relieved and hope that this will contribute to true national reconciliation in Myanmar and that Aung San Suu Kyi will be able to play a role in bringing national reconciliation," Surin told news agencies. "Let's hope that there will not be any relapse and that other political prisoners will also benefit from this gesture of national reconciliation."

A UN spokesman said Secretary General Ban Ki-moon called Suu Kyi "an inspiration" to the world. 

"The secretary general expects that no further restrictions will be placed on her, and he urges the Myanmar authorities to build on today's action by releasing all remaining political prisoners," said the spokesman.

The Philippines, the most outspoken ASEAN member in calling for Suu Kyi's release, also welcomed her freedom but said more needed to be done.

"This is a positive step toward the right path for Myanmar. But the question remains -- will all of her political rights be restored, will they take more substantive steps toward democratisation?" said Ricky Carandang, spokesman for President Benigno Aquino.

"We hope that this meaningful action will be followed by more substantive action. We welcome it, but more needs to be done," Carandang was quoted as saying.

Desmond Tutu, chair of the group of retired senior statesmen known as The Elders, called Suu Kyi "a global symbol of moral courage" and her release "offers hope to the people of Burma." 

The Elders said the government must respect her political rights and not place any conditions on her release. They also called for the freeing of all Myanmar's political prisoners. 

---HUMNEWS staff.

Helping Haiti: Stop the Handouts (Perspective)

By Danielle Grace Warren
The opinions expressed are her own.

The people of Haiti have a name for the earthquake that rocked their country: Goudougoudou, an onomatopoetic creole nickname invented for the earthquake meant to emulate the sound of the earth rumbling, the buildings falling. There are numbers for it, too: 230,000 deaths, 59 aftershocks and 1.5 million people who remain displaced nearly a year later.

While over a billion dollars in US aid was promised was for rebuilding Haiti is tied up in the umbilicus of Washington, Port au Prince residents are settling between piles of debris — 98% of which still has not been removed. Haitians pick through the rubble for building scraps to reinforce torn tarpaulin.

Many who were displaced by the disaster and came to the Haitian capital for aid have tried to re-settle in the small towns and villages of their birth. But they have been forced to return to the capital yet again since it is still where most of the food and aid in the country can be found.

Before the earthquake happened there were already 3.5 million people living in Port au Prince — nearly 50% of the total country population. This number has doubled in recent years as people have flooded in from severely deforested and degraded agrarian areas in the hope of finding a job. Yet the vast majority of Port au Prince residents are unemployed or underemployed. Eighty percent of city dwellers live below the poverty line in slum and squatter settlements with unstable housing and poor sanitation.

If living in poverty in Port au Prince is the best thing going for Haitians because it means hope for the possibility of work then the international community’s focus on the area is sure to keep the majority of the people there in a perpetual state of waiting.

It is this waiting, despite their desperate circumstances, that is turning the Haitian people into beggars. Begging, an activity that has always been rare in Haiti, despite historical poverty, is just making the nation even more of a client-state and ever more dependent on foreign aid.

(photo courtesy of: latinamericanstudies.org) Much has been discussed about rebuilding a better Haiti. In rethinking our strategy for measuring aid, President Obama urged that, rather than just managing poverty, “we have to offer people a path out of poverty. We need to help countries help themselves, not offer aid that provides short-term relief without reforming societies. That’s not development; that’s dependence … And it’s a cycle we need to break.”

As part of the global 2015 Millennium Development Goals, the UN identified the following targets: to halve the proportion of people who suffer from hunger, achieve decent work for all, integrate principles of sustainable development, and significantly improve the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers.

Whatever the amount of aid that arrives in Haiti in the near term, it will eventually run out. In order to provide much needed jobs and food, we need to be investing in sustainable agricultural education and development projects in partnership with leadership at all levels, especially local leadership in impoverished rural areas, that take both people and the environment into account like sustainable women’s farming cooperatives and mangrove reforestation initiatives in partnership with local fishers.

If environmental protection is ignored, the watersheds and coastal lowlands will be increasingly subject to erosion, inundation, and destruction. In turn, this will increase the likelihood of future disasters such as flash-floods.

If we do not decentralize aid, if we do not channel it to other distressed areas of the country as well, we will be marginalizing all Haitian people and ensuring that Port au Prince will become a ghetto once again.

This is not to ignore the fact that jobs can and should be created in the city itself nor that Port au Prince is home to a large population of people who have no desire to leave — and nor should they have to. But shouldn’t they have a choice?

Danielle Grace Warren is the president of the One Village Planet-Women’s Development Initiative and the treasurer of One Village Planet/Village Planète (Haiti), which has implemented the only successful mangrove coastal forestation project in Haiti.

This piece was first published 11/11/2010 in "The Great Debate", Reuters.

Food Security at Risk: What Do the Mozambican Riots and BHP Billiton Have to Do with Each Other? (PERSPECTIVE)

By Saliem Fakir

The recent Mozambican food and fuel riots raise the spectre, in general, about food insecurity and social unrest in the future.

We certainly have the capability to feed all of the world’s population, but the political economy of agriculture, food production and distribution somewhat has a greater influence as to whether people can feed themselves or not.

Food security though is not limited to good rainfall, soils, or the ingenuity of breeding the right strains of crops. Food security is fundamentally about access to food by the poor in an affordable manner.

For a long time we have been buying cheap food because of cheap oil or the lavishing of subsidies to farmers in Europe and the United States that produced food mountains in the 80’s and 90’s.

Cheap food is no longer guaranteed, as oil prices are likely to rise. Oil is a key ingredient of fertilizer and enables us to move food easily from one part of the world to another in a globalised economy. That privilege is not likely to last for long and governments will be required to intervene more and more in the food market.

Those who can afford it may well easily accommodate cost shifts because they have higher income capabilities.

But, as the Mozambican riots demonstrate, for the poor any sudden shift in prices (for instance a 30% bread price hike alone) without major shifts in income or the state’s ability to caste a wider welfare net is a source of great anxiety and stress. Much of it overflows out into the streets with angry crowds looting and baying for the blood of senior officials.

The control of global food production is the subject of numerous books. It would be fair to say that neither consumers nor farmers have great influence on these chains of supply because they have come under the control of very large agribusinesses and retail outlets.

The average subsidy in the US accounts for 12% of total farm income. In OECD countries, it’s about 26% and in the European Union about 29%. These, in general, have favoured consolidation of farming into large agribusinesses, and in the US, virtually wiped out family farms -- once a strong feature of the US rural scene.

Food costs are also influenced by the movement of input costs and the rent ‘surcharge’ that is exacted by those who control the distribution, marketing and processing of food.

The greater the dependency of the global food system for oil based chemical derivatives and fuel for transport, the more vulnerable everybody is to shifts in prices of these inputs. We were witness to this when oil prices hit $140/barrel two years ago.

The future picture of oil does not look optimistic and despite the decline in the price of oil, it has not gone below the $40-$50/barrel range. This has already lifted the cost of food production. Oil price inflation is slowly seeping its way into the food chain.

However, where inflation of inputs increase the cost burden of food production they also eat away at the purchasing power of individuals and households. Their impacts assault the poor as a double penalty.  Their incomes can’t accommodate the sudden cost shifts and their incomes are unlikely to keep pace with inflation to absorb future cost increases.

And, as we can see from the Mozambican riots much of this was centred in urban areas, in particular, Maputo. Urbanization in Africa is happening at a much faster rate than anywhere else in the world. It makes dependence on the supply of affordable food even more of a strategic challenge for government.

Especially, governments that are dependent on food imports and where the growing urban population starts to delink itself from the agricultural food production chain and base. This urban population will increasingly rely on the markets or state schemes to supply food.

Africa’s own agricultural production has to be boosted in order to facilitate intra-regional trade in agricultural goods to reduce reliance and dependence on imports. These will require considerable investments in new infrastructure and assistance to farmers.

This will not be easily forthcoming in countries that have very depleted state resources or financial means. Even if the money were available, it would take a good few years for the benefits of such infrastructure investment to come through.

A good proportion of food inflation costs have been attributed to rising oil prices, biofuel production and control, by major food suppliers, of the supply chain. There has been little focus on the control of strategic input ingredients.

At the global stage, new acquisitions of critical input resources like potash may not hold a positive portent for affordable food production in general and Africa as a whole. BHP Billiton is making a $39 billion bid for Canada’s Potash Corporation.

The ‘PotashCorp’, as it is known in short, is the world’s largest producer of potash, and the second and third largest producer of nitrogen and phosphate -- three of the critical ingredients for the production of fertilizer. By the end of 2007 the company controlled 22% of the world’s potash industry.

Potash supply, the world over, is controlled by eight large companies who control 70-80% of the potash market and operate in a similar fashion as OPEC does with oil. They operate as a cartel that can manipulate prices.

During the 2008 food crisis, the price of potash went up from $150/tonne in 2006 to $1000/tonne in 2008.  This is possible because potash itself is not ubiquitous. The largest reserves straddle mainly four countries: Canada, Russia, Israel and Belarus.

The use of potash in the fertilizer industry is relatively obscure and known mainly to industry experts for its strategic importance.

BHP seeks market dominance. BHP is one of the largest mining companies in the world and has been seeking to dominate the mining and resource sector in the last five years or so (given that it is cash flush) and has been undertaking mergers and acquisitions left-right and centre.

BHP’s attempt to seek market dominance has not gone unnoticed. China has become wary of BHP’s acquisition strategies, as it may influence the price at which this strategic resource could be obtained from the market.

In an attempt to block BHP’s control over Canada’s Potash Corp, Chinese officials have ordered the state owned company, Sinochem, to launch a counter bid. China is seeking to acquire a blocking bid in order to derail the hostile take-over by the Anglo-Australian miner.

China has also invited the Singaporean sovereign wealth fund, Temasek, to join in on the bid. China did a very similar thing when BHP sought to take a large stake in Rio Tinto. It paired up with the US aluminium producer Alcoa Inc. to buy a 9% stake in Rio Tinto forcing BHP out of the race for the stake in Rio.

The Chinese government, like the Indian government, suspects the bid to control the potash market by BHP is an attempt to milk the Asian market through market dominance as most of the future growth is expected in this region. China is the biggest importer of potash and is concerned about how it will feed its very large population in the future.

The control over PotashCorp is viewed as a strategic buy because it is a swing producer. In other words, it can ratchet production up or down depending on demand and so keep prices relatively high.

The interest in potash by investors is a reflection of a wider interest by big players in the potential of the agricultural sector, which is expected to boom in the next decade because of the growth in the global population. The FAO predicts food demand will jump 70% from now till 2050.

The potash bid and the volatility of other input costs in the agricultural sector is increasingly being viewed with concern by governments and consumer groups.

Between, 2007-2008 when food prices went sky-high, riots were seen from Bangladesh to Mexico. If you start adding other variables like climate change, the unpredictability of oil prices and the degradation of the purchasing power of the poor, the potential for social unrest seems almost certain.

----Saliem Fakir is an independent writer based in Cape Town. South Africa.

Hundreds Subjected to Sexual Violence During Mass Expulsions From Angola to Congo - UN Report

(CREDIT: Africamap.com) (HN, November 8, 2010) - A new report by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) says more than 650 people were sexually abused during mass expulsions from Angola to Congo.

"The conditions of expulsion are still terrible. In many cases, sexual violence is reported and even cases of torture," said the report.

It documents 657 instances of sexual violence based on evidence collated by welcome committees in the two territories of Luiza and Tshikapa/Kamonia, in Western Kasai province, in two waves during October.

The UN has called for an immediate investigation into the reports.

"I call upon the authorities of both countries to investigate these allegations and to proceed in compliance with relevant legislation," said Margot Wallström, the Secretary-General's Special Representative for Sexual Violence in Conflict, in a statement issued yesterday. "I expect the authorities of Angola and the DRC to respect human rights and to do everything in their power to prevent abuses of all kinds during any further expulsions."

Word of the allegations comes after publication of reports of systematic rape of up to 500 civilians in eastern Congo between July 30 and August 3 by rebel militiamen in the town of Luvungi, while UN peacekeepers were stationed nearby.

Atul Khare, the UN Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping, said UN peacekeepers had "failed" to protect the victims.

Meanwhile, UNICEF has raised the alarm on a polio epidemic in Angola.

Polio was on the brink of eradication in Angola at the end of 2004, UNICEF says, when the country had experienced three consecutive years without new cases. Then, in 2005, the wild poliovirus reappeared, and Angola now has one of the biggest polio caseloads in Africa. So far this year, 25 cases have been reported.

“While stopping the transmission of polio by the end of this year is on track,” says UNICEF Representative in Angola Dr. Koen Vanormelingen, “more effort and funding is still required."

-HUMNEWS staff

(REPORT): Early Reports from Myanmar Election: Low Turn-Out Amid Heavy Security Presence (UPDATED 20:43 GMT)

(HN, November 7, 2010) - Amid a heavy police presence and voter intimidation, the people of Myanmar voted in Parliamentary elections - the first in 20 years. However opposition candidates had an extremely difficult time making themselves known to the voters in this impoverished Southeast Asian nation.

Observers and diplomats said the military junta that has controlled Myanmar (also known as Burma) for almost two decades is hoping what many are categorizing as a sham election - no independent observers or journalists were allowed - will be seen as a legitimate exercise, especially by allies such as China. A stringer quoted by one of the western news agencies said some polling places were mostly empty.A mother holds her child amid the devastation of Cyclone Nargis. The military junta was accused of witholding foreign aid. CREDIT: UN

Today, during a state visit to India, US President Barack Obama described the elections as "anything but free and fair" and that its people have "been denied the right to determine their own destiny."

Ordinary people quoted by freelance journalists inside Myanmar said most voters interviewed will stay away from polling stations as a sign or protest. However, as in previous elections, local officials intimidate people to go vote.

During the short campaign period, while official candidates were ferried around streets in late-model Toyota trucks and with loud speakers and flashy posters, opposition candidates had to walk door-to-door with photocopied pamphlets, observers said.

The European Union's foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton also dismissed the election: "Many aspects of these elections are not compatible with internationally accepted standards, notably in the bias against most opposition parties -- such as the NLD -- and their candidates."

As it usually does, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) - of which Myanmar is a member - remained mostly silent on the election: there was no call for a free and fair process at its summit last month in Vietnam. Recently, the Philippines Foreign Secretary, Alberto Romulo, has stated that the election is a farce and is flawed, and would cost ASEAN not only goodwill but its legitimacy.

The country is still reeling from the effects of Cyclone Nargis three years ago, when severe rains and winds damaged large swaths of the country, killed tens of thousands and made many homeless. At the time, the military junta was accused of ignoring effected areas seen as not supportive of the government. And foreign government accused Myanmar officials of refusing badly-needed aid.

In the last Parliamentary election in 1990 - when the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) won a majority of seats - the junta nullified the results. NLD leader Aung San Suu Kyi, 65, has been under house arrest for most of the past 20 years and is unable to speak to the pubic. The party decided to boycott this election, citing intimidation and manipulation of the process.

If any opposition candidate do get elected, observers say one of the most important interventions they could provide is scrutinizing the national budget, which is a state secret. While the junta spends up to 60 per cent on defence, spending on social services and education are abysmally low.

In an analysis piece in Asia Times Online, Burma watcher Danielle Burnstein writes that decades of mismanagement in Myanmar have driven nearly a third of the country's population below the poverty line, and that the country's children - many of whom are forced to work and serve in the army - stand to suffer the most from the status quo.

"As the nation braces for its first national election in more than 20 years...it is Myanmar's most vulnerable citizens - its children - who stand to lose if the country's new leaders fail to reverse the trend towards further fiscal collapse, squandered," writes Burnstein.

- HUMNEWS staff