Anti TERROR Acts to DEFEND India Incs, ILLUMINITY and Brahaminical Zionist White WAR ECONOMIES Based ON GENOCIDE CULTURE under MILITARY RULE!Here's wh

Anti TERROR Acts to DEFEND India Incs, ILLUMINITY and Brahaminical Zionist White WAR ECONOMIES Based ON GENOCIDE CULTURE under MILITARY RULE!Here's what's in the 2nd stimulus package! RBI cuts key interest rates again! Whose INTERESTS Have to be SAVED Feeding the Killer Money Machine and the Gestapo? Nano goes on a test drive in rugged Garhwal!Indian Americans to lobby against Pakistan!Pak won’t extradite terror suspects to India! Pakistan has no right to advise us: India


"No quarter will be given to terrorists. Broad guidelines will be given to the Army, paramilitary forces and police operating under the Unified Command against terrorists," Chidambaram said in GUAHATI, adding that anyone posing threat to peace and development in the country would be dealt with severely by the security forces.

"More than 330 terrorist outfits are still operating in Pakistan, there is no improvement or any change in attitude," Antony said, responding to questions from media persons.

India is ready for MILITARY Rule extended beyond kashmir and Northeast! Thus, the Armed Forces get the BONANZA as soon as the Anti TERROR Acts enacted!Bypassing the Parliament, no less than RS. THREE LAC THOUSND Corore have been pumped into Indian market. And the Ruling hegemony puts the National revenue once again to sustain LPG system, denied by USA which ratehr opted for rejected Indian Way of NATIONALISATION to deal with Global Meltdown.

I have been insisting on again and again that the very phenomenon of International TERRORISM roots into the ZIONIST Galaxy Post Modern Manusmriti and aparteid ECONOMY and it also hapens to be the best TOOL for the ruling Hegemonies worldwide. Recent developments in India and abroad enhance my stance more or less!

Troubled Galaxy Destroyed Dreams: Chapter 134

Palash Biswas

“The battle...has to begin here. In America. The only institution more powerful than the U.S. government is American civil society. The rest of us are subjects of slave nations. We are by no means powerless, but you have the power of proximity. You have access to the Imperial Palace and the Emperor’s chambers. Empire’s conquests are being carried out in your name.”
Arundhati Roy

Should India have stringent anti-terrorism law?
Share this debate


Homegrown terror has engulfed India from all sides. Whether it is the Hindi heartland of Uttar Pradesh or Bihar, mountains of Jammu and Kashmir, metro cities like Mumbai and Bangalore, the terrorists have caught India on the wrong foot. The are planting bombs and killing people, safe in the knowledge that even if they are caught, the system will fail to punish them. After the withdrawal of the POTA, the terrorists feel that there is no strong law to check their activities. Terrorists find India a playground of local and global jehad. In a shocking disclosure it has been found that SIMI activists, arrested for the recent bomb attacks in Ahmedabad and other Indian cities were connected with bomb attacks earlier also. They had been arrested and due to the lack of adequate proofs were granted bail only to indulge in similar activities against the people, once again. Isn't it time for the Indian government and civil society to think about the future of the country and decide whether it will allow the country to become a Jehadi battleground or it will be a safe, peaceful and democratic country? Should India have stringent anti-terrorism law?
http://www.merinews.com/debate?debateId=88

Katyusha, Katyusha - a Gaza poem
Read Sean O'Brien's new poem in response to the latest phase of conflict between Israel and Hamas
Award-winning poet writes Gaza poem

Katyusha, Katyusha,
Arrow of fire:
Kingdom Come, is it
Below or above?
Choked in a tunnel
With morphine and bread,
Or charred in the wreck
Of an olive grove?
Katyusha, Katyusha,
Spear of desire,
Are there green pastures,
A brave desert rose,
Or must it be prison
With pillars of flame?
Katyusha, Katyusha,
A grave, or a rose?
Katyusha, Katyusha,
God only knows.

Pakistan should be made to pay the price for terror
Satish Chandra

December 09, 2008

The terrorist attacks on Mumbai are nothing short of an act of war against India. There is incontrovertible evidence that the terrorists were Pakistani Lashkar-e-Tayiba operatives, who had been meticulously trained by military personnel, former or serving over several months for this operation.

They came to Mumbai by boat from Karachi and much of the material recovered from them, from toilet paper to grenades, had its origins in Pakistan. Given the Inter Services Intelligence's close links with and patronage of the LeT, as well as the commando style in which it was conducted, leaves no doubt that Pakistan was behind this action.

This incident must sadden every Indian not merely because of its terrible toll on life and property but because it is a scathing indictment of our leadership. We do not enjoy the luxury of explaining it away on grounds of surprise. The 1993 Mumbai blasts were our 9/11 with a casualty toll around double that in the present incident. Since then, with increasing frequency in the last three years, there have been several major terrorist incidents in India undertaken from Pakistan.

The government's inability to prevent such incidents is testimony to its abject failure both, to compel Pakistan to desist from exporting terrorism to India and, to appropriately upgrade its intelligence and security systems, including at the local level, so that the impact of such incidents is minimised.
http://www.rediff.com/news/2008/dec/09mumterror-pakistan-should-be-made-to-pay-the-price-for-terror.htm?zcc=rl


Highlights of the first stimulus package

Following are the highlights of the mega-stimulus package announced by the government to boost the economy:

Additional plan expenditure of up to Rs 20,000 crore (Rs 200 billion)
Excise duty reduced across the board by 4 per cent.
IIFCL authorised to raise Rs 10,000 crore (Rs 100 billion) via tax-free bonds.
PSU banks to announce package for borrowers of home loans.
Rs 350 crore (Rs 3.50 billion) additional funds for export incentives.
Back-up guarantee to ECGC for up to Rs 350 crore.
2 per cent interest subvention for labour-intensive exports.
Rs 1,100 crore (Rs 11 billion) to ensure full refund of Terminal Excise duty.
Additional Rs 1,400 crore (Rs 14 billion) for textile sector under TUF Scheme.
The guarantee cover for loans to MSME doubled to Rs 1 crore (Rs 10 million).
The lock-in period for such collateral-free loans reduced.
Government departments allowed to take up replacement of vehicles.
Import duty on naphtha for power sector eliminated.
Export duty on iron ore fines eliminated.
The economy will continue to need stimulus in next fiscal.

On January 20th, Barack Obama will make history when he becomes the first African American President of the United States. It has been only 45 years since forced segregation was outlawed amid the racial tension of the 1960's. Since then, racial barriers have been broken down, paving the way for President-elect Obama and other black politicians to hold power.What we see to happen in United Sates of America, we may not dare to dream about that in AMERICANISED FREEsenSEX Shining India as the aboriginal and Indigenous people have lost its history, legacy, identity and cultural roots and even the DREANMS of our ancestors! In fact, the ancient great poet-sage of Tamil, Thiruvalluvar, said it all three thousand years ago when, in one of his famous kurals (couplets) he laid down laughter as the best answer to disaster. Gird up the loins, get the act together, stop beating the breasts, blowing the nose, and shedding those tears. Stand up and meet challenges head on without flinching or faltering. Follow the new mantra of hope: Yes, I can, yes, we can, yes, yes, all of us can! But the hard fact remains the same: WE CAN NOT!

India is ready for MILITARY Rule extended beyond kashmir and Northeast! Thus, the Armed Forces get the BONANZA as soon as the Anti TERROR Acts enacted!Bypassing the Parliament, no less than RS. THREE LAC THOUSND Corore have been pumped into Indian market. And the Ruling hegemony puts the National revenue once again to sustain LPG system, denied by USA which ratehr opted for rejected Indian Way of NATIONALISATION to deal with Global Meltdown.

I have been insisting on again and again that the very phenomenon of International TERRORISM roots into the ZIONIST Galaxy Post Modern Manusmriti and aparteid ECONOMY and it also hapens to be the best TOOL for the ruling Hegemonies worldwide. Recent developments in India and abroad enhance my stance more or less!India's president has signed into law a bill creating an anti-terror investigation agency, following last month's deadly terrorist attack in the commercial city of Mumbai.President Pratibha Patil on Wednesday approved the measure to set up a national agency resembling the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Ms. Patil also signed an anti-terror bill designed to boost police powers.


The CORE Economy of United States is enjoying a POLITICAL and Social Change , TWO in ONE, since it has OVECOME APARTHEID. Is Americanised PERIPHERY ECONOMY ruled by Brahaminical Post Modern Galaxy Manusmriti HEGEMONY and worldwide ILLUMINITY has ever tried to ANNIHILATE Caste to liberate the Majority Eighty Five percent aboriginal indigenous people with inherent inequality and injustice?

That is the question, our Caste Hindu previleged and enlightened friends do avoid to reply. rather they tend to launch an all out fascist HATE campaign ably supported by FDI TOILET media and Superslave Political system as well as Intelligentsia. They would rather point out at Casteology and so called CORRUPTION of Mayawati and would not take notice of the Brahaminical CULTURE modifying her!

President-elect Barack Obama will be sworn-in as 44th president of the United States with the Bible that Abraham Lincoln used when he took the oath of office more than a century ago. The Lincoln Bible is in the collection of the Library of Congress and was shown to the media this week. As President-elect Obama prepares to take office, it will be an especially uplifting moment for a generation of Americans, who witnessed the struggle for civil rights, and now some four decades later will see a dream fulfilled.

"And government of the people, by the people and for the people has not perished from this earth." On election night, president-elect Barack Obama borrowed this line from President Abraham Lincoln's famous Gettysburg address.


The Reserve Bank of India slashed its two key short-term interest rates by 100 basis points each on Friday to stimulate an economy that has been slowing faster than expected. It cut the repo rate, at which it lends cash to banks, to 5.5 per cent from 6.5 per cent. The reverse repo rate, the rate at which the RBI absorbs excess cash from the system, was cut to to 4.0 per cent from 5.0 per cent. Both reductions are effective immediately. The repo rate has been cut aggressively since mid-October last year as the central bank tried to minimise the knock-on effects of the global financial crisis.The central bank also announced a cut in cash reserve ratio, the proportion of deposits banks must keep with the central bank, by 50 basis points to 5.0 per cent with effect from Jan. 17.

In Washington,Political sources say U.S. President-elect Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi, the speaker of the House of Representatives, will meet Monday to discuss a stimulus plan for the ailing U.S. economy.They say the two Democrats will discuss the scope and timing of the economic recovery package, which is intended in part, to create jobs and invest in U.S. businesses.According to The Washington Post newspaper, Pelosi has said she wants a bill ready for Mr. Obama to sign when he takes office on January 20. The stimulus plan is expected to cost between $675 billion and $775 billion.The meeting between Mr. Obama and Pelosi will come after Mr. Obama and his family move to Washington in the coming days. Mr. Obama and his family returned to Chicago Friday after a 12-day vacation in Hawaii.



Pak won’t extradite terror suspects to India!Pakistan has reopened a key military supply route for U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan following an offensive against militants near the Khyber Pass.Shipments resumed Friday on the road linking northwestern Pakistan with Afghanistan. The Khyber Pass was closed for three days as Pakistani security forces targeted militants who have sought to disrupt shipments on the road.U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan get up to 75 percent of their supplies by road through Pakistan. The Khyber Pass is the main route. As soon as the ROUTE for US and NATO WAR against terror is reopened by PAKISTAN, USA cahnges its much hyped stance on Mumbai CARNAGE!The US administration is asking Pakistan to ensure that those responsible for the Mumbai terror attacks are punished inside the country instead of being extradited to India, according to a media report. The Bush administration has informed the Pakistan government that it would like it to initiate "prosecution with sufficient efforts to ensure conviction" of those behind the Mumbai incident, the 'Dawn' newspaper quoted US sources as saying. The move is a "clear change" in the attitude of the US, which earlier had backed the Indian demand that some of the suspects be extradited to India. The change apparently has been noticed in New Delhi, where External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said on Thursday that the US pressure on Pakistan to act against the Mumbai perpetrators had "not produced tangible returns", the newspaper said.

US officials had earlier supported India's demand for the handing over of those behind the attacks but the change in their attitude followed a realisation in Washington that it would not be easy for the Pakistan government to extradite key Lashker-e-Taiba leaders to India, the sources said.


Pakistan has rejected India's demand for extradition of the perpetrators of the Mumbai terror attacks even as the US reportedly favoured the suspects being punished inside this country. "There is no extradition treaty between India and Pakistan. We are keen on rebuilding our internal institutions. So if we engage in these issues, it will be harmful for Pakistan," Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi told Geo TV. The Minister was asked whether India and the US had made demands for handing over terror suspects -- Lashkar-e-Toiba operations commander Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Masood Azar and Hafiz Mohammed Saeed. Qureshi's remarks assume significance in the wake of External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Thursday saying that there was no need for an extradition treaty to take action on these matters.

It's day seven into Israel's offensive against targets in the Gaza Strip and Israeli warplanes have carried out more air strikes while Palestinian militants have launched further rocket attacks into Israel. The Islamist group Hamas has vowed revenge and called for mass protests against the Israeli actions. A cloud of smoke rises following an Israeli missile strike in the northern Gaza Strip, 02 Jan 2009
Israel said its aircraft struck a number of militant targets in Gaza Friday, including a mosque in Jabaliya, which Israeli officials say was used to store rockets and other weapons.Israel has hammered sites throughout the Gaza Strip and says it will continue to do so until Islamist militants stop firing rockets into Israel.

Many Palestinians and Arabs hope Barack Obama will be more supportive of the Palestinians and a Palestinian state than President Bush has been. One group calling for better balance is the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

"America has to show leadership - a new leadership," said Nihad Awad, executive director of the council. "And the team of Barack Obama should not repeat the mistakes of George Bush and even Bill Clinton. We need new change, and we need to exercise pressure on Israel."

In his campaign to win the White House, Barack Obama went to Jerusalem and expressed solidarity with Israel.

Mr. Obama also supported Israel's right to defend itself.

"If somebody was sending rockets into my house where my two daughters sleep at night, I am going to do everything in my power to stop that," Obama said.

Since his election, Mr. Obama has said nothing beyond repeating his desire to push for a a Jewish and Palestinian state living side by side in peace.

At the Brookings Institution, Middle East analyst Shibley Telhami said "one thing that he has to be careful of is not to say something that is going to tie his hands when he starts and comes into office."

Mr. Obama has also made it clear that there is only one president at a time, and for now, that president is George Bush.



We look at key moments in the civil rights movement that led to Mr. Obama's successful run for the White House.

November 2008, Barack Obama is elected as the first African American president, a monumental moment in the country's history.


For many who celebrated his election victory, it was a dream come true. Especially for African Americans and others who lived and protested during the tumultuous years of the civil rights movement.


Michael Luther King, Jr.
March 1965, blacks in Selma, Alabama were violently attacked by police as they marched to demand the right to register to vote. Images of the incident known as "Bloody Sunday" outraged many around the country. On this day, the future president was only two years old, living in a very different America, where segregation was enforced by law in many communities.


This day in Selma helped galvanize support for the civil rights movement led by Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."

In August 1963, a quarter of a million people watched Reverend King deliver his famous "I Have a Dream" speech. The March on Washington was widely credited with pressuring Congress to pass key civil rights legislation that would outlaw racial discrimination. Over the next two years Congress passed and President Lyndon Johnson signed two laws governing civil rights and voting.



"Through hard work and sacrifices each of us can pursue our individual dreams but still come together as one American family," Mr. Obama said.
Forty-three years later many believe the 1965 Voting Rights Act paved the way for Mr. Obama and other black politicians.

Barbara Arnwine is Executive Director of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights under Law in Washington. "Once that (Voting Rights) Act was passed, it opened the gateways for people of color especially African Americans to start bursting down barriers," Arnwine said. "Barriers to every level of elected office."

Seventy-six-year old civil rights leader Roger Wilkins remembers the sacrifices he and many others made in the push for equal rights. "That movement and everybody who put a foot to the road, have had a hand in this astonishing and wonderful moment that we are about to have the inauguration of an African American President of the United States," he recalled.

Barbara Arnwine says Mr. Obama's historic rise to become the nation's first black president will encourage other minorities. "They see a new possibility in politics and they see a rejuvenation of the concept of democracy -- that democracy no longer is just for one race," she added.






Since President Jimmy Carter in the 1970s, the White House has been involved in trying to bring peace between Israel and the Palestinians. But until now, no U.S. president has succeeded.

The effort has become more difficult not only because of the current Israeli operation in Gaza, but also as a result of internal Israeli and Palestinian politics - both fractured. And, on January 20, the pro-Israel administration of President Bush will be replaced by President-elect Barack Obama, who many on the Arab side hope will be more sympathetic to their cause.

President Bush has spoken repeatedly about the need for Israel and the Palestinians to work together and reach a lasting peace.

But during its two terms, the Bush White House, despite hosting the 2007 Annapolis peace talks, has shown solid support for Israel and its military operations against Palestinian militants.



A Palestinian woman gestures as others check the damage of their destroyed houses after an Israeli missile strike at Rafah refugee camp, southern Gaza Strip, Thursday, 01 Jan. 2009
The current Israeli strikes against Hamas in Gaza are no exception, as White House spokesman Gordon Jondroe made clear.

"Hamas has once again shown its true colors as a terrorist organization that refuses to even recognize Israel's right to exist," Jondroe said. "In order for the violence to stop, Hamas must stop firing rockets into Israel and agree to respect a sustainable and durable cease-fire."

Some observers believe Israel started bombing Gaza now because it wanted support from President Bush but also the upper hand with Mr. Bush's successor.


"So Ehud Barak, the Israeli defense minister, who is an ex-general, is, in a sense, seizing the ground while he has the chance. And so, the situation confronting Barack Obama when he comes in will be Israel having a stronger position," said analyst Paul Schram of the Middle East Institute.

The National Investigative Agency Bill and Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Amendment Bill on Tuesday became a law as President Pratibha Patil gave her assent to those legislations which were passed in the last session of Parliament.

.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Friday the United States wants a Gaza cease-fire as soon as possible, but she made clear the Bush administration does not want to see a return to the situation of last month, when an Egyptian-mediated truce was routinely broken by Hamas rocket fire into Israel.

Rice said she has no plans for an early trip to the Middle East.

In comments to reporters after a briefing for President Bush, Rice sharply criticized Hamas, which she said has held the Gaza strip hostage since illegally seizing power there in 2007 and used the coastal strip as a "launch pad" against Israel - deeply contributing to the humanitarian crisis there.

Rice said the United States is continuing a diplomatic drive to end the Gaza hostilities but made clear the Bush administration is not interested in a new cease-fire deal that would fall apart like its predecessor.

"We are working toward a cease-fire that would not allow a re-establishment of the status quo ante, where Hamas can continue to launch rockets out of Gaza," she said. "It is obvious that that cease-fire should take place as soon as possible. But we need a cease-fire that is durable and sustainable."

Rice noted that Hamas had rejected an extension of the Egyptian-brokered six-month truce that expired last month.

She said she has been in constant contact with key Arab states, Israel, and with European allies to find a solution to the Gaza situation, but said under questioning she had no plans to go to the Middle East.

Rice is due to begin her final trip abroad as secretary of state within the next few days. A full itinerary has not been announced but she will attend events in China marking the 30th anniversary of the establishment of full U.S. relations with the communist government in Beijing.

Turkish press reports have also said the Rice trip will include a stop in Turkey, which has been hosting the Israeli-Syrian peace talks that were suspended by Syria after Israel began its air assault in Gaza.

Hamas has depicted its rocket attacks on Israel as acts of resistance because Israel has refused to lift its blockade of Gaza.


Home Minister P Chidambaram told reporters that the presidential assent has been received .

"The regulations have come into effect from today," Chidambaram said.He said the NIA will get its Director General in a few days. A K Singh, an IPS officer currently with the Border Security Force, is tipped to become the first chief of of the NIA.

"NIA will be established to investigate terrorist offences. As and when any case is assigned to the NIA, it will take up investigation," he said.

WASHINGTON: The historic India-United States civil nuclear agreement, which 'reshaped the relationship between' the two countries, is one of the major achievements of the eight-year-long Bush administration, the White House has said.With less than three weeks for incumbent George W Bush [Images] to hand over the presidency to Barack Obama [Images], the White House has published two documents highlighting the major achievements of Bush's eight years (2001 to 2009) of rule as the President of the US.As expected, the US-led global war against terrorism, in particular in Iraq and Afghanistan, tops the list of achievements of the Bush Presidency.The two documents do mention the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal and the improved relationship between India and the US as one of the key achievements of George W Bush.


New Delhi:Rubbishing Pakistan's 'advice' for de-activating ground and air troops in forward areas, India on Friday said it has no right to give any such suggestion and pointed out that 330 terror outfits are still active in that country.Maintaining that India has done no escalation and the armed forces were only doing their duty, Defence Minister A K Antony said there is 'no noticeable change' in the attitude of Pakistan and Indian forces will have to remain alert.

In a bid to convince US lawmakers to put pressure on Pakistan to take action against perpetrators of Mumbai terror attacks, a group of Indian Americans have decided to hold 'Washington Lobby Day' on January 27. The objective is to 'show the US Members of Congress that Indian Americans and all Americans are expressing their strong support for the victims of the Mumbai attacks and for continued US-India efforts on the war against terrorist organisations based in Pakistan,' Chairman of US-India Political Action Committee (USINPAC), Sanjay Puri said.USINPAC and several other Indian American organisations including Asian American Hotel Owners Association (AAHOA) have come together to set up a national task force.


"I do not think there is any noticeable change in the attitude of Pakistan. Statements are not important. Actions are important. They have to prove by their action," Defence Minister A K Antony told media persons in New Delhi on the sidelines of a Defence Ministry function.

"More than 330 terrorist outfits are still operating in Pakistan, there is no improvement or any change in attitude," Antony said, responding to questions from media persons.

"Nobody will tell us, after 26/11 we must be prepared to meet any eventuality. It is our duty," he asserted.

"Armed forces are doing their duty. They are not escalating anything. They are not doing any power projection. They are doing their duty. They have to be fully prepared to meet any challenge from any quarter, any threat from any quarter," Antony said.

"We are not escalating the issues. There is no unusual troop movement on our side. Whatever is taking place, the exercise and others, is normal only," Antony said, underlining that the Indian troops had to remain alert always



Seeking to reverse the recessionary trend, the government on Friday gave the economy a second stimulus by enabling the industry to borrow more from abroad and FIIs to invest more in the country, besides stepping up public spending.The package, the last for the current financial year and announced in tandem with rate cuts by RBI, aims at providing much higher and cheaper funds in the economy along with additional expenditure by the Centre and the State to push demand in the country.While allowing states to access market for borrowing about Rs 30,000 crore (Rs 300 billion) to meet additional expenditure, the package provides for liberalisation of External Commercial Borrowing norms and raising FII investment limit in rupee-denominated instruments to $15 billion from $6 billion now.Focusing on countering the recessionary trends, the package also withdrew exemptions on countervailing duties on cement, TMT bars and structurals that were originally given to contain inflation.Announcing the package, Deputy Chairman of Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia said special attention was being paid to housing sector, macro and micro industries and infrastructure sectors through a series of measures including provision for higher credit and greater liquidity for the non-banking financial companies.

Meanwhile,Refusing to blame intelligence failure for the serial blasts in Guwahati, Home Minister P Chidambaram on Friday said Assam police had acted 'swiftly and decisively' on the inputs provided by the Centre but was 'unlucky' to have missed the culprits.Union Home Minister informed that Assam Police had identified two of the three terrorists, who had planted three bombs in Guwahati on Thursday and was hot on their trail.

"I have full faith in Assam police and am confident that they will capture them," he said.



"Assam police nearly apprehended him (one of the blast suspects). A little bit of luck evaded Assam Police. I am sure, next time, Assam Police will be lucky," Chidambarm told media persons in Guwahati.


Chidambaram said the Centre had intelligence inputs, which were passed on swiftly to the state. He disagreed that the blast occurred due to intelligence failure. Chidambaram said riverine police should be set up in Assam along Brahmaputra.


Asked whether the blasts were the result of intelligence failure, Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi had on Thursday said, "I do not say failure but lapses are there. No country can provide 100 per cent security and we don't have the best intelligence."

"We need to improve and strengthen our police force apart from ensuring its modernisation," he had said.

Five persons were killed and over 50 injured in three blasts in Guwahati on Thursday

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh [Images] is scheduled to visit the blast victims under going treatment in Guwahati Medical College Hospital later in the evening on his arrival at the city. The prime minister is travelling to Shillong on Saturday to attend Indian Science Congress.

After chairing a two-hour security review meeting of the counter-insurgency Unified Command structure with senior officials of Assam Police, Army, paramilitary forces, intelligence officials along with Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi in Guwahati this noon, Chidambaram promised a 'sharply focused operation strategy' to counter threat from terrorists.

"No quarter will be given to terrorists. Broad guidelines will be given to the Army, paramilitary forces and police operating under the Unified Command against terrorists," Chidambaram said, adding that anyone posing threat to peace and development in the country would be dealt with severely by the security forces.

Dropping hint that elected government in Assam should focus on development while allowing the security forces to tackle the menace of militancy, Chidambaram said, "I request the chief minister to focus his entire energy on development. The security forces will deal with terrorists in a most severe manner."

Referring to terrorists' leaders getting shelter in Bangladesh, Chidambaram said, "Most disturbing for us is that leaders of at least two banned terrorist organizations have found sanctuary in Bangladesh which didn't have an elected government for some time."

"Fortunately, the election was held in Bangladesh and the Prime Minister elect (Sheikh Hasina [Images]) has made a very positive statement to join India in fighting terror. We hope for a new beginning with the new regime in Bangladesh in our effort to neutralise terrorist leaders taking shelter in that country."

The Home Minister on Friday lauded the role so far played by the Unified Command in Assam and encouraged the forces to carry on with the good work. He praised Assam Police for acting very fast in intelligence shared by the central government on December 31 last about terrorists' plan to trigger blasts in Guwahati.

"We had intelligence input about blasts. In fact, intelligence was building up over the last few days. On the evening of December 31, we shared it with Government of Assam. I must complement Assam Police for acting swiftly on it.

"There was a manhunt for the person involved. Assam Police him name and his family. They nearly succeeded in apprehending him. With little bit of luck he escaped by throwing the bomb in the garbage bin at Birubari. The Director General of Police told me that two of his associates planted two devices at Bhangagarh and Bhootnath. The police know two of three culprits and will soon capture them."


With inflation down to manageable limits, the focus has clearly shifted to reviving industrial growth which took a beating under the impact of the credit crunch spawned by the global slowdown.The government will allow development of integrated townships, access to ECBs with a view to giving a boost to the housing and construction sectors, which are especially facing severe pressure.

As a key measure to revive the economy, the package will facilitate funding of pending highways and port projects of about Rs 25,000 crore (Rs 250 billion).

The India Infrastructure Finance Company Limited (IIFCL) is being enabled to access additional Rs 30,000 crore (Rs 300 billion) by tax-free bonds to finance additional projects worth Rs 75,000 crore (Rs 750 billion) over the next 18 months.

The IIFCL bonds would be issued soon for raising first tranche of funds. Troubled exporters received a reprieve in the form of higher rates for tax refunds and a commitment that the flagship reimbursement DEPB scheme would be extended up to December 2009, the government said.

Specific sectors like knitted fabrics, bicycles, agricultural hand tools and some categories of yarn would get duty draw backs at enhanced rates.

The commercial vehicle manufacturers, who have been hit hard due to decline in sales, are expected to see demand revival with accelerated depreciation of 50 per cent on vehicles purchased between January-March this year.

Non-banking finance companies (NBFCs), which are generally active in funding commercial vehicles would be provided a line of credit by the public sector banks.

Boost for realty sector

In an effort to boost the cash- starved realty sector, the government on Friday allowed the developers of integrated townships to borrow funds from overseas and also asked states to release land for low- and middle-income housing schemes.

"GoI will work with state governments to encourage them to release land for low- and middle-income housing schemes," the government said. The announcement forms part of its second stimulus package to minimise the impact of global financial crisis.

Besides, the government also relaxed norms on external commercial borrowing (ECB) for dealing with the problem of liquidity crunch faced by the developer community. The government said "all-in-cost" ceilings on ECB would be removed by RBI.

"To facilitate access to funds for the housing sector, The 'development of integrated township' would be permitted as an eligible end-use of ECB, under the approval route of RBI," the government said.

Earlier, as part of the first stimulus package announced last month, the public sector banks lowered home loans up to Rs 20 lakh and the government recognised the housing sector as an important employment generating field.

The demand in residential segment has declined in the last six months on account of high interest rates on housing loans and steep rise in property prices in the last 2-3 years.

In recent months, though some realty developers announced housing projects for mid-income section of the society, due to high land costs, many projects could not take off.

Security review meeting of the counter-insurgency Unified Command

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh [Images] is scheduled to visit the blast victims under going treatment in Guwahati Medical College Hospital later in the evening on his arrival at the city. The prime minister is travelling to Shillong on Saturday to attend Indian Science Congress.

After chairing a two-hour security review meeting of the counter-insurgency Unified Command structure with senior officials of Assam Police, Army, paramilitary forces, intelligence officials along with Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi in Guwahati this noon, Chidambaram promised a 'sharply focused operation strategy' to counter threat from terrorists.

"No quarter will be given to terrorists. Broad guidelines will be given to the Army, paramilitary forces and police operating under the Unified Command against terrorists," Chidambaram said, adding that anyone posing threat to peace and development in the country would be dealt with severely by the security forces.

Dropping hint that elected government in Assam should focus on development while allowing the security forces to tackle the menace of militancy, Chidambaram said, "I request the chief minister to focus his entire energy on development. The security forces will deal with terrorists in a most severe manner."

Referring to terrorists' leaders getting shelter in Bangladesh, Chidambaram said, "Most disturbing for us is that leaders of at least two banned terrorist organizations have found sanctuary in Bangladesh which didn't have an elected government for some time."

"Fortunately, the election was held in Bangladesh and the Prime Minister elect Sheikh Hasina has made a very positive statement to join India in fighting terror. We hope for a new beginning with the new regime in Bangladesh in our effort to neutralise terrorist leaders taking shelter in that country."

The Home Minister on Friday lauded the role so far played by the Unified Command in Assam and encouraged the forces to carry on with the good work. He praised Assam Police for acting very fast in intelligence shared by the central government on December 31 last about terrorists' plan to trigger blasts in Guwahati.

"We had intelligence input about blasts. In fact, intelligence was building up over the last few days. On the evening of December 31, we shared it with Government of Assam. I must complement Assam Police for acting swiftly on it.

"There was a manhunt for the person involved. Assam Police him name and his family. They nearly succeeded in apprehending him. With little bit of luck he escaped by throwing the bomb in the garbage bin at Birubari. The Director General of Police told me that two of his associates planted two devices at Bhangagarh and Bhootnath. The police know two of three culprits and will soon capture them."


RBI cuts key interest rates again

Encouraged by declining price line, the Reserve Bank on Friday announced steps to inject an additional Rs 20,000 crore (Rs 200 billion) into the system, a move that would pave the way for further cut in interest rates and more funds for credit disbursal. As part of decisions, forming the second stimulus package finalised jointly with the government, RBI announced cut in Cash Reserve Ratio (percentage of deposits that banks have to keep with RBI) and other key rates.

The apex bank has cut CRR by 50 basis points to five per cent, short-term lending (repo) rate by 100 basis points to 5.5 per cent with immediate effect and short-term borrowing (reverse repo) rate by similar percentage points at 4 percent.

The cut in CRR would lead to infusion of Rs 20,000 crore into the system over and above Rs 3,00,000 crore (Rs 3000 billion) injected since October 2008.

The central bank had last cut the key benchmark rates by 100 basis points on December 6. Today's announcement comes 25 days ahead of the third quarterly review of credit policy scheduled for January 27.

All the steps taken by RBI would lead to further reduction in the interest rates by the banks. SBI [Get Quote] chairman O P Bhatt said, "...we will definitely review our rates, both on the lending side as well as the deposit side in our Assets and Liability Committee, and as we have done in the past..."

Interest rate would definitely go down, Punjab National Bank [Get Quote] Chairman and Managing Director K C Chakrabarty told PTI. The bank would review the situation as rates were cut yesterday only, he said.



The reduction in policy interest rates and the CRR is widely expected to bring down interest rates, particularly home, auto, consumer and corporate loans, analysts felt.

The top five public sector banks have reduced their PLRs from a range of 13.75-14 per cent as on October 1, 2008 to a range of 12-12.50 per cent at present, RBI said.

On Thursday, several public sector banks including the largest lender SBI had reduced their prime lending rates.

SBI slashed PLR by 75 basis points to 12.25 per cent, applicable to all existing and new floating rate loans, including housing ones. Besides, it also effected a 0.25-1 per cent reduction in its deposit rates across various maturities.

Explaining the rationale for rate cut, RBI said on review of the current domestic and macro economic situations, it was decided to take these monetary stimulus, which would enable banks to provide credit for productive purposes at appropriate interest rates.

"Besides, RBI on its part will continue to maintain a comfortable liquidity position in the system," it added.

The central bank, however, noted that there was evidence of slowing down of economic activity, adding that the business confidence had been dented significantly and there were clear signs of declaration in demand.

Asserting that global financial situation continued to be uncertain, RBI said Indian financial sector remained resilient in the face of global turmoil that was so deep and pervasive.

The fundamentals of the Indian economy continued to be strong, RBI said, adding, "Once the crisis is behind us and calm and confidence is restored in the global market, economic activity in India would recover sharply. But a period of painful adjustment is inevitable."

Acknowledging that inflationary pressure had come down significantly, RBI said inflation had come down from the high of 12.91 per cent in August last year to 6.38 per cent as on December 20.

Kingfisher cuts fares up to 60%
Full service carrier Kingfisher Airlines has decided to cut its basic fares up to 60 per cent.

This announcement, which will mean around a 20 per cent cut in overall fares, follows competitor Jet Airways [Get Quote] and national carrier Air India's announcements to cut its basic fares at an average rate of 50 per cent and 40 per cent, respectively.
Low cost carriers SpiceJet and IndiGo have also announced special advance booking Rs 99 basic fares across all sectors today, while JetLite announced a cut of around 40 per cent across all sectors and special advance booking basic fares starting from as low as Rs 9.

Last week, Kingfisher had announced a range of fare cuts without exactly specifying the quantum of cuts across sectors.

While the fares have been marketed well and have led to a major response from the consumers, the airlines have smartly kept the artificial floor of fuel surcharges intact at Rs 2,500-3,000. The major onrush of the passengers actually led to one of the major Indian travel portal crashing on Wednesday.

"We have had to offer some lower fares since we saw February and March going really slow in terms of bookings. But after the lower fares were launched our overall bookings have gone up by around 70 per cent today compared to yesterday," Sanjay Aggarwal, CEO of SpiceJet had said a day after they made the fare cut announcement.

ATF prices, which accounts for the single largest chunk of an airline's costs have come down by more than 50 per cent compared to August prices.

ATF currently accounts for less than 40 per cent of an airline's costs, compared to 50 per cent around three months earlier. The civil aviation ministry has been in turn making repeated appeals to airlines to pass on the benefits of these cost cuts to passengers to stimulate air travel, which has seen a decline this year compared to last.

New investigation agency may not probe 26/11

The newly-constituted National Investigation Agency, which was created in the wake of Mumbai terror attacks, is unlikely to probe any of the cases related to the country's most audacious terror strike.

"The investigations into the Mumbai terror attack are being conducted by Mumbai Crime Branch and they have unearthed almost everything. There is nothing much left to probe by the NIA," a top Home Ministry official said.


The Mumbai Crime Branch, which is probing the terror attacks by examining and verifying different angles of the cases, including intercepts of conversation between the terrorists and their handlers across the borders, may file the chargesheet by January end.

"Like CBI, NIA will have no problem in taking over even the old cases for investigation if probe into that particular case has not made much progress," the official said.


There are many terror-related cases in different parts of India, which are yet to be completed due to various reasons, including want of evidence, and needed to be probed thoroughly.

"The Mumbai Crime Branch has also initiated the process of getting the Black and Blue Corner Interpol notices issued in the names of the terrorists through CBI," another official said.

The Black Corner Notices are issued so that people come forward and claim bodies and Blue Corner Notices are issued to check if the person has a criminal record in other countries.


The NIA will have concurrent jurisdiction which empowers the central government to probe terror attacks in any part of the country, covering offences including challenge to country's sovereignty and integrity, bomb blasts, hijacking of aircraft and ships and attacks on nuclear installations.


The Bill for setting up the Agency was passed by Parliament in the just concluded session and President Pratibha Patil [Images] has given her assent to the Bill on Wednesday.

The Union Home Ministry issued a formal notification on Thursday paving the way for the constitution of the agency. The agency will probe such incidents which are found to have complex inter-state and international linkages and possible connection with other activities like smuggling of arms and drugs, pushing in and circulation of fake Indian currency and infiltration across the borders.


The NIA has deterrent provisions like detention without bail for up to 180 days and enhanced penalty of life imprisonment for those involved in terror acts.

The measure came against the backdrop of Mumbai terror attacks [Images] and demands for tough anti-terror laws and provides for constitution of special courts to try offences under the NIA Bill and to provide for summary trial.

Taliban new dictum: Marry daughters to militants




Islamabad: On the heels of their crusade against girls going to schools, the Taliban have now issued new dictum in the areas under their sway asking parents of the grown up daughters to marry them to militants or ‘face dire consequences’.
This new force-marriage campaign is being run in most of the areas in the Pakistan's troubled NWFP through regular announcements made in mosques to congregations.

Such instances have come to light recently through some of the affected women daring to go to authorities for justice rather than meekly surrender to the militants dictates.

Salma, who teaches in a primary school in Peshawar, told the influential ‘Dawn’ newspaper that Taliban have told families to declare in mosques if they have unmarried girls so that their hand could be given in marriage, most probably to militants.

If they did not do so, the girls would be forcibly married off; the newspaper quoted the 30-year-old widow as saying.

She also said the Taliban in the Swat valley of NWFP have threatened women with dire punishment, if they are found outside their homes without identity cards and a male relative accompanying them.

Couples should also carry 'Nikah Nama' or marriage certificates with them when they venture out of home or they will be in trouble, she said.

"I have heard that Taliban have announced that if a girl above the age of seven is found outside her house, she would be slaughtered," Salma said.

Once an avid listener of Pakistani Taliban commander Maulana Fazlullah's FM radio station, Salma doesn't tune in to the channel any more.

"Usually there is only dreadful news on the radio, so I stopped listening to it," said Salma, who has three sons.

Fazlullah, also known as Mullah Radio for the fiery sermons he broadcasts on his illegal FM station, leads a campaign by Taliban militants to enforce Shariat or Islamic law in Swat.

Fazlullah's followers have blown up or torched over 100 girls' schools in Swat and barred women from going to markets.

The Taliban's recent decision to completely ban girls' education from January 15 has upset Salma and her colleagues because most of them are the sole bread-winners of their families.

"My colleagues were crying when they heard this bad news. Some have aged and handicapped parents while others have lost their male members in the ongoing conflict," she said.

"Our principal has said that all female teachers should write down the domestic problems forcing them to work so that they could be forwarded to Taliban, who would be requested to review their policy about women's education," Salma said.

Women who go out for work, especially social work, are tagged as immoral and eliminated by militants controlling the area, he said.

Bakht Zeba, a 45-year-old woman councillor who was a staunch supporter of girls' education, was murdered on November 25. She was first threatened by Taliban to stop her activities or face dire consequences. When she did not pay heed to the warnings, the Taliban shot her dead in her house.

Modi may play 'terror' card in LS polls

Press Trust of India

Gandhinagar: Terror as an issue may not have paid off for the BJP in the recent Assembly elections but its Hindutva mascot and Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi may not be averse to flagging it again in the Lok Sabha elections later this year.
Modi, who had exploited the issue of export of terror from Pakistan through his famous 'Mian Musharraf' campaign in the earlier elections, also feels that the Indian government has to "respond" to the Mumbai terror attacks from across the border "in their own language".

In an exclusive interview, he also spoke of the anti-terror laws passed in Parliament recently but feels that terrorism cannot be fought with the "19th century laws".

Disagreeing with the view that terrorism as an issue had not paid for BJP in the recent Assembly elections in Rajasthan and Delhi, where he had also campaigned against the backdrop of the Mumbai attacks, the chief minister said, "this theory is being propagated by a few people who wish to help Pakistan and Congress".

"In the four states (Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chattisgarh and Delhi) where the elections were held, more than 600 seats were in contention. BJP won 294 while the Congress won 274. This only shows that the people have supported BJP to root out terrorism."

Terming the recent Mumbai mayhem as an attack on the country, Modi said the people wished that Pakistan should be given an "apt reply in its own language".

He termed as "eyewash" the Central government's steps like creation of National Investigating Agency (NIA) and amendments in the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act after the Mumbai terror attack.

"It is an eyewash. The steps are not enough to give legal backing to fight terrorism. The only positive thing about these steps is that opinion of those who were saying that no new law is required to fight terrorism has changed. We cannot fight terrorism with 19th century laws," Modi said.

"The Mumbai mayhem was an attack on India by Pakistan. Now, India has to respond. Central government has to decide about the right kind of response that needs to be given to Pakistan. It is the wish of common people that India should give reply to Pakistan in its own language," he said.

A 'zero tolerance' policy should be adopted by the Centre as well as each and every state against terrorism like in the United States, he said.

Accusing the Congress led-UPA government of practising 'vote bank' politics over terror issue, Modi said the alliance has to decide whether it will continue to adopt such policies or care for common people.

"The more they indulge in vote-bank politics, the more the common people will become vulnerable. By not hanging Afzal Guru and repealing the existing terror law (POTA) they encouraged terrorism."

Replying to a question about the chances of his playing a bigger role in his party at the national level in view of the advancing age of BJP's prime ministerial candidate, 58-year-old Modi said people prefer experience when it comes to leading the nation.

He said India required experienced and capable leaders and compared two former Congress Prime Ministers Narasimha Rao and Rajiv GaNdhi. Rao ran a better administration due to his experience than Rajiv Gandhi, who had age on his side.

"In India issues are very complex, to run the country is not just a simple administration. The person needs to understand problems of South, North East, Gujarat, the hills and the plains. In such circumstances, experience is an advantage," Modi further said.

"BJP was one such party which had capable and experienced leaders like Advani. This is our plus point," Modi said.

He parried a question about Rahul Gandhi's performance in politics by saying "it is an internal issue" of Congress.


Nano goes on a test drive in rugged Garhwal
http://www.rediff.com/money/2009/jan/02tata-nano-goes-on-a-test-drive-in-garhwal.htm

People in the hilly town of Gopeshwar in Chamoli district were recently surprised to see the Nano, Tata Motors' [Get Quote] controversial Rs 100,000 car, parked on a roadside.

The Nano had travelled all the way from Pantnagar, crossing the tough, serpentine roads of Uttarakhand, to reach picturesque Gopeshwar nestling in the Garhwal Himalayan region.


This was one of the Nano's toughest tests, being conducted by engineers of Tata Motors in the rugged Himalayan region.

Significantly, the mileage of the small car is being projected at 17-20 km per litre in the hills.

"We have conducted the test drive of Nano in the hills of Uttarakhand and Pune. Initial reports are very encouraging," an official of the Tata Motors plant at Pantnagar told Business Standard.

Now after a series of test drives, the car is set to be launched in the first quarter of the next financial year, the official said. The exact date of the launch of Nano would, however, be decided by chairman Ratan Tata, the official added.

The company has already given a commitment to Uttarakhand Chief Minister B C Khanduri that it would roll out the first Nano from the state.

For expansion, the company has been allotted 45 acres of extra land at Pantnagar by the state government. A decision in this regard was taken by a high-powered committee headed by Khanduri, which met here on December 22.

Tata Motors is currently manufacturing Ace trucks at the Pantnagar facility. The commercial launch of the car has already been postponed by at least two to three months, after it was forced to relocate from West Bengal following political protests there.

Although, the mother unit of the car will be set up in Gujarat, where the company has recently been allotted 1,100 acres, the firm is also planning to set up a permanent manufacturing facility for Nano at Pantnagar.

In addition to 45 acres, the chief minister has also assured company officials that their other demands would also be considered.

The state government has been trying to lure Tata Motors to set up a permanent plant for the Nano at Pantnagar, stating that the company must benefits from the incentives available in the state in the wake of the Special Industrial Package, 2003, which offers a range of tax incentives.

DELHI HAS GOT NO GREAT EXPECTATION
Hasina invites Pronab Mukherjee to oath taking ceremony

Kolkata's largely circulated Bengali daily newspaper Anandabazar Patrika (ABP) has reported on December 31 that Sheikh Hasina has invited Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee to remain present in her oath taking ceremony in Dhaka.

According to the ABP report, the grand alliance leader and Awami League President Sheikh Hasina has made a phone call to the Foreign Minister of India Pronab Mukherjee requesting him to remain present at the oath taking ceremony of her next government.

This was reported in the (ABP) in its 31st December issue, which this correspondent retrieved from Internet. The ABP correspondent Joyanta Ghosal reported from New Delhi, quoting a source at South Block (India's foreign ministry), that the Manmohan Singh government did not want to go ahead with any great expectation about Bangladesh although the grand alliance of Sheikh Hasina won a great victory.

The report states that Sheikh Hasina means the past illusion of liberation war particularly to the people of West Bengal. The report probably for the first time prefixed the word 'Bangabandhu' before the name of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and said: "Yet the Bangalee Foreign Minister of India does not want to go by emotion, though the daughter of 'Bangabandhu' Sheikh Mujibur Rahman is poised to come to power."

ABP report says that after her victory in the election Sheikh Hasina called the Bangalee Foreign Minister of India, "Dada, you will have to come to participate in the oath taking ceremony (of my government) with Boudi." But the Foreign Minister of India has not yet decided whether he will attend the oath taking ceremony in Dhaka, though he will surely visit Bangladesh before the elections of Lok Sabha, the report added.

Several years ago when Pronob Babu switched his responsibility from Defence Minister to Foreign Minister, the Foreign Minister of the BNP government was the first among the foreign countries who sent him the congratulatory message, the report said. The report added that India had invited Chief Adviser Fakhruddin Ahmed to participate in the SAARC Conference after the installation of the Caretaker Government (CG) of Bangladesh to power.

The report said that, at that time a journalist, who is close to Hasina, asked a question to this correspondent as to why India was not coming forward in support of Sheikh Hasina openly in such a restive situation. India did not do that. On the other hand, Foreign Minister Pronab Mukherjee went to visit Bangladesh with relief materials.

During that visit it was seen that Pronob Babu was repeatedly informing the CG about matters of mutual concern and he never wanted to poke his nose into the internal politics of Dhaka. As Pronab Babu says: "This is 2008, not 1971. At that time what India did that was the necessity of the given circumstances. Now the situation has changed."

The ABP report further said: "Now India's stance is, India would establish relations with whoever comes to power in the sovereign neighbouring country. Even Delhi can not say that "it would not keep relationship if military rule is imposed in any neighbouring country."

The report pointed out that once Indian premier Pundit Nehru opened dialogue with Field Marshal Ayub Khan of Pakistan. Indira Gandhi was compelled to initiate talks with Gen. Ziaul Haque after the hanging of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. Again Atal Bihari Bazpayee gave democratic recognition to Parvez Musharraf by according him red carpet reception at the Agra Summit just after the wounds of Kargil war. Atal Bihari Vajpayee government also maintained good relations with Bangladesh during the rule of Khaleda Zia, and continued bilateral relations.

The report recalled that during the SAARC conference in Katmandhu, Khaleda Zia listened to Vajpayee's prescription for curing her knee pain. Again Brojesh Misra did not hesitate to visit Dhaka to warn about terrorist activities against India."

The report stated: "Pranob Babu, a follower of Indira Gandhi, knows Sheikh Hasina personally for a long time." It is doubtless that Sheikh Hasina has an image of a 'daughter of the same household' to New Delhi and West Bengal. It is obviously easy for India to go for diplomatic negotiations with the same much known 'daughter of Mujib'. But the Foreign Minister i.e. Indian government is aware of the limitations of the future government of Dhaka.

The report further said in the past Hasina had to pay a heavy price for her 'friend of India image', when she was in power. Hasina also learnt a lesson from her past experience. This time Jatiya Party of Ershad is the ally of Sheikh Hasina's Awami League, if Jamaat-e-Islami is the ally of Khaleda Zia's BNP. Like the Jamaat-e-Islami, the Jatiya Party also announced that they would introduce blasphemy law in their party manifesto. And it was Ershad who declared Islam as the State religion when he was in power. As a result the other religious communities became second class citizens.

The report further added: "Sheikh Mujibur Rahman wanted to lead the country towards the path of secularism. Delhi is doubtful about the ability of the 'daughter of Mujib' to renounce the influence of the fundamentalist forces, when the party of Ershad is her ally. Jatiya Party of Ershad also bagged 27 seats; so it will have some kind of control. Besides, there will be a control from the cantonment, whoever may come to power, under the given political situation of Bangladesh.

Sheikh Hasina is also not beyond the control of the military, though she is not like Khaleda. Keeping all these in mind India wants to strengthen the relations with Bangladesh because of recent conflict with Pakistan. The objective is that Pakistan can not use Bangladesh as the field of its anti-India activities. Referring to the act of terrorism on the soil of Bangladesh Pronab Babu has made it crystal clear. He said, "The problem will be raised when new government will be installed. Let us see how far we can achieve."

The Ananada Bazar Patrika report further stated: "This was the only hope of Delhi that the military and Jamaat-e-Islami in Bangladesh have not been strengthened as in Pakistan." This time it is also clear in the elections' result. The military wanted a fragile government. People have voted en-masse in favour of the alliance of Sheikh Hasina. The Jamaat-e-Islami has become obscure as it is seen in the results of the votes. Yet it is not that the extreme forces of the party of Ershad would try to hold the country inside 'veils'. Will Hasina be able to complete the trial of the killers of Sheikh Mujib by neglecting those extreme forces? Will Hasina be able to chant the slogans of development by discarding the anti-Indian card, when Norendra Modi is not stepping back from demolishing temple in the interest of development ? South Block is waiting to see that."

http://www.weeklyholiday.net/front.html#07

Hawk Modi for hot pursuit against Pak

Express News Service

Bhuj: Pakistan resorting to proxy war; it can’t afford a direct conflict, says CM


Chief Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday accused Pakistan of waging a proxy war against India and declared that it is now time for New Delhi to respond to Islamabad in the same language.

“Pakistan has begun a proxy war against India by attacking Mumbai. Pakistan is resorting to such means because it is not capable of waging a direct war against India. It is now time for India to answer back,” said Modi. “Pakistan knows that it will lose if it attacks India,” he added.

He said Gujarat is one of the industrial hubs of the country, and “enemy nations are eying the state.”

Earlier in the morning, Modi met the officers and men of the Gujarat frontier of the Border Security Force (BSF), deployed along the Indo-Pak International Border along Kutch. The visit was to celebrate the first day of the year with the men of the paramilitary force.

Modi visited the BSF’s Vighakot border outpost and the Koteshwar creek area and also took stock of the fencing and pillar post construction work there. “I gathered information about the border areas during this visit. Our (BSF) personnel are fully capable of answering the enemy nation in the language they understand,” he said.

Gujarat Director General of Police P C Pande, BSF Inspector General (Gujarat Frontier) G S Shekhawat, and Principal Secretary K Kailashnathan, along with officers from the district police and administration accompanied Modi during the visit.

Modi, who will be in New Delhi for the Chief Ministers’ conference scheduled for next week, said, he will appraise Prime Minister Manmohan Singh about the situation on the Gujarat border.

He added: “Having seen the situation at the border close up, and the commendable work the BSF has done, I am satisfied that our soldiers are prepared to handle any situation.
http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/Hawk-Modi-for-hot-pursuit-against-Pak/405708/

Nine Muslims removed from US flight

Washington: Nine Muslims, most of them of South Asian descent, were ordered off a domestic US flight after co-passengers overheard what they thought was a “suspicious remark,” a media report said on Friday.
The nine, all but one of them US-born citizens, were taken off off an AirTran flight headed to Orlando from Reagan National Airport on Thursday after two other passengers overheard what they thought was a remark about security.

The group, which was headed to a religious retreat in Florida, was subsequently cleared for travel by FBI agents who characterised the incident as a “misunderstanding,” Washington Post quoted an airport official as saying.

Kashif Irfan, one of the removed passengers, said the incident began after his brother Atif and his brother's wife wondered aloud about the safest place to sit on an airplane.

“My brother and his wife were discussing some aspect of airport security,” Irfan said. “The only thing my brother said was, 'Wow, the jets are right next to my window.' I think they were remarking about safety.” Irfan, 34, said he and the others think they were profiled because of their appearance. He said five of the six adults in the party are of South Asian descent, and all six are traditionally Muslim in appearance, with the men wearing beards and the women in headscarves.

Irfan is an anesthesiologist. His brother, 29, is a lawyer. They were travelling with their wives, Irfan's sister- in-law, a friend and Kashif's three sons, ages 7, 4 and 2.

AirTran spokesman Tad Hutcheson defended the handling of the incident by the company, which he said strictly followed federal rules.

Due to the incident, all 104 passengers were re-screened and their luggage checked before allowing the flight to take off two hours late and without the nine passengers.

The Quadrillion Dollar Powder Keg Waiting To Blow
Posted: October 11 2008


The Quadrillion Dollar Powder Keg Waiting To Blow
Posted: October 11 2008

Bob Chapman


http://theinternationalforecaster.com/content.php?topicId=2

Derivatives at the heart of the crisis, catastrophic losses are inevitable, financial system headed for oblivion, the new world disorder, EU doomed, Credit Default Swaps at the heart of the problem, Plunge Protection Team history, coverups for globalization failures, Bloodbath for the Yen,

The heart of the current crisis is the quadrillion plus derivative market. Roughly half of these derivatives are listed on exchanges, but the other half are on the totally unregulated, totally opaque, poorly documented and mostly naked (no reserves or collateral given to secure performance) OTC derivatives market.

The subprime and Alt-A mortgage debacles, and the soon to be recognized prime mortgage debacle, are little more than a side show with what will become their one to two trillion in losses which the Phony-Fraudie nationalization and the Paulson Ponzi Plunder Plan are meant to address, albeit futilely.

However, the real estate derivative problems created by these debacles have been important catalysts leading to the loss of confidence that is preventing banks from lending to one another, because these problems, like a Zippo lighter on high flame, metaphorically speaking, have lit the fuse leading to the quadrillion dollar powder keg waiting to blow any day now, and Hanky Panky and Helicopter Ben are running around like raving, corporatist, fascist lunatics trying to stomp out the lit fuse before the whole world financial system goes up in a blaze of glory.

It is this powder keg that has everyone trembling with fear and foreboding, because the inevitable losses will be catastrophic, with losses which may exceed the entire world's GDP, thus obliterating the balance sheets of every major Wall Street commercial bank, including the Fed itself, while virtually every major bank and financial institution in nations throughout the world join them on the receiving end of a destructive juggernaut of loss, insolvency, failure and bankruptcy. In the aftermath, most will be nationalized.

All of Western Civilization is about to become a smoldering collection of fascist police states. The entire world financial system is headed for oblivion, and there is nothing on earth that can stop it.

All they can do currently is try to delay and hide the destruction so that they can continue to milk their Ponzi system dry, ripping off the sheople in one final orgy of fraud and profligacy before the government and financial system are merged into an all-powerful super-entity that will rule all non-insider institutions with an iron fist. Frankly, from what we have seen lately, we are already there.

The final step to nationalization of our financial system will be little more than a formality. Their intention is to take total control, to make markets do whatever pleases them, thus creating their own reality.

The Paulson Ponzi Plunder Plan is the first installment of their final attempt to bankrupt the sheople, who they hope to beat into submission by hyper-inflating and Weimarizing them with bailout after bailout, ad nauseam, knowing full well that these bailouts are futile and useless.

The Illuminati will now attempt to force the poor, hapless sheople into a fascist police state as the next giant step toward the creation of a New World Disorder called Novus Ordo Seclorum (a New Order of the Ages), as set forth on the back of every dollar bill under the all-seeing eye overlooking the unfinished pyramid, both symbols of the new age, the occult and the ancient mystery religions.

What else would you expect from the satanic trillionaires who hope to become the new lords of the universe. Nice try fellas, but we suspect that God, the current and eternal Lord of the Universe, has other plans. Many of their own henchmen are going to go down in the chaos to follow, but the raving madmen we refer to as the Illuminati will gleefully sacrifice them on the alter of world government.

The New World Disorder is the hope and dream of the Illuminati which they have been planning for centuries. But we believe that something is going to happen on the way to that Forum, and that in the end they are all going to end up "swingin' in the breeze."

Their plans are unraveling. The destruction is far greater than they had planned. The whole plan is going up in smoke thanks to the bungling of their "Chaos" henchmen in our government and on Wall Street.

To think that they attempted to use naked credit default swaps to cover bonds and derivatives secured by houses borrowers could not afford on such a gargantuan scale tells you everything you need to know about their financial acumen.

They even permitted ownership of derivatives by those who did not own the underlying assets to be hedged (known as "dry derivatives," which are essentially the equivalent of insurance policies taken out on someone or something in whom the policy holder has no insurable interest), thus turning the world's financial markets into a giant gambling casino, with the added bonus that many unscrupulous people were put into a position where they could force an event that would give them a big payoff without suffering any pain on their end. In essence, by coming up with all these obtuse, Byzantine, rocket-scientist-created derivatives, the smugly clever Illuminati have finally outsmarted themselves.

Then there is the one-rate-fits-all plan in the now-doomed European Union. What a freaking blooper that was! We have been saying that this conglomerate banking scheme could not work from the inception of this ill-conceived union of what are very diverse and culturally unique nations, but of course no one listened.

They have so thoroughly destroyed the financial system that there is now no hope of keeping the EU together. The plan did not even work well in a period of substantial prosperity, and now they are going to attempt to keep the plan going in circumstances, which are the antithesis of prosperity. Good Luck!

If they hadn't allowed their system to be corrupted by all these financial weapons of mass destruction, out of their unending, boundless greed to milk their sheople, they might have had a shot at preserving the EU and then moving on to world government.

Now they are the proud owners of 75% of all the toxic waste derivatives produced by the American branch of the Illuminati. And they have piles of banking bonds covered by credit default swaps issued by AIG, and by who knows what other zombie entity, so their stock and bond ratings, as well as their cost of capital, are in serious jeopardy.

As the implosion of these derivatives transpires, the majority of their economies are going down in flames as inflation, recession, and eventually depression set in, adding to their already substantial woes. Their fascist dream is about to go up in flames along with their precious EU, the revived British Mercantilist system and the debt-based, fractional reserve Ponzi scheme of the evil European bankers and their Black Nobility clientele. Their American counterparts will fare little better.

Note that the major Wall Street investment banks, all leveraged to the hilt, are now all gone, whether by bankruptcy, buyout or change of charter. Goldman Sachs, the only investment bank, which has retained its namesake, other than the bankrupt Lehman Brothers, is on the verge of going under in a Bear Stearns-like squeeze on their liquidity and net equity. The recent demise of all these investment banks is just the first round. Things are going to get much worse as the money from the Paulson Ponzi Plunder Plan gets doled out to the various Illuminist toadies.

The latest idea, suggested by the Bank of England (what a feeling of confidence we get knowing that this bastion of financial acumen supports this idea!) and now adopted by Hanky Panky, is to make liquidity injections into the fraudster banks in return for equity positions, such as preferred stock ownership. What a joke. Like that is going to chase the credit default swap monster away and restore a feeling of safety and confidence so banks can start lending again. We have news for you. Even the bondholders of these toxic waste sites are going to get vaporized, so the sheople stockholders can expect to get a Big Zippo.

At least by acquiring toxic waste assets we might have an outside chance of picking up some chump change later, but with this new plan to fleece the sheople, you are throwing your money down a rat hole. We are told that this will get the money to where it is needed faster. The only "faster" we see is the rate at which taxpayers will get fleeced.

All these toxic cesspool repositories are headed for bankruptcy and nationalization. All you will be doing is keeping people employed with exorbitant salaries and bonuses as they continue to rip you off with insider trading and fraudulent derivative schemes.

These witless, pipe-dreaming dolts seem to think that they can get their fractional reserve multiplier going again as the Illuminati try to reinvigorate and re-inflate rampant market speculation along with their profligate money and credit system. They seem to think they can re-inflate the otherwise tanking real estate markets, using their perfect fraud machines, Phony and Fraudie, because they no longer have to worry about ticking off wealthy, influential and politically connected entities that own their stocks. All losses that are suffered by Phony and Fraudie will now go directly to the sheople, do not pass Go, do not collect $200.

What are these people thinking? Again we say: "It's the swaps, stupid!!!" The credit default swaps will be the first to blow as we move from hundreds of billions to trillions in quarterly losses.

That will send risk into the ozone while the bailouts send inflation into the stratosphere. And that of course means double-digit interest rates are on the way, which are the main fuse leading to the interest rate swap powder keg, which is the largest of all the derivative powder kegs by notional value, and thus by potential loss.

Take JP Morgan Chase for example, and their $90 trillion derivative portfolio by notional value. Let's say that $50 trillion are in interest rate swaps. If they have even a mere two percent overhang where they have to pay out variable rates of interest on two percent more of their total interest rate swaps than the portion of swaps on which they are, by contrast, receiving variable rates of interest, they could suffer horrendous losses that could easily put them under. Let's say that everything balances at 4%.

But now rates move to 14% as everyone totally ignores the rates set by the central banks sending LIBOR and T-Bill rates to unheard of levels, which are the types of rate indexes commonly used in these swaps. (Note that corporate debt in Europe, due to the lack of so-called insurance from credit default swaps, has already doubled from previous lower single digit rates into much higher double-digit rates in the 12% area). Two percent of $50 trillion is a trillion dollars of notional value overhang on which you are now paying out ten percent more, and ten percent of one trillion is $100 billion, a killer loss. That would put them under.

Even an overhang of only one half of one percent pumps out a loss of $25 billion. And what if the overhang is 5%, or 10%, or 20%? With an overhang of 20%, we hit one trillion in losses.

Now, what if rates go to 24%? And this is only one bank! As you can see, assuming that the system can survive the credit default swaps, which we very seriously doubt, we will be jumping out of the fire only to land face down in a red-hot frying pan.

It is only fitting that the credit-default swaps lie at the heart of the problem, which the fraudster banks now face. When you look at what has been done by these reprobates in the past, this is a most fitting fate for them.

First, they had President Reagan pass an Executive Order in 1988 forming the President's Working Group on Financial Markets so they could manipulate markets 24/7 with the PPT. That was forced by the 1987 Stock Market Crash, an event orchestrated by the Illuminati to convince everyone that we had to have an interventional team to stop such extreme market gyrations. Then Slick Willie does away with Glass-Steagall in 1999 to do away with the system of checks and balances that allowed banks to pass on paper that was falsely rated as AAA on to their patsy clients. Then for a double whammy, Slick Willie leaves OTC derivatives unregulated with the passage of the Commodity Futures Modernization Act in 2000, so Wall Street could write insurance policies called credit default swaps without having to comply with annoying, silly and burdensome rules requiring such things as loss reserves or an insurable interest. These were all passed to cover up the devastating losses our economy was suffering on account of free trade, globalization, off-shoring, outsourcing and both legal and illegal immigration.

The PPT moved our markets, contrary to what market fundamentals would indicate, to give the appearance of prosperity when we were really getting hammered by the free trade agenda.

Our government chimed in with their deceitful and fraudulent economic statistics by use of hedonics. Then credit default swaps were used to falsely suppress interest rates by insuring the risk of default for potential investors, and never mind that there were no loss reserves, collateral or requirement of an insurable interest.

AAA credit was assigned to otherwise risky companies based on Ponzi scam bond insurers who were insuring bonds with little or nothing to back up their promises. If our corporations were forced to pay the higher rates demanded by the market without the benefit of these swaps, our corporate earnings would have been dismal, and would have reflected the losses suffered by the globalist free trade agenda. Then the falsely rated subprime derivatives were created so that Wall Street could earn oodles of fees, commissions and spreads by continually rolling over the same money which they were borrowing short-term and lending long-term. These earnings helped to boost our GDP and thus to further cover up the losses being suffered by our bloodied manufacturing sector as everyone became Walmart greeters and hamburger flippers instead of being tool and die makers and machinists and as 5 million of our best-paying jobs were moved overseas. Let's hear it for the Illuminist free trade agenda. Yeah, rah.

It appears that for whatever reason the Illuminati now want Obama to become president instead of McCain. The current financial carnage is of course being associated with Caligula, and since McCain is a Caligula Clone, by association he gets hit vicariously with voter ire. Listen to the two of them promise to save the borrowers who were given mortgages based on fraudulent information about their financial circumstances. Let's bail them out too. Why should the fraudsters on Main Street be treated any differently than the fraudsters on Wall Street? Now we will have equal opportunity bailouts. It's enough to make you puke.

Worse yet, Obama is the biggest recipient of big banking largesse in the form of campaign contributions, especially from Fannie and Freddie, and he actively encouraged these organizations to pump out mortgages to people who could not afford them. Fortunately for Obama, McCain is not much better.

So what's going down in Illuminati town? In pondering the current pounding of gold and silver, we smell lots of rats. We hold out to you the following potential scenario: On September 15 and 16, the Illuminati thought they had the precious metals markets under wraps, driving gold below $800 per ounce and silver below $11 per ounce, in anticipation of their coming announcement of the Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch debacles that were made public late on September 16. Then the specs go wild, and gold is up $90 in one day, giving the Illuminists a collective myocardial infarction.

As punishment for such insolence, on Friday, September 19, the SEC takes away their right to short 800 financial companies, a big money maker. They are told to butt out, or they will never get to place another short again, but if they cooperate, they will get the mother of all crashes, which they can short with impunity. Note how open interest in COMEX gold futures declined from 398,386 contracts on September 15 to 321,021 on October 8. Yet the price of gold during this period kept pressing past $900, which means that there was some short-covering to the tune of some 77,000 contracts.

The specs under threat from the SEC, are told to butt out while the commercials cover their shorts. They are told that a crash is on its way, so they short all the non-financials, and stay out of the commodity markets. Then the Paulson Plan is introduced around September 20, and prior to the vote, the markets are crashed to make it look like a "no" vote will send us into the deepest depths of Mordor, knowing all along that markets will be crashed anyway no matter how Congress votes. Fortunes are being made shorting with knowledge of when markets will be crashed.

A short-covering rally occurs on Tuesday, September 30, as word is received that the Paulson Plan will be reconsidered and probably passed, but insiders know this is all for show as roughly half of Monday's 777 point loss on the Dow is recovered. Markets are crashed again on October 1 and 2 erasing Tuesday's gains, those being the two days leading up to the second vote on October 3, to convince Congressional boneheads that the Paulson Plan must be passed to save the markets, and when the vote starts to look positive on October 3, up the markets go in the early going that day just before the vote in order to give our bribed and threatened Congressional morons the impression that markets will rally if the Paulson Plan is passed. Congressional dimwitted idiots pass the bill, and the markets nose-dive, all as planned.

On October 6, paragon of virtue Jim Cramer scares the living daylights out of retirees, telling them they must get out of the markets. Panic hits the streets, and the cascade of losses is under way. The shorts are now cleaning up and are rolling in dough, but of course that was not enough for them. The Paulson Ponzi Plunder Plan also calls for an end to the ban on shorts against financials just before midnight on Wednesday, October 8, and because the specs have all been good little boys, the SEC lets the ban on shorts expire even though they could have extended it another week. The bloodbath continues on Thursday and Friday as the financials get bombed, the specs are fat and happy, and down go gold and silver while the grateful specs look the other way.

Meanwhile, the carry trade is unwound and both the dollar and the yen go ballistic due to the crashes around the globe which send traders into yen and dollars to buy Japanese and US treasuries, respectively, and the yen even outperforms the dollar, causing precious metal liquidations by thoroughly bloodying carry traders while the stronger dollar hits the metals also.

And of course, just as we predicted, oil gets hammered below 80, giving more dollar support through the euro effect, and reducing the need for gold and silver as a hedge against higher oil costs.
http://www.thetreeofliberty.com/vb/archive/index.php/t-32163.html



"I speak to you not as a candidate for president, but as a citizen," Obama claimed to the massive crowds. Yet if that were true, why was his every word in English? Both JFK and Reagan found a few moments to speak to Berliners in their language.

"Lass' sie nach Berlin kommen," the young Democrat memorably declared in June of 1963. And in June of 1987, the Great Communicator reminded his German audience that "there were a few things the Soviets didn't count on — Berliner Herz, Berliner Humor, ja, und Berliner Schnauze" — the Berliners' strong-heartedness, sense of humor and their sharp-witted tongue.

More importantly, unlike Obama, neither JFK nor Reagan went to Berlin to call on the world to join hands in some giant peace chain. Kennedy's brief speech was incendiary in its anti-communism (even if his policies were less so, most obviously his toleration of the wall's construction in 1961).

"There are some who say in Europe and elsewhere we can work with the Communists — let them come to Berlin," he declared.

Standing before the Brandenburg Gate," Reagan asserted that "every man is a Berliner, forced to look upon a scar." And he told a Europe distrustful of America's commitment to destroy communism that "we must remember a crucial fact: East and West do not mistrust each other because we are armed; we are armed because we mistrust each other."

Less than 2 1/2 years after Reagan stood there and demanded that Mikhail Gorbachev "tear down this wall!" that scar of totalitarianism did indeed fall, pulled and ripped down by ordinary East and West Berliners after almost three decades of suffering a divided city.

But there was nothing concrete about Obama in Berlin. The walls he spoke of were cliched, figurative ones — "walls between old allies on either side of the Atlantic . . . walls between the countries with the most and those with the least . . . the walls between races and tribes; natives and immigrants; Christian and Muslim and Jew . . . ."

Obama did provide a bit of bluster against the free world's far-from-figurative enemies of today, saying "we must defeat terror and dry up the well of extremism that supports it." But the Cold War analogy he gave was deceptive:

"If we could create NATO to face down the Soviet Union," Obama contended, "we can join in a new and global partnership to dismantle the networks that have struck in Madrid and Amman; in London and Bali; in Washington and New York."

The proposed anti-terror "partnership" of which he speaks has a lot less in common with the generals at NATO than with the feckless diplomats of the United Nations — an institution that, curiously, went unmentioned in the speech that Obama was supposedly giving to the world — not just to U.S. voters skeptical of the U.N. and diplomacy as a weapon against terrorism.

Both Reagan and Kennedy came to Berlin to condemn Russia's Communist empire, and their words shaped the history that followed, eventually liberating East Germany.

Yet without mentioning either president, Obama besmirched their memories before throngs of Berliners with a platitude suggesting U.S.-Soviet moral equivalence. "The two superpowers that faced each other across the wall of this city came too close too often to destroying all we have built and all that we love," he said — as if "we" (presumably freedom-loving people) were not on America's side.

No wonder Obama reportedly cancelled a planned Friday visit to our Ramstein and Landstuhl military bases in southwest Germany. His were words to elicit cheers from Europeans who resent America, not from GIs who fight for her.
=============================================

Noticed Germans did not applaud when he called on Europe to do more to defeat extremism........ it would eat into their vacation time and Gemuetlichkeit....
http://www.leonardcohenforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=11083&p=131016
Sri Lanka captures LTTE HQ; 3 killed in Colombo

Reuters

Colombo: Sri Lankan troops captured the Tamil Tigers' headquarters town on Friday in one of the biggest setbacks for the rebels in years, but in an apparent riposte a suspected suicide bomber killed three airmen in the capital Colombo.
Troops fought their way into the separatist stronghold of Kilinochchi deep in the north, dealing a heavy blow to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Details of casualties from the fighting were not immediately available.

"It was the constant dream of all Sri Lankans, whether Sinhala, Tamil or Muslim, who are opposed to separatism, racism, and terrorism, and have always, sought peace, freedom and democracy," President Mahinda Rajapaksa said in a nationally televised address.

"Today our heroic troops have made that dream a reality. A short while ago, our brave and heroic troops have fully captured Kilinochchi that was considered the main bastion of the LTTE."

Within an hour of his statement, a suspected suicide attacker struck near the Sri Lankan Air Force headquarters, a spokesman at the Media Centre for National Security said.

Hospital officials said 37 people were wounded in the blast.

The military said all three of those killed and 12 of the wounded were air force personnel.

The Tigers, who have been fighting for a separate homeland for minority Tamils in the east and north of the island for a quarter of a century, could not immediately be reached for comment.

Military officials say the rebels have in the past hit back with bombings in the capital and elsewhere whenever they have come under pressure on the northern frontline.

Analysts said the capture of Kilinochchi could make the capital and far south more vulnerable.

"Particularly after the humiliating defeat at Kilinochchi they will try to use their striking capability outside the theatre of conflict in a bigger way," said Iqbal Athas, an analyst with Jane's Defence.

Kilinochchi, in the Northern Province, has long been the centre of the Tamil fight for an independent homeland, which has seen more than 70,000 people killed in a bitter civil war since 1983.

Pro-rebel website www.tamilnet.com said the Tigers had moved their headquarters further northeast before the town fell.

"The Sri Lanka Army (SLA) has entered a virtual ghost town," the website said. "The Tigers, who had put up heavy resistance so far, had kept their casualties as low as possible in the defensive fighting."

FLAGS AND FIRECRACKERS

The fall of the rebels' de facto capital was greeted with the bursting of firecrackers in Colombo. Others waved the national flag as they drove through the streets of the capital.

"The capture indicates very clearly that the LTTE's attempt to build up a quasi-state has now collapsed," Pakiasothy Saravanamuttu, a political analyst, said.

Sri Lanka's military has been closing in on Kilinochchi since September. Over the past month, it has been assaulting Tiger defences encircling the town and both sides have claimed to have inflicted ever higher death tolls on the other.

Sources from Rajapaksa's office earlier said that troops had entered Kilinochchi from two locations.

State media said many rebels had fled the town.

The military developments powered the island nation's stock market higher. The Colombo All-Share index closed 5 per cent up. The market fell 40.8 per cent in 2008 on economic and war worries.

"With the news of Kilinochchi's fall, sentiment just got a boost," said Geeth Balasuriya, assistant research manager at HNB Stockbrokers.

The LTTE started fighting the government in 1983. It says it is battling for the rights of minority Tamils in the face of mistreatment by successive governments led by the Sinhalese majority since Sri Lanka won independence from Britain in 1948.

Exactly a year ago, Rajapaksa's government formally scrapped an increasingly tattered six-year truce brokered by Norway, saying the rebels were using it as cover to regroup and re-arm


Raul Castro warns leaders of US threat


Despite high hopes for improved relations
with Cuba's northern neighbor and decades-long foe after the US
election of Barack Obama, Raul Castro warned future leaders against
softening toward "the enemy."

"One after the other, all the
North American administrations have ceaselessly tried to force regime
change in Cuba," Castro said in a speech in Santiago de Cuba, the city
where Fidel proclaimed victory over US-backed dictator Fulgencio
Batista in 1959 after 25 months of fighting in the Sierra Maestra
mountains.

"Resisting has been the pledge and the key of each of
our victories during this half-century of tough fighting," said Raul,
who officially took over from 82-year-old Fidel last February.

Fidel,
who has not appeared in public since undergoing major surgery almost
two and a half years ago, sent a brief, signed greeting to the Cuban
people in Granma, the Communist Party newspaper.

But his image dominated giant banners and billboards in somber
celebrations amid a grim economic outlook.

"The next 50 years will also be of permanent struggle," Raul Castro
said in a 40-minute speech to a crowd of some 3,000 people.

N-E expert takes over as new IB chief as blasts hit Guwahati

Uttar Pradesh cadre IPS officer Rajiv Mathur, considered an expert in dealing with north-east insurgencies, took over as the new director of Intelligence Bureau (IB) on Thursday, the day Guwahati witnessed serial blasts.

Mathur, a 1972 batch officer, has served in IB for nearly three decades, including 15 years in Washington in various capacities.

Mathur took over from P C Haldar who retired on December 31. The name of Mathur, who was earlier special director in IB, was cleared by the Appointments Committee of Cabinet in early December. Since then, he was serving as Officer on Special Duty (OSD) to Haldar.

The 59-year-old Mathur will hold the post for two years or until fresh orders from the government.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/N-E_expert_takes_over_as_new_IB_chief_as_blasts_hit_Guwahati/articleshow/3923797.cms

Hasina seeks UN assistance for trial of war criminals


wami League President and the Premier-in-waiting Sheikh Hasina has sought cooperation of the United Nation for trial of war criminals in Bangladesh. Hasina asked for the legal assistance on Thursday while a Special Envoy of the UN Secretary General, Ian Martin called on her at the Dhanmondi Sudha Sadan residence in the capital.

Quoting her, Mohammad Jamir said, "During the meeting with the UN representative, our leader Hasina urged the apex body of the International Community to prove assistance as per the International Law to ensure the trial of the war criminals."

Asked about the outcome of the meeting, the UN representative assured the would be Prime Minster Hasina to provide all sorts of assistance to resolve the longstanding political issue which was also included in the AL Election Manifesto.

He mentioned that the UN delegation also discussed with Hasina how the United Nation can extend its support to gear up the governing system of the country.Talking to the newsmen Ian Martin said that he came to congratulate Sheikh Hasina on her poll victory.

"It's my privilege to congratulate Sheikh Hasina and the people of Bangladesh on this democratic occasion," he said.He assured the AL President to provide all-out cooperation to the Bangladesh Government the days ahead.

Asked about the BNP position regarding the election result, the UN Secretary General's envoy declined to respond to any question only saying, "We have sent our separate team to observe the election."

Earlier, Sheikh Hasina asked her party leaders and activists to continue their political activities by shunning the politics of vengeance and work for the welfare of the country and its people.

"People rejected the erstwhile ruling coalition for their widespread corruption, terrorism and looting. AL leaders and activists must realise this fact considering people's hopes and aspirations," former Premier Hasina continued, "If you do like them, you better understand what fate would wait for you."

"Remain clam, forgive their misdeeds and lead a disciplined life. Be careful about your work so that none can accuse you of resorting to repression and harassment to anyone," she directed her party leaders and activists, waiting in front of her Dhanmondi residence to greet her yesterday noon.

Wishing the huge crowed, mostly the newly elected MPs and district leaders, with a loud speaker from the rooftop of Sudha Sadan, the AL President said, "Happy New Year. Work unitedly to build up a 'Sonar Bangla' earlier dreamt of by the father of nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Muijibur Rahman ."

Dhanmondhi number 5 road yesterday continued to experience a mad rush as thousands of party men and well-wishers thronged to the Sudha Sadan to get a glance of Hasina.

Leaders of AL and other associate bodies, professionals, civil society, newly elected members of the ninth parliament, different socio-cultural organsations and foreign delegates called on Hasina and congratulated her. Many of them presented bouquet of flowers, boats made of flowers and sweetmeats to the AL President.Hasina also greeted the crowed through a video-conference.

http://www.thebangladeshtoday.com/leadi



Bangladesh India tensions & Awami League
Right before the Awami Leagues victory in Bangladesh, the relations soured a bit. The BNP is caliming massive fraud in the elections and maintains that the BNP was prevented from taking power in Bangladesh becuase the pro-Indians wanted to ensure an Awami League victory.

The AL will surely improve relations with Bangladesh. Shaih Mujib Ur Rehman had actually signed a Treaty of Freinship with Bangladesh wich would have paved the way for the absorption of the Muslim country into India. On 14th August 1975 Banagladeshi patriots assassinated Mr. Mujib and left his corpse to rot in the street for days. This was a signal to India that Bangladesh did not want to be part of India.

Recently the Indians have blamed Bangladeshis for terror in india and for massive immigration into the bordering states.Ms. Hasina Mujib will be able to navigate the Bangladeshi ship through some rough waters balancing the sovreignty of the Muslim Nation with the demands of India. It will be a tight rope with the Bangladeshi army watching each and every move very carefully.
A new generation of Bangladeshi leaders is now emerging, untainted by the events of 1971. Bangladesh grandsons: Can Joy Mujib defeat Tarique Zia?
Bangladesh summons Indian ambassador, lodges protest: Survey in gas-rich waters

DHAKA, Dec 27: Bangladesh summoned India’s ambassador on Saturday to protest exploration work by Indian ships in gas-rich waters claimed by both the neighbours, officials said.

Bangladesh Foreign Secretary Touhid Hossain summoned Indian High Commissioner Pinak Ranjan Chakravarty to his office and handed over a written protest urging an immediate cessation of survey activities, a foreign ministry spokesman said.

The complaint came after naval personnel spotted an Indian survey ship and two support vessels late on Thursday in territory claimed by Bangladesh in the Bay of Bengal.Bangladesh says the area in question is part of its deep-sea gas block number 14, which analysts say is rich in hydrocarbon.Crew members on the Bangladeshi vessel asked their Indian counterparts to exit the waters but were told they were in their own waters, a foreign ministry statement said.

In a separate written statement, Foreign Minister Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury urged New Delhi to “postpone the survey” until a settlement was reached on the territorial dispute.

“We are confident that peaceful deliberations and diplomatic measures will ultimately lead to a mutually acceptable solution in this regard,” the statement said.Indian High Commissioner Chakravarty told reporters after the meeting that it was incorrect to call the water disputed but that there was “an overlapping claim” on it by both countries.

“I don’t know exactly what work they are doing there but these are survey ships. They will finish their work and then go,” he told reporters, adding that New Delhi was keen to sort out the dispute through diplomacy and had asked Bangladeshi officials to travel to India to discuss the matter.“They are chartered ships, not Indian Navy ships. Bangladeshi Naval ships, however, are in the area.”

The Bangladeshi foreign secretary said: “We have taken the Indian proposal positively but hope India will remove the survey ships.”A naval commander told AFP that two Bangladeshi ships had been sent to the region and a third was on its way as reinforcement.

Last month, a similar row between Bangladesh and its eastern neighbour Myanmar flared over another disputed stretch in the bay. Bangladesh deployed four ships and put its navy and armed forces on high alert after a South Korean company escorted by Myanmar ships began work in the area. A series of meetings between the two failed to resolve the dispute and it was only after Myanmar removed the ships that it simmered down.-AFP

The Media Can Legally Lie


CMW REPORT, Spring 2003
Title: “Court Ruled That Media Can Legally Lie”
Author: Liane Casten


ORGANIC CONSUMER ASSOCIATION, March 7, 2004
Title: "Florida Appeals Court Orders Akre-Wilson Must Pay Trial Costs for $24.3 Billion Fox Television; Couple Warns Journalists of Danger to Free Speech, Whistle Blower Protection"
Author Not Listed


Faculty Evaluator: Liz Burch, Ph.D.
Student Researcher: Sara Brunner







In February 2003, a Florida Court of Appeals unanimously agreed with an assertion by FOX News that there is no rule against distorting or falsifying the news in the United States.



Back in December of 1996, Jane Akre and her husband, Steve Wilson, were hired by FOX as a part of the Fox “Investigators” team at WTVT in Tampa Bay, Florida. In 1997 the team began work on a story about bovine growth hormone (BGH), a controversial substance manufactured by Monsanto Corporation. The couple produced a four-part series revealing that there were many health risks related to BGH and that Florida supermarket chains did little to avoid selling milk from cows treated with the hormone, despite assuring customers otherwise.



According to Akre and Wilson, the station was initially very excited about the series. But within a week, Fox executives and their attorneys wanted the reporters to use statements from Monsanto representatives that the reporters knew were false and to make other revisions to the story that were in direct conflict with the facts. Fox editors then tried to force Akre and Wilson to continue to produce the distorted story. When they refused and threatened to report Fox's actions to the FCC, they were both fired.(Project Censored #12 1997)


Akre and Wilson sued the Fox station and on August 18, 2000, a Florida jury unanimously decided that Akre was wrongfully fired by Fox Television when she refused to broadcast (in the jury's words) “a false, distorted or slanted story” about the widespread use of BGH in dairy cows. They further maintained that she deserved protection under Florida's whistle blower law. Akre was awarded a $425,000 settlement. Inexplicably, however, the court decided that Steve Wilson, her partner in the case, was ruled not wronged by the same actions taken by FOX.


FOX appealed the case, and on February 14, 2003 the Florida Second District Court of Appeals unanimously overturned the settlement awarded to Akre. The Court held that Akre’s threat to report the station’s actions to the FCC did not deserve protection under Florida’s whistle blower statute, because Florida’s whistle blower law states that an employer must violate an adopted “law, rule, or regulation." In a stunningly narrow interpretation of FCC rules, the Florida Appeals court claimed that the FCC policy against falsification of the news does not rise to the level of a "law, rule, or regulation," it was simply a "policy." Therefore, it is up to the station whether or not it wants to report honestly.



During their appeal, FOX asserted that there are no written rules against distorting news in the media. They argued that, under the First Amendment, broadcasters have the right to lie or deliberately distort news reports on public airwaves. Fox attorneys did not dispute Akre’s claim that they pressured her to broadcast a false story, they simply maintained that it was their right to do so. After the appeal verdict WTVT general manager Bob Linger commented, “It’s vindication for WTVT, and we’re very pleased… It’s the case we’ve been making for two years. She never had a legal claim.”


UPDATE BY LIANE CASTEN: If we needed any more proof that we now live in an upside down world, the saga of Jane Akre, along with her husband, Steve Wilson, could not be more compelling.



Akre and Wilson won the first legal round. Akre was awarded $425,000 in a jury trial with well-crafted arguments for their wrongful termination as whistleblowers. And in the process, they also won the prestigious “Goldman Environmental” prize for their outstanding efforts. However, FOX turned around and appealed the verdict. This time, FOX won; the original verdict was overturned in the Appellate Court of Florida’s Second District. The court implied there was no restriction against distorting the truth. Technically, there was no violation of the news distortion because the FCC’s policy of news distortion does not have the weight of the law. Thus, said the court, Akre-Wilson never qualified as whistleblowers.


What is more appalling are the five major media outlets that filed briefs of Amici Curiae- or friend of FOX – to support FOX’s position: Belo Corporation, Cox Television, Inc., Gannett Co., Inc., Media General Operations, Inc., and Post-Newsweek Stations, Inc. These are major media players! Their statement, “The station argued that it simply wanted to ensure that a news story about a scientific controversy regarding a commercial product was present with fairness and balance, and to ensure that it had a sound defense to any potential defamation claim.”


“Fairness and balance?” Monsanto hardly demonstrated “fairness and balance” when it threatened a lawsuit and demanded the elimination of important, verifiable information!


The Amici position was “If upheld by this court, the decision would convert personnel actions arising from disagreements over editorial policy into litigation battles in which state courts would interpret and apply federal policies that raise significant and delicate constitutional and statutory issues.” After all, Amici argued, 40 states now have Whistleblower laws, imagine what would happen if employees in those 40 states followed the same course of action?


The position implies that First Amendment rights belong to the employers – in this case the five power media groups. And when convenient, the First Amendment becomes a broad shield to hide behind. Let’s not forget, however; the airwaves belong to the people. Is there no public interest left—while these media giants make their private fortunes using the public airwaves? Can corporations have the power to influence the media reporting, even at the expense of the truth? Apparently so.


In addition, the five “friends” referred to FCC policies. The five admit they are “vitally interested in the outcome of this appeal, which will determine the extent to which state whistleblower laws may incorporate federal policies that touch on sensitive questions of editorial judgment.”


Anyone concerned with media must hear the alarm bells. The Bush FCC, under Michael Powell’s leadership, has shown repeatedly that greater media consolidation is encouraged, that liars like Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter are perfectly acceptable, that to refer to the FCC interpretation of “editorial judgment” is to potentially throw out any pretense at editorial accuracy if the “accuracy” harms a large corporation and its bottom line. This is our “Brave New Media”, the corporate media that protects its friends and now lies, unchallenged if need be.


The next assault: the Fox station then filed a series of motions in a Tampa Circuit Court seeking more than $1.7 million in trial fees and costs from both Akre and Wilson. The motions were filed on March 30 and April 16 by Fox attorney, William McDaniels—who bills his client at $525 to $550 an hour. The costs are to cover legal fees and trial costs incurred by FOX in defending itself at the first trial. The issue may be heard by the original trial judge, Ralph Steinberg—a logical step in the whole process. However, Judge Steinberg must come out of retirement if he is to hear this, so the hearing, set for June 1, may go to a new judge, Judge Maye.


Akre and her husband feel the stress. “There is no justification for the five stations not to support us,” she said. “Attaching legal fees to whistleblowers is unprecedented, absurd. The ‘business’ of broadcasting trumps it all. These news organizations must ensure they are worthy of the public trust while they use OUR airwaves, free of charge. Public trust is alarmingly absent here.”


Indeed. This is what our corporate media, led by such as Rupert Murdoch, have come to. How low we have fallen.



Jane Akre can be reached at: jakre@bellsouth.net.

See The Top 25 Censored Stories of the year at www.projectcensored.org



http://www.relfe.com/media_can_legally_lie.html

Hundreds have been killed after days of Israeli bombardment of Gaza [AFP]

Despite growing pressure on Barack Obama to speak out on the crisis in Gaza, the US president-elect has remained silent on the issue.

Obama, holidaying in Hawaii, has made no public remarks on Israel's unrelenting military assault on the Palestinian territory, which has left more than 380 people there dead.

The former Illinois senator spoke out after last month's attacks in Mumbai and has made detailed statements on the US economic crisis.

But some fear that the US president-elect's reluctance to speak out on the Gaza raids could be sending its own message.

"Silence sounds like complicity," Mark Perry, the Washington Director of the Conflicts Forum group, told Al Jazeera.

"Obama has said that Israel has the right to defend itself from rocket attacks but my question to him is 'does he believe that Palestinians also have the right of self-defence?'"

Support for Israel
Israel says the operation is necessary to prevent Palestinian rocket attacks on the south of the country.

And Obama repeatedly spoke out in support for Israel during his election campaign, describing the country as one of the US' greatest allies and has vowed to ensure its security.


Obama was shown Palestinian rockets during his visit to Sderot [AFP]

He caused anger in the Arab world when he told a pro-Israel lobby group in June that Jerusalem should remain the undivided capital of Israel.

He also visited Sderot, the Israeli town close to Gaza regularly targeted by Palestinian rocket fire, in July, to show his support for residents.

Ehud Barak, the Israeli defence minister, has cited comments Obama made during that visit in his own justification for launching the assault.

"Obama said that if rockets were being fired at his home while his two daughters were sleeping, he would do everything he could to prevent it," Barak was reported as saying on Monday.

Obama's aides have repeatedly said he is monitoring the situation and continues to receive intelligence briefings but that he is not yet US president.

But George Bush, the current US leader, has also remained silent on Israel's attacks although the White House has offered its support to Israel.

Arabs pessimistic


Many Arabs were cautiously optimistic about Obama's election victory in November, in the belief that a fresh face in the White House would be better than Bush, who invaded Iraq and gave strong support to Israel.

But his choice of a foreign policy team, especially Hillary Clinton as US secretary of state and Rahm Emanuel as his White House chief-of-staff, have raised doubts that much will change.

But some see his see his silence as symptomatic of caution over his own position and the power of the Israel lobby.

"He wants to be cautious and I think he will remain cautious because the Arab-Israeli conflict is not one of his priorities," Hassan Nafaa, an Egyptian political scientist and secretary-general of the Arab Thought Forum in Amman, told Reuters.

"Obama's position is very precarious. The Jewish lobby warned against his election, so he has chosen to remain silent (on Gaza)," added Hilal Khashan, a professor of political science at the American University of Beirut.

Protests demand change

However many in the US have called on Obama to speak out personally on events in Gaza.

Protesters gathered at Obama's transition office in Washington DC on Monday, and outside his holiday residence in Hawaii on Tuesday, to demand he do more.

"The Obama administration is working hand in glove with the Bush administration and...there is no reason that they can't work together to get something done," Mike Reitz, a federal government worker, told Al Jazeera at the transition office protest.

At another protest against Israel's actions in Gaza outside the White House on Tuesday, some were sceptical about Barack Obama's commitment to Middle East peace-making.

"Is this the change that you were talking about?," said Reza Aboosaiedi, a computer specialist from Iran.

"If this is the change, you have a very, very deep problem, because if you add them up with the other economic problems and other problems in America, having this kind of problem in the Middle East, I don't think he can manage it."

But others at the protest still saw some hope that the former Illinois senator could make a difference.

"I would like to think that he would be more active than Bush in trying to push an agenda to bring Israel and Palestine together to have peace talks, but I don't know," said Bob Malone, a lawyer.

"But I'm an optimist, so I hope so."

Source:Al Jazeera and agencies

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2008/12/2008123101532604810.html



Lashkar's new ally: Dawood Ibrahim

Vicky Nanjappa
January 02, 2009 16:49 IST
After the November 26 attacks on Mumbai [Images] brought the Lashkar-e-Taiyba's India-based modules under the Indian intelligence and law enforcement agencies's special scrutiny, the Lashkar has changed its game plan.
Months before the Mumbai attacks, Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence directed fugitive Indian gangster Dawood Ibrahim [Images], who now lives in Karachi under the ISI's protection, to help carry out terror strikes in India.

Intelligence Bureau agents had earlier told rediff.com that Ibrahim -- the prime accused in the March 12, 1993 serial blasts in Mumbai -- played a key role in funding and identifying prospective targets for the November 26 attacks.

The Lashkar has instructed its local modules to lie low and steer clear of the Indian law enforcement agencies's radar. IB sources say members of Ibrahim's criminal gangs will now be involved in terror strikes in India for the forseeable future.

In the meantime the Lashkar plans to expand its operations in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala [Images]. It had relied on the outlawed Students Islamic Movement of India to conduct terror operations, but the crackdown on SIMI [Images] members across India has forced the Lashkar to make Ibrahim an ally, with the ISI's assistance.

IB sources say Ibrahim -- a native of Maharashtra -- has no option, but to agree to the ISI's diktat, since he needs its help and protection.
http://www.rediff.com/news/2009/jan/02mumterror-lashkars-new-ally-dawood-ibrahim.htm


Terror attack: Key queries and what India Inc can do

Pramod Kabra

December 31, 2008

Like millions of Indians, and especially Mumbaikars, the last few days have been an emotional rollercoaster for me. The recent terror attacks in Mumbai have shaken all of us.

Even before the rescue operations ended, the analysis had begun. And rightly so.

The electronic media has been particularly active in talking to the common man as well as scholars to ask them their views on what should be done to ensure that attacks of this dastardly nature never happen again and, more importantly, how to hold accountable those individuals in power who allowed for this catastrophe to take place.

This note is my attempt to participate in the discussions and be a part of the solution.

Why is this attack different?

Every terrorist attack affects the economy of the country. But this one will have a bigger impact than any that we have witnessed as of yet. A few days after the attack, as I was walking to my office at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in suburban Mumbai, I noticed there was not even a single customer at the breakfast table at the otherwise extremely popular coffee shop.

Terror strikes at Mumbai's heart: Complete Coverage
Industries and businesses across the board were impacted with a host of investor meetings cancelled and countries all over the world taking stock and reassessing the risks involved with doing business in India.

In addition to the recent economic downturn, this incident will provide an additional negative impact.

Although it has not been mentioned categorically because of the political 'incorrectness' of the subject -- this attack is different for one more reason. So far, every other terror strike has impacted the Indian common man walking in crowded bazaars and commuting in local trains. This is the first attack on India's rich and famous -- the elite upper class which has never witnessed such a largescale attack on its own.

This time, they are not happy with platitudes. They want action.

And this may well prove to have a positive effect. This crisis can potentially have same impact on our governance as the 1991 crisis had on the economic reforms.

Why we hate our politicians

A few days ago, on one of the television programmes Congress politician Jayanti Natarajan posed the question as to why politicians were so vehemently hated. A few weeks ago, another Congress politician Salman Khursheed was heard lamenting the same subject. I do not think they are as naive as they appear to be, but since they have asked the question, an answer is in order.

Over time, our politicians have created a self-serving system where they protect their privileged position and where an honest and ethical individual has no real chance of breaking their stranglehold on power.

There are several examples of this to choose from. Some years ago when the Election Commission proposed that all candidates should declare the details of criminal cases pending against them and declare their net worth, the entire political class was united in opposing this. It was only with the Supreme Court's intervention that this was implemented.

The Supreme Court has also been advocating police reforms for a while now. What is the response of the political class as a whole cutting across all party lines?

What was the reaction of the Samajwadi Party and the Congress party to M C Sharma's martyrdom? What was the response of the Bharatiya Janata Party to the Anti-Terror Squad investigating the Malegaon blasts? When Raj Thackeray was dividing the nation and beating up the North Indians, what was the reaction of the Maharashtra government? Why was the BJP silent and did not even bother to condemn the MNS? When Tasleema Nasreen was attacked in Hyderabad and hounded out of India, what was the political class doing besides maintaining a diplomatic silence?

Why the current government faces greater culpability

Every debate on television regarding terrorism becomes a scoring match between the Congress and the BJP as to who was worse. I ask, "Does it really matter"? The current government has been in power for the last five years and it must learn to be accountable for its performance without referencing to what BJP did or did not do.

Till recently we had the most inept home minister we have ever seen in India. In response to every atrocity he doled out platitudes -- saying that we must look for the root cause and we must remain united.

But where was the statement on the action being taken? Even when there was gross failure on the part of our intelligence agencies, and our commandos reach Mumbai 10 hours after the attacks begin, he did not feel there was anything amiss. He actually resigned on moral grounds!

Similarly, we have witnessed truly uninspiring leadership from our prime minister. I do not remember any prime minister's address to the nation being as ignored as his was recently.

In a testament to the lacklustre leadership provided, his government does not even execute the death sentence of a terrorist who attacked the Indian Parliament, whose sentence has been upheld by even the Supreme Court (I hope no one terms the Supreme Court as communal!).

Why should we banish the 'root cause theorists'?

Democracy is a social contract wherein every citizen agrees that there will be no system of private revenge. Despite this basic premise, we witness terrorism being justified on real or imagined root causes.

For Gujarat rioters, the Godhra carnage was the root cause, for the subsequent long list of terror acts, Gujarat was the root cause; and for the Malegaon episode, strikes on Sankatmochan and Rugveer temples will probably be the root cause.

I am not worried about the terrorists speaking this language of 'cause and effect', that is how they sell their wares. I am more concerned about when the Union home minister, leading politicians and so called 'civil society activists' speak this language. I am worried when the media gives them such visible platforms to spread this message.

We should banish the 'root cause theory' and, more importantly, its practitioners. Violence and terrorism cannot be justified on any pretext. This is not to say that we should not take their suggestions for improving our mechanisms for handling grievances, after all this is the promise of a vibrant democracy such as ours.

But the eternal question of the 'boundaries' within democracy concerning free speech need to be debated on an urgent basis.

What can we do?

Tackling terrorism is a complex issue and will require responses at several levels. It is the totality of response which will make the difference.

Police reforms

This is the single biggest issue that needs to be addressed and, unfortunately, not many people are talking about it. The police force in India is an instrument of political expediency.

The level of interference and corruption in the police is well known and, in most cases, taken for granted. Such a corrupt force cannot execute tasks efficiently on the ground. We have allowed this institution to be almost completely destroyed and therefore it has to be built up again from ground zero.

If we want to save India, the police force will have to be independent from any political interference. The Supreme Court has been trying to push these reforms but all our political parties are united in opposing it.

Just consider why the law and order in a state is good during the period when the Election Commission's code of conduct is in force. A police force which allows petty crime will also allow organised crime, which will occasionally, if not consistently, result in lapses on national security.

Make no mistake. These issues are interrelated; a case in point being the story of the custom officer who allowed smuggling of RDX in the country in 1993.

The police reforms will have many elements: First of which is to give the police administrative and financial independence from the political class, to separate policing functions from crime investigation and intelligence gathering, and to set up a federal investigation agency.

Police reforms will be the stickiest issue for our political class. We will have to struggle hard to achieve this, but without it there will be no lasting solution.

Reinvent our laws and judicial system

Our legal system needs to be overhauled. Shekar Gupta of Indian Express in a TV interview pointed out that if a terrorist who was caught alive in Mumbai was arrested in Jaipur; he would have to be released on bail after 30 days.

Arun Jaitley pointed out that had the special terror law not been there, even Rajiv Gandhi's assassins could not have been punished. Obviously something is amiss.

Let's begin with an even more glaring issue. We currently do not have an explicit law which makes eulogising, encouraging or justifying terrorism a crime. Sometime ago a minister in the Samajwadi Party government in Uttar Pradesh offered a reward of Rs 51 crore (Rs 5.1 million) to anyone who would kill Danish cartoonists. This was a clear incitement of terrorism. But the UP government took no action.

Dismantle the terror factories

In India (and elsewhere in our neighborhood), we have factories which radicalise youth. They eulogise, support or justify terrorism often on the basis of real or imagined 'root causes'. These factories must be dismantled.

For the terror factories in Pakistan, we must use all our economic and geopolitical clout to get them dismantled. But in the end if that does not work, we should take overt or covert action to destroy them.

Leverage technology and processes

Our police force is grossly under-equipped and under-trained. Did the ATS look properly equipped and trained to handle the threat? The NSG commandos took over 10 hours to arrive. The cable in the two hotels relayed the action for a long time. There is an endless list of gaffes and process failure.

Our technology and processes will have to proactively evaluate evolving threats. We are dealing with a determined enemy. The next attack could be different. We need to learn and have a contingency plan for the same.

India Inc can immensely contribute in this area. Indian managers at McKinsey, BCG, Hindustan Unilever, TCS [Get Quote], etc. can write the processes, help train our people. India is an IT superpower. Companies like Infosys [Get Quote] and TCS can help develop a technology strategy for the nation's security.

There are so many patriotic Indians who are keen to see this threat eliminated who will help contribute to this campaign.

Celebrate our heroes

We must commemorate our heroes who have laid down their lives tackling terrorism. The men who have lost their lives saving us should always be remembered.

Our martyrs' families should be taken care of financially. Mumbai and the larger civil society of India can create a fund for this purpose.

Let Hemant Karkare's wife, Sandeep Unnikrishnan's parents and Gajendra Singh's children feel that this nation is eternally grateful to them.

This is a huge agenda. It takes time to build the institutions. But many of the things can be done quite fast; almost immediately. In this crisis lies our opportunity to rebuild this nation.

The author is Partner, India Value Fund.
http://www.rediff.com/money/2008/dec/31mumterror-attack-what-india-inc-can-do.htm

26/11 points to military-style training: Admiral

Aziz Haniffa in Washington, DC
January 02, 2009 12:30 IST
Retired Vice Admiral P S Das said the methodology of 26/11 clearly indicated that the terrorists had received months of professional training, most likely from Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence.
Das, who retired as Commander-in-Chief, Eastern Naval Command, disagreed with those who put the blame entirely on the Lashkar-e-Tayiba [Images]. 'They are the face of what has happened, but this operation would not have been possible unless people had been trained militarily by military instructors, whether in service or retired, over a long period of time,' he told a seminar hosted by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, DC, recently.
'If I were to be asked as a commander in the navy, please send 10 fellows in a dingy 10 miles away with this kind of equipment, I would have said my sailors cannot do it, I require Marine Commandos. And I think the US naval commander will say the same thing -- that his sailors cannot do this, it requires SEALs. So if anyone thinks the terrorists were picked up from a madarssa someplace and trained by a terrorist group, they are living in a world of a different kind.'
Das said 26/11 was far more complex than other high profile terrorist attacks, like the September attack on the Islamabad [Images] Mariott, or the December 12, 2000 attack on the USS Cole by Al Qaeda [Images] elements.
'What happened with the USS Cole? One little boat went and rammed into the destroyer, tearing apart a big hole. Whenever a ship comes into harbour, there are a dozen boats that come alongside. Why? Because every ship wants to spruce up; they want the bottom and sides of the ship painted, and that is the kind of thing sailors don't like to do. So these little boats come, and in exchange for a can of diesel or for a bagful of bread or whatever, they do this job.'
'Until the USS Cole was hit, this was standard practice of every ship. And one of these boats went and hit the USS Cole in a suicide attack. It was not a planned military operation. But this attack was a planned military operation; it has been planned, and the people were trained for it, by a military institution -- whether it is the ISI or part of the military is difficult to say.'
'If we recognise this, and recognize that the ISI is the principal organization, we would be on track.'
http://www.rediff.com/news/2009/jan/02mumterror-2611-points-to-military-training.htm?zcc=rl
Let us emulate Israel this year

B Raman
January 02, 2009
Second part of strategic analyst B Raman's column, in which he takes a close look at the security scenario in the New Year.
Read the first part here: 2008 is not our worst terrorism-hit year
Cover-up is another part of our national culture. The report of the committee which enquired into the debacle of 1962 was never released and debated in Parliament and public.
The report of the Kargil [Images] Review Committee was released and acted upon, but never discussed in Parliament. There now seems to be an attempt to avoid a comprehensive enquiry into the terrorist attack of November 2008, similar to the enquiry by a bipartisan National Commission in the US after the 9/11 terrorist strikes and the enquiry by the Intelligence and Security Committee of the British Parliament into the London [Images] explosions of July 2005. With all eyes on the forthcoming elections, nobody wants a post-mortem.
The public should not accept this and should mount pressure on the government and the political class for a thorough enquiry. The argument that a public enquiry could demoralise the agencies and its officers should not be accepted. Thorough enquiries were held into the assassinations of Indira Gandhi [Images] and Rajiv Gandhi [Images] and the reports released to the public without worrying about any demoralisation. Why should we be worried now?
The police in the affected states have arrested many of the perpetrators of the jihadi terrorist strikes of 2008 -- operatives of the IM as well as Ajmal Amir Kasab [Images], the Pakistani who was captured alive during the attack in Mumbai [Images]. Their interrogation has given a wealth of nuts and bolts details of tactical significance -- what is their background, how did they gravitate to terrorism, where and how were they trained, who trained them, what kind of explosives they used, where they procured them etc. But they have not brought out much information of strategic value which could enable us to make a quantitative analysis of the threat facing us in 2009 and prepare ourselves to counter it.
Who are the real brains behind the IM? What is its command and control like? Does it have any strategic objective or is it purely heat of the moment reprisal terrorism? What are its external sources of funding? What are its external linkages -- with the ISI, the Pakistani jihadi terrorist organisations and with the world of organised crime? The involvement of the world of organised crime in acts of terrorism, which became evident in March 1993, continues to be one of the defining characteristics of jihadi terrorism in the Indian hinterland as could be seen from the suspected association of Riaz Bhatkal, an underworld character, with the IM.
Home-grown jihadi terrorism, which has struck us repeatedly since November 2007 in the name of the IM, is an iceberg. Till we are able to identify, measure and blow up this iceberg, more such terrorist strikes involving serial explosions in important cities are likely. Was the disaster which struck us in Mumbai in November 2008, the LeT tip of an Al Qaeda [Images] iceberg? It will be very unwise to presume that it cannot be so. There is an Al Qaeda iceberg which is on the move from the Pashtun tribal belt of Pakistan to areas outside as seen from the explosions outside the Danish embassy in Islamabad [Images] in June 2008, and outside the Marriott Hotel in September 2008. It is time we come out of our denial mode that what is happening in Pakistan cannot happen to us. It can.
We still do not have a coherent policy to deal with Pakistan, which has been a State sponsor of terrorism in Indian territory and with Bangladesh as a facilitator. Our approach to Pakistan's sponsorship continues to be marked by the kabhi garam, kabhi naram (sometimes tough, sometimes soft) syndrome.
India has been a victim of indigenous terrorism without external sponsorship as well as terrorism externally sponsored -- from Pakistan and Bangladesh. Before 1979, we were also victims of tribal insurgencies in the North-East supported by China, which is no longer supporting them after 1979. One of the reasons why Indira Gandhi decided to support the independence movement in the then East Pakistan was because the ISI was giving sanctuary to terrorists and insurgents in the Chittagong Hill Tracts from where they were operating in North-East India. The creation of Bangladesh ended this sponsorship in 1971, but it was revived by the intelligence agencies of Pakistan and Bangladesh after the assassination of Sheikh Mujibur Rehman in 1975. We are still struggling to cope with it.
One of the lessons of the post-World War history of State-sponsored terrorism is that it never ends unless the guilty State is made to pay a prohibitive price.
STASI, the East German intelligence service, was behind much of the ideological terrorism in West Europe. The collapse of communism in East Germany [Images] and the end of STASI brought an end to this terrorism. The intelligence services of Libya and Syria were behind much of the West Asian terrorism and the Carlos group, then living in Damascus, played a role in helping ideological groups in West Europe. The US bombing of Libya in 1986, the strong US action against Syria which was declared a State sponsor of terrorism, and against Sudan, where Carlos shifted from Damascus, and the prosecution and jailing, under US pressure, of two Libyan intelligence officers for their complicity in the bombing of a Pan Am plane off Lockerbie on the Irish coast in 1988 brought an end to State sponsorship of terrorism by Libya and Sudan. Syria has stopped sponsoring terrorism against the US, but continues to do so against Israel.
There are any number of UN resolutions and international declarations naming State-sponsored terrorism as amounting to indirect aggression against the victim State. Unfortunately, there has been no political will in India to make Pakistan and Bangladesh pay a heavy price for their sponsorship of terrorism against India. Once a firm decision based on national consensus is taken that the time has come to make Pakistan and Bangladesh pay a price, the question as to which organisation should do it and how will be sorted out. The problem is not that we don't have an appropriate organisation, but we don't have the will to act against Pakistan and Bangladesh. Our policy of kabhi garam, kabhi naram towards these two countries is encouraging them not to change their ways.
We must take action instead of depending on the US or other members of the international community to do so. Every country is interested in protecting the lives and property of only its own citizens. This is natural. It is the responsibility of the Government of India and the states to protect the lives and property of our nationals. There are many good things we can learn from Israelis such as their passion for up-to-date databases, all their agencies countering terrorism acting as a single team without ego clashes, turf battles and the tendency to pass the buck, public support for their counter-terrorism agencies, high investments in research & development of new technologies for counter-terrorism etc. India has remained a nation of dogs that bark, but not bite. We have seen it after Mumbai too. It is time we emulated Israel and become a nation of dogs that don't bark but bite ferociously.
At the same time, some methods employed by Israel such as over-militarisation of counter-terrorism will prove counter-productive in a pluralistic, multi-religious state such as India. We have produced many good intelligence bureaucrats, but we have produced very few good intelligence professionals. Our counter-terrorism experts tend to be over-simplistic and superficial in their expertise, are not innovative and try to deal with technology-savvy modern terrorism with methods and thinking which are not equally modern. The terrorists operating in India tend to be more nodern and innovative in their thinking than the counter-terrorism agencies. Increasing their numbers and budgets alone will not produce results unless, simultaneously, there is also a change in their thinking and methods.
2008 was not totally gloomy for India. There was gloom in the Indian hinterland. But there was also sunshine in Jammu and Kashmir for the first time in 19 years as seen from the spectacularly successful election held in the state in which over 60 per cent of the voters participated defying threats and intimidation from the terrorists and calls for boycott from their political mentors.
There is terrorism fatigue in J&K as there was in Punjab when P V Narasimha Rao was the prime minister. Rao was bold enough to lift President's rule and hold elections disregarding advice from senior bureaucrats not to do so. The elections in Punjab marked the beginning of the people's alienation from the Khalistani terrorists. People in J&K are tired of violence and of the difficulties which they had to face as a result of security measures for nearly 19 years. They want normalcy, but this need not mean the beginning of the end of their feelings of alienation.
The feeling of alienation will not end just because of the spectacularly successful elections. They will end only through meaningful measures by the Government of India and the new government headed by Omar Abdullah [Images] to address the legitimate grievances of the people and to fulfill some of the past promises to give greater powers to the state -- almost near autonomy, if not total autonomy. The elections also show that the mainstream parties have retained their political base despite 19 years of terrorism -- much of it directed against them -- and that the political base of the political mentors of the militancy such as the Hurriyat is as small as it always has been. Farooq Abdullah [Images] used to describe them as mohalla leaders and not state leaders who are afraid of elections because they know that elections could expose their limited following. He is probably right.
While keeping our fingers crossed in J&K, we have reasons to be proud of what our intelligence agencies and the security forces have achieved in J&K after 19 years of sustained and well-calibrated counter-terrorism. They are capable of achieving similar results in the Indian hinterland in 2009 if the systemic and individual deficiencies are identified and removed instead of being covered up, if they work in a coordinated and united manner as they did in J&K, if they receive the right political leadership, if Pakistan is made to pay a price for its sponsorship of jihadi terrorism and if we pay due to attention to the legitimate grievances of our Muslim co-citizens in hinterland India instead of dismissing them off-hand as imaginary. Some of them are not. Some of our Muslim youth have real causes for anger against the Indian State and society. We must take note of them and address them. Otherwise, we will drive them into the hands of the ISI and the likes of the LeT, the JeM and Al Qaeda.
To be continued
(The writer is Additional Secretary (retired), Cabinet Secretariat, Government of India, New Delhi [Images], and, presently, Director, Institute for Topical Studies, Chennai. E-mail: seventyone2@gmail.com)
http://www.rediff.com/news/2009/jan/02raman-let-us-emulate-israel-this-year.htm

Tens of Thousands Protest Across the U.S. and Around the World
Demanding an End to the Bombing and Seige of Gaza
5,000 Protest in Los Angeles at the Israeli Consulate

Tens of thousands of people took to the streets in scores of U.S. cities in response to the call for December 30 to be a National Day of Action to support the people of Palestine. The call was issued 72 hours ago by a number of organizations including the ANSWER Coalition, Muslim American Society Freedom, the National Council of Arab Americans, Free Palestine Alliance; Al-Awda, the Palestine Right to Return Coalition and others. Many organizations embraced the call and endorsed they day of action.

Massive Los Angeles Protest

In Los Angeles, 5,000 people joined a vibrant protest at the Israeli Consulate on busy Wilshire Blvd. Hundreds of Palestinian flags, signs and banners lined both sides of the street for three long city blocks. The massive sidewalks were packed 20-30 people deep all through the nearly four hour action. Chants like “Free Gaza now!” and “Bombing children is a crime! Free, free Palestine!” rang out.

The protest was militant and overwhelmingly youthful. Palestinian youth took over a nearby multi-level parking garage, waving flags from each floor. People also stood on top of electrical boxes and newspaper stands. The level of anger directed against U.S.-Israeli war crimes was palpable.

A spirited rally capped off the protest. Speakers denounced the war crimes committed by Israel and funded by the U.S. government, while championing the heroic resistance of the Palestinian people. The rally was chaired by Muna Coobtee of the ANSWER Coalition and the Free Palestine Alliance. Other speakers included Mahmud Ahmad, Al-Awda; Palestinian activist Eyad Kishawi; Preston Wood, ANSWER Coalition; Rana Sharif, Palestinian American Women’s Association; Al Garcia, Alliance for Just and Lasting Peace in the Philippines; Jim Lafferty, National Lawyers Guild; Carlos Alvarez, Party for Socialism and Liberation candidate for L.A. Mayor in 2009; and others.

About 100 Zionists came out to spew hate at the massive pro-Palestinian crowd, but they were protected by lines of riot police and had to be escorted from the protest site as the crowd chanted “Racists go home! Palestine will be free!”

The Los Angeles Police Department came out in full force, armed with riot gear and “rubber bullet” guns, much like those used by the Israeli Occupation Forces in Palestine. They detained a Palestinian man after they aggressively pushed his wife, but the pro-Palestinian crowd intervened and the cops were forced to release him from custody. It was a victory for the people.

The Los Angeles action took on a regional character. People came from Orange County, Ventura, Long Beach, the San Fernando Valley, and all throughout Los Angeles to attend. And all major English- and Spanish-language media outlets covered the protest in print, radio and on TV. The top photo from the protest in this email is on the front page of today's Los Angeles Times California Section.

Click here for more photos of the Los Angeles action.

For more info call 213-251-1025 or e-mail answerla@answerla.org.

Protests Sweep Across the U.S. and the World

In Washington D.C., 5,000 people gathered at the State Department and marched to the White House. Those taking to the streets included many children, teenagers and young adults demanding an immediate end to the bombing of Gaza. As the nighttime march entered the White House grounds, it took over and filled all of Pennsylvania Avenue with young people raising Palestinian flags at the White House fence.

Over 10,000 protestors filled the sidewalks in front of and across the street from the Israeli Consulate in San Francisco and marched. In New York City, thousands demonstrated at the Israeli Consulate. In Dearborn, Michigan, thousands braved below-freezing weather to demonstrate. In San Diego, 800 people protested.

Yesterday, people carried out demonstrations in Anchorage, AK; Phoenix, AZ; Modesto, Sacramento, San Jose, and Santa Rosa, CA; Colorado Springs and Denver, CO; Fort Lauderdale, Tampa and Ocala, FL; Atlanta, GA; Honolulu, HI; Chicago, IL; Louisville, KY; Baltimore, MD; Boston, MA; Ann Arbor, Flint and Kalamazoo, MI; Concord and Portsmouth, NH; New Brunswick, NJ; Albuquerque, NM; Buffalo, Rochester and Syracuse, NY; Cincinnati, Cleveland and Youngstown, OH; Portland, OR; Philadelphia, PA; Sioux Falls, SD; Knoxville, TN; Dallas and Houston, TX; Norfolk, VA; Bellingham, Seattle and Tacoma, WA; and scores of other cities in the United States. Protestors even lined the street in front of incoming U.S. President Barack Obama's vacation compound in Kailua, Hawaii.

Coordinated protests were also held throughout the Middle East, Europe, Asia, Latin America and Africa.

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--------------------------------------------------

A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition
Act Now to Stop War and End Racism
213-251-1025
http://www.answerla.org
answerla@answerla.org
137 N. Virgil Ave., #201
Los Angeles, CA 90004C

[Glenn Greenwald points out that the Israeli-Palesitnian conflict is one
more example of how the political leadership class and the punditry are out
of step with US public opinion. In the first paragraph he cites a poll
showing 71 percent favor taking neither side in the current crisis, an
astonishing number. No doubt the apologists for Israeli policy will quote
George W. Bush that policy should not be made by "focus group." meaning that
public opinion should be disregarded on such "important matters." SR]

George Washington's warnings and U.S. policy towards Israel

Glenn Greenwald
Salon
Tuesday Dec. 30, 2008

University of Maryland's Program on International Policy Attitudes -- July
1, 2008:

"A new WorldPublicOpinion.org poll of 18 countries finds that in 14 of them
people mostly say their government should not take sides in the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Just three countries favor taking the
Palestinian side (Egypt, Iran, and Turkey) and one is divided (India). No
country favors taking Israel's side, including the United States, where 71
percent favor taking neither side. "

CQ Politics, yesterday:

"Congressional leaders on both sides of the aisle rallied to Israel's cause
Monday as it pressed forward with large-scale air attacks against Islamic
militants in the Gaza Strip. . . .

"I strongly support Israel's right to defend its citizens against rocket and
mortar attacks from Hamas-controlled Gaza, which have killed and injured
Israeli citizens, and to restore security to its residents," said Senate
Majority Leader Harry Reid , D-Nev. . . .

"His view was echoed by leaders of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.

"Israel has a right, indeed a duty, to defend itself in response to the
hundreds of rockets and mortars fired from Gaza over the past week," Howard
L. Berman , D-Calif., chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said
in a statement.

"Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida, the ranking Republican on the House
committee, also expressed support for the Israeli offensive. . . .

"The White House on Monday also took Israel's side in the fighting,
demanding that Hamas halt its rocket fire into Israel and agree to a last
ceasefire."

Earlier this week, Nancy Pelosi issued an identical statement, and yesterday
Democratic House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer did the same.

There sure is a lot of agreeing going on -- one might describe it as
"absolute." The degree of mandated orthodoxy on the Israel question among
America's political elites is so great that if one took the statements on
Gaza from George Bush, Pelosi, Hoyer, Berman, Ros-Lehtinen, and randomly
chosen Bill Kristol-acolytes and redacted their names, it would be
impossible to know which statements came from whom. They're all identical:
what Israel does is absolutely right. The U.S. must fully and
unconditionally support Israel. Israel does not merit an iota of criticism
for what it is doing. It bears none of the blame for this conflict. No
questioning even of the wisdom of its decisions -- let alone the
justifiability -- is uttered. No deviation from that script takes place.

By itself, the degree of full-fledged, absolute agreement -- down to the
syllable -- among America's political leaders is striking, even when one
acknowledges the constant convergence between the leadership of both
parties. But it becomes even more striking in light of the bizarre fact
that the consensus view -- that America must unquestioningly stand on
Israel's side and support it, not just in this conflict but in all of
Israel's various wars -- is a view which 7 out of 10 Americans reject.
Conversely, the view which 70% of Americans embrace -- that the U.S. should
be neutral and even-handed in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict generally --
is one that no mainstream politician would dare express.

In a democracy, one could expect that politicians would be afraid to express
a view that 70% of the citizens oppose. Yet here we have the exact opposite
situation: no mainstream politician would dare express the view that 70% of
Americans support; instead, the universal piety is the one that only a small
minority accept. Isn't that fairly compelling evidence of the complete
disconnect between our political elites and the people they purportedly
represent?

There is, of course, other evidence for that proposition: the fact that
overwhelming majorities of Americans have long wanted to withdraw from Iraq
was completely dismissed and ignored by our bipartisan political class,
which continued to fund the war indefinitely and with no conditions. But at
least there, Democratic leaders paid lip service to the idea that they
agreed with that position and some Democrats went beyond rhetoric and
actually tried to stop or at least limit the war. But in the case of
Israel, not even that symbolic nod to American public opinion occurs among
the political leadership.

The other striking aspect of this lockstep American consensus is that the
Gaza situation is very complex, and a wide range of opinions fall within the
realm of what is reasonable. Even many who believe that Israel's attack is
morally and legally justifiable as a response to Hamas rockets and who
generally side with Israel -- such as J Street -- nonetheless oppose this
attack on strictly pragmatic grounds: that it won't achieve anything
positive, that it will exacerbate the problem, that it makes less likely a
diplomatic resolution, that there is no military solution to the rocket
attacks. Others condemn Hamas rocket attacks but also condemn the
devastating Israeli blockade and expanding settlements. Others still who
may be supportive of Israel's right to attack at least express horror over
the level of Palestinian suffering and urge greater restraint.

Anyone minimally objective and well-intentioned finds Hamas rocket attacks
on random Israeli civilians to be highly objectionable and wrong, but even
among those who do, one finds a wide range of views regarding the Israeli
offensive. But not among America's political leadership. There, one finds
total, lockstep uniformity almost more unyielding than what one finds among
Israeli leaders themselves -- as though Israel's wars are, by definition,
America's wars; its enemies are our enemies; its disputes and conflicts and
interests are, inherently, ours; and America's only duty when Israel fights
is to support it uncritically.

* * * * *

All of that underscores one vital point I want to emphasize with regard to
the commentary I've written on Israel and Gaza the last couple of days.
Yesterday, George Mason Law Professor David Bernstein wrote another
thoroughly childish response to something I wrote, and it merits very little
attention [he continues to insist that I let him pay for me to vacation in
Sderot so that I will see the light on the justifiability of Israel's
assault on Gaza, which is exactly the same type of "argument" as if I
offered to sponsor an online fundraiser to pay for him and his family
tomorrow to travel to and vacation in Gaza City so he can blog from there
about how restrained and justified and necessary the Israeli strikes and
blockade are, which -- one would have thought (wrongly) -- anyone above the
age of 12 would recognize as a juvenile and emotionally manipulative means
of argumentation].

Bernstein's mentality is echoed by The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg, who
defends Israel's actions by approvingly quoting Barack Obama's statement
that "If someone was sending rockets on my house where my daughters were
sleeping at night, I would do everything to stop it, and I would expect
Israelis to do the same thing." But that mindset justifies any and all
actions by any group with a legitimate grievance, as in: "if my family and
I were forced to live under a 4-decade foreign occupation and had our land
blockaded and were not allowed to exit and my children couldn't access basic
nutrition or medical treatment, I would do everything to stop it, and I
would expect Palestinians to do the same thing." That happens also to be
the same mentality that was used to justify the 9/11 attacks ("if my family
and I were forced to live in a region in which a foreign superpower
dominated our politics and propped up brutal dictators for its own ends, I
would do everything to stop it, and I would expect Muslims to do the same
thing").

But -- just like those who insist that American Torture is different because
American leaders use it for noble ends -- this is nothing more elevated than
an adolescent refusal to view the world through any prism other than
complete self-centeredness, where one's own side merits infinite empathy and
the "other side" merits none. When it comes to the Israeli-Palestinian
dispute -- like most intractable, bloody, hate-driven, decades-long wars --
there is endless blame to go around to countless parties. Commentary which
fails to recognize that, or, worse, which insists it's not true, is almost
certainly the by-product of this blind self-regard.

* * * * *

The real point here is that none of these intractable disputes between
Israel and its various neighbors should be a focal point of American policy
at all. Yet the above-documented orthodoxy has ensured that it is. And --
at least in the U.S. -- that is the real issue, the reason why the Israeli
attack merits so much discussion in the U.S. even among those who would just
as soon refrain from having any involvement. In his reply yesterday,
Bernstein wrote:

"I find it rather amusing that Greenwald refers to me as an
"Israel-obsessive." I blog a fair amount about Israel, not least because I'm
there twice a year and my wife is Israeli. Greenwald, meanwhile, blogs far
more about Israel, without similar ties. What does that make him?"

Bernstein obviously has absolutely no idea what "ties" to Israel I do or
don't have; he simply fabricated that claim. But (other than for those
interested in Bernstein's honesty -- and I'm not one of them), that point is
entirely irrelevant. The reason Americans need to be interested in what
Israel does is obvious, and it has nothing to do with one's "ties" to that
country.

As I wrote on Saturday regarding Israel's varied wars, walls and blockades:
"since we fund a huge bulk of it and supply the weapons used for much of it
and use our veto power at the U.N. to enable all of it, we are connected to
it -- intimately -- and bear responsibility for all of Israel's various
wars, including the current overwhelming assault on Gaza, as much as
Israelis themselves." With our bipartisan policy of blind and absolute
support for Israel -- not just rhetorical but military and material as
well -- our political leadership has inextricably (and foolishly) tied
American interests to Israel's interests.

Matt Yglesias made a similar point yesterday:

"Jonathan Zasloff offers the futility argument with regard to the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict:

"'All those who insist that the United States should "solve" the problem
should explain how. And if they can't do that, then maybe they should take
some quiet time.'"

I think that would be an appealing solution to a lot of people who have no
real desire to try to sit in delicate judgment weighing the moral balance
between a Hamas movement that seems indifferent to human life, and an
Israeli government that's lashing out brutally as part of a domestic
political drama. But as long as Israel is by far the largest recipient of US
foreign assistance funds and by an even larger margin the largest per capita
recipient of US foreign assistance funds, then I don't see how "quiet time"
is a realistic option.

Americans shouldn't be in the position of endlessly debating Israel's
security situation and its endless religious and territorial conflicts with
its neighbors. That should be for Israeli citizens to do, not for
Americans. But that distinction -- between the U.S. and Israel -- barely
exists because our political leaders have all but eliminated it, and have
thus imposed on U.S. citizens responsibility for the acts of Israel.

In doing so, they have systematically ignored the unbelievably prescient
warnings issued by George Washington in his 1796 Farewell Address, and have
thereby provoked exactly the dangers he decried:

"Observe good faith and justice towards all nations; cultivate peace and
harmony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct; and can it be,
that good policy does not equally enjoin it? . . . . .

"In the execution of such a plan, nothing is more essential than that
permanent, inveterate antipathies against particular nations, and passionate
attachments for others, should be excluded; and that, in place of them, just
and amicable feelings towards all should be cultivated. The nation which
indulges towards another a habitual hatred or a habitual fondness is in some
degree a slave.

"It is a slave to its animosity or to its affection, either of which is
sufficient to lead it astray from its duty and its interest. . . .

"So likewise, a passionate attachment of one nation for another produces a
variety of evils. Sympathy for the favorite nation, facilitating the
illusion of an imaginary common interest in cases where no real common
interest exists, and infusing into one the enmities of the other, betrays
the former into a participation in the quarrels and wars of the latter
without adequate inducement or justification.

"It leads also to concessions to the favorite nation of privileges denied to
others which is apt doubly to injure the nation making the concessions; by
unnecessarily parting with what ought to have been retained, and by exciting
jealousy, ill-will, and a disposition to retaliate, in the parties from whom
equal privileges are withheld. And it gives to ambitious, corrupted, or
deluded citizens (who devote themselves to the favorite nation), facility to
betray or sacrifice the interests of their own country, without odium,
sometimes even with popularity; gilding, with the appearances of a virtuous
sense of obligation, a commendable deference for public opinion, or a
laudable zeal for public good, the base or foolish compliances of ambition,
corruption, or infatuation."

Uncritical support for someone's destructive behavior isn't "friendship"; it
is, as Washington said, slavishness, and it does no good either for the
party lending the blind support nor the party receiving it. It's hard to
overstate the good that would be achieved if the U.S. simply adhered to
those basic and self-evidently compelling principles of George Washington,
who actually knew a thing or two about the perils of war.

* * * * *
If someone asked me to recommend just one must-read article on the
Israeli-Gaza conflict, I would select this column from yesterday in The
Guardian by Israeli-American journalist Nir Rosen. I disagree with several
of his points, particularly some of the specific ones about the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but his generalized explanation about how the
concept of "terrorism" is distorted and exploited by stronger countries
can't be emphasized enough.
UPDATE: To underscore the point: during the 2006 Israel-Lebanon war, the
Bush administration purposely expedited shipments of bombs to Israel to
enable Israel to drop those bombs on Lebanon. We fed Israel the bombs they
used on the Lebanese. A similar American action seems to have occurred with
regard to the bombs that the Israelis are now dropping on Gaza.
UPDATE II: Polls taken in the U.S. during the 2006 Israeli incursion into
Lebanon bolster the above point regarding American public opinion. A USA
Today/Gallup poll asked: "In the current conflict, do you think the United
States should take Israel's side, take the side of Hezbollah, or not take
either side?" A large majority (65%) answered "neither," while only 31%
wanted to take Israel's side.
A Washington Post poll actually found that a plurality of Americans (46%)
blamed "both sides equally" (Israel and Hezbollah) for the war and believed
(48%) that Israel's claimed "bombing [of] rocket launchers and other
Hezbollah targets located in civilian areas" was "not justified." The
lockstep, uncritical support for everything Israel does in the political
class is completely unrepresentative of American public opinion.
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/12/30/democracy/index.html
IV Online magazine : IV345 - November 2002
Economy

Imperialism in the 21st century
Claudio Katz

The renewal of interest in the study of imperialism has changed the debate on globalisation, previously centred exclusively on the critique of neo-liberalism and on the new features of globalisation. A concept developed by the main Marxist theorists of the 20th century - which enjoyed a wide diffusion in the 1970s - has again attracted the attention of analysts because of the aggravation of the social crisis of the Third World, the multiplication of armed conflicts and the deadly competition among countries.

The notion of imperialism conceptualises two types of problem: on the one hand, the relations of domination in operation between the capitalists of the centre and the peoples of the periphery and on the other the links which prevail between the great imperialist powers at each stage of capitalism. What is the contemporary relevance of this theory? To what extent can it contribute towards clarifying contemporary reality?
An explanation of global polarisation
The polarization of incomes confirms the importance of the theory in its first sense. While the wealth of three multimillionaires exceeds the GDP of 48 nations and a person on the periphery dies of hunger every four seconds, it is difficult to ignore the widening of the gap between the advanced and underdeveloped countries. Today nobody could believe that this asymmetry is a temporary phenomenon, to be ultimately corrected by the benefits of globalisation. The peripheral countries are not simply the "losers" from globalisation; they are also subjected to an intensification of the transfers of income that have historically held back their development.
This drainage has led to the intensification of extreme poverty in the 49 poorest nations and major deformations of partial accumulation in the dependent semi-industrialized countries. In this second case, the prosperity of those sectors inserted in the international division of labour is bought at the expense of those economic activities centred on the internal market.
The analysis of imperialism does not offer a conspiracy theory of underdevelopment nor does it absolve the local governments of responsibility for this situation. It simply presents an explanation of the polarization of accumulation on a world scale and the reduction of the possibility of its evening out among different economies. The accelerated margin of development which in the 19th century allowed Germany and Japan to acquire the status of great power, held until then by France or Great Britain no longer exists today for Brazil, India or Korea. The map of the world thus modelled is characterized by a ’stable architecture’ of the centre and a ’variable geography’ of underdevelopment, the only possible modifications being those of the peripheral status of each dependent country. [1]
The theory of imperialism attributes these asymmetries to the systematic transfer of the value created in the periphery towards the capitalists of the centre. This transfer is concretised through the deterioration of the terms of trade, the extraction of financial resources and the transfer of industrial profits. The political effect of this drainage is the loss of the political autonomy of the peripheral ruling classes and the increasing level of US military intervention. These three aspects of contemporary imperialism can be clearly observed in the reality of Latin America today.
The contradictions of the peripheral economies
Since the mid 1990s, Latin America has suffered the consequences of the collapse of the ’emergent markets’. Most of the nations affected have suffered sharp crises, preceded by the flight of capital and followed by devaluations that have strengthened inflation and reduced purchasing power. These crises have led to banking failures and the subsequent state bailouts have worsened the public debt, rendering any policies of reflation more difficult and accentuating the loss of monetary and fiscal sovereignty.
Capping the black gold in a Kuwaiti oilfield These crises stem from imperialist domination and not merely from the implementation of neo-liberal policies, since the latter have also been applied in the countries of the centre. The collapses in the Latin American periphery are much deeper than the disequilibria observed in the US, Europe or Japan, for they are characterized by periodic crises in the prices of raw materials exported, the periodic cessation of debt payments and the disarticulation of local industry. The periphery is more vulnerable in the face of international financial turbulence, for its economic cycle depends on the level of activity of the advanced economies. Nonetheless, the advance of globalisation has accentuated this fragility by deepening the segmentation of industrial activity, by concentrating qualified labour in the countries of the centre and by widening the differences in levels of consumption.
Imperialist domination allows the developed economies to transfer a part of their own disequilibria to the dependent countries. This transfer explains the asymmetric and non-generalized character of the current international recession. Although a crisis equivalent to that of the 1930s has already taken place in the periphery, such a situation is only one of the possibilities for the centre. The same policies of privatisation have not led to the same losses in every region. Thatcherism increased poverty in Britain, but in Argentina it has led to malnutrition and immiseration; the widening of the gap in incomes has reduced wages in the US, but in Mexico it leads to poverty and massive emigration; opening up to free trade has weakened the Japanese economy but has devastated Ecuador. These differences stem from the structurally central or peripheral character of each country in the world order.
Dependence is the main cause of the great regression in Latin America since the mid 1990s, despite the brief respite generated by the influx of hot capital. The region is reverting to the crisis situation of the ’lost decade’ of the 1980s. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the region stagnated around 0.3% last year and will be around 0.5% in 2002. After four years of net outflow of capital foreign investment has dried up and productive specialization in basic activities has ensured the deterioration of the trade balance (in numerous countries the sums remitted by emigrants to the US already exceed the currency earnings generated by exports). The result of this crisis: only 20 out of the 120 stocks of Latin American companies which were quoted on the world stock exchanges 10 years ago are still trading today.
Imperialist domination is at the origin of the big economic disequilibria that have led to the trade deficit (Mexico), the loss of fiscal control (Brazil) or the depression of production (Argentina). Currently these upheavals have provoked a succession of crises that have spread across the Southern Cone, destabilizing the Uruguayan economy and threatening Peru and Brazil. The neo-liberal economists try to analyse the particularities of this crisis, not understanding the general rule of these disequilibria. Ignoring imperialist oppression, they have a tendency to change their opinions frequently and to denigrate with an extraordinary rapidity the economic models they previously lauded.
But since the launch of the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), it has become practically impossible to avoid the analysis of imperialism. This strategic project of domination seeks the expansion of US exports to block European competition and consolidate US control over all the lucrative transactions of the region (the remaining privatisations, privileged contracts in the public sector, payment of patents).
The FTAA is a neo-colonial treaty that imposes ’free trade’ on Latin America without any counterpart from the US. To obtain ’fast track’ authorization (permission form Congress to negotiate rapid agreements with each country without referring back to the legislature), Bush recently introduced new clauses which block the transfer of high technologies to Latin America and which hinder the entry of 293 regional products to the US market. These customs barriers relate primarily to steel, textile and agricultural products. Moreover, Bush is committed to an aid programme for agriculture that, in the course of the next decade, will deal a deathblow to Latin American exports of soya, wheat and maize. [2]
The FTAA typifies the imperialist doubletalk that consists in preaching free trade to others while practicing protectionism itself. The signature of the agreement would provoke the collapse of the more industrialized countries like Brazil and the regional associations like Mercosur. After a decade of neo-liberalism, the imperialist message of free trade no longer convinces anybody. It is obvious that the prosperity of a country depends in no way on its ’global presence’, but rather the modalities of its insertion. For example, foreign trade as a proportion of GDP is much higher in Africa (45.6%) than is the case with Europe (13.8 %) or the US (13.2%) although it is the poorest region of the planet. [3] This extreme case of unfavourable subordination in the international division of labour illustrates a situation of general dependence which afflicts the peripheral economies.
Political recolonisation
The recolonisation of the periphery constitutes the political face of imperialist economic domination. It is based on the growing association of the local dominant classes with their northern equivalents. This intertwining is the consequence of financial dependence, the surrender of natural resources and the privatisation of strategic sectors in the region. The loss of economic sovereignty has given the International Monetary Fund (IMF) a direct grip over macro-economic management and the US State Department a similar influence on political decisions. Today no Latin American president would dare to take any significant decision without consulting the US Embassy. The preaching of the ’Americanised’ media and intellectuals contributes to the legitimation of this subordination.
Unlike the period 1940-1970, Latin American capitalists no longer envisage strengthening the internal markets through import substitution. Their priority is to link up with foreign companies, for the regional dominant class is also partially a creditor of the foreign debt and has benefited from financial deregulation, privatisation and the deregulation of labour. There is also a layer of civil servants that is more faithful to the imperialist organisms than the national states. Educated in US universities, tied up with the international bodies and the big companies, their careers are more dependent on these institutions than on the effective functioning of the states they govern.
However, this generalized recolonisation also accentuates the crisis of the region’s political systems. The loss of legitimacy of the governments under IMF orders has led in the last two years to a crisis of regime in four countries (Paraguay, Ecuador, Peru and Argentina). Following a long process of erosion of the authority of the traditional parties, the governments are growing fragile, the regimes tend to disintegrate and some states are decaying. This sequence completes the hollowing out of the institutions, which have ceased to be responsive to popular needs and which act like agents of imperialism. To the extent that the constitutional façade is disintegrating the US State Department encourages a return to the dictatorial practices of the past, although the old authoritarianism is concealed by new constitutional artifices.
This line was clearly apparent in the recent attempted coup in Venezuela. The replacement of the nationalist government of this country is a priority for the US government so as to strengthen the embargo against Cuba, undermine Zapatism, prepare for an electoral victory of the Workers’ Party (PT) in Brazil and teach a lesson to the Argentine popular rebellion. US diplomacy has already begun to evaluate the possibility of restoring the old protectorates in what it considers to be ’failed states’.
Military interventionism
Colombia and Haiti are the two main candidates for this neocolonial rehearsal, which could also be implemented in practice in Yugoslavia, Rwanda, Afghanistan, Somalia and Sierra Leone. Recently Argentina has begun to figure among the nations included in this project of vice-regal administration. [4] Such alternatives would involve a significant direct intervention by the US.
’Plan Colombia’ is the main test run for this bellicose intervention in Latin America. The Pentagon has already put aside the pretext of the narcotics trade and by forcing the end of the peace negotiations has initiated a military campaign against the guerrillas. The decision to minimize the direct presence of US troops, to reduce US losses (the ’Vietnam syndrome’), leads to greater bloodshed among the ’natives’.
The war in Colombia is about restoring the authority of a dismembered state and restoring the conditions of imperialist appropriation of strategic resources. As shown by the conspiracy in Venezuela, these actions are also intended to guarantee US oil supplies. To ensure these supplies the CIA has also set up a strategic centre in Ecuador and has set up listening posts capable of covering the entire territory of Mexico.
Imperialism is committed to the modernization of its military bases with rapid mobility forces. With this in view it has decentralized the old Panamanian command installing new bases in Vieques, Mantas, Aruba and El Salvador. Through a network of 51 installations across the planet, US troops are carrying out exercises that involve the simultaneous mobilization in the course of a few days of a force of 60,000 soldiers in 100 countries. [5] Aggression against Cuba, through terrorist sabotage or a renewed plan of invasion, remains an ever-present objective.
This bellicose course has deepened since September 11, 2001, for the US is gambling on the reactivation of its economy through rearmament and envisages potential wars against Iraq, Iran, North Korea, Syria and Libya. With 5% of the world population, the US now accounts for 40% of total military spending and has just begun the modernization of its submarines, the construction of new planes and the testing, through the ’star wars’ programme, of new applications of information technologies.
Military aggression is the imperialist response to the disintegration of states, peripheral economies and societies, provoked by the growing US domination over this periphery. That is why the current ’war on terror’ has some similarities with old colonial campaigns. Again, the enemy is demonised to justify the massacres of the civilian population on the front line and restrictions on democratic rights in the homeland. However, the more the destruction of the ’terrorist’ enemy advances, the more one witnesses a political and social dislocation. The generalized state of war perpetuates the instability provoked by economic pillage, political balkanisation and the social destruction of the periphery. [6]
These effects are most visible in Latin America and the Middle East, two zones of strategic importance for the Pentagon since they possess oil resources and represent important disputed markets for European and Japanese competition. Because of this strategic importance they are at the centre of imperialist domination and endure very similar processes of state disarticulation, economic weakening of the local dominant class and the loss of authority of their traditional modes of political representation.
Neo-liberal fatalism
Economic expropriation, political recolonisation and military interventionism are the three pillars of the current imperialism. Some analysts limit themselves to describing this oppression as an inexorable destiny, in a resigned manner. Some present the fracture between ’winners and losers’ of globalisation as a ’cost of development’, without explaining why this price persists over time and is still being charged to those nations who have already paid it in the past.
The neo-liberals tend to prognosticate that the end of underdevelopment will happen in those countries that gamble on ’attracting’ foreign capital and the ’seduction’ of companies. However, the dependent nations who have entered on this road in the past decade by opening their economies up are now paying the heaviest price in the ’emergent crises’. Those who were the most committed to privatisation have lost most on the world market. In providing every facility to imperialist capital, they have lifted the barriers that limited the pillage of their natural resources and they are paying for it today by more asymmetrical trade exchanges, growing financial instability and a sharpened industrial disarticulation.
Some neo-liberals attribute these effects to the limited application of their recommendations, as if a decade of negative experiences had not furnished enough lessons as to the result of their recipes. Others suggest that underdevelopment is a consequence of the temperamental inadequacies of the population of the periphery, the weight of corruption or the cultural immaturity of the peoples of the Third World. In general, the colonialist argument has changed style, but its content remains invariable. Today the superiority of the conquerors is no longer justified by their racial purity, but by their superior knowledge and patterns of behaviour.
Imperial trans-nationalisation
In arguing that globalisation dilutes the frontiers between the First and Third World, Toni Negri and Michael Hardt [7] mount a serious challenge to the theory of imperialism. They believe that a new global capital acting through the UN, the G8, the IMF and the WTO (World Trade Organization) has created an imperial sovereignty, linking the dominant fractions of the centre and the periphery in one system of world oppression.
This characterization supposes the existence of a certain homogenisation of capitalist development, which seems very difficult to verify. All the data concerning investment, saving or consumption confirms on the contrary the amplification of differences between the central and peripheral economies and shows that the processes of accumulation and crisis are also polarizing. The US prosperity of the last decade contrasts with the generalized crisis of the underdeveloped nations, while the social crisis of the periphery has for the moment no equivalent in Europe. In the same way there is no sign of a convergence in the status of the US and Venezuelan bourgeoisie, nor of a similarity between the Argentine and Japanese crisis. Far from uniformising the reproduction of capital around a common horizon, globalisation deepens the duality of this process on the planetary scale.
It is clear that the association between the dominant classes of the periphery and the big companies is a closer one, as it is clear that poverty is spreading at the heart of advanced capitalism. But these processes have not transformed any dependent country into a central one, nor have they brought about the Third Worldisation of any central power. The greater interlinking between the dominant classes coexists with the consolidation of the historic gap that separates the developed from the underdeveloped countries. Capitalism does not level out differences, nor does it fracture around a new trans-national axis; it rather strengthens the growing polarization which appeared in the preceding century.
The power held by the capitalists of about 20 nations over the other 200 is the main evidence of the persistence of the hierarchical organization of the world market. Through the UN Security Council, they exercise a military domination, through the WTO they impose their trade hegemony and through the IMF they ensure the financial control of the planet.
In analysing the predominant links between the dominant classes, the trans-nationalist thesis confuses ’association’ and ’sharing of power’. The fact that a sector of the capitalist groups of the periphery is increasing its integration with its allies in the centre does not mean it is sharing in world domination and does not suppress its structural weakness. While US companies exploit Latin American workers, the Ecuadorian or Brazilian bourgeoisie does not participate in the expropriation of the US proletariat. Although the leap recorded in the internationalisation of the economy is very significant, capital continues to operate within the framework of the imperialist order that establishes a fracture between centre and periphery.
Classes and states - I
Some writers argue that the trans-nationalisation of capital extends to classes and to states, thus creating a new structure of global domination that cuts across all countries and social strata. [8]
This thesis identifies the process of regional integration with social and state ’trans-nationalisation’, without perceiving the qualitative difference that separates the association between imperialist groups and the recolonisation of the periphery. The European Union and the FTAA, for example, are not part of the same tendency towards ’trans-nationalisation’ but are the expressions of two very different processes. We should not confuse an alliance between dominant sectors on the world market and the neo-colonial plan of a given power.
In reality, only the higher bureaucracy of the peripheral countries who also belong to the international organisms constitutes a fully ’trans-nationalised’ social group. The loyalty of this sector towards the IMF or the WTO is stronger than that they feel towards the national states that they lead and it might be thought that the behaviour and perspectives of these functionaries anticipate the future course of the dominant classes of the Third World. But such an evolution constitutes at most a possibility and does not represent today a verifiable reality, in particular in the countries of the higher periphery (like Brazil or South Korea), where the dominant class is more linked to processes of accumulation dependent on internal markets. The situation is totally different in the smaller countries (for example in central America) which are highly integrated in the market of a great power. These differences refute the existence of a general or uniform process of trans-nationalisation.
Some defenders of the imperial thesis affirm that the degree of effective unity between the central and peripheral classes is greater than allowed for by the obsolete parameters of national accountabilities. It is true that these categories are already insufficient to evaluate the current course of globalisation but they are accompanied by other undeniable indicators of the fracture between centre and periphery. The deepening of these inequalities can be seen at every level of productivity, of income, consumption or accumulation.
It is on the other hand false to suppose that the ’new global State’ has erased the distinction between dominant and recolonised states. This difference leaps to the eyes when one sees the influence of the bourgeoisies of the Third World on the decisions of the UN, IMF and WTO or the World Bank. The dominant classes of the periphery are not the victims of underdevelopment and profit greatly through exploiting the workers of their own countries. But this does not bring them any closer to world domination.
The thesis of Empire ignores this marginal role and underestimates the persistence of imperialist domination in the strategic sectors of the periphery. It does not acknowledge that this subjection is not currently purely colonial, nor is it centred exclusively on the appropriation of raw materials or on the direct control of territory, but subsists as a mechanism of metropolitan control of the strategic sectors of the underdeveloped countries. [9]
This domination is not exercised by a mysterious ’world power’ but through means of the military and diplomatic actions of each power in its main areas of influence. The role of the US is more prominent in ’Plan Colombia’ than in the Balkans conflict and the task of Europe is better defined in the Mediterranean crisis than in the development of the FTAA. This specificity relates to interests that each imperialist group channels in the geopolitical actions led by its states, something the theoreticians of Empire do not perceive.
Return to industrial capitalism?
The majority of the critics of neo-liberalism in the periphery see that dependence remains the central cause of underdevelopment. But they propose to go beyond this servitude by the construction of a ’different capitalism’. Today it is no longer about a strictly national project, autonomous and centred on ’import substitution’ - as imagined by their predecessors in CEPAL (The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean) - but a regional model, regulated and based on internal markets. They advocate Keynesian schemas to build ’welfare states of the periphery’, supported by institutional transformations (eradicate corruption, recompose legitimacy) and big changes in trade (greater protectionism), financial (limit the payment of the debt) and industrial (reorientation of production towards local activity) policies. [10]

Not everyone gets a place on the gravy train But how can we build an ’efficient capitalism’ in countries subjected to a systematic draining of their resources? How can we realize today an objective abandoned by the dominant class in the mid 19th century? What groups will build this system of social measures and profit maximization?
The partisans of the new peripheral capitalism have no reply to these key questions. They forget that the margins to realize their project are again reduced with the growing association of peripheral dominant classes with metropolitan capital. This liaison is an obstacle to internal accumulation, encourages capital flight and makes the application of policies seeking to revive internal demand more difficult. Bourgeoisies who have not attempted in the past to found an autonomous capitalism have still less capacity to fulfil such a goal today.
Their pro-imperialist attitude limits even the viability of regional projects like Mercosur. This association is foundering after a decade of setbacks for attempts seeking to set up common economic and political institutions. All proposals for concerted action (currency, organisms, arbitration bodies) have been shelved as crisis envelops the entire zone. This failure has been deepened with the policies of ’differentiation’ attempted by all the governments to show to the IMF that they ’are not irresponsible’. The regional fracture thus repeats the history of Latin American balkanisation and confirms the incapacity of the local bourgeoisies to lay down auto-centred accumulation policies.
Some authors explain this by the traditionally ’rentier’ character of the bourgeoisie in the region and the consequent absence of entrepreneurs disposed to invest or take risks. But then one must conclude that this absence of impulsions for a sustained accumulation has been strengthened. Why then gamble on a project deprived of subject? What could be the meaning of building a capitalism without capitalists interested in competition and innovation?
Proposing to the workers that they substitute themselves for the dominant class in this task is equivalent to inciting them to manufacture the chains of their own exploitation. The hope that the other social sectors replace the entrepreneurs in the task of constructing a prosperous capitalism (bureaucracies, the middle class) has neither foundation nor empirical precedents.
Those who wish to build ’another capitalism’ should remember that the model that prevails in each country is the product of certain historic conditions and not of the free choice of its managers. There is an objective dynamic to this process that explains why the development of the centre accentuates the underdevelopment of the periphery. It is obvious that all the members of the peripheral nations would have liked a destiny as developed powers, but on the world market, there is not much space for the dominant groups and very much space for the dependent economies. That is why the ’successful market economies’ of the periphery are exceptional or transitory. For to emerge from underdevelopment it is not enough to have anti-neo-liberal policies. Also you need to develop anti-imperialist action by building a socialist society.
Three models under discussion
The strength of the classical theory of imperialism’s ability to explain the relations of domination between centre and periphery is striking. But its ability to clarify the contemporary relations between the great powers is more subject to controversy. In this second sense, the concept of imperialism no longer seeks to explain the causes of the structural backwardness of the underdeveloped countries, but aims to clarify the type of alliances and rivalries predominant inside the imperialist camp. Diverse authors [11] have remarked on the importance of the distinction between the two senses, signalling that the modalities of domination of the periphery and those of the relations between the powers follow historically different courses.
The distinction between the imperialist phase and the free trade phase of capitalism, proposed by the Marxist theorists of the early 20th century, is the traditional point of departure to analyse this second aspect. With this distinction, they sought to characterize a new stage of the system, characterized by the reapportionment of markets between the great powers through war.
Lenin had attributed this tendency to open inter-imperialist conflict to the central place of the monopolies and finance capital, Rosa Luxemburg to the necessity of seeking external outlets to the contraction of demand, Bukharin to the clash between expansionist and protectionist interests on the part of the big companies and Trotsky to the aggravation of economic inequalities generated by accumulation itself. These interpretations claimed to explain why competition between the monopolist groups that had begun by trade confrontation and the establishment of monetary zones had ended in bloody conflict.
This characterization seemed inappropriate after the Second World War, when the perspective of armed conflicts between the powers tended to disappear. The hypothesis of such a clash was ruled out or at least rendered very improbable to the extent that economic competition between the various firms and their states was concentrated in more continental rivalries. These changes modified the terms of analysis of the second aspect of the theory of imperialism.
During the 1970s, Ernest Mandel [12] synthesized the new situation through an analysis of three possible models for the evolution of imperialism: inter-imperialist, competition, trans-nationalism (originally called ’ultra-imperialism’) and super imperialism. Arguing that the dominant feature of accumulation is growing rivalry, he saw the first alternative as the most probable. He predicted also that intercontinental competition would deepen with the formation of regional alliances.

Globalisation of the spiritual: absent friends praying by mobile at the Wailing Wall, Jerusalem Mandel questioned the second perspective, anticipated by Kautsky and upheld by those who envisaged the constitution of trans-national associations freed from the geographical origins of their components. [13] He argued that, although the internationalisation of multinational companies weakened their national roots, a great succession of mergers between the owners of firms of different origins was not probable. Taking account of the competitive character of capitalist reproduction, he believed it was still less feasible that such a process would be supported by the constitution of ’world states’. Moreover, he thought it highly unlikely that companies would be indifferent toward the economic conjuncture in their countries of origin and the need for national anti-cyclical policies, which an integration of this type would suppose. He thus ruled out this scenario, arguing that the unequal development of capitalism and its crises created tensions incompatible with the long-term survival of trans-national alliances.
The third alternative, super imperialism, supposed the consolidation of the domination of one power over the others and the submission of the losers to relations similar to those that existed for the peripheral countries. Mandel considered in this case that the supremacy attained by the US did not put Europe and Japan at the same level of dependence as the underdeveloped nations. He stressed that US political and military hegemony did not imply its long-term structural economic supremacy.
How can these three perspectives be analysed today? What are the dominant tendencies at the beginning of the 21st century: inter-imperialist competition, ultra-imperialism or super imperialism?
The changes in inter-imperialist competition
The initial interpretation of the thesis of imperialism as a stage of warlike rivalry between the powers has hardly any supporters nowadays. There exists however a diluted version of this vision, now centred not on the military outcome but on the analysis of economic competition.
Some analysts stress the active intervention of the imperialist states to shore up this competition and point to the operation of neo-mercantilist policies to weaken rival companies. [14] Other analysts point to the homogeneity of origin of the owners of firms and the priority given to internal markets in their activity. [15] This subordination of companies to their national basis allows us to explain, some studies argue, why the tendency to the formation of regional blocs is more significant than trade, financial or productive globalisation. [16] The fact that US growth in the past decade has been realized at the expense of its rivals is also seen as the expression of a return to inter-imperialist competition. These viewpoints coincide in presenting globalisation as a cyclical process of phases of expansion and contraction at the level of internationalisation of the economy. [17]
This kind of argument contributes to refuting the neo-liberal mythology of ’the end of states’, the ’disappearance of frontiers’ and the ’unlimited mobility of labour’. The thesis of inter-imperialist competition shows how this rivalry limits industrial relocation, financial deregulation and the abolition of trading barriers, bringing out the fact that competition between blocs demands a certain geographical stability of investment, restraining capital movements and the trade policies of each state.
However, while giving the lie convincingly to the simplifications of the globalisers, these contributions do not bring out the differences that exist between the current context and that extant at the beginning of the 20th century. It is certain that inter-imperialist competition continues to determine the course of accumulation. But why does competition between the powers not currently lead to direct warlike conflagrations? The same competition happens today in the framework of a strong capitalist solidarity given that the US, Europe and Japan share the same objectives as NATO and act in a common bloc of dominant states faced with various military conflicts.
It might be argued that the mutually destructive character of nuclear weapons has changed the character of wars, neutralizing the open conflicts. But such reasoning only explains the absence of a clash between the US and the ex-USSR, without clarifying the fact that the three imperialist rivals have also avoided such a confrontation. Again, it is certain that the ’struggle against communism’ diluted the competition between capitalist powers, but this conflict has not changed in nature since the end of the ’Cold War’.
In reality, the clash between the powers has been mediatised by the leap in globalisation. International capitalist activity tends to interlink with the growth of trade surpassing that of production, the formation of a planetary financial market and globalised management of affairs by the 51 companies which set the pace among the 100 biggest world enterprises.

The productive strategy of these firms is based on the combination of three options: supply of the factors of production, integral production for the local market and fragmentation of the assembly process with parts manufactured in different countries. This mixture of horizontal production (recreating in each region the model of the countries of origin) and vertical production (division of the process of production in accordance with a global plan of specialization) implies a more significant level of association between internationalised capital. [18] The companies which define their strategy on a world scale tend moreover to predominate over the less internationalised, as shown, for example, by the weight of companies of the first type in the mergers of the last decade. [19]
This advance in globalisation also explains why protectionist tendencies do not currently take on the dimension of the 1930s and do not lead to the formation of completely closed blocs. Neo-mercantilism coexists with the opposed pressure for trade liberalization, because internal exchange between the localized enterprises in different countries is growing significantly. This does not appear clearly in the current statistics, because operations between internationalised companies on a national market are generally counted as transactions internal to this country. [20]
This advance of globalisation, which weakens the traditional competition between the imperialist powers, expresses a dominant tendency and not only a cyclical feature of capitalism. The periods of national or regional retreat are movements contrary to this central impulsion of amplification of the geographical field of action of capital. The brake to this tendency comes from disequilibria generated by world expansion and not from the structural pendularity of this process.
In the final instance, the globalising pressure is the dominant force for it reflects the growing action of the law of value on the international scale. The more the trans-national enterprises take on importance, the greater the field of valorisation of capital on a global scale to the detriment of exclusively national areas. This is expressed in the tendency to the formation of world prices that represent new yardsticks of the labour time socially necessary for the production of commodities. [21]
The internationalised management of business erodes the vigour of the classical model of inter-imperialist competition. But this transformation is not perceptible if one observes the globalisation underway as a ’process as old as capitalism itself’. This attitude tends to ignore the qualitative differences which separate each stage of this process; and this distinction is vital if we wish to understand why the internationalisation of, for example, the East India Company in the 16th century, has little in common with the globally segmented production of General Motors.
The contemporary rivalry between companies unfolds in a more concerted framework of activity. It is inside global bodies of political (UN, G8), economic (IMF, WB, WTO) or military (NATO) significance that this common activity is negotiated. Unlike in the past, the traditional activity of competitive blocs coexists with the growing influence of these institutions, which act in the interests of the internationalised companies.
This is why the contemporary remoulding of territories, legislations and markets takes place through high authorities and not through means of wars between powers. If it is obvious that the new imperialist configuration is nourished by systematic warlike massacres, the scene of these massacres is peripheral. The multiplication of these conflicts does not lead to inter-imperialist wars and this change is due to the qualitative leap of globalisation; something the old model of inter-imperialist competition does not allow us to see or explain.
The trans-nationalist exaggeration
Some defenders of the trans-nationalist hypothesis argue that contemporary firms already operate in a manner disconnected from their country of origin. [22] Others [23] attribute the appearance of ’global capital’ to the informatisation of the economy, the substitution of industrial activity through the action of networks and to the expansion of ’immaterial’ labour. They conclude that this conjuncture eliminates the centrality of the process of production, favours the birth of a planetary market and strengthens the ’extra-territoriality of the empire’.
This vision tends to interpret embryonic tendencies as established facts and to deduce from the growing association between international capitals a level of integration that in no way exists yet. The trans-nationalisation of capital constitutes currently only the beginning of a process of structural transformation, which in the past has necessitated some centuries. No evidence of the last decade suggests that such a radical foreshortening of the historic rhythms of capitalism is likely. [24]
Trans-nationalism exaggerates the rise of world capital, reflecting a certain media pressure to construct theoretical novelties to match the rhythm of journalistic consumption. It is enough to observe the parameter indicated by Mandel - the sensitivity of the globalised firms to each national economic conjuncture - to invalidate the ultra-imperialist thesis. The four main economic features of the 1990s - US growth, European stagnation, Japanese depression and crisis at the periphery - illustrate the non-existence of a common evolution of ’globalised capital’. The profits and losses of each group of firms have depended on their situation in each region. The fact that US growth has been supported by the decline of their rivals confirms the existence of a winning bloc differentiated from the European and Japanese companies.
Certain forms of world association are beginning to emerge and for the first time trans-Atlantic and trans-Pacific structural alliances have emerged between European, US and Japanese companies. Connections of this type weaken the cohesion of the EU, oblige the US to fix their economic policy according to external financing and push Japan to grudgingly pursue the opening up of its markets. But these links do not eliminate the existence of structured competitive blocs around the old state bonds.
In its more moderate variants trans-nationalism ignores the fact that the FTAA, EU or ASEAN express these rival poles. But in the extreme variant of Negri this conception also propagates all kinds of fantasies on the subject of geographical ’decentring’, ignoring the fact that the strategic activity of firms continues to be based in the US, Europe or Japan. Global liaison has created a new common framework for competition, without however eliminating the territorial cement of this competition.
It is on the other hand certain that the information technology transformations favour the global interlinking of capital, for they tend to amalgamate financial activity, accelerate commercial transactions and accentuate the reorganization of the labour process. But the technological revolution also reinforces competition and the necessity of regional alliances between firms who compete for markets. ’The economy of networks’ not only unifies but also accentuates the national domain. The application of new information technologies is guided by capitalist parameters of profitability, competition and exploitation that prevent indiscriminate flows of investment on the world scale or unrestricted movement of labour. Their localization depends on the conditions of accumulation and valorisation of capital, which oblige the 200 globalised firms to concentrate their operational centres in a small handful of central countries.
Classes and states - II
Some argue that the trans-nationalisation of capital has led to a similar process at the level of the dominant classes and the states; as evidence of this change, they point to the increase in foreign investments, the internationalisation of labour and the weight of the global bodies. [25] Negri [26] considers as established the formation of a new legal order - inspired by the US Constitution - emerging from the transfers of sovereignty to the imperial centre represented by the UN.
Such a schema is completely forced for there is no indication of a complete globalisation of the ruling class. Whatever its internal divisions, the US bourgeoisie constitutes a grouping that is clearly differentiated from its Japanese or European homologues. These classes act through distinct governments, institutions and states, defending their own customs, tax, financial and monetary policies as a function of their specific interests. Even the integration of some bourgeoisies around a supranational state - as in the case of Europe - does not convert them into ’world capitalists’ because they are not linked in the same way with their non-European competitors in the same state.
The eventual trans-nationalisation of the management layers of some companies and the leading layers of the international bodies does not witness either to the emergence of a world ruling class. This staff of cosmopolitan bureaucrats forms a bureaucracy with high responsibilities, but it does not amount to a class. [27] The main parameter to evaluate the existence of such a social formation - ownership of the means of production - indicates clearly a geographical fragmentation of the bourgeoisie following the old structure of nations. The owners of each trans-national company are American, European or Japanese and not ’citizens of the world’. The deeds of ownership of the 500 most important companies confirm this national connection: 48% of them belong to US capitalists, 30% to Europeans and 10% to Japanese. [28]
Moreover, the IMF, WTO or World Economic Forum (WEF) are not homogeneous state structures, but centres of negotiation of the various firms who defend through their various state representatives various conceptions of trade agreements and treaties of investment. The firms rest on these structures to struggle against their rivals. When, for example, Boeing and Airbus dispute the world aeronautic market, they have more recourse to lobbyists in the US and Europe than to WTO bureaucrats. In inter-imperialist competition, it is states or regional blocs that count and not inter-company link ups of the Toyota-General Motors against Chrysler-Daimler Benz type.
The privileged role that the states retain shows that the main capitalist functions of this institution (guaranteeing the right of property, preparing the conditions of extraction and realization of surplus-value, assuring coercion and consensus) cannot be globalised as rapidly as business. [29] Even if a trans-national state could find the resources, experience and personnel needed to fulfil totally, for example, the repressive functions, it would lack the authority that each bourgeoisie has conquered in its nation over centuries to exercise this task.
Negri ignores these contradictions when he postulates the existence of a new UN imperial sovereignty. He deduces this capacity from a restrictive legalistic analysis that is totally disconnected from capital’s logic of functioning. What is most surprising is his candid presentation of the UN as a system which is oppressive at the summit (Security Council) and democratic at the base (General Assembly), forgetting that this institution - at all its levels - acts as a pillar of the current imperialist order. This rosy view rests on an apologetic attitude towards the US Constitution, misunderstanding how the elite of this country has built a political system of oppression, mediated by a mechanism of separation of powers intended to thwart the popular mandate. [30] This vision of imperial sovereignty pushes to the extreme the errors of the trans-nationalist viewpoint, for it exaggerates its main weakness: the failure to grasp the fact that the greater world integration of capital is implemented in the framework of states and existing or regionalized dominant classes.
The errors of ‘super imperialism’
The characterization of the absolute domination of the US is partially implicit in the thesis of Empire. Although Negri [31] stresses that the Empire ’lacks a territorial centre’ he also says that all the institutions of the new stage derive from US predecessors and are built in opposition to European decadence.
This interpretation converges with all the characterizations that identify the current US leadership with the ’predominance of a single power’, a ’unipolar world’ or the consolidation of the ’US era’. These visions actualise the theory of super imperialism that supposes the complete hegemony of one rival over its competitors.
The empirical support for this thesis stems from the US advance in the course of the last decade, in particular on the political and military level. While the action of the UN is aligned on the priorities of the US, the presence of the latter extends across every corner of the planet, through agreements with Russia and intervention in the regions - like central Asia or Eastern Europe - which were until now outside its control.
The US enjoys a clear technological and productive superiority over its rivals. This supremacy is shown by the current world recession because the level of world economic activity displays an extraordinary degree of dependence on the US cycle.
The US has resumed in the 1990s the leadership role held by Europe in the 1970s and Japan in the 1980s. Since the Reagan government the US has exploited the advantages that gave it its military supremacy to finance its economic reconversion with the rest of the world’s resources. In certain periods it lets the dollar fall (to boost exports) while in others it allows it to rise (to absorb foreign capital). In the same way, it combines trade liberalization and protectionism in the sectors where it holds, respectively, a competitive advantage or disadvantage. This regained hegemony is explained both by the international implantation of US companies and because US capitalism has been oriented for the past centuries towards the penetration of the internal markets of its competitors.
Nonetheless, none of these facts proves the existence of super imperialism, as US supremacy has not led to the submission of Europe and Japan. The conflicts that oppose the great powers have the character of inter-imperialist conflicts and are not comparable to the clashes between central and peripheral countries. In its trade disputes with the US France does not behave like Argentina, inside the IMF Japan does not beg for credits but behaves as a creditor and Germany is the co-author and not the victim of the G8 resolutions.
The relationship between the US and its competitors does not have the features of an imperial domination. US primacy in geopolitical relations is indubitable, but the ’the trans-Atlantic link’ does not imply the subordination of Europe and the ’Pacific axis’ is not characterized by Japanese subordination to every US demand. [32]
The super imperialist thesis exaggerates US leadership and underestimates its contradictions. Gowan [33] judges correctly that the US preference for a ’supremacist’ form of domination (that is, to the detriment of its rivals) rather than a ’hegemonic’ form (sharing the fruits of power) undermines its leadership. The strength of the US is moreover built on interlinking and not - as in the past - through themilitary crushingof its competitors. And this modality obliges the forging of alliances that are more fragile, since they do not originate in a military solution. The elitist character of current imperialism - in the sense that is deprived of the massive chauvinist and patriotic support of the early 20th century - also serves to erode US superiority.
US supremacy is exercised practically through wars in the most unstable peripheral zones of the planet. Yet this very bellicosity weakens the super imperialist course because these systematic aggressions reinforce instability. The new doctrine of ’war without end’ applied by the Bush administration deepens this loss of control, for it breaks with the tradition of limited confrontation involving a certain proportionality between the means employed and the ends pursued. In the campaigns against Iraq, the ’drugs trade’ or ’terrorism’ the US seeks to create a climate of permanent fear, of aggression without any time limits or precise objectives. [34]
This type of imperialist action not only dislocates nations, disintegrates states and destroys societies but also generates ’boomerang effects’, such as the US has experienced with the Taliban. ’Total war’ without legal scruples destabilizes the ’world order’ and deteriorates the authority of its authors. It is for this reason that the perspective of super imperialism has not been realized and is threatened by the action of domination of the US itself.
A combination of three models
None of the three alternative models to that of classic imperialism allows us to clarify the currently predominant relations between the great powers. The thesis of inter-imperialist competition does not explain the reasons which inhibit military confrontation and ignores the advances that have taken place in the integration of capital. The trans-nationalist orientation does not recognize that rivalries between firms continue to be mediated by the action of classes and national or regional states. The super imperialist vision does not take account of the absence of relations of subordination between the developed economies comparable to those that prevail with the periphery.
These insufficiencies lead us to think that contemporary rivalry, integration and hegemony tend to combine in a new manner which is more complex than had been imagined in the 1970s. Studying this tangled web is more useful than asking which of the three models conceived is prevalent at this moment. In the course of recent decades, the advance of globalisation has stimulated the trans-national association of capital and has also led one power to assume leadership in order to maintain the cohesion of the system. [35]
Recognizing this combination allows us to understand the intermediary character of the current situation. For the moment neither rivalry, nor integration nor hegemony predominate fully, but we can observe a change in the relationship of forces inside each power, which favours the trans-nationalised sectors to the detriment of the national sectors inside existing states and classes. [36] This differs from one country to another (in Canada or Holland the globalised fraction is undoubtedly stronger than in the US or Germany) and from one sector to another (in the car industry trans-nationalisation is greater than in steel). Capital internationalises while the old national states continue to guarantee the general reproduction of the system.
The new combination of rivalry, integration and imperialist supremacy forms part of the great recent transformations of capitalism. It is part of the framework of a stage characterized by the offensive of capital against labour (higher unemployment,poverty and deregulation of labour), its sectoral (privatisation) and geographic (towards the ex-’socialist countries’) expansion, the information technology revolution and financial deregulation.
These processes have altered the functioning of capitalism and multiplied the disequilibria of the system by weakening the state regulation of economic cycles and stimulating rivalry between firms. The old political institutions are losing authority to the extent that a part of real power is displaced towards the new globalised organisms, which lack both legitimacy and popular support. Moreover, imperialist military escalation leads to collapses in the peripheral regions, deepening world instability. [37]
These contradictions are characteristic of capitalism and do not present in any way the similarities with the Roman Empire postulated by numerous authors. Such analogies point to the similarity of the mechanisms of inclusion or exclusion of the dominant groups in the imperial centre, [38] the institutional similarities (Monarchy - Pentagon, Aristocracy - Firms, Democracy - UN Assembly) [39] or the decadence common to the two systems (the fall of Rome - the ’rottenness’ of the current régime). [40]
However, contemporary capitalism is not being eroded by an over ambitious territorial expansion, or corroded by a failing agriculture, unproductive labour or the wastefulness of the dominant caste. Unlike the slave mode of production, capitalism does not generate the paralysis of the productive forces but their uncontrolled development (subject to cyclical crises).
The contradictions derived from the accumulation and extraction of surplus value, the valorisation of capital or the realization of value lead to crises but not to the agony of Antiquity. However, the crucial difference resides in the role played by social subjects with capacities of historic transformation that did not exist in the era of Roman decadence.
The domains of popular resistance
The workers, exploited and oppressed of the entire planet are the adversaries of imperialism in the 21st century. Their action has in recent years modified the climate of neo-liberal triumphalism that prevailed among theeliteof the dominant class from the beginning of the 1990s. A sentiment of disorientation has begun to set in among the globalising ’establishment’, as shown by the critiques of current economic policy formulated by the popes of neo-liberalism.

Imperialism’s border guard: Palestinian workers queue through the night in hope of getting Israeli work permits Soros, Stiglitz and Sachs are now writing books that denounce the absence of control of the markets, the excess of austerity or the inconvenience of extreme structural adjustments. Their characterizations are as superficial as the overflowing eulogies they previously addressed to capitalism. They contribute no valuable reflection but witness to the malaise that has appeared at the summit of imperialism in the face of the social disaster created during the years of privatising euphoria.
These challenges to ’wildcat capitalism’ reflect the advances of the popular resistance, because the masters of the world can no longer confer in peace. They meet in distant corners, their meetings are cut short, and they must always face the demonstrations of the movement for another globalisation. They cannot isolate themselves in Davos, flee the scandalous repression of Genoa, or ignore the challenge of Porto Alegre. There is longer a ’single system of thought’ or ’sole alternative’ and with the development of popular scepticism, the image of the all-powerful imperialist recedes.
The participants in the movement for another globalisation are the main protagonists of this change. This resistance has already gone beyond the media impact provoked by the boycott of the summits of presidents, company bosses and bankers. Seattle marked a big step forwards for the development of this struggle that has not been beaten back sine September 11, 2001. The predictions of a great reflux have been rapidly disproved and ’anti-terrorist’ intimidation has not infected the ranks of the demonstrators. Between October and December of 2001, 250,000 youth mobilized in Perugia, 100,000 in Rome, 75,000 in London and 350,000 in Madrid. In February the second meeting of the Word Social Forum in Porto Alegre surpassed the attendance at previous meetings and a little after a march in Barcelona attracted 300,000 demonstrators. The mobilization in Seville against the ’Europe of capital’ was attended by 100,000 people. These events confirm the vitality of a movement that tends to incorporate in its action the struggle against militarism. An anti-war movement begins to emerge, in the image of the struggles against the war crimes in Algeria in the 1960s and in Vietnam in the 1970s. [41]



The working class stands out as the other adversary of imperialism, both through its convergence with the movement against capitalist globalisation (very significant in Seattle) and the renewal of its own struggles. The stage of severe downturn in struggle inaugurated by the defeats of the 1980s (FIAT-Italy in 1980, the British miners in 1984-85) has tended to reverse since the mid-1990s, driven by important mobilizations in Europe (strikes in France and Germany) and in the most industrialized areas of the periphery (Korea, South Africa, Brazil). The extraordinary mobilization of millions of Italian workers last May and the powerful general strike in Spain confirm this resurgence of the working class.

The popular uprisings in the periphery represent the third challenge for imperialism. The examples of this resistance in South America are incontestable, beginning with the significant extension of the Argentine rebellion. While the ’economic contagion’ has spread to the neighbouring nations (capital flight, bank failures and a fall in investment), there is also the ’political contagion’ with demonstrations and ’caceroleos’ in Uruguay, the big peasant mobilizations in Paraguay and the massive uprisings against privatisation in Peru.

On the other hand, the popular intervention against the coup in Venezuela marks the beginning of a massive reaction against the pro-dictatorial policy promoted by US imperialism. This success for the oppressed constitutes only the first round of a confrontation which will see many episodes, since the State Department has embarked on an escalation of provocations against any government, people or policy that does not meekly comply with its demands.

On the world scale the most dramatic case of such aggression is the massacre of the Palestinians. The level of imperialist savagery in the Middle East recalls the great barbarisms of colonial history and that is why the popular resistance in this region is symbolic and awakens the solidarity of all the peoples of the planet.

The movement against capitalist globalisation, the resurgence of the working class and the rebellions at the periphery show the limits of capital’s offensive. At the end of a decade of social savagery, the relationship of forces is beginning to change and this opens a new ideological space for critical thought that would render the ideas of socialism attractive. To the extent that neo-liberalism loses its prestige, socialism ceases to be a forbidden word and Marxism is no longer regarded as an archaic system of thought. This renaissance poses anew various questions of socialist strategy.

Four political challenges
A new internationalism has erupted with the movement for ’another globalisation’. These mobilizations are marked by a challenging of the principles of competition, individualism and profit and have already generated an advance in anti-capitalist consciousness, reflected in some of the slogans of the movement (’the world is not for sale’). Helping to transform this embryonic critique of capital into an emancipatory proposal is the first task that falls to socialists.

This alternative is already being debated in the world forums, when one analyses the social perspectives of the spontaneous internationalism of the movement. In this movement, there is a consistent opposition to the fundamentalist reactions against imperialist atrocities and a similar rejection of ethnic or religious confrontations between the exploited peoples, provoked by the right. This internationalist solidarity is incompatible with any kind of capitalist project, for such a project can only promote exploitation and thus stimulate national confrontations. Only socialism offers a perspective of real community between the workers of the word.


Dead but not forgotten: Richard Helms, the CIA’s weapon of mass destruction against Allende’s Chile The generalized revival of the anti-imperialist struggle at the periphery represents the second challenge for socialists. Some theorists ignore this eruption, because they have decreed the end of nationalism and celebrated this disappearance without being able to distinguish between the reactionary and progressive currents of this movement. These authors declare, moreover, the uselessness of any tactic, strategy or political priority towards the new ’horizontal struggles’ for according to them these are combats between capital and labour without any form of mediation. [42]

This vision constitutes a crude simplification of the national struggle, for it puts in the same bag the Taliban and the Palestinians, the executors of the ethnic massacres in Africa or the Balkans and the artisans of the wars of liberation of recent decades (Cuba, Vietnam, Algeria). It does not distinguish or situate progress and reaction. For this reason it does not understand why the peoples of the Third World fight for the abolition of the foreign debt, the nationalization of energy resources or the protection of local production.

Defining tactics and conceiving specific strategies is all the more important in that the national demands of the exploited of the periphery have no meaning for the workers of the central nations. The trans-nationalist viewpoint repeats the old neo-liberal hostility towards the concrete forms of popular resistance in the underdeveloped countries, employing a more radical language. Its imprecision diffuses a sentiment of powerlessness in the face of imperialist domination, for in the world they describe - without frontiers, centres and territories - it is impossible to localize the oppressor or choose the method of confronting them.

The third challenge for socialists is conceiving the strategies of seizure and radical transformation of the state to open the road to emancipation. This objective demands the demystification of the neo-liberal questioning of the utility of state intervention and neutralist faith of constitutionalism which masks the control by the dominant class over this institution. In particular, the opposition between neo-liberal deregulators and the advocates of regulation only hides a common capitalist management of the state. This manoeuvre is the cause of the growing divorce between society and state. The more public affairs depend on entrepreneurial profits the greater the weight acquired by the apparatuses and bureaucracies distant from the needs of the majority of the population.

But the transcendence of this fracture demands the inauguration of a new collective management allowing an advance to the progressive extinction of the elitist and oppressive character of the state. This objective cannot be attained through a magic act of dissolution of institutions that have age-old roots, nor by engaging on the enigmatic emancipatory road proposed by those who postulate a change of society that renounces the seizure of the state and the exercise of power. [43]

Some theorists argue that in the current ’society of control’ the forms of domination are so pervasive that they block any social transformation founded on the popular management of the state. [44] But this suggestion of an omnipresent power (’which is everywhere and nowhere’) transforms every concrete debate on the struggle against exploitation into a metaphysical reflection on the impotence of the individual faced with his oppressive environment. By avoiding the analysis of the objective roots and social foundations of this subjection, it becomes impossible to conceive the concrete routes to the transcendence of capitalist domination. [45]

Identifying the agents of this project of anti-capitalist transformation is the fourth challenge which socialists face. If one observes workers on strike, youth in the movement against capitalist globalisation and the masses mobilized at the periphery, it is not hard to define the authors of an emancipatory change. This new popular protagonism undermines the individualist neo-liberal discourse concerning the end of collective action but it does not yet generate recognition of the central role of the oppressed classes (in particular that of wage earners) in social transformation.

This omission is due, for one thing, to the weight accorded to ’citizenship’ in political change, forgetting that this category lumps together the oppressors and the oppressed in granting them the same status and ignores the fact that the ’citizen-worker’ has no access to the functions exercised every day by the ’citizen-capitalist’ (to hire and fire, accumulate, waste, dominate). Even in the most radical characterizations which speak of the ’insurgent citizenry’ ’world citizenry’, the frontier of class is dissolved and social antagonism is relegated to the second level.

Another way of diluting class analysis is to replace the notion of worker or wage earner with the concept of ’multitude’. This category is presented as the embryo of a ’counter-empire’ because of its capacity to agglutinate the ’aspirations for liberation’ of ’cosmopolitans, nomads and emigrants’. [46]

Although the promoters of this category recognize its essentially poetic sense, they nonetheless claim to apply it to political action. [47] This transfer generates innumerable confusions, for the same multitude can mean an amorphous grouping of individuals (nomads) and at other times refer to the action of particular forces (immigrants). In neither of these two cases it is explained why this category occupies such a significant place in the social struggle of an empire, which is not localizable and which does not confront well defined competitors. But the most difficult thing is to elucidate what use this category is.

It is possible to arrive at more useful conclusions by abandoning verbal confusions and analysing instead the emancipatory potential of the working class to steer a socialist project. This analysis can start from the growing ’proletarisation of the world’, that is from the strategic social weight attained by workers, defined in the broad sense as the total mass of wage earners. [48] This impressive force can transform itself into an effective anti-capitalist power on condition there is a significant leap in the socialist consciousness of the exploited.

The conditions for such a political advance are already met, as shown by the debates on internationalism, the state and the subject of social transformation. As in 1890-1920, the debate on imperialism is again at the centre of this political maturation. Will these similarities extend to the growth of the socialist movement? Perhaps the emergence of parties, leaders and thinkers comparable to the classical Marxists of the past century will be the surprise of the new decade.

Claudio Katz is an economist, and researcher. He is a Fellow at the International Institute for Research and Education, in Amsterdam, and a teacher at the University of Buenos Aires. Katz is involved in the Argentine network ’Economistas de Izquierda’ (EDI, ’Economists of the Left’).

NOTES


[1] I have analysed this process in: Claudio Katz, ’New economic turbulences’, IV 330, May 2001; ’Las crisis recientes en la periferia’, Realidad Económica number 183, October-November 2001, Buenos Aires. The polarization between the centre and the periphery is also recognized by those authors who classify nations into four hierarchical circles (central powers, countries which receive foreign investment, potential receptors of these flows and peripheral economies) and who contend that the sole change possible in this hierarchy would be the ascension of countries from the third rank to the second (or vice versa). Other changes are considered as very unlikely (from the second to the first or from the fourth to the second). See Charles Albert Michalet, ’La séduction des nations’, Économica, Paris 1999 (chapter 2)

[2] Carlos Montero, ’Efecto en América Latina de nuevos subsidios al agro en EEUU’, (ATTAC, May 29, 2002).

[3] Samir Amin, ’Africa: living on the fringe’, Monthly Review, vol. 53, number 10, March 2002.

[4] ’El fantasma del protectado’, Clarín, June 9, 2002.

[5] ’US military bases and empire’ (editorial), Monthly Review, vol. 53, number 10, March 2002.

[6] Phil Hearse, “Behind the War on Terrorism”, IV 335; Yvan Lemaitre, ’La paix et la justice impossibles’ and Christian Piquet, ’Nouvelle donne, nouveaux défis’, Critique Communiste, number 165, Winter 2002; Janette Habel, ’États Unis-Amérique Latine’, Contretemps number 3, February 2002.

[7] Antonio Negri & Michael Hardt, Empire, (Cambridge, MA, 2000); Tony Negri ’El imperio, supremo estadio del imperialismo’, Desde los cuatro puntos, number 31, May 2001; Toni Negri, ’Imperio: el nuevo lugar de nuestras conquistas’, Cuadernos del sur, number 32, November 2001.

[8] William Robinson, ’Global capitalism and nation-state-centric’, Science and Society, volume 65, number 4, Winter, 2001-2002.

[9] John Bellamy Foster, ’Imperialism and empire’, Monthly Review, volume 53, number 7, December 2001; Daniel Bensaïd, ’El imperio estado terminal?’, Desde los cuatro puntos number 31, May 2001; Daniel Bensaïd, ’Le nouveau désordre mondial;, Contretemps, number 2, September 2001.

[10] These positions are habitually put forward by the anti-neo-liberal current in the forums of the ’anti-globalisation’ movement.

[11] Bob Sutcliffe, ’Conclusion’, Robert Owen, ’Introduction’, Tom Kemp ’The Marxist theory of imperialism’, in Robert Owen & Bob Sutcliffe, Studies in the Theory of Imperialism, London, 1972.

[12] Ernest Mandel, Late Capitalism, chapter 10 (Verso, London, 1972); Ernest Mandel, ’Las leyes del desarrollo desigual’, ’Ensayos sobre el neocapitalismo’, Era, México 1969. A similar analysis has been also formulated by Bob Rowthorn, ’El imperialismo en la década de 1970’, ’Capital monopolista y capital monopolista europeo’, Granica, Buenos Aires 1971.

[13] Stephen Hymer, ’Empresas multinacionales e internacionalización del capital’. Ediciones Periferia, Buenos Aires, 1972; Martin Nicolaus, ’La contradicción universal’, ’El imperialismo hoy’, Ediciones Periferia, Buenos Aires 1971.

[14] James Petras, ’Imperialismo versus imperio’, Laberinto number 8, February 2002.

[15] Paolo Giussani, ’¿Hay evidencia empírica de una tendencia hacia la globalización?’ in J. Arriola & D. Guerrero, La nueva economía política de la globalización, Universidad de País Vasco, Bilbao 2000.



[16] Stavros Tombazos, ’La mondialisation liberale et l’impérialisme tardif’, Contretemps, number 2 , September 2001.

[17] Tony Smith, ’Pour une théorie marxiste de la globalisation’, Contretemps, number 2, September 2001.

[18] Wladimir Andreff, ’Interventions et débats’, ’Mondialisation’, Espaces Marx, Paris 1999; Philippe Zarifian, ’Interventions et débats’, ’Mondialisation’, Espaces Marx, Paris 1999.

[19] Richard D Boff & Edward Herman, ’Merger, concentration and the erosion of democracy’, Monthly Review, volume 53, number 1, May 2001.

[20] Some studies which have begun to take account of this problematic show, for example, that the US trade deficit calculated taking into account the location of firms constitutes in reality a surplus from the point of view of the ownership of firms. Cf. D Bryan, ’Global accumulation and accounting for national economic identity’, Review of Radical Political Economics, volume 33, 1999.

[21] Michel Husson, ’Interventions et débats’, ’Mondialisation’, Espaces Marx, Paris 1999.

[22] Odile Castel, ’La naissance de l’Ultra-imperialisme’, in Gérard Dumenil & Dominique Levy, Le triangle infernal, PUF, Paris 1999.

[23] Antonio Negri & Michael Hardt, ’Empire’, preface; Toni Negri, ’Entrevista’, Pagina 12, March 31, 2002; Tony Negri ’El imperio, supremo estadio del imperialismo’, Desde los cuatro puntos, number 31, May 2001.

[24] This is the justified objection of Giovanni Arrighi: ’Global capitalism and the persistence of north-south divide’, Science and Society, volume 65, number 4, Winter 2001-2002.

[25] William Robinson, ’Global capitalism and nation-state-centric’, Science and Society, volume 65, number 4, Winter 2001-2002.

[26] Antonio Negri & Michael Hardt, Empire, (chap. I-1, II-5, III-5, III-6).

[27] Michael Mann; ’Globalisation is among other things, transnational, international and american’ and Kees van der Pijl, ’Globalisation or class society in transition?’, Science and Society, volume 65, number 4, Winter 2001-2002.

[28] Financial Times, May 10, 2002.

[29] Robert Went, ’Globalisation: towards a tran-snational state?’, Science and Society, volume 65, number 4, Winter 2001-2002.

[30] Atilio Boron, ’Imperio e imperialismo’, Buenos Aires 2002 (chapters 4 and 6).

[31] Antonio Negri & Hardt Michael, Empire (chapter IV-1)

[32] Claude Serfati, ’Une bourgeoisie mondiale pour un capitalisme mondialisé?’. ’Bourgeoisie: états d’une classe dominante’, Syllepse, Paris 2001; Claude Serfati, ’Violences de la mondialisation capitaliste’, Contretemps, number 2 , September 2001.

[33] Peter Gowan, ’Cosmopolitisme libéral et gouvernance globale’, Contretemps, number 2, September 2001.

[34] See Contretemps, number 3, February 2002: Gilbert Achcar, ’Le choc des barbaries’; Daniel Bensaïd, ’Dieu, que ces guerres sont saintes’; Ellen Meiksins Wood, ’Guerre infinie’.

[35] Michel Husson, ’Le fantasme du marché mondial’, Contretemps, number 2 , September 2001.

[36] Leo Panitch, ’The state, globalisation and the new imperialism’, Historical Materialism, volume 9, Winter 2001.

[37] Alejandro Dabat, La globalización en perspectiva histórica (Mimeo), México 1999; Christian Barrere, ’Interventions et débats’, ’Mondialisation’, Espaces Marx, Paris 1999.

[38] Toni Negri, ’Imperio: el nuevo lugar de nuestras conquistas’, Cuadernos del sur, number 32, November 2001.

[39] Toni Negri & Michael Hardt, ’La multitude contre l’empire’, Contretemps, number 2 , September 2001.

[40] Antonio Negri & Michael Hardt, Empire, chapter IV-1); Gérard De Bernis, ’Interventions et débats’, ’Mondialisation’, Espaces Marx, Paris 1999; Marcos Del Roio, ’Las contradicciones del imperio’ and Carlos Martins, ’La nueva encrucijada’, Herramienta, number 18, summer 2001-2002.

[41] Tariq Ali, interview, Inprecor 466/467, January-February, 2002.

[42] Antonio Negri & Michael Hardt, Empire (preface, chapters I-3, II-2, II-3).

[43] This is the thesis of John Holloway: ’Entrevista’, Página 12, December 3, 2001.

[44] Antonio Negri & Michael Hardt, Empire (chapter I-2).

[45] See the excellent critique by Alex Callinicos, ’Toni Negri in perspective’, International Socialism no. 92, Autumn 2001.

[46] Antonio Negri & Michael Hardt, Empire (chapter III-6)

[47] Toni Negri, ’Entrevista’, Pagina 12, March 31, 2002.

[48] This weight grew massively in the course of the 20th century, going from 50 million in 1900 to 2 billion in 2000 (while over the same time period the world population went from 1 to 6 billion). See Daniel Bensaïd, ’Les irréductibles: théorèmes de la résistance à l’air du temps’, Textuel, Paris 2001.
http://www.internationalviewpoint.org/spip.php?article329

Letter on Imperialist War and Capitalist Economic Cycles


[This is a letter I wrote in 1979 to Bob Avakian, Chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party. As usual when communicating with the RCP, I received no reply.]



To Bob Avakian,
Chairman of the Central Committee of the RCP

Dear Bob,

In the recent Central Committee report published in the October/November issue of Revolution[1] you raise some important questions concerning the relation of imperialist war to economic crises. As you say in the report these are questions which need to be seriously taken up. Though I am certainly no expert on the subject I would like to submit a few thoughts for your consideration.

1. Does imperialist war "exercise the 'purgative function' that economic crisis does under pre-monopoly capitalism?" It seems to me that the formulation here raises some problems, but that the answer is basically "yes" for two reasons: First, war is an excellent means of destroying capital; and second, imperialist war leads to the redivision of the world among the imperialist powers. Of these two factors the first is now by far the most important though this has not been completely true in the past. In fact it seems to me that serious questions can be raised about whether World War I served much of a purgative function at all. (There is no question that World War II did, however.)

2. It should be noted first of all that there are real limitations on the "purgative" function of redistributing the world among the imperialist powers. Of course the imperialists who expand their empire will benefit, but just as surely those whose empire contracts will suffer. Therefore if redistribution has a "purgative" value for the victors it must have an aggravating effect on the economic problems of the losers. Is it possible that such a redivision will have a net overall beneficial or purgative effect for world imperialism as a whole? Maybe, but I don't see how.

3. Therefore speaking in an overall sense it seems to me that the primary purgative function of inter-imperialist war lies in the material destruction of capital in the form of factories, machinery, etc. Lenin says in Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism that imperialism does not resolve the contradictions which exist under pre-monopoly capitalism but on the contrary these contradictions are greatly intensified. In particular, the contradictions which give rise to economic crises are greatly intensified, as are the resulting crises themselves. Marx of course called these economic catastrophes "crises of overproduction" and explained them not as absolute overproduction as compared with what the people need to have produced, but as relative overproduction as compared with what can produced and sold for a profit. Marx emphasized that the resolution of such a crisis lies in the destruction not only of "excess" consumer commodities but of part of the means of production themselves. And indeed in every significant recession or depression there is an enormous amount of capital which must simply be written off, whole factories closed down and dismantled, etc. Imperialism intensifies every aspect of such a crisis including the necessity for wholesale destruction of capital as a means of fundamentally resolving the crisis. (Though of course this only lays the basis for a new cycle leading to a new crisis.)

Since the fundamental problem in any crisis is the relative surplus of capital (which results in the collapse of profits, etc.), the only fundamental means of resolving the crisis is the destruction of that surplus capital, together with some of the "non-surplus" capital. Other measures, such as the furious expansion of credit and even the opening up of new parts of the world for investment, marketing, etc., are only means of postponing the day of reckoning. (Here again is a reason why the redistribution of the world can only be a partial and temporary resolution of a crisis.)

In short, imperialist war plays a purgative function in the overall imperialist world crisis to the extent, and only to the extent, that it physically destroys the means of production.

4. In the past, imperialist wars have not necessarily destroyed the means of production. Although there was much property destruction in World War I, for example, my impression is that the factories and machines were not greatly affected in any country. (This is an important question of historical research.) Certainly except for a few sensational acts of sabotage there was no physical destruction of capital in the U.S. or Britain. Most of the war was fought in relatively restricted areas of France, Poland, Russia, etc. Even Germany probably was close to unscathed as far as physical capital goes.

In World War II the U.S. was the only imperialist power to escape severe damage to the means of production. Everywhere else there was tremendous destruction of physical capital.

In future imperialist world wars it seems almost certain that the means of production will suffer unprecedented extremes of destruction in every imperialist country (as well as large areas of the rest of the world). To be sure, it is possible that by means of nerve gas, neutron bombs, etc., the physical destruction (though not the human destruction) could be minimized but it does not seem very likely that these kinds of weapons will be the dominant factor in the next world war at least. On the other hand the next world war may well lead to victorious world revolution and the final destruction of the world imperialist system. In that case it will also be untrue, in a sense, that the war served a purgative function for capitalist economic recovery. (Something that kills the patient is not usually considered a purgative.) It may therefore turn out that only one world war, World War II, served a purgative function on the world imperialist economy.

But nevertheless the purgative potential of world war is an important point in the comprehension of the workings of the world imperialist system which unfortunately still exists today. It seems correct to say that, with the exceptions of the first and last world wars (for different reasons), inter-imperialist world war can and does serve a purgative function with respect to imperialist economic crises.

5. After World War I the world imperialist economic recovery was fragile and short-lived, at least compared to the aftermath of World War II. Why? In my opinion it is because there was a lot more destruction of physical capital in World War II.

Germany never did recover after World War I (at least until the Nazi war economy was put in place), and the usual explanation for this--the burden of reparations to other imperialists--is only a very partial and secondary explanation. The loss of most of its economic empire was far more important than the reparations problem, I suspect, but in any case the fundamental point is that there was no mass destruction of physical capital which could constitute the cleared ground necessary for renewed high-gear economic expansion. Even in the victorious imperialist countries the recovery was not all that impressive in historical retrospective. There was a severe, though short, downturn in 1920-21, followed by 8 or 9 boom years, and then the Great Depression. Those 8 or 9 boom years among the winners can be explained by a combination of factors: first, and probably most important, the new turf available for exploitation stolen from the Germans (not just its former colonies but less competition in the advanced countries on the part of the weakened German imperialists); second, the development of whole new industries (automobiles, especially, but also radio, etc.); third, credit expansion; fourth, with respect to France and Britain, the reparations loot taken directly from Germany; etc. The basic "problem" with World War I (with respect to its purgative ability) was that it was not destructive enough.

World War II on the other hand was quite destructive of physical capital and this is the primary reason why there was a quarter century post-war boom in the capitalist world. The secondary reason is the pre-war "voluntary" destruction of capital during the Great Depression. It's true that there were also other factors such as new industries to be built up (electronics, computers, nuclear, aerospace, etc.); credit expansion far greater than anything before in history; etc. And in the case of the U.S. especially there was the greatly expanded imperialist economic penetration of the world, and not only the former European colonies which were once off limits to other imperialists, but even more important, penetration of the European capitalist countries themselves.

It is usually recognized that, whatever the case may have been with Germany, Japan, etc., the U.S. economic boom after World War II was due to the great expansion of the U.S. economic empire around the world. But there is a crucial point here which often goes unrecognized: much of the U.S. imperialist expansion around the world--and most certainly within Europe--was possible only because of the tremendous destruction of physical capital in these countries during World War II. In other words, even though the home plant of the U.S. imperialists was not damaged in the war, they were able to benefit from the destruction of the capital of the other imperialist and capitalist countries. New markets opened up for them around the world, and more importantly, new possibilities for the expansion of U.S. capital in the countries damaged in the war. I don't want to unduly simplify matters here. There are a lot of special factors in the U.S. imperialist success after World War II including the new international financial system which in effect allowed the U.S. imperialists to print up I.O.U.'s in almost unlimited quantities in order to buy up companies and resources around the world. But I think that when it gets down to the fundamental cause of the U.S. imperialist post-war economic success, it is really no different from that of the other imperialist "success stories"--it depended upon the prior destruction of a large part of the means of production in the capitalist world by the war, and to a lesser extent, by the Great Depression.

6. Thus in part I am disagreeing with your comment that a new world war "would not at all constitute or signal some resolution of the crisis for the imperialists, in and of itself--for that, they would have to win the war, redivide the world favorably and at the same time prevent or significantly limit revolution leading to socialism in various parts of the world." [p. 9] Your point about their necessity to prevent or limit revolution is certainly correct, but not, I think, your point about their necessity of winning the war and favorably redividing the world in order to resolve the economic crisis. If we look at World War II, for example, both Germany and Japan lost the war and had the world unfavorably redivided from their point of view. And yet, because of the physical destruction of their own productive plant, and that of many other countries, they were able to begin a long and relatively rapid economic expansion which is only now drawing to a final close. I don't see any obvious reason why a more or less similar scenario could not be repeated after the next world war (again, excepting the possibility of revolution).

You say that "War in itself is not the end of crisis (or a particular spiral), but on the contrary represents the extreme concentration of the contradiction of the imperialist system and the crisis that preceded and led up to the war." World war is certainly the extreme concentration of the contradiction of the imperialist system and the crisis, but I don't see why this precludes it from being at the same time the means by which the economic crisis is in fact resolved through the destruction of physical capital. It seems to me that you yourself are saying that war can resolve such an economic crisis in your next paragraph where you talk about the "purgative function" of war. The point you raise on page 15 about viewing "major spirals under imperialism as being basically defined from inter-imperialist war to inter-imperialist war" also suggests--correctly it seems to me--that inter-imperialist war does constitute the end of one cycle, its resolution, and the beginning of the next.

7. Is it really true that the basic socio-economic cycle under imperialism is from world war to world war? Yes, I think it is. Actually the fundamental economic cycle still takes the same form as it did under pre-monopoly capitalism with the massive destruction of capital marking the end of one cycle and the beginning of the next. But historical experience so far seems to show that under imperialism only inter-imperialist world war is sufficiently destructive of capital to act as an effective purgative. Anything, from voluntary dismantling of factories to widespread natural disasters, which actually results in sufficiently massive destruction of capital could theoretically bring one cycle to a close and mark the beginning of the next cycle. But today it seems that only world war is capable of destruction on that massive scale.

The Great Depression, for example, undoubtedly resulted in the liquidation of enormous amounts of capital--but still not enough to effectively purge the system of its crisis. It is a very important question of political-economic theory to be able to say exactly why the Depression--despite its unprecedented severity--was unable alone to restore the imperialist economic system. Of course, if my general line of argument is correct, the reason is that the Depression wasn't sufficiently destructive of capital, but the question is: why wasn't it sufficiently destructive? I don't know that I can give a complete answer to this but some relevant points seem to be:

The excess capital plant built up under imperialism is way beyond anything ever seen before in pre-monopoly capitalism. To use a somewhat arbitrary numerical illustration, whereas under pre-monopoly capitalism it was necessary to destroy perhaps 10 or 20% of outstanding capital to get things going again, under imperialism the destruction needs to be more like 50 or 60%. (The exact percentages can only be determined by extensive and careful historical research.)
Giant monopoly corporations (and their controlling financial institutions in many cases) can in general allow a much larger portion of their productive plant to sit idle, and to sit idle for a much longer time, than can pre-monopoly capitalists, since their assets, resources, lines of credit, etc., are much greater.
Money and credit capital is much more easily destroyed by traditional cyclic processes than is physical capital, but because of the unparalleled growth of all kinds of capital in the imperialist economy it is more than ever necessary to wipe out a larger proportion of physical capital in order to really purge the system.
The state plays a much more central economic role than it did in the days of pre-monopoly capitalism. Of course this has expanded enormously since (and because of) the Great Depression, but even in the first few decades of this century the role of the state (Federal Reserve, etc.) was quite significant. Such intervention helps prevent or at least postpone the outright destruction of capital in a variety of ways: subsidies, government contracts, loans and loan guarantees, etc. And it helps postpone the collapse of credit which, when it comes, requires the writing off of enormous quantities of money capital as well as forces the widespread destruction of physical capital.
There must be other factors too. In any case, it seems to me that eventually all these mitigating factors would fail and the economic boil would burst on its own--except that the imperialists inevitably resort to war long before this. In short, under imperialism the crisis stage of the economic cycle is so severe and so prolonged that the various imperialist national groups are compelled to resort to war and fascism before the economy can complete its purgative collapse.

8. On page 9 you discuss two spirals or cycles under imperialism: the "major spirals" from one inter-imperialist war to the next, and the shorter term "cyclical developments". You suggest that the major spirals are principal over and condition the cyclical developments. I think your basic conception here is certainly correct: there are two kinds of cycles (I call them both 'cycles' rather than 'spirals', for reasons which I'll try to bring out below) and the longer one (from war to war) is the more principal, more important, and the conditioner of the shorter cycle.

However in saying that the shorter cycle "is not eliminated under imperialism" you seem to imply that it is the continuation of the pre-monopoly capitalist economic cycle while the longer cycle is something totally new. I don't see it quite that way. To me it seems that both present-day economic cycles are the continuation of the pre-monopoly capitalist economic cycle, that "one has split into two", and that if anything the longer cycle is the primary offspring. It is true of course that the period of the short cycle (the time from the beginning of one short cycle to the beginning of the next short cycle) is closer to that of the period of the pre-monopoly cycle, but that is not the essential point. The short cycle is based on the more superficial phenomena (such as variations in credit supply, inventory fluctuation, etc.) which existed also in the pre-monopoly cycle and which triggered the more basic variations (such as the collapse of credit and contraction of capital). These more basic fluctuations now occur in the long cycle because under imperialism the more superficial cyclic variations no longer trigger (in every case) the basic variations. To be less abstract, it seems to me that the basic capitalist economic cycle is the same in the imperialist economy as it was under pre-monopoly capitalism, going from one purgatory anihilation of capital to the next, but that now this takes a considerably longer period to develop. The more superficial economic fluctuations--which still occur and result in the short cycle--usually do not trigger the collapse of the credit bubble, for example, like they used to (the old time "panics"), nor result in the extensive destruction of capital like they used to. (The same sorts of reasons mentioned in section 7 above go part of the way towards explaining why this difference exists.) Eventually, after a number of such short cycles, and as the underlying basic contradictions build, one of these short-cycle downturns will trigger the more disastrous long-cycle collapse (unless world war cuts short this development).

From the point of view of Marxist political economy, from the point of view of the basic socio-economic contradictions at work in modern society, it is the long-term cycle which deserves to be viewed as the continuation of the pre-monopoly economic cycle. Altogether too much attention has been focused on the short-cycles in the recent past, to the exclusion of attention to the basic economic cycle. This is why I for one am very glad to see your discussion of this longer cycle as principal in the C.C. report. It seems to me to be an important step towards reconstituting Marxist political economy on a solid foundation under today's imperialist conditions.

9. The analysis that I have argued for in this letter, that the destruction of "excess" capital is the essential purgative activity of inter-imperialist war, requires the abandonment of the "capital shortage" theory which has been put forward by the RCP in the past. Since I submitted a paper to the Party leadership on this theory several years ago I will not go into it any further now.

* * *
I know there is a lot more to all this than I have gone into here, or indeed than I am capable of exploring at the present time. But I hope I have been of some small help in spurring your own thinking on these questions.


Sincerely,
Scott H.
(Dec. 2, 1979)


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http://massline.org/PolitEcon/ScottH/econ_cycles.htm

The impact of imperialist economic power on developing countries
by N M Sundaram, Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) [Edited]

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IN COUNTRY after country, we hear of the economic "reform" process in progress. This is variously described as a new economic policy, policy of economic liberalisation, globalisation and competitiveness in the world market. But there is, in fact, nothing new about this process. It has been tried over the past three decades in several parts of the globe -- both in industrial and in developing countries.

The euphemistically named Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) prescribed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), are projected as the panacea for all the world's problems including that of national economies. But because there is nothing new about this policy -- tried and tested in several countries -- experience is able to demonstrate quite different conclusions. It is no longer a matter of mere conjectures or perceptions. The stark reality of experience is there for all to see.


What "globalisation"?
According to the United Nations Commission for Trade and Development (UNCTAD): "International production has become the central structural characteristic of the world economy." In other words, the global economy is nothing but the internationalisation of trade, investment and production as well as employment. And national economies are linked together by a network of trade, investment and credit.

If this is so, the essence of international production should mean the development of all the countries, and the equitable distribution of world trade in the process of developing countries gaining access to resources, technology and markets through this claimed "globalisation".

But experience shows that these objectives have not been achieved. Far from it, the opposite has resulted. Backward countries remain backward and continue to be deprived of their legitimate share of resources and world markets. Instead of the net inflow of resources, a net outflow has occurred with attendant accentuation of economic and social problems.

In the process, though national identities have not been altogether obliterated, in practice this has gradually yielded to externally controlled forces -- the Transnational Corporations (TNCs). In fact, people, countries and their destinies have come under the control and are increasingly at the mercy of these forces. And because they remain outside the pale of national priorities, as well as being autonomous and socially unaccountable, these forces are dangerous to national interests and people of all nations.

The claim that there has been an internationalisation of production and employment, cannot hide the reality that the TNCs' motivating objective is profit and not social or human development. When advanced industrial economies, its people -- particularly its workers, are themselves victims of TNCs' inexorable quest for profits, what of developing countries' economies, and its workers?


Origin of underdevelopment
The preachers of competition tell us, from the pulpit of the IMF and World Bank, that we are all equals and belong to the global village and should compete for our mutual good. This, of course, follows in the footsteps of their colonial mentors, who subjugated and enslaved a major part of the globe and it's population through centuries of exploitation.

Unsurprisingly, today's forces of economic exploitation refuse to accept that the non-competitiveness of the Third World, or rather the competitiveness of the developed capitalist world, has its origin in this nefarious colonial exploitation which has consequently led to a lack of development.


What transfer of resources?
For a period the imperialists, after being divested of most of their colonies following the end of the Second World War, talked of undoing the ravages of colonial exploitation through redistribution of incomes and wealth. They undertook scholastic studies on "poverty of nations", "challenges" posed by "world poverty" and pointed accusing fingers at the "affluent societies" built on the foundation of unequal competition.

They appointed commissions -- the Willy Brandt Commission, for instance -- and set up institutions to find ways and means of remedying the long interlude of rapacity and exploitation, plunder and impoverishment of whole nations and people. And these bodies concluded that a reverse flow of incomes and wealth was the only remedy. A massive flow of funds through aid and loans resulted.



But this only increased the stranglehold of exploitation through a different process -- debt. Colonial exploitation gave way to more comprehensive exploitation, the neo-colonialist way. The formerly enslaved countries remained enslaved, but now through the mechanism of the debt trap, eventually endangering the very freedom they secured at enormous cost.


Debt trap and the lethal prescription
The burden of debt and debt servicing, of structural adjustment and so on, resulted once again in a flow-back of resources to the creditor nations and their instruments, the TNCs.

Poor countries like India, in the process of securing this "benign" assistance, ended up repaying more: so the debt increased The rich countries and their creatures, the IMF and the World Bank, were once again generous with further "advice". Debt is ruinous,they implored -- and threatened. So, they say, it is prudent to liquidate debt, which can be done by disinvesting the shares of vital public services.

Privatisation was proclaimed as the panacea for all the economic ills and shortcomings. The creditor soon became the owner: Force the state to retreat first, and then the people thereafter. Retreat, and further retreat, on the altar of competition and competitiveness and so-called global development and consumer satisfaction.


The power of TNCs
Around 40,000 parent TNCs and 250,000 affiliates or subsidiaries control 75 percent of all world trade in commodities, manufactured goods and services. This is apart from sub-contracting, licensing and franchising under the aegis of TNCs, which would further increase their stranglehold.

Outward Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) stock increased to a staggering $2.6 trillion in 1995 and $5.2 trillion in world sales by 1992. In 1990, the rate of growth of FDI stock has substantially exceeded that of world output in terms of GDP and world exports. FDI stockholding and their sales are taken as proxy indicators of international production.

As much as one-third of this world trade is intra-firm, that is, within different units of a single TNC. Apart from making any claim to genuine competition a farce, it makes it extremely difficult for governments -- or even the WTO -- to exercise any real control over their activities. TNCs also control one-third of the world's productive assets.


The strangehold of imperialism
The flow of FDI and investment in stocks remain concentrated predominantly in the developed world -- the European Union (EU), US and Japan. The developing countries account for only one-fifth and one-quarter respectively of world GDP and global inward FDI stock.

This is indicative of the vast disparity in not merely the flow of resources, but also in the global market, which makes a mockery of the claims about the virtues of "globalisation". Among the developing countries too, the lion's share of the meagre FDI stock flows, are concentrated in the 10 largest developing countries, amounting to two-thirds of the total stock in developing countries taken as a whole.

This unevenness reflects the dominant competitiveness of the TNCs of the developed world, particularly in the EU, US and Japan. So much so, the developing countries' outward FDI stock -- that is, investment outside their national boundaries -- constituted barely six per cent of the total world FDI stock in 1994. Even here, outward investments, as in the case of inward flows, remains concentrated in the hands of firms from only a handful of developing countries.

Furthermore, developing countries taken together have come to rely increasingly on FDI in-flows rather than imports (30 per cent in the 1990s). In contrast, they rely on exports more than their foreign investments, when it comes to supplying gootls and services to the rest of the world. This indicates who controls the world market, as well as world investments.

When UNCTAD claims that: "International production has become the central structural characteristic of the world economy," the unevenness of the relative share of the world market and the asymmetry of FDI flows cannot give any comfort to the developing countries.

On the contrary, this stranglehold by the developed countries and their TNCs over the developing economies indicates that exploitation of the Third World is increasing. Greater burdens are shifted onto the workers of the developed countries and the people of former colonies.

All competitive advantages of the developed countries' and their TNCs are further enhanced in the process of technological advance. For they not only lead the way in development and control of technology, but are also the main beneficiaries of technological and scientific advance -- particularly in electronics, telecommunications and transport. They therefore control manufacturing as well as services, including finance capital.

The circumstances are exacerbated as the concentration of the world market in the hands of developed countries' TNCs leads to acquisitions, mergers and hostile takeovers. TNCs' acquisitions worldwide increased by as much as 17 percent to $229 billion in 1995 alone.

Behind the facade of competition, a process of monopolisation and cartelisation is taking place. It is a case of the big fish gobbling up the small fish. It leads to more disparities between the Third World and the developed countries and within. The result is more intensive exploitation of countries and their people.

Germany's share of foreign acquisitions amounted to $21.2 billion. In the US alone, Germany succeeded in trebling its presence amounting to a total of $9 billion. Its acquisitions in Britain amounted to $5.8 billion. By 1994, Germany's foreign acquisitions amounted to more than the aggregate for the preceding 10 years.

Japan's acquisitions increased by 50 per cent to $15.9 billion in 1995. The US, which suffered a setback of sorts in the early 1990s, made a strong recovery. The repositioning that resulted brought back the US ahead of others. By 1995, TNCs headquartered in the US increased their acquisitions by 47 per cent over the previous year, to the tune of $63.7 billion.

The sum total of US acquisitions ill other countries was $4 billion more than what others could do in the US. In Russia alone, the purchases exploded to $10 billion in 1995 from $1.7 billion the previous year.

We can understand the extent of dominance secured by TNCs belonging to the EU, US and Japan -- particularly the US. Another important aspect to note is the explosion of acquisitions in technology and financial services. Information technology alone rose by 48 per cent to $134 billion with in countries and across borders.

The distribution of TNCs among the EU, US and Japan and other developed countries, as against the developing countries, clearly showed who actually benefitted from so-called globalisation and who were deprived.


Following the Mexican way: Thailand and Malaysia
It might be useful to consider certain specific country cases to illustrate how structural adjustment programmes operate and affect individual Third World economics. Apart from the case of Mexico (followed by Peru and Chile), which faced a monumental crisis following the devaluation of its Peso and the consequent devastation of the entire economy and living standards of its people, there are some other countries which call be considered to be well on the Mexican path.

The important thing to note here is that these countries, along with Mexico, were projected as economic miracles, brought about by the IMF's prescription of the structural adjustment programme and neo-liberal policies. Two such countries in Asia are worth mentioning in this respect: Thailand and Malaysia.

The distinctive features of these countries is their high "current account" deficits. Thailand's increased from three per cent of GDP in 1988 to 7.5 per cent in 1995. The corresponding deficit in Malaysia is still higher at 10 per cent of GDP.

FDI investments increased substantially both in Thailand and Malaysia. FDI in-flows into Thailand increased from barely $250 million in 1986 to $2.44 billion in 1990. Thereafter, it gradually declined to $2.11 billion in 1991 and ultimately reached a low of $640 million in 1993. But FDI picked up in 1994 to reach $2.3 billion. But the damage had already been done.

In Malaysia FDI in-flows were higher at $5.18 billion in 1992, which increased in 1993 and 1994 to reach a peak of $5.8 billion in 1995. Far from indicating strength of the economy, the FDI investments increased the external vulnerability of dependent nations.


Capital flight
The terrible effects of FDI are not far behind the havoc wrought by what is called portfolio investments. This is because much of these are short-term investments and the creditors can always refuse to turnover if confidence falls. This is precisely what happened in Thailand. And when FDI in-flows slow down, accentuating structural deficits by an excessive current account deficit, the position would be hard to manage.

This vunerability is made worse due to the ever present possibility of flight of capital in search of greener pastures. This is happening both in Thailand and Malaysia. The worst part of the scenario is that FDI investments have always been accompanied by an increase in imports (technology and capital goods, not to speak of pandering to consumerist trends), in the expectation that not only development and growth would materialise but also, through manufacture of efficient and competitive goods for the world market, that exports would increase.

In fact, following the increase in FDI in-flows, exports did increase substantially and so did imports. But this cannot beguile the developing countries into believing that the going would continue to be good. This has not happened. When the so-called global market is dominated by the developed countries and their TNCs how can exports from Third World grow?


Yet more debt traps
The regional blocs such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta), EU and APEC, are essentially imperialist-dominated protectionist blocs. This is apart from the individual country's protectionist policies, such as that of the US and other developed countries.

It happened that, as the FDI flows tapered off and the feared flight of capital materialised, Thailand and Malaysia were left with a high level of imports which have to be serviced as exports declined. They were forced, in turn, to seek external borrowing in a big way.

With respect to Thailand, external debt -- wllich was $23.45 billion in 1989 -- increased to as much as 560.99 billion by 1994. This is apart from bonds and loans secured from external capital markets which rose from $2.71 billion in 1992 and increased to as much as 96.50 billion in 1995. Foreign debt thus rose to 49 per cent of GDP with attendant repayment and servicing burden on the economy.

There is a point here with respect to Mexico: Foreign debt was only 35 per cent of GDP in 1994 when the catastrophe struck. The experience of Malaysia is no different. Its external debt rose to 39 per cent of GDP, again higher than that of Mexico. No wonder the currency exchange rate -- Baht of Thailand and Ringgit of Malaysia - was seriously destabilised. It seems that an off-shoot of the emerging crisis led to 3,600 workers being laid-off recently in Penang, Malaysia's leading enterprise zone and home of 130 electronic firms -- an expanding industry.

The World Bank Report 1994, said Thailand was providing an "excellent example of dividends to be obtained through outward orientation and receptivity to foreign investment and market friendly philosophy, backed by conservative macro-economic manage ment and cautious external borrowing policies." It is another matter that this appreciation catne after pushing Thailand into its present uncertain days. The dividend referred to in the World Bank Report obviously is FDI in-flow which has now sharply declined.

The Philippines' trade deficit for the first seven months of 1996 widened to $7.1 billion from $4.9 billion in the same period last year. Exports grew by 17 percent to S11.3 billion, but imports surged forward by 27 percent to $18.4 billion.


Cheap Asian labour losing its edge?

A study conducted by the Political and Economic Risk Consultancy (PERC), a Hong Kong-based firm, revealed that the traditional labour attractiveness of Asia may no longer hold. The cheap cost of labour availability, quality and stability, which marked Asian labour out as attractive enough for investors, may no longer hold sway. The consultancy firm assessing these labour attributes graded the Asian countries, along with some of the developed countries, in a scale of zero to ten.

Surprisingly, only the Philippines scored reasonably well in all categories. As for the comparative cost of labour, as against the United State's 5.06, Britain's 4.25, Australia's 4.71, Switzerland's 8.00, and Japan 8.08 points, India secured 2.14, Philippines 3.24, Vietnam 3.3, China 3.40, Indonesia 4.46, Taiwan 5.44, Thailand 5.00, South Korea 5.88, Singapore 6.41, Malaysia 5.06 and Hong Kong 6.32 points.


Shifting the burdens onto workers and consumers
In the name of competitiveness, workers in the developed countries are told to accept job shrinkage, lay-offs, casualisation, non-unionisation, social security benefit cutbacks, and so on. Production facilities are moved to other countries where labour is cheap.

In the countries of the Third World, where labour is already cheap and labour rights are fragile, on the plea of continuing to remain competitive in the global market, wage levels are frozen or further depressed. Worse working conditions are enforced; even the limited labour rights under existing labour and social welfare laws are denied.

The inevitable process of the downward spiral of wages and working conditions, has led to the creation of indentured lahour and the accentuation of unemployment and poverty. Innumerable examples can be given. The case of Nike shoes may be mentioned, which manufactures sport shoes in Indonesia using cheap labour.

The cost of manufacture of a pair of shoes may be as low as $4.5. These are brought to the home market in the US and sold for $140 to $150 per pair at the minimum.


Solidarity
For developing countries, increasing the level of employment must follow growth of the economy as an essential social policy. In this way, the purchasing power of the people would be increased and would enable them to save as well as consume essentials. Among other measures, this requires thorough-going land reform.

In all the Third World countries except a few, domestic savings are dwindling. Capital formation is lower despite the private sector's increased profits and easier access to capital markets following liberalisation. Incentives for mopping up domestic savings for national development should be provided.

The state, instead of withdrawing, must assume a proactive role in economic and social development. These are essential elements in any healthy development process which would pave the way for self-reliance.

Nafta, EC, APEC and others, are under the firm control and tutelage of imperialist powers. This must be countered. There must be public awareness through campaigns and struggles, as well as solidarity among the people of the Third World countries.

There is a great potential for independent development and growth of the countries of the Third World. National trade unions and democratic platforms must be used to mobilise public opinion against all imperialist machinations, against the globalisation idea and the structural adjustment programmes of the IMF, World Bank and imperialism.


http://www.newworker.org/imperial.htm

ALBA: Latin America's anti-imperialist economic project
Cuba, Venezuela and other countries on the Latin American continent are rejecting the neo-liberal model of integration and development.




“The Bolivarian Alternative for Latin America and the Caribbean (ALBA) is a different proposal of integration. Whilst the Free Trade Area of the Americas (ALCA or FTAA) responds to the interests of transnational capital and pursues the absolute liberalization of trade in goods, services and investment, ALBA puts the emphasis on the struggle against poverty and social exclusion and, therefore, it expresses the interests of the Latin American peoples.”[1]

To many, when ALBA was proposed it smacked of an interesting piece of rhetoric which did not and would not go beyond the exchange of Venezuelan oil for Cuban doctors.

However, there is much more substance to the proposal than just a Cuba-Venezuela ‘axis’. The growing resonance of ALBA and the number of Latin American countries which are in various degrees, joining the Bolivarian process of integration, show that ALBA has gone well beyond being merely an abstract aspiration and a purely Cuba-Venezuela alliance.

Brutal logic

The reason for the current success of ALBA can be found in the abysmal record of thirty years of unabated neo-liberalism in the continent. The figures confirm this: in the late 1970s Latin America had 19% of its population living in poverty; in 2004 it was 44% (in 1990, when neo-liberalism was running high, poverty reached 48.3% of the whole population.)






The brutal logic of the model of capital accumulation known as neo-liberalism necessitated the drastic economic restructuring of the regional economies, which involved:-

the complete elimination of protection for national industry,

the favouring of those sections of the economy that produced for the external market,

the elimination of all restrictions to the influx and operation of foreign capital in the national economy,

the privatization of all state assets,

and the elimination of all welfare provision.

With a few exceptions, it was ‘Third Way’ political currents/parties that became the instrument for either the consolidation and/or deepening of neo-liberal policies in the region.

True, in most nations of the Southern Cone of South America, neo-liberalism was originally imposed through fire and blood by nasty dictatorships such as in Chile, Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil.

'Third Way' to poverty

But it was 'Third Way' administrations such as the Concertación in Chile, the Peronist Menem in Argentina, the traditional parties, Blanco and Colorado, in Uruguay, the MIR-Banzer alliance in Bolivia, ADECO and COPEI in Venezuela, Fernando Henrique Cardoso’s Partido Social Democratico Brasileiro, in Brazil, and the most pro-US factions within the Mexican PRI, just to cite the most prominent examples, which systematized, perfected and consolidated neo-liberalism in these countries.

They were coalitions heavily based on the support of the middle classes and the better-off sections of the working class but politically hegemonized by a small financially-oriented, national elite who got significant crumbs from the multinational companies’ table.

They crucially rested on the exclusion of large sections of society that became not only politically but also socially irrelevant. Societies such as Venezuela had over 80% of its population living in poverty where most of the proletariat was part of the informal sector eking out a very precarious living, and even ‘success stories’ such as Chile had, as late as the 1990s had about 48% of people living in poverty. The levels of social exclusion in hitherto affluent nations such as Argentina became simply catastrophic, and it was far worse in Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia.

The utter failure of neo-liberalism and the social catastrophe it brought over the whole the continent, led first to the rise of powerful social movements and secondly to the unraveling of the social coalitions that had made the implementation and consolidation of neo-liberalism possible – in some cases leading to the actual collapse and near disappearance of those parties.

Social movements

The social movements had, in the long and hard years of opposition to neo-liberalism, formulated their needs, but they had done it in a way that universalized them in a new type of politics which can be summarized in the World Social Forum’s slogan: Another World is Possible.

At the risk of generalizing, the combined phenomena of the crisis of legitimacy of the existing political parties and the rise of powerful social movements, led to the emergence of unusual and unorthodox political conduits through which the mass movement could and did channel their energies and effect the formulation in policy (concrete) terms of their aspirations.


Slums in Caracas, capital of Venezuela
These social movements have roots deep in the history of the nations where they have emerged. It is not surprising that they seek to establish an intellectual and political link between their own struggles of those of their ancestors, such as Bolivar, Zamora, Rodríguez, Pachakuti, Artigas, Tiradentes, Zapata, and such like.


These movements seek to ‘complete’ what their historic national political ancestors began, and are Bolivarian in a Latinoamericanista sense: they share a common history, a common ‘enemy’, face similar obstacles to their progress, are mortgaged to the same international financial institutions, suffer similar kinds of discrimination, similar kinds of social, cultural, economic and political exclusion, and are in the grip of the same straitjacket, namely, neo-liberalism.

This is the material base on which ALBA rests.

“The epoch that has just begun through long and difficult battles, is that of President Chávez’s ALBA, that is the dream of Martí and Bolívar of a solidarious and united in social justice Latin America, the realization of the human potential of its inhabitants, the defense of their culture and the conquest of a dignified position in the century that begins.” [2]

The official document launching ALBA (Construyendo el ALBA “Nuestro Norte es el Sur”) poses the objective of building of a common, prosperous future for Latin America, one that addresses the abhorrent social inequalities and that allows the region to insert itself in the globalised world through a model with possibilities of sustainable development, that is, through an alternative economic strategy for the region, which involves fields such as culture, environment, politics, society, economics and many other features of Latin America.


ALBA is the alternative to ALCA firstly because it seeks to uphold the rights of society as a whole (the specific rights of workers, peasants, women, indigenous groups, the poor, youth, children, and so forth) and, secondly, it is the cumulative experience of the utopias which Latin Americans have attempted over the centuries since the European invasion and conquest back in the 16th century.


Thus, the new society is contained in the multifarious aspirations of the social movements and their struggles.

ALBA’s specific projects

The agreements signed with Cuba were based on the principle of recognizing asymmetries between the partners and building in compensatory mechanisms that address these asymmetries but which do not diminish the sovereignty of any of the participants.

Since July 2002, President Chávez had been putting forward the idea of creating Petroamérica, which he did for the first time at the II Summit of South American heads of State in Guayaquil, Ecuador. This was pursued in August 2003 in Trinidad and Tobago where a Letter of Intent was signed by various countries aimed at cooperation amongst Latin American state oil and gas companies; finally, in the Iguazu Declaration of 8 July 2004 when PetroAmérica was actually established. Two days later, Caracas proposed the creation of PetroCaribe and on August 27, 2004, in Jamaica, 13 nations signed an agreement to set it up.

They are viewed as strategic alliances that rest on the commercialization oil and gas but which are based on the conservation of non-renewable natural resources, shared solidarity and social co-responsibility aimed at ensuring people’s democratic access to energy at affordable prices; they are also viewed as agreements among governments which do not envisage the fusion with private capital, nor the transfer of resources from the state to the private sector.

The strategy consists of conceiving the state energy companies as complementary so as to have a continental reach. [3]


On 17 June 2003, Brazil and Venezuela held the third Venezuela-Brazil Entrepreneurs Encounter in the city of Manaus and at which both Lula and Chavez were present. At the event Chavez stressed the need to strengthen Mercosur, aimed at the creation of a South American regional bloc and proposed the establishment of a Fund for the Integration of Latin America to foster a model of regional integration where the interests of the peoples are above those of the market and where the aim of joint policies was the improvement in the standard of living of the poor seeking to reduce existing social inequalities through a reversal of neoliberalism and the setting up of mechanisms of regional cooperation.


In May 2005 PetroSur was created jointly by Argentina, Brazil and Venezuela, deemed the energy enterprise of Mercosur. In August 2005, Uruguay joined the initiative which is aimed at regional economic development as well as addressing some of the most urgent social problems of the member states through social, health and educational programs, as well as plans to reduce unemployment. [4]

PetroAmerica

Brazil, Venezuela, Argentina and Bolivia signed, on 8 June, 2004, a long-term, gradual project whose objective is that the state energy companies involved undertake investment, exploitation and exploration of oil and natural gas jointly, first as an alliance of companies which will end up merging into a continental multinational.


Venezuela has already signed bilateral agreements with Petrobras, Petroecuador, Cupet, and Petrotrin, all seeking similar objectives to those of Petroamerica. Also Venezuela set up a refinery with Brazil in Para, Northeast of Brazil in 2002, jointly run by Petrobras and PDVSA.

The broader objective is to establish a network of oil extraction plants, refineries and petrol stations in the whole of the Brazilian North East (the country’s poorest and most populous region) to supply fuel at heavily subsided prices. In 2003, a similar agreement was signed between PDVSA and Petroecuador which gave life to the “Unidad Hidrocarbuferica Regional” and whose natural gas sector will be jointly operated by the two companies and which will also involve the joint commercialization of liquid gas, kerosene, asphalt, and the raw material for lubricants.

Then, in October 2003, it was the turn of Argentina when Nestor Kirchner signed an agreement with Venezuela by which provincial state energy companies would enter into association with PDVSA and Petrobras. In 2004, Kirchner set up the Empresa Nacional de Energía, ENARSA, with a majority state stake for Argentina to better benefit from the energy agreements with Venezuela, Brazil and other oil producers in the region.

Setback for privatisation


ENARSA represents a setback for privatisation in the country since it comes to replace Yacimientos Petroliferos Fiscales (YPF), the old oil state company which was sold at a pittance to Repsol, a Spanish corporation, under the Menem administration.

In April 2004, Venezuela signed an energy agreement with Bolivia’s YPF, a state company strengthened by President Carlos Mesa and which had been reduced to nothing by former President Gonzalo Sanchez de Losada. PDVSA is to provide technical advice with the aim to assist Bolivia in the process of recovery of its natural resources.


Ramirez, head of PDVSA, spelt out the strategic objective behind PetroAmerica:


“Together we will be stronger and have greater bargaining power. We have culture, language, history and problems which are similar, but we must find consensus with regards to technology and commerce in order to cheapen energy for our countries.” [5]

Pipeline

On 26 September, 2005, the Energy Ministers of the governments of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, Surinam and Venezuela, signed the Caracas Declaration of the South American Community of Nations, which intends to continue taking concrete steps in order to advance towards the energy integration of the countries of the region. [6]

Also in September 2005, Brazil and Venezuela signed an agreement of energy complementariness and integration between PDVSA and PETROBRAS which includes intense collaboration in the areas of supply and commercialization of crude oil, as well as exploration and extraction of oil and gas; design, construction and joint operation of refineries, storage facilities and deposits; transport and logistics, technology, training and public policies. The purpose, as stated by Lula, was a gigantic step forward in the process of integration 200 years after the initiation of that process by the Libertadores. [7]


On 3 January, 2006, Chavez welcomed Evo Morales’ electoral victory in the December 2005 Bolivian presidential election by offering Bolivia all its diesel needs for 2006 (which amount to about US$30 million) and said: “I do not accept that they pay us a single cent, but the equivalent in agricultural produce.” He also announced that PDVSA will open a commercial office in Bolivia to facilitate the integration process. [8]


Petroamérica then, is unique in that it is an anti-imperialist multinational company which will control about 15% of the world reserves of crude oil, would benefit from the areas of strength from all the participants and would lift the standard of living of about 530 million people. [9]

The corollary of energy integration of the region will be a 8,000 km pipeline which will run the length of South America linking Argentina, Uruguay, Bolivia, Paraguay, Brazil and Venezuela with an estimated cost of between US$17 to US$20 billion. It is a joint project of Brazil, Venezuela, Argentina and Bolivia.

Collective efforts

A centerpiece of ALBA is to free Latin America from the iron grip of the IMF and such international financial institutions. Chavez knows that unless the collective efforts of key nations in the region are enlisted into a concrete project that actually significantly reduce their financial dependence from the traditional centres of multinational and U.S. power and influence, it will not be possible to embark upon progressive Bolivarian programs.


One way, as we have seen already with Venezuelan diesel for Bolivia, is to enter into barter agreements so that the exchange of goods and services takes place outside the usual international banking and corporate trading system.


“Hugo Chavez has been at the epicenter of this innovative change and is enlisting support of other leaders in the region to join with him. Discussions have been held about establishing a Bank of the South to finance "real" development projects without the suffocating and constricting burdens of debt that come with IMF loans.” [10]


The best known example of this is the exchange of Venezuelan oil for 20,000 Cuban doctors, the crucial factor that has ensured the successful implementation of the Barrio Adentro Missions to provide free basic and other more complex health care to at least 17 million Venezuelans.

Cuba has also sent teachers to teach illiterate Venezuelans to read and write. Another manifestation is the agreement between Argentina and Venezuela on oil for cattle and dairy products. No hard cash or currency changes hands. [11]

Wise measures

The Bolivarian regime in Caracas has already demonstrated practically what can be achieved if financial resources are used wisely and collectively. At the beginning of 2006 Venezuela bought about US$2.5 billion in bonds of Argentina’s debt. This plus the robust economic performance of the economy in 2005 allowed Argentina to pay about US$9 bn of its external debt that was due between the financial years 2006 and 2007.


Presidents of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil and Venezuela link hands
Chavez praised Kirchner’s decision and promised to help Argentina end its financial dependence on the IMF. Brazil also announced it will be paying ahead of schedule the sum of US$15.5 bn of its external debt which was due to be paid in installments up to 2008. Evo Morales, due to a combination of high gas prices and financial surplus, also announced that it will not require monies form the IMF either. [12]

The strong economic performance of these economies does not in itself explain their efforts to obtain as much autonomy from the IMF as possible. It is the process of regional integration which has created a context where this is possible. Bolivia itself has already benefited from Venezuelan oil; additionally it has received Cuban and Venezuelan volunteers to implement literacy programs and has been offered 5,000 grants to train Bolivian doctors from Cuba and another 5,000 grants from Cuba, plus full integration in Mercosur as well as full participation in the energy plans already mentioned.

Literacy

The Cuba-Venezuela-Bolivia agreement on literacy will benefit immediately 200,000 people in Bolivia through the Cuban audiovisual teaching method ‘Yo si puedo’ which will establish 10,000 centres of literacy in the nation. The total number of illiterate people on Bolivia is 1.1 million, that is, 13.3% of the population. A similar number in Venezuela were made literate in about 2 years. [13]

Venezuela argues that the Bank of the South is meant as a fund built up with part of the reserves of the participant countries (Brazil, Argentina and Venezuela have been specifically mentioned by President Chavez) to enable countries to borrow without their economic policies being determined by Washington.

However, Chavez’s proposal goes much further than the establishment of an independent financial institution. The Bank of the South is seen as a key instrument in the ongoing process of regional integration and, as Gastón Parra, President of Venezuela’s Central Bank, said at a seminar on financial integration organized by Venezuela, Brazil and Argentina held in Caracas on March 24, 2006, also aims at the creation of a single currency, the establishment of a free trade zone with common foreign tariffs and the coordination of economic policies. [14]

Telesur

Another initiative stemming from ALBA is Telesur, a TV channel primarily aimed at Latin America by the joint efforts of Venezuela (51%), Cuba (19%), Uruguay (10%) and Argentina (20%) with the support of Brazil. It aims to rival CNN and Fox, whose networks dominate the waves in the Spanish-speaking TV news and other media with a mass viewership.

Jorge Botero, the Colombian director of Telesur, says that the with the new TV channel "We want our cameras to get into places that their cameras have never been, to give a real, street-level view […] 'The true face of Latin America.'" [15] This is the view from the South about the South and the relation of the South with the South as well as the North’s relation to the South, as the channel’s slogan has it: “Nuestro Norte es el Sur”.

Telesur is a counter-hegemonic telecommunications project, unique in its field, a major undertaking because it confronts the hugely powerful media oligopolies that overwhelmingly dominate the airwaves.



Telesur: 'the true face of Latin America'
The importance of having an alternative, critical, view of news is becoming increasingly crucial as Latin America moves to the left and the pro-US traditional parties suffer defeat after defeat and increasingly rely on the manipulation and lies to stem the leftward trend.

TV imperialism

In the April 2002 coup against President Chavez the media, particularly the TV networks, played a central role in helping to create the atmosphere which made the temporary ousting temporarily of the President possible. In Venezuela 90% of the media are private, anti-Chavez, companies and their vociferous message has become increasingly strident and overtly propagandistic.


Furthermore, in the region 70% of the TV programming is imported with the United States being responsible for 62% of it. It is estimated that for the United States, the largest export industry is movies and television programs. Additionally, the US, the EU and Japan control 90% of the information worldwide, and out of 300 leading information corporations, 144 are in the United States, 80 in the European Union and 49 in Japan.

Telesur’s advisory council includes well known figures such as Ernesto Cardenal of Nicaragua, Luis Britto of Venezuela, Eduardo Galeano of Uruguay, Fernando 'Pino' Solanas of Argentina, Ignacio Ramonet of France, Danny Glover of the USA and Tariq Ali, a Briton of Pakistani origin.

Telesur is independent of the governments that sponsor it and has permanent correspondents in Bogota, Brasilia, Buenos Aires, Caracas, Mexico City, Havana, Montevideo, La Paz and Washington, along with a network of stringers.

Telesur actively seeks links with social and mass movements in the region so as to inform about their plight and struggles. Telesur consciously and deliberately seeks to show the ‘other America’ the one that never appears in the mainstream networks: the indigenous communities, Black people, peasants, workers, women, youth from the barrios (including their rapping), and the poor more generally, all combined with informative documentaries, interviews to intellectuals, artists and radical politicians. [16]

Never before has the cultural and propaganda hegemony of the United States in the region has been challenged so comprehensively and so effectively.

Economic and political obstacles to ALBA

As can be imagined, the United States is deeply hostile to all of this ands will do anything and everything to stop it.


An important plank of the US tactics is to lure as many countries as possible in the region to sign 'free' trade agreements (FTAs) as a way of inoculating them against the Bolivarianism of Cuba and Venezuela. Central America has been cajoled into CAFTA. The FTAs are being extended to Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Chile. Also, the United States is endeavouring to lure the more moderate Left wing regimes in the region, such as Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay, away from the ALBA project.


Where this is not possible the US unleashes destabilization programs. The program of destabilization against Evo Morales has begun and it consists of support for secessionist currents in Santa Cruz.

There is, additionally, the seemingly unsurmountable problem of existing asymmetries. This is evident in, for example, significant differences in the labour costs of Brazil and Argentina, both countries responsible for the bulk of the trade in MERCOSUR. As late as 2004-05, Argentina was breaking the trading bloc’s rules by practicing protectionism against imports from its powerful neighbour, because they were thwarting the country’s industrial recovery.

Furthermore, Brazil and Argentina are competitors in almost every area and they export to the same countries and seek foreign investment from the same sources.

The election of Morales in Bolivia consolidates the position of the Bolivarians at a continental level by changing the relation of forces further in their favour against the United States but the price of Bolivian gas for Brazil and Argentina will increase considerably, raising all sort of difficulties. [17]


Furthermore, if Morales is to increase the movement’s electoral and political strength he must address the pent up socio-economic demands of the vast majority of Bolivians. The only source of economic resources to finance social programs is the nation’s gas. [18] It will not be easy for Argentina and Brazil to absorb the extra cost.

These objective obstacles stemming from the uneven and combined underdevelopment of the Latin American countries can be multiplied ad infinitum (see the severe conflict between Argentina and Uruguay over the construction of two large cellulose factories in the latter which is being fiercely opposed by the former, for example).


Similar disparities can be found between Peru and Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador, Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina and all three of them, Brazil and all four of them. No process of integration, ALBA being no exception, can overcome these enormous hurdles in the short term.

ALBA and the United States: the coming showdown


ALBA and ALCA are fundamentally incompatible and the Bush administration (or its Democratic successors) will do whatever it takes to stop and reverse its objective and subjective logic.

It is unthinkable to imagine a government of the empire that is prepared to coexist in a hemisphere in which its neighbours – traditionally under its economic, political and cultural thumb – assert their independence, nationalism and autonomy away from and against the interests of its financial, industrial and military oligarchy.

Given the intense hostility expressed by high officials of the Bush administration such as Condoleezza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld, Roger Noriega, John Negroponte, John Bolton and a few others, the United States’ opposition to the Bolivarian integration of some Latin American countries, let alone the region as a whole, little needs to be said about the US intentions.

The inference of their hostility is clear, if they can overthrow the Chavez government, they will, whether through supporting a long-term campaign of domestic destabilization (which they have tried and failed, several times), a border conflict involving centrally Colombia which would allow the U.S. military to ‘jointly’ invade Venezuela, or through direct U.S. military invasion and ‘get the job done’. This hostility is compounded by the fact that Venezuela’s strategic ally in the Bolivarian project is Cuba. [19] In both cases, the logic of the US plans is the subversion and overthrowing of these regimes through massive military intervention.

It is difficult to interpret the obsessive desire of the Bush administration to establish as many military bases in Latin America as possible in any other way than a systematic preparation for a ‘preventive war’ against ‘rogue’ states in the region.

The United States has military bases in Guantanamo Bay, Roosevelt Roads and Forth Buchanan in Puerto Rico, air bases in Aruba and Curaçao, Palmerola and Soto Cano in Honduras, Manta in Ecuador, and radar stations in Colombia and several other secret locations in the region and it is busily militarizing the Triple Frontier (border area in Brazil, Pargauay and Bolivia), where US spokespeople allege Al Qaida and Hizbollah have links with Latin American Marxist guerrillas, radical populists, left wing narco-traffickers and, of course, with Chávez, Castro and Evo Morales.

A worrying trend in US military expenditure is that of the US$333.7 billion it spends on defense, 43% is devoted to Latin America. The US already operates from military facilities in Paraguay’s bases of Coronel Oviedo, Salto de Guairá and Pedro Juan Caballero, but since May 2005, it does it from its own military base granted by the Paraguayan government and parliament in Mariscal Estigarribia. [20] And recently, the US has set up a military camp in Barahona, Dominican Republic, which is building rapidly into a military base.


True, the empire is heavily bogged down in Iraq and it looks very difficult for it to extricate itself from the mire in which it got itself embroiled. Thus, objectively it looks quite unlikely that the United States will launch an all-out invasion of Cuba or Venezuela or both.

Nevertheless, they are getting quite desperate. The Bush administration has barely two years to ‘sort out’ Cuba and Venezuela. The presidential election in 2008 is unlikely to produce another Republican administration although since 2000 US elections have become quite unpredictable affairs. Thus, they are busily expanding their military positions and capabilities in the region for the showdown that they know is coming.




Francisco Dominguez is head of Latin American Studies at Middlesex University, UK





References:

[1] Alternativa Bolivarian apara las Américas, ¿Qué es la Alternativa Bolivariana para América Latina y El Caribe?, www.alternativabolivariana.org, visited Feb 7, 2006.

[2] Diputado Rafael Correa Flores, Constuyendo el ALBA “Nuestro Norte es el Sur”, Ediciones del 40 Aniversario del Parlamento Latinoamericano, 1ra Edición, Caracas, República Bolivariana de Venezuela, Mayo 2005, p. 16.

[3] Diputado Rafael Correa Flores, op.cit., p. 21.

[4] PDVSA, Uruguay firma Acuerdo de Adhesión a la Secretaría de PETROSUR, 10-08-2005, www.pdvsa.com

[5] Miguel Lora, “Petroamerica, la estrategia sudamericana para recuperar la soberanía energética”, www.granma.cubaweb.cu/secciones/alba, visited Feb 7, 2006.

[6] PDVSA, Se robustece Petroamérica en el ámbito de la integración, 26-20 September, 2006, www.pdvsa.com

[7] PDVSA, Acuerdo energético Venezuela – Brasil fortalece Petrosur y estructura Petroamérica, 30-09-2005, www.pdvsa.com

[8] PDVSA, Presidente Chávez: “Con la llegada de Evo se fortalece Petroamérica” 03-01-2006, www.pdvsa.com

[9] PDVSA, Petroamérica controlaría 11.5% de reservas mundiales de petróleo, 06-10-2004, www.pdvsa.com

[10] Stephen Lendman, Venezuela’s Bolivarian Movement: Its Promise and Perils, Wednesday, Jan 04, 2006, www.venezuelanalysis.com


[11] Stephen Lendman, Venezuela’s Bolivarian Movement: Its Promise and Perils, Wednesday, Jan 04, 2006, www.venezuelanalysis.com

[12] In January 2005, Venezuela also bought $25 million, or about 4 percent, of the first Ecuadorian bonds issued since the country’s 1999 default (Simone Baribeau Venezuela to Buy Argentine Bonds, Backs IMF Payoff Wednesday, Dec 21, 2005, www.venezuelanalysis.com)

[13] Ministry of Comunication and Information of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Venezuela-Cuba-Bolivia: Plan de Alfabetización para América Latina, 20 March, 2006; La Razón, Venezuela-Cuba-Bolivia: El Plan de Alfabetización, 20 March, 2006; Prensa Latina, Primera Oleada de Alfabetización Alcanzará a 200 Mil Bolivianos; 20 March, 2006.

[14] Prensa Latina, Venezuela urges Latin American Banco del Sur, March 25, 2006, http://www.plenglish.com/article.asp?ID=%7B65AF16BA-D011-47D6-A6AA-F9E905370052%7D&language=EN

[15] Iain Bruce, Caracas Venezuela sets up 'CNN rival', http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4620411.stm

[16] Telesur has been under severe attack from right wing Republican members of Congress – such as Connie Mack [R-Fla] - who see it as the most pernicious ‘communistic’ propaganda being used by Chavez to promote his Bolivarian Revolution throughout the rest of the continent and undermine the US position in the Western Hemisphere. In fact, in Mack’s website, Telesur is presented as something much worse: “New Alliance Between Chavez’s Telesur and Al-Jazeera Creates Global Terror TV Network”(http://mack.house.gov/index.cfm?FuseActionfiltered=PressReleases.View&ContentRecord_id=173).

[17] Green Left Weekly, Reversing neo-liberalism: an interview with Bolivia’s new energy minister, 1 February, 2006, www.greenleft.org.au/back/2006/654/654p12.htm

[18] The first steps were taken the day after Morales’ inauguration. PDVSA opened an office in La Paz on January 23. That same day, an agreement was signed by Chavez and Morales for cooperation between PDVSA and YPBF to develop projects for infrastructure, processing and refining of gas and petroleum (Green Left Weekly, 1 February, 2006, op.cit.

[19] With regards to Cuba, the US plan is to implement a blueprint for regime change in the Caribbean island which includes among other niceties, the complete dissolution of the state’s armed institutions, the illegalization of the Cuban Communist party and the Confederación de Trabajadores Cubanos and any other ‘communist’ organization such as the Federación de Mujeres Cubanas and many more that exist in the island, the transformation of Cuba into a capitalist country, the ‘recovery’ of the confiscated land, property, buildings, houses, enterprises and everything else that used to belong to US corporations and the some of the Cubans living in Miami; the US has even appointed a ‘Transition Coordinator’, Caleb McGarry whose sole job is to ‘transition’ Cuba.

[20] Cristian Lora, Fuerzas de EE.UU Inician Operativo "Medrete", Portalba, Alternativa Bolivariana para la América, 10 March, 2006 www.alternativabolivariana.org;
http://21stcenturysocialism.com/article/alba_latin_americas_anti-imperialist_economic_project_01110.html

Anti-terrorism laws in India & The need of POTA

In the new millennium, we face the very real and increasing prospect that regional aggressor, third-rate armies, terrorist groups and even religious cults will seek to wield disproportionate power by acquiring and using weapons of mass destructions - Secretary Of Defense William Cohen Of U.S.A.

Introduction
First in Varanasi then in Delhi then in Mumbai local trains and I do not think there is even a need to mention the continuing terrorist's barbaric activities in Kashmir. The bomb blasts have outraged every patriotic Indian. No civilized nation can allow this kind of barbaric inhumanity to be partly or fully supported or sponsored by any neighbor or domestic insurgents. The only way we can combat it is to minimize, if not eliminate, such occurrences. Prevention is crucial; and laws like Pota can prevent such occurrences. Acquittals even in a case like Parliament attack occurred because of poor prosecution rather then because of Pota.

After the 9/11 attacks on the world trade center the world's outlook towards the terrorist and terrorist organization has changed the laws have become much more stringent to curb such activities. The Indian outlook also changed specially after the 13 December attack on the Indian parliament which is seen as a symbol of our democracy then it became necessary to enforce a law which would be more stringent so that the terrorist can not go Scot free because after the lapse of TADA in 1995 following the wide spread complaint that it was being abused there was no law which could be used as a weapon against the rising terrorist activities in India.

India is facing multifarious challenges in the management of its internal security. There is an upsurge of terrorist activities, intensification of cross border terrorist activities and insurgent groups in different parts of the country. Terrorism has now acquired global dimensions and has become the challenge for the whole world. The reach and methods adopted by terrorist groups and organization take advantage of modern means of communication and technology using high tech facilities available in the form of communication system, transport, sophisticated arms and various other means. This has enabled
them to strike and create terror among people at will. The criminal justice system was not designed to deal with such type of heinous crimes. In view of this situation it was felt necessary to enact legislation for the prevention of and for dealing with terrorist activities

In 2002 March session of the Indian parliament the Prevention Of Terrorist Activities Act was introduced and it had widespread opposition not even in the Indian parliament but throughout India especially with the human rights organization because they thought that the act violated most of the fundamental rights provided in the Indian constitution. The protagonists of the Act have, however, hailed the legislation on the ground that it has been effective in ensuring the speedy trial of those accused of indulging in or abetting terrorism. POTA is useful in stemming "state-sponsored cross-border terrorism", as envisaged by the
then Home Minister L.K. Advani. The Prevention of Terrorism Act, 2002 (POTA), was seen as a controversial piece of legislation ever since it was conceived as a weapon against terrorism.

What is terrorism?
The term "terrorism" comes from the French word terrorisme, which is based on the Latin verb terrere (to cause to tremble). It dates back to 1795 when it was used to describe the actions of the Jacobin Club in their rule of post-Revolutionary France, the so-called "Reign of Terror". Jacobins are rumored to have coined the term "terrorists" to refer to themselves. Terrorism refers to a strategy of using violence, social threats, or coordinated attacks, in order to generate fear, cause disruption, and
ultimately, brings about compliance with specified political, religious, or ideological demands. The European Union includes in its 2002 definition of "terrorism" the aim of "destabilising or destroying the fundamental political, constitutional, economic or social structures of a country." Terrorism is defined in the U.S. by the Code of Federal Bureau of Investigation as: ".the unlawful use of force and violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives." The FBI further describes terrorism as either domestic or international, depending on the origin, base, and objectives of the terrorists.

Anti-Terrorist Laws in U.S.A. and Pakistan.
In Pakistan-
In 2002, ordinance was issued for the inclusion of military officers in the panel of judges to try terrorist offences. This not only
undermines the independence of the judiciary but makes the anti-terror law in the country even more draconian Described as necessary that appropriate administrative and judicial measures be adopted to fight a spate of terrorist activities and
commission of heinous offences in Pakistan these anti-terrorism laws opened the door to grave violations of human rights including the right to life, the prohibition of torture, the right to liberty and security and the right to fair trial. Inter alia, they provide for the creation of anti terrorist courts and give wide powers of arrest and interrogation to the police and army.
Amnesty International has criticized the legislation in its report,

Legalizing the Impermissible: the new anti-terrorism law. It is important to note that the existing legal and judicial system is already equipped to deal with offences referred to in the act. The problem then seems to be a lack of implementation, not a lack of laws. However, in an attempt to hide this inefficiency, Pakistan adopted the anti-terrorist acts which provide speedy trial without necessary guarantees for the accused, unfair trials and license to kill etc.

The right to shoot to kill 1997 Anti-Terrorism Act Under Section 5(2)(1): an officer of the police, armed forces and civil armed forces may: (i) after giving prior warning use such force as may be deemed necessary or appropriate, bearing in mind all the facts and circumstances of the situation, against any person who is committing, or in all probability is likely to commit a terrorist act or a scheduled offence, and it shall be lawful for any such officer, or any superior officer, to fire, or order the firing upon any person or persons against whom he is authorized to use force in terms hereof The enactment of broad provisions empowering summary executions is not the way a modern civilized state ought to act. Rather the government should set strict limits to the circumstances in which firearms could be used to prevent arbitrary killing by the security forces. The broad powers given to the police and consequently, to the military and civil armed forces contravene major international standards of human rights. Indemnity for acts done in good faith: Section 39 of the act says: No suit, prosecution or other legal proceedings shall lie against any person in respect of anything which is in good faith done or intended to be done under this act.? This is tantamount to providing impunity to the security forces for abuses, including extra judicial killings. To explicitly place any acts of police or other law enforcement personnel, including possibly random resort to lethal force, outside scrutiny and accountability may give law enforcement personnel the impression that they may commit such acts with impunity if only they can claim to have done them in good faith. It breaches a basic requirement of the rule of law, namely its equal and exception less application to everyone. Confessions to police made admissible in court: The provision in the act in section 26 which says: The special court may, for admission of the confession in evidence, require the police officer to produce a video
tape together with the devices used for recording the confession.

Article 14(2) of the Constitution of Pakistan prohibits the use of torture, though only in the limited context of extraction of confessions: No person shall be subjected to torture for the purpose of extracting evidence. However, Pakistani law enforcement officials, to extract confessions from the accused, routinely use torture. Lending greater legal weight to confessions and putting pressure on police to speedily resolve crime may indirectly contribute to the continued and perhaps increased use of torture.

The right to be tried in a public place without prejudice to the defendant: Section 15 of the 1997 Anti-Terrorism Act states, The
government may direct that for the trial of a particular case, the court shall sit at such place including the place of occurrence as it may specify. This is intended to expose the defendant to public expressions of outrage, anger or even violence for his deeds, to humiliate him and to deter others by the specter of public exposure; it does not appear to serve the purpose of helping the judiciary establish the truth and do justice in a detached circumspect manner and in calm circumstances. The right to be presumed innocent: The act lays down that only special courts may grant bail to people tried for offences under the act but they may not release a defendant on bail if there are reasonable grounds for believing that he has been guilty of the offence with which he has been charged and unless the prosecution has been given an opportunity to ?show cause why he should not be released. This gives the prosecution the right to veto to deny bail.

The right to appeal: Section 31 of the act reads: A judgment or order passed, or sentence awarded, by a special court, subject to the result of an appeal under this act shall be final and shall not be called in question by any court. The possibility of the defendant to appeal to a court in the regular judicial system, either to the provincial high court or the Supreme Court of Pakistan is therefore excluded. People convicted and sentenced by the special courts are clearly disadvantaged in so far as their legal remedies are restricted: they have only one possibility of appeal, whereas people convicted by regular courts may
also appeal to the Supreme Court. This provision violates the principle of equality before law laid down in the Constitution of Pakistan. It is one of the fundamental principles of international human rights law. Moreover, the right to appeal is restricted in so far as it is subject to severe time limitations. The defendant may not in seven days be able to present an adequate appeal while the prosecution has 15 days for the appeal.

Moreover, the right to appeal of those facing the death penalty also appears to be seriously infringed under the act. Death penalty: Under Section 7(1) of the 1999 Amended Anti-terrorism Act, for terrorist acts resulting in death, courts have to mandatory impose the death penalty. This does not give any discretion to the judiciary. Section 22 of the 1997 Anti Terrorism Act, The government may specify the manner, mode and place of execution of any sentence passed under this act, having regard to the deterrent effect which such execution is likely to have?. Section 22 opens the possibility for public executions
of the death penalty,

In U.S.A.-
Since its passage following the September 11, 2001 attacks, the Patriot Act has played a key part and often the leading role in a number of successful operations to protect innocent Americans from the deadly plans of terrorists dedicated to destroying America and our way of life. While the results have been important, in passing The Patriot Act, Congress provided for only modest, incremental changes in the law. Congress simply took existing legal principles and retrofitted them to preserve the lives and liberty of the American people from the challenges posed by a global terrorist network. Congress passed the USA PATRIOT Act in response to the terrorists attacks of September 11, 2001. The Act gives federal officials greater authority to track and intercept communications, both for law enforcement and foreign intelligence gathering purposes. It vests the
Secretary of the Treasury with regulatory powers to combat corruption of U.S. financial institutions for foreign money laundering purposes. It seeks to further close our borders to foreign terrorists and to detain and remove those within our borders. It creates new crimes, new penalties, and new procedural efficiencies for use against domestic and international terrorists. Although it is not without safeguards, critics contend some of its provisions go too far. Although it grants many of the enhancements sought by the Department of Justice, others are concerned that it does not go far enough.

Criminal Investigations: Tracking and Gathering Communications-Federal communications privacy law features a three tiered system, erected for the dual purpose of protecting the confidentiality of private telephone, face-to-face, and computer communications while enabling authorities to identify and intercept criminal communications. The Crime Control and
Safe Streets Act of 1968 s give authorities a narrowly defined process for electronic surveillance to be used as a last resort in serious criminal cases. When approved by senior Justice Department officials, law enforcement officers may seek a court order authorizing them to secretly capture conversations concerning any of a statutory list of offenses.
Foreign Intelligence Investigations- The Act eases some of the restrictions on foreign intelligence gathering within the United States, and affords the U.S. intelligence community greater access to information unearthed during a criminal investigation, but it also establishes and expands safeguards against official abuse. More specifically, it: permits roving surveillance (court orders omitting the identification of the particular instrument, facilities, or place where the surveillance is to occur when the court finds the target is likely to thwart identification with particularity).

Alien Terrorists and Victims- The Act contains a number of provisions designed to prevent alien terrorists from entering the United States, particularly from Canada; to enable authorities to detain and deport alien terrorists and those who support them; and to provide humanitarian immigration relief for foreign victims of the attacks on September 11.

New crimes: The Act creates new federal crimes for terrorist attacks on mass transportation facilities, for biological weapons offenses, for harboring terrorists, for affording terrorists material support, for misconduct associated with money laundering already mentioned, for conducting the affairs of an enterprise which affects interstate or foreign commerce through the patterned commission of terrorist offenses, and for fraudulent charitable solicitation. Although strictly speaking these are new federal crimes, they generally supplement existing law by filling gaps and increasing penalties.

New Penalties: The Act increases the penalties for acts of terrorism and for crimes, which terrorists might commit. More specifically it establishes an alternative maximum penalty for acts of terrorism, raises the penalties for conspiracy to commit certain terrorist offenses, envisions sentencing some terrorists to life-long parole, and increases the penalties for counterfeiting, cyber-crime, and charity fraud.

Other Procedural Adjustments: In other procedural adjustments designed to facilitate criminal investigations, the Act: increases the rewards for information in terrorism cases; authorizes ?sneak and peek? search warrants; permits nationwide and perhaps worldwide execution of warrants in terrorism cases; eases government access to confidential information;
allows the Attorney General to collect DNA samples from prisoners convicted of any federal crime of violence or terrorism; lengthens the statute of limitations applicable to crimes of terrorism; clarifies the application of federal criminal law on American installations and in residences of U.S. government personnel overseas; and adjust federal victims? compensation and assistance programs.

History of anti-terrorism laws in India.
Terrorism has immensely affected India. The reasons for terrorism in India may vary vastly from religious to geographical to caste to history. The Indian Supreme Court took a note of it in Kartar Singh v. State of Punjab [1994] 3 SCC 569, where it observed that the country has been in the firm grip of spiraling terrorist violence and is caught between deadly pangs of disruptive activities. Apart from many skirmishes in various parts of the country, there were countless serious and horrendous events engulfing many cities with blood-bath, firing, looting, mad killing even without sparing women and children and
reducing those areas into a graveyard, which brutal atrocities have rocked and shocked the whole nation Deplorably, determined youths lured by hard-core criminals and underground extremists and attracted by the ideology of terrorism are indulging in committing serious crimes against the humanity.

Anti-terrorism laws in India have always been a subject of much controversy. One of the arguments is that these laws stand in the way of fundamental rights of citizens guaranteed by Part III of the Constitution. The anti-terrorist laws have been enacted before by the legislature and upheld by the judiciary though not without reluctance. The intention was to enact these statutes and bring them in force till the situation improves. The intention was not to make these drastic measures a permanent feature of law of the land. But because of continuing terrorist activities, the statutes have been reintroduced with requisite modifications.

At present, the legislations in force to check terrorism in India are the National Security Act, 1980 and the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967. There have been other anti-terrorism laws in force in this country a different points in time. Earlier, the following laws had been in force to counter and curb terrorism. The first law made in independent India to deal with terrorism and terrorist activities that came into force on 30 Dec 1967 was

- The Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act 1967
The UAPA was designed to deal with associations and activities that questioned the territorial integrity of India. When the Bill was debated in Parliament, leaders, and cutting across party affiliation, insisted that its ambit be so limited that the right to association remained unaffected and that the executive did not expose political parties to intrusion. So, the ambit of the Act was strictly limited to meeting the challenge to the territorial integrity of India. The Act was a self-contained code of provisions for declaring secessionist associations as unlawful, adjudication by a tribunal, control of funds and places of work of unlawful associations, penalties for their members etc. The Act has all along been worked holistically as such and is completely within the purview of the central list in the 7th Schedule of the Constitution.

- Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act, 1987 (TADA)
The second major act came into force on 3 September 1987 was The Terrorist & Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act 1987 this act had much more stringent provisions then the UAPA and it was specifically designed to deal with terrorist activities in India. When TADA was enacted it came to be challenged before the Apex Court of the country as being unconstitutional. The Supreme Court of India upheld its constitutional validity on the assumption that those entrusted with such draconic statutory powers would act in good faith and for the public good in the case of Kartar Singh vs State of Punjab (1994) 3 SCC 569.
However, there were many instances of misuse of power for collateral purposes. The rigorous provisions contained in the statute came to be abused in the hands of law enforcement officials. TADA lapsed in 1995. Other major Anti-terrorist law in India is The Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act, 1999 which was enforced on 24th April 1999. This law was specifically made to deal with rising organized crime in Maharashtra and specially in Mumbai due to the underworld. For instance, the definition of a terrorist act is far more stretchable in MCOCA than under POTA. For, POTA did not take note of organised crime as such while MCOCA not only mentions that but, what is more, includes `promotion of insurgency' as a terrorist act. Again, the onus to prove a person guilty under POTA lies on the prosecution while under the Maharashtra law a
person is presumed guilty unless he is able to prove his innocence. MCOCA does not stipulate prosecution of police officers found guilty of its misuse. But POTA did.

The need of POTA.
It is normally said that terrorism is a low intensity war. But the loss, which our country has suffered in the last two decades due to the rise of terrorist activities, has been on a very large scale. This country has fought four high intensity wars and in those wars we have lost more then 6000 people. We have already lost more then 70000 civilians. In addition, we have lost more then 9000 security personnel. Almost six lakh people in this country have become homeless as a result of terrorism. Outside the expenditure on our armed forces, merely for maintaining the entire set up to fight insurgency, to fight cross-border terrorism, the economic cost itself has been Rs 45000 crore. The budgetary increase itself in the last 15 years, because of terrorism or anti-insurgency activities, has been 26 times. We have no record of the explosives that have been used in various parts of the country. We have a record of crime. But the explosives that have been confiscated by our security agencies weigh 48000 kilos. If our security forces had not been vigilant enough to confiscate these explosives, they would probably have been enough to take care of every inch of Indian soil.

What are the regions that are affected: It is not only Kashmir; Punjab too has suffered. Also Mumbai, Delhi and other regions of the country like the North East. Development has suffered, the economy has suffered. You have now a brand of Maoist terrorism; People's War Group and other groups. A large part of Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh and Jharkhand right up to the Nepal border is affected. We had insurgency and terrorism in Tamil Nadu. We lost two of our former
prime ministers to this kind of terrorism.

In terms of our sovereignty, unity and integrity and our feeling of nationalism, terrorism strikes at each one of them. This is the enormity of the problem that we are addressing. But it is also said that our criminal law systems have broken down; it seems to be a sad fact to accept. Are we aware of the conviction rate under the so-called ordinary laws- At times we try and conceal the figures and say that in India the conviction rate is 40%. But that 40% is actually a camouflage because every time there is a challan and somebody pays Rs 100 as fine, it is recorded as a conviction. Every time somebody feels guilty and pays a
fine under company law, we take it as a conviction and then claim that the conviction rate is 40%. In heinous crimes like murder, the conviction rate under the so-called normal processes has come down to 6.5%. There are several reasons for this. One is that when we deal with hardened criminals, some of our old notions of criminal law have to change. It is a sad reality that crime in India has become a low risk business. It is a high profit business with a 93% probability that you can commit a hard crime and get away with it.

So it becomes very necessary in a country like India that if a law regarding terrorism is enacted it should be made so stringent that the culprit be bought to book and does not go scot-free just because of the loopholes and lacunaes in the ordinary law because when our neighboring nation Pakistan which is the cause of perpetrating terrorism in India and can have such stringent laws why can not we have such laws.

Analysis of some important sections of Pota-
In the case of People's Union for Civil Liberties Vs. Union of India (UOI) (2004) 9 SCC 580 the constitutional validity of the Prevention of Terrorism Act, 2002 was discussed. The court said that the Parliament possesses power under Article 248 and entry 97 of list I of the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution of India to legislate the Act. Need for the Act is a matter of policy and the court cannot go into the same. Once legislation is passed, the Govt. has an obligation to exercise all available options to prevent terrorism within the bounds of the constitution. Mere possibility of abuse cannot be a ground for denying the vesting of powers or for declaring a statute unconstitutionally. Court upheld the constitutional validity of the various provisions of the Act.

1.Section 3(a) Defining terrorist act- Whoever with the intent of threatening the unity, integrity, security and sovereignty of India or strike terror in the minds of people or any section of the people does any act or thing by using dynamite or explosive substances or inflammable substance or firearms or other lethal weapon or poisonous or noxious gases or other chemical or any substance of a hazardous nature in such a manner as to cause death or injuries to any person or loss or damage to property or disruption of any supplies or services essential for life.

Case Law- Devender Pal Singh Vs. State of N.C.T. of Delhi 2002 (1) SC (Cr.) 209 In a case where 9 person had died and several other injured on account of perpetrated acts The court said that such terrorist who have no respect for human life and people are killed due to there mindless killing. So any compassion to such person would frustrate the purpose of enactment of Tada and would amount to misplaced and unwarranted sympathy. Thus they should be given death sentence.

Argument against- trade union activity would be affected because whoever disrupts essential supplies would be covered under POTA.Argument in favor- at least our trade union leaders are nationalist leaders. Nobody has ever suggested that when our trade union leaders go on strike, they threaten the unity, integrity, security and sovereignty of India.

2. Section 4 Possession of certain unauthorized arms- Where any person is in unauthorized possession of any- bombs, dynamite or hazardous explosive substance or other lethal weapons capable of mass destruction or biological or chemical substances of warfare in any area, whether notified or not.

Case Law- Sanjay Duttt Vs. State through C.B.I 1994 SCC 410 The expression possession though that of section 5 of Tada has been stated to mean a conscious possession introducing thereby involvement of a mental element i.e. conscious possession & not mere custody without awareness of nature of such possession and as regards unauthorized means and regards without any authority of law.




Consequences of repeal of POTA-
Finally on September 17, 2004 the Union Cabinet in keeping with the UPA government's Common Minimum Programme, approved ordinances to repeal the controversial Prevention of Terrorism Act, 2002 and amend the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967. By the promulgation of 1.Ordinance No.1 of 2004, it repealed POTA, a law specially designed to
deal with the menace of terrorism with its repeal, the state apparatus combating terrorism has been debilitated.

2. By Ordinance No 2 promulgated on the same day, virtually all the penal provisions of Pota concerning terrorist organisations and activities were transferred to the pre-existing milder sounding Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 (UAPA). By Ordinance No 2, the definition of unlawful association has been expanded to also include any association which has for its object any activity which is punishable under Section 153A of the Indian Penal Code, or which encourages or aids persons to undertake any such activity, or of which the members undertake any such activity. Section 153A is about promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, etc.

3. There would be no arrests made after the ordinance is promulgated.

4. Among the special provisions dropped are those restricting release on bail and allowing longer periods of police remand for the accused. Now suspected terrorists may roam free under the bail a rule, jail an exception dictum. The police will not get sufficient time to interrogate the accused to investigate the cases which, by their very nature, are complex. In Pota, as in Tada earlier, confessions made before a police officer of the rank of superintendent were admitted as evidence.

5. All terrorist organizations banned under POTA would continue to remain banned, under the Unlawful Activities Act, after the repeal of the Act.

6. Some of the clauses contained in POTA, which will be completely dropped in the amended Unlawful Activities Act, are: the onus on the accused to prove his innocence, compulsory denial of bail to accused and admission as evidence in the court of law the confession made by the accused before the police officer.

7. In another major departure from Pota, the government has removed all traces of strict liability. Meaning, the burden of proof has shifted from the accused to the police. There is no presumption of guilt under UAPA. Like under any other ordinary criminal law, the police will have to establish that the accused person had a criminal intention for committing the offence in question.

8. But beware, these concessions from the internal security establishment have not come without a price. As reported recently in the Indian Express, UAPA is more draconian than Pota when it comes to the admissibility in evidence of telephone and e-mail intercepts. The police can now produce intercepts in the court without abiding by any of the elaborate safeguards provided by the repealed law. Thus, if the police cannot anymore extract a confession in custody, they have been given
more scope than before to plant evidence in the form of interceptions.

9. Another glaring shortcoming in the new law pertains to the dichotomy in the provision for banning terrorist organisations and unlawful organisations. UAPA was originally meant only for banning unlawful organisations. Now it has a separate chapter for banning terrorist organisations as well. Thus, the procedures prescribed by the same law for the two kinds of bans are different. But the problem is that the procedure for banning a group on the charge of terrorism is easier than to ban it on the milder charge of unlawful activities. The government cannot, for instance, ban any group for unlawful activities without
having its decision ratified within six months by a judicial tribunal headed by a sitting high court judge. There is no such requirement if the ban is on the charge of terrorism. This anomaly has arisen because of the strategy adopted by the UPA government to hide special provisions in an ordinary law.

So what remains on the statute books- The UAPA was designed to deal with associations and activities that questioned the territorial integrity of India. When the Bill was debated in Parliament, leaders, cutting across party affiliation, insisted that its ambit be so limited that the right to association remained unaffected and that political parties were not exposed to intrusion by the executive. So, the ambit of the Act was strictly limited to meeting the challenge to the territorial integrity of India.

Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Amendment Act, 2004
It would however be simplistic to suggest, as some critics did, that the new law has retained all the operational teeth of Pota or it has made only cosmetic changes. The difference between Pota and UAPA is substantial even as a lot of provisions are in common.

A brief outline of the amended act:
The Act does not define the word terrorist in its definition clause but defines a terrorist act. The word terrorist is to be construed according the definition of the terrorist act. Terrorist act is defined in the Act as - Whoever, with intent to threaten the unity, integrity, security or sovereignty of India or to strike terror in the people or any section of the people in India or in any foreign country, does any act by using bombs, dynamite or other explosive substances or inflammable substances or firearms or other lethal weapons or poisons or noxious gases or other chemicals or by any other substances (whether biological or otherwise) of a hazardous nature, in such a manner as to cause, or likely to cause, death of, or injuries to any person or persons or loss of, or damage to, or destruction of, property or disruption of any supplies or services essential to the life of the community in India or in any foreign country or causes damage or destruction of any property or equipment used or intended to be used for the defence of India or in connection with any other purposes of the Government of India, any State Government or any of their agencies, or detains any person and threatens to kill or injure such person in order to compel the Government in India or the Government of a foreign country or any other person to do or abstain from doing any act, commits a terrorist act (Section 15).The above definition did not exist in the 1967 Act. The previous Act only defined and dealt with unlawful activity. An unlawful activity includes an activity which intends to bring about cession of a part of the territory of India or the secession of a part of the territory of India from the Union, or which incites any individual or group of individuals to bring about such cession or secession; or which disclaims, questions, disrupts or is intended to disrupt the sovereignty and territorial integrity of India, or which causes or is intended to cause disaffection against India Section 2(o).

Whether an association is unlawful is to be declared by the Central government by giving the grounds for such a declaration. Section 3 Thereafter; it is referred to the Tribunal Section 4. A notice is issued by the Tribunal to the association concerned to show cause why it should not be declared unlawful. To ascertain whether there is sufficient cause for declaring the association unlawful.

For taking cognizance of any offence under this Act prior sanction of the Central or the State government, as the case may be, is necessary. Criminal Procedure Code, 1973, is made applicable in matters of arrest, bail, confessions and burden of proof. Those arrested are to be brought before a magistrate within 24 hours, confessions are no longer admissible before police officers and bail need not be denied for the first three months. The presumption of innocence leaving the burden of
proof on the prosecution has also been restored.

The evidence collected through interception of wireless, electronic or oral communication under the provisions of the Indian Telegraph Act or the Information Technology Act or any law being in force has been made admissible as evidence against the accused in the court Section 46.The amended Act provides for following penalties: Offence Includes Penalty

Being a member of an unlawful association A person who is and continues to be a member of such association, takes part in meetings, contributes to, or receives or solicits any contribution for the purposes of the association or in any way assists the operations of such association. If such person is in possession of unlicensed firearms, ammunition, explosive, etc, capable of causing mass destruction and commits any act resulting in loss of human life or grievous injury to any person or causes significant damage to any property, and if such act has resulted in the death of any person. In any other case Imprisonment for a term which may extend to two years and fine.

Death or imprisonment for life.
Imprisonment for not less than five years. Dealing with funds of an unlawful association Includes an association declared unlawful by the central government. Such association is prohibited from dealing in any manner with moneys, securities or credits pays. Imprisonment upto three years, or fine, or both. Contravention of an order made in respect of a notified place Includes use of articles for unlawful activities found in a notified place (i.e. a place used for unlawful association and so notified by the central government). Imprisonment upto one year. Unlawful activities Includes taking part in or committing an unlawful act, advocating, abetting, advising or inciting the commission of any unlawful activity. Assisting an unlawful organization in its activities. A term of seven years and fine.

Imprisonment upto five years or fine, or both. The amended law now contains new provisions dealing with terrorist acts,
the offences and their punishments. Chapter IV, sections 15-22. The following table summarises these provisions:
Offence Punishment Terrorist act Resulting in death of any person In any other case Death or imprisonment for life.
A term for not less than five years.

Raising funds for a terrorist act Term not less than five years. Conspiracy Term not less than five years. Harbouring Imprisonment for not less than three years. Being a member of a terrorist organization The term may extend upto
imprisonment for life.

Holding proceeds of terrorism May extend to imprisonment for life. Threatening witnesses Imprisonment upto three years.
There is a provision in the Act which provides for enhanced penalties. Any person aiding a terrorist or acting in contravention to Explosives Act, 1884, the Explosive Substances Act, 1908 or the Inflammable Substances Act, 1952 or the Arms Act, 1959, or has unauthorized possession of bombs, explosives, etc, will be punished with a term not less than three years and may extend for life (Section 23). The Act also gives power to the Central and the State Governments, as the case may be, to forfeiture the proceeds of terrorism. The investigating officer is empowered to seize the concerned property with the prior approval of the Director General of the police of the State (Section 24 and 25). Cash (including monetary instruments) can also be seized if it is intended to be used for purposes of terrorism. The Court confirms the seized property and orders its forfeiture Section 26. An appeal to the High Court against the forfeiture is allowed within one month from the date of receipt of such order.

Chapter VI of the amended Act gives power to the Central government under section 35 to add or remove an organization in the schedule as a terrorist organization. Under section 36, an application can also be made to remove an organization from the schedule. Such an application can be made by an organization or any affected person. The offences and penalties under this chapter as given below:
Offences Punishment
Membership of a terrorist organization (S. 38) Imprisonment not exceeding ten years. Supporting a terrorist organization (S. 39) Imprisonment not exceeding ten years. Raising funds for terrorist organization (S. 40) A term not exceeding fourteen years.
The Act also provides for protection of witnesses under section 44 such as keeping the their identities secret even in orders, judgments and records of the Court, issuing directions to secure the identity of the witnesses and by imposing punishment for contravention of any such directions.
Conclusion
Various suspicion and voices have been raised by people NGO's under the pretext of constitution, constitutional provisions, and equality before law and civil rights. All these organizations must keep in mind that provisions are there in the constitution where reasonable restrictions can be enforced even upon the liberty of people and in view of the increasing terrorist activities in the nation more particularly in view of the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center which killed more then 3000 people and 13 December attack on the Indian Parliament and large number of terrorist activities not only in J&K, N.E., A.P., and other
areas of our country need for promulgation of POTA type legislation becomes the need of the hour. However there are numerous safeguards to prevent the abuse of above legislation by unscrupulous investigating officers, which are being ignored by various organization professing the repeal of such law. The attention of those who are against this legislation is invited to object and reason for which POTA was enacted. The repeal of Pota is just party politics to gain for their party's vote bank. If you do not give to your security forces and investigative forces the legal power, human rights violations will be much worse. Therefore, if you want, out of concern for human rights, the powers not to be misused, you cannot sustain a situation where you do not give powers to the police but put pressure on it to deliver. You will have a situation of anarchy.
Therefore, let us all understand the problem we are now dealing with. And this problem requires various kinds of provisions. Legitimate power has to be given because this is an extraordinary situation. Extraordinary situations require extraordinary remedies. Please do not advise us to use velvet gloves. Terrorism has several consequences that have to be faced in the context of a growing threat to the country. References have repeatedly been made to laws in other countries. It is very dangerous to quote selectively. Let us not selectively take our lessons from America. With all due respects to those great countries, when 3,000 people sadly died in the World Trade Centre, the US president said that a war had been launched on America. When 61,000 people and 8,000 security persons have died here, we are advised to show restraint. We are advised that this is the remedy; that we should deal with it under the normal procedure. Learning from this experience, I would urge
the people who are opposing this law to once again reconsider their stand because posterity eventually will decide that this country, for its integrity, sovereignty and unity certainly needs this law. Quite clearly, there is a crying need to fight the menace of terrorism unitedly. Partisanship of any sort in dealing with the ISI-sponsored terror attacks in India should be abandoned forthwith. Today terrorism has reached the heart of India in New Delhi's Parliament House. And to suggest that preventive detention laws without any safeguards whatsoever against their misuse were required in those relatively peaceful times in
the Seventies and Eighties but are not required now, even with safeguards against their misuse, is to betray a sickening streak of partisanship.
To the extent it detracts from presenting a united front against terrorists, the governments myopic stand on POTO and MCOCA in Delhi represents a greater threat to national unity than even the threat of the ISI-sponsored terror. So it becomes very necessary in a country like India that if a law regarding terrorism is enacted it should be made so stringent that the culprit be bought to book and does not go scot-free just because of the loopholes and lacunae's in the ordinary law because
when our neighboring nation Pakistan which is the cause of perpetrating terrorism in India can have such stringent laws then why can not we have such laws. Indian law as it stands today has come around in strange circumstances as the earlier legislation was found capable of being misuse. This law is less harsh than the previous anti-terrorism laws in India and is not equipped by way of express provision for discretion to deal with a vast variety of terrorist activity or other activities connected with perpetration of terrorism. Therefore I am of the considered opinion that the Prevention of Terrorist Activities Act should be brought back for curbing terrorism and such like activities with a strong arm, which may help in preventing and deterring such activities.
http://www.legalserviceindia.com/articles/anti_pota.htm
India must review its anti-terror laws, says British expert
Press Trust Of India
London, December 18, 2008
First Published: 11:06 IST(18/12/2008)
Last Updated: 11:11 IST(18/12/2008)

Print



India must have a root and branch review of its anti-terror laws including police powers to deal with terror attacks like the one in Mumbai, a London-based anti-terror law expert has said.
"The review should be coordinated federally, it should be wide ranging and robust. If we are to prevent another Mumbai, this time no stone should be left unturned," leading UK terrorism barrister Tanveer Qureshi told reporters in London on Wednesday night.
He recalled that after the Jaipur terrorist attack in May 2008, Gujarat's Chief Minister Narendra Modi, in a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, had pointed out that "states have been rendered helpless without proper legal backing to deal with such situations.

"While many nations across the world strengthened their anti-terror laws after the 9/11 incident, India has taken retrograde steps by abolishing POTA."
In the aftermath of the 7/7 terror attacks in the UK, the British government has passed a series of anti-terror laws designed both to deal with and prevent terrorist acts. In the US, in the wake of 9/11, the Patriot Act was passed providing the authorities with wide ranging powers to investigate stop and search those suspected of terrorist acts, he said.
"Inevitably there has been opposition to the laws, some of this opposition has been based on well founded fears by minority groups that they will be the community most affected by these laws. Certainly Muslims living in India voiced such concerns in relation to the now repealed Indian Prevention of Terrorism Act," he added.
Qureshi said such concerns should not preclude the passing of anti-terror laws, but equally the concerns should be addressed and reflected in the law so as to ensure that when applied, the law is used fairly and properly.
Police powers should be sufficient but at the same time checks and balances should be put in place to prevent abuse. One of the chief reasons POTA was repealed was primarily because police powers were not developed and reviewed to accommodate the robust and wide ranging provisions of POTA.




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