When Corporations Choose Despots Over Democracy

Friday, February 04, 2011
Amy Goodman
GUEST WORDS
TruthDig.com

“People holding a sign ‘To: America. From: the Egyptian People. Stop supporting Mubarak. It’s over!” so tweeted my brave colleague, “Democracy Now!” senior producer Sharif Abdel Kouddous, from the streets of Cairo.

More than 2 million people rallied throughout Egypt on Tuesday, most of them crowded into Cairo’s Tahrir Square. Tahrir, which means liberation in Arabic, has become the epicenter of what appears to be a largely spontaneous, leaderless and peaceful revolution in this, the most populous nation in the Middle East. Defying a military curfew, this incredible uprising has been driven by young Egyptians, who compose a majority of the 80 million citizens. Twitter and Facebook, and SMS text messaging on cell phones, have helped this new generation to link up and organize, despite living under a U.S.-supported dictatorship for the past three decades. In response, the Mubarak regime, with the help of U.S. and European corporations, has shut down the Internet and curtailed cellular service, plunging Egypt into digital darkness. Despite the shutdown, as media activist and professor of communications C.W. Anderson told me, “people make revolutions, not technology.”

The demands are chanted through the streets for democracy, for self-determination. Sharif headed to Egypt Friday night, into uncertain terrain. The hated Interior Ministry security forces, the black-shirted police loyal to President Hosni Mubarak, were beating and killing people, arresting journalists, and smashing and confiscating cameras.

The US asseveration

2010-11-03
Opinion  by LIM SUE GOAN
Translated by SOONG PHUI JEE
MySinchew.com (Malaysia)

Asseveration: An earnest affirmation or declaration of support (Source: Wiktionary)

The visit of US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to Malaysia is an arrangement of the American strategic layout in South-East Asia, or even Asia. It shows that Malaysia is still valuable in terms of diplomacy.

After attending the East Asia Summit (EAS) in Hanoi, and paying official visits to Hainan in China, Cambodia and Malaysia, Clinton continued her journey to Papua New Guinea, Australia and New Zealand. Together with the US Secretary of Defence, she will attend the Five-Power Defence Arrangements (FPDA) meeting of Defence Ministers. It is obvious from all these that the US is trying to balance China's influence in the region.

Among South-East Asian countries, Cambodia is having a close relation with China, and Clinton had actually advised Cambodia in Phnom Penh “not to overly rely" on China. Malaysia, too, is having a good relation with China. Clinton chose to visit Malaysia, instead of Singapore which is having a military cooperation with the US, to fight for a tie with Malaysia, a moderate Islamic state, to protect the American interests in the Straits of Malacca.

In the eyes of the US, national interests are always more important than any other issues. For the sake of its national interests, the US had assisted authoritarian governments that supported the US. For example, the US used to support the Taliban that confronted the Soviet Union. After the Soviet Union retreated, Afghanistan has become a terrorist nest under the rule of Taliban. The US then sent troops to defeat the Taliban government based on the American security concerns.

The US exerts pressure on China for the appreciation of the RMB not to save the world economy but to help the American exports instead. The appreciation of the RMB will make American goods cheaper.

The US is a selfish country. To save its own economy, the US government printed a huge amount of cash notes and devalued the US dollar. As a result, it exported inflation to countries around the world. Prices of various metals, commodities and food have been surging due to overflowing hot money. The US Federal Reserve is about to start the second round of Quantity Easing Policy. It is expected to continue inflating the asset bubble and harm the world.

However, the US is also "cute", in that it upholds its concepts of democracy and human rights, which are universal values in its views, and continues exporting them to other countries.

When former US Vic-President Albert Arnold Gore attended the Kuala Lumpur Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum on 22 November 1998, he critized Malaysia over the arrest of Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, causing a strong counter-attack from our political leaders, and leading strained bilateral relations between the US and Malaysia.

The US is a capitalist democratic country, with its own interests being its priority and its self-appointed "international police" role, which has been played down in recent years.

In comparison, China's policy on Third World seems to prioritize friendship rather than self-interests. For example, China has a large number of investments in Africa in addition to giving aid to the region.

During the 1997 Asian financial crisis, Asian currencies fluctuated and China didn’t depreciate the RMB. In 2007, the US subprime mortgage crisis swept across global financial markets and domestic demand was expanded, thanks to China's RMB4 trillion stimulus package.

Prime Minister cum Finance Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak is committed to implementing economic transformation. Hence, Malaysia needs to make friends with the US, China and India. However, we must know their temperaments and consideration to slot in between these great powers and protect our national interests.

The Axis of Grudging Cooperation

OPINION INDIA
MAY 4, 2010
By G. PARTHASARATHY
The Wall Street Journal

India has tried to prod the U.S. into taking a more active role in shaping Asia's security architecture.

After meeting the leaders of China, India, Brazil and South Africa at the Copenhagen climate conference in December, U.S. President Barack Obama hailed the deal struck on climate change: "Today we have made a meaningful and unprecedented breakthrough." What he evidently failed to realize was that the summit exposed how flip flops in American foreign policy in Asia had moved India and China into an unexpected embrace at Copenhagen, and beyond.

President Obama appears to be intensely focused on developing a better relationship with China, at almost any cost. During his visit to Beijing in November, he virtually conceded the role of an external security guarantor in South Asia to his hosts. Special Representative Richard Holbrooke thereafter reportedly advised the Chinese to play a more proactive role in expanding their arms transfers to Pakistan. The Obama administration's interest in "reconciliation" with the Taliban and possibilities of a precipitate U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan leading to a return to Taliban control, raised concerns in India about the possibility of a U.S.-China-Pakistan nexus emerging in India's neighborhood.

These developments inevitably led New Delhi toward adopting a foreign-policy hedging strategy of "engaging with all powers but aligning with none." This tack will be complemented with greater emphasis on joining emerging powers like Brazil, Russia and South Africa for developing a more "multipolar" world order.

The Copenhagen summit represented a good start. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh assured a visibly concerned Premier Wen Jiabao that India would stand by China during the summit, together with partners like Brazil and South Africa. Premier Wen, in turn, assured Prime Minister Singh that the U.S.-Chinese joint declaration in November was "not directed against India."

These assurances were all the more remarkable given that they came amid a backdrop of mutual suspicion. Since early 2007, reporting in Chinese state-owned media about India had been consistently hostile. Chinese commentators warned Beijing would not hesitate to enforce its territorial claims on the Indian border state of Arunachal Pradesh by "resorting to military action to thoroughly liberate the people there." China's criticism sharpened during a visit by the Dalai Lama to a sacred Buddhist shrine in Arunachal Pradesh at a time when President Obama had declined to receive the Dalai Lama.

Bilateral relations started to warm after Copenhagen. Hostile references to India in Chinese state-run media ended. The border spat calmed down. India is continuing to cooperate with China on climate change, the Doha Round of global trade talks and in the Group of 20. Indian President Pratibha Patil will embark on a state visit to China soon.

Yet India has to remain vigilant about warming relations with China. Beijing has become markedly more assertive abroad since President Obama assumed office. In May last year, China imposed a ban on fishing in the South China Sea, overruling Vietnamese protests. The state-owned China Offshore Oil Company announced in February that it had discovered a new deep-water gas field in the South China Sea and China dispatched patrol ships to assert its fishing rights in the waters around the Spratly Islands.

The Chinese military has acted similarly aggressively in the East China Sea, with the conduct of a military exercise and the commencement of oil and gas exploration in disputed waters, provoking protests from Japan. China has refused to join Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam as a member of the Mekong River Commission. Cambodia is particularly concerned about the lowering of water levels in the Mekong resulting from the construction of dams across the river in China.

India isn't immune to these sorts of threats. It was only after India provided China with satellite photographs that Beijing belatedly acknowledged that it was building a hydroelectric project on the shared Brahmaputra River and agreed to exchange data on water flows. India is raising two new infantry divisions to deploy along the Arunachal Pradesh-Tibet border, together with steps to improve communications and enhance air power along the entire Sino-Indian border. The Indian navy is set to acquire two new aircraft carriers and nuclear submarines in coming years—a clear response to China's build-up.

India has tried to prod the Obama administration into a more active role. New Delhi has recently had a detailed exchange of views on the Asia-Pacific region with the State Department's highest-ranking Asia official, Kurt Campbell, but much more needs to be done. While New Delhi welcomes cooperative and constructive relations between the U.S. and China, concerns in India are inevitable when the Sino-U.S. relationship is marked either by confrontation or collusion which undermines Indian interests.

Many Indians wonder if the Obama administration has any grand vision at all in shaping the emerging architecture for security and cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region. No one doubts that relations with the U.S. will remain a key feature of Indian foreign policy. But in the absence of mutual trust which characterized the relationship in the recent past, existing misgivings will not be put to rest merely by grand state banquets or glib talk about democracies being "natural partners."

Mr. Parthasarathy, a visiting professor at the Center for Policy Research in New Delhi, was India's ambassador to Pakistan from 1998 to 2000.

Malaysia Bidding For Oil And Gas In Cambodia [-Hun Sen's regime likely to give away 50% of Cambodian oil and gas in overlap area to Thailand]

From D.Arul Rajoo

"Cambodia is likely to opt for a 50-50 sharing agreement with Thailand to resolve the overlapping claim" - Sok An

PHNOM PENH, Nov 8 (Bernama) -- Malaysia is among dozens of countries vying for a share of oil and gas reserves in Cambodia.

The Indo-Chinese nation is expected to begin oil production in 2011, with an initial estimate of 700 million barrels in Block A.

Deputy Prime Minister Sok An said other bidders include China, France, Indonesia, Japan, Singapore and South Korea.

They have shown interest to drill oil and gas at Block A located 200km southwest of Sihanoukville, encompassing 6,278 sq km in total size area.

Currently, the US' Chevron is assessing the amount of commercial reserves, while there are also 27 more potential wells, he said.

Chevron discovered oil in 2005 off the Cambodian coast, southwest of Sihanoukville.

"We can only start production in the next decade as the processes from exploration to production take time.

"We need more studies to determine how to come out with the best formula between the companies and the government," he told the Cambodia Investment, Trade and Infrastructure conference here today.

Sok An also said there are several other potential areas, including an area of 27,000 sq km in the Gulf of Thailand, where Cambodia was involved in an overlapping claim with Thailand, as well as in Ton Sap Lake.

He said Cambodia is likely to opt for a 50-50 sharing agreement with Thailand to resolve the overlapping claim.

According to energy industry officials, the Cambodian Government is highly expected to back Chinese and American companies to undertake oil and gas productions, than regional players like Petronas and Thailand's PTT.

Petronas is currently operating two petrol stations in Cambodia.

Sok An said Cambodia was excited over the oil discovery as the country was now a net importer and was feeling the pinch of the high oil price, which was close to US$100 per barrel, with retail price above US$1 a litre here.

Besides oil and gas, Cambodia is also rich in minerals, among them are bauxite, gemstones, coal, gold and limestone.

Among companies engaged in the mining sector are world-class players like BHP Billiton and Oxiana.