Category Archives: European Union

Thanks to Snowden, EU moves ahead with tough new data protection rules

Slate reports: Lawmakers in the European Parliament have moved to combat clandestine mass surveillance programs by voting in favor of introducing tougher new data protection rules.

On Monday, the Parliament’s civil liberties committee approved the proposed reform, laying the groundwork for a significant overhaul of Europe’s current data protection framework. The changes have been in the works for 18 months, but the former NSA contractor Edward Snowden’s disclosures about U.S. and U.K. spy programs gave new urgency to the overhaul. The newly proposed rules, which still have to be agreed upon by EU member states, would restrict how companies such as Google and Microsoft could pass data on a European citizen to a third country. Companies would have to inform people whose data were requested and get any transfer of data signed off by the data protection authority. Any company caught breaching the regulations could face large fines of up to 5 percent of their revenue, which could in some cases amount to billions of dollars.

German member of the European Parliament Jan Albrecht described the vote as “a breakthrough for data protection rules in Europe, ensuring that they are up to the task of the challenges in the digital age.” Albrecht, a vocal critic of NSA and GCHQ surveillance on the civil liberties committee, added in a statement issued Monday that the legislation would introduce “overarching EU rules on data protection, replacing the current patchwork of national laws.” [Continue reading…]

Facebooktwittermail

How austerity is killing Europe

Jeff Madrick writes: On the last day of 2011, a headline in The Wall Street Journal read: “Spain Misses Deficit Target, Sets Cuts.” The cruel forces of poor economic logic were at work to welcome in the new year. The European Union has become a vicious circle of burgeoning debt leading to radical austerity measures, which in turn further weaken economic conditions and result in calls for still more damaging cuts in government spending and higher taxes. The European debt crisis began with Greece, and that nation remains the European Union’s most stricken economy. But it has spread inexorably to Ireland, Portugal, Italy, and Spain, and even threatens France and possibly the U.K. It need not have done so. Rarely do we get so stark an example of bad—arguably even perverse—economic thinking in action.

Over the past two years, the severe 2009 recession, which started in the U.S. but spread across Europe, have imperiled the finances of one European country after another. As a result, Portugal, Ireland, Spain and Italy are coming under pressure from the EU to cut government spending and raise taxes to reduce their deficits if they wanted to qualify for a bailout. All have done so. Ireland and Portugal sharply cut spending and still had to take tens of billions of euros to help meet financial obligations as of course did Greece. The European Central Bank bought the bonds of Italy and Spain. Britain’s Conservative government led the way in ruthless government cutbacks in 2010. France has adopted its own austerity package, and even Germany, the supposed economic leader of Europe, has planned to cut its deficit by a record 80 billion euros in 2014.

Proponents of austerity claim that as nations take control of their finances businesses become more convinced that interest rates will not rise and that growth will resume. Their reasoning has been abetted by the financial markets, which drove up rates on Greek debt and soon enough on the debt of nations like Portugal, Spain and Italy. Should these nations not be able to pay their debts, bond buyers wanted a high enough interest rate to compensate for the risk.

But this is pre-Great Depression economics. How could the EU so misread history and treat with contempt the teachings of John Maynard Keynes, who argued that during recessions governments must expand economies through spending and tax cuts, not the opposite? In practice, making large-scale budget cuts or raising taxes, as Keynes showed, will reduce demand for goods and services just when an increase is needed. Faltering sales will undermine the confidence of businesses far more than fiscal consolidation will embolden them. By ignoring this, European policy makers will deepen, not solve, the financial crisis and millions of people will suffer needlessly.

Facebooktwittermail

Iranians fear war, deprived of life-saving medicines — Washington satisfied

The Obama administration’s definition of diplomacy with Iran is that it does not talk about “regime change.” Instead it talks about “tightening the noose.”

As the rial collapses and Iranians die because they can’t afford life-saving medicines, no doubt they feel deeply grateful for America’s kind attention.

The Washington Post reports: At a time when U.S. officials are increasingly confident that economic and political pressure alone may succeed in curbing Iran’s nuclear ambitions, the mood here has turned bleak and belligerent as Iranians prepare grimly for a period of prolonged hardship and, they fear, war.

This stark contrast has been evident in the Iranian capital this week as a top military commander declared a “critical point” in the country’s long feud with the West and ordinary Iranians stocked up on essential supplies. Merchants watched helplessly as the Iranian currency, the rial, shed more than a third of its value, triggering huge increases in the prices of imported goods.

“I will tell you what this is leading to: war,” said a merchant in Tehran’s popular Paytakht bazaar who gave his name only as Milad. “My family, friends and I — we are all desperate.”

The sense of impending confrontation is not shared in Washington and other Western capitals, where government officials and analysts expressed cautious satisfaction that their policies are working.

Former and current U.S. government officials did not dismiss the possibility of a military confrontation but said they saw recent threats by Iranian leaders — including warning a U.S. aircraft carrier this week not to return to the crucial Strait of Hormuz — mainly as signs of rising frustration. U.S. officials say this amounts to vindication of a years-long policy of increasing pressure, including through clandestine operations, on Iran’s clerical rulers without provoking war.

“The reasons you’re seeing the bluster now is because they’re feeling it,” said Dennis Ross, who was one of the White House’s chief advisers on Iran before stepping down late last year. With even tougher sanctions poised to take effect in weeks, the White House had succeeded in dramatically raising the costs of Iran’s nuclear program, he said.

“The measure, in the end, is, ‘Do they change their behavior?’ ” Ross said.

The Obama administration is readying new punitive measures targeting the Central Bank of Iran, while leaders of the European Union took a step this week toward approving strict curbs on imports of Iranian petroleum in hopes of pressuring the nation to abandon what they say is a drive to develop nuclear weapons. Iran says its nuclear program is for peaceful energy production.

State Department spokes­woman Victoria Nuland deemed as “very good news” the E.U.’s commitment to shutting off the flow of Iranian oil to Europe.

“This is consistent with tightening the noose on Iran economically,” Nuland told reporters Wednesday. “We think that the place to get Iran’s attention is with regard to its oil sector.”

In Tehran, that tightening is being felt by millions of people. Economists and independent analysts say the sanctions have aggravated the country’s chronic economic problems and fueled a currency crisis that is limiting the availability of a broad array of goods, including illegally imported iPhones and life-saving medicines.

Facebooktwittermail

Depression and democracy

Paul Krugman writes: It’s time to start calling the current situation what it is: a depression. True, it’s not a full replay of the Great Depression, but that’s cold comfort. Unemployment in both America and Europe remains disastrously high. Leaders and institutions are increasingly discredited. And democratic values are under siege.

On that last point, I am not being alarmist. On the political as on the economic front it’s important not to fall into the “not as bad as” trap. High unemployment isn’t O.K. just because it hasn’t hit 1933 levels; ominous political trends shouldn’t be dismissed just because there’s no Hitler in sight.

Let’s talk, in particular, about what’s happening in Europe — not because all is well with America, but because the gravity of European political developments isn’t widely understood.

First of all, the crisis of the euro is killing the European dream. The shared currency, which was supposed to bind nations together, has instead created an atmosphere of bitter acrimony.

Specifically, demands for ever-harsher austerity, with no offsetting effort to foster growth, have done double damage. They have failed as economic policy, worsening unemployment without restoring confidence; a Europe-wide recession now looks likely even if the immediate threat of financial crisis is contained. And they have created immense anger, with many Europeans furious at what is perceived, fairly or unfairly (or actually a bit of both), as a heavy-handed exercise of German power.

Nobody familiar with Europe’s history can look at this resurgence of hostility without feeling a shiver. Yet there may be worse things happening.

Facebooktwittermail

Radical eurozone shakeup could see Brussels get austerity powers

The Guardian reports: The European commission could be empowered to impose austerity measures on eurozone countries that are being bailed out, usurping the functions of government in countries such as Greece, Ireland, or Portugal.

Bailed-out countries could also be stripped of their voting rights in the European Union, under radical proposals that have been circulating at the highest level in Brussels before this week’s crucial EU summit on the sovereign debt crisis.

A confidential paper for EU leaders by the EU council president, Herman Van Rompuy, who will chair the summit on Thursday and Friday, said eurobonds or the pooling of eurozone debt would be a powerful tool in resolving the crisis, despite fierce German resistance to the idea.

It called for “more intrusive control of national budgetary policies by the EU” and laid out various options for enforcing fiscal discipline supra-nationally.

The two-page paper, obtained by the Guardian, formed the basis for discussions on an interim report tabled by Van Rompuy, the European commission and the Eurogroup of countries that have adopted the euro, which is to be debated on Wednesday among senior officials in an attempt to build a consensus ahead of the summit.

Elements, however, have already sparked a backlash among eurozone member states and the suggestion that countries could lose their voting rights seems already to have been dropped.

The options outlined by Van Rompuy heavily emphasise the need for a new punitive regime overseen by EU institutions that would be given new powers of intervention. The proposals and policy options, if agreed, will be seen as seriously curbing the sovereignty of member states in setting budgetary, economic, and fiscal policy.

Dean Baker writes: The world is eagerly waiting to see if the European Central Bank (ECB) will take the steps needed to save the euro. Specifically, is the ECB prepared to act as a central bank and guarantee the sovereign debt of the countries in the eurozone as the lender of last resort ordinarily does in a crisis?

If not, there is little doubt what the outcome will be. The austerity being imposed on country after country will slow GDP growth and throw workers out of jobs. Higher unemployment will worsen deficits, since it means less tax revenue coming in and more unemployment benefits and other transfers being paid out. Higher deficits will cause investors to worry about the solvency of the government, leading interest rates to rise.

This gives us the famous downward spiral that already sank Greece’s economy and government. It will soon sink Italy and Spain if the ECB doesn’t start acting like a central bank. The fallout from disorderly defaults from these two countries will cause banks throughout the eurozone to become insolvent, leading to another Lehman-type freeze-up of the financial system.

The end result will be a second recession and another sharp spike in unemployment, not just in the eurozone, but almost certainly across the globe. The finances and the economies of the eurozone are too intertwined with the rest of the world to envision a meltdown that doesn’t also push the rest of the world into recession. At the end of this story, the euro itself is likely to be placed in the dustbin of history, another failed monetary experiment.

Facebooktwittermail

Russia promotes a “step by step” diplomatic initiative with Iran

Zvi Bar’el reports: It appears that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad can rest easy for now, as voices coming from the European Union suggest a military operation is not in the offing. Not only do Syria and China reject such an attack, but on Monday, Germany, France and Turkey added their voices to those objecting to a military option. The United States also does not seem thrilled at the prospect of launching another war in the region.

The European and American plan to impose another dose of sanctions on Iran may be worrisome, but it likely isn’t threatening as long as China, Russia and several of the Gulf states continue regular trade relations with Iran.

The effort to impose restrictions on the export of gasoline to Iran, which can only supply 60 percent of its own demand, is unlikely to come to fruition, as some fear the restrictions would only harm the citizenry and not the regime. Furthermore, the efficacy of such a plan remains doubtful. Iran recently declared that it is capable of producing more gasoline; with a strict rationing program it might well be able to overcome the entire shortage. This would not necessarily mean that Iran could successfully supply its demand for gasoline over the long term, but it would certainly be able to significantly reduce its dependence on foreign imports.

The more ambitious aim of obtaining a UN Security Council resolution to impose international sanctions will have to wait, especially given Russia’s efforts to promote – together with Iran – a new diplomatic plan that is being dubbed “Step by Step.” Under the plan, Iran will begin to respond to the International Atomic Energy Agency’s demands. In exchange for every satisfactory response, the international community would gradually roll back the existing sanctions on Iran.

Iran’s deputy foreign minister visited Moscow last week to discuss this idea with his Russian counterpart, and on Sunday the Russian deputy foreign minister for Middle Eastern affairs, Mikhail Bogdanov, went to Tehran to discuss the joint diplomatic effort with Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi.

Meanwhile, Iran is adopting a new line of public diplomacy aimed both at Europe and the United States. Yesterday Salehi declared, “Strengthening the ties between Europe and Iran will be very helpful to Europe, since if Turkey joins the European Union, Iran will be a close neighbor of Europe’s.”

Over the weekend Ahmadinejad also said that “The Iranians are a nation of culture and logic, and are not warmongers.” The remarks, made at an event marking the unveiling of ancient artifacts returned by Britain to Iran, received big headlines in the Iranian press.

It is not clear what Ahmadinejad meant by “logic,” yet it notably was Ahmadinejad who initiated the 2010 agreement to deposit Iranian uranium in Turkey. Ahmadinejad is also believed to lead a certain school of thought that maintains it is better to come to an agreement with the West now, as opposed to the views of much of the radical religious leadership, which objects to any agreement.

In the end, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei will be the one to decide whether to promote any new diplomatic options. But the assessment that he still hasn’t given the green light for the production of nuclear weapons seemingly leaves the window of diplomatic opportunity open.

Ahmadinejad also can rest easy about his domestic situation. Yesterday he got some unexpected support from Mohammad Khatami, Iran’s former president, who is considered the leader of the Iranian opposition, and who until now never failed to criticize his rival. Khatami declared that if there were an attack on Iran, all groups – those that want reform and those that don’t – would unite to rebuff the attack.

Khatami defined the Israeli threat as “psychological warfare and a bluff,” but expressed concern that such psychological warfare could persuade the international community that an attack on Iran was possible.

Iranian opposition sources say that the debate over a possible attack on Iran plays directly into Ahmadinejad’s hands, since it boosts his political position not only vis a vis the opposition, but also vis a vis the supreme leader, Khamenei, whose confidants see Ahmadinejad as a political threat.

Facebooktwittermail

Europe’s glaring democratic deficit

Larry Elliott writes: Financial markets rallied last week when the Greek prime minister, George Papandreou, announced he was dropping plans for a referendum on the terms of his country’s bailout. Bond dealers liked the idea that the government in Athens could soon be headed by Lucas Papademos, a former vice-president of the European Central Bank. Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy think Papademos is the sort of hard-line technocrat with whom they can do business.

Silvio Berlusconi’s long-predicted departure as Italy’s prime minister will no doubt be greeted in the same way, particularly if he is replaced by a government of national unity headed by another technocrat, Mario Monti. A former Brussels commissioner, he is seen as someone who could be relied upon to push through the European Union’s austerity programme during the next 12 months, watched over by Christine Lagarde’s team of officials from the International Monetary Fund.

From the perspective of the financial markets, this makes perfect sense. Papandreou could no longer be relied upon, and his decision to hold a plebiscite threw Europe into turmoil last week, blighting the Cannes G20 summit. He had to go.

In Italy, Berlusconi is seen as entirely the wrong man to cope with his country’s deepening crisis; bond yields are above 6.5%, a level that eventually resulted in bailouts for Greece, Ireland and Portugal. He, too, has to go in the interests not just of financial and political stability but to prevent the eurozone from imploding.

The European Union has always had problems with democracy, a messy process that can interfere with the grand designs of people at the top who know best. When Ireland voted no to the Nice Treaty, it was told to come up with the right result in a second ballot. The European Central Bank wields immense power, but nobody knows how the unelected members of its governing council vote because no minutes of meetings are published. That said, the latest phase of Europe’s sovereign debt crisis has exposed the quite flagrant contempt for voters, the people who are going to bear the full weight of the austerity programmes being cooked up by the political elites.

Here’s how things work. The real decisions in Europe are now taken by the Frankfurt Group, an unelected cabal made of up eight people: Lagarde; Merkel; Sarkozy; Mario Draghi, the new president of the ECB; José Manuel Barroso, the president of the European Commission; Jean-Claude Juncker, chairman of the Eurogroup; Herman van Rompuy, the president of the European Council; and Olli Rehn, Europe’s economic and monetary affairs commissioner.

This group, which is accountable to no one, calls the shots in Europe. The cabal decides whether Greece should be allowed to hold a referendum and if and when Athens should get the next tranche of its bailout cash. What matters to this group is what the financial markets think not what voters might want. To the extent that governments had any power, it has been removed and placed in the hands of the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the IMF. It is as if the democratic clock has been turned back to the days when France was ruled by the Bourbons.

In the circumstances, it is hardly surprising that electorates have resorted to general strikes and street protests to have their say. Governments come and go but the policies remain the same, creating a glaring democratic deficit. This would be deeply troubling even if it could be shown that the Frankfurt Group’s economic remedies were working, which they are not. Instead, the insistence on ever more austerity is pushing Europe’s weaker countries into an economic death spiral while their voters are being bypassed. That is a dangerous mixture.

Facebooktwittermail

Nicolas Sarkozy calls for air strikes on Libya if Gaddafi attacks civilians

The Guardian reports:

Nicolas Sarkozy has called for targeted air strikes against Muammar Gaddafi’s regime if his forces use chemical weapons or launch air strikes against civilians.

As the EU foreign policy chief, Lady Ashton, warned that a no-fly zone could risk civilian lives in Libya, the French president told an emergency EU summit in Brussels that air strikes may soon be justified.

“The strikes would be solely of a defensive nature if Mr Gaddafi makes use of chemical weapons or air strikes against non-violent protesters,” Sarkozy said. The French president qualified his remarks by saying he had many reservations about military intervention in Libya “because Arab revolutions belong to Arabs”.

Sarkozy said he had won the support of David Cameron for his plan which would have to be approved by the UN, Arab states and Libyan opposition groups.

Facebooktwittermail

Permanent temporariness

Alastair Crooke writes:

It was in 2003 that I realised something fundamental had changed. The door to the room in which I was sitting flew open. In stalked a figure still dressed in a dark overcoat and scarf. He evidently could contain himself no longer. I was in Downing Street with the prime minister’s foreign affairs adviser, David Manning; the overcoated figure bursting into our meeting was Jack Straw. He wanted to tell Manning that he had persuaded Joschka Fischer, the German foreign minister, to add Hamas to the EU list of terrorist movements. His tale of his conversion of Fischer was wrapped in expressions of outrage at Hamas. It wasn’t so much the proscription that shocked me. A ceasefire, which I had helped facilitate, had broken down. What was new was the elation with which Straw greeted the banning. I don’t know what Manning thought, but he will have been aware that the terrorist ‘list’ is one of those things from which it’s almost impossible to get a name removed. The consequences for diplomacy, for the politics of peace-making, would be profound, possibly irreversible; but Straw wasn’t worried. Manning, I knew, believed strongly that there could be no solution to the Israel-Palestine issue without Hamas involvement and had firmly supported EU efforts at inclusive peace-building. Officially, the EU remained committed to a political solution, but it now seemed that two key member states were heading in the opposite direction – towards a militarised resolution. The wind had changed.

There had already been hints that a political solution was no longer at the forefront of Whitehall thinking. Not long before, a senior British official had told me bluntly that my methods of building popular consent – holding ‘town hall’ meetings with all factions, working with Hamas, shuttling between Palestinians on the ground and President Arafat to ensure broad participation and continued momentum – were passé. We were in a new era, and it required new thinking: ‘The road to Jerusalem now passes through Baghdad,’ the official insisted. He was speaking just before the 2003 invasion. The message was clear: the Islamic resistance in Palestine was to be neutralised, and psychologically defeated, by the massive display of Western force in Iraq, rather than brought into the political process. Britain and the US expected that the chastened Palestinians would then make the necessary concessions to Israel. What was striking was the official’s conviction that such an outcome was inevitable.

These were heady days for American and British officials and enthusiasm for the ‘war on terror’ was soaring. At our first meeting, Manning’s Downing Street successor, Nigel Sheinwald, told me angrily that security in Palestine could be achieved by eradicating the ‘virus’ of Hamas from Gaza, and eliminating its ‘disease’ from the region. He had no interest in helping to create legitimate Palestinian security services, representative of a cross-section of the community. The language was Washington’s. The Palestinian conflict was seen not as a problem in its own right, but as a subset of a war against ‘extremism’ – another domino to be pushed over in order to strengthen the ‘moderates’. A senior Israeli intelligence official later told me, privately, that he believed the change had begun in earnest in September 2003, after Arafat forced Mahmoud Abbas – a favoured figure in Washington – to resign as prime minister. Angry and frustrated, Bush called Blair. He complained that the Europeans ‘were dancing around Arafat’, while the US was left to do the ‘heavy lifting’ with Israel. Bush also complained that he did not see peace-building as compatible with his ‘war on terror’. Al-Jazeera’s recent release of the Palestine Papers has cast some light on all this: the documents include copies of British covert plans from 2003 and 2004 to ‘degrade’ the capabilities of opponents to the Palestinian Authority, to disrupt their communications, intern their members, close their civil and charitable organisations, remove them from public bodies, and seize their assets. Blair had set aside the lessons of peace-building, so recently learned in Northern Ireland, and embraced the doctrine of counter-insurgency.

The shift in the British position, under American pressure, sabotaged European policy. It undermined the EU’s commitment to promoting Palestinian unity by suppressing, at the covert, security level, opposition to the PA, removing from Palestinian institutions not only all members of Hamas and Islamic Jihad but even those elements in Fatah who had been involved in the second intifada. From now on, the EU would ‘talk the talk’ of encouraging Palestinian unity, while several of its most prominent member states were ‘walking the walk’ of a security-led repression of the very movements the EU was trying to encourage into the political arena. The result was that when Hamas – rather than being demoralised or psychologically defeated by shock and awe in Baghdad – comfortably won the 2006 Palestinian parliamentary elections, the EU was forced into a militarised security response. The new commitment to counter-insurgency meant that there was no prospect of exploring the political possibilities of Hamas’s win. After the election the UN envoy to the Middle East, Alvaro de Soto, wrote a memo to the UN secretary general complaining that the conditions for entering into a dialogue with Hamas had been deliberately set so that Hamas would be unable to meet them – thus engineering its exclusion. De Soto resigned from the UN soon afterwards.

Facebooktwittermail

WikiLeaks: US government, acting on behalf of Monsanto, targeted EU over GM crops

[Updated below]

Make no mistake: Monsanto poses an infinitely greater threat to the world than al Qaeda.

The US government still marches in lockstep with this corporate behemoth which is intent and already frighteningly successful in its campaign to claim ownership over the global food supply.

The Guardian reports:

The US embassy in Paris advised Washington to start a military-style trade war against any European Union country which opposed genetically modified (GM) crops, newly released WikiLeaks cables show.

In response to moves by France to ban a Monsanto GM corn variety in late 2007, the ambassador, Craig Stapleton, a friend and business partner of former US president George Bush, asked Washington to penalise the EU and particularly countries which did not support the use of GM crops.

“Country team Paris recommends that we calibrate a target retaliation list that causes some pain across the EU since this is a collective responsibility, but that also focuses in part on the worst culprits.

“The list should be measured rather than vicious and must be sustainable over the long term, since we should not expect an early victory. Moving to retaliation will make clear that the current path has real costs to EU interests and could help strengthen European pro-biotech voices,” said Stapleton, who with Bush co-owned the St Louis-based Texas Rangers baseball team in the 1990s.

In other newly released cables, US diplomats around the world are found to have pushed GM crops as a strategic government and commercial imperative.

In a recent interview on Democracy Now!, Jeffrey Smith, executive director of the Institute for Responsible Technology, was asked to compare the Obama administration with the Bush administration on the issue of biotechnology.

President Obama, while he was campaigning here in Iowa, promised that he would require labeling of genetically modified crops. And since most Americans say they would avoid GMOs if labeled, that would have eliminated it from the food supply. But, you see, he and the FDA have been promoting the biotechnology. And unfortunately, the Obama administration has not been better than the Bush administration, possibly worse.

For example, the person who was in charge of FDA policy in 1992, Monsanto’s former attorney, Michael Taylor, he allowed GMOs on the market without any safety studies and without labeling, and the policy claimed that the agency was not aware of any information showing that GMOs were significantly different. Seven years later, because of a lawsuit, 44,000 secret internal FDA memos revealed that that policy was a lie. Not only were the scientists at the FDA aware that GMOs were different, they had warned repeatedly that they might create allergies, toxins, new diseases and nutritional problems. But they were ignored, and their warnings were even denied, and the policy went forth allowing the deployment GMOs into the food supply with virtually no safety studies. That person in charge is now the U.S. food safety czar in the Obama administration.

If you haven’t seen it already, watch Food Inc. (2008). This is the part of the documentary dealing with Monsanto’s ownership of the soy bean and the draconian means it uses to prevent farmers replanting seed grown on their own fields.

Update: Aaron Turpen writes:

Monsanto, the world’s largest producer of genetically modified seeds and of America’s most-used herbicide RoundUp, is finally showing signs of breaking. Earlier this year, the company was named Company of the Year by Forbes Magazine. Forbes has since apologized for that award while stock market commentator Jim Cramer has named Monsanto to be “the worst stock of 2010.”

So what’s happening to the GMO Giant?

Several things are happening at once, bringing the powerful company down to earth. First, Monsanto’s best-selling product, RoundUp (glyphosate), has seen its patent run out. This means cheaper competition, especially in large, foreign markets like Asia. Second, the company is also seeing many of its core seed buyers turning to other sources because of the growing threat of RoundUp-resistant crops.

Facebooktwittermail

Israel takes urgent action to counter Palestine’s rising diplomatic status

Haaretz reports:

After reports reached Jerusalem that the Palestinian Authority is trying to persuade about a dozen European Union member states to upgrade the PA’s diplomatic status, the Foreign Ministry on Monday ordered every Israeli envoy abroad to begin “urgent” diplomatic activity. The aim is to thwart Palestinian efforts at drafting a United Nations resolution that would recognize a unilateral declaration of statehood and put international pressure on Israel to halt settlement construction.

Acting Foreign Ministry Director General Rafael Barak sent a classified cable to Israeli charges d’affairs, in which he called for an immediate public relations campaign at the bureaus of the premiers, foreign ministers and parliament in each country.

The PA is in the midst of three diplomatic activities aimed at the international community, Barak wrote in the cable: advancing a UN Security Council resolution condemning settlement construction, securing international recognition of a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders, and improving the diplomatic stance of Palestinian representatives in Europe, East Asia and Latin America.

Israeli officials expect Ecuador to shortly announce it is joining Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Bolivia in recognizing a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders. Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon called his counterparts in Mexico and Chile in the past few days and asked them not to make a similar move. He also asked senior officials in the Obama Administration to support Israel’s stance in Central and South America.

Akiva Eldar writes:

Attaining a permanent settlement with the Palestinians appears to be about as likely as the opening of an Iranian embassy in “united” Jerusalem. Almost no day goes by without some other country recognizing a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders. According to the WikiLeaks documents, even the Germans, Israel’s steadfast supporters in Europe, have lost their faith in the peaceful intentions of Benjamin Netanyahu’s government. Even loyal partner Ehud Barak and Nobel Peace laureate Shimon Peres have ceased to praise the “new Bibi.”

There is even the hope that the Labor ministers – who constitute the shriveled fig leaf of the prime minister – have discovered the emotion called shame and the option called opposition.

And then, just when it seemed that the deterioration in Israel’s international standing and the cracks at home would open the eyes of the Israeli public, the Jewish-American Superman soars in the skies over the Capital Hill.

He shows the Jewish-Israelis that there is no need to be frightened by the U.S. president, that there is no need to be unnerved by the Europeans and that the United Nations remains insignificant.

The Superman (or woman) strikes a winning blow against the claim of the “defeatists” that it is impossible to conduct negotiations over a piece of land while building on it at the same time. This figure proves that Israel can block U.S. efforts to advance negotiations toward the establishment of a Palestinian state, and then block the efforts of the international community to recognize such state. Our current Superman sells the illusion that the Jewish and Democratic state can exists indefinitely in the Middle East without bringing the violent conflict to an end.

This Superman is the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Howard Berman.

Facebooktwittermail

Israel faces tougher line from EU after former heads call for Palestinian state

The Guardian reports:

Twenty-six European grandees have urged the EU to adopt a tougher stance towards Israel including taking “concrete measures” and exacting “consequences” over continued settlement building on occupied land, which they say is illegal under international law.

The former EU leaders said that in the face of “the ongoing deterioration of the situation on the ground”, the EU, in co-operation with other international bodies, should put forward a “concrete and comprehensive proposal for the resolution of this conflict”. A deadline of April 2011 for progress in peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians should be set, after which the international community should intervene.

“Time to secure a sustainable peace is fast running out,” said the group, which includes former EU commissioner Chris Patten, former EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, former Irish president Mary Robinson and another nine former heads of state. It sent a letter to EU president Herman van Rompuy, foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton and all EU heads of government before a meeting of foreign ministers on Monday, saying: “It is clear that without a rapid and dramatic move … a two-state solution, which forms the one and only available option for a peaceful resolution of this conflict, will be increasingly difficult to attain.”

Facebooktwittermail

Hamas welcomes EU proposal to monitor crossings

The Ma’an news agency reports:

Hamas officials have supported a proposed EU plan to monitor Gaza crossings and life the Israeli-lead siege on the coastal enclave, statements issued Sunday indicated.

Hamas leader Salah Al-Bardawil called statements by Spanish Minster of Foreign Affairs Miguel Ángel Moratinos, whose country currently holds the head of the rotating EU parliament, said the movement would welcome a European presence at all Gaza border crossings.

“We spoke with the team of the chief (foreign) representative yesterday and we are going to make a proposal over the next few days so that situations like the ones that happened (this week) will not be repeated,” Moratinos told Agence-France Presse on Saturday, referring to the Israeli attack on a Turkish aid ship carrying nationals from around the globe that killed at least nine.

The ship was carrying 10,000 tons of aid, including cement, books, prefabricated houses and medical equipment in an attempt to break Israel’s sea blockade of Gaza, from which it says it unilaterally withdrew in 2005.

The plan reportedly includes the activation of the EU monitoring committee at Rafah, and developing similar initiatives at at least three other crossings as well as assisting in sea patrols so that the Gaza Port could open.

“Hamas welcomes this proposal in all its aspects,” Al-Bardawil said, saying first that the party “does not mind at all” EU or international presence at Rafah, and reaffirmed the party’s refusal to accept Israeli policing in the south.

“Secondly, Israel should not obstruct any convoys or ships coming to the Gaza port,” the official said, reiterating the importance of having a “seaport that links Gaza with the world.”

As for the details, Al-Bardawil said, they need to “be studied by the Palestinian government so a consensus can be reached” on what is acceptable in terms of having international patrols in Gaza waters.

Breaking the siege on Gaza, the official said, would “contribute to the building of a modern seaport in Gaza,” which he described as an essential ingredient to the revitalization of all of Gaza.

Facebooktwittermail

EU calls for immediate end to Israel’s siege on Gaza


(Click the image above to watch livestream video from the Freedom Flotilla.)

EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton on Friday called for an immediate end to Israel’s Gaza blockade, as an aid flotilla prepared to set sail for the enclave despite the embargo.

“The continued policy of closure is unacceptable and politically counterproductive,” she said in a statement.

“We would like to reiterate the EU’s call for an immediate, sustained and unconditional opening of crossings for the flow of humanitarian aid, commercial goods and persons to and from Gaza.”

In spite of this appeal, the government of Cyprus has taken the extraordinary step of preventing members of the European parliament from joining the Freedom Flotilla.

Cypriot authorities prevented pro-Palestinian activists, including 30 MPs from nine European countries, from leaving the island yesterday to join a flotilla in international waters, which is on its way to blockaded Gaza.

In addition to issuing an edict banning ships headed for Gaza to set sail from the island’s ports, or dock on the island on their way back, the authorities yesterday forbade any small vessels from leaving Cyprus in case they were on their way to the flotilla of eight ships carrying around 700 peace activists, and 10,000 tonnes of humanitarian aid.

The government denied it bowed to pressure from Israel to put the ban in place.

The European Union guarantees the right of freedom of movement of its citizens within the territory of its member states. Cyprus has been a member of the EU since 2004.

A Tweet @freegazaorg said at about 11AM Eastern:

Twenty have left from Famaghusta, Northern Cyprus, four German MPs, one Swedish MP, all the passengers from Challenger 1. Hedy [Epstein] not going.

Meanwhile, Haaretz reports:

The Hamas leader in Gaza Ismail Haniyeh said Saturday that if Israel behaved like pirates and attacked the international Freedom Flotilla carrying 10,000 tons of aid meant for Gaza, then the Palestinians will have won.

“The flotilla’s message is clear and it will reach the entire world,” Haniyeh said Saturday morning during a press conference held at the Gaza port where the ships were expected to dock.

“The meaning of the flotilla is that the entire world opposes the siege on the Gaza Strip, and if Israel behaves like pirates and sea-terrorists – we will win,” he added.

Facebooktwittermail

Jewish lobbying fails to stop EU support for Goldstone report

On Tuesday, a headline for Haaretz declared:

Jewish lobbying sways EU against support of Goldstone Gaza report

The article said:

Members of the European Parliament have backtracked from their plan to pass a resolution demanding implementation of the Goldstone report, in response to pressure from European Jewish leaders, Haaretz has learned.

After leaders of all the major EP parties had agreed on the wording of a draft demanding implementation of the controversial document – which accused Israel of war crimes in Gaza last year and proposed prosecuting Israeli officials in the International Criminal Court – the European Union’s legislative body was scheduled to vote on the measure Wednesday.

But Tuesday, leaders of the parties backed away from the draft, after the president of the European Jewish Congress, Moshe Kantor, warned them that adopting it would seriously harm EU-Israel ties.

“It appears inconceivable that while the United Nations itself hasn’t yet officially adopted this report, the European Parliament, in this motion for a resolution, calls for and demands its implementation,” he wrote in a letter sent to the heads of major EP parties.

The joint motion for the resolution was removed from the plenary session’s agenda after the European People’s Party (Christian Democrats) blocked it.

“The European Jewish Congress played an important role in blocking the legitimization of the Goldstone report,” an official from the Foreign Ministry said Tuesday.

That was Tuesday, but this is what actually happened on Wednesday:

Despite an intensive lobbying effort on the part of European Jewish groups, the European Parliament has endorsed the Goldstone report, the UN’s official investigation into the bombardment of the Gaza Strip in January 2009, a report that accuses Israel of war crimes and calls for the prosecution of Israeli officials in The Hague.

In a 335-to-287 vote splitting the house between left and right, MEPs backed a joint resolution from the centre left, far left, Greens and Liberals calling on the EU’s foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, and the bloc’s member states to “publicly demand the implementation of [the report’s] recommendations and accountability for all violations of international law, including alleged war crimes.”

The report also said:

On Tuesday afternoon, the level of lobbying had reached such an extent that Irish socialist MEP Proinsias de Rossa, the chair of the chamber’s Palestinian Legislative Council liaison delegation, sent around his own email encouraging deputies not to buckle under the pressure.

“You are being bombarded with mails at present seeking to undermine your support for the the Goldstone Report in the vote tomorrow,” he said.

“Tomorrow’s vote is a test of the credibility of this parliament’s commitment to human rights irrespective of political considerations,” he continued. “The joint resolution is a fair and balanced position negotiated by all the main political groups. I appeal to you to support it.”

Imagine a similar turn of events in the US Congress. Just imagine…

(I guess it’s about as easy as imagining Congress including any socialist representatives or a Palestinian liaison group.)

Facebooktwittermail

Dutch anti-Islam leader is major winner in polls

Reuters reports on the latest display of European Islamophobia:

Dutch anti-Islamist leader Geert Wilders scored major gains in local authority polls Thursday, making him a serious challenger for power in a June national election, preliminary results showed.

In the first test of public opinion since the collapse of Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende’s coalition government last month, Wilders’s Freedom Party (PVV) led in the city of Almere and was second in The Hague.

The results came on top of an opinion poll showing that the PVV, which campaigns against Muslim immigration as its main platform, would win the most seats — 27 in the 150-member Dutch parliament — in the June 9 election.

That would make it tough for Balkenende’s Christian Democrats, projected to win one seat less, to forge a strong coalition without Wilders. Months of talks between parties, and the resulting policy vacuum, could threaten a fragile economic recovery and cast doubt on the scope of planned budget cuts.

The popularity of Wilders, who compares Islam to fascism and the Koran to Adolf Hitler’s book “Mein Kampf,” has dented the image of the Netherlands as a country that has often portrayed itself in the past as a bastion of tolerance.

Facebooktwittermail