Tiger diplomacy

President Robert Mugabe's government has agreed to send elephants, zebras and impala antelopes to China in return for four Siberian tigers, the state-run Herald newspaper said on Thursday.

Brilliant idea! This should solve the fuel problem and considerably reduce inflation and unemployment.

the Herald quoted a Parks and Wildlife Authority manager as saying Zimbabwe was looking at establishing a number of zoos to breed some endangered species before releasing them back into the wild.

Keep a couple of cages free, they might come in handy.

Zimbabwe, Mugabe, China

UN World Summit: Ahmadinejad

The whole speech was a cheap shot at the US and a pathetic attempt at showing a civilized face of his appalling regime. However, I think Bush did well in letting the garden gnome come to the UN world summit and make a fool of himself:

Justice must reign supreme in the Organization, and in accordance with its Charter, all Member-Stats must have equal rights. Greater power or wealth should not accord expanded rights to any member.

How dare the torturer talk about justice?

The principles of democracy and ethics should prevail in all organs and functions of the United Nations, so that the Organization could become a manifestation of the prevalence of these two commonly shared values.

How dare the murderer of innocent children mention ethics?

In our view, these concerns can only be met if the prevailing discourse in international relations is transformed from one based on violence, discrimination and domination to a discourse of peace and global stability based on justice and spirituality through dialogue, compassion and respect for human beings.

How dare the revolting sadist lecture on respect?

The greatest challenge of our age is the gradual spiritual depravation of human beings brought about by the distancing of the prevailing order from morality and unity of monotheism.

Does that mean that Hindus, Buddhists, Shintoists and, for that matter, Wiccans, are depraved? Should they be destroyed then, according to peace-loving Ahmadinejad?

The MSM should give more space to the demonstrations to show the world how much he is loved.

US, United Nations, Iran

UN World Summit: Bush

Always the visionary, Bush is challenging those countries who preach about increasing aid and fighting poverty but are very jealous of their tariffs and unprepared to abandon their policies of protectionism:

We must tear down the walls that separate the developed and developing worlds. We need to give the citizens of the poorest nations the same ability to access the world economy that the people of wealthy nations have, so they can offer their goods and talents on the world market alongside everyone else. We need to ensure that they have the same opportunities to pursue their dreams, provide for their families, and live lives of dignity and self-reliance.

And the greatest obstacles to achieving these goals are the tariffs and subsidies and barriers that isolate people of developing nations from the great opportunities of the 21st century. Today, I reiterate the challenge I have made before: We must work together in the Doha negotiations to eliminate agricultural subsidies that distort trade and stunt development, and to eliminate tariffs and other barriers to open markets for farmers around the world. Today I broaden the challenge by making this pledge: The United States is ready to eliminate all tariffs, subsidies and other barriers to free flow of goods and services as other nations do the same. This is key to overcoming poverty in the world's poorest nations. It's essential we promote prosperity and opportunity for all nations.

Germany and France must be shaking in their boots.

US, United Nations, Aid, Germany, France

UN World Summit: Mugabe

Mugabe blasts 'rich countries'

Forgetting that Zimbabwe was a “rich country”, before he destroyed it.

Zimbabwe, Mugabe, United Nations

Good news from Iraq

I am late in linking to Chrenkoff’s roundup but, to be forgiven, I’ll send you to an excellent press briefing of Colonel Robert Brown on Operations in Northwest Iraq that is very informative and gives terrific good news about Coalition Forces’ progress (via Gatewaypundit).

Iraq, Insurgency

After Mugabe

The succession struggle, tainted by tribalism, corruption, intimidation and greed, has started in earnest:

With Robert Mugabe having announced that he plans to step down as president of Zimbabwe in 2008, controversy continues to rage over the question of who will replace him.

Mugabe - in power for a quarter of a century - made clear who was his own favourite candidate for succession when he shoehorned his longstanding ally Joice Mujuru into the post of vice- president late last year.

But another member of the president's ZANU PF party, Emmerson Mnangagwa - who had been widely viewed as a natural successor before being sidelined by the move - retains support.
…
Mujuru - who earned the nickname Teurai Ropa, or Spill Blood
…
Mnangagwa -- a shrewd political player also known as Ngwenja, or Crocodile –
…
Mnangagwa and Joice Mujuru both belong to Zimbabwe's biggest tribe, the Shona. But within this tribe, Mnangagwa comes from a clan called the Karanga, while Mujuru belongs to Mugabe's own Zezuru clan.
…
Since power fell into the hands of Mugabe - a ruthless Zezuru intellectual who led the ZANU movement but did no fighting himself - many Karangas feel he has ignored their contribution, sidelined their leaders and promoted members of his own clan.
…
To make things more complicated, the coalition behind Mnangagwa's bid for the vice-presidency also involved members of a smaller Shona clan, the Manyika, and members of Zimbabwe's other main tribe, the Ndebele.

… Mnangagwa's best option would be to form an alliance with MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, along with representatives of the Manyika and Ndebele.

"Then we will see where Mugabe and his Zezurus get the mandate to rule Zimbabwe," said Mapfupa.

Zimbabwe, Mugabe

Germany opts out

The invaluable contribution of NATO to the stabilization of Afghanistan, is being hindered by Germany:

German reservations have slowed down Nato’s plans to expand its Afghan mission for eradicating poppy-growing and the hunt for al-Qaeda and Taliban fugitives.

As shameful as Zapatero.

But Nato officials have also let it be understood that they will wait until the German elections on September 18 before finalising the deployment plans for Afghanistan.

Good idea: both Germany and Afghanistan need a fresh start.

Germany, Afghanistan, NATO

See you in New York

President Robert Mugabe, who begged UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan to visit Zimbabwe so he could explain why he knocked down nearly a million people's homes, has withdrawn the invitation.

Which of course was fake from the start. He doesn’t like anyone to look too closely into his affairs or mugabe-made disasters in Zimbabwe:

The UN was also prevented from carrying out crop assessments last year and its World Food Programme was forced to stop feeding Zimbabweans after Mugabe falsely claimed a record maize crop.

The hole left in the economy by the payment of part of Zimbabwe’s arrears to the IMF will never be filled:

Officials hinted at “generosity” from businesses in the raising of the IMF dues, and there are suggestions that companies have liquidated some of their precious foreign-currency holdings in the national interest. Given the shortages, this would seem to be a crazy notion. But word in Harare is that the government offered takers a rate of Z$50 000 to $1 to make the exchange, against the official rate of Z$24 520.

The money has to come from somewhere and Mugabe, always a good one for encouraging foreign investment and confidence in the country, has had another brilliant idea: steal it!

A cabinet minister in Zimbabwe has warned the government may take over white-owned firms in an exercise similar to actions under Harare's five-year old land reform programme
…
"Most of these companies do not want to give us equity. We might decide to take over these companies just like we did during the land reform exercise,"
…
Finance Minister Herbert Murerwa told the CZI conference that the amendments to the constitution were not a threat to commerce and industry.

Zimbabwe, Mugabe

The stink is getting worse

I recommend you read this post, on the excellent Bad Hair Blog. Fausta takes us on a tour of the shady characters that would like to increase our taxes. With their background, precedent and current pending cases of theft, misappropriation, fraud and corruption, it sounds like a bad idea.

Furthermore, one of the proposed taxes would affect only you and me, who travel on discount airlines such as Ryanair or Easyjet and certainly not business travelers, or Lula and Chirac, who both travel at the expense of the taxpayer.

United Nations, UN, Corruption

UN World Summit

After the appalling show we had to witness today on the vaunted “reform” of the United Nations, I can only agree with Roger Simon:

The UN is now a ghost ship, heading up the East River. Wave good-bye. It's gone.

United Nations, UN, UN Reform

Definition of terrorism

Tomorrow’s United Nations world summit has already failed in its most important endeavor:

…we should all be saddened by news that the negotiators in New York have dropped the inclusion of a clear definition of terrorism from their reform program.

The definition put forth by the High Level Panel is clear and straightforward. “Any action constitutes terrorism if it is intended to cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or non combatants, with the purpose of intimidating a population or compelling a Government or an international organization to do or abstain from doing any act.”

Failing to define terrorism will have very negative consequences:

First of all it provides common ground for international cooperation in combating terrorism. It lays the foundation for requesting and receiving the mutual assistance and support required under the various UN counter terrorism resolutions and the 12 international counter -terrorism conventions now in place. The absence of a terrorism definition seriously hinders any effort to coordinate an international response to terrorism. Without a common definition countries remain free to interpret their own obligations and define for themselves which groups are terrorists and which are “freedom fighters.” Saudi Arabia uses this distinction, for example, to get away with funding Hamas, while Iran and Syria use it to provide funds and support to Hezbollah.

I would suggest we use the vote, if a vote there will be, as the selection criterion to enlist the countries that support the proposed definition to the future Peace and Security Union.

Let's hope that some of these statesmen will speak up and force a vote on this issue. Let those who support defining terrorism for what it is stand up and be counted, and leave those opposed remain seated for history and posterity.

United Nations, UN, Terrorism, UN Reform

Arabic dilemma

From MEMRI, an excellent analysis of “The Arabic Dilemma: In face of the New American Strategy” by Dr. Mohamed Houni. His conclusion:

"Arab societies have only one of two options: either to sever their ties with Western civilization and its cultural institutions and to continue to themselves harm... or to irrevocably sever their ties with the religious legacy of the Middle Ages, in order for their philosophy to be a philosophy of life and freedom, and not one of death and hatred..."

Very good, read it all.

Islam, Terrorism

Gruesome Galloway

Christopher Hitchens will be debating the revolting sell-out Galloway tomorrow in New York, don’t miss it!

In the meantime, let me wet your appetite with this article on Slate and this collection of idiotic statements from the British buffoon.

On a more serious tone, I still believe that, even in a democracy, opportunism and intellectual dishonesty should not go unchecked and unpunished.

Hitchens, Galloway, Terrorism

Assad on the way out

All pointers indicate that Bashar Assad has a few weeks, if not days, left. He has made all the wrong choices for the wrong reasons and must now pay the consequences.

The rats are attempting to both flee the sinking ship and take over the helm at the same time. As reported here previously, there is a palpable sense inside knowledgeable Syrian circles that elements of the Assad clan and intelligence apparatus have already initiated plans to replace Assad II--now essentially caricatured as a fledgling amateur with little to no credibility.

He thought he was tough, but he let events dictate his policies, never anticipating the next move, never taking the initiative.

The Bush administration's top envoy in Iraq warned Monday that U.S. "patience is running out" with Syrian interference across the border, and refused to rule out either a military strike or punishment through the United Nations.

Syria has become a hub for terrorists, as young, would-be terrorists travel unmolested through the Damascus airport on one-way tickets, U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad said. The United States also accuses Syria of turning a blind eye to terror training camps on its soil.

"Our patience is running out, the patience of Iraqis are running out. The time for decision ... has arrived for Damascus," Khalilzad told reporters at the State Department.
…
"The Syrians have to stop sending destruction to Iraq," Iraq Defense Minister Sadoun al-Dulaimi said in Baghdad. "We know the terrorists have no other gateway into Iraq but Syria."

Assad is down and this is the time to kick him, hard, by any means at the disposal of the international community, be it diplomacy, sanctions, military strikes in pursuit of terrorists. The advantages of a regime change in Syria are enormous: setting the country on the path to democracy, stop terrorists infiltrations into Iraq, isolate further Iran and encourage the democratic forces in that country, free Lebanon from interference, get Hezbollah to think hard about disarmament.

Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Iran, Assad

Mugabe’s busy week-end

While Mugabe enjoys his anti-imperialist week-end with another execrable loser, Fidel Castro, he has also managed to spit in the plate he is eating from by insulting the IMF, despite the unwarranted and unmerited six months reprieve granted to Zimbabwe.

In addition, he has also signed into law the (un)constitutional changes approved earlier by parliament and disappointed everyone by announcing that he will step down in three years (“tomorrow” would have been received better).

In the meantime, Morgan Tsvangirai is trying to mobilize the sluggish Zimbabwean masses:

PRESIDENT TSVANGIRAI'S MESSAGE TO THE PEOPLE OF ZIMBABWE ON THE SIXTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE MDC at a Rally at White City Stadium in Bulawayo.

We meet today as a severely battered nation run by a criminal government that no one wants to be associated with. We have become the laughing stock of the world and our kith and kin are scattered across the globe in search for economic security and sustenance.

Those of us at home have been thrown back into a hunter-gatherer, subsistence society: without food, without jobs, without basic security and without our democratic rights. Regardless of our sorry status and disabling plight, let me hasten to state that we are now on the home stretch.

Does he know something we don’t?

Allow me, Mr. Chairman, to state categorically as the leader of the MDC that we can no longer counsel patience among the people.

To do so effectively, we need to fashion key strategic re-alignments as part of our preparations for the ultimate demise of Zanu PF.
We must strengthen our critical mass for democratic resistance.
Passive compliance with tyranny goes against the spirit of the founding principles of the MDC. Passive compliance compromises our focus for democratic change.

We are confident of a sweeping national victory over the dictatorship as all indications now point directly to the demise of the Mugabe regime. The regime is fast running out of time. The people look set to triumph, once again.

Zimbabweans, especially Shonas, have been patient to the point of submission, and Tsvangirai has had to resort to this waiting game, but waiting for what? Hoping for a reformed Zanu PF “after” Mugabe is just wishful thinking (someone tell Mbeki).

At this stage, unable to reach an agreement with the Army, he must have dismissed the chances of success of a “people’s revolution” as nil. Without the active participation of other African countries and neighbors, he has no other option than to appeal to international partners and world community to increase the pressure on the regime and hope for an internal collapse of Zanu PF.

Zimbabwe, Mugabe, Tsvangirai, Castro, IMF

The beginning

THOUSANDS of triumphant Palestinians poured into abandoned Jewish settlements early today, setting a synagogue on fire and shooting in the air. They ran amok as convoys of Israeli troops rolled out of the Gaza Strip in the final phase of Israel's withdrawal after 38 years of occupation. Palestinian police stood by helplessly as crowds set fire to an empty synagogue and a Jewish seminary, and Hamas gunmen raised their flags. After flooding into the settlements, Palestinians tore down electricity poles, ripped out toilets and walked off with doors and window frames.

Things are always at their best in the beginning (B.Pascal)

Gaza, Israel

The Beeb Easy

I hope this won’t sound callous; take it as a relief from all the sad news with which we are being bombarded daily. The tragedy of Katrina has also generated some hilarious stuff. Read this fisking of the BBC’s Katrina coverage, I laughed aloud.

Some excerpts:

[a] snapshot of Louisiana and the city formerly known as the Big Easy […] the BBC manufactured in its recent willfully ignorant reportage of how George Bush intentionally withheld aid from black citizens whose plight he had caused by his refusal to sign the Kyoto thingy.

…Gavin Hewitt, togged out in tropical gear and possessed of an outboard skiff which he guided along the flooded streets. The drama was diminished, though, by people walking by in the background in water just up to their knees.

Back to the flooded streets and Hewitt speaking from his boat to a camera that was presumably held by a BBC man walking backward through the shallow water. It was unbelievable, he said angrily, how long it was taking the authorities to come to these poorest neighborhoods to rescue people, although he had to raise his voice as he spoke as there were three or four helicopters hovering overhead winching people up.

Jeremy Paxman, under normal circumstances possessed of a sharp intelligence, suffers, like so many other on-camera BBC employees, from a form of Tourette's syndrome whenever President Bush's name is mentioned. Among his comments on the program, according to blogger Natalie Solent, were "This is going very badly for the Republicans", despite that the Republican administration in Mississippi was doing blazingly well and the collapse of New Orleans civil order was solely caused by Democrat ineptitude.

Katrina, BBC

Blair’s faux pas

Mr Zeyno Baran, a contributing expert of The Counterterrorism Blog, has received a brief from a moderate muslim trying to support Blair’s fight against radicalism. Excerpts:

Tony Blair delivered the speech that inspired millions of Muslims around the world. We believed finally we had a world leader in the West, who not only had the courage to recognise the ideological battle that Muslims and the rest of the world are facing, but was prepared to take on the bad guys.

No sooner had the Prime Minister declared “Its roots are not superficial, but deep, in the madrasas of Pakistan, in the extreme forms of Wahhabi doctrine in Saudi Arabia, in the former training camps of Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan” the slick, well oiled machine that represents the Wahhabi doctrine in the UK went on the offensive. The spearhead of this network, the Muslim Council Britain (MCB), led the political networking that would be needed to ensure that they, and the groups that they represent, would be well placed to increase their foothold.

Mr. Blair, please do not leave the majority of the moderate Muslims that supported your government (even if we did not all agree entirely with your Iraq policy) at the mercy of these people that have proven themselves more than capable of playing the political game.

Why is there a majority of Wahhabis on all of the groups, in fact why have you included the very people that you describe as the problem? When will you finally realise that sects such as Deobandi, Ikhwan, Ah le Hadith, Wahhabi, Salaafi etc. all come from the same source.

My request, my PLEA to you, Mr Blair, is that you do not give the majority of us that are moderates false hope. For the sake of all of the children of the world, stay firm in your resolve to weed out this cancer. AND please do not lose credibility with the majority of us - help us “take back the microphone”

Wake up, Tony.

Britain, UK, Terrorism, al Qaeda

Crock of crap from the Post

(Via Rantburg): Published reports that al-Qaida forces have taken over the Iraqi city of Qaim are false, a Marine official in Iraq said on Sept. 9. Witnesses and residents in Qaim, as well as people living in the surrounding villages, said Abu Musab Zarqawi’s al-Qaida forces brazenly took control of the city, according to a Sept. 5 Washington Post report.

Maj. Neil Murphy, a spokesman for II Marine Expeditionary Force, told Marine Corps Times that reports detailing an all-out al-Qaida takeover in Qaim were a “crock of crap.”

Iraq, Zarqawi, Al Quaeda, Qaim