Water dilemma
What issue unites the United States defense department, American industry and environmentalists?
Honestly, this is not a trick question. The answer is the international Law of the Sea.
Whats that? Well, according to a Boston Globe editorial reprinted in the International Herald Tribune this week, it is the globes most comprehensive environmental accord, ratified by more than 140 nations.
What do you mean you hadnt heard of it?
The sea, for those of you who thought it was just a big apolitical blob of water, needs laws by which it can be governed. Want to stop North Korea smuggling nuclear technology to other rogue states? Better have a law that allows you to interdict its ships.
Unfortunately, though to no-ones surprise, the US has yet to ratify the treaty and is looking likely to stall further or even bail out (think ICC, think Kyoto).
Theres just something about the word international that makes American legislators teeth fur. Multilateral agreements? Are you serious, boy?
Conservatives in the Senate are looking to shelve the issue until at least after Dubya wins another term in November (or Kerry wins and they can block it, accusing JFK of international weenieism).
Bush wants the treaty approved and signed. So does Don.Rumsfeld@Pentagon.gov. Both know that if the US is to flex its muscles in international waters, it has to get with the programme. Environmentalists may be in it for different reasons, but this is not an alliance you see every day.
But a hard-core of Senate Republicans are opposed on principle to anything that whiffs of global, not national, interest. National Security will be threatened, they say. National Security is threatened, says their President and his cohort of tree-huggers. Time we acted.
Has anyone asked the sea what it wants?
Playing games
Speaking of the international community, lets head to Iran
The ongoing nuclear situation got a teeny bit less terrifying this week. I and the international community would like to bring the issue to a conclusion it obviously cannot go on forever, said Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the IAEA, as he emerged from five hours of talks with Iranian officials that were said to have produced welcome and positive steps.
What were they? Well, Iran has agreed to a timetable for nuclear inspections. In a matter of days a new set of UN inspectors will descend on Iran. Iran says the matter will be cleared up by June.
The problem is that Irans cover-ups are starting to unravel and, as is always the case with this issue, no one knows whether Tehran is being at all honest about its plans. Promises to stop work on centrifuges as of 9 April are a bit hollow if on 29 March youd already claimed to have done just that.
Is ElBaradei just being spun a line? Why have traces of highly-enriched uranium been found in a country that claims to have a peaceful nuclear industry? Are the Washington hawks right to demand tougher action?
Something dont add up, thats for sure.
Dont expect this to be over by June.
(Sources: Associated Press, BBC)
Cells and cellphones
Two weeks ago, the Diary wrote about the twin impact of mobile technology on both terrorism and democracy in Spain.
This week, mobiles come into political play again.
First, the raid Saturday by Spanish security services on an apartment in Léganes, in southern Madrid, that resulted in the terror cell responsible for the Atocha bombings blowing up themselves and a policeman in a suicide blast as they chanted Koranic verses.
The Spanish authorities traced the terrorists to the apartment because guess what? one of them used a mobile phone with a prepaid card from the same batch as the one found in the rucksack with the one bomb that failed to go off on 11 March.
The mobile in the rucksack, of course, was supposed to detonate the unexploded bomb.
Three days later, the Spanish electorate used mobile text messaging to organise against the incumbent administration, which was thrown from office.
Now, perhaps as a result of reading the Diary, William Abitbol, a Eurosceptic French member of the European parliament, has translated the entire draft EU constitution into text messages (or txt mssgs if you are so inclined).
The BBC reported some examples: Europe = p; Valery Giscard dEstaing = valeri Js? Dst1; Diversité = 10ver6t.
Hours of fun.
Abitbol thinks his texting underlines the Orwellian nature of the constitution, with its Newspeak language. Unfortunately, the Diary cant help thinking theres something Orwellian about texting it.
(Though, as a colleague recently proposed to the Diary, Perhaps its time for an embargo on the term Orwellian. Enough already.)
Apparently, the entire translation took only ten days to complete (a good use of taxpayers money, if ever there was one), because the text was so repetitive.
It is creating a debate, Abitbol claimed which, if true, guarantees him the Diarys best wishes.
Hong Kong hooey
Finally, China got tough with Hong Kong this week, declaring that Beijings ruling communists will control the territorys future and whether or not it can hold elections.
This is a big blow to democracy advocates and anyone clinging to a scrap of optimism.
A committee of bureaucrats in the Chinese congress has reinterpreted shamelessly the Hong Kong constitution. One country, two systems? Like hell!
Hong Kong was hoping to elect its local leaders you know, using that system they call democracy. Beijing, for those of you unfamiliar with communism, aint enamoured of the concept. Democracy means democrats may win elections. Democracy means a threat to entrenched know-it-all power, to one-party rule, to ideological monomania, to committees of faceless bureaucrats. Democracy means freedom, human rights and
Alright, thats enough. You get the point. The Hong Kong Chinese are not pleased (with a few Sinophile exceptions). When Britain handed over the territory to China in 1997, it came with a rather significant proviso: Hong Kong gets a fifty-year period of autonomy (by which time, China will have succumbed to the inevitable end of history, embraced democracy, market liberalism, human rights etc., and have no interest in denying these universal desires to the wealthy, progressive, skyscraper-lined Hong Kong).
This latest reinterpretation of the agreement (known as the Basic Law) is seen as a betrayal of Hong Kongs quasi-self-determination. This will intensify the already tense atmosphere in society, Lee Cheuk-yan, a Hong Kong legislator, warned the Financial Times.
Listen to this from Qiao Xiaoyang, centralising authoritarian par excellence (otherwise known as deputy secretary of the NPCs standing committee): The right to amend the law belongs to the National Peoples Congress. A locality has no fixed power. All powers of the locality derive from the authorisation of the central authorities.
Did someone say Orwellian?
This is an ominous sign of whats to come. There is widespread belief that China has been shaken by recent events in Taiwan and the controversial narrow re-election of President Chen Shui-bian (who has already criticised China for this latest display of authority). A separatist Taiwan? No way. A separatist Hong Kong? Absolutely no way!
Beijing insists its latest decree is mild, claiming it has every intention to push forward Hong Kongs political development (er, push it where?) but, unfortunately, the actual situation (love it!) is not currently conducive to universal suffrage and the only way to approach the future is with a gradual and orderly process (Fabianism?). Any democratic changes will be introduced only when there is a need.
If we allowed the discussion and debate to go on and on without limit, that would affect the stability, living standards and overall development of Hong Kong, said Qiao Xiaoyang.
Mmm
Meanwhile, this does nothing to improve Sino-US relations. As the New York Times notes, Beijings crackdown is likely to add to political tensions between the two countries, a friction already increasing over trade issues, human rights abuses and sales to Taiwan.
The Financial Times concludes that Chinas message of dominance in fact conceals its weakness and fear that Hong Kong is ripe for revolt. Protestors will take to the streets on Sunday 11 April. Says the Peoples Daily, mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party: the central government has the right to decide from the start to the finish on Hong Kong.
The finish? Oh, dear.
Quotes of the week
He doesnt pull any punches with women. Theres as much towel-snapping with them as there is with the boys.
Mary Matalin, campaign advisor to President George W. Bush, on his relations with women. Quoted by Elizabeth Bumiller in the New York Times.
Totally bury the pro-US conservative parties including the Grand National party and the Democratic Party.
North Koreas official advice to South Korean voters ahead of next weeks general election.
There is no use for demonstrations, as your enemy loves to terrify and suppress opinions and despises peoples. I ask you not to resort to demonstrations because they have become a losing card and we should seek other ways. Terrorise your enemy, as we cannot remain silent over its violations.
Radical Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in a message to his supporters.
The French have expressed their desire for justice. They have expressed their demand for efficiency. They have shown their doubt and impatience, and we have heard them. But they have not chosen abandonment, withdrawal, inaction. They have not chosen immobility. Because immobility is the enemy it is what is damaging France.
French prime minister (still) Jean-Pierre Raffarin vowing to pursue social and economic reforms, despite his partys drubbing in elections last week.
Contact the Diary: dominic.hilton@opendemocracy.net
