Pasta landmark
Hidden in amongst repeated images of torture at the hands of Iraqs liberating superpower, a few other things happened this week though none of them so shockingly unfit to print that the newspapers had to print them extra big.
Lets start with Italy.
Heres some amazing news: On Wednesday 5 May, the government of Silvio Berlusconi popular in Washington, Moscow, parts of London and half of Milan, not so popular in Berlin, Paris, and the entire Islamic world became Italys longest-serving (read: surviving) government since the second world war i.e. since Il Duce.
Whats more, as far as the Diary knows, unlike so many other Italian administrations over the past fifty-plus years, Berlusconis hotch-potch collection of right-wingers is not being propped up by the CIA. Not directly, anyway. All the greater achievement!
Silvios mafia has passed the 1,060 day threshold and, as the Diary went to press, was still going. In the past 58 years, Italy has had 59 governments, few of them particularly memorable, one of them dead after just seven days.
So, whats going on?
In the words of the International Herald Tribune, Even Berlusconis critics concede that the longevity of the government has much to do with the prime ministers charisma.
Oh yes, that. Silvio, the billionaire crooner with a propensity for internationally embarrassing, although somewhat humorous gaffes, has charmed his way into the history books.
At least, thats one interpretation. The other is the rather boring subject of a reformed electoral system. As the IHT notes, Italys political parties are now forced to form coalitions before the election, as opposed to after, when the glue tends to come quickly unstuck.
The lesson? If you campaign together, you stick together and then you release a CD of your best ballads. You cant fail!
The prime minister might be here to stay. In the words of the BBC: The face of Silvio Berlusconi, tanned and wrinkle free, now smiles down from giant billboards across Italian cities.
Well, at least its better than Mussolinis chin.
Canal vision
Meanwhile, in Panama
There were presidential elections this week. The victor, and president-elect, is a guy called Martin Torrijos.
You may be familiar with the name. Torrijos is the son of General Omar Torrijos, the dictator who ruled Panama between 1968-1981. When the General died, a guy called Manuel Antonio Noriega took over. You might have heard his name too.
Funny thing, democracy.
The New York Times puts Torrijos the Youngers success down to his having been educated in the United States and having run a skilful campaign in urban ghettos and among rural peasants. As he shook voters hands, or not, Torrijos embraced the memories of his father as a champion of the poor and as the visionary who had negotiated the treaty by which the United States gave this country control of the Panama Canal.
A not so elementary canal, my dear readers. As The Economist pointed out this week, the Panama Canal takes a great deal of managing. Big ocean liners are charged $250,000 to squeeze through. Lots of poor people the people who supported the dictators son face the prospect of being flooded out of their shacks.
Torrijos II might have his work cut out.
Unlucky for some
Last weeks Diary alerted readers to the news that Dear Leader Kim Jong-il of North Korea had been missing since the horrific train explosions in Ryongchon.
Those of you still lighting candles for Kim (count the Diary out of this collective), can breathe a sigh of relief.
According to KCNA, the worlds most reliable news service, Kim is still in one piece. Nobody has seen him, but thats just detail. The important thing is that footage of him visiting army troops flooded the state networks. When the footage was filmed is, of course, another matter.
As Kim keeps his bouffant down, this week marked the glorious thirteenth anniversary of Kims masterwork Our Socialism Centred on the Masses Shall Not Perish.
According to KCNA, the leader, the party and the people are singleheartedly united behind Kims irresistible philosophy.
Of course they are.
Party time
A world away, in Hong Kong, the Chinese military engaged in a show of military might in Victoria Harbour this week.
The message: quit your democratic aspirations, or else.
Such tactics, of course, are par for the course in Chinese foreign policy. Just ask the Taiwanese.
Up til now, China has resisted threatening its prize territory. This was the first physical display of Chinese aggression since the Communist mainland took Hong Kong off British hands in 1997.
The view out of the office window must have been a shock: two guided-missile destroyers, four guided missile-frigates and two submarines, all brandishing red flags. (New York Times)
No big deal, says the Peoples Liberation Army. Just a celebration of the navys 55th anniversary.
Hmm
As the NYT notes, the military forgot to celebrate the 50th anniversary. Obviously not as important.
Nobody here wants independence, said Martin Lee, founding chairman of Hong Kongs Democratic Party, so theres absolutely no need for them to do this.
Name games
The Greek Olympic Committee got into trouble this week for failing to list Jerusalem as Israels capital city on the official Athens 2004 website.
Jerusalem was replaced by *. At the bottom of the page it read: *Please visit the official United Nations website for further information regarding the capital of Israel.
The UN refers you to General Assembly Resolution 181 (II) of 29 November 1947.
Israel is not happy, especially as only a couple of months ago, the Olympic website had Jerusalem listed as the capital of a place called Palestine.
Posters in the Jerusalem Post online forum were apoplectic. Israeli Olympic Uniforms should incorporate a Jerusalem Emblem with the words since King David, advised Sidney Miransky from Alexandria, USA.
Loving feeling
Finally, lets talk hearts and minds.
The US, as you may have noticed, has not done the best job of late persuading the Arab and Muslim world of its commitment to justice, freedom, democracy and the like.
Both national security advisor Condoleezza Rice and President George W. Bush put in sheepish appearances on Arab TV this week, apologising for the images and reports of torture and sexual humiliation of Iraqi prisoners by American officers. Bush said the practice of ritual torture in one of Saddams chambers does not represent the America that I know.
Lets hope not!
Persuading the world is, of course, another matter. Anti-Americanism is reaching epidemic proportions. As Alioune Tine, a human rights activist in Dakar, Senegal, told the New York Times: If we see torture and ill treatment by the United States, we think it can give an example to some dictators in developing countries. We need the best behaviour from the United States.
In a painfully ironic twist of fate, Margaret Tutwiler, US first under-secretary of state for public diplomacy (and the woman who took over from PR guru Charlotte Beers charged with selling the USA brand to the Arab street), resigned this week to go work with the New York Stock Exchange.
A couple of days later, inspired by their British counterparts, sixty former American ambassadors and diplomats released a letter to their President telling him his policy in the Middle East had cost the US credibility, prestige and friends.
By closing the door on negotiations with Palestinians and the possibility of a Palestinian state, you have proved that the United States is not an even-handed peace partner, the letter said.
The diplomats insisted that a return to the time-honoured American tradition of fairness will reverse the present tide of ill will in Europe and the Middle East even in Iraq.
The only way is up.
USA Today just conducted a nationwide survey of 3,500 Iraqis. The findings told their own story.
In Shia and Sunni areas, only 2% and 5 % of respondents respectively thought the US forces had conducted themselves very well. However, 61% and 44% respectively of those asked were basing this on things theyd heard, not on personal experience. In fact, only 6% and 7% had had any contact with the US military.
Considerably more respondents thought theyd be worse off if the US forces left. When asked would Saddam Hussein have been removed from power by Iraqis if US/British forces had not taken direct military action? 89% of respondents in Baghdad, 89% in Shia areas, 85% in Sunni areas and 98% in Kurdish areas said no
Quotes of the week
We need to get a proper sense of balance.
British prime minister Tony Blair on the abuses at Iraqs Abu Ghraib prison.
We are in a race between cooperation and catastrophe.
Sam Nunn, former US Senator who helped organise Black Dawn, a simulated al-Qaida nuclear attack in Europe this week
We were enormously proud of what we had done in Guantanamo.
General Geoffrey Miller, US chief of detentions and interrogations in Iraq.
Certainly, Im not Balzac.
Brigitte Bardot appearing in a French court on race hate charges over her book A Cry in Silence.
Contact the Diary: dominic.hilton@openDemocracy.net
