{jcomments on}OMAR, AGNEWS, BXL, le 28 avril 2010 – news.xinhuanet.com- April 28, 2010–The UN Security Council on Tuesday put forward the possibility of establishing international tribunals to try pirates, as its members called for tougher legislation aimed at prosecuting and jailing suspects caught off the coast of Somalia.
RWANDA
Amnesty calls for ‘fair’ trial of Rwanda opposition chief
(AFP) /28042010
LONDON — Amnesty International has urged the Rwandan authorities to ensure opposition leader Victoire Ingabire gets a “swift, fair trial” after her arrest on suspicion of denying the 1994 genocide.
Ingabire, a likely challenger to President Paul Kagame in August presidential elections, was arrested in Kigali on April 21 and also stands accused of “collaborating with a terrorist organisation.”
A Kigali court handed her a conditional release the day after her detention.
“Amnesty International urges the Rwandan government to ensure that opposition leader Victoire Ingabire receives a swift, fair trial,” said the rights group in a statement released Tuesday.
“We have documented a number of incidents of intimidation and harassment of opposition groups in Rwanda in recent months,” said Erwin van der Borght, Africa programme director for Amnesty.
“Now with the arrest of a potential presidential candidate a few months ahead of the election, we call on the government to demonstrate that this is not another such case.”
A prosecution statement released after Ingabire’s arrest said she stands accused of “association with a terrorist group; propagating genocide ideology; negationism and ethnic divisionism.”
The charges stem from remarks made by Ingabire after her return to Rwanda in January, in which she called for the trial of those responsible for the death of Hutus in the genocide.
An estimated 800,000 people were killed in the massacre planned and carried out by ethnic Hutu extremists. Most killed were Tutsis but moderate Hutus were also victims.
Ingabire, a Hutu, heads the United Democratic Forces (FDU) party which was formed in exile but is not yet registered in Rwanda.
UGANDA
AIDS Programs Hit Setbacks in Africa
One year ago, Obama unveiled a new $63 billion global health initiative. So why are advocacy groups raising the alarm about HIV treatment shortages?
By Katie Paul | Newsweek Web Exclusive/Apr 28, 2010
Peter Mugyenyi runs the Joint Clinical Research Center (JCRC), one of the most successful AIDS-treatment providers in Uganda. Back in 2003, he went to Washington on a day’s notice to help the Bush administration draft its plan for what would become PEPFAR (the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief), the most ambitious public-health initiative ever to tackle the AIDS crisis, then sat beside Laura Bush at the State of the Union address when the program was announced. In the years since, he has been applauded when he exceeded his enrollment targets.
But today, despite treating 32,000 AIDS patients, he does not have a message of success. Instead, he was back in Washington in March, this time to warn that the stagnation of PEPFAR funding is beginning to “result in chaos.” At the beginning of April he was quoted in The Boston Globe, announcing that he had received word not to enroll new patients unless they are replacing others who have left or died. Midmonth, Health GAP, an independent activist organization, reported that antiretroviral-treatment programs at the JCRC and other clinics in Uganda were being “precipitously” transferred to government hospitals, which did not have the drugs to handle them. On Monday, Mugyenyi was again raising the alarm, having penned the introduction to a new report put out by the International Treatment Preparedness Coalition that warns of a global backslide in the AIDS fight.
Over the past year, the Obama administration has rolled out plans for a new, more pragmatic approach to U.S. global-health initiatives. As NEWSWEEK wrote in the fall, the plan was to get more results for less money, something health experts believed they could achieve by diversifying the U.S. global-health portfolio beyond the singular orientation of PEPFAR and teaming up with multilateral partnerships, like the Geneva-based Global Fund. This would allow HIV clinics to treat an array of health issues, including those not related to HIV, and stabilize funding for a variety of health concerns, independent of transitory fundraising pushes for the cause du jour. At the same time, driven by critiques of PEPFAR’s sustainability, the plan would cut costs by committing to treat the sickest patients first, shifting resources over to prevention efforts, and putting national governments on the hook for delivering services. The new plan isn’t chump change; Obama asked Congress for $63 billion for his new Global Health Initiative, to be spread out over the next six years. Still, the money previously authorized by Congress for PEPFAR ($48 billion over five years, approved in 2008) didn’t make it into this year’s budget. Instead, arguing for a smaller, smarter PEPFAR, the administration increased funding by just 2.2 percent this year, the smallest increase the program has seen since its inception.
AIDS advocates are now wondering whether “pragmatic” is just a euphemism for cheap. In the last year, the number of HIV-positive people that PEPFAR started on treatment was the smallest it has been for four years, even while demand increases as patients live longer and the disease continues to spread unabated. The program’s annual report is a thin 20 pages, consisting mostly of charts, compared with the 60- to 100-page tomes that used to mount vigorous defenses of the program each year. At the same time, the decision to slash $50 million from the U.S.’s commitment to the Global Fund has cast doubts on its commitment to multilateralism and partnership. There is a sense among AIDS advocates that a golden age of treatment has passed, says Emi McLean, the U.S. director of Doctors Without Borders’ essential-medicines access campaign. “Whenever we raise questions about why PEPFAR is flatlining, the response is that we need to move away from the U.S. being the primary actor toward a more multilateral response. But the Global Fund is that multilateral response, and yet there’s no increased commitment there,” she says. McLean has noticed a similar disconnect with PEPFAR’s “partnership frameworks,” jargon for agreements to divvy up responsibilities with recipient governments (and, ideally, to incentivize those governments to put forth more long-term investments). On a recent trip to Uganda, McLean found that the AIDS-control chief there had never even heard of a partnership framework, even as such agreements were being hailed at home as an innovative way to shift responsibilities to local providers.
Such mixed messages on the administration’s support for AIDS programs can have long-term consequences in influencing behavior patterns that affect the pandemic’s spread. “If you’re trying to encourage people to get tested, and then you can’t back that up with treatment for those who are sick, you’re creating a disincentive to get tested,” says Peter Navario, a global health fellow at the Center for Foreign Relations. Since patients tend to share when there are not enough drugs to go around, even those on treatment are likely to start underdosing as treatments are cut off. But perhaps what worries advocates the most is simple momentum. A big part of PEPFAR’s success, says McLean, was its commitment to ambitious targets, like the push to provide universal access to 10 million AIDS patients. With some 4 million people covered, and significant progress in getting reluctant states like South Africa to step up and address the problem, why pull back now?
To an extent, it’s because policymakers are coming around to some unpleasant realities about PEPFAR’s heralded successes. For one, there is the unfortunate reality that the world can’t treat its way out of the AIDS epidemic. Despite admirable advances, the number of people infected is simply growing at too high a rate. For every two patients put on antiretroviral drugs today, five others contract HIV, a rate that has remained steady even as PEPFAR money made enormous strides in bringing down the death rate. As that death rate drops, patients live longer, requiring ever more years of treatment. Plus, as AIDS awareness grows and more people volunteer to get tested—both good things—the ranks of those qualifying for drugs swell. The number skyrockets further if countries adopt a new World Health Organization standard stipulating that AIDS patients be given drugs earlier, when their immune-system cell count is at 350—the standard in the United States—rather than 200, as it is now. Eric Goosby, who directs PEPFAR, has indicated he is not going to do so, since it would triple the number of people eligible for treatment (though he makes an exception for pregnant women). “When you look at it from a global perspective,” says Navario, “there is a huge mismatch between the number of people requiring treatment and the resources available. PEPFAR scaled up immensely over four years. But did we ever expect that it was going to increase by more than a billion dollars a year forever?” Better to find ways to do more with less, he says, pointing to Malawi as a country widely held up as a model for its efficient, effective AIDS programs.
Then there are the questions of aid effectiveness more generally. The problems in Uganda, to take just one example, run far deeper than just PEPFAR cuts. Despite the influx of millions of dollars each year from PEPFAR, the Global Fund, and the British Department for International Development, the country’s HIV prevalence rate has actually risen, to 6.4 percent, from a record low of 5 percent in 2000. Those foreign agencies pay for more than 90 percent of Uganda’s AIDS-treatment regimens, leaving clinics vulnerable to fluctuations in donor contributions, as in 2005 and 2008, when Uganda lost $12 million from th
e Global Fund in the wake of repeated corruption problems. This year the Global Fund approved just $4.2 million of the Ugandan government’s $70.2 million request.
Given how fickle those donors can be, it would seem to make sense for recipient governments to keep some funds in the health ministries’ bank accounts for a rainy day. They aren’t. Revealing what was long an open secret in health and development circles, a study published in The Lancetlast week showed that sub-Saharan African governments have yanked between 43 cents and $1.14 from their own domestic spending on health for every dollar in health aid they received from foreign donors. This represents a big departure from the trend in developing countries in Latin America, Asia, and the Middle East, where most governments double their health budgets while receiving aid. Lead author Christopher Murray, who directs the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, notes that it’s relatively common for poor governments to shift money around between ministries to correct for the inequities that result from the ever-changing whims of international donors (to ensure, for example, that they can pay teachers in addition to building shiny new health clinics). But it’s impossible to know how legitimate the shifts are, since in most cases the money can’t be tracked. And the fact that Malawi, the model for success in the sub-Saharan African fight against AIDS, bucked the regional trend and actually doubled its own health spending does not speak well for the habits of its neighbors.
All of which is to say there is no one guilty party responsible for the treatment drop-offs, and there is no magic bullet that will fix some of the systemic problems underlying them. The question is whether the policy is still the right one—and, ultimately, whether a U.S. policy that puts recipient governments on the hook, makes those governments less vulnerable to funding whims, and attempts to increase efficiences is still the best way to go. But as McLean points out, it’s not enough simply to talk about partnership frameworks and multilateral institutions, nor to transition to new approaches for the long haul without making sure the money is still flowing through current arrangements in the interim; if governments commit to giving aid, they should give it, and if they commit to bringing recipient governments into the conversation, they should talk to them. Because as the dizzying array of the world’s global-health bureaucracies figure out how to do the necessary work of reconfiguring themselves, new patients are continuing to be added to the ranks via PEPFAR-funded tests, and to be told they will get help via PEPFAR-funded treatment—only to be referred to government hospitals that have no way to treat them.
© 2010
Senate Advances on International LGBT Rights
www.metroweekly.com/by Chris Geidner/ April 28, 2010
Foreign Relations Committee approves pro-LGBT equality language, offered by Senators Feingold and Gillibrand, to State Department funding bill
An amendment that successfully passed as part of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s State Department authorization bill would increase U.S. monitoring of international violence and other discrimination relating to sexual orientation or gender identity.
With some Republican support, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Tuesday, April 27, accepted the amendment, sponsored by Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.) and co-sponsored by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), on a roll call vote of 12-7. Later in the committee’s session on Tuesday, the entire Foreign Relations Authorization Act for Fiscal Years 2010-11 was passed on a voice vote.
Feingold’s amendment also would strengthen the State Department’s annual Human Rights Reports as to such discrimination, step up embassy involvement in addressing anti-LGBT discrimination and add foreign-service officer training in such areas.
”Passage of this amendment will help counter efforts around the world to restrict the rights of people just because of their gender identity or sexual orientation,” Feingold said in a statement. ”The anti-homosexuality bill in Uganda is just the latest example of why we need to strengthen the State Department’s ability to monitor and address these serious human rights abuses around the world.”
Gillibrand said in a statement Tuesday night, ”It is time for us in Congress to take a strong stand against all hate crimes and persecution – wherever they occur. People in this world should not have to suffer or fear for their lives because of who they are or what they believe in. It is wrong and it must end.”
She added, ”While the ultimate goal is safe conditions in these countries, until that happens, the U.S., UN and the international community must ensure that LGBT refugees can reach safety in countries where they won’t face persecution.”
Earlier this month the full Senate unanimously passed a resolution calling for the rejection of the proposed Anti-Homosexuality Bill in Uganda. Along with Feingold, that bill was sponsored by Sens. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine).
At the time of the Senate’s passage, Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-Calif.) said, ”I’m very pleased by the Senate passage and am working closely with Chairman [Howard] Berman [(D-Calif.)] to see a similar vote in the House.”
Today, in introducing the amendment, Feingold said, ”Unfortunately, the proposed legislation in Uganda is just one example of actions taken around the world to restrict the rights of people because of their sexual orientation.
”Members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered community face increasing levels of persecution and violence in Iran and Iraq, criminalization laws remain in effect in many other countries, and homosexuality is punishable by death in Iran, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Nigeria,” Feingold said in prepared remarks. ”If accepted, my amendment would reinforce the strong message sent by this body when we passed [the Uganda resolution], and demonstrate our commitment to addressing these widespread violations of basic human rights.”
TANZANIA:
CONGO RDC :
Congo is world’s rape capital: UN
Wednesday April 28, 2010/Source: ONE News/tvnz.co.nz
Top UN official Margot Wallstrom has called on the Security Council to help end the horrors that women in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have to face.
Calling DR Congo the “rape capital of the world”, Wallstrom said that women continue to suffer sexual violence “not because the law is inadequate to protect them, but because it is inadequately enforced”.
Her remarks come after her recent visit to the DRC.
The UN refugee agency UNHRC says 14 women are sexually assaulted every day on average in DRC.
KENYA :
DRC.Pilot blamed in 2007 Kenya Airways crash
Wednesday, April 28, 2010/The Associated Press
An investigative report released Wednesday blames pilot error for the 2007 crash in Cameroon of a Kenya Airways flight.
All 114 people on board died in the disaster.
The pilot of Kenya Airways Flight 507 didn’t notice the plane was banking right and when he did, he turned farther right, triggering a downward spiral, the report found.
The crash of the Boeing 737-800 on May 5, 2007, occurred during a thunderstorm less than two minutes after takeoff in Douala, in west Cameroon. But the report said weather did not likely cause the crash. Instead it blamed “spatial disorientation” by the pilot.
The report was posted early Wednesday on the website of the Cameroon Civil Aviation Authority. Some of the investigation was conducted by the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board and Boeing experts in the United States.
Executives with Kenya Airways were expected to comment on the report later Wednesday.
The report said the pilot didn’t adhere to standard operating procedures, had poor situational awareness and “reacted inappropriately in the face of an abnormal situation.”
No instrument scanning was done by the crew during the initial roll, and because it was night, the pilot had no visual references to correct the situation, the report said.
‘We are crashing’
On the plane’s cockpit recorder, about 90 seconds into the flight when the pilot notices the rightward drift, he says, “We are crashing.” Seconds later a young first officer mistakenly tells the pilot to turn right, before correcting himself and saying “left, left, left.”
The plane crashed nine seconds later, a minute and 42 seconds into the flight.
The 114 people on board came from 26 countries, including an American AIDS expert who worked at Harvard University; businesspeople from China, India and South Africa; Cameroonian merchants; a UN refugee worker from Togo and Briton Anthony Mitchell, a Nairobi-based correspondent for The Associated Press.
The crash investigation has been long and difficult. The plane went down in a mangrove swamp less than 6.5 kilometres from the runway, but it took officials 40 hours to find the wreckage. It took officials weeks to identify remains and there was a further delay before Cameroonian authorities released them to next of kin.
Security Council suggests tribunals to try Somali pirates
English.news.cn /news.xinhuanet.com/2010-04-28
UNITED NATIONS, April 27 (Xinhua) — The UN Security Council on Tuesday put forward the possibility of establishing international tribunals to try pirates, as its members called for tougher legislation aimed at prosecuting and jailing suspects caught off the coast of Somalia.
In a resolution unanimously adopted, the 15-member body appealed to all States “to criminalize piracy under their domestic law and favorably consider the prosecution of suspected, and imprisonment of convicted, pirates apprehended off the coast of Somalia, consistent with applicable international human rights law. “
The Security Council also requested that UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon present a report within three months on possible options for prosecuting and imprisoning suspects in connection with piracy and armed robbery at sea in the Horn of Africa.
In its resolution, members noted efforts by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and other international organization and donors, including the Contact Group on Piracy off the Coast of Somalia (CGPCS), “to enhance the capacity of the judicial and the corrections systems in Somalia, Kenya, Seychelles and other States in the region.”
They also highlighted the role of the European Union (EU), the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and other partners in bringing suspects to justice, in cooperation with Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government (TFG).
Ongoing violence between the TFG, heavily backed by the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) and other supporters, and rebel groups in the Somali capital of Mogadishu prevents piracy suspects from being tried or imprisoned there. Some of the burden has shifted to neighboring Kenya’s justice system.
The Security Council acknowledged “difficulties that Kenya encountered, encouraging its Government to continue prosecuting suspects and imprisoning convicted persons.”
The Tuesday meeting came just days after B. Lynn Pascoe, UN under-secretary-general for political affairs and chair of the Board of the Trust Fund to Support Initiatives of States Countering Piracy off the Coast of Somalia, unveiled 2.1 million U. S. dollars worth of projects planned to tackle the scourge.
The five projects being backed by the UN Trust Fund, which was set up in January by the Contact Group on Piracy off the Coast of Somalia, are focused largely on efforts to prosecute piracy suspects.
Editor: Mu Xuequan
ANGOLA :
SOUTH AFRICA:
South Africa’s Huge HIV Testing Campaign
28 April 2010/www1.voanews.com
This is the VOA Special English Health Report.
South Africa plans to test fifteen million people for H.I.V. by June of next year. That is almost one-third of its population.
South Africa has the most people living with H.I.V. of any nation. The number of infected men, women and children is estimated at more than five and a half million — or eleven percent of the population.
President Jacob Zuma launched the testing campaign on Sunday in Johannesburg. He announced the results of his latest blood test for H.I.V.
JACOB ZUMA: “My April results, like the three previous ones, registered a negative outcome.”
He said he was sharing the results to support openness and understanding.
JACOB ZUMA: “We have to work harder together to fight the perceptions and the stigma. We have to make all South Africans that people living with H.I.V. have not committed any crime.”
The country’s former president, Thabo Mbeki, was known for the unaggressive way his government dealt with AIDS. He questioned whether H.I.V. even caused the disease.
The new testing and counseling campaign will start at a single location in each of South Africa’s nine provinces this month. The program will be expanded every two months until fifty-two health centers are offering the service.
The government says it will also expand treatment and support services.
Francois Venter is a senior director in the Reproductive Health and HIV Research Unit at the University of Witwatersrand. He says the testing campaign may put additional stress on the health system, but that will show where the weaknesses are. He says knowing which areas of the system are going to cause future problems will make the effort worthwhile, even if the goal of fifteen million is not reached.
The South Africa National AIDS Council is heading the campaign. The council includes government representatives, medical experts and health activists. The theme of the campaign is “I am responsible. We are responsible. South Africa is taking responsibility.”
Along with H.I.V., South Africa also has high rates of diabetes, high blood pressure and tuberculosis. Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi says the campaign will be used to improve all health care. People who get tested for H.I.V. will also get other services including screening for blood pressure, blood sugar and TB.
This June the eyes of the football world will be on South Africa when it becomes the first African country to host the World Cup.
And that’s the VOA Special English Health Report, written by Caty Weaver. For more health news, go to voaspecialenglish.com. You can also get our reports on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and iTunes at VOA Learning English. I’m Steve Ember.
South Africa split on Freedom Day
By Bilal Randeree /Source: Al Jazeera /Wednesday, April 28, 2010
South Africans celebrated Freedom Day on April 27, 16 years after the country’s first democratic elections and the end of the racist and oppressive white minority Apartheid rule.
“From the ruins of a racially polarised order, we have built a nation driven by a strong commitment to the values of justice and equality,” Jacob Zuma, South Africa’s president and head of the ruling African National Congress (ANC) party, said during celebrations to mark the day on Tuesday.
“As taught by our icon President Nelson Mandela, we must remain steadfast in our determination that never, never and never again shall it be that this beautiful land will again experience the oppression of one by another,” Zuma said, repeating the very words made famous by Nelson Mandela in 1994.
He went on: “And so with freedom, came the responsibility of building a non-racial, united and reconciled nation.”
No economic freedom
But as the country prepares for the kickoff of Africa’s first football World Cup, the South African Student Congress (Sasco) spoke out against those -black, white and every shade in between – that it accused of failing the country.
Freedom Day marks the day economic freedom was surrendered in exchange for political freedom, Mbulelo Mandlana, the current Sasco president, said.
Sasco is a student movement that traces its history back to the early days of the struggle against Apartheid.
Many of the political leaders that fought in the liberation struggle were once members of the student body.
Steve Bantu Biko, the black consciousness leader who was killed by Apartheid police in 1977, was the first president of the student organisation when it was formed in 1969.
Rich rule
“We have secured a democracy that gives the rich the right to rule the roost in our political and economic terrain,” Mandlana said, on a day that is generally viewed by South Africans as a chance to reflect on a united, non-racial society.
Millions of South Africans still live in poverty and in recent years the country has experienced sporadic and violent social unrest as many become impatient with the slow pace of service delivery.
Sasco says that “tenderpreneurs”, those who have taken advantage of the new government’s tender process, have accumulated personal wealth while failing to deliver the goods and services they were contracted to deliver, resulting in collapsing low cost houses, roads and bridges.
Even though more than 2.3 million low cost houses have been built for nearly 11 million people since 1994, there is still a widespread shortage of housing and millions of people live in squatter camps with no access to running water or electricity.
But the government said it is doing all it can to meet the needs of the people, and Tokyo Sexwale, the minister of human settlements, recently said that the scale of government housing delivery is “second only to China”.
During Apartheid, the Group Areas Act was put into place, and this forced people of different racial groups to live in racially partitioned cities and towns.
“Many still live in areas once designated for black people … away from economic opportunities and civic services,” Zuma said during his address.
Apartheid’s legacy
He blamed the legacy of this and other historic laws for being in existence almost 20 years after they were repealed, saying that though apartheid laws have disappeared from the statute books, their effects still linger on.
“Our people still have to daily confront the impact of the laws [of the past],” Zuma said in Pretoria before thousands of people gathered outside the government Union Buildings.
South Africa suffers from extreme income disparities, with some reports citing inequality levels in the country as the highest in the world.
Between 1993 and 2008, income inequality in the country actually increased, as those who benefited and amassed wealth during Apartheid were best suited to profit from economic stability and prosperity in the new democracy.
But the gap between the rich and poor in South Africa has not only widened between whites and blacks (as all non-whites are legally known) but also within the different race groups.
BEE abused
Government policies, such as black economic empowerment (BEE) and affirmative-action, that were meant to redistribute wealth from the white minority population to the masses, have largely failed to do this.
Zuma and the ANC have acknowledged this to some extent and there are discussions underway aimed at finding ways to address this.
Instead of redistributing wealth and positions to the black majority, the policies have resulted mainly in “a few individuals benefiting a lot,” Zuma said, while leaving the leadership of most big companies in white hands.
The black masses, the intended beneficiaries, have hardly gained from these policies.
The richest 4 per cent of South Africans, a quarter of whom are black, now earn more than $80,000 a year, more than a 100 times what most of their compatriots live on.
The BEE legislation was originally promoted by big white businessmen in order to ward off post-Apartheid calls for nationalisation of the mines and the major national corporations.
What resulted were a few well-connected blacks being given huge equity stakes in big businesses, leaving whites with the bulk of the country’s wealth.
Many of those that were enriched by BEE were either struggle veterans themselves, or those close to them.
Although renewed calls for the nationalisation of the mines and banks have been heard within ANC ranks recently, the president has repeatedly said that this is not on the government’s agenda.
‘defeat capitalism’
Some claim that this is due to the influence that the new black capitalists have on the president and certain key figures within the ruling party.
So while many South Africans celebrated the positive changes that the country has seen since 1994, Sasco members were not in a celebratory mood.
They called on students and workers to use Freedom Day as a day to strategise on how to expropriate what they called the ill-gotten wealth of the black and white bourgeoisie.
“We call on all students and workers not to spare a moment but mobilise to defeat capitalism and neo-liberalism in the movement and in society,” Mandlana said.
While crowds ululated at the Pretoria Freedom Day celebrations, Sasco said that students and workers would only celebrate when education was free and fair.
“For now, we will stay in our dilapidated houses and residences and watch the ululation go by.”
It’s simply harassment
www.chicagotribune.com/Clarence Page/April 28, 2010
Congratulations, Arizona. If your new “reasonable suspicion” immigration ID-check law was intended to get Washington’s attention, it succeeded. It also raised my reasonable suspicion that the immigration debate has been hijacked by wingnuts.
This is the goofiest legislation since the Arizona House days earlier voted to require all presidential candidates to provide their birth certificates before they can have access to the Arizona ballot. This thoroughly useless legislation obviously sprang out of the goofy “birther” movement, a persistent cult of moon dancers who refuse to acknowledge the validity of Barack Obama’s birth certificate. What can you do with people who won’t believe the documents of a documented worker?
The new ID-check law not only allows but requires police to ask individuals for proof of their citizenship based on nothing more than reasonable suspicion that they might be illegal immigrants. Heaven knows how many un
reasonable acts have been committed in the name of reasonable suspicion.
The law requires legal immigrants to carry their alien registration documents at all times. That’s so they can produce them on demand in the way freed slaves were required before the Civil War. And here I thought those days were over. Silly me.
Of course, what about Americans who happen to look like what some people think an illegal immigrant looks like? These citizens better have some ID handy, too, or their next trip to the grocery could be interrupted by an unnecessary trip to a holding cell.
The ID-check law is worse than useless. It is a hazard. It actually endangers public safety, as some police officials have pointed out, by poisoning police relations with minority communities. It discourages victims, witnesses and informants from coming forward to provide the help with which most crimes are solved.
Worse, it puts Arizona in a class with apartheid South Africa in subjecting people to ID checks based on their appearance.
I had a taste of what that was like in the 1970s as a black American reporter during South Africa’s apartheid regime. The white-minority government’s “influx control” policy required all black South Africans to carry a photo-ID “passbook” in urban areas to prevent a deluge of black Africans from flooding in to areas where the jobs were. Sound familiar?
My American passport came in handy on a Johannesburg street when an Afrikaner police officer said “Wys my jou paspoort.” (Show me your passport.) I was strolling-while-black. He didn’t need any more reasonable suspicion than that.
Is South Africa’s pass coming to Arizona today? Even the usually sensible Gov. Jan Brewer admitted in a news conference that she doesn’t know what an illegal immigrant “looks like.” Yet since the overwhelming majority of Arizona’s legal and illegal immigrants happen to be Hispanic, the ID-check law sounds very much like a breathtakingly bold attempt not only to legalize but force ethnic profiling by police. Anyone who denies that, as Brewer does, does not know the definition of profiling or desperately wishes not to know.
But I congratulate the governor and her fellow state lawmakers for this much: They’ve brought Washington’s overdue attention to some very serious immigration issues, including their state’s porous border with Mexico. Unfortunately they’ve chosen to make their point with all the subtlety of a roadside bomb.
Congress and the White House have been shoving immigration to the back burner ever since then-President George W. Bush and Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain failed mightily to pass a reasonable “pathway to citizenship” approach to immigration reform, an approach that its right-wing opponents falsely but effectively labeled “amnesty.”
Now in a tight primary fight against conservative former Congressman J. D. Hayworth, McCain is calling for more troops on the border. He had it right the first time.
Now reasonable voices on both sides are calling once again for comprehensive immigration reform. That means not only tougher sanctions against employers who hire illegal immigrants, but also better enforcement of the sanctions we already have. We have the capabilities, for example, to build a national computerized instant-check enforcement system. Why don’t we have it?
But comprehensive reform also needs to include incentives for illegal immigrants to come out of the shadows, register themselves, go through background checks, pay whatever taxes they owe, learn English and get in line behind applicants already on a pathway to citizenship.
That’s not “amnesty.” It’s a reasonable alternative to unreasonable suspicions.
Clarence Page is a member of the Tribune’s editorial board and blogs at chicagotribune.com/pagespage
cpage@tribune.com
Orascom Talks With MTN Said to Be Advanced as Deal Hurdles Loom
April 28, 2010/By Alaa Shahine, Vernon Wessels and Jacqueline Simmons/Bloomberg
April 28 (Bloomberg) — Orascom Telecom Holding SAE is in advanced talks to sell assets worth $10 billion to MTN Group Ltd. and is seeking to resolve regulatory obstacles that may scuttle a deal, said three people familiar with the situation.
Regulators in several African and Middle East countries are complicating the negotiations, according to the people, who declined to be identified because the talks are private. Orascom is keeping its options open and also discussing possible transactions with two other phone companies, one person said.
Orascom and MTN plan to make an announcement on the talks today, two people said. MTN may say it is extending the talks, one of the people said. Orascom spokeswoman Manal Abdel-Hamid and Pearl Majola, a spokeswoman for Johannesburg-based MTN, declined to comment.
MTN, Africa’s biggest mobile-phone company, wants to add new markets to its 21 businesses across the Middle East and Africa as some of the world’s largest operators, including Vodafone Plc, seek expansion in Africa to counter slowing revenue growth in Europe. Orascom is under pressure to cut debt, analysts including African Alliance’s Randolph Oosthuizen have said.
“MTN want to be seen as a growth company and they are very reliant on South Africa and Nigeria,” said Martin Mabbutt, an analyst at Nomura International in London, via phone yesterday. “Even if this proves to be an extensive deal, it’s still a simple purchase for them within the African market.”
Egyptian mobile-phone operator Mobinil, jointly controlled by Orascom and France Telecom SA, probably won’t be involved in the deal, one of the people said. The acquisition of the units may include assets in Algeria, Zimbabwe, Egypt and Tunisia, people with knowledge of the plan said April 22.
Alternative Deals
Cairo-based Orascom is talking about alternative deals with a European phone company with a presence in emerging markets and a regional operator, said a person familiar with the company, declining to elaborate.
A sale of Orascom’s Algerian unit, which operates under the name Djezzy, would allow the company to exit the country after a tax dispute and damage to its infrastructure in November following riots after a soccer match between Algeria and Egypt. Algeria’s government ordered the unit last year to pay $596 million in back taxes, which Orascom said it would appeal.
MTN would need the approval of Algerian regulators for any transaction, said Sean Gardiner, an analyst at Morgan Stanley in London.
‘Game Changer’
“The game changer here is what the Algerian government thinks,” he said. “One would expect MTN to engage with them.”
MTN said April 23 that it had started unspecified talks that may or may not lead to a deal. Separately, Orascom, that day asked that its global depositary shares in London be suspended pending an announcement.
A simple acquisition by MTN of units owned by Orascom may have a better chance of success than a complex merger, such as a proposed deal with Bharti Airtel Ltd. that the South African company abandoned last year, Steve Minnaar, a fund manager with Cape Town-based Abax Investments Ltd., which manages the equivalent of $5.1 billion, including MTN stock, said April 23.
MTN and India’s Bharti failed for the second time last year to conclude a $23 billion merger that would have created the world’s third-largest mobile phone company by subscribers. The transaction would have been done in two steps, with Bharti getting a 49 percent stake in MTN in a cash and stock offer and MTN acquiring a 36 percent holding in the New Delhi operator.
Acquisitions
MTN’s Chief Executive Officer Phuthuma Nhleko has said the Indian Basin, Middle East and Africa are areas the company will look for acquisitions. He said on March 1 that a transaction before he leaves in March 2011 “could happen”.
Orascom operates in North Korea, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Egypt, Algeria, Tunisia, Central African Republic, Burundi Namibia and Zimbabwe.
–With reporting by Nicky Smith in Johannesburg, Mahmoud Kassem in Cairo and Jonathan Browning in London. Editors: Simon Thiel, Jeff St.Onge.
‘Learn South Africa’ programme for Indian travel agents
2010-04-28/sify.com
With an aim to spread more awareness about the region, the South African Tourism Board Tuesday announced a programme for the Indian travel agents beginning in July.
‘Learn South Africa’, as the programme is called, will have audio-video clips specially designed for the purpose which will help Indian travel agents get better knowledge about South Africa as a destination and all its tourist attractions.
Medha Sampat, the Indian country manager for South African tourism, said: ‘There is a growing interest in South Africa as a destination from many new trade partners in different cities across the country, and this programme will help us reach out to each of them.’
The one-day programme will take place in 12 cities across the country.
The programme will take place in Mumbai July 10, in Kolkata July 17, in Delhi July 24, in Chennai, Bangalore and Ahmedabad July 31 and in Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Surat, Kochi, Nagpur and Pune August 7.
The session will give a brief overview of the region, history, cultural heritage, provincial distribution, local cuisine, award-winning wines, wildlife game reserves, city attractions, tourism offerings among others.
‘This training will enable professionals to gain product knowledge and also create the ability to confidently market all that South Africa offers. It aims to help professionals promote, plan and organise quality holidays to suit client requirements,’ Sampat said.
Soccer World Cup Propels Cybercrime in South Africa
by Camille Tuutti/ www.thenewnewinternet.com/ April 28, 2010
Africa is currently seeing a spur of phishing attacks, and with South Africa’s hosting of the World Cup this year, cyber criminals in that region are getting even busier.
“Major sporting events provide a perfect cover behind which cyber criminals can launch sophisticated attacks on individuals, companies and governments,” said researchers from Symantec. “These range from simple identity theft to full-blown denial of service attacks.”
Symantec recently reported that World Cup-related scams have included a 419-type of email that claims the recipient has won $1,950 million in a weekly lottery. Another targeted email attack enticed users to open an infected PDF attachment, and other unsuspected users had their computers infected by a Trojan when they tried to take advantage of a bogus offer of VIP passes to the World Cup.
As a result of increased cybercrime activities in South Africa before the soccer finals, Symantec has launched a special website with information on related attacks and how to buy genuine World Cup tickets.
So far, more than 100 sites selling fraudulent tickets have been shut down by FIFA and South African authorities in an effort to stop fake World Cup tickets from being purchased by unsuspecting victims, according to TechWorld.
AFRICA / AU :
UN /ONU :
USA :
OPINION: Skip Gates Is Wrong – America Still Owes Us Reparations
By News One/ April 28, 2010
From AOL Black Voices:
Last week, Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr., made the controversial claim that black Africans were as much to blame for slavery as white Europeans and Americans. According to Gates the implication of Africans makes the messy issue of reparations for the descendants of slaves even messier. But is he missing the point?
In Gates’ mind, the people who profited most from the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade (Europeans and Americans) are no more or less guilty than those who first sold slaves into captivity (the African elite). That’s like saying the people who referred clients to Bernie Madoff are just as guilty as the man who made billions off of his marks.
In Gates’ New York Times op-ed “Ending the Slavery Blame Game”, he reminds us that “90 percent of those shipped to the New World were enslaved by Africans and then sold to European traders.” The debate over reparations, Gates argues, is at best irresolvable because black people were just as complicit in the slave trade as were white people. But following this logic misses two main points: one, that identifying the original sinner doesn’t absolve all other guilty parties of their sins; and two, the profits gained from the original sin are alone grounds for some form of compensation.
For years, Gates has made it his business to shed light on the fact that the institution of chattel slavery was made possible, in part, by early Africans who both enslaved other Africans and sold them into captivity. Whether or not his motivations for this historical muck-raking are purely scholarly or more about assuaging the guilt of white America is still up for debate. However, he does provide a necessary counterpoint to the lopsided view of history many black romantics have.
But a supposedly fair and balanced view of history doesn’t justify his nullification of the argument for reparations. If someone stole my car and sold it off, I would want the thief brought to justice, but I’m more concerned with getting my car back from the person who’s currently in possession of it. The people who sold Africans into slavery are of lesser significance in this equation. If it were Martians who sold Africans off to the Americas, what would that change about your thoughts on the United States or the companies birthed from slave capital?
America would not be the capitalist empire that it is today without more than 400 years of free labor to catapult it there. Many major corporations — tobacco companies, cotton companies, insurance companies, financial institutions — became major because of the profits attained through slavery.
Gates believes that the reparations request is burdened by the “practicalities” involved in determining who should pay. But this actually is a much more simple transaction than he can imagine: Those who’ve profited from that which was not theirs — the human lives of Africans — have a debt to pay, period. The full picture of justice is incomplete without this compensation.
Gates should ask himself if he’s more angry with Lucia Whalen, the neighbor who called the police on him when he was trying to get into his own house, or the police who actually put him in handcuffs, temporarily taking away his freedom.
ABG must first prove its mettle
Nick Hasell: Tempus /Times Online /April 28, 2010
Randgold Resources is no longer the London stock market’s only large-cap play on Africa’s gold.
Since last month, that is, when Canada’s Barrick, the world’s biggest goldminer, spun off its African interests over here. The company raised £882 million through floating the vehicle, African Barrick Gold (ABG), in which it retains a 75 per cent stake. At a stock market value of £2.3 billion, the company sits within sight of the FTSE 100.
The rationale for the demerger appears sound. The value of what are now ABG’s assets — four producing mines in politically stable Tanzania — was not fully reflected in Barrick’s share price relative to the implied rating of its interests in Australia and North America and rivals such as Randgold. Conversely, the scale of projects that might prove attractive for ABG to develop — either through acquisition or its own capital investment — are mostly too small to worry Barrick. The spin-off gives ABG a new set of shareholders and its own balance sheet and leaves Barrick with a strong interest in future growth.
As might be expected of a company only one month old, yesterday’s maiden first-quarter results from ABG contained nothing untoward. Operating profits in the three months to March 31 rose 143 per cent to $100 million, helped by near-record gold prices, and the company generated $67 million of cash, swelling its coffers to $320 million. More important, attributable production rose 40 per cent to 177,000 ounces, and ABG confirmed its forecasts of producing between 800,000 and 850,000 ounces in 2010 — making it the biggest London-listed goldminer.
If there was a niggle, it was that the cash cost of production — at $516 an ounce, against $537 last year — had not fallen as far as expected. However, ABG faced higher overheads from a rock fall at its flagship Bulyanhulu project but remains confident that it can meet its full-year forecast of costs of between $450 and $500 an ounce.
The question from here is how swiftly a standalone ABG can grow. Each of its Tanzanian projects is capable of producing between 50,000 and 60,000 ounces a year, and the company should be able to extend the life of Tulawaka, its most short-dated project. Greater excitement stems from ABG’s ability to buy junior miners in its target areas — whether in West Africa or sub-Saharan East Africa. It has already made a start with its purchase of the Australian-listed Tusker Gold.
At 550p, ABG trades at a discount to its issue price, and at 13 times 2011 earnings, is considerably cheaper than Randgold. However, on the view that a higher multiple is earned, rather than instantly achieved, await further progress before buying in.
N Brown
When a British retailer takes its first steps into America, it is often a good time to sell — as the troubled histories of Dixons, Marks & Spencer, and Sainsbury’s show only too well.
But the planned expansion of N Brown across the Atlantic might cause less alarm. The mid-cap home shopping group confirmed yesterday that it would launch a US pilot of Simply Be — its brand for women in their thirties up to size 32 — in the summer. The advantage of online and catalogue retailers is that, unlike their store-based rivals, the capital cost of such a sortie is slight. The company will print tailored US catalogues, buy lists of prospective customers (who can be identified down to their dress size) and set up a call centre in Fort Lauderdale — but the venture will be run from Brown’s Manchester headquarters, from where goods will be shipped daily by air from its existing warehouse. The prize is a foothold in the world’s biggest consumer economy, where the value of the plus-size clothing sector is put at $35 billion and where a market share of only half of 1 per cent translates into annual sales of £200 million, against the £690 million that Brown reported yesterday. The experience of privately owned Boden, the purveyor of mail-order clothes to Britain’s middle classes — which now books £100 million of US sales a year — suggests such a sum is not out of reach.
For now, Brown is doing fine at home. Its shares gained 5 per cent yesterday as adjusted pre-tax profits of £93 million comfortably beat City forecasts. Bad debts continue to fall — down to 8.3 per cent of sales, against 9.5 per cent in the first half of 2009 — and the company’s tight control of costs and shift towards online sales (which are cheaper to process) have made for better than expected margins.
The full-year dividend was raised 17 per cent, providing a solid 4.1 per cent yield and trading is being helped by warmer spring weather.
But at 265p, up 12½p, or ten times current-year earnings, the shares still trade at an unwarranted 15 per cent discount to Brown’s clothing peers.
Buy.
Faroe Petroleum
Faroe Petroleum is flush with cash — but it wants some more. Yesterday’s full-year results show that the AIM-listed oil and gas explorer is sitting on more than £33 million — a sum sufficient to fund its planned eight-well drilling programme between now and the end of next year. But the company wants to sink a further eight more, boost production through additional drilling at its Schooner and Glitne fields in the North Sea and bid for promising acreage in the UK, Norway and Greenland in this year’s licensing rounds.
So it was that Faroe tapped shareholders through an unexpected two-for-three £65 million rights issue at 100p — its biggest fundraising since floating in 2003. Bolstered with the proceeds, the company is fully financed for the next three years.
Faroe’s recent exploration success provides encouragement that it can deliver more of the same. The shares have nearly doubled on the year, helped by two discoveries west of the Shetlands — Tornado and Glenlivet — and last month’s gas find at the Centrica-operated Fogelberg field offshore Norway, where it has a 15 per cent stake. Faroe’s attraction is that has acquired its portfolio cheaply (most of it through government auction), boasts a broad spread of assets (it has an interest in 39 fields) and sits on £55 million of tax losses, which can be offset against future profits from production. More broadly, the interest of the oil majors in Faroe’s core territory near the Shetlands continues to grow, with Chevron and Total committing substantial sums to the region. It is not clear whether Dana Petroleum, Faroe’s 27 per cent shareholder, will participate in the cash call, which could create short-term uncertainty.
Even so, at 140p, take up the rights.
The 48th State, Nazi Germany, Soviet Union and Apartheid-Era South America
Written by David Seminara / www.rightsidenews.com/28 April 2010
What Does America’s 48th State Have in Common with Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and Apartheid-Era South Africa?
Opponents appear be divided on Arizona’s controversial new immigration law, S.B. 1070. Some liken it to the internment of Japanese-Americans during WW2, others, including Cardinal Roger Mahoney of Los Angeles, compare the legislation to the tactics of Nazi Germany. The bill reportedly “reminded” Hispanic Federation President Lillian Rodríguez Lopez of South African apartheid, while Robert Creamer, blogging for the Huffington Post, couldn’t decided between the Nazis, the Soviets, or merely the Deep South before the civil rights era.
Arizona’s S.B. 1070 will allow police officers to detain those that they suspect of being in the country illegally if they cannot prove otherwise, but opponents of the measure aren’t being very realistic about how this provision of the law will be enforced. For example, Jim Wallis blogging for the Huffington Post, claims that, “all law enforcement officers in the state will be enlisted to hunt down undocumented people, which will clearly distract them from going after truly violent criminals, and will focus them on mostly harmless families.”
The notion that trained law enforcement officials in Arizona are suddenly going to abandon their pursuit of violent criminals, and instead, focus on “hunting down” illegal immigrants is absurd. Those who believe that police officers in Arizona will use this new law as an opportunity to essentially harass law-abiding Latinos, don’t give the men and women who risk their lives to protect their communities much credit for having the ability to exercise good judgment and discretion. This isn’t to suggest that police officers aren’t capable of abuse; the actions of some, including Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, reinforce the need for strong oversight, but it isn’t fair to condemn police officers in Arizona with a broad brush.
One of the most common complaints I’ve read about Arizona SB 1070 is that police will now be able to pull over whomever they want, effectively legalizing racial profiling. As a white male who’s been pulled over by police officers four times in the last year — three times in the U.S. and once in Mexico — I can affirm the fact that police officers on both sides of the border already have the right to pull you over for any reason, or no reason at all. Most of us have no qualms about keeping a photocopy of our proof of insurance in our glove compartment, or about being asked for our driver’s license or registration.
Yet somehow, the notion that immigrants should keep a photocopy of their passport, green card, birth certificate, or visa in their glove compartments makes us Nazi Germany. The truth is that many developed countries around the world require citizens to have some form of a national I.D.
So what’s behind the fears and anxiety surrounding this legislation? Even though there are illegal immigrants of every color and creed in the United States, the lion’s share of illegal immigrants in Arizona are from Latin America, and thus, many Latinos are concerned that they will be unfairly targeted. Why should some of us have to carry proof of legal status while others will not? It’s a fair point, and it reinforces the need for us to have some form of national I.D., but I would argue that keeping some proof of legal status in your wallet and vehicle is a small price to pay for having the privilege to live in the U.S. As a former consular officer who has interviewed thousands of foreign nationals for U.S. visas, I can tell you, unequivocally, that if you ask foreign visa applicants, “Would you be willing to carry your passport or green card with you if you were granted the right to live in the U.S.?”, 100 percent of them would say, “absolutely, please just give me the visa!”
While the fear-mongering over the impact of SB 1070 isn’t justified, it is important to acknowledge the concerns that people have with the law. Law-abiding legal immigrants shouldn’t have anything to worry about, but for some, the very notion of being asked about their legal status is insulting and makes them feel second-class.
We need to respect the sensitivity of the issue, but that doesn’t mean that law enforcement officials shouldn’t be able to help enforce our nation’s immigration laws. The idea that officers are suddenly going to be detaining Latinos out for a Sunday morning jog or walking their kids to school isn’t realistic.
The reality is that the vast majority of all immigration-related police inquiries will come during the apprehension of non-immigration related crimes. This means that an illegal immigrant caught selling drugs, or driving drunk, or shoplifting might be deported instead of just given a slap on the wrist.
Most Americans back the law; a Rasmussen poll found 70 percent support in Arizona and 60 percent support nationally. The poll also found that 58 percent of respondents were at least “somewhat” concerned” that “efforts to identify and deport illegal immigrants will also end up violating the civil rights of some U.S. citizens.”
Given the widespread misinformation and condemnation of SB 1070 in the news media, it’s a wonder that figure isn’t higher. Still, Arizona’s tough new measure is going to be under tremendous scrutiny, so law enforcement officials in the state are going to have to strike the right balance between enforcing the law and respecting the rights of those who are here legally.
You can bet that there will be huge news coverage the first time a legal immigrant or U.S. citizen is wrongly detained based upon suspicion of illegal status. But will anyone be there to cover the story when the first violent criminal is deported thanks to this new legislation? Somehow, I doubt it, and, in the current political climate, Arizona has its work cut out for it in figuring out how to fix a problem the federal government hasn’t had the resolve to address itself.
CANADA :
A selective sense of morality
Don Martin, National Post /Published: Wednesday, April 28, 2010
When politics and religion collide, it’s inevitably over abortion. After being spared the angry debate for a generation, Canada’s Parliament is dividing anew over this hot policy potato, this time on the right of women in Africa to access safe abortions procured with Canadian monetary assistance.
Safe abortions are an oxymoron in most of sub-Sahara Africa, even in the few countries that allow them on demand. The World Health Organization estimates only five of every 100 procedures in the region are conducted under what it deems safe conditions.
The unsafe list of how terminations are induced include having pregnant women drink turpentine or bleach; impale themselves crudely; or jump from a roof and land on their feet.
Yet Canada has vowed to veto any use of its contribution to a proposed G8 funding effort to help these desperate women end unwanted, unaffordable pregnancies, even in countries where it is legal.
It is a difficult political position to decipher on several fronts.
Every major health agency describes botched abortions as one of the major threats to life on the list of maternal dangers, noting the devastating impact on children left behind without a mother. This is a continent, after all, where 700 women die for every 100,000 abortions. The comparable ratio in developed countries is 10 per 100,000.
That’s why it takes a selective sense of morality for this government to justify covering the 100,000 Canadian women per year it insures for abortions in sterile medical settings while African women are denied our foreign aid to access the same procedure.
It seems equally impractical from a monetary distribution view. How the Conservatives will segregate its contributions from the G8 pot if the United States, Britain or other
G8 members are willing to fund abortion is unclear.
And to suggest the Conservatives are taking this stand for partisan gain is difficult to comprehend. The Tory “base” is not uniformly anti-abortion and the swing vote it will need to gain seats is probably equally divided on the issue.
That’s why it was hard to figure when Stephen Harper suggested funding abortions in Africa is simply too divisive to touch, leaving Canada on the sidelines while back alley butchers injure or kill women who may have been denied contraceptives or impregnated by rape.
Sure, he’s got a decent political wedge to insert into Commons histrionics, especially since the Liberals lost a poorly worded motion in the House of Commons urging African aid for abortion without mentioning the word.
But it now seems this worthwhile overall initiative is doomed to suffer months of cheap shot political posturing.
Pro-life World Vision Canada is correct in its glum assessment of the emerging debate debacle. It’s sad to watch the splintering of an overdue rescue mission into pro-life and pro-choice factions when the cause is so noble and the need so urgent.
Making contraception available is a key part of the maternal care effort. Ditto for screening and treating sexually transmitted disease, enhanced immunization and fighting malaria, clean drinking water and sanitary health care.
Those initiatives will eventually lower the incidence of unwanted pregnancies with a corresponding reduction in the need for unsafe abortions, but Canada should not be standing apart to veto one specific medical step toward the solution.
There’s no obvious easy escape from the mess now. What started as a dream initiative is becoming a policy nightmare for Mr. Harper, who should’ve seen this coming months ago when he announced the plan.
Even when pushing a proposal to save lives among those living in wretched faraway conditions as his signature accomplishment, Mr. Harper has found a way to set his government apart from the opposition parties.
Given that he’s never seen parliamentary harmony he couldn’t inflame into political divisions, perhaps poisoning this motherhood initiative will end up a fitting Stephen Harper legacy after all.
dmartin@nationalpost.com———
WHAT WAS SAID
“We want to make sure our funds are used to save the lives of women and children and are used on the many, many things that are available to us that frankly do not divide the Canadian population.
“Frankly, there is not enough money to do all the things we want to do, even in those areas. We will concentrate our efforts on areas where the Canadian people are united and want to see progress,” highlighting the wide range of initiatives to be funded: training health-care workers, treating and preventing diseases such as malaria and pneumonia, screening and treating sexually transmitted diseases, immunization, clean water, sanitation and family planning. — Prime Minister Stephen Harper
“This is going to produce a major problem in pursuing a comprehensive strategy for women’s health and children’s health. I think he’s made a grave error.” — NDP leader Jack Layton
The government is “in the ridiculous position of failing to defend overseas the rights that Canadian women have here at home.” — Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff
“Instead of pushing forward in support of an initiative that could benefit millions, we’re allowing the potential for hope and opportunity to be swallowed up by a political debate about abortion that is stifling the potential for progress.” — a statement signed by the heads of CARE Canada, World Vision Canada, Plan Canada, RESULTS Canada, Save the Children Canada and UNICEF Canada, the six independent relief agencies that convinced Mr. Harper to champion the cause of maternal and child health.
Meagan Fitzpatrick and Richard Foot, Canwest News Service
African woman can stay – for now
Airport drama; She, unborn child could suffer harm if deported: judge
By MARIAN SCOTT, The Gazette/ www.montrealgazette.com/April 28, 2010
Sayon Camara looked dazed as her husband, Abdul Sow, hugged her in the glare of TV cameras at Dorval airport.
“Thank you, Canada. Thank you, Quebec. Thank you, everyone,” she said after learning she would not be deported to her native Guinea – for the moment, anyway.
Yesterday, the Federal Court granted the six-months-pregnant Camara an 11th-hour reprieve from deportation minutes before she was to board a 2 p.m. flight to Munich, the first leg of a 28-hour trip to the Guinean capital of Conakry.
Camara, 42, has Type 2 diabetes and is being followed at a high-risk pregnancy clinic at Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital. Judge Luc Martineau ruled she and her unborn child could suffer irreparable harm if deported.
The decision ended a tense, three-hour standoff between immigration authorities and Sow, who drove his wife to the airport at 11 a.m. in compliance with a deportation order issued Friday.
But Camara waited in a car in the airport’s parking lot as Sow told officials he would not put her on the plane unless the government took responsibility for her safety and that of their child, expected Aug. 15.
“I need a guarantee from the minister,” he said after meeting customs and immigration officials. “Once my wife arrives in Guinea, they will be responsible.”
Two immigration agents, one wheeling a suitcase, paced the departure lounge waiting to escort Camara to the West-African country.
The Canada Border Services Agency detained Camara last Friday in preparation for the deportation, but released her the next day on a promise to report for the deportation.
The Immigration and Refugee Board turned down her application for refugee status in 2007. She claime
d she was forced into marriage with a man who already had two other wives, sexually assaulted her and burned her breast with a hot iron.
In June 2008, she married Sow, 48, a Canadian citizen who manages a Brossard grocery store, but Immigration Canada refused his request to sponsor her last July on ground the marriage was bogus. Officials said the union was fraudulent because Sow travelled to Edmonton last year to find work as a cook.
“They’re pretty obviously a real couple,” fumed Camara’s lawyer, Stewart Istvanffy. “He was sending money, but they doubted that people travel to Edmonton to look for work.”
Yesterday, Sow’s frantic concern over the welfare of his wife and unborn child would probably have allayed most doubts about the relationship.
The St. Léonard couple met in 2006 when Sow picked Camara up at the airport at the request of a mutual friend.
Was it love at first sight? Actually, no, said the lanky Sow, who was dating someone else at the time.
“It was easy to recognize her,” said Sow, who had been told to look for a heavy-set woman.
Camara, who didn’t know anyone in Montreal, stayed at Sow’s apartment. The pair discovered they spoke the same language – literally. Malinké is spoken by less than one-third of Guineans.
“We had great communication,” Sow said. “Everything I was looking for in a woman, I found it in her: love, attention and respect. Above all, she really listens to me.”
About 50 people attended their wedding in a St. Laurent mosque.
“She is very sociable,” Sow said. “There hasn’t been a ceremony in the community where she hasn’t been present. She is always the chairwoman or the sponsor.”
According to the 2006 census, Montreal’s Guinean community numbers 1,555.
Yesterday’s ruling is only a reprieve for Camara, said Isvanffy, who plans to file a request to strike down the deportation order permanently. The process will probably take three to six months, he said.
“My real hope is that (federal Immigration Minister) Jason Kenney will wake up and say someone who has a real marriage and who is going to have a Canadian child will not be forced to go back to a nightmare in Africa,” he said.
Women in Guinea are subjected to various forms of abuse, including genital mutilation and forced marriages, human-rights groups say.
In September, members of Guinea’s armed forces massacred at least 150 people and gang-raped dozens of women at an opposition rally. The victims belonged to the mainly Muslim Peuhl ethnic group.
Camara emerged from the parking lot after Sow learned the good news about 2 p.m.
After the ordeal of the past few days, all she wanted was peace and quiet.
“I want to rest,” she said.
mascot@thegazette.canwest.com
AUSTRALIA :
EUROPE :
The Making of a Greek Tragedy
From Stratfor/beforeitsnews.com/mercredi 28 avril 2010
Contributed by The Pragmatic Capitalist (Reporter)
By John Mauldin at Investors Insight:
Greece has not had many good days in 2010, but Thursday was a particularly bad day. First, Europe’s statistical office (Eurostat) revised up the Greek 2009 budget deficit, which placed Athens’ accounting shenanigans in the spotlight again. The bottom line is that the situation is even worse than previously thought, and the budget deficit may very well be adjusted up as more Greek accounting malfeasance comes to light. Following the announcement, credit rating agency Moody’ s dropped Greece’s credit rating one notch, immediately prompting a rise in Greek government bond yields, thus increasing Athens’ borrowing costs.
The yield on a Greek 10-year bond shot above nine percent, while a two-year bond rose above 11 percent, both record highs since Greece joined the eurozone. Particularly daunting is the fact that short-term debt financing is now more expensive than long-term funding. This situation is referred to as an “inverted yield curve,” and it is generally considered a harbinger of financial doom. This means that investors are sensing that Athens is more likely to experience problems sooner rather than later.
Higher yields mean that Greece is facing increasingly larger interest payments on an increasingly larger stock of debt. This all but confirms that Athens’ claim that its stock of public debt will peak at 120 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) is simply wishful thinking. Worse still, Greece is also facing continued economic recession, induced in part by Athens’ austerity measures designed to reduce its budget deficit. Given this vicious dynamic, we cannot see how Greece’s debt level will stabilize at anything below 150 percent of GDP range.
The point is that the financial writing is now on the proverbial wall; some form of default is simply unavoidable. Exactly how the Greek default will unfold is unclear, but the bottom line is that the question now is not “if” but “when.” Under “normal” circumstances, when the IMF becomes involved with a country in a situation similar to Greece’s, the standard procedure is to devalue the local currency. By lowering the relative prices within the economy, the devaluation increases the competitiveness of the country’s export sector and helps to reorient the economy toward external demand. Devaluation is also politically expedient because regaining competitiveness does not require employers to slash employees’ wages, as the devaluation adjusts the relative costs silently and discreetly.
However, Greece does not have the option of devaluation because it is locked into a monetary union. The eurozone’s monetary policy is controlled by the Frankfurt-based European Central Bank. The fact that Greece is locked in the “euro straitjacket” raises two questions, the first being how the Greek debt crisis will play out.
Without the option of devaluation, the Greeks will have to implement and endure draconian austerity measures – in addition to the ones it has already enacted – similar to what Latvia and Argentina endured as part of their IMF programs. Argentina in 2000 and Latvia in 2008 also could not go the currency devaluation route because neither country controlled its monetary policy. In Argentina’ s case, the austerity measures were so severe that they caused considerable social unrest – including a brief period of outright anarchy in late 2001, which saw the country go through five heads of government in about two weeks – ultimately culminating in the country’s partial debt default in 2002. To this day, Argentina is still dealing with the fallout of that financial calamity.
Latvia is a case of more recent vintage. In late 2008, Latvia agreed to what the IMF itself has called one of the most severe austerity programs since the 1970s. To accomplish it, Latvia has done everything from slashing public sector wages by 25 to 40 percent, increasing taxes, reducing unemployment and maternity benefits and cutting the defense budget. The crisis has already cost the Latvian prime minister his job and stoked social unrest. Despite all of that, the budget deficit has not budged much, remaining around eight percent of the GDP mark. Spending has been cut to the bone, but Latvia is simply too small of an economy to emerge from recession on its own.
Since the broader European economic recovery remains moribund at best, less government spending has translated directly to less growth. Less growth means less tax income, and less tax income means that the country’ s budget deficit remains stubbornly high. Latvia has essentially become a ward of the IMF, and will remain so until either the broader European economic recovery is more robust or the Baltic state is fast-tracked into the eurozone itself.
An EU-IMF bailout of Greece would ultimately give Athens the choice of becoming either an Argentina or a Latvia. A financial assistance program that does not involve substantial structural reform on Greece’s part would lead to a default a la Argentina. A bailout that forces Greece to get serious about reforms would mean Greece becomes an IMF-ward like Latvia, with default still a serious possibility down the line. In either case, Greece will essentially lose control over its destiny.
The next question is what the rest of Europe will look like, and there is no shortage of impacts. Europe, and Germany in particular, must decide whether and to what extent it should “bail out” the Greeks. How that might happen is now the topic of the day in Europe. Driving the urgency is this simple fact: In the absence of substantial (and subsidized) financial assistance, Greece will inevitably default on its debts, thus generating write-downs for all those who hold Greek government debt (mostly European banks).
The Greek default therefore is no longer an isolated problem, but a problem that threatens to aggravate an already weakened European banking sector. One of the most misunderstood facts of the international financial world is that even at the peak of the U.S. subprime crisis, in the dark hours when American hedge funds seemed to be snapping like matchsticks, Europe’s banks were in even worse shape. As the Americans stabilized, so did their banks. But Europe never cleaned house, and now a Greek tsunami is poised to wash over the whole mess. [emphasis mine – JM]
Weakness Begets Weakness: from Banks to Sovereigns to Banks
By: Eric Sprott & David Franklin
Sprott Asset Management
The Greek debt situation has been an interesting case study for students of the sovereign bond markets. If there’s a lesson to be learned from Greece’s experience thus far it’s that sovereign bailouts are far more complicated than bank bailouts. They require more sophisticated negotiations and proposals and involve an extra layer of diplomacy that makes them especially difficult to accomplish. As we write this, the European Union has recently announced new lending terms to support the Greek government, with great efforts made to assure the markets that these new terms do not constitute a ‘bailout’. The problem with the Greek situation is that an actual bailout would involve an almost impossible coordination among all the major powers within the EU. It would require the unanimous pre-approval of all the EU heads of state. It would involve the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) all visiting Greece to perform financial assessments. And finally, it would involve at least seven EU countries affirming support through parliamentary votes – all of this before a single euro is spent.
A true bailout involves an almost impossible number of hurdles that essentially guarantee nothing will happen until all other avenues of rescue are exhausted. However, judging by the recent inc
re
ase in yields on 10-year Greek bonds, Greece may soon need more than a loan package proposal to solve its fiscal problems.
One aspect of the Greek situation that has been obscured by all the recent political wrangling is the crisis’ impact on the Greek banks. Although the banks were supposed to be rock solid after all the government-injected capital they received (not to mention zero-percent interest rates and generous lending terms from the European Central Bank), data shows that Greek bank deposits have fallen 8.4 billion euros, or 3.6 percent, in two months since December 2009. With no restraints on capital flows within the European Union, Greek savers are free to transfer their assets elsewhere. Given that bank deposit guarantees in Greece are the responsibility of the national government rather than the European Central Bank, we suspect Greek citizens are pulling money out of their banks because they question their government’s ability to honour its domestic deposit guarantees. We envision Greek depositors asking themselves how a government that can’t raise enough money to stay solvent can then turn around and guarantee their bank deposits? It’s a fair question to ask.
The Greek bank stocks have been thoroughly punished throughout the crisis. Chart A plots an index consisting of the four largest Greek bank stocks and shows an average decline of 47% since November 2009. The deposit withdrawals from these banks have been so damaging to their respective balance sheets (remember bank leverage?) that the Greek banks have asked to borrow 17 billion euros left over from a 28 billion euro support program launched in 2008.3 You see the connection here? Greece experienced a financial crisis, followed by a sovereign crisis, followed by another financial crisis. There is no doubt that the Greek crisis has helped drive the gold spot price to its recent all time high in euros. Gold is a prudent asset to own in times of crisis, and it’s possible that a portion of the Greek deposit withdrawals were reinvested into the precious metal. The fact remains, however, that if the Greek government cannot stem the outflows of deposits soon, the EU will have no other choice but to undertake a real sovereign bailout with all its bells, whistles and arduous protocols.
It’s a vicious spiral from financial crisis to sovereign debt crisis to banking crisis, and there is no reason it can’t spread to other European countries suffering from similar fiscal imbalances. With Spain and Portugal next in line with their own sovereign debt issues, we can expect depositors in these countries to make similar runs to the bank for their cash. “Guaranteed by Government” is truly beginning to lose its potency in this environment. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) seems to be preparing for such a scenario with its recent announcement of a tenfold increase in its emergency lending facility. The IMF’s New Arrangements to Borrow (NAB) facility is designed to prevent the “impairment of the international monetary system or to deal with an exceptional situation that poses a threat to the stability of that system.” The NAB facility has grown from US$50 billion to US$550 billion with the mere stroke of a pen. Does the IMF know something that the market doesn’t? Is this a pre-emptive measure to repel an attack by bond vigilantes’ on Europe’s fiscally-weakened countries?
Sovereign Debt
In our examination of the Greek situation this past month, we kept coming across various sovereign credit ratings. In an effort to better understand the Greek situation, we decided to look at how the ratings agencies generate their actual rankings and built our own model to determine a country’s credit risk.5 We used common metrics such as GDP per Capita, Government Budget Deficits, Gross Government and Contingent Liabilities, the inflation rate and incorporated a simple debt sustainability metric in order to generate our own sovereign ratings. What we discovered in the process was quite puzzling.
It should first be noted that the rating agencies are in the business of offering their ‘opinions’ about the creditworthiness of bonds that have been issued by various kinds of entities: corporations, governments, and (most recently) the packagers of mortgages and other debt obligations. These opinions come in the form of ‘ratings’ which are expressed in a letter grade. The best-known scale is that used by Standard & Poor’s (“S&P”) which uses AAA for the highest rated debt, and AA, A, BBB, BB, for debt of descending credit quality.
In our opinion, as they relate to sovereign debt, the ratings provided by the agencies are highly suspect. While these agencies claim to provide ratings that consider the business credit cycle, there appears to be very little forward-looking information actually factored into their credit models. In some cases, the agency ratings end up looking absurdly optimistic. This of course should come as no surprise – we all remember the subprime mortgages that were rated AAA that are now worth pennies on the dollar.
While there were some similarities in our rankings (for example, our model ascribed AAA ratings to the local currency debt of Australia, Canada, Finland, Sweden, New Zealand which matched the ratings given by S&P), we found some glaring inconsistencies in the rating results for less fiscally prudent countries that left us scratching our heads. A good example is South Africa. The agencies currently rate South Africa an A+ entity, while our model calculated a ‘BBB-’ rating for its debt using our estimates. ‘BBB-’ is the lowest ‘investment grade’ rating for local currency sovereign debt – one level above junk. We arrived at this rating without having factored in South Africa’s resource endowment. A significant contributor to South African GDP is derived from mining, particularly gold mining. While South Africa has been the largest producer of gold until very recently, their below-ground reserves have not been revised since 2001 when the country held 36,000 tonnes of gold (or about 40% of the global total). Recent stats from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) estimate that South Africa now has only 6,000 tonnes worth of economic gold reserves remaining. Further review by Chris Hartnady, a former associate professor at the University of Cape Town, using similar techniques to those of M. King Hubbert (the Peak Oil theorist), suggests that South Africa could have only half of the gold reserves estimated by the USGS.7 If these new estimates are correct, South Africa could have 90% less gold than claimed – and it’s not even factored into our BBB- rating! So what’s South African debt really worth? An ‘A+’ from the ratings agencies seems far too generous based on our cursory review of the country’s fundamentals.
The rating agencies’ ranking of the United States is even more disconnected from reality. To believe that the US sets the benchmark for sovereign debt credit ratings is preposterous. While we have written ad nauseam about the excessive debt issuance by the United States, we found a recent update written by United States Government Accountability Office (GAO) to be particularly instructive. The update noted the US’s budget deficit equivalent to 9.9% of GDP in 2009 – the largest 10 since 1945 – and stated that without significant policy changes the US government would soon face an “unsustainable growth in debt”.
This was not news to us. It goes on to state, however, that using reasonable assumptions, “roughly 93 cents of every dollar of federal revenue will be spent on the major entitlement programs and net interest costs by 2020.” This is news! In less than ten years, using reasonable assumptions, there will essentially be no money left to run the US government – 93% of all tax revenues the US government collects will go to pay social security, Medicare, Medicaid and the interest costs on their national debt. This implies no money left over for defense, homeland s
ecurity, wel
fare, unemployment benefits, education or anything else we associate with the normal business of government. And the US government is rated AAA!?
The historian Niall Ferguson recently wrote that, “US government debt is a safe haven the way Pearl Harbor was a safe haven in 1941.” It’s hard not to agree given the foregoing statements by the GAO. The risk inherent to investors, of course, is what happens when the bond market begins to realize and react to this new level of risk. In a speech earlier this month, Jürgen Stark, who is a member of the board of the European Central Bank, stated, “We may already have entered into the next phase of the crisis: a sovereign debt crisis following on the financial and economic crisis.”
The activities of the IMF would confirm this statement. The question we must now ask ourselves is whether “backed by government” actually means anything anymore. In the depths of the 2008 crisis it was the governments that stepped in to provide a guarantee on financial assets. It was the governments that backed our savings accounts, money market funds, day-to-day business banking accounts, as well as debt issued by US banks. But what happens when confidence in the government guarantee begins to erode? We’ve seen what happened to Greece. Leverage inherent in the banking system elevated a bank run, equivalent to a mere 3.6 percent of deposits, into another full blown banking crisis. In our view it’s time for investors to acknowledge sovereign risk. The ratings agencies can opine all they want, but it seems clear to us that the only true AAA asset to protect your wealth is gold.
Disclaimer
Communications from InvestorsInsight are intended solely for informational purposes. Statements made by various authors, advertisers, sponsors and other contributors do not necessarily reflect the opinions of InvestorsInsight, and should not be construed as an endorsement by InvestorsInsight, either expressed or implied. InvestorsInsight is not responsible for typographic errors or other inaccuracies in the content. We believe the information contained herein to be accurate and reliable. However, errors may occasionally occur. Therefore, all information and materials are provided “AS IS” without any warranty of any kind. Past results are not indicative of future results.
John Mauldin is president of Millennium Wave Advisors, LLC, a registered investment advisor. All material presented herein is believed to be reliable but we cannot attest to its accuracy. Investment recommendations may change and readers are urged to check with their investment counselors before making any investment decisions.
Opinions expressed in these reports may change without prior notice. John Mauldin and/or the staffs at Millennium Wave Advisors, LLC and InvestorsInsight Publishing, Inc. (InvestorsInsight) may or may not have investments in any funds, programs or companies cited above.
PAST RESULTS ARE NOT INDICATIVE OF FUTURE RESULTS. THERE IS RISK OF LOSS AS WELL AS THE OPPORTUNITY FOR GAIN WHEN INVESTING IN MANAGED FUNDS. WHEN CONSIDERING ALTERNATIVE INVESTMENTS, INCLUDING HEDGE FUNDS, YOU SHOULD CONSIDER VARIOUS RISKS INCLUDING THE FACT THAT SOME PRODUCTS: OFTEN ENGAGE IN LEVERAGING AND OTHER SPECULATIVE INVESTMENT PRACTICES THAT MAY INCREASE THE RISK OF INVESTMENT LOSS, CAN BE ILLIQUID, ARE NOT REQUIRED TO PROVIDE PERIODIC PRICING OR VALUATION INFORMATION TO INVESTORS, MAY INVOLVE COMPLEX TAX STRUCTURES AND DELAYS IN DISTRIBUTING IMPORTANT TAX INFORMATION, ARE NOT SUBJECT TO THE SAME REGULATORY REQUIREMENTS AS MUTUAL FUNDS, OFTEN CHARGE HIGH FEES, AND IN MANY CASES THE UNDERLYING INVESTMENTS ARE NOT TRANSPARENT AND ARE KNOWN ONLY TO THE INVESTMENT MANAGER.
CHINA :
Global governance reform should reflect new balance: Sarkozy
news.xinhuanet.com/English.news.cn /2010-04-28
PARIS, April 27 (Xinhua) — French President Nicolas Sarkozy promoted Tuesday for a “cooperative” and “coordinated” reform of global governance to reflect the new realities and new balance in the world.
“Global governance must be reformed to reflect new realities and new balances in the world,” Sarkozy said in an exclusive interview with Xinhua.
“We are in the 21st century, but we function with the institution of the 19th century, all the people well know that this kind of thing can’t work,” he said.
Accordingly, he called for a governance reform that could provide corresponding status to emerging economies like China, India, Brazil and South Africa.
Sarkozy referred to the development of emerging countries, which were already markedly global powers, as “chance for the world.”
“It’s simply an illusion of wishing to face the immense challenges our world is confronting” in the 21st century without the emerging powers, Sarkozy underlined.
“But the status of a great power also implies many responsibilities … and I trust the leaders of these countries to take full measure of their responsibility as they involved in the global development,” he said.
As to the economic reformation the Group of 20 was undertaking, Sarkozy urged to expand the global economic restructure, especially some international financial institutions.
On Sunday night, emerging countries and developing nations have increased their voting power in the World Bank by 3.13 percent from before, bringing the total for the developing world to 47.19 percent.
“These movements should be prolonged and amplified. This is only the first stage of the global reform,” Sarkozy said.
Laying out elements like commodity prices and the international monetary system, which threaten today’s global balance, the French President called for “open and constructive” discussions over these issues.
“I hope France’s presidency of G8 and G20 in 2011 will present advancement on these questions,” Sarkozy said, referring to the global reform in the financial sector.
Editor: Mu Xuequan
WISCO Starts Work On Iron Ore Project In Liberia
www.capitalvue.com/Wednesday 2010-04-28
April 28 — The parent company of Wuhan Iron and Steel (600005), Wuhan Iron and Steel Group (WISCO) has started work on an iron ore project in Liberia jointly with China Development Bank’s China-Africa Development Fund, reports news.cnxianzai.com, citing unnamed sources from Wuhan Iron and Steel Group.
According to the report, the iron ore project is the largest project in the history of China-Liberia economic relations.
On March 12, 2010, Wuhan Iron and Steel Group had signed a cooperative agreement and equity transfer agreement to purchase a 60 percent stake in China-Union Investment from China-Africa Development Fund.
Through this stake purchase, Wuhan Iron and Steel Group will obtain a controlling stake in the Liberian iron ore project which has total reserves of 4.1 billion tons.
India diamond cutters aim to stave off China
By James Lamont in New Delhi, Geoff Dyer in Beijing and William MacNamara in London/www.ft.com/April 28 2010
Indian diamond cutters and polishers are lobbying the government in New Delhi to combat Chinese efforts to secure rough diamonds from Africa by providing the continent’s nations with medicines and resources to build infrastructure.
The Indian diamond industry leads the world in cutting and polishing the precious stones and says China is locking up the supply of rough diamonds by direct deals with African governments. The scramble for African diamonds reflects intensifying competition between the world’s fastest-growing large economies for natural resources, particularly energy, minerals and land.
China wants to develop a competitive cutting and polishing industry as domestic demand expands.
India sees this as the biggest threat to their country’s 60 per cent share of the world’s diamond cutting and polishing business.
“The Chinese government has been investing a huge amount of money to get hold of rough diamonds,” said Sanjay Kothari, a senior official at India’s Gem and Jewellery Export Promotion Council.
The council wants New Delhi to follow China’s lead by exchanging rough diamonds for medicine and delivery of infrastructure projects and diamond cutting expertise with gem producers such as the Democratic Republic of Congo and Angola.
It also wants India’s foreign reserves used to create a $4bn fund to support the sector.
Vasant Mehta, the council’s chairman, said some Indian companies had already done barter deals with African mining companies, exchanging diamonds for help in setting up polishing factories.
Beijing has signed multibillion-dollar resources-for-infrastructure deals with Angola, Congo and west African countries. These centre on oil in Angola and industrial metals in Congo, with less public attention to diamonds.
Some international diamond industry executives expressed surprise at the Indian allegations.
“Clearly southern Africa has been an important investment area for China, but their focus has been on other areas, not rough diamonds,” said one.
India exported about $17.5bn in cut and polished diamonds last year. That dwarfs China’s $3bn a year in diamond exports. Botswana, the world’s largest producer of rough stones, is investing in creating cutting and polishing industries of its own too.
India imports more than half its rough diamonds through Belgium and has strong links with De Beers, Alrosa and BHP Billiton. Once cut, the bulk of the diamonds are exported back to big markets such as the US and Hong Kong.
INDIA :
India’s Bharti Airtel reports dip in profit
(AFP) /28042010
MUMBAI — India’s top mobile phone company Bharti Airtel reported Wednesday that fourth-quarter net profit fell 8.2 percent year-on-year, lagging forecasts, as cheap call charges hit earnings.
Net profit for the three months to March 31 fell on a 12-month basis to 20.55 billion rupees (46 million dollars) while revenues edged up 2.4 percent to 100.56 billion rupees, the company said.
A flood of new players has unleashed a cut-throat price war in India with calls now costing less than a cent a minute.
India has more than a dozen cellular operators compared with just two state-owned telecom players a decade ago.
Analysts had expected Bharti to report a profit of 20.7 billion rupees.
For the full year, the New Delhi-based company reported a 7.5-percent rise in net profit to 91.03 billion rupees (2.05 billion dollars) on a 7.0-percent increase in revenues to 396.15 billion rupees.
Bharti boosted its customer base by 41 percent for the year to 137.6 million subscribers across India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, the company said in a statement to the Mumbai stock exchange.
Last month, Bharti announced its entry into the African market with a 10.7-billion-dollar deal to buy Kuwait-based Zain’s Africa assets.
Bharti’s move on Africa — its first big foreign takeover — is part of a diversification push to maintain its growth momentum as India’s urban markets become saturated.
Bharti shares fell as much as 2.1 percent or 6.25 rupees to a day’s low of 292 on Wednesday, before climbing up to 297.05, up 0.4 percent on the Mumbai stock exchange.
BRASIL:
Venezuela, Brazil to sign deals on oil, power
(AFP)/28042010
CARACAS — Hugo Chavez and his Brazilian counterpart Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva will sign cooperation deals worth at least two billion dollars on oil and power generation, the Venezuelan president said.
“We are going to sign a package of agreements following what Lula was talking about in Caracas: speeding up the pace” of cooperation on Wednesday, Chavez said in a meeting of his cabinet broadcast on VTV state television.
The leaders will sign one pact worth two billion dollars to build in northeastern Venezuela a petrochemical plant to process polypropylene with Brazil’s Brasquen, Chavez said.
He and Lula will sign other agreements on electricity — as Venezuela confronts lingering shortages — as well as finance, farming, and cars.
“The political relationship that we have consolidated has been a victory for both of us,” Chavez argued in the meeting.
The two will meet at a series of regular direct talks, which they have been taking turns holding in each country.
Chavez also meanwhile took sides in Brazil’s upcoming presidential vote.
He said he hoped Lula’s ruling party candidate Dilma Rousseff, whom he called a “friend,” would win. With Lula’s leftist Workers Party, she would be Brazil’s first woman president.
“The Brazilian people will decide who they want to elect but one has one’s little opinion,” Chavez joked, noting “there is a nice friendship between us.”
Rousseff has been running second in opinion polls behind social democrat Jose Serra leading up to the October vote.
EN BREF, CE 28 avril 2010 … AGNEWS / OMAR, BXL,28/04/2010
