Josh’s blogg

   Caracas, January 27, 2008 (venezuelanalysis.com) - The 6th Summit of the Bolivarian Alternative for Latin America (ALBA), a joint Venezuelan-Cuban initiative based on fair trade as an alternative to the U.S.-sponsored Free Trade Area of the Americas, concluded in Caracas on Saturday with the founding of a new Bank of ALBA and the signing of a series of economic and social agreements between the member nations. The Dominica also became the newest country to join the regional fair trade bloc.

Commenting on the launch of the new financial institution, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said that it breaks with capitalist concepts and is a political instrument for social and economic development.

ALBA, “as its name indicates, is an alternative to the global capitalist model, a concept of a geo-economic, geopolitical, social, cultural and ideological space that is in construction,” he added.

Chavez also emphasized the importance of the incorporation of the Dominica into ALBA. saying, “despite the globalized media bombardment… it shows that an alternative continues growing and consolidating itself.”

In the face of this initiative, the Free Trade Area of the Americas proposed by the United States, “is a cadaver,” Venezuela’s Ambasador to Cuba, Ali Rodriguez Arraque commented.

With initial financing of more than $1 billion, the Bank of ALBA, aims to promote projects of economic integration and infrastructural development as well as progress in social, educational, cultural and health programs in the member nations. It also aims to eliminate the economic weaknesses of these countries and eradicate economic asymmetries as a result of the process of financial globalization Venezuelan economist, Jesús Faría explained.

Unlike other financial institutions such as the World Bank or the IMF, the Bank of ALBA will not impose loan conditions and will function based on consensus of all members. The summit agreed to a two tier mechanism for democratic decision making in the Bank, a Ministerial Council and an Executive Direction, with a rotating presidency of the member nations.

Also attending the summit were presidents Evo Morales (Bolivia); Daniel Ortega (Nicaragua); vicepresident of Cuba, Carlos Lage; Prime Ministers, Roosevelt Skerrit of Dominica; Baldwin Spencer of Antigua and Barbuda; and Dr. Ralph Gonsalves of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, as well as representatives of Ecuador; San Cristóbal and Nieves; Honduras; Haití; and Uruguay.

Referring to the economic crisis in the United States, Lage stressed the importance of the unity of the peoples and the formation of the Bank of ALBA, saying that Latin America should prepare itself for a “post-dollar and multi-polar world” with institutions and markets less dependent on the United States.

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega also spoke of the importance of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and made a call to industrialized and developed countries to “cease with the capitalist model” that every day weakens the planet. “The capitalist model is exhausted, it is unsustainable,”he said.

ALBA delegate and Minister for the Social Investment Fund in Nicaragua, Nelson Artola, said that through agreements signed in the framework of ALBA, “the supply of oil by Venezuela has allowed us to attend to the energy emergency that Nicaragua inherited from 16 years of neoliberal governments that left blackouts and chaos in the national economy.”

Nicaragua and Venezuela also signed an accord for cooperation in social programs, including the construction of eight Centers for Child Development in Nicaragua as the beginning of a program to reintegrate the country’s 47,000 street kids.

The three day summit involved a series of meetings, including the Political Commission of ALBA, the Finance Ministers of ALBA, the Technical Financial Commission of the Bank of ALBA, a meeting of ALBA Ministers, as well as a summit of social movements from the member nations.

In addition to the formation of the Bank of ALBA, the leaders of Bolivia, Cuba, the Dominica, Nicaragua and Venezuela, signed a political declaration in which they announced their support for Bolivia and its process of democratic changes.

They also ratified a plan to promote cultural exchange through the creation of “ALBA Houses,” which Jose González, president of the ALBA House in Caracas said, “will serve as centers for creativity, artists, cultural promoters, social movements - to generate a movement that allows the knowledge of values that at times are not recognized because the mechanisms of the market are not interested in them.”

Other agreements for security and food sovereignty among the member countries and the proposal to form an ALBA energy company were also made.

The closing act of the 6th ALBA Summit was held in the Latin American School of Medicine, where for the past six months 395 students from Latin America and the Carribean have been studying an introductory course on Medical Science as part of the educational program of ALBA.

 (Palestinians cross back from Egypt into Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip through the bombed metal fence, not seen, that used to separate the two sides of the border town, 24 January 2008.)

Three kids, their mother and their aunt hurried towards the Salah al-Din gate in southern Gaza on Wednesday.The mother, in her early thirties, explained in a rush, “We are heading to al-Arish [the Egypt border town] to follow my mom and brother who entered today after the borders were reopened.”

Mahmoud Abu Marrasa is an unemployed father of five living in the Shati (Beach) refugee camp in western Gaza City. Abu Marrasa depends entirely on UNRWA’s rationed food assistance.“Once this assistance is cut,” Abu Marrasa said, “my family and I will definitely be destroyed. I might commit a crime at any time in order to ensure there’s bread for my children. Today I am 100 percent [aid dependent].”

A staggering disparity in images has emanated from the Middle East over the past two weeks. While US President George W. Bush received a warm welcome during his tour of the Persian Gulf, Israel pounded Gaza killing over 40 Palestinians, nearly half of them civilians. Bush participated in sword dancing ceremonies, watched the prowess of hunting falcons, and in the United Arab Emirates he was finally greeted with the flowers that he once believed American troops would receive in Iraq. The obscene displays of wealth and extravagant gifts by the Gulf states, whose coffers are flush with cash from near-record oil prices, contrasted sharply with the images of death and destruction unleashed on impoverished Gaza. This was compounded by Israel’s total closure of the tiny strip late last week, leaving the 1.5 million Palestinian inhabitants with dwindling food and fuel supplies. As the only power plant in Gaza shut down Sunday night, Palestinian children in a candle-light march covered by Al Jazeera asked, “Where are the Arabs?” Yet, the Arabs weren’t the only ones absent from the scene. Indeed, Gaza appears to have been abandoned by the entire world, further revealing the state of fragmentation and isolation of the Palestinian national movement

The 25^th of January is my birthday and more importantly it is the day when millions remember the Scottish poet Robbie Burns. He was a man of great foresightedness and a good socialist too. I am proud to share the same birthday with this hero and hope that all those against war and social inequality will remember him, and even eat a haggis as is the tradition. Here is one of his poems….

Burns’s response after being asked to write a poem of National Thanksgiving…..(Perhaps applicable to Mr. Harper and co)Ye hypocrites! Are these yout pranks?To murder men and give God thanks!Desist, for shame! Proceed no further;God won’t accept your thanks for murther! 

New Labour has responded to action against its public sector pay curbs by threatening to ban a key group of workers from striking.

Some 20,000 prison officers in England and Wales took illegal unofficial action last August against Gordon Brown’s public sector wage cuts and the disastrous overcrowding in prisons.Justice minister Jack Straw said on Monday that he has “no alternative” but to reimpose a ban on prison officers’ right to strike if they won’t agree to a no-strike deal.The Prison Officers Association (POA) was banned from striking by a court ruling in early 1993 that was written into law by the Tories in the 1994 Criminal Justice Act.Labour promised to repeal the ban. It did this in 2001 – but instead pushed through a voluntary no-strike agreement with the POA.While there are contradictions in the role of prison officers, every trade unionist should oppose the use of anti-union laws and welcome any assault on Brown’s pay freeze.Prison officers should have the right to strike and to a union. Straw says prison officers can’t strike because of their “vital role”. If the government can ban prison officers from striking, will firefighters or transport workers be next?Traditionally governments have rushed to accommodate the demands of prison officers – or police – at the first sign of trouble. But Brown’s commitment to neoliberalism means he is currently more interested in maintaining the public sector pay limit than keeping the POA onside.POA chair Colin Moses, said, “The majority of the POA national executive are members of the Labour Party. For ten years we have promoted the Labour Party. “We will now actively tell people to vote against the Labour Party. We feel betrayed by this New Labour government.”So do millions of other workers.

WHEN police were called to a report of vandals painting slogans on a courthouse wall they found two elderly women, paint pots still in hand, freely admitting what they had done.

Georgina Smith and Helen John chose Remembrance Day to daub slogans such as “No cluster bombs” and “UK values? What values?” on to the High Court in Edinburgh.

The pensioners, aged 77 and 69 respectively, refused to admit they did anything wrong, despite causing £3,600 worth of damage. And yesterday they were behind bars after a sheriff sent them to Cornton Vale, Scotland’s only all-female prison, for 45 and 40 days each.

The pair are veteran peace campaigners, having both been involved in the early years of the Greenham Common peace camp.

In recent years they have been familiar figures in protests staged outside the Faslane naval base in Helensburgh. Both have a string of previous convictions for offences arising out of other protests.

John, a former midwife, of Keighley, West Yorkshire, took part in the original march from Cardiff to Greenham Common in 1981 and was among those to chain herself to the fence of the military base.

In 1999 John was caught cutting through the fence at the Royal Navy’s depot at Coulport, near Faslane, claiming her actions were justified because nuclear weapons were illegal under international law.

Smith, of Acharacle, in the West Highlands, is the owner of former Ministry of Defence land at Peaton Wood, near Faslane, which has housed several major peace camps. She was arrested along with former Labour MP George Galloway and the then Scottish Socialist Party leader Tommy Sheridan at a mass demonstration at Faslane in 2001. Both Smith and John were arrested during the start of a huge year-long protest at Faslane in October 2006, but charges against them were later dropped.

Weeks later they turned up at the High Court in Edinburgh, spending 15 minutes on their handiwork, which included phrases like “UK cluster bombs base products of evil work” and “Respect the war dead”.

Trident Ploughshares campaigner Angie Zelter said: “These women are very long-standing campaigners who have devoted a huge amount of their lives to protesting all over the UK, at huge cost to themselves. They command a huge amount of respect.”

John told him: “If I accept any of the offers of the court I am admitting that I have done something wrong, and I can’t accept that I did. You are dealing with somebody who is a law-abiding citizen and challenges things when they a re wrong.

“I have a great respect for law and that is why I do what I do, because the law is not upheld by the government. I still don’t consider I have committed any crime.”

  Prior to 1948 there was a country called Palestine. In Palestine Jews, Christians and Muslims lived relatively amicably, side by side and society was peaceful. It was a spiritual and important polity for all denominations. After World War II and the crimes of the holocaust, many Jews became supporters of leftist groups and the Communist Party with the hope of building a new world and also in recognition of the fact that the Communists had been the fiercest opponents of fascism since the days when Britain and Europe’s elites were building relations with Germany’s Nazi government. Another political movement emerged called the “Zionist” movement and Britain had the audacity and temerity to grant somebody else’s country to that Zionist movement in order to create a Jewish State. Essentially this decision was responsible for wiping Palestine of the map and heralding a dark day upon the peaceful, indigenous citizens of that country. Britain, of course, had no right to give somebody else’s country to people from Europe, whose persecution had been committed not by Palestinians but by Europeans. It is often claimed that the Jewish people deserved a homeland after the atrocities of WWII and that “it was time for a Jewish State”, but this is a chimera in the account of the historical process of colonising Palestine. It was in 1917, long before the holocaust, in the British House of Commons that the Balfour Declaration was passed, granting atheist Jews (i.e. not even based on their religion) the right to steal other peoples farms and orchards which didn’t belong to either of these groups of European people.  The Jews have unquestionably suffered for many years under persecution and discrimination. Most of the pogrom and bigotry was perpetrated by Christians throughout Europe for many centuries. Indeed often the only place they could ever live peacefully was the Muslim world which is why there is such a profusion of Jewish communities in Morocco, Iraq,  and elsewhere. The Muslims had undoubtedly been the least hostile and most accommodating to Jews fleeing British, Spanish and Europe-wide anti-Semitism. When the Muslim Civilization lost Spain to Christian armies in 1492 and retreated to North Africa all the Jews fled with them, so fearful were they of Christian anti-Semitism and bigotry. The Christian, European nations should have paid the price in reparations for the Holocaust not the Palestinians whom had never hurt any Jew nor any Christian in anywhere near the proportions that the Christian countries had done. In many people’s eyes Israel is (sadly) a nuclear armed, apartheid state which has the backing and unequivocal support of the U.S empire whom supports it’s illegal occupation and it’s illegal possession of nuclear weapons. I have been there and seen all the signs of an occupation and discriminatory system. Just as South Africa had to end its discriminatory system, so Israel will have to end its reign of terror over the people whose land they acquired unjustly at the behest of Britain illegally. No Justice, No Peace.

LIVING conditions in the besieged Gaza Strip became even harsher yesterday as a shortage of diesel fuel forced authorities to initiate a cut In electricity supplies for eight hours a day. One and a half million residents will be affected by the cuts, which authorities said were necessary because of Israeli restrictions on the supply of diesel that began in October.

Palestinian and Israeli human rights groups alike consider the reductions a collective punishment in contravention of the Fourth Geneva Convention.

Israel claims that, with other military and political steps, fuel and electricity cuts are “legitimate self-defence” in the face of continued rocket firing from the Strip into southern Israel.

Half of the 34,000 residents in the northern town of Beit Hanoun were last night plunged into darkness, according to its mayor, Mohammed Kafarneh. He added that, since October, power had been cut for two hours every morning, but starting yesterday had been cut for eight hours at 4pm.

“All institutions are affected. Shop owners who have goods in refrigeration are affected,” he said. “It is examination period for the pupils, but they cannot study because there is no light.”

Earlier, four Palestinians, including at least two civilians, were killed and dozens wounded during the latest Israeli incursion into the Strip.

A 17-year-old died after being shot in the chest by Israeli forces near Bureij refugee camp.

An airstrike on a house east of Bureij killed a 34-year-old woman and a member of the Hamas armed wing, reports from the Strip said. A fourth man was killed by a tank shell last night. Five soldiers were hurt by an anti-tank missile fired at their vehicles, the army said.

I have always followed events in Pakistan closely. My Grandmother was born in Lahore when it was still ruled by British imperialists who were illegally occupying the area which at the time was still part of India. It was the same old story back then; predatory British colonialism, conscious looting and despoiling of the territory whilst repressing and exploiting the people who were good Muslims, peaceful, poor, marginalized and 3^rd class citizens in their own country.

Britain was still trying to “make the world England” and my grandparents were tools of that operation back then.My other Grandmother was raised in Scotland not far from Dundee which they called “Juteopolis” as it was characterized by the abundance of cotton mills which were fuelled by the raw materials plundered from Pakistan. 

The great industrial output which resulted from the theft of these raw materials incontrovertibly 

contributed greatly (along with slavery and other things we stole from peoples countries) to Britain enjoying the 4^th richest economy in the world, and as we

are all aware Britain left Pakistan with quite the opposite, never paying back a penny like all fascist empires in history have done (and we wonder why Britain is the 3^rd most hated country in the world?).

I have also made a concerted effort to follow events in Pakistan for other reasons. My school in London was very close to Heathrow airport and the vibrant immigrant communities surrounding the airport. I had the privilege to study, act, play sports with and socialize with many Pakistani students who were my comrades at school. I was often bowled out in cricket games with their exemplary prowess and superiority at the wicket.

Indeed recently and more importantly I have been very worried about the duplicitous self proclaimed “president” General Parvaiz Musharraf. So loved by Bush, Blair, Harper and the rest of the Neo-Con raptures who have given their unconditional support to him, so hated by Pakistani’s and Muslims outside the country, he is undoubtedly an obstacle for those of us who want more Muslims to like us and not associate us with our leaders and their puppets. Not only did they support him politically, as Blair described him: “an example to all Muslims” but they even sold him a selection of nuclear weapons to boost his already vast arsenal. One of the most volatile and anti-US/Britain polities on the globe, with a puppet junta who if overthrown would leave nukes in the hands of God knows who?

Since the foundation of Pakistan in 1947, the oligarchy, a small group of wealthy families who control the military, have sucked the blood out of Pakistan along with its wealth. The struggle of the Bhutto family whom have suffered greatly, received a crushing blow with Benazir’s murder last week. It was the pernicious icing on a sanguinely democratic cake for them and for hopeful Pakistani democrats everywhere it was a major catastrophe.

I am truly saddened for Pakistan and for the revolutionary, brave,vivacious, true leader of the Pakistani people Benazir Bhutto. Apart from losing her father Zulfikar Ali Bhutto the founder of the PPP who was hanged by western backed tyrants, despite losing both her brothers, Shahnawaz who was poisoned, and Mir Murtaza who was gunned down in a similar way she was assassinated and despite coming from an affluent family and having the ability for a life of luxury, she said no! No to corruption, no to inequality, no to dictatorship.

She went through two election victories, two coups, court cases, imprisonment, trail by media, slander, rejection and long bitter exile. It is a story William Shakespeare could not have produced.

All of the anti-democratic dictators from General Zia to General Musharaf have been funded and supported by the west. We wonder why the Afghanis and Iraqi’s laugh when we invade their countries pretending to be doing so for the sake of “democracy” and to end “dictatorship”. We adumbrate about so called “elections” in one country, whilst colluding, collaborating and propping up repressive and oppressive dictators over the border .

Dictatorship is the curse of the Arab and Muslim world. Almost without exception from Marrakesh to Bahrain the Muslims suffer under dictatorship. All the oil, all the wealth, all the faith, all the people, fettered by western backed dictators. The Arab and Muslim people’s wealth is in the hands of the few, the kleptocrats and the junta’s who the west never utters a scintilla about, unless they stop doing good business with them. Every day the BBC, CTV, CNN, Fox News and the other ministries of propaganda coerce us into hating democratically elected regimes like the 11 times elected (including referendums) hero Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, like the indefatigable Evo Morales in Bolivia, like president-elect Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Iran, simply because they don’t support US imperialism and don’t sell out their people, as the more obedient dictatorships are willing to do. We tell Iran that it must not have nuclear power, whilst we sell hundreds of nuclear weapons to unelected despots in Pakistan, and illegal, terrorist states in the case of Israel. We are asked quite rightly by the western media to mourn the repression of the military in Myanmar, with endless pictures of Buddhist monks fleeing in anguish and turmoil. But when Musharaf executes Islamic clerics and mullahs in the street we don’t hear a peep, so biased is the double standard applied by these corporate media firms.

We have built up a Frankenstein monster in Pakistan, just as they did in Afghanistan when they sent the so called mujahadin to punish the Afghani people for having a government the west didn’t like. In Palestine too, the people went to the ballot and elected a government that Olmert, Bush and Blair didn’t like, so now we are starving the people for not electing “correctly”, so anti-democratic are the principles we espouse.  God rest Bhutto, let’s all support democracy and reject dictatorship.