Retrobites: Margaret Thatcher (1983)

Margaret Thatcher on Socialism

Thatcher: There Is No Such Thing as Public Money

Are You Young Enough to Appreciate This? Forever
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Hajj Guiding: An Ancient Family Business
THE TELEGRAPH: The Saudi government might manage the hajj, but the people who make it run for two million or more pilgrims are a handful of old Mecca families who monopolise the muttawif, or hajj guide, business.

Muslim pilgrims pray on Noor Mountain in Mecca. Photograph: The Telegraph
Organised into six companies, each taking care of pilgrims from a specific part of the world, they make sure the people who have waited a lifetime to perform the hajj get through it.

"We take control of the pilgrim from when he first puts his foot on the soil of Mecca," said Imad Abdullah, waiting for a bus load of Indonesians arriving in the Muslim holy city for the annual pilgrimage.

"We organise the shelter, food, transport, the rituals, and try to resolve any problems that come up," said Abdullah, who specialises in pilgrims from south-east Asia.

In what is a lucrative trade, the families deploy their members for the few weeks a year to manage pilgrim groups for all the time they are in Mecca: holding onto their travel documents, organising visits to important sites, and at the end, shopping trips so they can return home laden with gifts and souvenirs.

It is a gruelling job, having to be on call day and night for a few weeks, but thousands of young Meccans, men and women, seek the job and its good salary.

For several days' work they earn from $800 (£481) to more than $5,000 dollars each, depending on their experience.

Knowing foreign languages is a particular asset for a muttawif guide, and some excel in the tongues of the region they handle.

It is an ancient business, helping foreigners unable to speak Arabic navigate their way through the lengthy hajj ritual.

Families have long controlled it, but before the 1930s it was not very disciplined.

Then King Abdul Aziz bin Saud, the founder of modern Saudi Arabia, organised the families into six companies, each with rights to handle pilgrims from a specific region.

Abdullah's family - in the business for 150 years, is part of one of the companies, and he has been a muttawif for 30 years.

"Our sons will inherit the job," he said. >>> | Monday, November 23, 2009

Brown: Britain Must Be at Heart of Europe
THE INDEPENDENT: Britain must put itself at the heart of Europe to protect jobs and support economic growth, Gordon Brown insisted today.

In thinly-veiled criticism of the Tories, the Prime Minister claimed that retreating to the European sidelines would deal a "devastating blow" to UK business.

Speaking to business leaders at the CBI conference in London, Mr Brown said he was spearheading demands for a Europe-wide economic growth strategy.

Seeking to exploit the Conservatives' hostility towards the European Union, the premier said that UK growth was entwined with that of the Continent.

"It is by putting Britain not on the fringes of Europe, but at its heart, that Britain can protect its interests within Europe, and shape the future of Europe from a position of strength that can deliver growth and jobs for the British people," he said.

"To walk away from this would be to deal a devastating blow to the future of British business - and it's my belief that we must never allow this to happen."

Appealing for UK business to be "outward-looking" in order to harness the opportunities of global change, Mr Brown said higher European growth would create thousands of new British jobs.

"We must never forget that Europe accounts for 60% of our trade; more than three million British jobs depend on Europe," he warned.

"The European Union is the biggest exporter in the world and the second biggest importer. And it accounts for almost a third of the world's GDP." >>> Daniel Bentley, Press Association | Monday, November 23, 2009

THE TELEGRAPH: Direct rail links to be opened between London and Amsterdam, Gordon Brown announces: Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, has announced plans for direct rail links to be opened between London and other European cities including Amsterdam. >>> Rosa Prince, Political Correspondent | Monday, November 23, 2009

IMF Warns Second Bailout Would 'Threaten Democracy'
TIMES ONLINE: The public will not bail out the financial services sector for a second time if another global crisis blows up in four or five years time, the managing-director of the International Monetary Fund warned this morning.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn told the CBI annual conference of business leaders that another huge call on public finances by the financial services sector would not be tolerated by the “man in the street” and could even threaten democracy.

"Most advanced economies will not accept any more [bailouts]...The political reaction will be very strong, putting some democracies at risk," he told delegates.

"I do believe that the financial sector needs to contribute both to the costs of the financial crisis and to reduce recourse to public funds in the future," he said.

Mr Strauss-Kahn said that imposing high capital ratio requirements on banks was one price the financial services sector must pay to prevent the threat of further multi-billion dollar bailouts.

He pointed to the debate in the US over the Troubled Asset Relief Programme and said that in many countries, including France and Germany, he doubted that politicians would secure the mandate needed to secure any further bail-outs if banks got in to trouble again, in several years' time.

Europe is in dispute over the spiralling cost of the global economic bailout, with Germany and France calling for a reduction in state support as their economies have shown signs of an upturn. >>> Angela Jameson and Elizabeth Judge | Monday, November 23, 2009

Pope John Paul II 'Whipped Himself in Remorse for Sins'
THE TELEGRAPH: Pope John Paul II regularly whipped himself in a sign of "remorse for his sins", a nun has claimed.

Pope John Paul II. Photo: The Telegraph
The Pope, who died five years ago, is being considered for sainthood by the Catholic Church.

As part of the Vatican's investigation thousands of documents have been collected and examined by officials from the Congregation for the Causes of Saints.

Among them is the testimony of Tobiana Sobodka, a Polish nun of the Sacred Heart of Jesus order, who worked for Pope John Paul in his private Vatican apartments and at his summer residence in Castel Gandolfo near Rome.

Sister Sobodka said: "Several times he (Pope John Paul) would put himself through bodily penance.

"We would hear it – we were in the next room at Castel Gandolfo. You could hear the sound of the blows when he flagellate himself. He did it when he was still capable of moving on his own."

The flagellation is also confirmed by another bishop who has given testimony. Emery Kabongo was a secretary for Pope John Paul.

"He would punish himself and in particular just before he ordained bishops and priests," he said.

"I never actually saw it myself but several people told me about it."

Self flagellation is sometimes used by devoted Catholics as it reminds them of the whipping endured by Christ at the hands of the Romans before he was crucified. >>> Nick Pisa in Perugia | Monday, November 23, 2009

Video: US Deserter Seeks German Asylum
BBC: A US Army deserter is to meet German politicians in Berlin as he tries to secure asylum in the country.

Andre Shepherd left his military base, in southern Germany, in April 2007, after serving in Iraq. Eighteen months later, he applied for asylum on moral grounds, claiming the Iraq war was illegal. Tristana Moore reports. Watch video >>> | Monday, November 23, 2009

Europeans Sour on American-Style Capitalism
TIME: French President Nicolas Sarkozy has spent the past year hammering away at the excesses of American-style capitalism. In September, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso declared that workers' rights and "social cohesion" were top priorities on the Old Continent. And Italy's veteran Economy Minister, Giulio Tremonti, went out of his way last month to praise the posto fisso (guaranteed job for life) as a supreme public value.

In certain European political and intellectual circles, such talk would hardly turn heads. But those three men wagging their fingers at the free market were thought to have their capitalist bona fides as part of a generation of European business and government leaders who had pushed for reforming the welfare system and opening up the job market. Often in open ideological war against the entrenched interests of labor unions and leftist politicians, the likes of Sarkozy and Tremonti had long insisted that free-market reforms were the only way to create a more dynamic Europe in an increasingly competitive globalized economy.

So how do we explain the fact that longtime Ronald Reagan admirers are suddenly starting to sound like a union activist's picket sign? Has the Great Recession of 2008-09 effectively sapped all the energy from Europe's post-1989 wave of economic neoliberalism? "Quite clearly, the state is back," notes Iain Begg, a professor of European political economy at the London School of Economics. "In front of the failures of the Anglo-American model, we are seeing a revival of Keynesian approaches to react to the crisis."

Of course, the ideas of John Maynard Keynes are also behind the auto-industry bailouts, new financial regulations and public investments pushed by the Obama Administration. The difference is both in the details and the big picture: not only do specific national economic policies in Europe tend to still trail those of the U.S. on the free-market curve, but there is also a lingering ingrained suspicion about capitalism itself. >>> Jeff Israely | Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Mosquées : A Marseille, une page se tourne
LE TEMPS: France: 5 000 000 de musulmans (9% de la population), les 2/3 d’origine maghrébine

Hôtel de ville de Marseille, 6 novembre 2009. Tout sourire, le maire Jean-Claude Gaudin remet solennellement à Nourredine Cheikh, le président de l’association La mosquée de Marseille, son permis de construire tant attendu. Le site mesure 7500 mètres carrés, loué pour une somme presque symbolique (24 000 euros par an). Il comprend un minaret de 25 mètres, une salle de prières de 3500 mètres carré, un restaurant, un centre culturel. En 2011, ce devrait être la plus grande mosquée de France. Sous les balcons, le Front national donne de la voix, rappelant qu’il a déposé un recours en urbanisme. Mais les 200 000 musulmans de Marseille, dont la moitié ont la nationalité française, savent qu’une page est tournée, 72 ans après le premier projet de mosquée dans le principal port méditerranéen. >>> Catherine Frammery | Lundi 23 Novembre 2009

Minarets : Geert Wilders s’agite aux Pays-Bas
LE TEMPS: Pays-Bas: près de 900 000 musulmans (5% de la population), essentiellement de Turquie (330 000) et du Maroc (300 000)

Au sud de Rotterdam, ville multiculturelle où un habitant sur sept est de confession musulmane, la construction de la mosquée Essalam, qui a débuté il y a plus de six ans, est aujourd’hui ralentie. Le bâtiment principal est presque achevé mais les minarets, qui s’élèvent à plus de 50 mètres attendent encore d’être coiffés d’une pointe. En cause: le manque d’argent. Ni une, ni deux, le «Leefbaar Rotterdam» (Pour la qualité de la vie à Rotterdam), dernière section du parti fondé par Pim Fortuyn, le populiste de droite anti-islamiste assassiné en 2002, a exigé de la municipalité qu’elle retire le permis de construire de la mosquée. Et que le bâtiment, situé près d’un stade de football, soit utilisé à d’autres fins. Voilà pour l’ambiance.

Près de 900 000 musulmans vivent aux Pays-Bas. La plupart sont originaires du Maroc et de Turquie. Les mosquées seraient au nombre de 450, avec en tout, une trentaine de minarets. Depuis l’assassinat, en décembre 2004, du cinéaste Theo van Gogh, très critique envers les musulmans, par un Néerlandais radical d’origine marocaine, la question de l’intégration des musulmans est revenue sur le devant de la scène. Le discours à leur égard s’est nettement durci. >>> Valérie de Graffenried | Lundi 23 Novembre 2009

The Former British Police Officer Who Wants to Bring Down Barack Obama
THE GUARDIAN: Conspiracist prominent in movement claiming president is an imposter

Obama as a child with his mother. Photo: The Guardian
Neil Sankey has spent his life investigating organised crimes. As a former British police officer with almost 20 years experience, he was seconded to elite units of Scotland Yard through most of the 1970s and now runs his own private detective agency in California.

Over the years he has been involved in some big investigations. As part of the Special Branch and Bomb Squad he monitored British leftwing groups and the IRA, and in America his clients have included several big car companies.

But never has he handled anything quite as monumental as the investigation that is absorbing his energies today.

Sankey is pursuing what he believes to be fraud on a gigantic scale — a conspiracy, no less, to infiltrate and destroy the free world by putting a foreign imposter into the White House.

Sankey is a member of the fringe alliance known widely as the Birthers (he dislikes the expression, considering it pejorative). Together with other activists, he seeks to prove that Barack Obama is not a true American and is therefore ineligible to be president. >>> Ed Pilkington in New York | Sunday, November 22, 2009

Iran Sentences Former Vice-president to Six Years as Trails of Dissidents Reach a Peak
THE TELEGRAPH: A former Iranian vice-president was sentenced to six years in prison as reprisals meted out to leaders of street protests against the disputed presidential elections claimed their highest profile victim.

Former Iranian Vice-President Mohammad Ali Abtahi. Photo: The Telegraph
Mohammad Ali Abtahi, who was vice-president and a key aide to the leading reformist Mohammad Khatami from 1997-2005, was found guilty of conspiring against Iran's national security, state newsagencies reported yesterday.

He was arrested shortly after the presidential election in June as hundreds of thousands of people flooded the streets of Tehran claiming the results, which gave an overwhelming victory to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, were rigged.

State news agencies said he appeared before a court in Tehran on Saturday and was found guilty of charges including "gathering and plotting against the country's security", insulting the president, taking part in illegal demonstrations and issuing propaganda against the regime.

"Abtahi was sentenced to six years in prison for acting against national security and propaganda activity," a court spokesman said. >>> Richard Spencer in Dubai | Sunday, November 22, 2009

Nancy Franklin – Viewpoint: Unheavenly Host
THE NEW YORKER: Fox News Channel’s latest blowhard.

Bend it like Beck: Glenn Beck scores points with his political distortions. Caricature: The New Yorker
If you sensed something of a quiet spell about ten days ago, a lull in the usual media storm, it may have been owing to the fact that Glenn Beck, the energetically hateful, truth-twisting radio and Fox News Channel talk-show host, was absent from the airwaves for a week, to have his appendix removed. A few days after his surgery, he made it clear, via his Twitter feed, that he hated just watching TV, which is, of course, the terrible fate of those of us who don’t have talk shows. (“I know how U feel. Watching the news & knowing wht I say 2 my tv makes no difference,” he wrote. “I cnt wait 2 giv U wht I think has bn going on.”) By the middle of last week, he was back, breathing fire about Obama’s response to the Fort Hood shootings.

The persona that Beck has cobbled together over the past few years combines a determination to draw attention to himself, because what he has to say is so important, with an outsized, in-your-face show of modesty—he likes to refer to himself as a fatty (he’s barely overweight) and a clown, and, like many an egomaniac throughout history, he takes pains to present himself as a regular guy, shrugging his shoulders and saying, “But what do I know?” He declares himself no special friend to either Democrats or Republicans, and claims to be a libertarian, but his agenda is to throw tacks in front of the wheels of progress and, specifically, to make the Obama Administration crash and burn. Beck looks cherubic, with his boyish crewcut, his rubbery, expressive face, his wide eyes, and his seemingly innocent smile, but he has a wizened heart and a sulfurous outlook on American life and politics. >>> Nancy Franklin | Monday, November 23, 2009

Iran startet Militärmanöver - Warnung an Israel
DIE PRESSE: Die iranischen Revolutionsgarden proben die Verteidigung der umstrittenen Atomanlagen. Israel wird damit demonstrativ vor einem Angriff auf die Anlagen gewarnt.

Mit einem großangelegten Militärmanöver haben die iranischen Revolutionsgarden Israel demonstrativ vor einem Luftschlag gegen die Atomanlagen der Islamischen Republik gewarnt. Im Fall eines Angriffs werde der Iran Mittelstreckenraketen auf Tel Aviv abfeuern, erklärte der Repräsentant des Obersten geistlichen Führers Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in den Revolutionsgarden, Mojtaba Zolnoor.

Hauptziel des seit Sonntag laufenden fünftägigen Manövers ist es, die Fähigkeiten der Luftwaffe zu testen, die in Teheran sowie in Zentral- und Südiran liegenden Atomanlagen gegen einen Angriff zu verteidigen, wie der Nachrichtenkanal Khabar berichtete.

Israel hat wegen des iranischen Atomprogramms, das möglicherweise den Bau von Atomwaffen zum Ziel hat, einen Militärschlag gegen den Iran explizit nicht ausgeschlossen. Die Regierung in Jerusalem betrachtet einen nuklear gerüsteten Iran als Existenzbedrohung. Experten wenden jedoch ein, dass Luftangriffe auf die iranischen Nuklearanlagen das Programm bestenfalls um einige Jahre zurückwerfen könnten.

Für die Verteidigung der iranischen Atomanlagen sind die paramilitärischen Revolutionsgarden zuständig. Die mehr als 125.000 Gardisten bilden neben der regulären Armee die zweite Säule der iranischen Streitkräfte. Atom-Verhandlungen festgefahren >>> Ag | Sonntag, 22. November 2009

Obama bows to Emperor Akihito excessively deferentially. Photo: Google Images
Barack Obama Dream Fades as China Visit Fails to Bring Change
THE SUNDAY TIMES: Even his allies feel let down by the president’s lack of progress both in Asia and at home

Gazing serenely from the Great Wall of China last week, President Barack Obama appeared to be making the most of one of the supreme perks of White House occupancy — a private guided tour of Asia’s most spectacular tourist destination.

White House aides exulted that perfectly choreographed pictures of this moment would make front pages around the world. Yet an experience Obama declared to be “magical” turned sour as he returned home to a spreading domestic revolt that is fanning Democratic unease.

It was not just that the US media have suddenly turned a lot more sceptical about a president with grand ambitions to reshape politics at home and abroad — even one previously friendly newspaper noted dismissively: “Obama goes to China, brings home a T-shirt.”

Nor was the steady decline in the president’s approval ratings — which fell below 50% for the first time in a Gallup poll last week — the main cause of White House angst. Obama remains more popular than either Ronald Reagan or Bill Clinton a year after their elections, and both presidents eventually cruised to second terms.

The real problem may be Obama’s friends — or rather, those among his formerly most enthusiastic supporters who are now having second thoughts.

The doubters are suddenly stretching across a broad section of the Democratic party’s natural constituency. They include black congressional leaders upset by the sluggish economy; women and Hispanics appalled by concessions made to Republicans on healthcare; anti-war liberals depressed by the debate over troops for Afghanistan; and growing numbers of blue-collar workers who are continuing to lose their jobs and homes.

Obama’s Asian adventure perceptibly increased the murmurings of dissent when he returned to Washington last week, having failed to wring any public concessions from China on any major issue.

For most Americans, the most talked-about moment of the trip was not the Great Wall visit but his low bow to Emperor Akihito of Japan, which the president’s right-wing critics assailed as “a spineless blunder” and excessively deferential. >>> Tony Allen-Mills in New York | Sunday, November 22, 2009

Catherine Ashton, la lady qu'on n'attendait pas
leJDD.fr: La désignation de Catherine Ashton comme chef de la diplomatie de l'Union européenne, aux côtés du président Van Rompuy - deux fonctions créées par le traité de Lisbonne - suscite la perplexité.

Dans les couloirs de la Commission européenne, on l’appelle "the Baroness". "Avec ses vêtements rose et parme, elle a un côté très lady, façon reine d’Angleterre", s’amuse-t-on au sein de la haute instance bruxelloise. Elle a pourtant annoncé la couleur d’entrée, lorsqu’elle s’est installée dans le siège de commissaire au Commerce extérieur, en 2008: "Ne m’appelez pas baronne… Appelez-moi plutôt Cathy."

Catherine Ashton of Upholland, de son vrai nom, a été nommée jeudi haute représentante de l’Union européenne pour les affaires étrangères, aux côtés d’Herman Van Rompuy, nommé premier président "stable" de l’UE. Une désignation a minima pour ce poste qu’on annonce d’emblée dévalorisé, tant le profil de cette lady britannique de 53 ans ne semble pas susciter d’enthousiasme en Europe.

Décrite comme "consensuelle" et "discrète" par la BBC, comme une "technocrate dénuée d’expérience en matière diplomatique" par The Economist, "aussi inconnue que non élue" par The Guardian, la "Baroness", économiste de formation, a commencé sa carrière en dirigeant pendant six ans une œuvre caritative créée par le prince Charles, Business in the Community. Elle a ensuite été anoblie à la demande du Parti travailliste, en 1999, avant de rentrer à la Chambre des lords… puis d’être nommée successivement secrétaire d’Etat à l’Education, aux Affaires constitutionnelles et à la Justice. Son principal fait d’armes au niveau européen? Avoir obtenu, en 2007, l’adoption du traité de Lisbonne par la Chambre haute du Parlement. Un quasi-exploit au Royaume-Uni, pays plutôt réputé pour ses penchants eurosceptiques… >>> Camille Neveux, Le Journal du Dimanche | Samedi 21 Novembre 2009

Die stille EU-Aussenministerin: Catherine Ashton hat sich in ihrer Karriere daran gewöhnt, stets unterschätzt zu werden
NZZ am SONNTAG: Sie sei profillos und nie gewählt worden, schimpfen Kritiker. Doch die aus einem kleinen Dorf stammende Baroness Ashton ist auf ihre ruhige Art erfolgreich.

Die Zweifel kommen ihr bekannt vor. Schon als Catherine Ashton 2008 EU-Handelskommissarin wurde, fragte die britische Öffentlichkeit: Wer ist diese Frau? Und dann, aggressiver: Hat sie das Zeug für ein solches Amt?

Als Ashton nun am Donnerstag überraschend zur neuen EU-Aussenministerin und Vizechefin der EU-Kommission berufen wurde, waren die Einwände ähnlich, nur noch ätzender: Die 53-Jährige sei zu blass, fähig zwar, aber zu unerfahren, um die EU gegenüber den USA, Russland oder Iran zu repräsentieren. Für den Europa-Experten der Denkfabrik Chatham House ist Ashton «langweilig», die Boulevardzeitung «Daily Mail» bezeichnete sie als «Baroness Who» – die meisten Leuten hätten noch nie von ihr gehört. Viele Kommentatoren schrieben, Ashton und der neue EU-Präsident Herman Van Rompuy seien bestimmt worden, weil die EU keine politischen Schwergewichte wie Tony Blair wünsche, die den Regierungen dreinreden könnten.

Catherine Ashton, die am liebsten einfach «Cathy» genannt wird, konterte die Kritik selbstbewusst. 27 Regierungschefs hätten sie gewählt, und sie wolle zeigen, dass sie «die beste Person ist für das Amt». Sie habe jahrelange Erfahrung in Verhandlungen auf allen möglichen Ebenen, erklärte sie und fügte an, sie sei stolz, das Amt als Frau aufgrund ihrer Fähigkeiten erhalten zu haben. >>> Niels Anner, Cambridge | Sonntag, 22. November 2009

Iranische Machtverhältnisse: Der Gottesstaat wird zur Militärdiktatur
20MINUTEN.ch: Seit der umstrittenen Wiederwahl Mahmud Ahmadinedschads weiten die Revolutionsgarden ihren Einfluss auf die iranische Politik, Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft aus. Die schiitische Geistlichkeit wird in den Hintergrund gedrängt.

«Die Bewahrung der Islamischen Republik ist wichtiger als Beten», verkündete unlängst Mohammad Ali Dschafari, Kommandant der iranischen Revolutionsgarden. «Kommandant erlässt Fatwa», spottete tags darauf die exiliranische Zeitung «Ruz». Die Häme scheint unangebracht, drängen sich doch zwei Fragen auf: Wie «islamisch» ist eine Republik, deren Überleben wichtiger ist als die zweite Säule des Islam, das tägliche Gebet? Und da Iran auch keine echte Republik ist: Was eigentlich ist das Land, wenn weder islamisch noch Republik?

Auf dem Weg zu einer Militärdiktatur, meint einer, der es wissen muss: Mohsen Sazegara war Gründungsmitglied der Revolutionsgarden und in den 80er Jahren Mitarbeiter von Premierminister Mussawi, dem heutigen Oppositionsführer. Inzwischen lebt er im amerikanischen Exil und bezeichnet seine ehemaligen Kameraden als «etwas wie die kommunistische Partei, den KGB, einen Grosskonzern und die Mafia zusammen». Putschdrohung gegen Chatami >>> Von Omid Marivani | Samstag, 21. November 2009

Proche-Orient : L'eau de Gaza est impropre à la consommation
20MINUTES.ch: L'eau dans la bande de Gaza est «désormais impropre à la consommation humaine», a déclaré samedi un responsable palestinien chargé de l'approvisionnement des municipalités côtières de Gaza.

Cette situation jugée «critique» est notamment due à une salinité excessive.

«Des analyses d'experts internationaux ont montré que seulement 10% de l'eau de la bande de Gaza est potable, ce qui est un risque pour la vie des Palestiniens», s'est alarmé Mounzir Chiblak, responsable d'une compagnie de distribution d'eau dans le territoire. >>> ats | Samedi 21 Novembre 2009

Herman Van Rompuy: Europe's First President to Push for 'Euro Tax'
THE TELEGRAPH: Herman Van Rompuy, Europe's first president, is to join forces with the European Commission to push for sweeping new tax raising powers for Brussels.

Van Rompuy: Mr Van Rompuy, 62, who was appointed to the newly-created £320,000-a-year post at last week's special EU summit, set out his stall on direct Euro-taxes during a private speech. Photo: The Telegraph
Within days of taking office in January, the former Belgian prime minister will put his weight behind controversial proposals already floated by the commission's head, José Manuel Barroso, for a new "Euro tax".

He will add credence to Mr Barroso's plans, to be formally tabled in the New Year, by arguing for a Euro-version of a "Tobin Tax" – a levy on financial transactions already floated by Gordon Brown as a solution to the international banking crisis. It would result in a stream of income direct to Brussels coffers, funding budgets that critics say are already rife with waste and overspending.

Mr Van Rompuy, 62, who was appointed to the newly-created £320,000-a-year post at last week's special EU summit, set out his stall on direct Euro-taxes during a private speech at a recent meeting of the Bilderberg group of top politicians, bankers and businessmen. The group officially meets in secret, but when selected details of his remarks leaked out, his office was forced to issue a public statement on his behalf.

"The financing of the welfare state, irrespective of the social reform we implement, will require new resources," he said. "The possibility of financial levies at European level needs to be seriously reviewed."
Mr Barroso, whose commission acts as the European Union's executive arm and civil service, has set out alternative plans for a Euro tax that would involve Brussels taking directly a fixed percentage of VAT and fuel duties. While these taxes already help to fund EU spending – set at £121 billion next year – they are currently gathered by the treasuries of individual nation states, from which varying sums are paid into EU coffers.

A new Euro tax could appear on all shopping and petrol station receipts, showing the amount of VAT or fuel duty creamed off directly to Brussels. Supporters say it would take a fixed proportion of the existing tax revenue rather than increase it overall, and make the cost to taxpayers of running the EU more transparent. Critics argue this could backfire by increasing anti-Brussels sentiment. >>> Bruno Waterfield and Justin Stares in Brussels and Colin Freeman | Sunday, November 22, 2009

Herman Van Rompuy’s sister, a communist/extreme socialist, doesn’t agree with her brother’s politics:

Christine Van Rompuy bekeert zich tot klein links

Levi Johnston, Sarah Palin's son-in-law. Photo: Google Images
Levi Johnston's Mother Sentenced to Three Years in Prison
THE TELEGRAPH: The mother of Levi Johnston has been sentenced to three years in prison for dealing in prescription painkillers in the latest twist for the young man who fathered Sarah Palin's grandchild.

Sherry Johnston, 43, received the jail sentence after reaching a plea deal with prosecutors. Her son, who was engaged to Mrs Palin's daughter Bristol during her Republican vice-presidential run last year, was in court in Alaska with his mother.

Mr Johnston, 19, has been in a deepening feud with the Palins amid arguments over rights of access to his son Tripp since the end of his relationship with Miss Palin.

He has claimed that he has information that could "destroy" Mrs Palin, a popular figure on the Republican right. The former Alaskan governor is currently on a swing across America on a campaign-style book tour to promote her best-selling new memoir Going Rogue.

Mr Johnston is meanwhile in the headlines after posing nude, with some well-placed props such as an ice hockey stick, for Playgirl magazine. >>> Philip Sherwell in New York | Saturday, November 21, 2009

Enya: Marble Halls

Gay Islam: Special Report

Minarets in Switzerland

Tory Councillor Suspended for Complaining that Candidates Have 'Foreign' Names
THE TELEGRAPH: A Conservative councillor has been suspended after complaining that the party's would-be MPs do not have "normal" English names.

Peter Hobbins, a former parliamentary candidate, wrote a series of emails to fellow party members complaining that applicants for the Orpington seat in Kent sounded "foreign".

He also complained that candidates approved by Conservative Central Office all mention Africa on their CVs, describing their cover letters as "ridiculous" and "pathetic".

"I have been contacted by a Mr Dilon Gumraj and a Zerha Zaidi and others who are all on the approved Conservative Parliamentary Candidates list," he wrote in one email. "Not one of them has a ‘normal’ English name." >>> Matthew Moore | Saturday, November 21, 2009

Gorbatschew spricht über politisches Comeback
NZZ ONLINE: Der letzte sowjetische Parteichef Michail Gorbatschew spielt mit der Idee eines politischen Comebacks. >>> ap | Freitag, 20. November 2009

Raëd Salah, chef des radicaux du Mouvement islamiste israélien, dont les prêches enflamment Jérusalem
LE MONDE: Rien, dans l'apparence et la componction de Raëd Salah ne laisse supposer qu'il s'agit du prédicateur souvent vitupérant, capable, en moins d'une heure, de rameuter des milliers de Palestiniens en colère dans la vieille ville de Jérusalem aux cris d'"Al-Aqsa est en danger" ?

Qui est vraiment ce chef de la branche radicale du Mouvement islamique israélien ? L'érudit religieux souriant et affable qu'il souhaite incarner ce matin-là, ou la bête noire de la police israélienne, trop souvent obligée d'instaurer un quasi-état de siège dans la Ville sainte, pour éviter que l'esplanade des Mosquées, qui abrite Al-Aqsa, troisième lieu saint de l'islam, ne devienne un champ de bataille ?

Cheikh Raëd Salah, père de huit enfants, est un Janus palestinien, plutôt radical. S'il nous reçoit à Um El-Fahm, ville arabe perchée sur la crête de la montagne du même nom et dont il a été maire, à deux heures de route de Jérusalem, c'est parce qu'il y est interdit de séjour depuis les affrontements qui s'y sont produits, début octobre. Plus exactement, il ne doit pas approcher à moins de 150 mètres des limites de la vieille ville, ni participer à un rassemblement de plus de sept personnes. Ce qui n'entame en rien sa détermination : "Si je dois aller défendre Al-Aqsa, j'irai." >>> Le Monde | Samedi 21 Novembre 2009

Les Belges s'attendent à une période de grande instabilité
LE MONDE: La désignation d'Herman Van Rompuy comme président du Conseil européen devrait conduire au retour d'Yves Leterme, l'un des leaders du parti chrétien-démocrate flamand comme premier ministre en Belgique. Une perspective qui inquiète, la tenue de nouvelles élections générales dans les mois qui viennent n'étant pas exclue, explique Jean-Pierre Stroobants, correspondant du "Monde" à Bruxelles. Audio >>> Le Monde | Vendredi 20 Novembre 2009

Nude Carla Bruni Fails to Excite Paris Auction
AFP: PARIS — A nude photo of French first lady Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, identical to one sold last year for 91,000 dollars, was Friday withdrawn from a Paris auction after bids failed to hit the reserve price.

Bidding for the black and white shot, showing Bruni standing pigeon-toed and covering her crotch with her hands, began at 4,000 euros but reached only 5,800, less than the undisclosed reserve price, the Drouot auction house said. >>> | Friday, November 20, 2009

For Sale: Carla Bruni's Castle
THE TELEGRAPH: The Italian castle where Carla Bruni-Sarkozy grew up is for sale.

The castle used to belong to Carla Bruni-Sarkozy's family. Photo: The Telegraph
Carla Bruni-Sarkozy’s fairy-tale castle in Italy is for sale for $28 million (£17m). The 11th-century residence in the Turin hills was renovated by Bruni’s grandfather, Virginio Bruni Tedeschi, the founder of Italian tyre manufacturer CEAT, and features frescos and marble floors. Bruni lived there as a child, sleeping in an elaborately decorated bedroom and playing in the 173 acres of parkland. >>> Anna Tyzack | Friday, November 20, 2009

Hidden Fashion Show in Tehran

Union Européenne: Le nouveau président de l'UE ne soulève pas l’enthousiasme
lePARISIEN.fr: Sa première conférence de presse bruxelloise a donné le ton. Avec ses airs de professeur Nimbus, Herman Van Rompuy, le tout nouveau président de l’Union européenne, choisi pour deux ans et demi, s’est présenté d’une voix timide devant les journalistes européens pour expliquer qu’il ne fallait pas compter sur lui pour s’exprimer beaucoup et que son avis sur certains sujets comme l’adhésion éventuelle de la Turquie ne comptait pas : « Mon rôle sera de trouver un consensus. « Choisi pour ne faire d’ombre à personne » >>> Frédéric Gerschel | Samedi 21 Novembre 2009

Video Dispatch: Europe Chooses a President

Video Dispatch: In Iran, Nuclear Inspections and an Overture from Turkey

Report Warns of Pakistan's Younger Generation Losing Faith in Democracy
THE GUARDIAN: Swelling population 'risks demographic disaster' / Cynicism and disaffection among disturbing findings

Children study the Qur'an prior to examinations at the Dar al-Haqqania Madrassa near Peshawar, Pakistan. Photo: The Guardian
Pakistan faces a "demographic disaster" if its leaders fail to invest in a youth population that is disturbingly cynical about democracy, has greatest faith in the military and is resentful of western interference, according to a study published tomorrow.

The report, commissioned by the British Council, says the nuclear-armed country is at a critical point, with its population forecast to swell by 85 million, from its current 180 million, over the next two decades.

"Pakistan is at a crossroads," said David Steven, an academic who helped write the report. "It can harness the energy of that generation, and collect a demographic dividend. But if they fail to get jobs and are poorly educated, it faces a demographic disaster."

Pakistan has never had such a high proportion of young adults: half of its population are aged under 20, with two-thirds still to reach their 30th birthday. But they are deeply divided about how the country should be run.

Only a third believe democracy is the best system of governance, one third support sharia law, while 7% think dictatorship is a good idea. Fasi Zaka, a radio DJ and commentator who helped launch the report, called it a snapshot of a "lost generation".

"They don't believe in anything firmly. Maybe they want sharia law, maybe they want democracy. It's all over the place. But despite this there's a lot of patriotism. So it's not a lost cause." Summing up the contradictions, he said young Pakistanis "don't like this country, but they love it". >>> Declan Walsh in Islamabad | Friday, November 20, 2009

Islam: Schweinegrippe bedroht Millionen Hadsch-Pilger
WELT ONLINE: In diesen Tagen beginnt der Hadsch. Für Millionen Muslime ist die Pilgerreise der religiöse Höhepunkt ihres Lebens. Diesmal ist einiges anders, denn in Mekka herrscht Angst vor der Schweinegrippe. Saudi-Arabien bemüht sich um die Eindämmung des Problems mit Atemmasken, Thermo-Kameras – und Gebeten.

Mit Mundschutz: Eine Teilnehmerin des Hadsch am Flughafen von Dschidda. Bild: Welt Online
Ausgerechnet Schweinegrippe! Ausgerechnet jetzt! Das Schwein gilt im Islam ohnehin als unrein und wird gemieden, der Verzehr seines Fleisches ist Muslimen verboten. Unverständnis von Marokko bis Malaysia: Wie kann man sich denn da anstecken? Dass die Weltgrippe nichts mit Essgewohnheiten und auch nur entfernt überhaupt mit dem Schwein zu tun hat, kann die Muslime kaum beruhigen. Und das schlimmste ist: Der Hadsch steht bevor, die islamische Wallfahrt nach Mekka mit fast drei Millionen Pilgern aus rund 160 Staaten.

Was kommende Woche in Mekka geschieht, ist das exakte Gegenteil von dem, was die Weltgesundheitsorganisation (WHO) zur Eindämmung des H1N1-Virus empfiehlt: Hunderttausende Menschen in großer Enge und Hitze, die zusammen beten, essen und dieselben rituellen Gegenstände berühren. Der Pilgerort droht zum riesigen Inkubator zu werden. >>> Von Dietrich Alexander | Freitag, 20. November 2009

Swine Flu Kills Four in Saudi Arabia on Hajj Pilgrimage
BBC: Four pilgrims have died of swine flu as they take part in this year's annual Mecca pilgrimage, Saudi officials say.

Three of the victims, a woman from Morocco and men from Sudan and India, were in their seventies.The fourth was a 17-year-old girl from Nigeria.

The Health Ministry said none of the four foreign victims had been vaccinated against the H1N1 virus.

The latest figures from the World Health Organization show the virus has so far killed 6,750 people worldwide.

Up to three million Muslims from around the world take part in the holy pilgrimage every year, but health officials have expressed fears that it could provide a breeding ground for the virus. Egyptian fears >>> | Saturday, November 21, 2009

BBC: Video: Swine flu 'is not yet pandemic' >>> | Sunday, November 01, 2009

The Reluctant President
EUROPEAN VOICE: Van Rompuy says he will assume new job with conviction and enthusiasm.

Herman Van Rompuy, Belgium's reluctant prime minister, portrayed himself this evening as Europe's reluctant president. “I have not sought this post or worked for it, but I assume it with conviction and enthusiasm,” he said.

He stressed that he would continue with the consensual style that had been his hallmark in Belgian politics and which brought him to the prime minister's post at the end of last year.

“Every country should emerge victorious from negotiations,” he said. “A negotiation that ends with a defeated country is never a good negotiation.”

“We are living in a period of anguish and anxiety and lack of confidence,” he said, after highlighting the economic, environmental and security problems. He said that now that the Lisbon treaty was ratified, the issue of institutional reform was “closed for a long time”.

But Van Rompuy stressed that the presidents of the EU's three main institutions – the Council, the European Parliament and the European Commission – must work together, respectfully.

He said that he looked forward to the enlargement of the EU in the next two and a half years, to include “countries that of course meet conditions”. Asked his views on the admission of Turkey to the EU, he said that he would not be representing his own views but those of the 27 member states. “My personal opinion is totally subordinate to the views of the Council,” he said.

He said that, after consultation with Fredrik Reinfeldt, Sweden's prime minister, who currently holds the chair of the European Council, he would remain prime minister of Belgium until the end of the year and not take up his EU office until 1 January. Surprise >>> Tim King | Thursday, November 19, 2009

EUROPEAN VOICE: The Belgian who will lead the EU >>> Andrew Gardner | Thursday, November 19, 2009

La Belgique perd un précieux Premier ministre
L’EXPRESS.fr: L'Union européenne gagne un président, Herman Van Rompuy. Mais la Belgique devra renoncer à ce Premier ministre qui a su concilier les intérêts des Flamands et des Wallons, à défaut de les réconcilier durablement. La crise belge pourrait-elle ressurgir à cette occasion?

Ce vendredi matin, la Belgique est fière. Le tout premier président du Conseil européen a été choisi dans ce pays présent depuis le début dans l'aventure européenne: les Vingt-sept ont penché pour son Premier ministre chrétien-démocrate, Herman Van Rompuy. Consécration pour ce néerlandophone de 62 ans, considéré comme efficace et discret par ses compatriotes.

"Il joue un rôle important depuis près de 30 ans en Belgique, à la tête du parti démocrate-chrétien et flamand (CD&V) puis comme ministre du Budget et enfin comme Premier ministre. C'est normal que les Européens ne le connaissent pas encore, c'est un homme de l'ombre", explique Pierre Havaux, journaliste au Vif/L'Express.

A Bruxelles, Herman Van Rompuy est le "Sphinx". "Il ne se répand pas dans les médias, il y est allergique! Ne vous attendez pas à des déclarations flamboyantes... Mais ne vous y trompez pas, c'est un faux mou doté d'un humour cynique. Il a le sens du compromis, c'est dans ses gênes, il est Belge", ajoute le journaliste politique de l'hebdomadaire.

Ajoutez à cette savante alchimie une dose de lucidité: "Il sait parfaitement qu'on l'a choisi pour déminer le terrain et arrondir les angles, surtout pas pour faire de l'ombre à des figures comme Nicolas Sarkozy. Ca ne le dérange pas". Et vous obtiendrez le candidat idéal pour le poste européen dont les contours restent encore à définir. Bruxelles regrette déjà son "Sphinx" >>> Par Marie Simon | Vendredi 20 Novembre 2009

Russian Priest and Muslim Critic, Daniil Sysoyev, Assassinated in Church
The Russian Orthodox priest Daniil Sysoyev, 35, was shot by a masked gunman. Photo: Times Online
TIMES ONLINE: A Russian Orthodox priest known for his outspoken criticism of Islam and attempts to convert Muslims to Christianity has been assassinated in his Moscow church.

A masked gunman shot Father Daniil Sysoyev in the head and chest after asking for him by name, police said. The choirmaster, Vladimir Strelbinsky, was seriously wounded in the attack at St Thomas Church in southern Moscow.

Father Daniil, 35, died of his wounds in hospital late last night. A Russian newspaper reported that he had recently told its journalists of 14 death threats by telephone and e-mail, which he had received as a result of his work among Muslim migrants from former Soviet republics.

“They’ve threatened to cut my head off 14 times,” the priest told Komsomolskaya Pravda, adding that the Federal Security Service had contacted him last year after uncovering a plot to murder him. >>> Tony Halpin in Moscow | Friday, November 10, 2009

Kim Jong-Il. Crédits photo : Le Monde
En Corée du Nord, la situation des droits de l'homme reste très alarmante
LE MONDE: Le non-respect des droits de l'homme en République populaire démocratique de Corée (RPDC) était un sujet sur lequel les déclarations à Séoul du président Barack Obama étaient attendues. En Chine, l'hôte de la Maison Blanche a été peu mordant. Il ne l'a pas été davantage à Séoul dans le cas d'un pays certes moins puissant dont la situation a été qualifiée de "pire du monde" par Vitit Muntarbhorn, rapporteur auprès des Nations unies sur les droits de l'homme en RPDC.

Des organisations de défense des libertés civiles avaient exhorté M. Obama à la fermeté : "le problème nucléaire a trop longtemps éludé d'autres questions", estime Elaine Pearson, directrice adjointe pour l'Asie de Human Right Watch. Dans une lettre ouverte au président américain, Timothy Peter, directeur de Helping Hands Korea, rappelle que la Chine rapatrie de force les Nord-Coréens qui passent clandestinement la frontière. Ils seraient actuellement de 30 000 à 50 000. La plupart sont des migrants économiques qui passent temporairement en Chine en quête de travail et de nourriture. Ramenés en RPDC, ils risquent de lourdes peines de prison. >>> Tokyo Correspondant | Jeudi 19 Novembre 2009

Anwar al-Awlaki. Photo: Fox News
Hasan E-Mail to Radical Imam: 'I Can't Wait to Join You' in the Afterlife
FOX NEWS: The Army psychiatrist accused of killing 13 people in the Fort Hood massacre told a radical Muslim imam, "I can't wait to join you" in the afterlife, in one of several e-mails exchanged between the two men, ABC News reported on Thursday.

An unnamed official "with top secret access" told the network 18 e-mails were exchanged between Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan and Anwar al-Awlaki, who encouraged Muslims to kill U.S. troops in Iraq, from Dec. 2008 until June of this year.

Other e-mails, the official said, included discussion of when jihad is considered "appropriate," and if it is acceptable for innocent people to die in suicide attacks.

"Hasan told Awlaki he couldn't wait to join him in the discussions they would [be] having over non-alcoholic wine in the afterlife," ABC quoted the official as saying.

Hasan — with an annual salary around $92,000 — also wrote, "My strength is my financial capabilities," the source said. Investigators have found the Army major donated as much as $30,000 per year to Islamic "charities." American authorities have found several such charities to be conduits to terrorist networks. >>> FoxNews & AP | Friday, November 20, 2009

Sudan: The Harsher Face of Islam

Covering Egypt – Egypt
Watch Journeyman Pictures video here

US Postal Service Closes North Pole to Christmas Post
THE TELEGRAPH: The US Postal Service has been accused of Scrooge-like behaviour after it imposed strict rules on a 55-year-old Father Christmas letters service over fears that paedophiles might gain access to the young correspondents.

Since 1954, the Operation Santa programme, which is centred in the small Alaskan town of North Pole, has been forwarding about 150,000 letters a year addressed to “Santa Claus, North Pole”.

Replies written by volunteers around the US and bearing the North Pole postmark, come signed by one of Santa’s elves. However, concerns were raised last year when a worker at a sorting centre in Maryland recognised an Operation Santa volunteer in the state as a registered sex offender.

The individual was sacked before he could answer a child’s letter, but the episode prompted the Postal Service to tighten up the rules, which already required “elves” to show identification.

The service now prohibits volunteers from having access to children’s full names and addresses. They will be replaced by codes that match computerised addresses known only to the post office. >>> Tom Leonard in New York | Thursday, November 19, 2009

TIMES ONLINE: US cancels Santa Claus letter service over paedophile fears >>> James Bone in New York | Friday, November 20, 2009

Oprah Calls It a Day
TIMES ONLINE: Oprah Winfrey, the Queen of the American talk show, is to give up her sofa after 25 years of A-List interviews, weepy personal confessions, and spectacular audience give-aways—in spite of a contract that saw her earn an estimated $275 million (£166 million) last year alone.

The 55-year-old African American star, who was born into poverty in rural Mississippi—the daughter of a teenage single mother—is thought to have decided to call an end to her hugely successful show because of her much-anticipated plans to launch a cable channel.

“The sun will set on the ‘Oprah’ show as its 25th season draws to a close on September 9, 2011,” wrote Tim Bennett, the president of Ms Winfrey’s company, Harpo Products, in a letter to employees. They were reportedly informed of the decision late on Thursday.

In spite of its 4pm air-time and relatively modest viewership of 7 million, The Oprah Winfrey show is a force like no other in modern broadcasting.

Vastly influential with American women, its unashamed sentimentality and focus on inspirational first-person stories and self-improvement advice has influenced American pop culture profoundly, in particular the presentation of news.

Indeed, the ‘Oprahfication’ of news is such that when Ms Winfrey announced to her studio audience last year that she had gained weight—to the point where she had reached 200lbs—the revelation briefly turned into a more prominent story on the cable news channels than the collapse of the global economy. >>> Chris Ayres in Los Angeles | Friday, November 20, 2009

Archbishop Tells Pope: There Will Be No Turning Back on Women Priests
TIMES ONLINE: The Archbishop of Canterbury yesterday made his most outspoken challenge to the Roman Catholic Church since the Pope invited disaffected Anglicans to switch to Rome.

Speaking before he meets Benedict XVI tomorrow, Dr Rowan Williams told a conference in Rome that the Catholic Church’s refusal to ordain women was a bar to Christian unity.

“For many Anglicans, not ordaining women has a possible unwelcome implication about the difference between baptised men and baptised women,” he said.

The Anglican provinces that ordain women had retained rather than lost their Catholic holiness and sacramentalism, he said. >>> Ruth Gledhill and Richard Owen in Rome | Friday, November 20, 2009

European Union: Fading Presidential Ambitions
THE GUARDIAN – Editorial: Who do you call when you want to call Europe? After five years of wrangling designed to deal with the Henry Kissinger question, the EU last night failed to provide a satisfactory answer. The first ever president of the European council is to be the haiku-writing Belgian prime minister, Herman Van Rompuy, who is still little known in his own country, let alone the wider world. And the continent's pioneering high-representative on foreign policy is the able but unknown Labour baroness, Catherine Ashton, who is as unelected as she is obscure. Neither will stop the traffic even in Brussels, never mind in Beijing. Talk of President Blair has bitten the dust, but so too has any hope of Europe forcing the planet to pay it fresh attention.

That ultimately disappointed hope is what sunk the EU into a prolonged bout of introspection from which it has only just emerged. The 2004 draft constitution was all about creating identifiable leadership, until the people of the Netherlands and France scuppered the plan. But the ambition of providing Europe's half-billion people with a new voice lived on through the Treaty of Lisbon, which limped through near-death in Ireland and eastern resentment to be signed and sealed this month.

At last, the European council could be galvanised by a dynamic leader instead of drifting with an endlessly-rotating chair; and at last Brussels would be able to enter discussion on the Middle East, Africa and the environment with a figure able to look Washington's secretary of state in the eye. Or, at least, that was the theory. But while Tony Blair's divisive and doomed candidacy for the first of these posts created a terrific distraction, Europe quietly returned to its old ways. A Franco-German stitch-up in favour of an obscure Belgian is exactly how things traditionally worked – it is as if the Swedes, the Poles and the rest had never joined the club. There was no puff of white smoke, but the secretive manner in which 27 proud democracies reached the decision made the Vatican look almost transparent. >>> Editorial | Friday, November 20, 2009



THE TELEGRAPH: Herman Van Rompuy: the reluctant leader: Herman Van Rompuy, Belgium's reluctant Prime Minister, is an unexpected first President of the European Union. >>> Bruno Waterfield in Brussels | Thursday, November 19, 2009



THE TELEGRAPH: What will Europe's foreign minister Baroness Ashton do? : Baroness Ashton of Upholland has been appointed high representative for foreign and security policy on Thursday. But what will she actually do? >>> | Friday, November 20, 2009

BBC: Newspapers unite against EU President van Rompuy: There is an unlikely alliance among Friday's papers, with both the Guardian and Daily Mail leading with the same headline, "The Great EU Stitch-Up". >>> | Friday, November 20, 2009

THE SUN: Rompuy romps it: EUROPE'S obscure new President Herman Van Rompuy was celebrating his £320,000-a-year job last night - together with Baroness Ashton, the equally little-known British peer named as EU foreign minister. >>> Graeme Wilson | Friday, November 20, 2009

THE SUN – OPINION: THEY just don't get it.

Europe's two most powerful jobs were handed out yesterday.

But the 500million people who live in the EU were given no say in who got them.

Instead, Europe's elite chose the winners of this shabby lottery.

First in secretive meetings, then over a lavish feast, they thrashed out their sickening stitch-up. It was like the worst days of Soviet Russia.

And it exposed once again how this discredited European empire is rotten to the core. [Source: The Sun] Graeme Wilson | Friday, November 20, 2009

Ashton: 'I Am Best Person for EU Foreign Job'
BBC: Baroness Ashton has hit back at claims she does not have enough experience for the post of EU high representative for Foreign Affairs and security.

The Labour peer was the surprise choice of Europe's leaders for the role - dubbed the first EU foreign minister.

Lady Ashton told the BBC that EU leaders were "comfortable" with her appointment - and that she will show she is "the best person for the job". >>> | Friday, November 20, 2009

Last Night's Menu
Dinner menu: The Sun

BNP Signs Its First Non-white Member...
THE INDEPENDENT: ... but he's only joined because he hates Muslims

An elderly Sikh who describes Islam as a "beast" and once provided a character reference for Nick Griffin during his racial hatred trial is set to become the British National Party's first non-white member.

Rajinder Singh, an anti-Islam activist in his late seventies who blames Muslims for the death of his father during the Partition of India in 1947, has been sympathetic towards Britain's far-right party for much of the past decade even though he currently remains barred from becoming a member because of the colour of his skin.

But last weekend the BNP's leadership took their first steps towards dropping its membership ban on non-whites after the Human Rights Commission threatened the party with legal action. The move will be put to a vote of members soon. >>> Ben Quinn and Jerome Taylor | Friday, November 20, 2009

Le Belge Van Rompuy va présider l'Europe
LE FIGARO: À 62 ans, le premier ministre belge, qui prendra ses fonctions à la tête de l'Union le 1er janvier, est un homme discret, rompu à l'art du consensus.

Les Vingt-Sept ont préféré le consensus au panache. À l'issue d'un sommet rondement mené, le Belge Herman Van Rompuy a été désigné jeudi premier président du Conseil européen, et la Britannique Catherine Ashton devient quasi-ministre des Affaires étrangères au poste de haut représentant.

Déjouant les pronostics de négociations à rallonges, les chefs d'État et de gouvernement ont prouvé leur capacité à s'entendre sur le visage de la future Europe. Il n'est pas sûr pourtant que leur double choix fasse rêver. Les deux lauréats sont des figures nouvelles sur la scène internationale et ont pleinement bénéficié des tractations entre grandes capitales qui peinaient à trouver un dénominateur commun.

Van Rompuy a réuni le soutien annoncé de Paris et Berlin. De son côté, le premier ministre Gordon Brown «a joué un jeu superbement machiavélique», soulignait-on de source diplomatique. Les Britanniques, qui soutenaient vent debout la candidature de Tony Blair pour la présidence, ont accepté de le lâcher en échange du poste de haut représentant. David Miliband, candidat idéal, n'a finalement pas sauté le pas. C'est donc Catherine Ashton, commissaire européenne au Commerce mais novice en politique internationale, qui s'est retrouvée, à 53 ans, propulsée au premier plan, dans un contexte porteur pour les femmes. Il ne lui manque à présent que la confirmation du Parlement.

L'hypothèse Blair étant levée, la voie était aussi ouverte pour Van Rompuy, qui représente l'antithèse du flamboyant Britannique. À 62 ans, le premier ministre belge a su s'imposer par sa maîtrise des dossiers et son art du consensus dans le sac de nœud de la politique belge. Des talents qu'il compte transposer au niveau européen lorsqu'il prendra ses fonctions, le 1er janvier : «Une négociation avec des vaincus est toujours une mauvaise négociation», a-t-il affirmé jeudi. Originaire d'un pays fondateur de l'Europe, conservateur comme la majorité des pays au Conseil, il parle français et cultive la discrétion - un avantage pour les grands pays qui craignaient d'envoyer à Bruxelles une diva leur faisant de l'ombre. «Celui qui sera appelé, c'est celui qui parle pour l'Europe» >>> Claire Gallen, à Bruxelles | Vendredi 20 Novembre 2009

Arabesques sacrées des arts de l'Islam

LE FIGARO: Des manuscrits du Coran si petits qu'ils tiennent dans la paume de la main aux lourds rideaux de la Kaaba ; des premières estampes panoramiques de La Mecque aux miniatures de la chronique des rois perses ; des émeraudes intaillées pour le trésor du Grand Moghol aux tapis évoquant dans la soie ou le velours les jardins du paradis : l'infiniment grand et l'infiniment petit se côtoient dans cette collection d'arts islamiques. Tant il est vrai que, pour le croyant, Dieu est partout, dans l'Univers comme dans le détail. >>> Éric Biétry-Rivierre (Figaroscope) | Mardi 20 Octobre 2009

Bienvenue à l’institut du Monde Arabe >>>

Quantara – Patrimonie Méditerranéen – Traversées d’Orient et d’Occident (قنطرة) >>>

Europas neue Spitze: Die wahren Entscheider bleiben andere
ZEIT ONLINE: Geschmeidig, effizient, möglichst lautlos: Die Berufung von Ashton und Van Rompuy zeigt, wie sich die EU ihr Spitzenpersonal vorstellt. Eine wichtige Chance wurde vertan.

Man reibt sich verwundert die Augen. Der Belgier Herman Van Rompuy und die Britin Catherine Ashton – sie bilden Europas neues Spitzenduo. Es gibt wahrscheinlich außerhalb der kundigen Brüsseler Zirkel nur wenige, die mit den beiden Namen etwas anfangen können. Es hat schon eine besondere Ironie: Ausgerechnet zwei Politiker, die dem Publikum weitgehend unbekannt sind, sollen der Europäischen Union nun ein Gesicht verleihen.

Der neue EU-Ratspräsident Van Rompuy und die künftige "EU-Außenministerin" Catherine Ashton haben den Segen der europäischen Staats- und Regierungschefs bekommen. Die Autorität, die sich mit ihren Ämtern verbindet, werden sie sich allerdings erst noch erarbeiten müssen. Denn sie treten ihre Posten unter einem schlechten Vorzeichen an: Sie sind der kleinste gemeinsame Nenner im europäischen Posten-Poker.

Es ist kein Zufall, dass sich der EU-Gipfel bei der Besetzung der neuen europäischen Spitzenämter ausgerechnet auf zwei Politiker geeinigt hat, die in der Europapolitik noch wenig von sich reden machten. Gefangen im Parteien- und Geschlechterproporz, bemüht um den Ausgleich zwischen großen und kleinen EU-Staaten, fanden Angela Merkel, Nicolas Sarkozy, Gordon Brown und die übrigen europäischen Staatenlenker eine Lösung, die niemandem weh tut, vor allem ihnen selbst nicht. Sie sind die wahren Entscheider in der EU – und wollen es auch bleiben. >>> Zeit Online, Tagesspiegel | Freitag, 20. November 2009

Studie: Deutsche Türken wollen türkisch bleiben
DER TAGESSPIEGEL: Fast jeder zweite der in Deutschland lebenden Türken und türkischstämmigen Migranten fühlt sich nicht erwünscht. Bei den Werten gibt es große Übereinstimmung mit den übrigen Befragten – aber nicht beim Familienbild.

BERLIN - Fast die Hälfte der in Deutschland lebenden Türken und türkischstämmigen Migranten fühlt sich in Deutschland unerwünscht, 42 Prozent planen sogar eine Rückkehr in die Türkei. Das ist das Ergebnis einer am Donnerstag in Berlin vorgestellten Studie, für die 331 Türken in Deutschland befragt wurden. Diese stünden zudem „fest zu ihren kulturellen und religiösen Wurzeln und den türkischen Wertewelten“, schreiben die Autoren der Studie. Die ehemalige Berliner Ausländerbeauftragte Barbara John (CDU), die die Studie mit vorstellte, rief dazu auf, den Wunsch nach Bewahrung der eigenen Kultur zu respektieren.

Bei den jungen Migranten ist der Wunsch, in die Türkei zu gehen, sogar ausgeprägter als bei den älteren. Dieses Ergebnis mache besonders nachdenklich, sagte Kenan Kolat, Bundesvorsitzender der Türkischen Gemeinde in Deutschland, dem Tagesspiegel. „Es ist fatal, wenn Jugendliche, die hier geboren sind und die wir hier ausgebildet haben, unser Land wieder verlassen wollen.“ Den Grund dafür sieht Kolat in einer „unterschwelligen Diskriminierung“, die viele Türken in Deutschland erlebten. „Antitürkische Ressentiments haben in den vergangenen Jahren zugenommen“, sagte der Vorsitzende der Türkischen Gemeinde. Wenn so viele Menschen sich in Deutschland nicht angenommen fühlten, müsse dringend etwas getan werden. Insgesamt 82 Prozent der Befragten sind der Auffassung, dass die deutsche Gesellschaft stärker auf die Gewohnheiten und Besonderheiten der türkischen Einwanderer Rücksicht nehmen sollte. >>> Von Claudia von Salzen | Freitag, 20. November 2009

Iran: Campaign Launched to Annoint Neda Agha-Soltan Time Magazine's Person of the Year 2009
THE LOS ANGELES TIMES: The flickering images of Neda Agha-Soltan’s last moments in a Tehran street on June 20 before she died from gunshot wounds gripped the world, galvanized the nation and made the 26-year-old music student the face of Iran’s recent protest movement.

Five months after an unknown assailant took her life at a demonstration in the Iranian capital staged by pro-reform activists, supporters across the world have spearheaded a grassroots initiative in a move to immortalize her.

Through the use of various social media outlets such as Facebook and Twitter, they are pushing to make Agha-Soltan Time magazine’s Person of the Year 2009.

Each year, the U.S.-based magazine grants the title to one or several persons who "most affected the news and our lives, for good or ill, and embodied what was important about the year."

Administrators of the more than 1,000-member strong Facebook group "Nominate Neda Agha-Soltan as the Time Woman of the Year" say she deserves the title because she has become “the symbol of the recent Iranian movement towards democracy and freedom" through her tragic death that shocked the world.

Members of the group are encouraged to send letters to Time magazine to vote for Agha-Soltan and spread the word to their friends.

The campaign is also triggering traffic on the micro-blogging service Twitter, where supporters of the initiative are "tweeting" their thoughts on why Time magazine should choose Agha-Soltan as its Person of the Year and calling on fellow Twitterers to give her their vote. >>> Babylon & Beyond | Thursday, November 19, 2009

Herman Van Rompuy and Baroness Ashton Land Top EU Jobs
THE TEEGRAPH: Herman Van Rompuy and Baroness Ashton have been named the European Union's new president and foreign minister.

Herman Van Rompuy, left, and Baroness Ashton are the EU's new president and foreign minister. Photo: The Telegraph
They wouldn’t win a beauty contest between them, but, apparently, they have won the race to become EU president and EU foreign minister. Good wishes to both. – Mark
The little-known Belgian federalist and the Labour peer who has never held elected office were selected at a meeting in Brussels.

EU leaders chose the Belgian prime minister as the first President of the European Council. Britain's European Trade Commissioner was made the High Representative for Foreign Affairs.

The surprise combination emerged after Gordon Brown ended Tony Blair's hopes of becoming president, abandoning his support for his successor and proposing Baroness Ashton for the foreign job instead.

The Prime Minister's switch surprised European leaders, not least because of Baroness Ashton's lack of diplomatic experience.

A former health authority chairwoman made a peer in 1999, she held a string of low-key ministerial posts until last year when she was sent to Brussels as an interim replacement for Lord Mandelson on his return to the Cabinet.

Mr Van Rompuy is a poetry-writing economist almost entirely unknown outside Belgium until he emerged as EU leaders' choice for a president who could not possibly overshadow national leaders.

A staunch advocate of European integration, he has backed policies including a European-wide tax on all financial transactions to fund EU work. >>> James Kirkup and Bruno Waterfield in Brussels | Thursday, November 19, 2009

Tony Blair Dumped as Baroness Ashton of Upholland Gets Key EU Role
TIMES ONLINE: The EU appointed Herman Van Rompuy, the Belgian Prime Minister, and the British Trade Commissioner, Baroness Ashton of Upholland, to the two newly created posts of President and High Representative tonight, hours after Downing Street confirmed it had abandoned its support for Tony Blair.

Gordon Brown joined the seven other European socialist group leaders in backing Mr Van Rompuy and Lady Ashton after accepting that there was too little support for Mr Blair to be president.

Downing Street's U-turn was a humiliating snub to Mr Blair, Mr Brown's predecessor, who had hoped to take the plum role, but was opposed by key EU leaders who feared he would be too presidential. >>> Jenny Mills, Philip Webster and David Charter | Thursday, November 19, 2009

NZZ ONLINE: EU-Spitzenposten für Van Rompuy und Ashton: Staatschefs der Europäischen Union einig >>> sda | Donnerstag, 19. November 2009

NZZ ONLINE: Porträt von Herman Van Rompuy – Bekannt im eigenen Land als Streitschlichter: Herman Van Rompuy wird erster EU-Ratspräsident >>> sda/afp/dpa/apa | Donnerstag, 19. November 2009

NZZ ONLINE: Biographie von Catherine Ashton – Geschickte Verhandlungsführerin: Britische Ökonomin Ashton wird neue EU-«Aussenministerin» >>> sda/afp/apa | Donnerstag, 19. November 2009

LE FIGARO: Les Vingt-Sept donnent un président à l'Europe >>> Claire Gallen, Bruxelles | Jeudi 19 Novembre 2009

EU Presidential Perks: A Villa to Live In, an Art Deco Palace for Work
THE GUARDIAN: A sizeable salary, a generous housing allowance, renovated offices in an art deco pile, cars, chauffeurs, a security retinue and a hand-picked staff await Mr or Ms Europe.

The fine print of the lavish package that goes with the job is still being written. But according to proposals drafted last week by EU bureaucrats, the post of European Council president will cost more than €1.5m in his or her first year.

The president of the European Council will be remunerated in a manner commensurate with the pay and perks enjoyed by José Manuel Barroso, the president of the European Commission.

The salary for the post is expected to be between €300,000 and €350,000 a year, subject, it is said, to a tax rate of 25%. This comfortably exceeds the US president's salary of $400,000 (€270,000).

Then there are the perks. There is to be no official residence for the president. Barroso rents a Brussels villa and the council president will be expected to do the same, with a housing allowance of around €40,000 a year, plus perhaps half of that again for accommodating and entertaining guests. >>> Ian Traynor | Thursday, November 19, 2009

How Angela Merkel Quietly Sank Tony Blair's Bid to Become EU President
All smiles: Angela Merkel is believed to have convinced Nicolas Sarkozy of changing his mind on backing Tony Blair for top EU job. Photo: The Guardian
THE GUARDIAN: Bolstered by her confirmation as a second-term German chancellor and fresh from dinner and deal-making with president Nicolas Sarkozy of France, Angela Merkel went into theEuropean summit as the key swing voter, making or breaking Tony Blair's chances of becoming the first European president.

Despite Sarkozy being the first European leader to suggest Blair for the job two years ago, Merkel appeared to have talked the French president into changing his mind in Paris on Wednesday night.

Merkel is said not to be particularly opposed to Blair. But the realities of power in the EU, with centre right governments outweighing those of the centre left three to one, appeared to be clinching the job for a European Christian democrat, Merkel's political tribe.

Senior German sources said that at the crucial dinner on Wednesday evening, the two leaders did not discuss names for the two plum new posts of Europe president and foreign minister. They did, however, discuss the mandate for the presidential post. The Germans made clear that Merkel had no problem recommending a contender from a small EU member state.

In the British campaign for President Blair, the contest has been presented as a choice between a weak figure pouring cups of coffee for leaders at EU summits, or a strong leader who can open doors in Washington, Moscow, and Beijing. >>> Ian Traynor in Brussels | Thursday, October 29, 2009

Crux Vaticana Restored to Its Former Glory
THE TELEGRAPH: The Crux Vaticana, a golden reliquary said to hold fragments of the cross on which Christ was crucified, has been painstakingly restored.

A pictures of the Crux Vaticana before (left) and after it was restored. Photo: The Telegraph
The jewel-encrusted golden cross stands about a foot high and was given by the Byzantine emperor Justin II to the people of Rome in the sixth century.

It is one of the most valued treasures held in the Vatican's collection of religious artefacts.

Art experts said on Thursday the two-year restoration rendered the cross much closer to what it would have looked like at the time that it was made.

The restoration involved removing the brightly coloured jewels that had been added to the cross in the centuries after its creation and replacing them with a circle of pearls.

While there are purported fragments of Christ's cross in churches around the world, the Crux Vaticana is considered the oldest reliquary. >>> Nick Squires in Rome | Thursday, November 19, 2009

Hunderttausende nehmen Abschied von Patriarch Pavle
TAGES ANZEIGER: Mehrere hunderttausend Gläubige haben am bei einem Trauerzug Abschied vom Patriarchen der serbisch-orthodoxen Kirche, Pavle, genommen.

Rund eine halbe Millione Gläubige verabschieden sich von ihrem religiösen Öberhaupt: Trauermarsch für Patriarch Pavle in Belgrad. Bild: Tages Anzeiger
Das staatliche Fernsehen schätzte die Zahl der Trauernden in Belgrad auf eine halbe Million Menschen. Nach einer Messe in der Saborna-Kirche wurde der Leichnam des Patriarchen unter dem Läuten der Kirchenglocken von einem Trauerzug bis zur Sava-Kirche geleitet, wo der in Istanbul ansässige ökumenische Patriarch Bartholomäus I. einen Trauergottesdienst zelebrierte. >>> etr/ap | Donnerstag, 19. November 2009

Germany’s Nazi Exception: Constitutional Court OKs Curtailing of Free Speech
SPIEGEL ONLINE INTERNATIONAL: Germany's constitution strongly and explicitly protects the freedom of speech. Still, the country's highest court has now said that -- given the injustice and horrors of the Nazi regime -- it is constitutional to make an exception that bans speech glorifying Hitler's ideology.

Wunsiedel is a small town of about 10,000 in the northeastern corner of Bavaria. Every year, on one particular day, this otherwise sleepy town is on high alert. In late August, thousands of people come here from all over Germany and abroad. Dressed in black, these neo-Nazis come to march in commemoration of Rudolf Hess, the Hitler deputy and convicted war criminal who has been buried here since 1987.

Some of the locals board up their houses and get out of town. Others bring banners to protest the parade and even block it with vehicles used for transporting liquid manure. In 2004, the town's mayor, Karl-Willi Beck, launched a campaign called "Wunsiedel is colorful, not brown." Together with town councilors, church officials and citizens, he tried to block the streets. A group of skinheads insulted him as a "traitor to his fatherland" and a "grave desecrator." The neo-Nazis threatened to run him out of town.

But, since 2005, he hasn't had to deal with the crowds. In that year, the Bundestag, the lower house of Germany's federal parliament, passed an amendment that strengthened the legal article dealing with incitement to hatred. Otto Shily, who was Germany's interior minister at the time, said that it was done "in solidarity with the democratic public of Wunsiedel." The amendment was meant to make it easier to outlaw neo-Nazi commemorative marches in Wunsiedel and elsewhere. The amendment worked. And, last year, the Federal Administrative Court confirmed the decision upholding a ban on such assemblies based on the new law.

Still, Jürgen Rieger, the recently deceased Hamburg-based lawyer and neo-Nazi who organized the Hess commemorations, was determined to keep marching. To do so, he placed his hope in Germany's Federal Constitutional Court, based in Karlsruhe. Sure, the judges had already dismissed a number of Rieger's expedited motions. But, in this case, they had expressly determined that the new ban "raised a series of difficult constitutional issues." However, they also felt that these were not the type of questions that could be dealt with in expedited proceedings. Challenging the Amendment >>> Dietmar Hipp | Wednesday, November 18, 2009

L'islam radicale nel nuovo thriller 
del portoghese Dos Santos
IL MESSAGGERO: ROMA - José Rodrigues Dos Santos, anchorman di punta della tv pubblica portoghese Rtp e scrittore di successo, in Furia divina (Cavallo di ferro, pag. 507, euro 19.50) rappresenta in maniera inedita, documentata e accattivante il radicalismo islamico e la derivante minaccia terroristica. 



Nella fiction letteraria l’incubo della bomba nucleare s’intreccia con l’interpretazione letterale dei versetti coranici insegnata nelle madrase (scuola in lingua araba) del mondo musulmano. Dos Santos nel suo romanzo thriller, che riporta fedelmente citazioni religiose dal Corano e dati reali sul traffico dell’uranio, richiama l’Occidente distratto e “buonista” a una diversa presa di coscienza del fenomeno. Torna sulla scena il professore e criptologo Tomas Noronha, presente già nel romanzo dell’autore «Einstein e la formula di Dio», chiamato a sventare un attentato nucleare, che vede come protagonista il giovane islamico Ahmed, in uno scenario globale che affonda le radici nelle paure e nelle contraddizioni del nostro tempo. In Furia Divina rievoca scenari da scontro di civiltà tra radicalismo islamico e Occidente. Nel suo romanzo il Corano è un libro di “guerra”? >>> di Gabriele Santoro | Venerdi 30 Ottobre 2009

Le monde a faim
Photo crédits : L’Express.fr
Galerie de photos >>>

Homosexual Muslims Saying Farewell to Allah
Watch Journeyman Pictures video: Act of Faith – USA >>>

Wonderful World?

Mr Dynamo! Herman Van Rompuy
Is this the face of the new EU president? Belgian Prime Minister Herman Van Rompuy’s? Don’t you think he looks, well, what can I say? … just dynamic? This must surely be one EU president who will set the world alight! This is proof positive, if indeed proof were needed, that one needs to be neither a good-looker nor stylish nor a trailblazer to make it on the world stage today. Simply being moribund will do! – © Mark. Photo: Mail Online.

THE TELEGRAPH: EU president: Tony Blair out of the running: Tony Blair was out of the running as Europe's first president on Thursday after Gordon Brown dropped the former Prime Minister as his candidate. >>> | Thursday, November 19, 2009

THE TELEGRAPH: Germany wants the central bank presidency: Conspicuously absent in the debate over the two big EU posts up for grabs on Thursday, Germany has aroused suspicions that it wants a different job entirely. >>> Isabelle Le Page, in Frankfurt | Thursday, November 19, 2009

THE TELEGRAPH: EU presidential selection process condemned as secretive: Picking the first European Union president has had much in common with naming a pope. All that is missing is the black smoke. >>> Yacine Le Forestier, in Brussels | Thursday, November 19, 2009

America Speaks Arabic
YNET NEWS – OPINION: US accepts Arab terminology in respect to Jerusalem neighborhoods

US Special Envoy Mitchell’s demand that the Israeli government refrain from building in Jerusalem’s Gilo neighborhood is merely the prelude to a process meant to erode the legitimate status of Israel’s Jerusalem neighborhoods.

These neighborhoods (including Gilo, Ramot Alon, French Hill, and Neve Yaakov) were built after the Six-Day War within the jurisdiction of Israel’s capital; now, they are finally being granted American recognition of their traditional Palestinian name: Settlements.

A direct link exists between Obama’s speech in Cairo and the American decision that Gilo and French Hill are just the same as the settlements of Ofra and Elon Moreh. We can therefore conclude that the US Administration has started to speak Arabic. Salam Aleikum, America! >>> Moshe Elad | Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Illiteracy in Arab World Growing: Report
ARAB NEWS: DUBAI: A report on knowledge, released at the Arab Strategy Forum on Wednesday, warned of large-scale illiteracy in the Arab world.

Despite the fact that the region had spent five percent of its gross domestic product and 20 percent of its national budget on education one third of its adult population, (60 million people), remain illiterate -- two thirds of them women.

According to the report this situation will worsen in the future because 9 million children of primary school age are out of school. The report sought urgent action to remedy the problem.

The report highlighted the many obstacles to development focusing mainly on the fact that knowledge doesn't reach all levels of society, in particular the disadvantaged groups.

At the same time education at university level is not necessarily on par with advanced nations which is one of the main obstacles as it creates a critical mass of highly-skilled human capital capable of innovation, creativity and renewal, and essential to development. >>> Shadiah Abdullah | Thursday, October 29, 2009