Sunday, January 27, 2013

Voter Fraud concerns

January 25, 2013

Last week, we warned you about the Republican Plan (see below) to rig the Electoral College to win the presidential election in 2016.
And now they've already started to move this plan forward in Virginia! This past Tuesday, Virginia SB 723 passed out of the Senate Elections and Campaigns Subcommittee, and got one step closer to becoming reality.
SB 723 would allocate electoral votes by congressional district, and reward two statewide electors to the candidate who wins the most districts statewide. Had this bill been enacted last year, Mitt Romney would have received 9 of Virginia’s 13 electors, despite losing the state’s popular vote!
It's clear that the Republicans have decided that if they can't win over the majority of voters, they’ll just change the rules to rig the results -- and we have to let them know that they can’t away with such an overt power grab.
Thanks for all that you do,
Ben Betz, Online Strategy Manager

From: Ben Betz, People For the American Way
Date: Saturday, January 19, 2013
Re: GOP Moves to Rig the Next Election

every vote counts
Make SURE Every Vote Counts -- Speak Out to Stop the Right's New Scheme to Rig Elections!
sign the petition

Dear Arnulfo,
Imagine that when President Obama won Ohio in 2012, instead of getting all the state’s electoral votes, he only got six of them, while Mitt Romney, who lost, got 12 … that each candidate was awarded electoral votes based on how many congressional districts they won in the state. Now, imagine this didn’t happen just in Ohio, but also in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan and other “blue states” that right now happen to have state governments completely controlled by Republicans.
This isn’t just some thought experiment. It’s the latest Republican scheme to rig America’s elections in their favor, and it could work … unless we can create a public backlash against it.
Actions like this petition will help create the necessary backlash that will send these proposals down in flames in states like Pennsylvania, where a bill has already been introduced, and others like Ohio, Wisconsin and Michigan, where lawmakers are discussing it.
We’ll use the petition to lobby lawmakers in the states and make sure the media is giving attention to how unpopular this vote rigging scheme is.
If the scheme is enacted, the will of the people would mean nothing in those states. And, nationally, the playing field would be dramatically shifted towards Republican presidential candidates. That’s because one of the results of the Tea Party wave election of 2010 was that right-wing Republicans controlled the redistricting process in these states, and congressional districts there were gerrymandered within an inch of their lives, ensuring more “safe” Republican districts. It’s the same reason that Republicans maintained a healthy majority in the House of Representatives in 2012 despite losing the congressional popular vote nationally to Democrats by 1.4 million votes -- more than a whole percentage point.
In states like Ohio, where Republicans have a super majority in the legislature, they have the power to move this affront to democracy through unilaterally, bulldozing any opposition!
The head of the Republican National Committee, Reince Priebus, supports the scheme, and it’s gaining traction amongst GOP state lawmakers. We need to stop this NOW, before it gets too far!
Another similar idea being floated by Republicans in these states is electoral vote apportionment based on percentage of vote, instead of by congressional district. This could theoretically be a fair system, but only if EVERY state did it. With only blue, Democratic-leaning states splitting their electoral votes and definitively red, Republican states remaining winner-take-all, the national field would still shift dramatically to the Republicans favor -- and AWAY from the will of the people. To put it bluntly: election rigged.
Thank you for helping to save our democracy by protecting the voice of the voter -- the American Way.
-- Ben Betz, Online Strategy Manager


Clean Air Act

Open letter to President Obama:

Dear President Obama,
It was with great relief and gratitude that we welcomed, at long last, a clarion call in your inaugural address to "respond to the threat of climate change" — the greatest threat, challenge, and opportunity of our time.
We thank you for these words, because your words are powerful, and necessary for change. But words are not enough. We need action.
Mr. President, you are the first leader in our history who will be judged by what you do — or do not do — to protect your people from the already-begun ravages and disruptions brought about by fossil fuels.
So far, Mr. President, you are failing in the face of our earth heating up, and the damage accelerating.
Just a few months ago, we witnessed New York and New Jersey swallowed up by our still-rising oceans. Our worsening nationwide drought, after the hottest year on record, is clear evidence that our planet is not healing, but is hurtling toward greater climate disruption.
The simple truth is that you will continue failing in the fight against climate change, as long as you continue an energy policy which treats equally the fuels that are hurting us and those that will save us. To meet your call on climate change, your "all of the above" energy policy must end.
Your support for fracking and drilling, coal mines and pipelines, continues to obliterate the progress you could be making with your administration's gas mileage rule, or your investments in renewable energy. Even if you finally issue a carbon pollution rule that addresses existing sources of pollution, it will mean nothing if you are simultaneously lighting the fuses on carbon bombs by approving the Keystone XL pipeline, Arctic drilling, or fossil fuel export projects.
You must use the power of your office and our federal lands to stop promoting fossil fuel development, and reject these projects outright.
While we recognize that a majority in the House of Representatives are clearly not on the side of science or sanity, you can and must find a way — within Congress or the power of your office — to end fossil fuel subsidies and giveaways, and put a price on all greenhouse gas pollution, so that fossil fuel executives can no longer get rich from the destabilization of our climate, and so fossil-free energy can thrive. If Congress remains in the way, you must fight to change Congress.
You must invest significantly in sustainable sources of energy as part of a plan to rapidly transition our nation from fossil fuels. And these efforts should be coupled with resources to help our cities, states and industries prepare for the damage that climate change is already bringing. (The $50 billion Sandy relief package and the drought's impacts on food prices are just two painful reminders that the cost of inaction is enormous, and untenable.)
Confronting climate change also happens to be our best opportunity to create the broad-based economic revitalization that your policies have largely failed to achieve. This is not simply an empty trope of idealistic environmentalists, it is the truth.
Mr. President, we are urging you to do as our other Illinois president did when confronted with the great moral issue of his time: to take bold, decisive action to end one great societal ill, changing the economy in the process, and usher in a new era of American freedom, security and prosperity.
This is the moment. We will support you. But you must lead and take action, starting first and foremost with your rejection of the presidential permit required by the Keystone XL pipeline, which is your decision and yours alone.
Sincerely,
Becky Bond, Political Director, CREDO
Michael Kieschnick, President and CEO, CREDO
Elijah Zarlin, Senior Campaign Manager, CREDO

jobs are expected to be opened to women

By Phil Stewart

WASHINGTON | Fri Jan 25, 2013 3:39am EST


(Reuters) - Three years before he lifted the U.S. military's ban on females in front-line combat, Leon Panetta grew acutely aware that women in senior positions were already risking - and losing - their lives when a would-be informant blew himself up at a CIA base in Afghanistan.

Panetta was CIA director at the time of the December 2009 attack in Khost, Afghanistan, and two women -- including one who headed the CIA base -- were among the seven Americans killed.

A senior aide cited it among the experiences that helped shaped Panetta's thinking about women in war even before he took over the Pentagon in 2011, and inherited the difficult job of writing condolence notes to the families of fallen troops - men and women.

More than 150 women have died in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq since 2001, and nearly 1,000 have been wounded.

Saturday, January 26, 2013

the pesticide clothianidin

Bees have been dying off in the US at an alarming rate — nearly 30% of our bee population, per year, have been lost to so-called colony collapse since 2006.
Scientists have long thought that the pesticide clothianidin was at least partially to blame.1 But the EPA has repeatedly ignored scientists' warnings and Americans' urgings to ban its use, citing lack of evidence.
Now, a blockbuster study released last week by Europe's leading food safety authority, EFSA, has for the first time labeled clothianidin as an "unacceptable" danger to bees.2
The EFSA study could be a major breakthrough to convince the EPA to take emergency action, and suspend the use of clothianidin to stop the precipitous decline in global honeybee populations.
In addition to finding clothianidin too dangerous to use on plants pollinated by bees, EFSA's study specifically identifies as too flawed to be useful the shoddy studies provided by pesticide manufacturer Bayer as evidence of clothianidin's safety.3
It was these sham studies that EPA used to first approve clothianidin in 2003, even against the objections of EPA's own scientists.4
The pesticide, which is used to treat seeds like corn and canola, expresses itself through the plants' pollen and nectar — the honeybee's favorite sources of food. Clothianidin is in a class of pesticides called neonicotinoids, which are relatively new, and their use coincides with the rise of colony collapse.
If EPA does not take emergency action now, it won't review clothianidin again until 2018.
Given the rate of colony collapse, and the indispensable role that pollinators play in our food system — pollinating one-third of our food crops and providing literally billions of dollars in economic benefit — it would be stunningly irresponsible of EPA to continue allowing the use of this dangerous pesticide for at least another five years.
Thank you for speaking out for the bees.
Elijah Zarlin, Campaign Manager
CREDO Action from Working Assets

Friday, January 25, 2013

Florence Cassez a cause celebre

SHE left Mexico to jeers of "killer!" but touched down in Paris today to the fanfare of a state welcome.

Seven years in prison in Mexico on kidnapping charges and a flawed trial made Frenchwoman Florence Cassez a cause celebre in France, where her innocence seemed nearly beyond question upon her return.

Even though the court that ordered her release did not rule on her culpability, she declared to the throngs of journalists waiting to receive her: "I was cleared."

But back in Mexico, relatives of the victims of the kidnap gang she was accused of having ties to see her release as one more injustice perpetrated by an inept judicial system.

The Mexican Supreme Court panel voted 3-2 to release Cassez because of procedural and rights violations during her arrest, including police staging a recreation of her capture for the media. The justices pointedly did not rule on her guilt or innocence, but said the violations of due process, the right to consular assistance and evidentiary rules in her case were so grievous that they invalidated the original guilty verdict against her.
Digital Pass $1 for first 28 Days

The stark contrast between the reactions in France and Mexico underlined the uncertainty that still surrounds her case.

At home, the 38-year-old Cassez has been hailed as a hero. Two French presidents - Nicolas Sarkozy and Francois Hollande - fought for her release, and French media reported that Hollande's partner, Valerie Trierweiler, even sent Cassez a care package with makeup, chocolate and books. Cassez and her family will meet the presidential couple at the Elysee Palace on Friday.

When Cassez's plane landed in Paris, flight attendants asked to take their photo with her before she got off. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius linked arms with her and led her smiling broadly to a throng of journalists. Her father shook his fist in victory.

"The plane touched down, but I haven't landed yet," she told reporters. "I'm still in the sky."

In contrast, as she departed from Mexico, police whisked her to the airport amid shouts of "Killer!" by angry relatives of kidnapping victims.

The wife of one kidnap victim showed up as reporters gathered outside the Mexico City prison where Cassez had been held. Michelle Valadez said her husband, Ignacio, was kidnapped and held for three months by Cassez's boyfriend's gang in 2005. He is being tried separately.

"We paid the ransom, but they killed him anyway," she sobbed. "It's not fair what they've done to us, it's not fair they're freeing her."

A survey in Mexico showed that most people think Cassez was guilty and that the justice system doesn't protect victims.

The Frenchwoman said she had lived at the ranch where kidnapping victims were being held, but that she didn't know they were there. At least one victim identified Cassez as one of the kidnappers, though only by hearing her voice, not by seeing her.

The French media widely portrayed Cassez as being unfairly persecuted.

After she was detained and held incognito for a day, Mexican police hauled her back to the ranch and forced her to participate in a raid staged for the television cameras, a display that is not unusual in Mexico.

While Fabius hailed the Supreme Court's decision to release Cassez as evidence that Mexico is a democratic state of laws, many Mexicans felt exactly the opposite: that it only laid bare how flawed the country's justice system is.

Police torture and the fabrication of evidence have long taken place in Mexico and countless prisoners have been convicted on bad evidence. On the other hand, the criminals behind the country's astronomically high kidnapping rate are seen to enjoy widespread impunity. Even Cassez's long sentence of 60 years - criticized in France as beyond the pale - is one way the country is trying to clamp down on the crime.

"This is certainly a defeat for justice," Mexican Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam said late Wednesday. "But it's fundamentally a call for us to move forward to investigate and build evidence that can lead to a correct judgment in a process to which we all have the right."

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto vowed that such miscarriages of justice won't happen again.

"I've repeated instructions to the secretary of the interior and the attorney general so that each and every one of the actions by the federal police and prosecutors are done with strict accordance to the law with one fundamental purpose: to guarantee application of the law and prevent cases like this one from happening again," he said.

Cassez also called during her news conference for the guilty - "the real guilty," she called them - to be held to account. But she insisted her own innocence wasn't in doubt. "The court clearly understood that this absolute and immediate release was for innocence," she said.

But Ezequiel Elizalde, a kidnap victim who testified against Cassez, told local media that the ruling was fundamentally unfair. "I suffered for 65 days. Florence Cassez lived like a queen in prison," said Elizalde.

Anti-crime activists in Mexico said that it was simply another blow to victims.

"I can't believe that the highest house of justice in a chaotic country like we're seeing with insecurity would only rule in favor of the human rights of a convicted criminal," Isabel Miranda de Wallace told Mexican media. "Today they gave us the message that victims don't count ... the message today is impunity."

AP

Sunday, January 20, 2013

An unusually early and vigorous flu season

Jan. 20 11:08 AM EST


An unusually early and vigorous flu season is drawing attention to a cause that has scored victories but also hit roadblocks in recent years: mandatory paid sick leave for the 40 percent of American private-sector workers — more than 40 million people — who don't have it.

Supporters and opponents are particularly watching New York City, where lawmakers are weighing a sick leave proposal amid a competitive mayoral race.

Sunday, January 13, 2013

Bahrain protests

Bahrain’s government continued to face demonstrations and political unrest as the majority Shiite community campaigns for a more equitable constitution. The US was forced to reduce the number of navy and other military personnel stationed in Manama. The hard line Sunni monarchy accuses its Arab Shiites of being cat’s paws of Iran, but this is a red herring. The regime has resorted to the most despicable arbitrary arrests, absurd charges, punishments for thought crimes, and torture. The US has not done enough to condemn this situation or dissociate itself from the monarchy.

Juan Cole



The US State Department took the unusual step this week of warning the Bahrain government that the country could break apart if the monarchy went on with its heavy-handed repression of protesters. The Shiite majority in Bahrain wants constitutional reform and a greater say in governing, whereas the Sunni monarchy insists on something close to absolute monarchy and Sunni dominance. (There is a show parliament, but the king can overrule it and the Shiites have never had a majority even in the elected lower house, because of regime gerrymandering).



DUBAI, United Arab Emirates: Bahraini police fired tear gas and stun bombs to break up protests overnight in Shiite-populated villages around Manama, leading to arrests and injuries, witnesses said on Saturday.

The protesters took to the streets in response to a call by the February 14 Youth Coalition for rallies against a blockage imposed on the Shiite locality of Mahazza, near the capital, since November 7.

"The blockade will not make us afraid" and "Down with Hamad," chanted the protesters, in reference to King Hamad.

The protesters, some of whom wore masks, waved the Bahraini flag and pictures of prisoners.

Police responded by firing tear gas, sound bombs and buck shot, injuring some of the protesters, according to the witnesses who did not specify the number of casualties.

People injured at anti-government demonstrations in Bahrain avoid going to hospital for fear of being arrested.

In the latest clashes, police detained several demonstrators, and the skirmishes continued until dawn on Saturday, according to the witnesses.

Demonstrations have shaken Bahrain since its security forces crushed a Shiite-led uprising against the ruling Sunni regime in March last year.

The United States last week expressed concern about rising violence in Bahrain, one year after an inquiry report was issued on the violence, saying the country needed to put more of its recommendations into effect.

Read more: http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2012/Dec-01/196821-bahrain-police-break-up-shiite-demos.ashx#ixzz2Du88i1Jl
(The Daily Star :: Lebanon News :: http://www.dailystar.com.lb)




A heavy police presence is preventing people marking the first anniversary of pro-democracy demonstrations in Bahrain's capital, Manama.

Opposition activists have called on protesters to march on the site of the now-demolished Pearl Roundabout - the focus of last year's unrest.

A BBC correspondent says the area is quiet, but that in outlying villages there have been violent clashes.

Police have been firing rubber bullets and tear gas at stone-throwing youths.

Most of the demonstrators are from the Gulf kingdom's Shia Muslim majority, which has long complained of discrimination at the hands of the Sunni royal family, the Al Khalifa, and wants democratic reforms.
'Reforms'

The BBC's Bill Law, who is in Manama, says the centre of the capital remains quiet, with no sign of the mass protest called by the opposition a year on from the peaceful takeover of Pearl Roundabout.

Muslim fundamentalist governance

Egypt moved decisively from military to civilian rule. For the first time in its history, Egypt elected its president, Muhammad Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood.(There had been indirectly elected prime ministers in the Liberal Age, 1922-1952). Since the young officers coup of July, 1952, Egypt’s president had come from the upper ranks of the officer corps. As 2012 opened, the 23-member Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) was the de facto executive of the country, which had appointed the prime minister and approved his cabinet. In June 2012, the supreme administrative court dissolved the parliament that had been elected late in 2011, and SCAF promptly declared itself the interim national legislature, attempting to limit the powers of the incoming elected president, Muhammad Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood. Morsi gradually made senior officers retire and got an agreement from the junior generals that he promoted that they would return to the barracks. On August 15, Morsi abrogated the SCAF decree on the legislature. By the crisis of the referendum on the constitution from November 22 until December 22, the military had been effectively sidelined or turned into an instrument of the Muslim Brotherhood president. Egypt has many problems, including the question of whether the Muslim Brotherhood really respects individual human rights. But it is indisputable that the country’s basis for legitimate government has become free and fair parliamentary elections. Meanwhile, Egypt moved decisively toward Muslim fundamentalist governance, with the passing in December of a new constitution, crafted in large part by supporters of political Islam.



By George Friedman

The Egyptian presidential election was held last week. No candidate received 50 percent of the vote, so a runoff will be held between the two leading candidates, Mohammed Morsi and Ahmed Shafiq. Morsi represented the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice Party and received 25.3 percent of the vote, while Shafiq, a former Egyptian air force commander and the last prime minister to serve in Hosni Mubarak's administration, received 24.9 percent. There were, of course, charges of irregularities, but in general the results made sense. The Islamist faction had done extremely well in the parliamentary election, and fear of an Islamist president caused the substantial Coptic community, among others, to support the candidate of the old regime, which had provided them at least some security.

Morsi and Shafiq effectively tied in the first round, and either can win the next round. Morsi's strength is that he has the support of both the Islamist elements and those who fear a Shafiq presidency and possible return to the old regime. Shafiq's strength is that he speaks for those who fear an Islamist regime. The question is who will win the non-Islamist secularists' support. They oppose both factions, but they are now going to have to live with a president from one of them. If their secularism is stronger than their hatred of the former regime, they will go with Shafiq. If not, they will go with Morsi. And, of course, it is unclear whether the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, the military committee that has ruled Egypt since the fall of Mubarak, will cede any real power to either candidate, especially since the constitution hasn't even been drafted.

This is not how the West, nor many Egyptians, thought the Arab Spring would turn out in Egypt. Their mistake was overestimating the significance of the democratic secularists, how representative the anti-Mubarak demonstrators were of Egypt as a whole, and the degree to which those demonstrators were committed to Western-style democracy rather than a democracy that represented Islamist values.

What was most underestimated was the extent to which the military regime had support, even if Mubarak did not. Shafiq, the former prime minister in that regime, could very well win. The regime may not have generated passionate support or even been respected in many ways, but it served the interests of any number of people. Egypt is a cosmopolitan country, and one that has many people who still take seriously the idea of an Arab, rather than Islamist, state. They fear the Muslim Brotherhood and radical Islamism and have little confidence in the ability of other parties, such as the socialists, who came in third, to protect them. For some, such as the Copts, the Islamists are an existential threat. The military regime, whatever its defects, is a known bulwark against the Muslim Brotherhood. The old order is attractive to many because it is known; what the Muslim Brotherhood will become is not known and is frightening to those committed to secularism. They would rather live under the old regime.

What was misunderstood was that while there was in fact a democratic movement in Egypt, the liberal democrats who wanted a Western-style regime were not the ones exciting popular sentiment. What was exciting it was the vision of a popularly elected Islamist coalition moving to create a regime that institutionalized Islamic religious values.

Westerners looked at Egypt and saw what they wanted and expected to see. They looked at Egyptians and saw themselves. They saw a military regime operating solely on brute force without any public support. They saw a mass movement calling for the overthrow of the regime and assumed that the bulk of the movement was driven by the spirit of Western liberalism. The result is that we have a showdown not between the liberal democratic mass and a crumbling military regime but between a representative of the still-powerful regime (Shafiq) and the Muslim Brotherhood.

If we understand how the Egyptian revolution was misunderstood, we can begin to make sense of the misunderstanding about Syria. There seemed to be a crumbling, hated regime in Syria as well. And there seemed to be a democratic uprising that represented much of the population and that wanted to replace the al Assad regime with one that respected human rights and democratic values in the Western sense. The regime was expected to crumble any day under the assaults of its opponents. As in Egypt, the regime has not collapsed and the story is much more complex.

Syrian President Bashar al Assad operates a brutal dictatorship that he inherited from his father, a regime that has been in power since 1970. The regime is probably unpopular with most Syrians. But it also has substantial support. This support doesn't simply come from the al Assads' Alawite sect but extends to other minorities and many middle-class Sunnis as well. They have done well under the regime and, while unhappy with many things, they are not eager to face a new regime, again likely dominated by Islamists whose intentions toward them are unclear. They may not be enthusiastic supporters of the regime, but they are supporters.

The opposition also has supporters -- likely a majority of the Syrian people -- but it is divided, as is the Egyptian opposition, between competing ideologies and personalities. This is why for the past year Western expectations for Syria have failed to materialize. The regime, as unpopular as it may be, has support, and that support has helped block a seriously divided opposition.

One of the problems of Western observers is that they tend to take their bearings from the Eastern European revolutions of 1989. These regimes were genuinely unpopular. That unpopularity originated in the fact that the regimes were imposed from the outside -- from the Soviet Union after World War II -- and the governments were seen as tools of a foreign government. At the same time, many of the Eastern European nations had liberal democratic traditions and, like the rest of Europe, were profoundly secular (with some exceptions in Poland). There was a consensus that the state was illegitimate and that the desired alternative was a European-style democracy. Indeed, the desire to become part of a democratic Europe captured the national imagination.

The Arab Spring was different, but Westerners did not always understand the difference. The regimes did not come into being as foreign impositions. Nasserism, the ideology of Gamal Abdel Nasser, who both founded the modern Egyptian state and set the stage for an attempt at an Arab revolution, was not imposed from the outside. Indeed, it was an anti-Western movement, opposed to both European imperialism and what was seen as American aggression. When Hafez al Assad staged his coup in Syria in 1970, or Moammar Gadhafi staged his in Libya in 1969, these were nationalistic movements designed to assert both their national identity and their anti-Western sentiment.

These were also unashamedly militaristic regimes. Nasser, inspired by the example of Turkey's founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, saw his revolution as secular and representing mass sentiment, but not simply as democratic in the Western sense. He saw the military as the most modern and most nationally representative institution. He also saw the military as the protector of secularism.

The military coups that swept the Arab world from the 1950s to the early 1970s were seen as nationalist, secularist and anti-imperialist. Their opponents were labeled as representing Western interests and corrupt and outmoded regimes with close religious ties. They were not liberal regimes, in the sense of being champions of free speech and political parties, but they did claim to represent the interests of their people, and to a great extent, particularly at the beginning, they earned that claim.

Since the realignment of Egypt with the United States and the fall of the Soviet Union, with which many of these states were allied, the sense that these regimes were nationalist declined. But it never evaporated. Certainly they were never seen as regimes imposed by foreign armies, as was the case in Eastern Europe. And their credentials as secularists remained credible. What they were not were liberal democracies, but they weren't founded as such. From the Western point of view, that delegitimized everything else.

What the Westerners forgot was that these regimes arose as expressions of nationalism against Western imperialism. The more that Westerners intervened against them, as in Iraq, the more support at least the principle of the regime would evince. But most important, Westerners did not always recognize that the demand for democratic elections would emerge as a battleground between secular and religious tendencies, and not as the crucible from which Western-style liberal democracies would emerge. Nor did Westerners appreciate the degree to which these regimes defended religious minorities from hostile majorities precisely because they weren't democratic. The Copts in Egypt cling to the old regime as their protector. The Alawites see the Syrian conflict as a struggle for their own survival.

The outcome of the Egyptian election, which now pits a former general and prime minister of the Mubarak regime against the Muslim Brotherhood candidate, demonstrates this dilemma perfectly. This is the regime that Nasser founded. It is the protector of secularism and minority rights against those who it is feared will impose religious law. The regime may have grown corrupt under Mubarak, but it still represents a powerful tendency among the Egyptians.

The Muslim Brotherhood may win, in which case it will be important to see what the Egyptian military council does. But the idea that there is overwhelming support in Egypt for Western-style democracy is simply not true. The issues Egyptians and those in other Arab countries battle over derive from their own history, and in that history, the military and the state it created played a heroic role in asserting nationalism and secularism. The non-military secular parties don't have the same tradition to draw on.

As in many Arab countries that underwent Nasserite transformations, the army remains both a guarantor against Islamists and of the rights of some religious minorities. The minorities are the enemy of the resurgent religious factions. Those factions may win, but regardless of who prevails, the outcome will not be what many celebrants of the Arab Spring expected. We are down to the military and the Islamists. The issue is no longer what they are against. This year's question is what they are for. This is not Prague or Budapest and it doesn't want to be.

Read more: The Egyptian Election and the Arab Spring | Stratfor

FCC rules

Are Current TV's Slots on Cable Distribution Worth $500 Million?


For some reason no one appears to be asking this obvious question in the context of Al Jazeera's purchase of the Current TV station. According to the news reports, Al Jazeera does not intend to keep much, if any, of Current TV's programming. That means it is willing to pay $500 million simply to be carried by the large cable providers. That implies that these providers have extraordinary market power. This should be raising lots of questions at the Federal Communications Commission.

Yes, Cable Access is Too Cheap
written by Robert Salzberg, January 04, 2013 8:26
Activists for years have been saying that the rights to our airways are being sold way too cheaply by the U.S. government.

If this deal doesn't prove their point, what will?

We should be getting billions more in tax revenue from the telecommunications industry. The idea that they are providing a public service to compensate for the low rents they're paying is absurd in almost every case. (PBS being an exception along with other public access channels.)





Dear Friend,
Rupert Murdoch, the guy who controls the Fox News Channel, wants to expand his empire, and he's not letting FCC regulations get in his way.
Embattled and under investigation in England for phone hacking, influence peddling and bribery, Murdoch has set his sights set on the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune, the major papers in the nation's second and third-largest cities, where Murdoch already owns several TV stations.1
Shockingly, President Obama's Federal Communications Commission is trying to change the rules so Murdoch can get exactly what he wants. Even worse, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski is hoping the agency can pass these changes without you noticing.
That's why we're joining our allies at Free Press and calling on the FCC to stop trying to change the rules for Rupert Murdoch.
Murdoch's media grab would be illegal under the current rules. But Chairman Genachowski is pushing the other commissioners for changes that would translate into a giveaway for Murdoch and other media barons.2
These rule changes wouldn't just benefit Murdoch. If the FCC changes the rules, one company could own the major daily newspaper, two TV stations, and up to eight radio stations in your town. And that one company could be your Internet provider, too.
Sound familiar? It should — the FCC is pushing the same Bush-era media consolidation policy that millions rallied against in 2003, and 2007, and was defeated in court just two years ago. The Senate even voted to overturn this consolidation policy back in 2008, rebuking runaway media concentration led by, among others, then-Senator Barack Obama.3
Chairman Genachowski wants to ram these rules through without holding a single public hearing attended by all five FCC commissioners. He does doesn't even want to hold the vote in public.
These changes signal an astounding apathy toward diversity in media, which will result in fewer women and people of color on the airwaves. And with less independent and critical journalism we need to prevent abuses of power, we're at risk of more government and corporate corruption that goes unreported.4
The FCC could act at any time to demolish the rules that stop Murdoch's power grab, so we have to act now to stop the FCC from taking this perilous step.
Please speak out now and tell FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski: No more media consolidation for Murdoch. Click the link below to automatically sign the petition: 
http://act.credoaction.com/r/?r=6991719&p=stop_murdoch&id=51179-5154581-m91CQ2x&t=10
Thank you for standing up against Rupert Murdoch and holding the FCC accountable.
Jordan Krueger, Campaign Manager 
CREDO Action from Working Assets
1. Ronald Grover, "Murdoch Eyes L.A. Times, Chicago Tribune," Chicago Tribune, 10/20/2012. 
2. John Eggerton, "FCC Proposes Loosening TV/Newspaper Cross-Ownership Ban ... Again." Broadcast & Cable, 11/14/2012. 
3. [PDF] "A Change for the Worse." FreePress.net. 
4. John Eggerton, "FCC Report Shows Little Net Improvement in Ownership Diversity." Broadcast & Cable, 11/14/2012.

Censorship in China

7 January 2013 Last updated at 12:04 GMT

Journalists at a major Chinese paper, Southern Weekly, have gone on strike in a rare protest against censorship.

The row was sparked last week when the paper's New Year message calling for reform was changed by propaganda officials.

Staff wrote two letters calling for the provincial propaganda chief to step down. Another row then erupted over control of the paper's microblog.

Supporters of the paper have gathered outside its office, reports say.

سلفي‎

In revolutionary Tunisia, 2012 saw a political struggle between the small but violent minority of Salafis or hard line fundamentalists, and, well, everybody else. Salafi attacks on unveiled women provoked a huge anti-Salafi rally in the capital, Tunis. In summer, some Salafis attacked an art exhibit in tony LaMarsa. In September, Salafis of a more al-Qaeda mindset set fire to the parking lot of the American embassy and looted some of its offices. The leader of the movement for political Islam in Tunisia, the al-Nahda Party’s Rashid Ghanoushi, was caught on tape warning the Salafis that if they continued to be so provocative, they risked instigating a civil war like that in Algeria (where some 150,000 Algerians died in a struggle between secularists and Muslim fundamentalists in 1991-2002).



A Salafi (Arabic: سلفي‎) is a Muslim who emphasises the Salaf ("predecessors" or "ancestors"), the earliest Muslims, as model examples of Islamic practice.[1] The term has been in use since the Middle Ages but today refers especially to a follower of a modern Sunni Islamic movement known as Salafiyyah or Salafism, which is related to or includes Wahhabism, so that the two terms are often viewed as synonymous.[2] Salafism has become associated with literalist, strict and puritanical approaches to Islam and, in the West, with the Salafi Jihadis who espouse violent jihadagainst civilians as a legitimate expression of Islam.[3] It's been noted that the Western association of Salafi ideology with violence stems from writings done "through the prism of security studies" that were published in the late 20th century, having persisted well into contemporary literature. [4] More recent attempts have been made by academics and scholars who challenge these major assumptions. Academics and historians use the term to denote "a school of thought which surfaced in the second half of the 19th century as a reaction to the spread of European ideas," and "sought to expose the roots of modernity within Muslim civilization."[5]
Just who, or what groups and movements, qualify as Salafi remains in dispute. In the Arab World, and possibly even more so now by Muslims in the West, it is usually secondary to the more common term Ahl-as-Sunnah (i.e., "People of the Sunnah") while the term Ahl al-Hadith (The People of the Tradition) is more often used in the Indian subcontinent to identify adherents of Salafi ideology, a term which in the Middle-East is used more to indicate scholars and students of Hadith. All are considered to bear the same or similar connotation and have been used interchangeably by Muslim scholars throughout the ages, Ahl al-Hadeeth possibly being the oldest recorded term used to describe the earliest adherents[6] while Ahl as-Sunnah is overwhelmingly used by Muslim scholars, including Salafis as well as others, such as the Ash'ari sect, leading to a narrower use of the term "Salafi".[7] The Muslim Brotherhood includes the term in the "About Us" section of its website[8] while others exclude that organisation[9] in the belief that the group commits religious innovations. Other self-described contemporary salafis may define themselves as Muslims who follow "literal, traditional ... injunctions of the sacred texts" rather than the "somewhat freewheeling interpretation" of earlier salafis. These look to Ibn Taymiyyah, not the 19th century figures ofMuhammad Abduh, Jamal al-Din al-Afghani, and Rashid Rida.[5]
According to the 2010 German domestic intelligence service annual report, Salafism is the fastest growing Islamic movement in the world.



In a recent crackdown on radical Islam, German authorities have launched nationwide raids on an ultra-conservative religious group - the Salafists. They're suspected of having links to extremists and posing a threat to democracy. But for years the movement has enjoyed conditions that've made it thrive, as Oksana Boyko reports.



A group of Salafists attacked an art exhibition, Le Printemps des Arts, in La Marsa, (north suburb of Tunis) destroying some of the art works deemed blasphemous to Islam. The small, yet grave incident, soon grew in proportion when hundreds of Salafists - or thugs - attacked a police station in La Marsa, burnt a tribunal in Sidi Hussein (south of Tunis) and stopped police and firefighters from intervening. Clashes with police were reported in two neighborhoods throughout metropolitan Tunis and coastal city Sousse.

The aftermath led to a curfew, starting from Monday, June 12th, after the escalation of violence, in Metropolitan Tunis, Sousse, Monastir, Tabarka, and in other inland regions, including Gabes and Ben Guerdane.

An Interior Ministry official was quoted by the media as saying 162 people had been detained and 65 members of the security forces wounded in the incident.

Tuesday, January 8, 2013

American Power

"The Crisis of the Middle Class and American Power is republished with permission of Stratfor."

Last week I wrote about the crisis of unemployment in Europe. I received a great deal of feedback, with Europeans agreeing that this is the core problem and Americans arguing that the United States has the same problem, asserting that U.S. unemployment is twice as high as the government's official unemployment rate. My counterargument is that unemployment in the United States is not a problem in the same sense that it is in Europe because it does not pose a geopolitical threat. The United States does not face political disintegration from unemployment, whatever the number is. Europe might.

Google patents

By Andrew Longstreth

NEW YORK | Sun Jan 6, 2013 12:29pm EST

(Reuters) - While the focus of last week's agreement between the Federal Trade Commission and Google Inc was search, the deal's restrictions on how Google uses its patents could have a broader impact on the technology industry.

Under the deal, which ended an antitrust investigation by the FTC and disappointed many critics, Google will make only minor changes to its search business.

But Google is also now limited in when it can seek injunctions against products from rival companies that use certain of its patents.

Throughout recent smartphone wars and other major patent litigation, holders of so-called standard essential patents have been accused of using them to bully competitors into paying high licensing rates or as leverage in patent disputes.

The FTC's deal with Google clarifies the uncertainty over how standard essential patents can be used, said Colleen Chien, a professor specializing in patent law at Santa Clara University School of Law in California.

The deal set out a process by which technology makers can avoid injunctions and patent holders know they are going to get compensated, Chien said. "The FTC has deflated the power of the injunction and also the incentives to not pay that have existed."

In its case against Google, the FTC claimed that Google and its subsidiary Motorola Mobility Inc had breached commitments to standard-setting bodies to license its patents on terms that are fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory. As part of the deal, Google agreed to drop claims for injunctive relief against competitors in certain patent disputes around the world. It also agreed to submit to the jurisdiction of a court or arbitrator when disputes over payment rates arise.

Throughout the FTC's investigation, Google was represented by Susan Creighton of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati and John Harkrider of Axinn, Veltrop & Harkrider. The FTC retained Beth Wilkinson of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison.

'TEMPLATE'

The FTC said Thursday that the threat of injunction by a holder of an essential patent hurts competition. The agreement with Google could be used as a "template" for other patent disputes, it said.

Unlike a court decision, the FTC's agreement with Google is not binding on other companies. But it could give leverage to defendants in disputes with essential patent holders that could be used in court.

"We know in today's world, defendants are getting more aggressive," said Matthew Woods, an antitrust and patent attorney at Robins, Kaplan, Miller & Ciresi. "Defendants will seize on this and tell courts that injunctions are something the court should not even countenance."

But the agreement with Google may not be all good news for patent users, according to Jay Jurata, an antitrust partner at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, who said that it could have unintended consequences.

The elaborate agreement allows Google to seek injunctions against companies that are unwilling to pay for a license on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory terms. But the question of when a company is considered an unwilling licensee is one that the FTC may have unwittingly allowed holders of essential patents to manipulate, said Jurata.

"They provided a road map for other standard essential patent holders to engage in opportunistic behavior to paint otherwise willing licensees as unwilling licensees," he said.

Miller of Robins Kaplan also cautioned that the FTC's deal with Google may be unique because of the company's giant size and dominance, which can attract the attention of regulators.

"There are a lot litigants who aren't going to see this agreement as restraining them, because they don't have the same portfolio as Google," Miller said.

(Reporting by Andrew Longstreth; Editing by Eddie Evans and Maureen Bavdek)

Sunday, January 6, 2013

the WikiLeaks threat



LONDON (Reuters) - Britain said on Thursday that any decision by Ecuador to give Julian Assange political asylum wouldn't change a thing and that it might still revoke the diplomatic status of Quito's embassy in London to allow the extradition of the WikiLeaks founder.

We are the 99 per cent

WASHINGTON — The Federal Bureau of Investigation used counterterrorism agents to investigate the Occupy Wall Street movement, including its communications and planning, according to newly disclosed agency records.

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Zero Dark Thirty

Dear Friends,

Zero Dark Thirty is a critically acclaimed film nominated for many awards. Unfortunately, the filmmakers chose to imply – inaccurately – that torture leads to reliable intelligence. The movie opens in theaters nationwide on Friday, January 11.

In advance of the film’s opening, we invite you to attend NRCAT’s specially organized webinar on Thursday, January 10, at 12:30 p.m. EST to learn about our new “Fact Not Fiction” campaign.During the webinar, NRCAT will describe the various elements of the campaign and will explain how you can participate. Please sign up for the webinar here and urge people from other congregations to join us.

The major thrust of the campaign will be to urge more than 300 congregations to show NRCAT’s short filmEnding U.S.-Sponsored Torture Forever before June 30, 2013. We will also encourage people who see Zero Dark Thirty to watch NRCAT’s film. You can view NRCAT’s film online at www.nrcat.org/fact-not-fiction, and later this month we will add an updated discussion guide and other helpful materials. 

We also encourage people to distribute leaflets at local theaters sharing the facts about torture with people who are going to watch Zero Dark Thirty.  If you would like to learn more, please visit our website or email Paz Artaza-Regan, our Director of Program and Outreach. 

Please join us on the webinar to learn how you can help us make this campaign a national success and to share with us any ideas you may have. Registration is limited to the first 100 people - sign up today. We can’t stop people from watching Zero Dark Thirty, but we can share the facts about torture. 

Thank you for your support! 

Linda Gustitus, President
Rev. Richard Killmer, Executive Director
 


Questions? Please email campaign@nrcat.org
National Religious Campaign Against Torture: www.tortureisamoralissue.org



Published: 27 December, 2012, 17:44

The News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch has warned his followers on Twitter that the US Oscar contender focusing on the decade-long manhunt for Osama bin Laden, Zero Dark Thirty, "could inflame the Arab world."

­The media mogul tweeted that he "just saw Zero Dark Thirty" directed by James Cameron’s ex- wife, the Oscar-winner Kathryn Bigelow. The film received mixed reviews when it arrived in theaters across America for its depiction of torture, among other controversial issues.

Describing it as a “gripping film” Murdoch pointed out that the “coming debate on torture should include all sides, but won't."

Last week the acting head of the CIA, Michael Morell, wrote a statement to CIA employees to “put into some context” the drama whose title is a military terminology for half past midnight, the time at which the hunt of Osama bin Laden by the CIA was scheduled to take place.


The movie, which chronicles the hunt for al-Qaeda terrorist leader Osama bin Laden, has come under intense criticism from Washington. The CIA denounced the film, calling the interrogation scenes “a dramatization, not a realistic portrayal of facts.” Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Carl Levin (D-Mich.) also complained about the film’s “grossly inaccurate and misleading” torture scenes.

Critics claim that the film falsely depicts the CIA’s use of torture methods as an effective technique in capturing terrorist leaders. But Director Kathryn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal claim that the movie accurately portrays the events based on information they received from the CIA, putting the agency in an uncomfortable position.

The Senate Intelligence Committee, headed by Feinstein, is now launching an investigation to determine whether or not the film’s director and screenwriter were granted “inappropriate” access to classified information by the CIA.

The committee is also trying to determine if the CIA was responsible for the film’s depiction of torture as a key method in the capture of bin Laden, which it claims is false information.

US Foreign Policy on Terrorism

Mid-November, two Swedish citizens with Somali origins were renditioned from Djibouti to a prison in the United States of America.

According to the US, they are hardened terrorists. According to other people, they tried to leave the terrorist-branded organization al-Shabaab. What’s true there is unclear. But that’s not the point that makes us interested in the story.

An representative of United States Intelligence Services is reported to have told the two Swedes that “We’re waiting for permission from Swedish authorities to take you to the United States”. This is something that the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs first didn’t want to be associated with, and later declines any and all forms of comment.

Here, we have a natural and special interest, as the two men are Swedish citizens. Are they suspected of committing an act which carries criminal penalties in Sweden – and if so, should they not be indicted and prosecuted in Sweden? Or has the Swedish government given the USA a carte blanche to “take care of” two Swedish citizens in the name of the war on terror – and if so, on what grounds? (Further, the suspicions concern acts committed in Somalia, where the US doesn’t have jurisdiction.)

Suspicions of terror or not – the process of law must be respected, and international law followed. The government has no right to throw people into dark dungeons without a proper trial. We have a right to demand some form of damn order here.

This affair has a distinct image of not having respected due process. This image is further strengthened by the fact that the two Swedes’ lawyers and relatives were kept in the dark for several weeks about what had already happened.

If Sweden has agreed to rendition two people – Swedish citizens or not – to the United States of America within the context of what’s known as extraordinary renditions, this affair goes far beyond the questions about the formal due process. In such a case, it’s necessary to ask how much the Swedish governments’ promises are worth, when they promise to not extradite people to countries where they risk torture or death. This is a question that’s current and relevant in other cases, for example, regarding the Wikileaks founder Julian Assange.

Read More: Washington Post [in English], Svenska Dagbladet [in Swedish].

This article was originally published in Swedish on Hax’ blog. Translated into English by Rick Falkvinge.





(CFPA) http://peacecoalition.org/ 33rd Annual Conference & Interfaith Service for Peace on Sunday, November 11, 2012 in Princeton featuring Noam Chomsky, Amy Goodman & Juan Cole

We are treated to some 44 minutes of Noam Chomsky's special clarity just a week after the 2012 Election's wide ranging discussion of Media, Objectivity and Reality in US Foreign Policy on Terrorism and the Middle East

Mr. Chomsky discuss his Lawsuit with Chris Hedges, Daniel Ellsberg and others results in a permanent judicial injunction against the National Defense Authorization Act, "which authorized the military to detain U.S. citizens indefinitely, strip them of due process and hold them in military facilities, including offshore penal colonies."

We again here of Obama administration secretly developing a new blueprint for pursuing terrorists, a next-generation targeting list called the 'disposition matrix. Movement towards Nuclear Free Terror Zone in Middle East

Mr. Chomsky discusses the long US support of Dictatorship's in the Middle East and how it impacts our present foreign policy and its implications of the recent Arab Spring, our policies regarding Iran and Israel and the recent uprisings in the West Bank

an independent East Timor

UNMIT Background

Past United Nations missions in Timor-Leste

The establishment of the United Nations Integrated Mission in Timor-Leste (UNMIT) was preceded by a number of other United Nations operations or missions deployed in Timor-Leste beginning in 1999.
  • The United Nations Mission in East Timor (UNAMET) (June - October 1999) was mandated to organize and conduct a popular consultation to ascertain whether the East Timorese people accepted a special autonomy within Indonesia or rejected the proposed special autonomy, leading to East Timor's separation from Indonesia. UNAMET was a political mission.
  • The United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET) (October 1999 - May 2002) was a peacekeeping operation. The Security Council established UNTAET following rejection by the East Timorese of special autonomy. UNTAET exercised administrative authority over East Timor during the transition to independence.
  • The United Nations Mission of Support in East Timor (UNMISET) (May 2002 - May 2005), also a peacekeeping mission, was mandated to provide assistance to the newly independent East Timor until all operational responsibilities were fully devolved to the East Timor authorities, and to permit the new nation, now called Timor-Leste, to attain self-sufficiency.
  • Once the peacekeeping mission withdrew, a new political mission, the United Nations Office in Timor-Leste (UNOTIL) (May 2005—August 2006), supported the development of critical State institutions and the police and provided training in observance of democratic governance and human rights.

April/June 2006 crisis

UNOTIL was scheduled to end its mandate in May 2006, and the Security Council had already received the Secretary-General's recommendations for the post-UNOTIL period. However, a series of events in Timor-Leste culminating in April-June in a political, humanitarian and security crisis of major dimensions led the Council to prolong UNOTIL's mandate, ultimately to 20 August 2006, and to request the Secretary-General to present new recommendations taking into account the need for a strengthened United Nations presence. Against this background, Timor-Leste urgently requested police and military assistance from Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia and Portugal. On 26 May, incoming international forces began securing key installations in the country.
«UNMIT was established with a far-reaching mandate to assist the country in overcoming the consequences and underling causes of the 2006 crisis.»
Reporting to the Council in August 2006 PDF Document, the Secretary-General noted that the level of violence had abated significantly since its peak in late May and early June and that a new Government had been installed on the pledge to unify the nation. His view, however, was that the crisis was far from resolved, with many of the underlying factors needing attention over the longer term. Among these were the failure of government to engage with people, the unhealed wounds of the past and high youth unemployment. The Secretary-General noted that the resolution of the political stand-off merely created an opportunity to address the grievances that gave rise to the crisis and the longer-term issues.
In assessing the situation, the Secretary-General's report pointed to the mixed legacy of the 24 years of occupation, resulting in a gulf of understanding separating those who spent years as resistance fighters, those who lived in occupied towns and villages and those who went into exile. Veterans and young people were also likely to be divided by a generation gap. Furthermore, the single party that had dominated politics since 2001 rested its claim to be the party of government. Among other factors were long-standing frictions between easterners and westerners in the armed forces and the police. The report also noted that the roots of the imbalance in power between the institutions of State, allowing the executive to operate with few constraints, were political, institutional and constitutional. Poverty and its associated deprivations had contributed to the crisis.

Request for a new mission

On 11 June 2006, the President of Timor-Leste, the President of the National Parliament and the Prime Minister wrote to the Secretary-General requesting that he propose to the Security Council to establish a United Nations police force in Timor-Leste to maintain law and order until the national police could undergo reorganization and restructuring. The Secretary-General requested his Special Envoy, appointed on 25 May 2006, to lead a multidisciplinary assessment mission to Timor-Leste to identify the scope of tasks to be undertaken by a post-UNOTIL mission and to develop recommendations for a future UN presence. The mission conducted its assessment from 26 June to 9 July.

Secretary-General's recommendations

In his report to the Security Council dated 8 August 2006 PDF Document, the Secretary-General stated that much had been achieved since independence in major areas of institutional capacity building. Nevertheless, the United Nations and the international community had learned from lessons elsewhere, and had been starkly reminded by the Timor-Leste crisis, that nation-building and peacebuilding were long-term tasks. This was especially true of the time required to build a new police service and justice system.
The Secretary-General went on to note that successes achieved through the work of successive peacekeeping missions would be undermined if a failure of socio-economic development left the people of Timor-Leste in poverty and unemployment. Long-term development efforts to translate available budgetary resources into programmes addressing rural poverty and urban unemployment were as crucial as anything that could be done through a new United Nations mission.
He stressed that an enhanced international role in the security sector and elsewhere must fully respect the national sovereignty of Timor-Leste, and the process of nation-building must be Timorese-owned and led. At the same time, the international community should be able to expect that the country's political leadership, having reflected on the crisis, would work together to broaden the country's political functioning into an open, pluralistic democracy in which all Timorese felt that they have a stake.
The Secretary-General recommended the establishment of a United Nations multidimensional, integrated mission, with the mandate to support the Government of Timor-Leste and to assist it in its efforts to bring about a process of national reconciliation; to support the country in all aspects of the 2007 presidential and parliamentary electoral process; to ensure, through the presence of United Nations police with an executive policing mandate, the restoration and maintenance of public security; to assist in liaising with the Indonesian military through the impartial presence of United Nations Military Liaison Officers; and to assist in further strengthening the national capacity for the monitoring, promotion and protection of human rights.

Establishment of UNMIT

Welcoming the report of the Secretary-General and, among other things expressing its appreciation and support for the deployment of the international security forces, the Security Council, by its resolution 1704 (2006) PDF Document of 25 August 2006, established UNMIT with a far-reaching mandate to assist the country in overcoming the consequences and underling causes of the April/June 2006 crisis. The Council decided that it would consist of an appropriate civilian component, including up to 1,608 police personnel, and an initial component of up to 34 military liaison and staff officers. The Council requested the Secretary-General to review the arrangements to be established between UNMIT and the international security forces and affirmed that it would consider possible adjustments in the mission structure taking into account the views of the Secretary-General.
Since its establishment, UNMIT has been working with the Government of Timor-Leste, various political parties and other partners and stakeholders in the country and elsewhere to ensure the effective implementation of the entrusted mandate.
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2007 elections

Following the deployment of UNMIT, the overall situation in Timor-Leste improved, although the security situation in the country remained volatile and the political climate fluid. The three rounds of presidential and parliamentary elections in Timor-Leste concluded in June 2007, characterized by high voter participation of 80 to 82 per cent (47 to 48 per cent for women), a generally calm security environment and results widely accepted by all political actors, demonstrated that there had been considerable progress in dialogue and reconciliation since the April-May 2006 crisis. As a result of these elections, former Prime Minister José Ramos-Horta was sworn in as the new President on 20 May, succeeding Kay Rala Xanana Gusmão, and the new 65-member Parliament was inaugurated on 30 July 2007.

February 2008 events

On 11 February 2008, the armed group led by the fugitive Alfredo Reinado, the former Military Police Commander of the Falintil-Forças de Defesa de Timor-Leste (F-FDTL), carried out separate armed attacks against the President, José Ramos-Horta, and the Prime Minister, Kay Rala Xanana Gusmão, resulting in the nearly fatal injury of the President and the death of Reinado. Rapid medical intervention, in Dili and, subsequently, in Australia saved the life of the President.
The incidents presented an unexpected and serious challenge to State institutions, but encouragingly, and in contrast to the events of 2006, the situation did not precipitate a crisis destabilizing the entire society. The institutions of the State responded in an appropriate and responsible manner that respected constitutional procedures. The Prime Minister demonstrated firm and reasoned leadership; the Parliament functioned effectively as a forum for debate in response to the events; and leaders of all political parties urged their supporters to remain calm, while the general population demonstrated faith in the ability of the State to deal with the situation.
The Security Council, by its resolution 1802 of 25 February 2008 PDF Document extending the mandate of UNMIT, condemned in the strongest possible terms the attacks on the President and Prime Minister of Timor-Leste and all attempts to destabilize the country, noting that these heinous acts represent an attack on the legitimate institutions of Timor-Leste. The Council also entrusted UNMIT with some additional tasks.

UNMIT continues mandate implementation

Since then, the security situation in Timor-Leste had remained calm, albeit fragile, and UNMIT’s efforts to foster dialogue and reconciliation and to effectively implement other provisions of its mandate continued. The Mission maintained its integrated “one United Nations system” approach and made significant progress in achieving integration across all relevant areas of the mandate. The joint efforts of UNMIT and the United Nations country team were instrumental in providing coordinated policy, political, technical and financial support to help Timor-Leste accomplish its goals.
In September 2011, the Government and UNMIT signed a Joint Transition Plan (JTP) to guide planning for UNMIT’s expected withdrawal by the end of 2012. The plan, the first of its kind in peacekeeping, mapped out priorities and objectives until UNMIT’s departure, and identified 129 UNMIT activities to be completed by the end of December 2012 or handed over to partners thereafter.

UNMIT completes mandate

Thanks to the resilience and determination of the Timorese people and their leaders, and with the support of the international community, Timor-Leste has made tremendous progress since 2006. The displaced people peacefully returned to their homes. Since March 2011, the national police had been responsible for policing throughout the country, with no major breakdown of law and order. Timorese news media and civil society were growing ever stronger, making important contributions to the democratic debate in the country. Poverty decreased as a result of public investments in infrastructure and services. Since 2005, life expectancy at birth had increased by more than two years and averaged 62.1 years by the end of 2012. Primary school enrolment, a key element to future stability and growth, jumped from 63 per cent in 2006 to 90 per cent in 2012. The country was on track to eradicate adult illiteracy by 2015.
On the political front, 2012 saw free and peaceful presidential and parliamentary elections, followed by the smooth formation of a new Government. Well over 70 per cent of the population went to the polls to vote in both the presidential and parliamentary elections. Through a quota system, women comprised 38 per cent of the parliament, the highest representation of women in parliament in the Asia-Pacific region. Beyond its borders, Timor-Leste had transitioned from receiving peacekeeping assistance to contributing personnel to United Nations operations in other parts of the world. The country assumed a leadership role with the g7+ and was a key contributor to the New Deal for aid effectiveness.
By its resolution 2037 PDF Document of 23 February 2012, the Security Council extended the mandate of UNMIT for a final period until 31 December 2012. The departure of the Mission, however, does not mean the end of the United Nations engagement in the country as Timor-Leste continued to face many challenges. The United Nations has been determined to embrace the Government’s proposal for the global body to continue to be an important partner in the new phase of the country’s development and to establish an innovative working relationship of cooperation for the post-UNMIT phase focusing on institutional strengthening and development.
As UNMIT was completing its mandate, the Security Council, in its statement PDF Document of 19 December 2012, commended the remarkable achievements made by Timor-Leste over the past decade and recognized the important contribution of UNMIT in promoting peace, stability and development in the country.



19 December 2012 – As the United Nations winds down its peacekeeping operation in Timor-Leste, the Security Council today applauded the “remarkable achievements” made by the small south-east Asian country as it transitioned over the past decade from a colonial enclave to an independent and democratic State.