IV. International
(04-16-08)
.
An increasing demand for
exotic freshwater turtles and tortoises in
Southeast Asia
has fueled rampant alleged trade in
Indonesia,
according to a recent report. Turtles are among the most
popular species soled illegally in Asia as pets in
places like Japan, or as cuisine in China and other
parts of Asia.
. Protesters
in Australia
burned Chinese flags and police arrested 50 activists in
Nepal
during renewed demonstrations against Beijing’s
crackdown on Tibet.
. Seeking to
break out of its diplomatic isolation, Iran has applied
for full membership in the Shanghai Cooperation
Organization, an alliance dominated by China and
Russia and see as challenging US security interests in
Central Asia.
. The price
of rice in global markets has nearly doubled in the last
3 months, Keith Bradster reported in NYT. Fearing
shortages, some major rice producers, e.g., Vietnam,
India,
Egypt & Cambodia have sharply limited their rice exports
so they can be sure they can feed their own people.
.
Chinese authorities have
launched mass arrests of Tibetans in
Lhasa for interrogation
about the fiercest anti-Chinese uprising for decades, a
Beijing-based source told Reuters.
. At this
summer’s Olympic Games, Beijing’s CCP wants to
present China
as a gleaming new superpower.
But its brutal
repression of Tibetans jeopardized its image and placed
the Dalai Lama under pressure to keep urging
Tibetans on a course of non-violence.
. Everyday
seems to bring a new statistic about China: it has
become the world’s 3rd largest trading
nation, it has the most cell phone subscribers in the
world, and it emits the most carbon gases.
. Two-thirds
of China’s cities face shortages while deserts are
eating up arable land. Breakneck industrialization is
worsening this environmental breakdown as many more
power plants are built and run on coal that accelerates
global warming. This is a vicious circle here and not
only in China.
. The German
chancellor, Angela Merkel, became the first world leader
to announce that she would not attend the Olympics in
Beijing. French President Nicholas Sarkozy is
considering doing the same.
.
The World Bank has
called for tough reforms in the budget system to plug
governance loopholes in the
Philippines
controlled by Pres. GMA and her family (two congressmen
sons).
.
A country report prepared for the Philippine
Development Forum (PDF) proposes abolishing “poorly
controlled” special purposes funds, reforming the civil
service system amid perceived vulnerability to political
patronage and low compensation, and establishing reforms
in state procurement either during sale of public assets
or award of contracts, among others.
.
Other areas that need cleaning include collection of
taxes (slowdown on crackdown on tax exodus in last
quarter of 2007 versus 2006); in cases of grand
corruption, no public official or private sector
perpetrator had been convicted; without credible
enforcement, corruption will continue.
.
Grand corruption in RP involves theft of large sums by
top politicians and other officials. Political
corruption (also known as “clientelism” of “state
capture”) is misuse of state power by state officials to
shape the rules of the game for their own benefit and
the benefit of those who pay them.
.
Philippine poverty cannot be explained from a growing
population but rather the outcome of corruption in both
the government & business sectors. Both conspire to put
half of the national wealth and income in the hands of
less than 1% of the population.
.
Indonesian and
Malaysian governments have agreed to form an
Eminent Persons Group (EPG) consisting, among
others, experts from the youth, Islamic scholars,
intellectuals and prominent women, to foster mutual
understanding between the two nations.
.
Malaysian elections may be held during the school
holidays in early March a couple of days after the
Chinese New Year. Political parties seemed to have
stepped up a year in their preparations.
.
Malaysia has frozen the recruitment of Indian workers,
including temple priests, sculptors and musicians in a
move apparently linked to an unrest by
Malaysia’s
ethnic Indians, an official said.
.
The Indonesian
president called for Indonesians to be protected from
abusive employers in
Malaysia
as the 2 countries signed a pact to boost bilateral
trade. Almost 60% of the more than 2 million foreign
workers in Malaysia are from Indonesia, including more
than 270k maids.
.
The commander of
Pekanbaru Air Base, Col. Gandara Olivenca, was dismissed
for allowing foreign nationals without security
clearance to travel in a military helicopter that
crashed at Rian palm plantation.
.
The General Elections Commission (KPU) has
acknowledged it faces a tough road ahead in its
preparation for next year’s elections, because many
Regional/Provincial General Elections Commission
(KPUD) members have yet to be selected.
.
Pres. Nguyen Minh Triet
of Vietnam
called on the northern mountainous provinces of Ha Giang
to boost efforts in exploiting its own potentials and
human resources for the province’s development.
.
After 2 & ½ years of construction, the Thu Thiem Bridge,
which links HCM city’s center and the new urban area of
Thu Thiem in District 2, officially opened to traffic
last month.
.
The State Bank of Vietnam must provide economic
growth of 9% for 2008 while ensuring inflation stayed
below that figure, P.M. Nguyen Tan Dung said.
.
Protests by ethnic
Uighurs broke out in a remote city of
China’s far western
Xinjiang region even as authorities were suppressing
unrest in nearby Tibet and other Tibetan-inhabited
areas, according to reports from the region.
.
Xinjiang’s approximately 16 million Uighur Muslims speak
their own language, have their own customs at one point
in history, set up their own government. The US
has designated some Uighur separatist movements as
terrorist organizations, and declared one of them (East
Turkestan
Islamic Movement) as such!
. More
recently, the Chinese Public Security Bureau has
accused Uighur separatist groups of planning to blow up
an airliner using materials in a soft drink can but was
thwarted by quick-witted crew members.
.
Sandwiched between
China
and India, rugged, forested
Bhutan
is land-locked and has just 2.2 million people. It has
long feared for its survival, as Bhutanese watched
nervously the invasion/occupation of Tibet by
China
in 1950 and the tiny Himalayan kingdom of Sikkim was
swallowed up by India in 1975.
. Fresh from
elections last month, Bhutan is now a constitutional
monarchy. It is struggling to do what many other
countries have struggled to do: open up to the
world while retaining its way of life. In the capital
(Thimphu), the
young are wearing western-style jeans and tuning in to
satellite TV.
.
Thimphu is the
only capital in the world without a traffic light.
Instead, a white-gloved traffic officer directs cars,
pedestrians and yak herds. The city had a zoo but freed
all the animal saying it wasn’t in Buddhist spirit to
cage the takin, the national animal, which has
the head of a goat and the body of a moose.
.
Noting that the
government was concerned about inflation, Indian
PM Manmohan Singh said more steps would be taken to
contain it and a moderation could be expected in a
couple of weeks.
.
The Left parties and United National Progressive
Alliance (UNPA) joined hands to corner the Congress
on the rising prices of essential commodities, sending
out signals of a pre-poll arrangement between the two
groups ahead of parliamentary elections next year.
.
Almost the whole country
will become a no-smoking zone by May 31 if the health
ministry has its way. Homes and designated smoking areas
at airports & restaurants will be the only places where
one can have a smoke once the government introduces the
“Smoke-Free Workplace Rules.” When that happens, India
will join the list of countries most intolerant towards
smoking.
. According
to CFO Asia magazine’s latest compensation survey, CFOs
and second-tier finance executives got the highest pay
hikes in Asia in 2007 while beating out those in
Singapore, Hong Kong and China.
. Sri Lanka’s
war against ethnic Tamil rebels has been going on for
more than 25 years. Under a recent military offensive to
wipe out the rebels, government forces have abducted
hundreds of members of the Tamil majority group,
including civilians who just disappeared, according to
human rights groups.
. Pres.
Rajapaksa and his lieutenants are intent on eliminating
the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) no
matter what the cost. Its growing ties with Iran,
China
and Russia have emboldened the government to ignore
criticisms from the US and other western powers.
.
The US State
Dept., in its annual human rights report, cited
near-daily extra-judicial killings in the
govt-controlled
Jaffna peninsula and accounts of the army, police and
pro-govt military para-military groups participating in
the attacks against civilians. The Tigers are recognized
as a terrorist group by US & the West.
.
One of the most
significant results of
Pakistan’s
elections in Feb was the defeat of religious parties
that ran the NW Frontier province for the last 5
years. In their place, voters elected moderates from a
small regional party that may now wield big influence
over Pakistan’s changing strategy towards its militants.
. When it
comes to relations with the US,
the public mood in
Pakistan is angry. It is
highly likely that some US military actions routinely
allowed under the old government will be subject to
greater scrutiny.
.
An insurgent leader (Maulvi Faqir Mohammed) with alleged
ties to al Quaeda welcomed an offer by Pakistan’s new
prime minister to negotiate with Islamic fighters
accused of launching terrorist attacks from the tribal
regions bordering Afghanistan.
.
The command and control system for Pakistan’s nuclear
weapons will stay unchanged under the country’s new
government, made up of opponents of Pres Pervez
Musharraf., an official said. The military manages and
controls nuclear weapons on behalf of the NCA (National
Command Authority).
