Had a busy week, with a couple of nice aikido classes at HC Sparta, and an excellent milonga courtesy of Valentina, who was celebrating her birthday in grand style at her flat.Today I've been cleaning my own flat, and reading the IHT. Quite a lot's been happening, starting with the protests in Belarus' Oktyabrskaya Square being broken up and hundreds arrested - today's rally may gain some support, but the Americans' and Europeans' complaints and promised sanctions (against Belarus' elite) won't exactly change Lukashenko's mind. Not while the Russians are standing behind him, that is.South of Belarus, Steven Lee Myers looks at the political situation in the Crimea, which is about two-thirds ethnic Russian and home to Russia's Black Sea fleet. Tomorrow (Sunday) will see parliamentary elections in Ukraine, the first since the Orange Revolution a year or so ago. For reasons largely similar to why I would have voted for Lukashenko in Belarus (see below), Yuschenko's supporters look likely to lose out to the pro-Russia bloc led by rival Viktor Yanukovich. It's a sacrifice of democracy in the name of economics, with the prospects of cheap Russian gas and trade deals. And in Ukraine, disillusionment with the failure of Yushchenko's government to deliver real positive change after the revolution in the face of many unrealistic hopes didn't help.ETA, Basque separatists and (former) terrorists, declared a cease fire amid hopes for a future negotiated settlement, probably in line with the degree of autonomy just granted to Catalonia. The IHT draws parallels with the IRA.Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made peace overtures to Pakistan while launching another bus service between the two nations. It'll be a long process at best, with Kashmir at the centre, but the time seems ripe for a diplomatic resolution in line with consultations of Kashmir's populations.And finally, the French. This one had me laughing.
After Sunday's election, and the unsurprising victory of strongman Viktor Lukashenko (Europe's last dictator) over opposition leader Alexander Milinkevich, thousands of protesters turned out into the main square (Oktyabrskaya Square) in Minsk to protest. Echoing the language and determination of Ukraine's Orange Revolution, opposition leaders cried foul, and looked set to stay in place until forcibly removed. Yet after three days their numbers dwindled into the hundreds, and some opposition activists were arrested. Lukashenko dismissed all talk of revolutions, and the riot police are at the ready. Undoubtedly the election was fixed. Lukashenko isn't going to give up power until he wants to - his control over the state's forces is strong and his willingness to use them to repress dissent is solid. The EU has threatened more sanctions in response, and the US denounced the elections and demanded a re-run (unlikely, to say the least). Yet this all misses the point. Even with the terrible human rights situation in Belarus, and even if 83% is far above Lukashenko's actual support, if I was a Belarussian living in Belarus, I would have voted for Lukashenko. Obviously this needs some explanation, but the reasons are quite simple and real. Belarus gets most of its energy in the form of gas, which it gets at roughly one-fifth of its market value from Russia. Furthermore, its economy, which is performing well, is massively dependent on trade with and investment from Russia. If Lukashenko were to go, all of that would be jeopardised. Russia has already shown itself willing to use gas as such a lever (see entries on Ukraine and Georgia). Moreover, the EU, and any other states, would not be willing or able to replace Russia as Belarus' sponsor, and would have a lot of trouble moving quickly enough to prevent an economic tumble if gas prices rose. Basically, if Lukashenko goes, the country's economy will crumble.
So what's to be done? Well, not much, unfortunately. The time is not ripe for change. Perhaps one day Russia will not want to pay so much to have Belarus under its wing, or internal changes will occur and replace Lukashenko naturally. It's hard to say. There's little hope - Belarus will just have to live with its dictator for the time being.
The US State Department released its annual country report on human rights practices yesterday, serving as a stark reminder that America has lost its moral authority on human rights issues. Not only do the abuses at Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib (as indicators of the Department of Defence's treatment of its detainees in general), as well as 'sub-legal' (illegal) detentions elsewhere come to mind, but the Bush administration's apparent eagerness to act contrary to international and US law stand out. See, for example, Joseph Cirincione's comments on the nuclear deal with India, or the latest rumblings about the (probably) illegally-authorised domestic wiretappings in the US.
Coming to the report itself, one word comes to mind: pathetic. Unsurprisingly, America's political adversaries are given undue prominance. Most notable are Iran, with a democratically-elected president (just about) and relatively free speech (relative to Zimbabwe or Belarus, that is), and North Korea, where the government is certainly nasty, but is not, for example, actively involved in genocide (unlike Sudan). Also included among the top human rights abusers are China and Cuba: again, unpleasant enough in their authoritarian ways, but nothing compared to their war-exporting counterparts in Rwanda and Uganda, or Robert Mugabe and his forced evictions, for example. The report compares very badly indeed with those produced by NGOs Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International. Its political aims, and the drop in morality in America's foreign policies, serve to make it little more than a laughable affair.
Iran is being discussed at an IAEA board meeting in Vienna, with talks centering around a report delivered by Mohamed ElBaradei criticising Iran's push towards uranium enrichment and complaining of Iran's less than full cooperation with the IAEA.
At the same time, the latest Iranian diplomatic efforts to reach an agreement with Russia failed, when initial Russian acquiescence on the deal soon turned to a rejection of it, in the face of staunch opposition from the USA and Europe. The deal would have allowed Iran to pursue some enrichment testing on Russian soil, while Russia enriched the uranium on an industrial scale, as with the previous proposal, essentially allowing Iran to develop its enrichment skills, taking it further towards its goal of mastering enrichment at Natanz, and ultimately using high-enriched uranium (HEU) to make atomic bombs. Iran's coverage of the IAEA meeting and discussions are worth a look, for a bit of comic relief.
However, a recent New York Times article reminds us just how far, or near, Iran might be in developing the facilities and skills to enrich uranium. This serves as a reminder that while a concerted effort, perhaps with a little help and a lot of luck, could see Iran armed with an atomic warhead in a few short years, the hurdles ahead of them, and their trouble with the technology, indicate a far longer wait, perhaps better measured in decades. In fact, my opinion of Israel's worst case scenario is that it does not take account of Iran's determination to master the enrichment process itself. Iran's leadership, time and again, have stressed that Iran has a right to the technology (which it does, under the NPT). This leads me to doubt that Iran would be happy getting a small supply of enriched uranium or plutonium from somewhere else. They've invested a lot of time and money, and even more prestige (both domestic and international) chasing mastery of the enrichment cycle, and they're not about to give it all up and admit defeat. You might even say that this point - having the capability to enrich their own uranium - has become a central, unchangeable factor in the Iranians' thinking.
I just stumbled across an excellent article on Argentine tango on the Economist's website, from the end of 2001. Enjoy.
Football was cancelled today because some players don't like the prospect of playing when it's snowing. Huh.
Milonga tomorrow, and maybe I'll go to aikido Wednesday, if we finish early enough at CBW.
Had a busy week, with a couple of nice aikido classes at HC Sparta, and an excellent milonga courtesy of Valentina, who was celebrating her birthday in grand style at her flat.
