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September 2005 Archives

September 30, 2005

ECSSR warns on Al Qaeda

An editorial by the UAE government-run Emirates Centre for Strategic Studies and Research, reported by Associated Press, warns that Al Qaeda is busy recruiting and sinking roots into the region:

"The United Arab Emirates has so far been spared even though it has been a key player in the U.S.-led war on terrorism. Authorities have arrested at least two alleged high-profile al-Qaida members, passed laws against money laundering and kept a close watch on Islamic charities.

"Terrorism specialists have said Dubai was an ideal logistical hub for al-Qaida because of its liberal, cosmopolitan lifestyle and freewheeling business rules. Other gulf states, such as Bahrain and Qatar, could also be targeted because of their close ties to the United States. Like Dubai, they are home to a huge expatriate work force."

The report doesn't single out any specific country as a target, but is warning of a collective danger to the growth and stability of the region:

"Despite all the regional disputes over Iraq, it must be agreed that defeating al-Qaida is an Arab and Islamic goal... . The result of the battle against terrorism in Iraq is linked to stability in the Middle East," the report said.

Posted by secretdubai at 04:46 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Terrorism

Illegal Immigration - Borders & Madness: Mass Attempts at the Spanish-Moroccan border

Recently The Father of Aardvarks made a comment on some recent apparent censorship in Morocco with regards to press comments about illegal immigrants in Morocco attempting to reach Europe. Or as the Father of Aardvarks put it:

Here's a story of an Arab government clamping down on the media with an unusual twist. Al-Jazeera reports that the Moroccan government confiscated the press run of a local newspaper because it ran a "racist" and "inflammatory" article about African immigrants "invading northern Morocco."

While I understand the Father of Aardvarks is a media critic by interest and trade, my first thought was to the underlying crisis (the second being it would be nice to know which paper; there are some in Morocco I am familiar with which I have no problem suspecting of racist and inflammatory yellow journalism).

This past week saw rather dramatic events underlining precisely the level of bubbling tension on all sides that might well justifiably provoke action by the government: a series of mass assualts by "thousands" of African would be immigrants to Europe on the frontier fences of the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Mellila.

The crisis effectively is a rather large accumulation of sub-Saharan Africans building up in the Moroccan north - in the region called the Rif - along the border areas with the Spanish enclaves. This has been fairly little mentioned in the local press, although one does see time and and again in some areas clots of what are clearly sub-Saharan migrants begging and travelling north. Something most people do not trouble themselves about as Moroccans try to emmigrate in much the same way.

However, in the last few years, Morocco has been under intense pressure from the EU to "do more" with regards to stopping the flow of illegal immigrants to Spain and onwards and has taken stepped up measures to block transits via the Mediterranean and the enclaves.

Continue reading "Illegal Immigration - Borders & Madness: Mass Attempts at the Spanish-Moroccan border"

Posted by The Lounsbury at 05:47 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Filed Under: EU Foreign Policy , Economic Development , Economic Policy , North Africa

September 29, 2005

IPO madness

Earlier comments here have drawn attention to the surplus of liquidity in the region, and the resulting stock market bubble. So what happens when there's an IPO for a UAE company and no way to apply for shares in Abu Dhabi?

[T]he Dana Gas IPO brought chaos to UAE banks with would-be subscribers falling over themselves to pick up application forms. All flights from Saudi Arabia to the UAE have been booked solid for days and 33,000 people crossed the border in the past four days, according to local officials.

Several banks had to close their doors to control the crowds and some banks reported scuffles as the crowds struggled to get to the counters. At least one incident was reported in which a security guard was roughed up.

New laws regulating IPOs will soon be ready in the UAE. But I believe a stock market crash is inevitable regardless.

Posted by dubaiwalla at 02:01 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Business, Private , Economic Policy , Gulf , Op-Ed

September 28, 2005

Big Media Catches On: Images of Iraqi Carnage Exchanged For Porn

Well, seems like the BBC, FT and others finally noticed that website where photos of dead Iraqis were posted in exchange for access to amateur porn.

We mentioned it on August 21, after Nur al-Cubicle's commentary popped up on the 'Aqoul feed aggregator.

I really can't think of a more abhorrent combination for Arab sensibilities. Has it hit the sats yet?

Posted by eerie at 02:51 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Gulf , Iraq War , Media

Sexy Arab Abaya Women, Assumptions: US Public Diplomacy in KSA

Returning to a subject more or less dear to 'Aqoul, women in the Arab world, for a moment, I wanted to draw attention to this intriguing article from the visit by US public diplomacy director Karen Hughes to Saudi Arabia: Saudi Women Have Message for U.S. Envoy

Let me first say little in the article was surprising to me (including Ms. Hughes surprise that the "Sisters" did not look at their cultural heritage and mores in the same light as she expected), but it is a useful one for reflexion. Thus some comments on the article:

Update: The Financial Times also has this story. Better done actually.

Continue reading "Sexy Arab Abaya Women, Assumptions: US Public Diplomacy in KSA"

Posted by The Lounsbury at 09:25 AM | Comments (26) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Foreign Policy & MENA , Gender Issues , Gulf , MENA Region General , Society & Culture

September 27, 2005

For Future Pondering

I was recently in on some discussions regarding the creation of a pan-Arab private equity council.

My primary thought was: "Who wants to take a bet this is a dead letter"?

Takers?

Posted by The Lounsbury at 04:59 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Business, Private

September 26, 2005

Gulf & the MENA Region Finance, Booms & Inefficiencies

Our friend and sometime contributor Waterboy draws attention to something obvious to all involved, and yet an item that remains out of control: overliquidity in the Gulf region and the consquent mad asset price boom in the Gulf. His observation is spot on, that there is

there's too much cash chasing too few investment opportunities in the region; too little oversight, regulation or transparency; too much exuberance - bear in mind, as Japanese bank Nomura pointed out, that Saudi Telecom's market capitalisation of US$74bn is worth more than BT (US$35bn), AT&T
(US$15bn), SK Telecom (US$15bn), and Telekom SA (US$9bn) combined - and far too many unsophisticated investors who think that having the names of a couple of ruling family members in the IPO prospectus is a valid alternative to a business plan - or, for that matter, an existing business.

No doubt about this at all. Some conversations I had over the past week painfully illustrated that. This aside, a key point of disequilibrium is the degree to which despite the asset valuations in the Gulf being absolutely looney to the point of surreal, the money is not flowing within the region to a reasonable degree.

(cross posted from Lounsbury - 'Aqoul)

Continue reading "Gulf & the MENA Region Finance, Booms & Inefficiencies"

Posted by The Lounsbury at 12:24 PM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Business, Private , Economic Development , North Africa , Op-Ed

September 23, 2005

"Honor" in the West Bank

I was emailed this from Marthame & Elizabeth Sanders of SaltFilms.net, about a "honor"-related piece of mob violence in the village of Taybeh in the West Bank. I'm going to quote shamelessly:

What Happened in Taybeh?
September 21, 2005
Marthame & Elizabeth Sanders

The small town of Taybeh, located a few miles outside of Ramallah, was recently attacked by a mob from the neighboring town of Deir Jarir. The report below is based on news accounts and conversations we have had with friends in Taybeh, eyewitnesses to the event in question.

For ten years, a Muslim woman named Hiyam from the village of Deir Jarir had been working at a sewing shop in Taybeh owned by a Christian man named Mahadi Khourieh. Thirty-two years old, unmarried and pregnant, Hiyam was found dead from poison on Wednesday, August 31, 2005. According to her family, she committed suicide rather than bring the shame of a child out of wedlock on her family. It is likely, however, that her family forced her to take her own life. The family accused Mahadi Khourieh of being the father, a charge he denied.

Continue reading ""Honor" in the West Bank"

Posted by tomscud at 09:30 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Gender Issues

Will Fulla and Barbie Ever Have Tea Together?

I’ve just had a grueling few weeks attending back-to-back conferences and dealing with other work-related idiocy. As a result, I’ve fallen behind on ‘Aqoul correspondence, but I would like to thank everyone for their emails. Will be catching up slowly over the next few days, but in the meantime a tidbit from the New York Times (evaluna posted the link earlier today):

Best Seller in Mideast: Barbie with a Prayer Mat

Young girls here are obsessed with Fulla, and conservative parents who would not dream of buying Barbies for their daughters seem happy to pay for a modest doll who has her own tiny prayer rug, in pink felt. Children who want to dress like their dolls can buy a matching, girl-size prayer rug and cotton scarf set, all in pink...

"This isn't just about putting the hijab on a Barbie doll," Mr. Abidin said. "You have to create a character that parents and children will want to relate to. Our advertising is full of positive messages about Fulla's character. She's honest, loving, and caring, and she respects her father and mother."

Though Fulla will never have a boyfriend doll like Barbie's Ken, Mr. Abidin said, a Doctor Fulla and a Teacher Fulla will be introduced soon. "These are two respected careers for women that we would like to encourage small girls to follow," he said.

Continue reading "Will Fulla and Barbie Ever Have Tea Together?"

Posted by eerie at 12:10 AM | Comments (10) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Gender Issues

September 22, 2005

What's a Nice Muslim Girl to Do?

My hippie feminist Mom never let me have a Barbie; she believed they promoted overly traditional gender roles for girls. (Not that I wanted one - I was more a Lego girl).

But I can't help but wonder what she'd think of Fulla, the doll with Muslim values?

Posted by evaluna at 09:08 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Gender Issues

Handbook for bloggers and "cyber-dissidents"

Reporters Without Borders has published a blogging handbook to help bloggers protect themselves from recrimination and censorship:

Reporters Without Borders has produced this handbook to help them, with handy tips and technical advice on how to to remain anonymous and to get round censorship, by choosing the most suitable method for each situation. It also explains how to set up and make the most of a blog, to publicise it (getting it picked up efficiently by search-engines) and to establish its credibility through observing basic ethical and journalistic principles.

It can be bought from bookshops for Eu10, or accessed/downloaded for free online at this page. It is available in English, French, Chinese, Arabic and Persian.

The guide also contains interesting case studies from bloggers in Iran and Bahrain.

Posted by secretdubai at 01:27 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Media

September 18, 2005

Shadid on Iraq: A Contained Civil War?

Anthony Shadid's new book is out, and on TPM Cafe he gives a series of blog entries related to its content on Iraq. Here is one observation, of many, and I would solicit the Aqoul Brains Trust to give us a view of its accuracy and military-geographic-demographic rationale:

On the question of civil war, I don't see a lot of forces working against its intensification. To be honest, there are few national voices in Iraq these days. Ayad Allawi could be suggested as one, but I don't see him playing too great a role right now. Oddly, Muqtada Sadr is probably the figure who most plays up a nationalist discourse. That's in addition to his brand of sometimes messianic, populist religion. Beyond that, it is remarkable the degree to which politics are pronounced in communal terms. If a civil war worsened, I don't necessary see a conflagration. I think you could have an ostensible government in Baghdad, with ministries and embassies around it. In the hinterland, you could have militias staking out turf: Badr, Sadr and so on vying for influence in parts of Baghdad and the south, elements of the insurgency laying claims to land in the west and center, the Kurdish parties competing in the north, with varying degrees of intensity. Their points of intersection would be explosive, though not necessarily numerous.

I suspect he is mostly correct, though I do question whether parts of Baghdad are aptly described as "hinterland".

Posted by Matthew Hogan at 01:14 PM | Comments (21) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Foreign Policy & MENA , Iraq War , Political Development , US Foreign Policy

September 15, 2005

No place like home, literally

On visiting the Microsoft's Xbox360 website, something seemed to be missing... let's see... time for a little jigsaw work...

...ah yes - the entire MENA is wiped off the fucking map.

Posted by secretdubai at 02:22 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Media

September 14, 2005

Newspapers of the UAE

With the United Arab Emirates about to get its sixth daily English language newspaper, here is a summary - with links for those interested - of UAE newspapers:

1. Gulf News
Among western expats, Gulf News (circulation 91,000), owned by Al Nisr Publishing, is generally the best-regarded of the broadsheets. Over the past couple of years it has dramatically improved its content, quality, design and online version (300,000 hits per day). But in recent months some patchiness has crept back, perhaps due to staff being poached by the new paper. Gulf News arguably faces the toughest competition from the new Dubai paper, as its audience profile and content at this stage seem likely to be the most similar to it. Interestingly, Gulf News used to be a tabloid when founded in 1978, but was relaunched as a broadsheet in 1985.

2. Khaleej Times
The Khaleej Times (circulation 72,000), owned by Galadari Printing & Publishing, claims the highest readership (450,000) in the UAE and enjoys strongest popularity among subcontinental expats, the majority population here. It has a few good journalists and is sometimes rated for its business pages, but its general level of writing and reporting is abysmal, not just in the level of grammar and accuracy, but also in basic journalism such as story content, story structure, tone and style.

Continue reading "Newspapers of the UAE"

Posted by secretdubai at 06:21 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Media

September 13, 2005

Two Jews, Three Opinions: Marriage Law in Israel

Sometimes with all the infighting between Muslims, Christians, and Jews in the Middle East, not to mention among various flavors of Muslims and/or Christians, many people forget that the Jews aren't exactly one big, happy family. In fact, the Israeli Jewish community can be one big, unhappy, dysfunctional family in one very basic regard...the legal right to get married in a ceremony that reflects one's chosen level of religious observance, not to mention one's beliefs regarding gender equality: Unorthodox Weddings Dividing Israelis

Continue reading "Two Jews, Three Opinions: Marriage Law in Israel"

Posted by evaluna at 09:56 PM | Comments (10) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Gender Issues , Religious Minorities , Society & Culture

Lebanese Media: Al Safir, September 13

Okay, one today, and maybe another tomorrow, then I'm out of communication for a while again.

Damascus Opens the Door to Mehlis and to Interviews with Witnesses Next Week
Lahoud in New York Refuses to Air Dirty Laundry ... Siniora Attends Conference on Aid to Lebanon

It just doesn't stop. It appears that Mehlis got an extension to his investigation (of the death of ex-Leb PM Hariri) past the drop-dead date of September 15, since he'll now be interviewing Syrian intel people next week. The paper quotes a Syrian source extensively on the discussions, saying that both sides were happy with the outcome, that there was no formal protocol about how the two sides would work together, but that there'd be a "gentleman's agreement".

The paper names a bunch of people, including the last two Syrian heads of intel inside Lebanon, Ghazi Kanan and Rustom Ghazaleh, and a bunch of other high-level Syrian security types (I'll put the rest of the names & ranks in the extended).

In the meantime, basically all of the leaders of Lebanon's new ruling party are now in Paris, where it seems like they've been for weeks and weeks now. And President Lahoud is still firing off irritated comments at everyone else in the entire Lebanese government, now from New York, where he's at the UN.

Palestinians of Gaza "Free" ... in Their Giant Israeli Prison
Rafah Crossing Closed Before Crowds of Palestinians ... and Israel Expresses its "Anxiety" to Egypt

Finally, after 38 years of occupation and oppression and massacres, Palestinians yesterday tasted freedom for the first time... even though it was incomplete.

The last Israeli soldier had not lifted his foot from the land of the Gaza strip before thousands celebrating "victory" arrived...

But the joy didnot ease the anxiety of the powers that be about the coming days, for many aspects of the withdrawal have not been completed, most important of them being the oversight of the border crossings, and the end of Israeli control of the air and water."

The bit about the "giant prison" is a direct quote from Mahmoud Abbas, from later in the article.

Continue reading "Lebanese Media: Al Safir, September 13"

Posted by tomscud at 03:29 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Media

September 12, 2005

Underdevelopment as Dilettantisme: Why MENA Does Not Attract Capital, Reason No. 5

While sadly behind on my ability to comment substantively, I thought a bit of a comment on dilettanstisme would be worth a quick intervention (and it being all I have time for, it's what one gets).

The comment is provoked by a series of convos over the past few days in regards to a certain MENA country (which for various sensitivity reasons shall remain unnamed) and its hosting of a MENA region investment conference. Let's say that our certain MENA country is not exactly a star performer in the realm of attracted FDI, per capita or in gross. Of course neither is the region.

There are multitudes of reasons for this. The one to be discussed today, dilettantisme.

Continue reading "Underdevelopment as Dilettantisme: Why MENA Does Not Attract Capital, Reason No. 5"

Posted by The Lounsbury at 09:25 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Business, Private , Economic Development , Economic Policy , Foreign Policy & MENA , MENA Region General , North Africa , Op-Ed

September 11, 2005

Well, Secret Dubai Gets High Profile Mention

Nothing like fame for our colleague and friend.

Dubai Opens Door Wide to News Media, but Journalists Note a Catch

The quote: "More controversially, content that verges on the political has also been blocked: Secret Dubai Diary, a quirky blog about Western expatriate life here, was blocked for weeks this summer, raising howls from the blogger community. Etisalat says users can appeal to have a block removed."

Very nice. Quirky, though, irritates.

Posted by The Lounsbury at 08:08 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Gulf , Media , Op-Ed

September 06, 2005

Lebanese Media: Al Safir, September 6

Lahoud Forces Extra Session in Ba'abda to Settle "Crisis of the Prisoners"
Mehlis Briefs Annan and Security Council Today on His Investigation Before Going to Syria
Presidential Trip to New York on Monday, and Siniora's Enthusiasm for Cooperation Diminishes

God, I'm tempted to just knock off the Lebanese politics part of the paper, at least until the 15th. Anyway, latest in the ongoing government brouhaha: The council of Ministers, the highest branch of government, is having a very hard time meeting, on account of the President, who is to convene them, is practically on trial. They finally managed to have one working session (at which I guess a bunch of trivial administrative stuff such as RUNNING THE COUNTRY was accomplished), but were required to hold a second extraordinary one to answer the complaints lodged by the relatives of the four security chiefs currently under arrest for conspiracy to murder Rafiq Hariri that they were being held under inhumane conditions.

My heart bleeds.

Also, in an inset, they announce that half the cell phones in Lebanon are going to have their prefix number changed. 03 to 71. Just so y'all know.

Onward: the Lebanese political news is a bit short today, so we get THREE MORE articles on the front page:

Continue reading "Lebanese Media: Al Safir, September 6"

Posted by tomscud at 04:12 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Levant , Media

Ideological Rifts

One of my more bizarre side-projects involves keeping track of fatwas released by Muslim scholars on the subject of terrorism and the proper conduct of jihad in the service of Islam. Shortly after the London bombings, a number of Muslim groups in Western countries rapidly issued fatwas and/or press releases condemning terrorism and suicide attacks against civilians. These carefully-worded rulings revealed a broad spectrum of opinions in Muslim communities, perhaps even a deep divide between conservative and “liberal” Muslims (see my earlier entry on Canadian Muslim groups).

Last week, Asharq Al-Awsat published an article about a controversial ruling issued by Abu-Basir al-Tartusi, a prominent Salafi ideologue living in London:

London-Based Salafi Scholar Issues Fatwa Prohibiting Suicide Operations

Syrian ideologue Abd-al-Munim Mustafa Abu-Halimah, also known as Abu-Basir al-Tartusi, said on his website under the headline "A Word of Warning About Suicide Operations: "I have received 1,000 questions about these operations, which are for me closer to suicide than martyrdom. They are haram (Forbidden) and impermissible, for several reasons." Al-Tartusi, who lives in London, cited in the fatwa that he issued the day before yesterday some of the (Prophet Muhammad's) sayings, among them: "Anyone who harms a believer has no jihad." He said this is for someone who merely harms a believer, so imagine if he kills him, and kills him deliberately." He also cited the saying of the Honorable Messenger: "One who kills a non-Muslim does not find the winds of paradise; its wind is to be found from a 70 years walk"…

Continue reading "Ideological Rifts"

Posted by eerie at 01:20 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Islamism , Terrorism

September 05, 2005

Lebanese Media: Al Safir, September 5

Jumblatt Calls for Succession in the Presidential Portfolio: Lahoud will remain as long as he will [translation very very shaky]

Council of Ministers returns without redistributing portfolios [trans. very shaky], and three detainees are transferred to the military police

Basically a roundup of the current state of the Mehlis investigation into Hariri's death - Mehlis is in New York meeting with Annan, and various different accusations are being laid against him by different parties in Lebanon (see this asad abukhalil post for a (longwinded) example of the kind of skepticism). Also, on the political level, various people are meeting with other people - today it was (Druze leader and current majority-party honcho) Walid Jumblatt with Hizbollah head Hassan Nasrallah, who are apparently in a preliminary stage of coming to some sort of terms on replacing President Emile Lahoud, who will be in a very tricky situation indeed if four of his closest aides are on trial for murdering Hariri.

Also, three of the four suspects have been transferred from the jurisdiction of the civil to that of the military police. Why this is newsworthy, I don't know, but it's in the headline.

Editorial (by Talal Sulman): The Bitter Fruit of a Year after the Extension

The extension of Emile Lahoud's presidency, of course: "The truth is not born from error, and mistaken political decisions can lead to national disasters..."

He argues that the extension of Lahoud's term has led to a disaster for both Lebanon and Syria: for Lebanon, it has made the country a de facto international protectorate, while for Syria "the tab is still running, but it will be large."

Continue reading "Lebanese Media: Al Safir, September 5"

Posted by tomscud at 03:22 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Media

Willing. Unwilling. The Pretension of Interest in Democracy & The Middle East

From our dear friend Pratike, who made the error of going to Egypt and Cairo specifically to learn Arabic and thus condemn himself to speaking with a bufoonish accent for the rest of his day, a note on the 'elections' and the pretension that the US Administration is interested in democracy in the MENA region:

His quote from a Washington Post op ed:

Perhaps there is concern that too much pressure on Mubarak might produce a victory by the Muslim Brotherhood, the most popular Egyptian opposition party that has been outlawed by the government. That's a risk, of course, but if the Bush administration isn't willing to let Islamists, even radical Islamists, win votes in a fair election, then Bush officials should stop talking so much about democracy and go back to supporting the old dictatorships. It was precisely that kind of logic -- that friendly dictators are preferable to potentially radical alternatives -- that helped produce so much radicalism during the Cold War and, more recently, a healthy movement of Middle East terrorists.

Well, welcome to reality children. What news.

Continue reading "Willing. Unwilling. The Pretension of Interest in Democracy & The Middle East"

Posted by The Lounsbury at 07:30 AM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Foreign Policy & MENA , Islamism , North Africa , Op-Ed , Political Development , US Foreign Policy

Yorkshire Bombers - British Muslims shocked

An item worthy of attention:

British Muslims Shocked by Video of Bomber

Well, this makes the denial and the excuse making coming out of the mouths of what we might call "the usual suspects" unsupportable (although certain deluded and or mendacious elements will continue to do so, just as they do in regards to 11 Sep).

Continue reading "Yorkshire Bombers - British Muslims shocked"

Posted by The Lounsbury at 07:04 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Islam & Politics , Islamism , Op-Ed , Society & Culture , Terrorism

September 04, 2005

Lebanese Media: Al Safir, Special Hurricane Edition

From the September 3 edition:
Katrina stuns the world ... 10,000 estimated dead.
The "Giant" America Powerless and Overrun by Chaos.

Hurricane Katrina exposed the weakness of the "Giant" America, as the world's superpower was left in a state of confusion and responded only weakly to the storm, which was the greatest disaster to strike America since the attacks of September 11, 2001.

US President George Bush visited the affected region yesterday, five days after the storm passed. Describing the slowness of the arrival of the aid, he said "the results were not acceptable"...

There's further descriptions of the slowness of the aid in arriving ("Why can we get aid into Banda Aceh in 2 days but take 5 days to get into New Orleans?"; a bit keying off of a New York Times article talking about the effect of National guard deployments in Iraq on readiness in America; some discussion of the homeland security re-org; some international views (oddly, a South Korean and a Sri Lankan - but then, this is all cobbled together & translated from AP, Reuters and AFP); damage estimates (36 to 80 days till the city is clear; 10,000 dead in Louisiana; 100 billion dollars); and international and domestic aid (the $25,000 from Sri Lanka is specifically mentioned, as is the $10.5 billion rebuilding package before congress).

Posted by tomscud at 10:41 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
Filed Under:

September 03, 2005

New Orleans

Katrina's aftermath is dominating North American news. A somber cartoon from An Nahar newspaper (via Tom Scudder via Beirut Spring):

Posted by eerie at 04:18 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Media , US Foreign Policy

September 02, 2005

Lebanese Media: Al Safir, September 2

This one is going to be a bit thin. Been distracted by the lost city of New Orleans.

[International investigator] Mehlis Accuses "Security Cabal" of Cooperation in Planning [Hariri's assassination] and [Lebanese judge] Mirza indicts them

Subtitles:

• The international investigator renews his calls for Damascus to help in securing the testimony of "Lebanese officers".
  
• Political responses: Lahoud intends to remain president, Seniora responds by praising the integrity of the international investigation
  
• Sa'ad Hariri cautions against pressuring the judiciary
  
• New arrests made by the internal security forces.

I swear, the art of the complete story-in-titles has been lost in the English press. I cheated and looked at the Daily Star's coverage (also here and here.)

To sum up the story so far, the UN team appointed to investigate the murder of Rafiq Hariri a few days ago arrested four of the heads of Lebanon's security apparatus at the time of the murder, including one still holding his previous post. Yesterday, Detlev Mehlis, head of the commission, announced at a press conference that, yes, these four men are suspected of playing a part in the conspiracy to murder Hariri. (A fifth man, an ex-MP, was picked up with the other four, questioned, and then released.) The senior Lebanese magistrate connected with the case almost immediately announced their indictments on charges of conspiracy, etc. Mehlis also said at his press conf that he did NOT consider Lebanese president Emile Lahoud to be a suspect, nor did he have any Syrian suspects in mind - he wants to interview potential witnesses, not accuse anyone, when he asks the Syrian state for better cooperation. He also said that he had not heard testimony from anyone other than Lebanese and Syrians, and certainly not from any Israelis.

The conf triggered a cascade of political statements, including three from President Lahoud, in one of which he announced is intention to "continue to fulfil his duties to defend the constitution an laws and independence of Lebanon". Both PM Fuad Siniora and majority-party leader Sa'ad Hariri called for everyone to respect the independence of the Lebanese judiciary and of the UN inquiry and to not seek to influence or pressure it in any way. Hint, hint, we're looking at you, Mr. L.

Continue reading "Lebanese Media: Al Safir, September 2"

Posted by tomscud at 02:11 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Media

September 01, 2005

Colds, Fevers and Oil: US Gulf, Global Pricing

I think it worth bringing to others attention the following: Nadezhda on rather nasty scenarios regarding the impact of the hurricane that has apparently more or less destroyed the US Gulf Coast

There is plenty of electronic ink being spilled about this, I shall not waste time on that, however some reflexion on the problematic state of global oil markets and this event is relevant to the MENA region.

Posted by The Lounsbury at 10:51 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Economic Policy , Op-Ed

The Traditional Readers Poll

At the start of every new month I like to ask readers for feedback, input, requests for subject matter and whatever else may come to mind regarding 'Aqoul, the blog, and the MENA region.

Now, on my own blog this is probably abusive insofar as my customer service reputation is rightly quite poor, but in our little collective effort, not quite so.

Posted by The Lounsbury at 10:45 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Site News

Lebanese Media: As-Safir, September 1

From Lebanon's as-Safir newspaper:

Above the fold:

Will Mehlis Announce Today Why He Suspects the Security Cabal?

(Lahoud counterattacks: [Mehlis is trying to] "rescue" his trip to New York; Berri expedites security appointments; Sa'ad Hariri supports an international tribunal; Lebanon and Syria subject of discussions among America, Britain and France)

A not-much-there-there article, pretty much all in the headlines. First paragraph is expended complaining about how a much-anticipated press conf given by the head of the investigating committee was preempted in favor of a short press release written in English. There's a bunch of pointless speculation, followed by the news that the four security officials remain under guard in the Monte Verde hotel (where the investigating team is based), while ex-minister Qandil was let go after being interrogated yesterday evening.

Continue reading "Lebanese Media: As-Safir, September 1"

Posted by tomscud at 10:14 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Filed Under: Levant , Media