European Union: a House Divided

Conn Hallinan

“Larger now than the Roman Empire of two thousand years ago, more opaque than the Byzantine, the European Union continues to baffle observers and participants alike.”

— Perry Anderson, British historian

The European Union is one of the premier trade organizations on the planet, with a collective GDP that matches the world’s largest economies. But it is far more than a trade group. It is also a banker, a judicial system, a watchdog, a military alliance, and, increasingly, an enforcer of economic rules among its 28 members.

On the one hand it functions like a super state, on the other, a collection of squabbling competitors, with deep divisions between north and south. On June 23, the two-decade-old organization will be put to the test when Great Britain—its second largest economy—votes to stay in the EU or bail out.

The awkwardly named “Brexit” has stirred up a witches’ brew of xenophobia, racism and nationalism, but it has also served to sharpen a long standing debate among the European left over the nature of the organization, and whether it serves to unite a continent shattered by two world wars or functions as little more than a vehicle to spread a particular species of capitalism that has impoverished more people than it has lifted up.

The EU was originally sold as an effective way to compete with U.S. and Japanese commercial power (and later China) by integrating the economies of Western Europe into a common market. The 1957 Treaty of Rome established the European Economic Community (EEC), but that organization was plagued by currency instability.

Currency manipulation is a standard economic strategy, one the U.S. Treasury follows to this day. The idea is to boost exports by deflating one’s currency, thus making one’s products cheaper. In an organization like the EEC, however, where currencies were traded back and forth, that strategy caused chaos, particularly after the Americans decoupled the dollar from gold in 1971. The U.S. immediately began aggressively devaluing its currency and undercutting Germany.

To make a long history brief, Germany and France began pushing for a common currency, though for different reasons.

For Germany, fluctuating currency rates cut into that country’s export engine. For France, a common currency would give Paris some say over the EEC’s economic policies through the creation of a European Central Bank, policies that at the time were largely determined by Germany’s powerful economy.

Although Britain opted out of adopting the Euro, London rapidly became the financial center of the continent. In the end, 19 countries would adopt the Euro, creating the Eurozone. Eight others, including Denmark, Sweden and Poland kept their own currencies.

The common currency—established by the 1991 Maastricht Treaty and launched in 1999—effectively put the German Bundesbank in charge. Bonn agreed to the common currency, but only on the condition that everyone kept their budget deficits to 3 percent of national income and held their government debt level at 60 percent of GDP. Those figures matched Germany’s economy, but very few of the other states in the EU.

The Maastricht Treaty also transformed the EEC into the EU in 1993.

Deflating one’s currency as a tactic to increase exports and stimulate growth during a downturn was no longer an option, and the debt ratio was set so low that few economies could keep to its strictures. When the bottom fell out during the 2008 economic meltdown, EU states found out just what they had signed on for: draconian austerity measures, the widespread privatization of state owned enterprises—from water and electrical systems, to airports and harbors—and emigration. Millions of mainly young Portuguese, Irish, Greeks and Spaniards fled abroad.

The European Central Bank—with its cohorts, the International Monetary Fund and the European Commission, the so-called Troika—straitjacketed economies throughout the continent, turning countries like Greece, Spain, Portugal, and Ireland into basket cases, forcing them to borrow money to keep their banks afloat while instituting austerity regimes that led to massive unemployment, huge service cutbacks, and rising poverty rates.

The Troika had a neat trick: it shifted the debts incurred by private speculators on to the public, while the Germans spun up a fairy tale to explain the counter-example: the frugal frau.

“The Swabian housewife,” lectured German Chancellor Angela Merkel, “would have told us her worldly wisdom: In the long run you cannot live beyond your means.”

Except that the debts were not due to the Greeks, Irish, Spaniards, and Portuguese “living beyond their means.”  They were just picking up the tab run up by the speculators. The vast majority of “bailouts” that followed the crash went directly into the vaults of French, British, German, and Austrian banks. On the day the Greek “bailout” was announced, French bank shares rose 24 percent.

In many ways, the EU resembles a military alliance on the march.  Jan Zielonka, a professor of European politics at Oxford, calls the EU a “postmodern empire,” filling the vacuum created by the fall of the Soviet Union, using “checkbooks rather than swords as leverage.” During the Clinton administration, the EU—along with NATO—pushed eastward, creating what Zbigniew Brzezinski called “the Eurasian bridgehead for American power and the potential springboard for the democratic system’s expansion into Eurasia.”

The Obama administration strongly supports the UK remaining in the EU.

But the EU has very little to do with “democracy,” as the recent Greek crisis demonstrated. In a confrontation between the then newly elected Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis and German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schauble, the latter refused to negotiate over the austerity program that had cratered Greece’s economy. “I’m not discussing the program,” said Schauble, “This was accepted by the previous [Greek] government and we can’t possibly let an election change anything.”

In short, the Troika—an unelected body—makes all economic decisions and is unwilling to consider any other approach but that of the mythical Swabian housewife.  It isn’t democracy moving east, but the Bundesbank, and a species of capitalism that is unmoved by unemployment, poverty and widespread misery

So is the Brexit a challenge to the growing might of capital and an implicit critique of the EU’s dearth of democracy? Nothing’s that simple.

First, the loudest critics of the EU are people one needs a very long spoon to sup with: Marine Le Pen’s racist National Front, Britain’s xenophobic United Kingdom Independence Party, Hungary’s thuggish Jobbik, Greece’s openly Nazi Golden Dawn, and Italy’s odious Northern League. Hatred of immigrants and Islamophobia are the glue that binds these parties, which are active and growing throughout the EU.

Indeed, some on the British left have suggested voting against a Brexit precisely because the most vocal opposition to the EU comes from the most reactionary elements in the UK. The British Conservative Party is deeply split on the issue, with its most rightwing and anti-immigrant members favoring getting out.

The left is also filled with crosscurrents. While some argue for getting out because they see the EU as an undemocratic vehicle for the expansion of international capital, others are critical, but advocate staying in. British Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn—hardly a friend to international capital— opposes the Brexit.

While Corbyn is deeply critical of the EU’s lack of “democratic accountability, “ and its push to “privatize public services,” he argues that there is a “strong socialist case” for staying in.  Corbyn says the EU plays a positive role on climate change, and that exiting the EU would initiate a race to the bottom on issues like equal pay, work hours, vacations and maternity leave.  The Scottish National Party, which is to the left of the Labour Party, also opposes a Brexit, and threatens to call for another independence referendum if it passes.

Left parties in Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Ireland are critical of the EU, but most do not advocate withdrawing. What they are demanding is a say over their economic decisions and relief from the rigid rules that favor economies like Germany, and bar many others from ever becoming debt free.

It is ironic that Germany—the country that refuses to even consider retiring some of the overwhelming debts that enchain countries like Greece—owes its current wealth to the 1951 London Conference that cut post-war Germany’s debt in half, lowered interest rates, and stretched out debt payments. The result was the “Wirtschaftwunder” [economic miracle] and the creation of an industrial juggernaut. Greece’s Syriza Party has long called for such a conference to deal with the EU countries mired in debt.

There is no secret why Germany, France and the European Banks oppose debt reduction, or “haircuts”: Between the three of them they hold almost $84 billion of Greece’s debt

The polls show the British electorate could go either way on a Brexit. What happens if they do leave is hardly clear, because it would be a first. The predictions range from doom and gloom to sunny days, and everything in between, although it is doubtful the EU would severely punish Europe’s second largest economy.

One model the left needs to look at in this battle is Portugal, where three left parties, who have long fought with each other, found common ground around reversing the austerity policies that have racked the country’s economy for four years. Portugal just recently received a barely favorable bond rating that gives the coalition government some breathing room. The economy is growing and unemployment down, but at 129 percent of GDP, Portugal’s debt burden is still the third highest in Europe.

Alone, Portugal is no match for power of the Troika, but Lisbon has allies in Spain, Greece, Ireland and increasingly, Italy. Support for the EU in Italy has gone from 73 percent in 2010 to 40 percent today. “Europe has taken the wrong road,” says Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi. “Austerity alone is not enough.”

Given the absence of a strong, continent-wide left, however, reversing the current economic rules of the EU may be a country-by-country battle.

It is already underway, and for all of the economic power of the EU, the organization is vulnerable to charges that Brussels has sidelined democracy.

If Brussels—read Germany—can be persuaded or forced to agree to debt reductions, to loosen the spending restrictions and start pump priming, Europe can do something about its horrendous unemployment rate and underperforming economies. If not, whether the British leave or not may be irrelevant: a house divided cannot stand for long.

Obama’s Biggest Corruption Charade

James Bovard

The Obama administration wants Americans to believe that it is fiercely anti-corruption.   “I have been shocked by the degree to which I find corruption pandemic in the world today,” declared Secretary of State John Kerry at the Anti-Corruption Summit in London on May 12.   Kerry sounded like the French detective in Casablanca who was “shocked” to discover gambling. Six years ago at the United Nations, President Obama proclaimed that the U.S. government is “leading a global effort to combat corruption.”   Maybe he forgot to send Kerry the memo.

Much of the teeth-gnashing at the summit involved tax evasion. Politicians pledged to share more data on tax records and corporate ownership to help boost government revenue around the globe. Summit attendees castigated hidden offshore bank accounts – ironically, the same type of accounts used by both British Prime Minister David Cameron and Kerry. A joint communique solemnly pledged to “drive out those lawyers, real estate agents and accountants who facilitate or are complicit in corruption.”

But the summit largely ignored how corruption is fueled by western governments, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund. Foreign aid has long been notorious for breeding kleptocracies — governments of thieves. Economic studies have revealed that corrupt governments receive more foreign aid. Fourteen years ago, President George W. Bush promised to reform foreign aid: “We won’t be putting money into a society which is not transparent and corrupt.” (He probably meant “corruption-free.”) But U.S. aid programs – which cost taxpayers more than $40 billion a year – continue to bankroll many of the world’s most crooked regimes (according to ratings by Transparency International) – including Uzbekistan, Haiti, and Kenya. And there is no “Tyrants Need Not Apply” sign at the entrance to the U.S. Agency for International Development.

The Obama administration has valiantly resisted congressional efforts to stop payouts to political bandits abroad. In 2011, when a House committee sought to curb the abuse, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned that restricting handouts to nations that fail anti-corruption tests “has the potential to affect a staggering number of needy aid recipients.”

Since Obama took office, the U.S. government has provided more than $50 billion in foreign aid to Afghanistan – even though that nation’s president, Ashraf Ghani, admitted last week that his nation is “one of the most corrupt countries on earth.” Seven years ago, Obama gave his predecessor, Hamid Karzai, a six-month deadline to eradicate corruption. Obama’s imperative only accelerated the looting by Afghan government officials and cronies.

Pervasive corruption is a major reason why the Taliban is re-conquering more of that nation each year. At Afghanistan’s premier military hospital, some wounded Afghan soldiers starved to death because they could not afford to bribe the hospital staff for food. Much of the Afghan Army is practically bootless because of crooked contracts that deliver shoddy footwear that literally falls apart the first time soldiers wear them.

Kerry promised that the U.S. would help fund a Global Consortium of Civil Society and Investigative Journalists against Corruption. But on the homefront, the Obama administration has scourged individuals who disclosed federal abuses. Obama’s Justice Department launched more than twice as many federal prosecutions for Espionage Act violations as all previous administrations combined. When Obama took office, the U.S. was ranked as having the 20th most-free press in the world, according to the Reporters Without Borders’ World Press Freedom Index — in the same league as Germany and Japan. By 2016, it had fallen to 41st — worse than South Africa and barely ahead of Botswana. Despite Obama’s boast of running “the most transparent administration in history,” his appointees have helped turn the Freedom of Information Act into a charade.

Kerry joined foreign chieftains in calling for more transparency to fight corruption but he forgot to notify his own State Department. Three days before Kerry’s speech, the State Department confirmed that it had “lost” all the emails of I.T. technician who set up the private email server that Hillary Clinton used to potentially illicitly keep her correspondence secret (and to ignore federal law on classified information). Nor have we learned the shady details behind our former Secretary of State shoveling out scores of billions of dollars and special treatment to foreign governments at the same time the Clinton Foundation collected millions of dollars from some of the beneficiaries. Many of the oppressive nations that donated to the Clinton Foundation saw huge increases in approvals for weapons sales from the U.S. during Hillary’s time as Secretary of State.

In his London speech, Kerry boasted of U.S. government plans “to put $70 million into additional integrity initiative to help with local police training” to curtail “opportunity for bribery and graft.” Unfortunately, the Obama administration will continue fueling police graft here in the U.S. Obama’s Justice Department recently resumed a widely-denounced program to reward local and state law enforcement agencies for confiscating the property of hapless citizens who have been convicted of no crime. Government agencies routinely keep most of the money they confiscate, sometimes using it to pay bonuses to the lawmen who plundered private citizens. Federal law enforcement agencies used asset forfeiture programs in 2014 to seize more property from Americans than all the burglars stole nationwide.

Each summit attendee issued a statement “setting out the concrete actions they will take in order to tackle corruption.” Among other pledges, the U.S. government promised to conduct “Stronger Security Assistance Oversight” including “ensuring that our security assistance also addresses governance goals.” Tell that to the downtrodden Egyptians. The Obama administration continues providing more than a billion dollars of year to the Egyptian military – despite their role in toppling Egypt’s elected president in 2013 (a coup which Kerry bizarrely praised for “restoring democracy”) and slaughtering hundreds, if not thousands, of protestors. On the same day as Kerry’s speech, the Government Accountability Office reported that the State Department persistently violates federal law by providing military equipment to the Egyptian government and totally ignoring the requirement to track Egypt’s “gross human rights violations.”

Perhaps Americans should count their blessings that this particular international summit is not likely to spur a new war. Kerry and Obama are correct that corruption is a pestilence ravaging much of the planet. But the administration’s credibility would be boosted if it had not worsened the problem at home and abroad.

The Unraveling of Zionism?

Lawrence Davidson

Ideological movements, be they religious or secular, are demanding and Procrustean movements. By ideological movements I mean those that demand of their adherents resolute belief in some “deep set of truths” posited by a deity, by supposed immutable historical laws, or by some other equally unchallengeable source. Their followers, once initiated, or even just born into the fold, are expected to stay there and, as the saying goes, “keep the faith.”

However, in cultural, political and religious terms there are no eternal deep truths. History has an abrasive quality that erodes our beliefs in this god and that law. Though the process might take a longer or shorter time to manifest itself, yesterday’s faith will at some point start to ring less true. At some point followers start to fall away.

What happens when ideologically driven leaders start to lose their following? Well, they get very upset because those who are supposed to affirm everything the movement stands for are now having doubts. Such doubters are dangerous to the supposed true faith and so are usually dealt with in one of two ways: (1) the ideologues in charge attempt to marginalize the disaffected by denigrating them and then casting them out of the fold or (2) if we are dealing with totalitarian types, they send the dissenters off to a gulag, or worse.

This sort of unraveling – the loss of growing numbers of traditional followers of an ideological movement – seems to be going on within the Zionist community, particularly among American Jews. Zionism is an ideological movement that preaches the God-given Jewish right to control and settle all of historical Palestine. Since the founding of Israel in 1948 the Zionists have also claimed that the “Jewish State” represents all of world Jewry, thus self-aware Jews owe allegiance to both Israel and its prevailing Zionist philosophy. However, in the last ten or so years that allegiance has been breaking down. In the U.S. a growing “disconnect” has been noted between the outlook and actions of the ideologically rigid leaders of major U.S. Jewish organizations (who remain uncritically supportive of Israel) and the increasingly alienated Jewish American rank and file whom, at least up until recently, the leaders claimed to represent. This gap has been repeatedly documented by several sources ranging from, Pew Research Center surveys, to the Jewish Forward newspaper, and the organization of Reform Judaism.

As characterized by the Jewish Forward the situation is that ordinary American Jews are “far more critical of Israel than the Jewish establishment.” Almost half of the American Jews surveyed by a Pew study in 2013 did not think the Israeli government was making a “sincere effort” to achieve peace with the Palestinians. Almost as many saw Israel’s expanding colonization of the West Bank as counterproductive. Thus, this disconnect is not a sudden or new situation. The numbers of questioning American Jews have continued to grow, and things have only gotten worse for the Zionist leadership. Indeed, just as many young American Jews may be joining pro-peace activist groups as are cheering on AIPAC at its conventions.

Leadership Reactions in the U.S.

Following the two-option scheme described above, the main reaction of the leadership of American Jewish organizations is to try to marginalize these questioning Jews – to dismiss them as “uninformed, unengaged, or wrong.”  To that end American Jewish officials are now conveniently asking if they really need to represent “the disorganized, unaffiliated Jewish community … the 50% of Jews who, in a calendar year, do not step into a synagogue, do not belong to a JCC [Jewish Community Center], and are Jews in name only.”

This sort of marginalizing of all but the true believers was articulated by Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League. He told the Jewish Forward, “you know who the Jewish establishment represents? Those who care.” Here Foxman was engaging in a bit of circular thinking: the important constituency are those represented by the establishment. How do we know? They are the ones who still “care” about Israel. How do we define caring? Caring means continuing to believe what the Jewish establishment and the Israeli government tell them. Eventually Foxman goes even further, concluding that Jewish leaders aren’t beholden to the opinions of any aspect of the Jewish public. “I don’t sit and poll my constituency,” Foxman said. “Part of Jewish leadership is leadership. We lead.” It would appear that, over time, he is leading diminishing numbers.

Leadership Reactions in Israel

Reaction out of Israel to reports of the growing alienation of American Jews has been aggressively negative. After all, Israel is the centerpiece of Zionist ideology – its grand achievement. Being the subject of criticism by growing numbers of Jews, in the U.S. or elsewhere, is utterly unacceptable to those now in charge of Israel’s ruling institutions.

These leaders, both secular and religious, have begun to write off critical and skeptical Jews as apostates, even to the point of denying that they are Jews at all. Seymour Reich, who is a former chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations (such folks always wait till they retire to speak out critically), has recently described Israel’s current leadership as alarmingly anti-democratic. He writes of “the Israeli government’s assault on democratic values” and its use of “legislation and incitement to strike down dissent,” be it expressed through “speech, press, religion [or] academic freedoms.” He goes on to quote the Israeli Minister of Religious Affairs, David Azoulay. “Speaking about Reform and Conservative Jews,” who happen to make up the majority of Jews in the U.S., are often of liberal persuasion, and increasingly alienated by the ultraorthodox  policies of Israel’s religious establishment, Azoulay said, “I cannot allow myself to call such a person a Jew,” and, “We cannot allow these groups to get near the Torah of Israel.” Things appear potentially even worse when we hear Israel’s Intelligence Minister Israel Katz calling for the “targeted killing” of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) leaders. In the U.S. many of these leaders are Jewish.

Such official Israeli attitudes make a mockery of the claims of American politicians, such as Hillary Clinton, that Israel “is built on principles of equality, tolerance and pluralism. … And we marvel that such a bastion of liberty exists in a region so plagued by intolerance.” It should be noted that in January 2016 the Israeli Knesset rejected a bill that would have secured in law equality for all the country’s citizens.

In truth, Zionism and the state it created have always been ideologically rigid. Every effort at modifying the movement’s basic demand for a state exclusive to one people, from early concepts of “cultural Zionism” to more recent notions of “liberal Zionism,” has failed. The occasional bit of propagandistic dissimulation notwithstanding, Zionist leaders from Ben Gurion to Netanyahu have been dedicated to (a) territorial expansion based on the principle of Eretz Israel (greater Israel) and (b) the principle of inequality – none of them have ever seriously considered equal social and economic, much less political, treatment for non-Jews. That means that the present, obnoxiously rigid hardliners both in the U.S. and Israel are pushing persistent racist and colonialist themes.

It is the persistence of these Zionist themes that has led to increasing skepticism among U.S. Jews, most of whom take the ideals of democracy seriously. And it is the ideologically rigid refusal to reach a just peace with the Palestinians, who 67 years after the triumph of Zionism are still being ethnically cleansed, that has pushed many otherwise passive Jews into open opposition.

It has taken us several generations to get to this point, but our arrival has been predictable all along. That is because the ideology of Zionism brooks no compromises and admits to no sins – even as Israeli behavior grows evermore barbaric. Thus, the number of dissenters and critics grow and the ideologues start to become anxious and vengeful – a display of aggression that only alienates more Jews. Thus it is that Zionism has begun to unravel.

Sex , Sexuality And Sex Education In Punjab in 21st Century

Sunny Sandhu

Punjab is a predominantly patriarchal agrarian society . Men head the family and women playing a subordinate role . Sikhism and Hinduism are the major religions , with Muslims and Christians as Minorties .

What are Punjabis thoughts on Sex , Sexuality , Transgender and Homosexuality ? Punjabi people are deeply religious and religion dictates sexual attitudes . Kam / Lust is an enemy and has to be controlled . Marriage is the culturally accepted institution in which sex can be practised . Religious upbringing keeps Sex as primarily procreation activity and abhors the pleasure side of it .Premarital sex is not accepted by society , young punjabis are often humiliated for having premarital relationships and are blamed for bringing dishonour to the family . Transgenders are not accepted in mainstream society and have to live on the fringes reduced to beggars dancing and singing on weddings and birth ceremonies . Fate of homosexuals is not good either , Homosexuality is a taboo subject . In the mainstream media we read a lot about Child sexual abuse , Molestation , Kidnapping , Rape , Honour Killings , Lovers on the Run , Vulgarity , Eve Teasing , Acid attacks by dejected lovers .Rarely do we hear or read about good scientific sexual education being taught and respect to alternative sexuality . In our own day to day life how many homosexuals , transgender do we know or are friends with . Do we allow our young adults to practice their sexuality in a healthy manner ? According to the Indian penal code , Sexual intercourse below the age of 16 even with consent is considered rape . Is this law not creating unjustified fear ? Cant teenagers be taught to live healthy sexual attitudes from the the time of puberty ? Are teenagers above the age of 16 free to practice their sexuality in a comfortable manner ? Are they free to be in love and be loved ? Homosexuality is considered illegal when scientific research shows 1 in 20 individuals will have homosexual behaviour .

Sex and sexuality remain a taboo subject . Society continues to feel that there is something wrong in talking about Sex .Teenagers live misunderstood about their sexual feelings , which often leads to abnormal sexual behaviour . It has created a rather rebellious, violent and vulgar form of sexual culture in our society .

Human beings evolved from primates and grew in to societies and cultures . Our evolution is no longer merely physical but also cultural . Sex happens to be the most important but a very misunderstood activity . Sex from being a physical evolutionary reproductive force grew into a cultural evolutionary force with ability to enrich or destroy a society . In cultures where sexuality is respected in all forms , sense of harmony prevails . Individuals feel liberated , great energy is released in all domains of life , helping the nations/culture to be truly powerful and robust .

Science and spiritual aspects of Sex have been deeply explored in India which lead to growth of science of Kokashastra , Tantra and Kamasutra in India. Dasam Granth written by Guru Gobind Singh in Chaitropkahyan chapters , mentions of Kokashastras and the different sexual postures conducted to achieve high states of orgasmic pleasures . It also talks about consumption of opium , bhang and wine and achieving sexual bliss with them . These chapters gives us a very important historical and cultural understanding about Sexuality in Punjab . Spirituality was pursued with an open understanding of Sex and Sexuality and consumption of Opium , bhang and wine was a part of society . Such writings for most of the Punjabis in the 21 st century appear to be shocking with SGPC/Government avoiding any debate on it .

Modern Punjabi society seems to be in a crisis arising from misunderstanding towards Sex and Sexuality . First of all is the fixation for a male child which has lead to high rates of female foeticide in Punjab . for 893 females there are 1000 Men . These extra 107 men find difficult to find partners , are frustrated , prone to violent behaviours and drug abuse . Its also given rise to a new industry of buying wives from other states . Sex education is rather absent in schools . This further aggravates the situation as unhealthy sexual attitudes prevail in the society . Premartial sex is on the rise as the society is becoming increasingly westernised . Women are asserting themselves and are breaking patriarchal norms . More and more youth wish to have live in relationships , which is opposed to the traditional mindsets of society . While the law in India states that sex above the age of 16 is ok , culturally its hard to find openness to premarital sex . This is the grey zone where many myths are prevailing and where the drug epidemic and HIV/Hepatitis is being fuelled .

Its high time for society to open itself to sex and sex education . Our mind has to be trained for the beauty and sanctity of the human body and sexual urges . Respect for all forms of sexual behaviour has to be encouraged and youth have to be taught about Safe Sex , which prevents unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases . By practising healthy sexual life , individuals will feel mentally and spiritually well . Having stable sexual relationships of ones choice is important for the growth of the individuals .According to medical science half part of the brain is male and other half is female , that is the masculine and feminine side . There is a sexuality which is going beyond the physical sexual organs . A physical male can be feeling like a female at times and the vice versa . This is close to what is sometimes described as the Aradhnareshwara in Indian Philosophy . In the Guru Granth Sahib there is an excerpt reflecting on the same philosophy - Nar mein Purakh , Purakh Mein Naar , Jaane So Brahmgyani . A new culture of Love beyond the physical has to be created without denying the physical sexual wants and tendencies . True artistic /creative expression stems form the feeling of equality of the sexual energies within oneself beyond the physical sex of the body

Sexuality is a dynamic phenomenon and there are no fix interpretations to it . While heterosexuality is essential , Homosexuality also plays its own role in society. Homosexuality is not just about the act of anal penetration . Its about the whole aspect of an emotional bonding and relationships .Relationships are more about meaningful interactions , which bring an experience of being free . Society has to train itself to see meaningfulness of alternative sexuality and see divinity in all aspects of Sexual behaviour . 

Make Serving In War An Option, Not An Order

Kristin Y. Christman

Josef Beno didn't want to go to war. A Czech, he didn't want to kill his fellow Slavs, the Russians. A father, he didn't want to leave his starving family unprotected.

But the year was 1915 and Austria-Hungary was rounding up men and boys to serve in the war. Those who resisted were shot. After hiding for a year, Josef was captured for conscription. He escaped, only to be captured by Russians and marched to Siberia.

As the story goes, troops received injections by needle to make them aggressive. Perhaps it was merely a tale to explain a father's changed temper, for upon returning home, Josef physically abused his wife and children, including his daughter, my grandmother.

So women have gained equal rights to serve in combat. The top officials of the Army and Marine Corps earlier this year told Congress that women should register for the draft, and a bill to that effect is to be debated this month. But equal rights implies rights to greater freedom of will, not less. And while one can apply for conscientious objector status, this leaves one's fate with a judge.

It is now men who must gain equal rights with women, be freed from registration, and engage in war only by choice. Military service should not be dressed up as sacred responsibility if irresponsible policy entangles us in war.

When conscription was proposed prior to the 1812 U.S. invasion of Canada, an enraged Rep. Daniel Webster argued: "Where is it written in the Constitution ... that you may take children from parents, and parents from their children, and compel them to fight the battles of any war in which the folly or the wickedness of government may engage it?"

Do we truly care for our boys? It's hard enough for boys to endure an imbalanced childhood of overdone schooling. School staff can be wonderful and academics can be meaningful, but academic overkill can abort one's desire to ever read or write again as it represses biological and spiritual needs for adventure, movement, play, conversation, free thoughts, sleep, and fresh air. And then, at 18 years, to surrender the ultimate freedom, the right to live and let live, is, as Webster noted, blatant hypocrisy in a nation labeled free.

If "no taxation without representation" so stirred American revolutionists, why do Americans accept being taxed and potentially drafted for wars over which we've no vote, no hearings, no congressional dialogue? What was the point of school? To help us participate thoughtfully in democracy? Or to silence our minds and make us submissive? To create a repressed population eager to blame frustrations on foreigners?

Military registration threatens freedom far worse than gun registration. So why is military registration silently accepted while gun registration protest makes headlines? Or do folks plan to use their assault weapons against the draft board?

If males don't register, they're ineligible for federal college loans, federal jobs, and a New York driver's license. Just as selfish greed for resources can steer our external policies, venal selfishness is shamelessly bred by internal policies that bait males to accept killing in exchange for financial rewards and possible careers.

Ironically, draft proponents claim conscription is character-building; they see nothing selfish about killing as a means of building character. They don't see that the rest of us are building character in other ways.

President George W. Bush once remarked, "I do believe there is the image of America out there that we are so materialistic, that we're almost hedonistic, that we don't have values, and that when stuck, we wouldn't fight back."

But being willing to kill and be killed isn't a healthy, non-hedonist sign of morality, and thirst for shallow pleasure doesn't drive the anti-war movement.

President Gerald Ford abolished military registration in 1973, but President Jimmy Carter revived it in 1980 during Afghanistan's civil war in which Soviet-backed Marxists fought U.S.-backed fundamentalist mujahideen. Fear, ignorance, greed, "folly and wickedness" convinced U.S. policymakers to use foreigners' internal conflicts to pursue their own game of superpower rivalry for wealth and power. Even foreign efforts to help workers and the poor were labeled "communist" by the U.S. and sabotaged.

Decades of unpublicized controversy existed in government over the Cold War policies that many recognize today as small-minded. But why should U.S. males continue to pay the price and serve as a safety net for U.S. foreign policymakers' failures?

Like a hero struggling impressively to escape danger and grasp some hard-to-reach branch — that's the strenuous effort government should be exerting to pursue non-violent conflict resolution. Instead, government shirks its responsibilities and dwells upon which military strategy to pursue.

U.S. errors unnecessarily precipitating war include refusing to negotiate unless enemies obey U.S. pre-conditions, one-sided authoritarian negotiation, ignoring opponents' perspectives, discounting their fears, snubbing indigenous non-violent movements, opportunistically taking sides in others' conflicts, sending weapons, and covertly instigating conflict.

The obvious question: Should U.S. troops be required to fight wars precipitated by U.S. policymakers' failures and aggravated by an unrepresentative breed of Americans in power who obsessively prize wealth and control? Or is this an undemocratic abuse of troops?

With the refreshing exception of Green Party candidate Jill Stein, today's presidential candidates uphold the killing approach. But instead of sacrificing lives in some primitive rite upon Earth's altar, can't candidates sacrifice time to read books about foreign perspectives? Couldn't the Democratic and Republican parties follow the Green Party's lead and sacrifice allegiance to war-prone, wealth-oriented donors?

While some believe in the power of blood sacrifice to solve problems, it would be more practical for U.S. leaders to sacrifice time and ego to develop cooperative negotiation skills, sacrifice their addiction to sending arms, and sacrifice those murky pecuniary goals lurking behind war's stated goals.

Government had no right to force Josef Beno to fight 100 years ago, and it has absolutely no right to demand that our sons register and prepare for blood sacrifice today. No one has the right to such power over another being. So let's move beyond blood sacrifice and make the practical sacrifices that truly resolve conflict.

Religious Zealots Ready For Takeover Of Israeli Army

Jonathan Cook

Nazareth: In a surprise move, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu last week forced out his long-serving defence minister, Moshe Yaalon. As he stepped down, Yaalon warned: “Extremist and dangerous elements have taken over Israel.”

He was referring partly to his expected successor: Avigdor Lieberman, leader of the far-right Yisrael Beiteinu party, whose trademark outbursts have included demands to bomb Egypt and behead disloyal Palestinian citizens.

But Yaalon was also condemning extremism closer to home, in Netanyahu’s Likud party. Yaalon is to take a break from politics. With fitting irony, his slot is to be filled on Likud’s backbenches by Yehuda Glick, a settler whose struggle to destroy Jerusalem’s al-Aqsa mosque and replace it with a Jewish temple has the potential to set the Middle East on fire.

Israeli commentators pointed out that, with Lieberman’s inclusion, the government will be the most extreme in Israel’s history – again.

French prime minister Manuel Valls, who began a visit to the region on Saturday, is likely to face an impregnable wall of government hostility as he tries to drum up interest in a French peace plan.

Less noticed has been the gradual and parallel takeover of Israel’s security institutions by those espousing the ideology of the settlers – known in Israel as the national-religious camp.

None of this is accidental. For two decades the settlers have been targeting Israel’s key institutions. Under Netanyahu’s seven-year watch as prime minister, the process has accelerated.

Naftali Bennett, leader of the settler party Jewish Home and education minister, recently boasted that the national-religious camp, though only a tenth of the population, held “leadership positions in all realms in Israel”.

One such success for Bennett is Roni Alsheikh who was appointed police chief late last year. He was a long-time resident of Kiryat Arba, one of the most violent settlements in the occupied territories.

The force’s most recent campaign, “Believing in the police”, is designed to recruit more religious hardliners. Behind the programme are settler-politicians who have called Palestinians “sub-human” and expressed sympathy for those who burnt to death a Palestinian family, including a baby, last summer.

The other security agencies are being transformed too. Religious nationalists now hold many of the top posts in the Shin Bet intelligence service and the Mossad, Israel’s spy agency.

In the army too, the settlers are today heavily over-represented in the officers corps and combat units. For more than a decade their rabbis have dominated the army’s education corps, invoking God’s will on the battlefield.

But, despite these rising tidewaters, Israel’s traditional secular elite – mostly of European extraction – have desperately clung on to the top rungs of the army command.

Netanyahu bitterly resents their continuing control. They stood in his way at two momentous occasions, as he tried to overturn the Oslo accords in the late 1990s and to bomb Iran five years ago.

In a bid to curb their influence, Netanyahu tried to promote the religious Yair Naveh as military chief last year, but was blocked by the top brass.

Lieberman’s arrival as defence minister, however, may mark a turning point.

In some ways, less is at stake than Yaalon’s hyperbolic warning suggests. For decades the secular generals have been in charge of an occupation that has crushed the rights of Palestinians and caged them into ever-smaller holding pens. These generals have been just as cruel as the religious officers replacing them.

Nonetheless, the reverberations of this quiet revolution should not be ignored.

The old elites have lived off the fat of the land in the kibbutz, Israel’s spacious farming communities built on the ruins of hundreds of Palestinian villages ethnically cleansed in 1948.

After the 1967 war, the kibbutz-generals happily exported the same model of industrial-scale theft of Palestinian land to the occupied territories.

But their security obsessions were ultimately rooted in Israel, where they fear having to account for the crimes of 1948 from which they profited. Their abiding nightmare is a right of return to Israel of the lands’ original owners – Palestinian refugees today numbering in the millions.

The religious camp’s priorities are different. The lands they defend most passionately are not in Israel but in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. That is where many live and where the holy places that sanctify their territorial greed are located.

The spread of this zealotry into the army has deeply discomfited its more liberal elements. In recent years, small numbers of whistleblowers have emerged, from military intelligence unit 8200 through to a group called Breaking the Silence.

The recent video of an execution of a badly wounded Palestinian by army medic Elor Azaria – and the outpouring of public support in Israel for him – has only intensified these tensions. This month the army’s deputy head, Yair Golan, compared Israel to Nazi Germany in the 1930s. Lieberman, meanwhile, is Azaria’s most vocal supporter.

The goal of the religious nationalists is undisguised: to remove the last restraints on the occupation, and build a glorious, divinely ordained Greater Israel over an obliterated Palestinian society.

That means no hope of a peaceful resolution of Israel’s conflict with the Palestinians – unless it is preceded by a tumultuous civil war between Israel’s secular and its religious Jews.

Loathing Global Politics Is Dehumanizing The Mankind

Mahboob A. Khawaja

To Comprehend the Current Global Affairs

In 2008, Presidential candidate Obama inspired hope (“yes, we can”) for political change but it turned out to be a fallacy of perception and hope. The world is more dangerous place in 2016 than when a colored President Obama making history moved into the White House. In scholarly terms, politics is a game of pretension and obsession to egomaniac ideals to enhance one’s own image and interest for power. You can’t blame Obama squarely for all the wrong idealistic perceptions he generated to win the two presidential elections. Modern democracy is fast becoming a willful house of deception and exploitation for the rich and privileged ones. Was the 2011 Protest Movement not a revulsion against the same ideals? President Obama is leaving the presidency and the political world in much worst conditions than when he assumed the office. War is the only goal and policy aim that he pursued, not much different that of beleaguered George W. Bush did to dehumanize the American culture and victimize the humanity with new brand of terrorism. History speaks loud and clear. History will judge leaders and nations by their actions, not by their claims. None of these characters had any vision for universal harmony and sustainable political change or to foster peace and co-existence across many divided national lines of greed and hegemonic controls. American politicians do what political financiers and lobbyists dictate them to do - to loath the mankind with the fear of insecurity and continuous war agenda.

The Arab Middle East is virtually destroyed; its masses bombed, terrorized and displaced as unwanted refugees across many European national frontiers. The real problem of Palestine is replaced by the current wars to capsize the whole of the Arab world. Who is responsible for all the intriguing wars and backdoor conspiracies to kill one another? Have all the Arab people lost their sense of thinking and rationality? How would the future generations view them in a critical analysis? Were they so inept and stupid not to think of their own future and sustainability? The aggressors have carved up subjective titles and labels of sectarian killings, daily bloodbath and terrorism. As if it was not part of their planned scheme of things to dismantle the Arab freedom and human dignity. Was this perpetuated cruelty and darkness not the explicit outcome of the American and British war and occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan? Who will rebuild the century’s old cultures, human habitats and reputable ancient values that have been systematically destroyed by the war mongers?

In “How the United States and Britain Lost the Bogus War in Iraq and Afghanistan” (Global Research), this author clarified the pertinent facts of the bogus war: Michel Meacher, British Environment Minister under PM Blair (“This War on Terrorism is Bogus”) - provides reliable insight into the real reasons for the 'War on Terrorism'. He claims that the "war on terror" is flatly superficial: “the 9/11 attacks gave the US an ideal pretext to use force to secure its global domination ... the so-called 'war on terrorism' is being used largely as bogus cover for achieving wider US strategic geopolitical objectives ... in fact, 9/11 offered an extremely convenient pretext to put the PNAC plan into action. The evidence again is quite clear that plans for military action against Afghanistan and Iraq were in hand well before 9/11.”

David Swanson (“ISIS, Weapons Makers, Thugs Benefit from This Crime.” Dissident Voice), points out how the US weapon manufacturers have increased the cost of weapon sales by 19% and are ultimately the beneficiary of the war against ISIL. The coalition of war led by the US against ISIL is nothing but a paradox of self-contradictory coercive arrangement. The U.S. France, Germany, UK, Saudi Arabia, and Arab Gulf countries aim is to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad, which happens to be the goal of ISIL and other groups fighting in Syria. President Putin is shielding the besieged Bashar Al-Assad from final collapse and making gains in Syria and Arabian strategic thinking. Many Arab leaders are impressed by Putin’s decisive action to protect his client state. They could open new markets for Russian weapons and influence in the Arab world. President Obama remained in-between without any prompt action to oust Bashar Al-Assad. The current sectarian wars do not appeal to any holiest mission. The US and Russia are bombing to support their war economy and find a convenient pretext to kill the Arab people. American foreign policy aims at and acts like double-edge Razor King to install authoritarian regimes in the frontline Arab states and manipulate them for illegitimate purposes and exploitation of the natural resources. When these former neo-colonial tribal agents turned kings and princess become a liability, the US implies Plan “B” to get them killed by their own people like Ghadafi in Libya, Abdulla Saleh ousted in Yemen and Saddam Hussein hanged in Iraq. The Arab coalition leaders have no sense of time and history how the US will destroy the Arab culture and civilization by using false pretext of the war.

Truth is One, Not Many But Political Leaders will Deny it

We are witnessing an historic event and epic of empire-building. Leaders claiming to be democratically elected, think and behave like absolute dictators. President Obama is engaged in time-killing exercises at the end of his presidency. He was not an intellectual and proactive person leading to peaceful future-making. Mankind needs morally and intellectually responsible leadership to pursue a sustainable future. All absolute rulers and leaders tried to run down the mankind as if it was just a number - a digit - and conscious-less entity of technological imagination. But all of them have caused immense losses and liabilities to their own nations and empires. American political history was enriched with intellectual foresights and democratic values to safeguard the rest of the mankind. But its contemporary leaders and major institutions seem to defy the logic of peaceful co-existing with the global community.

The continuous wars have incapacitated the Arab states and rulers as some are complacent in providing logistical support to the US-British aggressions in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Western masses are against the wars but the US-Russian strategic plans increasingly pursuing more seen-unseen wars against the Arabs-Muslims, not just to occupy their natural resources but to go beyond Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria and Libya and occupy the lands and people. This is a call for a decadent Islamic culture to be destroyed within as the political developments are shaping up beginning with Palestine, Iraq, Syria onward to other Arabian Peninsula - collapse of the Muslim people to be taken over by the 21st century Crusaders. One wonders, if the oil enriched Arab elite occupying dusty palaces could come out to have the freedom to think on their own of a Navigational Change to avert the self-geared human catastrophes?

Chris Hedges (writes a regular column for Truthdig.com and was a foreign correspondent for The New York Times, and author of many books including his most recent book: Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle) contributes a realist observation (“The Ghoulish Face of Empire.” Truthdig.com), to make the US policy makers understand the untold and challenging facts of global politics:

The black-clad fighters of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, sweeping a collapsing army and terrified Iraqis before them as they advance toward Baghdad, reflect back to us the ghoulish face of American empire. They are the specters of the hundreds of thousands of people we murdered in our deluded quest to remake the Middle East…… The language of violence engenders violence. The language of hate engenders hate. “I and the public know what all schoolchildren learn,” W.H. Auden wrote. “Those to whom evil is done do evil in return.” It is as old as the Bible.

There is no fight left in us. The war is over. We destroyed Iraq as a unified country. It will never be put back together. ….We are not, as we thought when we entered Iraq…. We are something else. Fools and murderers. Blinded by hubris. Faded relics of the Cold War. And now, in the final act of the play, we are crawling away. Our empire is dying……. The disintegration of Iraq is irreversible. At best, the Kurds, the Shiites and the Sunnis will carve out antagonistic enclaves. At worst, there will be a protracted civil war. This is what we have bequeathed to Iraq. The spread of our military through the region has inflamed jihadists across the Arab world. The resulting conflicts will continue until we end our occupation of the Middle East. The callous slaughter we deliver is no different from the callous slaughter we receive. Our jihadists—George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld, Richard Perle, Thomas Friedman and Tommy Franks—who assured us that swift and overwhelming force in Iraq would transform the Middle East into an American outpost of progress, are no less demented than the jihadists approaching Baghdad. These two groups of killers mirror each other. This is what we have spawned. And this is what we deserve.

The Earth and Space are wired with secrecy, new and unthinkable weapons of mass destruction, and global warming is a clicking time bomb for the future. The most hated and feared leaders do not have the intellectual and political capacity to solve nay problems which they have engineered for their own interest and greed of power. The humanity looks to proactive scholars, visionary and intelligent people of new ideas and leaders of change to rebuild a systematic and institutionalized sustainable future for the humanity and to articulate a culture of freedom and human dignity to co-exist without the fear of wars and in complete harmony with the Nature of things - more so, to imagine man (human being), humanity and the Universe to co-exist without animosity of the few vengeful mindsets. Man being the most intelligent creation on planet Earth and being the nucleus of Humanity must think of his originality of Creation and coherent role-play within the Laws of God governing Man’s life and the Universe. The Man, the Humanity and the Universe must be seen as interrelated to envisage global peace and harmony on One Plant. Life, the Universe and the laws of governance of the planet are not the outcomes of politicians and staged actors. Is there anew culture of rethinking and emotions to bring the mankind back to its originality of rational unity and peaceful co-existence to save the humanity and civilizations? Lessons of history are ignored - most feared and most hated leaders, who drove the mankind to the insanity of the Two World Wars and current war agenda in the Middle East, likewise are actively engaged to undermine the future prospects of harmony between people of diversity and varied cultures. With failed international institutions, incompetent and corrupt global leadership affiliated to the Washington-based Military-Industrial complex continues to enforce militarization of the globe- an insane perversion against the logic of peace and co-existence amongst the mankind. The humanity looks to men of intellect, scholars of integrity for solutions, certainly not to the warmongers destroying life and habitats throughout the globe. Rationality asserts that the future belongs to the global citizenry not to the few sadistic warlords, and that an informed and politically mature and active global citizenry must have the opportunity to exercise its rights, choice and freedom to develop the futuristic global institutions and governance by integrating the moral and spiritual values of man, humanity and the living Universe as the rational forces of global conscience for a sustainable future. Being one Humanity on One Planet and One World, People of the world to which the Universe belongs, have never allowed any abstract institutions or governments or egomaniac leaders to act on their behalf? The message and its spirit are clear that the mankind as ONE rational force must act to safeguard the future.

China: How is Nuclear Security Understood?

Chao Xie

China is situated in a nuclear neighborhood, with Russia, India, and Pakistan in possession of nuclear weapons, the DPRK a potential owner, and several others with nuclear materials. Just as some of these states are confronted with eminent threats of political instability, terrorism and homegrown insurgencies, China is not immune from terrorist threats, and it has to tackle both domestic terrorism and the penetration of outside terror into its own territory. Thanks to the greater importance attached to nuclear security and safety, China has maintained a good record for more than 60 years, which is a remarkable achievement considering the volume of nuclear materials involved in its nuclear power capacity generation, and the threat level it has faced and is now facing.

According to the latest statistics, the Chinese mainland has installed 30 nuclear power generating units with a total capacity of 28.31 GW, and another 24 units of a total installed capacity of 26.72 GW have been planned or under construction. There are also plans to build offshore floating nuclear power stations. China is on the way to assure the world that more than enough measures have been taken to ensure security and safety. In order to make these achievements better known to the world, it published its first ever nuclear white paper in January 2016 - an unprecedented gesture - to show that its nuclear emergency responses have adopted “the most advanced technology and most stringent standards.”

However, its efforts in the nuclear security arena are not fairly recognised by the world: for instance it only ranked 19th, near the bottom in the latest theft ranking, in the Nuclear Threat Initiative’s (NTI) Nuclear Security Index. There is recent reportage to securitise China’s plans on nuclear power unit construction. The negative assessment embodied in such reports may partially be the result of a deep-rooted bias in some Western countries against a rising China, while in fact the latter has successfully developed effective systems to secure its nuclear material and facilities. As a matter of fact, greater concerns about the security of atomic energy establishments in the West only gained prominence after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and China’s emphasis on nuclear security predated even its Western counterparts. To some observers, the importance China has attached to nuclear security for decades is out of the ordinary.

Nevertheless, besides the hardware part of physical protection, there is an increasing awareness that it is up to individuals to ensure security by complying with rules and establishing best practices. This means a security culture should be able to permeate to all levels for people to understand the threats and the need to remain alert. Even though nuclear security culture is a relatively new topic in China, this does not mean it is lacking one. On the contrary, a deeper look into Chinese culture and way of thinking indicates that its perception about security and threat can better fulfill these needs.

In China, Anquan (安全) as a Chinese translation can be applied to both security and safety, while in English the two expressions – security and safety - have clear and specific meanings. When applied to the nuclear arena, as defined by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), nuclear safety is related to undue accidents and nuclear security - “the prevention and detection of and response to, theft, sabotage, unauthorised access, illegal transfer or other malicious acts involving nuclear material, other radioactive substances or their associated facilities.” In order to distinguish these two, nuclear experts in China are now translating security as Anbao (安保) in Chinese. The domestic debates on understanding security and safety, especially the enthusiastic discussions between nuclear technicians and strategists, help consolidate a typical culture emphasising both external and internal threats of nuclear establishments.

Chinese people have their way to understand the threat too. Compared with other states, especially the US, nuances in security paradigms can be found in China’s security culture and thus its out-of-ordinary emphasis on curbing nuclear threat can be understood. For US’ decision-makers and strategists, the threat is measured by the capability and intention of an outside power. In China, the threat is in parallel defined as a scenario in which its national security is threatened. With such a paradigm, the threat is not limited to that from a foreign power but also from within, and it embodies both military and non-military threats. This is why international analysts find that in China’s defence white papers, most security challenges come from various scenarios, rather than one specific enemy.

Compared to US’ rhetoric that nuclear terrorism is “the single most important threat” to its national security, nuclear security in general is prioritised to the level of national security in China, because a scenario of a possible nuclear theft or accident can threaten national security. This philosophy tends to raise domestic consciousness on nuclear security and safety and a security culture such as this can also help reduce “insider threats,” which are increasingly critical to safeguard a state’s nuclear security. This is as understood in a Chinese saying, Jia Zei Nan Fang (家贼难防), which literally means “a thief from within is hard to guard against.” The underlying logic is that an insider has the access, knows the vulnerable points and should he get the chance, is more likely to succeed in penetrating the system. Such emphasis on a greater sense of security goes in line with the increasing international awareness on nuclear security reflected in the four Summits.

Even as China has instituted effective security measures and is equipped with an active sense to safeguard nuclear security, it must remain alert and engage in more international conversations to review the rapidly changing threat scenarios, and share and learn best practices from each other. New ways are needed to tackle new threats and vulnerabilities; for instance, cyber security requirements at nuclear facilities should be reviewed and renewed on a regular basis.

A recent project undertaken by China can meet such ends. The establishment of the Nuclear Security Center of Excellence in Beijing was first discussed and agreed between China and the US at the Nuclear Security Summit (NSS) in Washington, DC, in 2010. The center opened in March 2016, on the occasion of the fourth Summit. According to sources, it is the largest of its kind in the Asia Pacific region, boasting a capacity to train up to 2,000 nuclear security staff each year and hence making itself a center for international exchanges and cooperation on nuclear security. Furthermore, China’s position on safeguarding nuclear materials could be better understood by the world through hosting international peer reviews, and publishing nuclear security-related annual reports.