Application Deadline: 31st July 2018 Eligible Countries: Developing Countries To Be Taken At (Country): Kigali, Rwanda About the Award: In order to ensure the daily issues faced by rural poor people and their communities are acknowledged, it is important that their stories are heard and their voices are amplified. With funding from the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the specialised UN agency, we will bring together journalists from around the world in Rome to attend IFAD’s event on innovative approaches to inclusive financing for rural transformation. The 2030 Global Agenda requires the development of innovative approaches incentivizing sustainable and inclusive investments. Such approaches are about aligning private and public investors around shared sustainable development objectives and mobilizing diverse sources of development finance (including climate finance and private finance), channeling it towards rural investors, including smallholder farmers and rural small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Being at the conference will allow journalists access to high profile delegates, leading experts in the issues, including IFAD and UN technical experts, as well as a number of small holder farmers who will be invited. IFAD works with those most affected by poverty, food security, gender inequality, environment and climate change. This should not be seen as a one-off workshop; indeed, we would expect all journalists who are selected to attend to pursue stories along these issues in their home countries after the workshop. Type: Workshop Eligibility:
An opportunity for journlaists from across Africa.
Applicants must be full-time journalists or regular contributors to a media organisation. Applicants must be able to demonstrate a commitment to a career in journalism in their country, and should have at least two years’ professional experience and have a good level in spoken and written English. Facilitators will also speak French.
We would also like to see professional evidence of your interest in the field of rural peoples’ issues and development.
Number of Awards: Not specified Value of Award: Bursaries would include air travel expenses (economy class), accommodation, local transfers and meals. Please note that you need to check visa requirements and ensure you have the necessary documentation required. The cost of your visa and any other related costs will be the responsibility of the participant. This arrangement is subject to variation. Duration of Program:03 September to 07 September How to Apply: Please provide the following: Statement explaining your motivation to attend; your CV or biography; and two examples of your work. APPLY Visit the Program Webpage for Details Award Providers: International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD)
Application Deadline: 12th October 2018 Eligible Countries: International To Be Taken At (Country): Germany About the Award: Applicants are invited to base their projects on the collections of the Deutsches Museum and to cooperate closely with museum staff on site when formulating their research proposals. Projects involving innovative approaches to artefact-oriented research are especially welcome. During their stay, visiting scholars will have daily contact with the museum´s curators, archivists and librarians (approx. 50 staff members) as well as members of the Münchner Zentrum für Wissenschafts- und Technikgeschichte (Munich Center for the History of Science and Technology; approx. 50 staff members). Scholarship holders will have their own workplace with a desktop computer and telephone, and the opportunity to reside temporarily in subsidized apartments of the museum complex insofar as these are available. They will present their research projects to colleagues at the beginning of their stay and will be expected to participate regularly in the museum’s and the Munich Centre’s Monday colloquium series and workshops. Type: Research Eligibility:
Scholars at any level of seniority are eligible to apply, provided they have at least one university degree.
There are no restrictions regarding nationality.
All scholars are requested to make their own provisions for health insurance.
The ability to read German is a prerequisite for the application (passive language skills).
Number of Awards: Not specified Value of Award: Pre-doctoral stipends: € 7,500 (six months) / € 15,000 (full year). Post-doctoral stipends: € 15,000 (six months) / € 30,000 (full year). Duration of Program: 6 or 12 months How to Apply: Please send applications, including:
two confidential references (can be sent directly by the referees)
to the following address: Andrea Walther Coordinator of the Research Institute Deutsches Museum 80306 Munich Tel.: 00 49 (0) 89 2179-280 Fax: 00 49 (0) 89 2179-239 E-Mail: a.waltherdeutsches-museum.de Visit Programme Webpage for Details Award Providers: Deutsches Museum
Until 2008, Bangladesh elections did not attract much attention in India and at the same, within Bangladesh India never figured as an important factor in any of its election discussions, neither.This changed since 2008. Although seeds of the change were sown more immediately in the aftermath of the end of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) rule in 2006, its origin goes back to the evolving character of politics of Bangladesh,especially since 1975.
In 1975,numerous coups and counter coups contributed to Ziaur Rahman, the military commander and a liberation war hero assuming power who also formed within couple of years his own political party, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, BNP. Zia re-oriented Bangladesh both ideologically that promoted the notion of a Bangladeshi national identity based on its majority faith, Islam. He also redefined Bangladesh’s geopolitical arrangements which until then was dictated by a‘25-year India/Bangladesh friendship treaty’ that gave India disproportionate control over Bangladesh’s foreign and defence policies. Zia scrapped the treaty. India was unhappy but not hostile.
India’s ire with BNP intensified after Zia’s death, more pronouncedly since 1990 when after staying few years in the political wilderness, the party returned to power through a first ever free and fair election in the country. During its first tenure, BNP focused more on development issues and less on foreign relations. However, it was during its second term, 2001-2006, that India became particularly unhappy with BNP as the party leaned more and more towards the Islamic block including Pakistan. India was also annoyed because during this term, it blamed BNP for alleged collaboration with Pakistan’s notorious ISI, its military intelligence in supporting cross—border insurgencies in North East India.
The discord between BNP and India was mutual – while, India regarded BNP as a security threat, BNP viewed India as an impediment to Bangladesh’s progress.
In end 2006, BNP’s second term ended amidst allegations of massive corruption, harbouring of cross—border terrorism against India and promotion of Islamic sectarian politics in Bangladesh. Furthermore, against the backdrop of growing mutual dislike between itself and India As the prospect of an election loomed, India for the first time became openly active in Bangladesh’s internal politics, with the aim to replace BNP with the party of their choice, the Awami League (AL), in the seat of government.
2008 Election and India: the beginning of engineering
An army backed Care-Taker Government (CTG) took over power in 2007 and under its supervision, an election was held in 2008 and as was predicted and given BNP’s poor record in governing BNP lost the election and AL won. Up to this was fine. Given BNP’s poor record in governance no one doubted that AL would win but what surprised most observers was the magnitude of the victory – AL won with two/third majority and this is where India’s engineering of Bangladesh’s election first began.Indeed it is surmised that one individual that played a key role in catalysing India’s engineering of Bangladesh election outcomes was none other than the then Foreign Minister, Pronob Mukherjee, Sheikh Hasina, the leader of AL addresses as ‘Dada’ (brother). India’s backing of AL did produce its desired result but as could be expected, not without a price.
Indeed, reporting on India’s role in AL’s victory and AL’s gratuitous reciprocation to India,the Economist, duly recorded how ‘bag full of Indian cash and advice’ produced dramatic results for the AL and that how ever since this victory, “….. relations with India have blossomed…..Bangladesh has cracked down on extremists with ties to Pakistan or India’s home-grown terrorist group, the Indian Mujahideen, as well as on vociferous Islamist (and anti-Indian) politicians in the country. India feels that bit safer.”AL’s 2008 victory also resulted in granting of numerous other favours without a quid pro quo,most notably the promised Teesta water never flowed to irrigate and navigate Bangladesh Rivers.AL’s gratitude and subservience to India also had a sad side to it. At this time when India’s Border Security Forces were indiscriminately killing border-crossing Bangladeshis – indeed illegally – AL government looked the other way and never complained.
Other changes of ominous nature that have changed Bangladesh’s political processes for ever soon followed, presumably with India’s nod.After ascending to power in 2008 AL took steps to ensure its permanency in the government. It took full advantage of its two/third majority in the Parliament- many believe an outcome of India’s election engineering – and scrapped the non-party election-time Care-Taker Government (CTG) system, a system that while in opposition AL itself once demanded and got installed and a system that conducted four elections – including the one that brought AL to power in 2008 – with such integrity and neutrality that it became a world model. However, killed by its midwife and by putting the government controlled Election Commission (EC) in charge of polls,the AL has virtually banished all possibilities of fair contest and instead ensured its permanency in government, an arrangement that obviously suited India.
2014 Election and India: blatant engineering
However despite these opportunistic changes and because of its poor record in human rights, corruption, rule and also due deteriorating law and order etc. AL’s popularity plummeted by the end of its tenure in 2013 and as another election neared, AL sensed trouble especially because its adversary, the BNP which it subjected to untold repression and suppression during the last 4 years of rule re-surged as a formidable force.
Encouraged by its renewed strength BNP started to prepare to participate in the upcoming 2014 election, but fearing another engineering from within and outside, it was reluctant to do sothrough the government controlled EC system. They demanded re-introduction of the non-party CTG system, as poll supervisor. However, given its dwindling popularity, this was too much of a risk forAL to take and thus it refused to revert to CTG system. BNP remained adamant and decided to boycott the election. This shook AL and also its patron India. India immediately got into the act to the rescue its client.
By ignoring all diplomatic norms India got itself engaged in Bangladesh’s election process quite openly and its top bureaucrats became regular visitors to Dhaka, lobbying and pressurizing brazenly various opposition parties including BNP to participate in the election under the EC system. Indians also started to lobby the international community in a partisan manner arguing that AL was West’s best bet in their fight against ‘Islamic terrorism’ and thus an AL ‘win’ in the ensuing election must not be compromised. However, as BNP’s – the only credible opposition party in Bangladesh – boycott of election became more and more evident, India’s biggest challenge was to find an ‘opposition’ to give the election result – which no one had any doubt what that would be – some legitimacy.
India’s scheming bureaucrats got into action with incredible zeal to manufacture an ‘opposition and found in the Jatiyo Party (JP), party of the much despised and deposed military ruler, Ershada willing partner. JP agreed to ‘participate’ in the ‘election’ in exchange of basket-full of favours in a post-election AL government.
Thus JP ‘participated’ andAL ‘won’ and JP got its promised gifts – itis now both an opposition in the Parliament and also a partner in the government, it holds several cabinet posts and the party chief, Ershad who once earned the unenviable title of Biswa Behaya(the most shameless person on earth)became a special envoy of the Prime Minister.
This is how India, World’s largest democracy created history by engineering one of world’s worst.Commenting on the farcical nature of the 2014 Bangladesh General Election the Hindu, a leading newspaper in India observed at the time that “By every account, the January 5 election [of 2014], Bangladesh’s 10th so far, was a low point for democracy. The boycott of the 18-member Opposition alliance meant half the seats Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League won were uncontested, and about half of the remainder were against unknown candidates with estimates of the turnout just 22-30% of the voting population.”Furthermore, even though West would always prefer a government in Bangladesh, a Muslim majority country that takes a strong stand against ‘Islamic terrorism’ and AL promised to do so, they refused to endorse India’s blatant engineering of the election and US slammed it by saying that it was “disappointed “andUK, Australia and the EU actually called for “another poll at the earliest.”
“Another poll” never happened. AL continued to rule,without any legal and moral legitimacy and with impunity. It unleashed unimaginable brutal and dubious legal means – which is continuing till to date – to suppress and marginalise the opposition, allegedly, with India’s help. Indeed, according to Shafquat Rabee, a social media activist that in post 2014 periods India’s control over Bangladesh complete and all-encompassing that “Many in Bangladesh now believe…….that India is behind the day–to-day security protection of certain Bangladeshi leaders. India is carrying out stealth operations inside Bangladesh wearing Bangladeshi forces’ dresses. India has trained and sent special operations teams in Bangladesh.”
India rejects these claims as “outrageous and unfounded”butwith another general election in Bangladesh looming at the end of 2018, itsdomineering role in Bangladesh’s internal politics that has not only re-surfaced but it is re-appearingwith a worrying difference gives much credence to this theory.
Upcoming 2018 Election and India: from blatant engineering to colonial domination
With general election in Bangladesh lurching and with ruling AL’s popularity plummeting again and in the absence of its old ally, the Congress in the government in India, AL including Sheikh Hasina, the PM of Bangladesh herself are vigorously lobbying the BJP government for its patronage(read this as engineering) in the election. Indeed, reporting on a recent meeting between Hasina and Modi, the Indian PM in Kolkata in May this year, the Anandabazar revealed that the Bangladesh prime minister made a fervent appeal to her Indian counterpart for support, while reminding him of the favours her government had extended to his country especially in tackling militant insurgencies in India’s Northeast, suppressing Islamists and also of the support the party provided to India “…..in all its international endeavours since her party came to power in January 2009”. Quoting unspecified sources, the Ananda Bazar also reported that Sheikh Hasina further reminded Modi that if ALfailed to ‘win’ the upcoming election, “India would have another Pakistan on its eastern front” alluding to the BNP, its rival as a ‘pro-Pakistan’ party, arguing that if BNP comes to power it would risk India’s security, with Pakistan’s help all over again.
However, what is quite revealing in the current dynamics and something that had never happened in the political landscape of Bangladesh before,is that the opposition BNP, often regarded as ‘anti-Indian’ and a staunchly nationalist political party has also become a cahoot in the cabal. In June the BNP had sent a high-powered delegation to Delhi and met BJP heavies and while promising to assist India in its security concerns and stressing that if elected the party would never allow and/or support any cross-border insurgency activities on Bangladesh’s soil, argued that it is in India’s interest that they be seen as a “champion of democracy and human rights” in the coming election and not be partisan and support Sheikh Hasina who according to BNP is building a “one-party rule” in Bangladesh. BNP delegation appealed to the Modi government to support a free and fair election and play “a constructive role, and not back any one party in the elections.” Following the trail of AL and BNP, other political leaders including Ershad have also joined the cavalcade to Delhi.
As could be predicted,parleys with India by the two rival major Bangladeshi parties for its election-time patronage have degenerated into usual AL/BNP spat. The pro-AL local media have greeted BNP’s- a party that until recently projected itself as a staunch nationalist party and AL as India’s stooge -lobby with India with sarcasm.However BNP claims that that there an important difference between them and AL – AL wants Modi to arrange its win, BNP appealed to India to ensure a free and fair election.
Regardless, the ominous dimension of the pilgrimage of Bangladeshi politicians to India on the eve of another general election in Bangladesh drives one hard and unpalatable truth which is that it is not the people of Bangladesh but India that decides who they be governed by – this is nothing but a clear manifestation of colonial structuration of relations currently existing between the two countries.
On Delhi’s defence this can indeed be claimed that so far has remained non-committal and has indicated that they may not take any side as they prefer not to put ‘all eggs in the same basket’. But putting different ‘eggs’ in different baskets hardly changes the fundamental and this is because in a colonial arrangement that currently characterizes Delhi/Dhaka relationship ‘eggs’ may be different but the ‘basket’ would still be Delhi’s – they would be calling the shots, not Bangladeshis. Indeed, in this evolving self-inflicted self-colonizing political scenario,the people of Bangladesh has lost their freedom. Thanks to self-seeking politics, their leaders have turned them into a flock of sheep to be herded by India. This is both sad and also dangerous.
Capture of Bangladeshi institutions, engineering election outcomes and installation of puppet governments in Bangladesh by India to fill its hegemonic aspirations may help it in the interim but a whole nation disrespected and cornered over a long period of time is unlikely to be in its best interest. Pakistan tried that. For over 25 years Pakistan tried to subdue, exploit and plunder erstwhile East Pakistan is through puppets regimes but failed. A time came when‘East Pakistanis’, the Bengalis of Pakistan’s eastern wing – 90% of whom are Muslims –rose against their Muslim cousins, kicked them out and separated from them in bloodied conditions.
Indeed, prolonged suppression of popular wills has its risks, sowould ‘Dadagiri’, eventually!
In order to chart a more mutually respectful and thus a more enduring relationship between the two countries what is required is that both countries understand each other’s needs and fears in equal measure. Bangladesh has to realize that India is an important and a powerful neighbour and therefore, it is not in its best interest to do things that threaten its neighbour’s interests especially its security interests and at the same time, as Kofi Anan once said, “No nation can make itself secure by seeking supremacy over allothers” India also has to appreciate that colonial domination and puppet and unpopular governments in its neighbourhood may give it temporary but not enduring reprieve. If history is any guide, such an approach may do just the opposite. While India has to ensure that it does not have another Pakistan next door, it also has to make sure that its actions do not produce another Kashmir in its backyard.
Therefore, as fast growing economies both India and Bangladesh must look at opportunities that benefit them mutually and also equitably and promote activities that strengthen each other’s security and sovereignty.
The Bangladesh 2018 election offers a good opportunity for both India and Bangladesh to end an arrangement that is unhealthy and mutually predatory and make a new-beginning to work towards lasting peace, security and prosperity of their people.
A new East Timorese government was sworn into office on June 22, following an early election held in May that was triggered by the collapse of a minority Fretilin administration earlier this year. Fretilin is now the official opposition party, after receiving 34 percent of the total vote and 23 of the 65 seats in parliament.
A new tripartite coalition called the Alliance of Change for Progress (AMT), led by Xanana Gusmão and Taur Matan Ruak, is in power, after it won 49.6 percent of the vote and 34 parliamentary seats. Ruak, the former head of the Timorese military, has been installed as prime minister.
Gusmão, the former guerrilla leader during the Indonesian occupation of the former Portuguese colony (between 1975–1999) and former president and prime minister of the new state, is reportedly preparing to serve as the Minister of State and Advisor to the Prime Minister. This position will see him retain control over negotiations for the pending corporate exploitation of the Greater Sunrise and other offshore gas fields.
The new government confronts an escalating political and economic crisis, exacerbated by rising geo-political tensions that are being fuelled by the efforts of the US and its allies, including Australia, to counter China’s regional influence.
Timor’s political establishment, which continues to be dominated by the “1975 generation” of independence leaders, is increasingly distrusted by ordinary people. Those aged less than 25 years comprise nearly 70 percent of the population. All they have experienced is the bitter failure of the promise that an “independent” capitalist statelet established under the patronage of various imperialist powers would deliver prosperity and national liberation.
Scheduled parliamentary elections in July 2017 followed two years of a so-called national unity government in which Fretilin and Gusmão’s National Congress for Timorese Reconstruction (CNRT) shared power. Mass poverty and unemployment continued to plague Timor, and both parties saw their vote decline in the 2017 poll, with the CNRT registering an 8 percent plunge, to 29.5 percent.
Fretilin only just won in 2017, securing 29.7 percent of the vote, and went on to form a minority government with just 23 of the parliament’s 65 seats. However, the CNRT and other smaller opposition parties subsequently blocked all government legislation, including the national budget. A protracted impasse was only broken earlier this year by President Francisco Guterres who triggered another election—the first time an early vote has been held in the country.
Fretilin lost despite its share of the vote increasing from under 30 percent in 2017 to 34 percent this year. This small rise did not reflect growing support for the incumbent government. Whereas in 2017 twenty different parties were on the ballot, this year just eight options were presented to voters. Minor parties formed multiple electoral coalitions in an attempt to reach the 4 percent of the vote required for a seat in parliament under the proportional representation system.
Fretilin’s election campaign featured party leader Mari Alkatiri promising to create additional “special economic zones,” in a bid to attract additional international investment by offering corporations more zero-tax and cheap labour havens. The pledge underscored Fretilin’s evolution over recent decades—in line with bourgeois nationalist organisations around the world—from a party purporting to represent the anti-colonial and even anti-capitalist aspirations of the masses to one acting as the open and ruthless instrument of finance capital and transnational corporations.
Less than a fortnight after the new AMT government formally took power, it is already clear that Timor’s political crisis has been exacerbated by the latest elections.
Beyond a shared thirst for the spoils of power, there is little uniting the three component parties of the governing AMT coalition. Gusmão’s CNRT and Taur Matan Ruak’s People’s Liberation Party are the main forces, backed by the year-old Khunto party that was formed by several of Dili’s martial arts street gangs.
The AMT is mired in numerous corruption allegations. President Guterres last month refused to swear-in 11 proposed government ministers, on the basis that some already had corruption convictions while others are under active investigation by the public prosecutor’s office. The latter category reportedly included the government’s proposed defence and finance ministers. Xanana Gusmão boycotted the swearing in-ceremony, in protest against Guterres’s decision.
While Ruak is prime minister and Gusmão his senior “advisor,” it remains to be seen how the two figures, who have previously clashed over rival economic development initiatives, will work together. In 2006, while serving as president, Gusmão helped instigate a violent split within the Timorese military and collaborated with an Australian military intervention in order to oust his rival, Fretilin’s then Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri.
There are also reported tensions between the AMT government and the Timorese armed forces.
A New Zealand Defence Force commander, Kerry McKee, who is serving as a “strategic advisor” within the Timor-Leste Defence Force (F-FDTL) leadership, has raised the prospect of a military coup. In a provocative email distributed via an East Timor “riseup” listserv, McKee explained that there were personal tensions between F-FDTL head Lere Anan Timor and both Prime Minister Ruak and his proposed defence minister.
“How this will play out will be interesting to watch,” McKee wrote. “[I]s there potential for the foundation of a coup d’état should Govt not perform [?] A long shot but not beyond the realm of possibility noting [Lere Anan Timor’s] continued commentary on politics.”
Australian imperialism is undoubtedly continuing to intrigue behind the scenes. Last March, concerned by China’s growing influence as well its ability to exploit Australia’s hypocrisy over territorial disputes in the South China Sea, the Turnbull government conceded a maritime boundary covering the gas-rich Timor Sea. The Australian government and its allied transnational energy giants are nevertheless still refusing to countenance piping the Greater Sunrise gas reserves to Timor to be processed.
At the same time, an anti-democratic, secret trial is being prepared for a former Australian Secret Intelligence Service (ASIS) officer, who is only identified as Witness K, and his lawyer, former Australian Capital Territory Attorney-General Bernard Collaery. Witness K exposed the illegal bugging of an East Timor cabinet room in 2004, by spies posing as aid workers, during negotiations for the division of Timor Sea oil and gas revenues between Canberra and Dili.
The provocative prosecution of the whistleblower and his lawyer is undoubtedly intended, at least in part, to send a pointed message to the Timorese government, ahead of a planned visit to Dili by Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop later this year.
Former Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak was arrested on Wednesday and charged over a multi-billion dollar corruption scandal involving the state investment fund, 1Malaysia Development or 1MDB. Razak, who appeared in court yesterday, pled not guilty to all charges and was released on bail of 1 million ringgit ($US247,000).
The newly-installed government headed by Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammad rapidly ramped up the 1MDB probe after winning the May 9 election, which ended six decades of rule by governments dominated by the right-wing United Malays National Organisation (UMNO).
Mahathir, who was head of UMNO and prime minister from 1981 to 2003, exploited the corruption scandal to the hilt during the election campaign. By ensuring that Najib is charged, he is seeking to consolidate his grip on power, which rests on an unstable five-party coalition. Other arrests could be pending. The new government has banned a number of former officials, as well as Najib, from leaving the country.
The 1MDB scandal, which erupted in 2015, has been a revealing exposure of the manner in which UMNO and its allies, not just Najib, have ruled Malaysia since formal independence in 1957. Najib attempted to quash any investigation into 1MDB, including by firing his attorney general, but the scandal triggered probes by authorities elsewhere—in the US, Singapore and Switzerland.
The US Justice Department filed a civil action in 2016 alleging that $4.5 billion was looted from the investment fund. The lawsuits implicated Najib, who was identified only as “Malaysia Official 1,” along with his close associates and relatives. It was alleged that $681 million from 1MDB went into his personal accounts, which he claimed was a legitimate political donation to UMNO.
Najib has been charged with three counts of criminal breach of trust, which is punishable by up to 20 years in jail, and one of using his position for gratification. The charges related to just one aspect of the scandal, involving $10.5 million, allegedly from a former 1MDB unit, that wound up in his personal account.
The scandal highlights the incestuous relations that UMNO and its political and financial cronies developed with all aspects of the Malaysian state. The UNMO-led coalitions presided over a police-state apparatus that suppressed all forms of political opposition. In 1998, in the midst of the Asian financial crisis, Mahathir fell out with his deputy and finance minister Anwar Ibrahim, expelled him from UMNO and had him arrested and jailed on trumped-up charges of corruption and sodomy.
Mahathir has never been charged with corruption, but he was notorious for his close connections to financial cronies. Last July, as pressure mounted on Najib to resign, he sought to deflect attention from the 1MDB scandal by lashing out at Mahathir. “Under his leadership many corners were cut, and the Malaysian people had to pay a very high price so that a few of his friends benefited, even when symbols of national pride had horrendous and catastrophic decisions inflicted on them,” Najib said.
In reality, the 1MDB affair has little to do with fighting the endemic corruption in the Malaysian ruling elites. It is bound up with bitter internal tensions fuelled by global economic instability and rapidly sharpening geo-political tensions, in particular between the US and China. Like its counterparts throughout the region, Najib’s government sought to balance between the economic powers as the Obama administration ramped up its confrontational “pivot to Asia” aimed at undermining China throughout the region—a policy continued under Trump.
Obama sought to woo Malaysia more closely into the US sphere of influence. In 2013, when Najib scraped back into office on the basis of a flagrant gerrymander, Obama rang the Malaysian prime minister to congratulate him, despite mass opposition protests. In April 2014, Obama became the first US president to visit Malaysia since 1966. He signed a “Comprehensive Partnership” with Najib and pointedly refused to meet with opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim.
Najib strengthened military ties with the US and lined up with the Obama administration in criticising China over its territorial claims in the South China Sea. Malaysia also joined the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), engineered by the Obama administration as a means for undermining Chinese trade and investment.
At the same time, however, Najib sought to maintain close economic ties with China, which is Malaysia’s second largest export market after Singapore, and largest supplier of Malaysian imports. In 2015, the state-owned China Nuclear Power Group announced a $2.3 billion purchase of 1MDB power assets, helping ease the pressure of the scandal on Najib. In 2016, Najib visited China and sealed a raft of agreements, including to forge closer military ties. As part of its huge One Belt, One Road infrastructure program linking Eurasia, China has heavily financed a number of Malaysian projects.
The growing ties between Malaysia and China must have sounded alarm bells in Washington. Certainly, the Wall Street Journal played a major role in exposing the various aspects of the 1MDB scandal and the US Treasury authorised a probe into the allegations. Along with concerns about Malaysia’s ties with China, Wall Street has always been hostile to the economic controls and cronyism that act as a barrier to foreign investment in Malaysia. In 2016, the Economist magazine’s crony capitalism index ranked Malaysia as the second worst in the world, after Russia.
Notwithstanding Obama’s diplomatic outreach to Najib and a meeting between Trump and Najib in the White House last September, Washington played a significant role in his political demise by highlighting the 1MDB corruption revelations.
Mahathir’s new government quickly signalled a review of Malaysia’s involvement in the One Belt, One Road program by suspending three Chinese-backed projects, estimated to be worth $22 billion. It is also probing whether a loan from a Chinese state-owned bank benefitted the 1MDB investment fund. During the election campaign, Mahathir pledged to review all Chinese projects and “unequal treaties.”
Whether there is a pronounced tilt toward Washington remains to be seen. The government’s instability is underscored by the fact that Mahathir and Anwar are both part of the ruling coalition. Mahathir is due to step down to allow Anwar to take over as prime minister in two years.
Their bitter clash in 1998 was over basic issues of economic policy—the right-wing populist Mahathir was determined to protect his economic cronies from the Asian financial crisis, whereas Anwar was doing the International Monetary Fund’s bidding to open up Malaysia to foreign investment. Those fundamental disagreements remain.
Last Saturday saw the biggest demonstration in the Austrian capital since the 2003 protests against pension reforms. More than 100,000 demonstrated against the working time reform being introduced by the government of Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, Austrian Peoples Party (ÖVP), and Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache of the right-wing extremist Austrian Freedom Party (FPÖ).
The government wants to permit a maximum working time of twelve hours a day and a working week of up to 60 hours. Previously, the standard working hours in Austria were eight hours a day and 40 hours a week. In special cases, companies can employ their staff for up to ten hours a day or up to 50 hours a week.
The Austrian trade unions called for Saturday’s demonstration under the slogan “For a Better Life.” In addition to trade unionists, prominent social democrats, such as party leader and ex-chancellor Christian Kern and Vienna's mayor Michael Ludwig also participated.
It was the first major demonstration since the right-wing government took office at the end of 2017. According to the government, the number of hours allowed is to be increased to give companies more flexibility. The Austrian parliament votes on the bill today, but the majority enjoyed by the ÖVP and FPÖ means its passage is considered safe.
The Working Hours Act reform is considered the first step in planned social attacks by Kurz and Strache. Further, deep-going “reforms” in pensions, health and education are also planned.
In order to suppress resistance, the government has already launched the so-called “security package.” Under the auspices of the ultra-right Interior Minister Herbert Kickl (FPÖ), surveillance is being massively expanded. The spying on private computers is being legitimized as is the construction of so-called Citizens Defence Leagues.
Another fundamental attack on democratic rights was the closure of several mosques and the expulsion of imams and their families.
Large sections of workers and young people are unwilling to give up their social gains and accept this right-wing policy. Tens of thousands had already demonstrated in January against the government's right-wing course when Interior Minister Kickl demanded that asylum seekers be “concentrated” in the future—an open link to the concentration camps of the Nazis.
But while government policies are rejected by most of the population, the unions and the social democrats are working to divert social opposition and anger into harmless channels. In principle, they support the right-wing policies of the Kurz and Strache government.
As recently as January, the Austrian Trade Union Federation (ÖGB) and its affiliated unions had expressly refused to support the protest against the government. In fact, there is a significant section within the Austrian trade unions that supports FPÖ policy. “Even in the chamber of labour and in the unions, contacts with FPÖ officials are cultivated,” noted the news magazine Profil .
The Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) has been in a coalition government with the FPÖ in Burgenland since 2015 and was open to a coalition with the far right at the federal level during last year’s election.
The fact that the protest on Saturday mainly served to let off steam and protect the government's flank was highlighted by government spokesman Peter Launsky-Tieffenthal. He emphasized that it was good “that we live in a country where there is freedom of expression and assembly, and where everyone can exercise these fundamental rights.”
This statement is noteworthy, as several editors-in-chief published articles in their papers on Sunday and Monday warning against attacks on the press and freedom of opinion. This was mainly directed against Interior Minister Herbert Kickl of the FPÖ, who attacked investigative journalists head-on in an ORF program last week.
At the closing rally, the unions' attitude to the Kurz government became clear when the chairman of the post union, Helmut Köstinger, rhetorically called for the “overthrow” of the anti-social and unjust government. Immediately following, several ÖGB leaders spoke out to distance themselves from him. ÖGB leader Wolfgang Katzian stated that the ÖGB accepted every democratically elected government. Before that, ÖGB vice-chair Norbert Schnedl had spoken against Köstinger and stressed that he was not in favour of overthrowing the government.
At the demonstration, the ÖGB then focused exclusively on the Working Hours Act. Not a single speaker mentioned the rigorous sealing off of the country's borders against those seeking help.
A few days earlier, the government had provocatively conducted a patrol exercise on the border with Slovenia. Several hundred policemen and soldiers practiced sealing off the border against refugees. The exercise was above all a signal to Germany. “The background is formed by the debate on internal European border closures, triggered by Germany, as well as current developments on the refugee routes in the Balkans,” said FPÖ chief Strache.
Following the agreement of the CDU and CSU in Germany in the asylum dispute at the beginning of the week, Austria is preparing its own national measures to protect its borders.
Notably, hostility towards refugees is not new to the Austrian trade unions. Two years ago, former ÖGB President Erich Foglar agitated against immigration. “Control of the labour market has been more or less lost,” Foglar told thePressenewspaper. He had previously spoken out in favour of “redefining” relations with the FPÖ and seeking close cooperation with it.
The British government intends to roll out nationally a scheme piloted in north London, whereby the families of gang members and violent criminals are evicted from their public housing residences.
The Conservatives are acting under laws conferred by the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014. Under the legislation, landlords in England and Wales, including councils, can evict tenants as a result of serious and violent criminal activity.
Home Office minister Victoria Atkins, the privately educated daughter of former Conservative MP and MEP Sir Robert Atkins, became the first minister to publicly endorse the scheme, saying the government had “changed the law to enable it to happen.”
Interviewed in the Daily Telegraph, Atkins said, “In the most serious cases, with these people who are exploiting young people, making the lives of local residents a misery, putting fear into people’s hearts when they’re picking children up from the school gates, I think absolutely they should understand the consequences of their criminal behaviour.”
Nick Davies, the police commander in an area of north London in which the eviction scheme has been piloted, said the power to threaten whole families “seems to be a particularly effective strategy in changing the behaviour” of gang members. In an interview with the Sunday Times earlier this month, Davies insisted the “threshold for eviction is high.”
Neither the police nor the government offered any evidence regarding how many families have been thrown onto the streets, nor how they measured the “effectiveness” of teaching offenders the “consequences of their actions.” Neither did they mention the consequences of evicting a family from a decent home, where they could have been living for life, and the consequences of pushing whole working class households into homelessness and destitution.
Such barbarous measures have zero rehabilitative purpose. This is punishment meted out by the ruling class to aid its brutalization of the working class.
Needless to say, the families of those found guilty of corporate crime involving millions of pounds—in the rare cases where this happens—can rest easily in their penthouses and mansions.
The legislation is saturated with right-wing, anti-working class stereotypes. Tellingly, the Daily Mail claimed, “Experts say the impact on family members, particularly single mothers, is one of the strongest deterrents they have.”
Press coverage was replete with stock photos of hooded gang members being led away by police and ubiquitous high-rise, multi occupancy modernist public housing—usually the worst looking examples—which are poorly maintained and neglected by local authorities.
In her Telegraph interview, Atkins claimed, “If they search someone’s address and they have suspicions this person is at the head of a gang or they’re recruiting young people to a county lines gang [that uses children to traffic drugs], I want the police when they get into the house and they find a zombie knife to have the power to arrest that person on the basis of that, so they’ve got all the tools they need to lock people away.”
Other anti-working class stereotypes are utilized to reinforce the claim that irresponsible parenting rather than socio-economic conditions is responsible for crime, that gang members and violent criminals reside solely within public housing, and therefore the provision of public housing, part of a so-called “dependency culture,” is assisting crime.
The measures create a two-tier and entirely arbitrary system, whereby simply because they live in a council home, families are to be made homeless. Working class families in council housing, who lose a member to prison, will then lose their home. Offenders whose families own their own home or rent in the private sector receive a conviction but no eviction.
Children will be uprooted from their communities and schools in addition to losing their home. Adults will potentially lose jobs, reinforcing reliance on a welfare system transformed over recent decades into a series of cruel and vindictive “sanctions,” designed to withhold financial payments for the merest transgression for months on end.
These families will be forced to register as homeless by the very local authority that has just evicted them. If they are lucky they will be housed in temporary rented accommodation. Local authorities no longer have a statutory obligation to provide suitable accommodation to those presenting themselves as homeless—meaning a family, once evicted, could be denied re-housing because they are deemed by the local authority, which colluded in their eviction, as responsible for their own homelessness.
The Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 was widely criticised when it was introduced. Civil rights group Liberty noted: “Whole families could be turfed from their homes because of the actions of one person. This will pile pressure on innocent and vulnerable people at a particularly difficult time for them and their family.”
Liberty added that people who had passed through the criminal justice system would be doubly punished. “A basic principle of criminal law is that an individual should be subject to appropriate punishment for their crime just once. Our criminal law is designed to do exactly this.”
The collective punishment of those living in social housing has been prepared over years. Following the 2011 riots in London and elsewhere in the UK—after which more than 5,000 people were rounded up and arrested, with 1,292 jailed for a total of over 1,800 years—Conservative-controlled Wandsworth Council in London moved to evict an entire family from their home based on the actions of a single individual. This was before the person involved, Daniel Sartain-Clarke, had even been convicted of rioting. In the event, he was convicted of shoplifting. The council eventually relented on its threats, but only after the family suffered months of trauma.
Two reports published last week bring out British intelligence’s role in torture and kidnapping. One, published by the Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) of Parliament, “Detainee Mistreatment and Rendition 2001-2010,” contains over 151 pages listing hundreds of instances of close British collaboration with mostly US torturers.
The sheer number of abuse and torture cases testifies to a level of criminal depravity far greater than previously admitted. The Labour Party was in power for the entire period covered by the first report.
Key findings include:
• 232 cases where UK intelligence agency staff supplied questions or intelligence to other intelligence agencies after they knew or suspected that the person being questioned was suffering torture.
• 198 cases where the UK agencies obtained information “from detainees they knew had been mistreated,” or where mistreatment, i.e., torture or abuse of some form, should have been suspected.
• 13 incidents where British personnel were present during torture and nine cases where British staff made “verbal threats.”
• 25 cases where British staff were told by detainees they were being tortured or abused.
• 128 recorded incidents where British agencies were told by “foreign liaison services” of “detainee mistreatment.”
• Three cases where British agencies paid or offered to pay for “extraordinary rendition” operations—kidnapping and illegal deportation to a secret location for torture. The report described this as “outsourcing” of action “they knew they were not allowed to carry out themselves.”
• British intelligence agencies “planned or agreed to rendition operations proposed by others in 28 cases.”
• In 22 further cases, intelligence was provided by the British to allow rendition to take place.
• The report cites British complicity in 23 more instances where Britain was aware that rendition was intended but its agencies “conspicuously failed to act.” These cases included British citizens or residents.
• The report notes that there is “no evidence in the primary material that any US rendition flight transited the UK with a detainee on board, although two detainees are now known to have transited through the British Overseas Territory of Diego Garcia.” Recording of flights was, however, “woefully inadequate” and available records are unreliable.
The ISC explains that between 2002 and 2004, staff of the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS-MI6), the domestic counterintelligence and security agency MI5, and the Ministry of Defence interviewed detainees mostly held by the US in Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. British agencies either carried out their own “interviews,” did so jointly with US agencies, or merely observed.
The committee estimated that the total number of interviews over this period was between 2,000 and 3,000. No estimate is made of how many of those interviewed were abused, but the great majority can be assumed to have suffered extreme fear and torment.
The ISC inquiry was based on 50 hours of oral evidence and the examination of 40,000 documents. Some 30,000 staff hours were expended examining the material. Participants included victims of torture and rendition and three agency staff who came forward as witnesses.
At several points the report refers to deliberately poor recordkeeping by the intelligence agencies where torture, or suspicion of torture, was involved. Former British diplomat Craig Murray told the committee in 2016 that “there was a deliberate policy of not committing the discussion on receipt of intelligence through torture to paper in the Foreign Office.”
The implication is that the documented level of involvement in torture and rendition is only a fraction of what actually took place.
The report lays out the international agreements and conventions the UK has signed and ratified that were routinely ignored. These include the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the European Convention on Human Rights and the United Nations Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. The latter requires states to “prevent acts of torture” and insists that “no exceptional circumstances whatsoever...may be invoked to as a justification of torture.”
The report also cites the 1949 Geneva Convention and the Statute of the International Criminal Court, which covers torture as a war crime. It notes that UK domestic law describes “complicity” in torture as something that might result from sharing intelligence in the knowledge or belief that action resulting in torture might flow from that intelligence.
The findings make clear that the thrust of policy was based on keeping up with the US in its “war on terror.” One SIS-MI6 officer told the committee that as the US “embraced torture as a methodology,” SIS chose to “find a way to deal with it and work as best they could... there were certainly SIS officers who felt that we should sort of go all the way and basically, you know, do whatever it takes.”
The same officer continued: “[S]ome people, perhaps to this day but certainly at that time, felt that the gloves were off and there was this sort of argument that...the UK needed to be much more aggressive in our approach on these issues... I think there was also this sense that we would lose our standing with the Americans if we weren’t aligned with them on this.”
The inquiry was wound up by the committee following Prime Minister Theresa May’s refusal to allow the ISC to question both low-ranking intelligence officers and previous foreign secretaries, including Labour’s Jack Straw, who was in office from 2001 to 2006.
The second report, “Detainee Mistreatment and Rendition: Current Issues,” deals with more recent and on-going questions.
Due to international outrage over torture and rendition, the British authorities eventually concluded that they had to defend themselves from “reputational risks” and litigation—in other words, war crimes charges. A “Consolidated Guidance” package of measures was introduced in 2010 to allow the intelligence agencies to find verbal formulations allowing distance to be maintained from the most egregious abuses.
The Consolidated Guidance demanded that British intelligence agencies and armed forces, according to then-Prime Minister David Cameron, “never take any action where they know or believe that torture will occur.” If they became aware of torture, they should report it.
Most contentiously, the guidance obliged staff to pass instances where there was considered to be a “serious risk” of abuse to government ministers. The government was taken to court at the time on the basis that “serious risk” was looser than the “real risk” formulations used legally. The case was thrown out.
The guidance appears designed to assist intelligence operatives to find “work-arounds,” whereby information can continue to be extracted while the risk of torture is deemed to be reduced to something less than “serious.” This less than “serious risk” is ill-defined, subjective and can simply mean an assurance, even offered retrospectively and verbally, that torture would not take place or had not taken place. It amounts to little more than taking the word of the torturers.
The committee reported that between 2013 and 2016 there were 2,304 cases in which the intelligence services considered that the Consolidated Guidance applied. This can only mean that in all these cases, staff considered that detainees in the hands of British allies might be at “serious risk” of torture or abuse.
No record was provided of how many of these were referred to ministers. However, while in 2013 the guidance was applied on 418 occasions, by 2016 this had more than doubled to 928. The report provides no explanation for this surge, but it coincides with sharply escalating conflicts in the Middle East fuelled by the imperialist powers.
The report considers the current functionality of the agencies. One section, “Agility,” makes clear that both the Consolidated Guidance and the entire set-up of the agencies are in preparation for new wars and new attacks on the working class and democratic rights.
The head of the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ—the UK’s mass surveillance agency) told the committee that GCHQ, SIS/MI6 and MI5 now have a “high degree of cooperation and integration.” As an example of this, SIS told the committee that “the lessons it had learned from dealing with the [US whistle-blower Edward] Snowden leaks had enabled it to improve its response to the March 2017 WikiLeaks release on CIA computer network exploitation capabilities.” No detail was provided as to what this meant.
Application Deadline: 29th July 2018. Eligible Countries: African countries About the Award: Access to reliable, affordable and clean energy is one of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Reaching this goal means providing electricity to 1.0 billion people and clean cooking systems to 3.0 billion people worldwide by 2030. To help reach these objectives, Total, ENEA Consulting, SEforALL and Acumen are launching “Energy Access Booster” – a call for projects to support entrepreneurs in the field of energy access in Africa. Type: Entrepreneurship Eligibility:
The project relates to one of the areas within the scope of the pilot call for projects Energy Access Booster:
Green mini-grids
Sustainable mobility
Refrigeration (cooling or cold storage)
Energy for drinking water and agriculture
The project is aligned with the SDG7 criteria of providing affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy.
The project is carried out by a legally established entity (properly incorporated entity).
The project takes place in subsaharan Africa. Note that for consulting missions, only areas assessed as “normal vigilance” or “enhanced vigilance” by the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs[1] at the time of the mission are eligible.
The applicant undertakes to pay the travel-related costs of the consultants acting under the skills-based sponsorship.
The applicant undertakes to comply with the collaboration rules for Total Energy Services support (and in particular to comply with the HSE and safety rules set out below and to report regularly to the steering committee):
the public policy provisions;
the standards, laws and regulations in force, in particular those applicable in the countries where the project is performed;
industry best practices and best practices of the trade;
the strictest safety standards with regard to the protection of persons property.
The project requests both financial support and skills support.
Selection Criteria:
Relevant and sound project.
Innovative project from a technical, economic and/or business model point of view.
Ability of the partners to provide the requested support.
Need for support from several of the partners. Any applicant requesting financial support only, will automatically be excluded from the list of potential successful applicants.
Number of Awards: 5 Value of Award: Up to five selected entrepreneurs will benefit from a selection of the following support, depending of their needs and the support capacity of each partner:
A strategic advisory consulting mission
A financial contribution of maximum $ 50,000 per selected entrepreneur
Operational support and potentially local support
Visibility of the project
The selected entrepreneurs will receive support on topics including the identification of relevant and sustainable economic models, customer acquisition and retention, pilot project development, production organization, building adapted distribution models, scale-up to the national or international level, and financing.
Application Deadline: 31st August2018 Offered annually? Yes Eligible Countries: Developing Countries To be taken at (country): Applicants may be registered for a PhD degree in their home country, or may enrol in a PhD course at a host laboratory/institute in India. Fields of Research: 01-Agricultural Sciences 02-Structural, Cell and Molecular Biology 03-Biological Systems and Organisms 04-Medical and Health Sciences incl. Neurosciences 05-Chemical Sciences Eligibility: Applicants for these fellowships must meet the following criteria:
Be a maximum age of 35 years on 31 December of the application year.
Be nationals of a developing country (other than India).
Must not hold any visa for temporary or permanent residency in India or any developed country.
Hold a Master’s or equivalent degree in science or engineering.
For SANDWICH Fellowships, be registered PhD students in their home country and provide the “Registration and No Objection Certificate” from the HOME university (sample is included in the application form); OR
For FULL-TIME Fellowships; be willing to register at a university in India.
Be accepted at a biotechnology institution in India (see sample Acceptance Letter included in the application form). N.B. Requests for acceptance must be directed to the chosen host institution(s), and NOT to DBT.
Provide evidence of proficiency in English, if medium of education was not English;
Provide evidence that s/he will return to her/his home country on completion of the fellowship;
Not take up other assignments during the period of her/his fellowship;
Be financially responsible for any accompanying family members.
Number of scholarship: Several Value of Scholarship: DBT will provide a monthly stipend to cover for living costs, food and health insurance. The monthly stipend will not be convertible into foreign currency. In addition, the fellowship holder will receive a house rent allowance. Duration of Award: Up to five years.
SANDWICH Fellowships (for those registered for a PhD in their home country): The Fellowship may be granted for a minimum period of 12 months and a maximum period of 2 years.
FULL-TIME Fellowships (for those not registered for a PhD): The Fellowship is granted for an initial period of up to 3 years. Such Fellowships may then be extended for a further 2 years, subject to the student’s performance. Candidates will register for their PhD at a university in India. DBT will confirm any such extensions to both TWAS and the candidate.
How to Apply:
Before applying it is recommended that applicants read very carefully the application guidelines for detailed information on eligibility criteria, and other key requirements of the application procedure.
Applications for the TWAS-DBT Postgraduate Fellowship Programme can ONLY be submitted to TWAS via the online portal and copy of the submitted application must be sent to DBT by email.
Apply Here Visit Scholarship webpage for Details Sponsors: The Department of Biotechnology (DBT) of the Ministry of Science and Technology, India, and The World Academy of Science (TWAS), Italy.