Lifting the Driving Ban: Saudi Arabia’s Glitzy Stunt

Robert Fisk

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is a media-savvy man, and he has just pressed the button he knew would make headlines: Saudi women will be able to drive for the first time in the history of the kingdom. And the act begat the headlines and the headlines begat a tweet from the President of the United States who himself begat a $110bn arms contract with the Saudis three months ago. And so it came to pass. For 24 hours, the world was told about the lifting of the driving ban rather than the chopping-off of heads, the arrest of human rights activists and the horrific war in Yemen.

And even then, it transpires, it will be next summer before Saudi women can start driving their sports cars around Riyadh or taking their children to school – for one of the prominent campaigners has claimed that she for one will buy a Mustang. First of all, a “commission” has to enquire into the lifting of the ban. But will it have the right to place restrictions on the new law? An age limit, perhaps? Married women only? For when a Saudi cleric said a week ago that women should not drive because they have “a quarter the brainpower of men”, there will surely be some limit to this new freedom.

There’s no doubt that Saudi Arabia needs some good news. Its fury at Shiite Iran – where women have been driving for decades – has turned out to be just another Sunni-Shia hate campaign. Its attempt to isolate Qatar is failing. Its war in Yemen (10,000 dead; 40,000 wounded) is viewed with increasing distaste by the Saudis, let alone by the Yemenis themselves whose country’s destruction has led to a cholera epidemic and whose destitution means that more than half the population live in poverty; and who cannot dream of feeding their children, let alone buying a Mustang. Many Saudis have Yemeni origins – remember the bin Ladens? – and the country’s Shiite minority are against the bombing of their fellow Shiite Houthis in Yemen.

But since the West adopted the women of Saudi Arabia’s cause in their desire to drive, the lifting of the ban must be regarded as a giant publicity step forward in human rights, for women’s equality in the Islamic world, and for Saudi Arabia’s “progress” in the Gulf – albeit that every other Arab country in the region has allowed women to drive cars for years.

King Salman, of course, signs the decree; but the world knows that the Crown Prince is behind all this, just as he was behind the ambitious new economic plan to move away from the world’s oil “greed”, which has even now been watered down by Saudi officials, its ambitions extended in time or abandoned altogether. Many oil analysts fear that Saudi oil reserves are not as large as the kingdom says; that Iran’s oil reserves may be underestimated; that even Syria’s may be higher than believed, especially if the Mediterranean coast is tapped.

In law, too, women in Saudi Arabia are still subject to the rule of their menfolk. Lifting a driving ban will not damage a patriarchal society whose very Sunni faith is dominated by the puritan teachings of Abdul Wahab, the 18th-century aesthete who formed an alliance with the House of Saud.

Like all immensely wealthy states, Saudi Arabia could be capable of enormous good in the world. But Yemeni wars, feuds with Iran, medieval laws and an orgy of Islamic school-building – let alone an orgy of American arms-buying – are no way to achieve this. If the Crown Prince had spent more time reflecting on the development of the rest of his Arab neighbours, on humanist education and justice for the people of the region (Palestinians, Kurds, Iraqis, yes, and Syrians too), then he might reflect what Saudi Arabia is entitled to do in the Middle East to establish its place in history.

A new museum dedicated to Abdul Wahab has opened in Riyadh. Women are no doubt welcome. But they may not choose to drive into the museum car park on their own. Besides, they have to wait until next summer – and it took only three months to dilute the Crown Prince’s economic plan this year.

The Pledge of Allegiance is Un-American

Ted Rall

Right-wingers conflate nationalism with patriotism. But they’re not the same thing. Patriots love their country because it does good things; for nationalists it’s our country right or wrong. A lot of stuff nationalists call patriotic couldn’t possibly be more un-American.

The singing of the national anthem before sporting events, and the reciting of the Pledge of Allegiance, are prime examples.

The latest nationalism vs. patriotism controversy arrives courtesy of Colin Kaepernick, the African-American pro football player blackballed by the NFL for kneeling in silent protest over police shootings of blacks rather than stand for the signing of the national anthem alongside his teammates and fans before games. The “take a knee” movement has spread throughout the league, largely in response to President Trump’s crude remark that those who refuse to stand during “The Star Spangled Banner” are “sons of bitches.”

At football games and similar events where the anthem is sung, standers far outnumber kneelers — and that’s weird. Because if one person is kneeling against police brutality, then it stands to reason that standing up means you support cops gunning down unarmed black people. Are there really that many racists?

That, and when you stop to think about it, the whole idea of rote rituals to prove our loyalty runs completely counter to what most Americans, liberal or conservative, think their country is about.

As I have written before, lefties and righties don’t have the same ambitions for the U.S. Following the tradition of the French Revolution and the Declaration of the Rights of Man, the Left idealizes individual rights. They dream of a country where everyone is not only created equal, but treated accordingly. The Right values empire. Rightists’ ideal America is a global military and economic superpower.

Still, the two sides have something in common. They want to be left alone, to live their lives as free of government interference as possible. Progressives want the government out of their bedrooms. Traditionalists want it out of their incomes. Totalitarianism — a form of government whose control over citizens’ daily lives leads to the requirement that everyone attend one meeting after another and report dissent to the authorities — could no more catch on here than North Korean-style displays of signs flipped by synchronized flags or parades of military hardware (though Trump wants to start those).

Like the singing of the anthem at games, the Pledge of Allegiance reflects a totalitarian impulse you find in fascist and authoritarian regimes, not democracies. The U.S. and Canada are the only countries on earth where national anthems are played at the start of sporting events. Even in many authoritarian states, the requirement that children (and athletes) swear fealty to the nation (or, as here, its flag) would be considered too creepy to contemplate.

When your country is crazier than Zimbabwe, it’s time to take stock — even if you’re a Republican.

Other nations require oaths of allegiance from those taking public office, like members of parliament. Some ask the same of foreigners seeking to become naturalized citizens. But the U.S. may be the only nation on earth to have a widely-used pledge of allegiance.

Children who refuse to recite the Pledge of Allegiance are routinely punished, criticized and ostracized, even in public schools. I know — it happened to me in elementary school. Kaepernick, a top-tier athlete, has been denied employment. These are obvious violations of the all-American value of free speech and expression guaranteed by the First Amendment.

The addition of “under God” in 1954, at the height of the McCarthy era and its rancid loyalty oaths, further violates another core principle of Americanism, the freedom to worship as you please or not at all as protected under the Establishment Clause of the US. Constitution.

In one respect, however, the Pledge of Allegiance owes its origins to something that couldn’t be more American: a huckster out to make a few extra bucks.

Why do Americans pledge allegiance to the “flag,” as opposed to the nation or its government? It boils down to capitalist greed. The origins of the Pledge date to 1892, when James B. Upham, the marketing executive of the popular children’s magazine The Youth’s Companion used the 400^th anniversary of Columbus’ arrival in the Americas to promote a conference in honor of the American flag. He pushed the Pledge in his magazine as a way to promote nationalism and sell flags to public schools. Schoolhouses purchased 26,000 flags the first year alone.

Kids reciting the pledge were supposed to raise their arms at the same time — yep, the Hitler “sieg heil” salute before Hitler. World War II put an end to that in American schools.

Having traveled extensively, I have observed that the countries whose governments insist upon the most extravagant displays of nationalism line up neatly with those with the least personal freedom. In authoritarian China and the police state of Turkmenistan, national flags and banners extolling slogans and quotes of the ruling party festoon every government office and pedestrian overpass. As Turkey moves away from democracy and closer to autocracy, Turkish flag stickers multiply on automobiles.

It is the opposite in the European democracies. A Frenchman who hung a French flag from his front porch would be ridiculed by his neighbors, socialist and Le Pen supporter alike. It is not that the French and the Dutch and the Spanish and other Europeans do not love their countries as much as Americans do; if anything, most Europeans are grateful that their countries are not like ours. They are patriots. And they remember World War II, when those who liked to wave flags and insisted on loyalty oaths to the state turned out to be dangerous.

Everyone should sit out the singing of the national anthem. It’s archaic and uncomfortably reminiscent of fascism.

It is time to leave the Pledge of Allegiance where it belongs, on the dungheap of history, remembered as a clever way to move piles of colored cloth.

The US Economy is Failing

Paul Craig Roberts

Do the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page editors read their own newspaper?

The frontpage headline story for the Labor Day weekend was “Low Wage Growth Challenges Fed.” Despite an alleged 4.4% unemployment rate, which is full employment, there is no real growth in wages. The front page story pointed out correctly that an economy alleged to be expanding at full employment, but absent any wage growth or inflation, is “a puzzle that complicates Federal Reserve policy decisions.”

On the editorial page itself, under “letters to the editor,” Professor Tony Lima of California State University points out what I have stressed for years: “The labor-force participation rate remains at historic lows. Much of the decrease is in the 18-34 age group, while participation rates have increased for those 55 and older.”  Professor Lima points out that more evidence that the American worker is not in good shape comes from the rising number of Americans who can only find part-time work, which leaves them with truncated incomes and no fringe benefits, such as healh care.

Positioned right next to this factual letter is the lead editorial written by someone who read neither the front page story or the professor’s letter.

The lead editorial declares: “The biggest labor story this Labor Day is the trouble that employers are having finding workers across the country.” The Journal’s editorial page editors believe the solution to the alleged labor shortage is Senator Ron Johnson’s (R.Wis.) bill to permit the states to give 500,000 work visas to foreigners.

In my day as a Wall Street Journal editor and columnist, questions would have been asked that would have nixed the editorial.  For example, how is there a labor shortage when there is no upward pressure on wages?  In tight labor markets wages are bid up as employers compete for workers.

For example, how is the labor market tight when the labor force participation rate is at historical lows.  When jobs are available, the participation rate rises as people enter the work force to take the jobs.

I have reported on a number of occasions that according to Federal Reserve studies, more Americans in the 24-34 age group live at home with parents than independently, and that it is those 55 and older who are taking the part time jobs.  Why is this?  The answer is that part time jobs do not pay enough to support an independent existence, and the Federal Reserve’s decade long zero interest rate policy forces retirees to enter the work force as their retirement savings produce no income.  It is not only the manufacturing jobs of the middle class blue collar workers that have been given to foreigners in order to cut labor costs and thus maximize payouts to executives and shareholders, but also tradable professional skill jobs such as software engineering, design, accounting, and IT—jobs that Americans expected to get in order to pay off their student loans.

The Wall Street Journal editorial asserts that the young are not in the work force because they are on drugs, or on disability, or because of their poor education. However, all over the country there are college graduates with good educations who cannot find jobs because the jobs have been offshored. To worsen the crisis, a Republican Senator from Wisconsin wants to bring in more foreigners on work permits to drive US wages down lower so that no American can survive on the wage, and the Wall Street Journal editorial page editors endorse this travesty!

The foreigners on work visas are paid one-third less than the going US wage. They live together in groups in cramped quarters. They have no employee rights.  They are exploited in order to raise executive bonuses and shareholder capital gains. I have exposed this scheme at length in my book, The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism (Clarity Press, 2013).

When Trump said he was going to bring the jobs home, he resonated, but, of course, he will not be permitted to bring them home, any more than he has been permitted to normalize relations with Russia.

In America Government is not in the hands of its people.  Government is in the hands of a ruling oligarchy.  Oligarchic rule prevails regardless of electoral outcomes. The American people are entering a world of slavery more severe than anything that previously existed. Without jobs, dependent on their masters for trickle-down benefits that are always subject to being cut, and without voice or representation, Americans, except for the One Percent, are becoming the most enslaved people in history.

Americans carry on by accumulating debt and becoming debt slaves. Many can only make the minimum payment on their credit card and thus accumulate debt.  The Federal Reserve’s policy has exploded the prices of financial assets. The result is that the bulk of the population lacks discretionary income, and those with financial assets are wealthy until values adjust to reality.

As an economist I cannot identify in history any economy whose affairs have been so badly managed and prospects so severely damaged as the economy of the United States of America.  In the short/intermediate run policies that damage the prospects for the American work force benefit what is called the One Percent as jobs offshoring reduces corporate costs and financialization transfers remaining discretionary income in interest and fees to the financial sector.  But as consumer discretionary incomes disappear and debt burdens rise, aggregate demand falters, and there is nothing left to drive the economy.

What we are witnessing in the United States is the first country to reverse the development process and to go backward by giving up industry, manufacturing, and tradable professional skill jobs.  The labor force is becoming Third World with lowly paid domestic service jobs taking the place of high-productivity, high-value added jobs.

The initial response was to put wives and mothers into the work force, but now even many two-earner families experience stagnant or falling material living standards. New university graduates are faced with substantial debts without jobs capable of producing sufficient income to pay off the debts.

Now the US is on a course of travelling backward at a faster rate. Robots are to take over more and more jobs, displacing more people.  Robots don’t buy houses, furniture, appliances, cars, clothes, food, entertainment, medical services, etc.  Unless Robots pay payroll taxes, the financing for Social Security and Medicare will collapse.  And it goes on down from there.  Consumer spending simply dries up, so who purcheses the goods and services supplied by robots?

To find such important considerations absent in public debate suggests that the United States will continue on the country’s de-industrialization, de-manufacturing trajectory.

Economic Sanctions Against Russia Flop

Eric Zuesse

The first comprehensive study of anti-Russia sanctions shows they hit EU much more than Russia.

Did U.S. President Barack Obama create the anti-Russia sanctions in order to weaken the EU in its competition against America? If so, the policy has been a huge success — it has enormously damaged the EU’s economy. But, if Russia was the actual target — as Obama claimed — then it’s been a total flop: It has produced $100 billion loss to the EU, thus far — almost twice as much as the $55 billion total hit to Russia, and the hit to Russia might be even less than that, maybe even zero, because the harms to Russia included the harms from the plunging oil-prices, which weren’t at all due to the sanctions. Furthermore, the sanctions strongly helped Russia’s economy, in ways that don’t yet show up in the economic data but that constitute long-delayed reforms whose pay-offs will start only during the years to come. Washington’s economic sanctions against Russia could thus end up producing a net plus for Russia, on a long-term basis.

The deal that U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry culminated with King Saud on 11 September 2014(after his having started those negotiations on 27 June 2014) to flood the market with oil to bring the oil price down and so harm Russia, which is a giant oil&gas-exporter, has hit Russia very hard, costing the Russian economy perhaps all of the $55 billion hit to Russia’s economy, measured thus far.

These figures come from the first-ever comprehensive study of the effects of the sanctions, a study which also estimates the negative effects upon human rights (this Special Reporteur’s chief mandate), but the cost-figures cited here, are entirely economic, not about “rights” at all (which are separately dealt with in the same report).

The study was issued, on September 13th, by the staff of Algeria’s, Idriss Jazairy, who is the U.N.’s Special Rapporteur on the Negative Impact of the Unilateral Coercive Measures. His mandate recognizes economic sanctions as being pre-invasion acts of war, and so as being threats to world peace, an up-ramp toward physical warfare. Mr. Jazairy has Masters degrees from both Oxford and Harvard, and is personally grounded in a democratic national legal tradition: Algeria’s Constitution explicitly is democratic: Its Article 6 is titled “Popular Sovereignty” and unambiguously states, in its Sovereignty Clause, which is the most important clause in any nation’s Constitution: “(1) The People are the source of any power. (2) The national sovereignty belongs exclusively to the People.”

However, the findings by Jazairy’s team have nonetheless produced criticisms against him and his team (not against the methodology or the economic statistics upon which the study was based) by neoconservatives such as Israel’s “U.N. Watch.” The U.S. Government’s “Radio Free Europe,” then cited “U.N. Watch” as an authority against “Russia’s state-controlled Sputnik news agency” for Sputnik’s having reported the findings. U.S. (and its allies’) ‘news’media had been silent about the findings, until Jazairy issued a response on September 15th to those neoconservatives’ objections, by headlining “UN Special Rapporteur rejects accusations of Russian influence on sanctions findings”.

At the time of the report’s release, on September 13th, there were only two news-reports about it, both from Russia: one on Sputnik radio, and another (the only report that was accessible to Western audiences), which appeared at rt-dot-com, which headlined “Anti-Russian sanctions cost Europe $100bn – UN Special Rapporteur”. Other than that news-story at RT, there was no coverage of this U.N. report, at all, in the West.

It should be noted that the U.N.’s own press-operation does everything possible to block the public from having access to the U.N’s reports, so that even when Mr. Jazairy’s office issued that press-release responding to the neoconservatives’ criticisms, and he wrote there “I stand ready to address any questions regarding the legal or factual findings in my report,” that crucial link was to something inaccessible, instead of to the publicly accessible online link to his report.

Until the present moment, there has been no press-report anywhere that links to the publicly accessible web-page, or that quotes more than just a few words from Jazairy’s report; and, so, here that is — the core of his team’s findings (and boldfacing the passages that I consider to be the most important, so that the boldfaced parts constitute a summary of the study’s findings):

——

Myopia And Mayhem Running Amok In Myanmar

Fazal M. Kamal

Indications are that leaders in both the adjacent countries have one factor in common: they’ve got caught in a cleft stick.

The world has witnessed numerous “cleansing operations” but rarely has it seen the unabashed capitulation of someone who was honored with the highest accolade and had the support of a wide range of people across regions. Whether it’s a Faustian bargain that Suu Kyi has made with the armed forces or not, it does exhibit the distance some will traverse to retain a grip on power (though in this instance it appears that the robust power maybe more in the grip of the military).

On the other side, the Government of Bangladesh, apparently, was initially more inclined to be swayed by the advice of “security apparatus” (here and there, perhaps) to offer the Myanmar junta its active support to confront the perceived “security threat” but subsequently sensing the overt disposition of the people moved toward a more humanitarian approach; though its purported leaders persisted with outrageous and self-serving declarations without any inkling about the absence of sense or sensibilities they thus demonstrated.

Given this backdrop, indications are that leaders in both the adjacent countries have one factor in common: they’ve got caught in a cleft stick. Certainly a most agonizing situation. Be that as it may. While more than half a million people have been rendered homeless, Suu Kyi, for the moment, is in the worse situation as her quick temper when confronted by a “Muslim” has been known to flare up like a pollen allergy as was displayed when a “Muslim” journalist was sent to interview her some years back.

Meanwhile, as the entire world is aware by now, a humungous tragic humanitarian crisis has developed with hundreds of thousands of Rohingya—mostly women and children—fleeing the marauding Myanmarese hordes who have been murdering, maiming, burning and raping at will with a wink and a nod from the Yangon administration which of course includes the brass under whose aegis previous campaigns to “clean the Rakhine state” had occurred.

Tellingly the UNHCR head reported in Geneva, “I have just returned from Bangladesh, where I witnessed people fleeing unimaginable violence …   They had to flee very sudden and cruel violence, and they have fled with nothing. Their needs are enormous – food, health, shelter … They have absolutely nothing. I have hardly seen in my career people that have come with so little. They need everything.”

In addition, British Prime Minister Theresa May in her speech to the UN General Assembly announced that the UK would end all defense engagement and training of the Myanmar military until attacks against civilians in Rakhine state had stopped while in his speech to the Assembly, French President Emmanuel Macron characterized recent actions in Myanmar as ethnic cleansing. Also during the opening of the Assembly, US President Donald Trump called on the Council to take “strong and swift action” to end violence against the Rohingya. Earlier the UN’s rights chief had described the atrocities in Rakhine as “textbook ethnic cleansing.” These very evidently leave no sliver of doubt about what bloodthirsty events are taking place in that unfortunate part of the world.

In view of these brutal actions there has been a rising international crescendo for stripping Suu Kyi of the Nobel Peace prize, and definitely given her reluctance even to distance herself feebly from the homicidal activities, the demand is more rational than rash. Her behavior is actually an outright shame for all the other Nobel laureates and in the end she cannot evade the responsibility for the deaths and huge losses incurred by the Rohingya people.

In spite of the early dithering of the Bangladesh administration it, like a sloth, ultimately made the moves to provide a safe haven for the “most unfortunate” group of people on Earth. But questions continue to dog the government’s efforts as well as the blathering of ruling party honchos most of whom, firstly, want to curry favor with their leader, and secondly, regurgitate lexis without having any knowledge of the political, social and historical circumstances in Rakhine.

While the carnage, the haggling and the geopolitical jousting continue, the fact to consider and agonize over is this: Like previous tunnel-visioned and myopic armed forces’ actions elsewhere in the world—including in Bangladesh in 1971—the exploits of the Myanmar military are ultimately clearly going to fail in attaining their cherished but vicious goals. Instead, in all likelihood, especially because of the extant circumstances around the world, these acts meant to accomplish the annihilation of an entire people will lead to the radicalization of thousands.

And this consequence cannot augur well for the region, as well as its economic, social and political evolution. That will most certainly create a breeding ground for unwarranted developments and in the final analysis generate huge misfortunes for the peoples of the whole area. Historically it has been proven innumerable times that militaries, wittingly or otherwise, launch onslaughts whose impacts prove to be not only beyond their command but also inflict inhuman torment on innocent people.

This present Burmese adventure isn’t proving to be any different. Sadly.

Modi government blocks Rohingya refugees entering India

K. Ratnayake

The Indian government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has deployed security forces along India’s northeastern borders to prevent thousands of Rohingya refugees entering the country. The Rohingya are fleeing ongoing military violence in Myanmar (Burma). New Delhi also plans to expel around 40,000 Rohingya already in India.

On September 22, Reuters reported that India’s Border Security Forces (BSF) had been authorised to use “rude and crude methods” to block the refugees. One official told the news agency, “We won’t tolerate Rohingya on Indian soil,” he said.

R.P.S. Jaswal, a BSF deputy inspector general leading patrols in the east Indian state of West Bengal, admitted that his troops had been ordered to use chilli grenades and stun grenades. Chilli grenades cause severe irritation and temporarily immobilise people who are targetted.

On Wednesday, the Hindu reported that the BSF had pushed back Rohingya trying to cross into the northeastern Indian state of Tripura. The newspaper claimed this was the first such incident since India’s home ministry ordered the BSF on August 19 to stop the refugees.

The newspaper has also reported that the chief ministers of Assam and Manipur had instructed border forces to prevent the fleeing Rohingya coming to their states. Assam and Manipur are ruled by political allies of Modi’s Hindu-supremacist Bharatiya Janatha Party (BJP). The Tripura state government is controlled by the Stalinist Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM)-led Left Front.

A recent editorial in People’s Democracy, the CPM’s web site, criticised government attempts to deport the Rohingya but did not defend the right to asylum or oppose New Delhi’s violent border actions. Instead the publication cynically called on the government to provide the Rohingya with identification papers so they could be sent back when the “conditions are conducive.”

During his visit to Myanmar last month, Prime Minister Modi endorsed government claims that the military violence in the Rakhine state was in response to “extremist attacks.”

What is occurring in Myanmar is the opposite. The long-standing oppression and military violence against the Rohingya has been intensified under the new ruling regime headed by Foreign Minister Aung San Suu Kyi.

The Burmese military has exploited minor attacks by insurgency groups in Rakhine to unleash a murderous ethnic-cleansing program against the minority Muslim community. Over half a million Rohingya have fled Burma since August, with about 400,000 entering Bangladesh and tens of thousands crossing to India.

The BJP’s backing for the Myanmar regime is driven by India’s geo-strategic ambitions. Encouraged by its strategic partnership with the US, New Delhi wants closer relations with Myanmar in order to isolate China’s influence in the region.

Modi’s hostility to the Rohingya is also connected to its anti-Muslim communalism, which is used to divide the Indian working class and divert the rising political opposition to the government’s austerity measures. In line with this reactionary agenda, the BJP is also stepping up its political and military provocations against Pakistan.

The Congress Party, India’s other main bourgeois party, is encouraging the BJP’s reactionary attacks on the Rohingya. Congress spokesman Ajay Maken has recently declared that the influx of refugees is a “serious” issue and appealed for an all-party conference to formulate Indian policy.

The BJP has tabled a constitutional amendment to the 1955 Citizenship Act in the Indian parliament. It states that minority communities—Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians—from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan “shall not be treated as illegal migrants.” The reactionary amendment fails to include Muslims from these countries.

Indian Home Minister Rajnath Singh claimed that Rohingya were “not refugees” and slammed anyone criticising the government’s crackdown. Speaking last week at a seminar organised by the National Human Rights Commission, Singh declared that human rights for Rohingya had been “raked up” but that they were “illegal immigrants” and posed a “threat to national security.”

Whitewashing the military repression unleashed in Rakhine state, Singh said, “I am sure Myanmar will take positive steps to take back the Rohingya.” He claimed that India’s actions were not in violation of international law because it was not a signatory to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention.

UN High Commissioner for Refugees Fillipo Grandi, however, recently rejected this claim, stating all countries, irrespective of whether they had signed the convention have obligations under customary international law. “They have obligations not to push people back to places where they would face these serious harms,” he said.

Early last week, the Indian government submitted an affidavit to the Supreme Court countering a petition filed by two Rohingya, Mohammad Salimullah and Mohammad Shaqir. The two refugees are attempting to prevent their deportation, arguing that they had fled Burma, because they faced violence, bloodshed and discrimination. The case is to be heard on October 3.

The home affairs ministry affidavit stated that the Rohingyas’ continued stay in India was “illegal” and posed “serious security threats.” It claimed that the refugees could have links with ISI, the Pakistan intelligence agency, Islamic State and other extremist Islamist groups.

The affidavit called on the court to allow the “executive” to make the decision on “illegal immigrants.” In other words, this will allow the government to hand over these refugees to the Burmese military.

Workers in India must oppose the Modi government’s anti-democratic actions against the Rohingya refugees. The Rohingya are victims of the pro-western government of Suu Kyi and her military backers. They must be given asylum and allowed to live in safety with full democratic rights wherever they choose.

Parsons Green bomb seized on to call for greater internet censorship

Steve James 

An 18-year-old orphaned Iraqi asylum seeker, Ahmed Hassan, has been charged with attempted murder and causing an explosion following the September 15 failed “bucket bomb” attack on a packed underground train at London’s Parsons Green tube station.

Around 30 people were injured, either by the “fireball” which erupted from a builder’s bucket in a supermarket bag or the panicked crush that followed the explosion. One woman suffered severe burns and will require months of hospital treatment.

The attack was used by both the British and US authorities as an opportunity to call for extended internet monitoring and censorship, as the bomb’s design has been circulating on the internet for years.

In the event, it seems that only the detonator exploded. Had the device functioned as intended the impact would have been much worse. According to the prosecutor at Westminster Magistrates Court, the bomb contained “many hundred grams” of triacetone triperoxide [TATP], a highly unstable explosive substance that can be concocted with easily purchased ingredients, and “an electronic timer and several containers of quantities of metal shrapnel including knives, screws and similar items clearly designed to cause severe injuries and death to those nearby.”

Hassan is accused of having constructed the device in a garden shed at the home of his foster parents, having bought some bomb components from Amazon.

Only hours after the explosion, before anything was made public about the suspected attacker, the bomb’s design and apparently homemade character and before any arrests had even been made, US President Donald Trump tweeted his view of the perpetrators as “sick and demented people who were in the sights of Scotland Yard [Metropolitan Police].”

He continued, “The internet is their main recruitment tool which we must cut off & use better!”

Prime Minister Theresa May said she was “working with the internet companies” to “deal with the terrorist propaganda, with the extremist propaganda, with the hatred that is put out across the Internet.”

Last week, May met with French President Emmanuel Macron and Italian Premier Paolo Gentiloni at a meeting at the United Nations that included representatives of Google, Facebook and Microsoft. Speaking for the trio, Macron threatened to “name and shame” companies that do not comply with their demands.

May asserted, “Industry needs to go further and faster in automating the detection and removal of terrorist content online, and developing technological solutions that prevent it being uploaded in the first place.”

Former CIA director, General David Petraeus, told the BBC that governments had to look at “the tools and the authorities necessary to eliminate if possible and at the very least reduce very dramatically the way Islamists have been able to use cyberspace.” He called the internet a “whole new domain of warfare.”

May, Petraeus, Trump et al are calling for carte blanche censorship and powers to exclude whole sections of the population from internet use as and when politically convenient.

Ultimate responsibility for the attack lies with the ongoing neo-colonial occupation and destruction of swathes of the Middle East by the United States and its British and European allies.

The alleged attacker, Ahmed Hassan, is clearly a traumatised youth. He was orphaned when his parents were killed in Iraq. He arrived illegally in the UK in 2015 and applied for asylum. He has been followed carefully by the British authorities from the moment he set foot in the country. According to an unnamed immigration officer who “mentored” Hassan, he had also been tortured in Iraq and was suffering from post-traumatic stress. He is said to have expressed “anger at Tony Blair,” then prime minister who, in 2003, sent thousands of British forces into Iraq as a part of the US-led invasion and occupation.

After arriving in the UK, Hassan was placed by Surrey Council and Spelthorne Council with Penny and Ronald Jones—from all accounts a dedicated and caring couple from Sunbury, who have, over the years, fostered hundreds of vulnerable children. The retired couple, aged 71 and 81, had only returned to foster care a few months ago to deal with the influx of refugee children. The couple, said to be in “shell shock,” reportedly had severe problems with Hassan.

According to the Daily Mail, Hassan had already been referred to the government’s anti-Islamic Prevent programme, intended to identify young people in danger of being radicalised, “several months ago”, by Surrey County Council. Neighbours reported that police had visited the Jones’ house at least five times in the four weeks prior to the attack.

Trump’s statement that the attacker was known to the British authorities was borne out by a report in the Daily Mail. It cited neighbours of Ronald and Penelope Jones who said that Hassan (then unnamed) was detained by police at the same tube station days before the attack. Serena Barber said, “I know about two weeks ago he was arrested by police at Parsons Green, for what I don’t know, and returned back to Penny and Ron. After that Penny said she was going to have to stop caring for him, she couldn’t handle him.”

Hassan was arrested at the port of Dover the morning after the explosion. Over subsequent days another six people were arrested in Newport and Cardiff, South Wales, Sunbury, Surrey and in Hounslow, London. All have been released, having been held for days without charge.

One Yahyah Faroukh, is a 21-year-old fast food worker from Hounslow, and a former foster child of the Jones couple. Faroukh too is a refugee, a Syrian who left Damascus in 2012. He was arrested the day after the attack and held for five days.

Faroukh was seized outside his workplace at a fast food restaurant by undercover police, who wrapped him in plastic to preserve forensic evidence before bundling him away. His picture and recent travel details were broadcast across the media. Faroukh’s mother suffered a heart attack following her son’s arrest and is now in a critical condition. The young man’s father also died recently. His employer has been subject to “abuse, threats, anger and hatred” and has demanded an apology from the Metropolitan Police.

Hassan and Faroukh’s circumstances have shed further light on the treatment of unaccompanied children, who arrive as asylum seekers in Britain, and their vulnerability. According to the Home Office, 11 percent of all asylum applications are from children who arrive in Britain alone. Between June 2016 and June 2017, 2,944 unaccompanied children applied for asylum. Most were from Libya and Syria. In 2016, 1,376 were from Syria. Unaccompanied children are placed in foster care until they become adults.

Fostering and adoption agencies, along with refugee support groups have expressed concerns that the May government will also use the bombing as a pretext to create further obstacles to settling child refugees within the UK.

Earlier this year, the British government dropped the so-called “Dubs amendment,” which committed the government to accepting 3,000 unaccompanied minors. Home Secretary Amber Rudd claimed “The specified number of 350 children ... reasonably meets the intention and spirit behind the provision.” The British government excused its filthy evasion by claiming that the programme could “incentivise” children to travel to Europe.

Officially, there are around 300,000 unaccompanied child refugees worldwide, although this is acknowledged to be only a fraction of the real figure.

German army build-up follows federal election

Tino Jacobson

Following the recent general election, the upgrading of Germany’s Armed Forces is advancing rapidly. On Monday, Germany ordered five new A330 MRTT transport and tanker aircraft from Airbus, which are to be financed together with Norway through the OCCAR Joint Cooperation Organization. The order is part of a European offensive to renew the air forces of European NATO members.

The new aircraft will replace four old Luftwaffe (German Air Force) A310s and will be based at Cologne-Wahn, where the defence ministry air transport corps is based. The parliamentary Budget Committee had already released finances of €1.4 billion before the summer break for their procurement.

Shortly before the election, the defence ministry had arranged another billion-euro arms deal. Five “Braunschweig” K130 class corvettes are to be purchased for about €2 billion. The warships are to be completed by 2025.

The ships are to be armed with fully automatic naval guns and two fully automatic 27mm calibre turret guns, as well as two anti-aircraft rocket batteries. In addition, there are sea-to-sea guided missile systems, the possibility of mine laying and technology to disrupt enemy communications. The vessels can also be equipped with “marine drones” to carry out reconnaissance and surveillance.

Armin Schmidt-Franke, vice president of the Federal Office of Equipment, Information Technology of the Bundeswehr, said: “We are enabling the German navy to fulfil its increased commitments within the alliance with boats that have proved their worth in numerous assignments.”

The official Navy website says of the corvettes’ procurement: “This type of vessel makes possible worldwide deployment and complements the existing capabilities of the high-speed patrol boats and frigates. Corvettes are optimal for tasks in naval warfare, especially in bordering seas and coastal waters.”

The latest acquisitions are part of a comprehensive armaments program over the coming years, whose dimensions recall the massive rearming of the Wehrmacht (Hitler’s Armed Forces) in the 1930s, and are to prepare Germany for war.

At present, the Ministry of Defence is working on an upgrade plan based on the so-called “provisional conceptual guidelines for the future capability profile of the Bundeswehr,” presented by the responsible department head in the ministry, Lieutenant General Erhard Bühler.

Accordingly, Germany’s military is to “grow strongly in the areas of the army, air force and navy ... in order to meet the new requirements,” as reported by the German Bundeswehr Association (DBwV) on its website. This concerns ensuring a “full defence capability on land, water, air, outer space and cyberspace.”

Specifically, the Luftwaffe should “be able to lead a multinational alliance,” which can fly up to 350 reconnaissance and combat missions every day. The air forces would have to be able to “maintain air superiority over Germany and, together with their allies, ensure superiority over an operational area.”

As well as the new tank and transport aircraft, Tornado jets and CH-53 transport helicopters will be replaced. In addition, drones, C-130 Hercules transporters and heavy transport helicopters are to be purchased. The stated objective of the measures is for the Luftwaffe “to take over protection of land forces from the air as early as 2021.”

Similar growth is planned for the other military forces. For the navy, “At least 15 ships and boats will be ready for operation at the same time.” To this end, six tenders, four frigates and mine defence units would have to be replaced in the coming years, and additional war ships procured. The navy should also “be enabled to conduct naval battles from the air.”

The largest restructuring is planned for the army. “In future, three fully equipped divisions with eight to ten brigades should be available, which are to be fully operational within three months,” writes DBwV. The necessary staff—a division usually consists of about 10,000 to 30,000 soldiers—is to follow with “the increased involvement of reservists.”

The DBwV’s summary of the planned armament of the tank fleet reads like preparation for a new land war in Europe.

At the centre of the demands for more military hardware is the Boxer armoured fighting vehicle. There are 200 units already at the disposal of the army, and 130 more were approved. “But that is not enough by far, internal calculations assume that a three-fold amount is required—at least. Higher numbers of the new Puma armoured personnel carriers, as well as Franco-German cooperation in the area of artillery systems are under discussion.”

Japan’s main opposition party dissolves itself ahead of general election

Ben McGrath

Japan’s Democratic Party (DP, Minshintō) came to a de facto end Thursday after party leader Seiji Maehara announced it would not run candidates in the snap national election on October 22. Instead, party members, including incumbent lawmakers, have been instructed to seek nominations under the newly established Party of Hope (Kibō no Tō), led by right-wing nationalist and Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike.

The announcement came the same day Prime Minister Shinzo Abe officially dissolved the Lower House of the Japanese Diet or parliament so as to pave the way for the election. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) appeared set to retain power due mainly to mass abstention as few voters regard the DP as an alternative. The party’s support in opinion polling has been sitting in the single digits for months.

The DP has been split between right-wing and so-called liberal factions, arguing over pro-war revisions to the constitution as well as cooperation with the Stalinist Japanese Communist Party (JCP). Yuriko Koike’s establishment of the Party of Hope provided the DP’s conservatives with an opportunity to salvage their political careers and potentially return to power while also breaking with the liberals.

Maehara, a member of the DP’s right-wing faction, and Koike agreed to work together on the evening of September 26. A general meeting of all DP lawmakers on Thursday approved the proposal to essentially fold their party into Koike’s. “We have to stop the Abe administration by all possible means,” Maehara said at the meeting. “By realizing a change in government again, I want to bring down the Abe administration that is selfish and distorting politics.”

It is unclear who would be nominated for prime minister should the Party of Hope win the election. Maehara plans to run as an independent while Koike has stated she will remain governor of Tokyo, though there is speculation that she is planning to run for parliament.

As of Thursday, 62 DP incumbents, or 75 percent of those seeking re-election, had committed themselves to run under the Party of Hope. However, Koike announced that not all DP candidates will be accepted. “I want to narrow (the list) down from various standpoints, like how well they can fit in with our policies,” she said yesterday.

Goshi Hosono, who left the DP in August to co-found the Party of Hope, stated that candidates will have to share a “realistic” stance on national security, i.e., supporting remilitarization. Like the LDP, the party supports revisions to Article 9 of the constitution that has limited the country’s armed forces and other amendments to further the pro-war agenda of the Japanese ruling class. The Party of Hope is trying to avoid a discussion of constitutional revision during the election, conscious of the mass hostility to war in Japan.

Domestically, Koike is promising to freeze a scheduled sales tax increase in 2019 and halting the use of nuclear power, while calling for pro-market economic “reforms,” without elaborating. On Monday, she declared, “When you look at the world, bold reforms are taking place everywhere, as represented by the corporate tax cuts undertaken by President Trump and President Macron (of France). Japan is lagging behind. I believe Japan needs a real reform-minded force.”

Koike is posturing as an outsider and opponent of the political establishment. However, she had been a longstanding member of the LDP, joining in 2002, before leaving the party earlier this year. She served in the Junichiro Koizumi’s cabinet and in Abe’s first government as defense minister. She first entered the Upper House of parliament in 1992 before being elected to the Lower House the following year. She is also a senior member of the far right-wing Nippon Kaigi, which whitewashes Japanese war crimes in the 1930s and 1940s and advocates emperor worship. Abe and most of his cabinet are also members.

The DP’s decision to effectively dissolve itself into Koike’s party is the end product of the upheaval in Japanese politics following the collapse of the Japanese Socialist Party (JSP) in the 1990s. The Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ, Minshutō) was formed in 1998 to keep working-class discontent and alienation within safe parliamentary channels. It comprised not only former JSP members, but also disgruntled ex-LDP members.

The inclusion of Ichiro Ozawa’s Liberal Party in 2003 pushed the DPJ further to the right. Ozawa, another former LDP member and political heavyweight, left the DPJ in 2012. His newly formed Liberal Party is also expected to join Koike’s party.

After being swept to power in 2009, the DPJ was quickly discredited, after it reneged on its electoral promises to distance itself from the US military alliance and to make limited social reforms. Abe and the LDP defeated the Democrats in a landslide in 2012. The DPJ attempted to posture as a left-wing opponent of Abe, working with the JCP, the Social Democratic Party (SDP), and other parties. This did not prevent it from merging with the far right Japan Innovation Party in 2016 to form the DP.

Not all DP members are satisfied with Thursday’s de facto merger. DP members who do not intend to join the Party of Hope are expected to run as independents, with an eye towards forming a new party after the election. This leaves the JCP as the main, so-called “left” party in Japanese politics. Its leader, Kazuo Shii, criticized the DP, saying, “Maehara’s proposal unilaterally abandons the agreement reached by the four opposition parties. It is a serious act of betrayal.”

For years, the JCP has promoted illusions in the Democrats as leaders for the Left. The “betrayal” felt by Shii is not over the fact that the DP has joined a right-wing party, but that it leaves the Stalinists exposed for supporting the Democrats to begin with. This will not prevent the JCP, which is thoroughly integrated into the political establishment and has abandoned any pretence of seeking to overthrow capitalism, from continuing to support former DP members running as independents.

Trump adds Chad to renewed travel ban

Eddie Haywood

Trump’s Sunday announcement of a new indefinite travel ban includes the African nation of Chad, a country that has given full support to Washington’s imperialist wars conducted against several African nations for over a decade. The limitations on travel from Chad to the US go into effect on October 18.

Taking to Twitter late Sunday, Trump expressed the ban’s reactionary nationalist character: “Making America Safe is my number one priority. We will not admit those into our country we cannot safely vet.”

As an explanation for Chad’s addition to the list, Trump’s proclamation states, “Chad does not adequately share public-safety and terrorism-related information and fails to satisfy at least one key risk criterion.”

The list of countries to be restricted include Iran, Libya, Syria, Yemen and Somalia, which were part of the initial ban, with the addition of North Korea, Venezuela, and Chad. Without explanation, Sudan was dropped from the list.

Significant is the fact that of the countries on the list, with the exception of Chad, all are either targets of the US for regime change or are currently undergoing US bombardment. In the case of Chad, the African nation has served a subservient role to Washington’s predatory aims on the continent.

The addition of two “non-Muslim” countries, North Korea and Venezuela, owe to the Trump administration’s attempt to scrub the xenophobic tinge that characterized the original and to ensure the measure’s resistance to court challenges.

The initial travel ban was announced a few days after Trump was inaugurated, and its implementation was blocked by a federal court as unconstitutional; a revised travel ban was also blocked in the lower courts leading the Trump administration to an appeal before the Supreme Court, which affirmed the measure in June.

Chad’s ruling government of President Idriss Derby issued a statement to the media condemning the ban. “The Chadian Government expresses its incomprehension in the face of the official reasons behind this decision,” adding, “reasons that contrast with the efforts and the ongoing commitments of Chad in the fight against terrorism.”

The inclusion of Chad in the ban, a country which has lent its full support to Washington’s imperialist operations across the Sahel region of Africa, provoked severe criticism from sections within the America ruling class, reflecting the broader conflict since Trump’s election over the direction of foreign policy.

There are concerns that the implementation of the reactionary travel restrictions will undermine the global economic order over which American capitalism presides, and provoke a backlash against the US from Washington’s allies around the globe, in particular Europe.

Speaking to Foreign Policy, Richard Downie, deputy director of the Africa program at the Center for Strategic International Studies, explained the character of Chad’s close relationship with Washington and its imperialist prerogatives on the continent, stating, “...the ban would only harm coordination between the Pentagon and Chad,” adding “[the ban] cannot be anything but damaging to a bilateral relationship.”

Chad has received tens of millions in US military aid to carry out Washington’s neo-colonial operations across the Sahel region by utilizing the standard pretext of “fighting terrorism.” Currently, on the behalf of Washington, Chad’s forces are engaged in a protracted battle against the Islamist militant group Boko Haram.

Recently, the US opened a $300 million embassy in capital city N’Djamena, making clear Chad’s geo-strategic importance to Washington.

Additionally, in 2013 Chad lent its forces in the US-backed French military invasion of Mali to neutralize Islamist rebels who conducted an insurgency against the US/French-backed forces who overthrew the government in Bamako.

Illuminating Washington’s interests in Chad, J. Peter Pham, an Africa specialist for the Atlantic Council, and under consideration by the Trump administration for deputy assistant secretary for African affairs, was more explicit.

Pham, in speaking with the New York Times, alleged that Chad had “played a somewhat duplicitous role against Boko Haram,” and had only cracked down on the Islamist militia when Chad’s trade routes were threatened.

Speaking on Chad’s geostrategic importance for Washington, Pham stated that “[Chad is] geographically, a country one doesn’t want to alienate.” Expressing the true face of Washington’s aim of unquestioned dominance of the continent, Pham added, “they’ve been a necessary partner but not a wholehearted one.”

In the country of 14 million, the chief victim of Washington’s calculations are the Chadian people, of whom 90 percent reside in impoverished conditions. The renewed travel ban represents an escalation of Washington’s imperialist offensive in the Sahel region and across the African continent.

US Justice Department demands Facebook turn over information on anti-administration activists

Trévon Austin

The US Department of Justice has issued warrants demanding that Facebook turn over private account information on three individuals described by their attorneys as “anti-administration activists” who “are generally very critical of [the Trump] administration’s policies.” The private account information on thousands of Facebook users could be funneled to the government as a result of the warrants.

Facebook received the warrants in February, but was until recently under a gag order barring it from making the warrants known to the targeted individuals or the public. The social media giant has not said whether it has, or plans to, comply with the search warrants.

One of the targeted Facebook users, Emmelia Talarico, operated the disruptj20 web page where protests against Trump’s inauguration were organized and discussed. Approximately 6,000 individuals visited the site, and the Department of Justice would have access to their identities should Facebook hand over the information sought in the warrants.

Talarico says that if the authorities are able to obtain her account information, they will have access to her “personal passwords, security questions and answers, and credit card information,” as well as “the private lists of invitees and attendees to multiple political events sponsored by the page.”

This follows a similar warrant issued to the web provider DreamHost, in which the government demanded that the company turn over all data on disruptj20.org, including visitor logs and IP addresses for 1.3 million people who visited the site. The warrant also demanded access to emails, photos and other data of those involved in contributing to and producing the site.

These warrants are part of a massive attack by the Trump administration on freedom of speech and political expression, focused on the Internet and social media. It is aided and abetted by a McCarthyite campaign led by the Democratic Party and the intelligence agencies, with bipartisan support from congressional Republicans, casting all political opposition to the policies of the government and to the growth of social inequality and poverty as the result of Russian “fake news” and media manipulation. The aim is to criminalize social opposition and political dissent and brand them as anti-American and treasonous activity.

Such sweeping demands for private information are in direct violation of the Fourth Amendment of the US Constitution, which prohibits “unreasonable searches and seizures” and states that warrants must be based upon “probable cause…particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

They also violate the First Amendment’s guarantees of freedom of speech and the press, and the right to peacefully protest.

Washington DC Superior Court Judge Robert Morin largely granted the Justice Department’s request to collect vast sets of records, including the emails of Facebook users and membership lists.

Yet this flagrant attack on democratic rights and assertion of police-state powers has evoked no significant protest from either the political or media establishment. Not a single leading Democratic politician has issued a statement opposing the warrants.

The other two Facebook users named in the warrants are Lacy MacAuley and Legba Carrefour. In court filings against the search warrant for his account, Carrefour said it “contains a significant amount of private material concerning my personal life.” He added in a statement that the warrants are “part of a pattern of prosecutorial overreach in the repression of Inauguration Day protesters.”

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), representing the three Facebook users, filed a motion to invalidate the three warrants. ACLU lawyers said the warrants were too broad and would reveal private information about those not involved in alleged violence during the inauguration protests.

“We are deeply concerned about the government engaging in a fishing expedition,” said Scott Michelman, a senior staff attorney with the ACLU of the District of Columbia.

Of particular concern, Michelman said, is that the government search would disclose “anti- administration dissident activities that would then be investigated by the very administration that they are protesting.”

The Trump administration claims the warrants are part of a criminal investigation into the January 20 demonstrations in the capital in which more than 200 protesters were arrested.

The disclosure of the Justice Department warrants coincided with an announcement by tech giant Apple that in the first half of 2017, it received its highest ever number of US government national security letters requesting data. According to Apple’s transparency report, it received between 13,250 and 13,499 requests affecting between 9,000 and 9,249 accounts.

On Thursday, Google also released its transparency report. It received up to 499 requests for data, affecting between 1,000 and 1,499 accounts.

These developments in the US are part of an international attack on political dissent. Just last month, the German government raided the homes of the alleged administrators of the left-wing website “linksunten.indymedia.org” and shut the site down. The German government has also passed a law requiring social media companies to remove “violent extremist” material.

The issue of illegal and unconstitutional domestic spying in the US, including the pervasive National Security Agency surveillance exposed four years ago by Edward Snowden, has been completely dropped by the media and the political establishment. The Obama administration defended the NSA and blocked any rollback of government spying on electronic communications or legal action against those who organized it. It set the table for the Trump administration by prosecuting more whistleblowers for exposing classified information than any previous administration.

Technology and information monopolies such as Facebook and Google are complicit in the ruling class attack on freedom of speech and access to information. The World Socialist Web Site has exposed the political blacklisting of left-wing and antiwar websites by Google, which has implemented algorithms that, in the name of demoting “low-quality content,” slash search referrals to left-wing sites. The WSWS has been most heavily impacted by this censorship.

In response to political pressure, Facebook has turned over to Congress a list of 3,000 accounts, supposedly connected to Russia, which the company claims made $100,000 in ad purchases to “sow divisions” during the 2016 US election. Twitter is facing similar demands that it crack down on ads from Russian users such as the Russian-language news outlet RT.