March 28, 2005

Israel Says Palestinians Abet Smuggling of Antiaircraft Missiles

By STEVEN ERLANGER

The New York Times

TEL AVIV, March 27 - Palestinians have smuggled several Strela antiaircraft missiles into the Gaza Strip with the help of members of the Palestinian military intelligence service, which is led by Moussa Arafat, according to Israel's defense minister, Shaul Mofaz.

"This crosses a red line for us," Mr. Mofaz said in an interview in his Tel Aviv office Sunday night. He said he had ordered the Israeli commander in Gaza, Maj. Gen. Dan Harel, to meet with Mr. Arafat, a cousin of the late Yasir Arafat, "and demand that they better put their hands on the smugglers and the Strelas and hand them over to us."

There have been vague reports of Strelas being smuggled through tunnels from Egypt into Gaza before, but rarely with this kind of specificity.

The Strela, a shoulder-fired missile developed in 1968 and then modernized, can be used against low-flying aircraft like helicopters, which are crucial for Israeli intelligence, especially after withdrawal from Gaza. Still, most Israeli helicopters and aircraft can deal with the missile, said Iftah Shapir of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University.

But for Mr. Mofaz, a former Israeli military chief of staff, the Strelas are a telling example of how little the new Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, known as Abu Mazen, has been able to put his stamp on the competing Palestinian security services. "It's a one-man show," said Mr. Mofaz. "There's a big gap between Abu Mazen's intentions and what we see in the field. All the others continue to act in the same way as before."

Not only are the Palestinian commanders rivals, Mr. Mofaz said, "you don't see all the leadership united around Abu Mazen," in particular the holdover prime minister, Ahmed Qurei, known as Abu Alaa. "We know Abu Mazen and Nasser Yousef," who is the interior minister, "want to coordinate Gaza disengagement with us," Mr. Mofaz said. "But Abu Alaa is speaking about not coordinating with us."

Mr. Mofaz, who was interviewed just before he flew to Washington for meetings with senior American officials, clearly wanted to explain why Israel was not moving more quickly to keep its promises to Mr. Abbas at the Feb. 8 summit meeting in Sharm el-Sheik, Egypt. There, the Israelis agreed to return security control over five cities in the West Bank to the Palestinians by the end of February.

Jericho and Tulkarm have been handed over, but Mr. Mofaz has ordered a halt in negotiations about the other three, Qalqiliya, Ramallah and Bethlehem. The Palestinians, he insists, have not yet kept their promises to disarm the 17 wanted fugitives in Jericho and 35 in Tulkarm, ensure that they abandon their military organizations and swear to give up terrorism, keep them under security control and ensure that they remain within the city limits for at least six months.

"They agreed to all these things at Sharm, but they've had Jericho back for two weeks and Tulkarm more than one week and we don't see them dealing with the fugitives as we agreed," Mr. Mofaz said. Even more, he said, "another 10 to 12" wanted men have moved into the city of Tulkarm "to seek immunity." The Israelis have provided the Palestinians with names, "but nothing is being done."

The Palestinians complain in turn that Israel is dragging its feet on its commitments, is pocketing Palestinian concessions, continuing to thicken settlements and is harming Mr. Abbas instead of helping him, giving those who oppose a truce and negotiations with Israel more ammunition, and making it more likely that the radical Islamic group Hamas will do well in the July 17 parliamentary elections.

Mr. Mofaz rejects that criticism, insisting that he has done what Mr. Abbas asked. Israel, Mr. Mofaz said, has removed 288 checkpoints in the West Bank, extended checkpoint hours, opened the main road through Gaza, allowed more Palestinians to work in Israel and even cleared police cars for the security services through the Ashdod port. "The Palestinian people feel there is a change. But we don't feel there is a change in the Palestinian security groups fighting against terrorism."

The security forces "have a lot of disagreements about who will be the commander, who will lead and who will go to pension," he said.

At the same time, Mr. Mofaz thinks the main Palestinian political grouping, Fatah, is losing ground rapidly to Hamas, which has agreed to a period of quiet with Israel but emphasizes its military resistance to Israeli occupation, which in the past has meant terrorism. The Palestinians hold legislative elections on July 17 for the first time in nine years, and Hamas will take part.

"My fear is that Hamas will be too strong in the Palestinian Parliament," Mr. Mofaz said. "If Hamas becomes part of the Palestinian Authority and leaves terrorism behind, I believe it's some kind of solution. But, and it's a big but, we should make sure that all of Hamas's infrastructure for terrorism will be dismantled."

For now, Hamas is continuing to regroup and rearm.

Mr. Mofaz is directing military planning to dismantle the 21 Jewish settlements in Gaza and four small ones out of the 120 in the West Bank. "It is one of the most complex missions the State of Israel has faced in its history," he said. Having been commander of the West Bank and Gaza, he knows the settler leaders and is meeting with them, telling them that the evacuation, democratically decided, is vital for the future of Israel, which he loves as much as they.

But only now that the political battles are nearly done will it be possible to know how many of the nearly 9,000 settlers will leave quietly for new lives, and how many will resist the police and the army, he said. "It's very difficult to predict the percentage right now, and that will make a big difference," he said.

Mr. Mofaz is intent on cordoning off Gaza to prevent nonresidents or those seeking confrontation from reinforcing the settlers; he wants the evacuation to be continual and rapid - no more than four weeks, and very likely fewer.

And he has told the cabinet that he will start cracking down on those settlers who attack Palestinians in the West Bank or Israeli troops there, stoning soldiers and slashing the tires of their jeeps. "We can't close our eyes," he said. "You have to stop it now and deal with it and not postpone it. Because the timetable for disengagement is short, deterrence should begin now. The disengagement is a big challenge for Israeli democracy, Israeli law and Israeli decision makers," he said, "to take the right decisions for the State of Israel and implement them in the right way."

Panel to Warn Bush of Intelligence - Sharing Problems

By REUTERS

Published: March 27, 2005

Filed at 6:09 p.m. ET

CRAWFORD, Texas (Reuters) - A commission reviewing U.S. intelligence operations will warn this week that major obstacles remain to intelligence sharing among spy agencies, despite calls for change after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, people who have seen a draft report said on Sunday.

The nine-member bipartisan commission, created by President Bush and headed by appeals court judge Laurence Silberman and former Virginia governor and senator Charles Robb, is expected to issue its report on Thursday.

Bush was spending the holiday week end at his Crawford, Texas ranch.

The report will also include recommendations aimed at bolstering U.S. intelligence operations after a series of high-profile failures, from missed opportunities to thwart al Qaeda before the Sept. 11 attacks to claims that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction. None has been found.

A commission spokesman declined to discuss the contents of the report, portions of which have been circulating among the U.S. intelligence agencies.

``The report that goes to the president will be a detailed analysis of all 15 intelligence agencies, and the assessment will be blunt and to the point,'' said spokesman Larry McQuillan.

Set up to investigate flaws in the intelligence cited in launching the Iraq war, sources said the report will look more broadly and is expected to cite shortcomings in U.S. intelligence on weapon programs in Iran and North Korea.

The commission's report is also expected to focus on continued hurdles to intelligence-sharing between U.S. agencies more than two years after Bush announced that he would address the problem by creating the nation's first unified Terrorist Threat Integration Center.

Bush later signed into law the biggest U.S. intelligence overhaul in a half century, based on the recommendations of a separate commission that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks.

In February, he nominated John Negroponte as the new director of national intelligence to try to curb bureaucratic infighting and organize closer cooperation among the Pentagon, CIA and other agencies.

``Intelligence sharing remains an issue,'' said a person who has seen a draft of the intelligence commission's report. ``They are not sharing the way they should.''

The unified threat center combines personnel from the CIA, FBI, and departments of defense, state and homeland security as well as other agencies.

Bush offered an upbeat assessment of inter-agency cooperation in a February 2003 speech touting the center as ``another crucial advance in meeting the threats of this time.''

But critics say the threat-center has had mixed results melding the cultures, technologies and secrets of agencies that have different computer systems and still closely guard highly-classified terrorism information.

According to a report on Sunday in Newsweek magazine, when members of the White House commission paid a visit to the threat center, now renamed the National Counter-Terrorism Center, they were dismayed by what they found.

There were no less than nine levels of classified information stored in the center's computers. Analysts from different agencies had different clearances, making it difficult for them to talk to one another.

The panel's recommendations will include folding the Justice Department's various domestic intelligence and national-security operations into one office, creating a streamlined national-security division, Newsweek reported.

Bicycle Bomb Kills Seven South of Baghdad

By Ellen Knickmeyer

Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, March 28, 2005; 12:40 PM

BAGHDAD, March 28 -- A bomb hidden in the basket of a bicycle exploded Monday, killing seven people on a road south of Baghdad crowded with Shiite pilgrims, police said.

Nine people were wounded in the attack in the Shiite city of Mussayib, about 40 miles southwest of the capital, according to Qais Hamza, police chief of Babil.

Police arrested three suspects, Hamza said.

Thousands of Shiites are on the annual pilgrimage to the holy city of Karbala. Attacks timed to Shiite religious festivals have killed hundreds since public observances of Shiite holidays revived with the ouster of Saddam Hussein's government two years ago.

Also Monday, four men were killed in separate attacks on Iraqi police.

In one, gunmen ambushed a police colonel at the foot of a bridge in the insurgent Baghdad neighborhood of Doura, killing the police officer and his driver, police said.

In the other, a bomb exploded near a police patrol on a bridge, killing a police captain and his driver.

U.S. Bases in Afghanistan Get Upgrade

By STEPHEN GRAHAM
Associated Press Writer

Mar 28, 4:25 PM EST

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- The United States is pouring $83 million into upgrading its main military bases in Afghanistan, an Air Force general said Monday in a sign that American forces will likely be needed in the country for years to come as al-Qaida remains active in the region.

Meanwhile, in a reminder of the instability still facing the 25,000 foreign troops in the country, a roadside bomb hit a Canadian Embassy vehicle and another car in Kabul, injuring at least four people.

U.S. Brig. Gen. Jim Hunt said the millions were being spent on construction projects already under way at Bagram, the main U.S. base north of Kabul, and Kandahar in the south. Both are being equipped with new runways.

"We are continuously improving runways, taxiways, navigation aids, airfield lighting, billeting and other facilities to support our demanding mission," Hunt, the commander of U.S. air operations in Afghanistan, said at a news conference in the capital.

Afghan leaders are seeking a long-term "strategic partnership" with the United States, which expects to complete the training of the country's new 70,000-strong army next year, but it remains unclear if that will include permanent American bases.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in Kabul this month that Washington had not decided how long to keep troops in the country, which neighbors Iran, Pakistan and oil-rich Central Asia.

U.S. commanders have said they may cut their 17,000-strong force this year if a Taliban insurgency wanes. But they say the Afghan government remains vulnerable and some kind of U.S. presence will be needed for years.

In an interview with CNN's "Late Edition," Army Gen. John Abizaid, the commander of U.S. Central Command, said fresh skirmishes along the Pakistani frontier showed "the fight is not out of the Taliban completely, and not out of the al-Qaida people that are operating in that region."

Asked where Osama bin Laden might be, Abizaid said only that "an awful lot of al-Qaida leadership" was operating in the mountainous border region and that U.S. troops were watching the area "with great interest."

Hunt said 150 U.S. aircraft, including ground-attack jets and helicopter gunships as well as transport and reconnaissance planes, were using 14 airfields around Afghanistan. Many are close to the Pakistani border. Other planes such as B-1 bombers patrol over Afghanistan without landing.

"We will continue to carry out the ... mission for as long as necessary to secure a free and democratic society for the people of Afghanistan," Hunt said.

American officials say fixing the runway at Bagram will make it suitable for Dutch F-16 fighters expected to deploy this year to support the separate NATO-run security force in Afghanistan. U.S. forces have begun vacating Shindand Air Base, near the Iranian border, as NATO expands its 8,500-strong force into the west.

U.S. forces are increasingly focused on the area along the Pakistani border, but security remains fragile also in the capital.

Monday's explosion damaged a Canadian Embassy vehicle and injured one Canadian, Afghan officials said. The bomb left a five-foot-wide crater next to the road. However, witnesses said the man, identified by an embassy official as a security guard, walked unaided from the damaged vehicle.

Canadian officials were investigating the blast.

"It detonated just as the embassy vehicle was driving by," Lt. Col. Roland Lavoie, a Public Affairs spokesman for Canada's Department of Defense, said from Ottawa.

"One of the goals of the investigation is to determine whether Canadian vehicles were targeted. At this stage we don't know," Lavoie added.

Three Afghan men traveling in another car caught in the blast were taken to a hospital, one of them for serious injuries, Wazir Gul, the driver, said.

Leader: Army May Secure Iraq in 18 Months

By TRACI CARL
Associated Press Writer

Mar 28, 4:19 PM EST

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Iraq's outgoing interior minister predicted Monday that his country's emerging police and army may be capable of securing the nation in 18 months, saying his officers are beginning to take over from coalition forces.

Insurgents, meanwhile, targeted Shiite pilgrims, setting off two blasts that killed at least three people.

Interim Interior Minister Falah al-Naqib's comments came as security was heightened in the already heavily fortified Green Zone, where the National Assembly will hold its long-awaited second session Tuesday to choose a parliament speaker and two deputies.

Negotiators haggled over who would get the parliament speaker job, considering interim President Ghazi al-Yawer. They hope the inclusion of Sunni Arabs like him in the new government will help quell the Sunni-led insurgency.

But al-Yawer turned down the post and instead asked the Shiite-led United Iraqi Alliance for the vice president's post, said Ali Faisal, political coordinator for the Shiite Political Council, which is part of the alliance.

Alliance members agreed to nominate former nuclear scientist Hussain al-Shahristani as one of two deputy parliament speakers and interim Finance Minister Adel Abdul-Mahdi as one of two vice presidents.

Alliance negotiator Jawad al-Maliki said the Sunni Arabs were expected to name a candidate for the parliament's speaker position Tuesday.

Al-Naqib predicted that militants will target Tuesday's National Assembly meeting - only the second since the parliament was elected nearly two months ago in the nation's first free election in 50 years. The lawmakers met March 16 but repeatedly have postponed a second meeting because of negotiations over Cabinet positions.

Roads were blocked off Monday, and security was tightened around the area, already surrounded by concrete blast walls and barbed wire. Several mortar rounds slammed into the banks of the Tigris River, just short of the Green Zone.

Underscoring tensions with the country's majority Shiites - who make up 60 percent of Iraq's estimated 26 million people - insurgents set off two explosions targeting Shiite pilgrims heading to Karbala for a major religious ceremony.

In Musayyib, 40 miles south of Baghdad, a suicide bomber on a bicycle blew himself up near a police patrol protecting the pilgrims, Capt. Muthana al-Furati of the Hillah police force said. Two policemen were killed. The attack wounded two other officers and three civilians.

The other bombing took place at the Imam al-Khedher shrine compound in Khalis, 50 miles north of Baghdad. The attack killed one pilgrim and wounded two others resting at the compound, Col. Abdullah Hessoni Abdullah said.

Pilgrims travel to Karbala to mark al-Arbaeen, the end of a 40-day mourning period after the anniversary of the 7th-century martyrdom of Imam Hussein, one of the Shiite religion's top saints.

In a news conference, al-Naqib outlined progress by the country's fledgling security forces, predicting that U.S. troops would be able to begin slowly pulling out of parts of the country, and that "hopefully, within 18 months at the most we will be capable of securing Iraq."

"We hope that next summer, there will be a huge reduction in the numbers of multinational patrols," he said. "In some cities, there will be no foreign troops at all."

He said Iraqi police had better intelligence on local insurgents and criminal gangs that have flourished since the March 2003 U.S.-led invasion, helping reduce the number of casualties caused by car bombs and other attacks.

"I think it will collapse very soon," he said of the country's insurgency.

The interior minister added that Iraq's most-wanted terrorist, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, "has been surrounded in more than one area, and we hope for the best."

Al-Zarqawi's organization has claimed responsibility for kidnappings and killings across Iraq. On Sunday, militants posted a video on the Internet showing the purported execution of a man identifying himself as Interior Ministry official Col. Ryadh Gatie Olyway. The authenticity of the tape could not be verified.

Al-Naqib gave no timeline for a complete U.S. withdrawal, something U.S. officials have repeatedly said hinges on the security situation in Iraq and the wishes of the Iraqi government.

In an interview Sunday with CNN's "Late Edition," Army Gen. John Abizaid, the commander of U.S. Central Command, said Iraqi forces had made progress although challenges remained.

"By the end of 2005, provided the political process continues to be successful, you will see the Iraqis more and more in charge, and in some areas completely in charge," Abizaid said.

He also expressed concern about the delay in forming a new government, saying: "The more uncertainty, the greater chance for escalated violence."

Residents were already expressing frustration with the gap in governance, as some lame-duck ministries struggled to provide services. Tensions rose Sunday when bodyguards outside the Science and Technology Ministry shot at several dozen protesting employees demanding to be paid in full. One person was killed.

Some employees said they had only received partial paychecks.

Al-Naqib defended the actions, saying the demonstrators were trying to enter the ministry's offices and bodyguards simply were doing their jobs. Haithem Jassim, one of three people injured in the melee, said the demonstrators did not have any weapons.

Al-Naqib warned citizens not to protest, saying the gatherings were an invitation for a large-scale terrorist attack.

"Iraq has witnessed more bloodshed than it should," he said. "We are witnessing a situation in which Iraqi blood is becoming very cheap."

Peruvian Intellectuals Plan Activities to Support Cuba on April 14

From Prensa Latina

Lima, Mar 28 (Prensa Latina) Intellectuals, artists and cultural workers from Peru have called for solidarity activities on April 14 in support of Cuba and against US anti-Cuban aggressions.

Speaking to Prensa Latina on Monday, filmmaker Federico (Fico) Garcia said one of the goals was to demand that the Peruvian government refrain from endorsing US-concocted maneuvers against Havana at the Geneva-based UN Commission on Human Rights.

On the solidarity activities, Garcia noted they are intended to back Cuba and its people, and to condemn George W Bush"s hostility towards the Caribbean island.

Last week, workers" and farmers" unions, students and ten parties within the Leftwing National Coordinator coalition marched in favor of the Island in Lima.

Participants demanded President Alejandro Toledo distance his country from the Bush anti-Cuban maneuvers.

According to reports, over 80 prominent cultural figures such as sculptor V¡ctor Delf¡n, poets Marco Martos and Hildebrando Perez, Casa de las Americas Award winners Arturo Corcuera, Reinaldo Naranjo and Winston Orrillo have all signed the world intellectuals´ call condemning the scandalous US tactics against Havana at the UNCHR.

In the meantime, on 23 March 78 legislators in the Parliament successfully presented a motion to demand the government abstain from any vote against Cuba in the UNCHR.

ef/ecq/rl/jwp

Europe hopeful of change in Cuba bringing engagement
By Marc Frank
Published: March 28 2005 03:00 | Last updated: March 28 2005 03:00
From the Financial Times

The last time Louis Michel, the European Union's commissioner for development and humanitarian aid, was in Havana he rode a Harley Davidson down a balmy Malecon, the city's picturesque seaside drive.

That was in 2001 when he was Belgium's foreign minister. Mr Michel was back over the Easter weekend looking to mend the EU's tattered ties with the Communist-run island two years after President Fidel Castro locked up 75 pro-democracy activists. This time a motorcycle ride did not seem appropriate.

"I am far more hopeful than I was before I came," was about all Mr Michel had to say for his visit, which included a four-hour talk with Mr Castro, meetings with other officials, dissidents and Catholic Cardinal Jaime Ortega.

"Cuba and the European Union must make a real effort to renew a political dialogue," he said, before departing yesterday.

Mr Michel is a veteran of the on-again off-again political dialogue begun in 1996 when the EU tied improved relations on Cuban progress towards a more open society. He said authorities wanted improved relations based on "mutual respect for sovereignty and reciprocity".

Felipe Perez Roque, Cuban foreign minister, said as much before Mr Michel's arrival but added that a fresh start should be made by ripping up the 1996 common position.

He said that was forced on the EU by José María Aznar, then conservative Spanish prime minister, in complicity with the US. "It is a unilateral measure and a conditional document aimed at reducing relations, not one that stimulates a dialogue and looks to improve relations," Mr Perez said.

In contrast to Mr Aznar's strong support for sanctions, Spain's new Socialist government has pushed for EU dialogue with Cuba.

When the EU retaliated over the 2003 crackdown by stopping official visits and inviting dissidents to national day receptions, Mr Castro declared "we do not need Europe". He cancelled plans to join the Cotonou aid agreement with Europe's former colonies and ordered his government to snub European diplomats in Havana.

When the EU temporarily suspended sanctions for six months this year on condition that Cuba improve the human rights situation, Mr Castro said he did not need anyone's pardon for jailing enemy mercenaries.

Mr Castro did conditionally release 14 of his opponents for health reasons and lifted the ban on contact with EU country diplomats.

"I think things have changed, because yesterday during four hours I had in front of me a very kind man, very skilful and very healthy, full of energy, who seems to be wishing to make some headway with the European Union," Mr Michel said.

He added that the EU position on human rights and the release of imprisoned dissidents remained unchanged, but the bloc was not setting conditions for Cuba in the hope that engagement, rather than sanctions, would bring about improvements.

But on Palm Sunday hundreds of flag waving and chanting government supporters besieged a few of the imprisoned dissidents' wives and female relatives as they peacefully protested by walking, dressed in white, down a main avenue in the Miramar district of Havana.

"I am sceptical the government will respond positively to the EU initiative," says Elizardo Sanchez, who heads the illegal but tolerated Cuban Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation. "The situation in terms of civil, political and economic rights has deteriorated in recent days and it appears it will deteriorate further, barring a miracle."

He pointed to the recent mob action, last used more than a decade ago to silence dissent, and what he termed "threatening rhetoric". Various officials have stated that the streets are for patriots and revolutionaries, not US mercenaries, which is what the government brands all opponents.

Local analysts say Mr Castro's ways have little to do with Europe and everything to do with his arch-enemy the US.

As Cuba's pro-democracy movement remains isolated and divided, the US has further tightened the embargo, doubled already hefty aid to dissidents and taken to calling for a regime change.

Meanwhile, Mr Castro, 78, has found new strength from Chinese loans and a close alliance with Venezuela, which provides cheap oil in exchange for doctors. Europe, however, remains Cuba's main trading partner.

Mr Castro, in power since 1959, speaks to the nation every Thursday evening about how the economy, in crisis since the demise of the Soviet Union, is on the mend after the tightening of state controls.

Both Amnesty International and Christine Chanet, special United Nations envoy to investigate Cuban human rights abuses, condemned the situation on the island as the annual UN meeting on human rights got under way in Geneva.

They also said the US approach provided Cuban authorities with an excuse for more, not less, repression.

US, China, India: A tri-polar world?

March 28, 2005

From Rediff

Ten years ago, Tom Clancy, master of the peculiarly American art of techno-novels, wrote a book called Executive Orders, in which Iran, China and India collude against the United States. It was rather a good book, even if at 1200-odd pages, a bit too fat.

Now Arvind Virmani (Director, Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations) has sketched out a different scenario. In a recent working paper* he concludes "that the current unipolar world will be transformed into a bipolar world during the first quarter of this century, and into a tri-polar one (China, USA, India) during the second quarter of the century." Europe will fade away.

He also recommends "the formation of an Asian Economic Community, patterned on the European Economic Community, with China, India and Japan at its core and including other countries of Asia."

The paper is actually an extension of another paper he had written a whit earlier. In that he had analysed the economic basis of national power and given projections for the global economy and national power potential up to 2035. Here he has revised and extended those projections to 2050.

Virmani depends on two assumptions for what some may regard as a rather optimistic conclusion about India, China and the US forming a trinity. One, that India and China will not be rivals; and two that India and the US will co-operate as closely and deeply as perhaps the US and the UK do at present.

It is worth considering, however, whether the two are not mutually exclusive. Historically, in a three-power situation, two have always colluded against the third.

The partners, as we saw in George Orwell's 1984, may change but the fact remains: triangular collaboration is inherently unstable. Besides, three-person games, I need hardly point out to Virmani, are the only ones in game theory without stable solutions.

Be that as it may, the process Virmani outlines is absorbing. Thus, he says, in the next decade China's economy will become larger than of the US, a projection first made by Larry Summers in 1993.

"Its power potential will therefore equal that of the United States sometime during the second quarter of this century." But well before that the US would have lost its monopoly of world power as China challenges it.

Then, "in parallel, India's economy will overtake Japan's within five years to become the third largest in the world. Its incremental impact on the global economy will exceed that of Japan within 15 years. The Indian economy will equal the US economy in size by 2040. The world will, therefore, become tri-polar by the middle of the century."

Naturally, "India will be the weakest pole for most of this century." Here Virmani raises but does not explore the most crucial question of all: China's attitude towards India.

At present, China despises India as a weakling. If relations between it and India have to improve, there will have to be a fundamental change in China's attitude. Virmani's paper would have been richer if he had discussed this aspect in some detail.

He also goes a bit awry when he says that "the US and India . . . have no conflicts of interest." What about Pakistan, then? As he himself says, "for the next decade or so US foreign policy will be driven by its traumatic experience of 9/11."

This makes Pakistan an important concern of US foreign policy. With Iran going the way it is, Pakistan's importance is likely to grow for the US, not diminish.

It would also have been helpful if, while discussing the likely scenario over the next half century, Virmani had given a specific, explicit and detailed place to the politics of energy, which is likely to be the single most important driver of foreign policy. Increasingly, energy is going to be the parameter around which national interests are defined.

* A Tripolar Century: USA, China and India, ICRIER WP No 160, www.icrier.org

Aussies rank US behind China

By Rodney Dalton and Patrick Walters

29-03-2005

From: The Australian

WHILE John Howard staunchly followed his close friend George W. Bush to war, Australians don't hold the same affection for our key ally, with the US ranking below China, France and Japan in the public's estimation.

Only 58 per cent of Australians have "positive feelings" towards the world's superpower, with more than two-thirds complaining that the US holds too much sway over Australian foreign policy.

According to the first annual Lowy Institute poll, released yesterday, Australians rated the US above only our northern neighbour Indonesia and the so-called axis of evil member Iran and its war-torn neighbour Iraq.

Despite the findings, the majority of Australians regard the US alliance as important. Sixty-one per cent said they regarded our alliance with the US as "very important" to Australia's security.

The national poll - conducted last month - found almost 70 per cent think that Canberra is too heavily influenced by US foreign policy.

Asked how worried they were about potential threats from the outside world, 32 per cent of respondents said they were "very worried" about US foreign policies. Thirty-six per cent said they were very worried about Islamic fundamentalism.

However, unfriendly countries developing nuclear weapons - 51 per cent - and global warming - 46 per cent - were the highest-ranked concerns of those surveyed.

While both political parties support the 53-year-old ANZUS alliance, Labor's foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd said yesterday that for Labor "alliance has never equalled compliance with every item of US foreign policy".

"The danger for the Howard Government is that they don't readily make that distinction," Mr Rudd said.

However, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, who had been briefed on the Lowy findings, said Australians "are very committed to the American alliance".

"It depends what questions you put to people, the time that those questions are asked and what happens to be in the media on that day," Mr Downer said. "We don't do polling on foreign policy, ever.

"Public opinion can shift very, very dramatically in very short periods of time.

"You can't run a foreign policy on the back of opinion polls. It just can't be done."

The Lowy Institute poll found that 94 per cent of Australians feel positive toward New Zealand, ahead of Japan (84 per cent), China (69 per cent) and France (66 per cent).

The poll of 1000 Australians could not explain whether the attitude was a temporary response to the Bush administration's foreign policy or part of a longer-term agenda.

"Is it something to do with the Bush administration ... (or) is it Australia's traditional thumbing-the-nose at authority," Lowy Institute executive director Allan Gyngell said.

The recent nomination of Mr Bush's close adviser Karen Hughes as under-secretary of state for public affairs suggests that the US is aware it needs to work on its international image, Mr Gyngell said.

While more than 70 per cent of respondents feel safer under the US alliance, an equal number said if the US went to war with China over independence for Taiwan, Australia should not follow.

On the economic front, only 34 per cent thought the US free trade agreement was good for Australia, with 32 per cent saying it was bad. Asked about a free trade agreement with China, 51 per cent thought it would be good for Australia.

EU arms trade ban with China set to end, Chirac tells Koizumi
From The Japan Times

By KANAKO TAKAHARA
Staff writer

The European Union will probably lift its arms embargo against China by the end of June as scheduled, despite opposition from Japan and the United States, visiting French President Jacques Chirac told Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi on Sunday evening.

While Koizumi reiterated Japan's opposition to the move, Chirac tried to reassure Tokyo by saying lifting the ban will not result in big arms exports to China.

"The decision is of a political nature," Chirac told reporters through an interpreter after meeting with Koizumi. "Regulations on exports of weapons and sensitive technology to China will remain unchanged" after the embargo is lifted.

Chirac, who is in Japan on a three-day visit, said weapons exports will be carried out in accordance with the code of conduct and other regulations imposed by European nations.

The arms embargo was imposed after China's bloody crackdown on the democracy movement in Beijing's Tiananmen Square in 1989.

France has led efforts to secure an early end to the embargo despite pressure from Washington to keep it in place out of fear that China may get access to advanced weapons.

The EU, eager to boost trade and diplomatic ties with China, agreed last year to aim to lift the embargo by the end of June.

Koizumi expressed concern that the move may change the military balance in East Asia at a time when China is rapidly building up its military and Japan is cutting its defense budget.

"It is necessary to deal with the issue in ways that would not create tension in the East Asian security environment," Koizumi said.

Koizumi also warned that lifting the embargo could result in increasing tension over the Taiwan Strait, especially after China recently introduced an antisecession law that authorizes the use of force against Taiwan if it declares independence.

"Japan hopes for a peaceful and diplomatic resolution over the issue of Taiwan," he said.

Media reports said last week that the EU may delay lifting the arms embargo in light of the passage of the antisecession law.

Chirac and Koizumi did not mention the possibility of a delay in their remarks to the press.

Koizumi and Chirac said they will continue talks on a project to build the world's first nuclear fusion reactor.

Japan and the EU are at odds over where to build the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor; Japan wants to host the project in Rokkasho, Aomori Prefecture, while the EU wants it built in Cadarache, France.

Koizumi stressed that Japan has no intention of withdrawing from the race.

The EU has threatened to press ahead and start building the facility in Cadarache if there is no international agreement.

Diet members meanwhile urged the government earlier this month to start building the reactor in Rokkasho with its supporters -- the U.S. and South Korea -- if no agreement is reached with the EU.

Chirac further expressed support for Japan's bid to gain a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council with the same conditions granted to the current five permanent members, including veto rights.

"I support the plan that will enable major nations to be represented at the U.N. Security Council with every possible rights," Chirac told reporters.

The Japan Times: March 28, 2005