13. januar 2003

Cease-fire in Cote d'Ivoire The government and two rebel groups have signed a comprehensive cease-fire just ahead of the anticipated peace talks in Paris. So far, the uneasy peace has been enforced by the French foreign legion. Now a number of peace-keepers from other West-African nations will join them. Cote d'Ivoire has until quite recently been a peaceful country in the midst of conflicts, but is now threatened to fall into total disarray, also destroying the economy of the world's largest cocoa producer. Hope is now resting on the upcoming Paris summit. 10:06:16 PM    comment []

Elephant festival Shrinking natural habitats for India's elephans have lead to increasing conflicts between villagers and the world's largest mammals. Villagers are complaining that the elephants threaten their crops and property, and there has been an increasing number of poisonings and other attacks on the animals. Officials in Assam in India, home to around 5,000 elephants, have created a festival in Mihimukh in honour of the animals, to raise the public's image of them, and to attract some tourists at the same time. Almost 300 elephants played football, danced and allowed members of the public to get close and comfy with the giants. 9:05:52 PM    comment []

Whose problem is Islamic terrorism? So-called liberals in the west and people in the Islamic world alike have been worried that the war on terror will escalate into a full war between the west and Islam. Wisely, the American government has made many steps to emphasise that this is not the case. Yet, as a cursory reading of history will reveal: conflicts do tend to escalate and polarise entirely populations into extremist.positions. Moderates risk becoming targets of both sides. Islamic terrorism started, naturally, in the Muslim world. They are primarily violent opponents of institutions they despise in their own countries. In Islamic countries, violent radicals have committed atrocious acts for decades and, with few exceptions, the reply has been appeasement from their governments and an absurd 'understanding' from the more spineless fractions of the west's leftist movements. Islamic terrorists have learned that their tactics worked, and it has strengthened them, made them more powerful, until the cancer spilled over into the western world with the devastating results we witnessed in Africa in 1998, on 9/11-01, on Bali (picture) and other places. The governments in the Islamic world who express concern that they are the long-term targets of the war on terror should rather ask themselves why they ignored the problem for so long. The Indonesian government was totally spineless and blind to the terror networks in its country, and only reluctantly it has accepted the facts put forth to them by western intelligence after the comprehensive Bali investigation: the western world was right in labeling these movements as terrorists, and appeasement does not work. Time will tell if we see any action following this realisation. The Islamic world, instead of clinging to US-phobic conspiracy theories, should face up to the fact that terror originated on their soil, and is their problem to deal with. They failed miserably, now we are all suffering, and the western world will assault the terrorist groups with all its fury, wherever they are. In this limited sense, I will even go as far as to give George Bush right in his otherwise unfortunate rhetoric: you are either with us or againt us. 7:57:07 PM    comment []

Joseph Lieberman runs for presidency Senator Joseph Lieberman, vice presidential candidate in the losing Gore/Lieberman ticket in '00, has announced to nobody's surprise that he will run for president in '04. Even in a country confusing moralism with ethics, I don't for a minute expect Lieberman, being the first Jewish politician on a major political ticket, having any chance for the democratic nomination and even less the presidency himself. Perhaps he'll again be somebody's running mate. 5:30:57 PM    comment []

The AOL Case As AOL Time Warner goes from an era of breathtaking expansion to a time of layoffs and frantic cost-saving, it comes as no surprise that Steve Case is stepping down as chairman in May. The board has tied his arms with necessary but demoralising demands, and there are not room for a visionary at the helm of the struggling entertainment giant, as The Motley Fool explains. 5:25:32 PM    comment []

Leech transfer David Yelland, editor in chief of the British tabloid Sun, has quit suddenly. So where to go for a replacement, considering it must be rather difficult to find people so totally devoid of morality and who can still run a business? Easy! His replacement is no other than editor of Sun's competitor News of the World, Rebekah Wade, a newspaper that, if possible, has an even worse reputation. That figures. 4:33:56 PM    comment []

The Occoquan Inquirer A new issue of virtual occoquan is out, containing some of the best of last week in Salon blogs (and it was a good week). Among other things, it contains the diablogue on language with Raven, Rob, Rayne and myself (obviously I ruin it all by not having a name on R). 2:35:50 PM    comment []

© Copyright 2003 Jan Haugland. Last update: 01.02.03; 00:36:48.