It's a scam. Who would ever have thought after the Iraq tragedy that the US and its client states would have had the chutzpah to repeat their dismal performance?
When the rumblings from the White House and the Israeli Knesset first began over Iran's alleged nuclear weapons ambitions, I thought their accusations would be laughed out of court. I was wrong.
I was wrong because I hadn't realised the depths to which some powerful nations would sink, even to the point of binning international law along with empirical justice, in furthering their own interests.
I was wrong because I failed to realise just how much other countries fear the wrath of the superpower or wish to continue receiving the monetary scraps that fall off its table.
And I was wrong because I had underestimated the lengths to which elements of Western corporate media would go to spin the story in favour of the belligerents.
And neither did I fathom just how deep the UN nuclear watchdog, the IAEA, would bury facts to appease the political agendas of its more powerful masters when it has been accused of doing the same over Iraq with such terrible consequences.
Let's get specific.
Friday, October 07, 2005
The Nazi Nine
The U.S. Senators who voted for torture:
Allard (R-CO)
Bond (R-MO)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Roberts (R-KS)
Sessions (R-AL)
Stevens (R-AK)
Ask not for whom the war crimes tribunal asks, it asks for you.
(Via War and Piece)
Allard (R-CO)
Bond (R-MO)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Roberts (R-KS)
Sessions (R-AL)
Stevens (R-AK)
Ask not for whom the war crimes tribunal asks, it asks for you.
(Via War and Piece)
The Axis Enemy Series: Which Rogue Nation?
What do you call a Nation that is defiant of, and routinely violates International Law; one who invokes International Law, only when it serves its own interests, acting unilaterally when it does not?
How is a Nation defined when it demands accountability for other Nations while denying the rest of the world the ability to ensure, and enforce, accountability upon itself; when its military might is used to enforce its ideology and agenda, basing its entire existence on the Rule of Coercion and Force?
What do you call a Nation that maintains and continues to pursue newer and better Weapons of Mass Destruction; when it exports those weapons around the world?
How should a Nation, that plans, supports, funds, and executes aggressions against other sovereign Nations, without regard for their legality, be viewed?
What is the definition of a State that engages in and supports terrorism when it suits its own interests and agenda, acting in the interests of the elite, without regard for its own citizens, or the citizens of other Nations?
The US labels Nations that exhibit these actions as "Rogue States." Ironic; the US defined the "Rogue Nation" concept and is now defined by it.
How is a Nation defined when it demands accountability for other Nations while denying the rest of the world the ability to ensure, and enforce, accountability upon itself; when its military might is used to enforce its ideology and agenda, basing its entire existence on the Rule of Coercion and Force?
What do you call a Nation that maintains and continues to pursue newer and better Weapons of Mass Destruction; when it exports those weapons around the world?
How should a Nation, that plans, supports, funds, and executes aggressions against other sovereign Nations, without regard for their legality, be viewed?
What is the definition of a State that engages in and supports terrorism when it suits its own interests and agenda, acting in the interests of the elite, without regard for its own citizens, or the citizens of other Nations?
The US labels Nations that exhibit these actions as "Rogue States." Ironic; the US defined the "Rogue Nation" concept and is now defined by it.
Ojeda's assassination gives fresh impetus to the independence struggle
CAPITALISM creates its own gravediggers, as Karl Marx and Frederich Engels explained in the Communist Manifesto. And the U.S. government, in its latest attack on the Puerto Rican people's struggle to free themselves from U.S. colonial rule, has not only revealed how alive that struggle is, it has given it new impetus.
After the FBI assassinated long-time independence fighter Filiberto Ojeda Ríos on September 23, rage exploded among Puerto Ricans and others everywhere, whether or not they identify themselves as independentistas (pro-independence). Some 300 agents surrounded the 72-year-old's home in Hormigueros, Puerto Rico - supposedly to arrest him for the 1983 robbery of an armored car –, refused his offer to turn himself in to a well-known journalist, shot him and left him to bleed to death.
Thousands demonstrated against this murder, both on the island and in the United States itself, where more than 1 million Puerto Ricans live. Thousands of people attended Ojeda's wake and funeral, and students and others took down the U.S. flag from various points around the island in protest.
After the FBI assassinated long-time independence fighter Filiberto Ojeda Ríos on September 23, rage exploded among Puerto Ricans and others everywhere, whether or not they identify themselves as independentistas (pro-independence). Some 300 agents surrounded the 72-year-old's home in Hormigueros, Puerto Rico - supposedly to arrest him for the 1983 robbery of an armored car –, refused his offer to turn himself in to a well-known journalist, shot him and left him to bleed to death.
Thousands demonstrated against this murder, both on the island and in the United States itself, where more than 1 million Puerto Ricans live. Thousands of people attended Ojeda's wake and funeral, and students and others took down the U.S. flag from various points around the island in protest.
Un médico diferente para una nueva forma de brindar salud
Se inicia el Programa de Formación en Medicina Integral Comunitaria. El plan de trabajo se divide en dos fases. Se utilizan nuevos escenarios de aprendizaje. Los estudiantes serán becados. Fraguamos el camino hacia un nuevo Sistema Público Nacional de Salud.
Por años, en Venezuela se aplica un modelo de formación en medicina desvinculado de las necesidades de las comunidades, que desestima el saber popular, considera el aula como el escenario de enseñanza por excelencia e impulsa la practica de una medicina individualizada, en la que están fragmentadas las distintas disciplinas en el abordaje de la enfermedad, en consecuencia, favorece una visión mercantilista que resguarda principalmente a grupos privilegiados.
¿Hacia dónde vamos? El país camina hacia un nuevo Sistema Público Nacional de Salud. Es un objetivo estratégico de la República Bolivariana de Venezuela transformar el modo como se viene prestando la atención de salud, tomando en cuenta para ello los principios de equidad, solidaridad, prevención y calidad que constituyen retos para la nueva sociedad que está en construcción en Venezuela.
Por años, en Venezuela se aplica un modelo de formación en medicina desvinculado de las necesidades de las comunidades, que desestima el saber popular, considera el aula como el escenario de enseñanza por excelencia e impulsa la practica de una medicina individualizada, en la que están fragmentadas las distintas disciplinas en el abordaje de la enfermedad, en consecuencia, favorece una visión mercantilista que resguarda principalmente a grupos privilegiados.
¿Hacia dónde vamos? El país camina hacia un nuevo Sistema Público Nacional de Salud. Es un objetivo estratégico de la República Bolivariana de Venezuela transformar el modo como se viene prestando la atención de salud, tomando en cuenta para ello los principios de equidad, solidaridad, prevención y calidad que constituyen retos para la nueva sociedad que está en construcción en Venezuela.
NED (a CIA front) - Imperialists in Democratic Clothing
With his ratings in the tank and desperately in need of a boost, not to mention a distraction from the sudden impotence of his administration, this week President Bush fell back on what worked so successfully for him in the past: fostering fear and promoting war.
Originally scheduled to mark the anniversary of 9/11, but postponed so that Bush and his cronies could ignore Hurricane Katrina, Bush delivered his latest pro-war screed to the ludicrously misnamed National Endowment for Democracy. A government-funded, semi-private organization (which happens to be free of Congressional oversight), the NED is a darling of the neo-conservatives and shares membership with the Project for a New American Century. Created by Reagan in the 1980s, ostensibly to promote "free market democracies" through "the magic of the marketplace," the NED's interests and practices are anything but democratic. As can be gleaned from its stated goals, the NED's notion of "democracies" are countries friendly to U.S. corporate interests. If a country isn't "democratic" enough already, the NED uses U.S. taxpayer money to subversively fund and instigate regime change.
Originally scheduled to mark the anniversary of 9/11, but postponed so that Bush and his cronies could ignore Hurricane Katrina, Bush delivered his latest pro-war screed to the ludicrously misnamed National Endowment for Democracy. A government-funded, semi-private organization (which happens to be free of Congressional oversight), the NED is a darling of the neo-conservatives and shares membership with the Project for a New American Century. Created by Reagan in the 1980s, ostensibly to promote "free market democracies" through "the magic of the marketplace," the NED's interests and practices are anything but democratic. As can be gleaned from its stated goals, the NED's notion of "democracies" are countries friendly to U.S. corporate interests. If a country isn't "democratic" enough already, the NED uses U.S. taxpayer money to subversively fund and instigate regime change.
Kill! Kill! Kill! - Ex-Marine tells his story about US brutality in Iraq
Former staff sergeant Jimmy Massey explains why US faces bloody insurgency in Iraq.
US military training has created troops so desensitised to violence that battleground brutality in Iraq is rampant -- and has helped fuel the bloody insurgency seen there today, a new book released Thursday in France by a former Marine says.
Jimmy Massey, a former staff sergeant, said that the daily attacks now doled out to US-led forces and Iraqi civilians are "because of the brutality that the Iraqi people saw at the start of the invasion."
In his book, " Kill! Kill! Kill!", he says he and other Marines in his unit killed dozens of unarmed Iraqi civilians because of an exaggerated sense of threat, and that they often experienced sexual-type thrills doing so.
The book was being released first in France -- and in French -- because, he said, "I didn't find an American publisher."
The French journalist who helped him write the work, Natasha Saulnier, said she believed the US companies were reluctant to touch the book because its "controversial" nature threatened commercial interests and the US public's image of their fighting forces.
US military training has created troops so desensitised to violence that battleground brutality in Iraq is rampant -- and has helped fuel the bloody insurgency seen there today, a new book released Thursday in France by a former Marine says.
Jimmy Massey, a former staff sergeant, said that the daily attacks now doled out to US-led forces and Iraqi civilians are "because of the brutality that the Iraqi people saw at the start of the invasion."
In his book, " Kill! Kill! Kill!", he says he and other Marines in his unit killed dozens of unarmed Iraqi civilians because of an exaggerated sense of threat, and that they often experienced sexual-type thrills doing so.
The book was being released first in France -- and in French -- because, he said, "I didn't find an American publisher."
The French journalist who helped him write the work, Natasha Saulnier, said she believed the US companies were reluctant to touch the book because its "controversial" nature threatened commercial interests and the US public's image of their fighting forces.
II Asamblea de Jóvenes involucra a 18 países
Mañana 7 de Octubre inicia la II Asamblea de Jóvenes de la Coordinadora Latinoamericana de Organizaciones del Campo (CLOC), en la ciudad de Guatemala; en la que participarán aproximadamente 120 jóvenes de 40 organizaciones. El evento que clausurará el día 8 del mes en curso tiene como objetivo contribuir a la consolidación de compromisos y la formación de un movimiento de jóvenes del campo en pos de fortalecimiento de las organizaciones campesinas e indígenas de todo el mundo, además de fortalecer las luchas contra las políticas imperialistas.
Esta segunda Asamblea tiene como lema “Jóvenes de CLOC unidos/as contra el saqueo capitalista cultivando y defendiendo unidas/as, la vida, la tierra, el territorio, la soberanía alimentaria, la autonomía de nuestros pueblos.” Entre los temas de discusión figuran: Militarización, Migración, Reforma Agraria, Racismo y educación.
El encuentro tendrá como base el IV Congreso de la CLOC.
Esta segunda Asamblea tiene como lema “Jóvenes de CLOC unidos/as contra el saqueo capitalista cultivando y defendiendo unidas/as, la vida, la tierra, el territorio, la soberanía alimentaria, la autonomía de nuestros pueblos.” Entre los temas de discusión figuran: Militarización, Migración, Reforma Agraria, Racismo y educación.
El encuentro tendrá como base el IV Congreso de la CLOC.
Cuando los narcos vienen marchando
Información divulgada recientemente en México reveló que los carteles internacionales de la droga ya no adiestran sicarios. Les resulta más barato enviar jóvenes marginales a centros de entrenamiento del ejército, la policía y las fuerzas especiales de combate en distintos países.
Guatemala : capital campesina de Latinoamérica
Guatemala, uno de los países de Centroamérica, que sufre el aumento de la pobreza y la miseria en el campo, y que ha sido duramente golpeada por fuertes lluvias causadas por tormentas tropicales que han agravado esta situación, se ha convertido desde ahora hasta el 12 de octubre, en la Capital del movimiento campesino organizado de América Latina. En efecto, en país de los “chapines”, se desarrollará el IV Congreso Continental de la Coordinadora Latinoamericana de Organizaciones del Campo, CLOC; durante los días 9, 10 y 11 de octubre.
Bill Bennett's Fantasy: Freak in Life, Demon in Imagination
Comedian Richard Pryor posed a question about how and whether America saw black people in its future. He noted that futuristic science fiction films rarely if ever had black characters. Was this absence a creative oversight or were we being given a hint?
Hollywood invariably presents the fantasies and desires of white Americans, particularly those of white men. If we pay attention, we notice that film producers aren't alone in revealing very telling yet frightening thoughts about black people.
William Bennett is the intellectual representative of the right wing. He served as Secretary of Education in the Reagan administration and as "drug czar" in the first Bush administration. After his days of government service he created a cottage industry of conservative tomes to scold and moralize to the rest of us. His best seller, The Book of Virtues, was followed by a plethora of books with the words virtues, values or morals in the titles.
Bill Bennett and Other Runaway Ideologues
Former Education Secretary, William Bennett's comments last week, tying the crime rate dropping to giving every black woman an abortion (his quote exactly; "But I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could, if that was your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down."), is just the latest of a string of vile excrement coming from a conservative far right movement gone awry. They're outta control, so arrogant, so disconnected from reality, so full of their own twisted ideology that they can't even see how insensitive they seem, how incoherent they sound, and how weak they’re making America look.
How do other nations respect a nation that doesn’t take care of its own? With the confirmation of Chief Justice, John Roberts, under their belt, the Republican Party’s neo-con element are "feelin' themselves," "teeing off" with regularity on how they see the world from their ideological prism, and with a consistency that they couldn't do in Baby Bush's first term.
How do other nations respect a nation that doesn’t take care of its own? With the confirmation of Chief Justice, John Roberts, under their belt, the Republican Party’s neo-con element are "feelin' themselves," "teeing off" with regularity on how they see the world from their ideological prism, and with a consistency that they couldn't do in Baby Bush's first term.
Where the Left Lives: Black America is the Core
"The great political divide in America today is not red vs. blue, north vs. south, coastal vs. interior, or even rich vs. poor - it is now clearly black vs. white." This was the conclusion of the Bay Area Center For Voting Research upon the release of their report listing the 236 US cities with populations of 100,000 or more in order of how "liberal" or how "conservative" they are. Researchers at BACVR reached what is to us at BC an unsurprising conclusion:
"The nation’s remaining liberals are overwhelming African Americans."
"The BACVR study that ranks the political ideology of every major city in the country shows that cities with large black populations dominate the list of liberal communities. The research finds that Detroit is the most liberal city in the United States and has one of the highest concentrations of African American residents of any major city. Over 81% of the population in Detroit is African American, compared to the national average of 12.3%. In fact, the average percentage of African American residents in the 25 most liberal cities in the country is 40.3%, more than three times the national rate."
"The list of America's most liberal cities reads like a who's who of prominent African American communities. Gary, Washington D.C., Newark, Flint, Cleveland, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and Birmingham have long had prominent black populations. While most black voters have consistently supported Democrats since the 1960s, it is the white liberals that have slowly withered away over the decades, leaving African Americans as the sole standard bearers for the left…."
"While there are some noteworthy pockets of liberals who are not African American, these places end up being the exceptions. College towns like Berkeley and Cambridge have modest black populations, but remain bastions of upper middle-class, white, intellectual liberalism. These liberal communities, however, are more reminiscent of penguins clustering together around a shrinking iceberg, than of a vibrant growing political movement."
An Evolution of Lies
While I was throwing out old newspapers recently, I stumbled upon a TV Weekly, or whatever it’s called, which had an illustration relevant to PBS’s special on Evolution as its cover, since that program was supposed to be the highlight of that week. When I saw it, it immediately reminded me of a qualm I’ve had since high school – why the funk is the fellow at the end of the evolutionary gamut not black, if the first humans on Earth were darkies? The first man, as depicted on the chart has a ruddy complexion, but he’s still definitely a pale face. Why the discrepancy?
The frickin' "hu" in human is short for "hue," which itself means pigment. Everyone, at least in the scientific community, knows about Eve. Every encyclopedia I’ve read acknowledges the people referred to as Australoid, known familiarly as the Aborigines, are the oldest "race" on the planet. (Yea, those people that too few know founded the Indus River Civilization, migrated all the way from India to Australia millennia before the rest of the world knew what direction was north, and might have been North America’s first colonizers.) Vitamin D synthesis as a description of how pale-skinned people ("Caucasoids," "Mongoloids") arose on our planet has been around at least 25 years.
So why, I emphatically posit again, haven't I ever seen one stinkin' illustration of evolution that got it right?! Why have I never seen a brown personage at the end of the line of more and more erect-standing creatures?
The frickin' "hu" in human is short for "hue," which itself means pigment. Everyone, at least in the scientific community, knows about Eve. Every encyclopedia I’ve read acknowledges the people referred to as Australoid, known familiarly as the Aborigines, are the oldest "race" on the planet. (Yea, those people that too few know founded the Indus River Civilization, migrated all the way from India to Australia millennia before the rest of the world knew what direction was north, and might have been North America’s first colonizers.) Vitamin D synthesis as a description of how pale-skinned people ("Caucasoids," "Mongoloids") arose on our planet has been around at least 25 years.
So why, I emphatically posit again, haven't I ever seen one stinkin' illustration of evolution that got it right?! Why have I never seen a brown personage at the end of the line of more and more erect-standing creatures?
How the World Was Duped: The Race to Invade Iraq
The 5th of February 2003 was a snow-blasted day in New York, the steam whirling out of the road covers, the US secret servicemen - helpfully wearing jackets with "Secret Service" printed on them - hugging themselves outside the fustian, asbestos-packed UN headquarters on the East River. Exhausted though I was after travelling thousands of miles around the United States, the idea of watching Secretary of State Colin Powell - or General Powell, as he was now being reverently redubbed in some American newspapers - make his last pitch for war before the Security Council was an experience not to be missed.
In a few days, I would be in Baghdad to watch the start of this frivolous, demented conflict. Powell's appearance at the Security Council was the essential prologue to the tragedy - or tragicomedy if one could contain one's anger - the appearance of the Attendant Lord who would explain the story of the drama, the Horatio to the increasingly unstable Hamlet in the White House. There was an almost macabre opening to the play when General Powell arrived at the Security Council, cheek-kissing the delegates and winding his great arms around them. CIA director George Tenet stood behind Powell, chunky, aggressive but obedient, just a little bit lip-biting, an Edward G Robinson who must have convinced himself that the more dubious of his information was buried beneath an adequate depth of moral fury and fear to be safely concealed. Just like Bush's appearance at the General Assembly the previous September, you needed to be in the Security Council to see what the television cameras missed. There was a wonderful moment when the little British home secretary Jack Straw entered the chamber through the far right-hand door in a massive power suit, his double-breasted jacket apparently wrapping itself twice around Britain's most famous ex-Trot. He stood for a moment with a kind of semi-benign smile on his uplifted face, his nose in the air as if sniffing for power. Then he saw Powell and his smile opened like an umbrella as his small feet, scuttling beneath him, propelled him across the stage and into the arms of Powell for his big American hug.
In a few days, I would be in Baghdad to watch the start of this frivolous, demented conflict. Powell's appearance at the Security Council was the essential prologue to the tragedy - or tragicomedy if one could contain one's anger - the appearance of the Attendant Lord who would explain the story of the drama, the Horatio to the increasingly unstable Hamlet in the White House. There was an almost macabre opening to the play when General Powell arrived at the Security Council, cheek-kissing the delegates and winding his great arms around them. CIA director George Tenet stood behind Powell, chunky, aggressive but obedient, just a little bit lip-biting, an Edward G Robinson who must have convinced himself that the more dubious of his information was buried beneath an adequate depth of moral fury and fear to be safely concealed. Just like Bush's appearance at the General Assembly the previous September, you needed to be in the Security Council to see what the television cameras missed. There was a wonderful moment when the little British home secretary Jack Straw entered the chamber through the far right-hand door in a massive power suit, his double-breasted jacket apparently wrapping itself twice around Britain's most famous ex-Trot. He stood for a moment with a kind of semi-benign smile on his uplifted face, his nose in the air as if sniffing for power. Then he saw Powell and his smile opened like an umbrella as his small feet, scuttling beneath him, propelled him across the stage and into the arms of Powell for his big American hug.
Diary of a Vietcong doctor: The Anne Frank of Vietnam
"I had to do an appendix operation without enough medicine. Only a few tubes of Novocain, but the wounded young soldier never cried out or yelled. He continued to smile to encourage me. Looking at the forced smile on his dry lips, knowing his fatigue, I felt so sorry for him ... I lightly stroked his hair. I would like to say to him, 'Patients like you who I cannot cure cause me the most sorrow, and their memory will not fade'."
So begins the diary of Dang Thuy Tram, a North Vietnamese army doctor who fought Americans in the Vietnam war and died defending her hospital from US attack. Since the diary's re-emergence this year after 35 years in the hands of a US veteran, it has become a phenomenon, selling more than 300,000 copies, generating numerous translations and a television show and causing a wave of patriotic nostalgia among young Vietnamese.
So begins the diary of Dang Thuy Tram, a North Vietnamese army doctor who fought Americans in the Vietnam war and died defending her hospital from US attack. Since the diary's re-emergence this year after 35 years in the hands of a US veteran, it has become a phenomenon, selling more than 300,000 copies, generating numerous translations and a television show and causing a wave of patriotic nostalgia among young Vietnamese.
Bush's D'oh! Factor
I have a slogan for the Bush administration: "D'oh!"
This President begins every new project, be it foreign or domestic, with the boyish enthusiasm of Homer Simpson. Just let his pals down at Moe's plant the seed of a half-baked notion in his head and George takes it from there.
Enthusiasm is a good thing when exercised by the rational and competent. But when exercised by a dimwit, all that passion and energy can only end with a resounding, "d'oh!"
And so it has come to pass with another of George's economic brainstorms. It all began after a few beers. The fellas at Moe's were discussing how high US corporate tax rates were forcing corporations to hide more and more of their profits overseas. Lenny suggested that maybe we could get that money repatriated if we gave those companies a freebee, let them bring the money back into their own country for practically nothing.
This President begins every new project, be it foreign or domestic, with the boyish enthusiasm of Homer Simpson. Just let his pals down at Moe's plant the seed of a half-baked notion in his head and George takes it from there.
Enthusiasm is a good thing when exercised by the rational and competent. But when exercised by a dimwit, all that passion and energy can only end with a resounding, "d'oh!"
And so it has come to pass with another of George's economic brainstorms. It all began after a few beers. The fellas at Moe's were discussing how high US corporate tax rates were forcing corporations to hide more and more of their profits overseas. Lenny suggested that maybe we could get that money repatriated if we gave those companies a freebee, let them bring the money back into their own country for practically nothing.
Flim-Flam and Hoo-Hah
Everybody and his dog in the political commentating trade now agrees the Bush administration is experiencing hard times -- the going is getting tough, and Bush is getting testy.
It seems to me what we are looking at was put best by noted journalist Billy Don Moyers, formerly of Marshall, Texas, who was home last week and observed that the Republican right came to Washington to start a revolution and stayed to run a racket. It has become a game of ideological flim-flam, a scam in which all manner of distracting hoo-hah - abortion, judicial activism, even "the war on terra" - is used to obscure the fact that the government has been taken over by people who are using it to make money for themselves and their friends.
''Sino-U.S. Energy Competition in Africa''
With oil prices hitting record levels of US$70 per barrel in recent weeks, major energy consuming countries are engaging in an increasingly heated competition for energy resources on the world stage. Nowhere is this more evident than between the United States and China, the world's first and second largest energy consuming countries respectively. In the contest for energy resources, numerous "stages" of competition are emerging, including the Middle East, Central Asia, Latin America, and the East and South China Seas. However, Africa is fast emerging as one of the most volatile stages of Sino-U.S. energy competition, given its vast reserves of energy resources and concentration of internal security crises. [See: "Setting the Stage for a New Cold War: China's Quest for Energy Security"]
Africa owns about eight percent of the world's known oil reserves with Nigeria, Libya and Equatorial Guinea as the region's leading oil producers. Seventy percent of Africa's oil production is concentrated in West Africa's Gulf of Guinea, which stretches from the Ivory Coast to Angola. The low sulphur content of West African crude makes it of further strategic importance.
However, the region is also vulnerable to instabilities ranging from piracy to terrorism, interstate and tribal conflict, AIDS and political uncertainties. Given the weak governments and significant Muslim populations of the region, the African continent may also emerge as a hub for al-Qaeda-linked terrorist groups.
Finally, oil-rich countries in Africa have been unable to escape the "curse of oil," which has fueled corruption, conflict, and environmental degradation across the region. For instance, while Nigeria has earned US$300 billion in oil revenues over the last 25 years, per capita income remains below US$1 per day. Nigeria is also subject to ethnic violence, oil strikes and sporadic attacks on oil infrastructure by the Niger Delta People's Volunteer Force. Adding Sino-U.S. energy competition to this volatile mix could further destabilize the region.
Africa owns about eight percent of the world's known oil reserves with Nigeria, Libya and Equatorial Guinea as the region's leading oil producers. Seventy percent of Africa's oil production is concentrated in West Africa's Gulf of Guinea, which stretches from the Ivory Coast to Angola. The low sulphur content of West African crude makes it of further strategic importance.
However, the region is also vulnerable to instabilities ranging from piracy to terrorism, interstate and tribal conflict, AIDS and political uncertainties. Given the weak governments and significant Muslim populations of the region, the African continent may also emerge as a hub for al-Qaeda-linked terrorist groups.
Finally, oil-rich countries in Africa have been unable to escape the "curse of oil," which has fueled corruption, conflict, and environmental degradation across the region. For instance, while Nigeria has earned US$300 billion in oil revenues over the last 25 years, per capita income remains below US$1 per day. Nigeria is also subject to ethnic violence, oil strikes and sporadic attacks on oil infrastructure by the Niger Delta People's Volunteer Force. Adding Sino-U.S. energy competition to this volatile mix could further destabilize the region.
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