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Power's
Weekly Columns 2005
Jonathan
Power, one of the world's leading columnists on
international affairs, human rights and peace. He
syndicates his columns with some 50 papers around the
world. We are proud to have featured every one of them
since 1997.
In 2003, Power came back to the International Herald
Tribune.
Power
is, of course, a TFF Associate.
2005
December 29, 2005
Waging
peace in 2006
Pull the wool of the war-mongering elite propaganda aside
and you will see that there were lots of positive
developments in our world this year - less war, less
acceptance of war, and more democracy. It's been progress
for the techniques of non-violent change too.
December 22, 2005
Supporting
the Jihadists fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan is the
cause of our present
terrors
The West's obsessive anti-Soviet policies during the Cold
War meant that the Afghanis, the Pakistanis, the Indians
(and the Vietnamese, Cambodians, Angolans, Somalis and the
Central Americans et al) paid a high price in war and
carnage, whilst we in the West got on with our economic
growth. Are we any more ready now to stop today's
decision-makers breaking the glass for the next generation
to have to pick up?
December 17, 2005
India
must now respond to Pakistan's bid for peace over
Kashmir
Musharaff appears to have transformed his personality. Singh
must now push his bureaucracy and intelligence services
which are resisting strongly. This is the time to push,
whilst the military strong man Musharaff can deliver
Pakistan. What is at stake is the avoidance of a nuclear
war...
December 8, 2005
Are
the madrasas in Pakistan spreading
hatred?
In contrast to those who just repeat convenient but igorant
views about Islamic education, Jonathan Power has taken the
trouble to go to Pakistan, visit a madrasa and see for
himself. His account is remarkably different from most, his
explanations more credible too. "The baby should not get
thrown out with the bathwater. After all, in the centuries
before imperial conquest madrasas were the major source of
Islamic religious and scientific learning. Our mortarboards,
tassels, academic robes and rituals of the oral defence of a
written thesis can all be traced back to the madrasas."
December 1, 2005
The
issue of Jerusalemn will never go
away
It is a matter of elemental historical justice that at the
very least the Arab parts of East Jerusalem be returned to
Palestine, as long as the Jews have free, untrammelled,
access to their sacred site, the Western
Wall. Perhaps
the protagonists should consider internationalising part of
East Jerusalem. But it is also the moment for inspired
religious leadership.
November 24, 2005
At
last a debate on Britain's nuclear
weapons
Ex-military people and political hawks call these weapons
irrational. It's a new opportunity and it is not beyond the
British parliament to develop a mind of its own on the
subject and start the anti-nuclear ball rolling.
November 16, 2005
Now
Liberia has a president, it is time to send Charles Taylor
for trial
Finally after mass murder, mass rape and mass economic
destruction the human spirit has shown its amazing ability
to somersault and become non-violent. Not a shot has been
fired during this election; barely a bad word word uttered,
at least until the results came in. A watershed for Africa
will have been crossed. After a decade and a half of rampant
civil war and economic decline a new Africa is finding its
feet. And the extension of international law is playing a
large part in it.
November 12, 2005
Bad
reporting on Zanzibar's election is part of a wider
problem
This election went much better that expected, there is a lot
of good things have been happening in Africa the last
decade: civil wars ended, peace processes took over,
economic growth and reduction of violence are obvious. How
many of today's African reporters and editors in the
newsrooms knew Africa in the 1960s and early 70s when there
was progress? Not very many. Most of their memories only go
back to the dark 80's and 90s when it has been decline and
carnage.
November 16, 2005
Now
Liberia has a president, it is time to send Charles Taylor
for trial
Finally after mass murder, mass rape and mass economic
destruction the human spirit has shown its amazing ability
to somersault and become non-violent. Not a shot has been
fired during this election; barely a bad word word uttered,
at least until the results came in. A watershed for Africa
will have been crossed. After a decade and a half of rampant
civil war and economic decline a new Africa is finding its
feet. And the extension of international law is playing a
large part in it.
November 12, 2005
Bad
reporting on Zanzibar's election is part of a wider
problem
This election went much better that expected, there is a lot
of good things have been happening in Africa the last
decade: civil wars ended, peace processes took over,
economic growth and reduction of violence are obvious. How
many of today's African reporters and editors in the
newsrooms knew Africa in the 1960s and early 70s when there
was progress? Not very many. Most of their memories only go
back to the dark 80's and 90s when it has been decline and
carnage.
November 4, 2005
Nigeria
- Can Africa's biggest country make
it?
For all the success of his second term the clock is now
ticking for Obasanjo. Only if the pay off from the macro
reforms becomes much more apparent in every day living
conditions might it be possible to so lock in the reforms
that it will be difficult for a successor to undo
them.
October 29, 2005
Nigeria's
conflict over oil wealth
I asked President Obasanjo, a religious man, if it was God
who gave Nigeria oil or was it the Devil? "God", he replied.
"However, the Devil is manipulating it!" But slowly the
devil is being exorcised and Nigeria's situation improved.
Compared with the days of the dictatorship it's the
difference between day and night.
October 20, 2005
Liberia's
peace depends on winning the battle against theft of mineral
resources
Whoever wins the Liberian election, which now goes to a
second round, will confront the question: how can Liberia
avoid a resumption of politics-as-plunder?
October 13, 2005
Liberia's
election on October 11,
2005
Even the worst of African situations can turn around.
Liberia is being given a second chance at life - and Power
visits it, liike he did a couple of years ago, together with
Nigeria's president. The changes are remarkable.
October 6, 2005
On
never tracking down bin
Laden
One still wonders at how the Clinton administration muffed
its chance to bring bin Laden to justice. Yet the Bush
Administration persists in believing that it can defeat its
demons by shooting up whole countries.
September 29, 2005
Getting
back to square one with North
Korea
All the delaying tactics of the Republican Congress in
Clinton's time were then subsumed into the active hostility
of the Cheney-John Bolton-George Bush policy of the "axis of
evil". Powell was pushed aside and Washington leant on Seoul
to slow down its policy of political reconciliation and
prohibited it from keeping a promise to send electricity to
the North...the results were predictable.
September 22, 2005
Turkey's
failure with its Kurds
Most of the country's Kurds want to be European and are
neither seriously tempted by the PKK or a united Kurdistan.
But Turkey still doesn't know how to bring its Kurds up to
the starting line. That may well delay Turkey's chances of
entering the EU.
September 18, 2005
The
need to be cautious about Turkey's entry into the
EU
On October 3rd a "yes" would be consistent with previous EU
promises. However it must be a "yes, but". There cannot be
promises about an entry date. It should be probably a
generation away.
September 7, 2005
Turkey
is only one of many Third World countries surging
ahead
Poverty, the scourge of centuries, could be effectively
abolished this century. Democratic India and Turkey are
showing what economic growth should be all about. India,
even though millions are still unspeakably poor, now has a
better distribution of income than the United States. And so
does Turkey.
September 1, 2005
The
fear of Islamist militancy still governs West's attitude to
Egypt's
September 7th election
The West will not progress in its effort to replace
autocratic regimes with democratic ones until it sheds its
knee jerk antipathy to Islamic fundamentalism. The likes of
President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt with their rigged elections
will continue to feel secure until the West full square
faces up to this.
August 26, 2005
Swedish
Prime Minister defends his socialist
model
Prime minister Göran Persson of the world's most
successful socialist state gives notice he is in no mood to
step down and pursue one of his two unfulfilled vocations -
as either a priest or a farmer.
August 17, 2005
Another
way of looking at Iraq
Iraq at best could go the Vietnamese way. At worst the
Algerian way. Either way the West is better out of it. At
least the invaders have laid the foundations for the basic
democratic institutions of a new Iraq. Let the Iraqis now
get on with it, alone.
August 10, 2005
Official
British crimes in Northern Ireland mean it's difficult to
close the book
Will the British government now go down the road of
provoking and feeding the paranoia of Islamists just as it
did the catholics of Northern Ireland for so long? Are no
lessons being learnt?
August 3, 2005
The
60th Anniversary of Hiroshima and
Nagasaki
This must be the time to get our grip on the urgent
necessity for big power nuclear disarmament, for without
that there is simply no credibility when dealing with
would-be proliferators in the Third World. Many of them are
quite as capable as the original big powers of one day
creating the "shadow on a wall" I saw in Hiroshima.
July 27, 2005
Bush
starts to get it right on India's nuclear
status
The critics of President George W.Bush's new nuclear deal
with India have got it back to front. They appear to have no
understanding of the history of U.S.-Indian nuclear
relations. They draw their pessimistic and sanctimonious
conclusions about how this new policy of relaxing the supply
of advanced nuclear materials to India will further
undermine the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty as if no
water had ever flowed under the bridge. Let's go back to the
head of that river...
July 20, 2005
London
and the legacy of Empire
Jonathan Power describes the historical background to the
world in which the suspect suicide bombers have lived. "The
British in their dealings with empire and its leftovers have
not just once but too often shied away from making the
causal links. The British are in Iraq, because they are
still trying to shape the politics of the oil-rich Middle
East, as they have tried to do for a century. But all they
have done is to stir the pot of hatred...
July 15, 2005
Swedish
women revolutionize Sweden's economy and
society
According to the UN's Human Development Report, the Swedes
have had more success in producing equality between the
sexes than any other country on earth. Come to Sweden and
unravel the mystery...Well, even in paradise surrounded by
Swedish women, I have to say I note a lot of falling
short...
July 7, 2005
Africa
at the G8 meeting
Prime Minister Tony Blair is going to give the G8 summit the
same kind of energy he famously gave to the launching of the
misconceived war against Iraq. The question is will he be
any more able to hit the target accurately than he was in
that case? He has certainly prepared himself better. But I
still don't think Blair gets it quite right.
June 29, 2005
No
need to denigrate Bob
Geldof
The first of two columns on the G8 meeting and aid to
Africa. Saturday will see more than twice as many concerts
as in 1985. Let us watch and see, not just the shows, but
how the political leaders of the G8 translate compassion
into deeds. For there is a lot of compassion to be tapped,
many deeds needing to be done and little reason to denigrate
either.
June 22, 2005
Sugar
today, Jam tomorrow? And the role of the Central American
Free Trade Agreement
There is no crop in the world more political than sugar.
Tragically, the political power of the American sugar lobby
may well be sufficient to torpedo the ratification of the
Central American Free Trade Agreement, in many ways the most
important American trade arrangement of recent
years.
June 15, 2005
An
urgent letter to the young voters of
Europe
The main point I want to make is never forget for a moment
how Europe was before the European Union came into
being...and, by the way, that constitution should never have
been called a constitution.
June 9, 2005
More
fudge needed to get peace in Spain's Basque
country
The crucial step is to repeat what Britain did in Northern
Ireland when London publicly recognized the Irish people's
right to determine their own future. It was this that
brought the IRA to the negotiating table, and it is clear
that ETA/Batasuna are holding out for a similar form of
words.
June 1, 2005
16
years after Tiananmen Square will democracy be another 30
years in coming?
It would be ironic if Deng's timetable - democracy by 2035 -
is about right and we have to sit and wait for a new
generation to grow up - the one only just being born - that
,like second generation middle classes elsewhere, thinks
more politically and humanistically than
materially...
May 27, 2005
Militarising
space is quite unnecessary
This is the ultimate in American unilateralism. It will not
only make enemies where they don't exist, it will make
friends in NATO wonder if they will be pressed to make up
the alliance's inevitable shortfall in more run-of-the-mill
programs whilst American indulges itself in its space
fantasies.
May 20, 2005
The
Bolton appointment could rock the UN
ship
Once Bolton is in place Washington can rock the UN boat to
ensure they get the secretary-general they really want. The
only possible candidate acceptable to Bush would be the by
then ex prime minister, Tony Blair...
May 11, 2005
On
being positive on the 60th Anniversay of the end of WW
II
For the first time in history there are many states that
have been free from war for the best part of two centuries.
For well over a decade now the number of civil wars has been
falling. If one considers the number of serious ethnic
disputes of recent years that have been resolved without
killing, the glass looks rather more than half full, not
half empty as the journalistic and political wailing of our
era suggests.
May 2, 2005
Tony
Blair's very weak point
Even if Blair wins, his majority may be so reduced, and thus
his ability to govern effectively, that he will be forced to
step down in favor of Gordon Brown, the chancellor of the
Exchequer. Then he might recall Shakespeare's line, "Lilies
that fester smell worse than weeds."
April 28, 2005
Kenya's
bad smell of failure
In Kenya, once the great hope of East Africa, the politics
is log jammed after years of misrule and corruption which
have totally hollowed out the ability of the government
machine to deliver what most people in their better moments
would consider are the priorities.
April 21, 2005
Is
successful Uganda preparing a return to the dark
ages?
Jonathan Power meets the president who tells him that being
a president here is not a career but a cause. Power is not
convinced and sees other signs of darkness over the horizon.
April 16, 2005
Tanzania
- An African country on the
up
Jonathan Power meets the
president and visits a village he saw 40 years ago - and he
is happily surprised at the changes for the better
everywhere - Zanzibar, though, being a risk factor.
April 5, 2005
Getting
China right
It is probably only a
matter of time before the faddish fascination with China
switches to booming India and once it does it is unlikely
ever to switch back again. Time is on Washington's side and
the time should be used to engage China further, not to fear
it or aggressively seek to counter it.
March 29, 2005
The
working shouldn't have to contemplate more
immigration
The growth of an even
larger immigrant population is inevitable if the natives
don't reproduce sufficiently and their older members retire
too early. Tensions are going to rise much
further.
Part of the answer to
this, paradoxically, is to liberalize the immigration market
- to take down all the artificial barriers of government
controls.
March 23, 2005
The
Europe debate in Britain has no sense of
history
A deep and disturbing
malaise has descended on Britain's European debate and one
powerful reason for that is that the agenda and the
discourse are set by journalists and not by historians. The
politicians too often seem to be fearful of challenging the
journalistic agenda.
March 16, 2005
The
wars in Yugoslavia could have been
avoided
If only there had been a standing international criminal
court 14 years ago with the power of arrest and if only the
EU had dangled the carrot of European membership then, the
worst of these so-called "ethnic wars" could have been
avoided. The people would not have allowed them.
March 10, 2005
The
danger of an Israeli attack on
Iran
Now that Saddam is defeated, Israel must seriously consider
foregoing its nuclear weapons as part of a grand bargain
with Iran. And the other Arab states, which are covertly
developing the possibility of going nuclear, must open up
and renounce the effort as Libya recently did.
March 6, 2005
On
the death of Peter Benenson
Benenson did not invent the cause of human rights. What he
did in a stroke of genius was to popularize it and give it a
political impact it had never possessed before. The idea of
Amnesty International was the simplest of all ideas.
February 28, 2005
When
land reform becomes a burning
issue
Many of the most violent 20th century conflicts occurred
when a substantial part of the population was blocked from
earning a secure living from the land they tilled. Land
protests played a catalytic role in successful revolutions
in Russia, Mexico, China, Bolivia, Vietnam, Cuba, Algeria,
Ethiopia, and Zimbabwe. Japan, Taiwan and South Korea have
carried out highly successful land reforms...
February 21, 2005
Democracy's
gates are opening in Iraq and the Islamic
world
Bush and Blair made a profound mistake in assuming that the
path to democracy in the Middle East could only be cleared
by war. It was an unnecessary step. It could have come about
without the bloodshed, by forceful evolution.
February 10, 2005
Europe's
great mistake would be to end the arms embargo of
China
In seeking to lift its arms embargo of China the European
Union has picked on the worst kind of issue at the worst
possible time. And to what point? To earn a few more euros
for the arms' export industry?
February 6, 2005
U.S.
policiy of nuclear weapons go into the
mire
It's 60 years since Hiroshima and Nagasaki. There are
alarming perspectives on the May 2005 Non-Proliferation
Treaty Conference and beyond. The danger is that instead of
being left with a more honest NPT we might be left at the
end of the day with no NPT at all.
January 27, 2005
After
the Iraq's elections, the U.S. and the U.K. must leave and
the UN take over
We tend to forget that UN missions have been successful in
many conflict zones.There could be a workable UN
peacekeeping operation in Iraq, but first the Iraqis have to
badly want it and second, the richer nations of the world
have to properly fund it and man a good portion of
it.
January 20, 2005
Abbas
must use non-violent resistance in
Palestine
Abbas needs to give the young militants a focus for their
energy. He needs to deploy them to surround Israeli patrols
with unarmed crowds who whilst refusing to move also refuse
to let the troops move. He needs to arm tens of thousands of
strong young men and women with only non-violence...and
there is a nobler Israel that will understand it.
January 15, 2005
The
US is being pressed on human rights
law
What if instead of a decade of sanctions and in the end a
war the Security Council had authorized an international
prosecutor to investigate Saddam's war crimes? Once an
indictment had been handed down an international or even a
single national force could have been authorized to seize
the indicted suspect.
January 7, 2005
A
profound change in attitudes to latin America's
development
Whilst the United States has been moving to the right South
America has moved to the left. Even better, although they
may not call it that, the revised Washington Consensus has
appeal to the modern day Latin left. Let's hope the Bush
administration doesn't work to undermine it.
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