Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Monday, August 27, 2007
Mauritania criminalizes slavery!
You heard that right - on 24 August 2007, the Mauritanian Senate passed a law criminalizing slavery. Having just finished the second season of HBO's Rome, this news report gave me an eerie sense that any moment I'd see a banner on Google news announcing Octavian Ceasar's victory at Mutina, but after a while I gave up. Anyway, here's an extract from the article:
Hooray for the half-a-million slaves in Mauritania - it must be encouraging to live in such a very progressive society. A bit of digging on the US Department of State's Human Rights Country reports for 2006 implies that slavery was really a bit of a rural area thing - however, when three-quarters of the country is desert or semi-desert and the capital (and largest city) houses less than a million people, slavery being a "rural phenomenon" suddenly seems a lot less encouraging.
So why am I picking on Mauritania this evening? Quite simply, I feel this sort of thing is symptomatic of so many of Africa's woes - stuck in the glorious age of Pan-Africanism (or in the case of Mauritania, the 1700s), Africa, by and large, has simply failed to get with the 21st century program. Sure, colonialism created a lot of very unpleasant circumstances that will take a long, long time to fix. But still, the continent lags behind the rest of the world. I can't fix an exact figure to this, but by my estimates Africa has received something like $500 billion in aid since independence, not including investment and income generated.
Personally, I think that for the bulk of African countries, much of the problem stems from a separation (and ever-growing gap) between a rich, ruling elite and an under-educated populace that spends most of its time fighting - quite often for survival. And that's only in countries where the government actually has some power over the citizenry - they don't call Joseph Kabila the Mayor of Kinshasa for nothing. But hey, who wants a smart populace anyway?
On 8 August, Mauritania’s National Assembly unanimously adopted a law criminalizing slavery, which continues to exist in Mauritania in both traditional and contemporary forms. The law, passed by the Senate on 22 August, makes slavery punishable by 5-10 years in prison. It marks the first time in Mauritanian history that slave holders have been sanctioned. (IRIN News)
Hooray for the half-a-million slaves in Mauritania - it must be encouraging to live in such a very progressive society. A bit of digging on the US Department of State's Human Rights Country reports for 2006 implies that slavery was really a bit of a rural area thing - however, when three-quarters of the country is desert or semi-desert and the capital (and largest city) houses less than a million people, slavery being a "rural phenomenon" suddenly seems a lot less encouraging.
So why am I picking on Mauritania this evening? Quite simply, I feel this sort of thing is symptomatic of so many of Africa's woes - stuck in the glorious age of Pan-Africanism (or in the case of Mauritania, the 1700s), Africa, by and large, has simply failed to get with the 21st century program. Sure, colonialism created a lot of very unpleasant circumstances that will take a long, long time to fix. But still, the continent lags behind the rest of the world. I can't fix an exact figure to this, but by my estimates Africa has received something like $500 billion in aid since independence, not including investment and income generated.
Personally, I think that for the bulk of African countries, much of the problem stems from a separation (and ever-growing gap) between a rich, ruling elite and an under-educated populace that spends most of its time fighting - quite often for survival. And that's only in countries where the government actually has some power over the citizenry - they don't call Joseph Kabila the Mayor of Kinshasa for nothing. But hey, who wants a smart populace anyway?
Saturday, August 25, 2007
An Admiral Ackbar Take on Sino-African Friendship
As anyone who is anywhere near an International Relations-related field can tell you, right now China is the hottest thing since Burberry Plaid. These are exciting times for African IR students in particular, and China's growing interest - and influence - in Africa is a pretty fascinating topic with some heavy implications for Africa's realtions with the rest of the world.
China, with its voracious appetite for energy and raw materials, has an uncanny ability to negotiate some very clever deals; it's been known to entice - shall we say smaller powers? - to bypass more traditional Bretton Woods institutions for condition-free, quick cash, but woe unto the country that defaults on a loan to China. Should the recipient of the loan default, China is quite happy to receive payment in kind - more often than not, this leads to African countries prioritizing service of the Chinese debt above existing loan repayments, and that makes for a fairly unhappy IMF. In Sudan, when providing finance for the Khartoum Refinery, China negotiated a nifty concession that if debt service on the refinery was not met, the CNPC (Chinese National Petroleum Corporation) could claim crude oil from the refinery in payment. As this would have left Sudan almost no oil for domestic consumption, no points for guessing whether or not Sudan took those repayments seriously.
Furthermore, assuming you believe (as I do) that it's a good thing for the international system to place pressure on countries that would lead to better domestic economic conditions, China's no-strings loans create a serious loophole through which many states are only too happy to squeeze. Angola, despite (or perhaps as a result of) having come under international pressure for greater transparency in its oil sector, accepted a $2 billion "soft loan" from China, creating less concern with meeting oil sector reforms. China's relationship with Zimbabwe (which I'll someday have the strength to blog about) and its continued propping up of the Mugabe regime translates directly into (more) bad news for Zimbabweans.
Sure, China's doing some good things in Africa, from the perspective of the ordinary citizen. Unlike the West, which has largely become bored with long-suffering African countries and their innumerable problems, China has focused heavily on infrastructure development - something Africa sorely needs. Even if most Chinese-built roads lead from mineral-rich areas to ports; even if Chinese labour is imported for the construction; the roads aren't going to go away. Nonetheless, it's a great area of concern that many African states aren't attempting greater leveraging in their deals with China. There are, I admit, huge problems - not least among them the age-old African curse of elitism and high levels of inequality. But hopefully someday African countries will gets their rears in gear and start taking a stronger stance in negotiations, aimed at providing benefits for their populations. And then I'll get an Ewok for my birthday and an acceptance letter to the London School of Economics. Right on.
China, with its voracious appetite for energy and raw materials, has an uncanny ability to negotiate some very clever deals; it's been known to entice - shall we say smaller powers? - to bypass more traditional Bretton Woods institutions for condition-free, quick cash, but woe unto the country that defaults on a loan to China. Should the recipient of the loan default, China is quite happy to receive payment in kind - more often than not, this leads to African countries prioritizing service of the Chinese debt above existing loan repayments, and that makes for a fairly unhappy IMF. In Sudan, when providing finance for the Khartoum Refinery, China negotiated a nifty concession that if debt service on the refinery was not met, the CNPC (Chinese National Petroleum Corporation) could claim crude oil from the refinery in payment. As this would have left Sudan almost no oil for domestic consumption, no points for guessing whether or not Sudan took those repayments seriously.
Furthermore, assuming you believe (as I do) that it's a good thing for the international system to place pressure on countries that would lead to better domestic economic conditions, China's no-strings loans create a serious loophole through which many states are only too happy to squeeze. Angola, despite (or perhaps as a result of) having come under international pressure for greater transparency in its oil sector, accepted a $2 billion "soft loan" from China, creating less concern with meeting oil sector reforms. China's relationship with Zimbabwe (which I'll someday have the strength to blog about) and its continued propping up of the Mugabe regime translates directly into (more) bad news for Zimbabweans.
Sure, China's doing some good things in Africa, from the perspective of the ordinary citizen. Unlike the West, which has largely become bored with long-suffering African countries and their innumerable problems, China has focused heavily on infrastructure development - something Africa sorely needs. Even if most Chinese-built roads lead from mineral-rich areas to ports; even if Chinese labour is imported for the construction; the roads aren't going to go away. Nonetheless, it's a great area of concern that many African states aren't attempting greater leveraging in their deals with China. There are, I admit, huge problems - not least among them the age-old African curse of elitism and high levels of inequality. But hopefully someday African countries will gets their rears in gear and start taking a stronger stance in negotiations, aimed at providing benefits for their populations. And then I'll get an Ewok for my birthday and an acceptance letter to the London School of Economics. Right on.
Friday, August 24, 2007
Sudan - Multilateralism's Epic Fail (again)
Out of Sudan today come two interesting bits of news (which I'll summarize for you, because no one follows links anyway): the first, in which the Sudanese Government declares one Canadian and one EU diplomat persona non grata and boots them out of the country (in the case of the EU diplomat... in absentia), and the second, in which Amnesty International has photos of weapons being offloaded from Russian-supplied jets.
Let's deal with the latter first. It's not really much of a secret that everyone and his brother (read here China and Russia) have been selling the Sudanese Government weapons like the Cold War is still in full swing. China, according to some estimates, has provided Sudan with over $100 million worth of fighter jets and helicopter gunships. Pretty rude, considering the United Nations Arms Embargo, but then again, Sudan having been under sanctions from the USA since 1997, it's hardly a surprise that it would seek out countries who are willing to fly under the radar to find the means to pursue its ends - those being the mucky, mucky situation with Chad and the horror that is Darfur.
So how does this link up with the diplomats being expelled from the country? Both Canada and the EU have provided troops to UNMIS (UN peacekeeping operation in Sudan - which, for the record, has a budget of $887.33 million for the 2007 - 2008 financial year), though neither to any great degree. The diplomats were accused of "meddling" in the country's affairs; however, there is no evidence as yet to suggest that either of them indulged in any more than the generic diplomatic urging to find peaceful solutions and play the democracy game, blah blah puppies and rainbows.
The Sudanese Government, then, doesn't really seem to care that the UN is trying to mop up its disaster. In fact, buying weapons when the war is theoretically over makes one wonder if it plans to stop causing disasters at all. China* and Russia are clearly willing to stick their fingers ever deeper into the Sudanese pie despite the disapproval of the UN; as such, one has to wonder what the broader implications for multilateralism (which might well already be on its last legs) will be.
* Of course, if you've spent over $3 billion developing the Sudanese oil industry, more or less solely for your use (as China has), you'd be wanting to keep an eye on your investments.
Let's deal with the latter first. It's not really much of a secret that everyone and his brother (read here China and Russia) have been selling the Sudanese Government weapons like the Cold War is still in full swing. China, according to some estimates, has provided Sudan with over $100 million worth of fighter jets and helicopter gunships. Pretty rude, considering the United Nations Arms Embargo, but then again, Sudan having been under sanctions from the USA since 1997, it's hardly a surprise that it would seek out countries who are willing to fly under the radar to find the means to pursue its ends - those being the mucky, mucky situation with Chad and the horror that is Darfur.
So how does this link up with the diplomats being expelled from the country? Both Canada and the EU have provided troops to UNMIS (UN peacekeeping operation in Sudan - which, for the record, has a budget of $887.33 million for the 2007 - 2008 financial year), though neither to any great degree. The diplomats were accused of "meddling" in the country's affairs; however, there is no evidence as yet to suggest that either of them indulged in any more than the generic diplomatic urging to find peaceful solutions and play the democracy game, blah blah puppies and rainbows.
The Sudanese Government, then, doesn't really seem to care that the UN is trying to mop up its disaster. In fact, buying weapons when the war is theoretically over makes one wonder if it plans to stop causing disasters at all. China* and Russia are clearly willing to stick their fingers ever deeper into the Sudanese pie despite the disapproval of the UN; as such, one has to wonder what the broader implications for multilateralism (which might well already be on its last legs) will be.
* Of course, if you've spent over $3 billion developing the Sudanese oil industry, more or less solely for your use (as China has), you'd be wanting to keep an eye on your investments.
Welcome
Why this blog? Quite simply, I figured One More couldn't hurt. And it's a good way to keep up with the news. Hope you enjoy!
Postscript:
And for the record, for anyone who's wondering why it took me so long, it's because I'm a techno-incompetent. But now that Blogger has made it all so ridiculously simple... good luck getting rid of me. Go Web 2.0!
Postscript:
And for the record, for anyone who's wondering why it took me so long, it's because I'm a techno-incompetent. But now that Blogger has made it all so ridiculously simple... good luck getting rid of me. Go Web 2.0!
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