Tuesday, June 27, 2006
A great pity, that the PM of East Timor has been effectively de-throned by an Australian-backed putsch. The western press has typically reported this through a western/australian lnes, but in Mozambique, which for a long time hosted East Timorese exiles during the struggle against Indonesian occupation, the commentary has a lot more depth.
The only more balanced piece I could find on the BBC was here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/5117510.stm
I hope one day someone analyses the facts behind the problems of the last few months. Certainly, western governments and their cronies have withstood much larger and more sustained demonstrations and riots, without anyone calling for the PM to step down. There are certainly shades of Haiti (where the US's client groups fomented unrest to allow the 'unacceptably left-wing' Aristide to be shunted aside), and even Iran in 1953 (where the CIA backed a coup against the democratically-elected moderate nationalist, Mussadiq).
Anyway, if Australia did play as dirty as it seems (not forgetting its sickening complicity in the original Indonesian invasion of E. Timor), then it will not necessarily profit from the operation. 53 years after the US intervention in Iran, one of the few consistent observations you could make about politics there, is that no-one likes the US. The price of interfering in the natural political development of a nation ten times older than the US itself.
In the case of E. Timor, it is a much smaller and younger country than Iran, but Australia has now interfered to "arrest its development". Like Prozac, I believe that this intervention will simply hide, suppress and defer key social and political problems, rather than resolve them.
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The only more balanced piece I could find on the BBC was here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/5117510.stm
I hope one day someone analyses the facts behind the problems of the last few months. Certainly, western governments and their cronies have withstood much larger and more sustained demonstrations and riots, without anyone calling for the PM to step down. There are certainly shades of Haiti (where the US's client groups fomented unrest to allow the 'unacceptably left-wing' Aristide to be shunted aside), and even Iran in 1953 (where the CIA backed a coup against the democratically-elected moderate nationalist, Mussadiq).
Anyway, if Australia did play as dirty as it seems (not forgetting its sickening complicity in the original Indonesian invasion of E. Timor), then it will not necessarily profit from the operation. 53 years after the US intervention in Iran, one of the few consistent observations you could make about politics there, is that no-one likes the US. The price of interfering in the natural political development of a nation ten times older than the US itself.
In the case of E. Timor, it is a much smaller and younger country than Iran, but Australia has now interfered to "arrest its development". Like Prozac, I believe that this intervention will simply hide, suppress and defer key social and political problems, rather than resolve them.
Monday, June 05, 2006
INTERLUDE: had to mention this...
http://www.notrly.com/jackbauer/index.php?tophundred
For anyone who has seen 24 (either the first one, or 2-4 which are the same as the first one except everyone but Jack changes roles).
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http://www.notrly.com/jackbauer/index.php?tophundred
For anyone who has seen 24 (either the first one, or 2-4 which are the same as the first one except everyone but Jack changes roles).
