REFLECTIONS OF FIDEL

(Taken from CubaDebate)

CUBA was forced to fight for its existence facing an expansionist power, located a few miles from its coast, and which was proclaiming the annexation of our island, which was destined to fall into its lap like a ripe fruit. We were condemned not to exist as a nation.

Within the glorious legions of patriots who, during the second half of the 19th century, fought against the abhorrent colonial status imposed by Spain over 300 years, José Martí was the man who most clearly perceived such a dramatic destiny. He confirmed it in the last lines that he wrote, the night before the anticipated difficult combat against a battle-hardened and well equipped Spanish column, when he declared that the fundamental objective of his struggle was, “…to prevent the United States from spreading through the Antilles as Cuba gains its independence, and from overpowering with that additional strength our lands of America. Everything that I have done up until now, and everything that I will do, is to this end.”

Without understanding this profound truth one cannot today be either a patriot or a revolutionary.

Without any doubt, the mass media, the monopoly of many technical resources and the substantial funds directed at dehumanizing the masses constitute considerable but not invincible obstacles.

Cuba demonstrated – starting from its position as a colonial yankee trading post, together with the illiteracy and generalized poverty of its people – that it was possible to confront the country which was threatening the definitive absorption of the Cuban nation. Nobody can even affirm that there was a national bourgeoisie opposed to the empire; the bourgeoisie developed in such close proximity to it that, shortly after the triumph, it sent 14,000 totally unprotected children to the United States, although that act was associated with the perfidious lie that parental custody was to be suppressed. This is what history recorded as Operation Peter Pan, described as the largest maneuver of child manipulation for political ends recalled in the Western Hemisphere.

National territory was invaded, barely two years after the revolutionary triumph, by mercenary forces – comprising former Batista soldiers and the sons of landowners and the bourgeoisie – armed and escorted by the United States with warships from its naval fleet, including aircraft carriers with equipment ready to enter into action, and which accompanied the invaders to our island. The defeat and capture of virtually all the mercenaries in less than 72 hours and the destruction of their aircraft operating from bases in Nicaragua and their naval transportation, constituted a humiliating defeat for the empire and its Latin America allies, which had underestimated the Cuban people’s fighting capacity.

In the face of the termination of oil supplies on the part of the United States, the subsequent total suspension of the historic sugar quota in that country’s market, and the prohibition of trade established over more than 100 years, the USSR responded to each one of these measures by supplying fuel, buying our sugar, trading with our country and finally, supplying the weapons that Cuba could not acquire in other markets.

The idea of a systematic campaign of CIA-organized pirate attacks, sabotage and military actions by armed bands created and supplied by the United States before and after the mercenary attack, and which would culminate in a military invasion of Cuba by this country, gave rise to events which placed the world on the brink of a total nuclear war, which neither of the parties involved nor humanity itself could have survived.

Without any doubt, those events resulted in the removal from the presidency of Nikita Khrushchev, who underestimated his adversary, disregarded opinions presented to him and did not consult with those of us in the front line concerning his final decision. What could have been an important moral victory thus turned into a costly political setback for the USSR. For many years the worst of crimes against Cuba continued and more than a few of them, like the U.S. criminal blockade, are still being committed.

Khrushchev made exceptional gestures to our country. On that occasion, I unhesitatingly criticized the non-consulted agreement with the United States, but it would be ungrateful and unjust not to acknowledge his exceptional solidarity at difficult and decisive moments for our people in their historic battle for independence and revolution in the face of the powerful empire of the United States. I understand that the situation was extremely tense and he did not wish to lose any time when he made the decision to withdraw the missiles and the yankees, very secretly, agreed to give up the invasion.

Despite the decades gone by, already half a century, the Cuban fruit has not fallen into yankee hands.

News reports currently coming in from Spain, France, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, Syria, the United Kingdom, the Malvinas and countless other points on the planet are serious, and all of them augur a political and economic disaster as a result of the stupidity of the United States and its allies.

I will confine myself to a few subjects. I must note that, going by what everyone is saying, that the selection of a Republican candidate to aspire to the presidency of this globalized and far-reaching empire is, in its turn – I am serious – the greatest competition of idiocy and ignorance that I have ever heard. As I have things to do, I cannot devote any time to the subject. I already knew it would be like that.

Some news agency cables better illustrate what I wish to analyze, because they demonstrate the incredible cynicism generated by the decadence of the West. One of them, with amazing tranquility, talks of a Cuban political prisoner who, it states, died after a hunger strike lasting 50 days. A journalist with Granma, Juventud Rebelde, radio news or any other revolutionary organ might be mistaken in any interpretation of any subject, but would never fabricate an item of news or invent a lie.

A Granma informative note affirms that there was no hunger strike; the man was an ordinary prisoner sentenced to four years for attacking and injuring his wife in the face; that his own mother in law asked authorities to intervene; family members were kept fully abreast of all procedures used in his medical treatment and were grateful for the effort made by medical specialists who treated him. He received medical attention, as the note states, in the best hospital in the eastern region, as is the case with all citizens. He died from secondary multi-organic failure related to a severe respiratory infection.

The patient had received all the medical attention administered in a country which has one of the finest medical services in the world, provided free of charge in spite of the blockade imposed on our homeland by imperialism. It is simply a duty that is fulfilled in a country where the Revolution is proud of always having respected, for more than 50 years, the principles which give it its invincible strength.

It would be more worthwhile for the Spanish government, given its excellent relations with Washington, to travel to the United States and inform itself as to what is taking place in yankee jails, the ruthless conduct meted out to millions of prisoners, the policy of the electric chair and the horrors perpetrated on detainees in the country’s jails and those who are protesting in its streets.

Yesterday, January 23, a strong Granma editorial titled “Cuba’s truths,” which occupied an entire page of the newspaper, explained in detail the unprecedented shame of the campaign of lies unleashed against our Revolution by certain governments “traditionally committed to anti-Cuba subversion.”

Our people are well aware of the norms which have governed the impeccable conduct of our Revolution since the first battle and which has never been stained over more than half a century. They also know that it can never be pressured or coerced by enemies. Our laws and norms will be respected unfailingly.

It is worth noting this with clarity and frankness. The Spanish government and the shaky European Union, plunged into a profound economic crisis, must know what should guide them. It is pitiful to read news agency reports of the statements of both utilizing their barefaced lies to attack Cuba. First concern yourselves with saving the euro if you can, resolve the chronic unemployment from which young people are increasingly suffering, and respond to theindignados, constantly attacked and beaten by the police.

We are not ignorant of the fact that Spain is now being governed by admirers of Franco, who dispatched members of the Blue Division, together with the Nazi SS and SA, to kill Soviets. Close to 50,000 of them participated in the cruel aggression. In the most cruel and painful operation of that war: the siege of Leningrad, where one million Russian citizens died, the Blue Division was among the forces attempting to strangle the heroic city. The Russian people will never pardon that horrific crime.

The fascist right of Aznar, Rajoy and other servants of the empire, must know something about the 16,000 casualties of their predecessors in the Blue Division and the Iron Crosses which Hitler awarded to officers and soldiers from that division. There is nothing unusual about what the Gestapo police are doing now to the men and women demanding the right to work and bread in the country with the highest unemployment in Europe.

Why are the mass media of the empire lying so barefacedly?

Those who manipulate the media are striving to deceive and dehumanize the world with their crude lies, possibly thinking that it constitutes the principal resource for maintaining the global system of domination and plunder imposed, particularly upon victims in close proximity to the headquarters of the metropolis, the close to 600 million Latin American and Caribbean people living in this hemisphere.

The sister republic of Venezuela has become the fundamental objective of this policy. The reason is obvious. Without Venezuela, the empire would have imposed its Free Trade Treaty on all the peoples of the continent who inhabit it from the south of the United States, a region where the greatest reserves of land, fresh water and minerals of the planet are to be found, as well as large energy resources which, administered in a spirit of solidarity toward other peoples of the world, constitute resources which cannot and must not fall into the hands of transnationals imposing a suicidal and infamous system on them.

For example, it is enough to look at the map to comprehend the criminal dispossession signified by stripping Argentina of a little piece of its territory in the extreme south of the continent. There, the British deployed their decadent military apparatus to murder rookie Argentine recruits wearing summer clothing in the middle of winter. The United States, and its ally Augusto Pinochet, shamelessly supported them. Now, just before the London Olympics, its Prime Minister David Cameron is also proclaiming, as did Margaret Thatcher, his right to use nuclear submarines to kill Argentines. The government of this country is unaware of the fact that the world is changing, and the scorn of our hemisphere and that of the majority of the peoples for the oppressors is increasing every day.

The case of the Malvinas is not the only one. Does anyone know how the conflict in Afghanistan is going to end? Just a few days ago U.S. soldiers desecrated the corpses of Afghani combatants, killed by NATO drone bombings.

Three days ago a European agency reported, “Afghani President Hamid Karzai has given his backing to a negotiated peace with the Taliban, emphasizing that this issue must be resolved by the citizens of his country.” It went on to add, “…the process of peace and reconciliation belongs to the Afghani nation and no country or foreign organization can take away this right from the Afghanis.

For its part, a cable published by our press communicated from Paris, “France today suspended all its training and aid operations in Afghanistan and threatened to expedite the withdrawal of its troops, after an Afghani soldier shot four French soldiers in the Taghab valley, in Kapisa province… Sarkozy instructed Defense Minister Gérard Longuet to travel immediately to Kabul, and indicated the possibility of an early withdrawal of the contingent.”

After the disappearance of the USSR and the socialist bloc, the U.S. government imagined that Cuba would be unable to sustain itself. George W. Bush had already prepared a counterrevolutionary government to govern our country. On the very same day that Bush initiated his criminal war on Iraq, I asked our country’s authorities to end the tolerance afforded the counterrevolutionary capos who, in those days, were hysterically demanding the invasion of Cuba. In real terms, their attitude constituted an act of treason against the homeland.

Bush and his stupidities prevailed for eight years and the Cuban Revolution has already lasted for more than half a century. The ripe fruit has not fallen into the empire’s lap. Cuba will not be one more possession with which the empire spreads through the lands of America. Martí’s blood will not have been spilled in vain.

Tomorrow I will publish another Reflection to complement this one.

Fidel Castro Ruz

January 24, 2012

7:12 p.m.

Translated by Granma International

Granma.cu

Caribbean Blog International

granma.cu EDITORIAL:

OVER the last few days, the media and representatives of certain governments traditionally committed to anti-Cuba subversion have unleashed a new campaign of accusations, unscrupulously taking advantage of a lamentable event: the death of an ordinary prisoner, which possibly only in the case of Cuba, is converted into news of international repercussion.

The method utilized is the same one as always: fruitlessly attempting, through repetition, to demonize Cuba, in this case through the deliberate manipulation of an incident which is absolutely exceptional in this country.

This so-called political prisoner was serving a four-year sentence after a fair legal process during which he was at liberty and a trial in accordance with the law, for a brutal physical attack on his wife in public and violent resistance to arrest by police agents.

This man died from multi-organ failure due to an acute respiratory infection, despite having received appropriate medical attention, including specialized medication and treatment in the intensive care room of Santiago de Cuba’s principal hospital.

Why did Spanish authorities and certain members of the European Union hasten to condemn Cuba without any investigation into the incident? Why do they always utilize pre-fabricated lies in the context of Cuba? Why, in addition to lying, do they censor the truth? Why is the voice and truth about Cuba openly denied the smallest space in the international media?

They are acting both cynically and hypocritically. How would they describe the recent manifestations of police brutality in Spain and a large part of "educated and civilized" Europe against the indignadosmovement?

Why is there no concern over the dramatic situation of overcrowding in Spanish jails with a high immigrant population – in excess of 35% of total prisoners in the country – according to the most recent report by the ACAIP prison union, dated April 3, 2010?

Who has made any effort to investigate the death in July of 2011 in the Spanish penitentiary of Teruel, of Tohuami Hamdaoui, an ordinary prisoner of Moroccan origin after a hunger strike of several months? Who has reflected the fact that he has insisted he is innocent?

Has the Chilean spokesperson slandering us by asserting that the dead man was a political dissident on his 50th day of hunger strike lost his memory and sense of reality? He must remember his days as a student leader linked to Pinochet’s troops, who massacred Chileans and instituted disappearances and torture throughout the Southern Cone via Plan Condor, while there have been no statements about the harsh repression of students peacefully demonstrating in defense of the human right to universal and free education. Is he one of those who supported re-labeling the Pinochet dictatorship a military regime in school textbooks? Has he made any statement about the repressive and arbitrary Anti-Terrorist Law implemented against Mapuche prisoners on hunger strike?

The United States government, the principal instigator of any effort to discredit Cuba in order to justify its policy of hostility, subversion and the economic, political and media blockade of Cuba, could not be missing from this campaign.

The hypocrisy of spokespersons for the United States, a country with a poor human rights record at home and abroad, is staggering. The UN Human Rights Council has acknowledged frequent serious violations in this country of women’s rights, in the treatment of persons, racial and ethnic discrimination, inhuman conditions in prisons, neglect of inmates, a differentiated racial standard and frequent judicial errors in imposing capital punishment, and the execution of minors and the mentally ill. This is compounded by abuses of the migratory detention system, deaths along the militarized southern border, atrocious acts against human dignity and the killing of innocent civilians by U.S. army troops in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and other countries, not to mention arbitrary detentions and acts of torture perpetrated in the illegally occupied Guantánamo Naval Base.

It is barely known that three people died in the United States last November 2011 during a mass hunger strike of prisoners in California. According to testimonies from prisoners in adjoining cells, prison guards offered no assistance whatsoever and ignored their cries for help, as opposed to the abusive practice of force feeding hunger strikers.

A few weeks previously, African American Troy Davis was executed despite a large body of evidence demonstrating legal errors in his case. The White House and the Department of State did nothing about this case.

A total of 90 prisoners have been executed since January 2010 to date in the United States, while a further 3,220 remain on death row. The government frequently brutally represses those who dare to expose injustices within the system.

This new attack on Cuba is clearly politically motivated and has nothing to do with legitimate concerns for the lives of Cuban men and women. It is fuelled by the complicity of the financial-media corporations such as the Prisa Group and the corporation running CNN en Español, in the finest style of the Miami Mafia. It is irrationally accusing the Cuban government without having made any investigation into the facts. Condemnation and judgment are made a priori.

It is apparent from the immediate and crude response of authorities and the apparatus in the service of media aggression against Cuba that they did not even take the trouble to confirm the information. The truth is unimportant if the intention is to fabricate and sell a false image of alleged flagrant and systematic violations of civil liberties in Cuba which could one day justify an intervention in order to "protect defenseless Cuban civilians."

The attempt to impose a distorted image of Cuba meant to indicate a notable deterioration in human rights, to construct an allegedly victimized opposition dying in prison, where health services are denied, is evident.

The humanist vocation of Cuban doctors and health personnel, who spare no effort or the country’s scant resources – to a large extent the result of the criminal 50-year blockade imposed on the Cuban people – to save lives and improve the health standards of their own people and in many other nations is well known.

Cuba is respected and admired by many peoples and governments who recognize its social undertakings at home and abroad.

Deeds speak louder than words. Anti-Cuban campaigns will not inflict any damage on the Cuban Revolution or the people, who will continue improving their socialism.

The truth of Cuba is that of a country in which human beings are most valued: a life expectancy rate at birth of 77.9 years; free health coverage for the entire population; an infant mortality rate of 4.9 per 1,000 live births, a figure exceeding that of the United States and the lowest on the continent along with Canada; a literate population with full and free access to all levels of education; 96% participation in the 2008 general elections; and a democratic process of discussion of the new economic and social guidelines prior to the 6th Congress of the Communist Party.

The truth of Cuba is that of a country which has taken its universities and schools to penitentiaries holding inmates who had fair and impartial trials, who receive the same wages for work undertaken, and enjoy high levels of medical attention without any distinction in terms of ethnicity, gender, creed or social origin.

It will be demonstrated yet again that lies, however much they are repeated, do not necessarily become truths, because, as José Martí stated, "A just principle, from the depths of a cave, can do more than an army."

Translated by Granma International

January 23, 2012

granma.cu

Caribbean Blog International

By Hania Sholkamy:

The Egyptian elections delivered a parliament that has one of the lowest rates of female representation in the world. Yet this is the parliament that expresses the political will of the people of Egypt. It may also be one that ignores the social realities of gender and of women’s political participation, says Hania Sholkamy

The mostly free and somewhat fair elections held in Egypt over the past two months have given the Freedom and Justice Party of the Muslim Brotherhood an overwhelming majority in parliament (approximately 40 %). The runners up are the Salafis who did very well at the ballot box and hold up to twenty percent of seats. Trailing behind, but with heads held high are the liberals, the revolutionaries  and a number of highly respected individuals who profess a secular creed. Almost all of these newly minted representatives of the people are men. In this protracted battle of multiple voting days, legal challenges, re-runs and complicated allocations of seats across proportionate party lists and individual seats only 8 of the 480 + seats went to women. (There are still ten seats to be allocated by presidential fiat )

But if we bracket yet unallocated seats the final result would give women less than 2% of parliamentary seats and make their representation in Egypt one of the lowest in the world. According to the UN the world average for women’s parliamentary representation is 19%. Even more revealing is the average for the Arab World, which stands at 13%. So what explains this dismal outcome of an election for which Egyptians have waited for decades?  No other Arab country has failed to deliver a modicum of gender balance to its elected institutions to the same extent. Morocco for example has just had an election in which 16.7 % of successful candidates are women and in which the overwhelming majority of seats went to the Islamic opposition.

What truly provides food for thought is the complacency with which these election results have been received. Few politicians, officials or commentators have voiced any concerns or found these outcomes remarkable, despite the importance placed on these elections as one of the first real gains and achievements of the revolution.

For example Dr. Manal Abu el Hassan (FJP member and spokesperson for women’s affairs) sees no problem in the low number of successful female candidates from her own party, She indicated that the new parliament, even if made up of only men, will do the right thing and deliver social justice in line with the Party’s programme so there is no need to be concerned by the absence of women. Indeed she further confirmed this trust in her male colleagues in a television interview on the 14 January 2012 when she condemned the women’s protests against the brutality of attacks by the military police against the very brave young women who were challenging the armed forces across a barricade in downtown Cairo. She said that women should not march in the streets to protest and protect their honour, since "it is incumbent on their ‘fathers, brothers and husbands to march and protest on their behalf!” So as far as her party is concerned the concept of welaya or guardianship is a robust one that negates the need for gendered representation. It makes one wonder if the FJP would have bothered to put any women on their lists if they had not been forced to do so by the new constitutional declaration, which imposed a quota for women on party lists, mandating that each list has one woman but without specifying the position of the woman on the list (the higher up the more likely a candidate will win a seat). Unlike the quotas for workers and peasants, where the candidates are given slots on the lists that give them a fair chance of success, women candidates’ placement suggests their inclusion is merely a gesture and their chances of success minimal.

It also explains why one of the Salafi parties in one constituency placed the picture of a candidate’s husband on their posters instead of the fully face veiled candidate herself.

One of the FJP’s successful female candidates speaking at a meeting  recently said “One woman is enough in Parliament!” She meant that a freely elected woman was better than tens appointed or foisted onto the people via quotas or corruption. The point is well taken, and does express mass resentment at the imposition of female quotas that were introduced in the discredited elections of 2010. When the Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF) cancelled these quotas for women people were happy that a wrong had been put to right. The result was that all parties, with very few exceptions, kept their women where they thought they belong; well below the men, thus guaranteeing unequal opportunities for women!

On the other hand the youth of the revolution, the radicals and the left also see no problem with this outcome as they reject the whole narrative of gender equality as a figment of a Western imagination. The denigration of legal reforms that have benefited women in the past decade, and have guaranteed their free mobility, right to unilateral divorce, and political representation through a quota system, are collectively known as Suzanne’s laws in reference to Mrs Mubarak and as such rejected and even deplored. These formal indicators are meaningless since policies matter, but individuals do not. 

Young activists and socialist parties are not sympathetic to gender as a political category, or as basis for rights and entitlements. The hundreds of frontline fighters in their midst who also happen to be women have attained their credentials as political leaders and foot soldiers without having to make claims based on their gender. They are keen to distance themselves from the language of gender equality and the recipes and prescriptions of old political and developmental paradigms. Interestingly, the world famous bloggers of the revolution are mostly women – like Israa Abdel Fatah, Nawara Negm and Asmaa Abdel Rahman. The most striking images from the new confrontations between people and the state portray women, and the marches and protests that forced the military to back-down and apologize were by women. Moreover the elections were decided by the overwhelming participation of women, millions of whom were mobilized onto the streets and towards the ballot box.

Elections aside, there are growing fears and worries about the future of pluralism in Egypt, and many of these fears focus on questions of women’s rights and liberties. A petition organised by independent women on facebook is currently going around demanding the prosecution of one of the potential presidential candidates who has made statements about women that are in contravention of our constitution - or rather what is left of it. Hazem Salah Abu Ismail has asked for the expulsion of non-veiled women from Islam- thus making them apostates, which is a crime. He has also said that women’s work leads to crime as a woman’s place is within the home. The press has reported recently that other Salafi groups have started a morality police that allegedly pays young men five hundred Egyptian pounds a month to impose morality on the public, including forcing un-veiled or rather improperly veiled women off the streets . Happily these attempts were foiled thanks to media and public outrage. One group of women even attacked this morality police in Sharqiyah. These zealots are a minority and may not be the worst enemies of women.

At stake, and in a serious fashion, are the possible changes to be made to the constitution that will limit women’s rights as individuals – the rights to public office, to guardianship of children, to all work, to some forms of mobility - and impose a state of dependency whereby women are considered parts of families and are therefore the responsibility of patriarchs. It is as yet not clear what the agenda of the religious majority is vis-à-vis legal reforms that pertain to women and families. One stated reform is the changes in custody law which will once again give custody to fathers in the case of divorce of children from the age of 8 years. The law now lets mothers retain custody for boys till the age of 15 years, and for girls until they marry or choose to live with the father. Yet despite the astounding importance of women as political leaders, activists, communicators, voters and as the focus of anticipated political, constitutional and social changes, they remain absent from parliament - although present, vocal and important outside it.

Egypt would be better off if it could continue to shed the oppressions of the past, including the hegemony of state sponsored spokespersons for women’s rights. The attempts to whitewash the failure of equitable social policies by imposing gender justice as a fig leaf not only failed, but created public antipathy towards women’s rights to social justice. But these sceptres from the past need not haunt the present and future of Egypt, and must definitely not provide an excuse for our current state of denial in which women are actually at the heart of the political process, but are formally hidden behind all -male structures and institutions. Shame on the religious, secular and all other parties for their complicity in this affair!

24 January 2012

opendemocracy.net

Caribbean Blog International

PARIS, January 24 (RIA Novosti):

France’s upper house of parliament, the Senate, passed a bill late on Monday making the denial of genocide a crime punishable by a 45,000-euro fine and a year in jail.

The bill that sets the country on a collision course with Turkey was approved 127 to 86 after a seven-hour discussion. It is yet be ratified by French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

The bill, initially criminalizing the denial of the Armenian genocide in the early 20th century, had been amended to outlaw the denial of any officially recognized genocide, partly in the hope of appeasing Ankara. So far, French laws classify only two mass killings as “genocide” - the Holocaust (the 1990 law) and the deaths of more than 1 million Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire between 1915 and 1917, recognized by France as genocide in 2001.

Armenian Foreign Minister Edvard Nalbandyan welcomed the move as an important contribution “to the record of worldwide human rights protection” and a worthy addition to the existing mechanism of preventing crimes against humanity.

Ankara, in its turn, threatened “grave consequences,” including diplomatic and economic sanctions.

“Turkey’s response to the adoption of the bill had long been decided. These measures will stay in place as long as the law stays in force,” Hurriyet Daily News quoted Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu as saying shortly before the bill was voted on.

Omer Celik, deputy leader of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), threatened “permanent sanctions” if the bill is approved.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday he would abstain from visiting France in future, accusing French President Nicholas Sarkozy of attempts to distort history for gaining political capital. Turkey has earlier suggested that the law is an attempt to play up to France’s 500,000 ethnic Armenians and secure their votes in the upcoming presidential election.

The Turkish genocide in Armenia was first recognized by Uruguay in 1965 and many countries, including Russia have since followed suit. Although it has been recognized by 42 U.S. states, the U.S. government has yet to pass a bill on the issue.

Ankara dismisses the genocide allegations, saying that many Muslim Turks and Kurds were also put to death as Russian troops invaded, often aided by Armenian militias.

Turkey and Armenia have had no diplomatic relations since the latter became independent following the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. Turkey closed its border with Armenia in a show of support for Azerbaijan following a bloody conflict over Nagorny Karabakh, in which some 35,000 died on both sides.

03:14 24/01/2012

rian.ru

Caribbean Blog International

LONDON, England (AP) — Interpol's chief sounded an alarm Thursday that countries are still failing to check identity documents against its database — a warning that comes just months ahead of the 2012 Olympics.

Ron Noble, secretary-general of the international police agency based in France, said out of the 1.1 billion travellers last year, ID documents of some 500 million people were not checked against Interpol's database, which is one of the world's most detailed.

"It will take a tragedy — a specific kind of tragedy — for behaviour to change," Noble told The Associated Press after speaking to foreign correspondents in London.

Noble has said Britain is the only EU country to systematically check passports against those registered with Interpol as missing worldwide. Britain carried out 140 million checks last year against the database — more than the rest of Europe combined.

Last year, he said more than 11,000 people were caught trying to enter the UK using lost or stolen passports.

France carried out the second-highest number of checks at 10 million.

"The only problem the UK appears to have is the number of people at immigration posts," Noble said. He was not voicing concerns over the Olympics.

A special Interpol team will be sent specifically for the Olympics, helping British authorities determine whether anyone trying to enter the UK is wanted, whether their documents have been listed as lost or stolen and whether they are considered a threat.

"We know terrorists use fraudulent ID documents," Noble said.

The UK Border Agency faced intense criticism last year after passport checks were relaxed during the height of the summer tourist season to lessen lines at London's Heathrow Airport, Europe's busiest. A government report on Thursday blamed poor communications, a lack of supervision and other shortcomings for the problems.

Olympics security has been a primary concern since 1972, when 11 Israeli athletes and coaches were killed at the Munich Games.

Noble said while there was no specific intelligence that the games would be targeted, such events provide an array of opportunities for criminals, including pickpocketing, forced prostitution, illegal Internet betting rings and hoaxes.

And then there is still the threat of terrorism. Noble said while al-Qaida's ranks had been depleted, affiliates were actively recruiting in places like Somalia.

Another fear that Noble said "keeps him up at night" is the threat of a nuclear or biological attack. Interpol has been alerted to some 2,715 instances where there were questions of whether there had been illicit trafficking of nuclear material.

Noble stressed, however, that didn't mean there were more 2,000 cases of trafficked nuclear material.

While most of the cases involved non-nuclear radioactive material cases — 2,535 — there were 200 cases involving nuclear material. Only four cases involved the attempted sale of highly enriched uranium, Noble said.

The United States, he said, had the most cases in the database — mostly because of its reporting through the US Nuclear Regulatory Council. After that, Eastern Europe has had the most and some of the most significant cases of concern in terms of criminality, Noble said.

As for whether terror groups were becoming more capable of unleashing biological attacks, Noble pointed to advances in both technology and biotechnology. He said the risk was increasing — partially because technology can be misused — but that did not mean there was an increased likelihood of a bio-terrorist attack.

"It's so easy to think about how an attack can be carried out because the screening of passengers doesn't focus on that at all," Noble said. "That's why it's important to identify people who are engaged in conduct that is suspicious or illegal."

Noble is American and a former head of the US Secret Service. Interpol is based in Lyon, France.

January 21, 2012

jamaicaobserver

Caribbean Blog International