A petition worth signing. (maybe)

I've been signing up for too many mailing lists recently. My latest acquisition is Avaaz.org, a group that coordinates petitions on issues of international justice. Their newest burning cross is the fresh round of talks in the mid-east being urged on Israel by the Arab League.

Arab leaders are making a serious peace offer, and the world supports them. Ordinary Israelis want negotiations too - but their leaders risk losing this rare chance. Talks just about security will never bring peace. (Avaaz)

The offer centres on an Arab peace plan rejected by Israel outright in 2002, but this time round the word is that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is reacting more positively, if still skeptically. Anyway, the pillars of the international community are generally rallying around the Arab push, notable UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and European Union's foreign policy chief Javier Solana.

Mr Ban told the summit that "the Arab peace initiative is one of the pillars of the peace process... [it] sends a signal that the Arabs are serious about achieving peace."

Correspondents say no-one expects any breakthroughs, but the fact that Saudi Arabia, the regional powerhouse, is being so pro-active means this will be one of the most scrutinised Arab League summits. (BBC)

So I signed the petition, because it seemed like a no-brainer. And then I ran into this fiery critique over at China Confidential. It's from Wednesday. It's titled Understanding The Saudi Plot to Destroy Israel.

The official version of the kingdom's peace plan calls for all Arab countries to formally recognize Israel's existence and establish relations with Israel if it withdraws from all land held since the 1967 war, recognizes the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, with East Jerusalem as its capital, and provides the so-called right of return for all Palestinian refugees. (China Confidential)

The general thrust being to flood Israel with Arabs, making it a dually-religious state, and thus not Israel at all. The pseudonymous Reporter seems to think this is a bad thing of course. I'm not so convinced, but that doesn't make the execution of such a plan any less duplicitous . I mean, God, at least Iran is being honestly malicious.

Nuclear-arming Iran, which has vowed to destroy Israel the old fashioned way--through blood and fire--is skeptical about the Saudi piece-by-piece plan. But Iran's energy-starved ally, China, is a believer. Sun Bigan, Beijing's special envoy to the Middle East, is said to be urging patience and restraint, advising Iranian monster-in-chief Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that a deescalation of his country's nuclear standoff with the West would allow for implementation of the Saudi scheme. (China Confidential again)

Which brings us back to Asia. To say that China is afraid of an escalation in the Middle-East is an understatement. China is the world's second-largest (second-worst?) oil consumer, and even its recent pax with oil-rich Russia is not enough to wean it off its Arabian addictions. (hint: not talking about coffee) I find myself torn in choosing sides though. Iran's President is a terrible, terrible man, and China's policies are not much better, but if Chinese money is one of the keys to extinguishing the inferno in the Middle-East...

I just don't know what to think. It's too complicated. I give up. I'm going to go read some web comics.

About four things

I'm in the library today from dawn to dusk, finishing up this paper that I thought was due tomorrow. Turns out that may not be true. I ran into Graeme on the way in, and he pointed out that while the English copy of our instructions simply says that we have to hand a copy into CIEC before our presentation on the ninth, the Japanese copy says we must do this the day before. Maybe. Literally it says "by about the eighth of March."

Huh? "By about the eighth"? Does that mean the morning of the ninth is okay? I don't understand.

Anyway, I've been walking around with this J-pop song stuck in my head for the last couple of days. It's called Chu-Lip, by Otsuka Ai, and the music video is terribly disturbing. I saw the whole crew on one of the many celebrity talk shows that float around Japanese TV. It was pretty hilarious, and the drag queen with the tutu kept hitting on one of the hosts.

Less hilarious but equally disturbing is the trial of Canadian citizen and refugee Husein Dzhelil in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region , China. Exactly what he stands charged with is unclear. Mr. Dzhelil, who fled XUAR in the mid 1990s, was detained by the authorities in Uzbekistan in March 2006, and handed over to China in June. He was held incommunicado initially, but on the 2nd of February a trial was held that, for the first time, his family was permitted to attend. His treatment is shocking, but not terribly surprising. This is China, after all.

Those close to Husein Dzhelil say he claims that he was tortured after his
extradition to China in June 2006, including by being starved and deprived of
sleep during the first fifteen days of his imprisonment. He has also claimed
that Chinese authorities threatened that he would “disappear” and “be buried
alive” unless he signed a document. This document was later held up as a
confession, although Husein Dzhelil reportedly later claimed he did not know
what he had signed. (Amnesty International)

The Amnesty Page has information on how to write the Prime Minister (of China), and other officials. There's also a link to a year-old open-letter to Stephen Harper, whose integrity when dealing with China's human rights record and Chinese officials has been impeccable. You may remember this article from the Epoch Times about Harper's tumultuous chat with Hu Jintao at APEC in November. Mr. Dzhelil was a hot topic at the time.

Whatever else may be said about the Prime Minister, I appreciate his efforts on this front.

Oh, and one last thing that I'm sure will offend my mom. I've decided to sign up for the Prime Minister's mailing list. I look forward to comparing it to the NDP newsletter, which I have found to encapsulate the worst sort of self-important aggression that has come to characterize the Left Wing. We'll see how it goes.

China Exploring Africa's Biodiesel Crop Potential

From the erudite China Confidential. Look for the third entry down, same title.

Energy-starved China is expanding its African oil safari to include oil from plants--the kind that can be used as feedstock for biodiesel production.

[...]

China, the world's second largest oil importer after the US, is showing significant interest in biodiesel as an alternative fuel. China has become the fourth largest--and the fastest growing--motor vehicle market. Under pressure from its own citizens and the international community to seriously address the worsening air polution problem, the government recently set a goal that that by the year 2020, 20 percent of Chinese energy is to be derived from renewable resources. Hence, the interest in securing supplies of feedstock.

Rack one up for China. Not that we should be singing the praises of the CCP mind you. The Middle Kingdom's human rights record in Africa is notoriously bad. At the end of all this, we are as likely to see exploitation under conditions reminiscent of colonial histories as we are to see a a decline in greenhouse gasses.

And then there's the question of small arms and munitions trade. I've commented on this before, but China is running a sort of oil-for-guns program, and the kinds of people they trade with are not the good kind of people.

Togo and the Congo are two countries of focus. In competing for commodities and and, Beijing's energy behemoths, which answer to the Chinese government (controlled by the Communist Party) and not to stockholders, have important competitive advantages over their European and US rivals. Chinese firms can offer African leaders an array of incentives--from presidential palaces and sports stadiums to guns and cash gifts--to achieve company aims and advance the national interest.

You win some you lose some, I guess.

Kim Jong Nam

Come on in. Grab a seat. Let's talk politics.

Me and politics haven't been to close recently, we've been in a test seperation period, seeing other anthropomorphic theoretical paradigms, super-intelligent shades of the colour blue, whatever. But this morning I got to thinking about the old ball and chain again. And here's why.

The eldest known son of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il has left his residence in Macau and is in Beijing preparing to travel to Pyongyang for his father's 65th birthday, South Korean media reported on Monday. (CNN)

The article goes on to talk about how this prodigal son, Kim Jong Nam, has fallen out with his father over a botched attempt to get into Japan on a forged Dominican passport, (he says he wanted to go to Tokyo Disneyland) and is no longer named as the successor. Moreover, he has been the target of at least two assassination attempts. Kim Jong Il, getting on at 65, has been mumbling about passing on his rule to a military junta, and has set up an Obama-style investigatory committee to this end.



And that's not even considering the implications of the son of one of two remaining communist dictators in the world being permitted to carry on his playboy lifestyle in an international gambling centre in Chinese territory. I hadn't realized before the degree to which the Chinese and North Korean governments were, uhm, interwoven. It also indicates that Great Leader Kim considers his first born expendable. It also adds a new twist to old news like this:

"It's another piece of the puzzle," said Jorge Godinho, an anti-money
laundering expert at University of Macau.

Macau is where North Korea did most of its international banking until late
2005, when Washington accused the city's Banco Delta Asia of helping Pyongyang
launder money and engage in other illicit activities, and threatened to take
action.

The Macau government, under U.S. pressure, froze $24 million in North
Korea-linked accounts, prompting Pyongyang to boycott the six-way talks for over
a year until December. (Reuters)

The Reuters article also has a more detailed breakdown of the dynstic tribulations in the hermit kingdom. It's fairly fascinating.

Anyway, I think that's about all the time I have today. My parents and sister are back in Toronto and I am so far behind on my thesis paper it's not even Seinfeld.

Next time: Chinese bio-fuel plantations in Africa!

Two quick notes.

Two quick notes.

The Epoch times has been praising Harper for taking a hard-ish line on
China's lacklustre human rights record. Hu Jintao and Stephen Harper met for a
brief 15-minute chat in Hanoi this week, and apparently Canada has not been
making friends. Among our sins:

Canada is concerned with the case of Huseyincan Celil, a Canadian citizen and human rights activist who fled China in the 1990s and who is being held in a Chinese prison for alleged terrorism links.

Liu said the case was discussed by the leaders who reiterated their positions. China considers Huseyincan a Chinese citizen. In another potential strain to ties, Ottawa declined to renew the visa of a Chinese diplomat who was reported to have spied on followers of the Falun Gong religious sect in Canada.

In September, Canada granted honorary citizenship in September to the Dalai Lama, Tibet's spiritual leader and a sworn enemy of Beijing for his
opposition to Chinese Communist rule in the remote, mountainous territory. (Epoch Times)

Even better, is the fact that the Japanese still don't want to go nuclear. Huzzah. Some 80% of over 1700 Japanese citizens interviewed responded that they were against nuclear armament. And on top of that, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe pledged at APEC to keep Japan on the nuke-free path.

A Yen for more Sidebar

I've made some more changes to the sidebar. A sizeable handful of my fellow exchange students have blogs of their own, so I've added in a second round of their various blogspots and LJs. They're listed under the new category フレンド which is jangrish for friend, except that I've never actually seen it used. The political blogs are exclusively in the ブログ category, and we have a new addition - China Confidential.

That's all folks. Happy Remembrance Day.

And if you understand the title of this post you know way to much about the English language. Nerd.

Miscellania

A few things to quickly mention, loose ends to wrap up, and news to dish out.

Yesterday was an important milestone. As of today, I have been in Japan for one month and one day.

That article that I talked about ages ago is up on the Ubyssey's website: Recycled pen trend comes to campus. (sounds juicy, no?)

Speaking of the Ubyssey, my favourite campus newspaper has been added to the sidebar. Check out the sexy new website. The other new side dishes are blogs from fellow exchange students Brookie (very proudly of Texas) and Magnus. (very sarcastically of Norway)

In response to the roguest of the rogues' recent actions, my favourite, funny-looking, double-minority politician is headed to the Far East. Condie Rice was dishing out optimism left, right, and centre over the weekend, encouraging China to live up to its sanction obligations against long-time-ally North Korea.

She said, "I am not concerned that the Chinese are going to turn their backs on their obligations. I don't think they would have voted for a resolution that they did not intend to carry through on. And let's remember: no one has an interest in seeing the trade in dangerous materials or weapons of mass destruction. That is, if anything, more destabilizing to the neighbors than even to the interests of the United States." (Epoch Times)

It's nice to hear the US tooting the multilateral horn every now and then. Now that the White House has broken its silence and confirmed what Russia has been saying for weeks I expect we'll be hearing a lot from them over the next few days. If the rhetoric stays this moderate, I'll be willing to give GWB and staff some points for diplomacy.

Not a lot of points mind you.

High-level Japanese politicians seem to be very aware of the need for multilateral and bilateral dialogue, and moderate language. But not surprisingly, it looks like some of the most radical language is coming from lower down.

"There are concerns that North Korea may launch large-scale terrorist attacks or sly and heinous activities in retaliation to additional sanctions," said Hiroto Yoshimura, deputy director general of the National Police Agency.

Yoshimura was addressing the first meeting of a security task force that he heads since North Korea's Oct. 9 atomic test, according to NHK.

Yoshimura told task force members to step up security and intelligence efforts to head off possible retaliation by North Korea. (Japan Times)

And that would be all for the day, if it weren't for some terrible news my old friend Evan told me this morning. He's going through a rough time, and my thoughts are with him and his family.

Osama bin Layton

Today is a day for general musings. It's rainy and miserable and I have these photos from my weekend trip to Nara but I don't think I'm going to get around to posting them for a while. There's too much stuff going on in the world right now, and I am spending way too much time staring at a monitor as is. I'm going to logoff, I think, maybe do some homework, maybe go to the gym. Maybe I'll put up those pictures tomorrow.

A guy I know is in Uganda

Let’s start on a positive note. Sort of. Here’s a little tidbit from a former Ubyssey-er. John Woodward has an article on CBC.ca today that documents the energy crises in Uganda that began four years ago.

North Korea still on the table

Getting back to Korea, I know I tried to point out yesterday how crazy Kim Jong-il is, but then today I ran across this little tidbit from an old CBC.ca biography that I just had to quote.

According to state officials, he was born in February 1942 at his father's guerrilla base on Mount Paektu, North Korea's highest mountain. "At the time of his birth there were flashes of lightning and thunder, the iceberg in the pond on Mount Paektu emitted a mysterious sound as it broke, and bright double rainbows rose up," the official lines read.

[…]

In 1964 he graduated from the Kim Sung Il University where legend has it he wrote 1,500 books, all of which are stored in the state's library. It is also said that he wrote six operas, all of which are better then any in the history of music, and designed the Juche Tower, a 150-metre tower that commemorates his father. (Source)

On the international scene, China, Russia and the US have all publicly ruled out an armed response, while talks on sanctions and blockades remain stalled. While US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton continues to push the six-party talks, Japan, the current president of the security council, continues to push unilateral sanctions, but says it will not take part in cargo inspections, which are considered an act of war and are therefore banned under Article 9 of the constitution.

China is still a horrible place to live

Even putting aside talk of coal mines and “death-vans,” Chinese ex-pat Yang Dazhi has a chilling story of persecution in Communist China. As much laud and honour as China may be getting these days for its transformation into the latest Asian miracle economy, it’s difficult to see what makes it that different from arms-dealing "terrorist regimes" like North Korea, or fascist, anti-Semitic Iran.

Not that we should be that hard on them, really. Among other things, we, the collective plutocrats of the West, have built our fortune largely on the blood and sweat of the lower-class that came before us. The same thing can be said about environmental pollution, or, say, nuclear weapons. The tricky part is, that in all the talk of China being a nation of socialists, or at worst dirty communists, it more closely resembles a fascist dictatorship like Nazi Germany, right down to the nitty-gritty of the internment camps. It’s gotten so bad that even the US Congress is beginning to take note.

David Kilgour, a former Canadian cabinet minister, was among those who testified. "The government of China and its hospitals, detention centers and other agencies in numerous parts of the country, has over the past half decade put to death a large, but unknown number of Falun gong prisoners of conscience,” he said. “Most of the victims were convicted of nothing. They were murdered by medical professions for their vital organs. These organs were, virtually, simultaneously seized for sale at high prices, often to foreigners."

It’s so easy to be a fascist state these days, what with ideas of “cultural differences” and “moral relativism” sprouting up in all the right places. But this guy can’t get away with it anymore. Neither can these guys. Meanwhile, rubes like Jack Layton continue to press for Canadian withdrawal from crisis points like Afghanistan. Whatever happened to Human Rights and anti-fascism?

This will make you laugh. "MR LAYTON: CANADA MUST CHANGE MISSION IN WESTERN EUROPE [1944]"

Some reasons to maybe not be so worried after all.

Among other things, even if Pyongyang’s touted “nuclear test” turns out to be the real deal, and Russia is saying that it is, it’s unlikely that Kim Jong-Il has the capability to fit his nukes on a Taepodong or the like.

Prototype nuclear weapons in the past have been physically very large and North Korea's is likely to be the same, James Acton, of the Verification Research, Training and Information Centre (Vertic) in London, says.
"If North Korea has just tested a first generation device then it is currently likely to be too big to fit on a missile," he said. (BBC)

Moreover, while fears of an Asian conventional arms race are legitimate, it’s important to keep in mind that for historical reasons Japan is one of the most vocal opponents of nuclear weapons, and nuclear technology in general, and is unlikely to acquire a Bomb of its own. If it chose to, Japan could no doubt develop the technology in a matter of days, but the domestic and international opposition to such a measure is broad-based, and very, very robust.

The nuclear topic has been sacrosanct in Japan for decades and the Japanese public remains vehemently opposed to becoming a nuclear power.
While Japan's hawkish new Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has won popularity with his tough stance towards Pyongyang and calls for a more assertive foreign policy, persuading Japanese people that they need nuclear weapons would be a tough task.
Equally, Mr Abe will be aware of legal constraints - such as the NPT - that prevent Japan having nuclear weapons, and also of the considerable international opposition, not least from main ally the US, to such a move. (BBC)

From the same source, we have people claiming that a nuclear DPRK may actually be the key to stabilizing the region. As crazy as that sounds, an internationally-relevant Pyongyang may be the key to finally injecting some maturity into Washington’s policies. It goes without saying that nobody in East Asia is interested in a nuclear arms race.

"Anything that causes regional instability is not in China's interests," says Dr Pinkston. Beijing needs stability so that it can focus on its economic development, he says.
Any economic dip could impact badly on a society already coping with rapid change and severe income disparities.
Popular unrest is one of the Chinese political elite's greatest concerns and so maintaining a stable society is the priority, he says.
Countries around the region will more likely put considerable effort into pursing a diplomatic course rather than moving rapidly to arm themselves further.
A North Korean nuclear test could, in fact, be the foundation for better regional dialogue and a more unified effort to put pressure on Pyongyang, says Nicholas Szechenyi of the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. (BBC)

The linchpin will be Pyongyang, and if Pyongyang behaves well it all hangs on how GWB reacts. So far, Kim’s been biding his time, and Washington seems committed to a multilateral approach through the Security Council. I think the most threatening the White House has gotten is to mention, of all things, economic sanctions and setting up a naval blockade of sorts.

And thankfully, despite the poignant timing by Pyongyang, Ban Ki-Moon is still poised to replace Kofi Annan as Secretary General of the UN. Kofi, I think, has been there over-long.

With the support of most of the Security Council and of all of the permanent members, the UN General Assembly can appoint Ban to take over after current Secretary General Kofi Annan's mandate is over at the end of the year.
In Ban, the Security Council, which has the ultimate say in choosing the new head, gets a balanced and neutral choice. His appointment would satisfy both the calls for an Asian secretary general and the United States, which considers South Korea to be a staunch ally.
"The Americans would certainly support the South Korean candidacy because that's sort of a validation of South Korea, which has been under the American orbit since the 1950s," Dr. Arne Kislenko, who teaches history and international relations at Ryerson University and University of Toronto, told CBC.ca. (CBC)

And in case you needed to be told, the entire goddamn world has condemned the test, including the Security Council. Some of the more amusing condemnations come from India, Pakistan, and Venezuela. Except Tehran, of course, which makes some good points about Western hypocrisy, but somewhat trips up its high horse when it buys its plutonium COD from the DPRK.

Then again, the Epoch Times reminds us just how close and worrying the ties are between NK, China, and fascist, Islamist Iran, Syria, and Sudan.

And Kim Myong-chol, unofficial spokesman for the DPRK, lets us know just how crazy "the greatest iron-willed, brilliant commander" Kim Jong-Il really is.