In 2014 the government of Turkey’s strongman Recep Tayyip Erdoğan banned YouTube and Twitter, fearing that millions of young Turks could otherwise read “dangerous content” on social media. The Constitutional Court declared the bans unconstitutional. In 2017, the Turkish government banned Wikipedia. That ban was removed only recently, after two and a half years. It is not that Wikipedia is a reliable source of information. Banning it altogether is a rogue state behavior. It is not, however, only about Wikipedia: in Turkey, truth, regardless of its source, is feared and often banned.
The World Report 2020, released by the Human Rights Watch, drew a realistic yet gloomy picture of civil liberties in Turkey:
“Executive control and political influence over the judiciary in Turkey has led to courts systematically accepting bogus indictments, detaining and convicting without compelling evidence of criminal activity individuals and groups the Erdoğan government regards as political opponents. Among these are journalists, opposition politicians, and activists and human rights defenders…
“Authorities continue to block websites and order the removal of online content while thousands of people in Turkey face criminal investigations, prosecutions, and convictions for their social media posts. There has been a dramatic rise in the number of prosecutions and convictions on charges of ‘insulting the president’ since Erdoğan’s first election as president in 2014…
“An estimated 119 journalists and media workers at time of writing are in pretrial detention or serving sentences for offenses such as “spreading terrorist propaganda” and ‘membership of a terrorist organization.’ Hundreds more are on trial though not in prison. Most media, including television, conforms to the Erdoğan presidency’s political line.”
Hence the nationwide lack of confidence in the judiciary as a constitutional institution, a sad reality that even Erdoğan’s government had to admit. Vice President Fuat Oktay said that only 38% of Turks had confidence in judiciary. The problem of trust is probably much worse than portrayed by the vice president. A survey by the Turkish pollsters ORC revealed that only 11.7% of Turks fully trusted the judiciary.
The ways through which the Turkish state silences dissent are typical of the unfree world.According to the findings of the Monitoring and Advocating Media Freedom project, the Erdoğan government resorted to three most frequently used ways to target journalists in 2019:
“Vexatious charges: Journalists were repeatedly charged with ‘insulting a public official’ or ‘insulting the president’ under Articles 125 and 299 respectively of the Turkish penal code…
“Physical attacks: Physical attacks on journalists took place throughout 2019… The violence was largely attributed to political divisions, specifically between nationalists and conservatives…
“Internet restrictions: The government continued to obstruct freedom of expression online… On 1 August, a regulation mandating online content providers, including all online news outlets, to obtain a broadcasting license from the radio and television watchdog RTUK, was published…”
(According to the left-wing Birgün newspaper, 5,223 people — including 128 children — stood trial on the charge of “insulting the president” in 2018, with journalists often being singled out and the charge being especially damaging.)
Part of the problem is the Turks’ notorious indifference to undemocratic practice — not that they are unaware of the rights violations; it is just that Erdoğan controls most media.
A recent survey released jointly by the Amnesty International’s Turkey chapter and Metropoll, a polling company, revealed the bitter truth about Turkish attitudes.
According to the survey 82.3% of Turks believe fundamental rights and liberties are violated in Turkey. In addition, only a third of them think that someone detained by the police is likely a criminal. Worse, only 37.7% of Turks think everyone is equal before the state.
A clear majority of Turks think that their rights are systematically violated and that they are not equal before law. Then half of them keep voting for Erdoğan (and his allies). These two facts point to a third, and unpleasant conclusion: Millions of Turks know that their country is not free and just, but they keep voting for the leader who is responsible for the gross democratic deficit Turkey has undergone over the past 18 years.
This is a bad message to Erdoğan: You will keep winning votes no matter how maliciously you crush dissent. We are with you and your undemocratic rule.
It was another bad year for Turkish democracy. A worse one may be in the offing.
Assange Case Exposes UK’s Solitary Confinement ‘Torture’ Loophole
Up until last week, Julian Assange had been held in unofficial solitary confinement inside of the Belmarsh prison healthcare unit – a loophole which the UK government began using in May, according to 21st Century Wire‘s Nina Cross.
Thanks to outcry by fellow inmates and Assange’s legal team, Assange was moved out of the Belmarsh healthcare unit – which has been “weaponized to arbitrarily isolate and punish a prisoner.”
Prisoners’ revolt and pressure from legal team and campaigners forces Belmarsh to move Assange out of solitary. WikiLeaks statement: pic.twitter.com/9Af9y3zC93
Of note, more than 100 Yellow Vest protesters traveled from France on Saturday to join a demonstration outside of Belmarsh in support of Assange.
Up until now, UK authorities had denied Assange has been held in solitary confinement – or that it’s even practiced in British prisons at all.
Until now, Assange has been locked in a cell alone for over 22 hours a day and deprived of association with other prisoners for several months. This is in breach of both the European Prison Rules and the British government’s own prison inspectorate human rights standards …
…
In an attempt to mitigate growing public outrage, Her Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) has been sending out letters in response to the influx of complaints it has been receiving regarding the abuse of Assange. In its response it refuses to address his case and produces a list of standards and laws written for the protection of prisoners as evidence he is in ‘safe hands.’ However, anyone who has followed the continued arbitrary detention of Assange in Belmarsh will know he has been placed effectively outside the reach of laws and standards; even access to his lawyers and legal documents, normally preserved by statutory prisoner rights – has been harshly restricted, all of which has had a crippling effect on preparation for his defence in a case of historical significance. –21st Century Wire
I asked the Prison and Probation Service why Julian #Assange doesn’t have enough access to documents and lawyers despite that being a fundamental right and received an answer pic.twitter.com/vbzygEzz9R
Meanwhile, the Brits are completely dismissing statements by UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, Nils Melzer, when they claim that “prisoners are not detained in solitary confinement.”
UN Standard Minimum Rules 43&44:
“Solitary confinement”: 22 or more hrs/day without meaningful human contact.
If “prolonged” (15+ consecutive days) it amounts to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment & is always prohibited!https://t.co/dxe5z9A2bY
Moreover, Cross notes that the UK’s laughable statement that they care for all prisoners clearly ignores the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, which says that Assange is being arbitrarily detainedin violation of international law.
“What’s more, the British state’s dismissing out of hand any accusations of ‘solitary confinement’ as a falsehood or public misconception – must surely undermine the work of prison charities and scholarship in law and prison systems which exists to shed light on the consequences of solitary confinement including ill-health and suicide,” writes Cross.
Hence, the HMPPS letter can be viewed as a public relations exercise designed to promote the image of good governance, a facade designed to mask the institution’s deployment of the very same strategy practised by the government when called upon to answer for its abuse of Assange: denial and silence.
Solitary confinement, technically speaking, is described by the prison charity Penal Reform as “… when a prisoner is confined to a cell for 22 hours or more, that constitutes solitary confinement, regardless of the reason for this confinement or its name,” while the prison ombusdman confirms that the definition has nothing to do with where it is.
“Segregated conditions are also sometimes applied outside of segregation units. Prisoners can be kept on the wing, but locked in their cells for the most of the day, and taken to shower and exercise separately from other prisoners on the wing.”
So what was Belmarsh doing? While official prisoner segregation is allowed under rule 45, holding Assange in the medical wing allowed them to ignore several associated laws.
“45.—(1) Where it appears desirable, for the maintenance of good order or discipline or in his own interests, that a prisoner should not associate with other prisoners, either generally or for particular purposes, the governor may arrange for the prisoner’s removal from association accordingly.
(2) A prisoner shall not be removed under this rule for a period of more than 3 days without the authority of a member of the board of visitors or of the Secretary of State. An authority given under this paragraph shall be for a period not exceeding one month, but may be renewed from month to month”
By holding Assange in unofficial segregation, he was excluded from ‘the rules’ and therefore may have been worse off than if he had been officially segregated:
“The regime for segregated prisoners (under Prison Rule 45 (YOI 49)) should be as full as possible and only those activities that involve associating with mainstream prisoners should be curtailed.” – SEG PSO
I never thought I’d hear myself say this, but I’m a little worried about Donald Trump. I’m worried he may be on the verge of a sudden, major heart attack, or a stroke, or a fatal golfing accident.
Food poisoning is another possibility.
Or he could overdose on prescription medication.
A tanning bed mishap is not out of the question.
He could accidentally hang himself during autoerotic asphyxiation, or get shot by a lone-wolf white supremacist terrorist trying to start the RaHoWa.
The Russians could spray him with that Novichok perfume.
There are any number of ways he could snuff it.
I don’t mean to sound alarmist, but the Resistance is running out of non-lethal options for removing Donald Trump from office.
Here they are, in no particular order…
RESISTANCE NON-LETHAL OPTION NO. 1
Resistance Non-Lethal Option No. 1 is winning the 2020 election, which isn’t looking very promising. The Democratic Party is in shambles. According to the polls, their current front-runner is a senile, hair-sniffing, finger-sucking freak who never met a credit card company or a healthcare lobbyist he didn’t like, and who rivals even Donald Trump when it comes to incoherent babbling.
Yes, that’s right, folks, it’s “Smilin’ Joe” Biden, vanquisher of the razor-wielding, swimming-pool-gangster “Corn Pop” to the rescue!
As far as I’ve been able to gather, the plan is for Joe to out-“crazy” Trump (and thus win back the “bull goose loony” demographic) by going completely off his medication and having a series of scary-looking petit mal seizures on national television.
He’s out there, in the heart of the American darkness, like a geriatric Colonel Kurz, operating without any decent restraint, totally beyond the pale of any acceptable human conduct.
According to the latest reconnaissance, he is building another “revolutionary” army of fanatical, doped-up, hacky-sacking “socialists” that he will lead into the convention in July and deliver to Biden, or Elizabeth Warren, or whichever soulless corporate puppet the party honchos eventually nominate, and then obsequiously stump for them for the next five months. (Or, who knows, maybe Michael Bloomberg will put the Democrats out of their misery and just buy the party and nominate himself.)
The “Crush Bernie” movement is just getting started, but you can tell the Resistance isn’t screwing around. Hillary Clinton just officially launched her national “Nobody Likes Bernie” campaign at the star-studded 2020 Sundance Film Festival.
MSNBC anchor Joy Reid brought on a professional “body language expert” to phrenologize Sanders “live” on the air … and, as I said, they’re just getting started.
In any event, no matter who they nominate, they have no chance of winning in November.
How could they, given the total stranglehold the Russians now have on American democracy?
As Adam Schiff just reminded everyone, unless Donald Trump is removed from office, “we cannot be assured that the vote will be fairly won,” because at any moment Putin could order Trump to pressure the Ukrainian president into investigating Biden’s son’s corruption by refusing to fund the Ukrainian military’s resistance to Putin’s secret plot to occupy the entire Ukraine and use it as a covert base from which to launch an all-out thermonuclear war against the United States(which Putin already controls through his puppet, Trump, and his network of nefarious Facebook bots, which, according to this expert on NPR, are already brainwashing gullible Black people into voting for Bernie Sanders this time, or at least refusing to vote for Biden, like they refused to vote for Hillary last time … which, OK, I know, that sounds kind of racist, but we’re talking NPR here, folks. These people aren’t racists. They’re liberals!)
OK, I got a little lost there… the point is, if the election goes ahead, and Trump doesn’t have an embolism or something, odds are, we’re looking at four more years of Putin-Nazi occupation. Which brings us to…
NON-LETHAL OPTION NO. 2
Resistance Non-Lethal Option No. 2 is, of course, the current impeachment circus. I don’t even know where to start with this one.
After three and a half years of corporate-media-manufactured mass hysteria and Intelligence Community propaganda designed to convince the American public that Donald Trump is a “Russian asset” (and possibly Putin’s homosexual lover) and also literally the Resurrection of Hitler, the Democrats are trying to impeach the man for something that most Americans either (a) believe is common practice among members of the political class, (b) don’t entirely understand, or (c) do, but don’t give a shit about.
Seriously, it’s like they held a contest to see if anyone could think of something that would out-anticlimax the Mueller report, and this is what the winner came up with … an over-acted, sanctimonious snooze-fest, the stakes of which could not possibly be lower.
Sure, the corporate media are doing their best to cover every twist and turn of the “drama” as if the fate of democracy were hanging in the balance, but everybody knows it’s a joke … or, all right, almost everybody.
So we’re down to…
NON-LETHAL OPTION NO. 3
Resistance Non-Lethal Option No. 3 is to whip up so much mass hysteria over “white supremacist terrorism,” “the sudden resurgence of anti-Semitism,” “the imminent Putin-Nazi Apocalypse” (which has been imminent since the summer of 2016), and other iterations of Hitler hysteria, that people can’t really even think anymore, and will join the Resistance and pour into the streets in their millions and demand Trump resign.
The Resistance has been at this for over three years now, i.e., casting the neo-Nazi subculture that has always been part of the political landscape as a powerful, worldwide fascist movement that is going to rise up any minute and Hitlerize the entire Western world.
It isn’t working. People aren’t buying it. OK, sure, some liberals are still buying it. But most people aren’t, not anymore.
For example, the hysteria leading up to the recent gun rights rally in Richmond, which according to the corporate media had been infiltrated by “Nazi terrorists” who were plotting to publicly mass murder each other in a desperate attempt to finally launch the “Boogaloo,” or the “RaHoWa” … or whatever.
Apparently, a few days before the rally, the FBI got some neo-Nazis to agree to conspire to murder some people and then violently overthrow the U.S. government with their arsenal of homemade machine guns.
These neo-Nazi masterminds were allegedly members of “the Base,” i.e., one of these little neo-Nazi clubs that we’re all supposed to live in mortal fear of now … this one, as it turns out, run by a former (and possibly current) “security contractor.”
The governor declared a state of emergency. Anti-Terror forces were put on alert. A “no-fly zone” was implemented, presumably to prevent the Russians from dropping a division of Putin-Nazi paratroopers onto the lawn of the Capitol. The corporate media warned that it was probably going to be a bloodbath.
Well, the day came and went, and no Boogaloo. No bloodbath. No Putin-Nazi Apocalypse. Just a lot of gun owners and militia types parading around with their guns and gear. Antifa didn’t even show up this time … or, rather, the few “anti-fascists” that did were also armed and supporting the rally.
And that’s the problem with Non-Lethal Option No. 3… there are only so many times you can have the corporate media scream, “THE NAZIS ARE COMING!” and then not produce any actual Nazis. The Resistance has exceeded that allotment.
Which brings me back to where I started, and my concerns about Donald Trump, and his health, and the assorted tragic accidents that could befall him before we get to November. Because, unless you believe that the Intelligence Community (and the transnational empire it is part and parcel of) is prepared to sit by and allow Donald Trump to serve another four years as president … well, I wouldn’t be sharing any Diet Cokes or riding in any motorcades with him.
I don’t know, maybe I’ve been reading too much of that “conspiracy theory” stuff on the Internet, but Senator Schumer’s warning to Trump back in 2017 keeps playing in my head:
Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you.”
Relax, folks. I’m just kidding, of course. The Intelligence Community would never dream of doing anything … you know, illegal.
In reality, they would never assassinate a president, especially not one they had been telling everyone is a “Russian asset,” and “literally Hitler,” and a “traitor,” and a “dictator,” for over three years.
OK, those are pretty harsh words, but they probably don’t really mean all that stuff. Odds are, they’re just horsing around.
They’re a notorious bunch of jokesters, those CIA guys.
The U.K. government is expected to decide on Tuesday whether to ban Huawei 5G equipment from the country’s telecommunication networks, reported BBC News.
Digital Minister Matt Warman said Monday that “security and resilience” of Britain’s “telecom networks are of paramount importance” in tomorrow’s decision.
“We welcome open trade and inward investment, however, our economy can only prosper and unleash Britain’s potential when we and our international partners are assured that our critical national infrastructure remains safe and secure,” Warman said.
We noted earlier this month how the Trump administration was pressuring U.K. officials to outlaw Huawei 5G equipment.
There’s speculation Monday that Prime Minister Boris Johnson could allow “core” Huawei parts in the backbone of networks.
Johnson told reporters that he needed a communication network that benefits the economy without jeopardizing national security.
“We are going to come up with a solution that enables us to achieve both those objectives, and that is the way forward,” he said.
Former Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt told BBC on Monday that he “wondered whether it was wise” for the U.K. to become entirely reliant on China for communication equipment.
“I would say if the decision goes the other way this week, as some of the signs seem to indicate it might, I hope there will also be some reflection in the U.S. because we have never needed the Western alliance to be stronger than now,” Hunt said.
If Huawei 5G equipment is banned from U.K. communication networks on Tuesday, it would mean that E.E., Three, and Vodafone, would have to replace Chinese equipment already installed in the country’s networks.
In all of the reporting of the Huawei story a couple of things are often ignored. There’s not one single UK 5G network but 4, and three of them are already rolling out with Huawei – here right at the heart of the city of London pic.twitter.com/sC4dDJ39LU
Tuesday’s Huawei decision will be important for Johnson. He will either side with the Trump administration and ban the Chinese telecom from communication networks. If he allows Huawei equipment to expand in the network, then it would likely draw intense anger from Washington.
Under the cascading roar of the 24/7 news cycle cum Twitter eruptions, it’s easy for most of the West, especially the US, to forget the basics about the interaction of Eurasia with its western peninsula, Europe.
Asia and Europe have been trading goods and ideas since at least 3,500 BC. Historically, the flux may have suffered some occasional bumps – for instance, with the irruption of 5th-century nomad horsemen in the Eurasian plains. But it was essentially steady up to the end of the 15th century. We can essentially describe it as a millennium-old axis – from Greece to Persia, from the Roman empire to China.
A land route with myriad ramifications, through Central Asia, Afghanistan, Iran and Turkey, linking India and China to the Eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea, ended up coalescing into what we came to know as the Ancient Silk Roads.
By the 7th century, land routes and sea trade routes were in direct competition. And the Iranian plateau always played a key role in this process.
The Iranian plateau historically includes Afghanistan and parts of Central Asia linking it to Xinjiang to the east, and to the west all the way to Anatolia. The Persian empire was all about land trade – the key node between India and China and the Eastern Mediterranean.
The Persians engaged the Phoenicians in the Syrian coastline as their partners to manage sea trade in the Mediterranean. Enterprising people in Tyre established Carthage as a node between the Eastern and Western Mediterranean. Because of the partnership with the Phoenicians, the Persians would inevitably be antagonized by the Greeks – a sea trading power.
When the Chinese, promoting the New Silk Roads, emphasize “people to people exchange” as one of its main traits, they mean the millenary Euro-Asia dialogue. History may even have aborted two massive, direct encounters.
The first was after Alexander The Great defeated Darius III of Persia. But then Alexander’s Seleucid successors had to fight the rising power in Central Asia: the Parthians – who ended up taking over Persia and Mesopotamia and made the Euphrates the limes between them and the Seleucids.
The second encounter was when emperor Trajan, in 116 AD, after defeating the Parthians, reached the Persian Gulf. But Hadrian backed off – so history did not register what would have been a direct encounter between Rome, via Persia, with India and China, or the Mediterranean meeting with the Pacific.
Mongol globalization
The last western stretch of the Ancient Silk Roads was, in fact, a Maritime Silk Road. From the Black Sea to the Nile delta, we had a string of pearls in the form of Italian city/emporia, a mix of end journey for caravans and naval bases, which then moved Asian products to Italian ports.
Commercial centers between Constantinople and Crimea configured another Silk Road branch through Russia all the way to Novgorod, which was very close culturally to the Byzantine world. From Novgorod, merchants from Hamburg and other cities of the Hanseatic League distributed Asian products to markets in the Baltics, northern Europe and all the way to England – in parallel to the southern routes followed by the maritime Italian republics.
Between the Mediterranean and China, the Ancient Silk Roads were of course mostly overland. But there were a few maritime routes as well. The major civilization poles involved were peasant and artisanal, not maritime. Up to the 15th century, no one was really thinking about turbulent, interminable oceanic navigation.
The main players were China and India in Asia, and Italy and Germany in Europe. Germany was the prime consumer of goods imported by the Italians. That explains, in a nutshell, the structural marriage of the Holy Roman Empire.
At the geographic heart of the Ancient Silk Roads, we had deserts and the vast steppes, trespassed by sparse tribes of shepherds and nomad hunters. All across those vast lands north of the Himalayas, the Silk Road network served mostly the four main players. One can imagine how the emergence of a huge political power uniting all those nomads would be in fact the main beneficiary of Silk Road trade.
Well, that actually happened. Things started to change when the nomad shepherds of Central-South Asia started to have their tribes regimented as horseback archers by politico-military leaders such as Genghis Khan.
Welcome to the Mongol globalization. That was actually the fourth globalization in history, after the Syrian, the Persian and the Arab. Under the Mongolian Ilkhanate, the Iranian plateau – once again playing a major role – linked China to the Armenian kingdom of Cilicia in the Mediterranean.
The Mongols didn’t go for a Silk Road monopoly. On the contrary: during Kublai Khan – and Marco Polo’s travels – the Silk Road was free and open. The Mongols only wanted caravans to pay a toll.
With the Turks, it was a completely different story. They consolidated Turkestan, from Central Asia to northwest China. The only reason Tamerlan did not annex India is that he died beforehand. But even the Turks did not want to shut down the Silk Road. They wanted to control it.
Venice lost its last direct Silk Road access in 1461, with the fall of Trebizond, which was still clinging to the Byzantine empire. With the Silk Road closed to the Europeans, the Turks – with an empire ranging from Central-South Asia to the Mediterranean – were convinced they now controlled trade between Europe and Asia.
Not so fast. Because that was when European kingdoms facing the Atlantic came up with the ultimate Plan B: a new maritime road to India.
And the rest – North Atlantic hegemony – is history.
Enlightened arrogance
The Enlightenment could not possibly box Asia inside its own rigid geometries. Europe ceased to understand Asia, proclaimed it was some sort of proteiform historical detritus and turned its undivided attention to “virgin,” or “promised” lands elsewhere on the planet.
We all know how England, from the 18th century onwards, took control of the entire trans-oceanic routes and turned North Atlantic supremacy into a lone superpower game – till the mantle was usurped by the US.
Yet all the time there has been counter-pressure from the Eurasian Heartland powers. That’s the stuff of international relations for the past two centuries – peaking in the young 21st century into what could be simplified as The Revenge of the Heartland against Sea Power. But still, that does not tell the whole story.
Rationalist hegemony in Europe progressively led to an incapacity to understand diversity – or The Other, as in Asia. Real Euro-Asia dialogue – the de facto true engine of history – had been dwindling for most of the past two centuries.
Europe owes its DNA not only to much-hailed Athens and Rome – but to Byzantium as well. But for too long not only the East but also the European East, heir to Byzantium, became incomprehensible, quasi incommunicado with Western Europe, or submerged by pathetic clichés.
The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), as in the Chinese-led New Silk Roads, are a historical game-changer in infinite ways. Slowly and surely, we are evolving towards the configuration of an economically interlinked group of top Eurasian land powers, from Shanghai to the Ruhr valley, profiting in a coordinated manner from the huge technological know-how of Germany and China and the enormous energy resources of Russia.
The Raging 2020s may signify the historical juncture when this bloc surpasses the current, hegemonic Atlanticist bloc.
Now compare it with the prime US strategic objective at all times, for decades: to establish, via myriad forms of divide and rule, that relations between Germany, Russia and China must be the worst possible.
No wonder strategic fear was glaringly visible at the NATO summit in London last month, which called for ratcheting up pressure on Russia-China. Call it the late Zbigniew “Grand Chessboard” Brzezinski’s ultimate, recurrent nightmare.
Germany soon will have a larger than life decision to make. It’s like this was a renewal – in way more dramatic terms – of the Atlanticist vs Ostpolitik debate. German business knows that the only way for a sovereign Germany to consolidate its role as a global export powerhouse is to become a close business partner of Eurasia.
In parallel, Moscow and Beijing have come to the conclusion that the US trans-oceanic strategic ring can only be broken through the actions of a concerted block: BRI, Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU), Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), BRICS+ and the BRICS’ New Development Bank (NDB), the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).
Middle East pacifier
The Ancient Silk Road was not a single camel caravan route but an inter-communicating maze. Since the mid-1990s I’ve had the privilege to travel almost every important stretch – and then, one day, you see the complete puzzle. The New Silk Roads, if they fulfill their potential, pledge to do the same.
Maritime trade may be eventually imposed – or controlled – by a global naval superpower. But overland trade can only prosper in peace. Thus the New Silk Roads potential as The Great Pacifier in Southwest Asia – what the Western-centric view calls the Middle East.
The Middle East (remember Palmyra) was always a key hub of the Ancient Silk Roads, the great overland axis of Euro-Asia trade going all the way to the Mediterranean.
For centuries, a quartet of regional powers – Egypt, Syria, Mesopotamia (now Iraq) and Persia (now Iran) – have been fighting for hegemony over the whole area from the Nile delta to the Persian Gulf. More recently, it has been a case of external hegemony: Ottoman Turk, British and American.
So delicate, so fragile, so immensely rich in culture, no other region in the world has been, continually, since the dawn of history, an absolutely key zone. Of course, the Middle East was also a crisis zone even before oil was found (the Babylonians, by the way, already knew about it).
The Middle East is a key stop in the 21st century, trans-oceanic supply chain routes – thus its geopolitical importance for the current superpower, among other geoeconomic, energy-related reasons. But its best and brightest know the Middle East does not need to remain a center of war, or intimations of war, which, incidentally, affect three of those historical, regional powers of the quartet (Syria, Iraq and Iran).
What the New Silk Roads are proposing is wide-ranging, economic, interlinked integration from East Asia, through Central Asia, to Iran, Iraq and Syria all the way to the Eastern Mediterranean. Just like the Ancient Silk Roads. No wonder vested War Party interests are so uncomfortable with this real peace “threat.”
Around 8:30 p.m. ET, Alan Dershowitz read at some length from my New York Times op-ed. Here is the clip:
At the time, I was lecturing at the University of Oregon, so I did not see it live. Though my phone quickly started to blow up. I am grateful that my friend and mentor, Randy Barnett, was in the Senate Gallery to watch it live.
Earlier today, I appeared on the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC for about 30 minutes. We spoke at some length about the Op-Ed. I may have answered some other questions you have raised. Here is the segment:
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Emergency Evacuation Of Americans Begins From Epidemic-Stricken Chinese City
Update (Jan. 27): The Wall Street Journal has provided an update on the emergency charter flight to evacuate Americans from the epidemic-stricken Chinese city of Wuhan.
The Boeing 767, with about 230 seats, is preparing to depart from Wuhan Tianhe International Airport on Tuesday for California, amid new fears that coronavirus has uncontrollably spread across the country.
The U.S. State Department’s rapid response operation to evacuate Americans from the region is due to the expected increase in the number of cases in the days ahead.
There are at least 1,000 Americans in Wuhan, and only 230 will get seats on the chartered flight.
We noted on Sunday that U.S. diplomats and their families were likely first on the list to receive seats.
People with tickets told the Journal that the chartered flight is expected to land in Ontario, California.
Vermont native Priscilla Dickie, 35, told the Journal that she and her daughter, 8, have seats on the plane but might not be able to get to the airport since transportation has come to a standstill. She said she’s 20 miles from the airport without a means of transportation.
Benjamin Wilson told the Journal he’s preparing for the worse and hunkering down with his Wuhan native wife and 7-year-old daughter.
“I would consider sending my daughter, if that were an option,” Wilson said.
“But I wouldn’t leave my wife. But if my wife and daughter could travel together, then absolutely yes.”
A U.S. official told the Journal over the weekend that additional emergency evacuation operations would be conducted this week, which would include the bussing of Americans from the outbreak zone to other cities for outbound flights to the U.S.
Besides the U.S., Reuters reports the following countries have already announced evacuation plans for their citizens trapped in Wuhan:
France expects to repatriate up to a few hundred of its 800 citizens living in the Wuhan area. Evacuees will have to spend 14 days in quarantine to avoid spreading the virus in France.
The German air force repatriating 90 Germans living in the area, Der Spiegel magazine reported on Monday.
Japan is expected to arrange charter flights as early as Tuesday for any of its citizens who wish to return from Wuhan, two sources familiar with the matter said. Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi said about 430 Japanese nationals have been confirmed to be in Hubei province.
Spain’s government is working with China and the European Union to repatriate Spanish nationals from the Wuhan area, Foreign Minister Arancha Gonzalez Laya said.
Britain is talking to international partners to find solutions to help British and other foreign nationals leave Wuhan, a spokesman for Prime Minister Boris Johnson said.
Canada has about 167 nationals in the Wuhan area, Foreign Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne said on Monday, and eight people have sought consular assistance, which is being provided. While the minister did not rule out possible evacuations, he did not indicate there were any planned at the moment, adding that each consular request would be evaluated on a “case by case basis”.
Russia has been in talks with China about evacuating its nationals from Wuhan and Hubei province, Russia’s embassy in China said.
The Dutch government is assessing ways to evacuate 20 Dutch citizens from Wuhan, press agency ANP reported.
Authorities in Myanmar said they had canceled a planned evacuation of 60 students from Mandalay who were studying in Wuhan. Kyaw Yin Myint, a spokesman for the Mandalay municipal government, told Reuters that a “final decision” had been made to send them back after 14 days, once the virus’ incubation period had passed.
The total number of confirmed cases has climbed to 2882, though the actual number of cases out there is likely much higher, as experts have warned.
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Update (1154ET): Yesterday it was the U.S. and Russia arranging charter flights to evacuate their citizens from the epidemic-stricken Chinese city of Wuhan.
Now Thailand has four Lockheed C-130 Hercules transport planes on standby to airlift its citizens from the city as the coronavirus outbreak spreads uncontrollably, reported the Bangkok Post.
Royal Thai Air Force Chief Maanat Wongwat told the Post that four C-130s, carrying medical teams, students, and medical professionals, are ready to take off from the Chinese city.
“The air force is ready” to evacuate its citizens, Wongwat said.
Thailand’s evacuation plan also comes as a quarter-million people across China could be infected with the deadly disease in the next several weeks.
At the moment, four countries have initiated evacuation plans for their citizens trapped in Wuhan.
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A new report from The Wall Street Journal indicates the U.S. government is preparing an emergency charter flight to evacuate Americans from the epidemic-stricken Chinese city of Wuhan.
China has restricted travel for 46 million people across 16 cities as the death toll surges, and the spread becomes uncontrollable.
New cases were also reported in Europe and Australia on Friday night.
In the U.S., there are 63 suspected cases, with at least three confirmed, with two reported so far in Illinois and California, and two suspected in Minnesota.
The Journal said about 1,000 Americans reside in Wuhan, but the official number has yet to be confirmed.
U.S. officials have contacted known Americans in the region with an offer for a seat on a Boeing 767 jet that holds approximately 230 people.
Confirmed passengers already include diplomats from the U.S. Consulate Wuhan as well as their families.
The Journal noted that medical personnel would be on the plane to examine passengers for potential cases of the deadly virus.
The emergency evacuation is planned for Sunday, but limited details were given on where the plane would land in the U.S.
A U.S. official told The Journal that additional emergency evacuation operations would be conducted in the coming days, which would include the bussing of Americans from the outbreak zone to other cities for outbound flights to the U.S.
Russia is also planning emergency evacuations of its citizens from Wuhan and Hubei province, reported RIA news agency on Saturday.
Emergency evacuations are coming at a time when upwards of 250,000 Chinese could contract the deadly virus in the next ten days, said Jonathan Read, a U.K. expert on the transmission and evolutionary dynamics of infectious diseases.
Evacuations by the U.S. are likely in response to Read’s warning that suggests the outbreak could exponentially increase in the next several weeks.
Just a few of the serious financial problems facing California include unfunded public employee pension promises, a potential state credit downgrade, an unprecedented homeless crisis, and a net out-migration of 912,000 residents since 2010.
One easy step California can take is to join every other state in the union and open up its state checkbook for review. Allowing citizens, journalists, watchdogs, academics, and public policy experts to review state spending would help the state get its fiscal house in order.
Unfortunately, last fall, California State Controller Betty Yee (pictured) rejected our sunshine request for the state checkbook. Oddly, the rejection didn’t argue the law, but instead claimed that the controller couldn’t locate a single one of the 49 million bills she paid last year.
This admission provides a troubling clue to California taxpayers who are wondering how and where their money is being spent. The answer is the people spending it literally don’t know. Or they at least say that don’t.
It is of course unimaginable, and laughable, that the state that is home to Silicon Valley can’t put basic transparency tech in place. That state’s feigned tech illiteracy begs the question: What are they trying to hide?
Taxpayers in California certainly want to know what’s happening to state funds. It shouldn’t take subpoenas and litigation to “find” up to $320 billion in annual state payments and show taxpayers how their money was spent.
So, our organization at OpenTheBooks.com, alongside our attorneys at Cause of Action Institute, a government oversight organization, filed an open records lawsuit in Sacramento state court. Our lawsuit begins the process of forcing open the state’s line-by-line expenditures.
We’ve never lost a state checkbook transparency fight. In 2012, we successfully sued Illinois Comptroller Judy Baar Topinka (R), and, in 2018, we sued Wyoming State Auditor Cynthia Cloud (R).
We believe the open government movement is revolutionizing U.S. public policy and politics. Just like the microscope transformed medicine, big data is modernizing government.
The purpose of transparency isn’t to scold state officials but to encourage accountability, trust, and better public policy. Here are just three of many critical issues facing the Golden State that could be improved by transparency:
State credit rating: The state auditor just issued a report saying the state’s $1.1 billion accounting system (FisCal) is so flawed that it could lead to a state credit downgrade.
Corruption: Controller Yee claims that 99.7 percent of all state payments were properly paid even though she told us she can’t find her receipts. Betty Yee is probably the only one of 40 million Californians who believes state government is that efficient, effective, and honest. Yee estimates the state only loses a mere 0.3 percent (less than one-third of one percent) of state dollars every year through waste, abuse, and fiscal mismanagement. The state’s myriad problems suggest this is a fantasy.
Homeless populations: a 2014 state proposition taxed millionaires to provide funds for mental health services. How did San Francisco — home to 7,500 homeless people — manage its funds? Last summer, we published an interactive poop map featuring 130,000 instances of human waste in the public way, which is in part connected to the state’s homeless problem
California, a state whose $3 trillion GDP ranks it ahead of the United Kingdom, spends an enormous sum of money. The state spends more than $320 billion per year with federal taxpayers funding $106 billion of it. If taxpayers can’t follow the money, it will be hard for the state to address its mounting fiscal challenges.
Every state across America can produce a complete checkbook of public expenditures. Are we just dreamin’ to believe that California can produce a full record too?
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Adam Andrzejewski is the CEO/founder of OpenTheBooks.com, dedicated to posting all government spending online.
Furious Chinese Defy Censors To Mock Local Leaders Over Bungled Virus Response
A few hours ago, the New York Times published an interesting story about how China’s population, known for assiduously self-censoring their speech online, is refusing to be silent in the face of the rapidly accelerating novel coronavirus. The deluge of critical posts, along with clever tricks to dodge censors, are making it nearly impossible for Beijing to control the narrative on the mainland.
Earlier, we mentioned how doctors, nurses and residents in Wuhan have demanded that their “useless” mayor follow through on an offer to resign for sluggishness in confronting the outbreak. But that’s not all: though reports claimed Beijing made an effort to remove horrifying videos of the situation on the ground in Wuhan (videos that showed what appeared to be dead bodies lying in hospital hallways), according to NYT, the censors have now been completely overwhelmed.
Some posters evade censors by referred to President Xi as “Trump”, or by comparing the outbreak to the Chernobyl nuclear disaster.
Public anger over the handling of the outbreak has been compounded by the cancellation of the LNY holiday. Internet critics posted scathing criticisms of public officials over often minor slights, like when officials in Wuhan wore their face masks incorrectly during a press conference.
After Wuhan Mayor Zhou Xianwang offered to resign over his handling of the outbreak, a commenter replied: “If the virus is fair, then please don’t spare this useless person,” according to the NYT.
After the Hubei Gov. Wang Xiaodong delivered a news briefing on Sunday, he was brutally mocked for twice misstating the number of face masks that the province would produce to help fight the epidemic. A photo of the press conference that circulated online showed one of Wang’s partners didn’t cover his nose properly with the mask, inviting another torrent of derision.
However, experts cited by NYT said this torrent of criticism won’t go on forever. The Communist Party doesn’t tolerate any criticism or challenge to its rule, and government censors are still scrambling to delete any articles, comments or posts that are too critical.
“Chinese social media are full of anger, not because there was no censorship on this topic, but despite strong censorship,” said Xiao Qiang, a research scientist at the School of Information at the University of California, Berkeley, and the founder of China Digital Times, a website that monitors Chinese internet controls. “It is still possible that the censorship will suddenly increase again, as part of an effort to control the narrative.”
Over the weekend, President Xi and the Politburo resolved to “strengthen the guidance of public opinion,” which sounds like a signal that a crackdown will go beyond deleting quack remedies and dangerous, false rumors.
It’s also possible that this is a Politburo strategy to focus domestic anger at local officials, scapegoating them ‘for the good of the country, and the party.’
Around 8:30 p.m. ET, Alan Dershowitz read at some length from my New York Times op-ed. Here is the clip:
At the time, I was lecturing at the University of Oregon, so I did not see it live. Though my phone quickly started to blow up. I am grateful that my friend and mentor, Randy Barnett, was in the Senate Gallery to watch it live.
Earlier today, I appeared on the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC for about 30 minutes. We spoke at some length about the Op-Ed. I may have answered some other questions you have raised. Here is the segment:
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