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By Colin Todhunter

It’s a lose-lose situation for Ukrainians. While they are dying to defend their land, financial institutions are insidiously supporting the consolidation of farmland by oligarchs and Western financial interests.  

So says Frédéric Mousseau, Policy Director of the Oakland Institute, an independent think tank.

Depending on which sources to believe, between 100,000 and 300,000 Ukrainian soldiers (possibly more) have died during the conflict with Russia. That figure, of course, does not include civilian casualties.

The mainstream narrative in the West is that Russia grabbed Crimea and then invaded Ukraine. Russia is portrayed as the outright aggressor which wants to restore its control over large swathes of Europe.

However, this narrative is false and has been debunked by various commentators who explain in some depth how Ukraine has been used and manipulated as part of a geopolitical campaign formulated by neoconservatives in Washington to destabilise Russia.

The expansion of NATO towards the east, the US-backed coup in 2014 – followed by eight years of the shelling of the ethnic Russian eastern parts of the country by the regime in Kyiv resulting in around 14,000 deaths – led up to the military intervention by Russia, which regards the expansionism and militarism as an existential threat.

It is not the purpose of this article to explore these issues. Much has already been written on this elsewhere. But billions of dollars’ worth of military hardware has been sent to Ukraine by the NATO countries and hundreds of thousands of young Ukrainians have died.

They died in the belief that they were protecting their nation – their land. A land that is among the most fertile in the world.

Professor Olena Borodina of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine says:

“Today, thousands of rural boys and girls, farmers, are fighting and dying in the war. They have lost everything. The processes of free land sale and purchase are increasingly liberalised and advertised. This really threatens the rights of Ukrainians to their land, for which they give their lives.”

Borodina is quoted in the February 2023 report by the Oakland Institute War and Theft: The Takeover of Ukraine’s Agricultural Land, which reveals how oligarchs and financial interests are expanding control over Ukraine’s agricultural land with help and financing from Western financial institutions.

Aid provided to Ukraine in recent years has been tied to a drastic structural adjustment programme requiring the creation of a land market through a law that leads to greater concentration of land in the hands of powerful interests. The programme also includes austerity measures, cuts in social safety nets and the privatisation of key sectors of the economy.

Frédéric Mousseau, co-author of the report, says:

“Despite being at the centre of news cycle and international policy, little attention has gone to the core of the conflict — who controls the agricultural land in the country known as the breadbasket of Europe. [The] Answer to this question is paramount to understanding the major stakes in the war.”

The report shows the total amount of land controlled by oligarchs, corrupt individuals and large agribusinesses is over nine million hectares — exceeding 28% of Ukraine’s arable land (the rest is used by over eight million Ukrainian farmers).

The largest landholders are a mix of Ukrainian oligarchs and foreign interests — mostly European and North American as well as the sovereign fund of Saudi Arabia. A number of large US pension funds, foundations and university endowments are also invested in Ukrainian land through NCH Capital – a US-based private equity fund, which is the fifth largest landholder in the country.

President Zelenskyy put the land reform into law in 2020 against the will of the vast majority of the population who feared it would exacerbate corruption and reinforce control by powerful interests in the agricultural sector.

The Oakland Institute notes that, while large landholders are securing massive financing from Western financial institutions, Ukrainian farmers — essential for ensuring domestic food supply — receive virtually no support. With the land market in place, amid high economic stress and war, this difference of treatment will lead to more land consolidation by large agribusinesses.

All but one of the ten largest landholding firms are registered overseas, mainly in tax havens such as Cyprus or Luxembourg. The report identifies many prominent investors, including Vanguard Group, Kopernik Global Investors, BNP Asset Management Holding, Goldman Sachs-owned NN Investment Partners Holdings, and Norges Bank Investment Management, which manages Norway’s sovereign wealth fund.

Most of the agribusiness firms are substantially indebted to Western financial institutions, in particular the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the European Investment Bank, and the International Finance Corporation – the private sector arm of the World Bank.

Together, these institutions have been major lenders to Ukrainian agribusinesses, with close to US$1.7 billion lent to just six of Ukraine’s largest landholding firms in recent years. Other key lenders are a mix of mainly European and North American financial institutions, both public and private.

The report notes that this gives creditors financial stakes in the operation of the agribusinesses and confers significant leverage over them. Meanwhile, Ukrainian farmers have had to operate with limited amounts of land and financing, and many are now on the verge of poverty.

International financial institutions are in effect subsidising the concentration of land and a destructive industrial model of agriculture based on the intensive use of synthetic inputs, fossil fuels and large-scale monocropping.

Much of what is happening in Ukraine is part of a wider trend: private equity funds being injected into agriculture throughout the world and used to lease or buy up farms on the cheap and aggregate them into large-scale, industrial grain and soybean concerns. These funds use pension funds, sovereign wealth funds, endowment funds and investments from governments, banks, insurance companies and high net worth individuals (see the 2020 report ‘Barbarians at the Barn‘ by Grain.org).

Financialising agriculture this way shifts power to people with no connection to farming. In the words of BlackRock’s Larry Fink: “Go long agriculture and water and go to the beach.”

Funds tend to invest for between 10 and 15 years, resulting in good returns for investors but can leave a trail of long-term environmental and social devastation and serve to undermine local and regional food insecurity.

By contrast, according to the Oakland Institute, small-scale farmers in Ukraine demonstrate resilience and enormous potential for leading the expansion of a different production model based on agroecology and producing healthy food. Whereas large agribusinesses are geared towards export markets, it is Ukraine’s small and medium-sized farmers who guarantee the country’s food security.

This is underlined by the State Statistics Service of Ukraine in its report ‘Main agricultural characteristics of households in rural areas in 2011’, which showed that smallholder farmers in Ukraine operate 16% of agricultural land, but provide 55% of agricultural output, including 97% of potatoes, 97% of honey, 88% of vegetables, 83% of fruits and berries and 80% of milk.

In June 2020, the IMF approved an 18-month, strings-attached $5 billion loan programme with Ukraine. Also that year, the World Bank incorporated measures relating to the sale of public agricultural land as conditions in a $350 million Development Policy Loan (COVID ‘relief package’) to Ukraine. This included a required ‘prior action’ to “enable the sale of agricultural land and the use of land as collateral.”

According to the Oakland Institute:

“Ukraine is now the world’s third-largest debtor to the International Monetary Fund and its crippling debt burden will likely result in additional pressure from its creditors, bondholders and international financial institutions on how post-war reconstruction – estimated to cost US$750 billion – should happen.”

Financial institutions are leveraging Ukraine’s crippling debt to drive further privatisation and liberalisation – backing the country into a corner to make it an offer it can’t refuse.

Since the war began, the Ukrainian flag has been raised outside parliament buildings in the West and iconic landmarks have been lit up in its colours. An image bite used to conjure up feelings of solidarity and support for that nation while serving to distract from the harsh machinations of geopolitics and modern-day economic plunder that is unhindered by national borders and has scant regard for the plight of ordinary citizens.

Renowned author Colin Todhunter specialises in development, food and agriculture.

10 May 2023

Source: www.globalresearch.ca

Under the chairmanship of Indonesian President Joko Widodo, the 42nd Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit commenced today. When Indonesia accepted the chairmanship from its predecessor Cambodia five months ago, there was renewed hope that ASEAN would take a harder line against Myanmar’s military junta in 2023. With only eight months left before the ASEAN chairmanship is handed to Laos, ASEAN’s emphasis remains on implementing its failed Five Point Consensus, engaging in an “inclusive national dialogue,” and facilitating the repatriation of refugees back to Rakhine State, against repeated calls from Myanmar civil society to change its course. As ASEAN drags its feet, Myanmar continues to burn.

For two years, the people of Burma have bravely resisted the junta’s violent attempt to take total control of the country. In the face of mass, unwavering public resistance, the junta has continued to increase its campaign of brutality and savagery as it carries out killings, torture, forced disappearances, sexual violence, and daily airstrikes against the civilian population throughout the country. Last month, a junta fighter jet dropped bombs on approximately 300 people in a village in Kanbalu Township of the Sagaing Region, killing at least 168 people according to the National Unity Government (NUG). Currently, the number of casualties is nearing 3,500 and still rising.

Despite ongoing atrocities, ASEAN’s response has remained limited to symbolic actions, like banning Burma from meetings. Burma was banned from annual ASEAN summits when Brunei held the chair in 2021 and again by Cambodia last year. However, ASEAN continues to normalize engagement with the junta by treating it as a reliable authority despite it having no legitimacy to represent the will of the people of Myanmar nor the ability to seize effective control of the country. A September 2022 briefing paper by the Special Advisory Council for Myanmar and maps recently produced by the Free Burma Rangers show that the junta does not have sufficient effective control of the country to warrant engagement with ASEAN and other international actors.

“ASEAN cannot expect to negotiate with an oppressive regime holding the country hostage,” said Burma Human Rights Network (BHRN) Executive Director, Kyaw Win. “The source of all of Myanmar’s most significant problems is the military. The regime only manages to survive because the world has taken a soft stance against them after each crime against humanity. This cannot continue, and ASEAN has particular influence to deny them any semblance of legitimacy.

With less than eight months remaining as chair, pressure is mounting on Indonesia to take concrete measures to end the crisis in Myanmar and to hold the junta accountable for its atrocities. As one of the largest democracies in the world with experience toppling its own dictatorship, Indonesia has the opportunity to do what its predecessors could not – to provide the help that the Myanmar people so badly need in their struggle for democracy.

To start, Indonesia should publicly acknowledge the NUG as the legitimate government of Myanmar, and engage with it, alongside representatives of Ethnic Resistance Organisations (EROs) and Myanmar civil society, on all issues. The NUG should be given Myanmar’s seat in ASEAN.

Indonesia should promote within ASEAN a new agreement to replace the failed Five Point Consensus, an agreement signed by ASEAN member states and Min Aung Hlaing’s junta in April 2021 which aimed to end the violence in Burma, foster negotiations between all stakeholders, and deliver humanitarian aid. Min Aung Hlaing has openly flouted ASEAN’s peace plan from the outset. ASEAN must recognize the futility of seeking a negotiated solution to Myanmar’s crisis that could be palatable to the exiled NUG, EROs, and the junta. Moving forward, a new agreement should be negotiated with the NUG and allied forces, not with Min Aung Hlaing, and it should include clear benchmarks and enforcement mechanisms.

Indonesia should immediately announce the appointment and establish a clear mandate for the ASEAN Special Envoy for Myanmar grounded in human rights, justice, and accountability. The envoy should be accountable to ASEAN leaders and foreign ministers instead of the incumbent ASEAN Chair. Once appointed, the envoy should open formal communications and engage with the NUG, National Unity Consultative Council, the Committee Representing Pyidaungsu Hluttaw, EROs, civil society, and other critical stakeholders from Myanmar’s Spring Revolution.

Indonesia should guide ASEAN to re-strategize its humanitarian support plan by working through the NUG, ethnic organizations, and Myanmar’s vibrant civil society to assist those affected by the humanitarian crisis. Currently, the junta continues to be represented in the Governing Board of the ASEAN Coordinating Centre for Humanitarian Assistance on disaster management.

As the main driver of the humanitarian crisis in Myanmar and an actor that routinely weaponizes humanitarian aid, the junta cannot and should not be trusted to deliver aid in an effective mannersaid

said Kyaw Win

BHRN calls on Indonesia’s leadership to work with governments worldwide to freeze all ties with the junta, impose travel bans, global sanctions on military-owned companies, and an arms embargo. ASEAN should also take a leading role in making the junta accountable for its horrific crimes. Finally, ASEAN should put the safety and security of those fleeing the conflict and ongoing atrocities in Myanmar by providing protection, support, and humanitarian and legal aid to all refugees fleeing Myanmar.

Organisation’s Background

BHRN is based in London and operates across Burma/Myanmar working for human rights, minority rights and religious freedom in the country. BHRN has played a crucial role in advocating for human rights and religious freedom with politicians and world leaders.

10 May 2023

Media Enquiries
Please contact:

Kyaw Win
Executive Director
Burma Human Rights Network (BHRN)
E: kyawwin@bhrn.org.uk
T: +44(0) 740 345 2378

By Jafar M Ramini

An innocuous phrase, meaning how welcome is the rain as it falls upon this earth beneath, full of goodness and sustenance, the nourishment of life. Not on Gaza.

Four days ago, when the people of Gaza heard the thunder in the heavens and looked towards the sky they saw surveillance drones, Apache helicopters and F-35 war planes bulging with state-of-the-art implements of war. Nothing and no-one was safe. There is no rain. There is only death and destruction, Mr Netanyahu promising more if the Gaza based resistance fighters do not submit. How can they submit, how can they not retaliate? Even when their only weapons are a barrage of rockets, primitive, ineffective and mostly glued together in the garden sheds and fields of Gaza.

Yes, the heavens have opened above Gaza and the harvest for Israel? Three days ago it was four Palestinian school children and their parents. I posted the pictures of the young, hopeful faces on this page. There were more already; fifteen including their parents and neighbours.

The next day the list of the dead had risen to thirty and before I had a chance to post it and show what these so-called enemies of Israel looked like, the tally has risen to thirty-four. I don’t believe that this will be enough for Mr Netanyahu or Mr Ben Gvir. They have promised total devastation and Mr Netanyahu certainly has the where-with-all to achieve it. He is also less popular than he used to be. But, there’s nothing like a good war to bring the people together under one banner.

Jafar M Ramini is a Palestinian writer and political analyst.

13 May 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

By Countercurrents Collective

The U.S. is meddling in Türkiye’s upcoming presidential and parliamentary elections, Ankara’s Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu claimed on Friday.

Speaking to CNN Turk, Soylu weighed in on the decision by presidential candidate Muharrem Ince, who leads the opposition Homeland Party, to drop out of the race on Thursday ahead of Sunday’s vote.

Ince attributed the withdrawal to a “slander campaign,” which involved the release of an alleged sex tape which he dismissed as fake.

The withdrawal of Ince came amid fears among opposition figures that his candidacy could damage the electoral chances of Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the CHP party chairman, who has emerged as the main rival to incumbent President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

“America has been interfering in this election from the very beginning. Biden said that we were not able to do this with a coup in 2016. This time we will do it with an election, not a coup,” Soylu claimed.

“That is basic logic. If we pull Ince we will get the votes that went to him,” he noted.

The minister went on to claim that Ince “was attacked in this election from outside. It is clear who produced it. The perpetrator is the Gulen movement and the U.S.,” Soylu added.

Turkish officials have insisted that the unsuccessful attempt to remove the Erdogan government from office in July 2016 was orchestrated by cleric Fethullah Gulen and his supporters. The failed coup, which resulted in thousands of arrests, also significantly strained U.S.-Türkiye relations as Ankara slammed Washington for harboring Gulen.

Türkiye’s presidential and parliamentary elections are scheduled for May 14. The race for the presidency is expected to largely be a battle between Erdogan and his main rival Kilicdaroglu. While the incumbent has pursued more conservative and independent policies, steering his country away from integration with the EU and fostering close ties with Russia, Kilicdaroglu champions a more Western-aligned approach.

Recent polls show the two locked in a close race. If neither of the candidates garners more than 50% of the vote in the first round, a run-off will be held on May 28.

In a 2020 interview to the New York Times, prior to being elected president, Biden described Erdogan as an “autocrat.” Washington should be “taking a very different approach to him now, making it clear that we support opposition leadership,” he added at the time, citing Erdogan’s crackdown on Kurds and his cooperation with Russia.

Erdogan Scolds Rival Over ‘Russian Interference’ Claim

Another media report said:

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has condemned rival Kemal Kilicdaroglu for claiming without evidence that Moscow is interfering in Türkiye’s upcoming elections. Erdogan claimed that the West, and not Russia, is “manipulating the elections in Turkiye.”

“Kilicdaroglu said that Russia is manipulating the elections in Turkiye. Shame on you!” Erdogan told a crowd of supporters in Istanbul on Friday.

In a Twitter post a day earlier, Kilicdaroglu accused the country’s “Russian friends” of being “behind the montages, conspiracies, deep fakes and tapes that were exposed in this country yesterday.”

“Get your hands off the Turkish state,” Kilicdaroglu warned the supposed Russian meddlers.

Kilicdaroglu was likely referring to the publication of a video showing another presidential candidate, Muharrem Ince, allegedly engaging in an extramarital affair. Ince dropped out of the race on Thursday, blaming followers of exiled cleric Fethullah Gulen, whose political movement Ankara claims orchestrated a failed coup in 2016.

There is zero evidence linking Russia with the publication or production of the tape, and the Kremlin said that it “firmly rejects” Kilicdaroglu’s claims.

“If I say ‘America is manipulating the elections in Turkiye, Germany is manipulating it, France is manipulating it, England is manipulating it’, what would you say?” Erdogan continued, addressing his remarks to Kilicdaroglu.

While Erdogan did not attempt to tie the leak of Ince’s sex tape with any of the Western countries he mentioned, his interior minister, Suleyman Soylu, did. “It is clear who produced it,” he told CNN Turk earlier on Friday. “The perpetrator is the Gulen movement and the U.S.”

Erdogan accused Western media outlets of trying to shift public opinion in Türkiye against him.

“What do all the magazines say on their covers? ‘Erdogan must go.’ Those published in Germany, France and England say so,” he said at Friday’s rally. “How do you put these words on the covers of these magazines? It is not you, not you, the West! It is my nation that will decide.”

This week’s edition of The Economist features the slogans “Erdogan must go” and “save democracy” on its cover, while France’s Le Point and L’Express magazines also featured anti-Erdogan covers.

Türkiye’s presidential and parliamentary elections will take place on Sunday. Recent polling shows Erdogan – a social conservative who steered his country away from integration with the EU – and Kilicdaroglu – a centrist who favors realignment with the West – within single digits of each other.

Moscow Responds To Claims Russia Interfering In Turkish Election

Another media report said:

Moscow has rejected claims made by Turkish opposition candidate Kemal Kilicdaroglu that Russian operatives were interfering in the country’s presidential race.

Russia has a general policy of not meddling in other nations’ elections and would certainly not do so in Türkiye, a nation whose friendship Moscow treasures and whose foreign policy it considers “very responsible, sovereign and thought-out,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday.

“We firmly reject such statements,” the Russian official added. “If somebody provided Mr. Kilicdaroglu with such information, they are liars.”

The leader of the Republican People’s Party (CHP) made the allegations on Twitter this week, without explaining what materials he was referring to. Kilicdaroglu, who is currently polling slightly ahead of incumbent President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, urged Moscow to “get its hands off Türkiye,” although he did reiterate his wish for the countries to have positive bilateral relations. The presidential election is set to take place on Sunday.

Erdogan Toprak, a close aide to Kilicdaroglu, told Turkish media that the CHP had monitored “rumors” of Russian interference, which he hoped were not true.

13 May 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

By Countercurrents Collective

Indian National Congress received a resounding victory in Karanataka Assembly Elections. Congress is now leading in 136 seats in the 224 seat Assembly. The ruling far-right Hindu nationalist party BJP is leading in 64 seats and Janata Dal (Secular) in 20 seats. Congress is set to form the government. The Karnataka elections hold broader implications for national politics. The outcome may impact the balance of power at the national level and shape the narrative leading up to the next general elections in the country.

The BJP had won the Karnataka assembly elections in 2018.

The outcome of the Karnataka election is a setback for Modi, who has been facing a series of challenges in recent months, including a slowing economy and rising unemployment.

The electoral battle witnessed a fierce competition between major political parties, including the BJP, Indian National Congress (INC), Janata Dal (Secular) (JD(S)), and regional outfits.

The Congress party has been campaigning on a platform of development and social justice.

The BJP has been campaigning on a platform of Hindutva, or Hindu nationalism.

The Congress party’s win the Karnataka is a major setback for the BJP and could encourage opposition parties to come together to oppose the ruling BJP in next national election in 2024.

13 May 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

By Rima Najjar

On the weekend of the 75th Nakba commemoration, I was in Toronto. A rally in support of Palestine was scheduled down the street from my hotel at Yonge and Dundas Square in the afternoon, not far from Trinity Square, where Canadians have erected a memorial commemorating their “glorious dead” of wars past.

At breakfast that morning, I couldn’t miss the CNN screen above the cereal stand silently flashing its ticker tape about the “Deadly clashes ongoing between Israel and Palestinians” and “1 Killed, 5 wounded as rocket hits Israeli Apartment Building.”

Over the heads of the oblivious hotel guests enjoying their breakfast, I fumed under my breath. No “clashes” these. Israeli raids on the besieged Gaza Strip were continuing for the 5th day “leaving at least 33 Palestinians dead, including children, the elderly and members of Palestinian armed resistance groups who responded to the attacks.”

As both Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Network and Masar Badil — Palestinian Alternative Revolutionary Path Movement have made clear, “these attacks are ongoing Zionist war crimes, funded and supported by US and Western imperialism, a key example of the ongoing colonial violence perpetrated against the Palestinian people, as well as the strength and steadfastness of the people and their resistance.”

Israel’s calculation was to conduct a ‘shock and awe’ campaign, slaughtering targeted families and terrorizing the Gaza Strip. But given how the Palestinian armed resistance has mobilized itself forcing Israel to evacuate at least 85 towns around the Strip, including Sderot in western Naqab, Israel’s terror tactics are once again falling on deaf ears.

As a settler-colonial state created by terrorism, including when Irgun blew up the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, Palestine in 1946 killing more than 90 people, Israel understands best the language of terror. Terrorism is imprinted in its DNA. As is a natural reaction for any usurper, Israel not only metes out terror, it also feels terrorized whether the Palestinian armed resistance is quiet or active.

By never giving up on justice, we Palestinians cast terror in the heart of the enemy even while we are sleeping. In its call to the Palestinian people in the Shatat (diaspora) and the Palestine liberation and solidarity movement, Masar Badil affirmed the role of the Palestinian armed resistance:

“The Palestinian armed resistance are currently engaged in a major battle responding to the crimes of the occupation forces: assassination, siege, colonialism, the attacks on Jerusalem, racism, exploitation, oppression. Palestinians across Palestine, from the river to the sea, are suffering daily from these colonial policies.”

The Palestinian resistance is at the forefront of the battle against imperialism, Zionism and reaction. Glory to our martyred dead.

Note: First published on Medium

_____________
Rima Najjar is a Palestinian whose father’s side of the family comes from the forcibly depopulated village of Lifta on the western outskirts of Jerusalem and whose mother’s side of the family is from Ijzim, south of Haifa.

14 May 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

By Nilofar Suhrawardy

Defying opinion polls predicting a hung assembly, clear victory of Congress in Karnataka elections sends strong signals at several levels. It is as yet too early to view electoral potential of Congress as finished. Negative campaign indulged in by rivals of Congress against Rahul Gandhi and his party colleagues have apparently failed to carry any appeal for people at grass-roots. Use of religious card to arouse aggressive fervour among voters and sway them to favour Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) bears minimal electoral significance. Howsoever “effective” BJP-stalwarts’ fiery electoral speeches may appear to be, the limited electoral impact that they have on voters has been proved by their verdict in Karnataka. Extensive media coverage gained by these campaigns should not be expected to decide or even indicate who/what people choose to support.

Undeniably, people in Karnataka have voted extremely wisely and also shrewdly during these elections. Comparison of the present verdict with that of 2018 may be viewed as an indicator of this reality. Their turnout to cast votes – 73.19% was described by Chief Electoral Officer, Karnataka, as a “record.” The turnout in 2018 was 72.13%. Paradoxically, despite Congress having won more votes than BJP in 2018, it failed to win the needed number of seats. Congress and its allies won 38.14% votes against 36.35% won by BJP-led NDA. On its own strength, BJP failed to sweep the 2018 polls or even win the needed majority. The results led to a hung assembly with BJP as the single largest party. A different picture has been projected this time. Congress has been favoured by more than 43% voters against around 36% supporting BJP. In 2018, JD(S) won 37 seats on strength of around 18% votes. This time, JD(S) has won 19 seats with support of 13.3% voters.

Shrewdness of voters is marked probably by their choosing primarily to favour either Congress, BJP or JD(S) and not letting their votes be wasted by opting to vote for other parties, independents, etc. Had perhaps voters exercised a similar strategy in 2018, the results may not have led to a hung assembly then also. The importance of this fact is further supported by the present fight for 224 seats having been contested by 2,613 candidates of which 918 were independents and 685 from Registered Unrecognized Political Parties (RUPP). True, in 2018 also, around eight percent votes were not cast for either Congress, BJP or JD(S). What bears greater importance, as suggested earlier, is 92% voters’ decision not to let their votes be wasted. Clearly, statistics of a greater number having favoured Congress in 2018 polls cannot be dismissed lightly. It is possible, this reality was not ignored by voters. This is partly suggested by greater difference between votes won by Congress and BJP leading the former to sweep these polls. This is, however, one side of the Karnataka-verdict.

Equally significant is the statistical importance apparently given to 2018 results by Congress leaders. Decision to select Mapanna Mallikarjun Kharge as President of Congress was certainly guided with eye on winning Karnataka polls. Kharge’s Karnataka roots are marked by his having won Assembly elections for a record 10 times. The importance given to this state by Congress party at national level has probably been well received by voters in Karnataka. Even though nominally, at least, his being supported to head the post breaks the notions floated about only Gandhi family holding this authority.

Undeniably, Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra (Unite India March) has had a greater impact than expected on Karnataka results. He did not simply pass through the state, addressing a few rallies and similar gatherings. Nature of his march was marked by his literally reaching out to people and addressing them on issues which bear importance for them. The latter includes their economic problems. That this march was a crucial part of Congress campaign for Karnataka elections and coming parliamentary polls cannot be denied. Had the same march been timed just ahead of assembly elections, the impact may not have been the same. Congress has probably taken a leaf from BJP’s communication strategy, that of planning as well as working on its campaign a little ahead of elections. It has apparently learnt that rushing to states at virtually the last minute can be of little help in gaining electorally.

Seats gained by BJP in comparison with victory of Congress and its “success” in 2018 also sends several important messages. Against 104 seats won in 2018, BJP has managed to retain only 65 seats. Undeniably, BJP stalwarts spared no efforts to retain its hold in southern India. Perhaps little importance was given by BJP leaders to people’s verdict in 2018. Karnataka is not Gujarat. Nor it is in the Hindi belt. Besides, had BJP swept the polls in 2018 with more votes than its key rival, it may have signalled the importance this party’s communication strategy holds for people in Karnataka. The present results have signalled quite emphatically Karnataka voters’ refusal to be guided by religious cards used by BJP leaders, negative campaign against their rivals and so forth. Hype raised about its stalwarts had limited impact in 2018 and hardly any now. These are just a few indicators suggesting that BJP can no longer bank on its own communication strategies at least in assembly elections in South India. Electoral rhetoric fails to sway voters when they choose to exercise shrewd wisdom as they seem to have in Karnataka Assembly elections!

Nilofar Suhrawardy is a senior journalist and writer with specialization in communication studies and nuclear diplomacy.

14 May 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

By Akbar E Torbat

The women-led anti-hejab movement that began after the death of Mahsa Amini on September 16, 2022, in Iran, is ongoing. Even though the street protests have subsided, many Iranian women defy to comply with wearing Islamic hejab in public. Nonetheless, the Islamic government is fighting to enforce hejab by various means, including closing stores that admit women without headscarves and preventing women without wearing hejab from entering metros and other public service places such as schools and universities. The government has also installed cameras in various places to monitor hejab enforcement. The enforcement of Islamic hejab has led to many anticlerical protests throughout Iran. The government has dealt with people’s protests by crackdowns, arrests, imprisonments, and executions. Consequently, a violent anticlerical wave has started in Iran.

Several clerics have been killed or injured in various places in Iran in the past few weeks. A senior Islamic cleric Abbas-Ali Suleimani was assassinated by a security guard on April 26, 2023, inside Bank Meli in Babolsar in the Mazandaran Province. Suleimani had previously served for 17 years as the representative of the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in the province of Sistan-Baluchestan. This province has been the site of many anti-government protests in recent months. According to people who knew Suleimani, he was pro-gender separation in all public places. On the same day, a junior mullah was purposely run over by a car, and on April 29, another cleric was stabbed in the city of Qum. On April 30, Lieutenant Alireza Shahraki, the head of the Saravan District Awareness Police Department, was assassinated. On May 5, the body of a mullah, Ibrahim Fazel, who had been missing for four days, was dragged out of the water in the coastal village of Goldasht in the Province of Mazandaran. On May 7, a mullah was injured after a young man attacked him with a knife in Ahmedabad village of Saveh city in the Central province.

The clerical oligarchy has claimed that the anticlerical incidents have been instigated by the reformists and celebrities inside Iran who are supported by the Western powers. The pro-clerics daily newspaper Kayhan wrote: “These [terrors] and dozens of other examples are just a small part of the efforts of the pro-reform media or domestic-westernization process to complete the puzzle of the enemy in creating hatred in society and social disintegration of the country.”[1]

In recent years, the ruling clerics’ political base has shrunk tremendously. The Middle class is feeling resentment and has turned against the ruling clerics. The clerics and their family members have moved up to the wealthy upper class by accumulating wealth. They engage in rent-seeking activity under the guise of Islamic and anti-imperialist slogans. In contrast, the high rate of inflation has pushed down the middle class to become a part of the dispossessed underpaid laborer, and that has further intensified the anticlerical feelings.

The clerics opiate the masses with promises of rewards in another world after death. They preach to people to pray five times a day to be rewarded by God to go to heaven. Even so, most Iranians have turned against the ruling clergy, as they feel they have been deprived of basic living standards. The young generation of Iranians does not listen to the clerics’ superstitious preaching. Two Iranian political prisoners, Yousef Mehrdad and Sadrollah Fazeli Zari, who had managed a cable channel called “Critique of Superstition and Religion,” were sentenced to death for the charges of “insulting the Prophet and religious sanctities,” “promoting atheism,” and “apostasy.” They were hanged on May 8, 2023. Many other people have been executed on various charges. According to Abdorrahman Boroumand Center for Human Rights in Iran, there have been 798 executions in Iran since the beginning of 2022 to this date.[2]

Ebrahim Raisi became president in a low-turnout election engineered by Khamenei. The results of Raisi’s two years in office include the fastest decline in the national currency’s value, the highest growth of money supply, the highest historical rate of inflation, and the biggest historical collapse of Tehran’s stock indexes in a day. The high rate of inflation has pushed down real wages, which has brought teachers and factory workers to the street to demand higher pay for their work. The country is struggling through the collapse of the nation’s currency, the rial. President Raisi has used printed money borrowed from the Central Bank of Iran (Bank Markazi) to spend on promises he had made two years ago during his presidential campaign. Inflation and financial corruption caused by the clerical leadership and their cronies have intensified anticlerical feelings throughout Iran.

The Islamic regime in Iran has become a Shi’a dictatorship by reactionary clerics. The clerics’ only concern is to remain in power. The Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, controls all three branches of the government directly or indirectly. The ruling clerics have used nepotism and marriage schemes to limit the important positions to themselves and their family members. For example, the current head of the parliament (Majles) Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf is a nephew of the Supreme Leader’s wife. The Supreme Leader’s daughter is married to the son of Ayatollah Mohamad Golpayegani, who is the chief of the Supreme Leader’s office. The Supreme Leader’s son Mujtaba Khamenei is married to a daughter of Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel, the former head of the parliament. President Ebrahim Raisi is the son-in-law of Ayatollah Ahmad Alamolhoda, the Friday Prayer leader in Mashhad, the hometown of Khamenei. Alamolhoda is also the city’s representative in the Assembly of Experts.

On April 30, 2023, Reza Fatemi Amin, the minister of Industry, Mines, and Trade, was impeached in the parliament to be questioned for providing wrong statistics and prioritizing the interests of two major Iranian automobile companies. The minister was dismissed by the Majles due to the high prices of automobiles and rent-seeking corruption.

So far, the mullahs have not given up their enforcement of hejab, believing that yielding on that issue will open the door to other demands, and those could pave the way for ending the clerical rules, which they are unwilling to accept.

Akbar E. Torbat (atorbat@calstatela.edu) is the author of “Politics of Oil and Nuclear Technology in Iran.”

14 May 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

By Jafar M Ramini

May 15th, is the 75th anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba (Catastrophe). And counting. I say ‘and counting’ because the theft of our land, the occupation, the siege on Gaza, the disposition of our people, the ethnic cleansing of Palestine and replacement of the Palestinian nation, with Jews, often of dual nationality, from around the world, continues more aggressively than ever. So does the building of illegal settlements to house those interlopers. They too are still going on apace with no end in sight.

Add to that toxic mix, the total indifference of western leaders and the conniving and betrayal of some Arab leaders, not to mention the shameful capitulation and collaboration of the Palestinian Authority and the picture is complete.

Try as I may to look for the infamous light at the end of the long, dark tunnel, I can’t find even the tiniest glimmer.

And I haven’t even got around to mentioning the Israeli prisons which are full of Palestinian men, women and children, tortured and held in disgusting conditions without charge or legal recourse. As if all of this was not enough to emphasise the cruelty and inhumanity of the occupation of our land, the longest in history, the Israeli Occupation Forces continue to raid, unhindered, cities, towns and villages all over Palestine. And what does the ‘free, democratic world’ do about it? This is but a small example of what they do.

The President of the European Commission, Madame Ursula Von der Leyen lauded Israel’s democracy and its ties to Europe.

“Today, we celebrate 75 years of vibrant democracy in the heart of the Middle East,” the German politician said. “We also celebrate 75 years of friendship between Israel and Europe,” pointing out that; “We have more in common than geography would suggest: our shared culture, our values and hundreds of thousands of dual European-Israeli citizens have created a deep connection between us.”

Really, Mme Von der Leyen? Shared values? Is the European Union proud to share with the Israeli Government the concentration camps and the ghettos Israel created for us Palestinians, in our own land? Is Israel’s ‘Administrative Detention policy’ which allows the imprisonment of Palestinians, men, women and children, indefinitely, without charge or legal representation, or even family visits, one that Europe might embrace? Is this what you might call a shared value?

Mme Von der Leyen continued to regurgitate Israeli propaganda by claiming that “you truly made the desert bloom”. I wonder if she is aware of the geography of Palestine and where the ‘land of milk and honey’, mentioned in the bible actually is? I venture to say it was not Berlin.

In the last 75 years there were many attempts to settle the so-called Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Yet, to put it in those terms is misleading. A conflict is between two opposing powers and their armies. Israel has the power, has the army, has the airforce, has the navy. Not to mention three hundred nuclear warheads and the total and complete support of the United States of America. The Palestinians have none of these. So how can we call it a conflict?

It is genocide. It was designed to ethnically cleanse all of Palestine and turn it into a state for Jews only, rubber-stamped by the Nation State Bill that was passed in 2018, which emphatically states that the right of self-determination in Israel is exclusively a Jewish prerogative.

Yet all of this has been just a starter for a much more ambitious, well-planned and financed settler-colonial project, which was started back in 1882, under the Ottoman Empire.

First: Facilitate the immigration of Jews from around the world into Palestine. Get rid of the Palestinians, or corral them in bins, euphemistically referred to as ‘cantons,’ and keep them on a strictly limited diet and under tight military rule.

Second: Present to the world that Jews are the only victims and Israelis are the biggest victims of all.

Third: Blackmail friends and allies to support Israeli ambitions, come what may. Steal their technology. Kill their sailors. Blame it on others. Those who do not submit, smear them as ‘anti-semitic’.

This is how Mr Benjamin Netanyahu has kept his grip on power since the 1990s. He has lied, he has waged wars, he has inflicted more death and suffering on the Palestinians and he has pretended to make peace. What he was actually trying to do, and is still trying to do is establish a legacy as the man who put the Greater Israel project on a higher level than any other leader before him. This is why Israel, until now, does not have a declared constitution or a declared, definitive border.

The opposition to these expansionist, racial plans in Israel is minimal, as was clearly illustrated recently by the Israeli electorate choosing to vote in the most fascist, far-right government ever in the State of Israel.

So, dear reader, as the thundering juggernaut of power and destruction by Israel rolls on, waved through by international indifference, what do you think? Can this inhumanity and murder in Palestine really continue unabated for anniversary after anniversary? Hope is still there, fluttering bravely. But it is all we have.

Jafar M Ramini is a Palestinian writer and political analyst.

9 May 2023

Source: countercurrents.org