The Daily Star
Friday July 22 2011
By Michael Glackin
The conflagration engulfing Rupert Murdoch’s media empire has accounted for more high-profile scalps than Custer’s last stand at the Battle of the Little Bighorn.
Last week Rebekah Brooks, the chief executive of Murdoch’s British print business, quit just hours before she was arrested by the police over her role in the now notorious phone-hacking scandal. Andrew Coulson, a former senior British government adviser and close confidante of Prime Minister David Cameron, has also been arrested, and the scandal has even forced two of the United Kingdom’s most senior policemen to resign in disgrace.
Across the Atlantic, the head of Dow Jones & Company, the publisher of The Wall Street Journal, which Murdoch acquired in 2007, has also resigned over the hacking scandal. The FBI is now investigating whether reporters working for Murdoch’s newspapers hacked the phones of victims of the 9/11 attacks. An increasing number of American politicians are calling for wider probes into his businesses.
It’s a postscript now to add that all this has resulted in the closure of the U.K.’s biggest selling newspaper, News of the World, the costly abandonment of a $12 billion bid by Murdoch to become the sole owner of the British satellite television station BSkyB, and a decidedly shaky performance by Murdoch himself (even before his wife beat off an attacker armed with a plate of shaving foam) before a House of Commons select committee on Tuesday investigating the scandal.
And this scandal, which began with the exposure of illegal practices by some journalists, has grown to lay bare police corruption and the dubious coziness between Murdoch’s newspapers, particularly The Sun and News of the World, and politicians and police.
Bookmakers are offering odds of 4-1 that Cameron will be forced to resign, down from 100-1 two weeks ago, as the scandal creeps closer to his door. Cameron is linked to this sordid affair via Coulson, who was editor of News of the World when its reporters hacked into the cell phone voice mails of royals, celebrities and, appallingly, murder victims and the families of soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.
It is ironic that Cameron was in Afghanistan when the scandal returned to dominate the British news agenda two weeks ago, for there exists a subtle link between Cameron, the Afghan war and Murdoch.
Prior to becoming prime minister, and unlike his predecessors Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, Cameron was known to be lukewarm about the need to court the Murdoch empire. Cameron briefly worked in television before entering politics and believed that the power of the print press, whose readership is declining, was overrated when compared to television stations, whose audiences continue to expand.
More importantly, at the time Cameron was also lukewarm about pursuing the war in Afghanistan, at a moment when public opinion was rapidly turning against British participation in the conflict. But less than a year before the election that saw him become prime minister, Cameron suddenly struck a hawkish note on the war. The change in heart stemmed in large part from a realization among Cameron’s advisers that Labour could still win and, therefore, that the support of The Sun and News of the World was vital for a Cameron victory.
Murdoch has been a vocal supporter of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. He has argued that the Iraq war in particular might lead to lower oil prices, therefore to the betterment of Western economies. In 2007, in the run-up to the Australian election, Murdoch publicly warned against withdrawing Australia’s small force in Iraq, a policy supported by the country’s Labour Party, then in opposition. Murdoch, who insisted he knew “a bit about this,” said that such a withdrawal would “rupture” the coalition campaigns in both Iraq and Afghanistan.
Cameron came on board in October 2009, just days after The Sun backed him to become prime minister. In an “exclusive” interview with the newspaper, he criticized the Labour government’s halfhearted commitment to the Afghan war, observing: “Our military is at war in Afghanistan but quite frankly Whitehall isn’t. If I’m prime minister, Whitehall will go to war from minute one, hour one, day one that I walk through the door of Downing Street if I am elected.” Despite declining public support for the Afghan conflict, Cameron also told The Sun that he would deploy more troops to ensure victory.
Downing Street insists today that “there is absolutely no linkage” between its policy in Afghanistan and Murdoch’s views. But part of the problem of the coziness between the Murdoch empire and politicians of all hues is that no one is entirely clear where his influence ends and government policy begins. A commitment from Cameron to vigorously pursue the Afghan war was perhaps not a top priority for Murdoch, but it could have been a sign that Cameron would toe the Murdoch line.
Realistically, the fallout from Murdoch’s woes won’t make any difference to British policy in Afghanistan. Both the United Kingdom and the United States are moving toward the exit. A Foreign Office official confirmed that the first phase of the transition process, which will see Afghan security forces take the lead on security operations in all provinces by 2014, starts this month. And Murdoch’s papers, having gone from “Backing our Boys” fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan to “Hacking our Boys,” are unlikely to argue if the timetable is accelerated.
Despite his Afghan conversion, it’s unlikely that the Murdoch affair would have impacted on Cameron had he not hired Coulson. It’s his judgment in belatedly backing a war he cared little for in return for Murdoch’s approval that is more damning. Cameron’s decisions have trapped him in a vise of his own making. If he does become the highest profile victim of this scandal he really will only have himself to blame.
Michael Glackin is former managing editor of The Daily Star
Friday, 22 July 2011
Friday, 3 June 2011
Britain exudes democratic hypocrisy
By Michael Glackin
The Daily Star
Friday June 3 2011
“We believe, not simply in the rights of nations, but the rights of citizens.” Thus spoke U.S. President Barack Obama during his speech before the British Parliament last month.
It was a wonderful address, articulating the United States’ and the United Kingdom’s democratic values which, Obama said, inspired the Arab Spring and encouraged a people that “longs to determine its own destiny.” It was also nonsense.
It was rather like what British Prime Minister David Cameron said following the fall of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. In that speech he apologized for the U.K.’s role in supporting autocratic regimes in the Middle East and said that his government would in the future support “peaceful protest” and “freedom of speech” and “the rule of law.”
And here’s some more nonsense. Ask any British government official why the kind of military intervention under way in Libya is not equally justified in Yemen, Bahrain and Syria and the standard answer you will receive runs along the lines of, “We can’t solve every problem, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t solve this problem.” Some might also point to the logistical difficulties of a military intervention in the Gulf.
Really? Let’s pretend for a moment that politicians were honest about the reasons for not lifting a finger to prevent civilian deaths in Arab countries different than Libya. They would say, unequivocally, that while the U.K.’s strategic interests are well served by the fall of Moammar Gadhafi’s regime, those same interests are not served by the fall of regimes elsewhere in the Middle East or the Gulf.
Why? In Libya, it’s worth pointing out that the country was in a state of civil war before the West intervened, one where a sizeable chunk of territory was under the control of those opposed to Gadhafi. The U.K., France and the U.S. believed a limited military intervention would tilt the balance toward the rebels and rid the world of a despot, with little wider geopolitical upheavals. Their intervention was overdue and has not been entirely effective, yet it was commendable and right.
But in terms of the Gulf, what the West wants is stability, and if politicians are honest, they are not overly particular how that is achieved. Central to British policy at the moment – and that of the U.S. – is the degree to which the wave of political unrest across the region will work to the benefit of international bogeyman Iran.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has accused Iran of attempting to hijack the region’s democracy protests in a bid to “destabilize” America’s allies in the Gulf. Bahrain has also accused Hezbollah of involvement in the protests in Manama. And straight from its success in suppressing dissent at home, Iran is understood to have supplied Syria with crowd-control equipment and technical help in blocking and tracing Syrian protestors’ use of the Internet and mobile phones.
It is worth pointing out that Egypt’s transitional government has already extended an olive branch to Tehran, ending years of sour relations. It has also opened its border with Hamas-controlled Gaza. It’s hardly a dramatic realignment of the balance of Middle East power, but goes some way to explaining why the G-8 is offering the giant carrot of Western aid to Egypt and others, despite the fact that so far only two regimes have been toppled by the wave of unrest across the region.
It is against this backdrop that the U.K. chooses to ignore events in Syria, Bahrain and Yemen.
Yemen is a deeply unstable country that has battled separatists in the south and Shiite insurgents in the north. Even allowing for President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s interest in hyping up the threat, the country is increasingly recognized as an Al-Qaeda stronghold. Saleh has been viewed in the U.K. as a crucial ally in countering that threat. Last year the British government announced it was looking to “substantially increase” the amount of aid it gave to Saleh’s government to prevent Yemen from becoming a “second Afghanistan.”
Meanwhile Bahrain, host to the U.S. Fifth Fleet, is also America’s largest military base in the region and a crucial ally of Washington and London. If something akin to British and American democracy replaces the Al-Khalifa regime, it means that the government could be dominated by Shiites, which in turn raises the specter of increased Iranian influence in a critical strategic outpost of the U.S. military.
Moreover, if the opposition prevails in Bahrain, neighboring Saudi Arabia, Washington’s most important ally, would have to address the demands of its own Shiite population. Hence the only foreign military intervention in Bahrain has seen Saudi and other Gulf units arriving to help contain the protest movement.
Bashar Assad, though no friend of Washington, is seen as critical to regional stability and any hope of a peace deal with Israel, since Western governments resumed courting him three years ago and he made his peace with Saudi Arabia. The British government also fears that the collapse, or even the weakening, of the Assads might open up a regional can of worms and lead, among other things, to a resurgence of Kurdish nationalism, which could impact Iraq and Turkey.
Therefore, for all the rhetoric, and commendable action in Libya, there are defined limits to how far the U.K. and the West will go in supporting human rights, free speech and democracy.
The West saved Benghazi, but it should explain why bloodshed elsewhere is not, in political terms, worth getting in a fight over. Sadly, the best that those seeking human and political rights in other Arab countries can hope for is that the eventual toppling of Gadhafi will send a message to their leaders. It would be nice if Cameron and Obama would just admit this rather than indulging in empty rhetoric while those seeking the ideals they espouse are being eliminated.
The Daily Star
Friday June 3 2011
“We believe, not simply in the rights of nations, but the rights of citizens.” Thus spoke U.S. President Barack Obama during his speech before the British Parliament last month.
It was a wonderful address, articulating the United States’ and the United Kingdom’s democratic values which, Obama said, inspired the Arab Spring and encouraged a people that “longs to determine its own destiny.” It was also nonsense.
It was rather like what British Prime Minister David Cameron said following the fall of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. In that speech he apologized for the U.K.’s role in supporting autocratic regimes in the Middle East and said that his government would in the future support “peaceful protest” and “freedom of speech” and “the rule of law.”
And here’s some more nonsense. Ask any British government official why the kind of military intervention under way in Libya is not equally justified in Yemen, Bahrain and Syria and the standard answer you will receive runs along the lines of, “We can’t solve every problem, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t solve this problem.” Some might also point to the logistical difficulties of a military intervention in the Gulf.
Really? Let’s pretend for a moment that politicians were honest about the reasons for not lifting a finger to prevent civilian deaths in Arab countries different than Libya. They would say, unequivocally, that while the U.K.’s strategic interests are well served by the fall of Moammar Gadhafi’s regime, those same interests are not served by the fall of regimes elsewhere in the Middle East or the Gulf.
Why? In Libya, it’s worth pointing out that the country was in a state of civil war before the West intervened, one where a sizeable chunk of territory was under the control of those opposed to Gadhafi. The U.K., France and the U.S. believed a limited military intervention would tilt the balance toward the rebels and rid the world of a despot, with little wider geopolitical upheavals. Their intervention was overdue and has not been entirely effective, yet it was commendable and right.
But in terms of the Gulf, what the West wants is stability, and if politicians are honest, they are not overly particular how that is achieved. Central to British policy at the moment – and that of the U.S. – is the degree to which the wave of political unrest across the region will work to the benefit of international bogeyman Iran.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has accused Iran of attempting to hijack the region’s democracy protests in a bid to “destabilize” America’s allies in the Gulf. Bahrain has also accused Hezbollah of involvement in the protests in Manama. And straight from its success in suppressing dissent at home, Iran is understood to have supplied Syria with crowd-control equipment and technical help in blocking and tracing Syrian protestors’ use of the Internet and mobile phones.
It is worth pointing out that Egypt’s transitional government has already extended an olive branch to Tehran, ending years of sour relations. It has also opened its border with Hamas-controlled Gaza. It’s hardly a dramatic realignment of the balance of Middle East power, but goes some way to explaining why the G-8 is offering the giant carrot of Western aid to Egypt and others, despite the fact that so far only two regimes have been toppled by the wave of unrest across the region.
It is against this backdrop that the U.K. chooses to ignore events in Syria, Bahrain and Yemen.
Yemen is a deeply unstable country that has battled separatists in the south and Shiite insurgents in the north. Even allowing for President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s interest in hyping up the threat, the country is increasingly recognized as an Al-Qaeda stronghold. Saleh has been viewed in the U.K. as a crucial ally in countering that threat. Last year the British government announced it was looking to “substantially increase” the amount of aid it gave to Saleh’s government to prevent Yemen from becoming a “second Afghanistan.”
Meanwhile Bahrain, host to the U.S. Fifth Fleet, is also America’s largest military base in the region and a crucial ally of Washington and London. If something akin to British and American democracy replaces the Al-Khalifa regime, it means that the government could be dominated by Shiites, which in turn raises the specter of increased Iranian influence in a critical strategic outpost of the U.S. military.
Moreover, if the opposition prevails in Bahrain, neighboring Saudi Arabia, Washington’s most important ally, would have to address the demands of its own Shiite population. Hence the only foreign military intervention in Bahrain has seen Saudi and other Gulf units arriving to help contain the protest movement.
Bashar Assad, though no friend of Washington, is seen as critical to regional stability and any hope of a peace deal with Israel, since Western governments resumed courting him three years ago and he made his peace with Saudi Arabia. The British government also fears that the collapse, or even the weakening, of the Assads might open up a regional can of worms and lead, among other things, to a resurgence of Kurdish nationalism, which could impact Iraq and Turkey.
Therefore, for all the rhetoric, and commendable action in Libya, there are defined limits to how far the U.K. and the West will go in supporting human rights, free speech and democracy.
The West saved Benghazi, but it should explain why bloodshed elsewhere is not, in political terms, worth getting in a fight over. Sadly, the best that those seeking human and political rights in other Arab countries can hope for is that the eventual toppling of Gadhafi will send a message to their leaders. It would be nice if Cameron and Obama would just admit this rather than indulging in empty rhetoric while those seeking the ideals they espouse are being eliminated.
Friday, 8 April 2011
Intervention lite isn't working in Libya
The Daily Star
Friday, April 8 2011
By Michael Glackin
Wanted: Accommodation for a soon-to-be-retired dictator. Will live in a tent, but must provide enough room for female bodyguards and occasional pop concerts by international superstars such as Beyonce and Mariah Carey.
Laugh if you will, but the idea of allowing Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi to spend his dotage in exile is becoming increasingly attractive to the British government, amid the realization that, despite two weeks of coalition airstrikes, the war to oust him has now reached a stalemate. At last month’s London conference on Libya, British Foreign Secretary William Hague insisted that the government was “not engaged in looking for somewhere for [Gadhafi] to go”; but then he quickly added, “that doesn’t exclude others from doing so.”
Unfortunately, a week remains a long time in politics and the failure of the West’s military operation, at least in its current form, to topple Gadhafi appears to have emboldened the Libyan leader. Last month Mohammad Ismail, a confidante of Gadhafi’s son Seif al-Islam, offered the West a way out by proposing Seif as leader while his father headed to his Elba in either the Libyan desert or Sudan. But this week, Abdelati Laabidi, Gadhafi’s deputy foreign minister, was busy touting the idea that Gadhafi himself should lead Libya’s transition to democracy, in return for a cease-fire.
All this comes at the same time as it has emerged that NATO’s bombing campaign is running short of aircraft, following America’s withdrawal of its fighter planes earlier this week. So as Libya settles into a de facto division between the rebel-held east and Gadhafi-held west, what else is the coalition doing to secure Gadhafi’s removal?
Talk at the London conference of arming rebels is a non-starter. It is being raised as a feeble alternative to deploying coalition troops, something the United Kingdom and the United States in particular are desperate to avoid. First, it is doubtful that the largely untrained rebels could operate the sophisticated weaponry they require to take on Gadhafi’s military might; and second, fears persist, particularly in Washington, that such weapons could fall into the wrong hands.
Indeed both the U.K. and the U.S. have now dispatched teams of diplomats to Benghazi in a bid to “better understand” who the rebels are, amid fears that many are allied to Al-Qaeda. The Foreign Office remains tight-lipped. But insiders say the primary focus of the British government now is to prevent Gadhafi from regaining control of any more of Libya by continuing the airstrikes, while at the same time encouraging members of the regime to abandon their leader.
This brings us neatly to the many conspiracy theories surrounding the arrival in the U.K. of Libya’s former foreign minister, Moussa Koussa. Initially some believed he had brought a secret message from Gadhafi, hard on the heels of Ismail’s secret visit. Another interpretation was that he believed the regime is doomed and that facing British justice would be preferable to facing rebel justice.
Because the West is so urgently trying to engineer an end to the war that allows them to avoid dispatching soldiers, not surprisingly there is little talk from the government of Gadhafi being hauled in front of the International Court of Justice, as this might hinder a negotiated outcome. Although the government insists that Koussa was not offered immunity from prosecution, it is hardly likely that a man with his background would have headed to the U.K. if he expected to pay for his past misdeeds. It is worth noting that Washington quietly removed Koussa Monday from its list of Libyan officials subjected to financial sanctions. Moreover, if the threat of legal proceedings in the West was left hanging over Koussa, it would hardly help the British policy of encouraging other regime figures to abandon Gadhafi.
Indeed speaking before Parliament earlier this week, Hague stated that those Libyans who deserted Gadhafi and came to the U.K. would be “treated with respect.” And despite the fact that Koussa spent two decades running Libya’s foreign intelligence service, the government has been careful to downplay claims that he was a key figure in the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie in 1988.
That said, Koussa may well face a court case brought by victims of Irish Republican Army bombings in the U.K., in which Libyan-supplied Semtex explosives were used. Court documents filed in the U.S. three years ago claim that Koussa oversaw the supply of Semtex to the IRA during its bombing campaign in the U.K. during the 1980s and 1990s. Lawyers representing the victims may well seek an arrest warrant for the Libyan, similar to the warrant that British magistrates issued for the former Israeli foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, and which forced her to cancel a trip to London in 2009.
Will Gadhafi, Koussa, and other Libyan officials eventually end up in court? Or will Gadhafi head off into the sunset to enjoy a happy exile with his family and friends? The multitude of possible outcomes stems from the coalition’s reluctance to follow through on the logic of its decision to remove Gadhafi from power. Intervention lite is not working. It is time for the West to show that it has the courage of its convictions by ending this war and Gadhafi’s tyranny.
Friday, April 8 2011
By Michael Glackin
Wanted: Accommodation for a soon-to-be-retired dictator. Will live in a tent, but must provide enough room for female bodyguards and occasional pop concerts by international superstars such as Beyonce and Mariah Carey.
Laugh if you will, but the idea of allowing Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi to spend his dotage in exile is becoming increasingly attractive to the British government, amid the realization that, despite two weeks of coalition airstrikes, the war to oust him has now reached a stalemate. At last month’s London conference on Libya, British Foreign Secretary William Hague insisted that the government was “not engaged in looking for somewhere for [Gadhafi] to go”; but then he quickly added, “that doesn’t exclude others from doing so.”
Unfortunately, a week remains a long time in politics and the failure of the West’s military operation, at least in its current form, to topple Gadhafi appears to have emboldened the Libyan leader. Last month Mohammad Ismail, a confidante of Gadhafi’s son Seif al-Islam, offered the West a way out by proposing Seif as leader while his father headed to his Elba in either the Libyan desert or Sudan. But this week, Abdelati Laabidi, Gadhafi’s deputy foreign minister, was busy touting the idea that Gadhafi himself should lead Libya’s transition to democracy, in return for a cease-fire.
All this comes at the same time as it has emerged that NATO’s bombing campaign is running short of aircraft, following America’s withdrawal of its fighter planes earlier this week. So as Libya settles into a de facto division between the rebel-held east and Gadhafi-held west, what else is the coalition doing to secure Gadhafi’s removal?
Talk at the London conference of arming rebels is a non-starter. It is being raised as a feeble alternative to deploying coalition troops, something the United Kingdom and the United States in particular are desperate to avoid. First, it is doubtful that the largely untrained rebels could operate the sophisticated weaponry they require to take on Gadhafi’s military might; and second, fears persist, particularly in Washington, that such weapons could fall into the wrong hands.
Indeed both the U.K. and the U.S. have now dispatched teams of diplomats to Benghazi in a bid to “better understand” who the rebels are, amid fears that many are allied to Al-Qaeda. The Foreign Office remains tight-lipped. But insiders say the primary focus of the British government now is to prevent Gadhafi from regaining control of any more of Libya by continuing the airstrikes, while at the same time encouraging members of the regime to abandon their leader.
This brings us neatly to the many conspiracy theories surrounding the arrival in the U.K. of Libya’s former foreign minister, Moussa Koussa. Initially some believed he had brought a secret message from Gadhafi, hard on the heels of Ismail’s secret visit. Another interpretation was that he believed the regime is doomed and that facing British justice would be preferable to facing rebel justice.
Because the West is so urgently trying to engineer an end to the war that allows them to avoid dispatching soldiers, not surprisingly there is little talk from the government of Gadhafi being hauled in front of the International Court of Justice, as this might hinder a negotiated outcome. Although the government insists that Koussa was not offered immunity from prosecution, it is hardly likely that a man with his background would have headed to the U.K. if he expected to pay for his past misdeeds. It is worth noting that Washington quietly removed Koussa Monday from its list of Libyan officials subjected to financial sanctions. Moreover, if the threat of legal proceedings in the West was left hanging over Koussa, it would hardly help the British policy of encouraging other regime figures to abandon Gadhafi.
Indeed speaking before Parliament earlier this week, Hague stated that those Libyans who deserted Gadhafi and came to the U.K. would be “treated with respect.” And despite the fact that Koussa spent two decades running Libya’s foreign intelligence service, the government has been careful to downplay claims that he was a key figure in the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie in 1988.
That said, Koussa may well face a court case brought by victims of Irish Republican Army bombings in the U.K., in which Libyan-supplied Semtex explosives were used. Court documents filed in the U.S. three years ago claim that Koussa oversaw the supply of Semtex to the IRA during its bombing campaign in the U.K. during the 1980s and 1990s. Lawyers representing the victims may well seek an arrest warrant for the Libyan, similar to the warrant that British magistrates issued for the former Israeli foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, and which forced her to cancel a trip to London in 2009.
Will Gadhafi, Koussa, and other Libyan officials eventually end up in court? Or will Gadhafi head off into the sunset to enjoy a happy exile with his family and friends? The multitude of possible outcomes stems from the coalition’s reluctance to follow through on the logic of its decision to remove Gadhafi from power. Intervention lite is not working. It is time for the West to show that it has the courage of its convictions by ending this war and Gadhafi’s tyranny.
Friday, 25 March 2011
Britain plans for regime change in Libya
The Daily Star
Friday, March 25 2011
By Michael Glackin
After a series of embarrassing fumbles, the British government appears to have finally come to grips with how to deal with Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi. Or has it?
When it comes to Libya, Prime Minister David Cameron has been guilty of more flip flops than an Olympic gymnast. Still, his role in the United Nations’ decision to protect innocent civilians should be welcomed. Unfortunately, while the West sat on its hands for a month, Gadhafi launched a vicious rearguard action against the myriad forces opposed to his regime, leaving thousands dead and allowing him reassert control over the west of the country.
The problem now that the West has finally taken action is to determine what happens next. A Foreign Office official told me that the British government’s objective in opposing Gadhafi is to ensure that there is “a unified Libya under a central government that is more open and democratic, not run by Gadhafi, which does not pose external threats either in the region or more broadly.”
This is a huge change from Cameron’s earlier statements – not to mention the United Nation mandate which does not mention regime change. Increasingly, the statements from the government are starting to resemble former Prime Minister Tony Blair’s ever shifting objectives in Iraq. The Foreign Office official declined to explain how Gadhafi would be deposed, but British policy, and with it that of French President Nicolas Sarkozy and the United States President Barack Obama, still appears to be tied in to three doubtful outcomes.
First, the hope that coalition air attacks on Gadhafi’s military machine, which have successfully grounded Libya’s air force and destroyed its air defenses, will push the Libyan leader’s armed forces to desert him to the extent that his regime implodes.
Second, and much more unlikely, is the hope the bombing has done enough damage to enable the rebels in the east to mount their own counterattack against Gadhafi’s forces. Unfortunately the rebels holed up in Benghazi are a ragtag bunch and extremely unlikely to topple the regime on their own. According to defense analyst Anthony Cordesman, from the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, the rebels are “divided, lack discipline and structure and are both poorly supplied and untrained in using advanced weapons.” It is unlikely that the West will send these people arms and the American-European coalition does not want to be transformed into the aerial arm of the rebellion.
The third outcome is what politicians like to call “decapitating” the regime, or more simply killing Gadhafi. The United Kingdom’s chief of the defense staff, Sir David Richards, was slapped down by the government for insisting that assassination was not an option after coalition planes dropped a bomb on Gadhafi’s private compound last weekend, in what looked like an obvious attempt to kill him.
All three options are weak platforms to support the view that military action will be short and accelerate Gadhafi’s demise. In fact, far from Gadhafi’s regime collapsing, it is actually the coalition that is now showing distinct signs of breaking apart.
Partly, that’s because several key questions remain unanswered. It is unclear who would take over were Gadhafi to be overthrown or killed. Readers of American diplomatic cables leaked by WikiLeaks will also be aware of concerns within the U.S. government that eastern Libya is a hotbed of Islamic extremism. Any new Libyan government is likely to require a good deal of support from the West, and it is against this backdrop that many in the U.K. are firmly opposed to the current intervention, and to further involvement in Libya.
Media reports that firing a single U.K. Tomahawk missile costs around $1.4 million, at a time when Gulf Arab countries are filling their coffers on the back of sky-high oil prices, sits equally badly with many in the British public. That is particularly the case when at least three of the Gulf states – Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Yemen (not to mention Syria) – are using force to crush pro-democracy movements.
Hardly helping matters is that Washington has been looking for the Libyan exit since the first coalition airplane took off. Barack Obama’s interest in foreign affairs seems limited to finding destinations for state visits with his photogenic wife. This poses a problem for Sarkozy and Cameron. Despite France being the first in the air last week, around half of the missions currently being conducted over Libya are being carried out by American pilots and, so far, all combat operations have taken place under American command.
Moreover, while Sarkozy and Cameron are united in support of military action, the European Union is not. The EU’s foreign affairs chief, the hapless Baroness Ashton, sided with Germany in opposing the imposition of a no-fly zone over Libya. Then there’s the unconcealed opposition of key NATO member Turkey to both the no-fly zone and to any further military action.
As things currently stand, it seems inevitable that the coalition will have to put boots on the ground at some point. The promise implicit in U.N. Security Council Resolution 1973 that there will be “no occupation force” does not necessarily rule out a temporary deployment of troops. Whether this is done through the dispatching of Arab troops remains to be seen. Bearing in mind that Qatar is the only Arab state that has committed any active military support to the current operation – four warplanes – it is more likely that the West will have to act alone, raising the specter of the bloody occupation of Iraq.
The coalition has saved Benghazi, but if Gadhafi survives this will create a stalemate, as it did in Iraq after 1991. At the time, Saddam Hussein’s regime survived while Iraqis continued to suffer. To believe that “intervention lite,” in the shape of a no-fly zone, can successfully safeguard Libyan civilians ignores recent history and Resolution 1973 itself. Obama, Cameron and Sarkozy have encouraged Libyans to stand up against Gadhafi’s repression and it would immoral to leave him in place to harm his people as the west abandoned Shiite rebels to their fate in Iraq. Anything less than Gadhafi’s departure prolongs the agony of those whom the coalition insists it is protecting.
Rarely has the West more clearly exposed itself to charges of hypocrisy in its policy and dealings in the Arab world than in its cozying up to Gadhafi in recent years. But now, it has no other option than to see what it has started through to its logical conclusion.
Michael Glackin is former Managing Editor of Beirut based newspaper The Daily Star.
Friday, March 25 2011
By Michael Glackin
After a series of embarrassing fumbles, the British government appears to have finally come to grips with how to deal with Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi. Or has it?
When it comes to Libya, Prime Minister David Cameron has been guilty of more flip flops than an Olympic gymnast. Still, his role in the United Nations’ decision to protect innocent civilians should be welcomed. Unfortunately, while the West sat on its hands for a month, Gadhafi launched a vicious rearguard action against the myriad forces opposed to his regime, leaving thousands dead and allowing him reassert control over the west of the country.
The problem now that the West has finally taken action is to determine what happens next. A Foreign Office official told me that the British government’s objective in opposing Gadhafi is to ensure that there is “a unified Libya under a central government that is more open and democratic, not run by Gadhafi, which does not pose external threats either in the region or more broadly.”
This is a huge change from Cameron’s earlier statements – not to mention the United Nation mandate which does not mention regime change. Increasingly, the statements from the government are starting to resemble former Prime Minister Tony Blair’s ever shifting objectives in Iraq. The Foreign Office official declined to explain how Gadhafi would be deposed, but British policy, and with it that of French President Nicolas Sarkozy and the United States President Barack Obama, still appears to be tied in to three doubtful outcomes.
First, the hope that coalition air attacks on Gadhafi’s military machine, which have successfully grounded Libya’s air force and destroyed its air defenses, will push the Libyan leader’s armed forces to desert him to the extent that his regime implodes.
Second, and much more unlikely, is the hope the bombing has done enough damage to enable the rebels in the east to mount their own counterattack against Gadhafi’s forces. Unfortunately the rebels holed up in Benghazi are a ragtag bunch and extremely unlikely to topple the regime on their own. According to defense analyst Anthony Cordesman, from the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, the rebels are “divided, lack discipline and structure and are both poorly supplied and untrained in using advanced weapons.” It is unlikely that the West will send these people arms and the American-European coalition does not want to be transformed into the aerial arm of the rebellion.
The third outcome is what politicians like to call “decapitating” the regime, or more simply killing Gadhafi. The United Kingdom’s chief of the defense staff, Sir David Richards, was slapped down by the government for insisting that assassination was not an option after coalition planes dropped a bomb on Gadhafi’s private compound last weekend, in what looked like an obvious attempt to kill him.
All three options are weak platforms to support the view that military action will be short and accelerate Gadhafi’s demise. In fact, far from Gadhafi’s regime collapsing, it is actually the coalition that is now showing distinct signs of breaking apart.
Partly, that’s because several key questions remain unanswered. It is unclear who would take over were Gadhafi to be overthrown or killed. Readers of American diplomatic cables leaked by WikiLeaks will also be aware of concerns within the U.S. government that eastern Libya is a hotbed of Islamic extremism. Any new Libyan government is likely to require a good deal of support from the West, and it is against this backdrop that many in the U.K. are firmly opposed to the current intervention, and to further involvement in Libya.
Media reports that firing a single U.K. Tomahawk missile costs around $1.4 million, at a time when Gulf Arab countries are filling their coffers on the back of sky-high oil prices, sits equally badly with many in the British public. That is particularly the case when at least three of the Gulf states – Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Yemen (not to mention Syria) – are using force to crush pro-democracy movements.
Hardly helping matters is that Washington has been looking for the Libyan exit since the first coalition airplane took off. Barack Obama’s interest in foreign affairs seems limited to finding destinations for state visits with his photogenic wife. This poses a problem for Sarkozy and Cameron. Despite France being the first in the air last week, around half of the missions currently being conducted over Libya are being carried out by American pilots and, so far, all combat operations have taken place under American command.
Moreover, while Sarkozy and Cameron are united in support of military action, the European Union is not. The EU’s foreign affairs chief, the hapless Baroness Ashton, sided with Germany in opposing the imposition of a no-fly zone over Libya. Then there’s the unconcealed opposition of key NATO member Turkey to both the no-fly zone and to any further military action.
As things currently stand, it seems inevitable that the coalition will have to put boots on the ground at some point. The promise implicit in U.N. Security Council Resolution 1973 that there will be “no occupation force” does not necessarily rule out a temporary deployment of troops. Whether this is done through the dispatching of Arab troops remains to be seen. Bearing in mind that Qatar is the only Arab state that has committed any active military support to the current operation – four warplanes – it is more likely that the West will have to act alone, raising the specter of the bloody occupation of Iraq.
The coalition has saved Benghazi, but if Gadhafi survives this will create a stalemate, as it did in Iraq after 1991. At the time, Saddam Hussein’s regime survived while Iraqis continued to suffer. To believe that “intervention lite,” in the shape of a no-fly zone, can successfully safeguard Libyan civilians ignores recent history and Resolution 1973 itself. Obama, Cameron and Sarkozy have encouraged Libyans to stand up against Gadhafi’s repression and it would immoral to leave him in place to harm his people as the west abandoned Shiite rebels to their fate in Iraq. Anything less than Gadhafi’s departure prolongs the agony of those whom the coalition insists it is protecting.
Rarely has the West more clearly exposed itself to charges of hypocrisy in its policy and dealings in the Arab world than in its cozying up to Gadhafi in recent years. But now, it has no other option than to see what it has started through to its logical conclusion.
Michael Glackin is former Managing Editor of Beirut based newspaper The Daily Star.
Tuesday, 1 March 2011
The U.K. vacillates on Mubarak money
The Daily Star
Tuesday, March 1 2011
By Michael Glackin
Fresh from savoring post-Hosni Mubarak Egypt first hand, the British prime minister, David Cameron, offered the Arab world a mea culpa for what he called the United Kingdom’s “double standards” in supporting autocratic governments in the region.
Cameron lamented that past governments “faced a false choice” between British interests and values. The U.K.’s interests, he said, will now lie in “upholding our values, in insisting on the right to peaceful protest, in freedom of speech and the Internet, in freedom of assembly and the rule of law.”
Unfortunately, while the prime minister was impersonating a statesman, he was also busy being a salesman. He touted the virtues of British defense companies – whose executives accompanied him across the Middle East – even as equipment and arms sold to Moammar Gadhafi by the U.K. were being used to murder peaceful protesters attempting to assemble freely in Libya.
So it was probably just as well that Cameron inserted a few of his own double standards into his speech. For while stressing democratic values, he also insisted that he respected the right of leaders to manage reform at their own pace.
This double standard is essential. For the following day Cameron was in Qatar – a country with no political parties and where the last election was held more than 40 years ago – presiding over the signing of a $3 billion gas supply deal between Qatar and the British group Centrica. The Qataris also sounded Cameron out about the possibility of investing in government-owned British banks.
What passes for Qatar’s political system is a long way short of what Cameron is enthusiastically calling for in Egypt. Qatar is not Libya of course, but then again neither, despite its many appalling aspects, was Mubarak’s Egypt. The simple difference is that the Qatari royal family’s relatively benign autocracy retains a much firmer grip on power than Mubarak could manage after 30 years. The great 19th-century statesman Lord Palmerston famously said that Britain has no permanent allies, only permanent interests. That remains the hallmark of Cameron’s policy. Values are measured in hard cash.
In fact every aspect of the British government’s current reaction to events in the Middle East is riddled with double standards. Take the cash piles dotted around the globe by the Mubarak family and the Gadhafi government. Witness the speed with which the U.K. and the European Union reached agreement to freeze the assets of ousted Tunisian President Zine al-Abedine Ben Ali and his cronies. France has confirmed receiving an Egyptian request for similar action against Mubarak family assets. The U.K. has also received an Egyptian request, but will not confirm which assets Cairo wants frozen. It matters little since neither Paris nor London has acted on the requests, even though the Washington-based Global Financial Integrity estimates that around $57 billion in illicit assets left Egypt between 2000 and 2008.
Bizarrely, Switzerland, banker to many a despot in the past, moved with commendable speed to freeze the assets of President Hosni Mubarak, his family, and his former ministers. The Swiss will now assess whether the money came from illicit activity.
Mubarak has close ties to London’s financial community through his son Gamal. Gamal owns half of Cyprus-based Bullion Company, which owns London-based investment fund Medinvest Associates, which Gamal helped set up in 1996 before leaving in 2001. Medinvest, Egypt’s first private equity fund, invested in Egyptian companies and public-sector organizations during the large scale privatization of the Egyptian economy undertaken by Mubarak in the 1990s. Gamal also has an 18 percent stake in EFG Private Equity, a subsidiary of London listed Egyptian investment bank EFG-Hermes.
But rather than act unilaterally and freeze these assets as the Swiss have, the British government is keen to secure agreement with the European Union. Why? Insiders at the U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office and Serious Organized Crime Agency, which investigate financial crime, say they have made inquiries and can act quickly if the go-ahead comes from the politicians. But for the U.K. to act alone requires proof of wrongdoing. Unlike Switzerland, the U.K. is not prepared to freeze first and ask questions later. In contrast, an EU decision to freeze the assets requires no such proof, merely agreement among European leaders.
Government officials insist that this is the speedy route. However, there may be another reason why the U.K. wants to pass the hot potato to the EU. Egypt has also asked that the assets of Ahmed Ezz, an Egyptian politician and owner of London-listed Ezz Steel, Egypt’s biggest steel company, be frozen. The main charge against Ezz, who insists he is innocent, is that he took control of a state-owned steel company illegally during the privatization program thanks to his links with Mubarak’s regime.
A similar charge could be leveled at some very rich Russians currently residing in London – the so-called oligarchs. Their fabulous wealth, speedily acquired and taken West during the chaotic privatization of Russia’s heavy industries during the country’s transition to a market economy, is largely attributable to connections to corrupt politicians. And it may explain why the U.K. is so reluctant to start freezing assets on that basis, when it is allowing billionaire Russians to enjoy the fruits of what many would argue are similarly ill-gotten gains. Far better to wait for the EU to act, allowing the U.K. to avoid setting what would be an awkward precedent.
Meanwhile, Libya’s cash is even easier to trace than Egypt’s. Moammar Gadhafi’s investment vehicle for Libya’s oil money, the Libyan Investment Authority, has stakes in commercial property across London. It is also the fifth largest shareholder in Pearson, which owns Penguin Books and publishes The Financial Times.
It seems bizarre to expect the U.K. to be capable of coordinating an international no-fly zone over Libya or sanctions on the country, or to take any action to stop the bloodshed, when it can’t even implement a standard financial transaction without passing the buck to the EU. Standards, even double standards, clearly aren’t what they used to be.
Tuesday, March 1 2011
By Michael Glackin
Fresh from savoring post-Hosni Mubarak Egypt first hand, the British prime minister, David Cameron, offered the Arab world a mea culpa for what he called the United Kingdom’s “double standards” in supporting autocratic governments in the region.
Cameron lamented that past governments “faced a false choice” between British interests and values. The U.K.’s interests, he said, will now lie in “upholding our values, in insisting on the right to peaceful protest, in freedom of speech and the Internet, in freedom of assembly and the rule of law.”
Unfortunately, while the prime minister was impersonating a statesman, he was also busy being a salesman. He touted the virtues of British defense companies – whose executives accompanied him across the Middle East – even as equipment and arms sold to Moammar Gadhafi by the U.K. were being used to murder peaceful protesters attempting to assemble freely in Libya.
So it was probably just as well that Cameron inserted a few of his own double standards into his speech. For while stressing democratic values, he also insisted that he respected the right of leaders to manage reform at their own pace.
This double standard is essential. For the following day Cameron was in Qatar – a country with no political parties and where the last election was held more than 40 years ago – presiding over the signing of a $3 billion gas supply deal between Qatar and the British group Centrica. The Qataris also sounded Cameron out about the possibility of investing in government-owned British banks.
What passes for Qatar’s political system is a long way short of what Cameron is enthusiastically calling for in Egypt. Qatar is not Libya of course, but then again neither, despite its many appalling aspects, was Mubarak’s Egypt. The simple difference is that the Qatari royal family’s relatively benign autocracy retains a much firmer grip on power than Mubarak could manage after 30 years. The great 19th-century statesman Lord Palmerston famously said that Britain has no permanent allies, only permanent interests. That remains the hallmark of Cameron’s policy. Values are measured in hard cash.
In fact every aspect of the British government’s current reaction to events in the Middle East is riddled with double standards. Take the cash piles dotted around the globe by the Mubarak family and the Gadhafi government. Witness the speed with which the U.K. and the European Union reached agreement to freeze the assets of ousted Tunisian President Zine al-Abedine Ben Ali and his cronies. France has confirmed receiving an Egyptian request for similar action against Mubarak family assets. The U.K. has also received an Egyptian request, but will not confirm which assets Cairo wants frozen. It matters little since neither Paris nor London has acted on the requests, even though the Washington-based Global Financial Integrity estimates that around $57 billion in illicit assets left Egypt between 2000 and 2008.
Bizarrely, Switzerland, banker to many a despot in the past, moved with commendable speed to freeze the assets of President Hosni Mubarak, his family, and his former ministers. The Swiss will now assess whether the money came from illicit activity.
Mubarak has close ties to London’s financial community through his son Gamal. Gamal owns half of Cyprus-based Bullion Company, which owns London-based investment fund Medinvest Associates, which Gamal helped set up in 1996 before leaving in 2001. Medinvest, Egypt’s first private equity fund, invested in Egyptian companies and public-sector organizations during the large scale privatization of the Egyptian economy undertaken by Mubarak in the 1990s. Gamal also has an 18 percent stake in EFG Private Equity, a subsidiary of London listed Egyptian investment bank EFG-Hermes.
But rather than act unilaterally and freeze these assets as the Swiss have, the British government is keen to secure agreement with the European Union. Why? Insiders at the U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office and Serious Organized Crime Agency, which investigate financial crime, say they have made inquiries and can act quickly if the go-ahead comes from the politicians. But for the U.K. to act alone requires proof of wrongdoing. Unlike Switzerland, the U.K. is not prepared to freeze first and ask questions later. In contrast, an EU decision to freeze the assets requires no such proof, merely agreement among European leaders.
Government officials insist that this is the speedy route. However, there may be another reason why the U.K. wants to pass the hot potato to the EU. Egypt has also asked that the assets of Ahmed Ezz, an Egyptian politician and owner of London-listed Ezz Steel, Egypt’s biggest steel company, be frozen. The main charge against Ezz, who insists he is innocent, is that he took control of a state-owned steel company illegally during the privatization program thanks to his links with Mubarak’s regime.
A similar charge could be leveled at some very rich Russians currently residing in London – the so-called oligarchs. Their fabulous wealth, speedily acquired and taken West during the chaotic privatization of Russia’s heavy industries during the country’s transition to a market economy, is largely attributable to connections to corrupt politicians. And it may explain why the U.K. is so reluctant to start freezing assets on that basis, when it is allowing billionaire Russians to enjoy the fruits of what many would argue are similarly ill-gotten gains. Far better to wait for the EU to act, allowing the U.K. to avoid setting what would be an awkward precedent.
Meanwhile, Libya’s cash is even easier to trace than Egypt’s. Moammar Gadhafi’s investment vehicle for Libya’s oil money, the Libyan Investment Authority, has stakes in commercial property across London. It is also the fifth largest shareholder in Pearson, which owns Penguin Books and publishes The Financial Times.
It seems bizarre to expect the U.K. to be capable of coordinating an international no-fly zone over Libya or sanctions on the country, or to take any action to stop the bloodshed, when it can’t even implement a standard financial transaction without passing the buck to the EU. Standards, even double standards, clearly aren’t what they used to be.
Wednesday, 1 December 2010
The BBC is shaken, rattled, and rolled
The Daily Star
Wednesday December 1 2010
By Michael Glackin
As everyone in Lebanon is now aware, BBC Television abruptly cancelled
the broadcast this month of “Murder in Beirut,” a documentary about
the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, only
days before it was due to be aired.
The BBC initially said the program, made by ORTV, a United
Kingdom-Saudi Arabian production company, had been pulled because it
had not yet complied with the corporation’s editorial guidelines. I
contacted the BBC for details about which editorial guidelines the
program had not met. A BBC spokesperson informed me that the program
had not in fact fallen short any of the BBC’s editorial guidelines,
but was still in the process of being verified, because the film was
“a work in progress.” The BBC failed to provide anything on which
material required verification.
The program maker, Christopher Mitchell, was unavailable for comment
and ORTV declined to comment. However, sources close to the BBC
dismiss the corporation’s official, rather opaque explanation and
insist that compliance with BBC guidelines or verification of its
facts was not an issue in the decision to pull the program. Indeed,
the program was originally completed more than a year ago, and no
fewer than four senior BBC Middle East specialists vetted it, and
recommended content changes that were then incorporated. As an insider
put it: “‘Murder in Beirut’ has been very much through the BBC’s
editorial mill.”
The vetting team is understood to have included Malcolm Balen, the
BBC’s Middle East “watchdog.” Balen is the author of a report the BBC
commissioned on its own Middle East coverage in 2004. The report was
prepared in response to accusations of bias from both Israel and the
Arab world, but was mostly prompted by a perceived anti-Israeli
predisposition at the BBC. No one outside of the BBC’s top brass has
ever seen Balen’s 20,000 word report and the BBC has fought a long and
expensive legal battle to prevent its publication – spending somewhere
in the region of $400,000 in British courts to keep it secret.
BBC insiders have said that “Murder in Beirut” went through an
extensive vetting process and the first episode was expected to be
broadcast on November 20. So, bearing in mind the program had been
scrutinized and amended by the BBC’s own Middle East specialists, why
was it so abruptly pulled from the schedule?
It appears that once the Lebanese daily Al-Akhbar, which is close to
Hizbullah, revealed much of the contents of “Murder in Beirut” and
attacked the program for accusing Hizbullah of having participated in
the Hariri assassination, senior people in the BBC’s Middle East team
took fright at the impact the program might have and recommended that
it be pulled. An insider told me: “Basically they were worried about
exacerbating tension in Beirut, how Hizbullah would react.”
Last week the BBC correspondent in Beirut, Jim Muir, wrote that the
recent Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s documentary on the Hariri
assassination, which reported that Hizbullah would be implicated, had
a “bombshell effect in Lebanon.” Although, curiously, he added that
the film might also “have the effect of reducing the impact of the
eventual [Special Tribunal for Lebanon] indictments,” because by the
time the indictments are handed down “they might be seen as old hat.”
Confused? Muir’s point was actually made earlier by UN prosecutor
Daniel Bellemare but was, oddly enough, reiterated at the weekend by
Hizbullah MP Nawwar al-Sahili, who warned that the CBC was fueling
religious tensions. Well, he would say that wouldn’t he?
Among the laughable aspects of the BBC’s actions in this affair is
that the publicity surrounding the decision to pull the program
prompted CBC to bring forward the transmission of its own documentary,
enabling it to scoop the BBC. But it doesn’t stop there. A version of
ORTV’s program was shown last week by German broadcaster WDR. To
paraphrase Oscar Wilde: To be scooped once might be regarded as a
misfortune, but to be scooped twice looks like carelessness. Or
spinelessness.
Of course, the fact that two films covering the same ground have now
been aired gives the BBC an excuse not to show “Murder in Beirut.” The
story has been told; there’s no point in doing anything else on it.
It is worth pointing out that the BBC is no stranger to running away
from the conclusions drawn by its programs. In 1985, it caved into
pressure from the British government and pulled a documentary about
Northern Ireland that focused on Sinn Fein leader Martin McGuinness,
then relatively unknown outside Northern Ireland, as well as the
hardline Unionist politician Gregory Campbell. That decision led to a
strike by BBC staff. The film was eventually shown later in a revised
form, a fate I suspect “Murder in Beirut” will share, probably after
indictments are handed down by the Special Tribunal for Lebanon.
But by pulling “Murder in Beirut” in the manner that it did, the BBC
once again raised the issue of how it reports on the Middle East amid
a continuing onslaught of accusations that its coverage is biased and
inaccurate. Last year the BBC Trust upheld a complaint from Israeli
supporters that a report by its Middle East editor, Jeremy Bowen, was
inaccurate and not impartial. There have also been accusations from
the Arab world, most recently when the BBC was criticized for refusing
to broadcast a television appeal by aid agencies for Gaza in the
aftermath of the Israeli attack. Mohamed ElBaradei, the former head of
the International Atomic Energy Agency and a Nobel prize winner,
refused to accept interview requests from the BBC in protest.
Many in the BBC say the decision not to broadcast the Gaza appeal was
a clumsy attempt to over compensate for the fact that the Balen Report
was understood to have concluded the BBC’s coverage was biased against
Israel. Against that backdrop it may be that the BBC once again over
compensated – this time for the Gaza decision – when Al-Akhbar
attacked “Murder in Beirut.”
All journalists put up with criticism. It comes with the territory,
whether you are reporting on flower shows or global events. But to
borrow a phrase from American war reporter Martha Gelhorn, reporters
should at least record truly, because “it is something no one else
will do.” Not only has the BBC failed to follow even that simple
maxim, it appears to have allowed a fear of how Hizbullah or Syria
will respond to dictate whether Gelhorn’s truth should be told at all.
Michael Glackin is former managing editor of Beirut newspaper The Daily Star.
Wednesday December 1 2010
By Michael Glackin
As everyone in Lebanon is now aware, BBC Television abruptly cancelled
the broadcast this month of “Murder in Beirut,” a documentary about
the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, only
days before it was due to be aired.
The BBC initially said the program, made by ORTV, a United
Kingdom-Saudi Arabian production company, had been pulled because it
had not yet complied with the corporation’s editorial guidelines. I
contacted the BBC for details about which editorial guidelines the
program had not met. A BBC spokesperson informed me that the program
had not in fact fallen short any of the BBC’s editorial guidelines,
but was still in the process of being verified, because the film was
“a work in progress.” The BBC failed to provide anything on which
material required verification.
The program maker, Christopher Mitchell, was unavailable for comment
and ORTV declined to comment. However, sources close to the BBC
dismiss the corporation’s official, rather opaque explanation and
insist that compliance with BBC guidelines or verification of its
facts was not an issue in the decision to pull the program. Indeed,
the program was originally completed more than a year ago, and no
fewer than four senior BBC Middle East specialists vetted it, and
recommended content changes that were then incorporated. As an insider
put it: “‘Murder in Beirut’ has been very much through the BBC’s
editorial mill.”
The vetting team is understood to have included Malcolm Balen, the
BBC’s Middle East “watchdog.” Balen is the author of a report the BBC
commissioned on its own Middle East coverage in 2004. The report was
prepared in response to accusations of bias from both Israel and the
Arab world, but was mostly prompted by a perceived anti-Israeli
predisposition at the BBC. No one outside of the BBC’s top brass has
ever seen Balen’s 20,000 word report and the BBC has fought a long and
expensive legal battle to prevent its publication – spending somewhere
in the region of $400,000 in British courts to keep it secret.
BBC insiders have said that “Murder in Beirut” went through an
extensive vetting process and the first episode was expected to be
broadcast on November 20. So, bearing in mind the program had been
scrutinized and amended by the BBC’s own Middle East specialists, why
was it so abruptly pulled from the schedule?
It appears that once the Lebanese daily Al-Akhbar, which is close to
Hizbullah, revealed much of the contents of “Murder in Beirut” and
attacked the program for accusing Hizbullah of having participated in
the Hariri assassination, senior people in the BBC’s Middle East team
took fright at the impact the program might have and recommended that
it be pulled. An insider told me: “Basically they were worried about
exacerbating tension in Beirut, how Hizbullah would react.”
Last week the BBC correspondent in Beirut, Jim Muir, wrote that the
recent Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s documentary on the Hariri
assassination, which reported that Hizbullah would be implicated, had
a “bombshell effect in Lebanon.” Although, curiously, he added that
the film might also “have the effect of reducing the impact of the
eventual [Special Tribunal for Lebanon] indictments,” because by the
time the indictments are handed down “they might be seen as old hat.”
Confused? Muir’s point was actually made earlier by UN prosecutor
Daniel Bellemare but was, oddly enough, reiterated at the weekend by
Hizbullah MP Nawwar al-Sahili, who warned that the CBC was fueling
religious tensions. Well, he would say that wouldn’t he?
Among the laughable aspects of the BBC’s actions in this affair is
that the publicity surrounding the decision to pull the program
prompted CBC to bring forward the transmission of its own documentary,
enabling it to scoop the BBC. But it doesn’t stop there. A version of
ORTV’s program was shown last week by German broadcaster WDR. To
paraphrase Oscar Wilde: To be scooped once might be regarded as a
misfortune, but to be scooped twice looks like carelessness. Or
spinelessness.
Of course, the fact that two films covering the same ground have now
been aired gives the BBC an excuse not to show “Murder in Beirut.” The
story has been told; there’s no point in doing anything else on it.
It is worth pointing out that the BBC is no stranger to running away
from the conclusions drawn by its programs. In 1985, it caved into
pressure from the British government and pulled a documentary about
Northern Ireland that focused on Sinn Fein leader Martin McGuinness,
then relatively unknown outside Northern Ireland, as well as the
hardline Unionist politician Gregory Campbell. That decision led to a
strike by BBC staff. The film was eventually shown later in a revised
form, a fate I suspect “Murder in Beirut” will share, probably after
indictments are handed down by the Special Tribunal for Lebanon.
But by pulling “Murder in Beirut” in the manner that it did, the BBC
once again raised the issue of how it reports on the Middle East amid
a continuing onslaught of accusations that its coverage is biased and
inaccurate. Last year the BBC Trust upheld a complaint from Israeli
supporters that a report by its Middle East editor, Jeremy Bowen, was
inaccurate and not impartial. There have also been accusations from
the Arab world, most recently when the BBC was criticized for refusing
to broadcast a television appeal by aid agencies for Gaza in the
aftermath of the Israeli attack. Mohamed ElBaradei, the former head of
the International Atomic Energy Agency and a Nobel prize winner,
refused to accept interview requests from the BBC in protest.
Many in the BBC say the decision not to broadcast the Gaza appeal was
a clumsy attempt to over compensate for the fact that the Balen Report
was understood to have concluded the BBC’s coverage was biased against
Israel. Against that backdrop it may be that the BBC once again over
compensated – this time for the Gaza decision – when Al-Akhbar
attacked “Murder in Beirut.”
All journalists put up with criticism. It comes with the territory,
whether you are reporting on flower shows or global events. But to
borrow a phrase from American war reporter Martha Gelhorn, reporters
should at least record truly, because “it is something no one else
will do.” Not only has the BBC failed to follow even that simple
maxim, it appears to have allowed a fear of how Hizbullah or Syria
will respond to dictate whether Gelhorn’s truth should be told at all.
Michael Glackin is former managing editor of Beirut newspaper The Daily Star.
Friday, 26 November 2010
Britain embraces the pageantry of retreat
The Daily Star
Friday 26 November 2010
By Michael Glackin
Next year Britain will remind the world of what it does better than anyone. The nuptials between Prince William and Kate Middleton, announced last week, will allow the United Kingdom to display its unmatched talent for pomp and pageantry to a global audience.
Unfortunately, last week also saw a pair of other announcements that relate to something the UK is no longer does quite as well as it used to. Being a global military power.
General Sir David Richards, the head of the British armed forces, finally broke ranks and revealed what many of his military colleagues and a number of politicians have been saying for some time: It is impossible to defeat Al-Qaeda and the Taliban with military force. Of course, neither the Taliban or Al-Qaeda can defeat the West’s military forces either, but they don’t have to.
The military has long believed that the Afghan war is unwinnable, just as it eventually did in Iraq, but Richards is the first to say it openly. And the reason the general felt confident enough to voice his opinion openly was because, as last week’s NATO summit in Lisbon made plain, the West’s political appetite for this war is now at an end.
US President Barack Obama used the Lisbon summit to insist that full responsibility for security in the country will pass to the Afghan army and police “by 2014,” as he reiterated his plan to start withdrawing American soldiers from Afghanistan within the next eight months.
NATO officials were at pains to downplay the increasingly indecent haste to beat a retreat from Afghanistan by insisting “events, not calendars” would dictate the withdrawal timetable. But it is obvious that the West’s focus in Afghanistan is to cut a deal and clear out.
In mid-November, the British foreign secretary, William Hague, stated that his government’s 2015 deadline for a British withdrawal was set in stone, regardless of whether large tracts of the country remained violent or the Afghan government remained corrupt. He said Britain’s presence in Afghanistan was to make sure the country did not pose a threat to “Britain’s security,” before adding: “This does not mean we will necessarily arrive at a situation where every valley of Afghanistan is entirely peaceful, where there are no difficulties in the governance of Afghanistan, where it has reached a point where it’s not 190th on the corruption league.”
Well, that last point is good news at least for Afghan President Hamid Karzai. But Hague’s comments underline how much British ambitions for Afghanistan have shrunk. From lofty plans to establish democracy, the UK and the West narrowed their ambitions to achieving “stability” in the country. Now it appears even that isn’t important. The West wants to clear out in five years at the latest and leave Afghanistan to its own devices, protected by what passes for a national army.
The elephant in the room is the fact that no one in NATO’s military command, indeed no one at all other than perhaps Karzai, believes the Afghan army will be capable of maintaining order by 2015. Earlier this year a US government report from the office of the Special Inspector General for Afghan Reconstruction revealed that just 23 percent of Afghan soldiers and 12 percent of police were capable of working unsupervised, and that there was widespread absenteeism, corruption and drug abuse among Afghan forces.
It is against this backdrop that both Richards and the American commander, General David Petraeus, have spoken of the need for many thousands of NATO troops to remain in Afghanistan to support the Afghan army as a back-up force until 2030 at least. However, there is a political imperative at work thousands of miles away from the dusty battlefields of Helmand and Kandahar and the moth-eaten government in Kabul. Obama faces an election in 2012, while the British prime minister, David Cameron, faces one in 2015. Both want to be able to wave significant troop withdrawals at their respective electorates at those crucial dates, while everyone still remembers that they inherited the Afghan war from their predecessors.
At the same time there is recognition within the British security establishment that none of the terror plots aimed against the UK have been hatched in Afghanistan. Indeed neither was the Madrid or Bali bombings. These days Al-Qaeda hangs its shingle in Pakistan.
Moreover, there is now an increasing emphasis within the British government on the need to direct attention to other potential centers of terror, most notably Yemen. The government has confirmed it is looking to “substantially increase” the amount of aid it gives to Yemen in a bid to prevent it from becoming what one official described as “a second Afghanistan.”
And lest we forget, these days Karzai is second only to Taliban in the frequency of his condemnation of NATO strategy. Some of his criticisms are justified, particularly concerning the large number of civilian casualties, but it also serves as another reason why the West is keen to wash its hands of Afghanistan.
The Afghan war is entering its 10th year for the United States and its allies in NATO. But for Afghans it has been going on for more than 30 years. There was never going to be a clear-cut military victory in Afghanistan. But the last week shows we are getting closer to the messy, inconclusive, endgame that was always going to mark the end of this phase of Western involvement.
Whether it finally ends decades of misery for Afghans no longer appears to matter. But at least we have a royal wedding to look forward to in the UK. When Britain last staged a military withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1842 it was at the height of its global influence. Then British forces were effectively run out of Kabul by Muhammad Akbar Khan and around 16,000 British soldiers and civilians were massacred in the mountain pass of Khurd Kabul. There were no royal weddings that year. Rule Britannia.
Michael Glackin is former managing editor of Beirut newspaper The Daily Star.
Friday 26 November 2010
By Michael Glackin
Next year Britain will remind the world of what it does better than anyone. The nuptials between Prince William and Kate Middleton, announced last week, will allow the United Kingdom to display its unmatched talent for pomp and pageantry to a global audience.
Unfortunately, last week also saw a pair of other announcements that relate to something the UK is no longer does quite as well as it used to. Being a global military power.
General Sir David Richards, the head of the British armed forces, finally broke ranks and revealed what many of his military colleagues and a number of politicians have been saying for some time: It is impossible to defeat Al-Qaeda and the Taliban with military force. Of course, neither the Taliban or Al-Qaeda can defeat the West’s military forces either, but they don’t have to.
The military has long believed that the Afghan war is unwinnable, just as it eventually did in Iraq, but Richards is the first to say it openly. And the reason the general felt confident enough to voice his opinion openly was because, as last week’s NATO summit in Lisbon made plain, the West’s political appetite for this war is now at an end.
US President Barack Obama used the Lisbon summit to insist that full responsibility for security in the country will pass to the Afghan army and police “by 2014,” as he reiterated his plan to start withdrawing American soldiers from Afghanistan within the next eight months.
NATO officials were at pains to downplay the increasingly indecent haste to beat a retreat from Afghanistan by insisting “events, not calendars” would dictate the withdrawal timetable. But it is obvious that the West’s focus in Afghanistan is to cut a deal and clear out.
In mid-November, the British foreign secretary, William Hague, stated that his government’s 2015 deadline for a British withdrawal was set in stone, regardless of whether large tracts of the country remained violent or the Afghan government remained corrupt. He said Britain’s presence in Afghanistan was to make sure the country did not pose a threat to “Britain’s security,” before adding: “This does not mean we will necessarily arrive at a situation where every valley of Afghanistan is entirely peaceful, where there are no difficulties in the governance of Afghanistan, where it has reached a point where it’s not 190th on the corruption league.”
Well, that last point is good news at least for Afghan President Hamid Karzai. But Hague’s comments underline how much British ambitions for Afghanistan have shrunk. From lofty plans to establish democracy, the UK and the West narrowed their ambitions to achieving “stability” in the country. Now it appears even that isn’t important. The West wants to clear out in five years at the latest and leave Afghanistan to its own devices, protected by what passes for a national army.
The elephant in the room is the fact that no one in NATO’s military command, indeed no one at all other than perhaps Karzai, believes the Afghan army will be capable of maintaining order by 2015. Earlier this year a US government report from the office of the Special Inspector General for Afghan Reconstruction revealed that just 23 percent of Afghan soldiers and 12 percent of police were capable of working unsupervised, and that there was widespread absenteeism, corruption and drug abuse among Afghan forces.
It is against this backdrop that both Richards and the American commander, General David Petraeus, have spoken of the need for many thousands of NATO troops to remain in Afghanistan to support the Afghan army as a back-up force until 2030 at least. However, there is a political imperative at work thousands of miles away from the dusty battlefields of Helmand and Kandahar and the moth-eaten government in Kabul. Obama faces an election in 2012, while the British prime minister, David Cameron, faces one in 2015. Both want to be able to wave significant troop withdrawals at their respective electorates at those crucial dates, while everyone still remembers that they inherited the Afghan war from their predecessors.
At the same time there is recognition within the British security establishment that none of the terror plots aimed against the UK have been hatched in Afghanistan. Indeed neither was the Madrid or Bali bombings. These days Al-Qaeda hangs its shingle in Pakistan.
Moreover, there is now an increasing emphasis within the British government on the need to direct attention to other potential centers of terror, most notably Yemen. The government has confirmed it is looking to “substantially increase” the amount of aid it gives to Yemen in a bid to prevent it from becoming what one official described as “a second Afghanistan.”
And lest we forget, these days Karzai is second only to Taliban in the frequency of his condemnation of NATO strategy. Some of his criticisms are justified, particularly concerning the large number of civilian casualties, but it also serves as another reason why the West is keen to wash its hands of Afghanistan.
The Afghan war is entering its 10th year for the United States and its allies in NATO. But for Afghans it has been going on for more than 30 years. There was never going to be a clear-cut military victory in Afghanistan. But the last week shows we are getting closer to the messy, inconclusive, endgame that was always going to mark the end of this phase of Western involvement.
Whether it finally ends decades of misery for Afghans no longer appears to matter. But at least we have a royal wedding to look forward to in the UK. When Britain last staged a military withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1842 it was at the height of its global influence. Then British forces were effectively run out of Kabul by Muhammad Akbar Khan and around 16,000 British soldiers and civilians were massacred in the mountain pass of Khurd Kabul. There were no royal weddings that year. Rule Britannia.
Michael Glackin is former managing editor of Beirut newspaper The Daily Star.
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