Saturday, 26 Sep, 2009

US Senate approves aid

THE long-drawn-out process of congressional authorisation for $1.5bn a year of aid to Pakistan over the next five years is near an end. On Thursday, the US Senate voted to approve a compromise bill negotiated by Senator Kerry and Howard Berman, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, overcoming perhaps the trickiest hurdle in the process. Given the comfortable majority the Democrats enjoy in the House of Representatives, a positive vote there is nearly a foregone conclusion and the final bill is expected to arrive soon on President Barack Obama’s desk for signing into law. The aid is meant predominantly for social development, capacity-building and democracy-related projects. However, the bill also authorises “such sums as are necessary” for military assistance to Pakistan and it was this aspect that caused some in Congress to baulk at approving without conditions. But it appears that the sting in those conditions has been removed; earlier versions of the bill made direct references to A.Q. Khan and India, whereas the final conditions include Pakistan’s cooperation in dismantling nuclear supply networks and combating terrorist groups and ensuring that the security forces do not subvert the judicial and political processes in the country. These do not appear to be unduly onerous or unfair.

Perhaps more worrying are developments outside the aid package being put together for Pakistan. On Friday an article in TheWashington Post made an unsettling disclosure: “A new wave of anti-American sentiment in Pakistan has slowed the arrival of hundreds of US civilian and military officials charged with implementing assistance programmes, undermined cooperation in the fight against Al Qaeda and the Taliban, and put American lives at risk, according to officials from both countries.” The article goes on to note that while at the “highest levels” cooperation is “running smoothly”, “just below the top … the relationship is fraught with mutual suspicion and is under pressure so extreme that it threatens cooperation against the insurgents”. So while approval of the Kerry-Lugar bill may be an important step, the US and Pakistan governments must work harder to ensure that their best intentions are not thwarted by hawks in both countries.

Resolution 1887

BILLED in glowing terms as “historic” and marking “a fresh start towards a new future”, the UN Security Council resolution on a nuclear arms-free world has generated a lot of euphoria. For that we have to thank President Obama who presided over the session. But given the ground realities, it is unlikely that global atomic arsenals are about to be wholly dismantled soon. Pious hopes for nuclear disarmament have been expressed from time to time — the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty itself speaks of it. But the challenge of bottling the nuclear genie has proved daunting mainly because the nuclear-haves have deemed it strategically unwise to renounce the privilege they have acquired by virtue of their atomic possessions.

Even Resolution 1887 adopted unanimously on Thursday hedges the disarmament resolve by seeking “to create the conditions for a world without nuclear weapons”. Who will decide whether the appropriate conditions have been created? With the NPT being reaffirmed as the cornerstone of world “security for all” there is no doubt that the nuclear club will continue to control the future of the disarmament process. The focus of the resolution is also overwhelmingly on nuclear non-proliferation rather than arms reduction. Obviously these features of the resolution will not please those who stand for total disarmament and consider it essential for all states — big and small — to dismantle their arsenals.

The resolution is not of a binding nature. But as a political statement from the nuclear club, this document will be welcomed. It at least defines the goals towards which the nuclear powers will ostensibly try to move. Moreover, by reaffirming their commitment to nuclear disarmament, the big powers have created a moral obligation for themselves. Thus the US and Russia, which will be negotiating a new agreement to replace START that will expire at the end of the year, will have to show progress if their commitment to the nuclear disarmament principle is to have credibility. The US must ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which it didn’t in 1999, to show its good faith. Were the big powers to start dismantling their nuclear weapons in earnest, they would at least have the moral right to exert pressure on others who tend to be hawkish on the matter. It would also give them greater clout at the various disarmament conferences that are on the cards, such as the NPT review conference, the conference of signatories of treaties establishing nuclear weapon-free zones, the IAEA-sponsored conference on the peaceful uses of nuclear energy and the disarmament conference in Geneva.

Cultural offensive

AFTER a gap of three years, two cinemas reopened this Eid in Swat with people thronging to them to see the three daily shows. This speaks volumes for the extent to which the Taliban’s hold in the area has been broken. As the militants consolidated their influence earlier on, the purveyors of popular culture — cinemas, theatre halls, music and CD shops — became their first targets. People from these professions were issued death threats or killed; as recently as early this year, the Taliban killed the dancer Shabana and strung up her body from a lamppost. The resulting exodus of performing artists and musicians left the Taliban-haunted areas in a cultural abyss that the militants filled with their extremist ideology.

There can be no denying that popular culture wields strong influences — indeed, the recent furore in the National Assembly about Indian films corroborates this. Ideologies and ideas can be communicated through film and the performing arts, which can encourage audiences to question long-held assumptions. Therefore, popular culture that promotes liberalism, peace and tolerance could prove of immense value in bolstering the state’s efforts to enforce its writ in the trouble spots of the northwest. There is a need for the government to not only support cinematic and thea- trical activity in the area by affording protection against possible attacks, but also to help the film and theatre industries achieve quality standards. As film actor and director Ajab Gul pointed out in Peshawar on Thursday, sufficient funds should be allocated for the revival of quality cultural activities in the region. He also criticised the government’s censor policy for preventing the production of films focusing on terrorism and its causes. Such restrictions must be revised. What the country needs is a means of understanding its recent, horrifying experience. A cultural offensive promoting tolerance could go a long way towards achieving this goal.


Mankind need government, but in regions where anarchy has prevailed they will, at first, submit only to despotism. We must therefore seek first to secure government, even though despotic, and only when government has become habitual can we hope successfully to make it democratic.

— Bertrand Russell.

PEACE in the world hangs from a thin thread, and that thread is a stable, democratic Afghanistan. Or at least this is what the US and the West think.

Hence the interest that the Aug 20 presidential elections in Afghanistan generated in most world capitals. However, instead of creating confidence at the global level, the elections have ignited many controversies.

The 5.6 million votes counted have seen the incumbent, Hamid Karzai, leading with 54.6 per cent. His main competitor, Abdullah Abdullah, could garner only 28 per cent of the vote. Although the Independent Election Commission (IEC), composed of three international observers and two independent Afghans, has declared Karzai the preliminary winner, European Union observers have alleged massive electoral fraud.

The EU Observation Mission to Afghanistan says that around 1.5 million votes cast in the elections were suspicious, including 1.1 million for Karzai and 300,000 for Abdullah. However, Karzai says rigging was “small” and “happens all over the world”.

Karzai’s information and culture minister Abdul Karim Khurram was more brazen when he accused western powers of trying to manipulate the process and of putting pressure on the incumbent to accept a power-sharing arrangement with his rivals. “The purpose of this pressure is to have a weak and dependent government that cannot stand on its own feet,” the media quoted Khurram as saying.

The UN-backed Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) has already ordered a recount and forensic audit of ballot boxes and ballots in any district where the turnout was 100 per cent (or more) or one candidate won more than 95 per cent of the votes. If Karzai stays with his current tally of votes — after the recount — he, and of course Afghanistan, will escape a run-off between him and Abdullah.

According to the complaints received by the ECC, ballot box-stuffing has been noted in Kandahar, Paktika, Faryab and Kabul provinces, which were won by Karzai, and Badghis and Ghor, which were won by Abdullah. The western media has reported that Karzai had hired 10,000 tribesmen to secure the polling stations in 21 out of 34 provinces “to ensure an orderly election”.

But the dilemma is that if a run-off is ordered, which is not expected before the second week of October, balloting will be impossible before April 2010 because of the arrival of the cold weather, which will keep people from trekking to the polling stations to cast their vote. This means that Karzai will be an ‘unconstitutional’ president till that happens.

The credibility of the elections came under scrutiny when at one of the polling stations all the votes were cast in favour of a single candidate whose rival got nothing. In a country like Afghanistan, even if elections are fair and transparent, this is entirely possible. Afghanistan’s being a tribal society and having elections only for the second time in its entire history, tribes could have made a collective decision in favour of a candidate in the disputed areas.

Apart from the rigging charges, the most important question is who — Karzai or Abdullah — can hold Afghanistan together. Also, the result of this election is going to determine the fate of democracy in Afghanistan. If the transition to power is smooth, democracy may take root and win public trust in Afghanistan. But neither Karzai nor Abdullah are national leaders of calibre and can hardly transcend the boundaries of ethnicity.

If Abdullah — who comes from a minority ethnic group — comes to power, it may cause the ranks of the Taliban to swell because the extremist group draws its numerical strength from the majority Pakhtuns who comprise more than 40 per cent of the Afghans. If they feel they have been robbed of power in Kabul even secular and nationalist Pakhtuns will look for their identity in the Taliban.

Any government in Afghanistan must enjoy a degree of confidence in the region, especially where neighbouring countries, specifically Pakistan, are concerned. Abdullah in the saddle can set off alarm bells in Islamabad because of his close ties with India and strong anti-Pakistan feelings. In such a situation the US cannot expect Pakistan to lend it its all-out support.

The war in Afghanistan is not for territory. It is to win over the common Afghans, which Nato and Karzai have so far failed to do. The Taliban see Karzai as a stooge of the Americans while ordinary Afghans see Karzai as an inept and corrupt ruler. The latter view is also shared by the US and the West. Considering the type of situation Afghanistan is passing through, the war-shattered country needs a father figure. Unfortunately, no one can fill that slot.

Therefore what is needed now is a government which may be ‘despotic’ to a degree but that can extend and impose its rule outside Kabul and across Afghanistan; one which can cobble together the ethnically fragmented Afghanistan and revive the nationhood of Ahmed Shah Abdali’s times. According

to The Economist, Karzai is still the closest thing Afghanistan has to a national leader. Abdullah, or for that matter any other person, is nowhere close to that category of leadership.

Although a Pakhtun, Karzai has never played the ethnic card. Also, he seems to be equally acceptable to Pakistan and India whose rivalries intensify when it comes to Afghanistan. President Asif Zardari has already expressed his readiness to support Karzai. Therefore, Karzai is the bitter pill everyone has to swallow until his government has become ‘habitual’ to be successfully made democratic.

faiz.jan@gmail.com

Dead walruses

“SOME experts have doubts about the missile shield concept,” as the more cautious reporters put it. (That example comes from the BBC website.) A franker journalist would say that the ballistic missile defence (BMD) system that the Bush administration planned to put into Poland and the Czech Republic, and that President Barack Obama has just cancelled, has never worked and shows few signs of ever doing so.

Obama has done the right thing. It saves money that would have been wasted, and it repairs relations with Russia, which was paranoid about the system being so close to its borders. And the cancellation also signals a significant decline in the paranoia in Washington about Iran.

‘Paranoia’ is the right word in both cases. Iran doesn’t have any missiles that could even come within range of the BMD system that was to go into Poland and the Czech Republic, let alone nuclear warheads to put on them. According to US intelligence assessments, Iran is not working on nuclear weapons, nor on missiles that could reach Europe, let alone the United States. Washington’s decision to deploy the system anyway was so irrational that it drove the Russians into paranoia as well.

The intelligence people in Moscow told Russian leaders that the US system was useless junk that had never managed to intercept an incoming missile in an honest operational test. (All the tests were shamelessly rigged to make it easy for the intercepting missiles to strike their targets, and still they failed most of the time.)

So why did the Russians get paranoid about it? Because although they knew how the military-industrial complex worked in the United States (and they have similar problems with their own domestic version), they simply could not believe that the United States would spend so much money on something so stupid and pointless. Surely there was something they were missing; some secret American strategy that would put them at a disadvantage.

No, there wasn’t, and almost everybody (except some Poles and Czechs who want US troops on their soil as a guarantee against Russian misbehaviour, and some people on the American right) was pleased by Obama’s decision to pull the plug on the project. As Dmitry Rogozin, Russia’s ambassador to Nato, said: “It’s like having a decomposing corpse in your flat (apartment) and then the undertaker comes and takes it away.”

But why did the Bush administration choose to deploy this non-functioning weapons system in Eastern Europe? Indeed, the same BMD system has already been installed in California and Alaska (to intercept North Korean missiles that cannot actually reach the United States either). It’s as if Ford or GM designed a car with faulty steering, and decided to put it on the market anyway.

The answer lies in another weapons project that began in 1946: the nuclear-powered airplane. It could stay airborne for months and fly around the world without refuelling, its boosters promised, and that would give America a huge strategic advantage. There was only one problem. The nuclear reactor needed a lot of shielding, because the aircrew would be only feet away. The shields had to be made of lead. And lead-filled airplanes cannot fly.

When Robert McNamara became defence secretary in the Kennedy administration in 1961, he was astonished to discover that the nuclear-powered aircraft was still in the defence budget.

It was, he said, “as if I came down to breakfast in the morning and found a dead walrus on the dining-room table”. It took McNamara two more years to kill the programme, against fierce opposition from the air force and defence industry. The fact that the nuclear-powered aircraft did not and could not work was irrelevant. President Obama has killed the most pointlessly provocative of the BMD deployments, but he still cannot take the political risk of admitting that the system doesn’t work.

Jinnah’s Supreme Court

“The Privy Council have on several occasions absolutely murdered Hindu law, and slaughtered Mohammedan law; with regard to common law, the English law, of which they are the masters, undoubtedly they command the greatest respect of every practitioner and of every judge in this country.” Mohammad Ali Jinnah had good reason for making these remarks in the Central Legislative Assembly on Feb 17, 1925.

He had begun his career as a legislator with a success few have achieved. He got overturned a ruling of the Privy Council in 1894 by successfully piloting in the Imperial Legislative Council the Mussalman Wakf Validating Act, 1913 to validate the family trusts known as the wakf-alal-aulad which the Privy Council had held to be void.

Moving the bill on March 17, 1911 he noted that “It has long been felt by the Mohammadan community that the result of certain decisions of the judicial committee of the Privy Council in cases of Mohammadan family settlements which have gone up before them on appeal from Indian courts has been the breaking up of an institution which rests upon the highest religious and social sanctions and which in the past has saved a large number of Mohammadan families from destitution while it has at the same time enabled pious Mohammadans to practise what they look upon as an act of great religious merit.”

In a rare success for a private member’s bill, it was inscribed on the statute book in 1913. Twelve years later Jinnah renewed his censures. Dr Hari Singh Gour had moved in the assembly on March 26, 1921 a resolution calling for the establishment of a supreme court of appeal in India leaving the Privy Council with a vastly reduced workload. The resolution was circulated among the high courts and the provincial governments. Opinion was divided. Among those who supported the proposal were Sir Abdur Rahim, Sir Shah Muhammad Sulaiman and Sir C.P. Ramaswami Aiyar. When the matter returned to the assembly in 1925, the resolution was defeated; but not before Jinnah had delivered his censures of the Privy Council.

A fine opportunity was missed. The Privy Council went on to commit worse wrongs, especially on vital issues of civil liberty. If a supreme court had been established in India, two decades before independence, the study of constitutional law would have received a boost as also a sound interpretation of the Sharia. The Privy Council ruled in 1903 that it would follow the dicta of “the ancient doctors of the law” rather than construe the Sharia itself.

English judges knew little of Islam or the Sharia or Hinduism or Hindu law. Hence the “butchery”. The Supreme Court of Pakistan broke the shackles and interpreted the Sharia for itself, enriching jurisprudence.

The missed opportunity is a subject of lament. Jinnah’s exposition in the subcommittee on the federal structure at the Round Table Conference in London on Oct 27, 1931 is of current relevance. The supreme courts of India and Pakistan are groaning

under the weight of arrears thanks to the vast jurisdiction conferred on them by the framers of the constitutions of both countries. The basic law of Germany (1949) establishes the Federal Constitutional Court as well as the Federal Court of Justice, the Federal Administrative Court, the Federal Finance Court, the Federal Labour Court and the Federal Social Court. They do not impair the dignity of the Constitutional Court one bit.

At the subcommittee, Jinnah received little support but what he said then makes great sense today. He said that “any question that relates to the federal constitution or arises out of the federal constitution should vest in the Federal Court”. But he baulked at giving it a wide jurisdiction over “federal laws”. After all the Penal Code, the Civil and Criminal Procedure Codes and the Transfer of Property Act were also central laws.

He added: “I maintain that it should be open to any subject, if his right is invaded or attacked — relating to the constitution, of course, or arising out of the constitution — to go to the Federal Court direct”. With such a limitation, the Federal Court “will not be so overworked and, therefore, the cases can be expeditiously disposed of”.

There would be another advantage “if you separate your Federal Court, and if you will, in making the appointments, select the personnel of that court which will be specially qualified in matters arising out of the constitution, you will then, I think, set up a court which will be the most desirable court. We know, sir, that this is an age of specialists. In India, we have not yet risen to that height. You will be surprised to hear — and I think my friends here will bear me out — that in India, in the morning, you are arguing a complicated question of Hindu law, and in the afternoon, you are dealing with a case of light and air and easements, and perhaps the next day you are dealing with case of a commercial kind, and a third day, perhaps, you are dealing with a divorce action, and a fourth day you are dealing with an admiralty action.”

He repeated his plea for a separate supreme court to “take the place of the Privy Council” and “a regular criminal court of appeal just as you have in England”. In short, three apex courts — the Federal Court for constitutional matters and enforcement of the citizen’s fundamental rights; the Supreme Court with appellate jurisdiction over the high courts and a Criminal Court of Appeal. Each would be manned by judges who had acquired high reputation for specialisation. The spectacle of judges, skilled in civil or criminal law but innocent of constitutional law, trying complex issues of constitutional law is not an edifying one.

The writer is an author and a lawyer.

Battling clouds

CHINA’S air force is gearing up for its biggest-ever assault on the clouds to ensure blue skies above Beijing for the 60th anniversary of the communist revolution.

Eighteen cloud-seeding aircraft and 48 fog-dispersal vehicles are on standby to intercept rain clouds that threaten to cast a shadow over the festivities, which will include the biggest display of military power in at least 10 years. The weather modification could exceed the huge cloud-busting operation for the opening ceremony of the Olympic games last year, when more than 1,100 rain-dispersal rockets were fired into the sky.

“It is the first time in Chinese history that artificial weather modification on such a large scale has been attempted,” said Cui Lianqing, a meteorologist, speaking to the Global Times newspaper.

Meteorologists will coordinate the mission using satellite data. The Beijing Weather Modification Office will supplement the campaign with rockets and planes that load clouds with silver iodide or liquid nitrogen — dry ice — to induce precipitation above reservoirs and rivers.

China has the world’s most extensive rain creation infrastructure, employing about 50,000 people nationwide. Their job is usually to alleviate droughts in the arid north of the country. For National Day they would have to encourage rain to fall from clouds before they reached Beijing.

The National Day events mark the founding of the People’s Republic of China on Oct 1, 1949. The Communist Party wants to use the occasion to showcase its achievements since Mao Zedong took power. The centre of the city will be closed for a huge parade, musical performance and show of military power.

— The Guardian, London

Germany’s dull election scene

THERE’S tension and suspense in the air as European Union policymakers wait for the results of the make-or-break Irish referendum on Oct 2 on a new reform treaty for the 27-nation bloc. True, the Irish vote will determine whether or not the EU can shrug off its institutional paralysis and re-engage with its citizens and the rest of the world.

But shouldn’t the same EU movers and shakers be paying similar attention to the polls on Sept 27 in Germany, the EU’s largest country and most powerful economy? Apparently not. The German elections are being described by most commentators as an uninspiring, unglamorous and an even boring run-off between conservative Chancellor Angela Merkel and her Social Democrat foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier.

There’s no doubt that Germany’s pre-election landscape appears dull and unremarkable. Merkel is virtually assured of a second term in office. The only issue still undecided is whether the 55-year old German leader, described by some as the world’s most powerful woman, will have to stick with her current Social Democrat coalition partners or whether her centre-right Christian Democrats can win enough votes to form their preferred alliance with the business-friendly Free Democrats.

In any case, whatever the colours of the next coalition, little is expected to change in German domestic or foreign policy — including the country’s domestically unpopular participation in international efforts to stabilise Afghanistan.

Shrugging off German politics and politicians as insignificant would be a mistake, however. Twenty years after reunification and the fall of the Soviet empire, it’s worth noting that Germany is standing tall in Europe, its leaders breaking from past practice and not only demanding a stronger say in running the EU but also seeking a more powerful international profile.

It was not always thus. For years under Chancellor Helmut Kohl, Germany went out of its way to keep a low profile in Europe and concentrated instead on spearheading EU-wide integration efforts.

Chancellor Kohl and his French counterpart Francois Mitterrand, along with European Commission president Jacques Delors, acted as the “European locomotives”, pushing forward the bloc’s plans to tear down internal borders and even more ambitiously to create a monetary union.

Germany remains the EU’s largest paymaster — and nothing can still be done at the European level without its full support. But former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, who succeeded Kohl, was no pushover when it came to EU or global policies. Remarkably, given Germany’s traditional post-war ties with the United States, Schroeder opposed the Iraq conflict. He also dared question Brussels on a range of EU-related issues, including environmental legislation.

As chancellor, Merkel has largely mended relations with the US. But Berlin’s participation in the international stabilisation force in Afghanistan remains unpopular within the country and the country is still reluctant to send soldiers into the volatile southern part of Afghanistan.

Increasingly, politicians face an uphill battle to convince the public their country needs to stay the course in Afghanistan. Demands for a withdrawal of soldiers are expected to grow following a controversial German-ordered air strike near Kunduz in which Nato says civilians died.

The German chancellor famously fell out with the Obama administration earlier this year over economic and financial policies and still bristles over US demands that Berlin increase domestic spending to spur demand. Instead Merkel — backed by her French counterpart Nicolas Sarkozy — wants to focus on increasing financial regulation and surveillance to prevent another financial meltdown.

Merkel and Sarkozy also oppose EU membership for Turkey and say that Ankara should instead be offered a “privileged partnership”. The German leader angered some of her European neighbours recently by playing a leading role in forging a deal between US automotive giant General Motors and a Canadian-Russian consortium that is expected to preserve jobs in car plants in Germany but cause redundancies in Spain, Britain and Belgium.

Still, the lack of excitement over the polls on Sunday is usual. It could be because neither Merkel nor Steinmeier, the country’s 53-year-old vice-chancellor and foreign minister, are charismatic. Also, having governed together for the past four years, they have shied away from personal attacks.

Their polite and passionless sparring during the one and only television debate held recently prompted one exasperated moderator to exclaim: “You two are like an old married couple.” Voters have struggled to separate the policies of the two main parties as their manifesto pledges differ only slightly on the key issues of the day, including Germany’s involvement in Afghanistan and the financial crisis.

As a result, the campaign is built around Merkel’s personality and reputation, with the emphasis on portraying the chancellor as a responsible, cautious and caring “mother of the nation”. Her shy smile beams out of election posters and billboards pasted across Germany. The chancellor has certainly transformed her dour, staid appearance over the years in office and now sports a new hairdo and wears brightly coloured jackets.

In fact, in her own way, Merkel is a trailblazer. She is a female politician in a country where the political scene is dominated by men. She is a Protestant in a political party with traditionally Catholic roots. And while most of Germany’s top politicians were born and raised in West Germany, Merkel grew up in East Germany.

She entered politics only in her mid-30s as the communist system crumbled, after earning a degree in physics from the University of Leipzig. “I really enjoyed being a physicist,” Merkel said recently. “But after the (Berlin) wall fell, politics became my passion.”

Merkel has certainly risen up the ranks to dominate German politics. But in recent years at least, she has certainly managed to hide the “passion”.

The writer is Dawn’scorrespondent in Brussels.

OTHER VOICES - Sri Lankan Press Moon and Earth

…WITH just 75 days to go for the … UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen … [UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon] has to deliver the goods…. He knows very well that striking a green peace deal with the US, China and other major polluters is the only way to save his face as well as Mother Earth.

… One of the biggest challenges that [Ban Ki-moon] faces in his attempts to save the planet is the limitations of US President Barack Obama, whose unwavering determination to cut down US emissions faces stiff resistance from [the] Republicans. … In contrast, Hu Jintao of China … is at a greater advantage. For instance, if the Chinese government decides to stop coal power tomorrow there won’t be anybody to oppose this.

However, it fell short of expectations with its insistence that the world should go by per capita emissions and not by national rates. China, in other words, says that despite being the world’s biggest carbon emitter [it] still [has] a right to stretch the limits given the fact it has a 1.3 billion population and [hasn’t] exhausted its carbon quota as has been done by the US. … But in what way will that help … human civilisation…?

… While India with its mammoth 1.2 billion population can still claim more, if one goes by the Chinese logic it is not going to be the case with the 142 million-strong Russia, the world’s fourth largest polluter, which has exhausted its quota. While an emotional Nicholas Sarkozy … reminded the UN that “We are on the path to failure if we continue to act as we have”, the EU, [the] world’s third biggest polluter … too is sharply divided…. France’s proposal to impose a carbon tax on products from countries that fail to reduce carbon emissions has been strongly rejected by Germany … [which] has pointed out that while the tax would be a violation of WTO agreements … it also runs the risk of creating an impression … that [the] EU is promoting eco-imperialism.

Moon’s attempts to save Earth [have] run into hot water. — (Sept 24)

__________________
Regards,
P.R.