Burma and Sudan. Two nations that have recently – as in, hour by hour = had a history of human rights abuses. What do they have in common, beyond grinding away at a beleaguered population? China, an Asiatic giant that is inviting the world to its door in less than a year.
In fact, as was noted in the Washington Post, China's start date for the Olympics is August 8, which happens to be the same date in 1988 that the Burmese junta brutally put down a student-led protest, killing an estimated 3,000 people, not exactly the historical precedent Chinese PR might be looking for.
10.25.2007
10.19.2007
Peril in Pakistan
An exiled female head of state returns to her home country, an Islamic state. Ten hours later, explosions rack her return procession in Karachi, with 134 dead and 150 to 300 injured, according to various sources.
Bombs marked Benazir Bhutto's homecoming. The Musharraf regime blames the bombings on Islamic militants. However, you've got to think about who benefits from the act. Plans for power-sharing between Musharraf and Bhutto were in the works. With this sort of unrest, Musharraf has stated that he may impose marshal law.
The first explosion was the work of a grenade. People rushed to the scene. A suicide bomber struck, killing many more. Bhutto escaped unscathed, but Bhutto thinks she has the beat on who is trying to kill her.
"I know exactly who wants to kill me," she told the French magazine Paris-Match. "They are dignitaries of General Zia's former regime who are behind extremism and fanaticism."
She suspects officials "who had belonged to the government of the former president, Gen. Mohammad Zia ul-Haq, who seized power in 1977 when he arrested and hanged Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Ms. Bhutto’s father," the Times reports.
Long before her return to Pakistan, Taliban leaders had made threats on her life. They thought she may cooperate with the U.S. in the pursuit of the War on Terror, the Guardian reports.
Militants were responsible for the attack, Bhutto said at a press conference today, and they must have had some sort of accomplice.
“(They) cannot act on their own,” she said in the interview. “They need logistics, food, weapons and someone to supervise them.”
“We believe democracy alone can save Pakistan from disintegration and a militant takeover,” she said in a press conference. “We are prepared to risk our lives and we are prepared to risk our liberty, but we are not prepared to surrender our great nation to the militants.”
Pakistan is in an interesting geopolitical situation. Afghanistan rests precipitously upon the postcolonial state. The borders don't quite match the ethnic groups. Afghani sectarian conflict often spills over to the Pakistan border.
Bombs marked Benazir Bhutto's homecoming. The Musharraf regime blames the bombings on Islamic militants. However, you've got to think about who benefits from the act. Plans for power-sharing between Musharraf and Bhutto were in the works. With this sort of unrest, Musharraf has stated that he may impose marshal law.
The first explosion was the work of a grenade. People rushed to the scene. A suicide bomber struck, killing many more. Bhutto escaped unscathed, but Bhutto thinks she has the beat on who is trying to kill her.
"I know exactly who wants to kill me," she told the French magazine Paris-Match. "They are dignitaries of General Zia's former regime who are behind extremism and fanaticism."
She suspects officials "who had belonged to the government of the former president, Gen. Mohammad Zia ul-Haq, who seized power in 1977 when he arrested and hanged Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Ms. Bhutto’s father," the Times reports.
Long before her return to Pakistan, Taliban leaders had made threats on her life. They thought she may cooperate with the U.S. in the pursuit of the War on Terror, the Guardian reports.
Militants were responsible for the attack, Bhutto said at a press conference today, and they must have had some sort of accomplice.
“(They) cannot act on their own,” she said in the interview. “They need logistics, food, weapons and someone to supervise them.”
“We believe democracy alone can save Pakistan from disintegration and a militant takeover,” she said in a press conference. “We are prepared to risk our lives and we are prepared to risk our liberty, but we are not prepared to surrender our great nation to the militants.”
Pakistan is in an interesting geopolitical situation. Afghanistan rests precipitously upon the postcolonial state. The borders don't quite match the ethnic groups. Afghani sectarian conflict often spills over to the Pakistan border.
10.11.2007
Trouble in Turkey
In my younger years I was relentlessly amused by Turkey and Hungary being nations that exist near one another. Obviously, my seven year old mind thought, one would consume another. Of course, as I have grown older, my understanding of Turkey has grown to be more nuanced. Evidently, Congress has not.
United States legislators have begun what has been called the “genocide vote.” The Turkish government said that a congressional committee vote labeling the mass killings of Armenians as genocide would endanger U.S. relations with the transcontinental nation, according to the Washington Post.
The Foreign Affairs Committee passed the nonbinding resolution on a 27 to 21 bipartisan vote. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has promised she will bring the resolution to the full House for a vote, the Post reports. Turkey had spent millions in a lobbying campaign to quell the vote.
Turkey rose out of the ruins of the Ottoman Empire. The nation is largely thought of as an axis between the East and West, or perhaps the Orient and the Occident. Rightly so, as the area factored into the split of East and West Roman Empire, to the change from Constantinople to Istanbul.
The nation acts a fulcrum between the Judeo-Christian and Islamic worlds. it joined the UN in 1945 and NATO in 1952. It is slotted to become the first Islamic nation to enter into the European Union. Turkey is one of America's closest Islamic allies, and the relationship is not quite as odorous as with Saudi Arabia, with not nearly the same oil interests.
At the same time, Turkey hopes to send its military into Iraq to pursue the Kurdistan Workers Party, a separatist faction in Turkish politics. Both the U.S. and the EU have asked Trukey to hold off on cross-border operations. Turkey's Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan,
The Post reports: “A Turkish military attack on northern Iraq could create chaos in that country's only relatively stable region, and a Turkish threat to limit U.S. access to its air bases and roads because of the congressional vote could cripple supply lines to American forces in Iraq.”
Turkey plans to play “diplomatic hardball” with the U.S. if the genocide bill goes through, the Economist reports.
That's all for now, I've got to go sign a lease.
United States legislators have begun what has been called the “genocide vote.” The Turkish government said that a congressional committee vote labeling the mass killings of Armenians as genocide would endanger U.S. relations with the transcontinental nation, according to the Washington Post.
The Foreign Affairs Committee passed the nonbinding resolution on a 27 to 21 bipartisan vote. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has promised she will bring the resolution to the full House for a vote, the Post reports. Turkey had spent millions in a lobbying campaign to quell the vote.
Turkey rose out of the ruins of the Ottoman Empire. The nation is largely thought of as an axis between the East and West, or perhaps the Orient and the Occident. Rightly so, as the area factored into the split of East and West Roman Empire, to the change from Constantinople to Istanbul.
The nation acts a fulcrum between the Judeo-Christian and Islamic worlds. it joined the UN in 1945 and NATO in 1952. It is slotted to become the first Islamic nation to enter into the European Union. Turkey is one of America's closest Islamic allies, and the relationship is not quite as odorous as with Saudi Arabia, with not nearly the same oil interests.
At the same time, Turkey hopes to send its military into Iraq to pursue the Kurdistan Workers Party, a separatist faction in Turkish politics. Both the U.S. and the EU have asked Trukey to hold off on cross-border operations. Turkey's Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan,
The Post reports: “A Turkish military attack on northern Iraq could create chaos in that country's only relatively stable region, and a Turkish threat to limit U.S. access to its air bases and roads because of the congressional vote could cripple supply lines to American forces in Iraq.”
Turkey plans to play “diplomatic hardball” with the U.S. if the genocide bill goes through, the Economist reports.
That's all for now, I've got to go sign a lease.
10.04.2007
Ecotourism: innovation and exploitation
Some of the world's greatest natural treasures are in the developing world. Perhaps this is partially because of its status as developing rather than industrialized. For these reasons, most temperate tourism takes place in the developing world, generally in or around the tropics. Simply put, ever since air conditioning, people want to live in, or at least visit, the warmer climes; think the ridiculous growth in Southern California, Arizona or Florida here in the states.
Tourism is also tied into places of interest, and often these tropical have fantastic natural attractions, be it diving, birding or jungle-trekking.
However, in many places across the globe industrialization is coming fast. Inherent to development, inherent to growth is the expansion of cities and civilization. Amazonian rainforest is logged, soy beans are planted. Burma's famous forests are logged as well.
Many of those who venture to exotic, tropical locales don't want to contribute to any further environmental impact. Enter ecotourism, short for ecological tourism, a way of sustainable travel to minimize the ecological, and anthropological, impact of the visit. The United Nations declared 2002 as the international year of ecotourism.
Many ecotourism events have taken place throughout the world this year, from Madison, Wisc., to Melbourne, Australia, to Nairobi, Kenya. The various ecotourism societies see themselves as not only businesses groups, but also political and environmental activists.
This year saw the Global Ecotourism Conference in Oslo, Norway. The conference based many of its observations compared to the benchmarks of the 2002 international year of ecotourism. Five years later, many of the world's natural areas remain under threat, and others under greater threat. According to the Oslo statement, world tourism has grown by 23 percent in five years and expects to double be 2020.
I was able to embark on an ecologically-friendly adventure this past summer, as my family and I went down to Belize for SCUBA diving. What I saw there was a grassroots take on ecotourism. The pleasant little island we stayed at, Caye Coulker, has seen sustained development in the past 10 years, including the first three and four-story buildings. Residents were generally opposed, in my experience.
Development has disturbed many native species, including the incredibly fragile seahorses, stressed by increasing boat traffic. I met a Rasta who has taken to being their ranger, as he has set up a tiny seahorse reserve on the quiet side of the island.
Ecotourism, at least in theory, is a wonderful thing. However, tourism still has its critics.
Ole Kamauro, writing for East African Business Week, brings up the negative cultural impact of the creation of parks and reserves in Africa. 70 percent of parks in east Africa are on the land of the Maasai, a semi-nomadic pastoral people. The parks, a good thing for the welfare of wildlife, may not be good for indigenous African culture.
Tourism has commodified parts of the Maasai lifestyle, Kamauro writes, “Traditionally, land was not a commodity for exchange like money or livestock. With the introduction of tourism it has become possible to trade land for money and this has created destitution and poverty, pitting members of the same clan against one another.”
Odds are that the forces tourism are not going to relent. It is the duty of the nations to step in and regulate tourism business, and to provide more nuanced legislation, to preserve pastoral culture, which should go hand in hand with the goals of ecotourism. When developed correctly, ecotourism can do great things for a country.
Karen Angel of the New York Times had an excellent article last month regarding the rise of ecotourism in previously war-torn countries. The Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development plans on investing $9.5 million in upgrades on hotels around Lake Kavu, Rwanda, according to the article.
Vietnam's tourism accounts for nearly a third of its gross domestic product. Laos recently hosted an ecotourism conference for countries in the Mekong River region of Southeast Asia.
Portions of tourism proceeds go to villagers in Rwanda, giving incentive to stop poaching wildlife, cutting down trees and draining water from national parks, Angel writes. According to her, no gorillas have been poached in Rwanda since 2003. With proper consideration, no cultures will be poached either.
Tourism is also tied into places of interest, and often these tropical have fantastic natural attractions, be it diving, birding or jungle-trekking.
However, in many places across the globe industrialization is coming fast. Inherent to development, inherent to growth is the expansion of cities and civilization. Amazonian rainforest is logged, soy beans are planted. Burma's famous forests are logged as well.
Many of those who venture to exotic, tropical locales don't want to contribute to any further environmental impact. Enter ecotourism, short for ecological tourism, a way of sustainable travel to minimize the ecological, and anthropological, impact of the visit. The United Nations declared 2002 as the international year of ecotourism.
Many ecotourism events have taken place throughout the world this year, from Madison, Wisc., to Melbourne, Australia, to Nairobi, Kenya. The various ecotourism societies see themselves as not only businesses groups, but also political and environmental activists.
This year saw the Global Ecotourism Conference in Oslo, Norway. The conference based many of its observations compared to the benchmarks of the 2002 international year of ecotourism. Five years later, many of the world's natural areas remain under threat, and others under greater threat. According to the Oslo statement, world tourism has grown by 23 percent in five years and expects to double be 2020.
I was able to embark on an ecologically-friendly adventure this past summer, as my family and I went down to Belize for SCUBA diving. What I saw there was a grassroots take on ecotourism. The pleasant little island we stayed at, Caye Coulker, has seen sustained development in the past 10 years, including the first three and four-story buildings. Residents were generally opposed, in my experience.
Development has disturbed many native species, including the incredibly fragile seahorses, stressed by increasing boat traffic. I met a Rasta who has taken to being their ranger, as he has set up a tiny seahorse reserve on the quiet side of the island.
Ecotourism, at least in theory, is a wonderful thing. However, tourism still has its critics.
Ole Kamauro, writing for East African Business Week, brings up the negative cultural impact of the creation of parks and reserves in Africa. 70 percent of parks in east Africa are on the land of the Maasai, a semi-nomadic pastoral people. The parks, a good thing for the welfare of wildlife, may not be good for indigenous African culture.
Tourism has commodified parts of the Maasai lifestyle, Kamauro writes, “Traditionally, land was not a commodity for exchange like money or livestock. With the introduction of tourism it has become possible to trade land for money and this has created destitution and poverty, pitting members of the same clan against one another.”
Odds are that the forces tourism are not going to relent. It is the duty of the nations to step in and regulate tourism business, and to provide more nuanced legislation, to preserve pastoral culture, which should go hand in hand with the goals of ecotourism. When developed correctly, ecotourism can do great things for a country.
Karen Angel of the New York Times had an excellent article last month regarding the rise of ecotourism in previously war-torn countries. The Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development plans on investing $9.5 million in upgrades on hotels around Lake Kavu, Rwanda, according to the article.
Vietnam's tourism accounts for nearly a third of its gross domestic product. Laos recently hosted an ecotourism conference for countries in the Mekong River region of Southeast Asia.
Portions of tourism proceeds go to villagers in Rwanda, giving incentive to stop poaching wildlife, cutting down trees and draining water from national parks, Angel writes. According to her, no gorillas have been poached in Rwanda since 2003. With proper consideration, no cultures will be poached either.
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