Category Archives: Security & Conflict

PLEA Network

24 June 2015, The Conversation, Political warfare on climate could leave national security at risk: Will the government’s forthcoming Defence White Paper discuss the national security implications of climate change? A report released this week by the Centre for Policy Development think tank urged the government to “manage the risks prudently”, while also acknowledging that “the parliamentary discussion on climate change increasingly resembles trench warfare”.

My research indicates that these bitter political divisions have, since 2010, stymied the Australian Defence Force’s response to the issue. Although there have been pockets of activity, a renewable program here or the use of some biofuels there, the ADF has largely been missing in action on climate change and its broader implications for national security. This has not been the case elsewhere. Take the United States, for instance. Facing an equally (if not more) polarised body politic and a tight fiscal environment, the US military and national security establishment has nevertheless been leading the way on climate security. The US military has a climate change adaptation plan. The Australian military doesn’t. In a period of austerity, the US military continues to invest heavily in adaptation and mitigation measures. The Australian military doesn’t. Read More here

 

PLEA Network

23 June 2015, Common Dreams, ‘A Great Day for Corporate America’: US Senate Passes Fast Track. ‘Shameful’ vote all but ensures approval of mammoth trade deals like the TransPacific Partnership. In a win for multinational corporations and the global one percent, the U.S. Senate on Tuesday narrowly advanced Fast Track, or Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) —ensuring for all practical purposes the continued rubber-stamping of clandestine trade agreements like the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) and TransAtlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). The cloture motion to end debate needed 60 votes and it got just that, passing the chamber60-37. The full roll call is here. A final vote will come on Wednesday. Having overcome the biggest hurdle, the legislation is expected to pass, and will then be sent to President Barack Obama’s desk to become law. Read More here

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8 June 2015, Ralph Nader, 10 Reasons the TPP Is Not a ‘Progressive’ Trade Agreement: One must seriously question what President Obama and his corporate allies believe to be the definition of “progressive” when it comes to this grandiose statement. History shows the very opposite of progress when it comes to these democratic sovereignty-shredding and job-exporting corporate-driven trade treaties — unless progress is referring to fulfilling the deepest wishes of runaway global corporations.

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the World Trade Organization (WTO) set our country’s progress back through large job-draining trade deficits, downward pressure on wages, extending Big Pharma’s patent monopolies to raise consumers’ medicine prices, floods of unsafe imported food, and undermining or freezing consumer and environmental rules. The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is formally described as a trade and foreign investment agreement between 12 nations — Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States and Vietnam. The White House is now pressuring Congress to Fast Track through the TPP. Fast Track authority, a Congressional procedure to limit time for debate and prohibit amendments to proposed legislation, has already passed in the Senate, although only after an unexpectedly rough ride. Here are 10 reasons why the TPP is explicitly not a “progressive” trade agreement: Read Them here

PLEA Network

28 March 2015, The Spectator, Sweden’s feminist foreign minister has dared to tell the truth about Saudi Arabia. What happens now concerns us all. Margot Wallström’s principled stand deserves wide support. Betrayal seems more likely. If the cries of ‘Je suis Charlie’ were sincere, the western world would be convulsed with worry and anger about the Wallström affair. It has all the ingredients for a clash-of-civilisations confrontation. A few weeks ago Margot Wallström, the Swedish foreign minister, denounced the subjugation of women in Saudi Arabia. As the theocratic kingdom prevents women from travelling, conducting official business or marrying without the permission of male guardians, and as girls can be forced into child marriages where they are effectively raped by old men, she was telling no more than the truth. Wallström went on to condemn the Saudi courts for ordering that Raif Badawi receive ten years in prison and 1,000 lashes for setting up a website that championed secularism and free speech. These were ‘mediaeval methods’, she said, and a ‘cruel attempt to silence modern forms of expression’. And once again, who can argue with that? The backlash followed the pattern set by Rushdie, the Danish cartoons and Hebdo. Saudi Arabia withdrew its ambassador and stopped issuing visas to Swedish businessmen. The United Arab Emirates joined it. The Organisation of Islamic Co-operation, which represents 56 Muslim-majority states, accused Sweden of failing to respect the world’s ‘rich and varied ethical standards’ — standards so rich and varied, apparently, they include the flogging of bloggers and encouragement of paedophiles. Meanwhile, the Gulf Co-operation Council condemned her ‘unaccept-able interference in the internal affairs of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’, and I wouldn’t bet against anti-Swedish riots following soon. Yet there is no ‘Wallström affair’. Outside Sweden, the western media has barely covered the story, and Sweden’s EU allies have shown no inclination whatsoever to support her. A small Scandinavian nation faces sanctions, accusations of Islamophobia and maybe worse to come, and everyone stays silent. As so often, the scandal is that there isn’t a scandal. Read More here