France faces tough choices over Chad

by Hugh Schofield

France is observing the dramatic developments in Chad in a state of nervous exasperation.

The latest news that the rebels have pulled out of the centre of N'Djamena - with President Idriss Deby still apparently in charge - has come as a relief.

But, seen from Paris, the situation remains highly unstable.

The government of Nicolas Sarkozy is going to have to walk on diplomatic and military egg-shells for some time yet.

The root cause of France's discomfort is that it is trying to pursue two policy objectives that the rebel offensive has made incompatible.

Civil war

On the one hand, the government is adamant that the bad old days of "la Francafrique" - when French troops regularly intervened to prop up corrupt allies - have been consigned to history. There is therefore no question of France's 1,450 soldiers permanently based in Chad being used to keep Mr Deby in power.

As Mr Sarkozy's Cabinet Director Claude Gueant said on Sunday, "the conflict in Chad is a civil war and the antagonists are Chadians; France can only intervene in the context of an international mandate".

In fact a military co-operation agreement does exist between France and its former colony, but officially this only extends to providing logistical and intelligence aid. So far in the conflict France has observed a strict neutrality, surprising some observers by not offering even the kind of discreet help it has done in the past.

In 2006, for example, a French Mirage jet fired shots across the bows of an advancing rebel column - thus delivering an unmistakeable message not to go further. Nothing similar has happened today.

This neutrality is an awkward posture for France because of the second of its two policy objectives.

This is the need, for now, to keep Idriss Deby in power. If the French government feels no special affection for the man, the fact nonetheless remains that the Chadian leader has become a key player in France's wider regional ambitions. The focus of these ambitions is the deployment - planned to take place as of now - of a new European protection force in eastern Chad.

Mr Sarkozy has staked an enormous amount of prestige in promoting this, the biggest ever EU peacekeeping force.

Officially given the go-ahead only a week ago, Eufor's task will be to provide security for refugees from Darfur and other displaced persons.

Eventually a mixed UN-African Union force should do the same job on the Sudan side of the border.

For Mr Sarkozy, Eufor represents both the symbol of a new ethical Africa policy, so different from the grubby arrangements of the past, and a supreme test for Europe's emerging defence identity.

It took months of tough negotiations with Mr Deby to get the force accepted.

It was nearly derailed by the Zoe's Ark charity fiasco late last year, when French aid workers were convicted of trying to smuggle out children.

And now, just as it was all about to happen, the plan has gone pear-shaped. The deployment has been put on hold, and if the rebels win it may never happen at all. Of course, for the French government, there is no coincidence in the timing.

The rebels did not want Eufor to deploy because its presence would hinder their freedom to manoeuvre against Mr Deby.

Painful dilemma

More disturbingly, the Sudanese government - generally accepted to be the Chadian rebels' backer - also had strong reasons not to want Eufor in place. They do not want any serious international force within reach of Darfur. The rebels had to act fast. They left the Sudanese border last Monday - the very day of Eufor's endorsement by Brussels - and were in N'Djamena by week's end.

The dilemma for Paris has been painful: to intervene - and be caricatured as a throw-back to the neo-colonialism of "la Francafrique" - or not to intervene, and see a first chance to stand tall on the African continent dwindle into the desert sands? So far the preferred option has been to wait, and hope that fortune turns. Signs that the rebels may have over-reached themselves - and their 500-mile supply chain - have been greeted with barely disguised glee.

But, if the situation deteriorates, there is another option: internationalisation. Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said on Monday that France was, for the time being, keeping its distance from the conflict. "But if there is a UN Security Council resolution or if the African Union comes up with a new suggestion, things could change," he said.

On Monday, the Security Council did pass a resolution condemning the rebel advance and calling for governments to extend support to President Idriss Deby. It remains to be seen whether that amounts to the cover that France needs to intervene.

BBC

'The Palestinian dream is over'

by Khalil Al Assali,

Dr Mustafa Al Barghouthi, a member of the Legislative Council and a prominent Palestinian activist, could not find a better word than "disaster" to express his anger at the announcement made by Hamas officials regarding a study that aims to separate the economy from Israel and connect with Egypt.

"These declarations are very risky and briefly mean the separation of the West Bank from the Gaza Strip and the end of the Palestinian dream," Dr Barghouthi told Gulf News. Dr Barghouthi as well as the rest of the Palestinian parties called for the immediate resumption of discussions between Hamas and Fatah.

"The talk that is spread in the media about suggestions and plans to separate the Gaza Strip from the West Bank is very risky and is inadmissible. No Palestinian could approve it at this time since it only serves the Israelis," the Palestinian Arab Bloc added in a statement in Ramallah on Sunday. "Hamas is driving the nation to hell.

This speech only benefits Israel which in every meeting between President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert excuses about Hamas and the Gaza Strip are brought up.

"And now this suggestion that is approved by some states in the area has come up in order to destroy the Palestinians' hope. Have mercy on the nation," the Chairman of the Negotiation Department in the Palestinian Liberation Organisation Dr Saeb Iriqat told Gulf News.

The economic analyst Taher Al Hajj asserted that Hamas, from this separation, wants to enforce its claimed stance that Arabs are the strategic depth of the Palestinian nation forgetting that this step will have negative economic effects. He also added that due to this separation, Israel will lose approximately three billion dollars which is about the amount of the Strip's imported goods and materials.

The negative impact that may appear is the transformation of the Gaza market to a market of forged currency which will, as a result, lead to the crash of the rest of the Palestinian economy.

A Gaza-based businessman, who asked not to be named, told Gulf News that he is working on transferring his business and factories abroad and specifically to Egypt as the economic condition is about to crash due to the political situation and Hamas' disorder.

As for Israel, relief was evident in the area. "Everyone knows that the connection between the Gaza Strip and the West Bank does not benefit Israel, it rather benefits Palestine.

"Therefore, we should encourage Hamas' complete separation from Israel and its connection with Egypt," the former General and former chairman of the National Security Council Uzi Dayan said on Sunday in an official broadcast. Egypt has not reacted to Hamas' suggestion.

Israel's Minister of Agriculture Shalom Simhon rushed to confirm in a weekly governmental session on Sunday that Israel is studying the possibility of preventing the exportation of agricultural production from the Gaza Strip to Europe and other states via Israel due to the breakthrough of the borders in Rafah and the entrance of Egyptian agricultural production to the Gaza Strip without supervision.

The Gulf News, UAE
 

Newly-wed Sarkozy woos nation

by Emma Jane Kirby

"There's no better place to spend my honeymoon than here!" grinned the newly-wed French president, as he addressed steel workers at Arcelor Mittal in Gandrange. If he expected applause and a congratulatory cheer he did not get it.

The subsequent booing suggested the employees, whose jobs are under threat, had a lot more on their mind than Nicolas Sarkozy's private life.

A new poll, released on Sunday, indicated that the president's popularity ratings had plummeted.

The LH2 poll for the left-leaning Liberation newspaper said 55% of those surveyed had a negative opinion of President Sarkozy, with just 41% thinking he was doing a good job - that is a 13% drop from a month ago.

Respondents said one of the main reasons they had lost confidence in Mr Sarkozy was because he seemed to spend more time worrying about his personal life than he did the concerns of France.

The front cover of Liberation today had a cartoon of Mr Sarkozy with his arm around Carla Bruni with the headline "The French people and Sarkozy - The Divorce".

Now that the fairy-tale romance of the president and the pop star has reached a "happily ever after" conclusion, France will be looking for a lot more from Nicolas Sarkozy than just a few glossy photos of his first kiss with the new First Lady.

The country remains in poor economic health, with very little growth and relatively high unemployment, while the daily cost of living continues to rise.

'On the ball'

So what became of the hard-nosed reformer I followed during the election campaign, who promised France an economic revolution? Has love turned him soppy? That is not an impression Nicolas Sarkozy wants to give.

It is quite deliberate that the newly-weds did not take a honeymoon. The French president is keen to show his country that only a day after his wedding, he has already got his eye on the ball again.

Two National Assembly by-elections were held in the Paris region on Sunday and Sarkozy's right-wing UMP party lost one of the seats to the Socialists. With municipal elections coming up next month, he knows he cannot afford to give much ground.

Carla's new role

But will Carla Bruni prove to be an asset or a distraction to the president? She does after all have a colourful past, with a string of high-profile ex-boyfriends, who include rock stars Mick Jagger and Eric Clapton, and she has given interviews in which she has declared she believes in polygamy.

Later this month the singer is due to release another album - it will be the first time that France will have had a First Lady featuring in the pop charts.

She may be unorthodox compared to previous presidents' wives, but Colombe Pringle from the celebrity magazine Point de Vue believes she will make France proud.

"Carla knows what the job is going to be, maybe she doesn't know all about it, maybe she doesn't measure that it's a difficult one and that it's going to ask a lot of her personal time, but at least she accepts it.

"I mean, when she says yes to the president, she says yes to France."

Ex-model and singer Carla Bruni is used to being in the spotlight. But if she wants to help her husband's career, the new Mrs Sarkozy must be prepared to take a back seat.

BBC News, Paris

Thais hold key to rice shortages

by Jonathan Head

If there is such a thing as the world's rice-bowl, it lies in the steamy, flat land surrounding the lower reaches of the mighty Chao Phraya river, which ends its journey to the sea in Thailand's capital, Bangkok.

About 150km (93 miles) north of Bangkok is the province of Suphan Buri, home to Thailand's most productive rice paddies. And Thailand has for many years been the world's largest exporter of rice.

Enriched by the alluvial soil washed down by the river, this land can produce up to four harvests a year.

In one sweeping vista you can watch barefoot farmers scattering seeds into the grey-brown mud, see fields of vibrant-green young shoots, and watch other farmers harvesting the mellow gold rice that has already ripened.

It is backbreaking work, and an unpredictable living.

A few years ago many of the farmers were weighed down by debt. But not this year. Rice prices shot up by 50% last year, and they are still rising.

According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization's index of food prices, they have reached their highest levels in 20 years.

"It's been unexpectedly good for us over the past year", said 76-year-old Sawan Katawut, who is head of the Suphan Buri Farmers Association.

"Maybe it's because of natural disasters in other countries, or problems with rice prices there - but it has been a windfall for us."

Vital commodity

At the regional headquarters of the UN World Food Programme (WFP) they are monitoring the sharply rising food prices with growing alarm.

"For millions of people across Asia this is a real crisis", says Tony Banbury, the WFP's Regional Director for Asia.

"Imagine if you're a family of four, getting by on a dollar a day, and spending 70% of that on food, and all of a sudden prices are doubling - you can't possibly get by."

Rice is an unusual commodity. A staple for two-thirds of the world's population, most is consumed locally.

Just 7% is traded on the international market - but that 7% is vital for countries like Bangladesh and Afghanistan that rely heavily on imports.

It is also a very political commodity, because it is so intricately linked to a sense of security and prosperity for many societies in Asia.

The price of rice is watched very closely by governments.

Even Japan, among the world's richest and most industrialised societies, maintains a huge rice stockpile - although it is impossible to imagine a scenario in which the wealthy Japanese could not buy it on the international market.

So as prices have risen governments that normally export rice have stopped, to try to maintain stocks at home.

Over the past year, India and Vietnam, the world's second and third largest exporters, have blocked exports, as has China, the world's biggest rice consumer, but an important supplier for perennially hungry North Korea.

Suddenly everyone wants Thai rice - and Thailand always produces more than it needs.

Unlike poorer rice-producing countries, where consumption of rice rises as incomes go up, Thailand's people have reached an income level where rice consumption is declining, as they eat a greater variety of foods.

In a dingy little office, tucked out of sight down a small alley in Bangkok's Chinatown, Supoj Vongjirattikarn wields a telephone in each hand, speaking rapidly and flicking his abacus with his fingers.

He is one of around 70 rice brokers in Bangkok who literally keep the international rice lifeline going - matching orders from abroad with suppliers, the thousands of rice mills in Thailand that take and process the farmers' harvest. And he has never been busier. "Thailand is lucky," he said between phone calls.

"We have plenty of rice, just as our main competitors Vietnam and India don't have enough for export."

Nightmare scenario

The reasons for the soaring rice prices are complex. Chookiat Ophaswongse, at the Thai Rice Exporters Association, says demand is rising fast in new markets like Africa, but production is falling, as farmers elsewhere have turned to more profitable crops like bio-fuels.

Rice, he says, is merely tracking the price boom in other commodities, and he expects prices to continue rising. For the first time in recent history, global demand will exceed global supply.

For the WFP this is a nightmare. Already it is being asked for extra food assistance from Afghanistan and Bangladesh as their populations struggle to pay for dwindling stocks of rice.

It is very worried about the impact of prices on North Korea and East Timor - both vulnerable to food shortages. Yet because of rising prices, it cannot afford to buy as much on the international market as in previous years.

"We're especially concerned about urban populations, populations that we used not to help", says Tony Banbury.

"People like casual labourers who don't have a coping mechanism for these prices, who can't grow any food of their own."

So are Thailand's rice producers laughing all the way to the bank? Actually, they are not.

"We don't like it when the price moves too fast," says Chookiat Ophswongse.

"As exporters we can get caught out. It is much easier for us to handle rice prices when they are more stable."

BBC

Bhutto's political will released

The Pakistan People's Party has released the political will of former leader Benazir Bhutto in which she backs her husband to be party leader.

The PPP originally disclosed the contents of the document shortly after her assassination in December.

A PPP spokesman said they were now releasing it to end speculation about its contents.

Analysts say the document could enhance the political position of Ms Bhutto's widower, Asif Zardari.

Mr Zardari is currently in charge of the party. Their 19-year-old son Bilawal is the titular head.

The handwritten, one-page letter dated 16 October says that Asif Ali Zardari should be interim leader until a new permanent party head is appointed.

Mr Zardari took over the leadership of the party after Ms Bhutto was killed. She died in a suicide bombing and shooting attack in Rawalpindi while campaigning for elections in December.

"I would like my husband Asif Ali Zardari to lead you in this interim period until you and he decide what is best," Ms Bhutto's letter states.

"I say this because he is a man of courage and honour. He spent eleven and a half years in prison without bending despite torture.

"He has the political stature to keep a party united." The letter - written two days before Ms Bhutto's return to Pakistan from exile and 12 weeks before her assassination - urged Pakistan People's Party (PPP) supporters to continue the struggle for change.

"I fear for the future of Pakistan. Please continue the fight against extremism, dictatorship, poverty and ignorance," she wrote.

'Foil controversies'

At a press conference to announce the release of the will, PPP spokeswoman Sherry Rahman said that "some enemies wanted to create chaos in the party by spreading false speculation about the contents of the will".

"That is why the party high command has decided to share the will with the public and the media to foil all such controversies and keep the party united," she said.

Ms Bhutto's killing on 27 December while leaving an election rally in Rawalpindi led to a six-week delay to parliamentary elections now scheduled for 18 February. Correspondents say Mr Zardari is a controversial figure in Pakistan, where he has faced repeated accusations of corruption.

PPP spokesman Farhatullah Babar said that the release of the will was not being done to strengthen Zardari's position within the party.

He said that the party would formally decide who was the party's long term leader after the election results are known.

BBC

Russian designer invents flying rug for civil and military use

Russian aircraft designer and inventor, Alexander Begak, created a unique aircraft which he named as Evolution. The aircraft is capable of traveling on land, water and air.

"This is a universal kind of transportation. It can fly at the height of 4,000 meters above the ground and cover the distance of up to 400 kilometers without additional refueling. Its 30 horse-power motor allows to develop the speed of 160 km/h in the air and 80 km/h on land. An on-board computer controls pilot's actions," Alexander Begak told ITAR-TASS.

Unlike heavy aircraft of modern-day aviation, Evolution is easy to transport. It is made of ultra-light coal-plastic and kevlar fibers. The total weight of the aircraft makes up only 60 kilos. The fragile as it may seem construction of the aircraft is protected with the hull made of ultra-strong materials.

The designer presented his invention at Russia's recent MAKS-2007 air show. Experts highly estimated the novelty. Evolution can quickly find a way out of a critical situation. In case of emergency in the air, the parachute system of the aircraft softens the gliding to the ground. When traveling on the water surface, the pilot can use the inflatable emergency device that will not let Evolution drown.

Alexander Begak was working on his aircraft for two years. Evolution has passed over 100 tests. Specialists from Russia's major aviation corporations, such as Roskosmos, participated in the research as well. The parts of the aircraft were produced at enterprises of Roskosmos, Sukhoi and Moscow Aviation Institute.

"We want to restore the fleet of ultra-light aviation - the project, which aviators turned down in the 1950s for the benefit of strategic defense goals," Begak said.

It is worthy of note that ultra-light aircraft can come in handy for non-civil purposes too. Evolution can serve as reconnaissance aircraft invisible to radars due to its plastic equipment. It can patrol frontiers, conduct day and night photography, mapping and monitoring.

Alexander Begak is a designer, pilot and parachute jumper.

Pravda, Russia